Coming home || macrock 2026 - day one

Restless Moons Brewing - Photo Credit r3dmedia - https://www.instagram.com/r3mediava/

I have not attended Macrock in fourteen years. I haven't attended a live music show in twelve. Perhaps I'm not properly equipped to be the one telling you about a music festival that predates myself, but this is my story from Macrock 2026. 

Dearest reader, this was one of the most important weekends of my life thus far. 

I have been on what we will call an extended period of self deconstruction and personal growth in these my most recent months. I have been feeling empty, yet full of possibility. On Friday, what would be day one of the festival, I felt an increased surge in my soul to attend a local show, and I needed it now, tonight if possible. This desire wasn't new. I knew I had been in need of a release that could only be provided by going to war in the pit. In the days of my youth the pit was my favorite blow off valve. It didn't matter who was playing. The experience would be enhanced by a band I personally enjoyed, but that was secondary to my need to get my ass beat. 

I like to believe I've been doing better about hearing the things my soul is saying, so when I feel her speak, I try to listen. I yelled over at one of my friends in the store, I knew she was still active in the local scene. I told her I needed to know where local DIY shows were happening these days. Excitedly, she started sending me instagram pages for bands, organizers, and everything in between. While she was busy buzzing I said to her, and myself, “Macrock has got to be coming up soon.” 

“What's Macrock,” escaped her lips as her fingers rapidly forwarded me page after page and for a moment, my heart stopped beating. 

A bit of backstory. I'm aware that 'back in my day' is an amorphous expression that's meaning is constantly in flux, and my 'back in my day' will vary wildly from your 'back in my day', but back in MY day, Harrisonburg had gone through a brief golden era of being a hidden metal mecca that kicked off proper with a little place called Captain T's, but that's a much longer story for a different time, and possibly a different voice, as I was just a bit too young to fully experience this primordial moment. 

My jaw dropped as I found the page. Not just because my sweet summer child had never heard of the event, but today just so happened to be day one, and the stars had aligned in a way with my schedule that meant I could attend the event in its entirety. 

“My child. Macrock is everything,” was the only thing I could say to her in reply. 

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I'm well aware that the hardcore music scene has waned across the board in places all around the country, and it isn't an isolated instance what Macrock has grown (or withered) into. I never stopped being aware of its existence. Even if my contact list in the local music scene has depleted, I still hear the whispers of what Macrock has become in my absence, but trust me dear reader, this is not a tale of sorrow. 

The fact alone that I could hear the bands actively playing at five venues when I was on my way to the first haunt of my evening and passers-by were confused by the sound was indication enough that in my absence, Macrock had become a much different beast. But still, it was shocking with the memories I have of hundreds of event attendees flocking from venue to venue in the twilight of the court building, Jess' Lunch, and an old fan favorite, Hole in the Wall. 

This evening had to start where my time with the scene had ended. The Blue Nile. But the Blue Nile is not her name anymore, and it hasn't been for some time. She's changed her face and changed her name, but her spirit still remains the same. I knew minutes after I'd opened my tab at the Golden Pony that I had come home. The cigarette haze drifting across the patio interrupted by the black band tees, and the most piercings and tattoos concentrated in a single place I had seen in years signaled I was with my people. 

I had just the time to down my first drink, grab a second, and extinguish my cigarette before I heard the tell tale pounding of sound check. I could see the scene from The Lion King playing in my mind with Rafiki softly saying, “It is time.” 

Quickly I found my perch near the back of the pit. Just close enough to the action where I could catch a good shove but much lower chances of catching a pit killer's elbow to the teeth. I don't have the elastic body I once did, and this was the FIRST band of my night, I wasn't going to risk going out of commission this early, though remind me to tell you of the time I lost my left flip flop under the stage at the Nile. I reckon there's a possibility it's still under there. 

You'll have to forgive me for not being certain which band was playing at this moment. I had slammed my two drinks as quick as my body would allow and I was caught up in the endorphins of being at fucking Macrock for the first time since two thousand and twelve. It didn't matter who was playing, or what they were playing. I nodded to the rhythm. It was metal show at the pony, I couldn't being to tell you what the fuck the singer was saying, but she believed it, and that was more than enough for me. 

