The Futureheads

_“You heard of The Futureheads?”

“Oh ya.”

“There’s a Futurehead in our shop.”_

(Guitarist/vocalist Ross Millard aimlessly scampers by with a mobile phone attached to his face.)

I’m a bit gitty at Millard’s appearance in the shop and I almost croak when he asks me where the blank CDs are. That’s fate, that is.

Only a couple of hours later, we walk into supporting act Thomas Tantrum’s few last bars of their last song and I don’t know if it’s their relief or tiredness that I hear, but with all the ratty locks and loud guitar work, it feels like we’ve walked straight into 1992. It’s night and day in comparison to The Futureheads’ max-out-amp-out-motivational pop. Minus the magnitude of their god-opening-the-heavens entrance, ornamented with a blaring symphonic sample amid singing games and organized chants, the set wiggles about like a youth jamboree on uppers. It’s loud, almost agitatedly fast, and there’s not a spot of negativity.

I forgot how tall they are. They’re all so tall and so loud and they all make the booming four-part harmonies that they're known for really rock, but not the threatening type of rock that your parents warned you about - it's the rock-around-the-clock kinda rock. It’s so happy and so positive I don’t know what to do with myself. They’re really chugging it out. I used to be on the fence about Barry Hyde’s lead vocals that make him sound like he’s constantly attempting to swallow the Atlantic, but I realise how much I like them whenever anyone else chimes in. The over-ambition I thought I heard just sounds like bright enthusiasm, and it’s a never-ending energetic enthusiasm that is equally matched by everyone else in the band. Millard and Hyde continuously throw their arms into the air and leap across the stage in pure rockist triumph.

New tunes are equipped with similar rambunctious, manic positivism, and with their boisterous stage antics, I eagerly wait for them to strip their cool-kid threads and reveal their KISS-style rock-bondage wear. They sound like they’re just itching for some stage pyrotechnics. Even if they have songs about kidnapping and murder, it never sounds that way. It’s simply invigorating, and they’re so enthusiastic, I ignore just how Universal-rating it sounds.

Read our review from Portsmouth here