What happened!?

Well, I am really dissappointed by the state of punk rock for kids nowadays. Case in point, I went to the warped tour this year, and even though I had a great time, there were things that just were not right. Bands like GBH, the Street Dogs and the Vandals had the smallest crowds I have ever seen in the tour (maybe like 50-100 people!). Crappy bands like Angels and Airways (Sorry Tom, but you cannot talk about Caca after singing your crappy emo songs), Motion City Soundtrack, and The Academy is.. had the biggest. Kids nowadays go to these shows to listen to emo. It should be called the emo tour. At least they also have more stages that have nice bands that I have seen in the past couple of years like the Aggrolites, the Unseen, the real Mckenzies. Every year, I am less and less willing to go to this tour due to the lack of good bands signed up for it. They do have this auction every year for the show here where the money goes towards the Arts and Music of the NW, and they have interesting stuff, and I have won an auction for the past couple of years. I just hope that these kids don't end up forming a crapp emo band :)

Anyways, enough of my rant. Everytime I think about the show and I am sure of subsquent Warped Tour shows, I think of the H2O song "What happened":

What happened to the passion?
What happened to the reason for screaming?
What happened the music and the message that I love?
What happened to the hard work?
And why does everybody look the same?
What happened the music and the message that I love?

If you have not picked up this CD, and you like the first H2O album, and like real punk rock and hardcore, I definitely recommend this CD. It is one of the best CDs I have bought this year. Good songs throughout the album.

I am glad that at least these guys and other bands like Less Than Jake has come back to their original sound, and that many bands like the Vandals, the Street Dogs, the Dropkick Murphys, NOFX, etc have not deviated from their sounds.

Later!

Still Trying to Keep Punk Rock Elite

Man, I need to start writing this posts more frequently!

The trifecta of the punk rock shows came about back in April when I went to see my favorite band, NOFX. This was a sold out show in the same venue where I had seen Flogging Molly just a while ago. First, American Steel played. Very good poppy punk rock. This was actually the first team I heard these guys, and I was pleasantly surprised.

Then came No Use For A Name. The funny thing about them is that the last two times I have seen them live, they have opened for NOFX. I really like them, especially their older stuff (around 1996-1998). They made sure to play many of their old songs, so that was a treat. One tidbit about this band is that one of the guitarist now plays for a "Slightly" bigger bands, the Foo Fighters. So next time you go see the FF, just tell Mr. Jackson that you liked him from where he was in NUFAN :)

Then came the main act, Fat Mike, El Hefe, Melvin, and Smelly! well, of course they started with .... talking! It is a great fact that in all NOFX shows, the guys really do talk a lot between songs, all very enjoyable however. They played a great set, songs like Bob, Sticking in my eye, Kill all the white man, the Longest line. they even played their longest song, the Decline, which is about 18 minutes of great punk rock.

This was the last show of their short West Coast tour (since the day after it was El Hefe's child's birthday), and I was glad they decided to stop in PDX. This is the 6th time I have seen this band life, and it just gets better and better. And I am willing to go a 7th if they ever come back!

Until next Post! Peace out!