King Street Bandroom, Newcastle

On this stormy Thursday night, the King Street Bandroom felt less like a music venue and more like the setting of a sinister ritual. Mèlancolia, the rising stars of Australia’s deathcore scene, took the stage and delivered a performance steeped in gloom, brutality, and something much darker, courtesy of their enigmatic frontman, Alex Hill.

From the moment Alex appeared under the dim, cold lighting, it was clear that this wasn’t going to be an ordinary deathcore show. There’s something eerie about the way he commands the space – not just as a vocalist, but as a vessel for the dark, unsettling themes Mèlancolia explores.

Kicking things off with “God Tongue,” Alex’s voice sliced through the thick atmosphere. His guttural growls were monstrous, but it was his piercing high shrieks that gave the performance its unsettling quality. When he wasn’t unleashing a brutal vocal assault, Alex was dangling spit off his fingers like a psych ward patient. The crowd wasn’t just watching—they were trapped in his performance, as if under a spell.

photos : Shaun Wilkinson

For a relatively new band on the scene, the synergy between band members was impressive. The band’s mix of slow, brooding sections with frenetic, fast-paced chaos was masterfully executed, keeping the energy dynamic and unpredictable throughout the set.

During “Hiss Through Rotten Teeth,” the tension in the room was palpable. Alex’s slow, drawn-out vocal passages echoed around the room, haunting and dissonant, as though he were singing from some forgotten, tortured place. It was these moments of eerie calm that showed his ability to not just perform deathcore, but to shape it into something more theatrical, almost ritualistic. Behind him, Mèlancolia was a well-oiled machine of brutal bone-crushing breakdowns, but all eyes remained on Alex, whose every word and movement seemed to channel the band’s essence—dark, oppressive, and emotive.

As they reached their final song, “Inure,” Alex’s performance reached its peak. His vocals felt like they were crawling under your skin, the atmosphere in the room growing thicker with every passing note. In the closing moments, as the final chords reverberated in the space, Alex rose from the crouch where he had spent the last minute screaming his lungs out and addressed the crowd, “Love us or hate us – you will fucking remember us”. He then grounds us with, “All the bands have merch over here. Go pick something up… this shit ain’t cheap”, a reminder that the heavy music scene depends heavily on merch sales to support its artists.

Mèlancolia’s performance wasn’t just about sonic brutality; it was one that left a lasting impression largely due to the eerie charisma of their demonic-goth frontman. Alex Hill possesses a rare talent for transforming a typical concert into a dark, haunting experience – one that lingers with you long after the final note fades… For anyone who thought deathcore was a genre limited to pure brutality, Mèlancolia proved that it could also be haunting, introspective, and utterly immersive. Well done, lads!

Mèlancolia : @melancolia_exe