warped tour bus

• Share full article

‘It Was 11 Guys on a Bus, and Then Me’: Women on the Warped Tour

As the traveling punk-rock extravaganza begins its final full cross-country run, the women who performed on the male-dominated festival tell their stories.

Credit... Bryan Bedder/Getty Images

Supported by

By Steve Knopper

• June 21, 2018

On the first Warped Tour, in 1995, the traveling punk-rock extravaganza was so low-budget that its founder, Kevin Lyman, had to buy supermarket hot dogs to feed the musicians. One day, the Sublime singer Bradley Nowell’s Dalmatian urinated on the buns.

“That was my favorite moment,” recalled Donita Sparks of L7, another top band on the bill that year. The other roving festivals of the time, from Lollapalooza to Lilith Fair, had an air of sophistication, but Warped was dirty, D.I.Y., and lacking air-conditioning and proper restrooms — and only three of the 21 headlining bands included women. When the tour sets off from Pomona, Calif., on Thursday for what’s billed as its final full cross-country trek , only six of the 84 bands listed on the lineup posted on the Warped website have women members, or 7 percent, far lower than the 19 percent average on top festivals this year, according to a recent study by the online music magazine Pitchfork.

The Vans Warped Tour, now in its 24th year, has expanded its catering to include gourmet and vegan options. But its core mission remains essentially the same — raging, screaming, punk and metal bands and bouncier emo and pop-punk groups, from mainstays like All Time Low and Taking Back Sunday to promising younger acts on smaller stages, setting up shop at amphitheaters and in parking lots from San Diego to West Palm Beach, Fla. Warped has showcased women stars over the years, including No Doubt, Katy Perry, Paramore and the underground bands on the pink-and-black Shiragirl stage, but its gender imbalance has remained striking.

The New York Times spoke to 75 women and nonbinary musicians who have performed on the tour, many of whom echoed NPR Music’s Ann Powers, who recently criticized Warped as a “wild boys’ paradise.” Some divulged #MeToo stories; others ripped bands known for making misogynistic remarks onstage. Most had kind things to say about Mr. Lyman, a former Lollapalooza stage manager who scouts Warped bands himself, praising him for hiring so many women in charge of production, catering and other departments. And some said they are intent on making a statement at this year’s festival. Doll Skin, a quartet of women from Phoenix, is employing an all-female crew and working to support the other women performers. “We make a little alliance, almost,” said the band’s 21-year-old drummer, Meghan Herring. These are edited excerpts from the conversations.

How would you describe your Warped Tour experience?

NOVENA CARMEL, 36, OF WALLPAPER It’s sort of like boot camp and a circus.

CHESKA ZAIDE, 20, OF A+ DROPOUTS Everything I didn’t like about the tour, like the heavy lifting, the sun, just the tiredness of it all, is everything that I loved about it.

SYDNEY “SQUID” SILVER OF LUNACHICKS It’s 100 degrees in the desert in the hot sun. We’re wearing vinyl cheerleader outfits. You actually have to train for it or you’ll pass out.

SIENNA DEGOVIA, 42, OF THE RANDIES Many, many times, I’d set up my sleeping bag in some disgusting restroom gym of a stadium.

MEG FRAMPTON, 33, OF MEG & DIA I did feel a pressure to drink like everybody else and party like the guys, whereas what I would’ve naturally wanted to do was have some tea and, I don’t know, watch a chick flick and go to sleep.

JESSICA VAUGHN, 30, OF CHARLOTTE SOMETIMES It was 11 guys on a bus, and then me. And they were passing gas. That was my summer.

K.FLAY, 32 There’s kind of a scene, within the Warped Tour community, of people who are really into backyard, down-home wrestling. I remember being in downtown Kansas City and it was still burning hot at 10:30 or 11 and everybody was crowded around this makeshift wrestling ring. I was like an anthropologist: “And now, the wrestling!”

LINDSAY CARD, 32, OF MIGHTY MONGO Our bus broke down a lot but we never missed a show. There were times we had to call taxis in the middle of the night to make it to the next venue.

NICOLETTE VILAR, 38, OF GO BETTY GO Looking back at it now, as a grown lady, I think it was straight-up dangerous.

AIXA VILAR, 37, OF GO BETTY GO We were in truck stops in the middle of the night.

NICOLETTE VILAR You guys left me at a gas station once.

AIXA VILAR That was by accident.

On a male-dominated tour, how did you approach your performances?

MONIQUE POWELL, 42, OF SAVE FERRIS The people who came to the shows loved punk, so they were pretty cool with a girl going up there and shooting her mouth off. It really helped me formulate what I was going to become. I really felt so comfortable to be myself.

GINA VOLPE OF LUNACHICKS The drummer for NOFX had broken his thumb right before one of their sets, so they had drummers from eight bands come and play two songs for their set — Pennywise and Green Day and Papa Roach, and our drummer, Helen [Destroy], who at the time was 19. All these dudes came on and played their two songs, then our teenage girl got up there and played her two songs and all the male drummers on the side of the stage sat there with their mouths open because she blew every single one of them away.

STELLA KATSOUDAS OF DIRTY LITTLE RABBITS All the other bands were very aggressive — the girls and the guys. I had this idea in my head that I wanted to completely embrace my femininity, like completely just go over the top with it. So I had this designer custom make me five sparkly tour dresses and I did my hair and my makeup for every single show.

SHAWNA POTTER, 36, OF WAR ON WOMEN It’s important to talk about the fact that we got to rock the [expletive] out, too, and we got to change people’s minds. We had dads coming up to us saying, “I’m so glad my daughter got to watch you, you guys are awesome.” And little trans kids still figuring their [expletive] out, saying, “Thank God you’re here.”

What was your daily lived experience of being a woman on Warped Tour like?

SILVER There was an artist on that tour saying, “Which 20-year-old girls am I going to get pregnant tonight?” And the same individual wanted to shake our hands, and we’re like, “You’ve got to be [expletive] kidding me, man.”

