Live Review: You Me At Six - Ovo Wembley Arena, London 04/04/2025
This is it. The final night of the Final Nights of Six, all culminating in one glorious show at London’s Wembley Arena, as rock legends You Me At Six called it quits after twenty years.
You Me At Six, for anyone living under a rock-free rock the past two decades, are a quintet from Weybridge — or were, anyhow — and, around this time last year, they announced that this tour would be their last. Cue a pretty much entirely sold out world tour — a co-headline tour with fellow fan-favourites Enter Shikari over in America, a five-date stint in Australia, an expansive European tour and, finally, a thirty-seven date tour around the UK and Ireland, supported by a mix of bands that You Me At Six have been lucky enough to call friends over the past twenty years. London, for instance, saw the likes of Mouth Culture and The Blackout in Brixton, Boston Manor and Holding Absence for the penultimate night, and, for this, the band’s end, one final duo of The Xcerts and Kid Kapichi to help round off their tenure as a group.
Although there was a hell of a lot of excitement for the band’s 3rd time headlining Wembley Arena, you couldn’t help but notice a palpable sense of sadness, of… loss. There might have been a frantic four hours ahead, but, for the crowd, that didn’t seem to matter — it would still be the last time they’d get to sing along to ‘Loverboy’, to mosh to ‘Bite My Tongue’, to salute the anthemic ‘Underdog’. With the crowd likely averaging late twenties/early thirties, it wouldn’t be amiss to state that You Me At Six have soundtracked most of the major events that everyone in the room had been through. In fact, Josh himself always mentions just how many fans claim that You Me At Six saved their lives — figuratively, presumably, unless Franceschi, Flint, Barnes, Miller or Helyer also moonlight as emergency workers!
So, even as the anticipation poured off the proto-pits in droves, the night still felt marred by countless thousands of fans pre-mourning.
But there was still a long way to go before they fully called it quits, and, helping to stem the sadness, it was time for The Xcerts.
Being given a lot as essentially the start of the end must have been nerve wracking - but from the first second of opener ‘Daydream’, everything went away. The painfully brief ‘Ache’ followed, and — what’s this? It’s only Architects’ Sam Carter, popping in for his quick thirty second feature! ‘I thought our backdrop was enormous - it looks like a fucking stamp!’ bemoaned frontman Murray Macleod, chuckling at just how ridiculously big the setting for their Friday night was.
‘Drive Me Wild’ lived up to its name, the crowd awash with a sea of clapping hands, while the throwback of the meandering ballad ‘Crisis in the Slow Lane’ gave those old school The Xcerts fans the emotional singalong they were waiting for. It was closer ‘Feels Like Falling In Love’, though, particularly preceded by a brief story about how they and You Me At Six had met back in 2018 and become close friends, that saw the crowd light up.
And then it was time for Kid Kapichi. From the first seconds of the foreboding, hackle-raising instrumental intro, and the opening salvo of ‘Artillery’, a sense of breathlessness pervaded the venue, and there was no time for such petty things as sadness. ‘Let’s Get To Work’ and ‘Rob The Supermarket’, came up next, the former a post-punk-esque anthem of getting a job done yourself, the latter a pounding, acerbic critique of the cost of living crisis, before the band belted out the Brexit-dedicated ‘Can EU Hear Me?’ and the vitriol-fuelled, racist-and-nationalist-bashing ‘New England’, featuring the appearance of Dumb Buoys Fishing Club.
A final furious duo of ‘Get Down’, strobes and head bangs everywhere you looked, and riotous, thunderous closer ‘Smash the Gaff’, and then the final band ever to support You Me At Six left the stage.
And then there was nothing to do but wait.
A string of venue sing-alongs, culminating in the mighty Oasis’ ‘Don’t Look Back In Anger’, and then… silence. It was time. Well, apart from the piercing screams and raucous cheers from the crowd. A gently tracked intro thus led into the band’s final opener — and what could it be other than Cavalier Youth’s ‘Room To Breathe’, an ironic song given the Wembley-wide pits that quickly both crushed and suffocated the crowd in good measure.
‘Ladies and gentlemen, this is it. The last fucking show: let’s go’.
‘Loverboy’ and ‘Stay With Me’ immediately got the crowd roaring along, with the latter just feeling like a plea from the fans to not go through with the split, and then it was time for the old-school duo of the going-on-17-year favourites of ‘Save It For The Bedroom’, and ‘Take Off Your Colours’, everyone letting their inner angsty teens loose for one last time with You Me At Six.
‘Give’ and ‘Night People’ came next, the former backlit by spotlights twinkling as if the stars had descended from the heavens to see what the fuss was all about, and then the peace was suddenly broken by the inimitable sound of a piano intro, arguably the most recognisable in emo-rock music bar My Chemical Romance’s opus: ‘Fresh Start Fever’. Sanguine blasts of light flashed over the increasingly feral crowd, Josh content to watch the circle pits unfurl into chaos as thousands of fans bounced in unison to the ‘Cavalier Youth’ favourite.
‘VI’’s more poppy ‘Straight To My Head’ took centre stage next, the stage looking like something out of Doc Brown’s post-DeLorean projects, and then it was time for ‘Lived A Lie’ — not that people were watching the stage, the track essentially turned into an obstacle course as fans ducked and weaved around the waves of crowd surfers. And, even with Josh suffering from “some sort of norovirus”, they happily proved ‘No One Does It Better’, as the band flew through the ‘Sinners Never Sleep’ classic — although Brixton sure were spoilt with the truly shocking appearance of Simon Neil two days prior.
A quick appearance of ‘The Mosh Pit’, by way of ‘SUCKAPUNCH’, ‘Jealous Minds Think Alike’, ‘The Swarm’ and ‘No Future? Yeah Right’, the rammed standing area in utter shambles, and suddenly it was time to slow it down. The tears of ‘Mixed Emotions’, and ‘Fireworks’, went hand-in-hand with a quick crowd-prompted twerk and an acapella ‘I Miss You’, the levity helping to lighted the mood; “You know we have to pay Blink for that?”, he (half-) joked. “Fucking shambles our band!” Still, you could visibly see the struggle to keep it together playing out on stage — and the duo of heavy hitters ‘Liquid Confidence’ and ‘Take On The World’ surely didn’t help.
“It’s been a fucking pleasure being your band for the past twenty years”, we’re told, before the angst-filled ‘Beautiful Way’ signalled it was that time of the set.
Three.
The seven spinning disco balls on stage were dazzling as they were epilepsy-inducing, paving the way for ‘Bite My Tongue’ to roar over the crowd one final time.
Two.
“I’m feeling Reckless”, Josh intones, a ‘Sinners Never Sleep’ classic drowning out Wembley arena for the last time.
One.
“Thank you for letting us in your headphones, your homes, your hearts. There is only one thing left to say — please stand for your national anthem”. And, as Flint broke into the pounding drum intro of ‘Underdog’, there was one final chance to mosh, to scream… and then it was over.
Zero.
Looking around, there wasn’t a dry face in sight, though it’s thought to say whether that’s from tears or just from the sweat gushing from the desperate crowd. Even the band wasn’t any better, seemingly desperate to find any excuse not to leave the stage. For the thousands in Wembley, and the likely thousands more watching the show being streamed live at home, it didn't feel real: this was it.
But Josh’s parting words, raising his glass to hide his welling eyes as he left the stage, said it all: “And just like that, we are dead — see you later”.
You Me At Six, thank you for being our band.
Words by James O’Sullivan
Photography by James Kirkland
