Over the past week, I’ve been to see McBusted not once but twice. The combination of bands billed themselves as the ultimate supergroup, a title they well and truly lived up to on both occasions, having more than impressed fans and critics on this sold out 35 date arena tour.
The night I’m going to review was the second night I saw them in my hometown of Sheffield, an arena held close to both bands with the first ever mini McBusted show happening there years ago when McFly’s Tom Fletcher filled in as drummer for Busted. We had pretty good seats already but my friend won some OMFG zone tickets after a trip to merch and obviously from that moment the night went from excitement to near fangirl hysteria for us both. As a huge fan of Busted and a long-time fan of McFly, this whole McBusted idea is something I’ve long since hoped for but never in a million years expected so for it to happen has well and truly made my life.
The OMFG zone, for those unaware, is the standing section right in front of the stage surrounded by walkways. During the show, members of both bands are constantly circling round you so you have no idea exactly which way to look to the point where I genuinely had a mini breakdown halfway through ‘Five Colours In Her Hair’. It was instantly obvious throughout that this was a show for the fans specifically the ones who’ve missed Busted since their split. It really was a rollercoaster of emotion in the truest sense from the opening of the sad press conference video of Busted announcing their split to the hysteria that greeted Matt and James arrival on stage in a Delorean to the sombre moments found in songs such as ‘Sleeping With The Light On’ to the laughs and jokes of the band’s onstage banter.
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From the first chords of opener ‘Air Hostess’ the entire sold out arena crowd was a mass of screams, singing along and dancing bodies, something that never really stopped throughout the fast pace of the first 6 songs. ‘You Said No’, ‘Britney’ and ‘Who’s David’ followed pulling the focus fully onto Busted before switching over to a couple of gems from McFly’s back catalogue in the form of ‘Five Colours In Her Hair’ and ‘Obviously’, their first two singles and still the ones that receive some of the biggest reactions. After the slower, almost ballad like pace of ‘Sleeping With The Light On’ the band decamped to the UFO stage in the middle of the arena for the sing along perfection of ‘Star Girl’, Busted’s 2nd album closer ‘Nerdy’ and old McFly favourite ‘Room On The Third Floor’.
Exploding [quite literally] back onto the main stage for one of my personal favourite Busted tracks ‘Thunderbirds Are Go’ and we were nearing the last stretch of the show. A cover of Jackson 5’s ‘I Want You Back’ complete with dance moves, a more recent McFly single ‘Shine A Light’ and Dougie’s extremely impressive, very high pitched version of ‘My Heart Will Go On’ all took us into Busted’s debut single ‘What I Go To School For’ which closed proceedings momentarily.
Busted’s ‘Crashed The Wedding’, McFly’s beautiful love song ‘All About You’ and the catchy pop wonder that is ‘Year 3000’ made up the encore, closing the show with a bang and as the band left the stage every single person in that audience was ecstatic with beaming smiles on their faces and rightly so.
You can tell that these 6 guys love what they do, they’re great friends and this tour is not an excuse to make money, like some people may have written it off as. It’s an opportunity to play Busted songs again especially for the fans like me that loved Busted more than anything but never got to see them first time around. Everything was thrown into this to make the show so good from the onstage energy to the perfect setlist for both sets of fans, from pyro to lighting, UFO stages to hilarious between song videos, T-Shirt guns to Matt Willis in a wedding dress. Every moment was utter perfection and I know this will be a show I will not forget in a very very long time. It was made even better to have won the opportunity of being that close to bands I have loved for years, it’s something I don’t think I will ever experience again but it was definitely the best experience of my life.
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Mixtape Couture 