ArcTanGent brings home the bacon with a stellar 10th edition, as Mogwai, Meshuggah, Electric Wizard and more deliver the more unusual side of music to Bristol’s Fernhill Farm.
What a difference 11 years can make. Those of us fortunate enough to have attended the first ArcTanGent back in 2013 remember a defiantly DIY experiment in left-field music, with esoteric underground headliners 65daysofstatic and Fuck Buttons descending on the rustic Fernhill Farm to lead the kind of line-up you’d never seen at a festival of such scale.
It was only a dream back then to be able to bring in the biggest names in outsider alternative music like Mogwai and Meshuggah, Explosions In The Sky and The Mars Volta under the ATG banner. And while organiser James Scarlett admits during his a lively 2 Promoters 1 Pod conversation this weekend that he’s given up on getting that elusive last band, the rest of those dream headliners have dropped into place for a 10th edition that, frankly, couldn’t really be any more stacked. In an era of festivals routinely failing, ATG is a genuinely great success story.
What’s arguably most striking about its growth, however, is how many of their old favourites they’ve managed to bring along for the ride. In 2024 alone they welcome back a host of acts from that original line-up, many of whom have grown in tandem with the fest, from Bossk and Brontide, to And So I Watch You From Afar, Three Trapped Tigers and reunited Nottingham metallers earthtone9 – after whose brilliant third album the festival was named.
Not wanting to miss a moment, we grabbed our flagon of scrumpy and pulled on the waterproofs to join 10,000-plus punters for a landmark celebration of music’s weird and wonderful…
Big things are happening for Hidden Mothers, and deservedly so. Having just announced the November release of their long-awaited debut LP Erosion / Avulsion, ATG invited the Sheffield lads to follow up their show-stealing set last year at the festival's now-traditional Wednesday night pre-event. A 2pm stage time would leave many bands struggling to scrape together an audience, but the gravitational heft of unreleased tracks like Death Curl, Violent Sun and Haze see the space utterly packed to kick off the weekend on the heaviest possible terms. Oooft! (SL)
Commissioned for ArcTanGent 2018 and named in reference to cult British sitcom Peep Show, few would have bet on Curse These Metal Hands – a collaboration between Conjurer and Pijn – to still be pulling big crowds in 2024. Despite (or perhaps because of) having played here in 2019 and 2023, they get a heroes’ welcome on Wednesday evening.
The shtick has shifted recently, to tongue-in-cheek statements on how they’re a massive Baroness rip-off, with their ‘I Can’t Believe It’s Not Baroness’ shirt spotted all around the site. But with those American icons also in attendance, it’s most remarkable how Endeavour and High Spirits aren’t just copy-and-paste jobs, paying tribute to John Baizley’s big riffs and sweet harmonies, sure, but packing far more of the originality and inspiration of CTMH’s exceptional feeder bands. Long may their hex on this festival continue. (SL)
LLNN’s suffocating embrace is almost too much for a summer night like this. The ultra-heavy Danish crew have been building a reputation for soul-shaking heft and light-draining dread since the release of 2016 debut EP Loss, but it feels that only since dropping third full-length Unmaker and returning to the live circuit post-lockdown have they really been getting their dues. Faced with a packed tent, they justify every ounce of the swelling hype, with the earth-shifting rumble of Desecrator, Interloper and Obsidian – a pulverisingly dense mix of metal, hardcore and industrial – causing some punters to retreat from the tent while others can do nothing but gaze on in open-mouthed awe. They’ve got all the makings of future cult favourites. Perhaps even so much more. (SL)
Festival favourites Bossk are one of a couple of bands to play two sets this weekend. While Saturday’s packed-out main stage appearance delivers all the pummelling riffage and heavy atmospherics that have long since become business as usual for the Kent crew, Wednesday’s pre-party special sees them cutting loose, with Pick Up Artist and HTV-3 mixed in alongside covers of Melvins’ Joan Of Arc and Torche’s Mentor. earthtone9’s Karl Middleton even jumps aboard for a cover of his band's own banger Tat Twam Asi. Double-duty that delivers on all fronts. (SL)
