Killswitch Engage (W/ Hatebreed, Fit For An Autopsy & Decapitated) – Leeds, O2 Academy 13th October 2025

October 2025 will be the month universally acknowledged as a complete maelstrom of tours. Be that Architects and Parkway Drive wrecking shop in arenas within the same week, Bleed From Within blazing their latest path from the top of the UK to the bottom, or the hall of fame worthy Testament/Obituary co-headline romping through Great Britain. With all that in mind, there is still no bill in the UK as unbelievably stacked as Killswitch Engage’s run through our shores. Never in doubt of selling out, the lineup of Killswitch, Hatebreed, Fit For An Autopsy and Decapitated descended upon Leeds.

Decapitated

You know you are in for a neckache when Decapitated is your opening act. The uniqueness of each band on this bill meant for a heavily varied crowd. It also meant there were many eager heads showing out for the 6:45 start for Decapitated’s set. The calmness that the group walk on stage with is very instantly dashed as they open a gate to hell with ‘Cancer Culture’ from their most recent album, and they continue with 2022’s material into ‘Just Another Cigarette’. They test the fans with some slightly older material from Anticult with ‘Earth Scar’ as well as Nihility with ‘Spheres of Madness’, which is also a trial for the ears as the bass and drums from Pasek and Stewart respectively creates an overwhelming rumble. New frontman Eemeli Bodde certainly justifies his spot at centre stage, almost a year to the day since he took on the role.

“Vogg” Kiełtyka is a stoic presence on stage right, rarely moving from his place on the floor, but with hands like a flurry. He’s notably muttering the words throughout ‘Suicidal Space Programme’ as they return to the Cancer Culture album with such passion but also ease that you can visibly see the band are living and breathing this record since its release a couple years back. Closing with ‘Iconoclast’, Decapitated proved once again why they are still the benchmark of technical death metal. Over the last couple of UK appearances fans have seen a headline set, festival rager, and now a fiery opener, so it’s very interesting to see what the outfit have in mind for next.

Fit For An Autopsy

Now if Decapitated opened the gate to hell in their set, Fit For An Autopsy slammed it several times over as the second mob on stage. Taking shape on this tour sans-Will Putney, who is on Better Lovers duty, the five-piece dyed the room almost a Saw film style of green as they kick off proceedings with ‘Lower Purpose’ from last year’s album as well as last months latest single ‘It Comes For You’ which garners a rave response from the Yorkshire crowd. Joe Badolato makes it clear they “did not come to fuck around” and insists on more action in the pit as they rumble through more recent material with ‘Hostage’. The remainder of the set jumps rope between each of their three most recent records, starting with 2019’s Oh What The Future Holds with ‘Pandora’ where its difficult to judge which party the track is the bigger sprint for between drummer Josean Orta and guitarists Pat Sheridan and Tim Howley who lean against each other whilst shredding the track away. A brief detour to play the title track from 2019’s The Sea of Tragic Beasts before one of the star tracks of last years The Nothing That Is with ‘Savior of None / Ashes of All’. Final track and “wrecking the venue” honours go to 2022’s ‘Far From Heaven’. As an end point to the set, it seems anything from the Oh What The Future Holds album is a lethal option, as the crowd is just a sea of movement until the very end of the number. With Fit For An Autopsy having been lined up for next year’s Bloodstock Festival, as well as promising to make an attempt on the festival’s crowd surfing record, this set felt like an omen.

Hatebreed

It took some major reminding that this tour was in fact not a co-headline event. The crowd that amassed ahead of Hatebreed’s set may have convinced a few people otherwise. ‘Balls to The Wall’ by Accept serves as an intro to the set, with Jamey Jasta striding onto stage and asking “who’s ready to go balls to the wall with Hatebreed” before immediately sparking the crowd alight with ‘I Will Be Heard’ from 2002 before leaping right into the modern day with latest single ‘Make The Demons Obey’. There are few bands who can boast a catalogue as reliable as Hatebreed as they hopscotch between the Supremacy and Rise of Brutality albums with ‘To The Threshold’, ‘This is Now’ and then ‘Destroy Everything’. It’s impossible to imagine a Hatebreed set without these tracks. Between demands for a pit in the middle, and fans growing more and more eager to climb over the barrier, the Connecticut mob had placed chaos firmly in the driver’s seat in very short orderMajor kudos have to be given to the iconic Wayne Lozinak, back on stage after recovering from surgery of the summer months as few guitarists are as synonymous with their band as he. The time off did absolutely nothing to dull his sharpness either, as the deepest cut of  ‘Smash Your Enemies’ from 1997’s Under The Knife and ‘As Diehard as They Come’ Supremacy brought the veterans out in full force from Jasta’s usual call to arms about being diehard fans. Leeds is often a less common market for tours like this, but has crept back into schedules in the last year or two, and the enthusiasm that fans attacked Hatebreed’s set with is a huge clue as to why. The energy never dipped. Rounding out the set was the title track of Perseverance, and well as ‘In Ashes They Shall Reap’ from 2009’s self-titled record. The final one-two of the set took fans all the way back to 1997, ‘Proven’ from Satisfaction Is the Death of Desire hit with pure elation from Leeds as somehow one of the most ever present but understated Hatebreed tracks. The closing anthem of ‘Looking Down the Barrel of Today’ from The Concrete Confessional tore the roof off in a fashion only Hatebreed can. There’s no feeling quite like one of these shows. It’s certainly hard to imagine them ever going back to tiny rooms with wall to wall mosh pits…

