Warped Tour @ Oceanport 7/19

July 27, 2009

Warped Tour has gone through many incarnations since its creation in 1995. For the summer tour’s fifteenth birthday, creator Kevin Lyman toned things down–just one main stage and substantially fewer acts. Mainstage acts also now received forty minute setlists, an opportunity for many bands to play two or three more songs than in previous years. For New Jersey fans, the tour also shifted venues from the larger Englishtown Raceway to Monmouth Race Track.

Chiodos

Chiodos

Arriving at noon, I hurriedly searched for the inflatable set-times board. It turned out to be located near the mainstage, where I caught Chiodos. Known for their intense live performances, the Michigan five-piece sounded great but had unfortunately already played half of their first set. Luckily, I did catch two of the band’s best songs: “The Words ‘Best Friend’ Become Redefined” and “There’s No Penguins in Alaska”). Vocalist Craig Owens (pictured left in a Pi Beta Phi shirt–interestingly the letters of a national women’s fraternity) controlled the crowd with ease, encouraging enormous pits and even a wall of death. Even with some weaker cuts from Bone Palace Ballet making the setlist, Chiodos certainly sounded good.

Anti-Flag

Anti-Flag

Anti-Flag took the main stage at 1PM, opening with 2003′s “Turncoat”. The Pittsburgh punks played a set spanning their entire career, reaching back to their debut album with “You’ve Got To Die For The Government” but focusing primarily on songs from For Blood and Empire. The band spoke out against corporate bailouts, expressing disgust that blue-collar workers aren’t being directly assisted. Of course, the band’s spoken messages were echoed by their songs; “Sodom, Gomorrah, Washington D.C. (Sheep in Shepherd’s Clothing)” from their latest album, The People of the Gun, addresses the issue of corporate control in America. The band’s the full set:

Turncoat
I’d Tell You But…
You’ve Got To Die For The Government
Sodom, Gomorrah, Washington D.C. (Sheep in Shepherd’s Clothing)
The Smartest Bomb
One Trillion Dollars
Death Of A Nation
The Press Corpse
This Is The End (For You My Friend)
Should I Stay Or Should I Go (The Clash cover)
Cities Burn

Bayside

Bayside

After Anti-Flag’s incredible performance, I rushed across the parking lot to catch Bayside. Unfortunately, the primary side stage was scheduled to slightly overlap with the mainstage and I only caught the last half of Bayside’s excellent performance.  I did manage to get the get the setlist and it turned out to be a fairly predictable affair, though “Boy” from Shudder was noticeably absent (perhaps to make room for the somewhat rare “Existing In A Crisis (Evelyn)”). The full setlist:

Masterpiece
Carry On
Existing In A Crisis (Evelyn)
The Ghost of St. Valentine
The Walking Wounded
Duality
Montauk
Devotion and Desire

Senses Fail

Senses Fail

While waiting to catch Streetlight Manifesto, I caught parts of The Devil Wears Prada–an Ohio six-piece putting on their take of a hardcore/metal hybrid immitation. Surprisingly, the effort wasn’t awful. Conversely, I also sat through Senses Fail at the Smart Punk Stage; the New Jersey quintet sounded awful. Part of this was due to the Smart Punk Stage’s ongoing sound problems all day, but a larger part can be attributed to band’s poor live show and incredibly weak catalog. Hardly memorable, much of the set blurred together like a bad night of drinking. The only bright spot during thirty minute performance was  “Bite to Break Skin”, clearly one of the only decent cuts in the band’s discography since their 2002 From Depths to Dreams EP.

