Live Review: The War On Drugs / Lo Moon – 3arena Dublin 14.04.2022


Carl McGrath

The War in Drugs brought their latest tour the ‘I don’t live here anymore’ to the 3arena this week.

Lo Moon opened on the night with a series of pleasant soundscapes punctuated by fantastic guitar parts and great melodies. Lo Moon were an excellent support band for The War on Drugs as they matched the Philadelphia rockers with a similar style of vast and spacey sounds. 

The 7 piece band from Philadelphia brought everything they had to the 3arena on the 14th of April. Their sound is uniquely theirs with the ability to create beautiful soundscapes transporting the crowd for a couple of hours. The sound is an interesting mix with a fantastic rhythm section driving the rock guitar solos and sprinkled with dreamy synths to create a vast sound. Their blend of 1980s psychedelic rock and modern arena rock caters to everyone in the crowd from the twenty-year-olds all the way to the middle-aged men. 

The production on the show was phenomenal with a plethora of lights creating a visual spectacle just as good as the sounds filling the crowd’s ears. This was most prominent on the song “Strangest thing’ with fantastic rainbow lights that were very interesting to the eye, almost 3-D like. 

The stand out moments of the show were the many cutting guitar solos punctuated with those dreamy synths transporting the crowd somewhere far away from real life. Crowd favourite ‘Red Eyes’ came early in a set that was made up of a range of material both old and new with an emphasis on their new material from their album ‘I Don’t Live Here Anymore. ‘Red Eyes’ was everything you wanted it to be sounding just as good as the record with the stage donned aptly in red. The guitar solo here was absolutely tremendous with the crowd bursting into action upon it starting.

After seeing them perform it is easy to see why The War on Drugs are brought up in discussions about the best rock bands in the world. Everything about their performance exuded rock’n’roll but yet was interestingly their own, there was no mistaking who’s show you were at. The 2-hour performance filled the arena with massive sounds and even bigger emotion. 

Their European tour continues this week in Germany, be sure to check them out if you get a chance! 

Previous Album Review: Pat Matshikiza and Kippie Moketsi – Tshona! : uplifting classic South African jazz from the 70s.
Next Live Review: The Mission / Salvation - Chalk Venue, Brighton 12.04.2022

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