Event: Onslaught Power From Hell: 40th Anniversary World Tour

Artists: Onslaught (Headliner) with Supports Harlott, Vexation & Desecrator (AU)

Venue: The Corner Hotel, Richmond, Melbourne

Organiser: Your Mate Bookings

Writer: Brady Irwin

Photography: Dan McKay

Sore Necks The Day After: Everyone’s

At the risk of writing myself into my own self-made writing trope-corners, my sentiments about thrash metal always bear repeating.

For me, thrash metal sits aside death metal as my all-time favourite sub-genre within the heavy metal canon.

It’s the default go-to once the dopaminergic response has sputtered out on either trying to keep up with new releases, or whatever other stint of genre-fixation has announced its’ departure.

Solid, dependable, stimulating and most important of all - fun.

You can say much the same about tonights’ lineup, particularly with respect to long-standing Bristol thrash vanguards Onslaught. Joining a cadre of acts proving old dudes certainly know not only how to rock but blow younger bands’/punters’ faces off, we were treated to a gig more akin to a whirling dervish of audio blades than a mere lineup.

Speaking of lineups - Your Mate Bookings. A pretty neutral name compared to peers such as Southern Extremities, but don’t let a name fool you. In both cases I’ve noticed a consistent pattern whereby young, new and/or up-and-coming talent receives slots alongside more established local acts, which is great.

Before we kick off into the review proper, I’d like to acknowledge this! Given the shoestring (or even nonexistent) budget the entire music industry hierarchy faces from production down to the merch desk, I get why promoters might opt to stack the whole thing with ‘safe bets’. When margins are thinner than the pathogen particles which eventually turned Pretty Much Nameless Guy #1 in Alien: Covenant into a butterflied organ soup. It seems kitsch and throwaway to say, but I’d just like to give a hat-tip in general to local/Australian promoters who are essentially taking their own financial risk to ensure local scenes are supported in Cost Of Living Crisis Hell.

That’s my intro blurb wrapped up. Speaking of tropes, let’s engage in a ritual of mine for Gig Reviews now it seems - some thank-you’s before the review proper!

With thanks to:

Your Mate Bookings, Corner Hotel (particularly the staff busy slinging thrash-metallers beer all night - salute), Harlott, Vexation, Desecrator and of course, our maiden-voyagers Onslaught. I’m never left without humility and appreciation for an opportunity to cover great heavy music shows - neither is anyone on our team.

And speaking of team, you’ve got some fantastic eye-candy to accompany my shonky word-smithing. Go check out Dan McKay’s portfolio - man’s not only a professional musician, he also has an eye for the art of gig photography too (bastard - love ya work, Dan)!

Links to artists and stakeholders available down the bottom of this review. Support The Scene.

Peace, Love and A Decades-Long Riff Onslaught - Brady.

Pride ourselves as much as we’d like on our supposed sentience and use of a big ol’ bundle of nerves in the brain’s pre-frontal cortex, we’re more mammalian than our ego would often have us believe.

Thus, stepping out into the preppy and definitely-not-my-scene dour and cold rainy air of Richmond’s trendy corner pun intended on a Saturday evening (the talk of an Ice Age following global warming feels more prescient by the minute)? Yeah, I’ll admit even my perrenially ready-to-headbang thrasher spirit was feeling a bit muted by such a lame duck nearly-summer bait and switch.

Alongside my equally as (if not more) thrash-addicted companion in fellow Musolegion admin and perpetual circle-pit starter Sammy, I nevertheless couldn’t help feel a bit of that autonomic masking kick in as we shuffle past your typical weekend-NPC’s.

Acknowleding the irony that is thinking we’re all so cool and non-comformist unlike said NPC’s, we enter shortly afterwards into our own den of very-similarly-garbed tribespeople within The Corner.

Having caught heavier stuff like Suffocation, Obscura et al here on the regular, I nevertheless always feel… jarred? Yeah, it was jarring to be honest, the idea of thrash metal at this venue.

Not that it’s a poor fit, perhaps more that the word thrash so immediately conjures up thought-association and mental imagery that’s more crust-punk traphouse. The place has, after all, been an iconic mainstay for the local/international touring scene for a long while. It’s a venue with nothing to prove, except how long we can go before the night’s first concussion on that goddamned pole (also looking at you, arsehole pillar in the way downstairs at what used to be Club 299/Crowbar Brisbane...).

There’s nothing pole-arising (HEH) about our first act, though.

Not if the unanimously-rowdy hoots of applause and plentiful two-way banter through the set is any indicator!

