Live Review: Offal Fest 4 – Friday
24th July 2026
Words: Dan Barnes
I’ve been coming to shows in Manchester for decades – literally four of ‘em – so it’s always interesting when I get to go to some place new. Recently I sampled the delights of Soup, when Putrid Pile played there back in May; there was the Castlefield Bowl for the Sex Pistols a couple of weeks since; and now, The Boundary, part of Manchester Metropolitan University, for this year’s brutally slam-tastic two-and-a-half-day Offal Fest.
News hit Friday afternoon, just before the pre-show opened its doors, that Saturday headliner, Devourment, would be unable to play due to visa and permits, but did promise to be back in 2027 for Offal Fest 5. Replacement was to be found in Regurgitation and their commitment to playing as both headliner on Saturday and co-headliner on Sunday.
The pre-show starts on Friday evening, away from the Manchester rush-hour traffic with Scottish newcomers, Dissolving Entity who may be still finding their feet after barely a year or so but hit the stage at Offal Fest like seasoned professionals. The title-track of the Parasite Enthroned EP comes early with a fetid putrescence, vocalised with growls and grunts. Double Blind is schizophrenic and dissonant, filled with spastic riffing and a cacophonous barrage; Opium and the People is introduced as a fast one, as it stretches out fierce tentacles, to rip the early attendees asunder. A cover of Defeated Sanity’s Entity Dissolving Entity seems obligatory for the event and goes down a storm with the growing crowd.
Hartlepool quintet, Ovulating Cadaver, were the catalyst during last year’s UK Slamfest, with their appearance being the moment the day stepped up in intensity. Uncompromising and infectious, brimming with filthy riffs and squealing vocals, yet rarely breaking the speed limit as far as tempo is concerned, it’s heavy enough to possibly create its own gravitational force. Songs about sucking your own penis – One-Man Sixty-Nine – having your chips stolen by seagulls – Aviary Firing Squad – and sleeping with your eyes open – Corneal Decay – are just some of the topics addressed during the band’s set. The soundbite from Phoenix Nights that is the intro to Inflatable Filth and there’s even a flirtation with groove as the set comes to its close.
Mancunian slammers, Coprocephalic Mutation, have a large contingent of fans in early tonight, possibly due to the fact that the band is comprised of several members of Offal Fest’s organisational body. Dense, heavy and mercilessly face-ripping, CM might not be the fastest band on the bill tonight, but they do their damnedest to be the heaviest. Not a single head is left unbobbed anywhere in the room, as the band flirt with progressive passages amid their gut-punching riffs. It was at this point that anyone thinking differently would be certain that Offal Fest 4 means business.
Another band back in Manchester from Autumn’s UK Slamfest is Glasgow’s gore-obsessed Scordatura who’ve been solidly releasing material since back in 2008. But forget about the past as this show is all about the here and now and a run-through of this year’s Led Into Oblivion album. Barely much more than a month old, this fourth full-length has all the chops to send the Scot’s status into the stratosphere. The title track harbours something of a punky edge, Echoes of a Fractured Mind finds vocalist, Daryl Boyce snapping and snarling, while Oppressed/ Repressed stomps like Godzilla is about to make an appearance. Big, bold and abrasive, Led Into Oblivion is sure to be in contention when the end of year brutality is examined. World Devoured, from Mass Failure, breaks up the flow of …Oblivion, as does Sutured Flesh from the Torment of the Weak debut, which Daryl suggests is probably the oldest song Scordatura will ever play, and it still bristles with youthful exuberance. The set is rounded off with …Oblivion’s closing tune, Begging to Die.
There is something strangely familiar about brutal technicians, Infected Disarray, and, after checking a forgotten parchment in the Razor’s Edge Secret Archive, I realised I’d seen them a couple of times before, back in the mid-noughties, both times when Satan’s Hollow hosted multi-band death metal shows. The first time, in 2005, opening the show that included Skinned, Amputated and Deranged; and the second time, with Insidious Discrepancy in a show that was opened by Crepitation. More of them later… We get some early gremlins – par for the course – before the brutal technicality hits with slamming efficiency. Bass-tapping and word-count busting titles like ‘Prenatal Excavation of Diseased Ovarian Atrocity, Demonstrating the Necessity for Extreme Prejudicial Infanticide Within the Vomit Filled Womb’ play against a backdrop illuminated with blood red lights, and fretboard flailing fingers. It’s admitted that this is the band’s first show in thirteen years, so they’re doing swimmingly just to remember song titles like ‘To the Sorrow Filled Eyes and Pallid Bloated Corpulence of My Drowned Children’.
More gremlins make their presence known, resorting to a hardwiring rather than the freedom of wireless; The Opening to Her Torso opens the crowd up somewhat and the band appear to be having a blast, regardless of the technical difficulties; there’s a whole load of goodwill in this room for Infected Disarray tonight and nothing is going to derail that. Side Order of Flies has a distinctly old school vibe, and the set closes with an oozing Disseminating Obscenity, the title track of the debut which is due for a brand-new polish and re-release this very year.
Pre-party headliners, and all-round local heroes, Crepitation, were always going to bring the curtain down with a bang; and sure enough, Offal Fest is treated to a twin-vocal’d masterclass in brutal slamming death metal. With more songs about bodily fluids than you’d ever think to want to hear, Crepitation bring a whole new meaning to Caveman Slam; fat chugs and bombastic bass are at the core of the band’s sound, and the evening is filled with revellers getting themselves psyched up for the rigours of two full days of the heaviest music known to man. No one exemplifies the strangely good time vibes better than Crepitation in full flight, and that is how the night-before is concluded.
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