Sad Night Dynamite - YES Pink Room

A brief and dramatic journey through the genres. Sad Night Dynamite, the ‘high school besties’ duo from Somerset brought a whole new wave of energy to the crowd of the ‘Pink Room’ at YES, Manchester.

Their sound was like nothing I’d heard before. They combined hip hop, Britpop, punk, electronica, dub and RnB and made it work; that alone I consider to be feat. Their mixtape, released in February 2021, is a self-proclaimed ‘nightmarish trip’ through all their influences, including Tarantino (the pair find themselves particularly inspired by film music also.)

This concert was the first megaphone I’d seen used for vocals. I quite liked it. It brought an inhuman, robotic quality to the melody, and really emphasised how much their music was influenced by ‘Gorillaz’. The use of rhythm, acoustic guitar with their bassy beats was also very creative, the track was quite trippy to listen to; it made for a very refreshing sound. Combined with the dramatic light displays, it created quite a dreamy atmosphere in the Pink Room.

They had an incredibly dynamic presence on stage too; you can tell they are childhood friends. Telling anecdotes from their past (the haunting smell of dead animal in past hotel rooms) and grinning whenever they caught each other’s eye, you could feel the authenticity of the music that they made together. So authentic that by the end of the track ‘Psychedelic Views‘, I too could smell the wrench of dead rats coming from the floor boards in Cheddar.

Sad Night Dynamite are definitely onto something new. I could see them a few years from now pioneering in making music of an eclectic genre. I’ve never heard such a cocktail of sounds at one concert before, I was even getting whiffs of country at one point. Their sound is just so versatile, one second, they were sat by the piano, the next they were jumping into the crowd, it made for a chaotic yet electric experience.

I hope the band continue to experiment with their instrumentation and the structures of their songs, it gives them an amazing unique selling point. As do their lyrics. I remember them suggesting that ‘if you find yourself a brain, pour it down the f***ing drain’. I’ll consider that to be a lesson learnt from this gig.

Originally posted on 'Gigs and Tours Discover', 30/11/21