warped tour horror movie

Punk Rock Holocaust

New prh 1 & 2 dvd 15th anniversary collection.

The live action horror comedy/concert series Punk Rock Holocaust is finally getting a re-release,  Creep Records has released a limited edition 15 year anniversary collection of the first 2 movies along with deleted scenes and tons of cool stuff, almost 5 hours of content on one DVD!!

YOU CAN ORDER IT ONLINE RIGHT NOW FOR ONLY $20 FROM CREEP RECORDS!

Punk Rock Holocaust on the Final Vans Warped Tour!!

The Punk Rock Holocaust crew will return to the 2018 Vans Warped Tour for one final romp! We’ll be working with Creep Records to release a limited edition DVD of both Punk Rock Holocaust 1 & 2 along with tons of exclusive bonus material that will be available on select dates of the tour!

We will also be finishing up Punk Rock Holocaust 3 with a Warped Tour-ending climax!  The demonic, pop-punk Executioner has returned to the tour with Angelo Moore of the ska/punk legends Fishbone .

Stay tuned for more details!!

About Punk Rock Holocaust 3: Angelo Moore of Fishbone is hosting his own talk show on the Warped Tour. Along with his field producer James, they travel with the tour interviewing bands on a homemade talk show set on a school bus. In their travels, Angelo and James discover the kids are turning into mindless zombies after their smart-phones become infected with a strange virus. Also band members who have previously died are now mysteriously playing on the tour. On top of all that the Executioner has returned and is running around killing the bands (sometimes re-killing) in the middle of the zombie chaos. Warped founder Kevin Lyman is once again caught in the middle of the madness, trying to maintain the Summer’s biggest rock fest and keep the Satanic Record Exec Belial at bay (once again played by Troma’s Lloyd Kaufman) amidst the biggest Punk Rock Holocaust yet!

What is Punk Rock Holocaust?

The Punk Rock Holocaust series is a unique mix of a horror/comedy movie combined with live concert performances shot on the Vans Warped Tour.

The plot of the first film follows Warped Tour founder Kevin Lyman as he tries to maintain the 2003 tour amidst a string of gristly murders at the hands of a pop-punk ‘Executioner’ while keeping the evil record executive Belial (Played by Troma Entertainment’s Lloyd Kaufman) at bay. Meanwhile, tour reporter Heather Vantress is trying to figure out who is behind the heinous crimes as the Warped Tour crew and bands (all played by themselves) are struggling to survive and stay on the road.

The original Punk Rock Holocaust features what has been called the highest on-screen body count in slasher film history with entire crowds being massacred in addition to the deaths of over 110 band members including (In alphabetical order) Atmosphere, Andrew WK, Beret, Big D and the Kids Table, Bowling For Soup, Destruction Made Simple, Dropkick Murphies, Face To Face, Glassjaw, Horrorpops, The Kids Of Widney High, Less Than Jake, Me First and the Gimmie Gimmies, MEST,Never Heard Of It, Pennywise, The Phenomenauts, Rancid, Simple Plan, Suicide Machines, Treephort, Tsunami Bomb, The Used, Vendetta Red and more!

Set one year after the original movie, the sequel finds the demonic Executioner’s headless, undead corpse back on the 2004 Vans Warped Tour looking for its head! The killer’s body is tearing the heads off of various band members and sticking them on the jagged spinal cord where his neck used to be, using them to look for his own head. The heads retain the personality of the band member but the body is pure evil and is still carrying out the killings. The estranged heads aren’t on too good and keep falling off.

On the tour there is total “Holocaust Denial” as Kevin Lyman and his tour production staff refutes the reports of carnage that happened in the previous year. Meanwhile, the evil Record Executive Belial (once again played by Troma’s Lloyd Kaufman) is on the rampage and on Lyman’s case about the deaths on the tour. One precocious, nubile “Holocaust Survivor” named Meghan has become a reporter for a small independent magazine. She is determined to get to the bottom of the story and reveal the truth to the world. Kevin Lyman is hiding something, but why? And what?

The film features live music performances as well as acting performances from some of the top bands of the 2004 and 2005 Warped Tours including The Aquabats, Bouncing Souls, The Casualties, My Chemical Romance, River City Rebels, Riverboat Gamblers, The Planet Smashers, Mr. Dibbs, Teenage Harlets, Shira Girl, Pro BMX Rider Rick Thorne and more!

“Punk Rock Holocaust truly turns the amps up to eleven in a way that Spinal Tap would never have dared.” -Filmthreat.com

“Doug Sakmann’s lunatic love letter to bloodletting and mosh pitting is (a) big, brash power chord layered across the entire DIY mentality of the music and moviemaking he’s championing. And the results are amazingly insane.” -DVDTalk.com

“Doug Sakmann’s mixture of tour commentary and George A Romero-style gore is the most original twist on the rock video genre in a long, long time.” – Raindance Film Festival

And a few on the sequel:

“Punk Rock Holocaust 2 touches parts of (the punk) aesthetic that usually are left pretty much unexplored and/or unscathed. As a result, this fabulous fright farce earns a Highly Recommended rating. Those who like it louder, faster, nastier and nuttier need apply…Thanks to the devious Doug Sakmann, all your simplistic chord progression tendencies will be sufficiently satisfied – and then some.” – Bill Gibron – DVDtalk.com

“If you want comedy, bloodshed, and quality live footage, this is definitely the movie to provide it…With hilarious antics, gore, and high caliber music, Punk Rock Holocaust 2 is a rollercoaster ride of chopped limbs, severed heads and mosh pits.” – Unbound Zine

“Lots of energy, lots of music, lots of B-film blood, plenty of tongue in cheek, even some half-pipe stunts! Punk Rock Holocaust 2 is a worthy follow-up to the original, beyond a shadow of a doubt.” – Grand Guignol – BScared.com – 3.5 out of 4 Stars

A series of live concert horror-comedy films directed by Doug Sakmann

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Horrifying Warped Tour Stories That Aren't Worth The Mosh Pit

While some mourned the loss of the Warped Tour in 2018, many others said good riddance to the festival and all the shocking and unsavory events that have transpired over the last 23 years. Ranging from the bizarre to the truly dangerous and disturbing, Warped Tour horror stories have become almost as synonymous with the music festival as, well, music.

The Warped Tour helped to establish a number of now-mainstream acts, catapulting careers and giving worldwide exposure to performers who had never previously played a high-profile stage. The roster of Warped alumni is a long and surprisingly diverse one, including the Black Eyed Peas, Blink-182, Fall Out Boy, Katy Perry, My Chemical Romance, Yelawolf, and will.i.am. Don't let these innocuous acts fool you, however, some terrifying stuff has gone down at Warped over the years.

In 2015, Slaves Was Accused Of Selling Illicit Substances From Their Merch Booth

There have been rumors of some Warped Tour bands buying and selling illicit substances. While it's certainly not shocking that a hardcore band would partake in such substances while on tour, the way one band allegedly went about it can only be described as brazen.

In July 2015 , the band Slaves reportedly bought and/or sold drugs right from their merch table. Slaves denied the claim, declaring, "There were NOT drugs involved nor was anyone in our band looking to buy, or sell" in a publicly issued statement.

This defense did not save Slaves from getting voted off Warped Island: In an assembly reminiscent of a town hall meeting, festival-goers booted Slaves from the tour.

Slaves Was Rumored To Have Dumped Sewage Out Of Their Tour Bus Window 

Rumors abounded in July 2015 that the band Slaves dumped the sewage tank from their tour bus. The band denied the allegations, saying, "We did NOT empty our non existent sewage tank from our bus all over." 

They made it quite clear: "We are not continuing Warped Tour because we were voted off because the opinions of certain people who believe that since Jonny drank, despite his success getting clean, will lead to his relapse."

PUP Remembered Sleeping In Walmart Parking Lots In 100-Degree Heat 

The Warped Tour's summer dates are notoriously scheduled during the hottest months of the year. This creates an uncomfortable environment for musicians and festival-goers alike.

The band PUP remembered their 2015 Warped Tour as "a really difficult experience." They continued:  

There were a lot of overnight drives and sleeping for three hours in Wal-Mart parking lots, and being in 100-degree heat for eight hours a day. We also did the Vans Warped Tour in a van, which is insane, considering most bands are in buses. We did that for a month, and it was very, very rough. People don’t understand [how much work the Warped Tour is] - it is basically like a mobile Hot Topic.

A 2008 Hot Dog Eating Contest Devolved Into Nausea

Josh James, guitarist for the band Stick to Your Guns, recounted an unforgettable moment from his 2008 Warped Tour experience. It didn't involve wild partying or debauched and depraved behavior. No, James's memory was forever scarred by a hot dog eating contest.

"I entered a hot dog eating contest at Warped in 2008 in Marysville and my team was killing it, but as I finished my 28th hot dog, the first 27 came back up" James remembered. "We were disqualified for puking... throwing up and laughing hurts, bad."

Warped Tour Founder Kevin Lyman Is Okay With The Lack Of Female Representation 

The Warped Tour seemed to have exemplified what one publication called a "woman problem." The vast majority of participating bands consisted of white males, a narrow demographic that did not grow and evolve with the tour's success. One telling exchange between tour founder Kevin Lyman and Megan Seling, a journalist from  Wondering Sound , illustrates that the lack of response to the "woman problem" started at the top:

"There's really not a lack of women," [Lyman] says, interrupting me before I've finished asking the first question. "If you've got 20 bands that have women in them out of 120 bands, that's one out of six bands." "You think that's OK?" I ask, surprised that he would be so comfortable with such a one-sided ratio. "That's absolutely OK," he says.

