Planning something in the United Kingdom and taking into account the travel restrictions and the things you have to pay for regardless of how long you are staying (meaning, the day 2 COVID tests that are absolutely unregulated by the government), you think, might as well stick around for a few days and have some fun. It is the train of thought that led us to Leeds on a frankly tropical Saturday night for the north of England in September.
But the truth is, where The Maine is, chances are, I want to be.

In the middle of their tour supporting long time friends All Time Low, The Maine added an extra three headline shows in England, playing Milton Keynes (of all places in the world), Leeds, and London. After spending about ten days looking all over the Internet for spare tickets, we headed to the Key Club and had one hell of a night. I personally had only been to Key Club for a show once before, in 2017, for With Confidence's Better Weather tour, and the place is loaded with memories for me. The ones added last Saturday night will remain positive ones and, after rum and cokes started flowing, impossible to explain, but fun regardless.

Support on the headliners came in the form of two acts, the first one being solo artist Jaws The Shark. I only managed to catch the last song, from memory, but I liked it enough to want to check out more, so there's a positive outcome for you. I caught more of the second act, Dead Pony, and I really enjoyed their sound and high energy performance. They're definitely a band I'll keep an eye on in the future. I like that, despite three shows not being a tour in the traditional sense of the term, effort was put into having a consistent line-up and choosing artists to play all shows instead of picking, almost last minute, whoever was available in a ten-mile radius.

If walking around in a t-shirt in Leeds after the first days of autumn meant tropical weather, I suppose the heat and sweatiness inside of Key Club were similar to the seventh circle of hell. This was my first small indoor show since the start of the pandemic, and I had almost forgotten what it felt like standing in a tiny room, sweat dripping from the ceiling, drenched, with other people's skin sticking to mine. I cannot say I missed the feeling as such, but I had definitely longed for the energy for the past eighteen months. There is something undeniably special about tiny venues, especially when you watch bands who could easily sell out larger, thousand people capacity rooms or more. The fact that it took us ten days to find tickets for the show truly is a testament to how popular and loved The Maine are.
As they should be.
These shows are an occasion for the Arizona natives to play more songs from their latest full length, the excellent XOXO: From Love And Anxiety In Real Time, as well as older tunes that do not often get played during shorter performances. As a long-time fan, it was nothing short of amazing to get a chance to hear Into Your Arms again. You know how, sometimes, you'll hear a song live, and the memory of that specific moment will stay embedded into your brain, for better or for worse? That was Into Your Arms for me. I remember hearing it the first time I saw The Maine, during their 2011 spring tour alongside NeverShoutNever. It was at the Nouveau Casino, in Paris, which is a no-barrier venue and, back in the day, no one really cared if you chucked all your earthly possessions on stage as long as you didn't get too much in the way, which we did, since we were first row. And the only thing I remember from Into Your Arms is an old friend of mine crying the whole time. Like, sobbing. Which I understand is rich coming from me, extreme crier extraordinaire.
As of September 25th, 2021, ten years, six months, and fourteen days later, I have a memory of myself smiling like an idiot, like, the kind of grinning that hurts your jaw, because I was just so happy to hear it live again. It's one of those moments when it absolutely hit me, square in the jaw and all, by how great a song it is, and hearing it live again was a treat.
Please never take it off the setlist again.

Apart from my weirdly specific, Into Your Arms related memories, this Key Club show was everything I could have wanted and expected from seeing The Maine: utter and complete chaos soundtracked by the best emo songs this side of the world. Never mind how hard we tried and, believe me, we did until the very last song, with all our might and energy, we simply could not get a moshpit going for more than two seconds, but we still had an awesome time. (And we'll get our revenge next time. I'm aware it sounds like a threat.) Chaos also came, as usual, in the form of frontman John O'Callaghan enthusiastically offering everyone a lift to Manchester, where the band was heading the next day to play with All Time Low, and phoning a random person's boss to tell them said person was quitting. Oh, also, not knowing what Lidl was. Yes, the supermarket chain.
Typing this, I realise explaining to an outsider what goes on when you watch The Maine perform on a stage is near impossible. It's one of those things: you have to witness it to understand it. This band is an all-encompassing experience.

