The last time I saw The Menzingers was in summer of 2014 when they were on tour with Pup, Lemuria and Cayetana. That all changed on Tuesday, March 14, 2017 when I headed to The Regent Theater in Downtown Los Angeles to see once again (my fourth time overall) along with Jeff Rosenstock and Rozwell Kid.

This was the second time I had seen Rozwell Kid. The first time was when I saw them open for Pup last year and they are always a good starter for a show to get the crowd warmed up. Two things always strike me when I seem. One is that they play these guitar harmonies as if they are in a metal band, but they are playing indie-punk songs. It’s an interesting mix. The other thing that strikes me about this band is that their lead guitarist swings his arms and sort of strikes these “rock star” poses while playing and I can never tell if it is serious or that he is trying to be ironic. Regardless their performance at this show was solid and the fact that the banner behind them read “JEFF’S UP NEXT” in gigantic letter was pretty funny.

Once Rozwell Kid’s half-hour set was done none other than Chris Farren got on stage to read a written announcement to introduce Jeff Rosenstock. This too, was my second time seeing Jeff perform and it was even better than the last rime I saw him, which was with Chumped, The Smith Street Band and AJJ at the same venue. I could be wrong, but it looked like he added a new member who played keyboard, saxophone and guitar. They played songs such as “Rainbow,” “Hey Allison!,” “Get Old Forever,” “I’m Serious, I’m Sorry,” and “Festival Song.” A solid amount of the rest of the set list seemed like it had songs from his newest album Worry. But the absolute best part of his set for me was when the band blasted out “Nausea.” That song is fantastic to hear live not only because they played it so well, but also because the room filled up with palpable excitement. During a couple of the other songs Jeff reached across the barrier and let the crowd strum his guitar and at one point he put his guitar down and crowd surfed while singing into the mic and letting those who were holding him up sing into it as well. It was yet another stellar performance from Jeff Rosenstock.

I was extra excited to see The Menzingers this time around. Again, it had been over two years since the last time I saw them. The band spared no time and blasted right into that spectacular opening of “Tellin’ Lies,” the first track off After The Party and then followed it up right away with “I Don’t Wanna Be An Asshole Anymore.” As you’ll see below the majority of the band’s set list consisted of songs from On The Impossible Past, Rented World and After The Part, but they did throw in some older songs like “Time Tables,” which as a long time fan was very pleasant surprises. I do have to say though that the new songs sound amazing live especially “Bad Catholics.” That tune really got the audience jumping and screaming along. What made this show stand out compared to the three other times I had seen The Menzingers live was that they were at their most confident. They mastered their live show so well that they made it look really easy. The entire audience including me were going absolutely nuts each time they started a new song. Hopefully the Last Call with Carson Daly didn’t film me going completely insane when they started playing that opening riff to “The Obituaries.” Interestingly, the last song of the set was “In Remission,” which at least to me was an unexpectedly amazing way to end the night.

Were there a couple of songs that didn’t make the set list that I hoped would? Sure. I was really hoping to hear “Charlie’s Army” live and maybe couple more older songs like “I Was Born,” “A Lesson In The Abuse Of Information Technology” and “Rivalries” could have been swapped in, but I’m not complaining at all. The Menzingers absolutely killed at this show and I will absolutely be there the next time they roll into Los Angeles.

The Menzingers Set List:

Tellin’ Lies

I Don’t Wanna Be An Asshole Anymore

Nice Things

Thick As Thieves

Good Things

Burn After Reading

Midwestern States

Time Tables

Rodent

My Friend Kyle

After The Party

House On Fire

The Obituaries

Ava House

The Bars

Gates

Bad Catholics

Encore:

Lookers

Casey

In Remission

You can see some pictures from the show on the Punknews Instagram.