First one that springs to mind is Rolo Tomassi supporting Future of the Left. Quite brave of FOTL to have them as support considering how ferocious they are live. Both bands nailed it that night
Saw Mars Volta supporting Les Savy Fav in 2002 ish and they were both amazing.
I also saw Groop Dogdrill supporting Therapy? around 1998 when they were my two favourite bands.
This is great but how is it happening without Tim Taylor?
Saw so many great bands supporting Therapy?
Cop Shoot Cop, Whipping Boy, Kerbdog, Ash, Sliverfish. Theyāre a GBOL.
Definitely two of the best for me were Dif Juz supporting the Cocteau Twins at the Ulster Hall in 1986, they were probably better than the main act on that occasion. And Dirty Three supporting PJ Harvey at the Barrowlands in 1998, knew nothing about them and they totally blew me away! Although I think Warren may have been part of the Bad Seeds when I saw them the previous year but didnāt connect the two.
Well, quite
You can enjoy us all being baffled and sort of figuring it out here:
Hell is for Heroes opening for Feeder at the Barras
Dananananaykroyd & Holy Fuck both supporting Foals. Barras again.
Franz Ferdinand supporting Fiery Furnaces, QMU and you could tell they were onto something.
Friendly Fires opening for Interpol at the Academy.
Saw The Killers supporting Stellastarr* at Tuts and they were really excellent. Coincidentally was only there because Iād seen Stellastarr* open for Ash a few months before that and thought they were great too.
Saw Pup in the Old Blue Last support Nai Harvest when NH decided they wanted to be a boring college rock band rather than an emo band. Pup completely blew them out the water and loads of people of people left half way through their set
Probably Olivia Tremor Control supporting Gorkys Zygotic Mynci
Mount Eerie & O Paon supporting Earth.
The only time I can think of that I went to a gig to see the support rather than the headliner was Coldplay supporting Muse at the Leadmill in 2000. Shiver had come out and Yellow was getting some airplay and it was kinda clear that Coldplay were going to get big. And they were really great at that time. Seeing Muse was a nice bonus but I think they had technical problems or something and I remember them being pretty mardy.
Lol - only six weeks off the pace thenā¦
I remember going to see Add N to (x) at portsmouth wedgewood rooms and the supports were Appliance and Hovercraft, as part of a Mute Records thing. Dragged a couple of schoolfriends to it. Applicance were a fun Krautrock thing and Hovercraft just played post rock / noise in front of a screen showing atom bombs exploding. My mate bought an Appliance t shirt, and I bought a Hovercraft t shirt. Not entirely sure Iāve ever listened to a note of Hovercraft since.
Saw Aereogramme supporting Thursday and Hell is for Heroes, both around 2004/5, great both times
Really enjoyed Poison the Well supporting DEP at the Forum around 2005 too
Prong supporting Faith No More
Hole supporting Mudhoney
Silverfish and Swervedriver supporting Soundgarden
CopShootCop supporting Therapy?
Gallon Drunk supporting Therapy?
Elastica supporting Trumanās Water
Death In Vegas supporting Primal Scream (on the XTRMTR tour, donāt listen to either bands now but is still one of the best gigs Iāve ever seen)
The Field and the Bug supporting Fuck Buttons
Flat Worms and Beak supporting (Thee)OhSees
There must be more
I also saw that Clem Snide and Andrew Bird combo tour. Mine was in Nottingham. Although I was such a big Clem Snide fan that they still ended up being my favourite of the night, although he was still very good.
I collected a story from him afterwards. I just remember saying that I was very impressed by his whistling, and then him saying thank you.
The National opening for Clap Your HSY. The National were supposed to headline this tour but the latter were cresting the wave of their brief Pitchfork-fueled moment in the sun, so they swapped spots on the bill.
TBF the National killed it (probably fueled by spite) and CYHSY showed up really late, several of them were rather drunk, and they were a bit shit.
What a bizarre plan. Like who would be able to make that decision to switch, the label or something?
Phoebe Bridgers (about 8 months before SITA was released) supporting Conor Oberst (who was touring Ruminations)
Bord Gais There, Dublin.
Amazing stuff. Very nice venue too.
Dry Cleaning supporting Bodega at the Portland in Cambridge, 2018 maybe? Just a fucking phenomenal gig all-round, tbh.
Also, a weird one but Nervous Conditions supporting, uh, I forget who. Same venue, a year or two previous. The singer turned out to be an abusive dickhead so absolutely fuck him, but the rest of the band went on to be Black Country, New Road, and Karl from Underworld was in the audience.