Pigscum plus Support @ Subway Cowgate

Tonight, local promotions community House of Flying Jaggers celebrated a successful move one door along the street from Opium to Subway on the Cowgate with a storming bill of Hardcore talent. Support from Dead at the Scene, The Black Chain and The Charles Manson Roller Disco Experience produced some fluid riffery, explosive grind and killer breakdowns.

Crowd participation is the name of the game in Hardcore-land and the jaggers were starting to get into the swing of things by the time Apathy is The Killer arrived. The dynamics of the Dundee band are remarkable, with a sound scope stretching from delicate screamo to pulverising noisecore: with all the best bits in-between. The vocals are emotive and executed with ability and not a little style.

Headlining were Pigscum, a bass-less 4-piece from Glasgow who promised, and duly delivered, the fitting finale. The band's on stage presence suggests a solid, immoveable force, the kick-drum pounds through the music leaving the conventional need for bass obsolete and the guitars hack away with blunt but precise brutality.

Clearly finding it hard-going to try and follow the exactitude of the duelling doom finger-work, the crowd took to alternative pursuits: human pyramids ahoy. A frenzy of shape-throwing dance-offs, rugby scrums and straight-up mosh outs signalled the delight of Pigscum's fans, and epitomised the community feeling fostered by the common love of hardcore music among these Scottish fans. When it's executed as well as Pigscum, resistance may well be futile. [Jamie Borthwick]