Liskfest 2.0 – at Oak Canyon Ranch – Irvine, CA – September 5, 2009

Last year's Lisk Fest was a great event with highlights being performances by Gorilla Biscuits, Cro-Mags, Ignite, and H20. The fest, which is put on by Chris Lisk of Speak 714, is turning out to be an annual get together of old guard Orange County Hardcore types with big name acts from all around the country. This year The Cro-Mags returned along with Ignite and H20, but were also joined by late 80's straight edge hardcore bands, Insted and Bold.

I got to the show pretty early in the day so I could check out my friends in Terezodu play on the local stage. There were some minor complications including a ten dollar parking charge (which I managed to avoid). Also many people seemed pretty unhappy with the ten dollar charge for buying tickets at the event (this made tickets forty dollars all together as they were thirty dollars in advance). This wouldn't have been so problematic if they had disclosed ahead of time that tickets would cost an extra ten dollars if they weren't bought in advance. Hopefully this will not affect the attendance of next year's Lisk Fest as otherwise it was a great event. Anyway Terezodu played a cool set and made the best out if a situation where only a hand full of people were watching them.

A few hours later Ignite played on the main stage. Most of the songs that they played were from "Our Darkest Days," but they did throw in "Embrace" for the more seasoned fans and a cover of U2's "Bloody Sunday." Ignite were followed by H20, who put on a great show, playing songs from all of their records. Vocalist, Toby Morse was accompanied on stage by his six year old son, Max who jumped around on stage and even sang with his father a bit. H20's classic New York Hardcore sound showed through in songs like "Family Tree," Thicker Than Water," "Still Here," "Guilty By Association" (Freddy Madball's lines were delivered by Scott Vogel of Terror), "Nothing to Prove," "I See It Us," "Five Year Plan," and "One Life, One Chance." H20 have always been a crowd favorite because they play catchy songs that are easy to sing along and dance to and they have always had enough wisdom to mix in their most current material with their older songs.

Connecticut's Bold opened their set with "Talk Is Cheap" and although vocalist, Matt Warnke's voice had some wear and tear from the band's recent European tour, it was fun to see them play some old hardcore classics. While Bold didn't have as many peole watching them as some of the other bands there were a few people who were clearly very stoked to see them. After Bold played I watched bits and pieces of Strife's set, which was a bit of a weird trip down memory lane. Strife were never a favorite band of mine in the 1990's but they did give a high caliber performance of heavy hardcore which reflects some Southern California influences.

Whenever the Cro-Mags play it is an event and they are never a band to be missed. Since it was a John Joseph/Mackie version of the band and not a Harley Flanagan version all of the original material played was from the seminal "Age of Quarrel" album. "Seekers of Truth" and "We Gotta Know" sounded heavy as fuck alongside other great tunes like "Hard Times," and "Life on My Own." As always they also played some Bad Brains covers- tonight they were "Attitude" and "Banned in D.C."

With all of the great band playing at Lisk Fest, Insted were still the highlight of the whole event. They brought the most energy out of any band playing and since it's such a rare occasion for them to play it made their performance pretty special. Vocalist, KevInsted moved some monitors on stage, commenting that he didn't like how they created a barrier between the band and audience and made stage dives more difficult. "We'll Make the Difference" and a cover of "Young Til I Die" were huge crowd pleasers and hopefully some younger kids who weren't familiar with Insted were turned on to their music by this performance. It's not easy for any band to follow the Cro-Mags, but Insted did the job well.

Event Website: www.liskfest.com

 

-Ditch-
Big Wheel Asst. Editor

 

More photos of the show can be seen HERE

 
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MAIN STAGE A 8:20 – Winds Of Plague 7:10 - All Shall Perish 6:00 - H20 5:00 - Death by Stereo 4:00 - Caliban 3:00 - Soulwraith 2:00 - The Throne 1:00 - City Under Fire 12:00 – Suffokate	SIDE STAGE A 8:15 - Cro Mags 7:15 - Eleven Thirty-Four 6:15 - Against the Wall 5:15 - Alpha and Omega 4:15 - Nations Afire 3:15 - Jahmbi 2:15 - Unwritten Legacy 1:15 - Pandemic Unleashed 12:15 – For The Ages
MAIN STAGE B 9:00 - As I Lay Dying 7:45 - Sleeping Giant 6:35 - Born of Osiris 5:30 - Ignite 4:30 - After the Burial 3:30 - Skies of Ruin 2:30 - Derail 1:30 - The Warned 12:30 – Gates to Abaddon	LOCAL STAGE B 8:45 - Insted 7:45 - Strife 6:45 - Bold 5:45 - Monument to Thieves 4:45 - Chaser 3:45 - Confined in Chaos 2:45 - Ghost City 1:45 - Terezodu 12:45 – Chaos One