After making waves at Rescue Rooms when they last visited Nottingham, Wargasm UK have now graduated to Rock City level audiences. Naturally, Izzy Morris was curious to see what all of the buzz was about...
Sam Matlock and Milkie Way pumped a serious dose of electrifying energy into the veins of Rock City, on tour off the back of the release of their incredibly well-received debut album, Venom.
The Wargasm set-up is incredibly well put together; Sam and Milkie’s partnership commands the respect of the audience, with Sam willing crowds into circle pits, and Milkie’s gorgeous vocals adding some much appreciated light and shade to the performance. They know how to get the crowd going and how to keep the crowd’s attention. At one point, the circle pit they were going for wasn’t quite to the level they were after so they stopped everyone, jeered them on, and demanded a better one. Sam did an excellent job of organising the chaos to get the heat rising here, to match their track PYRO, PYRO.
I also particularly loved the immense energy that their keyboardist was putting into his performance. At one point, he was almost doing an incredibly high intensity running man. It is so abundantly clear that everyone on that stage loves everything they’re doing.
“This isn’t your All Time Low or Machine Gun Kelly shit" asserted Sam halfway through their performance – they’re all about ‘real’ explosivity, and ‘real’ Venom. Some of the speech interludes, including this one, did border on slightly overly edgy or even something of a weird brand of stagey patronisation, which did take me out of it a bit, but the rest of the crowd seemed to respond pretty well to it.
Their setlist was well crafted, mixing together older tracks with new releases from Venom, in a way that appealed to the whole room. Some of the stand out tracks included Bang Ya Head, Modern Love and Do It So Good. The electronic riff of the latter track mixed with the programming of the lighting worked particularly well together, making it impossible for me not to get bouncing. There was not a single time that a track would start and was not met with excitement and eruption of limbs from the Wargasm fans. It is so clear that Nottingham are well and truly buying what Wargasm is selling.
This nu-metal duo have already demonstrated early signs of future mastery, with their unique blend of heavycore, electronic and rap elements. They’ve got a winning formula of fury, fun and creativity that I can’t wait to see extend further. Wargasm gigs absolutely live up to the hype, and as they continue to soar to new hypes, I’m sure their surprisingly sleek set-up for such a punky, rebellious band will soon settle into a place that feels a slight bit more genuine to incite an even bigger riot. I cannot wait to have my mind blown even more by this pair on their next visit to our wonderful city.
Wargasm UK performed at Rock City on 9 November 2023
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