A Day To Remember have easily been one of the best bands to emerge from the Warped Tour scene in the past 10 years. And it’s no surprise that they have risen to the top of the scene. Wrapping up their biggest UK tour show ever at Wembley Arena was guaranteed to be a special night.
Moose Blood (7) initially seem a little out of place tonight on this huge stage. Their songs might have the scope to fill a room this size but there’s a slight awkwardness to everything they do. It’s quite a mellow start to the evening but their emo rock still gets a strong reaction. Mixing plenty of older songs in with the newer tracks keeps the large amount of fans who got down early. With the newer songs coming across even better live with that excessive production on record stripped away.
Neck Deep (5) seem far more at home in an arena and immediately have plenty of the crowd bouncing along. At first it comes across as quite impressive but the appeal soon wears away. Neck Deeps music lacks any real personality other than imitating what is popular with American pop-punk. Right down to vocalist Ben Barlow putting on one of the worst fake American accents. “A Part Of Me” is as insipid as pop-punk ballads get but that doesn’t stop every fan from waving their mobile phone in the air. It can’t be ignored just how insanely popular Neck Deep are but they are like musical bubblegum, initially fun but the flavour soon fades away.
New Found Glory (7) are far more impressive even if the reaction is more subdued. Bursting on stage with “All Downhill From Here” the pop-punk veterans seem completely reinvigorated after being away in the studio. New Found Glory show no signs of age slowing them down either with Jordan Pudnik in particular never dropping his energy levels once. They throw in plenty of classics like “Understatement” and “Dressed To Kill” as well as throwing in their fan favourite cover of “Kiss Me”. Given how influential New Found Glory were on A Day To Remember they seem so happy to be out supporting them on this run. By the time they close with “My Friends Over You” they’ve ensured that everyone is suitably warmed up for the headliners.
A Day To Remember (9) come out swinging with everything they’ve got, opening with “Mr Highway’s Thinking About The End” and absolutely destroying everything in sight. The “Disrespect your surroundings” mosh call sounds absolutely devastating as the entire audience screams along before the pit bursts into chaos. Following this with “Paranoia” and “2nd Sucks” suggests A Day To Remember have no plans of making things more accessible for a wider audience. It’s a fantastic start to the set and the quality never drops once for the rest of the evening.
Firing out all the fan favourites alongside newer stuff, it all sounds absolutely massive in an arena. Even songs like “Fast Foward to 2012” which was written when the band were still playing clubs sounds massive on this stage. The stage show tonight looks great as well but never becomes distracting. The two massive screens just provide a nice backing and A Day To Remember throw in plenty of fun DIY touches. “We Got This” features a load of inflatables being thrown into the crowd resulting in Wembley Arena just becoming one huge pop-punk party.
By the time they wrap up the main set with the brilliant combo of “All I Want” and “The Plot To Bomb The Panhandle”, A Day To Remember proved exactly why they deserve to be headlining arenas but they weren’t done yet. Starting their encore off with “If It Means A lot To You” gets the biggest sing along tonight and shows that pop-punk ballads don’t always have to be terrible. Finally “All Signs Point To Lauderdale” and “The Downfall Of Us All” bring the evening to a spectacular close and as the audience are showered with confetti it is the perfect image to show just how triumphant A Day To Remember were tonight.
We’ve also got a full photo gallery of tonight’s action that can be seen right here.
