DeVere brought their fist in steel fury to Camden Town on an evening at the turn of the season. A thrilling cold freshness in the air beckoned hard rock aficionados from all corners of the city. What awaited was a night of orchestrated heavy music mayhem. ‘London’s loudest band’ had arrived.
DeVere
The Black Heart, London – 16 November 2023
Words: Monty Sewell
Photography: Ryan Hildrew
The quartet – produced by their Brit-nominated bassist Will Vaughn – has already ticked playing at Download Festival off the list. Their past backlog of sold-out performances seems to be just the finely tuned cusp of what is in store for them.
With a leather-bound look to put the rock gods to shame, it was time to chuck on the chains and head into the pit. Inside the venue, the stage was set with an arena-sized ambiance. Marshall amps stacked on either side of the drum kit were placed in front of a strikingly big DeVere banner, the logo fuelling a rock n’ roll anticipation.
The amplifying stage lights started to flash, signaling to the audience that a heavy rocking fire was about to rain down upon its willing prey. Music blared as Sam Cassidy (vocals), Mike Wroe (guitar), Will Vaughan, and George Love (drums) bound onstage with ferocious intent, snarling out as they took to their instruments.
Horns to the sky and smoke curdling in the air, DeVere lept from the gates with the powerhouse tune Nightmare. There was a potency within the thumping-set wrath of the band’s sound, making one guitar distort into the spectre of three.
Embellishing their modern musicality with strong essences of 80s hair metal, the music has an insatiable hard-hitting grit.
Surrender and Burnout are next as Cassidy stunned with his gravel-hewn vocals. Soaring into those top-note vibrato howls, he has already placed himself into the ring alongside the greats. Cassidy tore through the audience with his onstage bravado, gutting any apprehension from the back-of-the-room dawdlers.
Newly released track Like Lighting is an absolute slammer before Woe stood alone, tearing into an elongated solo. A breathtakingly talented axe-wielding virtuoso, the audience cheered him on as he swept, bent, picked, and contorted.
Love and Vaughn headed up a blazing rhythm section, the bassline thunder bellowing atop some seriously beasty drum slams. Eve, Deja Vu, Dead Before I Die, and released single Again kept the rugged vigor alive before the final throw.
The band finished up with a much-demanded encore from their sweat-thirsty audience. It felt like the whole of rocks most wanted had herded into Camden to be a part of the night.
Cementing themselves as the unmissable act of today, there is a sense it is only a matter of time before DeVere rises to unstoppable heights. We are living in their world now, and there ain’t nothing we can do about it.
