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Warped Tour 2002

live in Pittsburgh
2002
live show

Review by: StabbingGoldfish
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Vans Warped Tour 2002 (link)

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Published on August 16th 2002

This was actually the second Vans Warped Tour I have attended this year. The first one was about two weeks ago in my hometown of Cleveland, Ohio. Having several bands that I had never seen before, I decided to take the three hour road trip to Pittsburgh to attend Warped there.

I arrived a bit late at 12:15 thanks to MapQuest’s shady directions. The very first thing I saw was the Mustard Plug tent, I was ecstatic because they weren’t scheduled to perform and I’d never seen them before. After walking up the hill I heard a song that sounded very familiar but I couldn’t pinpoint what it was, then it came to me it was…

Recover! I then ran down the hill to the side stage at which they we playing. They played a relatively short set, but it rocked hard. They played old classics from their full length as well as a few new ones from their new E.P. Finally they finished with “Rodeo.”

After they finished I walked around a bit and checked out all the other tents and got the times for the rest of my favorite bands. While I was down there I heard..

Thursday kicked into “Understanding in a Car Crash” so I picked up my stuff and headed down to the main stage. After pushing my way through on-looking fans I made it up to the front of the stage. Their pit was pretty crazy and I managed to get kicked in the head by crowd-surfers twice. They played “Paris in Flames” and a couple others. Then they played a new song that is probably going to be on that new E.P. that is coming out shortly, it sounded very good. Finally they closed with “Cross out the eyes.” Thursday played an awesome show and I’d recommend seeing them live to anyone.

Next up was Autopilot Off at 1:30. So I headed over to the Drive-Thru stage. These guys really impressed me when I saw them in Cleveland and they didn’t disappoint here either. They played every song off the new E.P. and played them really well. Although their singers voice wasn’t loud enough and it was kind of difficult to hear the words, but I was familiar with most of them, so I didn’t mind. The crowd seemed into them, even though there was little moshing.

Next up was Alkaline Trio. I have seen these guys three times now, and this performance was defiantly my favorite out of them all. They were just on that day. Matt didn’t hold back on his singing and Dan was great too. They opened up with “Clavicle” and the crowd went nuts. Their set included “Crawl”, “Private Eye”, “Queen of Pain”, and a few others. After playing an awesome set they ended with a stunning rendition of “97.”

After the Alkaline Trio show I went to get my skank on to the crazy sounds of the Planet Smashers. They played a few songs, and then two members of Mustard Plug joined them as they sang the chorus from “Beer”. After that they closed with “Super Orgy Porno Party”, my favorite by them. They played an extremely short set, about 15 minutes, but I wasn’t bothered because I was tired from skanking.

From there I went to check out a local band from Los Angles called “Never Heard of It.” I missed these guys at the Cleveland show. They opened up with the first song from their new cd “Limited Edition.” They played a good set of pop-punk and got the small crowd into their set. I’m looking forward to these guys coming back in the fall.

When they finished I dashed over to the Drive-Thru Stage to see Finch tear it up. I started out very close to the front but as they rocked harder and harder I was pushed to the way back. They opened up with a very powerful version of “What it is to Burn”. Finch tore through most of their cd “What it is to Burn” before finally closing with my favorite song on there “Untitled.”

After Finch I was torn between seeing either RxBandits or Deviates. Seeing as how I had already seen the bandits in Cleveland and I’ve never experienced the Deviates live, I decided to watch a few RxB songs then head over to see the Deviates. I saw RxBandits perform “VCG^3” and “Who Would’ve Thought” before I ran over to catch the rest of The Deviates set. For as old and as hard to find as the Deviates debut cd is, they sure played a lot of songs off of it. I don’t own it so I didn’t recognize most of their set. The songs I did know were “The End” and “Right Back to You”. Then they finished with “Come with me.” It was a decent show but I was expecting better.

When the Deviates finished I headed over to the Punkrocks.net Stage to catch my most anticipated band, From Autumn to Ashes. I managed to get there pretty early and secured my place up against the stage, and dead center. As they began to set up their equipment, the Trojan guys came out and chatted with the crowd. Then they began to throw free samples of condoms out to the crowd. There was a ton; they had a large backpack stuffed with them that they were giving away. One of the sound guys for FATA opened one up and stuck it around the main mic, which got some laughs from the crowd. Finally FATA was ready to play. They opened with “The Royal Crown vs. The Blue Duchess” Throughout their set they played “Cherry Kiss”, “Take her to the Music Store” and “Capeside Rock”. Their set had so much energy and was my favorite show of the whole day. They finally closed with a beautifully stunning version of the nine minute epic “Short Stories with Tragic Endings.” After that song I knew I had gotten my $35 worth.

