Warped Tour 2002 Review

Warped Tour 2002

Venue: Orlando Speedworld in Orlando, FL
Date: August 02, 2002
Opening Band(s): www.warpedtour.com/orlando.htm…
Genre: Punk/Ska/Hardcore/Poppunk/Indie

Review Score: 85%



Warped Tour was held at this lame little race track a half hour away from the city it was advertised as being in.. so getting in and out was a very.. 'fun'.. process. Me and the 2 friends I went with left at 11am.. and didn't get there until 1:30.

It was unbelievably hot. This is Florida we're talking about, it has nothing better to do then get as hot as possible. We trek up to the gates, get frisked by an anxious security guard, and begin the Warp-edness. In the top area there was a Volcom Stage, the Drive-Thru Stage, a ton of booths (including Epitaph, which gets an A++ for amount of free stuff), and some horrible looking wooden bleachers. We went towards them, and saw the main area. It was all inside the center field of the race track, so you had to climb through a hole in the fence and jump down onto the track, about a 4 foot drop. I was amazed at these old people blazing right through it.

Once you're in, you realize the sheer size of it. We went straight to the band list, which was poorly placed at ground level. Already missed Thursday because of traffic, so that was a shame. Mighty Mighty Bosstones were up on the mainstage at the moment. Their instruments sounded right on track, but the singer wasn't doing too good. He would start singing really growly and then go back to a normal singing voice.. as if it was an accident. He just didn't seem very with-it.
Once they were done we went and checked out some merchandise booths. P.E.T.A. had this tent with some pretty witty bumper stickers, and a video playing with undercover video of live animal farms. Their booklets were actually pretty informative, so their booth was definitely up there on the booth-o-rama scale. Every record company I've ever heard of in the indie business was there, except for A-F Records (figures, the one I planned on spending a ton of money at). Mountain Dew had free samples of that Amp stuff, Fat Wreck Chords was giving away this rad flyer with "15 reasons why you should hate THE PRESIDENT" scrawled across the top. Its got a bunch of classic quotes from George Bush on the back... well worth a laugh. And they even write "our" instead of "are" on their plea to get us to vote, so that really adds to their credability *cough*

Then we hear Hot Water Music sound checking, so we run over there and push to get up close. I have a mohawk and a bright yellow Thrice shirt on, so I parted the crowd pretty easily. Hot Water Music plays "Turnstile", "Paper Thin", "Choked and Seperated", 2 songs off their upcoming CD (including Remedy, which you can get at Epitaph.com), a moving version of "Free Radio Gainsville" (even better for Florida fans since we actually know where Gainsville is), a few more songs I can't remember.. and then they completely kicked our ass with "It's Hard To Know", making the end almost epic as everybody chanted along.
When those 4 guys walked on stage, nobody had any idea how much energy they had in them. But when they struck the first chord, and screamed the first word.. the energy skyrocketed. I think most everybody was amazed with the 2 guitarists with practically the exact same voice, hitting every note exactly as they did on the record.
Hot Water Music stole the show at that point. Anything after them just wasn't as perfect. If you ever get a chance to see these guys, even if you've barely heard them- I can't suggest it enough.

Then we hear thunder. Within 5 minutes the scorching (nice word) sun had completely disappeared under a cooling breeze and black clouds. It starts pouring these massive rain drops, and that cooling breeze turned into gale-force winds. We took cover in a tent for a "ghetto/ska/pop-punk" band, as was displayed on their flyers. Hey, its shelter, I wasn't about to be picky. We wait the storm out for a bit, watching all the girls with painted boobs walk away covering up, and an endless supply of sad kids whose once up-right hair was now nasty and fallen down. Once the rain died we went around again. Nice and cool. But the ground turned to muck. It wasn't just solid mud.. the entire field was like an inch of slick water mud. Then the 12 year old kids got the bright idea of playing in the mud. I guess they figured it would pour again and wash the dirt away. Stupid kids.

Alkaline Trio was up next on the big stage (3:30), after Ozma played. I don't care for Ozma, sorry, so I didn't even bother watching.
When I saw the Alkaline Trio crowd, I was a little disappointed. It was huge, don't get me wrong.. but the people.. well, it was just a bunch of little girls. Have they even read the lyrics? I know Alk3 isn't the darkest band, but I don't see how a 12 year old girl can like a song thats chorus is "take your radio to bathe with you, plugged in and ready to fall", or "Tuck me in with the tarantulas, I wanna let 'em in my mouth, and down my throat to lay their eggs".
And then as I sat and watched, I knew how they won the hearts of little girls: they didn't play a single song off an old CD. They played almost every song on From Here To Infirmary, and nothing off their older CDs. Matt's (lead singer) amp blew, and he was having guitar problems the whole time. He seemed pretty pissed during the whole set. Alkaline Trio was probably the biggest disappointment of the day.

Then it started raining again.. this time not as hard. The mud kids were still covered in mud, no worries. We walked around to booths again, talked to Chris from Hot Water Music, and sat around.

Lagwagon was on the main stage at this point, which was at about 4:30. They didn't seem too horrible from the songs I'd heard before, but I knew when I saw/heard them live, they weren't anything I wanted to have a part of. Little too girly. Good Charlotte played after them I think.. another horrible band.
At about 5 we heard these wierd noises from across the field, and when we walked over we found out who it was. Flogging Molly.
Now, when I read that Flogging Molly was headlining, I went and downloaded a few of their songs to see if I would like em. Nope, I thoroughly disliked them. How the hell did this irish folk music get on Warped Tour?
But seeing them live changed my perspective on them. Seeing 6 people up there playing violin, acoustic guitar, big drums, and all kinds of other traditional instruments.. it was awesome. Near the end he said they were gonna play a song about the Catholic church, and a bunch of kids started cheering. Then in his irish accent he says "Ah fuck ya, nobody better clap for that shit". All in all they were really fun to watch live. My friend ended up buying their CD, and that was the first time he'd ever even heard of em.

