LIVE REVIEW: Electric Callboy, Bury Tomorrow, Wargasm, Alexandra Palace, London, 11/11/2025
Photo Credit: Rob Tilbury
An Electric Callboy gig is a beautiful thing. Chaotic and unpredictable, sure, but oh so beautiful. The band themselves are reliably unhinged — a neon-drenched techno-metal circus with more outfit changes than a one man staging of Cats — but their recent show at Alexandra Palace really upped the ante.
From the industrial-punk snarl of Wargasm to the stadium-ready metalcore might of Bury Tomorrow, the night was a genre blender set to “purée.” Even before the doors opened, one thing was clear. Things were going to get weird. And loud. And occasionally on fire.
Everyone needs a villain and, fairly or not, the music industry seems to have decided Sam and Milkie are its chosen ones. And yet, despite this — or perhaps because of it — they always give it everything. Say what you want about them — and plenty of people do — but the duo’s chaotic sincerity is impossible to ignore.
They tore into Fukstar with Sam Matlock immediately demanding a mosh pit like an indignant drill sergeant, screaming his lungs out, while Milkie Way was headbanging her way across the stage as though trying to detach her own spine. By Small World Syndrome, the crowd was being soaked by what was hopefully water, while D.R.I.L.D.O saw Milkie whipping the crowd into their first real frenzy of the night, even managing the first crowd surfers. And yet, somehow, it still wasn’t enough for Sam.
“I’m like a T-Rex. My vision is based on movement. And right now? I can’t see shit. Boo yourselves!” he snapped, cutting Spit. short with a theatrical glare. It might as well have been a performance at a panto, insert obligatory boo hisses here. And yet, as if egged on by the most obvious goad in the world, Feral turned the floor into a trampoline. Bodies launched. Voices tore. And suddenly the heel-turn was complete.
The set ended with Sam crowd surfing during Do It So Good, arms spread wide like some punk-rock messiah screaming, “Alexandra Palace, the best rollercoaster in the world!” As for Wargasm? What a ride. 8/10.
If Wargasm were chaos incarnate, Bury Tomorrow were calculated devastation. The lights dropped. A klaxon blared. “The annual purge has been authorised by the BT government,” a voice intoned. “Mosh pits of level four and above have been authorised.”
And with that anxiety-inducing message, Choke. No easing in. Just immediate, furious immersion. Daniel Winter-Bates tore into the guttural bridge seething with rage, pacing the stage like someone spoiling for a fight. The Southampton-based band’s ascension to Ally Pally feels less like ambition and more like a cosmic inevitability — and that night, from the crowd’s reaction, it could well have been their own show.
“The world is fucking on fire. And if I don’t use this platform — which is pretty big today, actually — to speak about inclusion, I’m not doing my fucking job. We’re not the other. We are one.” Boltcutter became a strangely beautiful moment — a song dripping with menace turned into something communal, the crowd embracing to a track that absolutely should not be tender. Similarly, thousands of hands swayed as Adam Jackson’s thunderous beat rattled bones during Let Go, and What If I Burn turned the arena into a sea of phone flashlights.
And then came the call to arms.
“Last time we were here, with While She Sleeps, we tried to break a record. There are sixteen security guards and only two crowd surfers so far… Stop behaving.”
Before Black Flame even kicked in, it began: wave after wave of bodies pouring over the barrier. Even when they stopped the song mid-way — presumably for the sake of the poor security staff, who were essentially starring in a live-action tower defence game — the surfers kept coming.
“Give it up for the front rows — and their necks,” Daniel laughed.
Closing with the fierce Abandon Us, ignoring the chants for Black Flame to be restarted, Bury Tomorrow left the stage ablaze — and then there was nothing to do but wait. 9/10.
Well, that’s not strictly true. Somewhere mid-set, a hero emerged. A man — nay, a legend — hoisted a tower of empty cups into the sky like a holy relic. Around him, the crowd launched multicoloured inflatables in a desperate attempt to knock it over.
