Photo + Words: Olivia Macrae

London punk-rock band The Molotovs took their Welcome To Urbia UK & ROI  2026 tour to Glasgow’s TV Studio on 10th September. The Molotovs have just recently announced their highly anticipated sophomore record ‘Welcome To Urbia’ to be released on 9 April next year, which you can pre-save here. 

Preston indie-rockers The Cases opened up the Thursday night with a cracking set of high energy tracks. Most of the setlist was from their recent debut EP ‘Mr Penny’. I liked their energy on stage, and you could really hear influences of The K’s and Oasis in their sound as well. 

The 4-piece have previously supported The Guest List and M60, and are set to kick off their own winter headline tour in November. If you like the sound of The Cases so far, I’d recommend listening to their most recent single ‘Don’t Lose Your Nerve’. 

From the get-go I could tell The Molotovs would put on a fantastic set. Fronted by sibling duo Matt and Issey Cartlidge, they both quickly made the stage their own from the first song, bouncing around all corners of the stage and putting on a performance hard to forget. Around 2 songs in, Matt was already airborne with his guitar whilst Issey was shredding her own. 

The setlist included ‘Today’s Gonna Be Our Day’ from their debut album ‘Wasted On Youth’. This was a fun, active track that saw Matt with a tambourine & catchy lyrics that honestly made me wish I knew more of their songs sooner. Next was ‘Urbia’ which, at the time I’m writing this, is currently at number 6 in the UK Official Charts! And for good reason too – the crowd loved this one. 

The Molotovs also played some unreleased stuff from ‘Welcome To Urbia’ including Father Flag which I loved. Later in the set Matt gave the crowd a couple solo songs with just an acoustic guitar and an overhead spotlight. ‘Nothing Keeps Her Away’ felt quite one-on-one in this sense, that it was just Matt plus the crowd in the room. 

Throughout the show the band always moved around, making sure to go to all edges of the stage so that the whole crowd felt engaged. I loved this about The Molotovs as it showed me that they didn’t just have a good soundscape but that they were a fantastic live act as well. 

Before heading into this gig I had heard great things about The Molotovs, but admittedly I had no idea the sheer scale of the hype. After doing some post-gig research I’ve realised they have already played hundreds of gigs and supported huge names like Iggy Pop, The Libertenes, Yungblud and Sex Pistols. Up next for The Molotovs is another big support tour with Razorlight where you can catch them at Glasgow’s O2 Academy on 26 November. 

This is definitely a band to keep on your radar – an exciting, striking energy that I haven’t come across in an up-and-coming band in a hot minute. 

Photo Credit: Olivia Macrae