Spanish Love Songs
Special Guests: Heart Attack Man + SUDS
Venue: The Garage, Glasgow.
Date: 17th January 2024
Review By: Ross Bowie
Hot on the heels of becoming one of the most revered bands in the current emo scene after a summer full of festival appearances and a support slot with Hot Mulligan, Los Angeles sad boys (and women) Spanish Love Songs have come to the UK for a headline tour in support of new album No Joy.
The show was kicked off by Norwich based band SUDS, fresh off their debut album The Great Overgrowth. The band offer a good balance of pop punk and Midwest emo to the ever-growing crowd, before main support Heart Attack Man take to the stage and open with a nu-metal riff that is drenched in so much chorus you would think it was taken from Korn’s Untouchables, before bursting into more familiar pop punk territory. The band do a good job of getting the room warmed up, with mosh pits opening up and song C4 getting a great response from the crowd.
Then Spanish Love Songs take to the stage for not only their first Glasgow headline show but their biggest headline show to date. The band looked in disbelief as they played to a sold-out room of this size and had a crowd ready to sing every lyric to every song. An opening run of Lifers, Losers, Clean Up Crew & Self-Destruction is as good a run as any emo band you want to name. The setlist was mostly made up of the last two records, but old school tracks like Bellyache and The Boy Considers His Haircut were thrown in for long term fans.
The crowd erupts when it’s announced that 50 members of Scottish drummer Kyle McAulay’s family are in attendance. Spanish Love Songs really took off during the pandemic, leaving them with a collection of great songs and no one to play them too. This headline run is the victory lap that not only No Joy but Brave Faces Everyone deserves. A room full of ageing Scottish emos singing “Have you ever felt lower than everyone else” would have been the stuff of frontman Dylan Slocum’s dreams in 2020 and after four years that dream has become a reality.
While roaring through their back catalogue, it’s Haunted that has become this band’s secret weapon in their set. A chorus that has every arm in the room up in the air, and a use of synth gives the song some extra edge live, but the setlist is all building to the final one-two of Routine Pain and Brave Faces Everyone. A set of songs that can only be described as a cathartic release, as a sold-out room chant along, hanging on Dylan’s every word. Spanish Love Songs have had their crowning moment, but with the crowd in the palm of their hand, you can’t help but believe this band are only getting started 
(5 / 5)
