Out of South Jersey since 1987, Macabre are death metal veterans who've spent decades refining a punishing, unrelenting approach to extreme heaviness. Their long tenure speaks to a genuine commitment to the craft that few bands from that era still maintain.

Ripping Death Metal from Fort Worth.

Everett's Mace fuse the pit-ready aggression of crossover thrash with classic metal riffing, coming in fast and low with every track. Since 2017 they've been a reliable dose of no-pretense, high-velocity heaviness from the Pacific Northwest.

Oakland's Machine Head have been a pillar of heavy metal since Robb Flynn founded the band in 1991, with their debut 'Burn My Eyes' becoming a groove metal landmark. Their 2007 masterpiece 'The Blackening' marked a dramatic creative peak that earned universal acclaim, and through lineup changes and stylistic shifts, Flynn's unrelenting vision has kept Machine Head a vital and confrontational force in metal for over three decades.

Machine Heed bring a riff-heavy approach to modern metal that draws from the groove and thrash traditions of their namesake's sonic territory. The band delivers crushing live performances built on tight, aggressive instrumentation and a no-frills attitude toward heavy music.

Richmond's Mack Thompson operates at the intersection of neoclassical technique and progressive metal ambition, threading intricate shred passages through experimental song structures. The project has evolved steadily since 2018 from experimental rock foundations into something bracingly difficult to categorize.

Mad Caddies are a Solvang, California ska punk band whose music stretches the form with reggae, dixieland jazz, Latin rhythms, punk rock, pop hooks, and occasional sea-shanty eccentricity. Formed in 1995, the group became one of Fat Wreck Chords' most distinctive ska-adjacent acts, releasing albums such as Quality Soft Core, Duck and Cover, Rock the Plank, Just One More, Keep It Going, Dirty Rice, Punk Rocksteady, and later work. Mad Caddies fit accepted scope through ska punk, punk rock, and pop punk, even when their arrangements wander into styles far outside standard punk vocabulary. Chuck Robertson's vocals give the songs a relaxed but expressive center, while horns, upstroke guitar, and quick rhythm changes make the music feel constantly in motion. The band can be rowdy, romantic, funny, melancholy, and musically playful, sometimes within the same album. Their importance lies in refusing to reduce ska punk to a single tempo or joke. Mad Caddies treat it as a flexible platform for touring-band craft, pulling from barroom swing, Caribbean rhythm, and California punk without losing their own personality. Their best songs feel loose on the surface but carefully arranged underneath.

Mad With Power Fest is Madison, Wisconsin's premier annual power metal and melodic metal celebration, created by the band Lords of the Trident. Since its 2017 debut, the festival has grown into North America's largest dedicated power metal gathering, uniquely combining heavy metal with arcade games and mead. The event consistently showcases rising and mid-tier power metal acts alongside international headliners in a setting that embraces the genre's inherent sense of fun.

New York hardcore institution Madball have been one of the genre's most enduring forces since Freddy Cricien first took the stage as a child at CBGB with his brother Roger Miret's band Agnostic Front. Emerging from the legendary NYHC scene of the late 1980s, Madball's sound is built on tough, groove-laden riffs, gang vocals, and an unwavering street-level authenticity. Albums like 'Set It Off' and 'Demonstrating My Style' defined the blueprint for tough-guy hardcore that countless bands have followed since.