GALLERY: 18.4.2025 Roadburn – Day 2 @ 013, Tilburg

June 17, 2025

Roadburn 2025 took place from April 17th to 20th at the legendary 013 club in Tilburg, Netherlands, continuing its legacy as a hub for boundary-breaking heavy music.

After some sleep to recover and get some relief from the muscle pain from the previous day, starting with a good breakfast is always a sign you are doing a festival right. Luckily, Tilburg has plenty of nice cafes, and after a walk in the city center, we also managed to meet up for lunch with a fellow roadburner.

Today promised to be more hectic than Thursday, while still not stressing too much about having to miss things. After all, there are long queues everywhere, so one has to be somewhat selective and prepared. The first act of the day for us was the collaboration between THROWING BRICKS and ONTAARD, bringing to life the vibrant Utrecht scene. This collaborative work, entitled “Something To Lose,” turned out to be the ideal way to begin the day in good spirits. All the musicians on the stage were really having a good time, and easily transferred those feelings to the crowd. A mixture of different genres and a sound with no boundaries gave the impression of the musicians being truly free to experiment, in the proper Roadburn spirit. While during the performance the vocalists and various musicians kept alternating themselves, the gig ultimately culminated with all of them on stage at once, more than a dozen people cramming that space in the climax of a very unique – and fun – show.

Things quieted down significantly with artist in residence MIDWIFE and VYVA MELINKOLYA performing their collaboration, “Orbweaving,” at The Terminal next door. For those who missed the earlier gig, this must have felt like the perfect hangover music, a great way to gently ease into the second day of the festival with the dreamy soundscapes created by the two artists. The suffused smoke quietly shaping the atmosphere with the lights and the images running on the screen behind them really added an extra layer to the show. Without any rush, if not some slight disappointment at the long ice cream shop queue preventing us from having one on the way to 013, we arrived at the Next Stage for DE MANNEN BROEDERS a.k.a. Broeder Dieleman and Colin H. van Eeckhout (AMENRA). The two performed their debut “Sober Maal” in a folkish/religious and very sombre atmosphere, with an additional choir and the same theremin and piano player that accompanied Broeder Dieleman in his previous appearance in this very same room. There wasn’t much time to witness their work in full, given that MESSA was about to start playing on the main stage, but we would have at least seen more of one of them, in the form of CHVE, soon after (we missed instead the Broeder Dieleman solo performance at V39).

MESSA has grown into a force to be reckoned with, and showing their Roadburn fans their latest work, “The Spin,” they definitely proved themselves to be worthy of their success. The venue was very much full even for an early afternoon show, as the guys went through the new tracks and filled the air with quality riffs and their distinctive doom-y atmosphere. We spent most of the time enjoying the gig on the top balcony, where we could see the lights dancing and illuminating the audience all at the same time. The charisma of their vocalist and overall talent of the band was enough to just quietly watch and let the music speak for itself. As an Italian, I cannot hide a little bit of pride in seeing some compatriots getting the recognition they deserve. This was easily one of the personal favorites of the day, and “The Spin” has been spinning quite regularly in my playlist since then (pun intended).

Still in a good mood from the gig that just ended, we went back to find the vocalist of AMENRA now alone on the same stage where he was playing until half an hour earlier, now lighting some fires on the stage floor in his other vest as CHVE. Aside from the hurdy-gurdy and the mantle partially covering the artist, engulfed mostly in darkness with some dim spotlights and flames, it was like listening to some kind of bard performing by a campfire in the desert. This quiet and introspective set broke a bit the flow, and it was nice to be in a not (yet) too crowded space for once, so we decided to take a breather and skip both THE HIRS COLLECTIVE and the second ENVY set.

In fact, the urge to retreat from the bigger crowd led us to stay here around the Next Stage long enough to get a very nice spot for WARRINGTON RUNCORN NEW TOWN DEVELOPMENT PLAN‘s commissioned piece “Industrial Growth.” Gordon Chapman-Fox, the man behind the project, guided us through these visuals of decadence and unfulfilled promises of progress with his electronic experimentation, some people even dancing to it, representing the disillusionment of the UK’s industrialization and its impact on society in a cinematic way. Definitely something to think about beyond the music itself, and one of those shows that one could only see here at Roadburn, while many people were divided between PIGMY LUSH, DIS FIG, or at the secret OFFICER JONES AND HIS PATROL CAR PROBLEMS-show, if not queuing already to see Patrick Walker‘s 40 WATT SUN solo gig at Paradox (this year we didn’t even try to go to the latter venue, simply as there was so much to see everywhere at any given time. It was even difficult to consider any of the “off-road” gigs, despite The Little Devil offering some really nice ones, for example.

