Live Review: Bring Me The Horizon, Architects, '68

Catching more than a few punters outside having a break after '68 's and Architects' brutal opening sets — and with a scream of "what the fuck is up!" — Sheffield's own Bring Me The Horizon kicked off their Australian tour by bouncing on stage ten minutes early at HBF Stadium. Fans streamed down to the front of the stage, filling the standing room as frontman Oli Sykes took no time in encouraging the first of many mosh pits.

Flailing limbs were the order of the night and from the opening bars of House Of Wolves the people of sleepy Perth proved they can make a circle pit with the best of them. There's no doubt angels would fear to tread in the maelstrom of arms, legs and the occasional shoe that had erupted in front of Bring Me The Horizon. Bodies surfed across the crowd, with one eager punter making it onto the stage for the first dive of the night. Feeding off the carnage the band turned it up a notch with the old favourite Chelsea Smile. Another would-be stage diver spent too long dancing and, after helping out Sykes with vocal duties, was escorted off stage by security. 

BMTH have an all-inclusive show with plenty of opportunities for fans to lend a hand in the chorus — the nearly full stadium screaming "We're going nowhere!" as one voice. The swearing, gnashing and spitting gave way for the more subtle and considered Doomed. Atmospheric sounds combined with almost surrealist images on the giant video screen behind the band to show a more thoughtful and complex side to six maniacs who until now had bounced and jumped all over the stage to deafening decibels. The crowd's response was anything but thoughtful and complex, they screamed with delight at every utterance and note.

Introduced as a song about depression, Sleepwalking opened up yet another circle pit. The punters seemed hell bent on shaking off any depression by crashing hell for leather into each other. Breaking bones never looked like more fun.

If encouraging carnage in the mosh pit wasn't enough, Sykes invited, in his words, every-fucking-one to crowd surf their way to the front and give him a high five. All hell broke loose as security were run off their feet as wave after wave of excited punters crashed their way towards to stage to grab a piece of their heroes. At one point the stage was almost overrun with well-meaning punters pogoing their way across what is usually hallowed ground reserved exclusively for musicians. The musicians in question ate it all up and didn't drop a note, no mean feat considering they were four beats in a bar away from becoming the epicentre of a metal-core riot.

BMTH delivered a tight set of passion, fury and a shitload of attitude. With plenty of tracks taken from #1 album That's The Spirit and enough old favourites to keep the most hardcore fan happy, Australia, you're in for a treat.