And they're damn good live performers too. As I explained in my All Time Low post, earlier this week, I never know what's going to happen in the crowd whenever I see The Maine play, but I know I'm going to be given a brilliant performance by the five men on stage, never any doubt about it, and I couldn't ever ask for more. The setlist is hit after hit, after hit, from oldies such as Into Your Arms and Everything I Ask For to newbies Sticky, Lips, or Pretender, through beloved tracks like The Sound Of Reverie, Slip The Noose, or Run. I can never be unhappy with a setlist of theirs, even when I don't hear a song live for a decade or when they simply forget they ever released an album called Black & White. 
Mind when I said, about All Time Low, that every time they played a song, my brain would go: "Shit, I love that one?" It also works for The Maine, ten times out of ten. Every single song. Shit, I love that one, sixteen times in a row, even with sweat dripping down from the ceiling, and even when I'm still giggling about the Lidl incident. It doesn't hurt that they always sound perfect. There's never a hit or miss situation. I don't remember ever leaving a show thinking it didn't sound good or anything that sort.

Every time I see The Maine live, I leave the venue feeling like I'm on top of the world, like my problems do not exist anymore, with a stupid grin on my sweaty face, covered in glitter, but most importantly, I leave the room in awe of how truly talented this band is. They are always consistently great, professional, and they always sound just right. They are one of a kind, really, the perfect mixture of chaotic energy and musical perfection, complete with matching outfits, jokes about Magic Mike, and more heart than many bands in the scene. They have one of the most loving and dedicated fanbases I have ever encountered, and you can tell this band means everything to all of us. Watching them play on a stage, though, it grows obvious that no joke, no lies, playing shows, connecting with their fans, sharing a moment with us, especially after being deprived of it for twenty months, it means everything to them too.

Check out Jaws The Shark HERE.

Check out Dead Pony HERE.

Even if this is my third live review of sorts since I picked this blog back up from the almost-dead over the summer, there is still something utterly unbelievable, in a magical kind of way, about being back at in-person shows. It seems too good to be true and, as we have seen through many tours being postponed and shows being cancelled over COVID cases in bands' teams, it still feels like it's all hanging by a thread, more fragile than ever. Yes, we do have live music back, for now, and it is something to be celebrated, and we are lucky enough to see bands travel from overseas to play, but now is not the time to take anything for granted.
Now is the time to love it with all our hearts, like we've never loved anything before, and appreciate it more than ever.

This time last week, I flew to London, England, without a three-hour stopover in Barcelona, Spain, like I had for Slam Dunk, to watch All Time Low play Brixton Academy. Back when I first started listening to the Baltimore pop-punks, about twelve years ago, I remember the idea of Brixton Academy being such a milestone for artists. If you played Brixton Academy, in some way, you had made it. I remember seeing people I knew travelling to the United Kingdom and watching bands play there, and it all seemed like something unattainable, the Royal Albert Hall of pop-punk kids, if you will. The first time I ever attended a show in the iconic venue was in February of 2011, when I bought seating tickets to see A Day To Remember, only because their Paris show was sold out. Still a baby in these corners of the scene, I assumed that, if they were playing a three-hundred-people capacity room in Paris, the show in London must have been roughly the same size. Despite Brixton Academy holding magic and power over the scene I was diving into, I had no idea how many people it could contain, and I suppose you can imagine my surprise when I turned up for doors, and the queue was going all the way around the block.

Since then, I have seen many bands in this legendary building, all lovely white statues and sloped standing area, but never All Time Low, despite them playing it regularly. When they announced a UK tour, no European Union shows, I knew I wanted to attend but refused to plan anything because of the potential travel restrictions. And when The Maine, who I absolutely adore, was announced as the main support act, I knew I needed to be there- a true come hell or high water situation. There was no way I could miss that tour.