A Musician Was Almost The Victim Of A Hate Crime

Not only was traveling with the Warped Tour mostly without glamour, but it could also be downright scary. Paul Adler and his band were on the road with the tour in 2010 when they ran out of money. Adler gave the remainder to band members so they could get home to Washington, DC, while he and an indie label owner shuffled off to Cincinnati on a Greyhound bus.

When the bus stopped in Knoxville for half an hour, Adler decided to grab a drink: 

I thought myself miraculously lucky when I found a bar right next door [to the bus station], but when I walked into the dank, dusky honky-tonk, I found myself in a scene akin to a classic movie. Every drunken day-shift worker put down his drink and stared right at me. These guys were white-bread, and I’m the kind of half-Indian who gets dark in the summer - on top of that, my tattoos were exposed and my beard was in full effect.  As soon as I got my $1 Bud, this yokel sidled up to me and slurred, "Hey, brother, you better get off that Allah, man - it's all about Jeeeezuss!"  "Oh. Oh no. No, I don’t like Allah. I love Jesus. I swear," The man put down his beer and started to stand up; several of his peers did the same. I grabbed my Budweiser and made for the door, full beer in hand.

Luckily, Adler made it back to the bus with no issues, but says, "I didn’t tour much after that."

A Storm Temporarily Stopped The 2007 Tour In Cleveland

Festival concert-goers are no strangers to bad weather - the weekend rains are part of what made 1969's Woodstock Festival so memorable. In 2007, attendees of the Warped Tour's Cleveland stop endured an hour-long storm, which had people running for cover to escape a torrential downpour and tornado-like gusts of wind. 

Alkaline Trio’s Matt Skiba got a tattoo that says, "Hello, Cleveland," which commemorates the event, his many years on the road, and one of his favorite films, Spinal Tap .

Less Than Jake Stopped Showering For The Summer 

Although the Warped Tour ended after a 24-year run, the sights, sounds, and even smells have stuck with attendees, bands, and everyone else behind the scenes who brought the event to life.

Official Warped photographer Lisa Johnson recalled when Less Than Jake decided not to shower for the remainder of the season, saying the memories stuck with her, "deep inside my olfactory receptors."

There Was A Big Fight Between Esham And D12 In 2001

If you're under the impression that the Warped Tour was some spiritual successor to Woodstock, you're horribly wrong. Peace and love did not abound at these events. On the contrary, fights occasionally broke out between artists. 

In 2001, rappers Esham and D12 were kicked off the tour after a fight broke out over Esham mentioning Eminem's daughter (Eminem was a member of D12) in a song.

"The bus stopped and about 30 or 40 guys ran out toward Esham," recounted an observer. "When I saw it I was like, 'Oh my God.' I didn’t know what was going on, but it was like 30 versus two."

Set It Off's Cody Carson Broke His Ankle Jumping Off Stage 

Cody Carson , Set If Off's energetic frontman, broke his ankle during a tour stop after jumping from a small stage barrier: 

I broke my ankle in the second song of a set and I had to finish the song... I jumped off the stage, in between the barriers, and landed fine - that’s like a ten-foot jump.  I get on the barricade which has a one-foot step... I grab this girl's hand and start jumping with her and laughing... she didn’t really get into it, but I could tell I made an impression. So I was like "Ok, screw it, I’m getting down, so the one-foot jump down from the barrier is what broke my ankle.

Yungblud's Toilet Flooded In His Tour Bus

In one of his first tours of the US, Yungblud , AKA, Dominic Richard Harrison, experienced the highs and lows of the road, from thousands of screaming fans to the dismal accommodations those fans don't see, which became even less glamorous when his bus toilet flooded: 

We had a bit of a crisis, as well. Our toilet flooded and there was piss all over the floor. We were running around, climbing everywhere. It should have been eventful, but it was a typical Warped Tour story.

In 1995, Sublime Traveled With A Dangerous Dog 

On the first tour in 1995, L7 found themselves sharing the bill with legendary Long Beach band Sublime. According to bass player  Jennifer Finch , they also shared space with the band and their dangerous dog backstage: 

Our year was definitely the learning curve year, the make-a-lot-of-mistakes year, the Sublime-completely-went-off-the-rails year. That was the first year Sublime were [on tour] out of Southern California. They were reckless. They brought their dog on tour, and it bit some people. Every day, somebody would take a Sharpie and write on the dog’s head, "DON’T FEED."

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Warped Tour turns into Slasher movie

" MTV.com has something about the film, tentatively titled " Punk Rock Holocaust " The organizers behind the Vans Warped Tour are tapping into the world of cinema by filming a "teenage slasher film" during the trek. It's about a disgruntled employee," said Kevin Lyman, founder of the tour that mixes extreme sports and punk/ska music. "The guy gets fired the first day and he comes back and puts a curse on the Warped Tour. Then all these things happen. " That's just plumb weird, but it's cool that they're working with the B-movie factory known as Troma Films .

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How 23 Years of Warped Tour Changed America

Please try again

After almost a quarter of a century, and having showcased upwards of 1700 bands, Warped Tour as we know it will come to an end when summer 2018 does. For the most mainstream of Americans who never attended, the tour always looked like an outlier -- a noisy summertime day out for the same kids that shopped at Hot Topic, wore too much eyeliner, and learned HTML by editing their MySpace profiles. Truthfully though, Warped Tour's impact on mainstream pop culture was enormous.

Warped Tour started out scrappy. It was 1995, pop punk was just starting to explode out of the underground -- thanks to Green Day's major label debut, Dookie -- and founder Kevin Lyman , having spent three years working on the Lollapalooza tour, recognized a gap in the festival market. That first Warped was 25 dates -- a breeze for bands and crews who later got used to the jaunt going on for twice as long. No one could foresee back then just how big -- or long-running -- this juggernaut would become.

While Warped's biggest impact has been taking underground culture and smearing it across America in broad daylight every summer, what is so often forgotten is that this was also the venue used by the likes of Katy Perry and Eminem to launch their careers to wider audiences. It's where Sonny Moore started out (in a band named From First to Last ) before he metamorphosed into EDM megastar, Skrillex . It's where No Doubt spent their summer the year before they exploded on a global scale.

Dominic Davi , Oakland-based bassist of  Tsunami Bomb , has been attending Warped since 1995 and playing it since 2001. "It's so easy to forget now," he says, "but when it started, and for a long time into it, the bands Warped Tour was assembling did not get played on the radio. They were not featured on festival lineups. Kevin Lyman helped shine a light onto all these bands that were drawing various amounts on their own, but together could fill a festival. That took a lot of vision."

"In the end," Davi continues, "Warped launched all these careers and was directly responsible for the punk rock explosion that happened in the early 2000s. That's quite a feat."

Warped Tour, especially in its earliest years, acted this way, year upon year, launching artists out of obscurity and into the eyeline of the mainstream. Blink 182, a band that was long considered too crude and provocative for mainstream success, appeared on three out of the four Warpeds between 1996 and 1999. It's no coincidence that by 2000, they were one of the biggest bands in the country.

Not only did Warped change how punk rock was treated by mainstream music culture, it had an indelible impact on the lives of the thousands of people who lived and worked on the tour over the years, some of whom came back annually, without fail. Along the way, it also helped to further unify a nationwide community of punks, rebels, and renegades.

Dominic Davi compares spending a summer on the tour to "running away with the circus." Photographer Lisa Johnson , whose work documenting Warped Tour has been featured on the covers of several official compilations, as well as in the book, Misfit Summer Camp: 20 Years on the Road With Vans , elaborates: "Warped Tour is a place where seemingly anything is possible. Utopia. Hard work and happiness, plus some fun in the sun. There is just always something magic in the air."

The unique spirit of Warped is precisely why hundreds of people have stepped up, year after year, to work in unbearably high temperatures, notoriously dusty environs, facing parking lot after parking lot with few views of the outside world (unless you count the occasional midnight trip to Wal-Mart) for weeks on end.

It's difficult to fathom why anybody would want to spend an entire summer in those conditions -- until you actually do it. In 2006, I joined Warped Tour for five days to write a story for a British rock magazine. Somehow, five days turned into seven weeks. I skipped my flight home to sell merch for one of the bands I had met along the way, and had zero regrets about hitting 'pause' on the rest of my life to do so.

For thousands of us, Warped has always been that way -- once you get caught in its vortex, it's hard to extricate yourself from it. "It's this huge production," Davi says, "with so many moving parts. It's hard work. You are moving all day. I think you have to be a particular personality to love that life. I always did."

The video below that Lisa Johnson took at a backstage party in 2014, effectively sums up the hilarity, unified chaos, and good-natured anarchy of Warped Tour (and also why the nightly after-show barbecues have become the stuff of legend). Take into account that the people you see in this clip are the people working the tour -- crew members, band members, merch people, stage hands. Work days may be long and conditions may sometimes be hard, but on the best nights, this is what happens once the ticket-buying public leaves:

There's no doubting that in recent years Warped Tour has, to some degree at least, lost its niche, while also weathering some damaging storms. "In many ways," Davi notes, "I think when the bands on the tour became bands that the radio and MTV embraced, it became harder to preserve that core exclusivity and unique feeling that Warped Tour had. At first it made the tour bigger, but having to chase the trends and adapt to bands with more exposure, I think made it more difficult to make the tour a special experience. By trying to please everyone they had a harder time pleasing anyone."

The summer tour's time might be drawing to a close, but Warped promises to live on in other capacities: there will be some sort of 25th anniversary celebration, and the first Warped Rewind at Sea cruise just happened last month. More than that though, the tour leaves behind a legacy. It impacted a couple of generations of punk, emo and hardcore bands, as well as their fans. Warped brought a newfound acceptance of alternative culture to all corners of the country. It was a confidence builder for teens who felt alienated in their suburban high schools; it was a training camp for small bands, and a springboard for larger ones; and, for a long while there, it fundamentally changed the fabric of alternative music in America.

