Placebo Deliver Huge Performance at The Piece Hall in Halifax [Photos]

Alt-rock darlings Placebo visited the idyllic surroundings of The Piece Hall for a night of punchy, powerful and, at times, beautiful rock.

Support act Friedberg is based in London but showcases much of Anna Friedberg’s Austrian heritage within their music. Stomping, bouncy alt-rock with a heavy pop influence running through it and lots of percussive elements designed to encourage dancing. It works, too. The Placebo fans in the audience seemed to love their set, and they most certainly left with new fans after this show.

I’d kind of lost touch with Placebo over the last 30 years, having first seen them supporting Bush in a tiny pub in Leeds in 1995, playing their debut album to death, and the second one too. They’ve grown as a band since then and morphed into some kind of deities for their adoring fanbase.

A message from Brian is delivered before they appear, asking for people not to use their phones throughout the set in order to share a unique experience that will never happen again and create a better connection between Placebo and the crowd. For the most part, people obeyed, and it was wonderful to see a crowd bouncing and enjoying the music with barely a phone in sight.

Now, with a backline of musicians to bolster the sound, they sound huge. It fits this setting perfectly, and Brian said he thought the venue sounded better than an amphitheatre.

A big chunk of Placebo’s latest album, Never Let Me Go, made up most of the setlist and was received well with some upbeat stompers getting the crowd bouncing. Only a couple of nods to the early days of the band “Bionic” and a song that apparently scares the shit out of Brian, “Nancy Boy,” saw the crowd reaction raised even higher.

They returned for an encore that included a great version of Kate Bush’s “Running Up That Hill,” which strangely made me think how good a Depeche Mode show here would be, and they got the loudest reaction from a crowd we’ve seen so far this year as they thanked the fans for being part of something special.

Having lost touch with them over the years this show was enough to make me go back and revisit their catalogue with fresh ears and proves yet again that rock shows at The Piece Hall are absolutely fantastic.

Placebo (w/ Freidberg) @ The Piece Hall (Halifax, UK) on June 25th, 2024

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