Concert Reviews
The Hives played the House of Blues Friday, along with opening act The Chats.
Howlin’ Pelle Almqvist performs with his band The Hives, who are one of the opening bands for the Foo Fighters at Fenway Park in July 2024. Matthew J. Lee/Globe Staff
The Hives with The Chats, House of Blues on Friday.
When the Hives arrived on our shores a quarter of a century ago, they were immediately lumped in with the White Stripes, the Strokes and the Vines as indicative of a new wave of bands that showed that rock and roll was alive and thriving.
The Vines imploded almost immediately. The White Stripes carried on for a few more albums before serving as a launchpad for Jack White’s ongoing solo career. The Strokes soldiered on to diminishing returns.
And the Hives kept going. Sure, there was a 12-year gap between albums and a single lineup change — swapping out bassists, reportedly for health reasons — but the Swedish group has proven themselves the only ones of their matriculating class who seem devoted to their band for the long haul.
That was on glorious display Friday at the House of Blues, where the band played with the fervor and commitment of their young and hungry selves and the confidence and mastery of time-honed veterans.
Perhaps that was why the new songs that kicked off and ended the concert were met with all-in responses as if they were old favorites, indicating that the audience was there just as much for the Hives of as it was for the Hives of 2001.
Sure, the snarling chord riffs of “Hate To Say I Told You So” and the sharply scuzzy “Main Offender” were enthusiastically received. But no more so than the snarling chord riffs of opener “Enough Is Enough” and the call-and-response chanting of triumphant closer “The Hives Forever Forever The Hives,” both from the album the band released last year.
Stoking that fervor was frontman Howlin’ Pelle Almqvist, already a skilled master of ceremonies as a youngster and now seasoned to perfection.
Rotated just a degree or two, his self-aggrandizing hyping of his band — “Are you happy?,” he asked the crowd after a few songs, following up with “Well, you are now” — could have been smug and distancing.
But the Hives seemed to believe two things: that they are the best at what they do, and that that comes with a responsibility to prove it.
And with that, Almqvist’s slick puffery became generosity, a rock star assuring his audience that his band came to entertain.
“We have crossed oceans,” he declared. “We have slain dragons. We are foreign imports, so we have paid tariffs.”
He had the audience count backwards from 10 to lead into “Countdown To Shutdown,” then cut them off at 5 to yell “Shut up and clap your hands!”
The guitarists served much the same role as AC/DC’s Angus and Malcolm Young, with rhythm and lead swapped, with Vigilante Carlstroem serving as the steady anchor, as Nicholaus Arson’s twitchy, rhythmic attack and big-eyed, neck-snapping mugging made him the more tricksy showman.
The whole band froze dead for a good minute in the middle of “Paint A Picture.” And the stage was periodically visited by a roadie dressed in ninja garb, who banged the occasional tambourine or cowbell and constantly fed out and retracted the singer’s microphone cord so that it was precisely the right length as he stalked the stage and wandered into the crowd.
Despite such spectacle, the playing was as tight as a drum. There was zero space between the instruments in songs like “Tick Tick Boom” and the breakneck “O.C.D.O.D.” — they all seemed to have collapsed into one another.
“Bogus Operandi” moved in clipped swerves and the churning, propulsive stutter of “Roll Out The Red Carpet” wouldn’t have had nearly the impact if the players hadn’t been in lockstep.
Which meant that it ultimately didn’t matter that it wasn’t clear whether any of the Hives’ songs were anything more than authoritative-sounding nonsense or that Almqvist’s two-note range meant that he never really sang, just declaimed enthusiastically.
The material and the performances had power regardless, from the choppy discombobulation of “Walk Idiot Walk” to the groaning swing of “Stick Up.” The songs uniformly had a glare embedded in them and they seethed with aggression.
More than anything, the Hives promised its audience a good time, which is more than most bands ever do. Nearing the end, Almqvist gushed, “We love you! You love us!,” and they had worked hard to make it so. And as the Hives took their bows, Carly Simon’s “Nobody Does It Better” filled the air.
With their headlong riffage and screaming vocals, Australian openers the Chats were like the Hives taken purely on musical terms.
They spat out an appealing garage-y blast, with bassist and vocalist Eamon Sandwith looking like wiry punk aggression, drummer Matt Boggis looking bored and guitarist Josh Hardy looking like he had just rolled out of bed and playing like he was afraid he’d be late.
Marc Hirsh can be reached at [email protected] or on Bluesky @spacecitymarc.bsky.social.
Setlist for The Hives at House Of Blues — March 20, 2026
Enough Is Enough
Walk Idiot Walk
Rigor Mortis Radio
Paint A Picture
Main Offender
Born A Rebel
Roll Out The Red Carpet
Stick Up
Bogus Operandi
Hate To Say I Told You So
O.C.D.O.D.
Countdown To Shutdown
Come On!
Tick Tick Boom
ENCORE
Legalize Living
Bigger Hole To Fill
The Hives Forever Forever The Hives
Marc Hirsh is a music critic who covers a wide variety of genres, including pop, rock, hip-hop, country and jazz.
Sign up for the Today newsletter
Get everything you need to know to start your day, delivered right to your inbox every morning.
