Trust Modern Life Is War, one of the darkest, moodiest bands in hardcore, to arrive in the UK smack-bang in the middle of a seemingly endless heatwave. The beer garden at the front of the Brudenell is positively packed out with moshers in sunglasses enjoying an ice-cold beer. Unfortunately this means there aren’t many people in watching Who Cares? open the show, but the London trio don’t seem to mind the sparse crowd as they power through their set of short, sharp, straight-to-the-point hardcore injections. What they’re lacking in low end (they had no bass player, although their facebook would indicate they usually have more members) they make up for in energy and enthusiasm and definitely leave Leeds with a few new fans.
Next up, Swain offer a much more relaxed half-hour of music as they embrace their love of alt-rock, 90s grunge and modern post-hardcore. Vocalist Noam is effervescent, even when talking about some darker times he has experienced, and his presence is undeniable as he leads the Berlin-based quartet through powerful tracks like ‘Punk Rock Messed You Up, Kid’, and ‘Strange Way Down’. The highlight of the set is new track ‘Never Clean My Room’ which is literally just the perfect amount of Weezer-worship without the band losing their own distinctive sound.
Main support Svalbard are one of the most hotly-tipped bands in UK heavy music at the moment, and likely have many people in the room who have come specifically to see them, which makes it all the more unfortunate that they suffer with technical issues right from the start. The bass drops in and out as it pleases, and the band are visibly distracted by this. On top of that, vocalist Serena Cherry has lost her voice, so her usually ferocious howl isn’t present and is almost entirely drowned out by accompanying vocalist Liam Phelan.
All that aside, when everything is working Svalbard sound absolutely monolithic, and still manage to deliver a performance to be proud of in circumstances that would have caused most bands to give up. The majority of the set is made up of tracks from 2018’s stellar ‘It’s Hard To Have Hope’ and the likes of ‘Unpaid Intern’ and ‘For The Sake Of The Breed’ sound just as feral live as they do on record. The band closes with ‘Revenge Porn’ and Serena seemingly summons every demon available to deliver the potent final bellow of ‘FOR THE WOMEN’. Even though everything that could go wrong, did go wrong, there’s no denying the ability of this band, and their unapologetic social and political lyrical content is so important in a climate where bands being vocal about certain issues is a no-go for fear of alienating ‘fans’. If Svalbard can make this much of an impact with their live set hindered, imagine what they could achieve at full strength.
Iowa melodic hardcore pioneers Modern Life Is War have been doing this for the best part of two decades and this shows tonight in their utterly flawless performance. They open with the abrupt ‘Fuck The Sex Pistols’ before sending the punters at the front into a frenzy with a one-two punch combo of ‘The Outsiders’ and ‘Martin Atchet’ from their seminal album ‘Witness’. Vocalist Jeffrey Eaton has stage presence in abundance, and he and his band seem to revel in the fact that this show isn’t sold out, the modest numbers allowing them to take things less seriously and just enjoy themselves. This does nothing to take away from their performance; every track is delivered with boundless energy regardless of crowd reaction. Post-reunion cuts like ‘Feels Like End Times’ and ‘Chasing My Tail’ from 2013’s ‘Fever Hunting’ are as good as anything Modern Life Is War have ever written, and a couple of cheeky covers (Stooges and Black Flag) go down a storm.
That said, it’s obvious that the crowd cares a lot more about the older material, particularly the tracks from ‘Witness’, as the only real crowd energy comes during the likes of ‘John & Jimmy’, ‘Young Man Blues’ and of course the anthemic ‘D.E.A.D.R.A.M.O.N.E.S’. The closing combination of ‘First and Ellen’ and ‘By The Sea’ brings the last few over-30s lurkers / hardcore dads out of mosh retirement and puts the perfect full-stop at the end of this incredible set. The room may not have been as full as the bands would have liked, but those who made it saw four great bands give it their all regardless, and Modern Life Is War remain one of the most vital bands in modern hardcore.
LIAM KNOWLES