And So I Watch You From Afar approach playing two sets somewhat differently. Saturday’s show over on the Arc Stage sees a full play-through of their just-released seventh album Megafauna, whose less-well-known odes to their Northern Irish homeland provides twists and a relaxed last-afternoon salve. It means they’re able to stack up the hits for the Wednesday setlist, with the instrumental high energy of Search:Party:Animal and Set Guitars To Kill sending the cramped Yokhai tent crowd ballistic. Across them both, you get to see how these ATG favourites have evolved from adrenalised post-rock upstarts into one of the genre’s most unstoppably compelling bands. Parful stuff. (SL)
Named after one of the most instantly recognisable star clusters in the night sky, there’s a little irony about trying to take in Pleiades at breakfast time. Not that the Manchester lot lack for celestial energy. What’s most striking about the blend of twisty post-rock and gunpowder-packed hardcore of Honeyguide II, Looming and No Living Thing is quite how hard they hit live, with Andy Calderbank’s scourging vocals quickly shaking awake anyone still drowsy from Wednesday night’s shenanigans. Meanwhile the recognisable moments of mathy melody and metallic punch from last year’s Affinity With debut round out a sound that could easily carry them to rock’s big leagues. (SL)
There’s a moment of horror at the start of unpeople’s set where it looks like the fast-rising Brit rockers’ perfect summer of festival slots might be derailed by sloppy sound. With only Richard Rayner’s drums and stand-in bassist Em Lodge's backing vocals properly audible for concussive opener waste, there’s a (much louder) groan from the crowd. But it’s to their immense credit that the show is back on the road as second song going numb begins to worm its way under the skin. There’s no cover of Nirvana’s Territorial Pissings today, but it’s hardly missed as the massive hooks of smother and moon baboon underline that this is already a band with the genre-busting catalogue to make its mark on any number of massive stages. Just watch how far they’ll have climbed by this time next summer. Truly sensational. (SL)
After a couple of years slowly laying down their roots in the British underground, Nottingham's Underdark have properly blossomed. Buoyed further by last year's excellent Managed Decline album, today they deliver a masterclass in cold atmosphere, slashing melody and gritty black metal power, frequently switching between hanging heaviness and full-pelt blasting so smoothly they should get a Gillette endorsement. Singer Abi Vasquez spends half the set screaming on the barrier, while onstage, her bandmates manage to bring the darkness of Managed Decline's observations of Thatcher's slow choking of mining towns into focus even with the sun putting in an appearance outside the tent. Underdark were already good, now they're becoming brilliant. (NR)
With the portable loos already getting a bit ripe, Hundred Year Old Man have no right to deliver this much gut-punching impact. Having earned their stripes on the UK underground for the best part of a decade, it feels like the Sheffield heavyists' expansive, scourging post-metal is finally getting the attention it deserves, with big numbers of punters on site sporting their eye-catching/brain-frazzling shirts. They’ve only got half an hour to work with here, but even a brief dip into the New Terror of 2022’s colossal Sleep In Light is enough to leave punters preaching their dark gospel for the rest of the weekend. Absolutely massive. (SL)
Drafted in at short notice to replace the absent Earthside, blanket might have already played ArcTanGent’s sister festival 2000trees earlier this summer but it’s fascinating to see how they tweak their performance to cater to an event much further left of centre. With surprising dexterity, it turns out. Leaning into the cooler, shoegazier elements of their grungy sound and with frontman Bobby Pook in sunglasses and baseball cap even in the shade of the tent, they embrace the fashionably gritty influence of heroes like Deafheaven and Slowdive today, as they lead a swaying crowd through the buzzing beauty of this year’s third album Ceremonia. A compelling victory. (SL)
URNE are well and truly in their groove at this point. Now at the end of their second summer showcasing tunes from astonishing second album A Feast On Sorrow, Joe Nally and the boys might not have long to make their mark, but the grief-fuelled power of Becoming The Ocean, To Die Twice and The Burden cut right to the heart. If there’s a complaint, it’s that there’s only time for Desolate Heart from their superb debut Serpent & Spirit. But on this evidence, there are far bigger shows, with lots more space to smash brains in and lift souls still to come from the mighty Londoners. (SL)
