How Australian grindcore evolved and made its way to Southeast Asia.
An insight on how Warsore grew to prominence as a pioneer of Australian crust grindcore.
GENERAL
6/29/20265 min read
The Background:
Sometime ago, a friend of mine requested an article on the band Warsore. I didn't know too much of them, but I've still heard them held with great regards in the grind scene. An essential band if you will. Like always, I started with a simple google search of the band. Though I must have made a slight typo that first time. Because as I started to look into them, I realized there was a little problem with the results. Woresore? I don't remember it being spelt like that. There was plenty of ep covers and pages dedicated to the band "Woresore." Must be some kind of Mandela effect or something. However, it didn't take long for me to realize I was looking at an entirely different band. This led me to initially write the article comparing the two bands Warsore and Woresore and the evolution of grindcore. Though after a couple days, I hit a slump and realized there was almost 0 information about Woresore I could write about. But I did manage to find another topic to pair with Warsore, as promised. So here's the pioneers of Australian crust as they spread the good word to other countries in Asia!
Warsore:
Warsore was an Austrailian born grindcore act that lasted from 1995 up until 2006. As expected, they displayed plenty themes of anarchism within their covers and song titles. Most of their discography consists of DIY tapes an split eps with other grind bands from the time. Users on Last.fm and Discogs claim they started out making more improvised noise-style music. But as the lineup changed numerous times, they switched to the ever-so peaceful crust-grind sound. With the change from noise to grindcore, some members had switched between the band Disgorge. The original singer, Eugene left the band to do vocals in Disgorge as their drummer left to do the same in Warsore. After another switch in bassists, Warsore remained complete. With of course other lineup changes here and there. The band makes full use of down-tuned guitars and blast beats. There is plenty of old movie samples of varying aggression sprinkled in the tapes. And they have that classic unpolished, crustgrind style. Warsore is an essential in its genre that ultimately met their demise in 2006 as founding member and drummer, Erik Simonsen passed away. So far throughout this website, I've had the most trouble finding exact information about Warsore than any other band. I guess you can't consider yourself truly underground if you have a Wikipedia page. There are little photos to be found of them and even less information about the members.
The Evolution of Punk in Australia:
Like most countries, punk started to grow with it's proto, sanguine pioneers in the early 1970's. In Australia's case, The Saints and Radio Birdman held the title as some of the fist punk bands in the country. They formed scenes in Brisbane and Sydney respectively, with the help of radio stations pushing the sound. Community driven radio station 4ZZZ was the main culprit in spreading the anti-establishment sentiments and bands. Things already started the branch out as Nick Cave planted seeds into the new up and coming genre, post-punk. Jump to the 1980s, and crossover thrash has already started to make it's way into the scene. This is when you can first hear the direct influence onto what would become grindcore. In fact this was my realization to how close thrash and hardcore punk are tied together. One on side of the spectrum, you had bands like Hobbs' Angel of Death and Mortal Sin keeping the more classic extreme thrash sound. But on the other side, you had bands like Slaughter Lord and Massappeal that really laid the groundwork for Australian grindcore. The dirty guitar tones, hollow production, and blast beats started to differentiate itself heavily from standard thrash and even past typical hardcore punk. In fact, Massappeals debut album, "Nobody Likes a Thinker" released just one year before what many people consider to be the first official grindcore album, with Napalm Death's "Scum' dropping in 1987. After that, today's recognizablegrindcore took its place in the early 90's with bands Damaged and the stoner-metal driven Blood Duster ripping the scenes in Melbourne and Ballarat. Now we have finally made it to Warsore's formation in 1995. They came to pioneer the exteme metal sound and crustgrind style of grindcore in Australia. Much more brutal vocals and riffs throughout the music. Things only got heavier over time. In some cases you could even group them in with the making of mincecore. Though Agathocles had been the blueprint for that since 1985.
Warsore's Spread to Asia:
As a result of the limiting geographical isolation of Australia, bigger venues and bands in the United States and UK weren't too accessible for the local bands in Australia. Instead, underground punk bands made their way to touring circuits in Southeast Asia. This included countries like Malaysia, Singapore, and Indonesia being infected by the hardcore punk from Australia. It wasn't much of a surprising sound to the new audience as there has been a long history of hardcore punk in Eastern Asia as well. This all started with Warsore as they first toured the region in 1998. You can find some live recordings of their performances in Japan in 1999 as well as some bootleg cassettes on Discogs. Warsore had managed to highlight the region as more bands from Australia and other countries managed to make their way into the touring circuit. They made split releases of the performances with bands like Dysmorfic who joined them in the Asian shows. The influence carried on from the 2000s to even modern day. Melbourne, born hardcore punk band Pisschrïst had connections with Appäratus from Malaysia and Framtid from Japan as they made split eps together in the late 2000s. You can even find modern Australian hardcore bands like No Peace embarking on Southeast Asian tours. Warsore had built themselves the title of bringing together the Australian and Southeast Asian hardcore punk and grindcore scenes that have stayed tied together ever since the late 90s. This goes to show the sheer amount of thriving scenes that can be found around the world. No matter how underground something may be, there will always be an audience and community built by such art and music.
Warsore performing in Japan, 1999