Brave Rival Bullingdon Oxford 16-8-24

 

Oxford had the privilege to host the opening night of The Fight Or Flight Tour and on album release day too so in front of an expectant crowd and band ready to show off their wares this was going to be good.

I recently rave reviewed the new album Fight Or Flight see review at the following link so was looking forward to seeing them in a live setting.

https://www.rockgig.co.uk/2024/08/brave-rival-fight-or-flight.html

Brave Rival are led front stage by dual vocalists Chloe Josephine and Lindsey Bonnick that gives the band a distinctive edge and character with the rest of the band being Donna Peters on drums, Billy Dedman on bass and Ed 'The Shred' Clarke on guitar.

My loss was not being there from day one and missing their debut album Life's Machine and after living with the new album for the last month I was interested to see how the new material transferred to the stage. 

I was not disappointed as the band played all 12 tracks over the course of 100 minutes with a couple from the debut album played too and a brand new first time played cover of Chris Cornell's James Bond theme You Know My Name that was greeted like a long lost favourite.

Chloe and Lindsey compliment each other amazingly well. Both sing lead vocals with the other backing them or it's a dual vocal giving the melody lines superb depth and it gives each of them the opportunity to hit long led notes and really give it their all at every chance. It works incredibly and must have taken many hours in the rehearsal room.

Their joy at playing together and having fun shines through at every note.

The rhythm team of Donna and Billy are the rock that holds it together and Ed Clarke on guitar is quite simply phenomenal able to play complex riffs and his short fiery solo's are perfectly played for the material with Insane a casing point. He gets to open up and play a lengthier solo which showcases his feel for the song and tells a story too.

Run And Hide and Guilty Love from the debut album were played with the latter's huge chorus sang back by the crowd with gusto.

New album singles Fairytale with it's fantastic chorus and Stand Up were crowd favourites and great to see other new songs including the acoustic led All I Can Think About and Unravelling well received on first listen.

Stars Upon My Scars sees the band explore it's bluesy side with wonderful emotive vocals and Ed opens up with a lengthy guitar solo that is full of emotion tone and talent in the outro.

Set closer Heavy is on repeat listen for me with it's balladic feel and wonderful vocal melody line and I love the way the song uses light and shade to get it's point across. On cd it's as good a song that I have heard in years and live it absolutely staggering.

Ed plays a mid song guitar solo that fits just so and the full band workout that follows wonderful to see as Chloe and Lindsey belt out long held notes and it all reaches a crescendo as they hold hands and leave the stage. You think wow as Ed picks notes and then jaws drop as he plays a guitar solo that I think went on for over 3 minutes with fluidity and dexterity with Donna and Billy holding it all together.

I love the recorded version but I want a live version please released now which I have now added straight after this review from Youtube.

Simply incredible.

One encore of Sink Or Swim that contains the title track words of Fight Or Flight and they leave to a huge ovation.

Brave Rival have produced the stand out album of Summer 24 and even better are fantastic live too and coming to a stage near you across the UK for the rest of the year.

Go see them.