WARGASM + JAR OF BLIND FLIES + BONES ATE ARFA – CHALK, BRIGHTON 30.6.26
JOY. promoters have put together a trio of exciting acts for the final date of Wargasm’s UK tour, so without further ado, let’s get down to business…..
Bones Ate Arfa 18:45 – 19:20
It’s early doors tonight at Chalk and only 15 minutes after opening, the hardest working band in Brighton; ‘Bones Ate Arfa’ have taken to the stage ready to rock. Why the hardest working band I hear you say? Well I’m referencing their recent run at the Great Escape and Alternative Escape festival back in May where they seemed to be playing quite literally everywhere, and every day, they easily put in over 10 gigs.
So who are they? Bones Ate Arfa are billed as a UK psychedelic street punk/desert rock three piece made up of Sonny aka Bones (guitar), Herbie aka 8 (drums), and Arthur aka Arfa (vocals & bass). One thing for sure is they have the look, the haircuts and the clothes, an image is definitely being projected. This is not my first dalliance with the band, I saw them at Daltons in February 2025 and felt at the time they were very much pushing into Nu Metal territory, so it’ll be interesting tonight to see how they have developed.
I was lucky what with train delays and the very early start that I literally made it through the venue door at 18:45 as the band walked on stage for this 35 minute, 7 song set. A slow moody introduction took us into ‘Vineyard’, what struck me immediately is how much rockier the band sounded since I last saw them, considering there are just 3 of them on stage, those guitars really rage.
“How are you Brighton, thanks for coming, we are Bones Ate Arfa, we are from right here in Brighton and it’s a pleasure” vocalist Arthur told us, but drummer Herbie Wilson was already hammering the drums as we moved into the very lively ‘Just Bananas’.
Following this there was minute or so interlude, whilst Herbie left his drums, climbed down off stage onto the venues bar and went all the way to the back of the venue hitting a cowbell, Arthur encouraged everyone to clap in time, by the time Herbie reached the stage again the guitars were ready and Herbie was straight back utterly pounding the drums, now that’s timing for you! I’m not sure if this was a continuation of ‘Just Bananas’ or the next song ‘Soda’, but it was a proper melee of heavy guitar and drumming, lots of whooping and cheering came from the crowd.
A sample introduction introduced us to the next song or perhaps it was ‘Soda’, it seemed like there were more songs played here than listed on their stage setlists, anyhow whatever the song was it had fast pace relentless drums, a heavy heavy bass line and rampant guitar. Arthur delivered his vocals in a sort of screaming style as all those big metal bands did back in the 70s. Arthur gave a countdown from 4 to 1 wanting everyone to shout “shoulder”, and everyone obliged.
We were thanked again and invited to head over to the merch stall afterwards “to buy a t-shirt and lighten the band’s load for their journey home” before they played ‘Asbestos’, another hard and heavy one with lots of throaty vocal screams. It got a big cheer.
Next came a new song ‘Not All Wings Are For Flying’ which had Sonny on backing vocals, after which he thanked us “Thanks for coming down so early to catch us, we’ve always wanted to play Chalk and here we ARE” Big cheers ensued once more, Sonny genuinely looked over the moon.
The last two songs of the set were ‘It’s All Good’ and ‘Akimbo People’, both powerful stompers, half way through the later the pace slowed to give Arthur time to say “F*ck Elon Musk, F*ck Donald Trump and F*ck Nigel Farrage” before the guitars ramped up into a very Rage Against The Machine style to close out the song with some true rock and roll stage theatrics from the band.
Well I must say, Bones Ate Arfa really did impress me, whilst I am not really a fan of the throaty screams, this bigger venue really pushes their quite frankly huge and heavy sound out to the masses, which is just how you’d want it, the crowd, many of whom were dressed up with face paint were lapping it up. The band were in great form, really enjoying it, not only perfectly playing those instruments with great skill, but the stage theatrics, the jumping about, coming into the crowd etc., it very much felt like they were at home with a big crowd and big stage, may it long continue.