Performing in a dress wreathed in glimmering LEDs, Julie Christmas seems particularly out of place amongst the dirt and hay bales of Fernhill Farm. Indeed, when she launches into Thin Skin from this year’s Ridiculous And Full Of Blood, it seems as if she’s barely of this Earth. There’s a humanity beneath the avant-garde-esoterica of her colourful cavorting, though, with her pulling at the aforementioned illuminated dress becoming the physical manifestation of the agony and ecstasy burning through End Of The World. The young kids on shoulders in the pit and punters relentlessly blowing bubbles only add another layer of strangeness to one of the festival’s most gleefully odd sets. (SL)
You know what you’re getting with Conan. Fortunately, big, bludgeoning riffs are exactly what the ATG faithful are after, and they gobble them down with giddy abandon as the Liverpudlian doomsters demolish the Yokhai Stage. It’d be easy to wax lyrical on how the pummelling Foehammer and Invinciblade are almost the antithesis of the complex, intricate music on offer elsewhere, but their gut-wrenching heaviness and the sheer visceral ordeal of their live performance feels just as much a repudiation of mainstream sensibilities as anything else at ATG. Even if it requires less high thinking than tapping into your primitive, barbarian brain. Hail the conquerors! (SL)
“It’s hard to pit to a Baroness song,” smiles John Dyer Baizley. “They change so frequently…” True, but the ever-grinning frontman seems to have forgotten that Under The Wheel, Shock Me and A Horse Called Golgotha are all pack the sort of electrifying riffs that move you whether you want them to or not. They also do a good line in sing-along solos à la Iron Maiden, and huge choruses that sneak up and send the whole tent yelling into the air. Nobody, though, is apparently having more fun than the band, with guitar whiz Gina Gleason in particularly enthusiastic form, shredding away from atop the monitors and drum riser. Even when John introduces Chlorine And Wine by recounting how it wasn't far from here that the band's bus crashed in 2012, it's a joyous moment, as the song's colossal finale erupts into a football terrace of impassioned voices. Guess what? Baroness are still one of the best bands on the planet. And yeah, you can pit to them. (NR)
Rain is absolutely hammering the roof of the Yokhai Stage as Red Fang step up, but the Oregon sludge-metallers simply will not be drowned out. “It looks like we brought the weather from the Pacific Northwest,” laughs bassist/vocalist Aaron Beam as more and more folk press for cover. Far more relevant is the catalogue of bangers they use to keep spirits high and a vicious pit-spinning despite the dispiriting shift in weather and stifling crush. Not many bands could hope to out-riff Baroness, but the relentlessness with which they dispense Hank Is Dead, Blood Like Cream and Dirt Wizard is legitimately staggering. One of the most smashing sets of the weekend. (SL)
With the smell of sweet leaf in the air, the sheer claustrophobic dread of Author & Punisher’s sundown set sets some punters on a bad trip. For everyone else, it’s a compelling journey into techno-darkness, with the biomechanical instrumentation of Drone Carrying Dread and Terrorbird standing out strikingly against the bucolic English countryside. The sense of place is emphasised further by a rumbling cover of Glory Box by local heroes Portishead: a startling industrial rework that somehow hits unlike anything else, even at this celebration of musical extremes. (SL)
Chatter is high about the special production for Amenra’s much-anticipated set. Among it, how the centrally-set pillars of the Yokhai tent were going to play havoc with their projected imagery, and how the festival have gone to special lengths to provide angled-in dual projection around the staging so that not an ounce of atmosphere is lost. They’re repaid with a set of quicksilver post-metal that blends heaviness and high emotion as well as anything this weekend. Striking as the monochrome imagery illuminating both players and backdrop is, it’s all about the uncompromising wrench of Boden, Plus près de toi (Closer To You) and A Solitary Reign. Simply stated, these are songs that feel like they could rip open the bowels of hell and drag every one of us in. (SL)
