By Jase Walker
December is here and it’s the home stretch to the end of the year and I’m kicking off this month’s romp of shows with the best of sadboi metalcore acts, Dayseeker. It’s been a solid while since I saw these dance across New Century Hall in Manchester (admittedly with some crying) and tonight’s show on Melkweg’s OZ stage is a much more intimate affair.
Along for the ride throughout this tour are pop metalcore group, Rain City Drive and ’80s pop vibe ensemble, Heart Of Gold. Another great lineup for me as I’m a solid fan of all three and despite the cold drawing in, it’ll be a heartwarming experience in the centre of Amsterdam. Not going to lie though, this is a night of clashes for me in a three-way between Dayseeker, You Me At Six on the other side of Melkweg and Alcest round the corner at Paradiso. While I adore all three of these bands, Dayseeker wins hands down for this as Dark Sun is one of my favourite albums ever.
It’s a proper early start time for Heart Of Gold but the venue is already looking pretty busy thanks to a clearly keen audience that had a huge line outside of the venue prior to doors. Their styled ’80s pop vibes are reminiscent of the revival of the new romantic aligned sound that’s espoused by the likes of recent Emarosa.
They’ve clearly captured the attention of the early crowd as they’re fixated on them and nodding along to their easy listening set. Reverby and chorus drenched guitars are the definitive sound for these guys and excellent vocal harmonies that frame this music as the kind of stuff you’d listen to driving down Miami beach in an open top car at sunset.
The music mixed with beautiful pastel colours and white lighting really drives home the ‘electric dreams’ feeling that Heart Of Gold clearly strive for in their sound. Despite them commenting on the fact that they may not be what you’d expect for a Dayseeker show, I’d argue that they fit in perfectly well for this sort of vibe and they shouldn’t sell themselves short. It’s great to see how these lads have progressed since last seeing them supporting LeBrock ages ago, they’ve clearly captured the audience’s heart (hah) tonight.
In-between the bands you can always rely on a crowd of metalheads to scream the words to ‘Backstreets Back’ and ‘Sweet Caroline’ at the top of their lungs, never fails. Even funnier still is Rain City Drive getting a full “aww” as they rudely interrupted the crowd singing Smash Mouth’s ‘All-Star’, oh well!
Anyway it’s time for a bit of pop metal and to start they seem a bit.. quiet? A bit further in it just seems like it’s mainly the guitars that are super quiet compared to the drums and strangely enough, the bass guitar. I hope this gets corrected as the show goes on because this is a bit of a rocky start. It’s steadily improving a bit but the melodic backing tracks and guitar playing is just getting lost in the mix because of how overpowering the drums are which is a real shame. The mix focusing so much on the ‘oomph’ of the show has muddied their overall fairly bright sound found on their recordings and it’s doing their great poppy sound a huge disservice as other than the vocals, the sound is almost 90 per cent chugs.
The overall vibe of the band’s performance on stage seems a bit off as well as they appear tired, movements kept to a minimum and there’s barely any interaction between the people on stage. Sadly for me this has been a very lackluster performance which I’m disappointed about as I love their music and have been keen on seeing them for years but this set really wasn’t it tonight unfortunately. The guest vocal spot from Dayseeker’s Rory was a nice touch though.
Comically, Dayseeker’s backing screen barely fits on OZ’s stage now I can see it clearly.
Anyway it’s Dayseeker time! Been looking forward to this! Opening with ‘Dreamstate’, we are cooking and it sounds fantastic right from the start. The heavier bridge kicks in and the most pit kicks off in response, and I’m belting the words out like I don’t have to talk in meetings tomorrow morning. ‘Crooked Soul’ up next and my mate behind me suddenly goes wild in celebration of it, only to see him zip off to join the most pit without a moment’s hesitation.
Dayseeker’s approach to carrying heavy emotional weight in their songs is made clear in ‘Homesick’, trying to make something happy out of horrific sadness is a defining part of their sound. Dayseeker’s mix for this show is outstanding, the backing tracks are nice and clear, the rhythm section is strong but not overpowering and all those lovely guitar melodies come through well and frame their vocalist’s voice brilliantly.
A brief break and Rory takes the keys on stage to break into ‘Midnight Eternal’, a wonderful slow ballad that breaks up the show before leading into ‘Dark Sun’. Things get even more heated with another big singalong as they hit the crowd with ‘Without Me’, the most again begins smashing into each other while the rest of the crowd raises their arms in unison to belt the words out loud and clear. ‘Crying While Your Dancing’ follows suit with ‘Dark Sun’s biggest bangers, phones raised to capture the occasion while Rory belts out its incredible vocal melodies. If there’s one song I hoped was going to be on the set and it’s ‘Paper Heart’, and here it is, a ballad that really stood out to me on the ‘Dark Sun’ album, also with a guest spot by Rain City Drive’s singer for a duet, beautiful.
Moving towards the end of the set, ‘Dark Sun’s album finisher ‘Afterglow (Hazel’s Song)’ starts the home run for the show. I’m already mourning this show being over as Dayseeker remains a real treat to watch and I feel a bit jammy because I’ve got to see them so close compared to before. A bit of a change in direction for the end as they go with a cover of Evanescence’s ‘My Immortal’ in a stripped back style (to start with anyway) before the other take the stage and it builds to an incredible peak.
The final song of the main set is ‘Sleeptalk’, a more aggressive, riffy one from their older material but an almost unmissable one for any Dayseeker set. But the finale sees that one song that’s been missing the whole set gets its time to shine with ‘Neon Grave’, a massive song that really leans into their metalcore roots with its techy riffs and huge breakdown but doesn’t exactly skimp on the pop either.
Dayseeker are a real special band that hits on so many different levels from lyrical content, delivery, riffs, textural elements and straight up fucking great songs. Hope the rest of the tour is fantastic, I doubt there’ll be many dry eyes at every show.
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