A weekend with The Maine

Hello everyone,
as we all know, I'm fairly emo. I get v. emosh about many things, from dogs to books to bands. One thing in particular that's made me emo since my early teens is a band (or Arizona Emo Group if you prefer) by the name of The Maine. I haven't seen this band live since 2010 so you can imagine that the emo scale did increase by 8123 (get it?). I had the absolute time of my life these past few days and so I wanted to write about it, so I can always remember and relive it.
The story starts in Birmingham, which is the place I first saw them live in (when I was smaller and less emo, but only slightly). As it always does, it rained from the moment I stepped out of the coach station and to the moment I got in my front door. What's interesting, and by interesting I mean HELLA EMO about this tour is that The Maine are on tour with Mayday Parade and that's the same tour (though it was co headlining the first time) I saw them on in 2010. It was as though the emo circle pit came rushing at full force.
I went to the Birmingham gig alone because I had nobody else to go with and I was under no circumstances going to miss out on another of their  tours. I'd seen their merch online so was already decided on what I wanted to buy; a physical copy of American Candy, a pack of patches and a shirt that I've wanted for sO LONG, which says 'fry your brain with The Maine' on it. By the time I got inside, Have Mercy were already on stage and my Tesco value vodka was working its magic. The Maine came out to check their sound and I made a noise that probably could never be redone. I was not ready but they were. English Girls was the opening track, pushing you to dance and I'm guessing punny because they're on the UK and Ireland slot of the tour. Over the first few shows they'd switched the setlist up playing My Heroine and Run but oh no, they decided to play Growing Up in Birmingham and I felt the emo of 2010 swell in my stomach. They're my favourite band for many reasons but I think the most important one is the way they push positivity onto the crowd. There sets are so carefree and invite you to leave your worries to one side, to enjoy the moment, dance, sing and embrace happiness. For so long, their shows and albums were my only happy place and it was so overwhelming to revisit that again.

I'm going to fast forward to Manchester now and try to reduce the likelihood of this being the longest, emoest entry in history. I had been filming little snippets to make a vlog of the weekend but my editing keeps crashing and I am not so free with time at the moment.
Manchester was different because I actually got to experience the gig with humans I know. I also drank a little more than I would like to have, to the point where: I lost my jacket, dropped my phone and had it given back to me, cried over how emo the Maine make me whilst in the toilet after their set. The show was even more special because I got to meet my favourite band for the first time since 2010. A lot of stuff has changed in that time- friendships, work life, education, positivity. It's so emotionally overwhelming to think that The Maine are one of few things that have retained permanent in my life. I got to tell Kennedy how emo I was, Pat how much I wish they could do more headline tours, Jared how cold I was (BECAUSE I LOST MY JACKET) and John I just about managed a hello, how are you, thank you for still being a band conversation (mainly because at this point my bladder was giving up on me). I've thought about how much I want them to do another headline tour a lot recently but something I've come to realise is that they could perform their entire discography, and I would still need another seventeen hours of them. I don't think it's possible to express in words, or any other methods of communication how much I love this band, their music, their sound, their ideology for lack of a better term. I don't want it to be another five and a half years before I see them again, I just know I want to still be feeling this way for the next fifty years at least.
Thank you for reading this post, as always,
Love
Aimee :) X (ENJOY THIS EMO GLO UP)