By Monk
There’s a private little game I like to play at gigs, especially ones where I’m moving even so slightly outside of my comfort zone, and that is “Spot The T-Shirt”. I feel it helps to give me an idea of the demographic of the audience and the appeal which the band the people concerned have paid their hard earned pennies to see and hear on this particular night. For tonight’s low key but nevertheless sold out pre-festival run show by the ÜS screamo vets, it’s indeed an interesting mix, ranging from the perhaps expected Green Day and Taking Back Sunday through Tool to the black metal Sadé one that was vogue a few hot minutes ago… hell, there’s even a Krusher-era ‘Kerrap!’ crop top!
On this theme, there’s a guy nervously pacing around the venue in a shirt with the question “Who The F### Is Winter?” on the back. It’s a question I’ve been asking myself, and the answer is about to be revealed as the chap in question walks towards the stage. But, that answer immediately raises more questions, relating to what exactly is happening in said stage… Are they emo? Are they faux hardcore? Are they post-anything/something/whatever?
It’s hard to figure out the solution, as their sound is a mish-mash of styles – thrashy solos countermanding grungy shoegazing main sections ultimately giving me very little about which to be excited, the squealy lead vocals lying somewhere between Paramore and a strangled cat – although they do finish strongly, with their last song being their most stylistically cohesive. And they seem to go down well with the slowly growing crowd, as their T-shirts subsequently fly off the merch stand faster than those of our headline act.
Talking of whom… The Ohio combo catch everyone – not least those who have ventured outside to catch some of the dying rays of this surprisingly balmy Thursday evening – by surprise with an amazingly rapid turnaround that sees them kick into this celebratory play through of the ‘If Only You Were Lonely’ album a full 15 minutes earlier than their advertised start time.
After the opening salve of ‘This Is Who Are’/’We Are So Last Year’ (nope, the guys aren’t messing around but jumping straight into it), JT takes his first pause to address the crowd: “Thank you Belfast, thank you Northern Ireland… you know, sometimes we forget where we are geographically, or we forget what money we’re supposed to use, but there is one thing we don’t forget: that’s what we’re here to do – and that’s play emo ‘bangers!”
Which is exactly what they immediately dive straight back into doing, with a high energy set delivered with few, if any, extra trimmings, as they let the music do the talking, holding the surprisingly respectful audience captive for its duration.
There are a couple of other spoken word interjections, with JT addressing the importance of the fellowship music brings, and later recalling how he spent his honeymoon in the studio recording their debut album (“and, yes, we’re still married!”).
The closing section sees them spin the wheel of time with the duotych of new single ‘Like A Cardinal’ and the virtually obligatory ‘Ohio Is For Lovers’ before the evening ends with two of the best things you can see at the finale of a gig – a queue at the merch stand (manned, of course, by JT himself) and people leaving with massive smiles on their faces!
If anyone has any doubt that screamo is dead, well just drag your carcass along to a Hawthorne Heights show for proof positive to its resilient determination to survive.
- Hawthorne Heights will play the Monster Energy Stage at this weekend’s Slam Dunk festival.