PLF Bring the Texas Apocalypse to Brunswick: A Night of Grind, Sludge, and Unholy Devotion at the Bergy Bandroom

May 22, 2026

PLF Bring the Texas Apocalypse to Brunswick: A Night of Grind, Sludge, and Unholy Devotion at the Bergy Bandroom

WORDS BY MARK. J AND PICS BY DAN MCKAY.

Thursday, April 9th. The Bergy Bandroom— that Sydney Road sweatbox that somehow always feels like home for the dispossessed—played host to one of those bills that reminds you why we still crawl out on weeknights when the rest of the world is doomscrolling on the couch. Four bands, zero filler, and a headliner from Houston, Texas, that’s been pulverising eardrums since before some of the punters here were born.

(to be honest I cannot recall who played first: ESP Mayhem or Hematemesis-who gives a fuck, you should have been there sucker!!!)

ESP Mayhem kicked things off with their particular brand of wired, synth-tinged grind. These Melbourne veterans don’t just play fast; they play like they’ve mainlined caffeine and existential dread.

The electronics give their riffs a cold, digital edge that slices through the usual meat-and-potatoes grind template. It’s grindcore for the surveillance age—paranoid, agitated, and strangely danceable in a dystopian sort of way.

The early crowd was still shaking off the work week, but by the third song, a mini-moshpit was properly alive. Sheer excellence for openers. They left the room buzzing and slightly uneasy, like the machines are already winning. Go see them at every chance and have a blast(beat) of evil synth.

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Next up, Hematemesis. Local heroes doing the fast-and-almost crusty powerviolence fueled grind thing with real demolishing conviction.

Mike’s retching vocals are a weapon, raw and stomach-churning in the best possible way, while the rhythm section (Mel on bass, Dan on the blasts) locks in like they’ve been playing together in basements since birth. There’s a genuine sense of urgency here—no posing, just pure, ugly energy. They’ve only been around a couple of years, but already sound like they’ve got a few split releases and a cult following under their belt.

The set was short, brutal, and left a decent portion of the front row looking like they’d been hit by a truck. Exactly what you want.

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Religious Observance then dragged everything down into the filth. If the first two bands were about speed and frenzy, RO were about weight and dread.

This is forbidding and confrontational sludge/doom/noise that feels less like music and more like being slowly crushed under decades of societal rot. Their visceral riffs move like tectonic plates, slow and inevitable, while the vocals/noise howls from some deep, personal abyss. The hellspawn and overwhelm, particularly of the cacophonous material from the antagonistic 7 Years of Neglect album, it all blended into one oppressive, glorious fog.

The lights caught the sweat and the beer haze just right; for a moment, the Bergy felt like some deconsecrated church where the only prayer left is feedback and distortion. They’re one of those bands that make you feel smaller and more alive at the same time.

Heavy in every sense of the word. And always one of the most mercilessly oppressive bands Australia has ever had.

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Then P.L.F. took the stage and the room fucking detonated.

Look, I’ve been doing this long enough to get cynical about “legends” touring Australia. Half the time, it’s nostalgia cash-ins with diminishing returns. Not these Texans. Pulverizing Lethal Force (formerly Pretty Little Flower) has been at this since 1999, and on this night, it was clear they’ve lost none of the fire. Insanely fast, punishing, and somehow still swinging with that greasy, urban-thrash edge that separates real grind from the bedroom blast-beat merchants.

They hit like a brick through a plate glass window—riffs that could level buildings, drums that sound like machine gun fire mixed with car crashes, and vocals that alternate between guttural barks and unhinged screams.

The set was a blur of classics and slightly newer cuts, the kind of relentless assault where songs bleed into each other and the concept of time starts to feel optional. The pit was absolute chaos in the best way: bodies flying, voices hoarse, that rare communal euphoria you only get when a band commits this hard. They didn’t just play; they invaded. Texas grindcore in full flight, thousands of kilometres from home, turning a Brunswick bandroom into a temporary warzone. By the end, the stage was a mess of spilled beer, the sound guy looked traumatised (in a good way), and everyone in the room had that thousand-yard stare that says “yeah… I was there.” Even your dear writer couldn't imagine how intense and thrilling this gig was( Dan, our photographer, went x3 times and considered even catching the interstate legs FFS), it was a brutal gem.

Nights like this are why the underground still matters. No algorithms, no industry suits, just four bands throwing everything they had at a room full of people who needed it. ESP Mayhem set the tone, Hematemesis raised the stakes, Religious Observance made us confront the void, and PLF reminded us that grindcore, at its best, is still a fucking public service.