Biffier than thou

BBC Berkshire

Glaswegian rockers Biffy Clyro must be a fan of Reading. Last year they played at BukandSkit Festival in Emmer Green, and they're playing there again this year on 19 June. If that wasn't enough, they also gigged at Reading Uni. Read the review.

In the midst of exams, the students of Reading University had been working hard, so this was the night for playing hard. Formed in the 90s, the Glaswegian Biffy Clyro is a band that likes to play it their own way, shunning the commercial musical rat race and ‘keeping it real’. They prove this in every live performance.

With vague comparisons to Weezer and Jimmy Eat World, Biffy are not a band that I’d like to see get any bigger, just because the touring of smaller venues makes their powerful chords and emotive tracks seem even more individual.

Opening up with Glitter And Trauma, the first track from their first album Infinity Land, Biffy Clyro strike down upon the beying University crowd. The bouncers are out straight away as the whole room jump from the first chord. Their powerful lyrics and emotive guitar riffs inspire the audience to chant: “Biff-y! Biff-y!” once this first track is over. The first mosh pit of the evening starts heaving during the second, heavier song, Babes.

Their power and energy is, in a word, overwhelming. With the first crashing notes of anthemic track Just Boy, there isn’t one person not jumping and singing along with the band.

As a three-piece, this band knows how to work the stage, with all of them sharing their vocal duties. The musical build-up during All The Way Down sends the crowd palpably crazy, the first crowd surfers riding on the crest of the energetic pit. Everyone feels the intensity, and heavy-laden new track Kids starts a circle pit with more frenzied fans. Quite rightly the Captain receives a welcome chant of: “We love you Biffy, we do!”

If you think it can’t get better than this, Questions And Answers becomes the sweat-dripping track that bathes the venue. With its powerful lyrics, a move away from the distortion pedal and drummer Ben Johnston pounding every muscular fibre into every drumbeat, this track is the reason Biffy are truly amazing.

This phenomenal buzz that enraptured us from the start of the night climaxes with a stage dive from guitarist Simon Neil during final track Now The Action. The crowd naturally welcome Simon into their dripping arms, sealing off an electric gig that will certainly be filed under one of the best Reading University gigs of all time.