Troy, Michigan's We Came As Romans became one of the defining metalcore acts of the early 2010s, blending electronic elements and soaring clean choruses with heavy breakdowns on albums like 'To Plant a Seed' and 'Understanding What We've Grown to Be.' The tragic death of vocalist Kyle Pavone in 2018 shook the metal community, but the band has continued to honor his legacy while pushing forward with new music.

Winston-Salem's We Follow the Earth formed in 2023, delivering sludge and doom metal that feels rooted in the Piedmont Triad's particular brand of Southern heaviness — unhurried, low, and immovable. Their name suggests reverence for something older and larger than the human scale, which matches a sonic approach built on patience and deliberate weight. Another entry in the long roll of North Carolina bands that understand how to let a riff breathe.

We the Kings formed in Bradenton in 2005 and became one of the bright, melodic faces of late-2000s pop punk. Built around Travis Clark's clear vocal style and an upbeat guitar-driven sound, the band broke through with its self-titled 2007 debut and the enduring single "Check Yes Juliet." Smile Kid continued the momentum with "Heaven Can Wait," "We'll Be a Dream," and "She Takes Me High," while Sunshine State of Mind, Somewhere Somehow, Strange Love, Six, and later releases leaned into pop polish, acoustic sentiment, and the band's Florida-rooted optimism. We the Kings fit punk scope through pop punk and emo-pop context, especially their early work and touring history alongside scene peers. They are not a heavy band, but their place in the pop-punk ecosystem is clear: brisk guitars, adolescent urgency, romantic choruses, and songs designed for communal singing. The band's strongest material works because it is open-hearted and immediate. Even when the production is glossy, the writing keeps the simple, kinetic lift that made the 2000s pop-punk scene so durable.

Pittsburgh's We the Unwilling have been playing metalcore since 2018, shaped by the rust-belt grit and working-class intensity the city stamps onto everything it produces. Their sound is rooted in the genre's twin commitments — heavy riffs and emotional candor — filtered through the Pittsburgh ethos of doing things the hard way without complaint. A band whose name captures something real about what it means to make uncompromising music in an overlooked city.

San Francisco's Weakling occupy a peculiar position in American black metal — despite forming in 2011 under the name of one of the genre's legendary one-album acts, they carry that city's long tradition of underground weirdness and uncompromising darkness. San Francisco has always hosted black metal that bends in unexpected directions, and Weakling operates in that lineage. Whatever their relationship to the original band's shadow, they carry the name as if they own it.

Denver's Weapönizer have been waging black/thrash war since 2011, bringing the classic Teutonic-style extremity of the form to a city whose altitude seems to sharpen everything into something more dangerous. The umlaut is earned: their music operates in the savage tradition of early Kreator and Sodom filtered through American blackened aggression. Relentless, deliberately raw, and built for maximum hostile impact.

Born Joseph Poole in Charlotte, North Carolina, Wednesday 13 built his career through successive horror-themed projects — Frankenstein Drag Queens from Planet 13 in the mid-1990s and the widely exposed Murderdolls, a collaboration with Slipknot drummer Joey Jordison — before launching his eponymous solo band in 2004. Drawing equally from Alice Cooper theatrics, glam metal, and death rock, the project debuted with Transylvania 90210: Songs of Death, Dying, and the Dead (2005) and has sustained a prolific output of horror-inflected heavy metal ever since. He remains one of the most consistent figures in the horror punk and dark metal crossover space.

Formed in Wilmington, North Carolina in 1998 by bassist and vocalist Dave "Dixie" Collins, a veteran of the sludge act Buzzoven, Weedeater channel the heaviest elements of Southern doom and noise rock into a characteristically filthy, low-register rumble. Their debut ...And Justice for Y'all (2001) and Sixteen Tons (2003) appeared on Berserker Records before the band joined Southern Lord for God Luck and Good Speed. Their most recent album, Goliathan (2015), continued the uncompromising approach that made them central figures in the North Carolina heavy underground.

Formed in DeKalb, Illinois in 2004, Weekend Nachos established themselves as one of the most uncompromising forces in American powerviolence, combining blast-beat ferocity with lurching sludge breakdowns and unflinching lyrical confrontation. After a debut full-length on Cowabunga Records, the band released four albums through Relapse Records — Unforgivable (2009), Worthless (2011), Still (2013), and the farewell Apology (2016) — before their 2017 retirement and eventual 2023 reunion. Their influence on the intersection of powerviolence and sludge has been substantial.