Photo: Jay Russell

Live Review: Funeral For A Friend – O2 Shepherd’s Bush Empire

If you could take yourself back to somewhere around 2005, you’d be hard pressed not to find Funeral For A Friend being blasted loudly through a speaker in your favourite ‘alternative’ club night.

To say it was most people’s soundtrack for that era would be a bit of understatement in all honesty, because let’s face it, love them or hate them, If you had a pound for the amount of times you stumbled out of the club after a night out, sun coming up all while humming ‘Juneau’ during the long walk home (after blowing your taxi money on a kebab)… well…you’d still be a broke because a pound gets you nothing these days.

But that for me sums up the theme of this past tour with Funeral For A Friend. Not to get all sentimental by any means, but it’s certainly the attraction of the ‘throwback’ to those times that I am sure plays a big part in filling these venues to this day and its London’s Shepherds Bush Empire and the full capacity crowd that are treated to the closing night of what I assume to be an evening of nostalgia for most.

Prior to the fun and games however, Static Dress are back on a London stage once again having only just recently supported Knocked Loose a few weeks back. Its pretty much more of the same. Chaos, noisy and a lot of fun. Frontman Olli Appleyard wonderfully fails to stay still on stage for longer than a second which only helps kick the crowd into fifth gear. If there were ever an opening band you wanted to adequately warm up the crowd, Static Dress are it. The injection of energy pumped into the room after their set is undeniable.

Photo: Jay Russell

Holding Absence are pure fire right now and it’s no surprise that it looks and feels as though there isn’t a soul in the crowd unfamiliar with the band. Building on the foundations already built by Static Dress moments before allowing for what looks like an effortless performance to the already lubricated fans. Its overly obvious that there is a lot of fun happening both on and off the stage. Plenty to sing along to, plenty of energy and the ultimate in feel good vibes emanating from the sounds shimmering brightly over the PA. For a split second you are able to forget about the world and everything wrong with it because Holding Absence are just that good.

Whilst I am certain Holding Absence could absolutely fill the room on their own, the night is Funeral For A Friend’s and boy don’t we know it. Electricity is amplified as the band fill the stage with all six members wasting very little time in getting started. Has there ever been a greater opening three songs from another live band? Almost certainly, but to those in the room, they’ll tell you otherwise.

‘All The Rage’ sets the tempo but ‘Juneau’ steals the show early on (as a surprising second song) with plenty of voices in the crowd in unison giving the volume of the PA a run for their money. These are clearly fans with a level of passion you don’t see as much these days – there are of course exceptions to the rule – but there is something about nostalgia that brings the best out of people and on this night, Funeral For A Friend deliver what I think will be the highlight of the year for many, if not all of those fans in attendance.

Photo: Jay Russell