HATE CITY FEST 2010

Lemme see what I can recall that night...

First of all I'll start with little introduction about Hate City Fest. Basically it's an annual hardcore festival featuring some of the best-known bulgarian hardcore bands plus sometimes foreign support. It's the place where one can see bulgarian hardcore in it's finest.

Now back to the story...
The fest was supposed to start at 19:30PM. Well I got there about thirty minutes late only to find out that the fest has already begun and that the first band was about to finish playing. To be honest I even didn't get the name of the first band. I heard it was a greek one. Missed. Don't care. No big deal. When I got in the club was like half-full.
The second band for the evening was Seven Ate Nine, a band that I've never heard before. The only thing I knew about it was that they've change their name from Toxic Hate...something... Once again don't know, don't care. What I saw was two kids screaming and kicking in what I was unable to determine - bulgarian or english. I've read that their style was supposed to be some kind of hardcore/beatdown but to me it looked more like screamo. Nevertheless it sounded bad almost to the point of me starting to regret for coming. I've nothing against those kids. It's just that their music sucks. Won't see them again. That's for sure.
Good thing that the third band for the night stepped in. To be honest I've been waiting for quite some time to see these guys live. Now I knew they were good (because I've already heard their demo) but I didn't know that they can be even better live. the band I'm talking about is none other than CUT OFF. They definitely managed to move the crowd, I give them that. If during the Seven Ate Nine set the people were mostly watching, during the Cut Off performance people were already starting to mosh.
Next in line were Brothers In Blood. In recent years they've become one of the better-known hardcore bands from Sofia mainly thanks to their frontman Alex or Shuta as he's best known. During their play the moshing became more intense with more people getting in. Well alot can be said about Brothers In Blood so I ain't gonna bother myself with writing any more stuff about them. What I can say is that they're damn good band and one not to be missed.
After the Brothers came the time for the most well-known in and out of Bulgaria local hardcore band, Last Hope. Chikata (Alex), the frontman is known to many and each time the guy makes a great show with his fellow bandmates. They've done a great set with fan favorite songs including "GFU" and "Fuck Police" as well as some older songs from their early years. Well what can I say more except that LH is the best hc band we have in town. It's THE band that everyone have to see. No excuses accepted.
And finally the evening's headliners straight from The Netherlands, No Turning Back. Well I didn't know what to expect from them as I've heard only a few songs on the internet. To be honest at first I had my reserves about the band which soon disappeared as they played song after song. Damn good dutch fast-passed hardcore which can't live one passive. Definitely not regretting seeing them. Damn good band.

Now... apart from the music I saw things I didn't like. In the moshpit there were a couple of people apparently trying to make problems. Good thing that I didn't escalate to something serious. I've heard that after the fest there were some more problems and even the police came. I don't about that as I left right after the NTB gig but one thing that I noticed and didn't approve was the presence of a bunch of skinheads. I even saw one with a tshirt with big "88" numbers in front. I don't like them and I don't like to see then in concerts. I still have no idea why they are tolerated but this has to chance.