Review: Lorna Shore at Metro City

Lorna Shore at Metro City
w/ Whitechapel, The Acacia Strain
Monday, October 19, 2026

Anyone who bought a ticket to Lorna Shore’s sold-out show at Metro City on Monday night expecting one of the heaviest nights of the year certainly got their money’s worth.

With fellow American deathcore heavyweights Whitechapel and The Acacia Strain joining the bill, Perth was in for an evening of sheer aggression, crushing riffs and enough guttural vocals to rattle the foundations of the venue.

The Acacia Strain wasted absolutely no time making their presence felt, launching into Whoa! Shut It Down and tearing through their set like a freight train. By the second song, the crowd made their presence known too, with a circle pit erupting and a nonstop stream of crowd surfers keeping security busy at the barricades.

Having evolved into a heavier, more punishing outfit over the years, the band delivered a barrage of filthy breakdowns and ferocious vocals, with frontman Vincent Bennett barely stopping for a breath throughout the set.

Bennett was in fine form, encouraging the audience to embrace the chaos with his characteristically blunt commentary. Describing the band’s music as being made for cavemen and violence, his calls for carnage were answered by a crowd that needed little encouragement.

Yet amid the general mayhem came a poignant moment where Bennett spoke candidly about grief, mortality and the importance of appreciating those still around him. His message was simple: tell people you love them while you still can, because tomorrow is never guaranteed.

It was a surprisingly touching moment from a man who had spent much of the set encouraging an entire room of people to beat the shit out of each other. The sentimentality didn’t last long. Declaring that for the next three minutes nobody in the room had any friends, Bennett promptly sent the crowd back into a frenzy.

The band powered through tracks including Beast, Send Help and The Hills Have Eyes before closing with Carbomb and disappearing from the stage almost as abruptly as they had arrived, leaving the crowd wondering, “What just happened?”

Following The Acacia Strain was never going to be an easy task, but Tennessee deathcore veterans Whitechapel managed to raise the bar even higher.

Opening with Prisoner 666, the band launched into a set dominated by material from their latest album, Hymns in Dissonance, a concept record exploring a descent into darkness through a story of religious betrayal, evil and the seven deadly sins.

The album follows a character who abandons his faith to embrace evil, and watching frontman Phil Bozeman bring that story to life was nothing short of extraordinary.

From the unsettling backwards vocals of Prisoner 666 to the piercing highs and cavernous guttural lows that followed, Bozeman commanded the stage like a man possessed. There were moments that genuinely sent chills down the spine, with the sheer range and precision of his vocals proving this was a performer operating on an entirely different level.

Tracks including Hymns in Dissonance, A Visceral Retch, Bedlam and Hate Cult Ritual sounded even more ferocious live than on the studio recordings, with thunderous percussion and punishing guitars matching Bozeman’s intensity.

The energy on stage was matched by the crowd, with circle pits opening across the floor and fans screaming lyrics back at Bozeman.

A return to earlier material with The Somatic Defilement and Devirgination Studies was met with deafening cheers before This Is Exile brought the set to a close.

Whitechapel hadn’t simply performed their latest album. They had brought its sinister world to life, delivering one of the most remarkable live performances of the evening and setting an extraordinarily high standard for the headliners to follow.

With Whitechapel’s set wrapped up, a large white curtain descended from the ceiling. Behind it, preparations were underway for Lorna Shore’s considerably more elaborate production. With Metro City unable to accommodate the band’s usual pyrotechnics, enormous LED screens would have to do the job instead, displaying digital flames and animations throughout the set.

Bonnie Tyler’s Total Eclipse of the Heart provided a rather unlikely soundtrack to the final preparations before the curtain dropped to reveal Lorna Shore launching into Oblivion.

Between the pounding drums, crushing guitars and sweeping orchestral arrangements, the sheer force of the music was enough to send vibrations through the barricades. For those standing at the front, there was quite literally no escaping it.

Ramos was every bit as impressive as his reputation suggests, tearing through some of the band’s most demanding vocal passages with an almost ridiculous level of control, somehow making the whole thing look relatively effortless.

Ramos appeared genuinely delighted by the sold-out crowd, expressing his disbelief that Perth had turned out in such numbers.

“On a Monday. A fucking Monday!”

Later, he reflected on how far the band had come since their previous visit, recalling playing to a crowd that was only a fraction of the size.

Ramos told the audience that Perth was his favourite city to perform in, reassuring the crowd he genuinely meant it.

“It’s not because of the beaches. It’s because of the energy you guys bring every time.”

The crowd’s reaction suggested Perth was more than happy to claim the title.

The band tore through Unbreakable before bringing out a very familiar face for War Machine. Perth’s own Sean Harmanis, frontman of Make Them Suffer, joined Ramos on vocals, sending the crowd into an absolute frenzy.

Few things were going to get a better reception than a surprise appearance from a bit of local metal royalty.

Apparently capturing the chaos wasn’t enough for Lorna Shore’s photographer and videographer Nick Chance, who stepped out from behind the camera to lend his vocals to the set too.

As the band powered through In Darkness, Of the Abyss and Into the Earth, circle pits continued to open across the floor, with the crowd showing little sign of slowing down.

Glenwood brought a more personal moment to the set, with Ramos reflecting on the song’s significance before the band launched back into heavier territory with Prison of Flesh, encouraging the audience to be on its worst behaviour.

The three-part Pain Remains trilogy followed, with Dancing Like Flames, After All I’ve Done, I’ll Disappear and In a Sea of Fire bringing an emotional intensity to the performance through soaring melodies and orchestral arrangements.

The band closed with To the Hellfire, one of the songs that helped introduce Lorna Shore to a much wider audience, delivering a suitably ferocious conclusion to the night.

But Ramos wasn’t quite finished entertaining the crowd, showing off a QANTAS hat he’d picked up on the flight over and joking that the band wasn’t endorsed by the airline before tossing it into the audience. Given his obvious affection for Perth and the difficulties of getting international metal acts over here, perhaps QANTAS should consider changing that.

The hat wasn’t the only thing making its way between the stage and the audience, with a fan on Metro City’s upper level catching Ramos’ attention with a shirt that appeared to give the frontman a good laugh. Ramos scrunched up a setlist and threw it towards the fan, who managed to catch it before returning the favour by launching the shirt towards the stage.

With extraordinary musicianship, enormous production and a frontman who appeared genuinely grateful to be there, Lorna Shore proved exactly why they have become one of deathcore’s biggest names.

TAHNEE GRAHAM

Photos by Carlie Hansen