OUTBREAK FESTIVAL 2023
Outbreak Festival 2023
at Mayfield Depot in Manchester, UK
words by Dan Tsourekas
Rarely is there a festival so unapologetically raw and authentic, that everything else pales in comparison. The most well-known festivals fascination with the mainstream has allowed them to feature a heavy level of commercialisation, which subsequently has lead to all sort of creativity, uniqueness, and memorability surrounding them pretty much derelict.
Walking into the BEC Arena last year for Outbreak Fest’s biggest and boldest event yet for their 10-year anniversary felt like a breath of fresh air. The organisers had managed to pull off the impossible and provide their audience with a completely no barrier show across both stages of the festival, which held a total of 5000+ attendants. It was a masterclass in upgrading a grassroots festival to a larger scale, while keeping its own identity intact, and it most certainly had one of the best lineups of 2022 to accompany it.
demonstration of power | credit: ashlea bea
When the first details for Outbreak 2023 surfaced, it made a lot of fans sceptical. Not only had they decided to move the hardcore fest to Mayfield Depot, a venue most known for hosting the infamous Warehouse Project raves, but they also decided to take a bold step forward and make two of the three headline acts hip-hop oriented. This came as quite the surprise to everyone, particularly the long-term attendees of the festival that were used to the likes of Knocked Loose, Turnstile and the overall three-day chaos of a purely hardcore and post-hardcore experience.
Despite this sudden change and bold upgrade, it was more than exciting to see how the atmosphere would be within Mayfield Depot, with the fantastic bookings of Bane and Converge, Death Grips, and Denzel Curry. At its core, Outbreak still represented the underground, and as the weeks flew by and more details emerged on the lineups of each day, as well as the extra activities located throughout the festival, it all started making sense. Following the interesting pre-show at the Bread Shed on the Thursday, which featured performances from Nyx, Despize, The Flex, Dynamite, Higher Power, and One Step Closer, it was time for the main event.
converge | credit: ashlea bea
Arriving at Mayfield at 11:30am on Friday, the queue leading towards the stages were quite fascinating to witness. Hundreds of people in multiple lines were getting checked and allowed into the venue, in what genuinely felt like an airport security check. It was a smart move having Pest Control kickstart the three-day madness at 1pm, because if it was any earlier than that, the crowd would have missed them due to the queue lengths.
The front section, however, didn’t take long to cut straight to the chase, and shortly after the music began, people were violently throwing themselves around in the pit and gracefully jumping off the stage. Witnessing this pandemonium, which one could only describe as scenes that felt like a massive brawl was erupting on stage, only led the bands to perform with much more intensity, and that carried on throughout the whole day.
Bands the likes of Sunami, Demonstration of Power, Pain of Truth and Spy shattered people’s eardrums and kept the intensity at an all-time high while security and staff were mopping up blood from the stage floor post-performance, while Fleshwater, Koyo, High Vis and Militarie Gun mellowed the crowd while still maintaining a high energy set. The welfare tent did an amazing job looking after all injured, which was a definite constant considering the nature of the festival and acts throughout the weekend. To close out the Friday, the powerhouses behind Converge and Bane sent the audience wild, and fully prepared them for the days to come.
Saturday was an interesting experience. Arriving at the Depot at 12:30 was a difficult task, as the majority of people’s bodies were battered and bruised from the previous day. Candy’s performance however, proved this task worthwhile as they presented one of the best sets of the day, alongside Narrow Head and SCOWL. Each band respectively brought their own bundle of catastrophe and moshers and were highly entertaining throughout the afternoon. Don’t be surprised if they are higher up on the bill by next year. Following these performances however, it was time for the lingering question of how the hip-hop acts would be received to be answered.
soulglo | credit: ashlea bea
Armand Hammer were the first of these acts to grace the stage with their experimental sound, flow, and energy. Throughout the whole of their set, it was difficult to pinpoint how the audience would react to them, but soon enough they erupted into cheers and gave the duo a very warm welcome and ovation. The following acts gave the audience more of a reason to stay at main stage. Soul Glo and Jesus Piece were easily in the top five performances of the whole weekend.
Unprocessed, raw, and brutal hardcore that had people even outside of the front standing area swinging their arms and headbanging till the final second. Seeing what could easily have been more than a hundred people storm the stage for Soul Glo’s final song was an example of how energetic their set was, while Jesus Piece on the other hand were quite literally breathtaking, as anyone in the first 6 to 7 rows in the pit had to keep their heads always covered. The set they performed for the half hour they were on stage can be described as pure headliner material, and it would only make sense for them to be back at a higher time slot next year.
code orange | credit: ashlea bea
The stacked lineup of the main stage unfortunately took the shine away from the second stage. This didn’t mean that there weren’t hidden gems to be found there however. Amazing bands and acts the likes of Micromoon, Nukuluk, TALIABLE, and Wu-Lu were performing throughout the day, and the two stage splits had equal amounts of talent and quality. To end Saturday’s madness, Machine Girl, Code Orange, and Death Grips decimated the main stage, with fantastic performances, and some unfortunate stoppages due to crowd crush, which will be elaborated upon further down.
