Punk V Metal @ The 12 Bar - 30th September

The top of the bill for the long-awaited Punk versus Metal night saw The Phlegm Fatales go head-to-head with Burn Machina in a battle of licks, screams, yells and decibels at The new 12 Bar last Thursday night. (30th September)

Supported by For My Anger (Metal) and The Reserved (Punk), both turning in honourable performances for such a night, The Phlegm Fatales took to the stage reasonably inconspicuously, until declaring ‘Metal is shit’ and tearing into their first number.

If when you think of punk you think The Clash or The Ramones, you may be surprised by the Phlegms who, despite all three of them looking like typically nice lads, their music is a ball of pure anger and velocity hurtling from start to finish of each two minute song, and succeeds in making the Sex Pistols look tame.

Extremity

This is usually the sort of music you either love or hate, but every single person in the bar, metal fans included, seemed to give up some sort of appreciation for the band as they sped through their set, so fast they even had time to fit a Dead Kennedy's cover in the middle. But aside from the Phlegm’s extremity, they have a knack of sounding surprisingly catchy, yet they are guilty of sitting back far too easily and conventionally in their chosen genre to send you away anything more than satisfied.

Burn Machina began in a blaze of feedback which quickly progressed into the thudding bass that you would expect from any number of teenage nu-metal bands around the world.

However, Burn Machina demonstrate that they have a lot more to offer. Their opening song sounds, in places, akin to the party metal of The Vine’s Get Free, and the front man’s input is that of a carefully crafted, tuneful singing voice, rather than the dry throated screaming that so often mars modern heavy metal bands.

Complicated and varied

In fact, all four musicians prove to have complete control of their trade tools to produce nu-metal/emo basslines with classy metal riffs, and displaying a near perfect change of tempo on more than one occasion.

The whole set was intricate and varied, holding the neutral’s attention until the end with duelling lead guitars scaling and screeching the final song to a halt, although they were taunted into an encore. ’You’re a bunch of f***ing whores.’ Exclaimed the Americanised lead singer, not a conventional method of gaining fans, but it seems to be working.

Written by Dan Jeoffroy

Photography: Dan Jeoffroy