Boston hardcore band Haywire became underground heroes by playing endless numbers of wild live shows. They maintain an insanely busy touring schedule, and they've also got a habit of playing guerrilla-style sets in places where bands don't usually play, or jumping on smaller regional shows at the last minute. But when Haywire tried to play a pop-up set in the middle of Times Square, the NYPD wasn't having it.
Earlier this month, Haywire released I Don't Wanna Say Goodbye, their second album and their first for bigger label Roadrunner. They've already made crazy videos for the singles "Interstate Love Affair" and "Sincerely Yours," and their Times Square set was supposed to be a shoot for another video. The band reportedly announced the set on Instagram story just an hour before it was supposed to take place on Wednesday night, posting a photo of the location and its longitude and latitude coordinates.
A few hundred fans and friends showed up for some mosh madness, but the band only played a song and a half before police stormed in and shut everything down. Per Setlist.fm, Haywire got through a performance of the I Don't Wanna Say Goodbye track "Flex Your Head," then launched into the anthemic singalong that's just called "Haywire." During that song, police stormed in, shoving moshers around and forcing them to disperse. One cop took the sticks right out of the drummer's hands.
But Haywire's publicist tells us that there were no arrests, thankfully. The happy irony, of course, is that Haywire probably got much better footage from that than they would've had if cops just let them finish what would've almost certainly been an extremely brief set. I'm sure that was not the most disruptive thing happening in Times Square at that exact moment.
You can see the footage for yourself below. I Don't Wanna Say Goodbye is out now on Roadrunner. Next month, Haywire will hit a couple of US festivals before heading off on an Australian tour.
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