Title Fight

Pennsylvania’s Title Fight was the first band I caught, playing earlier than scheduled on the Zumiez South Stage at 12:50PM. The four-piece’s take on melodic hardcore and punk-pop was enjoyable and refreshing in a genre that seems to be teeming with uninspired and bland acts (see: Four Year Strong, The Wonder Years, This Time Next Year). Sticking heavily to the solid The Last Thing You Forget released last year on Run For Cover Records, the band ripped through songs such as “No One Stays at the Top Forever”, “Memorial Field”, and album-closer “Western Haikus”, and properly energized the small crowd who caught their set early in the Bamboozle schedule.

The Pretty Reckless

While walking over to see The Pretty Reckless, I caught pieces of Score 24; the Long Island punk-pop band probably deserves a second glance, unlike The Pretty Reckless who were bland and motionless on stage. Fronted by sixteen year old Gossip Girl star Taylor Momsen (but really anchored by a backing band of far superior musicians and singers), The Pretty Reckless sang Gothic-inspired songs that seemed to drag without any hooks or memorable choruses. It’s disappointing but not inaccurate to sum up the band’s set with one of their own song titles: “Dull and Void”.

Relient K

Matt Thiessen-fronted Relient K played on the Sony Stage next, opening with “Who I Am Hates Who I’ve Been” from 2004′s Gold-certified Mmhmm. The band sounded crisp and experienced — the way a pop band touring for more than a decade should. Despite an enormous collection of seven full-length albums, the Ohio five-piece stuck almost entirely to their latest effort, Forget and Not Slow Down, including Thiessen’s favorite song, “Sahara”, which he described as being about lion cubs being eaten by birds of prey.

Who I Am Hates Who I’ve Been
Forget and Not Slow Down
I Don’t Need a Soul
Sahara
Flare
Candlelight
Devastation and Reform

The Aquabats

The Aquabats win any award for most entertaining band of the day — skin-tight matching superhero costumes that certainly didn’t flatter a band in their late thirties; a battle of good versus evil that featured The Aquabats fighting a team of men in crab costumes; and a song about the joys of pizza and why eating slices after 9PM for so many years lead to the first issue of unflattering costumes. The veteran Orange County, California, six-piece started with “Fashion Zombies” and rolled through a string of comical songs such as “Super Rad”, “Pizza Day”, and “Look at Me (I’m a Winner)” before closing with Myths, Legends, and Other Amazing Adventures, Volume 2‘s “Pool Party”, featuring inflatable pool toys tossed and ridden into the crowd. A fun cover of “Suburban Home” went largely unappreciated, leaving me to wonder if anyone in the crowd had ever heard Descendents’s essential Mile Goes to College — probably not.

The tail end (“Flowers and Fireworks, “Cities”) of All the Day Holiday’s set on the smaller Aquarian Stage sounded solid, but it was the stark contrast of Jersey locals Float Face Down on the opposite stage just moments later that captured my attention with their surprisingly large fan base and absolutely brutal metal/hardcore hybrid. Enormous pits of hardcore dancing spanned both stages in what must have amounted to being one of the largest pits in Bamboozle’s five-year history outside Giants Stadium.

Against Me!

Under the guise of Gegen Mich, Against Me! began a thirty-minute set on the Zumiez South Stage around 5PM with “High Pressure Low”, the first of four songs from the band’s solid White Crosses, an album to be released in early June on Sire Records. The album’s title track — described by frontman Tom Gabel as a pro-choice anthem — preceded an excellent performance of “Pints of Guinness Make You Strong” from 2oo2′s Reinventing Axl Rose. The small crowd, intimate singalongs, and top-notch performances by Gabel, guitarist Andrew Seward, bassist James Bowman, and drummer George Rebelo made Against Me! easily one of the day’s strongest acts.

