Saturday 2nd September 2023
Supports: Invent Animate (USA), Headwreck
It’s been about a decade since Michigan metalcore act We Came As Romans have crashed the Australian live music circuit, but their long-awaited return was met with much anticipation and even caused quite the ruckus in Adelaide. How many bands can say they broke the nightly news in Adelaide (and, eventually the world) because a complete stranger attempted to rob the band at their hotel room?
The tour came to an end on the launch night of the Brisbane festival and amidst the Riverfire crowd, the evening was already buzzing. Local boys Headwreck are everywhere you look this year, but set the scene ever-so-perfectly with their edgy nu-metal/hardcore hybrid which just seems to get bigger and better every time they play. We’ve followed Headwreck since their inception in 2021 and with vocalist Connor Hickman leading the charge, the guys are absolutely giving their absolute all on tracks like ‘Poseidon‘ and ‘The End of the Suite‘.
It was US metalcore five-piece Invent Animate that kind of stole the show that evening. Making teir live debut in Brisbane that night, I was in awe for a solid half hour as vocalist Keaton Goldwire gave us a phenomenal performance that will be remembered for a long time. The band showcased many of their tracks off of their latest LP, Heavener and special mention goes to ‘Elysium‘. Damn, I’m still reliving that in my mind.
While Invent Animate did in fact steal the show, it was pretty inevitable that the excitement for We Came As Romans‘ was atmospheric. The lights dimmed as the opening bars of the opening track for the band’s latest album Darkbloom played out to the Princess Theatre. While much of the set came from their latest two albums, vocalist Joshua Moore sang his heart out and gave Aussie fans the performance that was worth waiting eight years for.
Throwing in a stack of tracks from Darkbloom and Cold Like War, the legends also paid respects to fallen vocalist Kyle Pavone with ‘Lost in the Moment’ and ‘Hope‘. Their 60-minute set contained every emotion you could feel in one night. The room even went down a lighter tangent when Moore peer-pressured the band and himself to take down Australia’s worst pastime — the ‘shoey’. With all five members partaking in this activity, bassist Andy Glass took it a step further and premiered the world’s first ‘sockey’ on stage. Don’t think this trend will stick, mate, but each to their own I guess.
Ending the night on a high with ‘Daggers‘ and ‘Black Hole‘, We Came As Romans also left us with bigger anticipation than what they entered with. The band are set to be bringing back their energetic yet contagious live set back in the country sooner than you all think. So I’ll leave it with Josh’s words that night — “we’ll see you next year.”
Review by Tamara May @citylightstam