Bones Ate Arfa:
Sonny Whittington aka Bones – lead guitar, vocals
Herbie Wilson aka 8 – drums
Arthur Wilson aka Arfa – lead vocals, bass guitar
Bones Ate Arfa setlist:
‘Vineyard’ (from 2025 ‘Just Bananas’ EP)
‘Just Bananas’ (from 2025 ‘Just Bananas’ EP)
‘Soda’ (unreleased)
‘Asbestos’ (a 2023 single)
‘Not All Wings Are For Flying’ (unreleased)
‘It’s All Good’ (a 2025 single)
‘Akimbo People’ (from 2024 ‘Akimbo People’ EP)
Jar of Blind Flies 19:40 – 20:10
Second on the bill tonight we have Brighton based band; Jar Of Blind Flies, a band that are a regular fixture on the Brighton music scene. Whilst I know their name and have seen them on many posters, I didn’t think I’d seen them live before, but looking back at my charts it turns out I have seen them not once, but twice at Green Door Store for the annual ‘234 Fest’ way back in September 2024 and the year before in 2023, I suspect alcohol may account for my lapse of memory on those particular days.
The trio are made up of Maddy Jarvis (vocals, guitar), Marley Perez (drums) and Jake Smith (bass), Jake also plays with the Brighton band Goodbye, their sound is delicious grungy alt-rock.
They take to their stage and start at their allotted time of 19:40 on the dot with their 2024 single ‘Not Your Baby’, this had slow rumbling guitar, slow and brooding, the bass was like a motorbikes engine chugging, the darker vibe was added to by drummer Marley giving vocal guttural sludge screams now and then.
Maddy’s vocal style was rather unique, with emphasis on certain words, echoing the later parts of the line, going up and down often ending screams. Her vocal style reminded me of Placebo to some extent. It was the same again as the band morphed into next song ‘Plastic Boy’ which was sung “boy…yyyyyyaaaaaaaaahhh”. This is from their 2025 album ‘Míà’, of which the bulk of the set was to come from.
With no gap or break the band went straight into ‘Crawl Back Inside’ which really started to pick up the drumming pace. Bass player Jake addressed the crowd “Right how are we doing, we are Jar Of Blind Flies from right here, if you haven’t guessed Brighton is a pretty small place, buy some merch afterwards, I’m going to shut up, you probably don’t even care about this, but we love you, this is a new song” it was ‘Little Bo Creep’, and a fab song at that, I really enjoyed it, Maddy really stretching out creep in her vocal delivery “c ree eee eee p aah aah aaah”.
Next up was ‘Far From Land’, which had solid beefy drums with plenty of crashing cymbals, really growling guitars, a proper deep and rousing song, I loved it.
The final song of the set was ‘Playground King’, this one was slow brooding, contemplative, it reminded me of American grunge bands, with a hint of the Pixies, a great song to end with.
The set seemed to steam through so fast, but clocked up a respectable 27 minutes, I suspect partly due to the curfew on the venue and need to get Wargasm on in time, I really enjoyed their set, really tight as a band, perhaps giving the crowd a taste of something slightly different compared to the other bands this evening. I will have to make sure I catch them again, in fact they have just announced that they will be playing Concorde 2 on August 9th in support of Battlesnake, so I encourage you all to go and indulge.
Jar Of Blind Flies:
Maddy Jarvis – main vocals, guitar
Marley Perez – drums, backing vocals
Jake Smith – bass
Jar Of Blind Flies setlist:
‘Not Your Baby’ (2024 single)
‘Plastic Boy’ (from 2025 ‘Míà’ album)
‘Crawl Back Inside’ (from 2025 ‘Míà’ album)
‘Little Bo Creep’ (new & unreleased)
‘Far From Land’ (from 2025 ‘Míà’ album)
‘Playground King’ (from 2025 ‘Míà’ album)
Wargasm 20:40 – 21:45
Tonight concludes the final night of Wargasm European tour and what better place to end it than here at Chalk in Brighton, after all I think it’s been a while since their last visit, which I believe would have been at the Concorde 2 in November 2024. I have to admit I’m a Wargasm virgin, but from my pre-gig homework I’ve enjoyed everything I’ve heard and sense this is going to be a rather lively affair.
