ROYAL BLOOD // O2 ACADEMY, NEWCASTLE UPON TYNE

ROYAL BLOOD RETURN TO MUSIC SCENE WITH INTIMATE SOLD OUT SHOW IN NEWCASTLE

ROYAL BLOOD PERFORMING AT NEWCASTLE UPON TYNE'S O2 ACADEMY - 18/05/2017
PICTURE BY: CALUM BUCHAN PHOTOGRAPHY

Royal Blood made an energetic return to music scene. Following the release of brand new single ‘Lights Out’ and most recently ‘Hook, Line & Sinker’ which will be on their forthcoming new studio album release ‘How Did We Get So Dark?’ which out next month. Royal Blood announced 5 special intimate shows including a hometown show in Brighton at tiny venue to promote the new album release. Another shows included Cambridge’s Corn Exchange, Newcastle’s O2 Academy, Southampton’s O2 Guildhall and Leicester’s O2 Academy. After all these shows sold out in minutes, The band announced their massive Arena tour leg as part of album tour in UK for Autumn later this year, including massive show at London’s Alexandra Palace (Ally Pally).

Upcoming band ‘Black Honey‘, opened up the night, the band based in Brighton. The band have already kicked of their career supporting likes of Catfish & the Bottlemen and Slaves on Tour. Now are supporting Royal Blood on their UK intimate tour. Black Honey have released two singles in past year which were ‘Hello Today’ and most recent ‘Somebody Better’. The band had positive energy from the crowd and crowd were enjoying the music and singing back to the band, like they knew every single lyric. The band have been tipped for breakthrough success and are playing many more shows and festivals across the summer.

There might only be two of them in the band, but like the White Stripes and Black Keys who have been around longer, frontman Mike Kerr and sidekick Ben Thatcher managed to produce a far more expensive sound than you’d think three of the former’s voice and bass-playing and drumming would be able to make. Much of the time on stage, Mike Kerr even manages to create an impression that theirs a guitar somewhere which is producing sounds often like Led Zeppelin riffs which already have their trademark sound but doesn’t mean Royal Blood couldn’t pull it off.

They may have only been on for an hour at Newcastle’s O2 Acadmey, but their set-list which managed to go into double figures and didn’t run an encore seemed pull off with the rowdy crowd. I don’t think any member of sold out capacity crowd went home feeling short-changed. From opening up with their number ‘Where Are You Now? To set closer ‘Out of the Black’, the Brighton based band were given a rapturous welcome and rightly so as they were tremendous.

It wasn’t all hard to see why the band have acclaimed so my awards and heaped upon them since their formation in Brighton almost four years ago. The band peformed a handful of songs which included from their forthcoming second album, ‘ How Did We Get So Dark? ‘, due out next month, went down every bit as well more familiar material from their self-tilted 2014 debut album, sounding much the same, songs which included their massive hit singles 'Figured Out', 'Little Monster' and 'Ten Tonned Skeleton'.

Newcastle’s O2 Academy was one of just four smaller venues that the band are playing ahead of next month’s album release, including further shows in Southampton and Leicester, but have also announced a 10-date UK arena tour, including visits to London’s Alexandra Palace, Leeds’s First Direct Arena and Glasgow’s SSE Hydro.

ROYAL BLOOD'S TOUR CONTINUES:

