Debuting their European tour at Rock City, the band polished the sweat slickened cogs of a true rock and roll machine.
There are very few things promised in one’s lifetime: birth, death, and the yearly declaration that the demise of rock music has befallen upon us once more.
However, formed just a few miles up the road in Derby, the echoing wails of a guitar laden strut rival that critique.
Aptly named The Struts, the band are a pastiche to the tongue-in-cheek excesses of glam rock, transforming a typical Thursday into a night of debauched tyranny.
Rock isn’t dead, and this City is alive.
The world-famous Nottingham venue is arguably the closest the band will get to performing in front of a ‘home crowd’ – performing more so an understatement, for the two-hour set was a one stop tour in all things rock ‘n’ roll.
Bad Nerves certainly didn’t have any qualms about performing tonight.
Vocals dripping in nasal perfume, you would be forgiven in believing their bark was worse than their bite.
Opening the night with ‘Don’t Stop’, they did just that, and crashed onto the stage louder than their cymbals.
The Essex-based five-piece is irrevocably and unapologetically punk. ‘Electric 88’ and ‘USA’ successively scream with a garage band ethos, tearing through the thinly veiled reputation of being a support act.
There is an intentional scrappiness to their sound.
Bad Nerves are palpable in their delivery, their biggest hit ‘Radio Punk’ honing in on their already signature rush of meaty bass lines and scorched chords.
In the vein of the underground rock spirit, the band’s short yet punchy setlist has stripped the room back to a raw receptiveness ready for the headliner.
Image Credit: Talia Robinson
Putting the pout back in pop, The Struts are certainly living up to their name.
The Struts coyly appraise the audience for having spent their ‘Dirty Sexy Money’ on a ticket to the show.
Revelling in their blatant commerciality, the unabashed exuberance of the opening riff is weighted by the novelty of their genre and diversity of their fans.
Commanding that your ‘Body Talks’ with all the pruning and preening of a peacock, the crowd vibrate against one another.
The tribalistic nature in which Davies employs his beats are immaculately rehearsed, morphing into the bombastic choral of ‘Fallin’ With Me’ that has the audience soldiering on with an adrenaline-fuelled ferocity.
The floor physically feels like it could cave at any given minute.
There ain’t no rest for the wicked; adopting classic devil horns as a call and response — a motif it seems for this current phase in the band’s discography — The Struts truly have raised Hell here tonight in Nottingham.
As they’re imploring us to ‘meet [them] at the Rainbow’ and transporting us into a technicolour light show, their stage setup is otherwise minimal.
Wrapped up in patriotic colours, frontman Luke Spiller’s blazer is hardly a disco ball, but most of the glitz and glamour ricochets off the band.
Critics and fans alike have often thrown nostalgic punches at Spiller for his likeness to Freddie Mercury; his showmanship certainly rivals that honour, for a quick flick of the wrist has the audience copying his every move.
Whether that’s heralding his hands above his head to reap the thundering of claps he sows, or simply jumping up and down, Luke Spiller garners his own gravitational field and the crowd are alluringly pulled in every time.
He fully commits to one tried-and-tested rock star move after another, and it works every time.
Image Credit: Talia Robinson
Everyone tonight wholeheartedly embodies their zany and bombastic alter egos for ‘Primadonna Like Me’, the song graffitied with all the glitter and grit of an old school rock track.
The rhapsodic intervals are arguably the highlights of the show, and it feels like the band are prescribing operatic opioids with each song.
Slack flies through the lead guitar like it’s his own personal pegasus, and tenderly heads his stallion with an acoustic rendition of ‘Mary Go Round’.
It sees the venue swept up in mobile phone lights.
Their indulged cover of ‘Royals’ (originally by Lorde) pitches a fork in the road of their experimental excursions.
For as long as it’s been an on-and-off staple of The Struts’ shows, the irony of performing it at Rock City had never been felt more.
Given their pantheon status in America – having guest starred on America’s Got Talent and performed at Victoria’s Secrets catwalks in recent years – their relatively modest tour back on home turf feels like their teasing their own ellipses.
An aptly coined motif to ‘Remember The Name…’ taunts that this moment in the band’s history is the turning point, phrasing their own veneration to be on the cusp.
It’s the feeling that The Struts’ name should be on the lips of every live music fan.
Explicit remnants of the crowd’s “Na na na’s” solidified the intrusiveness of their latest single, ‘Too Good At Raising Hell’, and their upcoming fourth studio album.
It’s an ear worm, with Spiller himself in a recent Kerrang! interview cementing the fact that “it’s some of [his] favourite music, hands down, [they’ve] ever conjured up. It’s the record everyone’s been waiting for.”
You can listen to the single here:
A secondary debut song, the upcoming album title track ‘Pretty Vicious’ bleeds confidence and care with its swaggering drumbeat, baroque bass lines, and a truly haunting vocal performance from Spiller.
It’s an exciting time in The Struts’ career. After years of gigging and grafting, we’d place bets they’re hitting the arenas soon.
‘Put Your Money On Me’ has the audience flying up like the plastic notes themselves — it’s an ambitious moment of any Struts shows.
To crouch and down and spring back up again leaves your knees weak at their blatant drive to be the biggest band on the planet.
Or, perhaps that struggle was more literal. It’s a workout and a half being at a gig, but it’s a form of exercise we’re willing to endure.
The band will no doubt be back on tour once the album drops; they’ve truly teased us with this homecoming leg.
In the mean time, you can preorder their upcoming album ‘Pretty Vicious’, which releases November 3, 2023 here.
Featured Image Credit: Talia Robinson