BAND OF THE DAY: EMBERS

Forming in 2004 out of the ashes of an older punk band, Oakland California's Embers are most definitely part of the same pantheon of crust-etched extremity as the celebrated Neurosis and less celebrated but no less awesome Benümb, and more recent and feverishly received underground outfits like Skaven and Stormcrow. That said, it's easy to romanticise Oakland if you've no contact with the place beyond vinyl sleeves, draw yourself an internal picture of endless squats and crust gigs and fanzine symposiums. Luckily Embers go so way to helping preserve that fantasy. That's nice of them isn't it?

Two of the band are active in squatter rights, guitarist Steven DeCaprio appearing in the movie 'Shelter: A Squatumentary', and previous band Lesser of Two, which featured two of the three founding members of Ember, were much celebrated for their DIY ethic and anarchist politics. Obviously blackened crust, pitched somewhere between Bathory's howling at snow-capped mountains, Tragedy's bloody-nosed spite and Anti-Sect's rummaging through the skip behind Morrisons, is the official soundtrack to giving a shit, and it's packed tightly like rolled up astroturf into the slowburning, keyboard-laden menace of most recent album, 'Shadows'.

Available for free download, their 2007 EP 'Memoria In Aeterna' and their side of the split 12" with Portland's Book of Belial, 'Wrath', can also be picked up for naught from their bandcamp.

That's your weekend sorted, now play them loud and run into a forest.

BAND OF THE DAY: ABSERDO

Considering how much impact thrash had on extreme metal and grindcore, you don't hear so much of that toxic holocaust in many of today's neo-riff kings, merrily soloing away in their Bermuda shorts. It's like the '80s are being remembered solely as an endless parade of different Transformers and poorly rendered Saturday morning cartoons, and not the looming threat of the Cold War turning red hot, police brutality, political corruption, or race riots in the crowded inner city.

Glorified pop-punk masquerading as thrash metal does all bands who operated in that decade a great disservice, pissing on the legacy they've convinced themselves they're honouring through their gormless, up tempo squawking.

Philadelphia's fresh faced Abserdo sprang from the ground in 2008, combining razor edged thrash, punk and grindcore into a true crossover medley of anarchic, uncoordinated fury. Coupled with sheer, forehead mashing irreverence on their slim discography, the highlight of which is this year's 'Slim Baby Eagle's Coop' 7" which brings the grinding menace to the fore, like a pitbull straining at the leash of snarling, spat, punked up thrash vocals.

It's that same, caustic balance perfected by DRI, SOD, The Accused, Wehrmacht and a drearily decreasing number since. Crossover thrash can be pretty stupid, and it can be genuine and relevant. Rare are the band who can still manage bothy.

BAND OF THE DAY: STIGMA

Not that Stigma, or that Stigma, Croatia's Stigma formed in 2007 in Zagreb a whole year before Agnostic Front guitarist Vinny Stigma decided he had more chug than he could fit into an AF album and couldn't think of a name for his solo project.

Following on from a demo and a promo CD, 'Nova Doza Mržnje' (new dose of hate, thanks Google Translate, your cheque is the post) is the band's first full-length (download here with their blessing), a riotous battery of classic, metallic d-beat - delivered with the venomous pugilism of Ratos de Porão. Extremely rough around the edges, Stigma aren't exactly blazing new trails for classic crust, instead focusing on doing what they want with all the requisite power and conviction to make it worthwhile.

There's no excuse for a Discharge cover though, that really is an imaginative nadir.

REVIEW: WEEKEND NACHOS 'WORTHLESS' (RELAPSE)

Neatly sidestepping any meaningless bullshit about grindcore being a state of mind or way of life, just how much do Chicago's Weekend Nachos get to ramp up the NYHC chug and floorpunching groove before people start querying whether or not they're actually a grindcore band anymore?

'Worthless', the band's third full-length, and what feels like their eighth in 18 months, continues to ramp up the mileage between where the band are now, and their powerviolence origins, which remain forever with them like a novelty license plate holder. Rage is foremost, and genre comes second - 'Worthless' rushes between pounding, blasting grind abuse and slower, chugging, sludge refraction periods where the sweat rises from their once juddering forms as steam. Teeth grinding moments of d-beat, breathless '90s metalcore semi-spoken bits, and lapses into the harsh, semi-industrial ambience of 'Need to Control', act as a reminder that for all the shift in emphasis towards chest-pounding, Terror-style riff battery, the pool of constituent parts remains far broader and deeper than most orthodox grind units, currently achieving similar levels of hype through more blinkered ambition.

