A Night To Remember
Friday night at Qudos Bank Arena was truly a 00s emo kid’s dream line up.
Papa Roach kicked things off by transforming the floor into an ocean. Seriously, the sheer volume of crowd surfers outpaced Bondi on its best day.
There was absolutely no doubt from the off that the crowd was ready to give it all with multiple walls of deaths starting the night off right.
Singer Jacoby Shaddix took the time midway through the set to deliver a message about mental health, something that’s been a prevalent topic throughout the band’s history, and pledged to donate a portion of proceeds of the night’s show to a local charity.
That genuine connection with Sydney was palpable, they left everything on that stage.
Smashing through a 17 song set which spanned their massive 33 year run as a band, this really felt like a victory lap for the lads.
Then came the nu-metal time machine. It was a glorious descent into a chaotic medley, with the group smashing through Korn, Limp Bizkit and System of a Down anthems before the absolute carnage of ‘Last Resort.’
A Day To Remember then doubled down on the madness. Jeremy McKinnon’s opening gambit “playing music for a living is not fucking normal”, set the stage for a night that defied logic.
The night was a fever dream of circle pits, crowd surfer surfing and a shit ton of confetti. During ‘LeBron,’ the arena turned into a basketball court, pitting both sides of the crowd against each other in a bizarre, high-stakes game.
The Sydney fans put in a serious shift, a relentless mass of bodies that made the whole experience feel worth the 11 year wait since their last headline show.
