For a while now, the Bay Area hardcore scene has been on fire. The San Jose bands Gulch, Drain, and Sunami, all of whom share members with one another, have built up serious momentum and mystique, and they’ve maintained that during a period where they haven’t been able to play live shows. Drain only got to play one show, a backyard music-video shoot, behind their great 2020 album California Cursed. Before this past weekend, Sunami had only played one set ever, a legendarily violent house show. But this past weekend, all three of those bands — along with LA’s Xibalba, San Jose’s Maya Over Eyes, and Santa Cruz’s Scowl — played an absolutely massive event together in San Jose, guerrilla-style.

The members of the headlining bands put Saturday’s Real Bay Shit celebration together on their own, only announcing the outdoor location on the afternoon of the show. They built the stage. They charged $5 to get in. And according to most online estimates, more than 2,000 people came out. From all accounts, it was a beautiful and life-affirming spectacle, and the photos and videos from Saturday night definitely support that. Shit looks wild.

The sets from Gulch and Drain, in particular, had mass singalongs, gigantic convulsive pits, and fireworks shooting off overhead. Legends were made. Some of the videos are so chaotic that it’s hard to figure out who’s in the band and who’s just wilding out around them. Check out some documentation of the insanity below.

https://twitter.com/dirtyxmike/status/1406476768433766401

https://twitter.com/Scowl40831/status/1406705898802671616