Casey & The Nightmares @ Kulttempel (Oberhausen)

We are a band called Casey…again

This was the sentence everyone was longing to hear for 3,5 years. This show sold out within hours and the crowd was more than anticipating the return Casey.

Fellow countrymen and women The Nightmares opened this night. On a stage decorated with flowers,(electric) candles and music consisting of a mixture of Post Punk, Goth and Rock they set the bittersweet mood right. With their debut album on the horizon, The Nightmares played several new songs among their known material.

After round about 30 minutes, the black flowers were gone and The Nightmares surely made some new friends who like their candles scented and their music gloomy.

Casey entered the stage and their new EP Great Grief / Atone enlightened the faces of the crowd. Especially “Atone” will surely be a staple in the, hopefully, more upcoming shows in the future.

Casey continued with a block of Where I go When I Am Sleeping songs. This was and still is an emotionally very challenging album and even Tom Weaver was kind of relieved when the final notes of “The Funeral” were over. He said something like “Glad those difficult songs are out of the way”.

“Darling” gave the crowd a chance to breathe before another triplet of Where I Go When I Am Sleeping songs washed over the audience. “Bruise” has always been one of my favorite songs by them, so it was very special for me to hear it live for the first time.

For the last third of the show Casey dug deep in their discography and pleased the crowd songs of their first EP Fade and Love is not enough. “Fade” and “Hell” were greeted with crowd surfing bodies and a choir provided by the whole audience.

“Hell” and “Little Bird” concluded the show and the final words “One day you will ache like I ache” will surely ring in the ears of those who attended for weeks after this emotional night.

Casey being back feels like a “Back to the future” moment. Rewinding time to correct the fact that they just left too soon. Casey are a band again, period.

Setlist Casey:

Great grief
Atone
Phosphenes
&
Flourorescents
The funeral
Darling
Needlework
Morphine
Bruise
Happy
Haze
Fade
Where I go when I am sleeping
Hell
Little bird