Against Me! - 23 Live Sex Acts (Album Review)

Against Me! have made damn sure that ‘23 Live Sex Acts’ is a career spanning insight into their live show and, although at some points a little rough around the edges, it’s genuine and honest, choosing the warts and all approach over a slick, edited sheen.  The band have been touring almost constantly for the last two years, since the release of ‘Transgender Dysphoria Blues’, and it makes perfects sense for them to frame a snapshot of this moment in their career.

FUCKMYLIFE666 gets things off to a strong start, with Laura Jane Grace’s guttural vocals and pitch-perfect backing by James Bowman receiving welcoming applause. Pints Of Guinness Make You Strong continues to showcase Grace and Bowman’s complementary harmonies and the tongue rolls as Grace sings “Irish” give it a cheeky twist.

As always, it stirs uneasy feelings to hear a crowd so rapturously dive into a song with the lyrics: “If I would have known how things would have ended up, I just would have let myself die.” But that’s what Against Me! do best: wrap dark subject matter in a singalong.

Cliché Guevera keeps the relentless momentum going and the introduction to True Trans Soul Rebel, concise and profound - “This song is about celebrating gender variation as a thing of beauty.”- is a statement that will resonate for years to come.

You can hear the bile in every word Grace sings during Black Me Out and I Was A Teenage Anarchist, bile that continues to flow during an argument with a security guard that interrupts New Wave and illustrates just how off the rails an Against Me! show can get.

Turn Those Clapping Hands Into Angry Balled Fists would have been a good choice as the closer and the same is true of The Ocean. But the band have different plans and continue, at an unabated pace, to smash through song after song. There are moments of excellence and lulls - notably a lower-key Thrash Unreal - that could have been omitted. But that’s the journey of a live show. Against Me! have stayed true to it.

We caught up with Laura Jane Grace and Atom Willard at Reading Festival to discuss the new Against ME! record. Check out the interview here. 

Against Me Upcoming Tour Dates are as follows

Fri September 25 2015 - SANTA ANA California - Observatory (USA)
Sat September 26 2015 - MESA Arizona - Nile Theater - AZ (USA)

Click here to compare & buy Against Me Tickets at Stereoboard.com.

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