After a short hiatus from the photography game, I’m back doing what I love and what a fantastic show to return on! The mid-2000s nostalgia is strong with this one, featuring the hard rock Canadian juggernauts, Three Days Grace, making a long-awaited return to the UK in support of their latest studio album, Explosions. Alongside them is another band I grew up listening to in my late teens, 10 Years. So plenty to be excited about for this one.
At around 8pm, the lights go out and we start the evening off with Knoxville, Tennessee’s own, 10 Years. With a wonderful mix of haunting ambience contrasted by heavy guitar riffs, and powerful yet diverse vocals handled by Jesse Hasek and Brian Vodinh handling backing vocals and harmonies, these lads are one of the more underrated bands specifically from the post-grunge scene in the mid 2000s. An absolute joy to watch and you can’t help but be immersed in their performance. About half way through their set, we were treated to a cover of Nirvana’s “Heart-Shaped Box”. This was certainly a direction of the song I’d never seen done! The band ended their set on their biggest hit “Wasteland” to a roar of the crowd.
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After a brief intermission, once again, the stage goes to black and the crowd goes crazy as Three Days Grace hit the stage and waste no time going straight into “So Called Life”. I have to admit I’ve been a bit out of the loop since Adam Gontier left in 2013 so I’ve yet to hear much of the band with Matt Walst at the helm. I definitely need to go checkout some more of the bands later work after this show. Following the opening song was, “Animal I Have Become” at which point the crowd were chanting “Three Days Grace! Three Days Grace! Three Days Grace!”
Mid-way through the show the members of the band went off stage briefly and returned with some chairs along with an acoustic guitar wielded by lead guitarist, Barry Stock. At which point we were given a couple of acoustic versions of the songs “High Road” and “World So Cold”. It has to be said Matt did a fantastic job getting the crowd involved every step of the way, and even went an extra mile in bringing a couple of lucky fans on stage to sing along with “Just Like You”.
It’s been about 15 years in the making for me to see these guys live and it did not disappoint to say the least. The band seemed to fit all the big hits from back in the day in the set such as “I Hate Everything About You”, “Never Too Late” and “Riot” to name a few as well as some newer ones like “Painkiller”, “The Mountain” and “Lifetime”. Totally worth the wait to see these guys.
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Photos by Lawrence Potter
Three Days Grace: official | facebook | twitter | instagram | tumblr | youtube
10 Years: official | facebook | twitter | instagram | youtube