Killswitch Engage

It was hard to believe that anyone could follow Hatebreed, but if any band was equipped to do so, it was Killswitch Engage. The lights dim and the band enter one at a time, starting with heart and soul member Adam Dutkiewicz and going one by one through Mike D’Antonio on bass, drummer Justin Foley, and rhythm guitarist Joel Stroetzel. They are finally followed on by Jesse Leach who immediately kicks in with an almighty scream as the rest of the band drop into opening number ‘Strength of The Mind’ from 2016. This was the immediate energy that the crowd needed after an already generous night. This was only bettered by some classic 2000’s material with ‘Rose of Sharyn’. To dispel some of the debate people often have with Killswitch Engage, in the over a decade since his return, Jesse does a masterful job of performing tracks that were written and recorded during the Howard Jones era. ‘Rose of Sharyn’ is probably keymost in that argument. It’s also very much helped in the live setting by the fact Leech clambers down off the high O2 stage and literally throws himself into the crowd with airtime in the latter half of the track, and only returns to the stage by the end of the song in time for ‘Reckoning’ from the bands 2nd Self-titled album. 

‘Aftermath’ from This Consequence pushed the energy even higher. Leeds was in full support of the new material being mixed into the set just as much as the old tunes as they follow up with Alive or Just Breathing’s ‘Numbered Days’ or ‘This is Absolution’ from 2005. Killswitch are very much the same ilk as Hatebreed where they have an over abundance of classics. This means that the uncorking of 2013’s ‘No End In Sight’ for the first time in 6 years for this run of shows is a huge surprise, but doesn’t cause the set to lose out at all either. The middle of the set consists almost entirely of “All Killer” level songs, with ‘Broken Glass’ being the starter gun. Leach’s vocals in the This Consequence material is incredibly intense, and makes for a banger live. Dutkiewicz is an engineer for further chaos with the way he is constantly jogging side to side in the O2, whilst making an array of borderline insane facial expressions. 

Justin Foley’s drumming was faultless for an all too brief playthrough of Incarnate’s ‘Hate By Design’ before returning to the most recent album with ‘Forever Aligned’ means the circle pit in the middle is almost constantly on the move. Mike D’Antonio’s bass thunders through the venue in the early half of ‘A Bid Farewell’ before an almost guaranteed track to feature in ‘The Signal Fire’. It was interesting to note it was the only offering from 2019’s Atonement in the whole set. Leach paused briefly to thank the crowd for two decades of loyalty, but knows that time is short for what has already been a long show. That gives way to what might be the best final quarter of a setlist for any band currently on the scene, starting with the track that kicked off Jesse’s second stint in the band, ‘In Due Time’. The crowd is apoplectic in their response, and in response has almost the full hall singing the chorus back to the band. Another extremely welcome entry was ‘This Fire’, which sees Stroetzel and Dutkiewicz duelling guitars throughout. In recent tours it is probably the most ‘This Fire’ has ever been played. This borders on a niche track due to only being on the special edition of As Daylight Dies but has endured massively due to being linked with pop culture by way of WWE’s CM Punk. The finale was everything a Killswitch show should be, rounding out with ‘My Curse’ and ‘The End of Heartache’ for some gargantuan singalongs from the Leeds crowd. As welcome as the new material is, Killswitch knows how to send them home happy and play the hits. Leach thanks the crowd for keeping live music alive and paying their money to be with them tonight, before asking if they’d like a singalong before they go home. ‘My Last Serenade’ is welded into being the final song nowadays, with every round of chorus filling the whole room to finish off the night. This show felt bigger than Academy level, a reminder that Killswitch Engage are gods in this scene, there was no room to pick fault in this show.

Four bands, four different visions of heaviness, one perfect night. From the devastating heaviness of Decapitated and Fit For An Autopsy,  to the unbreakable spirit of Hatebreed, and Killswitch Engage.The O2 Academy crowd gave everything, and every fan quite safely got their money’s worth. It is a very, very good time to be a fan.