MAY 19 - O2 GUILDHALL - SOUTHAMPTON, UK
MAY 20 - O2 ACADEMY - LEICESTER, UK
MAY 23 - LUXOR - COLOGNE, GERMANY
MAY 24 - PARADISO - AMSTERDAM, NETHERLANDS
MAY 27 - SLANE CASTLE - CO. MEATH, IRELAND
MAY 28 - BBC RADIO 1'S BIG WEEKEND 2017 - HULL, UK
JUNE 02 - PARADISE ROCK CLUB - BOSTON, USA
JUNE 03 - WARSAW - BROOKLYN - NEW YORK, USA
JUNE 04 - THE GOVERNORS BALL MUSIC FESTIVAL 2017 - NEW YORK, USA
JUNE 06 - 9:30 CLUB - WASHINGTON, D.C, USA
JUNE 07 - UNION TRANSFER - PHILADELPHIA, USA
JUNE 09 - ST. ANDREW'S HALL - DETROIT, USA
JUNE 10 - NEWPORT MUSIC HALL - COLUMBUS, USA
JUNE 11 - BONNAROO MUSIC FESTIVAL 2017 - MANCHESTER, USA
JUNE 21 - 25 - GLASTONBURY FESTIVAL 2017 - PILTON, UK
JUNE 22 - EDEN PROJECT SESSIONS 2017 - ST. AUSTELL, UK
JUNE 23 - 25 - SOUTHSIDE FESTIVAL 2017 - TUTTLINGEN, GERMANY
JUNE 25 - HURRICANE FESTIVAL 2017 - SCHEESSEL, GERMANY
JUNE 30 - PLAINE DE LA FILHOLE - MARMANDE, FRANCE
JULY 01 - GAROROCK FESTIVAL 2017 - MARMANDE, FRANCE
JULY 04 - IBIZA ROCKS 2017 - SANT ANTIONI DE PORTMANY, SPAIN
JULY 06 - NOS ALIVE 2017 - LISBON, PORTUGAL
JULY 10 - THEATRES ROMAINS - LYON, FRANCE
JULY 15 - SITE DE KERAMPUILH - CARHAIX PLOUGUER, FRANCE
JULY 20 - METRO THEATRE - SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA,
JULY 21 - NORTH BRYON PARKLANDS - WOOYUNG, AUSTRALIA, 
JULY 27 - BURL'S CREEK EVENT - MEDONTE, CANADA
JULY 29 - WAYHOME MUSIC & ARTS 2017 - TORONTO, CANADA
JULY 31 - UPSTATE CONCERT HALL - NEW YORK, USA
AUGUST 01 - TOWN BALLROOM - BUFFALO, USA
AUGUST 02 - GRANT PARK - CHICAGO, USA
AUGUST 03 - GRANT PARK - CHICAGO, USA
AUGUST 05 - GRANT PARK - CHICAGO, USA
AUGUST 06 - GRANT PARK - CHICAGO, USA
AUGUST 08 - COMMODORE BALLROOM - VANCOUVER, CANADA
AUGUST 09 - THE SHOWBOX - SEATTLE, USA
AUGUST 10 - GOLDEN GATE PARK - SAN FRANCISCO, USA
AUGUST 13 - THE OBSERVATORY - SANTA ANA, USA
AUGUST 15 - OBSERVATORY - SAN DIEGO, USA
AUGUST 16 - THE WILTERN - LOS ANGELES, USA
OCTOBER 10 - AFAS LIVE - AMSTERDAM, NETHERLANDS
NOVEMBER 03 - HALLE 622 - ZURICH, SWITZERLAND
NOVEMBER 09 - ZENITH - PARIS, FRANCE
NOVEMBER 10 - AFAS LIVE - AMSTERDAM, NETHERLANDS
NOVEMBER 11 - LOTTO ARENA - ANTWERPEN, BELGIUM
NOVEMBER 13 - MOTORPOINT ARENA - CARDIFF, UK
NOVEMBER 14 - RIVERMEAD - READING, UK
NOVEMBER 17 - FIRST DIRECT ARENA - LEEDS, UK
NOVEMBER 18 - BARCLAYCARD ARENA - BIRMINGHAM, UK
NOVEMBER 20 - ALEXANDRA PALACE - LONDON, UK
NOVEMBER 24 - THE SSE HYDRO - GLASGOW, UK
NOVEMBER 25 - MOTORPOINT ARENA - NOTTINGHAM, UK
NOVEMBER 26 - THE 3 ARENA - DUBLIN, IRELAND
NOVEMBER 28 - BOURNEMOUTH INTERNATIONAL CENTRE, BOURNEMOUTH, UK
NOVEMBER 29 - BRIGHTON CENTRE - BRIGHTON, UK

REVIEW + PHOTOS BY: CALUM BUCHAN PHOTOGRAPHY

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