Russia 6

Russia 5

FLAWLESS VICTORY (Moscow)

ARGUMENT5.45 (Moscow)

CHANGES (Moscow)

DICE (Kaliningrad)

VILLAINZ UNITED (Ufa)

THE RAVE (St.Petersburg)

MY CRAZY DAYS (Izhevsk)

Russia - Samara

I live in the city of Samara which is a place where it is -30 in the winter and +30 in the summer but there are still kids who play hardcore!

The scene is not big and is only starting to develop. There are some independent shows, but you have to rent clubs more often. There are children who are interested in SxE and being vegan. I can't say that there is a big sense of community but we try to keep in contact and to help each other. Strange as it sounds, there are a lot of neo-Nazis in our country.

I will tell you a little about the hardcore bands:

Disobey
They play hardcore with social lyrics.

In the neighbouring city of Tolljatii there is good melodic punk/HC band Branch who play very well.

One of the very first bands in our region were Turbo Lax.
They have played with Madball and Sick of it All.

There is also a young band What We Became who play melodic hardcore punk.

Peace/unity

Montenegro

This report is brilliant IMO because it shows a young country finding its own voice of protest. I reminds me of the very first punk bands in the UK who had no point of reference, it was Year Zero and they had no regard for musical history. They were free to make the kind of music that felt right. This post was made by Mladen who plays in Qtera.

At this moment there are not many punk/HC bands. Here are myspace links for those I think could match with your needs:

Emotional Sickness (Podgorica)

Gomila Nesklada (Niksic)

Drustvo Skrivenih Talenata (Niksic)

Off Duty (Niksic)

Punkreas (Niksic)

However, many bands do not exist anymore, so I will give you a youtube link:

GreyStoNe (I played in this one)

One more thing, I don't know if you are aware, but Montenegro and Serbia are not the same country for years now, but one of my favourite Belgrade HC bands is Discord

Peace/unity :D

Austria - Vienna

I'm from Vienna (capital of Austria) and I think it is the biggest scene. It is like a small family. So there are about 50-60 kids, who go regularly to shows and support the local bands and promoters.

There are also other kids, who go to the bigger "mainstream" shows but I think they aren't really interested in hxc and diy. So the scene could be bigger ...

Some Bands:

Feeding Time RIP

Nothing Gold Can Stay

Mind Trap
(like Bracewar,Trash Talk, Infest)

Catilina
(like Killing the Dream, Life Long Tragedy)

Juggernaut
(like Guns Up!, No Warning)

Run Time Terror

One Pound Flesh From Your Chest
(like I don't know :) they make something special)

Nothing to Lose RIP

Some Fanzines:

Isolation

Down The Drain

Forgive in Hell

No Values

BreakAway

Switzerland

I come from the southern side of Switzerland and here we speak italian.
There's a lot of swiss people that play in italian bands, Stop Talking for example.

From the south:
The Coming Fall RIP (Ticino)
(Great band with great lyrics)

Open Close my Eyes (Ticino)
(Old band Better Than a Thousand oriented)

Crosscheck (Ticino)
(Old Band similar to Warzone)

Face the Game (Ticino)

From the german side:
Unveil (Werdenberg)

Deadverse

Fall Apart RIP (Schaffhausen)
(Nice Band with the same style as Empty Vision and Ritual)

Mimicry

From the French side (There are only bands with Gangstah attitude) :)
The Stand (Lausanne)

One Last Chance (Geneva)

Bulgaria - Sofia

I've been involved in the scene since 2001. The scene was pretty cool back then. There were 3 major acts:
Face Up

Last Hope
Skinflick

These 3 bands and some of their friends formed SCT crew (which stands for Sofia City Thugs:) )
Just the same year Face Up broke up and Vendetta were formed. It was also the year when the first band from the second wave of bands played.
This band is Breakaway (later Omerta).

After them a lot of new bands showed up:
Point-a-view
Hidden
Start Today (not the band from Plovdiv)
Switchstance
to name a few...

They formed the SYC crew (Sofia Youth Crew). It is funny...despite the name we (I took part of it) weren't mainly straight edge. In fact very few of us were but the name stayed because it was meant mainly to emphasize we were the new blood in the scene. During this period the scene was great. All the people knew each other and there was a great sense of friendship, unity and respect.

Then the third wave of bands spawned. The first were Death Squad, later Envy (now Redound) and Melekh. Personally for me it was the beginning of the end - new people, fashion, trends. Most of the new people are in it for the social scene and to be part of something "cool". The scene is now divided in small crews who hate each other and who are hypocritical at shows.

It is something that I've decided I don't want to be part of...

Netherlands

Hardcore does live in The Netherlands, except for the part that I live in, which is very metal-minded. So I just need to travel a bit more to see shows.

New Morality is one of my favourites right now.

Other bands worth checking out:

Strike First (Arnhem)

As Enemies Arise (Brabant)

Wasted Bullet

No Turning Back (Brabant)
I assume you already know about them - they did a world tour not so long ago.

I saw them last weekend in a tiny, tiny venue in a small city in the south of Holland. It was crazy! Knocking down chandeliers and falling over persian-style carpets. One weird venue that was. But loads of fun!

Mosh Meeting 2010
No Turning Back
Trailer
Skarhead

As HC is all about DIY you could say that I should organise things myself, but to be honest I am too scared to do it! For a fact I know that I would have to rely on people that have to travel from far away. Let's face it, with shows all around the country every weekend, people will not travel that far if there's something just as good around the corner. Although some others do have the guts: Death Before Dishonour are playing in a little town in the very south of Holland soon. And that town doesn't even have public transport to go there! I will attend, if only to support the promotor.

Here's link of Terror playing one of the best HC venues in Holland, which is The Baroeg in Rotterdam.

Sweden - Gothenburg

We had a show in the beginning of this year, a "donation-show" where all the money went to 2 girls who lived together but one of them was in a car crash and is now in coma. So there were some hardcore bands playing for free and giving all the door-money plus extra donation money to this girl so she can make up the rent :)

Also this Saturday we've got a HUGE hardcore-festival here in Gothenburg. Retaliate from the US is coming here on a exclusive show only in Gothenburg plus the best bands of Sweden are there as well. In total I think there will be 12 bands. I'm counting on loads of people too.

France

I live in the french south west coast, and there is no real hardcore scene in the place where I live (near Biarritz) but I go to the shows in Bordeaux city or Toulouse city. These are the most important cities in the south west for hardcore.

Toulouse has a creative hardcore scene and a lot of bands:

Alea jacta est

8control

Through My Eyes

A Bridge To Many

Fire at Will

UpxRights

In Bordeaux DIY organizations have appeared in the last 2 years like Enjoy the Show which have a lot of shows with foreign bands.

In the rest of France, Nantes has an interesting hardcore scene with:

Golden District

Lasting Values

Tromatized Youth

It has a lot of old school bands.

Paris has an interresting hardcore scene too with:

Kickback

xProvidencex

Fierce

Rise of the Northstar

Danforth

Onesta

Some more of my favorite french hardcore bands:

Back to Square One (Rouen)

Black Page (Nantes)

Hell Burns Away (Caen)


The scene in the south west is really cool and the audience is a mix of straight edge people, vegan people, vegan sxe people, or just hardcore kids. Everybody respects others and their way of life. A fun spirit is apparent with for example, a lot of jokes and parody of hardcore dancing during the shows. The kids like to dance in south west!