A Day To Remember rounded up their first headline tour in over a decade last night at the Brisbane Entertainment Centre and honestly, it was hands down the most fun I’ve had in awhile. I’ve seen A Day To Remember more times than I can count and it’d undeniably difficult to not have a good time at the shows. The Big Rock Tour was no different.
French metalcore rising stars LANDMVRKS landed the highly coveted opening slot tonight. Hailing from Marseille, the five-piece have been steadily building a reputation across Europe’s festival circuit, and it’s easy to see why. Their brand of metalcore hits with the weight of a freight train. Packing their set with thunderous breakdowns, a couple of well-earned wall of deaths and a circle pit thrown in for good measure, the band’s chaotic, visceral blend of Euro-metal did exactly what an opener should: it warmed up the pit and left the crowd wanting more.
Papa Roach tonight were on another level compared to their last show at the Fortitude Music Hall two years ago. With an upgraded venue came an upgraded experience. Vocalist Jacoby Shaddix wasted no time making it personal, doing a full lap of the arena to get up close with fans before rallying the crowd into one, momentum-fuelled circle pit to up the ante even further. The energy was relentless. Shaddix’s stage presence remains elite. Commanding, charismatic, and completely at ease in a room this size, and the band matched him at every turn. The nu-metal party was very real tonight, and fans were sent off with something to look forward to, as Papa Roach closed out with punchy new track ‘Braindead‘, set to arrive on a new record this September.
It’s hard to have a bad time at an A Day To Remember show, and the Big Rock Tour delivered the finale of finales. Brisbane fans were hyped and ready from the moment the lights dimmed and the lighting rig danced above them. As soon as the band let rip with ‘The Downfall of Us All’, the floor was relentless. ‘I’m Made of Wax, Larry’ and ‘2nd Sucks’ kept the good vibes nonstop, highlighting a celebration of the band’s 20-plus years in the game and unlocking a core memory of growing up in your early twenties, when late-night study sessions were crammed in between spending late nights at local shows and the club.
A Day To Remember deserve some kind of award for deploying the maximum number of confetti cannons humanly possible in the span of an hour. Sustainability, apparently, is not a concern in 2026. New tracks like ‘Flowers‘ and ‘LeBron‘ were a welcome addition, bringing fresh energy and proving the band still have plenty to say as they evolve. The traditional crowd-surfing beach ball got a fun reinvention too, with the addition of a basketball hoop game that sparked some unnecessary, but very entertaining heat between both sides of the pit.
‘If It Means a Lot to You’ in a phone-lit arena was a genuinely magical experience, even if it did open with a subtle tongue-in-cheek nod to Nickelback’s ‘Photograph’. As Jeremy McKinnon laid down the law and announced that encores are no longer a thing, ‘All Signs Point to Lauderdale’ brought the evening and the Big Rock Tour to a close in a shower of green and white streamers. Smiles were on every face walking out of the venue, a sure sign that this was undeniably 2026’s best show of the year so far.
Review by Tamara May
