To return to stage, the Outsiders have traveled a tumultuous road.
The Mesa-based metalcore outfit was riding high in early 2020 after playing an opening set for Gilbert’s Scary Kids Scaring Kids and guitarist Besart Sezairi was plotting a headlining gig when the world shut down.
“It was interesting because we had a lot of momentum and that came to a stop,” Sezairi says.
Drummer Jacob Coleman was devastated.
“When shows began to get canceled, it felt like a part of me had died,” he says. “One of my favorite things to do is play shows.”
They spent the beginning of the pandemic soul searching and bonding by playing hours of video games. Still, they couldn’t shake the urge to put their instruments back in their hands.
“After a year, we started going crazy and we wondered what we could do,” says Sezairi, an alum of Willow Canyon High School in Surprise. “It was the first time where we’ve had to practice patience.”
The band faced a conundrum of how to release tracks while the future of live music was uncertain.
“We then had to ask ourselves if we should put songs out with the risk of them being old by the time we were able to play them live again,” Sezairi says.
The Outsiders became proactive.
“We’ve been using this year to show everything we’ve been working on during the two years we couldn’t play shows,” says Coleman, a graduate of Glendale’s Mountain Ridge High School.
Deep dive
During the pandemic, the Outsiders honed their skills outside of music. Bassist Don Harris took up photography, and Coleman learned to edit videos.
Sezairi and producer Ryan Daminson continued to run their studio, StudioGoest in Mesa. Sezairi utilized Twitch to create content for himself and gauge if the band would benefit from it.
Then came the moment the band had been waiting for: its first show in over two years, supporting the California-based metal outfit Thousand Below on June 1 at The Rebel Lounge.
“It’s not as taboo anymore to go to a show,” Coleman says. “The fear behind that is beginning to relax and we were all aligned in that we would know when it would be the right time to play a show.”
However, June seemed like a ways off. So, they booked an April 9 show at Tempe Marketplace supporting The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus. With that show behind them, the Outsiders are looking forward to continuing the momentum it had early 2020.
“We discussed, in coming back, making the music we want,” Sezairi says. “Everyone in this band is so versatile in what they can play so it’s like, ‘Why just do one thing?’”
The setlist will be evidence of that by, for example, pairing the band’s staples “Escape” and “Griever” with new and unreleased material.
“There’s not a single moment of downplay in our setlist, it’s 22 minutes of straight killer, no filler,” he says.
“I do think that there’s a little bit of everything for everybody in these songs and I just want to show everybody everything we’ve worked on,” Coleman adds with a grin.
Sezairi says there’s a sweet spot in opening for a headline act.
“As direct support, you have to get people amped up and get them loose and ready for the headliner,” Sezairi says.
“I think people have this negative connotation about opening a show. But, in my opinion, if you can’t be a good opener, you can never be a good headliner. If you can’t start the show off right, how can you finish it?”
Besides energizing the crowd, Sezairi is excited to step on stage with his best friends and play to an audience he considers family.
“People can expect to see four dudes smiling and having fun,” he says. “We’re very inclusive to people who hang out and watch us. There is a family of people who come to our shows who we’ve grown really close to. I’m excited to start doing that again.”
Thousand Below with Outsiders, Foreign Bodies and Constellations
WHEN: 7 p.m. Wednesday, June 1
WHERE: The Rebel Lounge, 2303 E. Indian School Road, Phoenix
COST: $16
INFO: outsidersband.com, therebellounge.com
