Don Broco: Live @ Cardiff International Arena - Hive Magazine
It feels as though half of the audience is donned in baggy trousers with wallet chains and Korn shirts, embracing the fashion of early nu-metal in honor of the support; Papa Roach. They explode onto stage accompanied by Kill The Noise, a track from their latest genre bending album Ego Trip. Front man Jacoby Shaddix wastes no time in riling the crowd up, encouraging their movements and singing with a rendition of Getting Away With Murder that they have no trouble getting involved with. It’s pretty much an unspoken rule that support bands shouldn’t really play covers, yet Shaddix screams out a message for the late great Keith Flint as the wailing synth that begins The Prodigy’s iconic track Firestarter echoes throughout the arena. Papa Roach is quickly proving that they can do whatever they want, including playing as many covers as they like, further proved by the crowd’s reaction to their rendition of Still D.R.E. As the crowd catches their breath, Shaddix calls for an “old school, 1986, Metallica at Castle Donnington style circle pit”. Ask and you shall receive.
The band throws back the same energy as the audience, exuding a youthful energy that clearly hasn’t dwindled since the band’s inception over 20 years ago. They have used this tour as an opportunity to have their own little ‘greatest hits’ set, playing tracks like ...To Be Loved, Scars, and Between Angels And Insects for the largely millennial audience. Their nostalgia packed set keeps the crowd wrapped around Shaddix’s little finger, ensuring that they yell along to every word of some of the most iconic tracks to come out of nu-metal's heyday. In a culmination of all the energy of the last half hour, they close out their set with undoubtedly the most renowned of all these tracks – of course, it’s Last Resort. The opening line has enough to take the crowd back 20 years, although it seems as if a majority of the crowd would have been babies when it first saw the light of day. With a response like this from well over a thousand people, it's shocking that Papa Roach hasn’t seen a show like this of their own on UK soil in so long. If tonight is anything to go by, this legendary band will be back for more sometime soon.
Anticipation builds in the room as the full grandeur of the stage design is revealed, preparing for Don Broco’s entrance. We don’t have to wait long as the fuzzy bassline of Bruce Willis fills the room, the silence between filled with screams of adoration from those at the barrier. Each member is silhouetted against the impressive screen that fills the back of the stage, with front man Rob Damiani holding a smoke bomb, signaling the beginning of the carnage. As the track kicks in, bringing the band to life, he bounces around the stage like a man whose energy knows no bounds – somehow, he keeps this up for the entirety of their set – with chants of “yippee ki-yay motherfucker” spurring him on. The infectious Gumshield and Technology causes the crowd to erupt in an almost room-wide circle pit that barely ceases until the band leaves the stage. Don Broco has mastered the combination of traditional rock elements and electronic music, creating a sound that is so clearly their own and instantly recognizable in its own right.
Tracks like Uber and Come Out To LA prove this, whilst also allowing drummer Matt Donnelly to shine and illustrate his angelic vocals from the safety of the back of the stage. For the entirety of the show the screens at the back provide stunning visuals to accompany the band and enhance their performance, none more so than during Pretty as blood drips down the screen and over whoever finds themselves displayed. We are gifted a surprise appearance from Papa Roach’s Jacoby Shaddix for Manchester Super Reds No. 1 Fan, who brings what is an already energetic song to a whole new level and is having so much fun in doing so. Damiani can’t seem to believe that this is actually happening and exclaims it as if we didn’t just witness it ourselves. Shaddix isn’t the only guest appearance we get though, as Rob finds himself joined by the infamous Rob-Bot a few songs later.
Don Broco have not only decided to play a good portion of their new release Amazing Things but have included some older tracks like Automatic, What You Do To Me, Superlove, and Nerve, the more pop sound of which help to bring the audience down a level, if only for five minutes. While these tracks satisfy some of the older fans out there, Damiani assures them that they have one more surprise in the form of the band’s first ever single Priorities, which hasn’t been played live in literal years – they are really pulling out the stops for this tour and helping to sate the appetite of each fan in the room with a mix of tracks from each album. As the show nears its end the energy in the room doesn’t dwindle, the band feeding off the energy of the crowd and vice versa. As the band come back on for an encore that begins with Fingernails, we are given one last chance to feed from this energy which culminates in the iconic T-Shirt Song. In the middle of a crowd that is full of clothing flying around audience members’ heads, it is so easy to see why Don Broco have managed to fill arenas of this size and some even bigger. They have a truly infectious energy that when paired with their dedicated fanbase creates a live show like no other.
