Review: Joshua Hobbins
Photography: Nate Rose

August Burns Red rolled into The Tivoli on Sunday night with I Promised The World joining them from the US and two of Australia’s best emerging heavy acts in The Gloom In The Corner and Fallweather. Four bands with very different takes on heavy music, and by the end of the night there wasn’t much left of The Tivoli that hadn’t been subjected to a breakdown.

The room was still looking pretty sparse when Fallweather kicked things off, but those who had made the effort to get in early weren’t shy about making themselves heard. The Melbourne crew sounded tight and heavy from the outset, with strong harsh and clean vocals from both frontman Cullen Forbes and guitarist Brad Painter and plenty of energy across the stage.

I Would Have Told You got things underway before Glance dropped into a huge slowdown at its conclusion. Kill My Doubt showed another side of the band, its piano-led opening giving way to some excellent clean vocals, while Every Smile earned one of the strongest responses of the early part of the set.

After giving a huge shout-out to the other bands, Fallweather kicked into Mourn and managed to get an early circle pit moving. The introduction of Beneath the Dirt as “a soft song’ was technically accurate, at least by tonight’s standards, and again highlighted just how strong the band’s melodic vocals are. Once a Garden, Now a Grave and Tired Eyes rounded things out, and judging by the sizeable cheers following every song, Fallweather had done exactly what an opening band should do in warming up the crowd.

From the opening moments of The Jericho Protocol, The Gloom In The Corner sounded enormous. Their rhythm section was particularly impressive, with a monstrous bass tone and some seriously good work behind the kit, while the guitar leads cut nicely through the chaos. Backing tracks added extra vocal layers and keys without overwhelming what was happening onstage, and frontman Mikey Arthur was in excellent form, moving effortlessly between huge harsh vocals and clean sections, with bassist Paul Musolino providing equally strong backing vocals.

You Didn’t Like Me Then (You Won’t Like Me Now) kept things moving before Nope (Hollow Point Elysium) delivered one of several enormous beatdowns, the additional layers from the backing tracks making the impact even bigger.

Arthur introduced Angel’s Wrath Whiskey as one “for all the ladies in the room”, and its ridiculously catchy chorus gave way to a call for a circle pit. From my vantage point upstairs, this resulted in a determined two-woman circle pit in front of me.

Assassination Run showed why Gloom remain such an interesting band. Riffs, beatdowns, two-step parts and faster sections constantly collide without the songs feeling like a collection of unrelated ideas. Older track Misanthropic was arguably the heaviest moment of their set before The Problem With Apocalyptic Tyranny finished things in similarly punishing fashion.

The best moment between songs, though, belonged to drummer Nic. “We’re gonna do a first ever,” Arthur announced. “Our drummer is gonna say a few words.” What followed was a speech about beginning the tour in Perth, there being a port there, and only one ship that doesn’t stop there: “The premiership! Up the Lions!” Arthur’s response was immediate. “That is never happening again.”

Next up were Texas six-piece I Promised The World, making their first trip to Australia and bringing with them a sound that immediately transported me back to the early 2000s. There’s plenty of post-hardcore, metalcore and screamo in what they do, with shades of bands like Glassjaw and A Static Lullaby without simply sounding like a throwback.

Weather to Believe and Beloved introduced the Brisbane crowd to the band before Proud continued a set that was noticeably rawer around the edges than the two local acts that preceded them. I Promised The World are still a relatively young band, and there’s something enjoyable about watching a group at this stage rather than after every rough edge has been polished away.

Musically, there was plenty happening to hold your attention. The bass work was excellent, while clean vocals were handled primarily by guitarist Caleb Molina, with lead vocalist Hunter Wilson also adding his own.

A Pure Expression was an early highlight, with some excellent drumming from Mason Zschau and harmonies between Molina and Wilson. Future Worth Dying For, Don’t Just Stand There and Tears on the Moon kept the floor moving, with a decent pit running for much of the set.

