Viscera Infest - Gig Review 16th August @ Simo's Dive, Sydney Harbour NSW

Viscera Infest
Simo’s Dive on the Water, Sydney Harbour NSW
August 16, 2024
Supports: Crypt Crawler, Internal Rot, Gosika, Suppressant

Not even 10 minutes before we’re set to board Simo’s Dive on Sydney Harbour, the sky cracks and it starts to flog down. The lightning is close and fills every inch of Sydney’s sky, but the punters gathered on King Street Wharf could care less. The energy amongst the awaiting throng is as charged as the ion-filled night sky tonight as nearly a full boat worth of the city’s finest metal fans stand firm under whatever cover they can muster as they stare down the shitty weather. The thunderstorms and lightning know better than to hang around with this unruly mob and quickly piss off towards New Zealand, well away from the maelstrom of indecency that will be on display tonight.

Tonight’s headliners are Japan’s lords of Goregrind, Viscera Infest, a band so vile and disturbed that Spotify and Apple Music flat-out refuse to host their music on their acclaimed streaming sites. Along for tonight’s illustrious cruise are four of Australia’s most promising grind and death bands, Crypt Crawler, Internal Rot, Gosika, and Suppressant, each carving their own paths through the Aussie underground.

By the time Simo’s makes its way under the Harbour Bridge, the clouds have all but gone, the stars are out and the angry little grindcore bastards in Suppressant kickstart proceedings. There’s no gentle intro. No lube. They completely disregard my hearing and start blasting their way through a quick but solid set. At times, song introductions go longer than the songs themself, but the diatribes delivered are poignant and direct. After one particular minute-long intro, the band rip into a song that couldn’t have gone longer than 28 seconds, and even then, some smart-arse yelled out that it was too long. The crowd is already all in, including the young lad who just snapped his Achilles in the mosh. If this show was on land, the joint would still be rocking side to side. Suppressant have made the absolute most of this opportunity. 100% would watch again.

[caption id="attachment_189806" align="aligncenter" width="601"]

Suppressant[/caption]

Between sets, I step out onto the deck where the cigarettes, douche-flutes (vapes) and other smoky substances are being inhaled en masse. Tom from Grindhead introduces me to the Viscera Infest lads and they are stone cold legends. They speak fuck all English, but then one could argue that the same can be said of me. The Japanenglish vs. Boganenglish back and forth was understood by no one, but it was great getting to meet these upstanding blokes all the same.

Gosika take charge of the stage and they absolutely destroy. If one didn’t know better, you’d be lead to believe that a large subsection of this crowd are here strictly for this young local death metal mob. These guys have more fans here than they’re letting on as the lower deck quickly becomes packed to the gills. They tear through offerings from their new EP Ancient Magics with proud abandon when they rip into ‘Hammer Smashed Face’ by Cannibal Corpse, the place goes berserk. The surge of bodies to the side of the boat that the band is on puts this ship on a lean that has nothing to do with the waves on the harbour. They were so good I bought their new EP afterwards and it’s not leaving the CD player in my car. That’s right. I have a CD player. I’m old, and so is my ute.

[caption id="attachment_189805" align="aligncenter" width="690"]

Gosika[/caption]

Littered amongst the rabble on hand is a solid roster of some of Sydney’s finest musicians. Amongst them is Sean from Slaughtercult. He’s not playing on this bill but he wasn’t missing tonight for anything. I caught up with him on the way to the merch table where I was lucky enough to grab the absolute last Viscera Infest tour shirt. With all of tonight and two more shows to go in Victoria, a sold out merch line is great news and a solid indication of how much love there is for this band.

Internal Rot are great. Their name has been dropped quite a bit tonight as one of the bands that the crowd are most looking forward to. Sonically it reminds me of the first time I saw Blood Duster at the Big Day Out a million years ago. A gang of punters are calling them “puta’s” at high volume and it gets a smile from the band. One of their tunes lasts all of 8 seconds and it’s like a gunshot went off in my ears. The singer stomps maniacally around the stage but doesn’t dare to venture too close to their ravenous audience. Drummer Cristoph’s blastbeats move so fast it’s almost a blur as the pit runs left to right, almost trying to tip this vessel on its head. They thank the Grindhead crew for the night and I need a beer afterwards.

[caption id="attachment_189803" align="aligncenter" width="684"]

Internal Rot[/caption]

‍Crypt Crawler hit a packed room having made the trek from WA and are armed with an arsenal of killer new music to unleash on Sydney. With a couple of excellent albums up their belt, they should destroy this place. The pace is reigned in a bit from the rest of tonight’s lineup, but it’s definitely not slow by any means. These guys shred, have groove and when they get moving it is unreal.