That’s right, punters. You’re always safe in wagering a solid set and an appreciative crowd for our openers tonight.

Those openers being:

HARLOTT:

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Indeed. You’ll certainly cash out with your thrash out if you’re punting on these guys for a solid thrash lineup choice.

Although initially, perhaps that felt almost not the case, pit-side. Meekly scattered in a semi-circle ring almost back to the sound desk, the opening refrains of blistering riffage for the evening copped some beer-lifting and nods of appreciation, but the pre-gamers are uncharacteristically timid to begin with. I blame the personality-disordered weather, to be honest.

Don’t fret though (I do love fretless HEH) guys.

Politely British in his query, frontman Andrew Hudson asks “Are you guys ready for some thrash? We’re Harlott and we’re about to play some thrash for you, if you don’t mind!”. The momentarily milquetoast reception erupted in unison with a wild, hearty jeering response to what amounts to the worlds’ most rhetorical (and fun) question. Theeeere you go, mate. Just got to verbally gee ‘em up a bit.

As bodies pile up World War Z style in a slow but unending stream of concert-goers - so too does Hudson’s intensity and gnarly, Tom Araya-esque gruff vocal stylings. Sure, they’re decidedly Slayer in a sense… but that’s also like commenting on the fact both cake and bread often features flour. It’s almost a moot point.

Supplementing that Ameri-thrash recipe base is a heady mixture of punk-rock fun (gang-chants, oi-oi-oi’s, fist-pumping etc), a more technical and modernised songwriting scaffold (think Warbringer) and half a scoffed bottle of Ritalin in stage-facing energy. That’s even if Andrew remarks “I’ve been down south getting fat and lazy, not gig-fit anymore!”. (Don’t have to tell that to my huffing arse - kids, don’t vape).

Remarking he’s never been so disgusted in his life at the chant of “Cardio! Cardio!” (nice one, Sammy and Paul), Andrew is honestly more octane-fuelled than he gives himself credit for.

Belting out an endless procession of razor-sharp palm-mute/tremolo interval-training alongside a physiotherapists’ textbook worth of lick/solo/lead-work, Hudson and lead-blazer Leigh Bartley joined Tom Richards on bass in belting out familiar Extinction/Proliferation material, parsed with newer treats from most recent LP Detritus Of The Final Age (‘Bring On The War’ was a personal favourite of mine from their setlist). All noted material provided underneath a relentlessly stoic and cardio-cardio-heavy performance from a perpetually busy skinsman in Glen Trayhern.

I’m getting puffed just watching these guys, and we ain’t even over the first hurdle yet.

As ‘The Penitent’ draws out moshpit bloodthirst good and proper for a final menacing salvo, bodies are now in motion amidst duelling leads and a rockstar, applause-filled crescendo of a finish. Harlott finish their warm-up job (and then some) to great aplomb from us thrash-heads.

All of a sudden I’ve completely forgotten about both the gloomy weather and the stumbling crowd of gym-bros adorning the street outside. All that extraneous bullshit I’d otherwise be fighting to keep out of conscious awareness has melted away.

We’re locked in, and ready to thrash some more.

Good timing, ‘cause we’re about to melt face with:

VEXATION:

That comment I made before about supporting up-and-coming bands? These guys are evidently it. Sandwiched between two tried-and-tested local thrash institutions whilst also supporting none other than Onslaught for a national tour, the leg-up from opening slot is a good tactical move in terms of lineup flow.

Why, you ask? Well, here’s the thing. This is at least the third time I’ve covered these fast-rising Melburnian death-thrash firebrands in a Gig Review (see aforementioned Category for coverage of sets such as New Dead Festival, Brutefest etc), and there’s no temptation to retread the wheel where these guys are concerned.

Because frankly? I can’t. Not when there’s all of about twenty seconds worth of still necks from the band in total, right at the start (it’s all an impressively consistent weave of skulls and hair from then on ‘til the holler of applause on closing).

Particularly not, in my opinion, with staunch unit of a frontman Rhys Bailey seems to morph his vocals into an ever shriekier, harsher mix of rasping and guttural bellows. Dude’s vocals are only sounding gnarlier as time passes, and the high-register rasps hits an extreme metal/thrash synapse in the brain that feels just…. just right, man.