This is the first record where someone fairly aware, musically speaking, could stumble across Weekend Nachos as they go about their business, randomly ordering coloured vinyl on RevHQ or whatever, and treat them as 'just' a hardcore band - the closing passage on 'The Fine Art of Bullshit' is a set of gang vocals away from having gold teeth and STAY DOWN tattooed on its knuckles.

But is there really anything wrong with that?

INTERVIEW: WELCOME TO THE ATOMCK AGE

If you're into grind in the United Kingdom, shit well and truly sucks - this may the patch of dirt that gave the world Napalm Death, Extreme Noise Terror and Carcass, but everyone forgets how little of a shit were given about those bands right back at the beginning (and right at the end in Carcass' case). Just a handful of noisy punks screaming in the dark.

"All of the UK is hostile to grind," agrees Luke, guitarist and general noisemonger for Newport, South Wales based grindcore extremists Atomck, "perhaps because it's seen as badly-played death metal: an attitude that exists 'cos morons don't know shit.Throughout our lifespan we have been predominantly booked to play with metal bands of some description, and more often than not as the opening act despite orders of magnitude more busy-ness than many of the other groups in our area. Even though recently there has been something of a resurgance in interest in grind and powerviolence it seems mostly in internetland and not reflected in any actual scene, pertinent examples of this would be us trying to garner support slots for bands like Wormrot and Soilent Green; the promoters tell you to get lost if they are even bothered to reply.

"It's like we are not taken at all seriously as a band other than perhaps offering a show opening distraction for no-one to jeer at, and it can be pretty frustrating," he says, adding, "The same must be said of approaching the national extreme music press hahaha."

Hyperspeed, hypertechnical and hyperirritating - Bristol's Atmock rattle the eardrums and liquefy the soft matter that you use for all your complicated sums and overseas dialling. Forming as a drum machine duo in the unashamed mould of Agoraphobic Nosebleed, they built a reputation for furious noise, and gained a drummer off the back of it.

"We'd been used to operating drum machines and the like in our previous bands,"recalls Luke, "so naturally we went about writing ANb style material using that technology, we thought it would be just a fun project but it gradually snowballed into us playing gigs with the programmed drum tracks on an iPod.

"Even though I stand by the performances and material from that period as things went on our music evolved away from the ridiculous 6666666bpm violence towards 'properly written songs'. At the end of 2009 the drum machine lineup supported Insect Warfare in Cardiff and afterwards this Czech guy who was in the audience appraoched us and offered to play 'real drums'. With Marzena in the mix Atomck were fully reborn as a real band and not some stupid rubbish, much to everyone's indifference."

With indifference reigning supreme at home, they've opted to hit Europe instead - riding Continental grindcore enthusiasm like a Luck Dragon alongside the Atrocity Exhibit, all the way through England and into France, Germany, Poland and the Czech Republic - where they'll be returning later in the year for the the fist-in-mouth awesome of Obscene Extreme ("I am totally looking forward to it, as well as the community aspects and opporunities to watch the the other much better bands without having to pay for it, almost like we have been booked to support Rotten Sound which wouldn't happen unless they were playing my bathroom.") on July 15-17.

"The relative ease in which this year's euro tour has come together demonstrates to me that the interest for this kind of music is over there," he asserts. "Czech especially has an amazing music scene that is less concerned with genre tribal lines and more into getting together and rocking that shit. Touring Europe is an achievment for an underground band with precisely no support, and against my better knowledge I hope it will make things somewhat easier back here afterwards. I think audiences in the UK are increasingly lazy and uniterested in anything other than hearing their pals play Pantera covers, which is fair enough because those bands can play like three guitar solos and that, but don't complain when that's ALL you got."

Yeah, so either go see them, or shut up. On hand will be an extremely limited split cassette, shared with their tour buddies, but if you let that fly from your hands like a bar of soap - there's more to come:

"We have just recorded an EP for J Randall's Grindcore Karaoke net label, that should be mixed and mastered soon and good to go, we will certainly be open to offers regards putting that on vinyl WINK WINK WORLD, YEAH?

