Hardcore is your friend! and it was proven to be true this Thursday night. Surprisingly, not the Eagle Aerie Hall, or Legion Post 8, but the House Of Blues played host to this sold out hardcore show.
Kicking things off from all the way across the Pacific was Sydney, Australia’s Secret World. Their aggressive sounds set the tone for the evening with thrashing guitars, passionate vocals, raw emotion and solid jokes. What more could you ask for? They wasted no time pumping up the crowd’s energy with their punk-infused hardcore. I was completely unfamiliar with this band and they definitely gained a new fan. I’ve actually been listening to them regularly since the show.
Up second, and switching Punk genres every so slightly: the hardest working band in hardcore, Boston boot-boys Haywire! The band has been seemingly on tour for years. In 2025 they played a massive year- long tour across all fifty states and still haven’t stopped. Introducing the band was classic sing-along original Neil Diamond’s “Sweet Caroline”. The band sang the classic along-with the crowd immediately launching into their self-titled “Haywire” getting the crowd going. This is such a fun band to watch live, as they are energetic, aggressive, passionate, and chaotic. Recently Haywire put out a split with notorious Boston locals, Dropkick Murphys, and included the track “New England” forever from it. Appropriately for Las Vegas, they recoined the lyrics “Nevada forever, tattooed across our chest” for our stop of the tour that night. The pit was constant throughout the set, as well as the crowd screaming back lyrics at Austin Sparkman. Everyone obviously was having a super fun time.
By the time No Pressure hit the stage, the crowd was fully in hardcore mode. They were the perfect palette cleanser between the chaos of the previous set and that which Drain was about to bring. No Pressure are truly just that. “No pressure”, friends playing music they like, strictly for fun and it transfers to the audience perfectly. They told stories, talked about their gambling losses and played a snippet of “Party in the USA” by Miley Cyrus before breaking into a full blown cover of the hit 2000s popular Black Eyed Peas song “Let’s Get it Started” (a song I somehow heard twice with an hour) breaking into a dance party and really getting the vibes feeling right.
Finally after 3 bands, my personal favorite: Drain. The stage was decorated with a beach party backdrop perfectly going hand in hand with their California surf punk vibes. These Santa Cruz hardcore kids are very clear about their band motto “Drain is your friend”, and these shows are ours. The band was immediately ready to party, opening with “Feel the Pressure” and high-energy singer Sammy Ciaramitaro launching deep into the crowd from the stage. The band has the ability to somehow include every member of the audience even without direct contact and their shows are undeniably the most fun hardcore shows in existence. Security literally had its hands full throughout the entire set of never-ending crowd-surfers. A highlight of the performance (of course besides the Drain shark dropping it low the entire time) was towards the end of the set when the surfboard (not just stage decoration) was removed from the stage and Sammy literally surfed on top of everyone to a killer cover of “Good Good Things” by the Descendents. Unbelievably, the already rowdy ocean of people became an even greater storm, as wave after wave surfed their way to the top, climb aboard, and help him sing along.
Just because the surfboard was returned to the stage, it didn’t mean that it was time for security to rest just yet. Final song and crowd favorite “California Cursed” was introduced with a condition, a quota of 300 fans must make it over the barricade. Eager to oblige, people everywhere began jumping off the balcony and almost anything they could find. I watched maybe 20 in a row jump off the bar and stair railings, and it was wild. The last 2:35 of that show was an utter frenzy and there is nothing cooler than having witnessed it live.
After the Drain beach party ended, the band stuck around and greeted fans and took pictures. This band has been doing big, big things and I’m sure we will hear plenty more from them, their next stop after Las Vegas being Coachella.
If you ever have a chance to see any of these bands, do yourself a favor and don’t miss it, you are guaranteed to have a great time.
Photos: Aaron Mattern
No Comments