It's almost 11pm on a Sunday night, and although I'm exhausted (woken up at 4am by both the cat and dog wanting to join be in bed meaning I was pushed to a tiny corner of the mattress with no duvet, followed by a long day catching up with friends from uni who I've not seen since around April), I feel a strong urge to write this, an ode to a band who past, present, and future mean the world to me.
It all began in 2009. It started with a band called All Time Low, who my friends and I had gone to see live on 30th September. Then, that same band were announced as headliners for a tour in February 2010. They would be joined by three other bands, and unbeknownst to me in November and December 2009, two of those bands would go on to have such an impact on my life that it could barely be imagined by the fourteen year old I was. One was a band called The Blackout. That November/December, when my friends and I had gone to town for some shopping, I called into HMV (back when we had three HMV stores all in the same shopping centre. I went into the biggest, with the pale laminate floors and the bright lighting...) and picked up their album, The Best in Town. I remember that moment so vividly, because though I didn't know it, The Blackout would soon become one of my most favourite bands, and I couldn't wait for February to come so that I could see this new band I'd discovered live.454Please respect copyright.PENANAezqiH6IQbt
But this isn't about The Blackout, though maybe another day my nostalgia for days gone by might prompt me to write about my teenage years through their lens, too. No, this is about the second of those two bands I mentioned. They were still small, back then. Their first album wouldn't come out until the following summer, but around the time I bought The Blackout's first album, a band called Young Guns were releasing singles from their upcoming album. The music channel Kerrang! had a video special since Young Guns were also on the Kerrang! Tour lineup with All Time Low and The Blackout, and I remember the first time I heard that song. In my mind's eye I can see that music video. I remember having the house to myself - my parents had gone out somewhere I suppose - and it had gone dark. I was sat at the computer which in those days was in the dining room, the white wooden doors we used to have open so I could, if I leaned back in my chair, see the TV. The Winter Kiss video started, and I remember getting up and going to stand by the TV so that I could listen to this song, from this band that I would be going to see. I thought, I should probably listen to some of their stuff, seeing as in two months we'll be seeing them live. And I liked Winter Kiss. It wasn't love, not just yet, but that was where it all began. Just like the line in that very song: I will never be the same again.
That summer I bought their album, All Our Kings Are Dead, and then, then, it was love. I was obsessed. I couldn't wait until I could see them again. When I did see them again, it was with a girl from school who, before Young Guns, had only really been a friend-of-a-friend. I'd hardly spoken to her until this friend told us that we had this band in common. Now Hannah is one of the two friends I still speak to from high school. Young Guns made us such good friends and we've never missed a gig when they've played our hometown. But for the moment I digress - this is, for want of a better expression, a chronicle of the experiences Young Guns have given me, because I want to take a moment to appreciate every single moment of joy that band have given me. Anyway, the next time was February 2011, almost a year after the first time. They were supporting All Time Low, and just as a group of us had gone to see ATL in September 2009, a group of us went again (I think at least eight of us went this time). We got to the venue after school and as a joke Hannah and I had said we should write a letter to Young Guns and stick it on their van. Somehow that turned into a reality, and we rushed a letter that was probably just a longwinded recount of how much they meant to two teenage girls. The other friends we'd gone with laughed, and as we went to McDonalds up the road for some food to keep us warm as it went dark, we stuck it under their windshield wipers. 454Please respect copyright.PENANAssJnOiiSMV
That night remains up there with the best shows of my life. Young Guns were incredible, and afterwards, we had hung around the car park to meet them. I remember John being already back on the van by the time we got out - he wasn't well, they said, so he was staying inside. I remember Simon being hilariously drunk, and I remember Ben being mortified because someone (Hannah, maybe?) had brought a copy of their recent Rocksound magazine interview where he had admitted to dressing as a cheerleader one Halloween or something. Gustav was lovely, and as All Time Low came out we heard screams, and Gus, thinking we were going to any moment run off to see the headlining band, stepped back. We didn't go to see the members of All Time Low, instead we stayed chatting to Gustav. Our other friends were at the barrier to meet ATL and got signed albums etc. We were stood with the members of Young Guns with some other fans, no barriers in sight, in front of their parked white minibus, and we told Gus that we'd bought tickets to a festival they were playing that May in Liverpool. He said how happy he was, and I asked him if he would consider playing my favourite song of theirs, There Will Be Rain, at the festival. He promised it would be on there. (It wasn't in the end, but the fact that he promised it anyway is a favourite memory of mine).
