The night of the gig, you’re buzzing from the moment you wake up. You’re probably a bit cleaner than usual. You even use that fancy face wash you got for Christmas. The queue to get in is a festival of anxious energy. You can smell stale beer, cheap perfume, and the collective hope of a thousand people.
You find your spot. It’s about halfway back, which means you have a decent view of the back of a very tall person’s head. But then the lights dim, the opening synth of “Cocoon” kicks in, and suddenly you don’t care about that tall guy. You’re just a small part of a massive, sweaty, out-of-tune choir, and it’s perfect.
You spill someone else’s drink on your shoe. You lose your voice by the second song. You’re pretty sure you elbow a stranger in the ribs during “Tyrants,” but they’re too busy elbowing you back. And for a solid hour and a half, nothing else exists. Not your job, not your bills, not that weird noise your car has been making. Just the music, the lights, and the feeling of being part of a ridiculous, wonderful, slightly deafening tribe.
You leave the venue on a cloud, your ears ringing like a fire alarm, your lungs aching from shouting at a man from Wales. You’re already exhausted, hungry, and broke. The next morning, you’ll search online desperately for tickets to the next show. Because that’s just how it goes with Catfish And The Bottlemen. It’s a beautiful, expensive, slightly chaotic addiction, and you wouldn’t trade it for the world.