"After that we are booked into the rather excellent Rapture Audio in August, to record a big sexy LP that we will susequently take months to find interest in putting out. We are road-testing half the material for this LP on our prementioned tour, so hopefully that'll be six songs we can actually play by August. We will probably just make a load of shit up for the rest yeah, cos it's not proper music anyway is it?"

Atomçk - Violence Hero from Grarg on Vimeo.

BAND OF THE DAY: VILE INTENT

Pop the mouthguard in and prepare to gnash your teeth like it's your first anal encounter, Montreal's Vile Intent are their moniker made sonic - feedback-driven, epileptic powerviolence, thrashing like an a head wound out of the haunted forest of menacing Infest-style chug.

Classic, first wave PV influences and youthful fury incarnate, Vile Intent formed in 2008 and describe themselves as "Screwdriver in the urethra of Montreal hardcore". Their first non-tape, 2010's 'Shadow of the Skull' 7" (on Choking Hazard) is an portrait of real evil in just over ten minutes, like waking up, hungover and clutching your own limp member amid the family you killed - which bodes well for their new 7", 'Regression to the Mean', which is up for pre-order here.

BAND OF THE DAY: ABSOLUTIST

Maybe the smell of refined crude oil drifting over from the North Sea rigs is making the air especially dense and leaden, but Aberdeen based (although two of them are from Ireland, which sort of explains their presence on an "all-Irish" mixtape) trinity Absolutist are cloaked in a sense of thick, tarry menace.

Formed in 2010, they've already toured fairly extensively and released one EP, the foreboding 'Blasphemy' (which you can download for free here). All of which indicates a certain cold, hard vision driving them forward in their blend of atmospheric, d-beat-heavy crust, which brings the pounding apocalyptic hardcore of the latter to the fore, instead of swaddling in the syrup of the former, as is currently in vogue.

There's an album due in the summer (so, soon) and a US tour planned in 2012.

REVIEW: MARUTA 'FORWARD INTO REGRESSION' (WILLOWTIP)

There're few trickier propositions for grindcore fans - hyper-critical and aware creatures, largely - than California's young hellions Maruta. They sound good, perhaps too good, and look good, perhaps too good in their boxfresh Assück t-shirts, but they're kids who came seemingly from nowhere with their 'In Narcosis' debut, which was released via tech-death tastemakers Willowtip, and then contributed a drummer to Trivium - it's always going to be a cause for suspicion. Activate the Google machine and you'll probably find someone on a forum describing them as a boyband, like the grindcore Arsis - seriously, who on earth is going to construct a grindcore band as a unit shifter? They'd have been better off all migrating into the ranks of Trivium and hope nobody noticed all the extra members amid the pyro.

What Maruta actually are, is serviceable. Lurking in the same (somewhat uninspiring) territory as Misery Index, where more of their fanbase will be death metallers who haven't listened to a grindcore band since Nasum than, say, crusties with From Ashes Rise tattooes, 'Forward Into Regression' is a rapid-fire salvo, breaking the unrelenting tech-deathgrind firestorm with moments of Atheist-approved noodle. Satisfying on a purely musical level, it's impossible to not tap along to the intoxicating swirl of riffage or walk that little bit faster with the record blasting from the earbuds, but once silence reigns you're left with little to really sink your claws into, nothing to really engage with, no debates to be had, or opinions to be formed. Listening isn't an entirely passive experience, like much of technical metal - a balletic display of finger acrobatics for you to politely coo along to. It's just as dizzying in its rush of blood to the head and sudden surge of adrenaline as Magrudergrind, but once the music stops, the exhilaration fades fast.

If tech metal is at all onanistic, this is the proof that it leads to premature ejaculation.

REVIEW: HARMS WAY 'BREEDING GROUND' (CLOSED CASKET)

Briefly subjected to a flurry of modest hype in that golden age before 'vicious hardcore' became a thing that yesterday's Comeback Kid fans were all into, will Chicago's bludgeoning Harms Way get the sort of broader reception now being afforded bands like Trap Them, Nails, Magrudergrind etc, or was their load blown far too early?

We'll see, not right now - but in a few months when 'Isolation', the full-length follow up to 2010's 'No Gods No Masters' (seriously, how can you get away with that?), finally arrives to either apocalyptic trumpeting archangels or the sad, strangled honk of a clown on a unicycle. En route, though, there's 'Breeding Ground', the one-track tour 7" (on Closed Casket Activities, but also now up for download courtesy of the band themselves).