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ART INTERVIEWS

With vittorio carli, warped tour 2009.

The Vans Warped Tour was a daylong music extravaganza that featured strong sets by dozens of mostly punk and/or metal influenced bands. The show was well worth the $30 entrance fee.

Some of the highlights included the goth and horror film-influenced HorrorPops, the melodic and tuneful Charlotte Sometimes, the reggae influenced Aggrolites and the Street Dogs, who embodied the very spirit of punk.

The Saturday festival featured mostly punk and or metal based genres but included some lighter acts. It had an interesting mix of styles, and it had a mostly teenage audience.

The tour, started in 1995, a few years after the birth of Lollapalooza, is known for featuring harder bands, but the acts usually aren’t heavy metal or as metal as those at Ozzfest. A few of the groups, especially the metal core bands, could play at Ozzfest, and a few would fit into lineups at the Pitchfork or Lollapalooza festivals. One of the best groups in this year’s Lollapalooza lineup, the Gypsy punk band Gogol Bordello, appeared first at Warped Tour.

The best and most eclectic performance came from HorrorPops, which often transcended or matched its influences: The Blasters, The Cramps and X. Lead singer Patricia Day strummed on a colorfully painted bass sporting heavy makeup and leather gear. The mohawk-sporting Kim Necroman played a Eddie Cochran/Billy Zoom-influenced guitar. At one point they switched instruments and Necroman played bass with his teeth. The group brilliantly combined elements of punk, metal, rockabilly, metal and even a bit of ska. Many of the songs they played contained references to trashy B movies and film noir.

Some highlights of their set included “Kiss Me Kill Me,” from their new LP, and “Thelma and Louise,” a great seize the day anthem which was named after the film. All the members have great stage presence.

The Street Dogs gave the best pure punk performance of the evening and added a needed element of danger to the show. They dedicated a song to the Ramones, but they sounded more like the early ’80s LA punk bands like Black Flag and Fear (who actually played some dates on the tour.) The band was ferociously effective on a set of machine gun fast numbers, including the autobiographical “Tobe’s Got a Drinking Problem,” and “Mean Fist,” which featured some great Greg Ginn-like guitar work by Marcus Hollar and Tobe Bean II. The ex Dropkick Murpys member and lead singer Mike McColgan is a powerful vocalist, and he had complete control of the crowd.

At one point, McColgan encouraged the crowd to open a section in the front so they could start a circle pit. Dozens of mostly male audience members raced around in a circle and brutally pushed or smashed into other people in the circle and the audience.

Overnight pop sensation Katy Perry did most of her most well-known songs, including “I Kissed a Girl,” “Ur So Gay,” and “Hot and Cold,” Some of her songs show the influence of Alanis Morisette and Liz Phair, and the audience was really getting into the performance.

Some other bands also aquitted themselves well. The California based Randies lacked originality (sounding like a poppier L7 or more metal version of the Donnas) but partially made up for it in spunk. The Frantic did a unique and surprisingly effective punk cover of the Foundations’ standard “Fill Me Up Buttercup.” The Briggs perfectly captured the frustration of youth in “Bored Teenager.” The solo artist dubbed Charlotte Sometimes delivered haunting vocals in her songs with tough below the surface lyrics including “Cry Baby.” Her band (which included keyboards) helped recreate an 80s syth pop sound and provided fine support.

There were some bands that failed to ignite on stage. The metal/hip-hop band 3OH3 started promisingly, but its sonic barrage eventually grew tiresome. Classic Crime’s wailing and generic playing pleased the crowd, but to my ear, had no distinction. Like the original Lollapalooza, Warped Tour travels throughout the country and overseas. Unfortunately this can cause tour schedule conflicts, preventing some bands from playing at all shows. It’s the reason one of the most acclaimed Chicago based punk bands, Rise Against, were on the tour but unable to play Saturday.

Of all the music festivals I have attended, The Warped Tour was by far the most poorly organized. There were ten stages, but no maps or band schedules were distributed (I was told by a Warped Tour employee that people in charge were being eco friendly by saving paper). On top of this, many of the performance times kept changing, making it difficult to decide what to see.

Although the festival did not have as much variety as the Lollapalooza , Intonation, and Pitchfork festivals, Warped Tour did a great job in giving some lesser-known bands exposure. The median quality of the performances was high, and punk fans got a lot for their money.

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So Sorry, Its Over: A Look At The Final Vans Warped Tour

All good things must come to an end. As cliché as that may sound, truer words have never been spoken. Often time long running events overstay their welcome and eventually become a shadow of their former self. Now, although many old school Warped Tour fans would like to say the tour was well past its prime, I would say that the tour was continuing to meet its purpose.

The Warped Tour was originally brought to fruition by Kevin Lyman in 1995, and received the official Vans sponsorship in 96. While folks will forever protest that the Vans Warped Tour has always been a “punk festival”, I’ve always viewed it as a celebration of alternative genres and a way for newer acts to reach an audience. While those early years focused on the punk genre there were also many notable acts from across the musical solar system. The “punk-rock summer camp” was more of a tag line than a focus on a singular form of music. Now, a history lesson on the Vans Warped Tour is a story for another day. All you need to know is that the Vans Warped Tour has been the launching pad for hundreds of bands and is a staple for music fans across the country.

My experience with the Vans Warped Tour actually happened a little later in life, my first show being the 2010 edition. The eclectic mix of punk and metal was, pun intended, music to my 18 year old ears. Why had it taken me this long to reach the “promise land”? Since that fateful day at Merriweather Post-Pavilion I’ve attended 6 out of the 8 tours that followed, alternating between the Columbia, Maryland and Camden, New Jersey shows. I’ve discovered countless bands throughout my years attending the tour, many of which have become favorites of mine. Bands/artists like Every Time I Die, Ballyhoo, Yelawolf, MC Lars, Vanna (RIP) and many others are bands I discovered on Warped Tour and bands that remain in constant rotation today. No matter the lineup, it was always important to make it out to the show as you never knew what you might discover. It was something to look forward to every summer.

On November 15 th , 2017 Kevin Lyman announced that the 2018 Vans Warped Tour would be the final cross country tour of the brand’s lifetime. The reasoning behind this decision saw Lyman discussing falling ticket sales amongst the tours prime demographic (teenagers) and the fact that he’s just tired. This is completely understandable as the man has technically been doing cross-country tours for 26 years. The news was devastating. This incredible thing that I had discovered less than ten years prior, and others have been attending for over twenty years, was going away. It is truly the end of an era.

Fast forward to the summer of 2018. The bands, an eclectic mix of first timers and veterens, have all been announced. There was no way any sane person could miss this event. Even if you weren’t a fan of the lineup, the Vans Warped Tour had been a staple for all fans of alternative genres, how could you miss the LAST one. So, it was decided, I was adventuring out to where it all started for me. On July 29 th , 2018 I attended the Final Vans Warped Tour at the Merriweather Post-Pavilion in Columbia, Maryland.

As stated earlier, I spent a few Warped years attending the Camden, NJ show as I found parking to be much easier and the overall aesthetic to be much more pleasing. However, with it being the last hooray I knew where I needed to go. As I pulled into the parking garage it was easy to see that today was going to be special. Thousands of “kids” were lined up to get into the venue, a number that honestly dwarfed the amount of patrons lined up in years prior. Sure, in years past the venue eventually filled out, but you could tell that this year no one wanted to miss a second. I quickly checked in, grabbed my photo pass/ticket, and retrieved a spot in line. For the first time that I can remember, the doors opened 30 minutes early. Now, at Warped Tour the doors are usually scheduled to open at 11:00. From my experience, this has always been true, not a minute before or minute after. I welcomed the 10:30 surprise and made my way into the venue.

I quickly realized just how different this show was going to be compared to last. According to multiple merch workers, the venue decided that it didn’t want anyone to use the “woods” area of Merriweather Post-Pavilion. This was mind blowing; they had always used the woods area and the field on the other side. This allowed for easy movement and 0 congestion amongst many of the stages. For those of you unfamiliar with the area, by removing this portion of the venue they’ve essentially halved the available space. It was noticeable. Overall many of the stages were cramped with the Monster Energy/Mutant Stages being placed on the parking lot, practically turning attendees into fried eggs. Listen, I understand these are small complaints, but I just can’t wrap my brain around why things worked a certain way every other year and were different this year. One attendee mentioned that it may have been a reaction based upon the pavilion collapse at the beginning of the year, however, the adjustments that were made were nowhere near where the accident had taken place. Nonetheless, these are all complaints about the venue itself and their handling of the event, not Warped Tour as a whole. So let’s move on.

For those of you unfamiliar with how the Vans Warped Tour works, let me explain. No one is aware of the set times until you arrive at the show. Once you enter the gates there is a big inflatable schedule in the center that displays the times. There are also multiple vendors selling schedules for about $2 each. It’s definitely a stressful method that always keeps me up the night prior. I always end up wide awake the night before, stressed I’m going to sleep through my alarm and miss that “one special band”. This has never happened, but I stressed out about it yearly.

Once I received my schedule my first destination was decided. I made my way over to the Mutant Red Dawn stage to catch Australian metalcore band, The Amity Affliction . The band got their start in 2003 and first popped on my radar in 2012 with the release of “Chasing Ghosts”. I admit my knowledge of the Aussie trio is very limited. I came across the boys around the time I was stepping away from the metalcore genre as a whole. I felt it had become a bit oversaturated with countless bands sounding too similar to one another. Unfortunately I didn’t give The Amity Affliction a fair shot at the time, but I am thankful to say that that has changed in recent years. Being the first band of the day you’d think it would take Ahren Stringer and Joel Birch a minute to warm up, but to hell with that. As soon as they took the stage they busted out into a blistering rendition of the title track off their fifth album, “This Could Be Heartbreak”. The rest of the set contained tracks throughout the band’s career, closing with one of their larger songs, “Pittsburgh”. The Amity Affliction have a new album, Misery, dropping on the 24 th of August and you won’t regret picking it up!