High Pressure Low
Don’t Lose Touch
New Wave
White Crosses
Pints of Guinness Make You Strong
I Was A Teenage Anarchist
Suffocation
White People for Peace
Thrash Unreal

Saves the Day

Saves the Day began with Through Being Cool lead-off “All-Star Me” and stuck with thirteen of the band’s strongest songs during their thirty-five minute set. A string of the band’s better cuts from In Reverie, Sound the Alarm, and Under the Boards were enjoyable, but it wasn’t until the band returned to older material such as “Firefly” and “Holly Hox, Forget Me Nots” that the crowd really responded. As if to contradict 2001′s Stay What You Are, though, the band played the much more recent “Can’t Stay the Same”. Throughout the set, bandleader Chris Conley sounded great, hitting even some of the more difficult notes that seem to be more prevalent on the band’s newer songs. Unfortunately, after the blasts of energy from “Shoulder to the Wheel” and the penultimate “At Your Funeral”, “Kaleidoscope” closed the set and reminded the crowd that Saves the Day no longer writes the fast-paced anthems that they were once-known and renowned for.

All-Star Me
The End
Radio
Anywhere With You
Firefly
Holly Hox, Forget Me Nots
Can’t Stay the Same
Eulogy
Freakish
Shoulder to the Wheel
At Your Funeral
Kaleidoscope

Something Corporate

The most anticipated moment of the day had to be  Something Corporate‘s first New Jersey set in five years, and, to cut right to it, Andrew McMahon and friends absolutely delivered. The beautiful opening riffs of “Hurricane” started the band’s nine-song set with McMahon’s crooning: “Shake down you make me break for goodness sake..”. North‘s “21 and Invincible” was fun, but the return to Leaving Through the Window with “I Woke Up in a Car” was one of the set’s  strongest moments. “If You C Jordan” started to show its age — really, the song’s subject matter puts McMahon back into the late 1990s — but was still enjoyable, especially with the energetic frontman jumping on the piano’s keys.

Something Corporate

Undeniably the highlight of the band’s forty-five minute set was the ten-minute ballad, “Konstantine”. The song exposes McMahon’s soul and puts him alone in front of a piano to tell a story of lost love. A fairly simple composition, the song’s true beauty comes from its raw emotion and painstakingly honest lyrics. By the time McMahon addresses the song’s namesake character with the haunting “Did you know I miss you?” near the end of the song, it’s hard not to feel the songwriter’s entire emotional burden.

Something Corporate

“Punk Rock Princess” rounded out the nine-song set, leaving an enormous Bamboozle crowd wanting much, much more at 8PM on Saturday evening. McMahon’s elegant performance and stage presence (paraphrased, “Bamboozle, it’s a beautiful thing to play the sun out of the sky for you”) is just too charming to not want a full tour out of Something Corporate, who performed as a five-piece that also included Josh Partington, Clutch Page,  Brian Ireland, and Jack’s Mannequin guitarist Bobby Anderson.

Hurricane
21 and Invincible
I Woke Up in a Car
Me and the Moon
Fall
Space
If You C Jordan
Konstantine
Punk Rock Princess

Chiodos

Chiodos played on the Zumiez South Stage, sorely missing former lead singer Craig Owens. The band played a fairly standard set that included “Baby, You Wouldn’t Last a Minute on the Creek”, “The Undertaker’s Thirst For Revenge Is Unquenchable (The Final Battle)”, and “Is it a Progression if a Cannibal Uses a Fork”, and “The Words Best Friend Become Redefined”, but replacement vocalist Brandon Bolmer lacks the vocal qualities that once made Chiodos an enjoyable listen. The songs hit hard, but Bolmer’s mix of high-pitched screaming and singing is far too unbalanced and lacking in melody. It doesn’t help, either, that Bolmer came in following the subpar Bone Palace Ballet, a collection of songs that hardly finds Chiodos at their best considering their much stronger back catalog.

Paramore

By 9:50PM the night was almost over and only one band remained: headlining act Paramore. The Tennessee five-piece opened with a lengthy introductory jam and then moved right into “Looking Up”, the first of seven songs from their excellent 2009 full-length, Brand New Eyes. Frontwoman Hayley Williams was extremely energetic, invoking the crowd to sing along to the big choruses of “That’s What You Get”. “Playing God” sounded great; the hooks on Williams’s lines “but the way I, way I see it” are amongst the band’s most catchy moments.

Paramore

The crunchy guitars of Josh Farro and Taylor York lead the way on “Pressure”, a fast-paced cut from the band’s 2005 debut, All We Know is Falling.”Turn it Off” and “The Only Exception” (the latter described by Williams as a love song) slowed the set down tremendously, but  “Whoa” — which Williams joked was written in just five minutes, due to its simplicity — once again found the frontwoman singing huge choruses and instructing the crowd to do the same.

