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Three days of Euroblast – and 667 reasons to leave the house

667 shows across 231 cities in Germany, Austria and Switzerland are on this week's calendar. In Cologne one festival stretches across the entire weekend, in Berlin a punk band from Hoyerswerda plays a 3,500-capacity hall, and in the Ruhr area one club opens two nights back to back.

The big ones this week

Euroblast is the centrepiece: 25 to 27 September, Essigfabrik Cologne, two stages, more than 40 bands. "Progressive since 2008" is the line in the programme – behind it sit 17 years, 19 editions and over 400 bands. Saturday and Sunday are sold out; Friday and three-day tickets are still going. Friday belongs to Textures and Swallow the Sun, Saturday Decapitated and Vildhjarta take over, and Sunday closes with Haken, The Dear Hunter and Einar Solberg. If you want djent, tech-death and prog under one roof: here.

The week opens on Monday in Vienna, where Fear Factory play SIMM City. Tuesday brings Spiritbox to UFO im Velodrom in Berlin, with Jinjer and Dying Wish in tow – metalcore that has grown out of the clubs and into the halls these past few years. Three days later Evanescence play the big hall next door, the middle of three stops: Wednesday Barclays Arena Hamburg, Friday Berlin, Saturday Olympiahalle Munich.

🔴 Important if you are holding a ticket: on Friday Beartooth play not the Uber Eats Music Hall but Huxleys Neue Welt. The show was moved and tickets remain valid – doors 18:00, start 19:00, with Silverstein and Kingdom of Giants in tow. Saturday continues at the Zenith in Munich. Also relocated, from WERK7 to the Backstage in Munich: Devin Townsend, solo and carrying the new album "The Moth".

Underground gems and hidden tips

Helvete in Oberhausen runs two nights in a row. Friday is Blutfest with BLUTGOTT and Debauchery; Saturday follows with a pagan and black metal night headlined by Helgrindur from Solingen – just over 500 Last.fm listeners, which is precisely the scale this place exists for.

In Essen, Friday brings the third edition of the Zinnober Festival at Delta Musik Park, run by Zinnober e.V. as a DIY night cutting across punk, metal and gothic rock. Eleven bands, among them Split System from Melbourne, Vulture and Moral Bombing from Dortmund, whose emoviolence record "chrysopoeia" landed in August. Tickets 30 euros, 25 reduced.

And Pisse? The Hoyerswerda lot play three times: Wednesday Columbiahalle Berlin, Thursday Musikzentrum Hannover, Friday headlining Zinnober. A rehearsal-room band in a room for 3,500 people – that is the story of the week.

From hardcore to darkwave – all of it

Drug Church bring their post-hardcore to the Luxor in Cologne on Wednesday. The night before, Canadians Gob play the Sonic Ballroom – skate punk in a room that holds barely 200 people, roughly the opposite of the arena week.

Saturday turns darker: Asp at Huxleys Neue Welt Berlin with Schöngeist opening, Lacrimas Profundere at the Factory in Magdeburg touring the new album. Outdoors and considerably louder: In Extremo at the Elspe Festival Freilichtbühne in Lennestadt.

Sunday's full stop belongs to Axel Rudi Pell at the Zeche Bochum. The guitarist was born in Bochum – a home game in the narrowest sense.