The King Blues By Joe Speak
This year’s Hub Festival marked a change for the Liverpool event, with a shift from a free, unsigned band-focused festival to one that brought some big names in the rock scene.
One of these was The King Blues, currently performing shows to help promote their new album Punk & Poetry.
The set was well-received and energetic, although it became apparent that not everyone watching their set knew many of the songs. Whilst this didn’t stall the band’s performance, it did mean that the crowd lacked a bit of energy at times.
The first three songs performed were the first three tracks off Punk & Poetry, which was a bit predictable.
However, 'Last of the Dreamers' provided an atmospheric introduction, before bursting into the energetic and aptly titled 'We Are Fucking Angry', which is well-suited to a live environment.
A couple more songs were taken from the new album, making the set lean a bit heavily on new material. That said, 'Headbutt' and new single 'I Want You' show the band’s more classic punk influences, and make for fun live tracks. It was clear during these songs that The King Blues love performing and entertaining, and the crowd responded well.
'Mr. Music Man' was a nice surprise, and was the only song to be taken from Under The Fog, the band’s debut album.
Whilst the rest of the set was a bit predictable, songs like 'I Got Love' and 'My Boulder' are a staple of the band’s sets for a reason. The former, in particular, was a beautiful moment of the set, carrying a brilliant message and uniting the crowd as they sang along.
A circle pit was opened up and the crowd really bounced around for protest track 'The Streets Are Ours'.
Despite the audience being young today, the atmosphere for this song was stunning, everyone screaming their response of 'Our streets' when Itch asked 'Whose streets?'
The show came to a wonderful end with 'Save The World, Get The Girl', providing a fitting conclusion to the show.
This a band who clearly love what they do, and truly believe what they are singing. For anyone at the show today, there should be no doubt that Itch is genuine with his message. Similarly, no-one could argue that, some day, The King Blues could be the biggest band in the world.
Female First - Alistair McGeorge
Photo - Joe Speak