We returned briefly to the Main Stage for THE BODY‘s show (following the collaboration with DIS FIG the previous day), but we couldn’t really stay much as we had to grab a quick bite – in the form of bitterballen – before heading to BIG BRAVE‘s secret-not-so-secret show at the Skatepark. After some noisy shrieks and heavy distortions, it was actually a nice change of pace to fall back into the all-familiar sound of the Canadian band, a welcome recurring presence at the festival in the past few years. It was not the kind of “wild” skate hall show for sure, but instead a more relaxed and intimate setting in which the band could lay bare their emotion-filled music. The band has been proving itself as a quality live act, and it did so again today, with this being a nice little bonus on a very nice day so far. We later heard from Walter Hoeijmakers at the traditional Q&A session that the band had some free time in between their current tour and really wanted to visit the festival, so that’s how this show came to be.

On the way back from the Skatepark we dropped by The Engine Room to catch a glimpse of HUMAN IMPACT, being curious about this band featuring Chris Spencer of UNSANE, among others. Their live attitude provided the energetic impact that their noise rock combined with industrial sound and other, less harsh influences really needed to get the show going, and it would have been nice to be able to see more of that, if not that we had to hurry towards 013 again for CAVE IN. Just two years after their last appearance at the festival, they came back to playing “Jupiter” in full for the record’s 25th anniversary, something that clearly was long overdue for the fans of the band. However, as there was still quite a lot going on it felt like the audience was not as engaged as they should have been, or at least not nearly as excited as the last time the band visited Roadburn. After a few minutes we went to try to catch NEW AGE DOOM, performing with TUVABAND (Tuva Hellum Marschhäuser), that didn’t work out too well because the band had some technical issues that delayed their show just enough that we could barely catch one song, before heading to one of the shows we had most expectations on: GNOD and WHITE HILLS with their “Drop Out” collaboration having being re-issued just a month ago.

We have loved every time we got to catch GNOD live, and this time was no different, with the added treat of having the guys from WHITE HILLS jamming together in a show that was trippy and psychedelic as it should be. The hypnotizing space rock kept us glued to their show, the sound reverberating through The Terminal and melting together in what at times felt almost like a sort of trance. The heavy smoke and beautiful lighting did the rest to frame what was the top performance of the night for us. That, despite CHAT PILE having a secret show at the Skatepark at the same time. Trying to squeeze in everything from this collaborative performance, we almost were late for THOU, playing “Umbilical” on the main stage.

This is not to diminish the show as they never failed so far to meet the expectations, but admittedly it seems the big stage is not very well-suited for a band like THOU, which thrives from the raw energy and strict contact with its audience, although it was nice to see some guests appearances during the show, like the multi-talented Lane Shi (OTAY:ONII) and Michael Berdan (UNIFORM) – later apparently Silver Godling also joined the fray. However, having seen the band on the Next Stage on Wednesday and being almost certain to see them again later (even though in retrospect that didn’t work out, see the Sunday review), we went for SMOTE in the next room of 013. With their latest effort “A Grand Stream” out last year, the band showcased the new material engulfed in a deep red light, and the addition on stage of John Perry (GNOD, HOLY SCUM), Adam Sykes (PIGSx7), Lisa Ekelund (FLOWERS MUST DIE), and Ian Lynch (LANKUM, ONE LEG ONE EYE). They almost made us wish we had skipped directly from GNOD & WHITE HILLS to this, to give some continuity to that psychedelic sound, now turned more towards folk and drone, and so much more. It was really hard not to get caught up in the rhythm, not that we gave too much resistance, and we enjoyed most of the show from the balcony after we finished taking photos. We knew this would have been most likely a good show, but it actually exceeded our expectations, so much that we ditched everything else and stayed here until the end of the gig. Which, as far as we are concerned, could have lasted still another couple of hours, and we would have been very happy to keep going.

With the end of SMOTE came also the realization that we were already halfway through this year’s Roadburn. Time really does fly when you are too busy having fun and watching a variety of interesting shows during the day! With performances like those from GNOD and WHITE HILLS, SMOTE, MESSA, or even the opening gig of today as a collaborative effort between THROWING BRICKS and ONTAARD, we had once again our good fill of great and unique shows, and left pretty satisfied to recharge our batteries (literally and figuratively) at our accommodation. Weirdly enough, we didn’t even feel as tired as on the previous day. Maybe we are getting better at this pacing ourselves thing, or perhaps it was the excitement still pumping in our blood. Who knows! Check our photo gallery here…