The Maine & Mayday Parade Live at The Troxy London
5 February 2016
Mayday Parade have finally made their return to the UK playing a show at Troxy in London. The show was originally set to take place at Shepherd’s Bush Empire due to construction works. Despite the change in venue resulting in the show being harder to reach for a lot of people, many still flocked to the venue and packed it out. The main support for the evening was The Maine from Tempe, Arizona who has a large following within the crowd. The band opened up their set with ‘English Girls’ off their new album American Candy. From the first verse, everyone jumps around with great enthusiasm. The great thing about seeing the band live is the fact that they have managed to build a fanbase that is almost like a family. Many amongst the crowd who support the band know each other and there is a special connection between not only between the fans and the music, but also with each other. The pity was that the band did not have time to play a more extensive set, but they still had time to play a few older numbers. Crowd favourites included ‘Run’ from Forever Halloween and pop number ‘Everything I Ask For’ off their debut album, ‘Can’t Stop, Won’t Stop’. The band topped off their set with one of their more emotional numbers from their latest album American Candy where everyone sang aloud in perfect harmony to John O’Callaghan’s strong vocals to the chorus of the song. The Maine played an incredible set with all band members playing their instruments to a great degree of precision, exhibiting every drop of their talent into their incredible set. The only pit is that it could not have gone on as long as everyone would have liked due to set timing. Hopefully the next time The Maine is back, they will be playing headline shows.
After a short set up, it is finally time for headliners Mayday Parade to come on stage. The crowd edges in and it becomes harder to move around in the crowd. The band start the night with an instrumental intro titled ‘Look Up and See Infinity, Look Down and See Nothing’. It seemed as though throughout their set the band had been going in between new material and older material with a bulk of their set list focused on material from the days of A Lesson In Romantics. It is songs such as ‘Jamie All Over’ and ‘Three Cheers For Five Years’ that provoke the most response from the crowd. Although the band are known for their fast paced Emo/Pop/Punk influences that are mostly fast beats, the band are able to fit slower pieces into their set easily. The audience who were trashing about in a frantic mosh for a large bulk of the set were able to collect themselves and sway about to slower songs such as ‘Terrible Things’ and ‘Miserable At Best’ illuminating the room with their cellphone lights, setting the mood for the slower songs. Everyone sung along at the top of their voices, almost angelic in sound, even after frontman Derek Sanders had stopped singing on stage. The band put on an inherently fun set, they are easy to listen to and although many people dub them as ‘emo’, they are so far from being a band that you can’t dance along to live. Their set has always been fun and lively each time they’ve been in the UK and this never ceases to change each time they have been back. For me, it was mainly the older songs before their latest release of Black Lines that made the night. The newer material on the other hand I was not very drawn to. That is not to say that their newer material is not good, it might gave been a case of nostalgia for my younger days hearing the old material that struck this attitude within me. Nevertheless, an excellent night altogether that will remain in everyone’s memories for a long time to come. Hopefully it won’t be long before Mayday Parade return to the UK again.
