mgk @ The O2

mgk @ The O2 (Kalpesh Patel)

It’s a rare pause in what is otherwise a relentlessly high-energy, often chaotic celebration of the artist formerly known as Machine Gun Kelly. And chaos is very much the point.

The scale of tonight’s production is clear from the outset. A towering faux Statue of Liberty dominates the stage, complete with a nose ring and an oversized cigarette clutched in her outstretched hand. As the opening bars of outlaw overture rumble through the arena, mgk emerges through the statue’s mouth, grabbing a guitar dangling from above. “London, let’s go! Are you ready for the best night of your fucking life!” he roars.

Flame boxes scattered around the criss-cross stage erupt as the band launches straight into starman, mgk bounding across the stage with microphone in hand before swapping seamlessly to guitar. It’s a pattern repeated all night: outfit changes, guitars appearing and disappearing, dancers weaving through the performance and bursts of pyro punctuating the spectacle.

“London, get on your feet, jump!” he demands — and the arena obliges instantly. “So this is what it looks like when you sell out The O2, huh?” he grins.

Musically, the show darts through the many eras of mgk’s career. Video interludes — featuring a tongue-in-cheek vlogger dissecting the different phases of Baker’s genre-jumping catalogue — provide breathers between segments.

A rap-heavy medley of maybe, Wild Boy and El Diablo reminds the crowd of his early hip-hop days, while Blink-182 drummer Travis Barker drives the band with thunderous precision throughout.

Travis Barker with mgk @ The O2

Travis Barker with mgk @ The O2 (Kalpesh Patel)

Barker’s propulsive rhythms underpin much of the set, particularly during dont wait run fast, even when mgk briefly loses his place. “I’m so sorry, I fucked that up,” he laughs, before powering through the rest of the track as guitarists Sophie Lloyd and Justin “Jus” Lyons shred beside him while flames shoot skyward.

Justin "Jus" Lyons & Sophie Lloyd with mgk @ The O2

Justin "Jus" Lyons & Sophie Lloyd with mgk @ The O2 (Kalpesh Patel)

“We’ve got a two-hour show for y’all tonight — that’s 38 songs. I need to see if those voices are ready!” Baker shouts before the rapid-fire medley arrives. The crowd clearly are.

The show frequently leans into the pop-punk era that transformed Baker’s career. Acoustic guitars frame the evolving lost americana-tinged arrangements scattered throughout the set, notably during starman that slips into large swathes of Third Eye Blind’s 1998 hit Semi‑Charmed Life — a playful nod that sends the crowd into a nostalgic singalong.

The Tickets To My Downfall portion of the show hits particularly hard.“To one of my favourite cities in the world, can I play this pink guitar” he asks, appearing behind a mic stand enclosed in an oversized prop cigarette, brandishing a his signature Schecter PT electric guitar as title track from the 2020 LP shifts from sparse slow-drive to beat-driven rousing. drunk face, bloody valentine and forget me too ignite huge reactions, with the latter featuring pre-recorded vocals from Halsey shimmering over the PA. Cigarettes are the theme throughout, the musician will undoubetdly face fines for smoking himself throughout the high-energy show.

mgk @ The O2

mgk @ The O2 (Kalpesh Patel)

But it’s during bloody valentine, with fans invited on stage, that an excited audience member falls foul of the unique stage shape by stepping into a gap in the stage. The fan unhurt, mgk continues with the song before later gifting her a hat: “I wear this hat every fuckin’ day. My friend Icky made this hat for me, it’s special. It’s yours” he says placing the hat on her head.

“I like this view, but I think I’m gonna go over there,” mgk suddenly declares before diving off stage and sprinting through the arena floor toward the B-stage near the sound desk. From the smaller stage he strips things back with Glass House, rapping alongside the recorded voice of Naomi Wild. “This song is a song I wrote at one of my lowest times,” he tells the audience.

He soon pivots again, introducing new single times of my life with a heartfelt dedication: “I’m gonna remember this night for the rest of my life. This song is about nights like these, because I hope when you go home you’ll include tonight as one of the times of your life.”

In a spontaneous moment he segues into Fix You by Coldplay and Hey Jude by The Beatles, thousands of voices filling the arena. “We just decided to do that right before the show,” he shrugs. “Just wanted to show some love to a country that’s made some beautiful music that’s really lifted the spirit of my soul.”

