AFI Return to the UK!

The last time AFI hit a UK stage was in 2017 where they supported Deftones in much smaller venues than Chino and the lads are playing now. I was lucky to be there and AFI were as sensational as they always were. You’d have to roll back to 2010 to have been a part of their last UK headline tour. This has been a long time coming.

So, with anticipation building at the O2 Shepherds Bush Empire, a 2,000-capacity venue that feels perfect for the energy about to hit, TR/ST took the stage as the unenviable support act. They were good. A strong mix of heavy beats, electro feel and vocals. The crowd was polite, but there was a fair amount of clock-watching as the headliners readied backstage.

When the lights dropped, the room exploded. With many great potential openers, ‘Strength Through Wounding’ always stands out as the one uniting AFI fans most, with chants of “through our bleeding, we are one,” heard in the queue before the gig, now at absolute fever pitch.

With 30 years of material and a room full of die hards, it’s impossible to guess an AFI setlist outside of some unmissable classics. I’ll say this now. They could have played anything. Every fan had every word on tap, screaming every lyric and filling every gap. It was great to catch a few knowing smiles from Davey and Adam as the crowd reacted to song openers from drum rhythm alone.

The band themselves? Well, they were as phenomenal as they have always been. It’s hard to describe AFI to a casual – they’re fairly genre-spanning, from hardcore punk in their early days to perhaps a dozen others, including goth alt-rock, pop punk, post-hardcore and melodic emo. To hear this live is something else. OK, they’ve been together for a long time, but they are next-level tight for the complexity some of their music exudes.

While Davey Havok is iconic (more on him shortly…), way more credit needs to be given to the rest of the band who hold it all together and allow him to do his thing. Hunter is one of the most underrated bassists in rock. He is incredible – try picking up a bass guitar and playing along (I’ll nail ‘Sacrifice Theory’ one day..I really will…). Crossing paths with Hunter as he sprints across the stage countless times is Jade, who effortlessly makes being the only guitarist sound much bigger than it is while defining the sound of the band. Adam ties it up with incredible range and appears to be enjoying himself more than ever.

Age should never be a ‘thing’, but how does the energy of a band known for it change as they get older? Well, in this case, it doesn’t. This is reciprocated by a crowd who on the whole are aging together too (although it was brilliant to see some young fans experiencing AFI for the first time). Several circle pits appeared throughout the set with a collective energy that made me feel every single one of my 41 years in the days after.

While the band ebbs and flows behind him, Davey epitomises this – at one point climbing half the venue onto the bar forcing the entire audience to turn with him. At 50 years old, he’s an inspiration. He barely touches the ground over the 17-song set, leaping from podiums high up into the air on several occasions and nailing every note in between.

He has always been the master of reinvention, with his latest look described to me by one fan (affectionately) as Mark Twain becoming the 5th Golden Girl. He’s also always had a great stage presence, but this is now even more refined, and the connection with the fans is at boss level. By far the strongest I’ve experienced in the countless times I’ve seen them over the last 27 years. When Davey points at you, you feel it.

The setlist was exceptional and represented all but their first two records (at least in London). Perhaps the biggest reaction was kept for The Boy Who Destroyed the World and A Single Second, two songs that evoke madness whenever they turn up in a set. New material was also received with delight while their most commercially successful anthems like Days of the Phoenix, Miss Murder and Girl’s Not Grey pushed the room to its limits.

AFI continue to be one of the most undervalued bands in the business, but the community is strong – maybe the obscenely positive reaction to this tour will tempt them into returning to the UK more frequently. At least I hope it does.

The Perfect Gig.