The first night saw the largest queue I remember seeing in front of Brixton Academy since my first ever show there, a decade prior. As a consequence, though I cannot fault venue staff for their quick and efficient work, we missed the first song and a half played by East coast band Meet Me At The Altar. I had heard of them thanks to their ties with The Wonder Years' frontman Dan Campbell, and I first checked out their single Garden sometime in 2020, including it in a sadly short-lived "positive energy" playlist situation I had on Twitter. After releasing the excellent EP Model Citizen in the summer of 2021, I grew even more excited to watch them perform live, and these first two times did not disappoint in the slightest- quite the contrary, actually. There is such a quiet confidence exuding from these women, as if they know it's within their power to hold a five-thousand-people strong audience in the palm of their hand, which I hope they did. How could they not? They have too much charisma to leave anyone indifferent, and the scene needs a voice like theirs too badly to ignore them. While they played the UK, last week, I saw many people praising them and calling them important, and you know what, yes, they really are. I have a memory of me saying, about Candy Hearts/Best Ex, that had I found music like it when I was younger, I would have held on to it and never let go, I would have grown obsessed with it and modelled my entire personality around it, and the same goes for Meet Me At The Altar. Teenage me would have adored them with all her heart, and it's only natural that adult me, even more so with all the education and views on the world I now have, is on that path. I left Brixton Academy even more of a fan than I was before I walked in, and I am unbelievably excited to see them again at Slam Dunk Festival in June. (If there is any way we could get Feel It Again with Dan Campbell, that would be lovely, thank you.)
Also, realistically, how could I not love a band that covers Jimmy Eat World's Sweetness? That was a match made in heaven.

In the past fourteen years, The Maine, "spelled like the state, from Phoenix, Arizona," has grown into a band that is universally loved and completely underrated at the same time. They have one of the biggest and most dedicated communities of fans I have ever seen, but rarely will you ever see anyone celebrate them as a must-check out band or cite their albums as staples of the genre- and it is through no fault of their own. I have always admired The Maine because they seem to do whatever it is they want to do without worrying whether it will be accepted by their peers. They played a free tour in the United States, back in 2015. They tour with every band, newcomers and old friends alike. They reinvent themselves with every album without shouting on rooftops that they are evolving or changing. They wear matching outfits on stage and radiate a chaotic energy that feels completely genuine. The Maine just exist. They do their thing, follow their own path, away from labels and clichés, away from tropes and traps, and it is why they are this loved.
The best thing about watching The Maine play on a stage is that you never really know what to expect apart from a great performance given by the five men on stage. It's a given when I go see them live: I know I will never, ever be disappointed, and I know they always deliver. Maybe it's why I have never hesitated before buying tickets to their tours, maybe it's why I have now seen them live twenty-four times, maybe it's why I keep coming back for more with no signs of stopping. I know they are going to be absolutely brilliant.
I just never know what's going to happen to me in the crowd.
After about two songs of quiet dad-dancing on the side, the first night, we grow restless and decide to shake things up in the middle of the audience, which results in a three-woman moshpit, which then grows into a five-woman moshpit. (Side note, but Brixton Academy and its fifty-five thousand barriers scattered all over the standing area makes it hard to start some action of the pitting kind sometimes.) On the second time, the crowd seems a little more active, and I find myself being the first crowdsurfer of the show. The sense of uncertainty and jumping into the unknown whenever I watch The Maine means everything to me. This joyful chaos keeps me excited and eager for the next show. Mark my words: I will always be impatient for my next The Maine show.
Their Brixton setlist is a solid mixture of their biggest, most-known songs (Numb Without You, Am I Pretty?, or Black Butterflies And Déjà Vu) and tracks extracted from their latest record, 2021's XOXO: From Love And Anxiety In Real Time. "If you don't know the words, pretend like you do!" enthusiastically exclaims frontman John O'Callaghan, the leader of all this chaos. And we all do. We wave our arms about, we sing along as best as we can, we dad dance like it's our neighbour's barbecue and we have had one too many beers, we scream "Yeehaw!" when prompted, because why the hell not, and we are lucky enough to watch a band that I have followed almost religiously for the past twelve years of my life, a band who looks happier than ever, and a band who always makes me leave the room with a stupid grin plastered on my sweaty, glittery face.
And, just as always, I am already excited for the next show, for the next tour, even though I have no bloody clue where or when that may be.