Opening act Julia Wolf returns the to stage for a heartfelt cover of Goo Goo Dolls’ hit 1998 tune Iris, the pair rising above the stage on separate platforms. It’s an emotional high point before mgk cheekily follows it with treading water, which borrows heavily from the same chord progression.

Julia Wolf @ The O2

Julia Wolf @ The O2 (Kalpesh Patel)

Then things swing wildly back to chaos. DAYWALKER arrives like a sonic sledgehammer before comedian Pete Davidson wanders on stage for roll the windows up. “Pete’s shooting a movie in your town,” mgk jokes. “He said he wants you to bother him, find his hotel and just stay outside and annoy him all day.”

“I’m in Mayfair, bitches!” Davidson grins.

Amid the spectacle, the most personal moment arrives during play this when i’m gone, as home videos of Baker’s daughter Casie fill the massive screen. “I miss when you were that old,” he says softly as a clip of her as a toddler appears. “This song is for those here with their loved ones, or anyone who’s ever loved something or someone.”

The mood doesn’t last long. During papercuts, his guitar spits sparks from the headstock as flames roar behind him — until the pyrotechnic briefly malfunctions. “It’s going wrong dude!” he laughs nervously before the effect finally dies out. “Hell yeah, if I’m gonna be burned alive I’d rather it be at this motherfuckin’ place.”

mgk @ The O2

mgk @ The O2 (Kalpesh Patel)

The final stretch keeps the crowd roaring: the country-leaning Lonely Road, featuring recorded vocals from Jelly Roll (“Sing my buddy Jelly’s verse” mgk asks), followed by cliché, sweet coraline and the closing anthem vampire diaries.

For an artist who has spent much of his career shifting identities — rapper, rocker, provocateur — tonight feels like a milestone. Selling out The O2 for the first time clearly matters to him. And despite the genre hopping, the chaos and the self-deprecating humour, the sense of triumph is unmistakable.

For mgk, Thursday night in London isn’t just another stop on a tour. It’s a moment he intends to remember — and judging by the roar inside The O2, so will everyone else in the room.

Live review & photography of mgk @ The O2 Arena, London by Kalpesh Patel on 5th March 2026.

Third Eye Blind Bring Chaos, Charm And Catharsis To London’s Islington Assembly Hall

Foo Fighters @ O2 Shepherd's Bush Empire

Foo Fighters @ O2 Shepherd's Bush Empire (Kalpesh Patel)

They stroll on at 8:50pm — a casual twenty minutes past the billed time — six silhouettes against a low rumble of menacing guitars. Frontman Dave Grohl sports a new-on-the-scene Gibson RD Custom Ebony; alongside him are bassist Nate Mendel, guitarist Chris Shiflett, keyboardist Rami Jaffee, latest drummer Ilan Rubin and touring guitarist and Beck mainstay Jason Falkner. It feels both intimate and enormous at once.

“Are you fuckin’ ready? It’s gonna be a long night motherfuckers, you know that right?” Grohl smirks. “Let’s start from the beginning.”

They dive headlong into 1995 debut single This Is A Call and the Empire detonates. Every voice is raised, every word hurled back at the stage. There’s no easing in. All My Life follows with its menacing, one-chord spoken intro before exploding into cascading, headbanging chaos. Grohl paces side to side, hair flailing, urging the crowd to clap through an extended mid-song break as guitars and drums hammer with machine-gun precision. “Alright motherfuckers, you wanna dance?” he screams. We do. With everything we’ve got.

Crowd surfers begin their steady migration toward the barricade before the third song is done, ferried across a sea of hands and scooped away by security in the narrow pit. Times Like These offers brief uplift before Of All People provides the first taste of forthcoming twelfth LP Your Favorite Toy. It’s storming, less hook-driven than their radio mainstays, and over in a flash — a statement of intent rather than a concession to familiarity.

“Ladies and gentlemen, let me just tell you, what a fucking joy it is for me to hear you people sing so fucking loud. I love it so much. We’re gonna sing some songs together,” Grohl gushes as The Pretender shimmers into life. Mid-song he quizzes the room: “Do you love rock ’n’ roll music? Do you want some rock ’n’ roll music? Let’s rock ’n’ roll!”

