How on earth is Get To Heaven 10 years old?
The Manchester art-rock band are back in Nottingham for the 5th time in 2 years, this time they play to a sold out Rock City crowd, as part of the Get To Heaven 10th Anniversary tour.
That doesn’t mean this feels samey. On the contrary. This feels fresh. The performance is impressive and the band sound incredible. It feels very special to hear a favourite album in full and I really don’t mind that they don’t play other songs from their impressive discography. Tonight is about Get To Heaven.
They enter the stage in yellow jumpsuits, with Jonathon Higgs wearing a grey tunic over the top. The ever changing lights frequently show two green hands in the background. A nod to the Get To Heaven album artwork. This is then quickly replaced with neon lights, then onto spotlights. Visually its superb.
As this is an anniversary tour, we hear Get To Heaven in its entirety, some songs have only been played live a handful of times, so it feels special to hear them live. The band are on top form and the sound at Rock City is as good as ever. Jonathan is playing his burnt guitar. If you don’t know the story, on the very first day of lockdown in 2020, the lock up where the bands instruments were stored caught fire. Some of the damaged instruments were used in the music video for “Violent Sun”. “Spring / Sun / Winter / Dread” and “Distant Past” understandably receive the loudest reaction of the night.
The band leave the stage after “Distant Past”, but moments later are back to a rapturous applause as they go into the encore of “Hapsburg Lippp”, “No Reptiles” and “Warm Healer”.
The evening ends with “Cold Reactor”, the only song not on Get To Heaven. Then the lights are up. I look around the room at the crowd and everyone is beaming. It was definitely a special night.
Setlist Rock City 1-12-25
To the Blade
Blast Doors
Get to Heaven
President Heartbeat
Brainchild
Regret
Only as Good as My God
The Wheel (Is Turning Now)
Fortune 500
We Sleep In Pairs
Zero Pharaoh
Yuppie Supper
Spring / Sun / Winter / Dread
Distant Past
Encore:
Hapsburg Lippp
No Reptiles
Warm Healer
Encore 2:
Cold Reactor