Oddly, grindcore reference points are forever quoted in reference to Harms Way - in truth, there's the ominous  discordant intros of early Carcass, and the sort of crushing, crust-infused heaviness of Trap Them, Infest or Pulling Teeth, but the 'Breeding Ground' is as unmistakable hardcore as someone in sportswear doing a scissor kick while a roomful of sexually repressed, judgemental hypocrites all bellow words like 'together' and 'unity'. Pummelling and groove heavy, skirting the boarders of sludge like a more purposeful, though equally muscular Weekend Nachos, 'Breeding Ground' is a good solid dose of mirror-punching metallic hardcore.

BAND OF THE DAY: GRIDE

The history of the Czech Republic's Gride is almost typical of Czech grind as a whole, of its stalwart ethics, sense of purpose and its triumph over day to day shitfuckery. Almost, but not quite. While others endlessly pillage the dusty old manuscriptsof powerviolence orthodoxy, Gride have taken an odder, but no less furious path - making them fellow travellers with the likes of Total Fucking Destruction, Japanische Kampfhörspiele, Drugs Of Faith and anyone else in an Extreme Noise Terror patch jacket who suddenly had a moment of awakening three bong hits into their first Jesus Lizard album.

Since forming in 1996, the five-piece have weathered the typical storm of line-up changes and fuck-ups, evolving from a traditional crust-grind assault to something more awkward and dissonant. Incorporating elements of off-kilter alternative rock on their 2008 full-length 'Horizont Udalosti' – like Helmet and Fugazi blended at dizzying speeds with a handful of broken glass – they've remained fiercely tied to the scene that spawned them, releasing recent splits with the utterly righteous Lycanthropy and the now defunct post-hardcore unit Thema 11, tearing apart stages in fields and in squats.

Catch them at this year's Obscene Extreme.

WE ACCIDENTALLY SPONSORED A TOUR

Go to one of these shows or get smileybombed

It's all happened perfectly organically - I think Rich Hoak of Total Fucking Destruction/Brutal Truth is an amazing musician, performer and human being, and that Luc Favie of Doomstar Bookings (and FUBAR) is one of a handful of truly inspirational people who gives absolutely everything to make the music he loves happen. Obviously you know all that, you buy their records and go to their shows, so you scarcely need me to reiterate it.

And amazingly, they've put our logo on this tour poster. That's the kind of love that you just don't get in flakier scenes, grindcore is built on passion and hunger, and it rewards it too.

So make sure you get to one of these dates if you can.

BAND OF THE DAY: COMBAT NOISE

Cuba may be a lovely enough place in which to sip pineapple-punctuated piña coladas by the pool, but to live there it's a nightmare - your entire country is basically a theme park for rich Yanquis and Euros, who have exclusive access to all the best beaches, luxury hotels, fashionable bars and classy restaurants, while much of the population struggles to obtain a decent standard of living.

Forming in 1996, the vicious death/grind five-piece Combat Noise railed against their surroundings with three albums since 2004, numerous demos and international compilation appearences – all single mindedly focused on modern warfare. It may be a patronising comparison, but Combat Noise are following in the career path of fellow Latin Americans Sepultura, striving and striving to become a professional entity at home first, and then in the Central/South American sphere, by the time they really hit Europe and North America, they're going to unleash absolute hell.

With the uncompromising mission statement of Bolt Thrower, armed with the weaponised, fist-clenching fury of 'Harmony Corruption'-era Napalm Death and a touch of Swedish death metal on their 2010 album 'Frontline Offensive Unit', and renown at home for their unrelenting live shows, Combat Noise are going to blow the shellshocked punks of Obscene Extreme 2011 right back to their foxholes.

BAND OF THE DAY: LIFE ERASED

Life Erased are pure bottle-smashing thuggery, there's is rumbling punkish grindcore from a time before fingertips when we all just lashed at our instruments with cumbersome stumps. Forming in Dallas, Texas in 2009, Life Erased sound like OC punk monsters Phobia, by way of crusty metalpunk Darkthrone and the primordial anquish of Obituary on their six-track, free to download EP 'Atop The Mountain of Your Dead Selves', with the occasional spot of classic rock noodling.

