Full of Hell – Showbams

Better Lovers with Full of Hell, SPY, Cloakroom //
The Regent Theater – Los Angeles
December 1st, 2024 //

A post-Thanksgiving concert slot on a Sunday is enough to give most bands the willies. How do you get a group of people moving who have spent the last three days gorging themselves on carbs and Coors?

Just ask Better Lovers.

The supergroup made up by Greg Puciato of The Dillinger Escape Plan, Jordan Buckley, Clayton “Goose” Holyoak and Mitch Micciche of newly defunct Every Time I Die, and producer/guitarist Will Putney of End fame brought the heat — literally — to The Regent Theater in downtown LA with an explosive performance that left the crowd’s collective jaw on the floor.

The sluggish and bloated energy was most evident once Bay Area’s hardcore heroes SPY had taken the stage, powering through a riotous set without skipping a beat. But despite repeated attempts by the band, people just weren’t giving it a whole lot to work with. At the very least, the eardrums of everyone who was in attendance were getting primed for the pummeling to come for the rest of the night.

Full of Hell

Full of Hell have always been a bit of an outlier but opening for the motley crew that’s Better Lovers proved to be an unexpected treat with a set nothing short of monstrous. These guys are just a wall of noise in the best possible way, with Dylan Walker’s mixed-down vocals letting the rest of the group’s instrumentation cut through. Their variety of instrumentation, which includes electronic elements from Walker, proved to be the special sauce that elevated the set. Even with an equally tepid crowd, Full of Hell certainly got people’s attention before it was time for Better Lovers.

If you’re going to name your debut album Highly Irresponsible, you better have the balls to back it up onstage. Needless to say, when your vocalist is blowing fireballs by the end of the evening, you have officially earned the moniker. From the second the band jumped into the opening riffs of “Lie Between the Lines”, the crowd’s previously dormant energy was nowhere to be found. Buckley’s powerful and creative guitar work always set Every Time I Die apart from the rest of the pack, and ever since Better Lovers formed last year he has turned everything up to 11. When you factor in a god-tier guitarist like Putney however, the result is truly something special. And with a frontman as maniacally talented as Puciato, you’ve got lightning in a bottle.

Better Lovers

Puciato’s energy has always been the stuff of legends, and he was in full force at The Regent. What’s even more impressive is the vocal range he brings, though. From grunge-inspired singing that would make the late Layne Staley of Alice in Chains blush to his trademark screams, he’s a one-of-a-kind talent and Better Lovers couldn’t have found a better person for the job. While the five-piece played most of an admittedly limited discography (for now), it also dipped into a fun cover of Soundgarden’s “Rusty Cage” off 1991’s Badmotorfinger that really highlighted Puciato’s vocal range.

Then came the fire. We had seen Puciato pull this stunt before at Furnace Fest a couple months ago, but to see flamethrower-rivaling plumes of fire as the backdrop to Better Lovers’ stunning debut single “30 Under 13” was a memory I don’t think anyone will soon forget.

That said, there isn’t a band out there that does it like Better Lovers and by that alone we can’t wait to see what comes next for them.

Setlist:
Lie Between the Lines
Sacrificial Participant
Your Misplaced Self
Become So Small
Superman Died Paralyzed
A White Horse Covered in Blood
Drowning in a Burning World
The Flowering
Two Alive Amongst the Dead
Future Myopia
At All Times
God Made Me an Animal
Love as an Act of Rebellion
Rusty Cage (Soundgarden cover)
30 Under 13