Taking Back Sunday

The 93 Feet Club is situated in the very heart of East London and it may seem an odd choice for a band like Taking Back Sunday, used to play in arenas in front of a thousand people, while the club barely holds two hundred.
Tickets for the show went sold out in a matter of seconds, not minutes and the few ones who had a chance to get a hold of a ticket were clearly aware of their sheer luck, while the rest were left to try and buy them on eBay, where prices skyrocketed up to £200 a pair.

The club reveals to be even smaller than expected and clearly not used to this kind of shows, when the majority of the fans are left outside in a draconian enforcement of the 18 and over policy.
After almost an hour and only a handful of patrons, the venue softened their policy and let the rest of the crowd in. At this point the atmosphere is already electric and an odd sense of anticipation is running among the people cramming the tiny space.

Everybody seems to know already that this night is going to be special.
They aren’t wrong.

Since the very first opening bars of “What it feels like to be a ghost” you have the clear understanding that this band means business. Never shy to put up a really energetic and brilliant show, tonight the quintet from Long Island is in top form, determined to play a show that this audience (your reviewer included) will never forget.

Adam Lazzara is a front man that, in complete contrast with his reserved and shy persona, once on stage transforms completely, giving everything he has; including himself, to the delight of the people at the front that seems cannot get enough of him.
The rest of the band is tight and compact like a well oiled machine, but retaining a vibrant passion that never seems rehearsed or fake. These are guys that, after various tribulations, are now enjoying a well deserved success and tonight, happiness is a feeling that is not traversing the crowd alone.
They play their latest album in its entirety and, to the delight of the fans; they keep on playing accepting requests of old favourites that had not been played in a long time.

Hurling himself around the stage, colliding with his band mates, cavorting on the front, but always smiling and feeling every word, Adam Lazzara is the fulcrum of this night, all eyes on him and all ears on a band that sounds amazing and has the, even rarer, quality to really love what its doing.

The night is an explosion of energy, love and intensity.
The night belongs to Taking Back Sunday.

They came.
They saw.
They won.

by Laila