Elsewhere today, it has felt like a celebration of ArcTanGent at its absolute heaviest, with massive riffs and soul-crushing atmospherics deployed from first to last. Even as Explosions In The Sky take to the stage, the startling electro attack of John Cxnnor is rattling across the site from their own tent. When the Texan post-rock icons get going, though, the transportative power of The Birth And Death Of The Day, Catastrophe And The Cure and Greet Death ushers you onto another, more ethereal plane. Dropping the instantly euphoric Your Hand In Mine midway through the set feels like a bold decision, but the way in which With Tired Eyes, Tired Minds, Tired Souls, We Slept, The Fight and The Only Moment We Were Alone sweep you strangely into the cool of night makes for a far more intriguing end. (SL)
“Thank you for making our first-ever gig so special,” smiles Rebecca Need-Menear toward the end of i Häxa's set, unbelievably. Pulling in a decent crowd of mostly curious heads, they are a dark treat, with a strong witchy vibe, and folky in the Midsommar sense of the word. Backed by visuals of woodland scenes and, somewhat confusingly to anyone still not fully awake yet, themselves playing in a room, they're as perfect for a sunny summer's morning as this as they would be curled up indoors against the dead of winter. In half an hour, they cast a spell that would be challenging for a band 10 years in. Magic stuff. (NR)
By the law of averages, at some point Zetra eventually have to play a stinker of a gig. Not yet, though, and not today. Quite why such a nocturnal act are on just as the yard-arm passes noon is baffling, but the corpse-painted synth duo nevertheless look massive on this big stage as they beam out their velvety goth-pop. Somewhere between the graveyard-bonking gloom of Type O Negative, Deftones' quiet bits and the sort of futuristic sounds conjured up by Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark or The Human League – at once colourfully lush and coldly minimal and robotic – Sacrifice and The Mirror as ever are huge, with the guitars sounding particularly verdant and beefy, while Starfall from next month's long-awaited debut album points to an even brighter future. (NR)
Iress can't quite believe their luck. Informing the huge crowd who have gathered that this weekend has been the seed from which last week's blinding UK tour that included playing with Green Lung sprouted, by the end of their 30 minutes onstage the California mood-rockers look like they're about to smile themselves inside out. Their music isn't quite so cheery, but it is just as delightful – delicately constructed songs that quietly and slowly melt into something massive, with shades of A.A. Williams' dark magic and a sprinkle of doom in their heavier moments. Singer/guitarist Michelle Malley has one of the most naturally powerful voices of this fest, as well, making songs from their excellent Sleep Now, In Reverse album stand out marvellously. When you're this good, luck is irrelevant. (NR)
Sweltering temperatures have many literally laid out on the ground in the shade of the Arc tent as Year Of No Light pitch up for an overdue dose of doomy post-metal. True to their name, the French collective aren’t about to be cowed by the sun, no matter how high in the sky. Having been forced to cancel last year’s showing, and having played only a handful of shows in the interim, there’s an extra urgency about the crash of Hiérophante and Stella Rectrix today. Far more striking, though, is how the Bordeaux boys have grown into a band capable of filling this vast space after a far more chaotic, close-quarters showing that saw people shoving each other about for space to flail back in 2014. C'est incroyable! (SL)
Last weekend at Bloodstock, Mimi Barks told us that, having seen a couple going at it while she was playing in Europe, she wants to see more sex in the pit. One letter shy, aggy Manchester art-punks Maruja deliver sax in the pit, as Joe Carroll heads into the throng with his instrument. This, after singer/guitarist Harry Wilkinson has scaled the tent rafters as he yells his head off like IDLES man Joe Talbot's less chill little brother. It's a performance as in-your-face as their music is unpredictable, switching between hard, stinging riffs one minute, and more nocturnal-sounding moments that, squinting, share a footing with Massive Attack at their most energised. A rough and tumble statement of intent from a band already being talked about for something big. (NR)
Another crew of ATG veterans who’ve grown with the event, Three Trapped Tigers feel definitive of one branch of the festival’s trademark sound. The Londoners’ tangly instrumental noise-rock is the sort that rarely has the opportunity to sprawl out across a massive space except at weekends like this, and sprawl it does, as an impressively packed crowd jostles for a taste of Noise Trade and Rainbow Road. Conversely – symbiotically, to an extent – sets such as this are one of the main reasons for even the uninitiated to pay a visit, with even ultra-weirdo compositions Tekkers and Reset easy to be swept up in. (SL)