LEANOR ORTEGA TILL, 41, OF FIVE IRON FRENZY You had to be careful going onto everyone’s bus — it’s not a safe idea. One of the bands we went out with had a little inflatable pool. They’d get in their underwear and go out there and hang out. And I knew what they were up to, which was get girls into their underwear to hang out, too. So I would get in there and put my feet in [the pool] and read a book. But the guys knew me and they were nice to me. I was a drag. I don’t care.

KATY PERRY, 33 There were so many strong females who have led the way since the beginning of Warped Tour: Save Ferris, Juliette Lewis, Gwen Stefani, my friend Hayley [Williams] from Paramore. My album at the time was “One of the Boys” so it was something that was crossing my mind often — it felt good not only to be able to keep up with the boys, but do it all in heels.

DEGOVIA There wasn’t a whole lot of oversexualizing of women. Maybe it has to do with how the tour was really connected to skateboarding and skate culture and that was all opening up to women. I didn’t feel a lot of “this girl is hot, so her band is better” — I didn’t get that vibe.

VAUGHN They always pitted Katy Perry and I against each other: “Who do you think is hotter?” That would be a question they asked the boys on Warped Tour in video promos and stuff.

VICTORIA ASHER, 32, OF COBRA STARSHIP I definitely loved the power I had of being one of the few girls on tour. You would be allowed to cut in front of the long food lines and nobody had a problem with it.

Although the numbers have improved, few women have headlined Warped Tour over the years. How much did you notice that?

BRIDGET REGAN, 42, OF FLOGGING MOLLY Obviously you’d have to be blind not to notice that.

JENNY STILLWAGGON RADESKY, 40, OF THE SMOOTHS I was one of seven women that year. And three of the other women were on the tour bus with me, merch sellers. I remember feeling one day like, “Can I interact with other females, please?”

BRETT ANDERSON, 38, OF THE DONNAS It was literally no different than any other day, tour, show, place, anything. It wasn’t like the Warped Tour was any less women than anything else.

KARINA DENIKÉ OF DANCE HALL CRASHERS We didn’t feel intimidated. It felt like you have 300 older brothers protecting you, in some ways.

JULIETTE LEWIS, 45 I got the list right here. Fall Out Boy, Flogging Molly, Coheed and Cambria, Bad Religion, My Chemical Romance, NOFX, Simple Plan, Story of the Year. I’m trying to find the girls. Where the [expletive]?

TATIANA DEMARIA OF TAT I’ve found Warped to be very welcoming to women. For every 100 bands that apply to do Warped Tour, only 10 bands have females in them.

DONITA SPARKS OF L7 In 1999, we flew a plane over the Warped Tour that said, “Warped Needs More Beaver, Love L7.” It was a politically charged prank to promote our own album.

What do you remember about Joan Jett’s presence on the tour in 2006? (She returns for a few dates this year.)

KELLY OGDEN, 38, OF THE DOLLYROTS We met Joan Jett. I was like, “Just wanted to give you our new record, we’re the Dollyrots.” She was like, “I know, I watch your band all the time.”

SHIRA LEIGH YEVIN OF SHIRAGIRL Joan Jett used to ride her bike over and watch all the girl bands. The last day, in Cleveland, we performed “Bad Reputation” together.

JOAN JETT I had my own BMX. You needed a bike to get from stage to stage. A lot of the bands and the crews did that because the stages were far away from each other. As soon as I noticed that, I got a bike, and carried it under the bus in the bay and took it down every day and rode it around. Like camping, kind of.

DANI DOLL, 34, OF MIRACLE DOLLS When we came just for fun, our friends’ band said, “Hey, here’s some passes, you guys want to go backstage and meet Joan Jett?” And we were like, “ Yeah. We want to go backstage and meet Joan Jett.” We went up to her. The guitarist from NOFX was there. He tried to cut in front of us! And Joan Jett said, “Excuse me, I’m talking to these ladies.”

JETT It’s just part of the thing — I want girls to feel comfortable and not intimidated to get up and play.

How did you fight the sexism you faced onstage and off?

THEO KOGAN, 48, OF LUNACHICKS A huge portion of the Blink-182 guys’ audience was teenage girls, and it was an all-ages show and they would say [expletive] like, “Throw us your bras!” I was going onstage and saying, “Hey, girls, don’t do anything those guys tell you!”

DIA FRAMPTON, 30, OF MEG & DIA We’d give somebody a flier to come watch our band and somebody would say, “Oh, you guys gonna show us your breasts?” or something stupid. Meg and I would shrug that off: “It comes with the territory.” You learn, especially now, it’s not O.K. Back then, I was young, I tried to fit in, I didn’t want to be a snotty little girl who makes people feel uncomfortable.

JEANNE WAWRZYNIAK, 39, OF ALL THAT REMAINS Every once in a while I got “Oh, marry me!” But I never got anyone trying to grope me or anyone saying anything super rude.

TAYLOR JARDINE, 28, OF WE ARE THE IN CROWD We had this one band come on our bus. I didn’t have to sing the next day. I remember drinking too much and going, “Oh my God, I’ve got to go to bed.” [A man from the other band] kept grabbing me and making me sit super-close and keeping [his] arm around me — and we had never talked, I never knew this person at all. It was definitely uncomfortable. Thankfully, my guys are very protective. The next morning, I recall the guys going, “They are not welcome on our bus again.”

SYDNEY SIEROTA OF ECHOSMITH It is really hard on Warped Tour to have physical boundaries, because everyone’s so close and it’s so crowded and people are unpredictable. So there were meet-and-greets where somebody would try to touch my butt.

MARIEL LOVELAND OF CANDY HEARTS I was assaulted on Warped Tour. I felt like I had to say something because this person was threatening to ruin my reputation and my position on the tour by making up stuff to get me kicked off. Instead of my team and the people who worked for me being like “We’ll do what we can to make you feel safe” — which Kevin did do — it was “Why did you open your mouth?”

