Live Review: UK Slam Fest 2025 - Saturday
11th October 2025
Words: Dan Barnes
Photos: Rich Price
Saturday dawns with some of the most non-event weather you can imagine. But at least it isn’t raining (at the moment), so that’s something to be thankful for. Another thing to be thankful for is the ten bands on offer today, each of which promise an interesting take on the genre of extremity.
It’s a very early afternoon start for Warwickshire duo Hacked Up and the initial revellers make good use of the space at the front of the stage by showing off their pit-killing skills. Drummer Andrew and guitarist Callum share the vocal duties; slow and brooding riffs demonstrate extremity comes in a variety of forms. Seditionist arrives with brutal grunts, and the band manage a full sound way beyond their presence as a duo. Sophomore album Sporadic Genocidal Warfare is barely six-months old, yet a follow up is already on the way, and Slam Fest gets a sneak-peak at the slow, slamming bounce of a new tune.
Local lads Spinal Fluid are today’s late replacement for one-man project, Goremonger, who was forced to withdraw at the eleventh hour. Having formed in 2023 this is the band’s debut live show, and their dual vocals and creeping riffs blend with urban beats and a hip-hop aesthetic. This year’s The Monument of Hate EP is a very competent piece of work, and their set today is peppered with new tunes. As much, if not more than most bands on the bill this weekend, Spinal Fluid lean into the hardcore roots of Slam, certainly in the live setting; whether that will be something they develop further as they garner more gigging experience will be something worth keeping an eye on.
Despite only getting together in 2024, Hartlepool five-piece Ovulating Cadaver have a rich individual history of playing in a variety of extreme metal bands, cutting their teeth in the likes of Stone Cold Abyss and Septic Encroachment. No disrespect to the band who’d appeared before, but Ovulating Cadaver is where UK Slam Fest kicks into life and slams hard. Uncompromising and infectious, brimming with filthy riffs and squealing vocals, yet rarely breaking the speed limit as far as tempo is concerned, but heavy enough to possibly create its own gravitational force, we get Animated Corpse early on, followed by Pool Cue Shogun, all beatdowns and grunts. A soundbite from Phoenix Nights acts as the intro to Inflatable Filth and there’s even a flirtation with some two-steppin’ hardcore rhythms. The bar is set at a high level from an early on.
Not to be outdone comes local trio Chainsaw Castration, featuring sometimes members of Operation Cunt Destroyer, Clawhammer and Guttural Slug, among others. The opening narration of The Texas Chain Saw Massacre acts as the intro, leading to blast beats and brutally edgy riffs. Survivors of the first Slam Fest in Leeds, it’s fitting that the band make it to the tenth anniversary and are still creating new ways to scare the b’Jesus out of everyone. The single Skin Prison dropped last year to great acclaim and it’s clear why these three need to get back into the studio and get some more of this down on tape, though guitarist, Jack, does admit it’s a bastard to play. Multiple Stab Wounds rages and grinds and a free band shirt is offered to anyone able to crowd surf to the bar, get a round in and then surf back again. No one takes up the challenge, strangely.
London deathcore louts, Dygora might, on paper at least, appear to be the square peg in Slam Fest’s round hole, but when they take the stage this five-piece rage and slam with the very best. Vocalist Omar Swaby is in possession of one wholly impressive scream, and there’s a hint of Slayer in some of the bridges. Mostly though, it’s infectious grooves all round, head-bobbin’ and, at times, hypnotic, with some of the most upbeat and, dare I say, accessible of slams. Hefty beatdowns aplenty, but the band have been in existence for a decade now, no full-length yet, but a very passable series of EPs, including this year’s Southland Tapes.
The festival takes a bit of a turn for the old school when Exhumation hit the stage as theirs is the sound of the death metal of yesteryear, albeit brutalised almost beyond recognition. There’s a big crowd for these Liverpudlians, though singer Chris Furlong announces “The Beatles are shit” at one point, meaning such iconoclasm will probably see him exiled from his hometown. Mid-paced and evil sounding, the band rip through their set with reckless abandon, holding the sizable crowd in the palm of their hands. A pit opens up and there is much activity within, relishing the filthy riffs and belligerent beatdowns.
The Backsteet Boys intro tape pretty much sets the scene for Visions of Disfigurement’s set, another survivor of the first show in Leeds, these local lads have promised a Vile Mutation set, in light of their 2024 album of the same name. Grooving and fetid, full of sawing guitars and grinding riffs, one-time Begging for Incest live six-stringer, Dan Bromley isn’t averse to crafting a cheeky earworm every now and again. A new tune suggests an increased tempo will be in the offing for upcoming material, but the lads are menacing enough without adding that fuel to the fire.
Another band representing the early days of the festival is the hugely popular Crepitation and the prospect of a complete The Violence of the Slams play-through in honour of that album’s tenth anniversary. Festival organiser Joe straps on his bass for this one – fitting as he played on the original – for one of the weekend’s most anticipated sets. Pathological Armoured Ferret Tank is referred to as the band’s “Ummpa-Lumpa” song, and it was announced the band hardly envisaged ever playing Slagatha Fistie and the Wank Machine again. Paedophilic Back Passage Ensmashment comes with the news that vile PDF Ian Watkins had been slain in Wakefield Prison that morning, and Shittifying Quaffage of Hideous Smegmatic Rectal Chunder has the hint of a two-steppin’ rhythm. As the set comes to a close, there is still a requirement to check the complete and accurate title of the song Tumefied Thinsulation of Fetid Cranial Putrescence because, why wouldn’t you?
The business end of Slam Fest ticks around with the first of day two’s international acts: nineties technical brutalists Incinerate who make a rare visit to these shores. Led by the ever-present – and evergreen – vocalist Jesse Watson, guides relatively fresh-faced cohort through a masterclass of old school shock and awe. Grunts and guttural growls trade with technically mind-bending fretwork, all played over air-tight rhythms. Frankly, Slam Fest could have ended here, and no one could have complained about being short-changed.
But UK Slam Fest didn’t end there as only an equally rare visitation by Chicago blasters, Gorgasm for a festival exclusive set could bring such a remarkable event to a fitting conclusion. Unwilling to go gentle into the good night, OG guitarist and vocalist, Damian Leski, lines himself, and his fellow axe-slingers up behind a row of microphones across the front of the stage and destroys the Bread Shed with every devastating note and every eviscerating drumbeat, until Manchester – or at least this small part of it – is pummelled into submission.
And fair dos to the crowd at the Bread Shed this weekend, as after fifteen bands and fourteen-and-a-half combined hours of ear-shattering volume and brain-shredding intensity, UK Slam Fest was still ready for more. This was my first visit to the festival, and the first time The Razor’s Edge had sponsored the show, sadly post event, organisers have announced this would be the final Slam Fest. We can only hope they change their minds and it returns to the schedule sooner rather than later.
Photo Credits: Rich Price Photography