The festival came about quickly, and Hannah and I were joined by two of our other friends. It was a two day event, and YG were playing on day two. That morning we got up at 5am so we could get to Liverpool for 7am so we could get wristbands for a meet and greet they were doing. We got them, and Hannah and I got a group picture with the band which will always bring the biggest grin to my face. They played their show in the rain, and afterwards we stood at the barrier, having made friends with a girl called Dottie next to us, and shouted Ben's name. The security guard laughed and said there was no way he was coming out. But he did, against all odds he did. He brought with him signed drumsticks and two signed setlists. We asked for a picture and he agreed, and I still can't quite believe it. Others asked for pictures, but he had to refuse because he had to go, and in that moment I felt so special. Us three were the only ones he gave those things to, and the only ones he got a picture with. Two girls behind us snatched one of the setlists and stole it from us, but in that moment, I couldn't have cared less. They had the setlist, but I had the picture and the knowledge that he had brought the setlist for us. That was enough for me.
The next time we saw them was 14th September 2011. I remember the venue: the university union with three spaces for gigs, they had booked the one on the first floor - the biggest - with the red painted strip running around the wall the stage was set into (that has since been painted white) and the stairs that brought you out into the (closed) cafe right outside the concert room, where the merch stall was set up and they had water waiting on tables for you after the gig had finished (now they make you use a different set of stairs and bypass the cafe completely). I remember the first support band being so boring I couldn't tell when one song finished and another began, but I remember laughing. I remember leaning against a wall and wondering when Young Guns were going to come on, because we'd been waiting so long it seemed.
That night they played a song that gave me chills the first time I heard it. It sounds cliche and dramatic, but I knew when I heard that song that it would be huge. And good God, it was. It went to number one in America, I think? It was called Bones, a huge, stadium-rock anthem that it is physically impossible to listen to and not want to turn it up as loud as it will go. I remember the exact moment I heard that song, just like I remember the exact moment I first heard Winter Kiss, and I feel so smug that I can say: I knew Young Guns before Bones. I was there was Bones was still new, when it was being played for the first time as a new song people had never heard before in September 2011. I remember them introducing it as a brand new song from the new album.
The album followed, also called Bones, and in February 2012 they played a tiny club venue tour. I remember being so nervous that it would sell out - because the venue they played had a max capacity of 260 (the venue we had seen them in previously had a capacity of 900). I was terrified we wouldn't get tickets because it was bound to sell out, but somehow we managed it and they called it the Bare Bones Club Tour. They had decided to play exclusively tiny venues and do intimate gigs and to this day it is probably one of my most favourites gigs ever. I remember the wooden floorboards underneath my feet; I remember standing in the crowd and being able to look over at the merch stand and look at the t-shirt I was planning on buying after the show. It was the night before school broke up for the February holidays, and so somehow I'd gotten my parents to agree to let me stay out just a little bit longer after the gig finished at 10:30, so the two of us made our way after the show to the car park round the back. It was empty, save for about four other fans. We got talking, and before long the band came out. Fraser first, in fingerless gloves and complaining of the cold. I was shivering (my stubborn sixteen year old ass refused to wear a coat to a gig, though I was wearing a Young Guns hoodie that had been a Christmas present and was two sizes too big for me). He gave me a hug. I remember Ben too, and I remember catching the smell of the alcohol in his plastic cup he had with him. I remember John, and getting pictures with all three. I don't think we met the other two. I remember us standing in two groups of fans, and before Fraser went back inside he came back over to our group and said goodbye to us all, and squeezed my shoulder as he left. To this day, all these years later, they haven't changed. They are still the most down to earth guys I have ever met, and I will always love them for it.