But when the guitarist comes on drunk and starts hurling his guitar around in a hiss when the on-stage sound starts to fuck out, it puts a few punters off. Couple that with the drummer throwing shade at the sound technician while she, and the rest of the Grindhead team are trying to rectify the issue, then I’m off them a bit. They eventually get past their diva bullshit and once they kick on, it actually sounds great from where I’m standing. But the excitement I had to see this mob is gone. Plus the dead silence or innocuous banter between songs stalls any momentum left in this performance.

[caption id="attachment_189802" align="aligncenter" width="575"]

Crypt Crawler[/caption]

I grab a beer and head out to the smoker’s deck to take in the night air. The weather has calmed considerably and save for a few strikes of lightning off in the distance, the earlier storm event has well and truly subsided. Sydney is looking schmick. I’ve been on this cruise before for a daytime stint with King Parrot last year and this city really turned it on. At night though, Sydney becomes a different type of beautiful, especially when the water is as glassy as it is now. The cruise itself through this majestic harbour is worth the price of admission alone. Coupled with live music and this view is a no-brainer. Undeath are here next month. What’s stopping you?

[caption id="attachment_189800" align="aligncenter" width="706"]

Viscera Infest[/caption]

‍Viscera Infest arrive to a hero's welcome and after a brief soundcheck, a few high fives and the dimming of the lights, the trio from Japan tear Sydney a new tunnel. They rip into ‘XXX Minced’ and the hype I’ve heard all night from the fans in this room is real. The lightning-fast precision drumming of Yuya Yakushiji is even more impressive when seen in person. It’s not long before he strips his clothes off down to his undies, pulls them up like my grandfather and continues to blast the ears off everyone dumb enough to get within earshot.I can't stress how fast he is. He may as well aim an AK-47 at the snare and let rip. Easily one of the best drummers I’ve ever seen.

[caption id="attachment_189801" align="aligncenter" width="582"]

Yuya Yakushiji - Viscera Infest[/caption]

Now we’ve all met that muppet that says “I listen to anything, except that screamo crap because you can’t understand what they’re saying”. Well, good luck on this voyage mate because these guys don’t sing a speck of English and even if I did speak Japanese, it wouldn’t matter one bit. The dual growls of bassist Harufumi Nomiyama and guitarist/founding member Eizo Asakura are indecipherable in any language. Plus I had a young lad chew my ear off earlier saying that they sing in a dialect that is an amalgamation of Japanese and some other language that Eizo has made up.

Whatever it is, none of it makes a lick of difference because when they spit out ‘Senile Olguria Glucagonoma’ it all sounds like pure evil and I love it.

[caption id="attachment_189799" align="aligncenter" width="638"]

Harufumi Nomiyama - Viscera Infest[/caption]

The lad who snapped his Achilles earlier is propped up on the barrier, head banging like it’s 1986, as the band tear though ‘Mottled Coloration of Octopus Warts Ulceration’, ‘Macular Dystrophy (Stargardt)’ and any given amount of songs named after some god awful infectious disease. A group of legends in the pit form a straight line from stern to bow and starts running in unison, from port to starboard and back, all in an attempt to quite literally rock the boat and tip this vessel.

There’s fat chance of that happening but the guys in Viscera Infest grin at their efforts nonetheless. But it’s when the lunatics on hand get a dose of ‘Paracoccidioidomicosisproctitissarcomucosis’ that I witness something for the very first time in my life. Every punter gets on their backs, puts their arms and legs in the air, and starts doing the “Cockroach Mosh”. Now I might be a sick bastard but I lost it. I’ve been in my fair share of pits but this had me absolutely pissing myself laughing. I couldn’t help it. It was dead set carnage and I didn’t want it to end.

The rabble get up as Viscera Infest close out with ‘DIPG’ to a full endearing applause and no one wants to leave. Even after five bands, going full throttle, the mob on hand still want more. The ugly lights come on and everyone escapes upstairs, out of this dank room and into the Sydney night air, taking in the events of the evening.

[caption id="attachment_189797" align="aligncenter" width="670"]

Viscera Infest feat. the rabble of Sydney[/caption]

What a night. Another triumphant cruise through the harbour that has the metal fans of Sydney buzzing. I get talking to Gosika’s drummer Connor Kingdom, an absolute demon behind the kit, and he says jokingly after watching Yuya Yakushiji, “That just inspires me. It inspires me to give up drumming, he’s that fucking good”. Judging by the conversations taking place on deck right now, I think it’s fair to say that everyone here has experienced something uniquely special tonight.

When starting a goregrind band in a garage in Japan, would any of these guys have imagined playing on a boat on the world famous Sydney Harbour? Hell no. But with any luck, we’ll be fortunate enough to witness it again. An all time night. One I won’t soon forget.

Review by Duane James @duanejamestattoo

‍