At this point I took off towards one of the main stages, the Journey Right Foot stage in order to catch The Maine . Having played the festival 6 times, the Arizona band is always one I try my best to catch. Their infectious pop rock grooves are catchy enough to get even the hardest of metal heads dancing. Honestly, it is crazy how these guys having completely blown up. They’ve got the skills to write pop hits for days and damn do they know how to put on a show. Lead singer, John O’Callaghan always has the audience in the palm of his hands. He says jump, the crowd screams, “how high?!”. The band called The Maine played songs across their decade long career. The highlight definitely being when O’Callaghan pulled an audience member on stage to join him in singing “Girls Do What They Want”. Unfortunately I’ve never seen The Maine outside of Warped Tour, and that definitely needs to change soon.

During the show there was another festival happening in Philadelphia known as “This is Hardcore”. Obviously I wasn’t able to be there so I had to figure out another way to get my hardcore fix. Enter, Kublai Khan . Kublai Khan is a band I hadn’t heard much of in the past, but I knew I wanted to check out. Their downtuned guitars and slow, but heavy grooves had me two-stepping all over the photo pit. If there is anything that annoys me about being in the photo pit, it’s that everyone in there just looks pissed off to be there. What’s there to be mad about? You’ve got a front row spot, you more than likely were able to get in for free, and your work is going to get posted and recognized by other music fans across the globe. Hey, why not have some fun while you’re doing it!? That’s what I did. Kublai Khan put out their latest record, “Nomad” last September. Check it out!

Next up was hands down the wild card of the festival. The night prior I had been researching a few artists on the lineup I had never heard before. I came across the artist known as Yungblud . I was completely enthralled within seconds. Between the visuals, the lyrics, and the varying genres that weave in and out of one another, I couldn’t help but be fascinated. I can happily say that this was increased tenfold when I witnessed it live. I would describe Yungblud, real name Dominic Harrison, as Twenty One Pilots meets MIA with a big glass of IDGAF attitude. While Dom played one of the smaller stages of the day, you’d never realize it. The crowd was packed into this stage like sardines. The place went wild as the 19 year old hit the stage and there wasn’t a body standing still in sight. Yungblud just released his debut album, “21 st Century Liability” on July 6 th . If you take away anything from this write up it should be to go pick up that album!

We’re a few hours into the day, but there is no time to rest. Next up we have Warped Tour legends, and one of my favorite bands of all time: Less Than Jake ! Honestly, what can I say about Less Than Jake that I haven’t said before? They’ve been going strong for 25+ years and show no signs of stopping. They opened the show with “All my Best Friends are Metal Heads” and that was all she wrote. What followed was 30 minutes of ska punk greatness that only Less Than Jake can provide.

At this point I headed over to the second main stage, the Journey’s Left Foot stage which was for some reason not next to the Right Foot stage like it had been in years past. When I arrived at the Left Foot stage a wave of fear crashed over me. This was not enough room for the amount of people who would be filling this space later (which we’ll get to). Regardless, the next band to take the stage were some high school favorites of mine, 3OH!3 . 3OH!3 is an electropop duo that got their start in 2004. They hit it big with 2008’s “Want”, releasing hits Don’t Trust Me and Starstrukk (both tracks having remixes that feature Kid Cudi and Katy Perry respectively). When I felt that some of their later albums started having a jokey vibe in the vein of The Lonely Island I stopped listening. That being said, Sean and Nat absolutely killed it. Much of the setlist focused on the band’s early work which was right up my alley. 3OH!3’s latest release, “Night Sports” is available now from Fueled By Ramen.

Now it’s time for a band I never thought I’d see on Warped Tour. I’ve covered them multiple times before, and it’s always a pleasure. I’m talking about, of course, the demented duo TWIZTID . If you’re a usual visitor here at Icon Vs Icon then you know my history with this band. I went into a long tangent of my experience in the Juggalo world back when I covered Twiztid’s Psychomania tour, check it out because it’s a great read! A quick refresher: since leaving Psychopathic records Twiztid has been doing huge things! They’ve received opportunities they could only dream of in years prior. Not to mention they’ve started their own label with some of the best names in underground hip hop. Twiztid is going strong, and they’re definitely not stopping. Also, no surprise here, they absolutely killed it! I was truly curious as to what tracks they would choose for the setlist. While the crowd was filled with juggalos it was also filled with people whose curiosity led them to the Mutant Red Dawn stage this afternoon. I was happy to see that they played tracks that spanned their entire career. Anyone that thinks the demented duo is hurting in recent years either isn’t paying attention or is in serious denial. The crowd was packed and I can’t wait to see where they go from here.

A change of pace was needed so I made my way back to the main stage for some ska goodness. The next band to grace my ears was The Interrupters . I’ve had the pleasure of catching this group of fine folks three times, the last being in Ohio at “Punk In Drublic”. While the crowd was a bit lighter, it definitely filled in as the band took the stage. Aimee Interrupter has such an infectious smile that it is impossible to be upset when they’re playing. Leave your cares at the door and get ready to skank because by the end of their set we were all one big family! The Interrupters just released their newest album “Fight the Good Fight” on June 29 th from Hellcat Records.

What happened next is what I was worried about in this small space. The night before Warped Tour, founder Kevin Lyman had tweeted about Maryland having a very special guest. Well this was it. Maryland was greeted by hometown heroes, Good Charlotte . GC is no stranger when it comes to Warped Tour having played the festival 3 times prior. No surprise, they came out and the crowd went absolutely nuts. We were definitely at capacity when it came to this area of the festival, and it was definitely poor planning on the venue’s part. Nevertheless, Good Charlotte ran through every hit they could in their short time set. Joel mentioned after playing the opener, “The Anthem”, that they wouldn’t be talking much as they wanted to get through as many tracks as possible. They achieved just that. These guys haven’t lost a step. Good Charlotte has a new album out on September 18 th .

During the Good Charlotte set, my younger sister had gotten hurt in the crowd. We went and sat down a little bit, tired and hungry. Unfortunately the next band that played would be the last I would see on the Vans Warped Tour, but how appropriate that that band would be Reel Big Fish . Reel Big Fish is a band I’ve seen over 15 times. I grew up listening to them and I’ve been attending their shows ever since I was old enough to go. There is nothing in this world like a Reel Big Fish show. While Aaron Barrett may be the only original member left in the band his eye/ear for talent has kept the band going for 27 years. They tour nonstop but play every show like it’s going to be their last. Here’s the thing with an RBF show, you know what you’re going to hear, but that doesn’t make it any less fun. Reel Big Fish played all of their well-known tracks, well…well known to their fans. I cannot recommend checking out Reel Big Fish anymore than I already have in the past. If you want an incredible time, go see Reel Big Fish!

So that was the end of it. No one in my party felt well after spending all day in the heat so we decided to cut our day short. The only band I am really disappointed I missed was Every Time I Die. So here’s a hypothetical review of that show: it was great, they’re always great, go and see them.

Well there it is! That was the Final Vans Warped Tour. Life will never be the same without this cross-country tour being in my life every summer. Kevin Lyman announced that something will be done next year, for the tour’s 25 th anniversary, but this is the FINAL cross-country tour. It’s bitter sweet really. It’s sad that it’s over, but it feels great to reminisce about all the incredible memories. I can’t wait to see what happens next!

Obsessed with all things horror, video games, comics and vinyl, Dylan has been surrounded by all things geek culture since birth. Along with writing for Icon Versus Icon he’s also the co-host for the year long Christmas podcast, “Christmas 365” .

 “No wimps. No False Metal.”

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Punk's not dead? How Vans Warped tour jumped the shark

The festival defined noughties pop-punk and united America’s outcasts – but as it shuts for ever, we ask: did it fail to champion diversity?

T he sun is blazing mercilessly in Columbia, Maryland, on a Sunday in July. It is not yet noon, and the nasal singer of a jet-black metalcore band is crying out: “Will you miss me when I’m gooone?” Already this weekend, I have seen hair-dye jobs in impossibly electric hues of bubblegum pink and highlighter-pen lime. I have seen ripped fishnets and Tim Burton mini-backpacks and earlobes stretched as big as the rims of drinking glasses. I have perused the wares of outfitters called Mall Goth Trash and Sad Boys Club. I can confirm that the campaigns to “Stay Positive and Hail Satan” and ensure that “Ska’s Not Dead!” have endured in some corners of America.

I am on my third consecutive day inside the misfit carnival that is Vans Warped tour, which, after 24 years, finished its final run as a national touring festival last week. While American festivals such as Lollapalooza have long retired their caravans and turned into annual fixed-site weekenders, Warped persevered as a roving punk-themed circus. The brand will probably continue with abbreviated tours, says Kevin Lyman, its founder. An exhibition about Warped’s history will open next year at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, Ohio. But it is the end of an era for the generation who invented “mall punk”.

Now 58, Lyman says he felt like an outcast as early as junior high. He was partial to British street punk, reggae and the Clash’s Sandinista! album. Socialising with the band geeks and theatre kids – “You got food thrown at you in school,” he says. “I was always the guy who said, ‘Let’s unite and throw food back.’” After several years working behind the scenes at Lollapalooza, Lyman founded Warped in 1995.

Warped made its name packaging the more brashly commercial strains of pop-punk, emo, hardcore and ska that peaked in the early- to mid-2000s, though the tour has also featured household names including Limp Bizkit and Eminem (and, early on, Katy Perry). It had no identified headliners: the schedule changed daily and was not announced until gates opened. To ensure you would see your favourite band, you simply had to arrive by 11. “No one did things the way I did, and no one has since,” says Lyman. “This was the last festival for the people.”

