Rockfreaks.net

support Existenz + Rumkicks
author PP date 23/11/23 venue BETA, Copenhagen, DEN

It's mohawk o'clock here in Copenhagen as the rebellious street / hardcore punkers The Casualties are gearing up for a packed show at the 200-capacity BETA. Studs, patches, vests, and the whole shebang are on display within the audience, closely mirroring tonight's headliners who have donned the anarcho-punk outfits for their entire career and have become synonymous with both the sound and the look.

Rumkicks

Rumkicks

The venue lights dim and tonight's opening act is getting ready on stage. Wow, what's this gonna be like, is my first thought as I notice the three crazy-looking, tiny punk chicks with mohawks and the whole street punk look I was talking about earlier. Not only that - but they are from South Korea of all places. They play a brand of pogo-pogo pop-punk with clear hints of early Ramones contrasted by a hardcore edge with plenty of speed and attitude. In between songs, they joke around in broken English with a ridiculous amount of sarcasm where you can't tell whether they are serious or not ("Do you drink every day here? Drinking every day may be bad for your hair", before proceeding with a song called, yes, "Drinking Every Day").

Rumkicks

The whole set is simultaneously totally bizarre and awesome. It's three-chords and no-frills all the way, which makes it super simple, but it's also equally effective. The upbeat melodies are instantly catchy, and their high-energy onslaught combined with the bubblegum pop punk vibes bring smiles to our collective faces. By the time they are halfway through their set, they have half the venue pumping fists and singing along in what is very much a back to the basics of punk rock set. It just works - and given the commentary about being poor and driving here 15 hours without sleeping from Poland, the audience is lapping it up. "We've been called fake punk, fashion punk, and plastic punk on social media... we are too fashionable to be punk. We are TikTok punk", they shout, before launching into "Punk Is Nowhere", a song written in response to the online haters. Now this is how you successfully warm up a crowd!

Existenz

After that spectacle, it's going to be an uphill battle for Swedish hardcore punkers Existenz, who have been a band since 1982 but have only recently reactivated in their old age. You know exactly what you're gonna be getting when you glance upon their looks on stage: one of them is donning an Anti-Nowhere League t-shirt while the singer looks like the angry old guy from the corner of the pub about to unleash a pissed-off monologue about the state of the world if you dare ask. Indeed, their raw, true hardcore punk sound is tight and raw coupled with barked and yelled lyrics throughout - think anyone from the Rebellion Fest lineup. Unfortunately, it's also generic as hell, where the songs blend without leaving a trace in your memory.

Existenz

No wonder the crowd is way less animated than before, save for a few usual suspects at the pit. Most people are content just watching from the back for a few songs, but the room experiences a steady stream of people heading back towards the bar as their set progresses. There is virtually no interaction between the songs and barely any movement either, meaning we're in for one long set of mediocre Oi/street punk ideals. Sure, their 1984 song "Fight For Freedom" is solid, "Point Of No Return" features decent gang shouts, "Zombieland" sticks to mind, and the final song "Let's Get Drunk Before It's Too Late" is surprisingly catchy given its simple topic. Still, it's almost the polar opposite of the party atmosphere we had just before them.

The Casualties

A brief passage of Europe's The Final Countdown leads into a short "Hey! Ho! Let's Go" bit that immediately transcends into a caustic "Let's goooooo" scream and a ridiculous tempo to "Under Attack". The pit is fucking mental from the get-go, with "1312" drawing a frantic response from the crowd. Fists are up in the air as the band tears through their hardcore punk material relentlessly with plenty of woo-hoo moments and gang-shouts from the crowd to support. It takes but a few songs for The Casualties to translate BETA into a vivid image of how anarchistic the street punk shows probably felt back during the original days of the genre.

The Casualties

No wonder the temperature is rapidly rising as the pit looks vicious throughout. Jorge Herrera's comments like "Let's see how many of you can pogo bounce" before "Ashes Of My Enemies" only serve to egg the crowd on even more. It's stage dive galore from here onwards, leading to countless spilled pints on the floor as people vault from the stage at regular intervals. It's a great example of why The Casualties are so revered live: their performance transitions venues into special punk rock spaces no matter where they play.

We sing along from the top of our lungs to "We Are All We Have" halfway through the set, pogo-bounce some more after Herrera's request, and split the entirety of BETA into a wall of death from stage to the back door where it feels like the whole venue participates. They also play a Ramones cover ("Teenage Lobotomy" - minus points for not playing your own songs), "For The Punx" and a couple of others before an encore finalizes the high-energy insanity both on the stage and in the crowd.

The Casualties

At the end of the day, The Casualties still offer one of the rawest and most true street punk / anarcho-inspired experiences out there. The band is bouncing around sweating like shit with their mohawks falling due to the amount of energy on stage. The venue is likewise drenched and full of original punk show vibes from back in the day. There's no doubt that the band is at their element at tiny, intimate club shows like these where they can source from the crowd energy.

Setlist:

• 1. Under Attack
• 2. Rejected & Unwanted
• 3. 1312
• 4. Chaos Sound
• 5. Borders
• 6. Nightmare
• 7. Ashes of My Enemies
• 8. Written in Blood
• 9. We Are All We Have
• 10. Running Through the Night
• 11. Riot
• 12. Ya Basta
• 13. Made in N.Y.C.
• 14. Teenage Lobotomy (Ramones cover)
• 15. For the Punx
• 16. Ugly Bastards
• 17. My Blood, My Life, Always Forward
• --Encore--
• 18. Punk Rock Love
• 19. Unknown Soldier

Photos by: Philip Onyx