Courteeners played the ‘Whites Of Their Eyes’ tour to a sold-out Brixton Academy last Friday night, the first time the band have been back in London since the Coronavirus pandemic began a year-and-a-half ago.
The tour was to celebrate 15 years since their first gig at the Manchester Roadhouse in October 2006.
Opening Support
We arrived at the venue around 6:45pm and queued up to get in which took around 15 minutes after scanning tickets and going through security. We got on the second row so we had a clear view of the stage and was in amongst the action.
Support for the night came from two Scottish artists. 22-year-old singer Brooke Combe and the band Vistas. Each act played a 30-minute set with Brooke on first playing from 7:30 till 8:00pm and Vistas on from 8:10 – 8:40pm.
Brooke came on stage and sang a couple of her own songs including ‘Impress You’, ‘A-Game’ and ‘Used to Love Me’ before singing a cover of Arctic Monkeys ‘Why Do You Only Call Me When You’re High’, which got the audience singing and dancing away.
Brooke made sure to get the crowd going.”How we doing London? It’s mad being here” was shouted from the singing sensation as people standing at the back whistled and shouted out to her on stage.
Viva Vistas
Vistas were on next. I’ve seen them before back in 2019 when they supported Circa Waves at the Roundhouse. They were good then and even better this time around, mainly playing songs from their 2021 album What Were You Hoping for including ‘Start Again’ and ‘Dayglow’. They also played some of their older tracks including ‘Retrospect’ and ’15 Years’. By the end of the set, the crowd were warmed up ready for Courteeners to come on.
‘Morning Glory’ by Oasis came on just before they took to the stage and the crowd went wild, screaming the lyrics to one another, drinks flying everywhere and a massive mosh pit started to form in the middle of the floor.
The audience was a mix of both old and young fans, some of who have been fans since the beginning.
Courteeners Sing Away
The Manchester four-piece walked onto the stage and immediately broke out into song with ‘Heart Attack’ followed by ‘Are You in Love with A Notion?’, ‘Cavorting’ and ‘Acrylic’. By the end of ‘Bide Your Time’, I had gone from the second row to sixth as another huge mosh pit had started. I got pushed back and forth and crushed by people before getting knocked to the ground having people fall on top of me.
Overall, they played a mix of songs from all their albums St Jude (2008), Anna (2013), Concrete Love (2014) and Mapping the Rendezvous (2016) as well as the debut album More Again Forever released in January 2020.
The band went off stage then the lights went low but lead singer Liam Fray returned and took to the stage alone to perform some acoustics: ‘Average Marriage’, ‘Please Don’t’ and ‘Smiths Disco’.
‘Smiths Disco’ had the audience knowing every lyric with Liam even stopping and letting just the audience sing-along by themselves. It gave me goosebumps just looking around the room and seeing everyone come together with their phone lights up in the air
Ending Ways
The remainder of the band returned and ended the gig with an encore of old songs including ‘Modern Love’, ‘Not Nineteen Forever’ and ‘What Took You So Long?’.
The audience screaming the lyrics at the top of their lungs “Was there a queue at the post office and was there a dirty double stagecoach you just happened to miss?”
By this point, everybody, including people sitting at the top, were up out of their seats dancing around. I had a man standing behind me put his arm around me, dancing away, drinks and cups were flying around the room in different directions. Everyone was just living in the moment, the way concerts should be.
All photos are credited to Ellissa Chiles.
