Vans Warped Tour
The Vans Warped Tour is the Mecca of punk rock music. Each summer in cities across the nation, devoted fans make a pilgrimage to catch not just one, but a multitude of their favorite bands. As soon as the gates opened on Friday morning at Vinoy Park, the sea of Mohawks, tattoos, and piercings flooded the park.
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Veteran concert goers knew exactly where to start by hitting up the giant board of band names in the middle of the park to find out where their band was playing and what time. If newbies didn’t get that tip right away, there was always something to see anyway. The Warped Tour is always great experience to catch anything from the up and coming local acts to the nationwide headliners and many bands in between. Just by wandering around the park in a ten minute period it was very possible to catch a sample of four or five different bands that ranged from ska to metal to electronica. The Warped Tour is definitely the one festival of the year where it’s easily to expect the unexpected including a seven foot tall working drum machine. The Atlanta-based alt-rock band, Family Force 5 sported the giant drum machine and actually hit and kicked it to get certain noises they wanted out of it. It was hard to watch any particular part of the stage since the band was moving just as much as their fans were. |
Michelle Pryor, who had never seen them before exclaimed, “I think they’re crazy!” while she was watching them.
Judging from the futuristic outfits and the large metal fists the lead singer was wearing, Pryor’s experience was an understatement. As if to prove how over-the-top Family Force 5 is, they even had a seemingly random shaggy-haired man dancing sporadically all over the stage.
The band played a high energy performance that mixed together songs from their album, Business Up Front/Party in the Back and their soon-to-be released album Dance or Die that hits on August 19.
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Across the park on
the main stage Gym Class Heroes was playing. From the beginning the band had
full control of the large crowd before them. When front man Travis McCoy
commanded the audience to raise their hands and clap the beat, a sea of clapping
hands rose up obscuring even the tallest and most colorful of Mohawks. Under his
direction he formed moshpits and had their fists up in the air. During one song
he even commanded the audience to put a specific finger up in the air. Overall,
Gym Class Heroes played a mixture of new and old songs and even plugged their
new album, The Quilt, soon to be available on iTunes. Even though they’re
classified as a hip-hop group, their preference for performing high energy live
music over prerecorded beats makes them enjoyable for rock and rap fans alike. By utilizing MySpace and appealing to the younger technological generation, Gym Class Heroes are quickly achieving household name status even though many of their fans haven’t necessarily seen them live before. |
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Though as high energy as Warped Tour is as a whole, it does have its price to pay. The heat and lack of cloud cover caused many of the sunburnt attendees to find shade wherever they could. Small clusters of fans were found lying against each other trying looking exhausted as they sipped on bottles of water that cost nearly as much as a gallon of gas. However that didn’t cause spirits to dampen too much. Many first time attendees thought Warped Tour was still amazing and promised to come back in the future. 17 year old Sandy Jones who showed up to watch 3oh!3, Say Anything, Cobra Starship, and As I Lay Dying declared Warped Tour to be “awesome of course!” Fifteen year old Kevin Petersen, another first time attendee said Warped Tour was “pretty amazing. A little crazy thought, but that’s fine.” Even though it wasn’t an ideal show for everyone, it was hard to find negative criticism of the show (other than the heat). “It’s awesome every year,” Alex Wilson, an 18 year old Warped Tour veteran said. “The set list isn’t as good as last year’s but it’s still good.” |
Though it was a long draining day full of blood, sweat and tears (a few crowd surfers took some bad spills), the day offered a lot of fun for everyone. Just as the show ended and the security guards started ushering everyone towards the gates, the skies opened up and the rain came down offering the much needed relief from the heat. All in all it was a pretty successful show and despite the rising costs of gas, the cost of admission was well worth the extra emission.
To visit The Vans Warped Tour MySpace page click here
By. Jerry Schutjer
