Live Show Review: Rise Against with The Used and Senses Fail in Asbury Park, NJ

Stone Pony Summer Stage – 14 Aug 2022

Personal Growth, Shakespeare and Revolution… the stuff of legends

A sea of formerly disaffected teens (still disaffected, just older and more sore now) converged upon the Stone Pony Summer Stage in Asbury Park, NJ as Rise Against came through with The Used.  The sun beat down upon

But it wasn’t just a dual bill, as Jersey’s own post-hardcore stalwarts Senses Fail opened the concert and seemed so different from the band I remember playing at a church in the small town of Summit, NJ 20-plus years back.  There has been some significant growth from frontman Buddy Nielsen, both musically and simply in the way in which he carries himself on stage.  The new facet of his persona, humility, has improved every part of their show.  Growth is a fantastic thing to see, and the maturation of SF is visible from space.  They’ve come so far and it improves their show emphatically.

The hometown rockers crushed their set, culling from a lengthy career with fan favorites like “Calling All Cars,” “Buried a Lie” and “Death By Water.”  To close out their performance, they went with their classic set closer of “Bite To Break Skin,” but broke it down in the middle with a bit of Woodstock ‘99 throwback, a medley of Disturbed‘s “Down With The Sickness,” Limp Bizkit‘s “Break Stuff” and Rage Against The Machine‘s “Bulls on Parade” that got the crowd beyond amped before The Used were to take the stage. 

After doing this for so long, with no hiatus, no break-ups, one would expect The Used’s frontman Bert McCrackin’s vocal cords would be shredded beyond their former glory, but immediately upon taking the stage it was clear he’s not lost any of his range.  The band got right to work with larynx eviscerating performances of “Take It Away,” “Blow Me,” “I Caught Fire” and “The Taste of Ink.”  

This super fun set included a “Wall of Death” explosion from the pit as McCrackin channelled Moses to split the sea of sun-scorched attendees before unleashing their wrath as a maelstrom of hair and limbs charged one another with the kind of violent love and admiration that have always encapsulated the spirit of The Used.  In a twist I never could have seen coming, the crowd initiated a circle pit at the band’s behest, while the charismatic frontman recited the “Sound and fury signifying nothing” soliloquy from Macbeth.  A Shakespearian circle pit is definitely a welcomed first for me.  To close out their set, the band sandwiched “A Box Full of Sharp Objects” between intros and outros of Nirvana‘s “Smells Like Teen Spirit” exiting the stage to a chorus of adoring boos from the crowd (as the band requested).

The sun sets and a cool breeze flows off the Atlantic as Rise Against prepares to bring their Second-City political punk to crowd in Asbury.  IT was at this moment that I noticed the true make-up of the crowd.  Sure, we were all punks who love a good breakdown, but many of us have also become parents.  The barriers were crowded with small children on dads’ shoulders, encircled by friends and strangers and strangers who become friends, ensuring that the ebbs and flow of the crowd do not leave the children vulnerable to injury.  It’s becoming more recurrent at the shows I’ve been attending, but seeing the future of independent music getting their lessons from the same artists we learned from is a beautiful thing to experience.   

The band stormed the stage and wasted no time getting the crowd moving with “Prayer of the Refugee,” “Under The Knife” and “Satellite” as a flurry of kickoff tracks.  The economy of time is at the center of the band’s sound with dozens of tracks in their oeuvre coming in under 3 minutes.  The band play fast and loud, like this scene should be.  The volume of the outdoor venue seemed to continue raising, they started the set at 10 and skipped 11, went to 12 when frontman Tim McIlrath took to the bullhorn for the reprise in “Satellite” and by the time they got “Re-Education (Through Labor)” the soundboard knobs may have been at 18, leading to the ensemble in the crowd to raise their voices in unison.

Every Rise Against show I’ve been to, from their first Jersey show opening for Thursday at Krome all the way through today Rise Against is never too far separated from their beliefs.  McIlrath and crew don’t need to stop the show to eschew their politics because they know that it takes only one playthrough of one album to make it clear where they stand.  Today, McIlrath spoke out on what is not a tenet of any righteous revolution; the bigotry of racism, sexism, homophobia, xenophobia and nationalism.  “If you find yourself in something called a revolution and you have noticed that one or more of those elements are present, you might be in the wrong fucking revolution.” 

The band is never a letdown, instead they get better with age, turning the sea of strangers into a community, a family.  A place where everything stops to protect one another.  Evident when the band full stopped a track as the crowd self-policed a fight that had broken out until security could clear the situation.  Evident by the way the band and Stone Pony staff moved a young girl and her father over the barricade to stand stage right so she could safely enjoy the performance.  Evident by the way the crowd never needed to be told that we pick up those who fall.  This sincere empathy from the stage and the crowd is the reason the Rise Against revolution will always win.

The band closed out their set, pulling out the big guns “Swing Life Away” and “Nowhere Generation” before an epic performance of “Give It All” as McIlrath joined the fray and shared the mic with the audience cheering their performances as loudly as they cheered on the band’s.  A brief intermission before encore performances of “Survive” and “Savior” gave the crowd one last chance to dance in Jersey with Rise Against and their perfectly crafted tunes of rebellion and community.