COURTNEY LAPLANTE OF IWRESTLEDABEARONCE I’d just been playing Canadian Legions and stuff. There were a few times I’d come up to the barrier, I’d be so excited to sing at the fans, and someone would just reach out and honk my breasts. And I was like, “What do I do? Do I just punch in that direction?”

ELIZABETH CARENA OF MOTHER FEATHER I was going backstage to help another artist do his makeup for his show and I was walking by, and Waka Flocka Flame shouted out, “Hey, your booty’s hanging out!” I thought it was funny! He didn’t catcall me.

ANN COURTNEY OF MOTHER FEATHER It was a “heads-up, girl!”

CARENA More like a shout-out.

What did playing on the Warped Tour teach you about touring and yourself?

ALEXIA RODRIGUEZ, 30, OF EYES SET TO KILL What did I learn? Wear sunscreen.

FRANCHESKA PASTOR, 20, OF BAD SEED RISING I loved it because it was dirty, it was grungy, it was gross, it was very aggressive — which are the terms I use to describe myself.

LOVELAND As a musician, I wouldn’t let my daughter go without me, absolutely not. But as a fan, it’s fun.

JESS BOWEN, 28, OF THE SUMMER SET I was super sad when I heard that it was going to be the last year. I have a family at Warped Tour. When I go to Warped Tour, I kind of feel the most comfortable. I feel myself.

ALICIA SOLO, 25, OF BEAUTIFUL BODIES It’s like getting a Purple Heart for the music industry. If you can get through Warped Tour, you can do anything.

Find the Right Soundtrack for You

Trying to expand your musical horizons take a listen to something new..

The rock musician and revered engineer  Steve Albini  has died at 61.

Cass Elliot ’s death spawned a horrible myth. She deserves better.

What happens next for Kendrick Lamar and Drake ?

He sang “What a Fool Believes.” But Michael McDonald  is in on the joke.

Hear 10 of the week’s most notable new songs on the Playlist .

Advertisement

An Oral History of the Warped Tour

The hard-partying music festival holds its last Denver show this month.

The Local newsletter is your free, daily guide to life in Colorado. For locals, by locals. Sign up today!

In August 1995, a traveling alt-rock music festival called the Warped Tour played at the University of Colorado’s Franklin Field in Boulder—the tour’s second show. Over the next 23 years, it helped launch the careers of big names like Eminem and Paramore, plus hundreds of less-famous talents. These days, the Warped Tour is best known as an epic musical carnival filled with nearly as much debauchery as music. Jon Shockness, of the Denver band Air Dubai, compares it to a never-ending summer block party set to ear-drum-damaging decibels. Unfortunately for the festival’s fans, the party is over: 2018 will be the Warped Tour’s final encore. In advance of its last Denver stop this month, we asked bands and promoters to recall the best, and worst, of Warped.

“Bill Bass was the promoter with [the late] Barry Fey. They were so busy with other shows they assigned an intern to run the Warped Tour. About an hour before, we realized they had no concessions. We bought two Weber barbecue grills and $1 sodas and hot dogs at the supermarket. Barry called and yelled at us because the show was a piece of crap and he lost money. All I could think was, We made $500 selling hot dogs.” – Kevin Lyman , Warped Tour founder

• Why Pilots Still Can’t Land a Seaplane in Colorado
• We Say Goodbye (and Good Riddance) to Chipotle
• Denver’s Flourishing Ultimate Scene Takes The World Stage
• Two New Waterparks to Check out on Balmy Days
• Meet the Squad Saving Crested Butte’s Wildflowers
• The True Story of a Reluctant Forest Bather
• Tap Into Colorado’s Western Roots at These Weekly Rodeos

“Warped Tour isn’t glamorous. Katy Perry’s going in a port-a-potty like everyone else. Toward the end of the tour, she had a number one song. She threw a crazy party in a hotel room in Portland. She was dragging us across the floor of a booze-stained hotel room. It was a rock ‘n’ roll moment.

When we did the whole tour for the first time [in 2008], we shared a bus with another band and two sponsors. This was in the emo era of music—off-center, straight, asymmetrical haircuts were in vogue. I could count the seconds until the bus was going to short out because the bands were flat-ironing their hair. The bus would just power down and go bzzzzsh. It was like clockwork.” – Nathaniel Motte of Boulder electronic duo 3OH!3, which played the entire tour three times

“Playing the show is 35 minutes of the day, and you’re there for 24 hours. My fun didn’t start till 5 or 6 at night. I got the word ‘f—’ tattooed on my back one year; I tattooed ‘f—’ on somebody else’s back.

We rode in inflatable rafts that went out into the crowd every day. Sometimes the rafts reached another stage. I’d have to grab a mic and run back to the [original] stage.” – David Schmitt of Breathe Carolina, a Denver-born EDM band that played the Warped Tour four times

“Some of [the Warped Tour’s stops] are isolated. One time, I did not want to use the port-a-potty, so I walked like five miles to find an office building in the middle of nowhere. Awesome tour. Horrible bathrooms.

Once the doors would close, the barbecue grills would light up. The parties were awesome.” – Jon Shockness , whose band Air Dubai played Warped in 2009 and 2014

Editors' Picks

3 Years Into Colorado’s Sports Betting Experiment

The Oversimplified Guide to Shoveling a Sidewalk

Rocky Mountain Raclette Makes Diners Melt With Its Cheese-Centric Catering

How to Make Snooze Pancakes at Home

Sign up for our newsletters.

All things Colorado delivered straight to your inbox.

The Untold Truth Of Vans Warped Tour

From 1995 to 2019, Vans Warped Tour became the mecca of alternative music. Fans would flock to the traveling festival to see their favorite artists and to discover the next big thing, while musicians would know a spot on this coveted tour could elevate their career. After all, there's no disputing the impact it had in the ascension of the careers of groundbreaking acts like Paramore, My Chemical Romance , and Fall Out Boy .

