9 September 2025 – The Triffid, Brisbane – words by Alessandro Ambrosi – pictures by Bec Harbour
Grindcore on a school night? YES PLEASE!
After a 17-year absence from Australian soil, Pig Destroyer finally returned—and they didn’t come to ease back in gently. They came to obliterate. From the moment they hit the stage at The Triffid, it was clear they weren’t here to play nice. Their sound? Think razor-sharp guitars, relentless drumming, and vocals that sound like someone screaming through a meat grinder. In the best way possible. It was going to be like being hit by a freight train made of riffs and rage.
Their lyrics, as always, are dark and twisted—painting bleak portraits of self-hatred and existential dread. But let’s be honest, no one came for a poetry night. We came to get wrecked, and Pig Destroyer made sure of it.
AWFUL NOISE coming first on the bill with their own brand of face-melting grind, and they were the perfect warm-up act—if by “warm-up” you mean “get your ears punched repeatedly by sound.” Their energy was brutal, and the crowd, apart from the first couple of songs were most of the punters were still lined up for merch, answered en-masse from the get-go.
Awful Noise – The Triffid – photos by Bec Harbour
Opener ‘Cryptic Shit Smearing’ and ‘When Going too Far is Not Enough’ showed the few that didn’t know the band what the next 30 minutes would sound like. New single ‘Mr Type A Personality’ had some great transitions between blasts and more mid-tempo drumming from Marco and some great transition between growls and screams from Lindon.
Ali and Chris on guitars were also very comfortable in their grindcore delivery. You can hear many influences in the band sound, from Dying Fetus in some transitions to tonight’s headliners but AWFUL NOISE still maintains their originality by wonderfully blending all those influences and making them their own. ‘Parasite Hilton’ and ‘Histor(ectom)y’ end their set in front of a decently full pit. AWFUL NOICE!
WORMROT back in town feels like Christmas came early—if Christmas involved blast beats and circle pits. They’ve hit Aussie stages before, but this time they’ve dusted off their original lineup, and it absolutely ripped. The vibe was different from the 2023 gig, and it felt, at least for me, that the trio was way more in-tune with each other. Now, grindcore sets are a bit like speed dating with riffs. You blink and three songs have already happened. Wormrot packed over 25 tracks into 40 minutes, which is basically a musical sprint through a warzone. From lightning speed blasts to hardcore there’s plenty to go around for every taste.
Wormrot – The Triffid – photos by Bec Harbour
Vocalist Arif, guitarist Rasyid and drummer Fitri are a well-oiled grindcore machine as they’re fast approaching their 20th year anniversary of destroying our eardrums. The setlist is a nice mix from all albums with a focus on the latest release HISS. ‘The Darkest Burden’ and ‘Behind Closed Doors’ warm up the pit which will be a whirlwind of bodies from start to finish. A few songs from 2016 album VOICES in the likes of ‘Fallen into Disuse’, ‘Oblivious Mess’ and the smartly announced as – a slow one for you – ‘Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Grind’.
BREAKING NEWS – It’s a grindcore band – There are ZERO slow songs!
Wormrot – The Triffid – photos by Bec Harbour
‘Murder’ and ‘Left to Rot’ from ABUSE and a couple more from the NOISE EP are thrown into the mix which ends with the final song from HISS which is the violently sang ‘Glass Shards’. Everyone in the pit is sweaty and undoubtedly sore but definitely happy after these 40 minutes of musical violence.
30 minutes for air, drinks and merch and there’s more grindcore to come with the headliners.
PIG DESTROYER took the stage and wasted no time launching into chaos. The crowd, already battered from the earlier sets, braced for impact as the band opened with ‘Gravedancer’ from TERRIFYER. If Wormrot packed 25 songs in 40 minutes the swine annihilators packed 27 in just a little less than an hour – ahhhh sweet old grindcore.
Pig Destroyer – The Triffid – photos by Bec Harbour
Scott Hull is a shredding machine on guitars and Adam Jarvis (also in Misery Index) is as skilled as they come when we’re talking about tonight’s style of music and drumming. Alex on samples and noise is an unrelenting moving object on the stage providing some backing vocals with Travis Stone on bass guitar, to JR screaming. ‘Thumbsucker’ with it’s crushing wall of sound and ‘Pretty in Casts’ with it’s crazed screams set the mood for the time ahead.
It’s a relentless mix of grindcore, noise, samples and many influences. There are breakdowns and blastbeats. ‘The American’s Head’ and ‘The Diplomat’ hit like a train. ‘Army of Cops’ slows down just a bit but it’s still heavy as ever. The computerized voice of “Jennifer” precedes ‘Cheerleader Corpses’ from the seminal PROWLER IN THE YARD album. From the same album are the last two songs of the night ‘Piss Angel’ and ‘Junkyard God’ before a brief pause and the encore with ‘The Machete Twins’.
Pig Destroyer – The Triffid – photos by Bec Harbour
If you missed this show, you missed a masterclass in grindcore brutality. Awful Noise got everyone revved up. Wormrot accelerated everyone’s heart rate to 200BPM and Pig Destroyer didn’t just return—they reminded everyone why they’re legends. And if you were there? Congrats. Your ears may never be the same.
