Royal Blood + Turbowolf @ The Institute, 4th November 2014

Digbeth was looking busy tonight in preparation for Royal Blood‘s sell out gig at The Institute.

It’s hardly surprising given that the duo of Mike Kerr & Ben Thatcher are behind the fastest selling British rock album of the past three years, and I’d be lying if I said that I wasn’t looking forward to it as much as every other person in the queue.

Inside there was an air of anticipation and all three levels of the room filled up pretty sharpish with a throughly mixed crowd. I was surprised at how full it was early on for the support act Turbowolf, I didn’t really know anything about these guys but I’d been reliably informed that I wouldn’t be disappointed. They played a short six song set and were nothing short of brilliant with a little crazy thrown in for good measure. The room seemed to enjoy it too and the crowd were now appeared to be warmed up and ready for Royal Blood.

Its a fairly simple stage set-up for the pair who clearly intend to let the music do the talking, there’s a rapturous applause the moment they both walk onto the stage and It’s straight into the first track of the night Hole followed by the familiar Come on Over, the over-driven bass and vocals from Kerr appears to get the crowd going for it pretty quickly, while Thatcher seems to be beating the hell out of his drum kit (in a good way) and this pretty much sets the tone for the rest of the evening.

Every track from the pair’s début album is played tonight with a couple of B sides thrown in for good measure. the crowd go nuts to the opening riffs of “Little Monster” and “Loose Change”. I think everyone is simply amazed at how two guys can make so much noise, Kerr stops at one point to tell us ” I’d like to introduce you to the rest of the band.. And their name is Ben Thatcher..” as if just to prove that point.

Everyone looks like they are having a great night and my eye catches mosh pits opening up and crowd surfers coming past before we come to the final song of the evening “Out of The Black” at which point everyones hands go up in the air, Thatcher comes to the front of the crowd during a break in the song before quickly heading back to his kit to finish the night off.

And that it, no encores here..

I don’t think anyone left The Institute tonight feeling that they had seen anything less that a great but simple show, the set seemed to fly by and was perhaps a little short but given that their debut album is little over half an hour in its entirety, that didn’t really come as much of a surprise.

Those heavy guitar riffs and pounding drums sounded as at home in there tonight as I imagine they would in a stadium, and I wouldn’t be surprised if we find out for sure at some point in the future.

 

Photos & Review – John Dent

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