Words by: Mitchell Patrick
If you’ve ever walked into a gig at 170 Russell in Melbourne and felt the floor practically vibrating before the opener even hit their first note, you know exactly the kind of night we were in for. The venue was absolutely heaving from the second the doors opened, buzzing with wall-to-wall, unfiltered hype. From the absolute jump, the energy locked in and refused to dip. Every single band had the room in the palm of their hands, and honestly, it was one of those rare, perfectly chaotic gigs where you wouldn’t even risk a quick run to the bar out of pure fear you’d miss something epic.
Melrose Avenue kicked things off, and man, they came out swinging. Being the first band on the bill was never easy, but they brought this massive wave of energy that hooked the room straight away. They tore through their set and kept everyone completely invested, dropping tracks like the new song Bad Guy and Body Bag before wrapping up with Suffering. They absolutely nailed the vibe for the rest of the night.
TX2 were up next and their crowd control was actually wild. At one point they just launched themselves straight into the mosh and the place went off, creating total chaos during Vampire by Rumor and Black Wedding. But it wasn’t just nonstop mayhem. They took a real moment to talk about mental health and what their X movement meant, and you could feel it hit everyone in the room. And obviously, because it was an Aussie show, they did a massive shoey and the crowd lost it.
As an epic little bonus to the night, we got the opportunity to attend the TX2 meet and greet before the show, and it was absolutely awesome. The whole band was incredibly welcoming and genuinely some of the nicest people I’ve ever met in the scene. We got to chat about how they all got into music originally, their plans to hopefully come back down here for a massive headline tour, and hilariously, their huge love and weird desire to meet a huntsman spider while they were in Australia. It gave a really cool behind the scenes look at the guys, making an already sick night even better.
Finally, Rain City Drive took over. I’d never seen them live before, and let me tell you, the wait was entirely worth it. Walking out to Frozen, they instantly grabbed the room and set an insane pace. They brought absolute buckets of energy to the stage and knew exactly how to work a packed out crowd. Between tracks, they gave us these cool little titbids about how they hadn’t played some of these songs live in years. But they figured since they hadn’t been down to Australia in so long, it only made sense to dust them off and bring them back out for us.
The venue was absolutely heaving by this point, but the positive vibes from everyone in the room were unmatched. They delivered all the heavy hitters we were hoping for, dropping huge singalongs like Talk to a Friend and Blood Runs Cold. Hearing those live was unreal, with the whole place bouncing and screaming the words right back at them. The momentum never slowed down for a single second. Tracks like Heavier and Neverbloom kept the entire floor moving. They completely owned the stage through a massive fifteen song setlist. You could tell they were feeding off the energy, and we were giving it right back. After smashing through Cutting It Close, they came back out to cap it all off with a killer encore of Medicate Me. It was the perfect close to a flawless set.
All up, it was just a ridiculously solid night of live music. The venue was heaving, the good energy stayed high the entire time, and every single act left it all out on the stage.
GALLERY
RAIN CITY DRIVE
