LIVE REVIEW: Nova Twins, HotWax, Ashaine White, SWG3 TV Studio, Glasgow, 12/10/2025
Photo Credit: Maryleen Guevara (15th October – O2 Ritz Manchester)
It’s night number two after an enjoyable day at the Tenement trail on Saturday where Pale Waves and Dead Pony had the Barrowland Ballroom bouncing to its core, the big question is can Nova Twins live up to the energy from the previous day? Nova Twins released album number three Parasites & Butterflies in September to critical acclaim, and we were excited to hear the new tracks live tonight at SWG3 in the West End of Glasgow,
We arrived as Ashaine White was taking to the stage, this is a new name for us tonight and we were sure to have a listen on the drive up, the Londoner is joined on stage by a full band tonight. It it is an impressive half-hour set that goes by in a flash as we get to hear a few tracks from their EP Look What You Made Me Do that was released in May. Just Like You is a new track being played live for the first time as Ashaine tells us while Whole Lotta Me has a very catchy guitar riff running through it and is the best of the set, the crowd have become the backing vocals for this one. The couple of hundred that got down early showed their appreciation at the end of the set that was highly-charged at times. 7/10
Hastings-based HotWax are the main support for tonight, a band that we are very familiar with at Bring The Noise having reviewed a couple of their recent shows and also interviewed the band. This is our third time seeing the trio this year after the album tour earlier in the year at Nice n Sleazy’s as well as them making their debut at the TRNSMT festival back in July. Tallulah Sim-Savage (vocals & guitar), Lola Sam (vocals & bass) and Alfie Sayers (drums) make up the trio that have a reputation for putting on a wild live show and tonight is no different. Rip It Out and Strange To Be Here are the outstanding tracks for us and we are lucky to hear a new song Change My Name that sounds great live. We loved the intensity of One More Reason tonight, Tallulah and Lola are playing at such an explosive pace here it is hard to keep up! The set ends in true punk style with She’s Got A Problem that is a personal favourite from the debut album Hot Shock, this band never lets you down. 9/10
As we await Nova Twins taking to the stage the crew are setting up massive white flowers around the stage and also the speakers have butterflies on them in reference to the latest album release Parasites & Butterflies. We would eventually get to hear eleven tracks from that very album so a very decent return. It’s very difficult to pigeonhole the music of Nova Twins, there are elements of rap, rock and metal all working well alongside the psychedelic experimental bass from the brilliant Georgia South, her performance is mesmerising at times and the amount of foot pedals being used is unreal! Black Roses and Sandman from Parasites & Butterflies get the show under way with the mosh pits opening up early on, anyone that was looking for a quiet Sunday night gig was in the wrong building. Amy Love on vocals grabs hold of the crowd from the get-go and unleashes an outstanding performance throughout the set especially during Cleopatra and Taxi. For anyone worried about how the new songs would go down needn’t have, they fit in so well alongside some of the more prominent tracks such as Antagonist and Choose Your Fighter.
N.O.V.A. has the crowd chanting back the lyrics “What’s the name bitch? Say our name, all you bitches say N.O.V.A”, this is one of the best of the set and the crowd energy is unreal while Drip has Georgia South doing the usual bass experimentation with a big smile on her face. There is some hidden magic going on here that is far too complicated for me to even begin to try and explain! Choose Your Fighter has both Amy and Georgia out among the crowd for a mosh pit and all the while HotWax and Ashaine White keep the crowd entertained on the stage as they reappear to help out, Jack Woodward on drums has been a delight to watch and listen to tonight. Amy excels vocally on Hummingbird and is a contender for the track of the set, the way she uses the vocal range is a special moment from the set tonight, the push towards the end of the song as all three musicians give 110% is memorable. The encore begins with Antagonist but has to be restarted twice due to technical issues while Monsters has a love over hate banner appear on the stage supported by Greenpeace to the delight of the crowd … chants of free, free Palestine reverberate around the room. There was one last chance for everyone to let off any energy they had left during final song Glory and that they did in style, this was a Sunday night crowd to be proud of, well done Glasgow for showing up! 10/10
Written by: Alan Brown
