On Sunday, the 2010 Vans Warped Tour rolls to an end and while we still have a few interviews (and a photo gallery of pictures from the Edmonton, Alberta show) to post; as the tour comes to an end, so does our on-going coverage of it.
Over the past several weeks we’ve posted tons of interviews, photos and articles about the tour and today I’m wrapping it all up with The Vans Warped Tour 2010 – Edmonton and Beyond where I look at my feelings for the tour and examine the day that the tour stopped in Edmonton for the first time.
The full story is below; but like I said – keep your eyes peeled for more interviews and pictures to go live soon.
The Vans Warped Tour 2010 – Edmonton and Beyond
By Bobby Gorman
I’ll be honest, I wasn’t that excited for the 2010 Vans Warped Tour. In fact, after last year’s disappointing day I wasn’t even sure if I’d bother making the three hour trek down to Calgary for the festival; because quite frankly the 2009 edition of the tour was pretty bad.
There were very few bands that I wanted to see and I missed the two bands I wanted to see most of all because of the horrible access (read: absolutely no access other than a two-to-three hour line-up of cars) to the venue. The day was filled with a few good points, a few low points and a whole bunch of mediocrity and I was left to think about all that mediocrity as I sat in a parked car for over an hour waiting for movement in the parking lot to get out of the venue.
As I drove back home to Edmonton the day after, I wondered if I would take the few days off work and travel down to Calgary the next year.
Flash forward a year and I just got back from my sixth trip to the Vans Warped Tour (although this time it was in Edmonton, in a venue where it took literally ten seconds to leave as opposed to two hours) and I have a very different outlook than I did 365 days ago; so much so that I’m sure I’ll be going back again in 2011.
For you see, for the first time ever I looked at the tour in a very different manner. I flew down to California to take in the first two days of the tour along with the rehearsal day. I talked to bands who were about to embark on the 51 day summer camp. I talked to people behind the scenes – Kevin Lyman, Tara Redavid the Warped Eco-initiative leader and Lisa Johnson the official Warped photographer among others. I saw what went on once the crowds left and the bustling activity before they arrived the next morning in a brand new city.
Each week I followed the tour, posting new articles myself along with reading what other people were saying about the tour. Over the past seven weeks, the Vans Warped Tour was always on my mind and I saw it from every perspective I could: the old school fan, the new school fan, the band, the promoter, the crew and more.
Through all that, I realized something: the Warped Tour no longer means the same thing to me as it did seven years ago when I first went and that’s not a bad thing. After all, I’m sure there were twenty-two year old punks saying the same thing when I went to the tour for the first time in 2004.
Back in 2004, I wanted to see basically every single band on the tour. I ran from stage to stage to stage, never resting, never stopping and just watching band after band after band. Hell, there were a few years where I didn’t even stop to eat or go to the bathroom – I just went all day long and those are memories I’ll never forget. I’d run into friends, meet bands at their merch booth and take in the wonder that is the Vans Warped Tour.
2010 was different in a few ways. Out of the fifty seven bands on the Edmonton bill – one of the smaller shows on the tour due to the fact that some bands couldn’t make the two day drive or get across the border – there was a good chunk of bands that I had no interest in seeing. This meant there was more down time which was filled by chatting with my friends, getting food or walking out of ear shot from the bands I wanted to avoid hearing.
I won’t lie, for me the thought of sitting down at Warped Tour is disheartening. To me, it was always a day of constant music and no rest. Still, if I looked at it objectively, the Warped Tour continues to deliver.
You see, there’s no other situation where I would ever be able to see Andrew WK, Reel Big Fish, Anti-Flag, Face To Face, Pennywise, Alkaline Trio, Fake Problems and Reverend Peyton’s Big Damn Band all in one night; and for less than fifty bucks too. Throw is sets by Set Your Goals, Every Time I Die, Far From Finished and Riverboat Gamblers and the day was filled with some damn good music in my mind. While they may no longer be fully targeting my demographic, there’s still enough of a pull to get me coming out for more.
There were so many memorable moments that can only happen at a show like this: Matt Skiba joining Pennywise for Bro Hymm. Alkaline Trio covering NoMeansNo. Reel Big Fish being their comical selves and playing the best ska show Edmonton has seen in a while.
Anti-Flag put on one of the strongest sets of the day, creating the biggest circle pit in recent memory and playing The Clash’s Should I Stay or Should I Go. During Die For You Government Chris #2 went crowd surfing and Pat Thetic set up his entire drum kit in the middle of pit right in front of the barricade for the final song – completely eliminating the distance between band and fan in a throw back to times before stages and barricades.
There were a few variations on the famed “Wall of Death” as Every Time I Die turned it into the “Crawl of Death” in order to make it “as uncomfortable as possible for everyone involved” and Reverend Peyton had the “Penguin Of Death” and got the crowd to demolish a stuffed penguin.
These are the things that make Warped Tour so fun and if you have to kill thirty minutes here or there waiting for the band you want to play to come, then so be it.
The tour has changed; it’s hard to deny that. Both the arguments for and against the tour have their merits but at the end of the day, The Warped Tour is a pivotal part of the punk rock community. Yes, it’s targeted towards the MySpace generation more and more but it’s still strong enough to get us jaded twenty-two year olds out there for a day of live music.
And just think, seven years from now all those kids running around to see We Are The In Crowd, Piece The Veil, You Me At Six, Artist Vs Poet, Fight Fair or Mayday Parade will be saying the same thing.