As La Dee Da rings out, he calls for “those old-school, deep-cut Foo Fighters motherfuckers.” They get their wish with a thunderous Stacked Actors, its gentle sway snapping into blood-curdling choruses, one of the night’s heaviest hitters. Every track tonight stretches beyond its recorded counterpart — extended breakdowns, pounding drum solos, indulgent guitar licks. This is a band revelling in looseness. Grohl is back to playing his Gibson Trini Lopez at some point, switching up colours that match different tunings.

“I gotta be honest,” Grohl begins as These Days unfurls. “This is what it felt like 30 fuckin’ years ago. And I’m so happy… if you hear me laughing in the middle of songs, it’s ’cause I’m so fuckin’ happy that we’re still here.” He grins: “This is our last song.” Eight songs deep. No one believes him.

Walk becomes a mass stomp-along. “We should just play here every night,” he suggests. “We’ll do a residency, for the rest of our fucking lives.” He references the old-school ticket-buying process for these shows. “That’s how you used to do it!”

Foo Fighters @ O2 Shepherd's Bush Empire

Foo Fighters @ O2 Shepherd's Bush Empire (Kalpesh Patel)

To newcomers: “It amazes me that you got your asses off the couch and came down here to buy tickets without knowing what you were getting yourselves into… We’ve been a band for 30 years, we have a lot of fucking songs… some of you have to work tomorrow.” He pauses. “Just call in sick! Tell your boss your buddy Dave said: ‘it’s cool’. And then good luck finding another job!”

Band introductions follow. Mendel gets a nod to Sunny Day Real Estate. Former Wallflowers man Jaffee delivers a gloriously loose solo that Grohl frames as “side stage, dance tent, Reading 1992.” Falkner is hailed a “badass motherfucker,” filling in while Pat Smear recuperates from a broken leg.

Then: “This is my favourite number.” My Hero prompts a deafening singalong, Grohl surrendering the chorus to the crowd as he patrols the lip of the stage. Learn To Fly bounces with soft-pop exuberance before new LP title track Your Favorite Toy proves itself a future stadium titan.

No Son Of Mine folds into a cheeky nod to Motörhead’s Ace Of Spades, dedicated to Lemmy. Run arrives blistering and unrelenting. Rubin peels off into a solo. “I like to call that amuse bouche. It’s an amuse Shepherd’s Bouche,” Grohl quips. “When we do these smaller club gigs, I like it fuckin’ loose.”

They cool the temperature for Aurora, dedicated to the band’s late drummer Taylor Hawkins’ wife Alison, here with us in the audience tonight. Once a rarity, it now feels sacred — the Empire swaying in collective gratitude.

“Let’s play a fuckin’ rock ’n’ roll song, what d’ya say?” Grohl slurs, shifting gears from the heartfelt back to his usual dry wit. “Do you want a loud screaming a rock ’n’ roll song or do you want a pretty little love song?” he teases. The answer is White Limo, all guttural ferocity. Monkey Wrench and Hey, Johnny Park! keep the voltage dangerously high. “I’m contractually obligated to scream my fucking balls off every night,” he laughs. “Do you need me to teach you how to scream like a consummate professional?” Circle pits erupt as he conducts a mass howl.

Foo Fighters @ O2 Shepherd's Bush Empire

Foo Fighters @ O2 Shepherd's Bush Empire (Kalpesh Patel)

“We’d like to do something… we haven’t done for 25 years.” A320, the deep cut from the 1998 Godzilla film soundtrack, rumbles into the room — a genuine holy-grail moment.

“Who’s got one more in ’em?” he asks before Best Of You detonates in unified catharsis.

A brief disappearance, then they return.

“For all the old-school motherfuckers, thank you for growing old with us. For all you youngbloods… welcome to the fam.” A young fan is lifted from the crowd and placed side-stage for the encore. “There’s probably somewhere safer for that person to sit.”

They close as they used to three decades ago: Exhausted grinding and raw before Everlong seals the night. “You know it’s the last one, it’s time to dance.”

