The last time that Joey Valence & Brae headlined in Manchester was just under a year ago, in the significantly smaller Club Academy. In around 12 months, then, not only have they doubled the size of venues they can convincingly play, but also the buzz and energy around themselves. Of course you’d expect the most outgoing party-starters in hip-hop to pull a matching crowd, but now being more demographically diverse and widespread than ever, there is a shift to make note of. Part of that could be New Century Hall itself, a glitzier, more lavish venue to fit the feel of their current album HYPERYOUTH at its best—extra, club-ready and gleefully lost in the colours and lights. Makes sense for a duo whose entire touring M.O. is one worldwide jet-set after the next, grabbed and squeezed with almost a childlike whimsy.
It makes for a freewheeling, easy-to-like atmosphere that can be such a useful tool to grasp in hip-hop. It’s no doubt behooved openers AG Club, whose usual standing of multidisciplinary tastemakers has been subbed out for as many bangers as they can muster. They’re here for hype-building purposes, and can clearly pull that off without a hitch. When the bass is ratcheted to floor-shaking levels and the flows and interplay are consistently on point—plus wrapped up in palpable charisma from both Baby Boy and Jody Fontaine—it’s tough to complain about flavours that aren’t expanding the palette of modern hip-hop. Even more so when the crowd are pleasingly receptive to this, willing to get stuck in with chants and an early wall of death on Bodega Bandit. When any apprehension is removed like that, it can be all that’s needed that give a just-good set that bit more speed.
Still, by comparison, Joey Valence & Brae are setting off at Mach 1 and only increasing from there. It helps when they’ve got a more decked-out launchpad to work with, thanks to their DJ Ewook and his preliminary set. The warm-up is tailored to where the duo are at right now, hence why there’s a lot more EDM and drum ‘n’ bass to muscle out some previous rock remixes, with the exception of Limp Bizkit’s Break Stuff and Linkin Park’s Faint to keep the connection alive. What produces the most rapture, though, is the diversion into the music that inspired HYPERYOUTH, where the all-too-apparent club era of Joey Valence & Brae is hammered in even further. If the cover of 365 by Charli XCX was the prelude, Lady Gaga’s Just Dance, Icona Pop’s I Love It and Kesha’s Die Young herald the next strata up of bigness and boldness.
So what does that look like from these two when embraced wholesale? Well…it looks like Joey Valence & Brae. As time as gone on, they’ve only gotten better at moulding every clump of influential matter into a singular context that not only makes sense, but thrives coming from them. It’s where the charm of neither having your ‘stereotypical’ rapper image comes from—Joey clearly enjoys his scrappier, charged punk side, while Brae shows more comfort in a pop mould, almost boyband-esque in his moves on HAVE TO CRY. That could also be why the whole thing isn’t quite as full-on as in the past, in a combination of a brighter, less compact space and music that favours it. It’s very marginal, though; when there’s still a hard, fiery, rowdy edge thrust right to front on the run of HOOLIGANG, STARTAFIGHT and LIKE A PUNK—and, critically, it gets embraced by an audience who mightn’t otherwise be partial to such sounds—it shows how deep and wide the well of fundamental energy runs.
Moreover, the pair know how to direct that into the most entertaining show possible. A headline set just eclipsing an hour mightn’t seem like much, but you need to factor in how much gets crammed into it. It’s pretty full-throttle, the first slowdown coming in IS THIS LOVE? a whole nine songs in, and even that’s only to serve as the backing snippet for Joey and Brae to stand on the stage risers and gyrate like Chippendales. On a heavily HYPERYOUTH-skewed set, the album’s inconsistent pacing is never much of an issue when there’s such a dogged commitment to forward motion. Take THE PARTY SONG, which is as shriekingly overbearing as it needs to be with its hard pink-and-purple lightshow, so much so that its gearshifts into soul are more ready to work when there’s a physical presence and air that’s just been heated past boiling point. The same goes for LIVE RIGHT, able to sound more euphoric against the sea of phone lights, as opposed to the indie-pop candyfloss of its recorded counterpart.
Genuinely, it’s as well-put-together as you could ask for from a show like this, given that nearly every loose end or pothole (of which there weren’t many to begin with) are accounted for. There’s quite literally one instance where the battering-ram confidence seems to chip, when JPEGMAFIA’s verse on WASSUP is played through the tape and Joey and Brae look a little for what to do during. Otherwise, as they bubble with personality and enjoyment levels are through the roof, it’s impossible to question the near-vertical trajectory of this rise. It speaks for itself—a rap-rock swagger; the club-pop glamour; the proliferation of songs like BUST DOWN and SEE U DANCE that marry the two; the two-step-friendly drum ‘n’ bass swerve of FREAKS, GUMDROP and Napalm that’s a complete other thing, yet still fits perfectly. Even DISCO TOMORROW, HYPERYOUTH’s sluggish closing number, can function as an end-credits moment, winding down into arm-swaying to go off into the night to, though still with a danceable closing leg to ensure it’s not a total fizzle out.
To judge overall success, though, let’s consider the three rules of the HYPERYOUTH Tour that Joey and Brae go over during the set—to dance, to sweat, and to make a friend. Given there’s a whole beat taken to ensure that third point, that’s all sorted. Dancing and sweating, though? Odds are, if you were here, it’s the most you’ll have danced and sweated all year.
Words by Luke Nuttall
