The Lostprophets are back after a three year departure from the rock world. They are back to bring us the best in pretty-boy rock and roll, the glamour and style of  re-vamped nu-metal, the cock-sure swagger and razor sharp crunches that the UK have been without for too long. And all this happens in… Newport leisure Centre, f’in brill-iant!

This is the last night of their warm-up tour which will prepare them for their headlining appearance at the Give it a Name festival, and what a warm-up show this is: it is positively incinerating.

The Pontyprydd boys race through a relatively short set crammed with the rock genius that got them noticed (‘Fake Sound of Progress’) and the jagged pop that made them famous (‘Last Train Home’). But what the fans have been looking forward to is the 'prophets' long awaited new material, which is set to take them one step further to metal stardom. The new tunes are as radio friendly as their last batch of singles; ‘New Transmission’ sounds like their take on Franz Ferdinand, whereas ‘Town Called Hypocracy’ is full-blown catchy rawk. Only the imminent single ‘Rooftops’ spoils the show, especially when front-man Ian trains the crowd to sing the overly cheesy chorus. To say it’s bad doesn’t fairly warn the consumer…it’s kind of Mary Poppins bad, strange but unfortunately true.

The secret in the 'prophets' live success is not only their massive metal anthems, but their cheeky between-song banter, which actually becomes massively endearing as the band introduce their parents who are all cheering from the back. It’s so refreshing that such a glitzy metal band can successfully warm a crowd of riff-crazed teenagers. In essence, it’s so very Welsh.

This very short set tonight shows that the boys from Ponty are going to, yet again, dominate Radio 1, take over the British festival scene and basically just take the UK by storm.
(4/5) 

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