With a classic mix of punk, rock and hardcore, the Eastpak Antidote Tour brought an eclectic mix of bands and some pretty pumped fans to Manchester’s Academy 1 this week. The first to grace the stage was the only English band on the tour, The Ghost of a Thousand. Playing plenty of tracks from their latest album ‘New Hopes, New Demonstrations‘, the hardcore style and brutal lyrics from Tom Lacey proved popular with crowd. The crowd lapped up their effervescent stage presence responding particularly well to the bands previous single ‘Black Art Number One‘ Despite the Brighton Band‘s best efforts to rally up the crowd with a wall of death, the early slot resulted in a much smaller audience than the bands performance truly warranted.

Four Year’s Strong added a more happy-go-lucky punk sound to the line-up, playing a number of songs from their 2007 album ‘Rise or die trying’ including Catastrophe and The takeover. Despite the change in style and some slight issues technical issues with the sound the band worked well to achieve a strong atmosphere throughout the crowd, even starting a circle pit during a very popular performance of ‘Prepare to be digitally manipulated’.

The second support act and previous headliners on the European dates were Anti-flag, who attempted to add a little political substance to gig. Their opening song ‘Press Corpse’ saw the crowd responding with peace signs. The band performed a number of tracks from both their past album ‘Die for your government’ while pushing their most recent album ‘For Blood and Empire’. The crowd responded to well to Anti-Flag’s music, while less respondent to their political rants between songs the band managed to achieve the “best circle pit of the entire f***ing tour!” as described by singer Justin Sane.

Finally though Alexisonfire arrived on stage to prove exactly why they were headlining the UK dates of the tour. With the kind of performance that from the mere introduction has the crowd hyped, Alexisonfire delighted the crowd with songs including ‘Young Cardingals’ ‘Drunks, lovers, sinners and saints’ and ‘We are the sound’. Alexisonfire delivered the kind of performance that demanded full attention except when participating in the epic mosh pit the length of the stage.