Founded by Kevin Lyman, Vans Warped Tour is widely associated with the punk rock movement and a strong ethos of the do-it-yourself attitude, being seen as the everyday person's music event. However, in the later years, controversy engulfed the tour. From scene politics to giving a platform to disgraced musicians, there were accusations that it was no longer the same place it was in the beginning. For some, it simply didn't feel like home anymore. As a result, there were mixed feelings when Lyman announced the tour would officially call it a day after its 25-year celebration.

Regardless of the sentiment toward the Vans Warped Tour, no one can deny the importance it played in the music scene throughout its run. It outlasted many of its peers and inspired others to start their own events, too. With that said, let's take a look back at the untold truth of Vans Warped Tour and if it is due to make a comeback.

The founder cut his teeth on Lollapalooza

Anyone who has worked on the live side of the music industry understands it is a demanding and grueling job. Not only is there the physical aspect of setting up the equipment and ensuring everything is in working order before the doors open, but there is also the marketing element and understanding of how to deal with unexpected issues that may arise on the day. Think of it like organizing a big birthday bash, but times the difficulty level by 100.

Kevin Lyman was no rookie when he decided to start his own tour, since he had already spent time working as a stage manager at another famous music festival. "Before Warped I was on three years of Lollapalooza, so [it's been] 26 straight summers out on the road," he told Billboard .

Having experience, Lyman also understood that he needed significant sponsorship to make this dream tour a reality. As revealed by Vans Vice President Steve Van Doren, Lyman approached the sneaker manufacturer for finance, and Vans saw it as a mutually beneficial opportunity to expand its reach throughout North America.

Vans Warped Tour gave a lot of people second chances

When applying for jobs, background checks have become the norm. However, that hasn't stopped people from being prejudiced against for having a criminal or substance abuse history, as research has shown, per Criminology . There's a stigma that sticks with people long afterward and makes it exponentially more difficult for them to find work and rebuild their lives.

Speaking to Loudwire , Kevin Lyman discussed the importance of affording people second chances, explaining how it is something deeply personal to him and his value system. "The majority of my early Warped Tour crew guys all had to spend a little time in jail for stupid decisions," Lyman said. "A lot of them were selling meth or whatever and did their time, and I gave them their second chance. And that built a loyalty, giving a second chance to people."

It is also one of the main reasons Lyman became involved in other organizations and philanthropy projects, such as MusiCares and FEND, which address addiction. He believes a large portion of society is still reluctant to allow others back into the community after they have shown remorse and tried to make amends, so he wanted to do his part in inspiring change.

If you or anyone you know needs help with addiction issues, help is available. Visit the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration website or contact SAMHSA's National Helpline at 1-800-662-HELP (4357).

Why the schedule for the Vans Warped Tour changed daily

Vans Warped Tour would take the acts across the country, performing sweaty day-long sets in numerous cities and states. There were even groups of fans who would follow the tour and try to attend as many shows as possible. To keep the shows fresh and unpredictable, the tour's organizer switched up the order of the lineup on a daily basis.

In an interview with Forbes , Kevin Lyman brought up his past as a stage manager for Lollapalooza and how this influenced his decision with Warped Tour's schedule. He explained how he would notice the same acts performed at the same time every day, and the predictability reflected in the audience attendance, as a majority of the people would only show up when it was time for the headliner to go on stage.

"So I said, if I ever get to do this, I'm going to mix it up," Lyman said. "It just spurred in my mind what I thought I'd do. I'll write the schedule each day. It keeps people engaged — you never knew who you were playing before or after, or what time you were playing. It keeps everyone on their toes." The unpredictability encouraged the audience to hang out for the whole day since they never knew who would be playing and when, while it excited the bands too. As Every Time I Die's ex-vocalist Keith Buckley explained, no one knew when they would be hitting the stage, which provided an element of surprise.

How the BBQ Band concept came to be

With all those bands on the road for Vans Warped Tour, there were bound to be a lot of hungry stomachs after a show. However, the tour figured out a way of solving this problem while also giving a group a unique opportunity every year. In return for working the grill after every show, a musical act would be given a spot on the tour's lineup. Hence the birth of what became known as the "BBQ band."

Kevin Lyman revealed to Vice where the initial idea stemmed from. He explained how punk rockers Lagwagon had their own barbeque after a show, but only bands with laminate passes sourced from Lagwagon themselves could get any. Lyman thought that every group deserved access to this and that it shouldn't be limited to the friends of the band, so he came up with a plan where a single act would be responsible for the barbeque at every stop for everyone.

Explaining what the group would get in return, Lyman said, "Yeah, they get a full set, they sell merchandise, they sell albums, and I pay 'em some money on top."

The time when Deftones set a Porta-Potty on fire

If there isn't an element of danger involved, can it really be considered rock 'n' roll? While no one decided to put their head inside a tiger's mouth or challenge a bear to an exploding barbed wire death match, other outlandish shenanigans took place throughout Vans Warped Tour's history.

Alternative Press interviewed numerous people who participated in the tour, and the stories ranged from a golf cart being wrecked to Sublime's trusty dog biting people. However, it was Kevin Lyman who recollected one of the wildest tour tales.

Lyman explained how he intended to take a few days off in 1997 after the birth of his child, but when he stepped off the plane, he was alerted to the chaos taking place in his absence. "It turned into the 'Lord of the Flies' out there," he said. "Deftones got fireworks and set a portable toilet on fire. My production manager's quick decision was to take the Porta-Potty on a forklift and push it into the river. The city's mayor had been running on this 'clean up the river' platform, and that was on the front page of the newspaper the next morning."

The presence of the controversial anti-abortion clinic

The spirit of punk rock is built on progressive values and fighting against oppressive systems. As a result, many non-profit organizations set up tents to promote their causes at Vans Warped Tour throughout its 25-year run; however, there was one that raised more than a few eyebrows. In 2016, the anti-abortion organization known as Rock for Life became a part of the tour, and it drew ire from many attendees and online commentators. The next year, Rock for Life returned to Warped Tour, again reigniting the debate about the presence of a pro-life organization there.