Which says nothing at all about his histrionic, sweep-heavy employment of soloing, flaunting skills alongside the similarly technically-proficient-but-flavourful lead-work from fellow talented six-string bastard, Ryan Butler. Not to be understated (and not just cause I’m a bassist myself), it’s truly always a pleasure to watch Sam Gilfillan paint a more kaleidoscopic and nimble performance on the bass than many lead guitarists in other thrash bands might allow. Hit the Steve DiGorgio dopamine receptors nicely, without being showoff-ish. Complementing that is an equally creative and feverish display from drummer Adrian Zuccon, a man looking as much like he was about break apart from his own fury as he was Gavin Harrison-tier, Porcupine Tree-cool about it. Bastards, the lot of them.

Wrap the whole package up together, and you’ve got something this thrash-junkie feels is missing somewhat from the Melburnian (and national) metal climes - solid, technical but hard-grooving death-thrash. Like the resurgence of metallic hardcore and subsequent ‘there’s the door - fuck off’ to watered down bands that’ve gotten too safe, Vexation represent both Dew Scented/The Crown style 90’s early-aughts death/thrash nostalgia and a very modern riff-threat.

From the next-level intensity and chiropractor-friendly headbanging employed by the entire band and audience for ‘Journey Beyond Mortality’, the equally morbidly-curious up-tempo banger ‘Messiah of Death’ through to numerous chunky thrash-breakdowns, we witness a band more than confident in their stride, and more in tune with stage intensity than ever.

It’s band two and by the end of that set, we’re not a warmed-up crowd. Not at all.

We’re fucking torched.

They’ll be sweeping our ashes into bin liner by the end of the night.

DESECRATOR:

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Honestly? Very tempted to just off-handedly and expressively shrug, flail my hands around in the air and puff my greaser jacket up. The most Brooklyn/New Jersey leaning “ahhhhhh, forgeddaboutit” mobster gesture I can manage.

Not out of antipathy towards these guys, moreso a rhetorical Australian-metal question:

Does Desecrator need any introduction?

Well, this is the internet and I can’t run on the assumption this household-name institution’s stage-return is as desperately pined-for outside of Melbourne, I guess. Despite this, I nevertheless can’t understate the sheer religious fervour that accompanied this bands’ opening refrains. I really like this band, a lot, and yet I still felt as Paul Muad’dib must have in first witnessing the sheer zealous ferocity of the fremen on Arrakis.

The religious reverence even extends to one punters’ zealous look of wrath to Yours Truly. Specifically, as I spot a wide-grinning Riley Strong, reflexively proclaiming “oh yeah! The guy from Resistance (d-beat/crust punk band Strong is also in)!”. Fella, it’s fine, I’m aware who came first - this ain’t my first rodeo. Point about this momentary exchange being added is to show the respect with which these guys are held by their community though. A respect they bring right back to the table with equal fervour.

On that note - you can always tell who’s on the Desecrator-carousel for the first-time, too. An easy tell is by measuring how bug-eyed and riddled with phrases such as “Holy shit, those guys were so fucking good!” as they amble past you later on.

With a few years’ leave of absence, tonight you’d be forgiven for thinking someone just let a bunch of estranged parents out of a Siberian gulag to reunite with long-lost family. There’s a veritable boom of appreciation as the crowd roars the local thrash-legends back onstage, with the applause refusing to be curtailed to the space between songs.

Lapping up every inch of this unrestrained potential energy gone fully kinetic, Riley’s half crab-like stage sweep and Bruce Dickinson-ian vocal warble threw it right back at a crowd now completely unfettered by hesitancy. Cranking out iconic gang-chanted lines like “Bang your heads/break your necks/bang another day” alongside your hombres Andrew Hudson (correct, that Andrew - Lead Guitar) and Gerad Biesboer (Bass) certainly helps! As too does being propelled forward by Jared Roberts expending a marathon’s worth of energy laying down drum-based artillery-fire for a whole set.

Showing more of that sense of logical progression in the lineup choice, I can’t help but feel like we’re copping an injection that is equal parts Vexation death-thrash and fly-by-night punk-addled Gama Bomb styled fun-riffin’. From the heavily classic-metal stylings of newer track ‘Belly of The Beast’ through to the Endless Pain-coded martial stomp of ‘The Summoning’, the widespread appeal (and longing, in absence) of these guys amongst the metal-crowd becomes clear. Performatively, they’ve got all the flourishes, gesticulation, gang-chants, call-responses and genuine, super-appreciative verbal feedback you’d expect. Structurally, the songwriting material sweeps across a much larger sub-genre palette than your average local thrash act. There’s a deceptive amount of variety at play both within and between songs here, but it’s all wrapped up in our sub-genre’s favourite auditory drug - s p e e d.

