Live Review: Hot Milk - Academy, Manchester 25/11/2023
It’s that time of the year again when the hottest new act coming from Manchester comes back home for a bigger and better show than ever before. Hot Milk have reached new heights with their Manchester Academy debut, sold out and full from wall to wall of thousands of adoring fans. Maybe this new act isn’t so new anymore, but they are still piping hot in the punk scene.
Welcoming the fans into the venue is Modern Error, the heavy rock project hosted by twin brothers Zak and Kel Pinchin. Having released their debut full-length record Victim Of A Modern Age almost two years ago, the duo alongside their drummer Connor Nichols brought their take on the heavy punk sound to a crowd that seems to be the best fit to stretch their own audience out.
With tracks such as ‘The Truest Blue’ and ‘Error of the World’, the band’s aim is to shine a mirror onto society and with the easily digestible medium of music, they want to open everyone’s eyes to what is going on around them and bring reality and truth into everything they create and every note they play live. Punk is real, raw, true and honest, a tell-all genre, and there is no doubt Modern Error have found their new following with the power within the chords, the words and the emotions they were spreading around the room.
Following on that night is Witch Fever, a rising riot grrl-esque Manchester group who are right at home in this venue, in this city, and before these faces of rebellion and acceptance. Being a band on the move over the last couple of years, most notably opening for American alternative rock act My Chemical Romance for one of their UK shows in 2022, they are only getting bigger and louder and prouder and stronger.
Being non-stop from the first second they stepped on-stage to the very last wave to the crowd, there were no slow moments and no lulls. The energy is sky-high and the roof is being blown off the building. There is no better way to introduce the act of the evening than with the predecessor of Witch Fever. Everyone is ready.
The time has come. The air is tense. The crowd is cheering and chanting and as the lights flash, the music starts up, the void is calling and everyone is about to jump in. Welcome once again to the hometown stage, Hot Milk.
This is the tour where the group are bringing their all; their entire hearts, souls, talents, faiths, everything about them is on display like the most punk rock art display to ever open in the city. Co-frontpeople Hannah Mee and Jim Shaw were ready. If there were shakes or nerves, they didn’t show. There were no cracks or breaks, they were ready and they were rocking from start to finish.
Bringing their debut record A Call To The Void to the main stage for the first time, the reaction was positive. Wildly, madly, adoringly positive. There is always a guarantee with a Hot Milk crowd, especially in what Mee dubs “the 0161”, will never ever hold back. Every good and bad feeling is coming out and there’s no more appropriate place than the mosh pit. This came alive during newer tracks such as ‘Bloodstream’ and ‘Alice Cooper’s Pool House’, but never died out when the classics came out to play. Labelling these tracks as “classics” sounds ridiculous but with how far this group have come in such a short amount of time, with the monstrous climb they have had to the top in the punk scene, older tracks such as ‘Candy Coated Lie$’ and ‘Split Personality’ are instant classics and will be held as souvenir songs. Precious memories of older and newer fans, that will be treasured and remembered for years and hopefully decades to come.
The band stands as never being labelled as ungrateful or lacking humbleness. Hot Milk, who will always be those kids playing their silly little songs in their rooms, who will always stick to their working-class roots, take pride and honour in every show they perform, especially within the northwestern region. This humility came with stories and short speeches: from Mee telling about her father claiming her band will never sell out Manchester Academy, to dedicating ‘Breathing Underwater’ to her brave little sister who was watching the show that night. This was balanced out perfectly with her and Shaw’s declaration of love to their “sexy” crowd and Mee specifically claiming the fans are, “making me wet”. No more to explain from these quotes than the band are so happy with the feat they’ve achieved, and the fans are happy for them.
Ending with ‘Glass Spiders’, another classic from earlier in their career, Hot Milk said their goodbyes and farewells. But these are never forever, as everyone in that room has learnt at this point on with the Manchester punks. There will never be a goodbye forever - more of a “see ya later”.
From their earliest releases from the end of the 2010s, Hot Milk was always destined to be at the top of the food chain in this scene. They kept to their beliefs, they worked their heads, hands and butts off to get to where they are, and the payoff with every milestone reached feels suitable and well-deserved for them. There is no telling where they’ll end up next, or what they’ll end up doing next, but there is one promise. Wherever they’re going, they’re going up and up, higher and higher, and they deserve every step they are granted.
Words by Jo Cosgrove
Photography by Maryleen Guevara
