Bowling for Soup / Zebrahead / MC Lars

live in Exeter (2009)

Jake

We arrived at the venue to see a long queue of what can only be described as children, which took me by surprise as the venue is a university; in hindsight, I should've realised -- my first show was Bowling for Soup all those years ago too.

The night started with the Leftovers. I didn't like them, but I can see why they are on this tour; they seemed like a fun band and the kids loved them (there were a lot, and I mean a lot of kids around the 12-16 age group) but to me they sounded like one of those kids' TV "let's all have a party and be happy" bands, and not a cool one like Imagination Movers (who are super bad-ass, by the way). I won't lie, I really didn't like them, but other people seemed to.

MC Lars was on second. Again, a fun band, and I did enjoy them. They were clearly well-suited for the tour. The constant video on the screen behind was a little nauseating, however, and once they told us that the backing band were Failsafe I couldn't help thinking I'd rather just be watching Failsafe. Still, good act and I'd watch him/them again.

So now onto Zebrahead, the band that I'd gone to see -- and sadly, this is where it went wrong. I have no idea what happened, but the sound was awful. You couldn't hear the vocals or the guitar to the point where it was difficult to even identify which song they were playing. It's not the band's fault -- they gave it their all and still went down a storm, but it ruined it for me, personally. I did get a pick, though.

Bowling for Soup played exactly as you'd expect. They played well and went down the same. It's worth mentioning that they played a very, very long set, of about an hour and a half; however, by this point I was too grumpy from Zebrahead to truly enjoy them. They were funny, too, but i feel they could've been trying a bit too hard. Still, they played very well and you couldn't fault their performance.

So, in conclusion then, exactly what you'd expect from a tour entitled "The Party in Your Pants Tour," with ample toilet humour, pop-punk and fuck-loads of kids. Disappointing, though, if you went to watch Zebrahead.