Let’s Be Honest, The AP Tour, Featuring Mayday Parade Flies Into Maryland For A Night To Remember

AP Tour Ft. Mayday Parade
October 18, 2015
Filmore- Silver Spring, MD

Ohio-based music magazine Alternative Press is celebrating their 30th year running. To give back to the fans they brought back the return of the Alternative Press Tour. There was a lot of speculation and rumors about this tour, but the four leading men of each band on this tour were attending the APMA’S in Ohio back in July, where they announced that Mayday Parade will be the headlining band on the AP Tour this year with support from Real Friends, This Wild Life, and As It Is.

The tour began this past Wednesday in Boston, then ended up here in Silver Spring, Maryland on October 18^th at The Fillmore. First up was As It Is, a band all the way from the UK getting the crowd warmed up and ready for the following bands. Now I have never seen As It Is before and I will say I was left impressed. Patty Walters got the crowd all up on their feet by jumping as high as he can (which was pretty high), to close out their set the ended with fan favorite, Dial Tones which got everyone off their feet and singing back to them as loud as they possibly could.

After the stage was cleared from As It Is, Kevin and Anthony of This Wild Life took the stage and performed such a fantastic set, like usual. The acoustic duo opened up with Ripped Away. More into the set, Kevin, front man of This Wild Life opened up about his Mother battling Breast Cancer so he had everyone in the whole room turn on their handy flashlights on their mobile devices and had the lighting guy darken up the room so they can see the lights swaying back and forth during the song Kevin had written for his mother called, No More Bad Days. That was such a touching moment and such a beautiful song. As their set came to an end This Wild Life ended with their most popular song, Concrete which had everyone off their feet, and had Anthony end the song playing the drums. They are definitely a band you should see live!

Next up was Real Friends; I have never seen them live so being able to see them live was a great experience, although it appeared that front man Dan Lambton was under the weather. Real Friends started off the night with Cover You Up from their latest album Maybe This Place Is The Same And We’re Just Changing. Dan Lambton had a couple messages throughout the show which addressed always making time for your loved ones before it’s to late and one message he made pretty clear throughout the night… “Put the f*cking phones away”. The band also played songs mostly from their latest album such as Loose Ends, Anchor Down and I Don’t Love You Anymore. Despite being under the weather Lambton and the rest of Real Friends definitely got the crowd off their feet and crowd surfing all over the place that security couldn’t even keep up with all of them being thrown their way, they were ready for Mayday Parade.

Now onto the band most people were waiting for, the headliners, Mayday Parade. This band has always been an impressive band to see live but on tour they had taken it up a notch, consisting of bringing their own lighting set-up which included an LED wall behind them that flashed “MAYDAY PARADE” in big bold red letters, fog cannons, and a couple risers. They began their set with One of Them Will Destroy the Other which featured Real Friends’ front man Dan Lambton. This song just so happens to be the opening track on their brand new album Black Lines. It is definitely a different direction for the band, but the fans seemed to dig the new sound.

Of course, there were some fan favorites thrown into the set list such as, Jamie All Over (A Lesson In Romantics), Terrible Things (Valdosta), and the piano-driven Oh Well, Oh Well (from their 2011 self-titled album). But with a new album to promote, Mayday Parade threw in several new songs, including Keep in Mind, Transmogrification Is a New Technology and Let’s Be Honest, which they performed for the first time that night.

Before ending their 16-song set with Miserable at Best, front man Derek Sanders took a moment to tell the crowd, “I want to point out how amazing this is, you all coming together and watching us play. You could be at home watching Netflix.” Just after leaving the stage, Mayday Parade returned for an encore, which they played Just Say You’re Not Into It for the first time since I believe 2007 and Jersey.

For more information on Mayday Parade, follow/like the band on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and their official website for more updated information.