The cheers and groans became the loudest of the night, all while remixed rock classics blasted — as if Electric Callboy had secretly tekkno’d every hit from the last twenty years. We salute you Cup Man.
And then — the main event.
Gentle electronic pulses drifted across the room, growing, rising, brightening — teasing snippets from recent single TANZNEID starting the show. Strobes flared. Smoke rippled. And, as if answering the 10,000 prayers in what promised to be their temple for the night, Electric Callboy were there.
Cue sparklers, pyro, explosions, and the unmistakable sense that the band had been handed a budget and told, “spend absolutely all of it.”
Still Waiting hit next, Frank Zummo pounding the drums with defiant precision as the Sum 41 classic echoed throughout Alexandra Palace over three years after the Canadian legends’ last visit to the venue. Tekkno Train followed straight after, barrelling down the setlist’s tracks, gouts of steam shooting from the ceiling in time with the mechanical chugs.
Hypa Hypa was a nostalgia whirlwind, opening with snippets of its many remixes before exploding into the usual mix of bouncy absurdity and animalistic growls. Pump It — the Eurovision contender that Europe will always regret not having allowed — turned the room into a gymnasium run by a raving cult. The Hurrikan medley brought both the lightest and heaviest vibes of the night — though the drop was cheekily replaced by a DJ set blending dubstep, blink-182’s All the Small Things, and Drowning Pool’s Bodies.
Another costume change followed, naturally. Fun? Sure. But nothing, NOTHING, can ever beat the whiplash breakdown of Hurrikan, and that’s the hill we die on.
Anyway, Revery and Hate/Love shimmered in sing-along splendour, while Mindreader erupted in pillars of fire, the tour photographer weaving between them, presumably immortal or insane. Or both.
Then: darts. Actual darts. A mere 20 points for Ally Pally’s newest would-be champion — though Nico Sallach’s grouping was respectable. Maybe there’s something there!
A quick, rapid-fire medley of older tracks (from 2010’s Monsieur Moustache vs. Clitcat to the recently benched Crystals) was as phenomenal as you expect, even if most of the crowd probably didn’t recognise half of it, with each one underlined by its respective album cover being emblazoned on the backdrop, and then… nothing. Some drums by Frank, duelling the robot projected behind him, but that was it. A fourth-odd costume change, perhaps?
Nope. The band seemed to slip seamlessly into the crowd, visible only through the rising phones of excited fans and spotlight halos shining down from above . Acoustic time!
A beautiful acoustic Fuckboi let Kevin Ratajczak take a breather at the piano, each second thankfully shown on the big screen for anyone not directly next to them, along with the ‘actual’ Eurovision song of Cascada’s Everytime We Touch — first tender, then resurrected as the full metalcore Tekkno version as they sprinted back on stage.
Normal play resumes, then. Or at least as normal as the German electronicore outfit get.
MC Thunder II erupted with high kicks, screeches, and cannons launching streams of ribbon across the room. Elevator Operator unleashed so much flame that “pyromaniacs” feels like an understatement, the recent set opener becoming a firm, fan favourite set closer.
Encore time. Costume change. Obviously.
The band returned in mirrored disco-ball helmets, dancing as the darlings of BABYMETAL flashed across the screens for RATATATA before leading the crowd in extra-terrestrial chirps for Spaceman.
One final change, one final burst of chaos: We Got the Moves, wigs and white shirts in full futuristic splendour. It was hard to see whether they were doing the understated yet iconic dance throughout, given the literal thousands of raised hands and greedy phone cameras trying to hide them, but it seems a safe bet.
Electric Callboy are a band that, having sold out the 10,000 capacity venue months in advance, are still somehow seeming like a band on the rise. But with a phenomenal stage show, iconic, anthemic tracks, and a self-deprecating, tongue-in-cheek absurdity that SCREAMS ‘a good time’, they’re someone that everyone should see. Even just for the dancing.
An easy 10/10.
Written By: James O’Sullivan