Since their first show in September 2009, Life Erased have played with the highly respected likes of Hatred Surge, Hellbastard, Book of Black Earth, Phobia, Javelina and Kill the Client, and they also help run a local DIY space and generally contribute to the scene beyond merely singing about it.

Needless to say, this is heavily endorsed. Go listen.

LIVE REVIEW: NEUROTIC DEATHFEST DAY 2

As if personally responding to yesterday's scheduling frustration, Neurotic organiser Ruud personally hands me an updated running order – I choose to believe that he does this for absolutely everyone. Those are the kind of mad skills you need to run Europe's best death metal weekend.

In the Small Hall, the absolutely stellar goregrind clowns Rompeprop unleash a frenzy of their tightly honed, downright ludicrous swamp gurgle. It's completely baffling that you don't see this band on Cannibal Corpse style tour packages, but that makes their live performances all the more special – if you want to see them on the massive stage they deserve, go to Obscene Extreme and prepare yourself for blood and nudity.

The heat is unbearable in this little sweatbox, and the spectacle of Decapitated on the Main Stage croons to me like a mermaid. Missing a bassist (which in the grand scheme of their history is the least of their problems), they put in a hammering performance that eventually wins over even the extreme cynics. Vocalist Rafał Piotrowsk has delusions of being asked to join Chimaira or Shadows Fall with all his nu-metal dances and hideous rasping mosh calls, but they're undeniably strong musicians playing some incredible material, and if the best they do is simply not fucking that up, that's a good day.

http://www.metalchroniques.fr

Back in the sweatbox and Cripple Bastards don't have the audience share they deserve, but there's a dedicated core of Italians, grinders and bastards to make sure they at least get the feverish response they're entitled to. The sound is crisp perfection, bringing to the fore the different strands of influence lurking in their strings – rancid Italian hardcore, even a spot of NYHC's robust pugilism, and the kinetic frenzy of grindcore. The red lights enhancing Giulio's near demonic possession as he holds the mic aloft like a dagger.

At the risk of being one of those cunts who prevaricates about a band's career in a review like they have the answers to everything, it's the Neurotic demographic that will make or break Cripple Bastards time on Relapse Records, the meatheaded Misery Index fans who want brutal beer-swigging music. Hopefully this time next year, the room will be packed, because the alternative is just to dreary to bear.

Swedish oddballs Birdflesh grind hard and fast - clad in what look like rubber masks and dresses, they send the temperature soaring to the point where lesser humans (me) are driven into the rafters of the main stage to await Obituary.

There's a comforting predictability Obituary, all the tunes are wheeled out and Ralph Santolla jabs his foot at the whammy and comes forward for his regulation solo - it's like clockwork. There may be few surprises but there's no shortage of thrills as Donald Tardy grabs the drums and joins his brother, lending a tribal edge to the percussion reminiscent of Sepultura before their descent into the nu-metal era groove metal doldrums alongside Biohazard.

And then he does it again, and again, and again, and we keep smiling but the super special new thing is becoming less super special and new with each battery.

http://www.metalchroniques.fr

Having been forced to cancel their flight due to a tornado, old school gorelords Necrophagia are in the unapologetically sucky position of having a set that starts dead on Obituary's finish and ends dead on Autopsy's start. The Midi Theatre being a five minute walk away, the additional minutes soon rack up when you factor in the crowds. Being as Necrophagia fans are obviously also Obituary fans, and Necrophagia fans are obviously also Autopsy fans, cracking this conundrum is up there with the Lament Configuration.

There's the tense slow building horror score opener, and then Necrophagia take to the stage in a tumultous rainfall of razor sharp riffs. Rarely do they get recognition for musicianship - hopefully new album 'Deathtrip 69' will change all that, because it already carries itself like the death metal album of the year, even in the face of forthcoming Morbid Angel and Autopsy. What gives Necrophagia such strength is the that although they're painfully contrived, in terms of a concious construction, it's totally uncontrived in terms of any cynical agenda - Killyjoy, looking like the cannibal carnie from a Coffin Joe flick, sticks his tongue down the throat of a dismembered head and raps two bones together like they're woodwind, for the simple reason that he thinks that's cool. You might think that's cheesy, crass or just downright laughable, but the believe it - and in spite of you, it grants them incredible, gleeful potency.

