Live Review: Bad Wolves + Hollowstar @ Academy 3, Manchester on December 11th 2022

There’s a healthy crowd in early for the upbeat and energetic Cambridge based openers Hollowstar. They go down very well with their fresh modern NWOCR sound full of punchy riffs, catchy choruses and songs that capture your imagination. There’s a nice cover of Skynrd’s ‘Simple Man’ thrown in there ensuring a rousing sing song from those old enough to remember it first time around and the generations since. There’s a nice touch with the powerful track ‘Little Miss Innocent’ with its borrowed Alien Ant Farm vocal line, but quite possibly the highlight for many would be their track ‘Good Man Gone’ which almost got the hairs standing up on your neck and those goose-bumps going as they inform the crowd about men’s mental health and a buddy of the band that sadly took his own life. It’s a heartfelt and emotive song that rips and resonates through the busy Academy 3. They finish their set with the track ‘All I Gotta Say’ going down very well with a good percentage of the crowd who hadn’t seen them before. It would be rather rude if the self-confessed ‘posh boys from down south’ hadn’t picked up some new fans tonight.

Just off a European arena tour with Volbeat, and with a new album and singer in tow, it’s more than healthily busy in here. For many it would be their first glimpse of new singer Daniel ‘DL’ Laskiewicz with this tour being the Bad Wolves’ first appearances in the UK since the very public split with former vocalist Tommy Vext.  DL is a former guitarist for Acacia Strain who worked with the band behind the scenes on their 2019 album “N.A.T.I.O.N.”. New album “Dear Monsters” and the Christmas song ‘Carol of The Bells’ are the first to feature him. So, how would he and the rest of the band perform live and would they play that Christmas song?!

They’re certainly a lot heavier than last time around on these shores were they packed out the 2nd stage at Download Festival. That could be the sound logistics of the venue, but they certainly seem to have a lot more force. They play a nice mix of old songs including favourites ‘No Masters’ and ‘No Messiah’, and new tracks which makes sense as it is the tour of the album and of course, the only one featuring him as the singer! He does a great job with the other stuff though making them his own. Funny really as many folks see Bad Wolves as a poor man’s Five Finger Death Punch but quite obviously based on this performance they aren’t even though Vext did front them for a stint.

The night seemed decidedly a very short affair though, with them being on stage for barely an hour but I guess if you are building a momentum, you may as well run with it and Bad Wolves are sprinting. It was nice to see them dedicate the superb cover of The Cranberries track ‘Zombie’ to Dolores O’Riordan as the whole room lights up with phones creating an unbelievable atmosphere. Despite some of the crowd shouting ‘we love Tommy Vext’, it made absolutely no sense to ask for ‘Remember When ‘ as the encore as that was a personal song wrote by Tommy about Tommy. Instead we get ‘I’ll Be There’ and it’s a case of thank you, goodnight and job well done for DL and the boys.

Check the “In The Flesh” page for more photos!
Bad Wolves, Hollowstar