Speaking to Spin , Kevin Lyman explained how Rock for Life's values didn't necessarily align with his pro-choice stance, but that he included various other NPOs on Warped Tour with differing ideologies so that debate and conversation could take place between people.

He said: "I go to the booth, and I see people talk to them. They're really promoting adoption, and other things besides abortion. I'm adopted. I'm not supporting them, but they can have the spot. They're not hassling people."

13,000 people signed a petition to stop a musician from playing, but he did

In late 2014, disturbing accusations surfaced regarding Jake McElfresh, aka Front Porch Step. According to the allegations, McElfresh had sent inappropriate messages and images to minors. Considering Front Porch Step had performed at the 2014 Vans Warped Tour and was relatively well known within the music scene, the news spread fast and wide among the community.

Over 13,000 individuals signed a change.org petition to not allow Front Porch Step to play at Vans Warped Tour again. However, in 2015, McElfresh was confirmed to appear on the tour. This resulted in backlash from fans and other musicians, who couldn't believe Front Porch Step had been allowed this platform — especially considering how many young fans attended Warped Tour and the harrowing nature of the allegations.

Speaking to Alternative Press , Kevin Lyman stated that McElfresh had not been formally charged with any crime and his appearance was part of a rehabilitation program, based upon discussions with his counselor. In a later 2018 interview , Lyman expressed regret at allowing Front Porch Step to have performed at the 2015 Vans Warped Tour.

If you or anyone you know has been a victim of sexual assault, help is available. Visit the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network website or contact RAINN's National Helpline at 1-800-656-HOPE (4673).

The accusation of being a boys' club for the most part

The Vans Warped Tour faced accusations of being a boys' club from certain sections, with  The New York Times citing how only seven percent of the bands listed for the 2018 edition featured female members. Although the tour had shown improvement in its numbers and given more opportunity to women over the years, especially as headliners, there was no disputing that the acts on display were predominantly male throughout the years. Coupled with this was the prevalence of a bro culture that boasted bad behavior. 

The publication spoke to several women and nonbinary artists to get their perspectives of the tour. Each person had their own unique experience, with some stating they hadn't seen misogynistic behavior, while others expressed opposite views.

Five Iron Frenzy's Leanor Ortega Till, for example, explained how there was a need to be cautious with tour buses as an example. "One of the bands we went out with had a little inflatable pool," Till said. "They'd get in their underwear and go out there and hang out. And I knew what they were up to, which was get girls into their underwear to hang out, too."

Kevin Lyman said 2017's Vans Warped Tour was a bad one financially

When Kevin Lyman announced the end of Vans Warped Tour, there was a lot of debate about the real reasons for doing so among fans. One of them was that the tour had stopped making money. However, Lyman dispelled this notion in an interview with "All Punked Up" podcast, revealing that Warped Tour made money — except for one year.

"I had one bad year: 2017," Lyman said. "It was one of those years where everything goes wrong that could possibly go wrong, went wrong in 2017."

While Lyman didn't delve into exactly what his challenges were, the initial announcement of the lineup for the Vans Warped Tour 2017 wasn't warmly received by the fans. There were notable acts such as Anti-Flag, Andy Black, Gwar, and Hawthorne Heights on the bill, but the audience felt it didn't have the star power of the previous year's edition, which had featured the likes of Good Charlotte and New Found Glory. Undoubtedly, the lack of excitement for the artists might have factored into the decision for many fans to give it a skip that year.

The one thing that the Warped Tour never managed to do

From Katy Perry to My Chemical Romance and Blink-182, there was no shortage of world-renowned musicians who performed at Vans Warped Tour. Considering the traveling festival ran for a quarter of a century, there can't be much that it failed to achieve in this time. However, for Kevin Lyman, there is something he wanted to do that he never managed to. When asked by Outburn what that is, he replied: "Have a Ramones reunion."

The seminal New York punk band called it a day in 1996 — a year after the formation of Vans Warped Tour. At that early stage, it might have been difficult for Lyman to attract a band of that caliber to the tour — plus, it would have been mighty costly, since the Ramones were bona fide legends and wouldn't come at a discount price.

Unfortunately, by the time Warped Tour had become a force to be reckoned with in the early 2000s and could probably afford the Blitzkrieg Boppers, most of the members of the Ramones had already died . 

Scene politics contributed to its demise

Music brings people together, but the community also has the potential to divide like no other. Much like with any other fandom on Planet Earth — just ask "Star Wars" fans — there is a lot of politics, elitism, and people disliking each other for random reasons. Heck, even the bands themselves partake in this peculiar behavior, with social media feuds becoming equally the most hilarious and sad things to witness online.

Appearing on Kerrang's "Inside Track" podcast, Kevin Lyman opened up about how scene politics contributed to the demise of Vans Warped Tour. The promoter explained how he would reach out to various groups that he found talented and would offer them a slot on the tour; however, they would spurn his advances, citing how they didn't want to perform alongside X band or be seen as a "Warped-esque" band. They either had preconceived negative notions about other acts on the tour or didn't want to be bracketed with the type of genre artists the tour attracted.

Lyman didn't understand the logic, as most bands wouldn't even know the others and acted based on impressions rather than facts. Plus, he considered this a self-limiting behavior that impacted a band's ability to grow their fanbase and reach different audiences. Consequently, Lyman started to feel a disconnect from the community and the very reason he started the tour in the first place.

Fronzilla wants to bring back the tour

Since Vans Warped Tour hit the stop button in 2019, a massive gap has been left open in the music festival scene. Of course, the COVID-19 pandemic did no favors to live music, and many have pondered if the return of Warped Tour could help bring back the crowds in droves. Appearing on "No Jumper" in 2020, Attila frontman Chris Fronzak explained what Warped Tour meant to bands. "It's not glamorous, but it's an opportunity for bands to play in front of a huge audience that they wouldn't normally have," he said.

