[Night Out] YAK @ Berlin (03/30/2016)
Sometimes I don't want a big fancy show where I'm singing along with 700+ other people smart enough to like the same artist as me.
Sometimes I just want to sweat and have some sassy guitarist randomly fling himself in the middle of a crowd and almost knock me on my ass in the process.
This was the case with last Wednesday night at Berlin. As a #teen this was a regular occurrence for me, so where some people would get really irritated to have someone fling their entire bodyweight in your direction or get sprayed by a bottle of water, but these kinds of shenanigans leave me squealing in delight.
Fresh off their stint at SXSW, London's noise-rock trio YAK has thrashed their way around North America and directly into my heart. As soon as singer Oli Burslem wandered onto the stage with his pants and belt undone yelling about how he just needed to take a piss before they started their set, I immediately knew that I would need to be on high alert for the next 30something minutes of my life or else I might get kicked in the head or something of that nature.
YAK are as playful as they are loud. Burslem made sure to multitask his beer breaks, occasionally playing guitar using his beer bottle or enabling the occasional sip for drummer Elliot Rawson like he was giving a baby some milk. This was before the occasional thrash about into the crowd, which sent other folks snapping photos into a frenzy every time.
The nice thing about being a band who doesn't give a fuck is if you feel like playing a song over because you think you could do it better the second time around, you just do it. This was an added bonus for me considering of all of their songs I attempted to learn as quickly as possible, my favorite is "Victorious (National Anthem", which is the one that received the special do-over treatment.
YAK's debut album Alas Salvation will be dropping on May 14th, courtesy of Octopus Electrical. Be sure to have a look at my photos from the show below to see all the fun you missed out on / prepare yourself for awesomeness for when they roll into your city!
YAK ON TOUR
Apr 7 Amsterdam Paradiso w/The Last Shadow Puppets
Apr 15 Festival Printemps de Bourges
May 11 Birmingham The Rainbow
May 12 Sheffield Bungalows & Bears
May 13 Glasgow Stereo
May 14 Manchester Deaf Institute
May 15 Leeds Brudenell Social Club
May 17 Reading Purple Turtle
May 18 Bristol The Exchange
May 19 Leicester Cookie
May 20 Southampton Joiners Arms
May 21 Oxford The Bullingdon
May 24 London Dingwalls
May 26 Paris Point Ephemere
May 28 Lille La Peniche
May 29 Gent Big Next Festival
May 30 Nijmegen Merleyn
May 31 Amsterdam Paradiso
Jun 1 Hamburg Molotov
Jun 3 Nimes This Is Not A Love Song
Jun 4 Clermont-Ferrand Europavox
Jun 30 Garorock Festival
Jul 2 Eurockennes
Jul 7 Lyon Les Nuits De Fourviere