Lyman sought to “put punk rock in the sunshine”, to escape the violence of clubs, which he thought distracted from the genre’s radical message. But Warped ultimately became a shorthand for an easily digested candy-coated version of rebellion. The spirit of commodified dissent was exemplified by its name – sponsored by Vans shoe company, in a checkerboarded break from punk’s historically anti-capitalist ethic. Warped’s scale meant it dealt bands like gateway drugs, which plenty of young people need. My three days following the tour evoked a complete scene of maladjusted suburban youth: the car park, the mall, the skate park, the mosh pit.

In contrast to its diverse audiences, Warped’s lineups were shockingly male and white and, at times, the tour presented worrying streaks of conservatism – in Maryland, I saw a recruiting tent for the US Marines. Warped came under fire in 2015 for allowing a performance by Front Porch Step after he had been accused of sexual misconduct and preying on young fans. This prompted Paramore’s Hayley Williams, one of Warped tour’s most renowned alumni, to tweet: “What happened to our scene?”

Lyman says: “If I look back at Front Porch Step, probably I made a mistake. With hindsight, I probably wouldn’t have let it happen.” Lyman says he’s open to criticism, though he seems allergic to the way it plays out online. “Maybe that’s why I’m ending it,” he says. “We all used to be a community that figured things out. Now people prejudge so quickly on the internet.”

Only 7% of bands on this year’s touring lineup included women, such as Australia’s Tonight Alive and ska revivalists the Interrupters. The feminist rock band Potty Mouth (incidentally once managed by Warped veterans Good Charlotte) ended up on one Californian date after tweeting about gender disparity on the tour: “We wanted access to that fan base of young girls,” says bassist Ally Einbinder. “For us, it would be breaking into a whole new audience who might not hear of us otherwise.” Lyman mentions that the production crew of Warped tour has been heavily dominated by women, and reasoned that this year’s gender disparity was due in part to the fact that he curated the festival (he still chooses the bands) as “a nostalgia tour”.

Over the years, Warped formed alliances with bands such as Less Than Jake, a Floridian ska-punk troupe who first played the tour in 1996 and have remained fixtures since. The drummer, Vinnie Fiorello, reminisces about performing, in the scrappy early days, on a stage made of plywood and cinder blocks. “Warped was supposed to be a punk rock summer camp,” he says. Less Than Jake embodied that, instigating “maximum fun” and an air of weirdness: regular mayhem at a Less Than Jake Warped set might, for instance, find “a metalhead shooting a toilet-paper gun”.

“We were never, at any point, even remotely in the cool kids’ club of punk rock,” says Fiorello. “But Warped was a common denominator among punk bands, hardcore bands, screamo and metal, ska punk. You had to play Warped tour.” Fiorello, who also co-founded the influential pop-punk and emo label Fueled by Ramen , noted that Warped was a crucial marketing tool: “Warped tour would be a huge chunk of the launch for a record or label or band. It was in the Less Than Jake marketing plan in the 90s, for sure. The end of that truly means the shrinking of some ways to market what’s out there.”

Fellow ska-punk elders Reel Big Fish have also been enmeshed in Warped since 1997. Year after year, they built their audience on the tour, though trumpeter John Christianson was not shy about the price. “There’s a lot of anxiety,” he says. “There’s five bands playing at one time. Five bands playing at one time is cacophony, and that is not any fun for me.”

Chuck Comeau is the drummer of Montreal pop-punks Simple Plan: 11 Warpeds in total. “You had this cultural movement that was happening,” he says of the scene’s 2003 peak. “And Warped had the cultural currency. If you wanted to be part of this scene, if you wanted to be respected, if you wanted to reach the audience, it was a must.”

The music of Warped has not all aged well. In Maryland, surprise guests Good Charlotte led a workmanlike singalong to Girls and Boys, their arguably sexist 2002 single about teenage materialism. Speaking backstage, Buddy Nielsen of the New Jersey post-hardcore band Senses Fail (eight-time Warped veterans, who this year performed a medley of nu-metal covers) cited childhood trauma and a bad relationship with his mother as sources of the toxic masculinity in some of his earliest material. “I don’t necessarily celebrate those songs,” Nielsen says. “I wouldn’t encourage my daughter to listen to music like that.” His self-awareness reflects a broader cultural milieu that has recently been forced to reckon with its ingrained misogyny.

I was watching a formulaic pop-punk band in matching Hawaiian shirts play a side stage when I heard a woman’s demonic roar in the distance and ran towards it. “Where my fucking ladies at?” seethed Lauren Kashan, singer of Baltimore metalcore band Sharptooth. They played Clever Girl, the title track from their 2017 debut, which culminated with a mosh-summoning breakdown and an incendiary refrain: “Dead men tell no tales,” the crowd chanted. “Dead men talk no shit.” This jolt of radical feminism felt shocking in the context of Warped tour. “The world we live in is not a safe place for too many of us,” Kashan shouted from the stage. “So this needs to be.”

Sharptooth’s sets were thrillingly righteous. Kashan issued a call to arms or systemic indictment between every song, attacking street harassment, police brutality and US border policy. She drew attention to the fact that she would be the only woman performing on that stage all day and, before a song called Left for Dead, spoke bluntly about her experiences of sexual violence. “I’ve been raped multiple times,” Kashan told the crowd. “I don’t like talking about it, but if I’m the person with the mic and I can’t talk about my trauma, how is any other survivor supposed to ask for help?”

I watched a pink-haired girl in the eye of the pit scream along with Kashan: “I can’t be silent anymore!” “Sharptooth and [2017 Warped band] War on Woman make me feel so relieved about being into music in this scene,” says Niquey, 20. “Stuff like that needs to be talked about at places like Warped tour because it’s so hypermasculine.” Niquey has come to Warped every year since she was 12 – she had only seen Hannah Montana and Jonas Brothers in concert before that – and said she looked forward to it more than her birthday.

Some have welcomed the demise of Warped and the aggressively male-dominated culture it came to represent. But after witnessing Sharptooth’s set, it occurred to me that it would be a tragedy for Warped tour to simply end, not evolve, at a moment where powerful, wide-reaching platforms are increasingly rare in rock music of any kind. Potty Mouth’s Einbinder agrees: “There is so much potential to make some changes and evolve the whole culture of the festival,” she says. “But so much of that cultural shift would have to come from the top down.”

I felt optimistic watching Doll Skin, a band of women aged 18 to 21 who play pop-punk with riff-heavy nods to classic rock, and strive to be “as raw and feminine and powerful as we can”, according to singer Sydney Dolezal. They played an original song called Punch a Nazi and a cover of Fugazi’s Waiting Room, which stood out as strongly at Warped as the flower crowns in their circle pit.

Multiple times a day, Dolezal says, young girls approach Doll Skin to say they feel inspired by their set, sometimes crying. “If there’s anyone out there who feels like they can’t be in a band – they can,” she says. “It’s attainable. You don’t have to be a super shredder – you can just play guitar. You don’t have to be soloing on drums, you can just play a beat. You don’t have to be doing runs, you can just yell into a microphone.” It’s no stretch to say this was the most punk statement I heard at the 2018 Warped tour.

In Mansfield, Massachusetts, I meet 19-year-old Felice, who wants to see more bands resembling Doll Skin at Warped. “I wish we could see more intersectionality,” she says. “I wish I could hear more queer artists or artists of colour.” Her friend Felisha chimes in: “It’s a prime time to keep going if anything.” But after Doll Skin’s Long Island set, another new fan, Katie, 26, had a firmer suggestion: “Burn it to the ground and start something new.”

A pair of 23-year-old fans on Long Island, Neena and Gabrielle, tells me they had long fantasised about forming bands. Growing up, they were enthralled by fictional all-girl groups such as Josie and the Pussycats. Neena wonders whether she might have taken up drums had she seen more female instrumentalists.

“I’m such an emo kid. You feel like an outcast sometimes,” Gabrielle says. “But when you’re in this setting, you see there are thousands upon thousands of people who are just like you. It’s so comforting.” I mention how the huge number of outsiders does not quite register until you get here, and it makes you realise – Neena finishes my sentence – “how not alone you are”.

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• Young people

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Before & After ‘The Black Parade’

By Christopher R. Weingarten and Aliza Aufrichtig Dec. 18, 2019

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In 2006, a gaggle of Jersey boys obsessed with horror movies, comic books and death made an audacious piece of goth-punk Broadway. “ The Black Parade ,” the third album by My Chemical Romance, was a full-fledged rock opera — the type of shameless, pretentious statement that punk was ostensibly created to destroy. Fueled by the Beatles, Queen, Pink Floyd and a bunch of ’70s and ’80s movie musicals, MCR made “The Wall” for the era of black eyeliner and body piercing.

The emo-pop heartthrobs had spent the better part of two years riding the runaway success of their 2004 album “ Three Cheers for Sweet Revenge ”: They brooded on magazine covers, flailed on MTV’s “Total Request Live” and conquered the Warped Tour. Instead of cashing in with another set of morbid pop-punk anthems, My Chemical Romance — the brothers Gerard (vocals) and Mikey Way (bass), Bob Bryar (drums), Frank Iero (guitar) and Ray Toro (guitar) — attempted to make something more ambitious and timeless.

The group recruited Rob Cavallo, who had experience producing both Green Day and “Rent.” It concocted a complex, deeply personal story line about an ailing young hero named the Patient and sang ballads with lines like “Baby, I’m just soggy from the chemo.” They wore marching band uniforms that looked like Tim Burton art-directing “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.” In a much repeated metaphor for the entire theatrical, daring endeavor, they got Liza Minnelli to sing on it. The album went triple platinum.

