If you were a teenager in the late 00s or early 10s and a frequent gig-goer, The Blackout may be a familiar name to you. I was one of those teens who saw The Blackout support bands such as You Me At Six and My Chemical Romance during that era, and even back then, I was always stoked to see them on the bill due to their energy that was so unbeatable, you almost forgot you were there to see the headliner.
Tonight's show is at Birmingham's O2 Academy, and let's not forget this tour is very special as it is the band's comeback tour after calling it quits eight years ago. Support comes from Lunars and Dead Pony.
Lunars, local to Birmingham, had a bit of a delayed start with their set. From an outsider's perspective, it seemed to be a problem with the playback for their intro, but you never know what’s happening behind the scenes. Nevertheless, the crowd didn’t seem to mind and many actually knew most of the songs word for word.
As for Dead Pony, the sound was very current, and as Sean Smith (Vocalist for The Blackout) said later that evening, he expects them to blow up and wouldn’t be shocked if My Chemical Romance supported them. You can see why this prediction may have been made, with a polished set and even some martial arts moves performed by vocalist Anna Shields. I think a tour paired with someone along the lines of Spiritbox would go down a treat!
Now time for the main event. I was slightly worried I was going to be blinded by nostalgia but as soon as the band took to the stage, I remembered why this band captivated me in the first place all those years ago. Starting strong with 'This Is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things’, it was like being transported back in time to 2011, the year I probably saw The Blackout the most, with Sean Smith’s iconic mic swing and Gavin Butler’s smooth clean vocals. It’s worth noting, that Gav is sporting a cast on his foot (the band mentioned going motorcycling while on the tour, perhaps this had something to do with it?), but it’s worth noting, if you didn’t look down on his leg you wouldn’t have even noticed anything was wrong, the energy and passion was still there.
One thing that I always remembered about The Blackout was the banter on stage, so I was extremely pleased that was still a prominent part of the show. I would probably pay just to see two hours of Sean Smith talking and taking the piss out of the audience. He’s a natural comedian. But what differed this time was now the band joked about having a midlife crisis and becoming older and fatter (far from it in my opinion).
A slightly heart-touching moment was during ‘Children of the Night’ when the band dedicated the song to anyone who was ever called “a smelly greebo”, given that most the room was full of now ‘elder emo’s’ I’d say that was most of us.
Despite all the laughs, there was a sense of heartwarming emotion and gratefulness. The band were originally only supposed to play the O2 Institute 2, a room of 600, before being upgraded to tonight's venue of roughly 3000. “If we never play here again, this has been worth it” proclaims Sean.
The metalhead in me appreciated the ‘Raining Blood’ by Slayer riff before the room opened up for a circle pit to ‘I'm a Riot? You're a Fucking Riot!’ Before moving on the the iconic ‘Higher and Higher’, where the first two notes played and everyone instantly knew when to “woo” on beat as if 8 years hadn’t passed. Sean's brother Jay joined the band onstage for the rap part of the song.
After a couple of emergency stops, Sean announced there were only two songs left, which brought out a loud boo from the crowd “Okay we have one song left”, always the tease is Sean.
The final song was the iconic 'Save Our Selves (The Warning)’ and I was so psyched to see they kept the iconic crouch and jump (“fuck your old knees”) part of the set. Most audience members knew before it was even asked of them that this was coming.
As I said earlier I was worried I would be blinded by my previous attachment to this band from my teen years. But I honestly think if this had been my first time I would have felt the same joy as I did leaving the venue. Once again they prove they are ‘The Best In Town’ (I’m sorry I couldn’t resist).
This. Is. The. Blackout.
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