My friends from Devon had also gone to see them on this tour, and it was the night before a friend and I were going to another gig (another Kerrang! tour, and once again The Blackout were playing!) and I was staying at her house. They rang me during the gig, and as they were on the front row, Gustav grabbed her phone and sang down it. I didn't know that whilst I was listening to it, of course, but I was told afterwards. And it got even better: it was Valentine's day, and they had recorded Gustav saying happy Valentine's day to me, and I remember waking up that morning to messages of them saying they had a surprise for me. I saw that video and I remember being so excited that I was on a high all day. I still have it saved on my phone and backed up on my computer, and I'd be devastated if it ever went missing. Anyway, I digress.
The next show was in Wolverhampton in October of the same year. Between February and October, we'd left school and started college. We'd planned to get the train down to Wolverhampton and my friend's dad would pick us up and bring us back to Manchester. By sheer chance - meant to be, I guess - Hannah had the day off and I had what college liked to call a 'review day' - meaning I had to go in for a fifteen minute meeting with my tutors and then I was free. We got an early train and were the first at the venue. We were there a while before three others turned up and for the longest time it was just the five of us there. They'd brought Si a Toblerone, and were worrying about smuggling it in to the gig. As the time till doors opened got closer, the queue got bigger, and at one point one of the band (I can't remember who - perhaps Gustav? Maybe Si?) had wandered to the doors and stood on the other side of the glass, right next to us, and waved whilst he was on the phone. That day was incredible for us, our first real taste of independence. Chalk that up on the list of things this band have given me. We didn't stay after the show, because the Manchester show was the day after. By the time we got home it was gone midnight, and we were meeting at 7am the next morning to walk down to the venue.
We did, and I was wearing shorts despite it being October. We sat outside the venue all day, with Dottie, the girl from Liverpool, who bought beer from the shop at the end of the street, and a few others that were by this point familiar faces. Friends from Devon too had come up for that show, and they arrived in the afternoon. I believe two (maybe three?) friends from school came too and joined us in the afternoon, and as we all sat, cross legged on the floor, beer in hand, I don't think I've ever felt more surrounded by friends. It was Ben's birthday that day, and so one of us went and bought a giant Millie's Cookie that said 'happy birthday Ben!' on. When they came out in the afternoon to carry equipment out of the bus, we gave the cookie to John with strict instructions to give it to Ben. The gig itself was fun (a speaker was kicked off the stage by a very enthusiastic support artist) and I left with a brand new hoodie from the merch stall, and afterwards we met Ben outside. He said he did get his cookie, and he thanked us very much.
I think the next time was February 2015. Valentine's day, to be specific. We had bought tickets to the 2015 Kerrang! tour because another band we liked, Don Broco, were playing. And then, like a week before, it was announced that Young Guns would be doing a 15 minute set on the tour, and it was the best surprise, and it made the gig that extra bit special. They played again in June 2015, with their new album Ones and Zeros. At this point we were in uni, and things had changed once again. They swiftly released another album, Echoes, the year after, after three years between the last two albums. This time there was no Manchester show, so instead we went to Preston in October 2015 and stayed with our friend who was at uni there. The show was in a bar, and it was tiny. Afterwards we went to another bar and drank all night.
The last time was September 2017. I've ben waiting ever since for new tour dates, waiting with bated breath. That night we went, as usual, for drinks beforehand and afterwards in the union at uni. It was a chance to catch up; both being at uni means that we don't often see each other and Young Guns have always been a catch up for us over recent years as well as a chance to see a band we've loved since 2010. I can't believe that as of next year it will be ten years of loving Young Guns. Ten years of my life that they have shaped, influenced, and ultimately made better. I know this is has rambled on, and I doubt anyone will read this far because it is a completely personal account of things that won't make a damn bit of a sense to anyone else, but today I heard another band friends and I used to see have broken up, and it has made me truly, truly appreciate Young Guns, one of the last bastions of my teenage years I have left. Not only did they forge friendships, they made existing ones stronger. They gave us the excuse to travel to cities we'd never been to before to see them, and prompted friends from far away to come here to see them with us. They are perfect to me, and always will be. They are, to take inspiration from the song that made them so much more well known, in my bones. Engraved in my bones are their lyrics and their music and the experiences they gave me, and they will be, forever and a day.454Please respect copyright.PENANA99gkH73Zxy