Fronzak added that Kevin Lyman offered to sell him Warped Tour in the past, but Fronzak didn't have the funds at the time to strike a deal. When that changed, the musician reached out to Lyman again in 2020.

"He explained to me that for legal reasons, which I can't go into depth, Warped Tour can't come back for at least another three years or so," Fronzak said, "but after that I'm happy to re-open conversation, and hopefully I'm the one that brings it back because I have a really good plan for how to make it sustainable and make Warped Tour even bigger than it's ever been."

• Manage Account

On the Scene at the Final Warped Tour Show: Simple Plan, New Found Glory and More Look Back

Billboard went to West Palm Beach, Fla., to document the last Warped Tour concert, with behind-the-scenes insights from founder Kevin Lyman and members of Simple Plan, New Found Glory, and Less Than…

By Ariana Bacle

Ariana Bacle

• Share this article on Facebook
• Share this article on Twitter
• Share this article on Flipboard
• Share this article on Pinit
• + additional share options added
• Share this article on Reddit
• Share this article on Linkedin
• Share this article on Whatsapp
• Share this article on Email
• Print this article
• Share this article on Comment
• Share this article on Tumblr

First, a moment of silence — or, perhaps more appropriately, a moment of loud, guitar-backed screams — for the Vans Warped Tour , which just concluded its final year as the traveling festival as we know it. After 24 years of spending summers bringing punk and pop and rock and ska and emo and screamo to cities around the country, founder Kevin Lyman decided it was time to call it quits due to a combination of reduced ticket sales and exhaustion. 

“I’ve done everything I can in the format that this is in,” Lyman says at the tour’s final stop in West Palm Beach, Fla.. “It wasn’t supposed to be around 24 years. It wasn’t supposed to be around more than one year. But enough people saw what I was trying to do.”

What Lyman was trying to do was give people like him a place to be themselves — and feel good about being themselves. “I know Warped Tour isn’t perfect, but the world’s not perfect,” he continues. “And I think that the kids that came here from a society where we always look for perfect weren’t perfect, but they realized they were all right.”

Trending on Billboard

Some of those kids are no longer kids; some brought their own children this year, introducing a new generation to the loud playground that is Warped Tour. While the festival used to be chiefly about discovering your new favorite band, it’s now more of a haven for nostalgia — an excuse to bust out studded belts and Avenged Sevenfold caps and, in the case of one young attendee, (hopefully) fake blood.

Billboard  was on the scene to capture it all. Read on to find out more about what it was like to be on the grounds for the final day, along with behind-the-scenes insights from Lyman and members of Simple Plan, New Found Glory, and Less Than Jake.

Goodbye, Warped Tour: 21 Bands Relive Their Favorite Festival Memories in Their Own Words

10:51 a.m.: My first mission is to find the press trailer. I spot a boy with shaggy blond hair and an official-looking orange shirt guarding a metal fence and ask him to point me in the right direction; instead, he just lets me through the fence. I feel triumphant, momentarily forgetting that I’m sporting two press bands on my wrist. The triumph quickly dissipates as soon as I realize I still have no idea where I’m going. 

This is where my new pal Randy comes in: As I’m wandering around the sea of buses, I see a man wearing a Warped Tour badge and ask him where to go. Turns out Randy is a bus driver for Nekrogoblikon — a band that “gives 110 percent,” he says earnestly — and has been driving different musicians for 12 years on Warped. Right before he lets me into the press trailer, he shouts out at someone, “I don’t know when I’m going to see you again, but I love you!” This is like high school graduation but with ratty Old Skools and cargo shorts instead of shiny caps and gowns.

12:18 p.m.: About halfway through the Mayday Parade set, frontman Derek Sanders muses about how cool it would have been if Blink-182 returned to their Warped Tour roots for the final go-around. “I fucking knew it!” a man exclaims, seemingly expecting Mark Hoppus to prance onto the stage. This man did not fucking know it, though, because Sanders was just teasing. They launch into a cover of “The Rock Show” and let the audience sing the line “couldn’t wait for the summer at the Warped Tour.” 

12:22 p.m.: Everyone is vaping. Everyone is sweating. If Warped Tour had an official candle, it would be called Man Smoking a Cherry-Flavored Cigarillo in a Sauna.

12:32 p.m.: Real Friends come on and suddenly, giddy audience members start scaling over the seating in the amphitheater to get closer to the stage. A girl accidentally kicks me with her checkered Van, which feels poetic.

The Summer Punk Went Pop: Oral History of the 2005 Warped Tour

1 p.m.: Simple Plan are now Warped Tour veterans, coming in second behind Less Than Jake in the record of who’s played the most shows. But there was a time when it seemed impossible that they’d return: Drummer Chuck Comeau remembers receiving an, uh, interesting welcome the first time they played in 2003. “They started throwing everything they could find at us, whether it was grass or bottles, and at the end it was literally rocks,” he recalls to Billboard , explaining that the Warped crowd wasn’t too pleased with Simple Plan’s pop-leaning sound. “We were like, ‘We don’t give a shit. We’re just going to keep playing.’” 

Luckily, they aren’t fielding projectiles anymore. Instead, they’ve found fans where they’ve least expected them. “These super heavy bands will be like, ‘It’s been so great watching you guys every day,’ and I’ll be like, ‘You were watching us every day? You? ’ And they’re like, “Yeah, man, I grew up with you guys, and I know we do heavier stuff now but, man, you’re my childhood.’” Now they’re someone else’s childhood: Comeau breaks out his phone to show me photos of his three-year-old son, London, wearing blue over-ear headphones and jamming out behind his dad onstage. 

1:35 p.m.: Time to meet Kevin Lyman, who has the rare skill of making everyone feel like he’s there to talk to them, just them, even though he’s probably the busiest guy on the lot. Someone suggests we do the first part of our interview in the air-conditioned bus, but he waves off that idea. It’s in the 80s with sun attacking anyone who dares walk outside; to him, this is a beautiful day — sunburns and all. “You can never let your guard down on a tour until the trucks are closed,” he says. “And today we’ve already had our catering truck catch on fire on the way down here. And then one of our staff thought they had a heart attack. I just heard my head of merchandising tripped on some cords in a tent, might have broke his ankle.” 

