The first time I saw 5 Seconds of Summer play live was at my very first concert, ever. It was on One Direction’s Where We Are Tour, and I remember knowing all of the words to every song in both sets. I had asked my best friend in middle school to burn me a copy of 5 Seconds of Summer’s EP they had just released onto a CD for me, and listened to it over and over again. I knew every deluxe track, and could list the writers for each song. I had a huge crush on Ashton (5SOS) and Harry (1D), and I remember reading the lyric booklets and loving the album art, one that looked a lot like the doodles I would draw in class. At the end of the show, I ran to the front of my section near the confetti for the last song.
Looking back, it is so embarrassing that I’m admitting to all of this, but it was also a bit crazy that I got to see both bands in the same show, with both bands meaning so much to both pop culture and to me growing up.
5 Seconds of Summer (or 5SOS) is an Australian pop rock band. Formed in Sydney in 2011, the group consists of lead vocalist and rhythm guitarist Luke Hemmings, lead guitarist Michael Clifford, bassist Calum Hood, and drummer Ashton Irwin. The boys initially rose to fame uploading videos onto YouTube, where they would play mainly acoustic covers. They then had an explosion of popularity when One Direction member Louis Tomlinson tweeted them and said, “Been a fan of this band for a while, everyone get behind them” and took them as an opening act on their tour.
5SOS went on to become the only band in chart history to see its first three full-length studio albums enter the Billboard 200 at No. 1, and since then, the band has released three more studio albums. They are currently touring their most recent record, Everyone’s A Star!, and I was able to stop by their Los Angeles show at The Kia Forum (you can read my review from their last show at The Forum in 2023 here).
The set started off with a video of them being mock interviewed, and asked, “Now, can you tell me … what was it like being in the biggest boy band in the world?” where Hemmings dryly, yet very seriously, remarked, “It was big.” It then segued into a montage of them detailing their “biggest” show at The Kia Forum, as if it were a documentary of the band, ending in a screen that said “IT WOULD BE THEIR FINAL PERFORMANCE.”
It then cut to them inside of a car, where the first notes of their single “NOT OK” started to play. The video cut, and they then started coming out of the top of a white car in the middle of the stage.
“Inside every one of us, a shadow side, I call it my better side, I call it the call-me-up-if-you-wanna-feel-better side,” Hemmings sings, “I’ll put on my suit and tie to emphasize, you and I together, double homicide, let’s ride.”
The band then played a few of their older hits, such as “Teeth,” “Easier,” and “She’s Kinda Hot,” as well as songs from their recent record including “Boyband,” “No. 1 Obsession,” and “istillfeelthesame.” They also gave a unique nod to each other during a section where they played a song from one of their solo records, starting with “Starting Line” (Hemmings), going into “Have U Found What Ur Looking For?” (Irwin), “Don’t Forget You Love Me (Hood), and ending with “enough” (Clifford). The band then played an acoustic version of fan favorite “Amnesia.”
5SOS normally has a part of the set where the audience votes on which song they want the band to play as a surprise song, but Clifford said, “Tonight, we get to pick. Because this is our hometown show and we don’t want you to fuck this up for us,” and the audience laughed. “We need you to be so fucking excited no matter what song it is,” Clifford said, pointing to a briefcase. The briefcase opened, and it said “What I Like About You,” a cover the band did in 2014 on the She Looks So Perfect EP, the very one I had my friend burn for me all those years ago.
They played my favorite song, “Voodoo Doll,” among a few older cuts toward the end of the show, which also included “English Love Affair,” and their breakout hit, “She Looks So Perfect.” Before the song, they showed another video of them having to relearn how to be a boy band, which included learning the punk jump (a move beloved by fans of both 5SOS and bands of the past where the band jumps in unison with their legs kicked to the side). During the peak of the “hey”s in “She Looks So Perfect,” I’m happy to report that they executed it flawlessly.
“We started this in Australia a long time ago, and to be here 15 years later…,” Hemmings joked about how old it made him feel, then earnestly said, “Thank you so much for having us.”
More than a decade ago, I asked my best friend in middle school to burn me a CD.
Man, I feel old too.
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