Before I get to talking about how the bands
performed, I feel I really need to make a point
first about the venue’s technical staff.
The man behind the sound desk is an absolute moron;
he couldn’t even play the music between
bands without buggering around with the volume
let alone get the levels right for the set.
The Bunny The Bear are quite possibly the worst
live act I have ever seen. If they weren’t
strung out on some form of drug then there is
no excuse for what I just saw; the screaming vocals
were pathetic, their on stage performance was
sloppy, the music on the whole was atrocious and
they continuously said “thank you London”
which was met by silence from this black country
crowd. If it were me I’d be wearing those
masks to hide my identity so I wouldn’t
be associated with that set, I also feel that
my opinion was shared by many attendees tonight,
mostly because I heard them say so.
 The Amity Affliction have been given the easiest
job in the world, follow whatever the hell that
previous act was. Here is where the sound problems
begin due to neglectful sound engineering (the
first band may have had some but it was terrible
anyway so you wouldn’t have noticed), the
guitarists microphone doesn’t even work
for God’s sake. Taking into consideration
that there is 6 guys on stage, it’s understandable
there isn’t a lot of space for them to really
manoeuvre but the band appears to be trying their
best; thankfully they aren’t bumping into
each other, which is a miracle considering how
energetic the keyboard player was. The style of
the material that the band performs tonight is
some post-hardcore music, things to compliment
here are the good guitar work and superb clean
vocals reminiscent of Atreyu but I must say whilst
the main vocals are good the lyrics here seem
to be forced into the song and don’t really
fit well, maybe that’s just the point and
people do enjoy it but it’s a bit hard to
follow in my opinion.
 Escape The Fate are greeted to an ear deafening
screech of adoring female fans. Hailing from Las
Vegas the band are finally on a full UK tour which
if you ask any Escape The Fate fan they will tell
you is a rare occurrence, so that screech we heard
was an audience unleashing their built up anticipation.
Having said that all these fans have been waiting
a damn long time to see this, they would want
everything to be absolutely perfect because God
knows when you’ll get this opportunity again;
now unfortunately, due to no fault of the band,
things are far from perfect. There the band are
rocking it, diving around the stage giving it
their all hitting every note with precision yet
due to that moronic sound guy the volume of the
lead microphone is barely existent in the mix.
The only time you can hear the lead vocals are
when he really screams his lungs out or when every
other member is silent and when you can hear him
he’s doing a really good job, but the fact
you can’t make out any of the lyrics most
of the time has really hurt the performance tonight.
Hopefully the band will come back soon because
they cannot leave their good names tarnished like
that.
 Funeral For A Friend were last here headlining
the Birmingham Academy 2 a mere 7 months ago on
a headline tour; that venue was much smaller and
I believe it was sold out, I think the band thrived
off the atmosphere provided there as it was a
terrific gig, extremely funny with a really rowdy
crowd. Tonight isn’t a touch on that; it
was the perfect show, this however is in a larger
room and whilst many tickets have been sold there
is a lot of empty space, that I think has had
a considerably large impact on the band as well
as the crowd because when there is a lot of empty
space feel people more singled out and as though
people are being watched which in turn affects
how crazy they get. The band feels this as people
aren’t making anywhere near as much noise
either which I think hurts the charisma of lead
vocalist Matthew Davies-Kreye as he isn’t
as upbeat or full of life as he once was. Never
the less I enjoy a lot of the tracks from the
set list; some of the greatest  classics like “Bullet
Theory”, “Roses for the Dead”,
“Streetcar” and “Escape Artists
Never Die” mark some of my highlights, they
throw in some good new tracks too “Front
Row Seats to the End of the World”, “Broken
Foundation” and “Spinning Over the
Island”. The encore could not have been
more perfect; “Your Revolution is a Joke”,
“History” and finally my personal
favourite FFAF song “Juneau”. Whilst
the performance here hasn’t been the best,
the material was all note for note perfect and
played with aggressive bursts of energy so for
that I can forgive them, maybe the next tour will
be in more appropriate venues.
The Bunny The Bear – 1/5
The Amity Affliction – 3/5
Escape The Fate – 3.5/5
Funeral For A Friend – 3.5/5
Review By James Webb
Photos By Robert Lawrence |
