REVIEW: Everybody That Loves You Third Annual Holiday Show Full of Welcome Surprises
12/27 @ No Fun, Troy
“Every bit of the raucous, thrashing set felt like being inside of a painting, finding new angles, sounds, and avenues for movement each time the song crashed into the opening.”
I approached No Fun on this 12 degree Saturday night on a whim — I’d seen the flyer for the Third Annual Everybody That Loves You holiday show on Instagram a few weeks back and, though not intimately familiar with any of the bands, decided it could be a fun time. Naturally, my social anxiety and the freezing temperatures had me second guessing minutes before getting in the car (How bad would it be if I didn’t go? What if something happens on the way there and I’m stuck on the side of the icy Northway? What if…?). Yet, I must practice what I preach and get outside my house and go to shows, lest I be the worst of the worst: a phony (that’s for the Catcher in the Rye fans out there).
It was a classic No Fun scene once I stepped foot in the doors: merch splayed across the pool table, Christmas lights and an odd string of tinsel hanging down from the ceiling, some remnants of last night’s Hellseeker event strewn across the floor, a sci-fi flick playing on the TV above the bar. Members of the opening band, Hidden Drive, hung out next to the stage, chatting with friends as they awaited the clock striking 8:00. Soon enough, the four-piece took the stage and announced themselves, though not too verbosely — their mantra is “stay hidden,” after all, so hidden in fact that I cannot find their names anywhere. Mysterious.
For their set, they alternated between full-on hardcore and punk, led by their frontman’s range of vocals. I’m no expert in hardcore — it’s definitely not in my top five genres — but I know enough to say I was impressed by the frontman’s sound: while he spent most of his time in a mid-range growl, he could throw down a guttural scream and reach up for a higher yell to add some texture and emotion to the songs. What I loved about Hidden Drive, though, was that they didn’t rely on the vocals to do the heavy lifting. Oftentimes, they left wide spaces open for dark guitar and bass melodies to come through, carrying the sharp-edged vibes while their frontman abandoned his own guitar and thrashed around in his own one-man mosh pit on stage. Currently recording music, Hidden Drive is a band to keep your eye on in the new year.
Following them was Radical Joy, a Massachusetts-based group that, just picking up their instruments, had all the markings of a quintessential punk rock group. To start with, guitarist Shaye Marino is just nuts. The entire set, when Marino wasn’t ripping chords to drive things forward, they were running around the stage, headbanging to an extent that should’ve caused a concussion, and even ended up on the floor in the last song. Meanwhile, on the opposite side of the stage there was bassist Jakob Garofalo, who has mastered the art of nonchalant and plugged away at heavy bass lines whilst looking completely unphased and unenthused by any of the antics around him. Honestly? I loved the dichotomy between the two.
In the back was drummer Sean Maclure holding everyone together like a quarterback in his fitting Raiders jersey, while vocalist and guitarist Ethan Kennedy was putting up such edgy vocals up front that he didn’t even need banter between songs to get the crowd riled up. His few lines in between were always sheepishly thanking the raging crew for coming out and the other bands for having them, lauding their talents. It was endearing to see this kind of awkwardness completely transform into power punk rage and back again in a matter of minutes.
The crowd fed into their every note, jumping into the air from the first chord of their September single, “Nineteen.” For the next 30 minutes it was the perfect, unpolished, edgy punk that I love out of bands like Modern Baseball. I will absolutely be catching these guys the next time they come to the 518.
So, to pause for a moment, I’m two bands into a four-band show of which I had probably 5% prior knowledge and I’ve had two pleasant surprises. Can it be true that there are more ahead? Well, yes, there absolutely can, because I was about to meet Perennial. Holy shit, did this band shock me.
The three-piece gets on stage in matching pink-and-green striped shirts, no bass, an electric organ, and probably a generation on the previous two bands. When lead singer Chad Jewett asked if us newbies were ready for the Perennial experience…no I was not. He promptly started scraping his guitar on amps, on the wall, on anything he could find, while keyboardist Chelsey Hahn did the same with her keyboard.
The rest of the set followed this sporadic manner, their songs short bursts of energy driven by loud guitar, the low thrums and vibrations of the keyboard organ replacing any need for a bass. At one point, Jewett was out in the crowd, standing atop the pool/merch table whispering the refrain, “In the middle of the night, oh yeah, alright” from “Uptight” as drummer Ceej Dioguardi came out into the crowd crashing a cymbal. At several points, Jewett soap-boxed profoundly over subjects like art as movement — directly related to their tune “Art History” — and the importance of venues like No Fun, who exist purely for art’s sake rather than for art to help sell alcohol. Every bit of the raucous, thrashing set felt like being inside of a painting, finding new angles, sounds, and avenues for movement each time the song crashed into the opening.
Finishing out the night was the band who brought everyone together, Everybody That Loves You. Though Perennial was a tough act to follow, they held their own as they played new music from an upcoming album, giving audiences a hint at an instrumental-driven punk record that should hopefully debut in 2026. While the new material sounds great, I was definitely drawn in the most when they played some of their shorter and punchier classics like “What if it Killed Me?” There was no waiting for a riff escalate or a drum beat to hit in those, it was slap-you-across-the-face punk from opening note to close. That being said, I’ve been known to do a 180 on songs that didn’t strike me from the jump, so I’ll still be eagerly awaiting the new record with an open mind.
Lead singer Avery Budnick kept things short and sweet between tracks, thanking the other bands and abandoning his banter after he mistakenly introduced a different song as “I’m Not.” When they finally did play “I’m Not,” though, Budnick’s vocals carried a weighty emotional impact as they rose beyond the edgy guitars as he gritted out the lines, “I’m not useless, no I swear I’m not useless/Just a little bit nervous/And lazy and scared/But I’m not a waste.”
As I left the venue back into the cold, I reflected on how much I would’ve missed had I stayed home. Sure, I might’ve gotten more sleep, but you can’t watch a young band find their sound from your bed, nor can you feel like you’re inside someone else’s art project, nor can you watch strangers jump around with the tangible joy of explosive punk music. All of these moments came as a surprise to me, and I think we all need to begin actively putting ourselves in spaces to be pleasantly surprised in the new year.