Sensing there’s a few of us trying to reserve battery power even towards the end, Ryan ain’t impressed. Issuing a directive to wring ourselves much harder than we have been, our axe-slinging frontman bellows a stern call to “get moving - you guys had better show Onslaught what you’re made of, Melbourne!” prior to the blistering riffage of ‘Destroying God’s Work’ (complete with off-stage playing antics), the sentiment isn’t lost on a crowd hell-bent on a final pre-headliner rage.

Peppering the set with all manner of sincere platitudes about returning to and being part of the community, these guys effectively acted as Horn of Gondor to rouse one hundred percent of mayhemic thrasher spirit ahead of the main act.

ONSLAUGHT:

Now. The adage about old dudes rock from before?

No, I’m not just blowing smoke up arses. Quite a few of the most intense shows I’ve reviewed here (such as Possessed and Atheist) feature members who’ve been doing this whole live-show, fast heavy metal thing for longer than a lot of us millenial/Gen Z punters have even been alive.

Forty years, dude. Forty years of unrelenting thrash metal. Plugging away out of the stadium-sized limelight of peers like Metallica, these UK juggernaughts haven’t bent the knee for anything except their own punk-rock muse.

Kreator kinda hit the snooze the button around Endorama (and to a lesser extent post Hordes of Chaos). Sodom keep the Teutonic flat-stick alive, but by virtue of that fact they almost feel like an outlier example. I don’t need to mention the Big Four at all, do I? Exodus, Testament, you name it. Sure, those vanguards are still kicking goals and hitting hard live. I’ll pay that.

But…. these guys?

Jesus seagull-kicking, bridge-building, goddamned Bristolean Christ, dude.

This is veteran energy, right here.

The most immediately noticeable evidence of time, experience and veterancy is just so how goddamn comfortable and effortless these guys are - both in their playing, and their instinctive stage presences. For instance, take bassist Jeff Wiilliams - one of a few of us low-end monkeys planetwide to earn so much chanting of his name. There’s good reason for that, too. Stabbing his instrument at the audience, consistently throwing hands and rousing a “COME ON!” gesture/yell at anyone daring to be within five rows of the front & standing still, etc. All the while, leaping about like a pop-punker on Warped Tour. Jeff’s as perpetually manic as a whole inpatient psych ward during a medication shortage.

He’s the ultimate antithesis to resting on your stage-laurels as time passes. I think if he and Mike Muir played onstage together, we’d end up with a black hole from all the condensed energy.

But also don’t, because holy imperialist-isle hell Batman, the perfection of that bass tone. The clack. Oh god, the clack. To boot, the guitar tone was a stupidly delicious mix of treble-y and Swedish buzzsaw. It’s like we’re at a freaking Bloodbath gig. Tone’s gnarly as shit from left to right, and those snare hits are cutting into me like a wonderful, glorious scythe. Ahh. ASMR for my soul.

All up - the tone, the bands’ intensity, the crowds’ virulent mayhem - this is feeling closer to a gig I’d imagine in Tampa Bay late 80’s/early 90’s than a rainy/windswept Melbourne in 2025. It’s electric in here, positively crackling and spurting fire.

Contrastingly more reserved than Speedy Bass-zales in terms of physical movement/gait, the relentless procession of rhythm-guitar mayhem was employed with no less enthusiasm by Nige Rockett. Eyes locking, sweeping and fixating on pretty much everyone in the room individually, the crowd attentiveness is as thorough as his endless riff-battery. Plus, dude is having FUN. The grin on this guy is threatening to pierce both eyebrows. Takes a seasoned metal musician to be that comfortable and laidback whilst producing an ionic storm of palm-mutes, chugs and spindly, snap-fire lead-guitar breaks.

Pivoting back and forth on both floor and foldback like he’s the cartel and they owe him money, it’s a little more difficult to get a read on Wayne Gorman’s suite of guitarist facial expressions. An unyielding swivel of mop-hair and shit-hot soloing, there simply isn’t enough time packed into the primarily sub-2/3 minutes runtimes across the set for him to be concerned about acrobatics onstage. Man’s simply far too busy playing the part of thirty monkeys type-writing on cocaine to bother with pretense. Transfixed as he might seem, he’s just an endless a torrent of head swivel and axe-chopping motion as the others.

The relatively cramped amount of stage-side real estate offers a great view of the unrelenting ballistic tour-de-force that is James Perry behind the kit, too. We’d all look that lean were we also asked to play such an infinite sea of d-beat, fills, and all other manner of thrash drum-foolery at quadruple speed too. Keeping in mind this human drum-machine is bashing out more hits in a night than entire bands’ tours, but also multiply that by an entire tour. Like Nige, there’s a classically cool British calmness about the man, intermingled with some real cheeky-breeky grins at the swarm of pit-maniacs before him.

