You’ll be hard pushed to find a festival of this size anywhere else at this time of year, so featuring 100 acts spread across 10 venues and without a major label in sight, Icebreaker makes a triumphant return to help promote the ever growing music scene we have here on the south coast.
Determined to catch as much as realistically possible I headed to the Deco stage only to find that (due to a last minute cancellation) things were starting a little later with Victorian Whore Dogs, a band I was looking forward to seeing, having been moved higher up the bill.
Sticking to my original plan I abandoned the Deco and headed to the One Eyed Dog for Outgun Empire, who having also managed to start a few minutes behind schedule had a small gathering in attendance and whilst their melancholic tunes were fairy inoffensive it was back at the Deco where the first band of the day would start to liven things up – albeit not entirely for the right reasons.
When it came to the deeper growls of their frontman shock rockers Hell Puppets actually weren’t too bad and they certainly gave it everything with regards to their stage act, but on the whole they somewhere between Murderdolls and a poor man’s Cradle of Filth. Doused in corpse paint and doing their best to look evil, if their guitarist put as much effort into playing as he did his makeup and emulating Gene Simmons poses whilst trying to emphasis his “screw you” punk rock attitude then it may have been a little easier to take them seriously.
After a chaotic introduction to the day’s proceedings some acoustic refreshment was already in order and so off to the Atrium for Martin Coyne. I had already resided myself to the fact the acoustic stage would fall foul to the audience talking amongst themselves and whilst this was indeed the case it didn’t put Coyne off and his country twang made him more than just another singer song writer.
Upon leaving to the sounds Jamin’ with Steve perform a fun “Only Fools and Horses” cover next was upstairs at the Loft for some funky Portsmouth hip hop courtesy of Hang Dai, the groove of the bass lines and some 70’s sounding organ making for yet another showcase of the diversity on offer at a festival that has something for almost everyone.
This was however a stop gap en route to the legendary venue the Wedgewood Rooms for the power house that is Southampton’s Hummune, their Godflesh and Prong inspired industrial rock had them sounding like some of Killing Joke’s recent output however it wasn’t long until things were brought to a temporary halt with a broken sting and no spare guitar to hand.
We were soon back up and running though and the PA at the Wedge certainly did do the band justice, as such all was forgiven and Hummune finished their albeit shorter set with a massive sound that felt right at home being blasted out in the larger venue.
Next I split my time between another trio the Traits next door in the Edge and King Gidora, who back on the Wedgewood Rooms main stage seemed to be a lot heavier than I remember, before stepping out to see a band whom I’ve been recommended in the past.
I did however arrive in time to see Murdoc play just the one song and surprisingly the only reference of my day to the recent death of David Bowie, although the band claimed they had been working on their cover of “Let’s Dance” for some time – not that it matters, for they pulled it off and I’m sure the great man would have been proud of their rendition.
With so many bands on offer there were of course numerous clashes throughout the day and when Morass of Molasses were due at the Wedgewood Rooms this was one of many a tough decision (sincere apologies Battery Hens, the Reading three piece won on this occasion).
Pulling entirely from their upcoming second album Morass of Molasses have no problem churning up Sabbath influenced riffs with Fu Manchu stoner rock, often drifting off into psychedelic jams along with the odd bit of random Smurf related banter in-between for good measure.
It was then a quick nose next door for the youngsters of Hollowed Hour before heading up to the Loft with Pompey’s top ska reggae outfit the Silhouettes and a band who always know how to get a party dancing. You have to question the venues ability to keep on top of glass collecting when there are so many people bouncing around in close proximity, but with good time vibes coming from the stage the Silhouettes are a band every festival needs to keep the momentum in full swing.
The running times at the Deco worked in my favour this time around and I was able to see three tunes by the SLM, who thrive on punk songs about sharks, zombies and zombie sharks… the crowd were loving it, the band were having fun and even though it’s all very light hearted in subject matter you have to give the guys kudos given the frightening speed at which they were played.
Over at Little Johnny Russells Veludo Planes opened with “Come Together” by the Beatles and it was soon obvious they were going to provide a faultless performance. It could be the brotherly love of twins Chris and Mike or the time spent rehearsing in the studio, but either way the indie rockers certainly had an edge over others in the same vein and although ending on another cover in the Pixies “Debaser” they certainly made this one their own.
I spent a lot of time at the bigger venue of the Wedge and this is where my day slowly drew to a close, starting with metallers Stray Bullets Kill who after a short hiatus were back for their first gig with a new singer, although the frontman is by no means a stranger to the local music scene.
The set was kept bleak with white backlighting projecting onto the darkened stage, hoods up and with no crowd interaction Stray Bullets Kill still maintained a mesmerizing presence, heavy doom riffs combined with screamed hard-core vocals and as the band left the stage with the samples and chimes ringing in your ears it’s safe to say the alternative line-up had nailed it.
As if that wasn’t enough there was one more band to go and Seething Akira were ready to pump up the crowd as last act of the night, from the off the pit got messy and whilst in my youth I would have been stuck in these days it was a quick escape to safer ground in order to witness the carnage unfold as personally I prefer to drink my own beer rather than wear someone else’s.
They may be slightly behind their time but rap metallers Seething Akira are pretty good at what they do and certainly know how to work their loyal fans and to gain new followers along the way, there were plenty of electronic dance beats to have the audience dancing along and the packed venue had just about enough space to divide the room into an old fashioned wall of death, whilst the duel attack on the vocals kept the momentum going throughout.
With that it was time for the DJ’s to take over as the closing party was that of a silent disco, in what I can only imagine is on the same level as the enforced “fun” of fancy dress or karaoke and as such I decided to call it a night – after all, it had been a long day and as for all those involved in Icebreaker 2016, you’ve done our city proud… and with the amount of artist not on the line-up being as important as those that were it just goes to show if we could do it all again tomorrow, most of us probably would.