There was some drama the night before, too. “We should have our parties in a parking lot, but we went off-site at a wings place, and the locals and that energy don’t mix,” he explains. He doesn’t go into more detail but clarifies that there was “almost a little trouble” before they dealt with it, narrowly avoiding a showdown. “Warped’s a tornado, and once you jump into it, you gotta be careful,” Lyman says with a laugh. “But you jump on and try to hold on until you get kicked out the other side.”

1:44 p.m.: Everybody loves Kevin, and Kevin loves everybody. We’re walking to a tent for a signing, and multiple people stop him on the quick journey to thank him for everything he’s done. He stops for each fan, listening to their stories and smiling and posing for selfies. Much of the day so far has seemed fairly business-as-usual — beyond bands shouting, “It’s the last Warped Tour ever!” throughout their sets, there’s not much indication that this is the end of a 24-year-long journey. But seeing Lyman interact with these musicians and crew members and fans feels special, and each new “thank you” is a reminder that Warped Tour has been so much for so many people. 

1:52 p.m.: A fan asks Lyman to sign her yearbook of sorts. He takes his time writing a sweet message: “It may end, but we will all see each other down the road!” he signs it. 

2:09 p.m.: After posing for a photo with a large group of fans, Lyman begins meeting people one by one. One boy asks Lyman to sign his white graduation cap, which he got — along with tickets to the final four Warped shows — after finishing high school this past May. Others ask him for photos, including a little girl with “THANK YOU KEVIN” written in messy black ink on her arm. 

2:55 p.m.: Less Than Jake have played more Warped shows than anyone else — tonight marks their 440th — so saxophonist Peter “JR” Wasilewski is definitely the person to ask about what changes the tour has gone through over the years. “The bones and the heart of this tour are completely the same as they’ve always been, but the body type is completely different,” he says. “Everybody treats everybody the same. If you have a laminate on, it doesn’t matter if you’re in a vendor booth, if you’re playing on the Owl.ly stage or the main stage — you’re supposed to help out everybody and treat everybody the same. And so I guess some of that stuff is still happening. That’s a good thing, but maybe not as much as it used to be. But maybe that’s more societal? That’s a different generation of people now.”

3:30 p.m.: New Found Glory weren’t planning on coming to Warped Tour this year — until the Florida-bred band heard the last few stops were in their home state. That’s when they decided to dive back in. “There was a point where people were like, ‘I don’t need to go this year, I can just stream it online,’” frontman Jordan Pundik says. “But now it’s this resurgence, especially with the bands from the early 2000s and stuff. It’s cool to see it grow, and it’s just been cool to be a part of it for so many years.”

4:40 p.m.: This past May, New Found Glory headlined a benefit for Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School , the site of a mass shooting in February that left 17 dead, and today, they reveal they raised $116,000. This is especially meaningful for the band, who founded New Found Glory at that very high school.

4:51 p.m.: Yellowcard’s Ryan Key is playing second guitar for New Found Glory after previously playing some solo acoustic sets earlier on the tour. “Play ‘Ocean Avenue’!” someone shouts — the “Play ‘Freebird’!” of Warped Tour. It doesn’t work.

6:47 p.m.: We the Kings frontman Travis Clark wants to teach everyone a dance move that involves squatting and then jumping up and down while waving your arms violently. He instructs anyone who spots someone not obeying the rules to force said rebel to do it. “That’s obnoxious,” I think to myself, waiting for half the crowd to ignore his demands. I quickly learn these people defer to their Kings when everyone in the front sections shrinks before popping up like possessed Whac-a-Moles.

7:30 p.m.: Less Than Jake are the second-to-last act of the night, but they put on a big enough party that their set feels like an appropriate conclusion. At multiple points, they bust out toilet paper streamers (fun, but probably deeply upsetting for anyone who encountered a TP-free Porta Potty at any point in the day). They invite a few crowd members on stage, including a guy with long, curly red hair that lead vocalist Chris DeMakes says “dances like John Travolta” and two men dressed as Mario and Luigi. The horn section of Reel Big Fish, who played earlier in the day, also join them on stage, and they lead the audience in a “Kevin” chant for a full minute until the man of honor comes out for a hug.

8:29 p.m.: At the very end of the last set of the night, Lyman comes up to the mic to share that he always said Pennywise would be the last band to sing the last song on the last tour stop. That song? “Bro Hymn,” a 1991 track they dedicate to “our fucking Warped Tour family.” From there, they — along with dozens of guests crowding around them onstage — lead the audience in the final, celebratory sing-along. There’s moshing and crowd-surfing and jumping and screaming at the front; in the back sections, people sit in their seats, looking tired and chatting and fiddling with their phones. Even with the packed stage and energetic pit, the ceremony as a whole feels fairly understated, a strange thing to notice at a festival known for unbridled enthusiasm. No tornado can go on forever, though. It’s time to come out the other side of this one.

Get weekly rundowns straight to your inbox

Want to know what everyone in the music business is talking about?

Get in the know on.

Billboard is a part of Penske Media Corporation. © 2024 Billboard Media, LLC. All Rights Reserved.

optional screen reader

Charts expand charts menu.

• Billboard Hot 100™
• Billboard 200™
• Hits Of The World™
• TikTok Billboard Top 50
• Song Breaker
• Year-End Charts
• Decade-End Charts

Music Expand music menu

• R&B/Hip-Hop

Videos Expand videos menu

Culture expand culture menu, media expand media menu, business expand business menu.

• Business News
• Record Labels
• View All Pro

Pro Tools Expand pro-tools menu

• Songwriters & Producers
• Artist Index
• Royalty Calculator
• Market Watch
• Industry Events Calendar

Billboard Español Expand billboard-espanol menu

• Cultura y Entretenimiento

Get Up Anthems by Tres Expand get-up-anthems-by-tres menu

Honda music expand honda-music menu.