Streetlight Manifesto

Streetlight Manifesto

Ska powerhouse Streetlight Manifesto took the Hurley.com Stage next, promptly removing the awful taste of Senses Fail from anyone’s mouth who might have been unlucky enough to sit through that set. Replacing frontman Tom Kalnoky’s guitar was a sling for his broken left arm, but the band nonetheless played a quality set from 2:45 to 3:15. Even without songs from the essential Keasbey Nights (written by Kalnoky’s former band Catch 22 but rerecorded by Streetlight Manifesto in 2006) , the band captured the crowd. Drawing heavily on Somewhere in the Between (including the band’s only single to date, “We Will Fall Together), Streetlight Manifesto sounded excellent. Unfortunately, Underoath was scheduled at the same time I missed the Christian metalcore group’s mainstage set.

Saosin

Saosin

The next band I caught was California’s Saosin. Opening with “Seven Years”, it’s quite evident how, even five years since his departure, the band misses former vocalist Anthony Green–and not just on Green’s songs. Replacement Cove Reber is devoid of the energy and personality that elevated Saosin above their peers in 2003. In 2009, there are simply too many bands doing what Saosin does, yet better. The completely forgettable set consisted of three mediocore songs from the upcoming In Search of Solid Ground in addition a few of the stronger cuts from their debut EP (“Voices”, “Sleepers”).

Less Than Jake

Less Than Jake

I hurried over to the mainstage to see Less Than Jake, who came out to the traditional Star Wars theme. The band joined in on the song’s final moments  before kicking into “Last One Out of Liberty City”. I caught a few more songs before heading to The AKAs tent to say hello to some friends, but the full set is as follows:

Last One Out Of Liberty City
Automatic
Johnny Quest Thinks We’re Sellouts
Ghosts Of You and Me
Sobriety Is A Serious Business And Business Ain’t So Good
Help Save The Youth Of America From Exploding
Never Going Back To New Jersey
Plastic Cup Politics
Science of Selling Yourself Short
Sugar In Your Gastank
Does The Lion City Still Roar?
Look What Happened
All My Best Friends are Metalheads

Gallows

Gallows

Gallows was playing across the parking lot, and so we rushed to see the British hardcore punk outfit. Frontman Frank Carter took the band’s set to epic proportions, singing from the crowd the entire time. To be clear: to say he was singing from the crowd doesn’t mean he spent some time on the barricade, returning to the stage between songs. No, Carter was in the pit for the set’s duration, even starting the day’s biggest circle that would surround the stage’s sound tent. Gallows was loud, fast, and abrasive–and, as they put it, “sick of playing car parks” and Warped Tour dates.

The band’s passionate hardcore engaged the crowd, and even the band itself; midway through a sixty second song dedicated to “all the fake bands on this tour”, Carter threw the microphone and abruptly joined in on the giant circle pit. On a hot Sunday in New Jersey, with angst-filled youth and extreme energy, Gallows managed to top even the best of punk veterans and put on the best show of the day.

NOFX

NOFX

Warped Tour veterans NOFX played next. Clearly drunk, frontman Fat Mike spent much of the set telling offensive jokes (“Arming The Proletariat With Potato Guns”) and stumbling through three minute punk songs. The band touched on classics such as “Linoleum” (1994) and “It’s My Job To Keep Punk Rock Elite” (1998) and more recent cuts such as “We Called It America” from 2009′s Coaster. The band took stabs at everyone, including the fans (“Fuck Da Kids”) and even themselves for thirty minutes. “Eat the Meek” featured Fishbone’s Angelo Moore on saxophone and lead vocals. The full set:

Seeing Double At The Triple Rock
Murder the Gov’t
It’s My Job To Keep Punk Rock Elite
Mattersville
Fuck Da Kids
Linoleum
Arming The Proletariat With Potato Guns
Louise
Eat The Meek
Don’t Call Me White
We Called It America
Franco Un-American
Whoops I Od’d

Before giving up the stage, Fat Mike joked “thanks for coming to see us…and Underoath”–a nod towards the feud between the two bands over Underoath’s Christian beliefs and prayer sessions. Each band also issued a limited edition tour shirt in response to the situation: NOFX’s “Noah FX” shirt, designed with Underoath’s signature miniscule (“Ø”; Underoath’s “Underoath Loves Fat Dinosaurs” shirt, with a dinosaur personified as Fat Mike.