As the final chords of Everlong fade and the band take their bows, this doesn’t feel like a novelty club show or a clever album-launch stunt — it feels necessary. In the tight confines of Shepherd’s Bush Empire, you see the glances, the grins, the split-second cues; you feel the floor shift under Monkey Wrench and hear individual voices cutting through the mass catharsis of Best Of You. Thirty years in, Foo Fighters don’t resemble a legacy act preserving history — they look like a band reanimating it, rediscovering the sweat, looseness and reckless joy that built this in the first place. If these guerrilla gigs are about reminding themselves who they are before the next inevitable stadium run, consider the message received — loudly.

This isn’t nostalgia. It’s renewal. In a 2,000-capacity room, thirty years deep, Foo Fighters sound as vital — and as loud — as ever. “That was fucking awesome, thank you very much.”

Live review & photography of Foo Fighters @ O2 Shepherd’s Bush Empire, London by Kalpesh Patel on 25th February 2026.

Beck Is Transcendent With The BBC Concert Orchestra At The Royal Albert Hall

White Lies @ Roundhouse

White Lies @ Roundhouse (Kalpesh Patel)

They open delicately with All The Best from last year’s Night Light, Harry McVeigh’s husky vocal sitting right at the heart of the room. Midway through, the song is abruptly halted as the house lights rise and venue staff attend to a medical emergency in the crowd. McVeigh leans forward, concern cutting through the atmosphere. “Is everything ok down there?” he asks, waiting patiently until it’s safe to continue. “We’ll start that song again if that’s alright, it’s one of my favourites so it’d be a shame not to play it,” he offers warmly. When the band restart, the song’s soaring closing guitars feel even more cathartic, and the crowd’s response confirms it was worth the reset.

Jack Lawrence-Brown’s pounding drums then tear into Farewell To The Fairground, instantly lifting the tempo and the energy. The Roundhouse floor bounces as every word is screamed back at the stage. “London you know the words, I want to hear you sing them,” McVeigh urges, though the chant of “Keep on running, there’s no place like home” hardly needs prompting.

“It’s so good to be here, it’s such an honour to be here for two nights as well,” McVeigh tells the crowd. “Thank you for joining us on a Sunday, we are going to try and make tonight even better than last night.” With that, they launch into There Goes Our Love Again, its swirling electronics and Charles Cave’s relentless bassline anchoring the 2013 single as he disappears into the groove. New material slips effortlessly into the set. Bowen’s synths usher in Hurt My Heart, Cave’s bass once again prominent beneath McVeigh’s increasingly gravel-toned delivery. The track feels both fresh and familiar, highlighting how naturally Night Light sits alongside the band’s earlier work.

“It’s been 10 years this year since our fourth album Friends came out,” McVeigh reflects. “We’ve been reminiscing about a few of the songs off that record, choosing a few of our favourites.” Hold Back Your Love follows, its synths layered neatly over the rhythm section, McVeigh’s live vocal adding a deeper emotional pull than the studio version. The buoyant Is My Love Enough keeps the retro-tinged momentum going before Going Nowhere pulls the set firmly back into the present.

White Lies @ Roundhouse

White Lies @ Roundhouse (Kalpesh Patel)

The unmistakable synth line of Tokyo sparks recognition before McVeigh even sings a word, Cave’s signature basslines driving the Five standout forward. Time To Give arrives like an old friend, its haunting organ tones filling the room, before Juice jolts the energy back up.

“With the next song we’ve decided to go right back to the start,” McVeigh explains. “We’ve chosen a track from the first album that we haven’t played so much over the years so perhaps it will come as some surprise to some of you.”

“I think maybe we should dedicate this song to our oldest friend Ed Buller,” Cave adds, nodding to their debut producer as the stark beats and desert-dry guitar of The Price Of Love echo out, a rare and welcome deep cut.

I Don’t Want To Go To Mars represents As I Try Not To Fall Apart, before the Roundhouse erupts at the opening notes of Big TV. “London, get your hands in the air!” McVeigh commands, and the crowd obeys as Lawrence-Brown locks the tempo and McVeigh’s guitars soar. To Lose My Life turns the venue into a mass singalong, and Bigger Than Us brings the main set to a triumphant close.

The band barely keep the crowd waiting before returning. “Thank you so much, we’ve got a few more for you,” McVeigh smiles, as Night Light unfurls gently. Cave swaps his bass for an acoustic guitar, his delicate picking supporting McVeigh’s haunting, gravel-edged vocal as the song slowly builds.

