Feminist post-punk is no longer a threat; it’s the onslaught we were promised. Like a Molotov cocktail in a Charlotte Tilbury bottle, The Pill and Panic Shack are detonating the patriarchy one snarling hook at a time. Forget the Sex Pistols’ faux anger or The Clash’s earnest hand-wringing – this is punk for the Love Island generation, scrolling, swiping, and smashing the system with a smirk.

The Pill — no, not the contraceptive (although maybe metaphorically, yes) — are a band that sounds like someone forced Le Tigre and IDLES to collaborate on a TikTok skit after three pints of snakebite. Hailing from Isle of Wight they’ve got the sound of a house party gone rogue in a women’s bathroom: loud, messy, conspiratorial.

Their set kicks off with a song poking fun at Leonardo DiCaprio’s eternal search for youth — a biting commentary on online grooming masked in shouty one-liners and coordinated backbends. Yes, actual backbends. Lily Hutchings and Lottie Massey are the utter powerhouse front duo who have co-ordinated each of their perfectly timed guitar/bass shreds with high kicks and pirouettes. With Rufus Reader smashing out guttural percussion. Lottie announced the track (which we can’t seem to ID online) like Cher with a fringe and a beef with all men named Josh — snarls her way through internet tropes like a Buzzfeed listicle with brass knuckles.

The crowd is asked if they can all “do a 360” — a move possibly invented on the spot or a fun bout of audience participation — but they oblige, in an ecstatic display of groupthink and irony. A fun prelude to introduce their song “Money Mullet” by first checking to see if there are any mulleted men in the crowd. There is. Apologies are made and assurances given that you are “probably really nice”, why? The song? A mullet anthem with dual vocals and a bassline so gargantuan it could flatten a Ford Fiesta. Think Wet Leg’s bratty cousin who got expelled from art school for writing diss tracks about her tutor.

“Woman Driver” is an eye-roller turned middle finger: a subversive shout of “yes, I can reverse park and overthrow capitalism.” “Bale of Hey”– finishes their set with a feral growl and a reference to Bill Murray that’s either praise or punishment.

In short: if Karen from Facebook ever walked into The Pill’s gig, she’d leave with a septum piercing and a sudden distrust of her husband.

Enter Panic Shack: Cardiff’s crown jewel of chaos, the Spice Girls reimagined as a gang of vigilante babysitters with distortion pedals. Comprised of Sarah Harvey, Emily Smith, Meg Fretwell, and Romi Lawrence, this four-piece is what happens when you throw Bikini Kill, the Sugababes, and the soundtrack to Skins into a blender and add Monster Energy instead of water.

They open with “Gok Wan” followed swiftly by “I Don’t Want To Hold Your Baby” (self-explanatory, deliciously so), then “Girl Band Starter Pack” – a scathing self-own and a takedown of every music exec who’s ever asked, “but who’s the pretty one?” If The Pill were the opening punch, Panic Shack are the roundhouse kick that sends teeth flying.

Mannequin Man” (about those hollow hunks who say “not all men” while DMing 19-year-olds), and new material from their self titled debut due for release on 18th of July. A digital album pre-release the band are offering exclusively at thier gigs but buying a lanyard that gives you a code to buy the album ahead of schedule, “ So if you see us actually make the charts then you can all think, that’ was me I did that!” coos Sarah Harvey with a gargantuan smile on her face.

The new tracks are tighter than your ex’s jeans post-lockdown. “Thelma & Louise” is a distorted love letter to their own band — tender yet blistering. “I Don’t Really Like It” is reworked with brooding bass and electric pads, when half way through the track the band verges off into a cover of The Ting Tings’ “That’s Not My Name”.

The penultimate track is “Pockets,” with lyrics listing vape, phone, keys, lip gloss — a catalogue of female essentials sung with the urgency of a war cry. Forget “Born To Run,” this is “Born To Rummage Through Your Handbag In Rage.”

At one point a fan makes a very loud “Shooshing” noise not because they are disgruntled by their peers but as a segue into the set finale, “The Ick”, a track that could be the new national anthem for anyone who’s ever dated a guy who says “banter” in earnest. It’s not just about bad dating — it’s about British male tropes as a whole: emotionally constipated, tragically ironic, and too proud to ask for directions. Picture Jarvis Cocker falling into a bin full of vape pens and protein powder.

There’s plenty of chanting to “Free Palestine” Panic Shack don’t do performative politics, they live it. Panic Shack aren’t just singing about womanhood. They’re building a sweaty, subversive, glitter-coated movement in Doc Martens and ironic mullets.

This isn’t girl power. This is woman rage – compressed, amplified, and screaming through a Marshall stack. And if you don’t like it?

Don’t look at them like that…

Words: Angela Canavan

Images: Angela Canavan & Chris Hogge