There are many who say punk rock is dead, but if it is indeed dead, how do you explain the popularity of one of the longest-running summer music festivals in the country?
Despite the mass consumption of pop music and indie rock across America, it is the Vans Warped Tour - truly a punk rock festival - that is drawing the biggest crowds and surviving the test of time.
This year, the "punk rock summer camp" (as it is often referred to by bands) celebrated its 10th birthday. The Warped Tour, which was created in 1994 by Kevin Lyman and hits about 50 cities in the United States and Canada, has grown in size and popularity over the past decade.
The tour, which rolled through the Nissan Pavilion Aug. 4, not only features dozens of bands performing on numerous stages, but also motocross, half-pipes for skateboarding and hundreds of booths, among other things.
With so many summer tours failing, getting cancelled (we're talking 'bout you, Lollapalooza) and only filling venues halfway, how is it that the Warped Tour has been - and still is - so successful?
Jay Bentley, bassist for Warped Tour vets Bad Religion, contends that the tour's success lies in its ability to offer more than just live music to its fans.
"I think it presents a lifestyle versus just being a plethora of pasty-faced musicians just coming out and playing in the dark - it's a daytime event with skateboarders and snowboards and bicycle racers," Bentley explained in an interview backstage at Denver's Warped Tour in July. "The bands are always walking around. It's very 'all of us.'"
Unlike a club show, it is fairly easy to meet your favorite band at the Warped Tour. Most bands sit at their merch table signing autographs and meeting fans after their sets, and many of the musicians walk around the festival like regular guys. Indeed, the tour offers a sense of equality; even though there are technically headlining bands, the lineup changes daily and each band on the tour is given only 30 minutes to play - a practice that helps keep the tour fair.
"The Warped Tour's [success], as far as touring festivals go, is the best mainly because of the whole policy of moving the time every day for every band because what that affords is a chance for every band to survive all kinds of kids," said Ima Robot's bassist Justin Meldal-Johnsen at the show in Denver. "That gives every band, big or small, a chance to do their thing. Everybody gets a 30-minute set and that's very cool."
Pat Thetic, drummer for political-punk band Anti-Flag, agreed: "I also think the idea that the bands rotate and that you don't know when you're going to play - as horrible as it is for the band - it makes bands willing to do it," Thetic said in an interview at the D.C. show in August.
Bands also point to founder Kevin Lyman as one of the primary reasons for the tour's success.
"[Kevin's] as passionate today about his morality and his visions as he's ever been," Bentley said. "That's impressive to me. He never got out of control even though this tour has become wildly successful. He's the most down-to-earth person you can imagine."
Thetic agrees that Lyman has been crucial to the growth and success of Warped Tour.
"I think that [Lyman] has done a very good job and I think without him this tour would be very difficult," Thetic said. "Also Kevin's ability to get enough money and all also keep the ticket prices low enough so that everybody can have access to it."
Low ticket prices are key for maintaining a tour's ultimate achievement, and Lyman has been able to keep a Warped Tour ticket at a relatively reasonable $25.
"I think Warped Tour ticket prices have stayed fairly lower than the other festivals," Matt Rubano, bassist for Taking Back Sunday, said in Denver. "That's why you're getting to see three or four as many bands. I think when you have bands that have really loyal followings and you put them all together, that crossover factor, you just end up with a bigger audience. With a Lollapalooza kind of bill, it's all bands that are hot right now."
Warped Tour, while it remains a punk tour at heart, has expanded to include a much more diverse lineup that surely draws in a bigger crowd. This year, bands like Ima Robot, Swedish '80s-revivalists the Sounds, hip-hop act Atmosphere and D.C.'s own Washington Social Club rounded out the lineup.
Rubano emphasized this: "They've got a lot of diversity on the bill this year while still being a really punk-oriented show. There's a lot of different sounds this year."
Besides the apparent growth and diversification of Warped Tour, Bentley contests that not much has changed over the years that Bad Religion has been playing the tour.
"It's much bigger," Bentley said, "[But] the content hasn't really changed. Kevin's still running the show. It's his baby. It's just that more people are interested in this idea. The bands aren't necessarily the biggest bands in the world, but for some reason this is the only tour doing well. There's something to be said about the concept of this tour."
Bentley also noted that he would never consider the option of skipping out on the Warped Tour experience.
"The Warped Tour is a hot, dirty, disgusting tour," Bentley said. "It's the tour that makes grown men cry. I've never been on anything like this and I'll do this forever. I would never not do this."
Rubano agrees, pleased that his band has had the opportunity to be a part of the 10th anniversary of something so incredible.
"It feels like an honor, a responsibility and like we've been done a favor to be here," Rubano said adamantly.
Lyman is reportedly already hard at work planning next year's tour, which is thus far set to include Rancid frontman Tim Armstrong's side project the Transplants, as well as My Chemical Romance.
