AFI – Gig Review & Photo Gallery 16th September @ Eatons Hill, Brisbane QLD
AFI
Eatons Hill Hotel, Brisbane QLD
September 16th, 2017
Supports: Basement and Introvert
What can be said about AFI that hasn’t said before? The men can rock and still pull a huge crowd and it was an absolute pleasure checking them out in action for a headline slot this time around, which meant MORE songs from the back catalogue and loads more fun to be had. Here’s what you missed/saw.
Introvert opened the night and they sounded sooo much bigger than when I witnessed them at Big Sound a couple weeks ago. Take away the fact the room was barely full, these lads put on a show as if they were playing in the headline slot. Frontman Audie Franks battled through the flu and his screams still sounded wholesome and clean. Guitarist Mitch Raschke toyed with the crowd and flipped his hair more times than I can remember, yet didn’t miss a beat, as did bassist Max Priest. The star of the night would have to have been drummer Viserys Targaryen Stephen Hopkins who managed bash his kit and sing at the same time without issue. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, these guys will be huuuge and Newcastle should be proud to have yet another fantastic musical act to get behind.
Basement took to the stage next and while I wasn’t the biggest fan of their music, I could appreciate the way they owned the stage. With Andrew Fisher up front on vocals, he drew the crowd in (which had almost tripled in size) to witness their performance and the rest of the band played along with his every move. I used this time to grab more beers, because, I wasn’t going anywhere during he next band’s entire set.
AFI took to the stage shortly after 10pm and considering their setlist had changed with every show of their Australia tour, we didn’t know what to expect but as soon as the opening chords of ‘Girls Not Grey‘ began, immediately we all knew it was going to be a non-stop night of celebrations. Looking around the room there were a vast array of AFI fans from the emos to the goths and the older men with mohawks and denim vests to the elegantly dressed women who looks out f place. We were all there for one reason and they had just began playing an epic 17 song set. The boys played through songs like ‘So Beneath You‘ and ‘17 Crimes‘ and from the middle of the moshpit, everyone was looking out for each other. Girls were moshing without concern, guys were helping each other up when they took a tumble and bodies were flying all over the joint during the classic track ‘This Celluloid Dream‘. Frontman Davey Havok oozed with perfection as he paraded across the stage lapping up all the screams and cheers coming his way. Drummer Adam Carson looked so peaceful bashing away at the drums in the background and bassist Hunter Burgan thrashed around like a lizard who just lost it’s tail.
The footsteps during the backing track of ‘Love Like Winter‘ began and everyone collectively lost their shit once more. There wasn’t anyone in the place not enjoying themselves, even the crew up on the mezzanine were getting into it, one bloke played his air guitar for the entirety of the show and was fucking killing it. People in the crowd below at times were shifting their attention to his performance instead of the band. ‘The Lost Souls‘ and ‘Beautiful Thieves‘ played out fantastically but once again ‘Paper Airplanes (Makeshift Wings)‘ sent everyone into a nostalgia filled frenzy. Guitarist Jade Puget, managed to pull off the eye covering hair fringe well for a bloke in his 40’s and played his guitar even better. At times it was the Davey and Jade show with the pair bouncing off each other like Bert & Ernie, Harold & Kumar etc Name another more iconic duo… I’ll wait
Towards the end of the band’s set, crowd favourites like ‘Bleed Black‘ and ‘Snow Cats‘ picked up the energy in the room but it wasn’t until Davey jumped into the crowd during ‘I Hope You Suffer‘ that things really got mental with bodies flying left and right trying to get as close to the mesmerising frontman as possible. He made his way back to the stage and immediately the band got straight into ‘Miss Murder‘ the next 3 minutes of my life are a blur, I just remember jumping with what seemed like the entire Eatons Hill venue for the length of the whole song. The band left the stage but we knew they weren’t done yet… Within a couple minutes they were back on deck for ‘The Days of the Phoenix‘ which went fucking off, everyone had been waiting for them to pull this one out of their pockets and we fucking enjoyed the shit out of it. Classic AFI trumps everything else but in an interesting approach the band decided to close the night with ‘Silver and Cold‘ instead of ‘The Leaving Song‘, but in saying that, either of those songs would have been great. The band gave it their all, everyone in the join sang along with Davey and even tried to hit his high notes too. At the end the band thanked us all for coming and their Australian tour came to an end… Until next time, thanks for the memori… oh shit wrong band. Until next time AFI, stay classy you iconic mother fuckers.
Review by Browny @brownypaul
Revisit our Wall of Sound: Up Against The Wall episode with AFI‘s Adam Carson co-hosting here
Check out the photo gallery by Mitch Chamberlain, Please credit Photographer and Wall of Sound if you repost.
Follow Mitch on Twitter: @MJChamberlain. Stalk him on Instagram: @MJChamberlain
Introvert
Basement
AFI
Easily ranks in my top 5 live gigs. Davey’s energy and vocals were so on point, Hunter went nuts and Jade was almost nonchalant with his guitar work, seemed like everything he did was effortless. Brilliant show!
Definitely Top 5 of the whole year for me I reckon. AFI always kill it, this was further evidence of that