Fontaines DC, Aviva Studios, Manchester, November 29 

There’s a sea of people bouncing in green balaclavas, beers are flying, sweat is dripping, bodies are hoisted up on top of shoulders, and people are lovingly embracing one another. The mood is palpably jubilant this evening, as Fontaines DC kick off their three-night residency in Manchester. 

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This 2,000-capacity space is a comparatively intimate setting to the rest of their arena tour dates, so to have this relatively up-close environment – in which the screech of guitars and rumble of bass feel tangible, and singer Grian Chatten’s kilt flaps away just inches from fans’ faces – already feels like it might be the end of an era for the group. 

You can understand their successful trajectory. Over the course of three albums they have pulled off the impressive feat of balancing music that is smart, literary and experimental but also accessible, melodic and bursting with the kind of anthemic choruses that feel increasingly absent in contemporary guitar music. They are the rare kind of band that act as a bridge between young kids, ageing millennial Strokes fans, Britpop dads and classic rock aficionados – and the breadth of that audience is here tonight. 

They open with the dense, brooding “Romance”, which is all eerie atmospherics and surges of industrial-tinged electronics, before the curtain falls away to reveal the band against a huge backdrop of the wonky-shaped heart from the cover of their most recent album Romance. The swift shift into “Jackie Down The Line”, from their previous 2022 album Skinty Fia, quickly displays the other side of the band – punchy, hooky, infectious – and it immediately whips the audience into a frenzy as they scream the words back in elated unison. 

“Big Shot” sounds like My Bloody Valentine meets Nine Inch Nails with immersive washes of hazy yet harsh guitars filling the room, while “Big” is delivered with a deadly stomp. “Boys In The Better Land” is frantic, agitated and hyper, with rapid-fire drums and Chatten’s half-spoken words tumbling out hurriedly. It sets the room alight, but so too does “Favourite”, which relishes in slowing things down and letting the words ring out with clarity over its irresistible hook. Despite only being out a few months, the song is received like a firmly embedded classic, as the room swells with joy and rows of arms wrap around one another. 

Palestine is a constant presence throughout the evening – from flags wrapped over amps to green, white and red tape being placed over Chatten’s mic stand – and “free Palestine” are the parting words as the band leave the stage.

The four-track encore of “In The Modern World”, “Desire”, “I Love You” and “Starburster” is a killer final run that really hits home just how many big songs this relatively young band already have. “Desire” thoughtfully allows its quiet moments to sound just as huge as the loud parts, while The Cure-like “I Love You” unfurls from its melancholic yet shimmering guitar-heavy opening to a powerful, almost speech-like delivery from Chatten as he spews words with an intense ferocity, landing each line like a punch.

“Starburster” is a song that mirrors a panic attack via sharp and rushed intakes of breath, and you suspect it has to be a set closer because it takes so much out of Chatten to deliver it. However, there is also something quite fitting about finishing on a song that leaves the band utterly breathless; it’s the same state they have kept the audience in for much of the evening. 

Setlist

Romance

Jackie Down The Line

Televised Mind

A Lucid Dream

Roman Holiday

Big Shot

Death Kink

Sundowner

Big

A Hero’s Death

Here’s The Thing

Bug

Horseness Is The Whatness

Nabokov

Boys In The Better Land

Favourite

Encore

In The Modern World

Desire

I Love You

Starburster