I find you can usually tell if you’re going to enjoy a gig by how you react, on first impressions, to the venue alone. And here at the O2 Academy in Islington, the smell of stale beer, the misty haze of BO and the abundance of band t-shirts, all spell an undisturbed evening of pure rock, which is totally my scene.

My concert-going companion wasn’t so much in the same frame of mind as me, and didn’t want to get too close to the special breed of Shinedown fan present tonight, who have Crue-like long hair and had been waiting outside in the freezing London weather since 3:00pm.

We managed to turn up perfectly in time to see Brighton-native openers The Crave, crank into a blinding, nigh-on ten song set. The boys are tight and their songs are catchy in an alternative-rock kind of way. The quartet dispel my statute to never let ANOTHER ‘The’ band grace my speakers, as I consider picking up their debut album ‘Anywhere to Everywhere’.

Once The Crave depart, and after the regulatory 30-minute break, the lights go down and a pre-recorded dark and ominous voice comes in. The haunting story of a man has the crowd a little baffled, but they nonetheless give it their full attention in anticipation of Shinedown’s appearance. The Academy is packed tonight and, agreeing with the guy standing behind me, these guys could have sold out a larger venue.

Filing onto a dark stage to a roar of sound from the mainly male audience, the 4 Shinedown boys get straight to business with raging track ‘Cry for Help’ from their latest album The Sound of Madness. This track is meant to be played live with the obvious opportunities for crowd participation in lines like “Pull the trigger if you're gonna/We all know that you wanna/Count off 1, 2, 1, 2, 3”.

The next track ‘Heroes’ has lead singer Brent Smith smiling the entire time, and I don’t doubt it is somewhat due to the fact that almost every crowd member knows every word to this tune. The single, taken from their 2005 album Us and Them, is a powerful rock track, where Smith’s Chris Cornell-like vocals are perfectly up front and raw.

Shinedown use an effective technique in between tracks where guitarist Zach Myers, bassist Eric Bass and drummer Barry Kerch have semi-jam sessions in the shadows, while Smith introduces a song, or coddles to the crowd.
Before the boys rip into ‘Cyanide Sweet Tooth Suicide’, Smith acknowledges the audience with a surprisingly heart-felt welcome and show of appreciation for coming out tonight, confirming that you don’t have to be an asshole to be a rock star.

Smith then introduces ‘If You Only Knew’, dedicating it to his fiancée and 1 year old son. This is such a powerful song, and with the added rhythm that Kerch interjects for the show tonight, this would be one of the stand-out tracks of the night.

In a move that actually freaked my concert cohort out, Smith inspires the crowd to join in on what Shinedown has named ‘The Rise’. This basically means rousing the sufficiently rarked up audience to surge forward, back and from side to side. So while Myers nails the guitar solo during ’Left Out’, I’m thankful I chose a spot just outside of the pit for this one.

In response to Smith’s question as to what the crowd wants to hear next, there can be no denying the over-whelming response of “45!”, as it is screamed at him from every corner of the room. Smith declares that it is too early in the show for the slow, emotional border-ballad ‘45’. Instead, they furnish the eager crowd with a dark and hopeful track, ‘Burning Bright’ from their first album, Leave a Whisper.

‘The Crow & the Butterfly’ has the entire crowd singing along again, with giant chorus “When you and I were getting/High as outer space/I never thought you'd slip away/I guess I was just a little too late”.
Reinforcing Smith’s encouraging words about being strong in yourself, Kerch’s introduction to ‘The Sound of Madness’ is epically tough to say the least. This is my favourite track from The Sound of Madness and the intensity of it is only heightened when you can see for yourself the passion in Smith’s face when he recites the lyrics “That the darkest hour never comes in the night/You can sleep with a gun/When you gonna wake up and fight... for yourself?”.

The rolling transition from ‘The Sound of Madness’ into ‘Save Me’ keeps me amazed at the harmony of the four boys together, considering the recent and relentless line up changes. Myers seems to have no problems being the bands only rhythm and lead guitarist, and Bass seems content switching between bass and acoustic guitar where he can.

As soon as Smith asks for the lighters to come out and the cell phones to be put up, everyone knows it’s the long awaited ‘45’. There is no doubt that this is the fan’s ultimate Shinedown song. I was looking forward to hearing this track most of all to see if the passion from the album was carried through outside the studio. I am not disappointed, and even days later I have “Coz I’m staring down the barrel of a 45…” stuck in my head.

Final song before the boys disappear for their Fake Out, ‘Devour’, holds it as the hardest track of the night.

It’s hard not to like Shinedown as a band, as they look like they are absolutely loving every minute of the entire show, and the unwavering grins on their faces throughout final tracks ‘Second Chance’ and ‘Fly from the Inside’ are testament to how much fun they are having.

All of a sudden, Shinedown are finished, and indeed, an evening of pure, unadulterated rock is over.
In all honesty, I was probably always going to enjoy a Shinedown concert, as I really like their sound and what they’re doing. But I will say this….Once all the dust/sweat had settled in the Academy, I did wonder where the creativity was in the show. They played all their great songs, and played them well, but sticking to such a strict format with no room to have fun, it came off a little stiff.

I find it a tough call when a band tours somewhere they haven’t played very often, when they have so much material to chose from, but are technically still promoting their latest album. I wanted to hear all the songs from The Sound of Madness, but I’m greedy, and wanted to hear all of the tracks from the previous albums as well.
But really, unless everyone wants to change the entire gig format to a length suitable for an act to perform their complete back catalogue, I think I’m going to have to suck it up – and, basically, just vow to see them again!