Then we see this guy with a really cool sign that says "Shai Hulud playing at 6:30 at the Drive-Thru stage" (which by the way, I grabbed that sign after seeing it sitting in the dirt many hours later). Anyway, I'd heard of em, tried em out before.. and didn't like them at all. Just not my cup of tea. But there was nothing on, and I wanted to give them another try. I was smart enough to not want to stand too close. The band came out, made their amps sound as harsh as possible, and then just started going crazy. After watching them for 15 minutes, I had a whole new respect for them.
I still can't see myself listening to them casually.. but to see that guy going absolutely insane on stage for a half hour, and screaming his lungs out.. it was inspiring. When they weren't singing, they were kinda fruity. The lead singer complained about his Italian Ice getting wet when it rained, and the bassist kept saying things like "this songs about love and relationtships!!" before the songs. Maybe he was being funny, I dunno.
They did a cover of NOFX's "Linolium", and just the non-monotonous drumming made it 10,000X better. These guys put any other band I thought was 'hardcore' to shame.. I was impressed.

After they kicked our ass for a while, we went back to the mainstages to see Guttermouth. I didn't really like Guttermouth.. they're not that talented or special. There were all these crazy people scattered everywhere, so the crowd had a wierd feeling. The singer came out with huge aviator sunglasses on. Somebody threw a Gatorade bottle in the air, and he screams "hey, don't throw shit at me fucker! somebody kick that guys ass". Then a girl with painted boobs got on some guy's shoulder and he says "whoa, check out this chicks boobs", and she gets all happy and stuff, then he says "I couldn't fuck those things if I wanted to! look how small they are, goddamn!". And then she got down, obviously crushed. He also made fun of some guy for having his shirt off and rubbing up a bunch of other guys. I guess he had to sacrifice a few fans to win over the whole audience. Anyway, they started playing. When they played "Lipstick", the entire crowd turned into a moshpit. All the crazy people weren't in one place, so there was no central area for a moshpit. I don't find Guttermouth generally moshable, but I guess I'm alone in that feeling. There was no place to go, so I just sat there and pushed off muddy people as they came close. Even older men and little girls were pushing and shoving. It was really wierd.
All-in-all, Guttermouth wasn't too bad. I just don't see what the big deal with em is.

After them was No Use For A Name, on the other mainstage. I heard a few of their songs before, and they seemed alright.. but after I heard them live, I knew they were no good. Just sounded like another lame NOFX rip off with boring drum and guitars. So we sat in the field, which hours before had tons of tents, and now was a wasteland of trash.
The local radio station had imported some horrible shitty bands, and they were playing on the actual track, like on the slant. They were all horrible, nobody watched them, and nobody liked them. I plan on writing the radio station and telling them that they ruined Warped Tour. When there wasn't a crappy radio station band playing, they were playing the actual radio really loud. So when bands stopped playing between songs, you could hear Sting or some shit playing to the left of you. It was horrible. Makes me hate the radio even more...

Anyway, around 7:50 we got up to get close to the other stage. Why? Bad Religion at 8pm.
They were the coolest guys, and they played some kick ass songs. They come out, and go right into "Generator". I imagined them playing that first, so when they ran on stage and started playing it, I was very pelased. They played such a kick ass set, but they almost sounded like they were getting sucked into the "play everything off our new CD" curse. They played "Supersonic", "Prove It", and "Kyoto Now" in a row. But they saved it with all out hell in "American Jesus", along with "Anasthesia", "No Control", "I Want To Conquer the World" and "21st Century Digital Boy". Then they played "Epiphany", which set this freaky mood, along with the rumbling thunder of the storm that lingered over us all day. The bass intro shook your body and gave you goosebumps, it was creepy. They encouraged us to sing along to the chorus of the next song, which ended up being "Sorrow". Those 2 songs together were awesome live, and the chorus to "Sorrow" matched the epicness of Hot Water Music. They even asked how we liked HWM, since I guess they're pretty good friends (they toured together earlier this year).
At the end of their half hour of ass kicking, they directed us over to "a band that beats the hell out of that Good Charlotte bullshit"- NOFX.

I don't really like NOFX. I take that back.. I really like 1 NOFX song- The Decline.
They were trying too hard to be funny, and they just weren't impressing me. They kept talking, I guess they had wireless guitar problems. I waited for em to say that they were the only true punk rock band left, like they have in the past, but I think they knew Bad Religion put them to shame. Once the 'true punk rockers' got their 8,000 guitar techs to fix the thousand dollar wireless guitar system (thats punk rawk!!) they started playing again.
They were really uninspiring. They didn't redeem themselves like a bunch of other bands did that day.. they're still on my "don't really like" list.


The rain ruined a lot of things, including the Metal Mulisha skateboarding team thing, and Shai Huluds italian ice!. But I think I would much rather be drenched in rain water and mud, as opposed to being drenched in sweat and mystery mud (Port-O-Potty run-off, I suppose). There were plenty of great things going on, but I don't want to go into more detail than I already have.
I picked up a bunch of CDs, one of which is the Matt Skiba / Kevin Seconds split that doesn't come out officially for another 3 or 4 months. Epitaph gave away free stickers for almost every band on the label, balloons, posters.. all kinds of good shit.

I just wish that Florida wasn't the ass end of the tour, because half the bands had already dropped out. We got screwed out of Lawrence Arms, Anti-Flag, Andrew WK (I wanted to see him live so bad!), Small Brown Bike, Thrice, and a ton more I'm sure were good.