Heaven’s Basement – Barfly 2009

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Heaven’s Basement, whose previous incarnations were Hurricane Party and Roadstar, have been touring fairly consistently this year, both as support and as headliners in their own right. On this occasion they were headlining, supported by Dear Superstar and New Device, who have both opened the other gigs on this tour.

Having previously only seen a couple of their tracks performed live as support for Shinedown in Camden back in the Summer it was a real treat to see them do their own thing with new bass player Rob Elleshaw.

Barfly in Cardiff is a small, dark but not dingy venue, attracting the cool and grungy student types who aren’t littering the pavements in fancy dress. The crowd was sparse but perfectly formed and although these guys should receive a lot of support anywhere they go it was clear there were some friends in the crowd. The arches add to the acoustics but the sound levels were far from great with the vocals being swamped by the rest of the band. They have a big sound anyway and while it was great to see them in such an intimate venue they were really too big for it. They need to be playing larger venues where they can really own the stage as opposed to just trying to stay on it.

The set list consisted of half the material from the self-titled EP plus several new tracks – here’s hoping they’ve got an album and even more material on the way. Seeing as Heaven’s Basement only formed in 2008 they’re not doing too bad material-wise and their sound has really come together. Tear Your Heart Out and Executioner’s Day are probably the two strongest and most popular tracks from the EP, so opening and closing the set with them ensured the crowd hit a high at both ends of the set.

They were in great form and crowd went wild in all the right places. Richie Heavanz had his voice in good shape and Elleshaw has seamlessly become part of the group. They’re personable guys too. One of the benefits of a smaller venue is that the bands sometimes mingle with the audience after the show which is exactly what they did on this occasion, chatting and signing autographs, coming across as thoroughly unpretentious.

They’re done with tour dates for this year but look out for more dates in 2010, with a tour of Spain already booked for February.

“ crowd went wild in all the right places ”

Setlist: Tear Your Heart Out / Can’t Let Go / Misunderstood / The Long Goodbye / Unbreakable / Such Is Life / 10 Minutes / Paranoia / Mirrors / Best Without You / Reign On My Parade // Executioners Day

Written by Vikki Roberts
More: Gigs, Rock, Heaven's Basement