Hyde and Beast, The Cluny 2, Newcastle

The British summer is truly in full swing, it’s a balmy Summer's evening in Newcastle as we head to tonight's show. The tiny Cluny Two is sweltering as tonight’s support act, the ever-brilliant Barry Hyde of The Futureheads, takes to the stage.

Playing tracks off his debut solo album, he delivers these with his usual Mackem twang. His dry wit fills the gaps in between songs with various odd stories around how the songs were written about. ‘My Sugar’ is a particular highlight, written about that person who takes away all of your attention and saps all of your energy.

There are also some great covers of Tom Waits and Prince, we cannot help but grin from ear to ear throughout this set. We’re left waiting with baited breath for the release of Barry’s aforementioned solo album. We take a quick breather to catch some fresh air as the heat continues to rise.

As Hyde and Beast take to the stage the packed venue's temperature is off the scale, this shows on the band's faces from the off. Dave Hyde (Barry’s brother and fellow Futurehead) looks particularly warm at the helm of his side project. It's safe to say though that within moments of taking to the stage the whole crowd have forgotten about the heat and are fixated on the brilliant band in front of them.

Premièring tracks for their new LP Keep Moving, opening with new track ‘Blue’ it sees them picking up where their debut, Slow Down, left off. ‘Blue’ has a hefty paisley influence to it, a great way to kick proceedings off. ‘Pictures in the Sky’ sounds great, sparking a crowd sing-along whilst with the addition of extra layers of instrumentation, the old songs sound even better than ever.

‘You Will Be Lonely’ receives a similar transformation to ‘Pictures in the Sky'; there seems to have been a huge evolving of the Hyde and Beast sound in the time they’ve been away. Slow Down almost seemed to be them finding their feet in comparson. The tracks off Keep Moving see them now honing that sound and subsequently building on it. ‘A Dark Mistake’ really does stand out as being a highlight of the band's new output, exactly what we expect from a track with a title like that.

However, the only issue we take with this evening is the short set, we would have liked to hear everything that band had, despite that being rather greedy of us, but we were having such a great time and it was just a shame it had to end. We’re left waiting with baited breath as to what the new album will bring but on this first listen, Hyde and Beast are back with a truly awesome record that sees them building upon their previous success.