It’s 2001, and I’ve just graduated high school. My music taste has consisted primarily of what I’ve heard on the radio, and I’ve never been to a live show in my life. My friends decide that summer we should go to the Vans Warped Tour. I have no idea what to expect.
As soon as we’re in, we break off, and I find my way into the pit for a band I’ve never heard of called The Bouncing Souls. As soon as they start playing, chaos erupts around me. I’m being pushed from all sides, crowd surfers are flying over my head, and one of my shoes gets knocked off and lost in the crowd. And I am a changed man after this.
Anyone who follows this site and our socials know I am now a live music fiend, and forever a punk rock kid at heart, and it all started with New Jersey’s Bouncing Souls. Their music has now been a significant part of my life soundtrack the last quarter of a century, and yet surprisingly, I haven’t been able to see them again since until last Friday night at The Bellwether in Los Angeles, when they came through town on their East Coast F*!$ You tour with fellow punk bands Mercy Union (New Jersey), Dave Hause and the Mermaid (Philadelphia) and H2O (New York).
The first moment I heard Mercy Union, I was a fan. They very much fit that Springsteen-meets-punk rock Jersey sound that The Gaslight Anthem popularized, and in a live setting, frontman Jared Hart‘s ragged vocals added an extra heaviness to their melodic anthems. The band opened with one of my favorites, the dynamic “1998”, and followed it with “Young Dionysians”. Still a rising band, the group seemed grateful for their opportunity to reach the West Coast with the Souls, who they were very reverent towards. Even if they acted like a young group, their sound is fully formed, with songs like “Prussian Blue” packing a punch, and “Chips and Vics” creeping up with its grungy guitars before swelling with a lovely harmonized chorus. And “So Long Siberia” is just a rip-roaring singalong perfect for any road trip playlist. I very much recommend checking out this band’s music (as well as Hart’s solo EP, which you may find in our EOY EP list…).
Flashback to February of 2020, and unbeknownst to me, I’m about to watch my final live show for a very long while. It’s Dave Hause and the Mermaid at Spaceland in Silverlake (RIP). As far as last shows (for a long while) go, that was a great one, and I looked forward to my next chance to see Hause in concert. While not a Jersey boy, Hause (now based in Santa Barbara, CA) has moved in further in the ‘heartland punk’ direction since going solo (older fans will know him from his band The Loved Ones). And with his fantastic new album …And the Mermaid out (another one to look out for in our EOY Album list), I was excited to finally see him again.
Hause opened his set with three stand-out tracks from his new album; the nostalgic look back at tough living “Cellmates”, the prescient and political “Enough Hope”, and the most Boss-leaning “Look Alive” (one of my favorite songs of 2025). Each one was a singularly perfect anthem, made for raising fists in the air and singing at the top of your lungs (which I was doing). “Saboteurs” from 2019’s Kick has the same qualities, with an extra romantic streak underlying it. Hause’s earlier punk influences came through on the next trio; new one “Mockingbird Blues”, “Damn Personal” and “Dirty Fucker”, which he sang with glee even with his two songs in the audience (lol). He closed out his set with another one of my favorites “The Ditch”, which I was so passionately singing along to, I think Hause actually noticed me in the balcony and gave me a friendly, acknowledging nod. These songs are a part of me, so if you read this Dave – you keep writing them, and I’ll be there to singalong.
On the way to the show that night, I was listening to Toby Morse‘s podcast interview with Brian Fallon (The Gaslight Anthem). Though I’ve been aware of H2O for years, I will admit I’ve listened to Morse’s side project Hazen St. more than I’ve listened to the band he’s most famous for. And I’ll also admit that his east coast hardcore style is generally not melodic enough for my tastes (with exceptions like “Memory Lane” from their one major label album). Even not being a fan, I could still fully appreciate the powerful live performance from the band of veterans (and Morse’s son on drums). Their energy on stage was palpable, as they blazed through songs like “Nothing to Prove” and shout-along tracks “Family Tree” and “Still Here”. The band had a lot of old school and new school fans in the audience, creating a circle pit and getting the crowd surfing and slam dancing started.
I loved that Morse shouted out the fans bringing their kids to the show, and that he took time to meet one of the kids and his dad in the audience, spreading the love of punk rock and hardcore to the next generation. Though hardcore music can seem scary to those outside the scene, the band themselves all seemed to be friendly, welcoming lifers with a deep love for their scene and fans. Being in the world so long, Morse has gathered a lot of friends in the music world (you may have heard him recently as a guest on Papa Roach‘s single “BRAINDEAD“), and later in the set the band was joined by friend Matt Skiba (Alkaline Trio, blink-182), who seemed almost shy joining a band he clearly admired on stage. And while I didn’t catch his name, the band had a friend and rapper join them for their closer “Guilt by Association”.
And then came The Bouncing Souls. Birthed in the late 80’s, it’s hard to imagine that this band has been around for nearly 40 years, as when hitting the stage, they all still look relatively youthful, and frontman Greg Attonito’s voice sounds as good as it did 24 years ago when I first saw them. After the explosive energy of H2O, there was a bit of an adjustment watching as the Souls went into “The Gold Song”. While not raging cross the stage like their hardcore brethren, The Bouncing Souls make-up for that with a tight, controlled stage presence that focused on delivering the songs from their deep catalog as perfectly as they could.
For their setlist, the band did seem to be favoring more of their older, more hardcore-leaning material. Tracks like “East Coast! Fuck You!”, “Manthem”, “Cracked” and “Kate is Great” (all over two decades old) blazed by, pleasing their old school fans. Something that took me by surprise was how comfortable and casually these die-hard fans took the stage, would hop on a mic with one of the band members to sing a verse, before returning to the crowd (one big guy in the audience did this 4-5 times throughout the night). And the band were always perfectly comfortable with it, seeing it as part of a Bouncing Souls show. This is a band still as connected to their fans now as they were when just starting out, and they want to make them feel a part of the show and like members of the family.
As someone who gravitates more towards the band’s later, more melodic songs, I did find myself not as enthused by the overall setlist. Newer singles like “Ten Stories High” had the kind of hooks I enjoyed, and the touching “Kids and Heroes”, “Sing Along Forever”, and their epic cover of Avoid One Thing‘s “Lean on Sheena” all brought a smile to my face. As the band seemed to have some confusion with their setlist, they took a couple requests from the audience including “Late Bloomer” and “Quick Check Girl” (chosen over “Coin Toss Girl”). The band ended their main set with oldie “The Freaks, Nerds & Romantics”.
But they were far from done. Their encore started with 2003’s “Apartment 5F”, before playing one of their newest singles “United”, a pop-punk unity song that reaches to bring people together. Well, their final two tracks of the night definitely did bring the people together – their classics “True Believer” and one of my all-time favorite punk songs, which I’ve carried with me since seeing the band in 2001, “Gone”. As the band launched into “Gone”, it wasn’t just the audience members coming on stage to singalong. Members of Mercy Union, Dave Hause and the Mermaid, and H2O all rushed the stage to sing along with the chorus.
Fans old (one very old guy came on stage and fell into the audience) and new (a ten year old came on stage to dance and have the time of his life) joined together to enjoy this piece of pop punk perfection. I felt emotion well up in me, as it brought back the feelings of first seeing the band all those years ago, as well as touching upon what I love so much about live music. The joy of a room of people singing together to a song they all love, letting their inner punk kid out for a brief moment again.
It’s a beautiful thing. Thank you Bouncing Souls for letting me have that feeling again, and being the first band on my continuing journey of live music obsession.
Catch the band on tour, and if you’re not familiar with their music, here‘s a great place to start.
The Indy Review 