Gig review: McBusted

SOUNDING like something that should be served with large fries and a jumbo soft drink, two multi-million selling British pop-punk bands of the 2000s – Busted and McFly – have merged in a supersized bid to respectively turn back time and reverse diminishing returns.
A combination  of the bands Busted and McFly. Picture: FacebookA combination  of the bands Busted and McFly. Picture: Facebook
A combination of the bands Busted and McFly. Picture: Facebook

McBusted - The Hydro, Glasgow

***

To call McBusted a supergroup would be overgenerous, particularly considering preeminent heartthrob Busted’s Charlie Simpson remains absent in his ongoing quest to be taken seriously. But the tongue-in-cheek dumb fun factor of this energetic and very watchable spectacle nevertheless couldn’t be faulted, even if all who partook were surely old enough to know better by now.

A patchy turnout in a scaled-down Hydro suggested at least some fans have grown up since those noughties glory days. Any arena band who manage to hit the back row every time with their T-shirt guns has to be asking questions of their appeal.

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But the budget hadn’t been scrimped. Among myriad pyrotechnics, we got Busted’s Matt Willis and James Bourne entering in a Back to the Future DeLorean, then later the whole band descending from the ceiling on a flying saucer. Only McFly’s baby-faced Tom Fletcher could claim to still look youthful, with muscles and tattoos overcompensating for advancing years among the other five members, but my did the girls still scream.

There was literally no filler in a near all top-five-singles setlist including eight number ones – with Crashed the Wedding, All About You and Year 3000 saved for the finale, three-chord wonders each laughing brazenly in the face of musicality by suggesting it now takes six people to play them.

Seen on 15.05.14

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