Warped Tour founder Kevin Lyman; Philly bands on Warped 2007
Submitted by jstudent on Tue, 2007-07-31 22:38.Staying Warped
Thirteen years in, Warped Tour founder Kevin Lyman moves the tour backward, to the future
By Alan Sculley
Philly EDGE Correspondent
As it enters its 13th year as an annual touring festival, the Warped tour has gone back to its roots.
“I kind of sat back and said ‘What is the Warped tour really about?’ and it’s always been about discovering music,” tour organizer Kevin Lyman said in a recent phone interview. “At least the initial concept of this tour was to bring bands that you might never have ever seen, maybe expose you to different genres of music.
“So I sat back and said ‘Let’s try to focus in and try to find the best talent, diverse talent, and let the chips kind of fall where they may,’ … if this music’s not what you like, maybe it’s time for you to stay home,” he said. “Some people took it as I was whining or something, but I was more just kind of being honest. You’re never going to make everybody happy.”
Lyman knows that having Warped return to its initial concept of showcasing fresh talent won’t be embraced by some fans. Last year, the tour was criticized for not offering the same star power that some previous editions possessed.
The 2005 Warped Tour set a new standard for featuring bands on the verge of huge breakthroughs in the mainstream rock scene: when the 2006 tour came up short on big names - Joan Jett and the Buzzcocks were probably the most recognized acts in the lineup - Lyman heard about it.
“I’ve always felt like your success can be your downfall in some ways, and I think last year there were a lot of expectations for people,” Lyman said. “We never count on bands being top-selling record sellers, and just by fluke or by luck or by chance or by fate, at the end of the (2005) tour we had four top 20 bands, with Fall Out Boy, My Chem (My Chemical Romance), Hawthorne Heights and All –American Rejects, where last year we had one band in the top 200, Underoath.
“We didn’t set out to have that lineup (in 2005). It just happened,” he said.
The shortage of breakout acts last summer translated to the box office. For the first year in Warped’s history, ticket counts fell from the previous year, from roughly 700,000 to about 600,000 for the entire tour.
Lyman, though, will be satisfied if the 2007 tour merely matches ticket sales from 2006.
“I think we settled into what our niche is,” he said. “I think the Warped tour is a niche of about 600,000 concert-goers.”
This year’s lineup for Warped would not seem to portend any huge jump in attendance. Once again, there is no obvious headliner that would be a magnet for ticket sales.
The biggest names appear to be Bad Religion, Coheed & Cambria, The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus, and on select dates, Yellowcard and Sum 41.
Lyman hopes to have made up for whatever this year’s Warped tour might lack in lineup sizzle with sheer quality.
For one thing he has cut back considerably on the number of bands that will be playing at each of the tour’s 40-plus stops.
“Last year, in some places, we had over 100 bands a day. I think we’re looking at 60, 62 bands a day (this year),” Lyman said. “I think people were kind of getting burned out. There was just too much going on. The quality of the music may have been going down a bit. So we worked on quality live shows.”
Lyman said, though, that he’s excited about this year’s lineup and its diversity, and feels fans will discover at least a new favorite band or two at Warped.
“About eight months ago I just kind of felt this was the year when there was going to be no (hot) scene,” he said. “Like right now, I think maybe emo got so big and so popular with so many bands within that genre of music, that the kids would be looking for something new by the summer. So when we booked the lineup, back in October we kind of gambled …you’ve got ska, you’ve got punk, you’ve still got the emo, but let’s just kind of put it all out there because kids are going to be kind of gravitating to Warped to find out the next thing they might be into.
“I’m really excited about our international bands,” Lyman said. “These international bands, like Gallows and Parkway Drive and the Automatic, and some of the bands from Mexico, this will be the first time they’ve played extensively in North America.”
One problem Lyman hopes to avoid this year is the tension that received considerable press coverage last year. Although he said the atmosphere wasn’t much different than in previous years, Lyman acknowledged that a few issues surfaced during the course of last year’s tour.
In particular, some more seasoned bands were irked by newer bands that came on the Warped tour last summer displaying rock star attitudes, while there was also some tension between punk bands and Christian groups.
Lyman said he became acutely aware that some newer bands feel entitled to a slot on Warped tour when a young musician attending one of the shows approached him to complain about his band, which had only been playing shows for about six months, not getting a slot on the tour.
“The Warped tour comes once a year. Is that the value that’s put on the Warped tour?” Lyman said. “In six months you think your band really probably deserves to be playing in an amphitheater?”
“I want the Warped tour to be special again, so bands, when they get out there, they work,” he said. “They take the opportunity to work hard, and they also look at it as hey, this is something to aspire to and not just take it for granted. You’re not entitled to be on the Warped tour because you’ve been a band for six months.”
Last year’s Warped tour also saw more bands drop off the tour early than in any previous year. Underoath, From First To Last, Gatsby’s American Dream, Mewithoutyou, Spitalfield and Gogol Bordello were all among the early departures.