Next I headed over to check out Against All Authority at the small and crappy Ernie Ball Stage. I listened to a few songs by AAA but I was disappointed that all that was left of their “horn section” was a trumpet. The songs I did here, were a few from “All Fall Down” but most of them were from “24 Hour Roadside Resistance.” So I left mid-set to watch a more ska filled Reel Big Fish show. When I got to the main stage I was very surprised to see how large the crowd was to see RBF. I stood pretty far back in the crowd and watched on as they played “Thank you for not moshing.” They then played a handful of rock-heavy songs off their new cd entitled “Cheer Up.” Their cover of A-Ha’s “Take on me” was next. Aaron even claimed that he wrote it. They then closed their set with the crowd favorite “Sellout” All in all a pretty good show; I just don’t like the new cd.

Closing the day for me was none other than Mustard Plug. I had never sent these guys before even though they are from Michigan which is very close to Ohio. I was expecting a stellar performance from them and they delivered. They played a decent amount of tunes of their upcoming cd “Yellow 5” which comes out in September. Let me tell you it sounds like a great improvement over their last one “Pray for Mojo.” Unfortunately they didn’t play anything off of “Big Daddy Multitude” which is one of my favorite cds by them. They then ended their set and my day with “Beer.” Even members of the Planet Smashers joined in. All in all it was a great day, and I saw a huge amount of great bands. This show was definitely better then the Warped Tour in Cleveland.

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Posted by Anonymous on Thursday, August 22, 2002 at 5:50 PM (EDT)
My Score:

about the guys down there posting that NOFX followed the same technique as other shows, so what?! i didn't see the other shows, id never seen them till pittsburgh warped, and i though their set was awesome. diversity of songs from different albums, new stuff, funny stuff between songs, and the black guy playing trombone during the decline outro was funny shit. that's my two cents anyway

Posted by Anonymous on Wednesday, August 21, 2002 at 1:47 PM (EDT)
My Score:

Did anyone else notice that he said he saw a local band from Los Angeles but he was watching this show in pittsburg? How is any band from Los Angeles a local band when you see them in Pitt? If Thats like when I see NFG in October can I call them a local band from San Diego (or wherever they are from). Local has to do with location... in fact its even a shorter form of location. Local has nothing to do with popularity or whether then band is signed to a label or not. -pat41

Posted by Anonymous on Monday, August 19, 2002 at 5:49 PM (EDT)
My Score:

Bigwig definately stole the show at NJ Warped as well. As I said in another of these stupid warped tour reviews (why not spend 2 pages reviewing one band there rather than 2 sentances?) the speakers on the two 'main stages' or the mixing or something along those lines was horrible and it was difficult to hear any of the 'bigger' bands, but at least it was better than the drive-thru stage where literally every band sounded the same.. I watched 20 minutes of rx bandits and never heard upstrokes... All their 'new shit' has screaming like that lame fucking band finch. yawn. also, to the person saying NoFX was 'great'... you realize that this is the same formula they used on their last two tours, and follows the same basic technique they use every year.

Posted by evildeadalive on 2002-08-19 12:29:25
My Score:

Good call waste_elite.

Posted by StabbingGoldfish on 2002-08-19 02:55:11
My Score:

ahh Thrice was gone by this show..I woulda like to see them again. I can't wait till Fall for the Hot Water Music/Thrice/Coheed and Cambria show. That is going to rock hardcore.

Posted by Anonymous on Monday, August 19, 2002 at 1:45 AM (EDT)
My Score:

at least you saw good bands at the show. Was Thrice still on the tour, or were they gone by then?

Posted by waste_elite on 2002-08-19 00:41:39
My Score:

"Cause maybe when they were ska-punk it was refreshing to hear, cause there aren't too many bands that sounded like old AAA, while now they're just another one of the thousands of generic punk bands with snotty sounding vocals."

seriously, name a band that sounds like the new AAA so i can go out and buy some of their records. i don't see anything generic about them. excellent lyrics, "punk as fuck", vicious but catchy. all around good band.

Posted by Anonymous on Sunday, August 18, 2002 at 3:28 PM (EDT)
My Score:

I saw Bigwig at this show and they fucking kicked ass. www.njbigwig.com
check them out

Posted by Anonymous on Sunday, August 18, 2002 at 12:44 AM (EDT)
My Score:

i just saw brand new and tbs at peabodys in cleveland.. and i would just like to say i love both these bands. to death. cept it seems both times ive seen brand new jesse cant seem to reach the stellar bar he set for himself on the cd.

and good review too.