It's arguable that Ihsahn was making music in the ATG spirit long before ATG set up camp here. Post-Emperor (themselves no strangers to pooh-poohing the rules of music), the Norwegian genius enthusiastically embraced the fringes of his creativity and spent the past two decades warping metal around it. What's surprising for his debut turn here, then, is that he doesn't reach into his musical bag of tricks and pull out more weird stuff. There's no saxophone freak-outs, for one thing, in a place that would eat it up more readily than anywhere else. But, actually, it doesn't matter: there's enough twists and turns in the likes of Twice Born, The Promethean Spark and Stridig to keep him in the fest's premier league, and the precision force and heaviness of it all steamrolls in a most satisfying manner. Want a bit of cool synth and a weave of ’70s prog vibes? Here's Lend Me The Eyes Of Millenia, sounding taller than the highest mountain. Sheer brilliance from an artist still very much worthy of his crown. (NR)
Here you go: blood, burning Bibles, a flaming katana, armour, two little kids in corpsepaint leading a packed tent in throwing the horns, and a diversion from thrashy black metal into what's essentially a ’70s cop show theme. Yes, it's Sigh. This sort of madness is par for the course from the Japanese black metal legends, but it's thrown under a new light (literally) in the glow of the late evening. Moreover, it only enhances their thrilling, frenzied metal attack. Corpsecry – Angelfall is a riot, a Frankenstein's monster of NWOBHM speed and black metal horror, while Bring Back The Dead and Me-Devil get surprisingly huge sing-alongs. In his kimono, Mirai Kawashima looks cool as hell, upstaged though by Dr. Mikannibal, drenched in blood and parping her sax like a possessed woman, grinning her face off the whole time. The kids, meanwhile, stand vigil at the back of the stage until called forward to sing, adding an extra layer of the joyously surreal to proceedings, particularly when one is spotted absently picking their nose and eating it (surely the true heart and soul of black metal). There's no cover of Venom's Black Metal today, with Mirai telling K! he's unsure if anyone here would get it. Mate, if they can handle the rest of this brilliantly bonkers BM buffet… (NR)
Few bands within ArcTanGent’s remit combine as much brain-teasing musicality and real star power as Animals As Leaders. With djent-pioneer and guitar-wizard Tosin Abasi at the fore, the LA prog-metallers reap a huge crowd, with a pulsating mosh-pit illuminated by psychedelic imagery on the LED backdrop that smashes about in time to Ectogenesis and Monomyth. At times, the music almost feels too precise and polished, but thanks to Tosin’s inimitable charisma (asking members of the audience for mushrooms for Meshuggah’s set is big banter) and a crashing closing salvo of Micro-Aggressions and CAFO, everyone’s far too punch-drunk and starstruck to even think about complaining. (SL)
Not that they've ever been low powered, but someone's clearly put fifty pence in Blood Command. Decked out in regulation adidas cult trackies – with Nikki Brumen doing a mid-set kit-change into a massive, fabulous sequinned shirt that even Jonathan Davis would consider on-the-nose – the Norwegian-Aussie crew are a force of nature from the off. Songs from last year's excellent World Domination are thrown out with all the power of that title, creating a hurricane of hardcore, black metal and Turbonegro-y rock’n’roll that's hard to resist getting swept up in. There's a stark reminder that dickheads walk among us when Nikki talks about getting groped in the crowd during a recent show, but the anger and pain is rechanneled into joy as she dives into the crowd a couple of songs later. "If we see you after the show, we're confiscating your cocaine," she promises at one point. After such an adrenalised performance, there's really no need for stimulants to keep you up. (NR)
