RPM Fest: Heavy Music Campout in Western Mass
10 minutes ago
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Millers Falls Rod & Gun Club
Montague, MA
September 4-6, 2026
I went back to my home state of Massachusetts, that I’d left for San Francisco back at the end of the 1980s, for a serious week of heavy metal.
The start of Megadeth’s farewell tour, supporting Iron Maiden, was somehow playing 2 nights in LA but zero in the Bay Area. So I decided to catch the tour in Boston, to see old friends and avoid So Cal.
We started the week with the magical RPM Fest, three days of metal, stoner rock, and camping out in Western Massachusetts (the countryside), a little over 2 hours drive west of Boston. This festival in the woods takes place at a Rod & Gun Club that has a nice property, and was celebrating its 10th anniversary.
I’ve never been a festival guy, I don’t like large venues like Shoreline and skip the Golden Gate Park music crowds. But RPM Fest was an awesome scene, not crowded, fun people, and camping was included.
Being back in the Massachusetts woods made me feel right at home, and seeing 9 of 11 bands the first day (!) got me in the metal mood for sure. This was one of the most fun metal shows I’ve seen (and I see a lot, see this site as proof).
The festival was way more mellow and family friendly than I expected, with lots of kids but lacking the uncomfortable crowds I’d expected. Plus I miss the Masshole attitude, people giving you shit just to mess with you in a friendly way, without it being threatening like it could be in places where shit talking isn’t part of the culture.
I’m gonna write about a lot of the bands, but also: I was on vacation, no way I’m coming close to even mentioning every band. With a main stage and a second stage under a tent (more clublike) a few hundred yards away, the music was non-stop going from one to the other.
The Outlourdes were the first band of the fest, kicking it off at 3 pm on the Friday of Labor Day weekend. A stoner rock 3 piece, with a female singer handling the drums. She had a great deep and angry growl, and lyrics with a message. Though when someone filled in on drums so she could be up front (and in the pit) for a final punk song, I thought they were even better.
Pegzilla was a heavy rock trio from Los Angeles with a strong message of fighting the patriarchy and female power “They’re taking our power, they're —ing our pride! If I give you a baby, will you keep it alive?” Pretty great set.
Antagonizor was hands down our favorite band of the first day, a heavier (and tighter, though that's not so hard to do) band that reminded me of Motley Crue’s first record Too Fast for Love. The singer guitarist was full of energy and bravado, thrusting her hips while playing, calling out people, great stage persona.
Her top notch between song banter included whipping the drummer’s cymbals and threatening to whip the crowd. “You're going to scream the entire time I tune my guitar, if you don't I'll come down there and whip you!” Is that a threat? What if we want that?
Antagonizor was a very fun band, fantastic name, great set. I convinced my friend to buy their t-shirt, which featured an image of Baphomet with menstrual blood running down her legs.
I’m not sure where we got off the female empowerment train onto more traditional male stoner and doom metal, but things did shift toward the end of the first day.
Khemmis was one of the bands on my list to see, and they did not disappoint. Fantastic set of epic metal with soaring vocals that could not even be tamed by the frontman’s mullet. I have a couple of their records that get regular spins on the turntable, but I’d never seen them live. Probably the most polished band of the day. I won’t miss them the next time they come through the Bay for sure.
Dopethrone reminded me of some great Bongzilla remixed, hammering bass tone, ok vocals that sometimes experienced technical difficulties. Pretty good, would be great in a small club.
Day 1’s headliner was Monolord from Sweden. I hadn’t heard them before, they reminded me of a fusion of The Sword and Khemmis. Really good sound, and a bass player who fully rocked out through the performance.
Though the last couple bands were not as entertaining to us drunken old men as the afternoon's lessons in female power.
The party continued long after the bands were done for the day, I vaguely remember something about a drag show of forest witches. And the Rod & Gun club members kept slinging cheap beer and whiskey at their bar. Good times.
RPM Fest Day 2
We got a much later start on day 2 due to night of partying, and the 17 bands kicked off at noon, so the second day’s ratio of bands we caught was much lower than 80% we saw on day 1.
Western Massacre is a fantastic name for a Western Mass heavy band, though I don’t think people would get it elsewhere. They were good, one of several Deathcore bands that day playing a style that I can’t quite wrap my musical head around.
