SO..a nice pop punk music night ahead of me. Lets start from the beginning. We got to the venue (O2 Academy) at about quarter past 7ish. MASSIVE QUEUE! It was no surprise. You Me At Six's fan base averages about 14 and female. This is where my recent trip to see Owl City came in handy. I found myself desensitised and not bothered by any of this. Stood near the front of the queue yet not in the queue i caught sight of a sign that read 'O2 Priority' .... I figured 'if you don't ask, you don't get'. So i asked... showed my phone and got in straight away :)
First band on, once we made our way into the crowd, was We The Kings. I am a big fan of the first album. Great pop songs in effect that i imagine would come across ina way taht All Time Low did recently on the Kerrang tour. I was wrong.... We The Kings out did all my expectations. Opening with 'She Takes Me High' the crowd (not surprisingly seen as they are a bigish pop punk band) joined in. Later they covered Jimmy Eat Worlds 'Middle'. The Cure's Robert Smith once said 'there are two types of covers, those which are note for note and those that have the artists own twist. Neither are bad. Neither are good.' ... This applied to the first. It was note for note with JEW. BUT not bad at all. Got the crowd going too. Although i felt old knowing every word. It was an 'old school' punk song to the majority of the crowd. Any who... WTK played couple more songs then ended on their big hit 'Check Yes Juliet' which had rapturous applause from all.
Next on were Forever The Sickest Kids. I had high hopes for these from friends experiences through to just the fact they are well known. They came on and i eagerly waited the first song. They only went and pulled out 'She's a Lady'... amazing.
Full of energy every member of the band (all 6 of them) went mental. With the lead singer and guitarist worryingly making explicit hand and tongue gestures towards the young girls in the crowd..... other wise.. amazing. From 'She's a lady' they went into 'Believe me I'm lying'. Another big hitter for fans and great sing along song. They continued to please the crowd with jumping and shouting until they finally played 'Whoa Oh'. The big one,every one was jumping up and down. To the point where i ended up at the front of the crowd..... great stuff :)
Now it was time for the headliners of this tour, You Me At Six. I wasn't that excited but i was eager to hear what they are like live. The crowd got tighter and i started to feel a little crushed watching the roadies sound check all the stuff. I didn't know whether it was because i was delirious from been squashed or if the one beer i drank went straight to my head but at one point i heard drums been sound checked yet no one was on the drum kit..... weird. The stage was also still surprisingly small, usually its only small for support bands.... weird again.
YM@6 came on to a piercing sound of screams and went straight into a song off their latest album 'Hold Me Down' called 'Safer To Hate Her'. The crowd knew every word and sang in unison with the lead singer Josh. Half way through the second song 'The Truth Is A Terrible Thing' i noticed a familiar face at the side of the stage. It was only Bring Me The Horizons lead singer and owner of the Sheffield based clothing company Drop Dead's Oli Sykes! Singing along too. Would of thought YM@6 was a bit timid for the hardcore singer. Friends perhaps? After a couple of more songs the band went off stage.... weird. The drum kit was taken away by roadies.... weirder. A minute or so later air raid sirens were blasted through the speaker system... 'ahh i see'. 'Consequence' was the next song to be played and when the drums kicked in, the curtain dropped to reveal a transparent platform in which the drum kit stood with ramps both sides for the rest of the band to play with. That explained the ghost drum kit i heard and the fact they had only about 20% of the available stage. To be honest the whole 'surprise' element could of gone a lot smoother. Felt slow and unnecessary to do it after 3 songs. If they opened with all this it would of been a lot more effective.
The rest of the set was a mix of new and old album. Nothing that exciting except a nice 'closer' in the form of 'Always Attract' attracting a massive sing along and arms/lighters in the air situation. The encore was where it got really fun. Coming back on, saying thanks then bursting into the intro for 'Save It For The Bedroom'... It was awesome! Been their biggest the song, every person in the crowd sang every word to their hearts content. Even i was jumping up and down with excitement. In the legendary 'bridge' of the song people screamed 'TOO LATE, SAVE IT FOR THE BEDROOM' at Josh making him smile every time he looked out at the crowd. For this and the memories of singing along to this at Corp... this was the song of the gig. After that energy drainer they played their final song. It was pretty obvious what it was going to be. 'Underdog' their most recent hit showed the devotion of the fans and sold out academy to this band. To top the set off i caught a drumstick :) good times.
As a whole the entire gig was very good. Unfortunately none of the 3 bands played my favorite songs - WTK didn't play 'August Is Over', FTSK didn't play 'Becky Starz' and YM@6 didn't play 'The Rumour'... besides this all three were great. Hats off especially to We The Kings and Forever The Sickest Kids for coming over and playing under a band of equal or perhaps even less status in the US. I felt they played to impress where the headliners played to satisfy.
After the gig we headed to the Leadmill for the after party where i met the majority of all three bands. Travis the lead singer of We The Kings was a genuinely nice guy and was very thankful for the support. At the bar i also had a good conversation with Caleb from FTSK. Discussing the fact that his $20 was worth about 3p over here and chatted about Brand New. Nice guys in a whole. YM@6's DJ set was great, pretty much Corp playlist but that's never a bad thing.
I was rough the next day....
Next gig I've already been too so it just means me typing it all up. Frightened Rabbit.
Peace
x
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