And what of our frontman?

The warmly welcomed-back Sy Keeler? Y’know, I really enjoyed this guy’s demeanour, his dynamic. More different than you’d think for a thrash band, let alone one belting out tracks with a frequency that’d have NOFX’s head spinning.

Chill as a goddamn cucumber and boasting a comfortable yet powerful stride, our frontman somehow manages to blend a more reserved, bardic physical presence onstage with all the exacted and flourished classic-metal gesticulations, wails and King Diamond-esque shrieks you can dream of. Pack it in, power/trad metal frontmen, Sy’s got you beat in the vibe stakes. Blending impressive wails amongst a consistently narky, gravelly rasp is a combination that feels like it shouldn’t work. Lord knows a lot of modern metal bands try similar. Sy pulls it off onstage so seamlessly you’d swear he was just popping down the road to grab a pint at the local.

Suppose this IS a gig review, hey? I should speak to the setlist, eh? Look man, it’s called setting the scene. ‘kay? That’s my cope. This is also the Power From Hell anniversary tour so… you know. Okay, I’ll play.

‘Power From Hell’ is delivered with the strained wails and shrieks a thousand speed-metal bands have tried to imitate since, a furious opening so immediate and urgent in tone that the entire (and I do mean entire, like wall-to-wall) first few rows erupt in a near cartoonish cloud of circle-pitting, writhing bodies and arses/shoes rotating and rising ceiling-wards, falling like thrash leaves in autumn. And this chum-riddled frenzy of thrash-sharks doesn’t let up for a second. Not one.

Ageist stereotypes die in a fire, tonight. They’re put to bed as a full age-ranging demographic spectrum floorside give an intensity multiple times more energised, antagonised and mosh-happy than the preceding three bands put together. We’re scrambling to stay on the headliners’ level, and the whole thing feels like the most fun cartwheeling derailed train ride ever.

Walking into this gig with a cricked back (nothing exciting to report, just waking up in the wrong position, mid-30’s stuff) but resolute to at least be amongst your perma-headbang front few rows - seems from the first power chord onwards that this little bit of pit-etiquette out the window, too. I’ve not seen so many hands desperately cling for a barrier in some time, perhaps maybe the recent Suicidal Tendencies show (thrashers and punks, eh).

But honestly - how can you not? How can we not?

‘Thermonuclear Devastation’?

‘Death Metal’ and the legally mandated crowd-wide chant-along of the title that ensues?!

The better ‘Angel of Death’ in its’ plural form - the absolute gut-ripping piranha that is ‘Angels of Death’?!

Proclaiming he/they’d instantly “fallen in love with Australia - the people, the bands, the food, the beer, the weed”, Sy’s gratitude and sincerity are both emotionally unrestrained and atypically not-Bri’ish throughout.

He’s beaming, grinning painfully, all the way through.

Which is great, ‘cause otherwise it is downright brutish down here in the pit. Good old-fashioned pepped up Australian thrasher brutishness, but you’ll always cop an immediate rescue chopper of arms if you go over the falls.

That beam-smile widens to a death ray with our crowd-wide rousing during pit-rabies-inducing ‘Metal Forces’.

It only leaves momentarily in a moment of sober gratitude in thanking his band members (and us) for having him back so recently (August). But it’s not all sombre platitudes - we’re given classic-rock/metal fan-service with both a partial ‘Let There Be Rock’ AC/DC cover prior to the much-more-furious ‘Let There Be Death’… and even a joining by Vexation to the stage for a rip-tearing, fun as hell Motorhead rendition to see out the night.

My dudes, dudettes and dudefolks - these Bristolean mother-truckers crammed fourteen songs into just over an hour - with little to no breaks (and certainly posturing) in between.

Finalising the night with an assertion he’d love for the band to double back and play more album-related material in future, it’s clear as blue summer sky that Sy and Co are already chomping at the bit for the next chance to run rough-shod over us sunburnt convicts ASAP. Heck, there was even hints at giving a crack at 2026-2027.

After witnessing tonight’s maiden Melbourne voyage and the subsequent decimation of The Corner?

I can only hope these vanguards head straight back to the war room to prepare for the next assault.

DAN McKAY - PHOTOGRAPHER LINKS:

Instagram: @dannomc

Stay tuned, as we’ll also have a Gallery of Brewicide photo/video gallery out soon!