As I spoke about in my albums of the year post, at the end of last year, Wake Up Sunshine is the album that made me fall back in love with All Time Low, after years of drought and music I didn't connect with as much as I used to. It's the album that swept me off my feet all over again and, in some way, the girl who played it on repeat from her little countryside village could almost be the adult version of the university-aged kid who used to listen to Nothing Personal every morning as motivation for classes, minus the awful fringe. (Thank God for that!)
There is always something akin to a celebration whenever you watch All Time Low live and, albums I clicked with or not, the feeling never went away. They would play a song, and I would immediately start dancing and singing, thinking "Shit! I love this one!" every three minutes for an hour and a half. With Wake Up Sunshine tracks in tow, the feeling became heightened. Both nights, because they swapped setlist between both shows, every time a song started, old or new, all I could think about was: "Shit! I love that one!" 
You know how, sometimes, you'll watch a band, and they will say something about their new record and how they would please like to play material from it if you don't mind, as if they are asking you for a favour? All Time Low didn't really do any of it tonight, but I wouldn't have cared if they had. I wanted them to play as much stuff from Wake Up Sunshine as possible. I would have had my money's worth if they had played the album from start to end, and back again. Because this was not in the card, we simply got Some Kind Of Disaster, Sleeping In, Monsters (sadly sans blackbear or Demi Lovato), Favourite Place, Clumsy, Glitter & Crimson, as well as the two recent non-album singles that followed, Once In A Lifetime and PMA. The rest of the setlist was largely composed of classics, and let me tell you one thing, nothing compares to hearing five thousand people echoing the opening lines to 2007's Six Feet Under The Stars or watching confetti cascade over the crowd during the iconic Dear Maria, Count Me In.
The first night, during Glitter & Crimson, which frontman Alex Gaskarth said he wrote about a gay couple fighting for their love, I see a group of people holding a pride flag, not far from me, down the front. The second night, a similar flag is thrown on stage, only to be worn by guitarist Jack Barakat as a cape. And there's something that made me so happy about both those sights. Yes, nothing in the world compares to the joy of hearing the songs you love played by the bands who created and crafted them, but most importantly, nothing feels like knowing there are people who have found, in All Time Low, at their shows, a place where they feel safe enough to be who they are, unapologetically, as they should. And I don't think I will ever be able to listen to Glitter & Crimson without thinking of those Brixton shows, now.

There are a million things that have been said about All Time Low's stage presence and performances in the past, and I could only paraphrase the most complimentary. Even when I didn't quite click with their music, I attended every show I could, because they are just that good on a stage, whatever they play. They have an energy that is limitless, that knows no bounds, and the way they communicate with the audience, wherever in the world it is, is natural, never forced, and feels comfortable to witness. They seem to have toned down the dirty, blink-182-like jokes of yesteryear, though people will always throw bras all over the stage, apparently, and they are still the band I fell in love with, back when I was a lost nineteen-year-old kid with no sense of direction or fashion. They are fun, they are like the sunshine, they are full of energy, enthusiasm, and joy, they make you laugh and cry all at once, and now, they have the budget of their big ambitions and confetti and fancy screens behind them on stage, enhancing an already stellar performance. Yeah, maybe that was rude to my feelings to play Therapy and Missing You back to back, please, can I just not cry for a minute, but they were instantly forgiven anyway.

The first night, we end up in the moshpits, tearing it up and, strangely, after about seventeen shows or so, I had never been in the middle. (It took me ten shows to get the barrier I so desperately wanted back in the day, cut me some slack.) And, yeah, maybe some people need to relearn pit etiquette, but it was a fun time regardless. I crowdsurfed to Dear Maria, Count Me In on the first night, and when I landed on the other side of the barrier, running back in the crowd and seeing the confetti fall, I couldn't help but think that teenage me, the girl with nothing going for her, the girl who listened to the same album every day for months on end, the girl who tried to find joy wherever she could, nevermind if it was just stupid boys making basement noise in the basement, yeah, in Baltimore, Maryland, where she's still never been, well, that girl, she would be damn proud of adult me, and at that moment, it was all I cared about.

As I said on Instagram, 2020 sucked, big time, and I don't think we need to be reminded of any of it, but it gave me my stupid love for All Time Low back, and I think I have no choice but to be grateful. The joy I felt inside Brixton Academy, those two nights- I have to be grateful.

