I
get to the venue early, for once, to do a lovely
little interview with the first support band Lacey,
after which I'm escorted into the Academy 2 to
catch a very special vip ticket holders only acoustic
Patent Pending set which sounds great and is worth
the extra money these ticket holders have paid.
After which the band mill around and have photos
and conversations with all the people before the
main doors open and the first support get on stage.
Lacey
a relatively new band from Nottingham take to
the stage. They're not really pop punk like Patent
Pending, but tonight's line up isn't the normal,
keep everything in the same vein. It’s broaden
your horizons night with this wealth of new music
and with that Lacey don't disappoint. They're
melodic rock with power chords and brutal riffs
thrown in for good measure. They remind me of
Lower Than Atlantis crossed with Twin Atlantic
minus the Scottish accents. They have lovely harmonic
vocals and trash about the stage during the bridges,
they're powerful emotional and fill this already
heaving room with great noise.
They take some time to talk to the crowd between
songs to say how they beat Jaret at Fifa every
night on their shared tour bus. They brighten
up the room and bring in some help toward the
end in the form of Patent Pending who add a little
extra oomph to this already great set by getting
down in the pit and crowd surfing whilst playing
guitars. They're really awesome and I can’t
wait to catch them again in there rise up.
People
On Vacation take to the stage, this is Jaret from
Bowling for Soups new band, they’re acoustic
rock with a hint of country and punk thrown in
for good measure, think BFS's Turbulence and you’re
on the right line, but obviously it’s not
all the same as that. They sound great and this
4 piece play a great catchy set, which changes
pace and has a few guest slots from patent pending
and Lacey throughout. Jaret does the normal BFS
thing of chatting to the crowd allot, including
a story about when he was peeing next to Josh
from Lacey and how Josh has this system that he
has to do after he finishes, “I mean I shake
and done but his goes on for five minutes”.
They then go on to talk
about dick cheese and hick babies but that's a
bit to crude for this write up. They go down great
but it’s hard not to with this great crowd
which is a mixture of all different ages and backgrounds,
this gig definitely brings a universal group to
play. They play allot off their album Sumer In
The Fall a BFS song; The Bitch Song, which starts
acoustically before going into a flow blown cover.
Before ending on a cover of Cum On Feel the Noise
by the mighty Slade and they play Because Of The
Sun before bowing out after getting this crowd
warmed up and ready for the main attraction. They
were really tight and although there are just
2 full time members, the touring members do an
amazing job of pushing the band further, the only
down side is that the set goes on too long and
gets a bit samey, but the crowd love it and are
ready for headliners.
Patent Pending are the main attraction, and they
take to the stage with their touring member who
sits at the back of the stage holding the door
open for them, as they run on into to a bang and
have their backdrop drop down revealing an awesome
mural of Patent Pending in Nintendo style lettering
and a Donkey Kong style level. They come out to
I Already Know (she Don’t Give A Shit About
Me) and get the party started with singer Joe
Ragosta instantly jumping off stage into the crowd
and crowd surfing whilst singing for a while,
before getting back on stage and moving around
like crazy, which is a hard thing to do on
such a small stage like the academy 2. They continue
with Let Go and this is where it gets hard for
me, as I love Patent Pending live, but I haven’t
really listened to them at home, so I don’t
know the songs, and as the band don’t have
set lists on stage as they change it every night
its hard for me to know exactly what songs where
played, but I think they continued with Anti-
Everything which involved Joe again jumping off
stage into the legion of adoring fans. Patent
Pending sound amazing, its so hard to sound good
in this room, but they pull it off so well. Even
though there setlist changes every night they
can still keep things going and even with all
there random events like during the next song,
a cover of Party Hard
by Andrew WK they get two members of Lacey to
come out dressed all in white like Andrew WK does
which is awesome. They then go into Therefore,
I Party and prove that they can party just as
hard as Andrew WK. After this they take a bit
of time to breath after the pure craziness of
the first five songs, and take some time to talk
to the crowd, but it’s not the normal how
you all doing, its “Ladies and gentlemen
of Birmingham,” said buurrmingum, “I
cordially invite you to, the world Olympic crowd
swimming championships”. Which if you’ve
seen Patent Pending before you’d know exactly
what is going on, but if you haven’t they
split the crowd up and part them in the middle
before Joe and bassist Corey DeVincenzo go to
the back of the room
and climb on to the crowd dressed in swimming
bands and goggles and swim back to the stage on
top of the fans, and whoever gets on stage the
first wins. They do this as the band plays the
music to Psycho in Love before the two members
get on stage and join in with the OOOH OOOH OOOH,
oh and in case you were wondering Joe won. They
start the next song by saying how One Direction
through down the gauntlet down as they said they’re
better dancers than the people in Patent Pending.
“So during this next song where going to
show them up”. They then proceed to do a
dance routine on stage during the chorus of Falling
out Of Love. They continue to play there great
sounding set list with Shake Weights and Moving
Crates in which guitarist Marc Kantor leaves the
stage un noticed and goes round
to the balcony at the back of the venue and climbs
up over the edge to play a solo before heading
back to the stage and continuing the song. The
band take a break after this and slow things down
with Joe doing an acoustic version of Spin Me
Around, before the set list continues, during
the final songs of the main set we see more crazy
antics with other members of Lacey and People
in Planes joining in on stage, with fans joining
in on stage and with some pure good old fashioned
pop punk. They finish their set with Brighter
and the internet classic Hey Mario, which is currently
being made into a documentary about them making
a video for it. The band leave the stage and the
crowd goes crazy chanting Patent Pending and the
band quickly come back to play There Was A Time,
Second Family
and there biggest hit Douchebag. The crowd leave
happy, and the band come down to thank everyone
for coming, showing that they love what they do
and they love their fans.
Overall tonight’s gig was great, it started
with a more indie rock start with the awesome
Lacey which turned into acoustic mellowness with
People on Vacation before ending in the pop punk
craziness of Patent Pending. I can’t stress
enough how awesome Patent Pending are live and
the next time they’re back over hear please
check them out, as you’ll have an awesome
time, they truly love their fans and due to the
ever changing set lists on a nightly basis they
want their fans who follow them on tour to have
just as much fun each night too, as not knowing
what they’re going to play is something
that doesn’t really happen much these days,
but Patent Pending are keeping that mystery alive.
Lacey 4/5
People on Vacation 3.5/5
Patent Pending 5/5
Review And Photos By James Daly And Elizabeth
Aston
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