Support: Call Me Amour, Lowlives
Date: 18/02/20
New Years Day, February 18th 2020. The date of the first international band I saw this year and my first (of what I’m hoping will be quite a few appearances of mine) the Key Club in Leeds. I was so happy this was my first Leeds show of the year because it was honestly; near perfect! I’d been waiting a few years to see New Years Day, the first being Slam Dunk Festival a few years ago, the other a few months ago but other commitments held myself back from being in attendance on the dates closest to myself. I’ll say this, they didn’t disappoint!
First up on the bill are the dark electronica with distorted guitars and iconic melodies, this can only be Call Me Amour. Cards on the table, I was roughly five minutes late for their set because it took a while to get everyone in but straight in and straight to the point with the bands for gigs, that’s what you want right? Well, that’s exactly what Call Me Amour did, get everyone up and moving slightly, venturing out to communicate with the audience but they only possibly hit about half their capabilities with everything. Their energy though, there’s no doubt that they were infused with it.
Heading into the faster grooves on the night, Lowlives describe themselves as in your face and you can certainly see why. From the point of the inception of their set and they go a little crazy, enough to see that they do mean business here yet give a fresh perspective into the scene. Looking from my perspective, the audience did take to Lowlives a little better than Call Me Amour but I think its because part of their whole look is genre-defining and bending to rekindle the flame and get you truly warmed up for what’s coming next. Nevertheless, what you can see is this band just gaining a legion of followers, even though they’re not the headlining band… yet.
Now, New Years Day. They were formed in 2005, and hail from Anaheim, California. The band consists of Ash Costello on vocals, Nikki Misery on rhythm guitar, Frankie Sil on bass, Max Georgiev on lead guitar, and Zac Morris on drums. They started on Myspace and released their self-titled EP in 2006, then their first full length My Dear in 2007. Since then, they’ve released three EP’s and two full-length albums. Straight away, the audience roars and you can tell this set is going to be a success unless it just blew up in their face via Instagram (where they were streaming the performance on the evening). Also, this is the very first UK headlining tour the band have ever done, so you can expect things to get a little crazy, such as the band moving into the audience to gain a better perspective of everyone.
What’s more, is that tit’s hard to believe that this is the bands first ever UK headlining tour. I mean sure they’ve supported but they play as if they’ve been made for headlining shows. ‘Kill Or Be Killed’, ‘Fucking Hostile’ and ‘Shut Up’ all play key roles in their setlist whether it’s to get everyone moving, their horns in the air (for which everyone kept them all in the air for at least one track). The band have been around for now what will be fifteen years by the end of 2020 and now they’ve headlined the UK, we’ll be begging them to come back for more and just like with every other Post-Hardcore band, we won’t let them go that easily.
Above all else, Ash Costello and co made everyone feel welcome. This wasn’t your usual crazy output of things but this is where you have a sense of belonging within the scene and that’s just a beautiful thing to be feeling and massive well done to New Years Day for making everyone feel loved and included on the night because it felt more personal when Ash Costello shouted it but it’s more than that as if a family was coming together out of all of this.
Rating: 8/10
Almost Anything Music 