Good music, I guess after growing up on Slapshot and other Boston hardcore, Deathcore confuses me since I’m expecting simple punk riffs (“three cords and the truth” as the famous country saying goes), not metal complexities. I did buy a Western Massacre t-shirt after getting soaked by the rain later that afternoon though. 413 (area code) represent! That will be excellently confusing back in the 415.
Graveripper from Indianapolis has kind of a generic metal name so I wasn’t sure if I had seen them before. They turned out to be a killer thrash metal 3 piece, a band I will certainly be following on Bandcamp and paying attention to. Closer to the old school extreme metal I live for than most of the bands of the fest to that point.
Castle from our hometown of San Francisco rocked the stage next with their brand of stoner doom. Pretty good set but the rain picked up as soon as they started, and we got soaked to the skin watching them.
Half the crowd ran for cover, but the band was visibly and pleasantly surprised (being from the desert land of California) that the other half of the crowd stayed in the pouring rain. It was warm, but man it rained. Welcome home to Massachusetts, there’s a reason everything is green.
Dysentery was a decent and aggro death metal band, a little too much cookie monster vocals for me but love me some death metal and they delivered. Leather Lung and Acid Witch I caught parts of, perhaps there was too much afternoon whiskey as it all blends together (and I had seen Acid Witch before).
The Saturday night headliner was High on Fire, so great as always, Matt Pike enjoying a couple of cigarettes on the outdoor stage. I’ve seen them many times over the years, most recently last year in San Jose, and they always put on a good show.
I went back to the tent, miraculously dry inside. The woods were full of the calls of two different frogs, one a constant loud drone in the background and the other kind of quacking like a duck. Perfect bedtime music for my ringing ears. Then the rain picked up and it was pouring all night, pounding on the tent as I passed out.
RPM Fest Day 3
As an old dude, I was surprised to be up for a third day in a row of drinking and metal, but RPM Fest had me going, and being back in the Massachusetts woods of my childhood gave me energy I guess.
There was some rain early but it cleared up. A bunch of tents left, some people cleared out, but Sunday is great when you have Labor day off, so there was still a decent crowd.
I caught the end of Street Trash, dirty angry punk rock with some great stickers and offensive buttons I came across later.
I had always wanted to see Phantom after receiving one of their records from a friend, who saw them in their hometown of Guadalajara, Mexico. So great and so young! These 19 / 20 year olds pulled off a flawless set of retro 80s thrash (Destruction, Kreator, etc.) and sounded great doing it. Really impressive. Fittingly I met one of their dad’s working the merch booth later on.
Void, hailing from Lafayette, Louisiana, was equally impressive and equally young. They had more of an early Def Leppard feel, great stage showmanship and a very tight classic metal band. Apparently they are on tour with Phantom – the metal world is in good hands with this new generation!
I’d heard legend of Squid Pisser but this was my first time seeing them. Strange masks, strange stage set (weird painting background instead of band logo, large fake floral arrangements on the stage like a funeral home), and offbeat music flawlessly executed. Great live band, though I’m not sure if I’d listen to their records at home.
The Dwarves were a surprise at this metal festival, it had been a couple decades since I last saw this punk band, familiar to many only through one of the greatest album covers of all time, 2 naked women and a little person covered in blood on their 1990 opus Blood Guts & Pussy.
The Dwarves were entertaining as one might expect, alternating fast and then slower garage rock type songs, check their discography to understand their unique humor. They played their classic anthem “Let’s Fuck” so what more could you ask for.
Capping off three great days of music was the Sunday night headliner, Whores. I’d seen this fantastic noise rock band a month ago supporting Corrosion of Conformity and they were great. Sparse but seriously heavy, they shook the field and delivered a strong end cap on the weekend. A cold wind really whipped up midway through their set, the first fall weather of the weekend.
A third night of partying and camping capped off a fantastic weekend. RPM Fest was so much fun, pretty flawlessly run even though it seemed relatively low budget.
The only criticism I could find was this year’s Halloween theme, that made kind of a lame t-shirt compared to the past years that were for sale. And it was 2 whole months before Halloween. But I have a feeling I’ll be back to RPM Fest for 2027.
–Hectic
