Highly Suspect has been building toward something for a while now, and The Tour of Yellow Roses feels like the moment it’s all clicking into place. The band rolled into Harrisburg’s XL Live once again on a night that had most of the city sheltering indoors during a rainy holiday weekend, but a sold-out crowd packed the room regardless, primed by an energetic opening set from Dead Poet Society that had the floor moving well before the headliners took the stage.
The set spanned their full discography, hitting the newer singles – “Yellow Roses XL,” “Big Shop of Horrors,” and “Wasted” – without abandoning the deeper cuts that built their fanbase. Lead singer Johnny Stevens came out with a game plan: a rose for every crowd surfer that made it to the stage, a gimmick that immediately turned the floor into a relay race that didn’t let up for the rest of the night. “Lydia” drew one of the loudest singalongs of the evening, with the room screaming back every word, before a surprise guest appearance – introduced only as “Yungblud” – joined the band to close it out and sounded pretty similar to the real deal if you pretended a bit. Harrisburg has turned up lately for shows and Highly Suspect was no different as mosh pits opened early with crowd surfers flowing over nonstop.
Midway through the set, Stevens took a moment to address the crowd directly, speaking to the importance of the community they’ve built around the band and making clear there’s no room for hate in it. It was the kind of thing that could come off as rehearsed, but landed genuinely given how the night had unfolded around it. The band looked like they were exactly where they wanted to be.
Highly Suspect continue The Tour of Yellow Roses through the beginning of June before shifting to the summer festival circuit – be sure to catch them now before you miss these intimate shows. This band is destined for bigger things yet.
Highly Suspect Tour
