Bobfest Recap
brought to you by East Tennessee Hardcore Collective
Right in the middle of January, East Tennessee Hardcore Collective hosted their second annual, one-day winter festival, Bobfest. I was there from the very first band until the last band and I enjoyed every second of it. From beatdown to throwback christcore to black metal influenced hardcore, the fest had something great on offer for any fan of heavy music.
I’m going to include photos of some of my favorite sets here and talk a little more about my favorite set of the whole night, but before I do that, I’d like to thank each band and link to their Instagram accounts. So, thank you to Deceit, TwoxChoices, Extinct, Switchblade, Lack of Control, Damage Control, Banishment, Every Promise Kept, Do Yourself In, Septum Bone, Irae, Your Spirit Dies, A Knife in the Dark, and Heavens Die. Give them a listen! You might just find your new fave! Some of these bands drove a long way or stopped on a busy tour run in a relatively small town in Tennessee to play sets for us and I’m very grateful.
I also reached out to Gaining Purpose Media, who was at the fest covering everything and interviewing many of the bands for their thoughts on Bobfest II and here’s what Asheton had to say:
“The East Tennessee Hardcore Collective held Bobfest 2 and Gaining Purpose was able to get some amazing interviews through it all, but more importantly had some of the greatest bands play some sick sets. My top sets were Deceit, Banishment, and Damage Control. 3 insane sets that were absolutely menacing. Deceit set the energy for the whole day opening the festival up covering “Dogs Can Grow Beards All Over” by The Devil Wears Prada, and the entire room went insane. Damage Control played one of the loudest and heaviest sets of the day with a crazy 100 Demons cover then played a back to back set with Banishment that blew me away.”
—Asheton Robison, Gaining Purpose
I got to say, I agree with Asheton here. Deceit, Damage Control and Banishment had three of the best sets. Deceit is a relatively new band from East Tennessee, but is full of scene veterans including the best mosher I know, Liam, and resident ETHC videographer, Shane. Being the band to kick off a festival is no small task, especially when the fest started at 1:30pm (practically morning for many in the crowd), but they brought an immense amount of energy that was impossible to deny, really helping to start the day off with a bang.
As for Banishment and Damage Control, these were a few of the most brutal sets from the day. It was late-afternoon by then and most of the crowd had really showed up and they were ready to mosh as soon as Damage Control hit their first chord. Both of these bands were in the middle of a short run with Every Promise Kept (a band that we will talk about a little later), which was sadly cut short due to the weather turning pretty dire just as soon as the festival was over. Nine inches of snow and ice in this part of the country is no joke!
Every Promise Kept continues to be one of the best modern christcore bands in our area (maybe ever), taking all of the best parts of the long lineage of the genre and mashing them together with some their distinct bass lines and intricate riffs. Jay’s vocals are cutting and precise in both screaming and spoken word parts and every set from them warms my heart a little more. EPK played a few new songs which sound so sick, and they started off their set with a room-moving cover of Norma Jean’s “Memphis Will Be Laid to Waste”. Any band with a synth player in the 2024th year of our Lord and Savior deserves immense respect.
Lastly, I’d like to highlight my favorite set of the night, which was the reunion set from Irae. This is probably the set I have the fewest photos from, but that’s simply because I was enjoying every minute of their time on stage. Irae has members from all over the east coast, and it had been 4 years since they played a show, so it was a real treat to get to see them. By far one of the best bands I’ve ever seen live. Kashif’s vocal range is incredible from guttural lows to piercing highs, while the rest of the band is so tight and decisive with each chug, pause and riff.
”'Spirit' contains many religious themes that are coupled with humanity's emotional experiences, for the purpose of provoking people to thought. The intent with this album is to encourage conversations between the religious and secular, and bridge the gap between common misconceptions that have existed for centuries.”
Over the last 6 months or so, Irae has become one of my favorite bands, and I was absolutely psyched to not only hear the news that they have new music that they are working on together, but to actually get to hear one of their new tracks live (it rips). Bobfest II was a really special event —one that will be hard to top by any other show this year. Thank you again to all the bands and to all the attendees. I think it’s safe to say East Tennessee really is on top now huh.
Since I know someone’s gonna ask, I’m going to put a little bit of information about the gear that I used for these photos here! All the black and white photos were taken on a full-spectrum modded Canon 6D, a Yongnuo 35mm f/2 lens and an Andoer IR49S infrared hotshoe light. The color photos were taken on my Olympus OM-D E-M1 MKII, a 7.5mm f/3.5 CCTV fisheye lens, and a Yongnuo YN560 II flash. And as for the video, it’s a mix of footage from a DriftCam HD with a hotshoe mount and the E-M1 MKII.
If you’d like to see all 180 photos or download the videos from Bobfest II, you can do so here on Archive.org.
Well, that’s it for this week! I hope you enjoyed the music and photos! If you’re looking for found media, please check out my page on Archive.org for the full list of digitized media. If you have any questions, feel free to send me a message right here or drop a comment below. If you haven’t already, please check out the suggested posts below! or any of my other previous posts here. Thanks so much for checking out this week’s edition of Diptych!
See you soon!
—Forrest
YSD came here and shoowee what a show...