Photo Credit: Jim Fuller
Cian Godfrey brought his Somebody’s Child project to Glasgow for what turned out to be a thoroughly enjoyable night of music at the old church that is Saint Luke’s, a stone’s throw around the corner from the famous Barrowland Ballroom. We love this venue so much and the sound quality is second to none in this vibrant music city. Somebody’s Child released their second album When Youth Fades Away in March of this year and it is so good to hear most of the tracks live tonight for the first time, Bring The Noise reviewed the album earlier in the year and you can have a read here.
First up though were a band that came on to our radar just before the 2025 Sound City festival in Liverpool that champions up and coming bands from around the UK, that band are better joy who are led by Bria Keely. We are expecting big things from better joy over the next couple of years and deservedly so, this is a band with so much potential for moving up to the next level in a similar way that Sunday (1994) have done so quickly. The similarities between both bands are striking: powerful vocals backed up by a well organised band. There is already a decent sized crowd in the venue as the set kicks off with Carnival and What A Day; two songs that push all the right buttons with the latter track providing some quirky lyrics to go alongside the beautiful vocals and musicianship, “Jenny ran off with an atheist, she got her name on the church hit list” being just one example. We were delighted when it was announced that the band would be back in Glasgow in March 2026 for a headline show at the iconic King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut. Latest releases Steamroller and Plugged In were the best of the eight track set but to be honest every track stood out from a band that only released their first song in 2024 so Dead Plants was a nice song to end the set.
better joy still have a lot to look forward to in 2025 with second EP at dusk dropping on Halloween, look out for the Bring The Noise review of this one. There is also a support slot in Bria’s home city of Manchester alongside Bastille at the AO Arena follows that as well as an arena tour with Amy MacDonald including a sold out show at Glasgow’s OVO Hydro in front of 13,000, now we can’t wait for that one! 10/10
We moved up to the balcony for the main act as the lights went down at 8.30pm and a long intro led into opening song The Kid, taken from the When Youth Fades Away album it is the first of seven from that particular record. We also get seven from debut album Somebody’s Child so there is a good mix of old and new music tonight from the Dublin band. Even though it’s a Sunday night the crowd are right up for this one already and we haven’t seen the balcony this busy at Saint Luke’s for a while, the energy levels remain high for Last Night I Held Your Hand and Broken Record. The musical cohesion at the end of the last mentioned song has all six band members on the stage giving everything, a very memorable moment to take away from the night. During Hold Me Like You Wanna frontman Cian Godfrey shows off an impressive vocal range while How Long begins at a slow pace but doesn’t end that way as once again the collective musicianship is unreal. Irish Goodbye, Give It Up To Love and New Orleans continue the high intensity start and it’s not long until the big hitters come out to play with Lost and The Lover from the 2021 EP Hope, Amongst Other Things both being very connective with the crowd and displaying a deep level of emotion from Godfrey.
One of our favourite tracks from When Youth Fades Away is Porcelain (Losing All My Patience) and is great to hear live, we last caught Somebody’s Child live at TRNSMT Festival in 2024 and they have been on our ‘must see again’ list since then … it was well worth the wait. The band have toured with some big names in the music industry including The War On Drugs and there are definitely influences of their music in Somebody’s Child. I Need Ya raises the intensity once again and the last track of the main set is Jungle, the band’s most streamed song to date, what a reaction this one gets from the sell out crowd. A massive roar goes up as the band leave the stage and the Palestine flag that has been on the stage all night takes centre stage as a poem titled If Only was played over the PA system written by Hayam Taha as the crowd fall silent … there is only one song that can end the seventeen we get tonight: We Could Start A War. This song has everything you could possibly want but it is the poignant lyrics and especially the chorus that stand out for us, “You know we could start a war, or we could live in peace/so what the fuck are were fighting for, what are we hoping to achieve?” no more words required here. This was a Sunday night well spent with two outstanding bands and we will follow both with interest over the next few years as they surely gain a massive fan base. 10/10
Written by: Alan Brown