Wargasm are a London based duo formed in 2019 by Sam Matlock (vocals and guitar) and Milkie Way (vocals and bass). On stage we also have a band taking in drums, a guitarist and a laptop/beats tech station. Their sound is Electro Punk, blending nu-metal, EDM, hip hop, industrial rock and post-hardcore. It’s a potent blend and when delivered by Wargasm, you don’t need the national grid, this music makes and delivers energy right off the scale. Their website states: “ANGRY SONGS FOR SAD PEOPLE and our backdrop message this evening is A sordid collusion of Euphoria & Violence”.
At 20:40 with the venue properly packed out, bulging with an incredibly up for it crowd, the band came to the stage under the glare of plenty of red and orange lighting. Sam in his shades and white t-shirt (which didn’t last long) and Milkie in a sparkly bikini like get up, they looked the biz. The backing music cranked, and the tag team vocal action between Sam and Milkie started “Brighton, Brighton, Brighton, sing” shouted Sam as ‘Backyard Bastards’ came into effect, more commands came from Sam “YOU, front to back, open it up, YOU, side to side, open it up, open it up, are you with me, we are Wargasm make some noise”. Milkie demanded “Brighton, listen & repeat”. The crowd did just that, and you could hear the song being sung right back before the guitars and drums fully exploded. What a start to this utterly glorious one hour set.
Next up was their 2025 single ‘Vigilantes’, a clap-along started in the crowd, some utterly lovely throbbing bass from Milkies guitar came too during this, but coupled with frantic guitar and drums of the band, so frantic I think one of the drums had to actually be replaced at the end of this song.
Everyone was waving their hands side to side during ‘Bad Seed’, there had been no slow easing into this gig, it was full on energy from the get go, and the crowd surfing had already started. We were not just getting mad guitar and drums, the band also had a laptop set up with Adam Crilly at the controls, bringing in more beats, samples, sounds, taking the sound way further afield from its Nu Metal roots, it was highly danceable, highly bounceable, highly moshable, constantly fueled by Sam and Milkies commands “Come on Brighton, Open that shit up, we’ve been here before, I know what you want”.
“Yeah, yeah, yeah, ooooohhh, Oh yeaaaaah, f*ck yeah” called Sam, each word getting repeated one by one back by the crowd as he said them as they launched into the awesome ‘Fukstar’ from the 2022 album ‘Explicit: The MiXXXtape’, jeez the drumming on this was hard and fast . “Brighton all I want is a mosh pit from the bar to wall” shouted Sam, it happened.
With a small break in the action Milky addressed the crowd “I f*xking love you Brighton, but I’ve only got one thing to say, I don’t want to see your f*cking phones, we are going to play some new shit, so put it the f*ck away, if I see one, I’m taking it and you are not getting it back, that is a threat….continue”. This was in reference to a post the band put out in advance, they don’t want to see any recording or filming at their shows, this message was also plastered over pretty much every door and wall in the venue with posters saying “Would you steal a gig – no recording or filming of the show” and you know what after having been to so many gigs over the past few year with the relentless phones out, people standing motionless staring through their screens can grind on you a bit, but tonight, everyone was getting involved, they were moshing, hands in the air, crowd surfing, it was refreshing and got me all nostalgic of my early gigging days.
“Can I go” asked Sam lightening the mood a little, “Hello, ladies and gentlemen make some noise for the f*cking Gibson Les Paul” the guitarist cracked it up and then some with some sexy tunes, Sam continued “when your parents f*cked they probably done it to the sound of a Gibson Les Paul”. The song was a new unreleased one called ‘Get Down’ an awesome song, more beat heavy with Sam delivering more softer rap-like lyrics and Milkie backing up in a computer style stutter like “get down, get down, g g g get down”.
The crowd were told to get a circle going and start running, Sam interjected “Now can we talk, I don’t want to stop things and make it look like it’s on purpose, because you’ve got a nice circle pit over there, but on this side of the stage I’ve got no circle pit, that makes me lonely. So from the back to the wall make it or get the f*ck out, make it, make it” and boy did those pits form and the craziness continued throughout ‘Pyro Pyro’. The contrasting vocal styles really shone through, Milkie with her more softer calming melodies and Sam with his screaming raps.
‘Small World Syndrome’ came next before the hard electronic beat intro to ‘Shin Venom’ “Can you keep up” teased Milkie as the drummer kicked in over the electronic beats, a real bass rumbler of a song, perhaps the most electronic song so far.
