SKYND
Special Guests: ZETRA
Venue: St Luke’s, Glasgow.
Date: 29th November, 2023.
Review By: Ross Bowie
SKYND have brought their extravagant and well-rehearsed live shows back to our shores again, for another dash of serial killer inspired tunes. The Australian 2 piece have been hitting the UK market hard in recent years, appearing at both Download Festival and most recently a second stage headline slot at Bloodstock, as well as a headline tour and support slots thrown in for good measure. This is a lot of work for a band who are still yet to release a debut album. The band have released 2 Eps and since 2020 have been releasing stand-alone singles rather than compiled bodies of work, which is becoming a far more standard practice in other genres of music.
The show was kicked off by ZETRA, who I also caught at this year’s Bloodstock Festival and was happy to dive back into that world. The London based duo are so good at crafting their own world and making the audience feel like they’re in a cold, abandoned forest right beside the band. The band have just released a brilliant new single and announced they have now joined Nuclear Blast Records, so expect to see a lot more from these barefooted freaks in the future 
(4 / 5)
Skynd
While preparing for this gig, I realised that this is my sixth time catching SKYND live, which is good going for a band who earlier this year only released their 14th song. Live, the band play as a 3-piece and rely heavily on backing tracks for the dance and electronic elements of their sound. As stated earlier the live show is incredibly well rehearsed, the vocals are extremely modulated live, so every element of the live experience must be running exactly on time for the vocal delivery to have its desired and unsettling effect. This is my only real criticism of the SKYND live experience, is I’m not sure of how much I’m watching in front of me is live. There is no real audience interaction besides the occasional thank you to the crowd and of course the news broadcasts that play between each song. All of this aside, the band are just so much fun to watch. They craft songs that are so unbelievably catchy that they will not leave your head for days, I’m not able to go about my normal life any more without singing “bang bang, boogie boogie bang bang” or making gun the gun sounds from the Columbine chorus.
The band also played 2 unreleased songs at the show, one of which was a highlight and has me excited for their next release, this has been a feature the previous times I’ve seen the band, their songs are so memorable that even after only hearing them live I’m able to recall melodies and vocal hooks. SKYND’s presence as a frontwoman is so eye catching, too. One moment she’ll be moving across the stage like a marionette or pretending to drink cool-aid in Jonestown. This is a band who know how to put on a live show that is going to grab your attention from the start to the very end of their set time.
SKYND continue to impress with their tight live show and catchy melodies, they’re a band who really know how to start a party and keep those vibes going till their last notes, regardless of how dark their lyrical themes are. Some more released music would certainly aid the live experience as they tour very intensively, but the performance is worth catching every time they roll through town (4 / 5)
