By Desh Kapur, Rock At Night Manchester

Venue: O2 Victoria Warehouse, Manchester-DMA’s w/ Neon Waltz-December 13, 2018

I love going to O2 Victoria Warehouse, its an amazing venue. And tonight was even better; I was going there to review the DMA’s who were being supported by the Neon Waltz….Awesome!!! Two bands I really admire.

First up were NEON WALTZ. A 6 piece indie psyche – rock band from Caithness, Scotland. As I mentioned earlier, I’m a fan of Neon Waltz and I keep waiting for them to break into the nation’s musical consciousness. It must be any time now. I have seen the band a couple of times before and once again they didn’t disappoint. Lush, heavy guitar and beautifully crafted indie anthems from start to finish, the awesome “Sundial’, the brilliant “Perfect Frame”, “Heavy Heartless” and the self reflecting “I Fall Asleep”. Jordon Shearer’s vocals are impressive, delicate and powerful, all at the same time. That boy can sing and he is captivating to watch, swaying with his eyes closed, lost in the music and words he is singing to the packed out Victoria Warehouse. They look and sound like a band that are destined for major success and stadium gigs so come on people, what are you waiting for?

Then it was the turn of the DMA’s, who are having a spectacular 18 months, with even Liam Gallagher pronouncing their last album as biblical. High praise indeed.

Australia has served us up some amazing Britpop inspired bands over the last decade; two of my personnel faves being Jet and The Vines. I now add the DMA’s to that list. Three lads from Sydney, Australia, playing, what I guess, if I had to pigeon-hole it, I don’t want to but I will anyway…. is Oasis-inspired Britpop, but they are so much more than that. They write truly great songs.

Playing to a full O2 Victoria Warehouse crowd, they played a set of anthemic indie pop gems and the fans lapped it up, it was amazing to watch a crowd of over 3,000 singing along word for word, bringing back memories of scenes past, and anticipation of what these three chaps could go on to achieve. Lead singer Tommy O’Dell voice dipped and soared across the room, accompanied by Matt Mason and Johnny Hook on bass and acoustic guitar and the crowd were with them all the way. The stand-out songs on the night for me were “Delete”, “Step Up The Morphine”, “Lay Down” and “In The Air” but there was so much more, please please check them out, you’ll love them.