He’s still got some way to go before he reaches the stature of Takahiro Moriuchi, mind, the man ONE OK ROCK fans (and before that, fans of the Japanese boyband phenomenon NEWS) know as Taka. Spend five minutes with the man (we spend quite a bit more than that; we tell him he recently featured in K!’s 2017 edition of The 50 Greatest Rockstars In The World Right Now, he replies, “I hope I was placed high!”) and it quickly becomes apparent that Taka is a very big deal here.
It also quickly becomes apparent that what Takahiro Moriuchi wants, Takahiro Moriuchi gets. Not sure how Broco he is, but in Japan, he is definitely the Don.
“We’re here, and playing in these massive rooms, because ONE OK ROCK personally invited us,” says Rob with a smile brighter than the sun. “It was an incredible feeling to hear that this huge band knew about us, let alone wanted us to play with them. Taka is very clued in to the UK rock scene. He knows about Kerrang!. He knows about new and emerging bands. It’s testament to what an influence and impression British rock is making on the rest of the world that we’re on his radar…”
Celebrity endorsement or not, Don Broco deserve to feel proud of the part they’re playing in this. Tonight, performing in-front of a crowd who’ve never seen them before, they’re embraced like the headliners they will surely one day return as. Rob, now clad in a studded red leather jacket Michael Jackson might have rejected for being ‘a bit OTT’, races down the headline band’s ego ramp like he possesses the receipt for it. On his band’s dates with 5 Seconds Of Summer last year, Rob was told he wasn’t allowed to set foot on theirs. Taka personally told him he was fine to use his. Rob needs no encouragement: “Greetings, Osaka! We love you!” he bellows with the glee of a child eating a bowl of sugar on Christmas morning.
And what quickly becomes apparent over the course of this weekend is that Don Broco have, quite quietly, become the best pop-rock band in the world. In Superlove, they have a tune that knocks on the door. In Money Power Fame, they have one that says ‘hello’. In Everybody, one that kicks the door off its hinges if nobody is answering, and yet in Nerve, they have a slow, delicious, wet-throated anthem that will soon take them into room of this size without any assistance. Let it be known that a band that can write a song like Nerve is a band who can achieve anything.