As my friend and I were entering the HMV Picture House in Edinburgh we realized we should have arrived earlier. The crowd was massive already, and the support act (Foxy Shazam) was about to finish their set. Still more than forty minutes until the glam-rock band was supposed to enter the stage. The crowd was a mixture of metalheads in their late 40’s to young adults in their early 20’s, nearly everyone dressed in black. I even caught a glimpse of a mother and a boy not older than 12. I was surprised by the mixture of the generations of rock’n’roll attending.
We were standing by the back, and bummed out a bit because we could not really see over the heads of what looked like an older man and his son. To be honest I had not really listened to The Darkness since their debut album Permission To Land was released in 2003, and I did not even know they still had it going. After waiting for a while, which seemed forever, since we were both quite excited to hear Justin Hawkins’ typical voice echoing in the venue, The Darkness finally entered the stage. Lights, strobe lights,and something that looked like confetti drizzled quietly from the roof. A massive cheer throughout the crowd spread like fire. They began playing Black Shuck, which honestly surprised me even further, I did not expect them to play old songs until the latter part of the set. They played hits like Growing On Me, One Way Ticket To Hell...And Back! and so on, and Justin Hawkins let his stage personality shine through. At one point they even had pyros on each side of the stage in the little venue, and I could see the crowd in front dancing like crazy. The Darkness did a cover of Radiohead’s Street Spirit (Fade Out) and Queen’s Tie Your Mother Down, and were showing Edinburgh they still are good entertainers and know how to play glam rock.
The venue became alive, the band nearly got drowned out as Justin Hawkins’ started singing I Believe In A Thing Called Love and it was a fantastic moment to have in mind before we went home back to Stirling, singing quietly on the train.