PLAYLIST : 

• At the end of 2016, Of Mice & Men's former frontman Austin Carlile announced his departure from the band, due to health issues. A lot of confusion ensued as the band was adamant they wanted to carry on as a four piece, and they came back this month with new track Unbreakable, featuring Aaron Pauley on both screams and cleans. I didn't know what to expect and I was scared, but... it works, guys. It works, Unbreakable is a banger and a half and Pauley's vocals are brilliant. (Music video)
• SO. I was completely unaware that SHVPES had released an album this year until I stumbled upon their newest music video, False Teeth. See, before that, I was pretty neutral about the band, but this song is so damn catchy, the vocals have a hint of Stray From The Path and I might just throw myself on board with this lot.
• To go along with the deluxe version of their sophomore Around the World and Back, State Champs have put out a pretty acoustic version of single Secrets. Speaking of bands also doing deluxe versions of their albums, say hi to blink-182. The new and improved version of California will be out on the 19th of May, and two new tracks have emerged into the world ; the 36 second long Can't Get You More Pregnant, and the incredible 6/8, that the band have described as "the strangest song blink has ever recorded". I adore it.
• In Hearts Wake have announced their fourth album Ark (out May 26th) and have already given us two new songs, Warcry and Passage. They have also announced that instead of doing a traditional run of signings around the release of the album, they would do beach clean ups around Australia instead, meeting fans and giving everyone a free t-shirt in the process. Don't dare telling me we don't need more bands like them in the world.
• As a way of coping with the long, long wait until we get to hear the whole of Lorde's second record, Melodrama (out June 16th), everyone (in the form of All Time Low, and then Sainte) has decided to release covers of the first single, Green Light.
• April was also a big month for the Australians of Tonight Alive! The five-piece has signed to Hopeless Records and given us a taste of what's to come with the excellent World Away. Frontwoman Jenna McDougall also declared that the future music will have "the angst and the edge that The Other Side had". I am beyond excited.
• I didn't mean to, but I got into Against The Current - I simply cannot resist frontwoman Chrissy Costanza's incredible voice anymore. Here's two stunning acoustic versions of their tracks Chasing Ghosts and Runaway, both extracted from the band's début, In Our Bones.
• Things that deserve capital letters all around : ROYAL BLOOD ARE BACK. The follow up to their wonderful self-titled début is going to be called How Did We Get So Dark, we all get to listen to it on the 16th of June, and it even has its own mural in Brighton, the band's hometown.
• Another band coming back that I am very excited about is Paramore, and I have a feeling that "very excited" doesn't quite cover it. When they showered us with new info - a new album, After Laughter, out on May 12th, a European tour (which I got tickets for this morning) and a new single, little pop bomb Hard Times, I was so ecstatic I cried and proceeded to listen to said little pop bomb about fifty times in a row. (The music video is aesthetically pleasing as hell, too)
• More comebacks : Plain White T's have signed to Fearless Records again and have put out the extremely catchy Land of the Living, proving to this world that a) they are a fine and completely overlooked pop-rock band and b) their frontman Tom Higgenson just doesn't age. French pop giants Phoenix have just released their new single J-Boy, and my teenage favourite band, BB Brunes, are going fully eighties with Eclair Eclair.
• God but also Jesus bless Upset for making me discover Tigers Jaw (I know I mentioned them last month, but, you know), The New Tusk, Nineteen Fifty Eight and Joyce Manor.
• Little tasters for music to get excited about : Gnarwolves' Outsiders is out next week, Twin Wild have just released a new single, Control, Ultralife, Oh Wonder's second record, arrives on the 16th of June as well as Broadside's Paradise. Also, gentle reminder that All Time Low's seventh studio album, Last Young Renegade, is out on the 2nd of June, and the band have just released a third excellent single from it, Life of the Party.
• There will be a new documentary on Green Day entitled Green Day : The Early Years, and that is set to cover the trio's career up until the release of Dookie, in 1994. A couple of bands, have covered some of Green Day's songs as a contribution, and let me tell you, Pierce The Veil's rendition of Coming Clean is nothing short of stunning.
• Music videos ! Counterfeit keep it simple in As Yet Untitled, Twin Atlantic relive their three sold-out nights at Barrowlands in the heartbreaking Whispers, we say one last tearful goodbye to Yellowcard with A Place We Set Afire, Basement go around London to the sound of Promise Everything, Columbus are let loose in a thrift shop with $50 for their outfits in Next to Me and Canadian pop punks Seaway take us on the road with Airhead.
• Catchy metalcore, you say? Wage War are here for you with Don't Let Me Fade Away.
• Speaking of comebacks, we're not talking about Fall Out Boy.