Flogging Molly

Flogging Molly

I managed to catch the end of Alexisonfire (who sounded great) before Celtic-punks Flogging Molly took the mainstage and put on an excellent performance. Written in honor of frontman David King’s father, “What’s Left of the Flag” was dedicated to King’s mother, who turned 81 that day. The band’s performance drew a lot of other bands, including Anti-Flags Justin Sane who joined on stage and Gallows’s Carter, who–more appropriately–could be seen navigating the pits. The full set, which drew from each of the band’s full-length albums:

Paddy’s Lament
The Likes Of You Again
Requiem For A Dying Song
Selfish Man
Drunken Lullabies
Float
Devil’s Dance Floor
Salty Dog
What’s Left Of The Flag
Seven Deadly Sins

After Flogging Molly, I wandered around catching parts of some other bands, including A Skylit Drive (just one song, “Wires and the Concept of Breathing”) at the Smart Punk stage. I also listened to some of Boston’s Westbound Train, who played an appealing blend of ska and rock but ultimately fell victim to a scheduling conflict that pitted them against Bad Religion, the next and final band on my list.

Bad Religion

Bad Religion

As the sun set on the mainstage at around 7PM, punk veterans Bad Religion started their set. The scene might have worked as a metaphor: the sun setting on the band after thirty years of touring and fourteen full-length albums. Indeed, it’s difficult to picture many of the bands on the 2009 Warped Tour existing without Bad Religion or their related projects (Circle Jerks, Minor Threat, Government Issue, Dag Nasty,and  Suicidal Tendencies–to name just a few). For Bad Religion, however, this was anything but goodbye. The band sounded angry and discontent with the modern world and modern music scene, and for forty minutes expressed these views through three-minute So-Cal flavored punk numbers:

Do What You Want
No Control
Social Suicide
Requiem For Dissent
Anesthesia
Generator
The Defense
I Want To Conquer The World
21st Century Digital Boy
Sorrow
Them and Us
Infected
American Jesus
Fuck Armageddon… This Is Hell

I left Monmouth Race Track after Bad Religion’s set, satisfied that I had done my best to see a large selection of quality bands during the eight-hour day. With few exceptions (Bayside, Underoath, Alexisonfire), scheduling conflicts were not a big issue–a nice benefit of the toned down Warped Tour. Even with a plethora of throwaway acts crowding the bill (including A Day to Remember, Attack Attack, Breath Carolina, Brokencyde, Dance Gavin Dance, Escape the Fate, Hit the Lights, I Set My Friends on Fire, Jeffree Stars, Meg and Dia, Millionaires, and The Maine), Warped Tour 2009 managed to impress thanks to give-it-all performances from new acts (Gallows) and veterans (Bad Religion, Flogging Molly, Anti-Flag) alike.

Photos by: Alexandra Tinder, Joshua Lowe, Danxcore, Dani Drainpipe

4 Comments | Anti-Flag, Bad Religion, Bayside, Chiodos, Flogging Molly, Gallows, Less Than Jake, Monmouth Race Track, NOFX, New Jersey, Oceanport, Saosin, Senses Fail, Streetlight Manifesto, Warped Tour | Permalink
Posted by Anthony Charles Ambrose

Warped Tour @ Englishtown 8/5

August 7, 2007

For as long as I can remember, I’ve been attending Warped Tour in Camden, the “Philadelphia stop” of the annual tour. To mix things up this year, I ventured north to Englishtown Raceway.

The first band I intended to see was Straylight Run, but I didn’t make it to their stage in time, unfortunately, so I kicked off the day with Christian hardcore/metalcore Underoath on the main stage closest to the entrance. I’ve enjoyed Underoath since 2002′s The Changing Of Times, but a few shoddy performances live have turned me off to the band somewhat, and I was hoping their performance today would convert me back into a follower (religious pun intended).