While there was speculation that some bands quit over tensions on the tour, Lyman said that wasn’t the case. The bands, he said, simply had health issues, were exhausted from touring or had internal issues to address. He pointed to Underoath, who endured some public needling from NOFX frontman Fat Mike in the early stages of the tour, as an example.
“Underoath had been on the road for too long,” Lyman said. “Underoath, who have very strong (Christian) convictions, like Fat Mike, were dealing with those convictions internally. I walked on the bus and their manager wanted me to go talk to them to stay on the tour, and I walked in and looked in their faces and said ‘You need to go home.’
“They’re very young,” Lyman said. “They’d been on the road the whole time. They never got to be young and be at home. I said ‘Go home; go away. Don’t even talk to each other for three weeks. Then have your gear set up at wherever you rehearse, whether it’s a garage or rehearsal (place) and get together and just play music and see if you want to still be a band.’ And they did, and they’re coming back this summer and making up those dates.”
2007 Warped Tour
A Static Lullaby, Alkaline Trio, All Time Low, Amber Pacific, Bad Religion, Bayside, Biffy Clyro, Big D and the Kids Table, Bleed The Dream, Bless The Fall, Boys Like Girls, Chiodos, Cinematic Sunrise, Circa Survive, Coheed and Cambria, Cute Is What We Aim For, Drop Dead Gorgeous, Escape The Fate, Evaline, Funeral for a Friend, Gallows, Hawthorne Heights, Hot Rod Circuit, IainTerry band, It Dies Today, K-OS, kaddisfly, Killswitch Engage, mayday parade, Meg and Dia, Monty Are I, mxpx, My American Heart CA, New Found Glory, Paramore, Parkway Drive, Pepper, POS, Red Jumpsuit Apparatus, Revolution Mother, So They Say, Straylight Run, Street Drum Corps, The Almost, The Confession, The Fabulous Rudies, The Graduate, The Matches, The Rocket Summer, the spill canvas, The Starting Line, The Toasters, The Unseen, The Vincent Black Shadow, Throwdown, Tiger Army, Underoath, Valencia, The High Court, Capitol Risk
Tweeter Center, 1 Harbour Blvd. Camden, N.J.
Friday, August 3, 11 a.m.
Tickets: $30
Call: 856.365.1300
OMG! and WTF?
Cool, and not so cool, at the Vans Warped Tour this year
OMG!
-The Skip the Line Gate:
Fans with AT&T service can flash their phones (no boobies, please) and get into the concert without having to wait in a line.
-Bros. Grim Side Show:
No matter how many times you see Zamora The Torture King stick a skewer through his arm or munch down a broken light bulb…it never gets old.
- Guitar Hero II videogame stations:
The potential to be an instant regional gaming tournament.
WTF?
- Reverse Daycare Tent:
Kids are supposed to drop off parents here to cool off, get a massage.... That’s just sick… what’s next Levitra Speed Dating for Single Parents?
- Comics in the Skullcandy Mix Tent:
We’re sure they are funny and all… but does this seem to be the place for 115 Lindsay Lohan jokes?
-truth
We know, we know, we know. Tobacco is not good for you. Please, no more dramatic stuff. Just let us rock, ‘kay?
The Philly 5
For these Philly and Jersey bands the Camden date of the Warped Tour gives their friends and family a shot to see them in a much bigger venue than usual.
The Starting Line
Members: Kenny Vasoli, Matt Watts, Mike Golla, Tom Gryskewicz
After moving from Drive-Thru records to Geffen for 2005’s Based On A True Story, this ’burbs band found that a major label doesn’t always mean major support. Their new CD, Direction, hit stores yesterday (July 31), on Virgin Records’ label.
Circa Survive
Members: Anthony Green, Steve Clifford, Brendan Ekstrom, Colin Frangicetto, Nick Beard
BucksCo product Anthony Green, formerly of Saosin, and former members of This Day Forward melded into a post-emo monster which has been seen on the cover of AP and has high billing on the 2007 Warped Tour. Its latest CD, On Letting Go, debuted at No. 24 on Billboard’s album charts this spring.
Valencia
Members: Shane Henderson, JD Perry, Maxim Soria, George Ciukurescu, Brendan Walter
After releasing This Could Be a Possibility to positive reviews in 2005 and 2006, Valencia has toured relentlessly, as chronicled by guitarist Brendan Walter at http://valenciatourjournal.blogspot.com . Walter, incidentally, was one of 32 users sued by the RIAA in the first round of file-sharing suits.
The High Court
Members: Lou Cuello, Denny Carvell, Kyle Shellhammer, Mike Matranga, JB Brown
While the Tweeter date will be first, this Jersey rock five-piece is probably more excited about Sunday’s (Aug. 5) Warped date at Old Bridge Twp. Raceway in Englishtown. Their latest disk, Puppet Strings, dropped last week.
Capitol Risk
Members: Vince D'Annunzio, Brian Quindlen, Max Perla, Jimmy Guardino
There is no confusing this band with one that doesn’t have fun both live and in the studio.
A quick listen to tracks off its latest CD, Dream, reveals tons of power pop hooks and lots of bouncing energy. CR will also play a show at the North Star Bar Sunday, Aug 5.
-Joe Student
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