A sample of Garth from ‘Wayne’s World’ played out as the intro to the unreleased ‘Never Gonna Get It’, more blending of rap lyrics from Sam into fast and frantic tag teaming with Milkie, a wicked song. We were asked to rate the song out of 10, everyone shouted 10, Sam replied that sounded like an 11 to me.
Two from the 2023 album ‘Venom’ came next, first was ‘Bang Ya Head’ and hell yeah, didn’t we just, what a sight looking out seeing the whole crowd fully banging their head in time to the insane guitar and beats. The second was ‘Feral’ which pretty much sums it, the constant flow of crowd surfers continued, Sam called out “make some noise for the mosh pit operator” a mega fan who he’d pulled up on stage to mosh and go crazy, Milkie reminded everyone they were having an after party at Dust straight after and who’s coming. The mosh pit operator guy grabbed the mic and ordered the crowd to open up and go crazy, I don’t think anyone would have denied his request as we entered the realms of ‘D.R.I.L.D.O’ the crowd chanted “Drink, F*ck, Fight, Love”, the pit circles ran wild, the moshing continued, a lovely guitar solo from Edison came through too. This song was something else, what energy, what a feeling it gave.
Next came the crowd favourite ‘Spit’, which later morphed into the sound of the Prodigy’s ‘Voodoo People’ and Sam and the guitarist Edison positioned themselves on the metal barrier, before launching themselves out to be crowd surfed around, whilst singing and playing the guitar, proper carnage, the crowd were so fired up. Sadly at one point Sam dropped down but he was soon back up and when back on the stage checked in with the audience that everyone was okay before the final song ‘Do It So Good’ and with that we were told see you at the after party.
A lot of people started to leave after the band had left the stage, come on folks, there’s always going to be the possibility of an encore, and whilst it was not on the setlist the band did re-appear and Milkie announced “I know I said I don’t take requests, but….” plenty of calls screamed out for ‘Salma Hayek’ and that exactly what we got. A fine and ultra-lively way to end the set.
If only I could bottle the energy from this gig, there was sweat, sweat, sweat, all males in the band had their tops off by the end, the music, the power, the energy it was non-stop from start to end. I was gagging to get in the pit, but I was pretty much penned up against the wall due to my late arrival and had no chance of getting near the front, plus I had my work bag. The band’s mantra of no phones is excellent, only last weekend I’d been watching a DVD of Rage Against The Machine at Reading Festival from 1996 thinking, oh man why can’t we have crowds like that all focused on the band, all bouncing, crowd surfing and then I come here tonight and hey presto it was like my Carter USM crowd surfing days all over again. Milkie and Sam know how to work the crowd, their looks, their stares, their commands, a real loyal army of fans ready and waiting. I really hope the band come to Brighton again soon. Next time I’m wearing something with zip up pockets and leaving everything else at home, I want to ride those waves.
Wargasm:
Milkie Way – vocals, bass
Sam Matlock – vocals, guitar
Jack Wrench – drums
Adam Crilly – laptop
Stone – guitar
Wargasm setlist:
‘Backyard Bastards’ (from 2021 compilation ‘A Year of War’ album)
‘Vigilantes’ (a 2025 single)
‘Bad Seed’ (from 2024 ‘Listen All You Mother Fuckers Tape’)
‘Fukstar’ (from 2022 ‘Explicit: The MiXXXtape’ album)
‘Get Down’ (unreleased)
‘Pyro Pyro’ (from 2022 ‘Explicit: The MiXXXtape’ album)
‘Small World Syndrome’ (from 2025 ‘The Unlicensed Mixtape’)
‘Shin Venom’ (a 2025 single)
‘Never Gonna Get It’ (unreleased)
‘Bang Ya Head’ (from 2023 ‘Venom’ album)
‘Feral’ (from the 2023 ‘Venom’ album)
‘D.R.I.L.D.O’ (from 2022 ‘Explicit: The MiXXXtape’ album)
‘Spit/Voodoo’ (from 2021 ‘A Year Of War’ compilation album’)
‘Do It So Good’ (from 2023 ‘Venom’ album)
(encore)
‘Salma Hayek’ (from 2022 album ‘Explicit: The MiXXXtape’)
