Gurriers are right. Nothing ever happens here. Not in the backwaters of England. Travelling two hours by bus to get to the closest city with a gig venue is worth it to see Gurriers, hot off the heels of releasing their second album, Nobody’s Coming to Save You. Returning to the Newcastle University Student Union for a gig, years after the last time, is a strange feeling. Seeing Gurriers is a thrill but a sobering walk to the show with the weight of the year so far on your shoulders is an exhausting experience. The Dan Hoff-fronted band are in exceptional form though and lift the audience to a euphoric high during their pent-up, rocked-out performance. A thrill of an experience from start to finish in a room built to keep the heat in. One of the hottest venues you’ll ever go to. Between the last time (a staggering Bob Vylan set) and now, nothing has changed. Some things do happen twice. You will leave Newcastle University’s Student Union drenched in sweat, even if you’re stood at the back of the room.
But it’s well worth the sticky atmosphere to spot Gurriers play into the energy of the crowd. Stage dives, mosh pits, a communal spirit that comes through intimate venues and bands with a whole new album to promote and prove. Gurriers tapped into an energy and response to the world around us that’s only growing stronger. Songs like Nothing Happens Twice and Approachable are built on the struggle that’ll no doubt come for those in the audience. Having to decide not just what you do but how you do it and what you wish to seek from experiences that won’t happen again is an overwhelming way to live but it comes for us all. There’s a social construct being dismantled by bands like Gurriers who share in the pain and struggle of having to power through. They’re a band who want you to know this spiralling feeling, of not quite knowing what to do next, not having a grip on anything in your life, is perfectly fine.
Embed that energy into a reactive and up for it crowd and you get an exceptional atmosphere. Gurriers’ latest album is stacked with sharp lyrical play and an instrumental energy that comes out brilliantly on stage. Hoff is an exceptional frontman too, between his calls for a free Palestine and thanking the crowd for returning their guitarist safely to the stage after being carried over the heads of the crowd, riffing away during a real highlight of the show. It’s a show built around the thrill of letting your energy spill out from yourself like you’ve been mangled by a hydraulic press, but at the end of it all there’s a communal experience in Gurriers’ work that makes it a safe space to act like that. Gurriers are building a name for themselves, quite rapidly, as a sharp, socially conscious band with plenty to say and more than a few ways of constructing their message with that socially thrilling connection.
You’d be hard-pressed to find a better song out there that quotes legendary bowler, Pete Weber. “Who do you think you are, I am,” has had a resurgence recently in all the right circles. Between comedian Vittorio Angelone using it as the premise for a stand-up show and now Gurriers repeating it on Waiting for Fisher, Weber’s words are becoming a strange yet accurate summary of modern culture. An artist or individual can express themselves and be met with a response that boils down to that celebratory quote from the world’s greatest bowler. You can feel that energy in Gurriers as they break down the “me, me, me” mentality of the modern world with songs that signal it’s not worth taking it all so seriously, but it is worth making the most of the moments that won’t happen twice.
Discover more from Cult Following
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
