FESTIVAL PREVIEW: Grind After Death Fest 2026
Words: Dan Barnes
Sausages of the world unite – or at least the ones who can get to the Alma Inn on 30 May, and are looking to have their ears blown and faces melted by a dozen of the finest, most grinding / slamming / crustiest bands who’ve agreed to come from across the globe and play in a Bolton beer garden for our pleasure.
There’s been an amount of line-up jiggery-pokery going on for this fifth anniversary show, but the Grind After Death executives have worked tirelessly to bring a mouth-watering bill together, representing a host of UK debuts in the process.
Headlining is French brutalists and goregrinders, Sublime Cadaveric Decomposition, who celebrate their thirtieth anniversary with a trip to the north-west and a shindig at the Alma. Early career splits with the likes of Rot, Infected Pussy and Serum Sickness Syndrome got the band’s recorded eye in, leading to the self-titled debut in 2001. Following an appearance at last year’s Obscene Extreme festival, and with a June date at Hellfest to look forward to, it looks like these Frenchmen will have ample opportunity to introduce the world to the musically warped world of SCD, including selected ditties from latest release, The Macabre Voodoo Messiah of Masochism and Fetishism. Hellfest may well find them in the company of Possessed and Napalm Death but topping the bill at Grind After Death’s fifth anniversary is sure to be a career high.
Main support comes in the form of Norwegian Death Metal newbies, Celestial Scourge, who will be making their UK debut in Bolton, as well as celebrating a fifth anniversary themselves, bringing with them the brutal technicalities of last year’s first full-length, Observers of the Inevitable. Carved from the same Scandinavian stone as the likes of Blood Red Throne and Bloodbath, it’s not to be overlooked that the rhythm section and guitarist, Sindre Wathne Johnsen, have spent time with BRT in some capacity.
Also making their UK debut appearance comes Romanian goregrind groovers Porn the Gore who look to be about the make the same splash at Grind After Death 2026, as Grindcore Cake Makers did in 2025. Formed in 2008, yet only issuing their first album in 2013, PtG combine danceable beats with gruff and squealing vocals and are sure to be bringing the party atmosphere and a high possibility of chaos. It’ll be one of those shows that will go down in the annals of extreme music history and you’ll be asked “Where you there?” What’re you gonna say???
Avian-obsessed Belgians, Volière, bring their slamming deathgrind to Bolton for another Grind After Death UK debut. The Antwerp collective’s love of our feathered-friends is writ-large through their two full-length albums and the 2021 split with Liège brutalists, Klysma. 2024’s sophomore album, Numero Fazan'dos, is loaded with bird-based blasters, including Lords of the Wings, Quack Sabbath and Black & Pecker. Surely Slamingo will feature in the set, as a matter of course.
Californian goregrinders, Sausage Wallet, seem ideally suited for Grind After Death’s anniversary jamboree. Making their UK debut, the Wallet is sure to be spreading the filth from the first note. Saucily referencing a ladies’ parts and calling their version of music “Pornoeaux Grind”, the Anaheim project is the single vision of Bradley Miller, who provides all instruments and vocals to the plethora of releases from the band since 2023. Splits with Flowering Shrubs, Poodator, Fupa Goodess and Jizzaster suggest the company Bradley keeps may be a bad influence; SW’s only full-length, Bad Habit, shows he doesn’t need much leading astray.
East Anglians, Berenice, blend savage hardcore with sludge, crust and grind to create an ungodly racket which can be sampled on their extremely competent self-titled debut EP. Fearlessly following in the footsteps of the likes of Nails, Gatecreeper and All Pigs Must Die, they land at the Alma with a ferocious sonic onslaught already locked and loaded. We are guaranteed to be truly woken up by the time these lads have played. Combined UK/ Ireland’s DeathCollector proved themselves to be one of the underground’s most exciting prospects back in 2022 with the debut EP, Time’s Up; and a year later with the first full-length, Death’s Toll, which found the band at Bloodstock Open Air in 2024. A switch in personnel saw the arrival of Rich Mumford of Malediction and Severe Lacerations’ drummer, Callum Warren to handle rhythm duties. A single, Backroom Abattoir, was issued in 2025, suggesting the band is gearing up for head into the studio soon.
A healthy obsession with perversions, sex and BDSM seem to be the order of the day for German goregrind outfit, Rosetta Twist. With a single, six-track demo from 2022 shows what the band is capable of as they blend sick riffs with some grooving rhythms. The first of todays debutants, RT is sure to get the early crowd in a celebratory mood. Old School Death Metal trio, Deliberate Miscarriage head up to Bolton from South Wales with a mission statement to infect the Alma with classic, Morrison Sound-inspired filthy riffing and a sense of sheer abandonment or regard for the well-being of the good people at Grind After Death. Fetid like those Floridian swamps, it’s sure to show that particular sound is “Classic” for a reason.
I can’t imagine any early good will being shown by Fetus Destruction, regardless of the hour. The band’s one and only album, Biologic Organic Brutal, is thirty-minutes of intense madness put to music. Grinding and dripping with gore, you’re certain to be questioning your life choices before the end of the set. Burnt Body don’t have far to come for their appearance at GAD. Formed but a couple of years ago, the north-west quartet’s sole recorded offering, the EP Queimadura, is as eviscerating a collection as you’d want to hear, full of slamming grinders and a few lengthier pieces to show BB aren’t just smash and grab merchants. Kicking off the whole thing is Merseyside’s OmegaThrone whose blackened death metal approach will be the perfect way to ease us all into the carnage to come.
Last year’s show was monumental, and it was a real pleasure to see the extreme music scene supported so well. For the fifth anniversary, the stops have been pulled out, and a bill has been assembled that pretty much represents every facet of the music we all love to lose our shit to.
See all you other sausages there…