And so onto Autopsy, the last piece in a triptych of old school bludgeoning evil, and it's actually kinda boring. The sound is significantly quieter than it was for Obituary, and despite the clear, palpable enthusiasm of Chris Reifert - there's not a whole lot to look at, and the crowd is unresponsive and thinning gradually. Whether made up of people who don't really care about Autopsy, but just feel as they should watch them for history's sake. As blasphemous as this sounds, perhaps Obituary should have headlined - as festival closers go, they bring the party, the headbanging cast iron tunes. But caught between downplaying a band who haven't been in the Netherlands for 20-odd years, and an over-exposed dead-cert like the constantly touring Obituary, Neurotic Deathfest doesn't go out fighting, screaming and voiding fluids of all brands, it simply drifts home and falls asleep.

Which is fine, sleep's a good thing.

LIVE REVIEW: NEUROTIC DEATHFEST DAY 1

I'm a traitor, and this is probably why Winterfylleth and all the other proud patriots don't like me. Just when I should be settling down to my Daily Express-approved street party in honour of the nuptials of our Greco-German Royal Family, I'm in the Netherlands. It's the day before Queen's Day, Koninginnedag, and everyone is in the streets, knocking back Belgian beers in orange feather boas to pumping '90s Eurodance – the Venga Bus is coming once every fifteen minutes from 2pm through to 3am, so don't worry if you miss one.

http://metalchroniques.fr

Just up the street is the 013, where Neurotic Deathfest is well underway, and according to the schedule Exhumed are playing. One of the undisputed selling points, the return of the Carcass-flavoured deathgrinders filled a Carcass shaped hole in my life when Jeff Walker decided to be a dick (bro totally blanked me at Hole In The Sky, the swansong to my fanboy enthusiasm for even 'Swansong'). They're not playing though, some middle-of-the-road slam merchants are. “Please refer to the various TV screens at the 013 venue” advises the programme sagely. According to said screens, Cripple Bastards are on now and that's worth lining up like convicts at the slops queue for – within the heatbox of the Small Hall however, are another middle-of-the-road slam band, this one half the age of the first one. They've got American accents, but all that means is they could be from Belgium – everyone now sounds like the idiot in the Global Village.

Apparently Master totally kill it, with a sort of volcanic rumble that causes island nations to stark sacrificing their first born – but I was totally sulking by then. Winded by my early disappointment at Neurotic Deathfest I'd retreated to the Orange-clad disco heaven of the Koninginnedag celebrations for one of those horrible Mexican-style Mojito beers that Germans imagine Mexicans must drink.

http://metalchroniques.fr

Over in the Midi Theatre (showing the spectacular Bad Girls musical soon!), the screens are showing Washington, DC grindcore whirlwind Magrudergrind started an hour ago – but thankfully that's a lie. It's insane watching them on a stage that dwarfs even the one at Bloodshed, but here they are – occupying a space probably reserved for Hatebreed, and filling it with an impassioned flurry of mosh-heavy, star-jump grind. Apparently they've popped over for two shows in Europe and then back home, which almost excuses him saying “Danke schone” after one of the songs as some sort of disorientated, jet-lagged brainfart.

Watching Hail of Bullets in the Netherlands is probably akin to seeing Hate in Poland – mercilessly mediocre, on record they deliver solid, if stodgy, death metal thrills. Live though, surrounded by the national equivalent of a home crowd, they seem titanic, utterly enthralling and absolutely mighty in their primordial, warlike death metal rumble.

Over on the Main Stage, the tribes gather for At the Gates. People who think melodic death metal is 'gay' lose their shit in a big way for the progenitors of all that they believe is rotten about the genre (people who still bang on about metalcore being 'gay' are going to lose their minds when they finally discover deathcore). The band are tight and the tunes come thick and fast, but compared to the first wave of reunion shows, it's starting to feel ritualised – that spark that made them At the Gates, as opposed to a bunch of old dudes who used to be in At the Gates playing At the Gates songs – which was the domineering theme of Carcass' piss-poor efforts.

Those dreary depths feel a long way off when Tompa and company are right in front of your face, begging you to shamelessly scream along to one of the bands that got you into extreme metal in the first place, with every single guitar flourish. Come on, you know the words...

Time to catch the Venga Bus.