Paramore

Bassist Jeremy Davis and drummer Zac Farro locked together for “crushcrushcrush”, a predictable yet excellent part of the band’s set. “Let the Flames Begin” received an extended outro, before the band closed out their set exclusively with Brand New Eyes material including hit singles “Ignorance”, “Careful”, and “Brick by Boring Brick”. “Where the Lines Overlap”, a song that begs for live treatment, sounded great and was dedicated to the Williams’s recently deceased grandmother.

Paramore

“Misery Business” went last in the evening as part of the band’s encore, no surprise to anyone who has seen the band perform since that single propelled Paramore into the mainstream world-wide. A big surprise, however, came when Williams invited a random girl from the crowd onstage to sing the song’s bridge, taking a play right out of the playbook of local hero Bruce Springsteen (who often invites random kids onstage to sing “Waitin’ on a Sunny Day”. The biggest surprise of all, though, came when the girl invited on stage absolutely nailed the vocal part and continued to sing with Williams side by side until the song’s end. With the exception of “Decode” (possibly the band’s weakest song to date), set selection was flawless:

Looking Up
That’s What You Get
Playing God
Pressure
For a Pessimist, I’m Pretty Optimistic
Turn It Off
The Only Exception
Whoa
crushcrushcrush
Let the Flames Begin
Ignorance
Where the Lines Overlap
Careful
Brick by Boring Brick
Decode
Misery Business

Paramore

With their seventy-minute setlist, Paramore did their headlining duties by trumping every other band through the day: Williams sounded as strong as ever through the set’s duration, evidence that her time with a vocal coach is paying off tremendously. Instrumentally, the band was as close to perfect as possible, even while running around the stage and doing flips off of each other. Paramore was genuinely appreciative of their chance to headline Bamboozle, moving up from an unknown side-stage act just a few years earlier.

Though Saturday featured a plethora of throwaway acts (including Drake, Kesha, Four Year Strong, Escape the Fate, Angels and Airwaves, VersaEmerge, The Maine, The Ready Set, The Word Alive, Of Mice and Men, Asking Alexandria, Attack Attack, Emmure, and I Set My Friends on Fire to name just a few), there were more than enough gems in the rough to completely occupy the festival’s ten hours. Even rushing from stage to stage for most of the evening, I still missed a few promising acts such as Hanson, The Bled, and Protest the Hero.

The top performances of Saturday’s Bamboozle belong to Paramore and Something Corporate, two bands who are clearly leaps and bounds ahead of their peers in terms of stage presence and live execution.

All photographs by the excellent Dan Gonyea.

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 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

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

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

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

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

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 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

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

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

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

I arrived on Saturday around noon to check out the first day of The Bamboozle, heading to the 5 Gum side stage to check out Long Island’s The Sleeping. A post-hardcore act that I’ve caught at Bamboozle in the past, the band performed with Sebastian Bach (ex-Skid Row), playing a solid set featuring some of Bach’s material in addition to The Sleeping staples such as “If Your Heart Was Broken”. Though later in the evening after fatigue set in I’d chill out to some pop-rock acts, The Sleeping were a great way to kick off the weekend with a crowd that was certainly ready to dance. The band sounded tight; guitarist Cameron Keym’s metal-inspired licks were sharper than ever, and vocalist Douglas Robinson captured the crowd.

Story of the Year were next on my list at 2PM, so I ventured to the Asbury Park main stage. Let it be known that the sound, for both Day One and Day Two, was terrible on the Asbury Park stage–unfortunate because about half of the bands I saw during the weekend set up on that stage. As I’m not a professional audio engineer, I’m not exactly sure what the problem was but the sound was never consistent: bass was either muddy or non-existent, and microphones never maintained the same volume, often cutting out nearly entirely for seconds at a time.

Despite common sound issues that would plague nearly twenty bands on that stage, Story of the Year sounded excellent for the duration of their set. It’s been some time since i caught the band on tour, but their live show had always been their strongest point; it’s great to see they’ve only improved over time. Their set:

And the Hero Will Drown
The Antidote
Anthem of Our Dying Day
Wake Up
In the Shadows
Until the Day I Die
Is This My Fate? He Asked Them

Over half of their set came from their debut Page Avenue, but the band unfortunately included two of their lesser songs from that release in “Anthem of Our Dying Day” and “Under the Day I Die” but did include two of the strongest, opener “And the Hero Will Drown” and “In the Shadows”. The new songs from The Black Swan (“The Antidote”, “Wake Up”) sounded promising, so I’ll need to check out that album soon.