White Lies @ Roundhouse

White Lies @ Roundhouse (Kalpesh Patel)

Then technology threatens to derail the moment as Bowen’s synth rig begins to falter. The band ride it out with humour. “We should have bought PCs but we bought Macs,” Lawrence-Brown jokes, while McVeigh hovers and the audience shout suggestions of “acapella” and “acoustic.” The issue resolves just in time for Death, the crowd clapping along from the first beat.

“London, thank you so much for being with us on the Sunday night, we appreciate you so much,” McVeigh says sincerely. “We’ve been doing this so long now, 15 years, and there’s no guarantee of longevity in this industry so I’m just so grateful that we’re still here and you guys are still coming to the shows.”

“We’re going to see if our keyboard rig lasts long enough to play one final song,” he chuckles, before In The Middle closes the night, defiant and euphoric.

On the second night of their Roundhouse residency, White Lies prove not just their staying power, but their ability to balance nostalgia with forward momentum. Technical hiccups and unexpected pauses only underline the band’s professionalism and connection with their audience, making this hometown show feel intimate, triumphant, and fully alive.

Live review & photography of White Lies @ Roundhouse, London by Kalpesh Patel on 1st February 2026.

Mumford & Sons Return Home Renewed And Reignited At The O2 Arena

Mumford & Sons @ The O2

Mumford & Sons @ The O2 (Kalpesh Patel)

The band emerge onto The O2’s vast stage cloaked in darkness, a lone banjo ringing out before Marcus Mumford’s unmistakable voice cuts through the gloom. Run Together, lifted from the forthcoming sixth album Prizefighter, feels instantly familiar yet strikingly new. Mumford, bassist Ted Dwane and keyboardist Ben Lovett are joined by a larger touring ensemble that thickens the sound with brass, guitars and additional percussion, signalling that this is a bigger, bolder Mumford & Sons.

“Hello, we’re Mumford & Sons!” Mumford yells as he crashes into the acoustic intro of Babel, and the arena erupts. “Sing it!” he demands, and 20,000 voices oblige, filling the space from floor to rafters. Beaming, he pauses only briefly to take it in. “It’s good to be home,” he says, surveying a sold-out arena packed to the highest tier.

Introducing Rubber Band Man, Mumford grins: “Got some new songs to play tonight, just put this one out.” As the track slowly builds, the production reveals itself in full — a vast, tiered lighting installation of stars, birds and hearts lowering above the front of the crowd, bathing the arena in warm, theatrical glow.

Mumford & Sons @ The O2

Mumford & Sons @ The O2 (Kalpesh Patel)

Ever the provocateur, Mumford stirs the room further. “Look, if you’re sitting down, if you’re concerned about the person sitting behind you… fuck ’em!” he laughs. “You can do whatever you like, just don’t be a dickhead.” With that, the opening strums of Little Lion Man ignite the night’s first full-scale eruption. “We didn’t come to fuck around,” he shouts, and the barnstorming anthem lifts the entire arena to its feet.

Hopeless Wanderer and Lover Of The Light keep the momentum surging before the mood shifts with Believe, its slow-burn tension and crashing drums showcasing the band’s rockier Wilder Mind era. “Sorry it took us so long, but fucking hell we’re glad to be back London,” Mumford yells. “And we missed you, and now we’re not gonna go away for a little while.” The guitars snarl into Truth, brass punching through as the crowd roars its approval.

“One of the reasons we don’t want to go anywhere is because we missed ya,” Mumford continues. “Another one is ’cause we spent quite a while writing lots and lotsa songs and we just thought we’d start fucking playing them to you like it’s 2009.” He grins again. “And we made this other record, it’s coming in February, called Prizefighter and we fuckin’ love it. It’s so good to be home… look around us and be like, ‘this is it man, this is it!’ We missed you so much, we love you so much.”

Support act Sierra Ferrell returns to the stage for Here, the first song on Prizefighter, her voice weaving beautifully through the band’s Americana-tinged arrangement. Then, without warning, the band vanish from the stage — only to reappear moments later at the very back of the arena on a small, dimly lit B-stage. “We’ve been around arenas for a while,” Mumford explains, “and this is the end of quite a long tour — they don’t get much better than this one. It’s one of our favourite venues in the whole world, so when we get the opportunity we like to sample different areas of the room.”

