Bleech 9:3
I walked in, and I could feel the intense atmosphere in this room filled with a buzzy, young, energetic audience. Bleech 9:3 are back in Norwich to cause a scene in the Waterfront Studio.
I walked in, and I could feel the intense atmosphere in this room filled with a buzzy, young, energetic audience. Bleech 9:3 are back in Norwich to cause a scene in the waterfront studio.
The pit was a sea of Kagol hats which must be the new indie/ rock thing as I found the same thing while seeing Keo (Finn Keough has been known to wear a Kagol hat)
The energy was intense but for a sold out gig I thought it was pretty empty, I figured they had to account for the rowdy raucous audience.
The support band, Theatre, triggered my shoegazing stance with their dreamy guitar and ethereal vocals. They set the perfect tone for the night. Micro bangs, long unkept hair guitarists thrashing and crying.
When theatre ended their set the football hooligans arrived shouting “wheyyy” and “oi oi” every two seconds. I had to ask myself a few times “why are hey shouting, is this what being old feels like, am I just being boring”
Never did quite work out why they were doing that, but I think it was quite fitting for the performance we experienced.
The band strutted on, green Mohawk, Korn tshirt, pink hair a very Fontaines Esque band looking very fashionable.
They started with “Jacky”, a crowd pleaser. Baz, vocalist and guitarist, opened a pit immediately and hopped straight in the crowd. I can’t imagine how tiring it is to sing, play guitar and try not to be crushed by a rowdy group of young excitable people. Guitarist Sam Duffy seemed to be having a blast as well thrashing about with his guitar.
As a band with only 5 released songs, it was really incredible to hear unreleased songs and still hear the crowd shouting the lyrics back. They played several unreleased songs: No surprise, Lowboy, Mysystem, (figure 8), Tourniquet, Best day and still no one was stood still.
They finished their set with the most popular song “ceiling”. This began with Duffy whispering into the microphone hauntingly. Again, Baz instantly threw himself into the crowd and got flipped over but that didn’t stop him from giving a raw, intense, emotional performance. He stayed in the crowd until he was eventually dragged back to stage by the audience.
Baz does not break eye contact when he sings, I think that really adds to the haunting, intense, terrifying kind of thing they’ve got going on for them.
It’s hard to tell whether the bands extreme passion and excitement when it comes to performing is due to the atmosphere and crowd or if they’re perpetually on drugs. However, if I were a musician lucky enough to have such an energetic supportive audience I would be acting the same way.
It almost didn’t feel like a gig. More like a group of mates (including Baz who is probably still in that crowd somewhere) screaming lyrics to songs they all love at.
Instead of doing an encore both Bleech 9:3 and Theatre headed to the merch stand to chat to fans which I think is very humble and exciting especially for such a young, passionate audience.
While the high energy was maintained throughout the evening Baz paused the singing in order to highlight how lucky we are to have freedom and shine a spotlight on those who aren’t as fortunate as us. It’s always nice to see artists utilising their platforms.
I feel lucky to have been able to see them in such a small, intimate venue as they are growing so fast, I know I’ll probably never be lucky enough to be in a crowd that small stood so close to such talented musicians.
