Riot Fest 2022 (September 16-18, Chicago IL) Festival • Page 131

Gotcha. Most at FF got 40-45 after the first couple on the side stages. Headliners only got an hour, though.

 

Joey Valence & Brae have been my favorite undercard find thus far. Straight Beastie Boys worship. And Sitting On Stacy was pretty cool with the Sublime-sans-dub/ska vibes. I'll definitely be going out of my way to check them both out.

There's a few others that I really dug, but I need to recap and really write things down to keep track. It was a very quick cruise last night.

But my key takeaway is that Riot is staying relevant in smart ways that still align with the festival's overall vibe. Yeah, I kinda wish there was more in the way of punk, pop-punk, emo, ska, or whatever lower on the bill but... I get it.

And I'm sure they'll swing back in that direction at some point, stage headliners depending. The ones I was most expecting were Heart & Lung, TIghtwire, and/or Rational Anthem. Maybe next year!

 

That's better than I had expected, TBH. What was the set-up time for each band? 15 minutes or 30? Riot does 30 at Radical/Rise which, if it were 15 instead and you added it up across the day... Could easily be another 2-4 bands.

 

For some reason I've been dying to see TIN's band for awhile now. Are they on your date?

 

That's who I'm playing with! I'm usually Thomas's bassist when he's in the Chicago area.

 

It was like 15 minutes for the first 6-7 bands on the stage, then 20 before the three biggest bands closing each stage. It ran incredibly smoothly. I think FF has an extra hour at night, though. Noise ordinance was 11pm and Underoath, etc ended at 10:55.

 

last night i only got through making my friday playlist (too busy being elated watching the Celtics...up until the last 3 minutes of the game...then turned to utter despair, hah) and from the 'i havent heard of them' camp i was instantly most impressed with Algiers, very cool blending of post punk and blues. its like a mix of bloc party and black pumas

 

Well, I didn’t see anywhere in any post or on the website about another announcement for full album plays. Wondering if that will even really be a thing anymore.

 

Yeah, I think that's the main difference. The two main stages at Riot effectively run back-to-back with ~5 minutes between. But the other three stages have ~30 minutes between each band.

At a glance, Algiers didn't grab me. But I'll certainly be revisiting!

I'm not sure if you ever listened to sports talk radio while you were here, but the morning show on the bigger sports station in Boston (Toucher & Rich) actually spent a few minutes talking about Riot Fest today, hah. Nothing noteworthy except the host was just really annoyed that Yellowcard was billed over Bad Religion. LOL It's funnier if you're familiar with the personalities so I won't bother delving any furhter... But I enjoyed it.

 

There aren't too many big album anniversaries this year, at least for the artists I'm excited about. The Menzingers doing On the Impossible Past is probably the most likely. I'd love to see Yellowcard do Southern Air at some point, but there's no way that happens at their first show back from a hiatus.

 

It dawned on me today how high up Rocket from the Crypt is compared to year's past (and just the band's stock in general). Wondering if they might bust out Group Sounds or Scream, Dracula, Scream for an album play.

That said, the lack of a reference to album plays has me second-guessing if that might be a thing anymore. Then again, they may have a few in the works... But are hesitant to say anything given how hard that flopped last year.

 

Joey Valence & Brae are not to be slept on. Good shit

 

I thought it was more-so the fact that they really don’t tour much anymore and also haven’t played Riot in years, so their stock kind of increased. But… they would be a solid choice for an album-play!

 

I am loving it. It's a situation where, yes, it's basically just Beastie Boys rip-off shit but the pure joy behind it pushes past it.

Are they new to you too? Or did I miss something along the way? Because this is totally my shit.

I'm not sure. They haven't been a very active band for years on years (15+). The last time they toured the venues were relatively small (500-800, if memory serves) and they played mid-afternoon last time they were on Riot. And I don't think they've gotten any more popular with young kids or whatever, the way some other bands might...

I'm incredibly stoked they're playing/love the band, so it's not a slight or anything. I'm just surprised is all. Might be just they have a good booking agent and got signed up for the right festival at the right time, TBH. Haha.

 

I'm just excited to see my dude Atom Willard slam the drums again.

 

That's awesome. Is it sill mostly covers? Are you playing with him on the other shows in the area in the next few weeks?

 

Oh awesome, I'm really looking forward to that show.

 

My gf actually introduced me to them a few weeks back because she discovered them on TikTok. She was like “check it out, these guys are basically like a gen z Beastie Boys.” And I LOVED what I heard! That’s the type of hip hop I love.

And yeah, I guess some of the lyrics are cheesy and whatnot, but they’re just channeling the style of that era, so it works!

 

It could be Mario playing drums instead. He played drums with them at their Halloween show last year

 

I'm really annoyed about Suicide Machines they definitely seemed like a lock especially playing some Punk In Drublics and Fest.

Goldfinger + RBF have been pretty quiet coming out of the pandemic which is odd because Goldfinger dropped a new record in the middle of it and RBF usually tours nonstop lol

 

Goldfinger makes sense considering Feldy’s producing career, and I think he started up a label. So he’s probably too busy with all of that to do any Goldfinger shows


But RBF’s hiatus is really sus lol. Out of all bands, it’s really surprising that RBF hasn’t even attempted to tour yet. I thought they would’ve been the first to do so

 

How did album plays flop last year? I didn't go

 

The ones they did have went over well. What I meant by "flop" was just that they didn't really have many. It was Lupe Fiasco, Fishbone, and Joyce Manor I think. I might be missing one or two, but it was definitely a much smaller number compared to years prior. And one of them was during the Thursday Preview Party.

All I meant by "flop" was that they said they were coming and... They never really did.

 

Probably like half and half covers and originals. His new original stuff is really good. We've been playing a song he wrote with Ace Enders that wouldn't sound out of place on an Early November album. I'm playing the Bolingbrook, Chicago, and Elgin shows - had to get a fill in for the 28th since I already had something that night.

 

How are you planning to resell? The tickets say non transferrable and that they are in non pdf format which would make them ineligible for uploading there. I am also not going and I paid around $400 for two last year . I figured it'd be easy to get my money back since a pair now is $700 including fees. But if I can't list on StubHub, I'm not so sure.