Killswitch Engage brings heavy-hitting music and high energy to Old National Centre

Everyone knows the weekend is the best time to go out and have fun, and this is no exception for live music lovers. The Egyptian Room at Old National Centre in Indianapolis was packed full on Saturday, May 10th – probably one of the busiest shows I’d seen in this room so far. The energy was going before the bands ever got on stage, with fans excitedly waiting to see Killswitch Engage, Shadows Fall, Fit For A King, and Boundaries. It was a night that called for throwing water bottles, moshing, and many, many crowdsurfers – really putting the security guards to work.

Boundaries came out with a bang, their energy and music both hitting the room hard. While vocalist Matthew McDougal ran between both sides of the stage, bassist Nathan Calcago jumped all over his area, all while hitting the backup vocals right when needed. The band also started off the circle pit trend of the night, successfully getting a good portion of the front of the room into one. It was obvious they already had some fans in the room, and by the end of their set, there’s no doubt that they had even more. 

If you’ve never seen Fit For A King live, there’s still a chance you’ve seen videos of them, specifically of bassist Ryan “Tuck” O’Leary spinning in circles so fast it makes you dizzy to look at him. O’Leary’s antics weren’t the only thing that Fit For A King brought to the stage, with their heavy breakdowns, exciting guitar breaks, and impressively long-held screams backing up their energetic stage presence. The band also treated us to a live performance of their latest single, “No Tomorrow,” off their upcoming album, marking the second time it’d ever been performed live. The band expressed their love for Indianapolis specifically as well, not just in the way band’s tend to always say on stage, but mentioning the fact that after the pandemic lightened up they played four shows to get back into the swing of things and two of those shows were hosted at Hooiser Dome, our local, very tiny, DIY music venue. In honor of how much they loved this city, they dedicated the last song to the fans here in Indiana, telling everyone that their job for the song was to “move at least one person each.”

Shadows Fall told the room that they were there to party, and I can confidently say they got the energy amped up even higher than it was before. By the second song, vocalist Brian Fair had launched himself over the barricade and into the crowd, crowdsurfing a few feet away before coming back up to the barricade again. Fair’s antics got the crowd tossing water bottles in the air, and many, many people off their feet and into the air – more than 15 within just a few minutes if my counting was accurate. The party didn’t stop at the energy, though, as the band’s flashing colorful lights helped to set the vibe, along with multiple intense, intricate guitar breaks. The band didn’t leave the stage without one final trick, either, with Fair telling the crowd that for over a decade now he’d unsuccessfully been asking fans to buy him a tequila shot at the nearest bar in the room, crowdsurf him there and back, with enough time to take his shot and nail the vocals on time. I’m pleased to report that the 10-year-long failure streak was broken that night, with the Indianapolis crowd pulling it off flawlessly.

There are many places I could start with Killswitch Engage’s performance, so I’ll start with what anyone would notice first: the lighting. At many metalcore performances I’ve been to, bands tend to spend most of the time flooding the stage with solid color backlighting, and it can make everyone on stage turn into silhouettes, a great vibe for some bands performances, but can make it hard for fans further back in the crowd to track what’s going on onstage. Killswitch Engage, however, strayed far from this stereotypical lighting setup and instead brought something different to the stage. With colorful backlights, bright front lighting on the band members, and unique circular LEDs swirling and casting beams across the stage, it kept the performance colorful and beat-driven strobe lights effective, all while making it easy to see the physical aspects of the performance as well.

And those physical aspects certainly weren’t lacking, with Adam Dutkiewicz’s well-known humorous stage attire of the night being a sweatband with the word ‘beer’ embroidered into it, a pizza-decaled guitar, and a tank top boasting ‘I’m with stupid’ across the front of it, pointing towards whoever was unfortunate to be standing to his right. Aside from Dutkiewicz’s outfit adding its own level to the performance, the band members spent plenty of time running around the stage and onto each other’s sides, and vocalist Jesse Leach spent a portion of one song crowdsurfing. The crowd matched the energy in return, with an ever-growing circle pit taking up more and more of the room, more personal items getting tossed in the air, all while the crowdsurfers steadily continued flowing forward. 

Leach made sure to take time to talk with the crowd and to shout out many different groups in the room, starting with the security guards who were working hard to keep crowdsurfers safe and get those who got injured in the mosh pits out. The kids in the room also got a shoutout for continuing the scene – and one ‘tiny metalhead’ in particular got a shoutout for crowdsurfing the most out of anyone in the room. There was also a lengthy shoutout to all of the fans in the room, regardless of age. Leach discussed how much of a privilege it was to get on stage and do what they do every night, and how they’ve only been able to continue on Killswitch Engage’s 25-year legacy and expansion into new sounds because of them. Transitioning straight from the thanks, Leach announced to the room that they’d be the first to get to witness “Broken Glass” live – and that he hoped he “didn’t f*ck it up,” and I have to say that they pulled off the hard-hitting song just as if it was one they’d played a hundred times before.

Killswitch Engage isn’t slowing down on touring anytime soon, with a few more dates on this headliner run before joining in on the Summer of Loud festival-style tour throughout June and July and a European tour this fall. Head over to the band’s website to grab your tickets for whichever show is closest to you, and be sure to follow them on social media in case there’s anything else planned that’s yet to be announced.

Killswitch Engage setlist:

1. Strength of the Mind
2. Rose of Sharyn
3. Reckoning
4. Aftermath
5. Fixation on the Darkness
6. Numbered Days
7. This Is Absolution
8. Broken Glass (Live debut)
9. Hate by Design
10. Forever Aligned
11. The Signal Fire
12. I Believe
13. The Arms of Sorrow
14. In Due Time
15. This Fire
16. My Curse
17. The End of Heartache
18. My Last Serenade