The Academy Is... - Academy 3 - 14/09/08 by Dannii Martin (photo by Sarah Cook)

Two years ago, The Academy Is played at the Manchester Apollo in support of Fall Out Boy. It was obvious back then what a great live band they are. Now, they are back in the UK with a headlining tour in support of their new album “Fast Times At Barrington High”.

Before the main act took the stage, Florida based power-pop band We The Kings played support. Although just support for this gig, We The Kings will be co-headlining a US tour with The Academy Is in October. Tonight, they put on a solid performance and even do a cover of The Gorrilaz “Feel Good Inc”. Vocalist Travis Clark, claims to like England because everyone “has sexy accents”.

The Academy Is kicked of their performance with “Neighbours”, which prompted the crowd to sing in unison with the “You should have shown up, Should have shown up by now” lyric. They quickly followed this with crowd favourite “Slow Down”. Through all of this, Vocalist William Beckett, struts around stage like he owns the place! He is a hugely confident front-man, and his performance belies his 23 years of age. During “Skeptics and True Believers”, Beckett decided to start taking his shirt off – much to the joy of the crowd.

Although Beckett is very much the focal point of the band, nothing should be taken away from the other band members: Michael Chislett and Mike Carden on guitars, Adam Siska on bass, and the drummer, simply known as The Butcher. All members are a very tight unit, and produce some excellent sounding songs. The sound is clear and well played and Beckett’s voice sounds fantastic, none more so than on “We’ve Got A Big Mess On Our Hands”.

Beckett’s interaction with the crowd is excellent. He looks perfectly at home on stage and he is relaxed and confident. He even exclaims that “The only way to kick off a tour is in the UK!”. To which, he got a massive cheer.

The band play songs from all their albums, and songs such as “Bulls In Brooklyn”, “The Tension” and “About A Girl” all sound fantastic. They close the set with “Almost Here” and leave the stage to rapturous applause.

The band finished their set off with “Checkmarks” whilst the crowd pushed their way as far forward as they possible could. Then with a simple ‘Thank you and goodbye’ from Beckett, the band left the stage without an encore. But the gig was so good, it didn’t need one.