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| Yellowcard Live in Manila 2017 | The Final World Tour |
Almost a month after their final show here in Manila, here I am, finally uploading more photos about it on my blog! If you weren't there at the show, read more about what happened at the event here and read the rest of this blog entry to see more photos from Yellowcard's The Final World Tour in Manila.
Yellowcard Live in Manila 2017 Videos:
The show started at half-past 8 pm that night with Gracenote serenading everybody in the venue. Frontwoman Eunice Jorge’s voice was powerful and undeniably similar to the high hitting notes like that of Hayley Williams. The comparison was obvious and became more evident when they performed Paramore’s “That’s What You Get”. Normally, the audience often overlooks the front act but this time, that just isn’t the case. The audience were enjoying themselves with the band’s music and even more so when they performed their famous cover of Stevie B’s “When I Dream About You”.
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| Eunice Jorge of Gracenote |
As the set of Gracenote ended and as we eagerly waited for Yellowcard, alternative rock and pop-punk hits filled the venue with songs varying from Paramore, Fall Out Boy, Sum 41 and many many more. I never knew waiting could ever be fun.
An hour after the show started, the lights dimmed and smokes were all over the stage. We were greeted by the thick voice of the host to further amp up our excitement and to remind us to put our phones down and enjoy the show instead. A few minutes after, screams echoed and consistently filed the air as Yellowcard entered the stage and greeted the fans briefly.
They started their set with the soothing sound of the violin played by Sean Mackin from their song “Believe” off their Ocean Avenue album and then that was it—Skydome was full of people jumping and screaming their hearts out with lyrics from every song Yellowcard played.
Set list:
Intro
Believe
Lights and Sounds
Way Away
Always Summer
Five Becomes Four
Rest In Peace
What Appears
Rough Landing Holly
Awakening
Light Up The Sky
Sing For Me
Lift A Sail
A Place We Set Afire
With You Around
Cut Me, Mick
Breathing
Empty Apartment
Hang You Up
Be The Young
Hollywood Died
- Encore –
Only One
Ocean Avenue
After five songs, Yellowcard’s frontman Ryan Key welcomed the audience to the final world tour of their band. “I know there’s at least twice as many people in here tonight as there were in the last time that we’re in here in Manila, so thank you so much for this gigantic, amazing show tonight. Thanks for having us back here in the Philippines”, he said.
“We started our band in Florida in the United States. It’s safe to say that I don’t think we ever could have imagined that we’ve had that opportunity to play not one, but I think 3 shows here in the Philippines so far. Well, 4 shows. We’ve been here many times and you guys are always so amazing to us and we thank you for giving us this amazing opportunity to travel the world the way that we do. It’s one of the coolest things that we got the chance to do in our lives… We love coming here to Manila, everybody always takes such amazing care of our band here, we feel like fucking rock stars every time… So thank you so much.”
He added, “Alright everybody, so, you’ve seen us play before maybe, so you know that it’s really important to us that every single one of you loses your voice before you go home tonight. So we’re gonna play a whole lot of songs, we’ve got a couple of hours of music playing for you here tonight but some of them are gonna be from some of our newer records throughout the night, so if you’re here tonight, and we haven’t seen you ever before, or we haven’t seen you in a couple of years, or if this is your first Yellowcard show, because maybe, Ocean Avenue was your jam in like, seventh grade and nobody told you that we put out six records in the last five years. But if that’s the case, if you’re one of those people, welcome for your first time, or welcome back, thank you so much for being here.”
“You may not know all the words to some of the newer songs we’re gonna play tonight, and the thing is, if you stop singing at any point tonight, how the fuck are you gonna lose your voice?” and that triggered more screams. My favorite part in his 4-minute speech to the audience was, “If we play a song that you may not know the words to, what I want you to do, is dig deep down in your soul and sing to us tonight, whatever fucking words you got. Just do not stop singing.”
