YUNGBLUD – CHALK, BRIGHTON 23.8.21 (early show)
Today was finally the day that Yungblud fans got the opportunity to see their idol live in the flesh up close and personal. He was in Brighton to perform two Resident music outstore performances at CHALK in support of his latest album ‘Weird!’.
For those of you that don’t know, Yungblud is the alter ego of 24 year old Doncaster born Dominic Richard Harrison. To date he has released two studio albums, one live album, six EPs, twenty-five singles (including one as featured artist), and twenty-two music videos. His twelve tune ‘Weird!’ album came out on 4th December last year, which is right at the height of the Christmas buying spree and yet it burst into the album chart and made it to No.1 by chart selling 39,000 units in its first week alone. It has thus far spawned no less than six singles.
As an extra push, the ‘Weird!’ album was available in a number of formats, including white vinyl, white cassette and CD. In addition to this, Yungblud had organised to appear live in Brighton on 31st March this year, but sadly lockdown was still in operation and so the date was moved to tonight.
‘Weird!’, with its cover made to imitate the film poster for ‘This Is England’, is very difficult to pigeonhole as it clearly spans punk, pop, emo, metal, rap and rock. Yungblud is on record as stating that its inspirations come from such artists such as My Chemical Romance and Marilyn Manson.
Prior to beginning his music career, Yungblud appeared in Emmerdale and The Lodge. He has admitted that he suffers from insomnia and ADHD, but this has certainly not held him back as he is clearly very popular, having no less than 3.7 million followers on Instagram, and thus there were two concerts on offer from him at CHALK today. There was a 6pm show, which we are reporting on here, as well as an 8pm show which followed.
I arrived at CHALK to be greeted by an impressively long queue of young people waiting to enter the venue. There was no support act this evening and thus there was very little waiting for this tightly knit crowd before Yungblud hit the stage.
Those familiar with Yungblud’s usual hi-energy shows are in for something a little special tonight, something far more intimate. The stage decked out with a rug and a lampstand (that wouldn’t look out of place in a large living room) with three stools, a keyboard and a drumkit. It’s what you’d call semi-acoustic tonight, but it is certainly not devoid of punch and a lot of volume.
They kickstart the set with the insanely catchy ‘Strawberry Lipstick’ from last year’s ‘Weird!’ LP and the crowd seem to sing every single word. CHALK’s sound system is put to the test and passes with flying colours. The sound is superb tonight, wrapping itself around your ears and bouncing from the venue walls.
Yungblud starts the set in what appears to be a mohair sweater and PVC jeans and large buckle boots, later losing the top to reveal a Sex Pistols ‘God Save The Queen’ T-shirt.
The show is pretty much bang on an hour, not a substantial set, but enough time to run through 9 songs interspersed with plenty of banter from the enigmatic frontman and at one point getting people in the crowd to shout out their favourite jokes. Most of the evening’s set comes from the latest platter. It’s hard to pick highlights yet ‘Parents’ worked the crowd up into a lather early on, but for me, it was when Yungblud took up on the keyboard for a divine version of ‘Mars’, which just outshone its recorded offering.
The final trio of the beautifully majestic ‘Love Song’ then the pit opens up for a lively ‘Loner’. The set closes with everybody in the venue losing it to the title track ‘Weird!’. Due to timing, there’s no encore this evening and the cries for one more song are left ringing in the air. It doesn’t seem to dampen the joy and excitement, and I personally would do this all over again now if I could.
Tonight goes to show what a top frontman Yungblud is. Even armed with an acoustic guitar, he’s still deadly. This evening kind of feels like the prequel to something bigger brewing on the horizon when Yungblud hit the Brighton Dome on the 27th of September. I’m sure everyone here for both of the sets already has their tickets booked for that sold out gig! Count me in too!
Yungblud setlist:
‘Strawberry Lipstick’
‘Parents’
‘Charity’
‘Fleabag’
‘Mars’
‘Casual Sabotage’
‘Love Song’
‘Loner’
‘Weird!’
