Ah man, with the temperatures still on the wrong side of icy and the sky a depressing shade of perma-grey, Bowling For Soup have come to Nottingham to provide the perfect antidote. Following their grin-inducing set at Download 2024, where they brought the whole crowd together for singalong after singalong, they’re back on the road (complete with geek-rockers Wheatus and up-‘n’-coming Floridian rockers Magnolia Park) for a tour that celebrates the twentieth anniversary of their massively successful A Hangover You Don’t Deserve. Playing the album in full, it’s a night for the fans, with deep cuts a-plenty, a handful of big hitters, and a wonderfully chaotic atmosphere.
Opening the night, Magnolia Park have the task of converted this fiercely partisan crowd with their genre-hopping sound. Formed in 2018 and signed to the legendary Epitaph label, the band may be relative newcomers compared to Wheatus and BFS, but with three albums already to their credit (and a fourth due in April), they’ve certainly been putting the work in.
Taking to the stage, this high energy unit, fronted by powerful vocalist Joshua Roberts, work their collective asses off to get the crowd warmed up. Mixing up nu metal, pop punk, and just a touch of hip hop, their sound incorporates elements from Linkin Park and Fever 333, alongside more traditional pop-punk fare, making them an original addition to the bill in their own right.
Opening with a suitably crunchy pair of numbers in Misfits – all pulsing synths and throbbing bass – and the Linkin Park-esque Do Or Die, Magnolia Park make a memorable entrance. Keeping the energy levels high, they unleash a heavier track in the form of the unreleased Crave, which leans into the nu-metal elements hinted at on Misfits, although an arena-sized chorus is never far behind. A fun cover of I2I (from A Goofy Movie) sees the band find a more soulful edge amidst the guitar-led bluster, while a couple of more traditionally pop-punk cuts highlight the band’s connection to tonight’s show. Arguably the weakest tracks on offer, they’re fun, but they’re soon swept away by the heavier Shallow and Animal, the latter track particularly tumultuous.
Unbelievably energetic and with a charismatic vocalist, Magnolia Park more than have the chops to set an arena of this size alight and, with their varied albeit melodic sound, they already have the songs to go the distance. It’s easy to imagine them going down a storm at Download, and they more than earned their place on the stage tonight with a solid set that certainly warmed the crowd up.
Opening with a surprise Darkness cover, Wheatus take to the stage with Growing On Me. Strangely, the house lights remain up, while the sound is a little muddy, as if the tech team haven’t quite figured what’s happening. Nevertheless, it earns a huge cheer (“it’s not our song, calm down” laughs Brendan), before the band turn to Erasure’s A Little Respect, another track that leans heavily on Brendan’s vocal range. For the rest of the set, Wheatus spend a good deal of time amidst their early albums (regularly plugging their forthcoming tour along the way), the exception being Fourteen (from the Valentine LP), which is a solid rocker that gets people bouncing. Indeed, it appears people are bouncing a little too much, with Leroy stopping on a dime as Brendan spots trouble and halts the set. It’s well handled and a clear indication of the band’s professionalism despite the slightly goofy onstage personas they adopt.
From there, we get quick run through of Lemonade, Mope (“the real Teenage Dirtbag” laughs Brendan), andHey Mr. Brown, the latter a punchy song that is easily the best track not to have dirtbag in the title.
Of course, it wouldn’t be a Wheatus show without that hit and the crowd are more than happy to oblige when it comes to singing along at lung-bursting volumes. For many, it’s the sound of their teenage years brought vividly back to life, and it makes for a hell of a conclusion, with Brendan gleefully milking it for all its worth. Following a brief halt in which the entire arena unites to sing in his place, he makes to walk off, only to be hit with a wall of boos (“it’s like Trump at the Superbowl” he quips), before the band bust out the chorus one last time. It’s nostalgia 101, but it works, and it’s heartening to see such a large crowd, young and old, completely lost in an anthem that has soundtracked their lives this last two decades.
And so, to the main event. With a cartoon screen providing the self-proclaimed greatest band in the world with a suitably ridiculous opening, Bowling For Soup launch themselves at the stage with the one-two opening punch of Almost and Trucker Hat – the latter peppered with singalong moments including a medley of well-worn tracks such as Slade and The Beastie Boys. With the audience already screaming their approval, and the massive screens flanking the stage capturing the band on their travels (complete with poignant images of recently retired and much-loved guitarist Chris Burney), it makes for a hell of a start to the show, and it only gets better from there. With the irrepressible Jaret Reddick in great, wisecracking form, it’s a notable feature of a Bowling For Soup show that there’s as much entertainment to be had from the great on-stage banter as there is from the music itself. As such, with Jaret showing surprise that they’re two songs in and he has yet to speak to the crowd, they take a break while he rambles happily on. Noting that it’s the absolute earliest we’ll ever hear the next track at a BFS show, he leads his grinning band into their evergreen cover of 1985, complete with confetti blasts, leaving us to worry about the foundations of the venue as the crowd seemingly jumps as one. A little snippet of Teenage Dirtbag gives way to My Own Worst Enemy, which just as quickly segues into Get Happy – the band racing breathlessly through the material with a joy that is palpable.
The rest of the night simply flies past. A cheeky English lesson (prompted by a throw away comment about alliteration) paves the way for Ohio (Come Back To Texas), which even finds space for Dave Pearson (Lacey) to jump behind the kit, while an impromptu audience survey finds that Last Call may not have the lyrical longevity that might have been expected when it was written 20 years ago. Of course, nothing is straight forward, and even the handling of bonus fare is brilliantly ad hoc, with a mildly nervous audience member (fortuitously celebrating her birthday) instructed to spin a mini wheel of fortune in order to select Life After Lisa. With those shenanigans suitably dispensed, BFS wrap up A Hangover You Don’t Deserve with Down For The Count, which comes complete with a nod to the importance of looking after your mental health, and Two-Seater, before bringing the whole thing to an emotional close with Friends O’Mine, which compresses the whole ethos of this band of brothers into just a few heartfelt minutes.
Having truly set the faithful on fire with a mix of cracking anthems and rarely heard deep cuts, Bowling For Soup round the night out with an encore that includes the blink-and-you’ll-miss-it theme tune to Phineas and Ferb – Today Is Gonna Be A Great Day – as well as monster hit Girl All The Bad Guys Want, which is suitably celebrated with a barrage of confetti. A track that seemingly never grows old, it sends the entire crowd – young and old – into the cold night air still singing and beaming from ear to ear.
Bowling for soup are one of those bands for whom music is the ultimate form of escapism. No matter how dark the world around them gets, their sense of family (both within the band and with their fans) is what gets them through, and it’s impossible not to leave one of their shows feeling brighter than when you went in. It helps that the audience is truly multigenerational, older fans reliving their adolescence, and younger ones finding their own soundtrack, which makes for a lively, inclusive atmosphere that only adds to the sense of fun. From the brilliant on-stage banter – part Beavis and Butthead, part Jay and Silent Bob – to the timeless tunes, Bowling for soup know exactly how to pace the night and their showing at the Motorpoint Arena is an absolute blast.
Bowling For Soup return in December for a massive show at Wembley Arena
