Photo Credit: Esme Brigden / Words: Angelica Ubando

Reigning from Rotherham, legends of indie Brit rock culture, The Reytons brought the party to the Big Smoke, London, hailing the British Airways Arc stage for one exclusive night only. It was mosh pits, it was football kits and it was everything British and more. Drawing inspiration from their homegrown roots, the band performed in an immersive urban street set, reflecting classic British sights, your local Turkish barbers, BetterBet and of course, you can never forget your closest Off licence corner shop.

Supporting artists following a similar journey to the band, growing from urban small towns and cities included, Derby bred artist, Taylor Liam Jackson, performing his original acoustic Britpop inspired tunes, Mancunian rising star, Alex Spencer, bringing his infectious indie pop charisma onstage and the band’s most recent trailblazer, debuting earlier this year is Cruz Beckham and his 3-piece band, The Breakers.

It hits 9.01pm, the holy triad of British nostalgia wavers its lights one by one, and frontman Jonny Yerrell’s voice pounds through the venue, “We’re all f*cking Reytons aren’t we? and all we can see is pure red. The gig kicks off with iconic banger, Red Smoke, the ground erupts with the crowd’s jumping feet and canons of fire engulf the set.

Their electric hooks swiftly moved into tunes from their most recent album released in August, ‘A Love Letter to a Broken Town’, which achieved UK Number 1 on the charts independently. The album explores the Northern working-class roots of the band, centring around the impact of community power and nostalgia. Tunes such as Jukebox and 241, kept the true spirit of Brit rock, with the crowd’s energy reciprocating every riff of Joe O’Brien’s guitar.

All of a sudden, the bass of the drum kicks in and familiar electric chords strike through and the fans are brought to one of the band’s most popular singles, ‘Retro Emporium’, showing the most loyal of listeners that the lads were ready to bring everything they had out. And they did not disappoint, pulling out the ultimate moshing banger, ‘Harrison Lesser’ immediately after, filling the scene with a unified chant of “Da, da, da, da da’s” from a whole spectrum of generations,

Frontman, Jonny, took time to appreciate the performances of their chosen openers, stating that he knows what it’s like starting from the ground up, trying to form themselves in the industry independently, honing in on their origins growing in working class families. Jonny also added how next year marks the band’s 10th Year performing, creating and being THE Reytons, “I don’t know how this happened but I’m so grateful that it did”. Where he then hinted to a possible celebration for their momentous milestone, maybe right back to the beginning…right back to Rotherham?

Which is exactly where they landed next, with their most popular tune of their discography, “On the back burner”, which narrates a fallen dream of achieving fame and the struggles of being a musician. Because when you’re from South Yorkshire, you just know that everyone round there’s got a cousin or a mate who’s best friends with Alex Turner.

As the gig drew to a close, the band played an ode to their realities of home, ‘Kids Off the Estate’, celebrating what kids nowadays would call small town boredom but will one day call it pure nostalgia and reminiscence, celebrating the next generation of dreamers. And it truly was a celebration of life as speckles of confetti burst into the air raining down as the fans took over the song and it suddenly became theirs.

To finish off the night, they closed with a rocking encore of ‘Low Life’ because if anything, the night was going to end with one more mosh pit, a few more canons of flames and rockets of smoke, leaving with an epic night to remember and a memory fans will never forget.