The era of emo-pop dominance ended shortly after. MCR rebooted once again as a post-apocalyptic glam-prog group for the 2010 LP “Danger Days: The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys,” then broke up three years later. (The band will play its first show in seven years Dec. 20 in Los Angeles.) Its legacy lives on, not only in contemporary emo bands, but in the young rappers, metalcore bands and genre-hopping pop musicians who grew up nodding along with the Black Parade’s grand marshals.

Here’s an audio guide to the album’s songs, plus what came before, and what came after.

All music previews and full tracks provided by

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David Bowie

My Chemical Romance was directly inspired by classic, character-driven rock concept albums like David Bowie’s “The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders From Mars.” Like “The End.,” Bowie’s “Five Years” is a theatrical, grandiose crescendo in 6/8. “The idea of the song is that the world is ending in five years, so it was about finding a drumbeat that got that across,” the Bowie drummer Woody Woodmansey told the Quietus about its laconic intro.

In the Flesh

The opener to “The Wall,” the most famous concept album of all time, was a key influence. “We wanted it to feel very much like that kind of beginning, like that you were about to get taken on a journey,” Gerard Way said on a commentary track included on the “Black Parade” deluxe edition. “And it tells a story right away.”

My Chemical Romance

Beginning with “Now come one, come all to this tragic affair,” the soaring intro to “The Black Parade” sets up the album as a high-concept piece of theater. In live shows, Gerard Way would start the song dressed in a hospital gown, singing from a gurney.

Oh Catastrophe

Crown the Empire

The Dallas metalcore band Crown the Empire begins its 2012 concept album “The Fallout” with this scene-setting tune.

Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band

The Beatles

The bridge of “Dead!” reminded MCR of the Beatles’ baroque landmark. So the band broke out the tuba parts.

Mr. Blue Sky

Electric Light Orchestra

“Dead!” borrows its springing gait from this Top 40 hit by the lusciously arranged Electric Light Orchestra. Those clangs reminiscent of the anvil sounds in the Beatles’ “Maxwell’s Silver Hammer”? ELO used a fire extinguisher.

I Want You to Want Me (Live)

Cheap Trick

The Cheap Trick bassist Tom Petersson told Classic Rock magazine that the breakout moment for his power-pop band started as somewhat of a joke by the group’s lead guitarist, Rick Nielsen: “The idea was to have it like a heavy-metal pop song. Cheap Trick doing Abba — except a very heavy version.” Beyond that excellent metaphor for My Chemical Romance, this tune is also bulging with guitar heroics and a bouncy groove.

Alive With the Glory of Love

Say Anything

Though the Los Angeles emo band Say Anything didn’t fulfill its initial intention of making a rock opera, its influential second album, “ … Is a Real Boy,” nonetheless beat MCR to the punch when it came to theater-kid histrionics and an omnivorous rock palate.

“It’s about being dead and about people not liking you,” Gerard Way said in the unofficial MCR biography “Not the Life It Seems.” In the tune, a doctor delivers a terminal diagnosis with a wild mix of show-tune bravado and stadium rock. “We wanted to say, ‘You may hate us but we’re still here.’ We wanted to say, ‘Here we are and we’re more daring and more defiant than ever,’” Way said.

Ode to Sleep

Twenty One Pilots

This genre-crossing duo opens its multiplatinum third album, “Vessel,” with a multipart suite that often swings into the bounce-and-bleed of “Dead!”

I’m No Good

New Year's Day

The California metal band New Years Day took the jaunty, gothy, blood-soaked influence of MCR to heavier depths.

I Haven’t Been Taking Care of Myself

The brassy-voiced Australian indie-rock songwriter Alex Lahey covered “Welcome to the Black Parade ” for the radio station Triple J’s “Like a Version” series. After Gerard Way expressed his approval, she thanked him, saying, “So many of us wouldn’t be here without you.”

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This Is How I Disappear

Aces High (Live)

Iron Maiden

The first live album from Britain’s grandiose, highly theatrical, grandly visual heavy metal bulldozers Iron Maiden was formative for the Way brothers. “I listened to that thing for five years straight,” Gerard told Rolling Stone . “That’s one of the things that really made me want to be a live performer.”

Mandatory Suicide

Gerard and Mikey Way used to hide their copy of this thrash-metal classic from their parents because of the skull on the cover.

Cut the Wheel

Before the emergence of influential metalcore bands like Converge and Hatebreed, Rorschach — from New Jersey, MCR’s own backyard — was finding ways to mix the monolithic riffs of metal with the scruffy attitude of hardcore punk.

The most adrenaline-charged song on “The Black Parade” was inspired by the séances that Harry Houdini’s wife conducted after his death in 1926.

Sleeping With Sirens

Though My Chemical Romance called it quits in 2013, bands like Orlando’s Sleeping With Sirens kept mixing post-hardcore and pop-punk.

The adventurous Houston band Waterparks mixes MCR’s keening melodies and bold honesty with jittery rainbows of electronic pop. MCR’s own Mikey Way has even served as their touring bassist.

The Sharpest Lives

“The Rocky Horror Picture Show” Cast

“The beauty of that movie is self-expression,” Gerard Way told Spin about the gender-bending, proto-goth rock musical. “All of these characters are rampant and totally free no matter what happens to them. They’re all gonna end up dead, but they don’t care.”

Joy Division

When Gerard Way played “The Sharpest Lives” on an acoustic guitar, he said it sounded like it was by New Order, the dance-rock band formed by three-fourths of Joy Division.

Astro Zombies

The Misfits

New Jersey’s the Misfits, with their love of cheap sci-fi, vintage horror and pulpy Hollywood lore, became the progenitors of “horror punk.” “This record changed everything for me,” Gerard Way told Guitar World about “Walk Among Us,” the 1982 Misfits album that exposed the middle school Dungeons & Dragons fan to punk. “My mom wouldn’t buy it for me because it has a song called ‘Devil’s Whorehouse,’ so I got my grandfather to buy it for me.” When he put it on, he said he felt “more liberated” than he’d ever been.

Somebody Told Me

The Killers

This modern classic combined post-punk beats and stadium-rock ambition.

A driving pop-punk burst with lyrics like “You can watch me corrode like a beast in repose.”

The Glass Elevator (Walls)

The members of Crown the Empire are fans of concept albums, soaring melodies and a stage-centric presentation: “Break down your walls tonight/We’re here to sing for you,” this song begins. “Tear down your walls tonight/We’re here to scream for you.”

Mr. Doctor Man

Palaye Royale

The gothy, glammy Canadians Palaye Royale are also a group made of brothers, and they regularly cover MCR in their live shows. (Learning of the band’s reunion, they joked on Twitter, “We covered ‘Teenagers’ so much that My Chemical Romance finally said, ‘let the pros do it.’”)

Welcome to the Black Parade

Goodbye Eddie, Goodbye

The Juicy Fruits

Two titans of ’70s film — the songwriter Paul Williams (“Rainbow Connection”) and the writer and director Brian De Palma (“Carrie”) — collaborated on “Phantom of the Paradise,” a horror-themed rock opera that was critically panned and financially disastrous. Its quiet cult following includes Gerard Way, who seems to have internalized this tune from it. “When I was doing ‘The Black Parade,’” Way told The New York Times , “I thought about the film all the time, about its message of sacrificing integrity in order to reach more people.”

Bohemian Rhapsody

You know the story by now: a grand multipart suite, a three-week recording session, a tape with so many overdubs that you could see through it, an iconic guitar solo, an outlandish title and a record label that couldn’t understand its ambition. Said Gerard Way in a 2007 interview, “I think Queen is the greatest rock band of all time.”

It’s the Hard Knock Life

The Original Broadway Cast of Annie

My Chemical Romance was inspired by this Broadway smash, and would refer back to this track when talking about the massive, shouted gang vocals in the bridge of “Welcome to the Black Parade.”

Jesus of Suburbia

“American Idiot,” the Grammy-winning punk-rock opera from Green Day, set the modern standard for latter-day grand-scale, Broadway-ready , character-driven concept albums. My Chemical Romance not only opened some dates on the subsequent tour, but poached the album’s producer, Rob Cavallo.

The first single and the album’s grand opus was made of 167 tracks. Toro said it was “like our ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’” in a 2007 interview . Brian May returned the salute by performing the song with the band at Reading Festival in 2011.

The New York City trio fun. rode a combination of Queen, Broadway and emo-rock to a triple platinum album.

The Show Must Go On Prt. 1

Famous last words.

The Michigan metalcore band Famous Last Words isn’t named after the MCR song, but its vocalist, JT Tolles, has said MCR was his first live show. The band made its debut with a theatrical concept album called “Two-Faced Charade.”

“I’ve shed a remarkable amount of tears in my life over My Chemical Romance,” the chart-topping star said on Twitter . Like MCR, Halsey’s pop is personal, gloomy, yet soaring. “I grew up ritualistically attending warped tour and lurking livejournal,” she wrote . “Then I became a musician and met all my emo faves. Proud emo and will never deny it.”

Into the Unknown

Panic! at the Disco

My Chemical Romance made emo-rock sound like movie musicals. Now movie musicals, like Disney’s “ Frozen 2 ,” sound like emo-rock.

I Don’t Love You

Have You Ever Seen the Rain

Creedence Clearwater Revival

The Minutemen will tell you that the members of Creedence Clearwater Revival were good workingman’s proto-punks. The band is an acknowledged influence on MCR’s mid-tempo single “I Don’t Love You.” During MCR’s European tour dates in 2007, the band would occasionally play CCR’s “Fortunate Son” during the encore.

Please, Please, Please Let Me Get What I Want

The 15-year-old Gerard Way and his younger brother were entranced by “Best … I,” the greatest-hits compilation by mope-rock’s reigning kings of rainy days and sour moods. “At the time, everything in America was so macho,” Gerard Way told The Times about growing up in ’90s New Jersey. “The British stuff was the opposite of macho. I heard the Smiths, and that really changed everything for me.” This song, the final track on “Best … I,” was used as intro music for MCR’s European tour dates before they wrote “The Black Parade.”

