Cape Town winters can be brutal — cold, wet, and all too good at convincing you to stay home. But the lineup on 23 May made a persuasive counterargument: layer up, step out, feel something loud. From the moment you walked into District, there was a charge in the air — not just from the hum of amps warming up, but from the crowd itself. A room full of faces, both familiar and unfamiliar, pulled together by the gravitational force of live sound. It was intimate. It was electric. It mattered.
Madman Mayhem Vol. 2, put together by Foul Play and Planet Karavan, was a testament to how curation can shape a night — and this one was meticulously built for impact.
Betty’s Nuklear didn’t so much open the evening as detonate it. Their set had the twitchy adrenaline of a band trying to outrun their own songs — and mostly succeeding. Vocals were raw-edged and unfiltered, guitars sliced rather than shimmered, and the rhythm section landed like a brick through glass. It wasn’t refined, but refinement would’ve missed the point.
Crash & The Void provided a necessary shift. Brooding and sculptural, they approached heaviness like an art form: less about volume, more about tension. A band that knows silence is a weapon too, and uses it well.
The Man Motels followed with a set that felt like a controlled burn. Gritty, anthemic, and utterly locked in. Their bassist — all snarling charisma and kinetic limbs — might as well have been leading the charge. This is a band that doesn’t perform at you, they drag you into the pit with them.
Shadowclub closed with quiet confidence. No frills, no preamble — just songs honed sharp through repetition and time. Bluesy, lean, and all muscle. Their set didn’t explode — it smouldered, and the room followed every move.
In the end, Madman Mayhem Vol 2 didn’t aim for perfection. It aimed for connection. And it hit hard.