Playing selections primarily from their brutal Define The Great Line, the Florida six-piece dominated the crowd. I’m always disappointed that the band has abandoned the best song they’ve ever written (“When The Sun Sleeps”, from their old singer’s era), but new songs such as “In Regards To Self” are absolutely stellar live. Despite existing for nearly a decade, the band doesn’t dip into any material older than 2004′s They’re Only Chasing Safety, from which they played excellent songs (with especially precious titles) “A Boy Brushed Red…Living In Black And White” and “It’s Dangerous Business Walking Out Your Front Door”. I walked away from Underoath’s set quite impressed, anxious to see them on their upcoming tour with Every Time I Die.

Somewhat like Underoath, Coheed and Cambria were once one of my favorite bands, but I’ve enjoyed them less and less in recent times. Also similar to Underoath, their Warped Tour performance changed my opinion of the band in a positive direction. With new a drummer in Chris Pennie (the founder of The Dillinger Escape Plan), the band’s live performance was immediately upgraded, and it showed on the hot afternoon. Integrating some of his math-influenced Dillinger styled playing into Coheed and Cambria’s progressive rock, the band sounded tighter than ever. The band opened with the stunning “Welcome Home”, and moved into some catchy pop-influenced songs such as “The Suffering” and “A Favor House Atlantic”. “Everything Evil”, one of the songs that hooked me onto Coheed and Cambria earlier in the decade, was improved with impressive new guitar work and double-bass drummed beats. The band closed their setlist with “In Keeping Secrets Of Silent Earth”, and helped recapture why I enjoyed the band so much just three or four years earlier.

Chicago’s best dark-rock band, Alkaline Trio, played a great set that featured one brand new song and some older essentials. Matt Skiba and Dan Andriano split vocal duties well live, feeding off the energy of one older Warped Tour crowds of the day. Following their set, I wandered Englishtown Raceway, eager to learn the differences between the familiar Tweeter Center in Camden that I’ve grown accustomed to.

Englishtown certainly manages the space well, and all the stages are ultimately closer to each other, although the two main stages are placed on opposing ends of the parking lot (in stark contrast to Camden, which places its stages directly adjacent to each other). Checking out various tents, I didn’t find too much that interested me and for the first time didn’t buy anything from any of the tents. Even the “freebies” seemed tuned down this year; my pockets are usually overloaded with free stickers, discs, and promotions, but this year they held only my wallet and keys.

A Static Lullaby, a band I slightly enjoy but seem to spend too much time defending, were next on my list. I arrived at their stage to find a less-than-enthusiastic crowd; their performance couldn’t be described as the same, but it was certainly much less entertaining that I had hoped for. I decided to rehydrate myself instead of standing around listening to their screamer attempt to scream, and walked to the Monster truck and cooled down for a moment.

Chiodos was next on the main stage, and vocalist Craig Owens held the crowd’s attention with his high-pitched vocals and gut-wrenching screams over the band’s take on modern emocore/hardcore/metalcore tinged with keyboards and effects. Opening with “The Words ‘Best Friend’ Become Redefined”, the crowd (much like Underoath, filled with young girls) exploded into a handful of different pits. Unlike traditional hardcore pits, however, these modern bands seem to draw out ignorant teenagers doing what they believe is hardcore dancing. It couldn’t be any farther from that, however, and pits generally turn into push-moshing; no surprise, though, as I’d imagine most of the crowd is only into these bands as a trend–they’d likely learned their “moshing skills” from the previous trends such as Papa Roach or Korn. Chiodos played two new songs, each one as good as songs from All’s Well That Ends Well. Favorites from that debut album were also played (although nothing prior to that–in fact, I’m pretty sure all the material prior to that has been completely abandoned), such as “There’s No Penguins In Alaska” and “Baby You Wouldn’t Last A Minute On The Creek”. The band was quite tight musically, and I’ll certainly be picking up their next album, Bone Palace Ballet.