Posted by Anonymous on Sunday, August 18, 2002 at 12:35 AM (EDT)
My Score:

dude... you left after mustard plug!? you missed some pretty awesome sets from bad religion and nofx.

bad religion was really good [i don't know why brett wasn't there, but whatever]. they played american jesus, fuck armageddon this is hell, i want to conquer the world, supersonic, kyoto now, and closed with sorrow.

nofx was really cool. they opened with the brews, and played dinosaurs will die, a new version of murder the government ["i want to see dick cheney have a heart attack/don't wanna see any more kids die in iraq"], a brand new song about g-dub bush properly titled "idiot son of an asshole", they [expectedly] played the decline outro [which was cool], and closed with theme from a nofx album. after they all walked offstage, eric melvin continued to play a little reprise to "theme" on his accordian for about 5 minutes.

anyway, good time was had by all. me too.

Posted by Anonymous on Sunday, August 18, 2002 at 12:07 AM (EDT)
My Score:

You made a wise choice in seeing the deviates, but how can you say you were dissapointed. When I saw them I thought they put on the best performance out of all the bands. Shame on you.

Posted by StabbingGoldfish on 2002-08-17 23:08:32
My Score:

to the guy a couple posts down who bashed me for spending me whole day at the drive thru stage... You consider seeing like 2 bands there a whole day. That is lame as fuck. Get a life and get over what I listen to. Thanks.

Posted by evildeadalive on 2002-08-17 21:22:29
My Score:

I am a huge fan off AAA but I gotta say their ska kinda sucked and their horns were pretty terrible most of the time. 24 Hour Roadside Resistance is by far their best album yet, and I am completely looking forward to more and more ska-less punkrock from these guys.

Don't get me wrong, I am a pretty big ska punk fan, and usually get pretty angry at all these bands losing their ska (Mad Caddies come to mind), but I just don't think AAA's ska cut it.

Posted by Anonymous on Saturday, August 17, 2002 at 6:29 PM (EDT)
My Score:

Cause maybe when they were ska-punk it was refreshing to hear, cause there aren't too many bands that sounded like old AAA, while now they're just another one of the thousands of generic punk bands with snotty sounding vocals.

Posted by waste_elite on 2002-08-17 18:22:17
My Score:

why is it that people don't like AAA as much now because they aren't as "SKA" as they used to be. "24 hour roadside resistance" was almost completely punk and it's their best record yet. i like the direction they're going in.

Posted by guitarer1c2 on 2002-08-17 15:47:55
My Score:

Dude, take a deep breath! 1....2....3.... ok, are you better now? Good. If you don't like it, why don't you get off your ass an review some stuff!

Posted by Anonymous on Saturday, August 17, 2002 at 2:33 PM (EDT)
My Score:

there are 3 warped reveiws up right now- and all three reveiwers watched drivethru allday. this is beyond lame- i know wapred tour is cheesy and all.. but there were decent bands on the show. PEOPLE- dont write a reveiw if 2 other people already reviewed the same show AND the same shitty bands you saw. i dont care how much running around you did- nor do i care about the EMOPOP you waste your money on. fuck this reveiw. fuck this reveiwer.

Posted by Anonymous on Saturday, August 17, 2002 at 2:24 PM (EDT)
My Score:

i noticed that shit too. autumn to ashes are tame and boooooooring! enough of the silly hype.. put this band in cheapo bin cause they are trash.

Posted by Anonymous on Saturday, August 17, 2002 at 9:38 AM (EDT)
My Score:

How can it be that I'm the only person that notices that FATA sucks horribly?

Posted by r-punk on 2002-08-17 02:46:03
My Score:

dude i saw taking back sunday yesterday in cleveland. they and Brand New are fucking awesome. no other way to put it. its too bad the lead singer from taking back sunday was like dying from some sinus infection but he still tore it up. and i saw warped in columbus. a good show, no use and autopilot off were the main two that stuck out for me, but i can't remember any band that wasnt good that i saw. a good line up over all

Posted by Anonymous on Saturday, August 17, 2002 at 1:22 AM (EDT)
My Score:

very good review!

Posted by Anonymous on Saturday, August 17, 2002 at 12:17 AM (EDT)
My Score:

i didn't go to this show and i don't really care! who saw BRAND NEW tonight (8.16.02) at club laga though?

now that was one hell of a show! taking back sunday is actually decent live, but BRAND NEW owns!

sorry for the lack of adjectives, i'm going to bed...

- Scott
http://www.local-felons.com/~uw/

Posted by Anonymous on Saturday, August 17, 2002 at 12:14 AM (EDT)
My Score:

A good Pittsburgh band is Better Off Dead. They played when i saw them with the code, and they rocked!

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