Being the first-timer at Yellowcard’s show, I was in awe with how amazing their performance is. Ryan Key’s voice is still as flawless and youthful as ever; it was as if 2 decades did not pass because his voice still remains the same as that from their first few albums. Sean Mackin was and still is amazing with his violin solos and second voice singing, and most especially, I love how he managed to interact with his fans through countless nodding and handshakes with us while he’s on stage. Josh, the bassist and Ryan Mendez on lead guitars’ tunes were impeccable. Touring drummer Jimmy, as emphasized by Ryan Key was forced by the band to learn all the Yellowcard songs for this tour, but like the others, he did not disappoint.
Ryan occasionally had his solo for acoustic versions of their songs like Empty Apartment. When the band reached the end of their 19th song, “Hollywood Died”, they put their instruments down and the lights dimmed, prompting screams from the audience as they leave the stage. The disappointment was in the air as fans yearn for the band’s biggest hits to be performed. Several decibels of screams and chants of “Yellowcard!” later, the band returned and the lights were turned back on. This is it. An encore performance of fan favorite, “Only One”.
During the show, I couldn’t count how many thank you’s were said and shown by the band. But among all those, and in behalf of their Filipino fan base, thank you, Yellowcard for almost 20 years of music, your dedication to your fans and most especially for tonight. It was definitely one for the books. I hope whatever they seek to do after the end of their world tour will bring them the same joy they gave to their fans.
After the song, the band showed how grateful they were with another batch of “thank you” and a humble bow from the members. Brace yourself for such a heartfelt message from Ryan Key, in behalf of their band, Yellowcard:
“We’re here in Southeast Asia as part of our final world tour and we are so lucky that we had the chance to be here with you guys, one last time in Manila tonight. So, I know that it was tough to hear that we have made this decision for this to be our final record and our final tour, but, we made this decision a long time ago and we’ve been working really hard to make sure that we did every part of this exactly right for you. And that we got to spend these nights hanging out and playing our songs and hanging out with as many friends and fans around the world as we possibly could before we go. We just wanna thank you guys for what is now been nearly 20 years of making music together for you. We’ve played rock and roll shows on 6 out of 7 continents on this earth. All because of your love and support for Yellowcard, so thank you all so much for the memories we’ve made together up here on this very stage. Thank you for having us back in the Philippines. Thanks to anyone who traveled from far away to be here tonight. Thanks to everyone here in Manila. Thanks to everyone that takes such good care of us while we’re here in Manila every time and we love you guys so much we’ll never forget you. We thank you for everything you’ve ever done for our band. We have literally been able to live our dreams in reality. We’ve been able to accomplish things that we never could’ve imagined possible and you have made our dreams come true. We thank you all so much, we love you more than you could ever know and we will miss you so much. But we thank you, for giving us one last amazing rock show here in the Philippines and I want everybody to make sure that your voices are gone before this song is over. Ladies and gentlemen, before we go tonight before we say goodbye, let’s sing Ocean Avenue together one last time. Thank you so much, everybody, we love you, here we go!”
And with that everybody, I honestly almost cried. This show wasn’t just about a farewell performance, clearly, it was a “thank you” and a parting gift from Yellowcard to each and everyone who loved them and their music. I have never been to a rock concert as emotional as this one, but I must say, this by far, was the best. I felt the band’s sincerity with their music and every word uttered to us, audiences. If I was to describe this show in one word, it would be “bliss”, because I grew up listening to their music during my teenage years and finally seeing them live for the first and last time, l realized that their music helped me (and I’m sure others too) get through good or bad times. The thought of them saying goodbye was sad, of course, but happy in a way, because I know that they loved what they do, they were happy, and through that, they made their fans happy too.
During the show, I couldn’t count how many thank you’s were said and shown by the band. But among all those, and in behalf of their Filipino fan base, thank you, Yellowcard for almost 20 years of music, your dedication to your fans and most especially for tonight. It was definitely one for the books. I hope whatever they seek to do after the end of their world tour will bring them the same joy they gave to their fans.
Special thanks to DMC Entertainment!
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