Instrumental piece 02 gave the guitars and bass some room to show what they could do before Bliss in 7 Languages closed things out. Wilson had already noted that Brisbane was considerably more vibrant than Newcastle, and the response from the crowd suggested the feeling was mutual.

Then it was time for August Burns Red.

The Pennsylvanian metalcore veterans don’t really do understated entrances, and from the moment they launched into Meddler, The Tivoli felt like an entirely different room.

The sound was massive. JB Brubaker’s and Brent Rambler’s guitars shifted effortlessly between intricate melodic lines and enormous breakdowns, Dustin Davidson’s bass supplied a huge low-end foundation, and Matt Greiner spent the night sounding less like a drummer and more like some sort of precision-engineered percussion machine. The double-kick work alone was ridiculous.

And out front, Jake Luhrs sounded immense. Back Burner came with a simple instruction: “Move!” Brisbane obliged. Luhrs’ vocals were particularly vicious here, and throughout the set he showed just how much range he has developed across the band’s career, moving through highs, mids, cavernous lows and the occasional perfectly placed bree without losing power.

The newer Sonic Salvation was greeted like an old favourite, with the crowd singing along to its melodic sections, before The Eleventh Hour was dedicated to “all the ladies in the room”. Blast beats tore through the song before an absolutely massive breakdown reminded everyone that romance comes in many forms.

Paramount delivered a ripping guitar solo toward its conclusion before one of the more interesting aspects of the set became apparent during The Nameless, with Davidson and guitarist Brent Rambler swapping instruments. It wasn’t a novelty either; Davidson looked completely at home on guitar as the band tore through one of the heavier new tracks of the night.

They remained switched for Behemoth, another new track where the slower, groove-heavy direction of some of August Burns Red’s recent material really came through. It was noticeable across the newer songs: less constant forward momentum and more willingness to sit inside a filthy groove before dropping the hammer.

Luhrs introduced Bloodletter as “one of the heaviest songs we’ve ever written”, which is a fairly substantial claim from this band, but they did their best to justify it. A marching drum pattern built into another crushing beatdown, Luhrs went deep vocally, and Davidson even threw in a guitar solo for good measure.

Den of Thieves had a circle pit moving almost immediately before Davidson and Rambler finally returned to their usual instruments for Invisible Enemy. Luhrs called for everyone upstairs and down on the floor to headbang together from the beginning, and somewhere between the duelling guitar work, clean vocals and yet another gigantic breakdown, The Tivoli happily complied.

Empire was another highlight, combining huge beatdowns and vicious blasts with one of the best crowd singalongs of the night.

Then came Exhumed. “How many people have never crowd surfed before?” Luhrs had apparently decided it was time to fix that. “This is your song. Get up here!”

What followed was a steady stream of bodies making their way toward the stage for basically the entire song, eventually prompting Luhrs to give a deserved shout-out to the security crew who had just spent several minutes catching half of Brisbane.

For Marianas Trench, phone flashlights filled The Tivoli as Luhrs briefly addressed how divisive the world outside the venue can feel, asking the room to choose love and forgiveness instead. It provided a rare moment of calm and connection before one of the band’s most beloved songs brought the main set to an end.

Of course, August Burns Red weren’t finished. An air-raid siren sounded through the room before an announcement declared: “Ladies and gentlemen, the moment you’ve been waiting for… drum solo!”

Greiner duly went to work, because apparently everything he’d done for the previous hour hadn’t been enough. The guitars and bass eventually joined him, turning the end of the solo into a seamless introduction to Composure.

There was really only one way this night was going to finish. White Washed gave us one final wall of death across The Tivoli, and Brisbane threw whatever energy it had left straight into it.

August Burns Red have been doing this for more than two decades, but there was nothing routine about this performance. The older material still sounded ferocious, the melodic guitar work remained as sharp as ever, and the newer songs brought a slower, groovier kind of heaviness that worked exceptionally well alongside the classics. More than anything, though, they were just ridiculously tight.

Four bands, a lot of breakdowns, an increasingly battered Tivoli crowd and one drummer who probably isn’t human. Not a bad way to spend a Sunday night.