Washington DC – 15 Mar 2023
My two faiths intermingle on a cold March evening
Like Dante in Clerks, I wasn’t even supposed to be at this show.
On March 15, my cousin and his spouse were supposed to be traveling down to the District so we could watch his mighty Buffalo Sabers play the hometown Capitals. When my cousin bothered to tell me that they couldn’t make it a week before the game, my wife reminded me that she had gotten one ticket to a sold out concert, and maybe… just maybe… I should procure another.
Some background: in October 2011, my now-wife and I went to our first concert together in Baltimore, MD—the Pop Punk’s Not Dead Tour. At this stop, we saw two bands I needed to Google to remember (This Time Next Year and Man Overboard) along with a late phase Set Your Goals and a rapidly ascending Wonder Years all set up the headliner. Riding the coattails of the easy core genre they helped create, New Found Glory finished the show with their greatest hits, a smattering of songs from their recent release Radiosurgery, and healthy helping of classic covers.
As that 2011 concert is one of the bedrocks of relationship (along with 2011’s The Revival Tour), I tend to get dragged to whatever New Found Glory show trucks through the DMV. In this case, when does one get to see bands in a refurbished synagogue? I waited out the ridiculous markup on the secondary market and only spend sigh $70, including fees, to spend an acoustic evening with some legends of Coral Springs.
For reasons that boggle me, my wife selected seats in the balcony section of the synagogue, ensuring that I had two flights of stairs between myself and the bathroom. This was sufficiently far away that I could get but a smattering of decent photos from my Google Pixel.
I had never before heard the evening’s opener, Leanna Firestone. Armed only with two acoustic guitars, this self-described unreliable narrator played a forty minute set composed of songs from her 2022 album FORWARD/slash and her 2023 EP Public Displays of Affection. Song topics ranged from toxic relationships (“You Just Didn’t Like Me That Much”) and parent problems (“Least Favorite Only Child”), resting heavily on true love (“God and the Government”, “Right Person, Right Time”).
I thought that Leanna had a certain je ne sais quoi about her, although my wife informed me that most of the quoi was Olivia Rodrigo from an indie TikTok angle. Regardless, I’ve found my jaded self turning on her EP when listening to music around young ears.
After the opener, the aged Warped Tour kids and I wander down to the first floor bathroom for relief from our ill-advised and overpriced bottles of macro craft beers. Some, like myself, doubled down on this mistake while we waited for the lengthy line to shorten.
It’s hard to believe that New Found Glory celebrated their 25th anniversary last year, and they seemingly played songs from their extensive back catalog. Opening with “Get Me Home”, the lead single from their acoustic EP Make the Most of It, the band gave mostly-acoustic spins of the greatest hits (“Hit or Miss”, “My Friends Over You”, “All Downhill from Here”), deeper cuts (“Reasons”, “Too Good to Be”) and a healthy helping of covers (Edwin McCain‘s “I’ll Be” and the pride of Buffalo, NY The Goo Goo Dolls‘ “Iris”). The show had a very Dashboard Confessional MTV Unplugged feel to it, especially considering that I could hear most of my fellow attendees in the nearby pews (yes, pews) singing along.
In some ways, it felt like New Found Glory was somewhat hamstrung by the acoustic format. Singer Jordan Pundik looked like he was regularly restraining himself from what should have been a set list filled with high energy songs. While drummer Cyrus Bolooski filled numerous roles (rhythm guitar, keyboards) in addition to his normal throne behind the drums, the mix seemed needlessly treble heavy, with little tonally between bassist Ian Grushka and the rest of the band.
Finally, New Found Glory was joined by Four Year Strong‘s Dan O’Connor, who was subbing in place of founding guitarist Chad Gilbert, who is undergoing treatment for a recurrence of a Pheochromocytoma tumor. While O’Connor was clearly living his best fucking life supporting his heroes, I can’t help but feel like the rest of the band felt like they were playing without their strong right arm in his absence.
Halfway through the encore, I realized that it was 10:30 pm, which was the same time that we were supposed to relieve our babysitter. My wife and I rushed to our car and fought with traffic from the hockey game to get home about an hour late. (Pro tip: pay the babysitter a little more when this happens—and no, music recommendations don’t count.)
GOOD EATS: The synagogue was around the corner from Shouk, a vegan middle eastern street food restaurant. Even this carnivore would recommend the kale caesar salad, as the tahini dressing does a delightful lift in elevation of this simple salad.
YO VINYL NERDS: Leanna Firestone noted that she pressed compact discs of her latest EP so people had something to buy. Is this a sign of the vinyl apocalypse?
Once hailing from the salty tundra of Syracuse, NY, Ben now calls the DC suburbs his home. He fell in love with punk after listening to Punk-O-Rama 3, Less Than Jake and MXPX in middle school. He loves to slam dance but is too large to stage dive.
When he’s not pretending to have exquisite musical taste, he’s raising two children, designing RPG products and practicing law. (Who knows if he’ll ever get the hang of it.)
