concert review: Real Friend’s emotional night in Boston.
november, 25th 2024 • the paradise rock club • boston, massachusetts
full gallery can be found here
Real Friends is also a pop punk/emo band that formed in 2010 in Illinois. The band currently consists of members Kyle Fasel (bass), Dave Knox (guitar), Brain Blake (drums), Eric Haines (guitar), and Cody Muraro (vocals). The group is signed to Pure Noise Records and takes inspiration for their sounds from groups like American Football, Dashboard Confessional, and Jimmy Eat World. The group released their debut Ep This Is Honesty in 2011. At first the group struggled to find their sound; the first Ep they released didn’t feel right to them and they worked on finding a sound they all felt strong about.
Real Friends have released multiple Eps and around seven studio albums over the 13 years of them being a band — Put Yourself Back Together (2013), Maybe This Place Is The Same and We’re Just Changing (2014), The Home Inside My Head (2016) and Composure in 2018. In 2020 the groups longtime frontman and singer Dan Lambton stepped away from the group and Youth Fountain singer Cody Muraro stepped in. The group has released two albums since the wonderful and successful addition of Cody; Torn in Two in 2021, There’s Nothing Worse Than Too Late on February 24th, 2023, and their most recent release was album Blue Hour that was released in October of this year. It was their first release not on a label. The album includes singles “Waiting Room” and “When You Were Here.”
Some of their well known songs include “I’ve Given Up On You” off of Put Yourself Back Together (2013), “Get By” and “From the Outside” off of Composure (2018).
Due to life events in 2020, I had accidentally stopped listening to a lot of the music I held dearly to my heart, Real Friends unfortunately being one of them. When sitting down to listen to their last two albums and ep, Cody’s voice instantly pulled me back in. Live, his stage presence was looming, but in an extremely powerful and positive way. His voice and delivery matches up perfectly with the songs and you can tell the whole band know how to work very well with each other. During their song “Teeth,” Cody came down into the crowd and performed the entire tear-jerking song. He was surrounded by lit up phones and the audience in a circle around him, singing in unison. It was a very beautiful scene to witness. He also did this for the entirety of “I’ve Given Up on You".
Real Friends is a band that has gone through many changes in their lifetime, but they have never once dipped in quality. I was lucky to be able to see them last December when they were on tour with Knuckle Puck, One Step Closer and Arm’s Length. That show was what pulled me back into their music and I’m very thankful for that. Even though he already seemed to be comfortable and a perfect addition for the band last time around, you could really see how well Cody fits in with the band. Their shows are always electric and tonight was no different. I actually flew back from Los Angeles earlier today and although I felt dead on my feet and I was more than eager to attend the show. I know what album I’ll be listening to on repeat for the foreseeable future.
