Attack! Attack! & Tonight Is Goodbye – 24/02/2009 Liverpool
Filed under: Live Reviews by Chris2 Comments »
We managed to see three of the four bands playing tonight, at the Academy in Liverpool.
Well, that’s not strictly true – We did catch the end of the set by the first band, but didn’t manage to catch a name. A quick search on google yields no results either. It’s a pity, because they seemed alright. (If you were in this band, and happen to read this, drop us an email! contact@crowdsurfer.net). They were certainly better than the next support band, ‘Out Of Sight’. Not that they were terrible, as such, but the music they played was so trite and generic, they could have just put on a compilation album of other lesser-known pop-punk bands and walked off the stage. But, what they did they did well enough, and atleast half the smallish crowd enjoyed it.
The lights dimmed, enveloping the entire room in black, and a Joker quote welcomed Attack! Attack! to the stage. It makes a change that a band puts effort into their entrance, beyond walking on, saying ‘Hi’ and hitting their instruments, and it worked well.
Despite the most talkative member of the band being convinced he was more north than he was (greeting Newcastle in his opening speech), the set starts off well. Following a swift and sincere apology to the Liverpool crowd, all is forgiven and the crowd get involved.
A!A!’s sound is very similar to Fallout Boy, as mentioned at length in the album review, and not much changes in a live setting. All the positives from the album transfer well, and the few negatives are negated by the bands obvious talent and love for what they do. So this is no bad thing; the energy remains the same, the singalong chorus’s retained, and the lead singers powerful Stump-esque voice transfers to the stage without losing anything, which is rare even in much more well-known bands.
Even the slower, more ballad-like ‘From Now On’ goes down well; the band showing the bravey, confidence and skill to slow it down and still keep the crowd interested. Throw in a cover of The Knack’s ‘My Sharona’ and a number of their faster, poppier songs, and what you have is a brilliant gig from a promising young band. They even managed to get a pit going. Well, I say pit, it was actually more like a gap in the crowd with two thin boys pushing each other a bit, but it’s still impressive to see a band have that impression on a young crowd. It was the most energy and interest they showed to any of the bands here tonight.
As for the joint headliners, Tonight Is Goodbye…well…they were awful. Sorry, but they were. As soulless and boring as a U2 cover band (without the back catalogue of mildly interesting songs to rely on). Contrived lyrics, run-of-the-mill music and a lead singer more concerned with posing than actually singing (he actually gave up midway through a verse, and stood there looking lost for a minute). Still, atleast some of the crowd were now already in the mood and danced about anyway.
Maybe it’s me. Maybe i’m getting too old to enjoy this sort of stuff…but I do prefer to watch a band with actual talent and interesting hooks…which Attack! Attack! have plenty of.
A good gig, thanks to Attack Attack.