Last Sunday we went out to see Torrance, California’s punk outfit Joyce Manor in Castricum, the Netherlands. While till in awe of their 2011 self-titled debut LP and jamming this beautiful vinyl on a regular basis, the band released their third full-length album Never Hungover Again on Epitaph Records last summer. SPIN praised the band’s “songs that are rich in melody, short in length, and colored with gentle-hearted loneliness”. Noisey said that Never Hungover Again “will most definitely rule incalculably hard”. Were were stoked to finally see them live to say the least.
De Bakkerij is an incredibly small venue and when you enter the bar/cloakroom you quickly find out that’s the actual room. Cheap Girls was soundchecking upon our arrival and were hidden behind a small group of people and two enormous speakers. It was actually quite hard to notice that there was a band playing in the room since there’s no actual stage. Cheap Girls played a good set that was more entertaining to watch than the session they did for Hurley in September.
Joyce Manor was up next after a short line-check and the room filled up quickly. They played a solid mixture of their discography and kids were singing along lustily. As expected, no one jumped off of the monitors or speakers after the recent controversy that was created by the band’s stance on stage diving. It was a good show that was withheld of being great because of the horrible sound in the venue, standing awkwardly close to the band and a lack of submission by the band members.
Pictures by Anne Carolien Köhler – Facebook
Legends Arising 