Scowl Made Hardcore Purists Angry. Now the Band Is Doubling Down.

Last fall, on the second-floor stage of a cramped tavern called Neck of the Woods in San Francisco, Kat Moss was throwing elbows, shoving men twice her size into a packed circle pit and screaming into a microphone.

Moss, the frontwoman for the Bay Area hardcore band Scowl, held her own. In the tight-knit circle of Northern California punks, this sweating, pulsing, tattoo-covered cluster of bodies were her people. Just before midnight, the crowd streamed out of the swampy bar into the cold air, bruised and smiling. In this crowd, stage diving, moshing and the occasional foot to the face all come from a place of love.

But as Scowl’s star has risen from a group of underdogs playing house shows across the West Coast to a broader national audience, Moss and her four bandmates have been engaged in a different kind of fight — one with the gatekeepers who believe the band isn’t hardcore enough.

The band was blasted on message boards and social media in 2023, accused of “selling out” when it struck a brand deal with a corporate sponsor. (Many hardcore contemporaries have done similar ones.) The group later took heat for putting out what some saw as pop sensibility masquerading as punk. Scenesters chafed when megastars like Post Malone and Hayley Williams of Paramore said they were fans of the group. And some of the most aggressive purists didn’t appreciate Moss’s proclivity for posting beauty tutorials on her personal social media channels. (Her mop of neon lime hair is hard to miss in a crowd.)

Scowl isn’t shying away from the conflict. Instead, its members want to push the limits of their sound and what they feel hardcore music can be. With Scowl’s second album, “Are We All Angels” out April 4, the group is moving from the stalwart hardcore label Flatspot Records to Dead Oceans — home to Phoebe Bridgers and Mitski. It has enlisted Will Yip, a producer known for broadening the sound of punk bands. And it has leaned more into a slower, heavier sound with grungy riffs and catchier choruses.