The event music aficionados had been waiting a solid 12 months for finally arrived last night as pop-punk kings blink-182 took to the Main Stage at Leeds for the coveted Friday night headline slot.
Mark Hoppus, Travis Barker and Tom Demonge made it three times they had headlined both Reading and Leeds sites, the first for four years and ahead of a new album rumoured to be released to the world by the turn of 2014.
A single black curtain covered the Main Stage, as the anticipation reached breaking point, before the music stopped, the drape dropped and the trio emerged to a Union Jack with the unmistakable blink logo taking the centre stage.
Kicking off with ‘Feeling This’, everyone’s favourite childish rockers breezed through their set, peppering song breaks with some genuinely crude, hilarious humour and entertaining the masses excellently with their extensive back catalogue.
The crowd of course reacted magnificently to all-time hit ‘All The Small Things’, but then this was Friday night of Leeds 2014, it was heaving and pits were breaking out all over the inside barrier.
Photo courtesy of Leeds Festival – Giles Smith
The trio of songs that made up the encore summed up the evening for the Americans; ‘Violence’ a breath-taking tune that allows every band member to step up to the plate, ‘Dammit’ a veritable classic that the first strokes of the guitar riff sent everyone into a fit of excitement, and ‘Family Reunion’, a 40 second tune that manages to pack in all of the band’s trademark crude humour in an expletive-ridden blast.
And that was it! Around 90 minutes after they’d first taken to the stage, blink were done and dusted. They’d brought bags of humour and energy to the Leeds Main Stage, not to mention a number of outrageous drum solos from the magnificent Travis Barker. Sure leadman Delonge was a bit off-key at moments, but the show that was put on by these three over-sized children was still a sure-fire, reliable way to kick-off another year of Leeds.