“Don’t slow down now, too much is never enough.“
Closing out their UK run with a packed out show, Gideon bring their southern groove to The Dome, with support from Still In Love, Xile, and Grove Street.
Still In Love
No light show, no intro track and precisely zero theatrics are necessary for Still In Love. Their pedigree is made immediately obvious in how effortlessly they manage to launch from a still silence into their fiercely emotional metalcore, in a time when image has never been more important in the industry it is a necessary palette cleanser to have such raw and openly personal catharsis put front and centre. Songs from their recent record, Recovery Language, speak for themselves without needing aesthetic frills, and it’s satisfying to watch a clearly unfamiliar audience becoming engaged by them on the spot.
XILE
Kiwi Beatdown outfit Xile walk out into a rapidly filling The Dome and immediately grab the room’s attention. Frontman Luke Manson bounds up and down the stage relentlessly, it’s clear that Xile are a band that have a lot of fun with what they do, their easy smiles and infectious enthusiasm thaw out the crowd all the way to the back of the room. Pummelling through their set, the competition for most eye-catching pit moves becomes fierce quickly.
Grove Street
With the crowd suitably warmed up, Grove Street‘s blistering crossover turns up the tempo with a sound that’s instantly nostalgic to any fan of genre greats like Mizery or Power Trip, the speed of the riffs isn’t the only change of the night though – drinks have been flowing on and off the stage and classic thrash antics open the room up to a mass of two-steppers and headbangers, with some incredibly inebriated and shamelessly enthusiastic crowd surfers and stage divers launching themselves from all angles, the photographers and more passive members of the crowd are forced into a life-sized game of whack-a-mole that only intensifies with each song.
Gideon
By the time Gideon step out, the room is steaming hot, and the audience pressed to the stage with anticipation. Opening with recent single “Wrong One” the crowd explodes into action – Gideon’s low-end grooves are made for this, irresistibly heavy riffs and hooks built for crowd interaction. The sound is simple, devoid of the pop influence that permeates modern metalcore, presented with a polish that only years of experience can provide, they make inciting deafening singalongs and waves of crowd surfers look truly effortless. With whole albums of fan favourites to draw on, Gideon are able to hold the crowd’s energy at a peak for the entire set, no small feat for any artist. It feels like a club venue night, being barely able to contain them, and it’s easy to see how even a single viral moment or choice collaboration could catapult Gideon into the territory of peers like Kublai Khan or Knocked Loose, closer “No Love/No One” shows the songs are already there and the band are absolutely ready for it.
