The Barbarians of California goes nuclear in Nashville

A couple of months ago, I was scrolling through Instagram stories when one of my friends (who also happens to be a music journalist) posted about a new band I’d never heard of before. The band was called The Barbarians of California and the song was “Bomb to a Knife Fight”.

My first thought was that this band absolutely rocks and the song is incredibly catchy.

It was refreshing and different in a way I wasn’t used to hearing. Most metal these days seems washed down with a ton of screaming and typical breakdowns, but this had a groove that was unmistakeable. The more I listened, the more I recognized something I hadn’t noticed at first — the unmistakable voice of Aaron Bruno of AWOLNATION. I thought to myself, there’s no way Aaron started a heavy metal band… or did he? A quick Google search confirmed it was, in fact, his band, and the deeper I dug into their music, the more obsessed I became. So, when I found out they were headlining The Basement East, I just had to be there.

There are certain times when side-project supergroups just don’t have the same power or energy as the original bands; Barbarians of California go against the grain of everything I’d previously believed about artists who start side projects.

This band, and this show, was by far the best I’ve seen this year.

Every single song hit like a punch in the face. Every song had the crowd jumping and Aaron’s energy as a frontman was off the charts. It was like sweet, beautiful, heavy metal magic. I haven’t seen a heavy metal show this good in a very long time; every song was an absolute banger. For a band playing their first headlining show outside of their home state in Nashville, things went off like a nuclear bomb… A megaton nuclear bomb. 

If you haven’t heard Barbarians of California yet, a great place to start is their most recent album. A couple of my favorite tracks are “Modern Fashion” and “Earthquake”. I highly recommend checking this band out as soon as you can, especially if you’re in the mood for a night of jumping, head-banging, energy-releasing fun.

Photography by Derek Jones

Share this article

or