Don Broco
Following the release of their fifth studio album Nightmare Tripping, alternative group Don Broco headed to London’s Outernet. The sold-out show contained plenty of material for fans old and new as the expert musicianship on the stage was paired perfectly with the energetic crowd below.
Opener Ando San wielded an eight-string slap bass as he performed jazz in a metal style. This genre-fusing crossover brought even more into the mix when he began to rap over these dazzling instrumentals. With the voice of rapper Baby Keem and the energy of a pure rockstar, he’s one unique artist.
Unpeople are one of the most exciting fresh acts in the UK alternative scene. They opened Download Festival’s main stage earlier this year and have now sold out their biggest headline tour yet. Their set was melodic yet riotous fun. A large number of Don Broco fans were clearly also Unpeople fans: chanted lyrics filled the air throughout a small but well-curated selection of the band’s best tracks, including a guest appearance from Conjurer’s Brady Deeprose for ‘clouds’.
The main event began with Nightmare Tripping’s ‘True Believers’ followed by its title track. The album’s been out for around half a year now, so fans have had plenty of time to learn the words. That said, older tracks earlier in the set, like ‘Gumshield’, lifted the energy in the room even further. By the time the band performed their biggest hit, ‘Everybody’, the floor had descended into a swirling mass of bodies that danced and surged forwards and backwards.
If you don’t know the words to Don Broco’s songs, that’s not a problem. Their melodies are so distinctive that each track had hundreds of voices chanting the tune in unison. These tunes are upbeat, heavy and, above all, incredible fun. Frontman Rob Damiani personified this fun with his outgoing character as he strode about the stage, microphone in hand. As he bounced, so did everyone else in a euphoric frenzy.
The show’s encore featured two tracks. ‘T-Shirt Song’ had the audience whirling their tops in the air above their heads before everything came together for the very last song. A huge pit opened as the opening notes of ‘Hype Man’ rang out. Right before chaos unfolded, however, Damiani held back, calling for even more energy to end the gig on. The track restarted and an even bigger pit opened, closing when the beat hit as bodies clashed one last time.
Don Broco have always been known to be a strong live band, but with the arrival of Nightmare Tripping they’ve taken it up a notch. Their performance at Outernet displayed this perfectly in a set that had both the energy and the tunes to make for an incredible evening of heavy music.