Sierra Ferrell @ The O2

Sierra Ferrell @ The O2 (Kalpesh Patel)

Ghosts That We Knew is haunting in this stripped-back setting, Dwane’s upright bass resonating deeply. A tender cover of Simon & Garfunkel’s The Boxer follows, drawing hushed reverence from the crowd. Reflecting on the moment, Mumford says, “It’s funny playing in London… so many of these songs were written in different corners of this city. This city means a lot to us.” He adds, “What the corners of this city have given us creatively have allowed us to do what we get to do. We love you London.”

After a delicate acoustic Guiding Light, the band return to the main stage for White Blank Page, its raw emotion landing with renewed weight. As Ditmas begins, Mumford takes off again — sprinting into the arena, climbing to the top of the first tier, circling the venue, then plunging back down into the standing crowd before charging through to the stage, tracked by a single spotlight as The O2 reaches fever pitch.

There’s no let-up from there. The Cave turns the arena into a sea of raised phones, Roll Away Your Stone keeps feet stomping, and 2025 album title track Rushmere leans into classic Mumford territory. The main set closes with The Wolf, a curtain of fireworks cascading from the roof toward the stage as the song’s ferocity rattles the building.

Mumford & Sons @ The O2

Mumford & Sons @ The O2 (Kalpesh Patel)

For the encore, the trio return alone, huddled around a single microphone. “Don’t make me do the tough love thing,” Mumford jokes as a fan shouts their devotion, before an intimate Timshel hushes the room. “Let’s play one we can all sing together,” he says, launching into Awake My Soul, before I Will Wait brings the night to a euphoric, stomping peak.

“We’ve got one more song for ya,” Mumford says, visibly moved. “We’re just unbelievably grateful that we get to do what we do and that you come along and help us out and listen to us. We made this next record and it’s honestly my favourite thing we’ve ever done.” They close with Conversation With My Son (Gangsters & Angels) — a hopeful, heartfelt glimpse of what’s to come.

It feels like both a homecoming and a rebirth, a band reconnecting with its roots while clearly looking ahead with renewed purpose. There’s a sense of gratitude, resilience and hard-earned confidence running through every song, as if the years away have sharpened rather than softened their resolve. If this night is any indication, Mumford & Sons aren’t simply back — they’re stepping into a bold new chapter with clarity and conviction, and London is right there with them, singing every word.

Live review & photography of Mumford & Sons @ The O2 Arena, London by Kalpesh Patel on 11th December 2025.

The Last Dinner Party Turn O2 Academy Brixton Into A Cathedral Of Chaos And Harmony

The Last Dinner Party @ O2 Academy Brixton

The Last Dinner Party @ O2 Academy Brixton (Kalpesh Patel)

Count The Ways follows, greeted with a cheer the moment its menacing guitars fire up. Morris’s range is spectacular—low velvet tones giving way to piercing highs—while the band, as ever, play with the precision of classical musicians and the ferocity of a glam-rock troupe. When Luca Caruso’s pounding drums launch The Feminine Urge, Morris addresses her audience at last. “Welcome to the party, London,” she beams. “We’ve waited all tour to come home and say that.” There’s a glint of something emotional in her voice as she introduces the players around her: Lizzie Mayland from Hebden Bridge, Emily Roberts, Aurora Nishevci and Georgia Davies—originally from Australia, now as integral to London’s scene as any of them.

Caesar On A TV Screen whips the room into a fervour before the mood softens for On Your Side, its aching slow-burn ushering in one of the night’s most striking sequences. Second Best opens with an immaculate five-part harmony—Nishevci, Mayland, Davies and Roberts flanking Morris at their mics—showcasing the choral blend that sets The Last Dinner Party apart from nearly every young band around them.

Then the spotlight shifts: Nishevci takes centre stage for I Hold Your Anger, seated at the grand piano, leading with a calm emotional weight that hushes Brixton. Morris stands further back, adding gentle harmonies. It’s a moment that underlines everything about this group: egos nowhere in sight; musicianship everywhere. Before the next song, Morris turns the spotlight outward: “Brixton, sweetie, I’d like to ask for you to raise your hands skywards in the applauding motion, once more, for Imogen And The Knife.” She goes beyond the usual nod to a support act—she plugs their merch, praises them sincerely, and the audience responds with a roar.

