All Time Low, Friends Of Friends @ Hindley Street Music Hall, Adelaide 11/12/2025
As Good Things Festival departs into the sunset, the party continues on with All Time Low bringing the colour over into Adelaide.
With a set design like a giant kid’s playground, the combination of red, green, blue, and yellow present the band like giant crayon pieces leaping out of the box, drawing pretty pictures across the room.
For All Time Low is that. Vibrant, fun, playful and a carefree attitude only enhanced by the bands last show of the year. Or last day at school.
Openers Friends Of Friends, well I’m kicking myself and regretting getting there late. I only catch the last two songs, one a waltzy cherry flavoured dream, and the finale, a rocking, uplifting stomper. A gentle disapproving reminder to myself that the musical magic we crave is often found in support acts, and that we all need to be present each time to capture it. They are now on my radar.
For Maryland’s All Time Low, the tour for 2025 landed in Australia for Good Things and as vocalist Alex Gaskarth states, ‘what about Adelaide?’
Let me tell you about Adelaide. From my vantage point on the balcony, I was able to witness the mergence of band and crowd into one. Like two giant symbiotic organisms combining, everyone in the crowd swayed, bobbed and hit that downbeat in perfect unison each and every time. It looked sublime from my spot, imagine what the band saw.
Opening with Suckerpunch, the band bounce out and have the room clapping before the balcony ironically shakes during Weightless, such is the electricity within the room.
The bands repertoire is such that even late tour shenanigans – three Happy New Years celebrations, I kid you not – are picked up and run with by the choir known as the audience, as Poppin Champagne shows.
As Alex and the crew run around the stage to the stomping PMA, Damned If I Do Ya and Dark Side Of Your Room like teenage boys at a frat party, the crowd let go and become one with the magic. That space where the music seeps into your soul and makes you sing.
Whether is getting on shoulders during Something’s Gotta Give and the burst of emotion during the songs anthemic chorus or Alex wondering why Adelaide is so special for having a half hour time difference – the only one in the world no less – the crayons are being drawn over everyone, coloured in pop punk pomp and grandeur.
The banter continues as Alex literally speaks with crowd members about playing drums, guitar pics and ‘marking’ territory, all with that last hour of the last day of school feel. It’s playful, quirky and just a little bit silly.
Monsters sounds huge, Rian Dawson’s drums rumbling and the chorus perfect before finishing, after the Happy New Years, with Dear Maria, Count Me In, the inflatables, the cheers and the voices reaching for the skies.
It’s only fair to continue the giddiness of the band tonight and say that while they were All Time Low, many tonight, had an All Time High. Now, school is out!
Live Review By Iain McCallum