Smashing Pumpkins

In high school, both Gerard and Mikey Way were fans of Smashing Pumpkins, another band that found success mixing tender emotion, arena-rock bombast and a love of Queen. After seeing the band at Madison Square Garden, Mikey Way told Entertainment Weekly . “Me and [Gerard] were both like, This is the band we want to be. We want to save people’s lives.”

Born less than two months before Gerard Way in 1977, the Coldplay frontman Chris Martin grew up on a similar musical diet, and kept Britpop’s moody, mid-tempo guitar-rock ballads commercially viable throughout the ’00s.

Thursday was a scene leader in the New Jersey post-hardcore community that ultimately spawned MCR. Gerard Way credits its singer, Geoff Rickly, with inspiring him to front a band at all, and Rickly produced My Chemical Romance’s 2002 debut. Thursday’s MTV-grazing success on its 2001 breakthrough, “Full Collapse,” was an early spark that foreshadowed the eventual pop windfall of emo bands like MCR, Fall Out Boy, Panic! at the Disco and Paramore.

This power ballad was written during the long stretch of touring for MCR’s 2004 breakthrough “Three Cheers for Sweet Revenge.”

Awful Things

Lil Peep featuring Lil Tracy

Lil Peep amassed a huge internet following and a handful of charting singles for a pioneering mixture of trap beats with the heart-rending emo melodicism of bands like My Chemical Romance and Fall Out Boy. (Peep even dressed as Gerard Way for Halloween one year as a child.) After Peep died in 2017 at the age of 21, MCR’s “Helena” played at his memorial service.

The depressive melodies of the 21-year-old singing-rap star Juice WRLD, who died earlier this month , mirror the mid-00s era of emo, and his message resonates like a modern update as well: Even when he finds “true happiness,” he told Vulture , “I’m gonna still lead people through whatever they’re going through.”

Hope for the Underrated Youth

“Gerard Way knew every single thing I was going through,” the pan-genre musician and eye-shadow fan Yungblud told Forbes . “Ain’t a singer, he’s an activist.” Indeed, Yungblud is part of a generation of artists mixing the emo era’s blood-spattered diary entries with the sound of modern lo-fi rap.

House of Wolves

Sing, Sing, Sing

Benny Goodman and His Orchestra

The powerhouse drumming of Gene Krupa makes this one of swing music’s most memorable moments.

Three Little Bops

Shorty Rogers

For this song about sin, Toro envisioned Friz Freleng’s Looney Tunes spoof “The Three Little Bops.” In the classic cartoon, the Three Little Pigs are rebooted as a jazz trio, and the Big Bad Wolf is a thwarted and vengeful trumpet player. After a failed use of explosives, the Wolf ends up in hell, blowing his horn from a cauldron.

Detroit Rock City

Another theatrical, high-volume riff machine fond of makeup.

American Nightmare

The venerable horror-punks let their rockabilly flags fly on this track. It was recorded in 1981 but released after the band’s 1983 breakup.

Shakespeare’s Sister

Even the perpetually miserable Smiths couldn’t resist breaking into the occasional rockabilly-fueled rave-up, albeit one believed to reference Virginia Woolf.

The guitarist Frank Iero played a melody that he thought his father would like, and the band was soon wielding its switchblades for a piece of rockabilly-metal.

Canada’s Sum 41 broke out in the sillier, brattier 2001, though it was already leaning in a more “mature” direction by its 2004 album, “Chuck.” The band’s fourth album, a 2007 concept record called “Underclass Hero,” emerged in the wake of Green Day’s “American Idiot” and MCR’s “The Black Parade.”

Though the Black Parade (the fictional band) dressed like Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (the fictional band), “Cancer” feels more like this McCartney gem from the Beatles’ final LP.

Ozzy Osbourne

The formative MCR influence Ozzy Osbourne was no stranger to symphonic, string-soaked piano ballads. To get its Beatles-esque sound, the string arrangement here was done by Louis Clark, who worked extensively with Electric Light Orchestra.

The emotional climax of “The Black Parade” is a piano ballad about the titular disease. The producer Cavallo plays piano on the track and said it was written in eight minutes. “It’s not a poetic track. It’s very direct, very brutal, but that’s the way disease is,” Way said in a 2006 statement. “For me it was almost like an attempt to write the darkest song ever, and I think we achieved that.”

Twenty One Pilots covered “Cancer” in 2016, but you can already hear some similarities in this crescendoing piano ballad that closes their four-times platinum album “Blurryface.”

Alabama Song

Lotte Lenya

Any journey into cabaret-punk begins with the work of Bertold Brecht and Kurt Weill in Weimar-era Germany. Their proletarian theater blended American jazz and the pop music smoking out from German nightclubs, adding a socialist bent.

Alabama Song (Whiskey Bar)

The Doors, perhaps the most indelibly theatrical rock band to soundtrack the Summer of Love, covered Weill’s “Alabama Song,” influencing MCR’s dabble into the Brechtian ether.

Liza Minnelli

Liza Minnelli’s Academy Award-winning performance as Sally Bowles remains her most iconic role, onstage or onscreen. Directed by Bob Fosse, “Cabaret” refracted the Hollywood musical through a darker and more cynical lens, without sacrificing any of its beauty or bombast.

Glamour Ghouls

The World/Inferno Friendship Society

Thanks to Amanda Palmer’s Dresden Dolls, “cabaret punk” and “dark cabaret” bands had a new smoky spotlight in the years leading up to “The Black Parade,” including Denver’s DeVotchKa, the British pioneers the Tiger Lillies and the long-running Brooklyn band the World/Inferno Friendship Society.

This campy, melodramatic piece of goth cabaret features Broadway’s own kinetic queen. “I love those guys,” Minnelli told The Times in 2006. “They are so much fun, but truly professional. And Gerard’s musical knowledge knocked my socks off.”

Melanie Martinez

The quirky Beatles fan Melanie Martinez has made two Top 10 albums that crawl on the edges of goth, pop and cabaret.

All the Good Girls Go to Hell

Billie Eilish

The goth-flecked teenage alt-pop star of the moment grew up on Green Day, Paramore and, of course, My Chemical Romance.

Beat My Head Against the Wall

Though the members of MCR generally gush over the frenetic, hyperactive hardcore that Black Flag released between 1979 and 1981, the band’s 1984 LP is more analogous to what happens in “The Black Parade.” Black Flag played punk rock at the sludgier gait of heavy metal, complete with ripping guitar solos and savagely bleak lyrics.

Final Dream

Gerard Way loves Toto’s lush, dreamy soundtrack for David Lynch’s 1984 vision of “Dune” for its mix of rock sound and orchestral fury. He told Rolling Stone this was “the most powerful piece of music I’ve ever heard,” and “Sleep” pays somewhat of a tribute.

This post-hardcore landmark was an influence on MCR and other chart-storming emo bands of the following decade. “Million” comes from the New York band’s only major label record. It was incredibly divisive among fans since it was given a slick, polished sheen by none other than future “Black Parade” producer Cavallo.

Clove Smoke Catharsis

AFI debuted in 1993 as snotty skate punks and broke through in 2003 as brooding emo stars. In between, albums like “Black Sails in the Sunset” were crucial in drawing the aesthetic links between hardcore, post-hardcore, goth and Misfits-style horror-punk.

To write “The Black Parade,” the band holed up at Paramour Estate, the former home of the silent film star Antonio Moreno and his wife, the oil heiress Daisy Canfield Danziger. Rumor has it her ghost still frequents its halls and, indeed, the band said they experienced some strange stuff: slamming doors, faucets turning on by themselves, a sighting of a lady in white dress and a mysteriously moist bathtub. Anxiety drove Gerard Way to sleep terrors and nightmares — an experience he detailed in the recording that opens “Sleep.”

Wherever You Are

One OK Rock

This Japanese arena-punk band has millions of streams and has toured with Ed Sheeran, 5 Seconds of Summer and many more.

Bang a Gong (Get It On)

Gerard Way loved the T. Rex leader Marc Bolan’s glittery, shimmery, feather-boa’d twist on traditional masculinity. MCR’s glam makeover on “Teenagers” owes a debt there.

Mama Weer All Crazee Now

The British miscreants Slade ratcheted up the hard rock crunch on the era’s glam shuffle, ultimately influencing everyone from Mötley Crüe to Smashing Pumpkins.

The Headmasters Ritual

This song, which confronts corporal punishment, was inspired by Morrissey’s own experiences suffering abuse as a student in Manchester. It was a direct lyrical influence on “Teenagers,” a song that tackled violence in America’s schools.

“That song almost didn’t fit on the record but it’s a topic that’s so important to our culture. It’s about a really big problem in America where kids are killing kids,” Gerard Way told NME . “The only thing I learned in high school is that people are very violent and territorial.”

Last of the American Girls

For this song off its second rock opera, “21st Century Breakdown,” Green Day followed its old tour mates MCR down a similar melodic path.

Disenchanted

Chemical World

Gerard and Mikey Way were fans of Britpop bands like Blur, which offered a more stylish and less macho Anglophile alternative to the churn of American grunge.

Young Gerard was hesitant to get into these impolite songsmiths, but his brother had no qualms.

MCR was playing an early version of this ballad as part of the Three Cheers for Sweet Revenge Tour in 2005.

XO Tour Llif3

Lil Uzi Vert

This Top 10 single with more than 1.5 billion streams across YouTube, SoundCloud and Spotify was a locus point for the contemporary wave where slow-rolling rap beats meets emo-styled bloodletting.

Post Malone

Avowed emo fan Post Malone has had three No. 1 hits with his narcotic sing-speak mix of trap, country, alt-rock and hazy cloud rap. When he guest-DJ’d the Los Angeles party Emo Nite, Malone sang along and played air guitar to “Welcome to the Black Parade.”

