Rival Schools – Leeds The Wardrobe 6th May 2025

The Wardrobe is a venue in the centre of Leeds which has a colourful history. Mainly known for playing host to comedy, but is also a wonderful venue for Yorkshire rockers to let their hair down and put on their dancing shoes. The venue gets it’s name from the fact that the building used to house the wardrobe department for the West Yorkshire Playhouse and you would often see actors in their costumes, after a fitting, ready for a rehearsal or performance in the theatre.

Tonight though, the venue is to host Rival Schools, a band that I hold a great fondness for and whose star was in the ascent when TotalRock was in it’s infancy in the early 2000’s. Led by Walter Schreifels, the New York hardcore legend who had previously fronted both Gorilla Biscuit and Quicksand, the band released one of the great albums of the decade, that started a new Millenium in a wonderful way. This album was United By Fate which sadly became the bands only proper release in August 2001 (a second album , Petals was released after the band had split up). This Leeds show had a secret gig feel about it, having not been included in tour adverts for the UK run.

The set begins with Wring It Out (which suitably fits the temperature of this room on a very warm May day) and is followed by 69 Guns and Everything Has It’s Point. The first thing you really notice is just how happy the band seem to be here, playing together again. High Acetate follows and starts a series of songs that have the crowd singing along to every word. One of the things that I am surprised by this evening is that there is a real mixture of ages in the audience, there being far more people in their twenties than I expected, considering they would have been toddlers when Rival Schools were around.

Shot After Shot, The Switch and My Echo all sound as wonderful as they did twenty odd years ago. Now I am not superstitious in the slightest but if I thought that thirteen is an unlucky number, any such ideas left me this evening when song number thirteen in tonight’s set list is Used For Glue. It is followed by two other classics from the United By Fate album, first Travel By Telephone followed by a truly awesome rendition of Good Things which has always been, in my humble opinion, Rival Schools’ greatest moment. All good things must come to an end and the band leave the stage with Hooligans For Sale. An evening with Rival Schools was like having a meal with an old friend and chatting about the old days….. I sincerely hope we get to reminisce about the good old days again!!!