A DAY TO REMEMBER W/ EVERY TIME I DIE, MALLORY KNOX

ALEXANDRA PALACE, LONDON 12.02.14

From their garage back home in Ocala to a garage overlooking the world

The best house parties are the ones that keep their guests, nobody leaves early and many probably even cancelled plans to be in attendance. 10,000 RSVP’d, pyros have been ordered and according to their big screen introduction, Jeremy’s free house is the location of the huge get-together. That house is on a stage and as the saying goes; home is where the heart is.

New Yorkers Every Time I Die are the gate crashers tonight, opener No Son Of Mine strikes up a joining force between metal and dirty southern rock with Keith Buckley’s roaring vocals. They’re hurling aggressive riffs and melodies with a mean punch through to Underwater Bimbos From Outer Space.

Mallory Knox have had some high standards expected from them recently but they’re playing to earn the right to write “Mallory Knox was here” on the walls. The likes of Wake Up, Beggars and Lighthouse make enough impact to prove their worthiness on the bill. They might not fill the room but they boast more than enough energy to show that if they had been absent they certainly would have been missed.

Parties are usually one of two things. They’re either a) marking a celebration or b) just a reason to let your hair down. Tonight it’s both. The celebration follows from their nightmare ordeal with their former label and the relief of finally releasing their hugely anticipated album Common Courtesy, after a judge took to their favour. The stress and frustration for the Ocala bunch is over and they can breathe, letting their hair down and seeing their new material welcome with open arms. But it’s their entire back catalogue lying down the foundations. Emerging from the garage of this house, All I Want commences before I’m Made Of Wax, Larry, What Are You Made Of? shows how indestructible Jeremy McKinnon and co really are; they fought the law, they fought critics and naysayers and the frontman fought a recent illness too but their time is now. It takes five tracks in before the new material makes an appearance. Right Back At It Again sums up what this tour is partly about; recognising a birth of a band, playing in their parent’s garage to playing in front of thousands across the pond. But to be able to play the likes of Alexandra Palace there’s the need to remember where they came from, the garage is behind them and the almighty sing-alongs and hooks are ahead. 

There’s no time to shoot some hoops (there’s a basketball net attached to this onstage house!) as City Ocala and Life Lessons Learned The Hard Way are performed for the first time in the capital. Between is You Had Me At Hello and If It Means A Lot To You, showing that there’s more to ADTR than ground shaking breakdowns. Scorching heat from the pyros, a frontman in a zorb ball and a couple of Santa’s are a what the ****? moment but clearly they’re funnier than a clown making balloon animals. Closing anthem The Downfall Of Us All only kicks off once fake cops raid the stage to call time out and the band plead for one more song. With the sound of a helicopter gliding above them the curtain drops, some party huh?