A Metal Platform Built to Run Itself
CLIENT — METAL FROM NL
After more than a decade on WordPress, Metal From NL had outgrown it. We rebuilt it on our own CORE framework with a custom blog engine, live events agenda, and band self-service portal, bringing page speeds down to under 200ms flat. Sixteen years of scene history migrated with zero data loss.
Metal From NL has been the go-to home for the Dutch metal scene since 2010. By the time we stepped in, it was running on WordPress alongside manual form plugins, a setup that works fine at first before quietly turning into a maintenance trap. Over sixteen years, it accumulated more than 1,300 bands and 2,700 events, all managed by hand with zero connection between them. A band page was just a static bio; finding their upcoming shows or past interviews meant digging across separate sections. Every profile update required emailing an admin and waiting, and broadcasting urgent news meant hoping a social media post reached people in time.
Instead of putting temporary patches on an aging system, we migrated the platform to CORE, our proprietary in-house framework. We structured it into four clear pillars: a lightning-fast public site, an intuitive admin panel, a self-service band portal ("Bandmin"), and an internal dashboard. We safely migrated every legacy band profile and event with URLs intact, ensuring a decade of Google authority stayed completely untouched.
On top of that foundation, we built a robust blog engine for reviews and interviews alongside an extensive events calendar where fans can filter concerts by date, venue, genre, or band. Both systems tie directly into band profiles, meaning articles and show dates populate automatically without manual curation. We also integrated live Spotify syncing so follower counts and discographies update automatically, while giving bands direct control over their own bios and imagery.
For the team behind the scenes, we introduced role-based access control, real-time visitor analytics with geographic mapping, and a global announcement system to broadcast urgent updates instantly. Paired with a custom caching layer built directly into CORE, the homepage now responds in under 200ms server-side and scores 99/100 on Google Lighthouse.
We successfully brought 1,337 band profiles and 2,737 events across from the legacy system with zero data loss, zero broken links, and zero SEO disruption. Band pages are now living hubs that update themselves, and artists manage their own profiles instead of filing support tickets. The editorial team can push critical site-wide announcements in seconds, while admins have real-time visibility into traffic without giving up security. Best of all, the platform is blazing fast, earning a 99/100 performance score and a 0.7 second Largest Contentful Paint. It has been running smoothly ever since, keeping the Dutch metal scene connected around the clock.