With Honor.
For two sold-out nights at Space Ballroom, Connecticut’s own With Honor delivered to their fans after a 10-year absence, bringing an energetic and positive communal vibe to the Hamden club.
The May 20 and 21 shows were rescheduled from last year due to Covid-related postponements, and with much anticipation, musicians and the audience alike were eager to finally get down. With plenty of age-centric jokes, laughter and gratitude, the hardcore band, along with a selection of their friends and former tourmates, brought the spirit and energy of early 2000s hardcore to an audience of those who were in their teens and twenties back during With Honor’s period of peak activity.
Albany, NY’s After The Fall kicked the weekend off with a blazing set of uptempo hardcore punk. The band ripped through a series of quick, short songs, mainly from its January released record, Isolation, band members breaking just enough to mention how honored they were to be a part of the festivities.
“We’ve been a band for 22 years and we’ve always played that fast NOFX beat, so we wrote a couple slow ones for this new record,” singer/guitarist Mike Moak said before launching into a more mid-tempo song. Trading vocals with Moak throughout the set was bassist Jasmine Mayberry, providing a different sound and an upfront female presence, which Moak noted as he spoke briefly of inclusivity and diversity in hardcore.
“We’re all here to relive 20 years ago,” Shai Hulud vocalist Jay Pepito said between songs Friday night. In the mid-1990s, the band — originally based in South Florida — helped to shape the more technically proficient mindset hardcore was adopting at the time by infusing complex rhythms with melodic guitar leads and crushing metallic breakdowns. Even though it was the night of the 19th anniversary of the band’s second full-length album, That Within Blood Ill-Tempered, Shai Hulud played a set of mainly even earlier material. A majority of the set was particularly from its 1997 hallmark album Hearts Once Nourished With Hope And Compassion — a record that Pepito, who grew up a fan of the band before joining in 2020, said he places as his second favorite hardcore album, just behind the Cro-Mags classic The Age Of Quarrel. Mosh-worthy songs like “For The World,” “Solely Concentrating on the Negative Aspects of Life,” and “My Heart Bleeds The Darkest Blood” were met with a ferocious pit while the anthemic closer “A Profound Hatred Of Man” brought the pile-ons.
Local CT-based Life In Your Way took the stage third Friday night, bringing its style of progressive metalcore. With guitar leads, catchy choruses and stomping breakdowns, the group worked its way through a set of classic material, and the audience responded accordingly. Between songs vocalist Johua Kellam asked the crowd to help him out, and fans joined in singing along and jumping around to the beat.
“What a freaking dad fest,” guitarist James Allen said between songs, calling a false start on the next song “Dad Play.”
“That was a meatball,” With Honor singer Todd Mackey joked on Friday after asking the audience who was over 30. It was in jest, but it was also a reference to how much time has lapsed since With Honor’s original run between 2002 and 2006. With children of the band members sitting stage side, the melodic hardcore band played a sincerely heartfelt set of material spanning its short but fruitful career. From the opening seconds of “Bridges & Gaps” to the closing moments of “Like Trumpets,” Friday’s set was a frenzy of two-steps, pile-ons, and stage dives, with plenty of laughter involved. In particular the band members played a number of songs from their second and final full-length, This Is Our Revenge, with Mackey dedicating “You Always Said” to those who lost someone during the pandemic. In keeping with the communal vibe, former With Honor member Greg Thomas joined the band, with guitarist Jay Aust taking lead vocals, to cover a song by Ambitions, a short-lived band that followed up With Honor’s demise.
Saturday started with an energetic set from CT’s own Lift. Sharing drummer John Ross with With Honor, the band played a spirited blend of ’90s hardcore, drawing from bands like Snapcase and Helmet. With three band new songs, and a new frontman as well, the group announced it was entering a new era and recording a full-length record, something for CT hardcore fans to look forward to.
Following Lift was Silent Drive, a band composed of former members of such notable groups as Bane and Drowningman. The four-piece played its intriguing blend of hardcore and rock, mixing screamed and sung vocals, to an engaged audience who sang along and made the most of the moshable parts. Vocalist Zach Jordan mentioned the band’s last show was six years ago, and their last show before that was six years prior, saying in a tongue-in-cheek manner that they might play again in another six years. The group debuted new material from a forthcoming record to a positive response.
Taking the stage for the second time over the weekend, Shai Hulud played an even more ferocious set on Saturday, and the audience returned the favor with a higher level of intensity. Sticking with the classic material, the group worked in a later song — the title track from their 2013 album Reach Beyond The Sun — as well. Making a shout-out to Static Era Records — a local Milford based shop owned by Jay Reason of the CT bands The Distance and Voice Of Reason as well as Stillborn Records — Pepito reminded the audience that hardcore is made in spaces like that and Space Ballroom, and not on the internet.
With Honor’s second set of the weekend brought perhaps even more energy than the first as well. While the group may have shaken out the cobwebs with a pair of southern dates last fall, the band was now playing its home state, and the feeling of joy was palpable.
“Last night’s theme was ‘getting old,’” Mackey told the audience. “Tonight’s theme is about staying young.” Carrying over some songs from Friday, the five-piece mixed the set up enough for those who came both nights, which appeared to be a majority of the audience. With even more dancing, stage-dives and group vocals, the show had the spirit of everything that makes hardcore great. In a heartfelt moment, the singer told his children — again stage-side — that that was what they loved about playing music so much.