Flying High Again

For inspiration on “Famous Last Words,” Toro listened to his favorite guitar solos by the influential Ozzy Osbourne guitarist Randy Rhoads, whose furious, classical-influenced shredding gave a majestic quality to albums like “Diary of a Madman” before his death the following year.

Somewhere in the Swamps of Jersey

Formed in 1990, the seeds of New Jersey’s punk community were planted with Lifetime. “If it weren’t for Lifetime, New Jersey punk rock would have ended with the Misfits,” Iero told Spin . “Every day I hear a new band trying to sound like Lifetime, whether they know it or not.”

Before their eventual friends and tour mates formed My Chemical Romance, fellow Jersey acts like Midtown, Thursday and Saves the Day were deftly mixing the hooks and energy of ’90s pop-punk with the spilled emotions and crunch of contemporary hardcore in all-ages shows in basements and V.F.W. halls.

During the “Black Parade” writing sessions, Gerard Way was having anxiety nightmares, Mikey Way’s bipolar disorder led him to abandon the project briefly and the band struggled with uncertainty. This song, whose working title was “The Saddest Music in the World,” was both a reflection and a creative breakthrough. “That song’s so undeniably powerful because it was born out of that period,” Gerard told Spin.

Hand Crushed by a Mallet

The music of 100 gecs is a postmodern bouillabaisse of weirdo pop, mutant techno, harsh noise, dubstep, MySpace-era “crunkcore,” John Zorn’s cut-and-paste compositions and “nightcore,” the internet-born practice of speeding up songs. However, the duo’s Laura Les once remixed an MCR song and the melodic basis of much of their music has the distinct taste of emo-pop.

Listen to the playlist

Hidden Track

I’m Henry the Eighth

Harry Champion

This piece of classic British music hall from the variety shows popular in the early 20th century was originally released on a shellac 10-inch. Harry Champion’s “I’m Henry the Eighth” has had an excellent second life in rock music: Herman’s Hermits had a hit cover during the British Invasion. But, like MCR, it also has a morbid streak: In the final verse, the undertaker who took away the seventh Henry is having a slow day and begins sizing up number eight.

When I’m Sixty-Four

Paul McCartney’s father, Jim McCartney, was a working musician who loved the tunes of the music hall era. This song is widely considered to be a tribute to his dad’s taste.

Jolity Farm

The Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band

Though many ’60s and ’70s bands would occasionally flirt with the sounds of 1910s music hall, the satirical British cult weirdos Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band made it part of their overarching aesthetic.

Lazing on a Sunday Afternoon

Queen dropped this kooky vaudeville number as Track 2 on “A Night at the Opera.” To get the old-timey megaphone sound, they sent Freddie Mercury’s vocals through a pair of headphones and into a metal can.

The curtains close with a hidden track, an jaunty, ironic, metatextual number in the British music hall tradition. It pokes gentle fun of the years when MCR was photographed in fake blood.

Illustration by James Jean. Additional work by Shannon Lin.

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This rare video of Avenged Sevenfold at Warped 2003 is chaos and we love it

This footage of Avenged playing old school track Second Heartbeat has us reaching for our battered old Vans

Years before Avenged Sevenfold became one of the single biggest heavy metal bands of their generation, they were a bunch of contrary, lairy Orange County kids making a racket and mixing it up in a scene dominated by emo and pop punk mainstays and emerging metalcore heroes-in-waiting. 

With early albums Sounding The Seventh Trumpet and, in particular, classic 2003 breakthrough Waking The Fallen , the five-piece's scintillating blend of punk rock velocity and heavy metal histrionics was winning them fans across all corners of the 00s rock spectrum. They played festivals all over the place, from Reading and Leeds in the UK to the legendary Vans Warped Tour in the States - and it was perhaps on the latter where they truly cut their teeth in the early days.

Between 2002-2007, Avenged showed up on no fewer than five Warped tours, racking up an impressive 110 gigs in the process and solidifying themselves as one of the definitive Warped bands of their era. It's why they were attracting such impassioned crowds from the get-go, as this classic footage from way back in 2003 shows.

Taken from an official 03 Warped Tour DVD, the clip shows a youthful and eyeliner-ed Avenged smashing their way through a scrappy rendition of Waking The Fallen anthem Second Heartbeat , causing absolute bedlam in front of them as the entire song threatens to fall off the rails from the start and a rabid Warped crowd descends into a sea of moshing, crowdsurfing and windmilling.

With only The Rev's reliably tight-as-a-gnat's-pisshole drumming keeping things on course, the rest of the band stomp and swagger their way around the stage, frontman M. Shadows even jumping into the front row at one point to incite further shenanigans.

It's an awesome - if heartwarmingly messy - window into a time where Avenged Sevenfold weren't an arena-straddling, festival headlining 'event' band. They were, simply, the hottest young metal band in the world, and about to explode. And explode they did.

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Merlin moved into his role as Executive Editor of Louder in early 2022, following over ten years working at Metal Hammer. While there, he served as Online Editor and Deputy Editor, before being promoted to Editor in 2016. Before joining Metal Hammer, Merlin worked as Associate Editor at Terrorizer Magazine and has previously written for the likes of Classic Rock, Rock Sound, eFestivals and others. Across his career he has interviewed legends including Ozzy Osbourne, Lemmy, Metallica, Iron Maiden (including getting a trip on Ed Force One courtesy of Bruce Dickinson), Guns N' Roses, KISS, Slipknot, System Of A Down and Meat Loaf. He has also presented and produced the Metal Hammer Podcast, presented the Metal Hammer Radio Show and is probably responsible for 90% of all nu metal-related content making it onto the site. 

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Why Did Warped Tour End?

Why did Warped Tour finally come to an end?

The annual rite of summer passage, also dubbed "Punk Rock Summer Camp" by many, was a place where many music lovers discovered new bands in the '90s, 2000s and 2010s, but in 2018, the Vans Warped Tour finished its final run.

What Was the Warped Tour?

The Warped Tour, which eventually picked up sponsorship from shoe manufacturer Vans, was a traveling rock tour that started in 1995, initially with the idea of being an alternative rock festival, but eventually finding much of its early success focusing on the punk rock music scene.

As the years passed, the festival evolved to include a wider variety of acts. From the early ska and skate punk bands to welcoming nu-metal, emo, pop-punk and eventually metalcore, there was a little something for everyone.

READ MORE: Whatever Happened to the Bands From the First Warped Tour?

When Did Warped Tour Officially End?

Though 2018 was the final year of Warped Tour as a touring festival, plans were announced that a 2019 25th anniversary would be taking place.

This turned into a three-city celebration, with shows taking place in Cleveland on June 8, 2019, Atlantic City on June 29 and 30, 2019, and Mountain View, California on July 20 and 21, 2019.

Why Did Warped Tour Come to an End?

While there had been rumors of the festival not being as profitable in prior years, Warped Tour founder Kevin Lyman spoke of the traveling tour's eventual downfall and marked it up to a loss of community.

Speaking on Kerrang! 's Inside Track podcast in 2019 , Lyman stated, "Ultimately, when I started to think about winding this down after 25 years, it was, ‘I think we’ve lost the sense of community.'"

"It took a community to make Warped Tour go," he added. "Some of that was self-inflicted… I thought you addressed the fans that complain on Twitter! I was addressing everyone and tried to keep that conversation going, but you realize that you can’t really negotiate, debate, or educate on social media!"

Lyman also added that playing on Warped Tour also came with its own stigma, revealing that some bands turned down playing the festival because they didn't want to be known as "a Warped act."

"This is what kind of pissed me off," he recalled. "Because in 1997, ‘98, Pennywise couldn’t judge a band until you met ‘em in the parking lot. You’d be in line at catering because of this community setting with no dressing rooms. You’d meet these people, and they were musicians too. Then I started watching this community tear itself apart from within, with this band — not even meeting these people, just disagreeing with them or with how they look — bashing that band online."

"People would come up to me on Warped Tour, and say, ‘Well, I don’t want to be on Warped Tour because Attila are on Warped Tour,’" he continues. "Have you met the guys in Attila? We’re not here to judge each other’s music. The fans will judge each other’s music.’ Atilla brings people. Do I personally run around screaming ‘Suck my fuck?’ No. Do you? No. But they’re good musicians and they’re not bad people. I’ve never seen them do a bad thing to someone."

"Every year, I’d send offers, and just — ‘We don’t want to tour with those bands. We don’t wanna be a Warped-esque bands,'" sighs Lyman. And it’s like, dude, Warped-esque bands — you mean Bad Religion . A Day To Remember . Paramore … it got very frustrating."

Will Warped Tour Return?

Though Warped Tour wrapped in 2019, there have been rumblings in the years since about a possible return.

In 2020, Kevin Lyman suggested in a tweet responding to a fan that it could eventually return, but with one caveat .... "it might just be called something else." But, so far, there has not been a Warped Tour rehash under the old name or something different.

One other proponent of Warped Tour's return has been Chris Fronzak , the vocalist for Attila. In 2019, Fronzak reached out to Kevin Lyman with a plan to resurrect Warped Tour .

"I've honestly been thinking about this for 2 years now," he explained at the time. "In this time period I've formulated a business plan and setup that would be viable for both bands and @VansWarpedTour itself. I have a chip on my shoulder and I wanna prove to the world that rock isn't dead."

Then, in 2023, Fronzak revisited the idea of reviving the Warped Tour as part of his presidential platform , announcing that he had planned to run for President of the United States in 2024. "If you vote for me as our next president, I promise to bring back Vans Warped Tour," he responded to a fan who suggested they'd have his vote if he brought back the popular tour.

So far, the Warped Tour has not returned.

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