Show Me The Body have had a hell of a summer so far. Whether stealing the show at Manchester’s Outbreak, holding their own at Hellfest, or smashing a top-of-the-bill set at Glasgow’s core., the banjo-toting post-hardcore trio could rightly lay claim to being one of the most exciting bands in all of alternative music right now. Which makes it extra perplexing that they get such a lukewarm reception here. It’s no fault of the band’s, for sure. With frontman Julian Pratt stomping back and forth across the stage while wringing startling sounds from his synths and banjo, and bassist Harlan Steed and drummer Jack McDermott stoking the tectonic rumble of Out Of Place and a cover of Beastie Boys’ Sabotage, it’s a bracingly intense showing. But the tired, heat-sapped, indifferent audience response falls well short of what they deserve. (SL)
Teeth Of The Sea take their name from the French title of Jaws, and their guitarist Jimmy Martin recently did very well competing in Channel 4's Popmaster. Interesting trivia, but completely outshined by how fascinating their music is. A mix of electronic beats, walls of noisy, occasionally shreddy guitar, and space-staring psychedelia, they sound like something being beamed at you from a sci-fi future. One wag compares them to Executioner's Bong from Peep Show, but really, there's no real comparison with anyone else. Quickly, you realise they've taken a bite out of the past 15 minutes without you realising, dragging you into their swell of sound with ease. Bigger boat? You're gonna need a bigger brain to adequately process TOTS' mind-blowing noise. (NR)
Machine-tooled malevolence is what every one of the bodies packed into the Arc Stage – probably the biggest crowd of the weekend – come looking for from Meshuggah. And machine-tooled malevolence is exactly what they get. Few bands can even dream of matching the sheer uncompromising power of Broken Cog, Perpetual Black Second or God He Sees In Mirrors, and close to four decades into their career, they know how to wring every ounce of intensity. Indeed, they electrify a pit that borders on outright violence for long periods of their 80 minutes onstage. Those familiar with Meshuggah’s shtick – those not being punched in the face, anyway – may rightly complain that there can be a monotony to their sets these days. And over two years into the Immutable tour, the bold production will have lost much of its impact for those who've already seen it. But with all-time classic Bleed back in the setlist, and a climactic Demiurge inspiring absolute chaos, it’s another vulgar display of power from tech-metal’s most deservedly revered elder statesmen. (SL)
As Meshuggah fire up their musical pneumatic drill across the site, in the PX3 tent, there's a completely different kind of aural brain-smash going on, courtesy of Berlin techno nuts Komfortrauschen. Playing it live on drums, bass, synth and ultra-FX-sodden guitar, they bring a Berghain party (minus the pissing, minus the shagging, minus the squalor…) to Fernhill Farm, backed with eye-blasting colourful lights and a very welcome flashing 'K' at the front of the stage. Even the band seem genuinely surprised at how wildly it goes off when they drop their huge rhythms and an entire tent dances ecstatically along, particularly when they get called back for two encores. Clearly, big beats are the best. (NR)
It's almost funny how heavy Torpor are. It goes beyond just being very slow and hitting very hard: more than once, the London trio reach a frequency so satisfying that it makes you just go, 'Ooooooh.' Such things are actually more tricky than they look, but Torpor are masters of the craft, naturals at making slugging along absolutely exhilarating as they drag you through a doomy post-metal soundscape that's as impressive as it is nightmarish. Is brunchtime on the last day of a festival when people are still getting on top of their hangovers the right environment for all of this? Well, 'torpor' means a state of physical or mental inactivity and lethargy when the body starts to shut down, so, sort of. Actually, the hefty boot they put up ATG's arse could be just the thing to snap you out of such a thing. Great success, either way. (NR)
Throwing together Hawkwind-y psych, wild soul, a bit of retro rock and a non-stop flow of bright, charismatic energy, Codex Serafini are awesome, perfectly living up to their own description as "a Saturnian Ritualistic band hailing from outer-space, currently passing through Earth and temporally residing in Sussex". They also use their saxophone more smoothly than any other act this weekend, adding cool, jazzy flourishes rather than spiky, piercing blasts. Dressed all in red robes, it's a bit like watching Slipknot: The Cool ’60s Cult Years, but it just adds to their effortless style. Rituals haven't been this much fun since the one in The Devil Rides Out. (NR)
