What a trip down memory lane!
A Day To Remember brought their The Least Anticipated Tour to Huntington Bank Pavilion at Northerly Island in Chicago on Thursday, playing a 23-song set that touched on every record and hit the band from Florida has had over the past two decades.
The night felt surreal. Maybe it was because I started my day in Indianapolis doing football press and drove three hours to make the show, but it was the perfect set list that I could only imagine in my dreams. But more on that later.
Scowl started the show off, and unfortunately – due to the aforementioned travel – I missed their set. Later, I saw fan videos of the performance and I certainly missed out on a fun set. I arrived just in time for Four Year Strong. The pop-punk veterans played a high-energy set that I thought set the tone for the night, touching on each era of the band over their long history. Following suit was The Story So Far, who released a new record in the spring titled I Want To Disappear. They played a mix of their old and new stuff, which was turning out to be a theme for the night.
Admittingly, I am not as familiar with the supporting acts on this tour, but I enjoyed the performances, which is usually when the foundation is laid for my becoming a fan. They got the energy to a level that was maintained through the end of the night.
The main event
The last time I saw an A Day To Remember set was just a few months ago at Sonic Temple Art and Music Festival in Columbus, Ohio. It was my favorite set of the festival, but left a lot to be desired as they didn’t perform some of the songs I thought would be mainstays in their sets. I chalked that up to limited time on the main stage – it was a festival, after all.
What that set did do was give me a heads up for what to expect for this performance: smoke, pyrotechnics, beach balls, crowd surfers and pits.
A Day To Remember hit the stage and immediately jumped into my three favorite songs from 2010’s What Separates Me From You – “Sticks & Bricks,” “All I Want” and “2nd Sucks.” For those of us in the photo pit, the band did us a favor by not having any smoke or pyro firing off for the opening trio.
Later in the night, the band performed more from the What Separates Me From You – “You Be Tails, I’ll Be Sonic,” “All Signs Point To Lauderdale,” “This Is the House That Doubt Built” and “It’s Complicated.” That’s seven nostalgic songs off a 10-track album that I played heavily in college.
As we left the pit, ADTR began playing “Paranoia” – which did have the smoke and fire. They then jumped back in time further to perform “I’m Made of Wax, Larry, What Are You Made Of?”
If What Separates Me From You was the soundtrack to my college life, then Common Courtesy is the soundtrack to my professional life. The 2013 record is my favorite from the band and it gets heavy play more than a decade later in this house. So when they played “Right Back At It Again” next in the set, I sang along to every word and danced while holding my camera equipment. They played “Miracle” next (another favorite here) before taking perhaps their first break of the set as vocalist Jeremy McKinnon introduced my personal favorite ADTR song – “Violence (Enough is Enough).”
In McKinnon’s introduction to the song, he said the band doesn’t play the song much because in the past they’ve received blank stares during its performance. That wasn’t the case here, as the Chicago crowd chimed in during the breakdown with “What’s the world gonna say when I call your bluff, punk?!”
Next up was “Mindreader,” which McKinnon again introduced by “discouraging” fans to crowd surf on top of each other. In May at Sonic Temple, I was front and center for this and it was nuts, so I was quite glad to be off to the side and out of the mix for that. It’s crazy fun.
Following this, A Day To Remember played “Rescue Me,” “Have Faith In Me,” “My Life For Hire” and their newest single, “Feedback.”
McKinnon then introduced bassist Bobby Lynge of Fit For A King fame. He said before coming on tour, he asked Lynge which song he’d love to play, in which Lynge immediately responded with “Heartless.” They did not play that, but eventually revealed it was the famed “Since U Been Gone” cover. The Chicago crowd roared over this, as it’s been no secret they’ve been playing the Kelly Clarkson hit again on this tour after many years of not doing so.
Touching on every era
A Day To Remember corrected what I thought was a mistake at Sonic Temple by playing “Mr. Highway’s Thinking About The End.” There’s nothing better than hearing a large crowd scream “disrespect your surroundings” as pits open up and everyone goes crazy. Before 2010, Homesick was my favorite ADTR record thanks to songs like this and the aforementioned “My Life For Hire.”
The next five songs featured some of those mentioned earlier in this review as well as “Resentment,” “The Danger in Starting a Fire” and finally ending the set with “If It Means A Lot To You.” As always, the crowd singing along to this one is deafening and magical in what seems like an effort to outperform McKinnon.
Of course, this wasn’t the true end of the set as A Day To Remember returned to the stage to play “It’s Complicated” before ending the night with “The Downfall Of Us All.”
In the end, A Day To Remember rarely took a moment to catch their collective breath through a long set that touched on nearly every record the band has ever put out. This setlist and performance looks like something a longtime super fan would put together, and that was the point – ADTR wanted to give a fan of every era something special in this performance.
What would I change? Play a bit more from Common Courtesy (which I actively had on while writing this review).
