Longtime readers will know that SYWH has hyped Southern California as the greatest place in the world, and there really isn’t any disputing that. We have the greatest Mexican food, the best weather (provided you don’t live inland lol) and most importantly, the world’s greatest hardcore scene! As a Socal native currently living in the Sacramento area, I’ve been lucky enough to sample a wide variety of California hardcore, and it would be a disservice of me to NOT aware you to the extremely advanced trend that is sweeping the best coast: CLOSEDCASKETACTIVITIESCORE.
The best part about naming this part of the California scene after this label is the fact that Closed Casket Activities isn’t even from here, because it’s actually run by some dude in New York. The label released plenty of east coast bands (Harm’s Way being the biggest name they helped blow up) but a few years ago they became permanently entwined with southwest hardcore. Incidentally or not, CCA serves as an incestuous hub for California’s latest and greatest bands to lay down sick, metal-influenced hardcore in the footsteps of All Out War and Stigmata. Places like Santa Barbara, Pomona and Van Nuys are on some seriously next level shit, at least as far as putting crushingly heavy spins on old trends go. Any time you see a hardcore kid jocking obscure death and doom metal from before they were born, you can bet it’s due to the bros in Nails, Twitching Tongues and Xibalba making destructive moshcore out of the husks of those bands. It’s thanks to these bands, heavy in ways that are almost weird, that I was ever able to discover hardcore in the first place, so here is their due.
Obviously the crown jewel of the California scene is NAILS- ABANDON ALL LIFE, but everyone and their sister’s tumblr followers knows about that one. So next up in Hardcore Worldwide™ visibility is Xibalba, who dropped a new track recently. These guys pulled an unprecedented move by going full doomcore on Hasta La Muerte, evidenced by the fact it was released on Southern Lord and even featured a guest spot by dronemaster Greg Anderson. But “Death Threat” is more along the lines of devastating tracks like “Cold” and “Stoneheart”. Somehow, this song manages to have both thrash riffs AND crushing slamz, which is an unusually anachronistic mixture, like if you time traveled to the Civil War and started killing soldiers with laser guns and plasma grenades. CCA is putting out Xibalba’s new split with Suburban Scum soon, and their song ain’t no slouch either.
For obvious reasons, Twitching Tongues is the flagship Closed Casket Activities band. Taylor (drums – Nails//guitars – TT) and Colin Young (vocals – TT) are almost synonymous with the label and the Socal hardcore sound. As a former IMN that worshiped Type O Negative and oldskool death metal and talked shit on anything that had the “-core” in the name, Twitching Tongues is the hardcore band tailor-made for me. If you told me back in high school that a band in the DIY punk scene would sound like a combination of Life of Agony and Bolt Thrower, I’d get mad trying to comprehend something so inherently bizarre. But if a band can sound as weird as Twitching Tongues does, then I know hardcore isn’t a bad thing after all. These guys used to get a lot of flak online because the vocals are strange and their debut record sounded like Bob Seger at points, but when I see them play there are always tons of bros singing along and fangirls dreamily staring at Colin so that should tell you who won. I already know the “YOU CAN DIE IN PAIN, OR LIVE ANOTHER DAY” pre-breakdown mosh call at 3:51 here is going to be my favorite pit memory when I’m an old man.
In this photo of THE NAILS, hardcore tastemaker Taylor Young casually sports a Demilich shirt. Thankfully I already had my “obscure Finnish death metal” phase in 9th grade, but expect forgotten bands like Adramelech and Rippikoulu to gain some hardcore cred in the next few years.
I am from Ventura, California, so my experience with CLOSEDCASKETACTIVITIESCORE bands are mostly based in neighboring Santa Barbara county. So I may be biased in saying this, but not much captures the attitude of SBHC and California mosh as well as HARNESS did during their brief existence. Considering these guys barely wrote more than 10 songs, I feel like they managed to command more hype than a sub-mid-3rd tier band normally would. In 10 years people will probably remember them as if they were on the same level as Nails and Xibalba. These guys are literally just mosh riff after mosh riff, like an Exhorder song condensed into two minutes. Victim of Suffering is mandatory listening, and the demo is worth checking out if you can’t get enough of this stuff.
You could consider Disgrace to be the sister band to Harness, because they put out a split together last year and essentially have the same sound but with more fast parts . The band’s current lineup is just Twitching Tongues, but with Taylor on the mic and their guitarist and bassist switching instruments. This EP is heaven if you’re anything like me and your definition of hardcore includes death metal riffs and Dan Seagrave artwork.
Minus is one of the older CCA bands, holding down the southern California scene back in 2010ish, the days of the Ruckus/Xibalba/World of Pain split. It’s hard to say whether the dudes in Minus are as overtly into metal as most of these bands are; I feel like they fit in well with both traditional and brutal hardcore. All that matters is that they are from Santa Barbara and go hard as fuck, and this song is particularly violent. Hard Feelings is legendary-status regretcore, and their debut record is one of my favorite 2013 albums. They have a new split with Soul Search coming out on CCA this year, get stoked!
Downpresser is another one of my personal favorite in this scene, and they’re probably the most (relatively) successful SBHC band at the moment. Their new album Don’t Need a Reason has definitely resonated in the tumblrsphere, probably because they choose to write catchier songs with more memorable vocals than most bands do. Age of Ignorance is my favorite release of theirs but all of their material is excellent. They recently self-released a compilation CD of everything before Don’t Need a Reason, which should be available online as soon as they finish their current tour with Xibalba and Comeback Kid.
God’s Hate are a new band, so there won’t be that much information about them until they start touring a little bit. All I know for sure is that Colin plays guitar for them. As you can tell, these guys are jocking late 90s NYHC pretty hard. Everything from the chunky riffs to the wack groaning vocals screams Merauder and Irate. If you like No Zodiac, or thought Crowbar would be better if they sped the fuck up already, you will definitely love this band.
I was pretty butthurt when Harness disbanded while they still had so much potential, so Forced Order might be the closest to a Harness Part 2 as we’ll get. Same vocalist, and the rest of the members culled from Twitching Tongues, Creatures, Soul Search, e.g. the typical Closed Casket lineup. Like God’s Hate, Forced Order is a brand new band that just has a quick 4 minute demo out so far, but at this point it should be clear that these dudes are experts at churning out brutal fucking hardcore. Their demo is available for free, check the mediafire link on their bandcamp.
Soul Search is the only band listed here that I haven’t seen live or listened to much, even though they’re another important pillar of this scene. They sound like your typical Entombedcore band to me, and that doesn’t have to be a bad thing. They have some sick riffs for sure, and overall they seem to go for a slower approach than most bands. If you love Xibalba and wish they had more shit out, pick up Soul Search’s EPs. They’re headlining a mini tour of California with Disgrace, God’s Hate, Forced Order and Violent Situation in early April, so I hope I can really get into them then.
What are your favorite CLOSEDCASKETACTIVITIESCORE bands??? Did you call Twitching Tongues a nu metal band in 2011 and now jock them like everyone else?? Will ppl in 2025 write blog posts about how Creatures and Skinfather were “legendary” in the California scene??