I felt myself settling right back into the creature of my younger years, though that feeling stalled a little when I felt the cold glass clinking in my hand, and my ears weren't already ringing. Because at this Macrock, there were no X's on the back of my hands and I had brought hearing protection in the form of pass-through headphones. I'm a 'responsible adult' now. (Emphasis on the air quotes) 

I was going to need more alcohol. 

I came to Macrock alone. It was easy for me to sneak out after the second band wrapped up undeterred. It's an experience I genuinely recommend if you're the kind of person that can be alone with their thoughts for more than fifteen minutes. 

I pulled out my phone and returned to the site with the weekend's lineup and their various band-camps. I decided pretty early that Restless Moons (a wholly new venue to me) was where I was already going to finish out the night. I've always leaned heavier in terms of my music interests, and while the more hip-hop coded acts at Broad Porch had my attention, as I stated previously, I've been doing better about listening to my soul. 

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DIALS DIALS DIALS was the fucking shit. 

I'm aware I just established to you dear reader that my interests lean heavy, but when I saw a self described 'jungle' artist sandwiched between some of the more hardcore acts, I knew this was one I was going to need to see for myself, and goddess, I was not disappointed. My view was partially obstructed so I'm unsure if there was actually a saxophone plugged into that fucking amp, or if he was pulling it from what I assume to be a sample board, a looper, and other arcane musical wizardry, but the end result fucking ripped. 

It was a single continuous 30 minute set with very little separation between tracks. If there was a setlist I could not find it. DialsX3 gave it their all for every moment of the performance. They seamlessly shifted between high bpm driving jungle beats, to chipped out DnB-coded jams, all the while drumming by hand on the better part of an acoustic drum-set. I like to think of myself as relatively technically inclined but even I could not discern how the whole ensemble was coming together. It was entrancing. Enchanting. It was far far from the kind of act that colored the Macrock's of my past, but it had me excited and left wanting for the rest of Macrock to follow. 

DIALS DIALS DIALS would be the final musical act I experienced on the first night of Macrock, and this is the part of the story where I tell you: this is not a story about the bands, the music, or the venues. It's a story about connections and coming home. 

_________________ 

Dials X3 wrapped around 9:30, and I did not make it back home until some time around 3 am. When Dials had finished I made my way to the bar, got another beer, (Shoutouts to a beer I think was called Solstice from Restless Moons Brewing. It was good shit. Refreshing. Crisp.) and made my way to the back to smoke and check in with my digital existence. The phone never made it out of my pocket. A friend from the past was seated perched at one of the picnic tables. Truth be told it was someone I'd not expected to ever see again, but I was absolutely delighted that their path had crossed with my own. 

The hours that followed were a revolving door of familiar faces from my past, new friends I thought I'd never make, and taking back what I thought I had lost as a person.

Connection. 

From the outside looking in, it's easy to see Macrock as a shadow of its previous self. A far cry from the days of tents, vendors, and food stalls lining the streets of court square as droves of young adults adorned in black flock from venue to venue. To the untrained eye, it could look like a dying relic of the past. But to me, it looks like what had been lost had simply made way for untamed passion to bloom. 

I came to the festival alone. Told few I was coming. I wanted to experience the event with minimal expectation, minimal performance, and minimal perceived necessary social presentation. In the time I spent chatting with festival goers into the wee hours of the night, I observed the other people talking and connecting, dipping in and out of the patio to catch an act, only to return and continue their fellowship with their fellow human. I saw no phones. Few cameras. Everyone was present to celebrate the experience whether they knew it or not. I saw so, so many smiles. 

I may have only managed to visit two venues and observed merely a handful of acts, but the experiences I collected that Friday night rival the memories of the Macrock's of my past. Of course, it IS about the music. But more importantly it's about community. I think I had at a minimum forty unique conversations with as many new individuals in the back of Restless Moons and the crossing streets between the here and there. 

I returned home with a newfound rejuvenation I'd not experienced in the better part of a decade. That likely says much more about me than it does Macrock. But I'm reminded of a feeling that only Macrock could provide in my teens. It's raw. It's unprofessional and unfiltered. I had still yet to experience the full breadth of this feeling, for when my head finally hit the pillow after inhaling a dose of empty calories in the shape of a greasy sheetz footlong pepperoni sub, I remembered, this had only been day one. 

To be continued in part 2. (Yes. I saw more bands, including one I have yet to stop listening to as I commit these letters to the page.) 

-Raven Ashcroft 

From the Crossroads