The Matches played the Hurley.com side stage, so I rushed over to catch them. Always exciting live, at festivals the band sticks to material mostly from Decomposer but did include older songs such as “Chain Me Free”. The Matches seem to attract a more respectful crowd than any other band, and the “pits” aren’t for slamdancing but more for jumping around, and, when “Salty Eyes” is played, waltzing. The band is very appreciative for its fans, and Shawn Harris even brought a girl up on stage who had created an intricate home-made shirt of the band’s lyrics. Playing near flawlessly for twenty-five minutes, the band closed with “Papercut Skin”.

One of the biggest surprise albums of 2007 is Paramore‘s Riot!; their debut, All We Know Is Falling, was solid, but Riot! is a tremendous follow-up I wasn’t expecting. Paramore may always just be a vehicle for teenage vocalist Hayley Williams, but if that’s the case then she’s certainly riding in a luxury car. Paramore’s most distinguishing feature may be its vocals, but the music is fine-tuned and pop-perfect.

Paramore opened with their biggest single, “Misery Business”. At first, the band seemed sluggish and Hayley’s vocals were not quite as strong as I remembered from the last time seeing them. As if changing gears, however, the band exploded with their next few songs, including seamlessly flowing from one song to another without braking for even a second. “Here We Go Again” received a touch-up with the band integrating part of At The Drive-In’s essential “One Armed Scissor”. The band played others from All We Know Is Falling, as well, including “Pressure” and “Emergency”. Putting on one of the strongest performances of the day, Hayley Williams is certainly elevating herself to role-model status for a generation of confused teenage girls.

I wasn’t going to miss even a moment of Bad Religion, so I rushed across the parking lot to catch the eldest (and unquestionably most important) band on Warped Tour 2007′s lineup.  The band kicked off with the familiar “American Jesus” riff, and true punk-styled circles broke out in the crowd. The band played eleven songs, touching on nearly every essential Bad Religion song including “Social Suicide” and “Infected”. Midway through the band’s set, a man in a wheelchair made his way on top of the crowd, surfing it all the way to the stage, at which point the band announced it was the coolest thing they had ever seen. Greg Gaffin called out all the parents sitting in the distance on the raceway’s bleachers, but he quickly noted that in his old age, that’s where he would be watching bands perform. The band closed their strong set with “Sorrow”.

I did spend some time wandering around, catching parts of various bands’ setlists throughout the day, hearing pieces of The Starting Line and even All Time Low covering the essential punk-pop “Dammit”. I sat down for the first time all day and listened to Bryce Avary perform for awhile while waiting for Bayside to take the stage; the crowd of entirely teenage girls seemed to melt to every word of every The Rocket Summer song.

I had hoped to see Circa Survive, but their set conflicted with Bayside, who took the side stage as one of the last bands of the evening. The New York four-piece didn’t hold anything back, opening with “Montauk” from their self-titled album. Their setlist consisted of primarily songs from The Walking Wounded, which is certainly their strongest release to date. They played the title track from the album (with Aaron Gillepsie of Underoath), and also “They’re Not Horses, They’re Unicorns”, “Duality”, and “Carry On”. The band sounded tight as always, and the crowd didn’t show any signs of fatigue. Sirens And Condolences‘s opening track “Masterpiece” was also played, and the band closed with “Devotion And Desire”.

Before leaving Englishtown, I caught the end of Tiger Army’s set, which included “In The Orchard” at a fan’s request and the standard closer, “Never Die”. I didn’t stick around for MC Chris (the very last act of the day), and headed back to the car as the evening was beginning to get dark. Certainly a solid Warped Tour lineup, and definitely a great place to see the show. I may be at Englishtown again next year instead of Camden.

Leave a Comment » | Alkaline Trio, Bad Religion, Bayside, Chiodos, Coheed and Cambria, Englishtown, Englishtown Raceway, Paramore, The Matches, Underoath, Warped Tour | Permalink
Posted by Anthony Charles Ambrose