The city of Southampton was alive and well on Friday, 26 June, as a sea of colourful hair, baggy shorts and Chuck Taylors lined up outside Guildhall Square, eagerly awaiting a night fueled by punk, of both the pop and rock variety.
First onto the stage were American Hi-Fi, pop-punk alumni that haven’t played on this side of the pond in many years. Their set was wall-to-wall bangers from the early to mid-2000s. These were songs released more than twenty years ago now, but they still sound just as good today as when they were first released. Songs like ‘Flavor of the Weak’ and ‘The Geek Gets the Girls’ were sung not only by lead singer Stacy Jones, but by the enthusiastic crowd reliving their angsty Kerrang! days, where CD covers and posters littered their walls and the stench of energy drinks permeated their rooms. Their energy, sound and crowd work made them the perfect openers for this kind of show and got the crowd ready for an amazing night. They played as loud, as fast and as tight as ever, and I, for one, hope they don’t leave it as long before they make it over to our side of the water for another amazing show.
Next onto the stage was our (sort of) hometown hero, Frank Turner, a man who can mix punk, pop, rock and folk like no other. He’s not someone I think any of his fans would consider “mainstream”, but he easily has one of the biggest and most dedicated fanbases around. You can’t deny how impressive it is to come out on stage as someone in your mid-40s, start playing ‘I Still Believe‘, and have young kids all the way up to adults in their 60s singing your lyrics right back at you. Musically, Frank was everything you’d want him to be, Every chord strummed and every word sung is filled with just as much feeling and emotion as that record you’ve spun about a thousand times, but with that irreplaceable, chest-pounding feeling of being in a live setting that’ll never be captured by a live album. All of his crowd interactions come with that same heartfelt and honest feeling you get while chatting to your friend down the pub, and all the love he shows to his band, The Sleeping Souls, displays his humbleness and how much he cares for the people who have supported him. The highlight for me during the set was Frank playing ‘Recovery’, ‘Haven’t Been Doing So Well’ and ‘Do One’ one after the other, three songs that will always hold a special place for me. Considering each one was delivered with a heartfelt message, it really brought it all together in the perfect sequence. If you’re a fan, but have never allowed yourself the absolute pleasure of seeing Frank Turner live, then you owe it to yourself to do it.
Last up was the one and only Bowling for Soup, who, in my opinion, are the unsung heroes of pop-punk. With 32 years as a band, 11 studio albums under their belt, and not a single hiatus, break-up or accusation of selling out, they’ve remained one of the most consistent, catchy and exciting bands amongst their contemporaries from the late ’90s and early 2000s, influencing hundreds, if not thousands, of bands since their formation. A live Bowling for Soup show isn’t just a concert, it’s a full experience. There were guitar picks and pictures hidden amongst the crowd for lucky individuals to find, a contest to win a custom guitar, videos playing on a huge screen behind the band, and a full intro song and video just for them to walk on stage, and that’s not even mentioning how well they interact with the crowd. They told funny stories, shared personal anecdotes, and threw a barrage of balls into the crowd for one of the biggest games of keepy-uppies I’ve ever seen. What makes this so impressive is that, amongst all of this, they still managed to pack their setlist with 15 songs that every single person in the crowd sang along to. Opening their set with ‘Almost’ instantly got the entire crowd jumping and dancing, the bouncy riff being the perfect choice to get everyone moving. Another highlight for me was seeing every younger Millennial and older Gen Z in attendance screaming along to the Phineas and Ferb theme song (Today Is Gonna Be a Great Day) including all the added fills from the TV show. By the time the evening was coming to an end and we got to the closing songs, ‘Star Song’ and ‘1985’, there wasn’t a single face that wasn’t plastered with a smile, accompanied by legs exhausted from dancing and throats sore from screaming every lyric like their lives depended on it. That is, of course, except for Bowling for Soup, who, despite their weeks on the road and many years behind them, looked like they could have carried on for another hour and are clearly just as filled with love for what they do as they were all those years ago when they first started.
All in all, it was another successful night for the Southampton Summer Sessions, and I, for one, hope the event organisers continue to book bands like this every year and keep this renaissance of punk rock and pop-punk alive for many years to come.