2003 may only have been seven years ago, but in the music business it’s a helluva long time. It also feels like a lifetime ago that Funeral For A Friend first burst onto the scene with two well-received EPs before releasing Casually Dressed And Deep In Conversation, an impressive collection of pop-punk influenced hard rock songs tinged with metallic riffage and Maiden-inspired leads to a rapturous public. If you and your friends where into the heavier side of music around this time, it was the album to have, and FFAF where the very definition of cool. Seven years have passed, and with founder member and guitarist Darrran Smith on his way out to concentrate on family life, playing the band’s most successful record in its entirety seems as fitting a send off as you could get. Tonight, Cardiff has turned out in full force for this special event, along with support from Young Guns and local boys The Automatic. Both sets are well received but are simply a distraction until the main event.

It’s clear from the opening notes of Rookie of the Year that FFAF are determined to give Darran a decent send-off, and go about proceedings with an extra spring in their step. This only adds fuel to an already excited crowd, with the first ten rows a sea of jumping, singing bodies. The dedication on offer is obvious from the beginning, as every single word of the album is sung back with force at frontman Matt Davies with aplomb. Crowd favourite and emo-anthem Juneau comes and goes early on as the setlist dictates, which certainly saves any over-eager idiots from screaming for it to be played for an hour, but oddly enough, the highlights of this first set are the more reflective, restrained moments. Inparticular, Davies’ and Ryan Richards’ acoustic rendition of Your Revolution Is A Joke sends shivers up the spine, and the set-closing Novella is as visceral, emotional and moving as the band have ever sounded. As the band head for a quick break before beginning the second half of the evening’s festivities, you can’t help but think of the album’s impact upon its release along with its lasting effect here. It’s a record that has stood the test of time, and on the basis of tonight, it’s not in danger of being forgotten any time soon.

The rest of the evening was dedicated to celebrating the band’s career as a whole, so we were treated to more recent singles such as Into Oblivion and Wrench along with songs truly for the hardcore/older fans in the audience in the shape of The Art Of American Football. Looking out at some of the front row, you couldn’t help but wonder if some of them were even teenagers when FFAF released that thrash-inspired romp. The second half of the set helped to confirm just what a great catalogue of songs this band has, even if they haven’t enjoyed such levels of success and popularity since the heights of the Casually Dressed days. A penultimate and anarchic run through This Year’s Most Open Heartbreak, with guest vocals from Bullet For My Valentine’s Matt Tuck provided yet another ping of nostalgia, before the evening comes to a close with a slow, soaring rendition of History. Perhaps the perfect send-off for the departing Smith, a signal for the end of one chapter and the beginning of another in the history of one of the UK’s most beloved rock bands.

Iwan Lehnert