English band Asking Alexandria rocked The Belasco Theatre in Los Angeles, CA on Tuesday, October 29th during their final U.S. shows of the All My Friends tour. With supporting acts from American metalcore bands, Archers, The Word Alive and Memphis May Fire, the tour has rampaged across the states with stages ablaze.
The show opened with the fun Wisconsin-founded metalcore, pop-infused sounds of Archers, followed by Phoenician post-hardcore, alt metal band The Word Alive. Hailing from Texas, metalcore band Memphis May Fire took stage to a packed theater of fans growing more and more excited. The energy of the audience was at one-hundred. In between sets, the whole venue sang along to “Chop Suey!” by System of a Down that was playing as the house music. It was the perfect lead up to the energy we were about to receive from a group like Asking Alexandria.
A band with over a decade of music spanning genres from metalcore to electronicore to different alternative sounds of rock, it was a fun show to experience not knowing which tracks from which eras would emerge. The show started with a bang as the band came out and immediately ripped us into, “Dear Insanity” from 2011 album, Reckless and Relentless, to tribute some of their earlier signature sounds before jumping forward into tracks, “Down to Hell,” “Into the Fire,” and “Where Did It Go?” from their 2020 and 2017 albums. Then we jumped even more modern to their latest 2023 album, Where Do We Go From Here? with tracks, “Dark Void” and “Things Could Be Different” and an album cover that matched the stage imagery of a man sitting on the hood of a car floating in water forlorn in the eye of a storm.
The show then took a slower pace with some acoustic guitar moments and lamentations from tracks like, “I Don’t Need You”, and “Moving On” before getting energy back up with “To the Stage.”
Then things went way back in time to some signature classics from the 2009 album, Stand Up and Scream and we all stood up and screamed. The pit got ripped and roaring for the old heavy favorites, “If You Can’t Ride Two Horses at Once… You Should Get Out of the Circus,” “A Prophecy,” and “The Final Episode (Let’s Change the Channel).” Crowdsurfers were thrashed around erratically, a random shoe went flying, and someone got their face slammed into the metal barricade. Singer, Danny Worsnop, stopped in between songs to tell everyone to chill it down after someone got hurt. With such a diverse and long-spanning catalog, it was interesting to see that diversity across the crowd and it was obvious who was there to rage.
Before diving into “The Final Episode (Let’s Change the Channel)” Danny announced, “This next one’s our last song!” It’s not really our last song but let’s pretend like it is!” After playing, the band then left the stage and the lights went low. The audience cheered in unison for “one more song!”. After a little while the audience started to think maybe that really was their last song, until they came back out with the haunting intro of “Don’t Pray For Me” from the 2012 album From Death to Destiny, followed by the last energetically punchy and much loved, “Alone In a Room” played to a jumping crowd who all had their hands in the air.
The All My Friends Tour will continue north with only a few U.S. dates left in Ventura, San Francisco and Chico before jumping over to the U.K. and Ireland in December. Be sure to catch this fun and versatile show stacked with unmatched energy, acoustic laments, face-melting riffs and the deep roars we all yearn for.
FULL SETLIST:
Dear Insanity
Down to Hell
Into the Fire
Where Did It Go?
Dark Void
Things Could Be Different
Someone, Somewhere
I Don’t Need You
Moving On
To the Stage
If You Can’t Ride Two Horses at Once… You Should Get Out of the Circus
A Prophecy
The Final Episode (Let’s Change the Channel)
Don’t Pray for Me
Alone in a Room
GALLERY: Asking Alexandria at The Belasco in Los Angeles (October 29, 2024)
