Friday nights at the academy are club nights,
therefore every Friday night has early doors and
an early curfew of 9.45pm to make way for the
quick change over to the club night ready for
opening at 10pm, we got to the academy just after
8pm, knowing that The Presidents Of United States
Of America will take to the stage at 8.30pm. When
we walked into the venue we noticed that It was
quite a rare sight, the venue wasn’t sold
out for a change even though it looked pretty
full, also there was no kids or teenagers in sight,
instead the venue was rammed with people aged
20 plus which was quite interesting to see but
meant long queues for the bar with nearly everyone
in the venue stood with a pint in their hand.
We made our way to the main area at 8.30pm expecting
The Presidents to take to the stage at any moment,
after a 5 minute wait the lights dimmed and The
Presidents took to the stage waving to the crowd
as they walked on. When drummer Jason sat down
behind his drums I had a little chuckle to myself
as from where I was standing he reminded me so
much of Earl from the American hit sitcom My Name
Is Earl.
The Presidents instrument playing isn’t
anything special with front man Chris playing
a two-string bass, sticksman Jason had a small
sized drum kit and was no Travis Barker, but his
drumming skills suited the band, guitarist Andrew
had some interesting riffs and handled the guitar
duty really well.
Now I first got into The Presidents Of United
States Of America back in 1995 when they released
their self titled debut album, the album was full
of killer songs such as 'Kitty', 'Lump', 'Dune
Buggy' and 'Peaches', but since then I moved on
in music tastes and never checked out any of the
bands albums after the debut but did enjoy the
hit singles 'Mach 5' and 'Video Killed The Radiostar',
I came here tonight to hear the songs listed above,
and I got that and so much more, The Presidents
played for over an hour and thirty minutes and
played well over 20 songs in that time with every
song being such a pleasure to hear.
The first crowd pleaser of the night was 'Kitty',
with the majority of the crowd shouting along
word for word, another really big crowd pleaser
was 'Zero Friction' a song from the bands 'Love
Everybody' album, now this is a song I have never
heard before but was so easy to pick up on and
within moments I was singing along word for word
and loving every moment. The Presidents love to
interact with their fans and spent time talking
to the crowd before and after each song, frontman
Chris surely knows how to talk fast and make people
laugh.
Midway though the show a member of the support
band Electric Eel Shock took to the stage to hand
out shots of Jagermiester to The Presidents as
well as some of the fans at the front of the stage,
with Chris asking everyone to consume a drink
at the same time, this went down pretty well.
The highlight of the night was when they played
a double whammy of great songs, the first being
'Peaches', as soon the opening chords were strummed
the crowd erupted with screams, The Presidents
played the song with passion and the crowd was
loving every minute with a random girl jumping
on the stage rocking out with the band head banging
at every opportunity, as soon as the 'Peaches'
finished, the real fun began with The Presidents
telling the girl that she now had to do a stage
dive into the crowd, she looked quite shocked
and frightened, the crowd soon started chanting
"jump, jump, jump" the girl ran like
she was going to jump then whimped out at the
last moment, the Presidents then took over again
telling the girl that the exit is to the right
of the stage, the girl walked off stage to major
boo's from the fans who were expecting a stage
dive. The Presidents then carried on with Andrew
strumming along for the intro to the next song,
now this was the highlight of the night for me
as the next song was 'Mach 5' and it sounded so
good live. They announced the last song of the
night and play 'Kick Out The Jams' and then finish
with a little rendition of 'The Ace Of Spades'.
You could tell the people in the crowd here had
been to many shows in the past, as normally when
a band plays their last song and leaves the stage
a lot of the crowd leave as well not knowing that
the band are due to come back on in a couple of
minutes for the encore, The Presidents fans weren’t
amateur gig goers and weren't stupid they knew
an Encore was due and everyone stayed in place
shouting "Presidents! Presidents! Presidents!"
and within moments the band retook to the stage
and played a number of songs including the crowd
pleasing 'Video Killed the Radiostar'.
What a night, The Presidents Of United States
Of America are one of the best bands I have had
the pleasure to see live, they are so happy and
energetic and really know how to please themselves
and their fans when on stage, they were smiling
throughout the whole show, they played all their
hits and much more. Everyone seemed to be leaving
the venue with a massive smile on their face,
Fans of the band must of had the time of their
life and the people who got dragged along by their
friends or partners should well be new fans of
the band and clearing out the play.com warehouse
of The Presidents Of United States Of America
albums as you read this.
5/5
Review by Trigger
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