Woman Is A Tree begins in near silence, those exquisite harmonies drifting over the room like incense. Then Nishevci steps forward to introduce Gjuha. She speaks quietly at first: “For the last few years I’ve been saying it’s about being ashamed about not knowing my mother tongue as well as English.” The crowd cheers as she references the Kneecap film. “It was like a lightbulb moment… it’s about a yearning to connect—to a people, to a place, to a culture you’ve been removed from. And it’s a celebration of language. Every one or two words you learn in another language brings you closer to so many people.” Roberts’s mandolin glitters, Nishevci’s organ swells, and the harmonies bloom into one of the set’s most breathtaking performances.

Without pause, we slide into Rifle, Mayland stepping forward to take lead vocals. It’s French language section could be seen as pretentious, but somehow it works instead to elevate the operatic tune. Big Dog unleashes something wilder, rawer—less refined than the band’s album work, but intentionally so, a chance to let their feral rock side claw through. The recognisable pulse of Mirror rises from the depths, Roberts tearing into her guitar lines until Morris, grinning, declares: “Emily. Fucking. Roberts!” to deafening cheers.

The Last Dinner Party @ O2 Academy Brixton

The Last Dinner Party @ O2 Academy Brixton (Kalpesh Patel)

Then the 26-year-old band lead pauses. “This is crazy that this is at the end of the tour,” she laughs. “You’re the last stop. It’s gone so quickly. But this has been the best tour of our lives, ‘cause this is exactly what we dreamed of when we were in the studio writing the second album.” She talks about daydreaming of these rooms, about sobbing through record store shows earlier this year, about the power of hearing the audience carry these songs back to them. “Having you guys feel these songs and sing them back to us has been really special.”

The Scythe begins, and she warns the crowd—playfully—of her own emotional fragility: “This one has taken me a long time to stop crying when you sing it with us—try not to cry challenge.” A beautiful piano line signals Sail Away, introduced with a reminder of the band’s partnership with Bankuet and their Ribbons for Provisions food bank initiative. “It’s another thing we can help facilitate thanks to you,” Morris says, revealing that £35,000 has already been raised on this tour.

The final run is euphoric. Sinner sees Morris cede vocals to the audience. My Lady Of Mercy becomes a unified clap-along. Nothing Matters, of course, turns Brixton into a single, moving, singing organism—balcony and floor alike on their feet at last.

The band disappear, but only briefly. The encore begins with This Is The Killer Speaking, amps cranked, tempo shifting between thunderous and triumphant. Members of Imogen And The Knife—Jack Banjo Courtney and Evan Abel—join to add brass, thickening the arrangement into something cinematic.

Then comes chaos of the best kind. Morris returns with a wicked grin: “Brixton, Brixton, Brixton… you’re good, but you could be great. We’ll teach you greatness, in the form of dance.” She invites Imogen Williams and her bandmates onstage to demonstrate choreography, barking mock-stern orders: “Don’t kick the person behind you, that’s not nice… Silence in my class!” The entire room becomes a dance troupe, 5,000 people moving in unison before the song erupts into its final chorus.

“Well London, that’s our show,” Morris beams, and it feels like the perfect summation of a night that has been less a gig and more a communal rite — one where Brixton has sung, cried, danced and roared on command. As the extended Agnus Dei outro swells and Morris painstakingly thanks every member of the crew, it becomes clear that this finale isn’t about grandstanding but about unity: a band at full creative power, each member shining in sync — Roberts and Mayland firing melodic sparks, Nishevci shifting effortlessly between piano, organ and synth, Davies anchoring everything with quiet force, and Morris guiding the emotional arc. Closing out their tour in their hometown, The Last Dinner Party don’t just meet expectations — they eclipse them, delivering a show that feels theatrical, intimate and momentous all at once. Tonight, they don’t seem like a band on the rise, but a band fully arrived.

Live review & photography of The Last Dinner Party @ O2 Academy Brixton, London by Kalpesh Patel on 7th December 2025.

Alessi Rose’s Voyeur Tour Burns Bright At The O2 Forum Kentish Town