Polish sludge-metallers Sunnata might not be among this weekend's biggest names, but it’s massive credit to the ATG audience that there are a couple of thousand people in attendance for their lunchtime set on a none-more-hungover Saturday. They’re rewarded with a textural masterclass, with the sweet hum and deep grooves of Saviours Raft and A Million Lives proving the perfect soundtrack as you enter the final straight. With only half and hour to work with, there is the sense that they need to finish just as they’re coming up to speed, but hopefully today can be a stepping stone towards long-overdue UK headline shows for one of Europe’s most intriguing bands. (SL)
Transporting you from the sunny West Country to the cold dark of the Finnish winter, Hexvessel are a refreshing change of pace. With a dark forest on the video backdrop, trademark long cowls slung over their heads and the folksy, psychedelic post-black metal of The Tundra Is Awake coming from their none-more-kvlt Peavey practice amps, theirs is arguably the most straightforwardly theatrical set of ATG 2024. They invite you not just to listen to their music, but to step into the frostbitten world of myth and dark magic they create. Remarkably, there’s no hint of absurdity in that. With frontman Mathew ‘Kvohst’ McNerney in fine voice, and an excellent mix highlighting even the most delicate aspects of their sound, Homeward Polar Spirit and A Cabin In Montana offer a tantalising mystical allure you could follow to the ends of the earth. (SL)
Watching VOWER at 2000trees back in July, we noted that the rising British tech-metallers’ expansive sound was still coming into focus. It feels a damn sight sharper today. On one hand, the finely measured, piercing angularity, post-rock expanse and layered crunch of False Rituals and Eyes Of A Nihilist are better suited to ATG’s more tech-savvy clientele. On another, it’s just the pedigree of a band featuring members of Palm Reader, Black Peaks and Toska shining through. The band's debut EP Apricity teased that this was a Brit-rock supergroup with the chops to be truly super, and already they’re delivering live performances to match. VOWER? More like WOWER! (Sorry…) (SL)
Ten editions in, it feels like ArcTanGent has already worked through most of its really feasible dream bookings, but the arrival of Canadian noise-rock lunatics KEN Mode feels like An Event. Sound in the Bixler Stage has been a little patchy through the weekend, but the mix for A Love Letter, The Shrike and The Illusion Of Dignity sounds as high-end as Metallica suffering a psychotic break. They're some of the most unhinged, genuinely disquieting sounds of the four days, landing with surgical precision and explosive impact. It’s a fleeting set, but every second is made to count as Jesse Matthewson and company showcase their mastery of mania through the none-more-tellingly-titled Lost Grip, Doesn’t Feel Pain Like He Should and No Gentle Art. Terrifyingly good. (SL)
Even here, SCALER feels like something completely different. The artists formerly known as SCALPING offer the kind of dense, pounding electro that would arguably be just as at home up the road at Creamfields next weekend, for one thing. But scratch the surface of LOAM or Cloak & Dagger, and there’s an undulation between offbeat cool and sci-fi nightmarishness that probably doesn’t really fit in anywhere. It’s all the better for it, too, with the sea of bodies in the Arc Stage handing themselves over to the beat as they dissolve into the music and spiral towards Monolithium. (SL)
Imperial Triumphant often feel too complex, too ripe, too downright crazy to sit easily on festival bills, but the avant-garde New Yorkers are perfectly at home today. Their trademark gold masks and black capes might not be as jarring as they once were, but the cacophonous, frequently bewildering jazz-metal of Lower World and Chernobyl Blues still thrill. Festival touring necessitates that only the core trio are in attendance today – with a world of distended brassy, synthy sounds playing on backing track – but any sense of feeling short-changed is negated when they crack a bottle of champagne to shower the front rows before piling into an unapologetically bonkers Swarming Opulence. Mind-blowing stuff, in every sense. (SL)
Asked during a live podcast at last year’s edition whether there was any chance we’d see eartone9 at ArcTanGent 2024, festival director James Scarlett simply shrugged that, as far as he was concerned, the Nottingham metal trailblazers simply weren’t a band at that point in time. It’s a delight, then, to see them onstage, powering through new tracks from their excellent fifth album In Resonance Nexus next to colossal bangers of old Evil Crawling I and Withered. Unfortunately, a disappointingly thin sound undercuts the occasion. They’re obviously throwing everything into it , but those songs demand better than the insubstantial rattle that comes through the PA for much of this evening. Disappointing, but with et9 back, louder nights will definitely follow. (SL)
