Hardcore bands spend Halloween moshing to support Gaza

Cora Perkins, Assistant Spectrum Editor

The walls shake as bass booms through the speakers. The pit is a storm — possessed by bodies colliding to the rhythm and arms and legs swinging and kicking around and into each other in a blur. Full of fans dressed as ghouls and goblins, madness envelops the crowd, getting rowdier and rowdier as the night continues.  

Halloween at The Hole, a benefit show featuring seven local hardcore and alt-metal bands, brought many fans to Richmond on Halloween night — all to support the Gaza Soup Kitchen, where proceeds for the show went. 

The rowdy energy at the show was one familiar to regulars at The Hole, according to Hunter Johnson, drummer for Auto-Icon. 

“It’s very tough to keep that energy up the whole time, and it seems like from beginning to the end people were just having fun, letting loose, giving energy and then the bands [were] throwing it back and it was just a nice exchange throughout the night,” Johnson said. 

The bill was filled with a diverse array of bands and subgenres of alternative metal and hardcore — bouncing from grindcore to screamo, turning swiftly from emoviolence to post-hardcore; the show’s sound shifted all night.  

All the music was harsh in different flavors, but the scene is not very divided, Johnson said. 

 “There’s definitely some unity, and coming together for a great cause is a great way to get everybody together, despite maybe not sounding the same or liking the same music or playing the same music,” Johnson said. 

Halloween at the Hole is not the only benefit show to hit the scene, with different DIY venues and bands constantly organizing. Auto-Icon is currently working on a benefit show to support RVA Community Fridges.

“I feel like the benefits that are happening are great and keeping people informed,” Johnson said. “Maybe people who didn’t know all of the stuff that’s going on with access to health care, what’s happening in the world at large, it may help spread the message that way or any effort is awesome.” 

What makes Richmond’s DIY scene special is the sense of urgency and community, according to Johnson.

“A great example is the warehouse, when they had something happen and they weren’t able to really do bigger shows anymore, immediately Studio Two Three somehow jumped in and became a beacon for shows that would be at the warehouse to otherwise happen there,” Johnson said. “Same with The Hole, it just sort of popped up when the scene sort of needed more of a DIY connection, because I mean, there’s a bunch of houses that people don’t know about.” 

Ashley Pearson, guitarist and backup vocalist for grindcore band Bacteria, also believes The Hole provides a community connection. 

“The Hole specifically is really big on that, I think the music scene is a very community-invested scene,” Pearson said. 

The event raised nearly $2,000 for the Gaza Soup Kitchen, according to Pearson. Starvation tactics spurred by Israel have left thousands of Gazans hungry since the Genocide started. 

“All of us really care about that and think it’s a huge issue right now, especially since Israel’s kind of once again ignoring ceasefires,” Pearson said. “Something like that is incredibly important.” 

Bacteria would love to be a part of something like the benefit show again, according to Pearson, as they all found it wonderful.  

To Sonny Malario, Nico Delgado and Jordan Barte of Athera, a post-hardcore band from the area, performing a benefit show is extremely important. 

“It does feel good cause often times, I feel like the stuff in the scene isn’t necessarily addressed as it should be,” Sonny Malario, Athera’s guitarist, said.  “Playing a benefit show brings attention to the situation while also doing a good thing, as providing money for the Soup Kitchen.”

Jordan Barte, one of Arthera’s vocalists, said they think it is important to bring attention to these issues, as well as the different organizations supporting them. 

“I think like often times, it’s not even necessarily about the money, it’s about the message, and it gets the attention to what matters to us,” Barte said. 

Community is a crucial part of the DIY scene. It is common for anyone involved in DIY or punk to subscribe to an ethos of helping others and being active in your community, according to Gus Caldwell, bassist for screamo band Ostraca. 

“A lot of the draw of DIY and Screamo, in particular, is that all these people are subscribed to some kind of left-wing ideology and that there is hopefully a sense of community care and caring about the general well-being of other people baked into the music,” Caldwell said. 

What makes the scene in Richmond interesting is that those involved are happy to be there, and are not just looking to move on to a different city or venue, Caldwell said. 

“I feel like most of the people I know in Richmond who are in DIY are there for the right reasons and don’t see it as a stepping stone in their next career move or something,” Caldwell said. “I really value the kind of interconnectedness.”