The final day was the highlight of the festival in terms of its musical consistency and variety of acts. This time, the task of getting down to Mayfield Depot for the first act was even harder, as Zulu took to the stage at 12:10PM. Considering the success and nature of their set last year, many believed that they they should have been placed later in the day. Despite this, they had a good turnout, and signalled an amazing start to the finale of Outbreak Fest. Following Zulu up with Speed was the best possible decision. Their energy was unmatched, as the Australian hardcore band continue to prove why they’re the ones to watch in this space. For people that were still unconvinced, all they had to do was witness the amount of people heading to welfare after their performance.
Later in the day, on second stage, Tom the Mail Man and Ekkstacy were giving their crowd an exceptional performance, while on main stage, Meechy Darko was proving to his audience why he deserved a place on outbreak’s lineup. Throughout the whole weekend, while acts were jumping into the crowd and participating, Meechy took it a step further and not only performed one of his songs while in a mosh-pit, but also front-flipped into the crowd and kept stage participation at an all time high. This energy was only further amplified after Meechy’s set was finished, with what could easily be considered the best set of the weekend.
show me the body | credit: anna swiechowska
Last year, Show Me the Body were so intense, that the show had to be stopped for at least 15 minutes due to a quite grim crowd surfing accident. Following the release of their fantastic album Trouble the Water, it was very exciting seeing them back to perform this year as well. This excitement proved to be worthwhile, as Show Me the Body provided their fans with an amazing setlist of songs, both intense and atmospheric, with amazing crowd participation and exchanges between lead singer Julian Cashwan Pratt and everyone that took to the stage to either two-step, crowd surf, or scream the lyrics into the microphone. The cherry on top for this performance came with the last song, a mashup of ‘USA Lullaby’ and ‘Body War’. The scenes following this song could have been taken out of an art book, picturing Julian pouring his heart out into the microphone, while behind him, one could see an army of people moshing, singing and jumping off stage until the final moments of this spectacular live show. Hats off to Show Me the Body.
The rest of the day continued with acts of equal quality. Lil Ugly Mane took the people attending through a time portal leading to the OG era of Mixtape and Soundcloud Rap, Loathe as per usual performed their array of fan favourite songs from I Let It In And It Took Everything, Trapped Under Ice featured a very hectic front section area, while Turnover made countless people cry their eyes out. It was genuinely fascinating seeing this medley of music not only work but share so many similarities as a whole.
denzel curry | credit: nat wood
The final three acts came in the form of Earl Sweatshirt, Wiki, and Denzel Curry. Each act came through with an amazing back catalogue of old, new, and even unreleased tracks. In particular, Earl Sweatshirt and Denzel Curry both played new songs that were heavily appreciated by their audience, and each of them made history at this year’s Outbreak Fest, respectively bringing out both Wiki, and Lil Ugly Mane for their collaborations that are not only rarely played live, but have been songs that their fans have been waiting to experience for years. Leaving Mayfield Depot feeling physically broken but with a smile was the outcome that majority of the crowd wanted, and ended up getting.
While the festival was fantastic music-wise, there were some overarching issues, particularly revolving around toilet and stall placements and the front standing area. Throughout the weekend, the left-hand side of the main stage had a quite unpleasant smell due to the toilets being located directly next to it. This increasingly became more unbearable as the weekend progressed, with Sunday definitely being the worst day for it. Alongside this, due to it being a new venue for the festival, the food stalls could have been a bit more conveniently placed around the venue, due to the nature of the two smoking areas being quite narrow and taking into consideration that 5000+ people were attending each day.
denzel curry | credit: nat wood
Finally, because the bars were located on each side of the stage, the golden wristband front standing area was longer than it was wider, which did lead to some issues with crowd crush on the Saturday and Sunday, specifically for Death Grips and Denzel Curry, of which the prior even had a stoppage during their performance. Despite these problems throughout the weekend, they can be easily tackled in time for next year, and there are a lot of aspects of the extra additions that the festival provided that were fantastic and absolutely worked.
Hoodsoulja Protections were a fantastic addition to the festival once again, with the security firm averting any major injuries throughout the whole festival, same as last year. They are a key part of why the no barrier feature works seamlessly, and it could not have been possible without them. Alongside this, the food stalls were of good quality (shout out to the 2 large samosas for £5 stall), and the return of the podcast stage in the Star and Garter, hosted by Ray Harkins of the 100 Words or Less podcast, was once again a very welcomed feature, which I believe should always be present each year.
In conclusion, Outbreak Festival made some bold changes to both the music lineup and the venue layout, and while not all of the changed elements were a complete success, it is on the right track to becoming a staple festival for the hardcore and hip-hop community, if it isn’t already.