I recently attended my fifth Outbreak Festival in Manchester, and it’s hard for me to admit, but it felt different this year. I will preface this article by saying, I have all the love in the world for Outbreak. I can confidently say it’s my favourite music festival, the community, the lineups, the crowd and the people behind it truly understand what hardcore is about. This festival has done more for hardcore within the UK than any other company putting on shows. This isn’t about the festival itself, it’s about the etiquette and what independent festivals can do to approach this issue.
Let me stop rambling and get to the point. The crowd etiquette at Outbreak this year was the worst I’ve ever seen. Countless people attempting to stage dive were dropped, the front of the crowd seemed unaware of the chaos they were about to witness and much of the festival boiled down to attempting to manoeuvre through massive shoulder to shoulder crowds.
I believe there are a few reasons for this, and it mainly boils down to how popular the festival has gotten as of late. Since my first Outbreak I have watched the BEC Arena become increasingly overpacked, with the vast majority of people I spoke to this year mentioning how this was their first experience of hardcore in general.
This issue came to the forefront in my soft supple brainstem after watching some of the short form content that came out of the recent Bring Me The Horizon anniversary show hosted by Outbreak. People were recording themselves on stage, moshpits were opening up outside of the fenced off pit area, and the entire thing appeared to be a battle between traditional hardcore kids attempting to experience the show as it was intended, and newcomers treating the whole thing as a social media validation opportunity. The comment sections reflected this.
@outbreakfest oli sykes stage dive perfection 👌 #bmth #outbreakfest #countyourblessings ♬ original sound – Outbreak Fest
One video I saw involved somebody climbing up on stage with his phone out recording himself, before stage diving directly onto another crowd surfer. There are obviously many issues with this. If somebody is distracted by a poorly recorded selfie on stage they could unknowingly knock somebody off, receive a spinning kick to the head, not to mention, somebody who is focused on their phone don’t have the wherewithal to actually avoid danger and experience the show safely.
The focus is entirely on what they want to post on social media later that evening. The comment section was a mess. Countless paragraphs of people within the subculture attempting to explain why this wasn’t acceptable were bombarded with replies exclaiming that “metalheads” were supposed to be friendly, alongside butthurt explanations that you shouldn’t ruin somebody else’s fun.
Sure, have fun, but this isn’t about fun. As Outbreak hosted shows continue to barrel towards popularity, it will inevitably attract new people. If these new people consume content that makes it seem as if it’s ok to act without etiquette on stage or within the moshpits, they will do just that. Very quickly there will be a risk that the elements that make Outbreak so unique in the first place will need to be limited purely because of safety. All it takes is one major accident, and accidents are a lot more likely when etiquette is avoided.
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This isn’t new. During the pandemic hardcore received an insane boost in popularity. This all boiled down to bored kids trapped within the sweaty four walls of their bedrooms witnessing hardcore shows on TikTok and yearning for such an intimate germ fueled environment. This then affected the shows as the pandemic lifted. The most prominent I saw was Basement at Sound and Fury in 2025. As the band blasted out that one TikTok song, the stage invasion was so intense that it almost resulted in Andrew Fischer having a panic attack.
This wasn’t an isolated issue, during Knocked Loose Bryan Garris was seen throwing off countless kids that were treating the stage as if they were the lead singer, not an audience member.
There are multiple obvious reasons for this. Clearly newcomers to the scene won’t be fully versed in hardcore etiquette, some will be drunk, and outside of genres like hardcore, the artists on stage aren’t particularly seen as human, so the idea of a panic attack seems almost alien to the fans.
It’s a problem that will require more than just gatekeeping to solve. Healthy gatekeeping has one fatal flaw. The vast majority of people that consume or see it are already well versed within the subculture, the others are too busy scrolling AI brainrot.
Let’s lazily return to Outbreak. It’s a festival that has changed its approach almost every year, from hosting Death Grips on the same lineup as Converge and Restraining order, to having Alex G headline, to putting on separate hip hop and hardcore adjacent days.
It’s commendable and makes the festival increasingly interesting, but it does bring a few issues. Last year in 2025 I saw one festival attendee with a Gucci backpack assume that every spinkicker in the pit was trying to fight him, before recording himself on stage and jumping into empty sections of the crowd. That makes sense if somebody is attending purely for Alex G, what doesn’t make sense is why this year in particular felt so dangerous.
The Outbreak Manchester 2026 lineup felt like the most hardcore adjacent one they have done for years, yet they still had to send out a notification on the app reminding people to catch stage divers.
It’s a difficult topic for me to approach, because I love Outbreak so much, but that is why I also feel like these issues need to be addressed.
First of all, I believe the BEC Arena was far too packed, not only was it almost impossible to manoeuvre through the arena in between bands, but a few acts attracted so much attention that half of the potential crowd weren’t even allowed in the building.
I am primarily referring to Hatebreed and Suicidal Tendencies, both legends in their own right. Acts that would draw main stage level crowds at festivals like Download. These bands were placed within the indoor second stage, which resulted in countless people not being allowed indoors due to full capacity.
This is partly the fault of poor stage placement, and don’t get me wrong, festival organisation seems incredibly difficult. It’s not my place to make any criticisms there. The idea of hosting these legacy acts on smaller more intimate stages is also a great idea in theory. But it does raise an issue if multiple bands across the weekend experience this. What if the festival gets bigger and problems like this result in a crowd crush due to rowdy fans?
I recently joked in an Instagram comment section that Outbreak is going to have to start writing up mandatory etiquette guides before the festival, maybe that is actually the way to go. That or we need to healthily gatekeep a bit more viciously. Not to alienate people from this beautiful scene, but to keep it safe, keep it aligned with our ethos, and most importantly keep it fun and unhinged for anyone who wants to experience this beautiful festival.
What I will say is I believe that Outbreak has outgrown the BEC Arena, it was so incredibly busy and as the organisers continue to put on amazing events such as the BMTH anniversary show, it’s only going to become more popular.
It’s a difficult conundrum, Outbreak becoming more popular has a boatload of positives. The bands get paid, the organisers get their flowers and this beautiful genre attracts more people that will slowly snowball the entire subculture into a more healthy financially viable place. What scares me is one singular unfortunate accident. One that results in the festival being forced to limit the freedom of the crowds.
Do I have a solution? No, I am just a dumb YouTuber. I don’t think anyone has a concrete solution to this. If you’re wondering what you can do as a reader, just attempt to educate people, some will listen. But it is the unfortunate reality that social media has made people a lot more argumentative. I guess we’ll see.
This article is not intended to take anything away from Outbreak Festival, it is a fantastic experience hosted by some amazing people, I just feel some of this needed to be said.
