Surprisingly, we haven’t gone to the Mod Club so far this year, but we went yesterday to see the most pop-punk show of the year since The Wonder Years last month: The Heart Attack Tour featuring Knuckle Puck, Forever Came Calling, Transit, and (headlined by) Man Overboard.
Man Overboard: the one with the glasses and hat is Zac, the singer. The one is the middle is Nik who also sings. I don’t know the other dudes.
The first band to go on was Knuckle Puck. I didn’t realize it until later, but I’ve actually heard one of their songs before. They’re fun, generically pop-punk (that’s mostly a compliment), and I respect the singer for keeping his glasses on while head-banging/jumping around the stage (it’s not easy, trust me).
Next was Forever Came Calling who was also good, but honestly, their songs all sort of blended together so I can pick one particular one to include here.
Transit and Man Overboard are apparently really close friends (they’ve done at least one split EP), so it made sense for them to tour together. They also have a very similar vibe and I don’t know how to describe their sound apart from saying POP-PUNK over and over again. Transit was good, the crowd was insane (so many crowd-surfers, which was absurd because the crowd was not big enough to support more than two people at one shot), and the singer continued to sing while flailing in the pit, which was impressive.
You know Boston never drinks alone.
I’ve listened to most of Man Overboard’s songs, but I’m not overly familiar with their first two albums. Luckily, this tour was in support of the third album, 2013’s Heart Attack, which I have listened to several times and therefore knew a lot of the songs (even though I can’t tell you the names of said songs). I was very happy (ironically) when they played “S.A.D.” because it wasn’t on the setlist from Montreal (the tour kicked off in Montreal on Tuesday, so we were the second date – that so rarely happens!) and it happens to be my favourite Man Overboard song.
I hate me, so unoriginal. No other feeling could feel so traditional.
I don’t know the lyrics to many songs, but I did enjoy them. If anything I think like – with The Wonder Years – I now like them more after seeing them live than I did before (though Ro said she might not be able to listen to them any more because Zac has an incredibly high-pitched voice in real life and it was driving her crazy). I’m glad we saw them – at $20 a ticket, it was a small price to pay for us to “Defend Pop Punk” for one night.
bellsiebooks 