“This is Bristol,” observes Jus Oborn. “You’re all high already, right?” That smell all weekend hasn't always been the food stalls (or, indeed, the urinals), but when Electric Wizard arrive, the Arc Stage is a full-on pea-soup of doob smoke. Pre-show, guitarist Liz Buckingham asks K! if we think they'll go over alright among the rest of the bill. Any worries are annihilated when their red sigil appears on the massive screens to an almost impenetrably-packed tent. From the moment Return Trip kicks in, sounding even more malevolent than normal, the Wizard are on fire, perhaps punching harder to assert themselves. There's the usual horror/porn/motorcycle movie visuals adding an extra layer of violence and sleaze, but as much as this adds another way in to their depraved world, their victory here is that they're on a form that, even for them, is deadly. And louder than nuclear war. Black Mass, The Satanic Rites Of Drugula and a sinister Time To Die are nightmarish trips, Sabbath having a dark one, while a closing Funeralopolis is apocalyptic as its faster second half crashes into a finale of noise. It's a particularly good, and knowingly nasty, showing from a band who just don't live in the same world as others. (NR)
Since day one, Mogwai have felt, above all others, like the band that ArcTanGent was made for. Apparently a late 2024 booking, slotted in above intended headliners Electric Wizard when their availability was confirmed, and with a fee above and beyond the allocated artist budget, there’s a hell of a lot of expectation heaped on the legendary Glaswegians’ climactic Sunday headline set.
So contrarian is their reputation, however (‘frontman’ Stuart Braithwaite concludes a Q&A earlier in the day by explaining, in detail, why British rock royalty Queen are a ‘terrible’ band) and so mercurial is their music, that it’s never a safe bet on whether they’ll opt to barnstorm their way to stealing the show or creep through deep cuts to delight the hardcore. That’s very much the point.
Ambling into life with the dragged drums, keys and (admittedly deafening) textural guitars of To The Bin My Friend, Tonight We Vacate The Earth from 2021’s shock UK Number One album As The Love Continues, it seems initially like this isn’t the landmark gig for them that it is for so many in attendance. Even the festival’s inbuilt video screens are curtained in favour of a more old-school light show.
It's I’m Jim Morrison, I’m Dead that reminds you of Mogwai’s elemental power, a composition that could be reduced to near ambience cranked up and electrified to cataclysmic effect. The ever-layering guitars of Rano Pano are a first foray into truly eardrum-bursting territory, but then you’re taken on a tour of heavier atmospheric hits, from the trippy vocoder-laden Hunted By A Freak and rare sing-song Richie Sacramento, to the noisy clatter of Ex-Cowboy, and propulsive, upbeat classic How To Be A Werewolf.
It’s over an awesome final 30 minutes that they really blow you away, however. As if accepting an unspoken challenge laid down by the mighty Wizard, a titanic, 12-minute Like Herod becomes the heaviest song unleashed all weekend, its fake-out retreats into near silence and deafening returns knocking the uninitiated on their arses. Old Poisons buries punky influence in its dissonant, discordant high volume, while Remurdered employs the synths one last time for a bit of thrillingly throwback John Carpenter-worship. Then We’re No Here absolutely brings the house down. Already one of the greatest post-rock songs of all time, it's deployed with a purpose and venom that is simply transcendent, ending in a perfect wash of noise, with the full array of guitars left to spiral into feedback only eventually cut off for the 11pm noise curfew.
If this festival exists to showcase music from the far left-field on the biggest possible stage, at the maximum possible volume, you could hardly have asked for a more spectacularly uncompromising end to their incredible 10th edition. More than that, it feels like the bar has been raised for where they go from here.
With only 11-and-a-bit months to go until ATG 2025, the race is already on to find the visionaries, trailblazers and downright weirdos that’ll keep the institution that ArcTanGent has become going for another 10 editions and far, far beyond. (SL)
ArcTanGent 2025 takes place from August 13 – 16.