New Jersey ska-stalwarts Streetlight Manifesto were up next on the opposite main stage (which suffered from none of Asbury Park stage’s sound issues). The band played extremely well, with a large selection of songs coming from Somewhere in the Between. The band pleased the crowd with “Dear Sergio”, a song that engaged many people listening who were familiar with Catch 22′s Keasbey Nights but not necassrily Streetlight Manifesto.

At 3:30PM on the Nokia Ticket Rush stage, Vinnie Caruana played a set entirely of The Movielife songs with Set Your Goals as his backing band. Though he stated numerous times throughout the set that “this [wasn't] The Movielife”, you’d be hard pressed to find a single person in the crowd who was concerned with that fact. Vinnie sang like the band hadn’t broken up five years ago, with dead-on delivery of songs nearly a decade old. Set Your Goals’s (a band I wanted to see as well but passed up on to see Saves the Day) guitarists, bassist, and drummer covered each song with precision. Cuts included “Hand Grenade”, “Pinky Swear”, “Hey”, and “Face or Kneecaps” before the near-obligatory closer, “Jamestown”. Vinnie constantly thanked the crowd for giving him the chance to play these songs, but it was really the crowd constantly thanking him for resurrecting the songs of an incredible punk-pop band.

Dressed as cops and coming out to Inner Circle’s “Bad Boys” on the PA, Less Than Jake took the Asbury Park stage at 4PM, opening with “All My Best Friends Are Metalheads”. My first time catching the band live, I was quite impressed with how tight the band sounded. I’m not a huge fan of the band (perhaps getting into them late into their career), but I respect their contributions to the genre and their live show convinced me to give them some more attention. Their full set:

All My Best Friends Are Metalheads
Last One Out Of Liberty City
Overrated
Gainseville Rock City
Johnny Quest Thinks We’re Sellouts
Great American Sharp Shooter
Ghosts Of You And Me
Science Of Selling Yourself Short
Look What Happened

I took an hour break between 4:30 and 5:30 to check out various tents and merchandise, picking up a great Refused Shirts For a Cure tee. SFaC is a great project; all proceeds go to the Syrentha J. Savio Endowment. The SSE provides financial assistance to underprivileged women who cannot afford expensive breast cancer medicine and therapy; there are a lot of shirt designs, I urge you to see if your favorite band is there and to pick one up for just $12.

I caught a little bit of theAUDITION and Bless the Fall, two bands I didn’t have much interest in checking out but stayed at for a little bit while talking to some friends. Chiodos played at 5:50 on the Asbury Park stage, my next destination. The band played a balanced mix between their two full-length albums; they sounded decent, and the crowd was explosive the entire time. The full setlist:

The Undertakers Thirst For Revenge Is Unquenchable (The Final Battle)
There’s No Penguins In Alaska
Baby, You Wouldn’t Last A Minute On The Creek
Teeth The Size Of Piano Keys
Bulls Make Money, Bears Make Money, Pigs Get Slaughtered
The Words ‘Best Friend’ Become Refined
Is It Progression If A Cannibal Uses A Fork

I rushed over to the opposing NowWhat mainstage before Chiodos was finished to catch New Jersey locals Saves the Day, who opened up with Stay What You Are‘s “See You”. Chris Conley sounded tremendous: his voice was not only crisp and clear, but he sounded confident and in control of the crowd the entire time. When told the band had time for only one more song (the main stage times were getting increasingly backed up), he asked the crowd to pick between “Ups and Downs” and “Firefly”–”Firefly” apparently was the first thing he heard and played both that and then “At Your Funeral”, upping the count of songs from their 2001 LP to three. The full set:

See You
The End
Anywhere With You
You Vandal
Can’t Stay The Same
Head For The Hills
Shoulder To The Wheel
Firefly
At Your Funeral

It would have been nice to hear “Ups and Downs”, one of my favorite Saves the Day songs, but the band still played a great set nonetheless. The band has too much material to get picky about songs not played, especially when they picked nine great tracks anyway.

