Animals As Leaders performing The Joy Of Motion at The Roundhouse, London, 15.03.2025

I approached The Roundhouse on a very crisp Saturday evening after a casual stroll across Camden, battling the Camden weekend crowds (and pain from my freshly tattooed arm), silently cursing myself that the morning sunshine fooled me into putting on a lighter jacket. However as I got there, way ahead of advertised doors, and noticed the tail of the queue – I was also overjoyed to see we were already being let into the venue. Such was the excitement of the fans of prog, jazz, djent, metal in general (and Tosin Abasi). A passer by approached me as I waited for a friend and asked ‘why is everyone queueing? what’s happening here today?’ and when I replied ‘Animals As Leaders are playing’ – she nodded knowingly and went on her way.

The Roundhouse is a stunning venue – it’s only 1500 capacity, but has an air of space much grander. However as soon as the doors to the main space opened, it started to fill up with fans donning their band merch and ‘djent is not a genre’ Periphery hoodies. Warming us up for the night were Night Verses.

The Californian trio were the perfect opener for Animals As Leaders – technically incredibly impressive and incredibly tight, presenting great focus amidst the ever changing time signatures. However if this makes you thing ‘sounds like your typical prog night’, I will ask you this – have you ever seen a drummer jump over their drum kit? I have witnessed many a guitar jump in my tenure as a music photographer, but a drummer jump must have been a first for me. It’s very easy to make technically difficult prog a chin-stroking and shoe-gazing experience for the crowd, but Aric Improta knows how to spice things up from behind the drums, and is also front a centre of the stage, putting on a fearless drumming spectacle. To add texture to a fully instrumental performance, the band cleverly uses samples and elements of spoken word to allow the audience to fully immerse in their world. And the crowd was loving every note. Near the end of the set, we all belted out ‘Happy Birthday’ – and because the crowd were roaring, I couldn’t tell whether it was for Reilly Herrera or Nick DePirro! Before finishing their set with ‘No. 0’ with a yet another over the drums jump from Aric, Night Verses mentioned they will be back on their own headline tour in September – I will be seeing you there!

Then it was time for Animals As Leaders to perform The Joy Of Motion in full for its tenth anniversary and from the opening notes of ‘Kascade’ is became imminent how seminal and important that album was to the 1500-strong crowd. There was an overwhelming sense of camaraderie, community and plain and simple good vibes in the air, and it emanated both from the audience as well as from the stage. Tosin Abasi was full of smiles, and throwing horns back at the room. The front row was simply giddy with excitement. Among some of the heckles I heard was ‘Tosin, how did you get so good?!’

When The Joy Of Motion came out back in 2014, it was widely lauded as Animals As Leaders’s return to form – and then some. After initially blowing everyone’s minds with the eponymous debut, back when Animals As Leaders was Tosin’s solo project, the band expanded with the addition of Javier Reyes, the jazz and prog virtuoso, joining Tosin on the second 8-string guitar and proving their mastery on sophomore Weightless. With the final addition on Matt Garstka on drums, The Joy Of Motion – and the band as we now know it – was born. And it was clear as day that after a decade in people’s ears the album is just as much loved now as it was then. My favourite moment was hearing the audience sing along to the riffs, which proves how much emotion and passion is shared among the prog / metal / djent community. It was also amazing to see how diverse is the band’s following – proving the point that if you can see it you can be it.

With it being the anniversary tour of playing the album start to finish, the room felt like a warm hug, everyone gathered together under the warm blanket of familiar riffs, however technically complex and impressive. Such is the admiration for The Joy Of Motion that if you wanted to apply a meter to measure which song got the loudest cheers, it would be near impossible – but ‘Lippincott’, ‘Tooth and Claw’ and ‘Physical Education’ were standouts. I also don’t believe I have ever seen a crowd surfer at The Roundhouse, and it’s genuinely incredible to see people crowd surf to some of the most complex jazz/prog/metal fusion ever known to humanity.

The sheer energy of the room would not let the trio from Washington DC leave the stage after the last notes of ‘Nephele’. The roars of ‘one more song’ weren’t in vain and Tosin, Javier and Matt soon returned to riff us off with ‘Micro-Aggressions’, ‘Red Miso’, ‘Monomyth’ and ‘Gordian Naught’ from their latest LP Parrhesia (2022) – an truly impressive encore, solidifying Animals As Leaders as the true masters of musicianship, but also a glue that united a truly wonderful, diverse bunch of humans. As I was walking out of the photo pit, I got asked by a man in his 50s to take a photo of him and his mate – there must have been at least a decade and a half between them, but none of that matters. This is why Animals As Leaders went down such a treat at ArcTanGent – they appeal to people who truly see no barriers between musical genres, but who cultivate their open minds and the sense of community that can only come with worshipping the most technically impressive band there is.