Jack’s Mannequin, another casualty of the Asbury Park stage, was next at 6:50; they didn’t start immediately after Saves the Day, so I managed to make it across the parking lot in time to get close to the stage before the band started. “Dark Blue”, with part of the extended introduction, kicked off the setlist which included a song from the upcoming The Glass Passenger (which certainly sounds promising — I was worried after a slew of less-than-stellar post-Everything in Transit tracks) and a cover from Something Corporate’s North. The set:

Dark Blue
Holiday from Real
The Mixed Tape
Suicide Blonde
Bruised
Kill the Messenger
La La Lie
Me and the Moon (Something Corporate cover)
MFEO

The band played well, but their sound was somewhat marred by the stage. Before “Kill the Messenger”, frontman Andrew McMahon commented on the weather; during the song (which features the lyrics “I’m going to send a little rain your way”) the misty rain slowly picked up. Even taking into account projection, the song had never felt so real or so powerful. Aside from the lack of staple “I’m Ready”, I don’t think I could have asked for a better setlist. “MFEO” is an incredible track that stands on its own, but it really works perfectly for closing a set, especially outdoors in the rain, in the parking lot.

Paramore played the Asbury Park stage at 8PM; almost immediately it was obvious just how poor the stage’s sound actually was, as one of the tightest pop-rock acts in the scene today suddenly sounded sloppy and uninteresting. The band kicked off with Riot!‘s “Let the Flames Begin”, following it with All We Know is Falling single “Emergency”. Either during that track or during “Stop This Song (Lovesick Melody)”, a b-side from the Riot! sessions, the stage’s sound started to click back together and the band sounded incredible for the rest of their set, which was, in its entirety:

Let the Flames Begin
Emergency
Stop This Song (Lovesick Melody)
Here We Go Again
That’s What You Get
Pressure
For A Pessimist, I’m Pretty Optimistic
crushcrushcrush
Woah
Misery Business

“Here We Go Again” was sans the At The Drive-In mini-cover, instead segueing flawlessly into “That’s What You Get”. Much like an hour ago watching Jack’s Mannequin amongst teenage girls barely (if at all?) old enough to drive, I felt out of place singing along to every word, but it’s always refreshing to catch other guys mouthing the words: this is great pop music, and I’m glad that these young teens are growing up on true pop-rock, not manufactured radio garbage or Britney Spears-esq bubblegum, even if the band is dominating the radio with songs such as “Misery Business”, the set’s closer.

During the aforementioned hit single, I walked out of the crowd to get to Jimmy Eat World, an act I’m almost embarrassed to admit I had never seen live. The band’s performance was unparalleled by any other act all day, and their forty-five minute setlist was incredible:

Big Casino
Sweetness
Work
Always Be
Crush
Here It Goes
A Praise Chorus
Let It Happen
Dizzy
Bleed American
Pain
The Middle

The rain was a constant mist during their performance; it was a little chilly, but incredibly relaxing. There’s not much to be said about the band’s performance other than that their live sound is a near perfect recreation of their studio albums, from the guitar subtleties to the incredible harmonies.

Snoop Dogg closed Day One, coming on around 9:30. I was a little further back than normal (near the soundboard) for his set, but he still sounded pretty good. I had never seen him live, so I wasn’t sure what to expect, but he managed to hold my attention for some time. I left midway through his set to get to a party, but his full set was:

Murder Was The Case
P.I.M.P. (Remix)
Who Am I? (What’s My Name)
That’s That Shit
Gin And Juice
Lodi Dodi
Woof!
I Wanna Fuck You
Snoop’s Upside Ya Head
Beautiful
Nuthin’ But A G Thang
Ain’t No Fun
Deeez Nuuuts
Notorious DPG
Snoop Dogg
My Medicine
Sexual Eruption
Drop It Like It’s Hot

The entire day was great, as I got to see some older bands for the first time live in addition to seeing some of my favorites once again. The weather was great: I’d prefer chilly and rainy to blistering heat and humidity any day. Moreover, cell phone service actually worked, which allowed me to meet up with friends throughout the day. There was room for improvement though: I couldn’t find any time cards (something usually handed out when you walk in), and, to beat a dead horse, the Asbury Park stage sounded terrible. Scheduling was pretty solid: Set Your Goals and Men Women & Children were the only two bands I missed due to conflicting times.

If anyone has any corrections/updates to the setlists I posted (which should be accurate, but there’s always room for error), please post them in the comments.

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.