• Entertainment

Bands on the Warped Tour economize to fill up their vans and buses on the road

If the reflective Los Angeles punk band Say Anything had toured in a bus for two months last summer, gas prices would have cost roughly...

Share story

If the reflective Los Angeles punk band Say Anything had toured in a bus for two months last summer, gas prices would have cost roughly $12,000 to $14,000. This year, as one of the 50 or so acts playing the two-month Vans Warped Tour, Say Anything expects to spend $20,000 to $24,000 on gas.

“It’s crazy, how much gas has gone up in the past little while,” says guitarist Jake Turner, by phone from a tour stop in St. Petersburg, Fla. “We actually had to cut down. We used to get a crew room and a band room [at hotels]. Just this tour, we’ve only gotten one room every day. Usually there’s a line waiting: ‘Next shower!’ … You’ve got to do what you’ve got to do to save some money.”

Of the hundreds of concert tours sputtering around the United States this summer, the 13-year-old Warped Tour has felt $4-a-gallon gas perhaps most acutely. (The tour comes to the Gorge Amphitheatre in George, Grant County, Aug. 9.) Some of the top acts, such as Gym Class Heroes, Angels and Airwaves and Motion City Soundtrack, are more established and can adapt more easily to higher expenses. Others need help. Singer-songwriter Charlotte Sometimes and her band are among many on the Warped bill sharing buses with other acts (in her case, Evergreen Terrace). Some acts are renting out their unused bus bunks to food and merchandise vendors for $100 a day. With the help of sponsors and promoters, the tour also gives out free-gas cards to bands who drum up fan support online — Say Anything, in particular, has won hundreds of dollars that way.

“Three years ago, it would take us $50 to fill up a tank for a big 15-passenger van with a trailer. Now, it takes that much to fill up my car,” says Matt McGinley, drummer for Gym Class Heroes, in a phone interview. “I can’t imagine what it’s costing some of the hardworking, hustling bands that are on Warped Tour this year that are doing it in a van.”

Most Read Entertainment Stories

• Susan Buckner, ‘Grease’ actor and former Miss Washington, dies at 72
• New season of 'Naked and Afraid XL' features former WA resident
• The time a Rolling Stones drummer walked into Seattle's Screwdriver Bar
• Live Nation Concert Week 2024 offers $25 shows in WA, Oregon
• Steve Albini, legendary producer for Nirvana, the Pixies and an alternative rock pioneer, dies at 61

For years, the way for a band to make a living in the music business has been through relentless touring. That’s especially true today, given an eight-year decline in CD sales and low profit margins on iTunes Music Store-style song downloads. So more musicians are touring than ever — but skyrocketing gas prices have shocked them in recent months. Warped officials say the tour is doing OK at the box office, maybe even a little better than usual, but acts are having a harder time making a living on the tour. According to Say Anything’s Turner, one Warped act paid for a bus before the tour began, but fuel prices forced the band to downsize to a minivan and try to rent the bus to someone else.

“It’s definitely way more expensive to be in a bus than it is to be in a van,” Turner says. “You don’t want to go back to the van, but a lot of bands are having to go back.”

Gas prices rose too abruptly this summer for the tour itself to make many changes. Producer Kevin Lyman says he wishes he’d eliminated two or three buses and a couple of trucks, and hired local crews and equipment for lighting and sound in certain cities. But at this point, for the tour that continues through Aug. 17, it’s too late.

“I’m committed to what we’re doing this year. I had an accountant saying maybe we should drop a stage. I said no — what, we’re going to make someone stay home now? Hopefully we’re working every angle, so a band doesn’t have to drop off the tour,” Lyman says, recalling the early days of Warped, when bands were less known and had fewer resources. “I’m traveling with a lot of broke bands right now. We’re a hardworking tour this year. In the long run, there are some positives to it.”

Filed under:

How Warped Tour led the consumerist music festival revolution

The iconic festival was as much about brands as it was about bands.

Share this story

• Share this on Facebook
• Share this on Twitter
• Share this on Reddit
• Share All sharing options

Share All sharing options for: How Warped Tour led the consumerist music festival revolution

Most of what I remember about being 14 involves wanting stuff: I wanted straighter hair. I wanted to seem like a grown-up (or at least like a 16-year-old). And I really, really wanted to go to Warped Tour.

It was the summer of 2004, and pop-punk was ascendant. In Canada, where I grew up, this meant listening to a steady stream of Sum 41, Avril Lavigne, Simple Plan, and Billy Talent — all homegrown acts that got regular radio play thanks in part to Canadian content laws . With that as our gateway, my friends and I began our foray into skate-punk lite, memorizing Taking Back Sunday lyrics, trying (poorly) to land an ollie , and developing extremely unrequited crushes on any boy who bore a passing resemblance to Blink-182’s Tom DeLonge.

To us, Warped Tour — the traveling “misfit summer camp” that merged punk, ska, rock, and emo with extreme sports and a healthy array of corporate sponsors — was the pinnacle of cool. Unfortunately, I never got to attend, on account of being at actual summer camp.

This summer, Warped Tour celebrates its 25th birthday, making it far older than the teenagers it has courted for two and a half decades. Last year was the tour’s final cross-country run — it featured hundreds of bands over the course of 38 stops for which nearly 550,000 tickets were sold, but this impressive turnout was buoyed by the announcement that it was the event’s last hurrah. Attendance the prior year, in 2017, had been down significantly, particularly among the 14- to 17-year-old demographic that had historically been Warped’s lifeblood. The audience was getting older, production costs were rising, and bands weren’t sticking around year after year like they used to. Plus, according to founder and producer Kevin Lyman, he was just getting tired.

But in the era of reboots and remakes , it’s not surprising that organizers would want to honor the tour’s silver anniversary just one year after it shut down. The result is a three-city affair: a single-day event in Cleveland celebrating the opening of a retrospective exhibit at the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, and weekend shows in Atlantic City, New Jersey, and Mountain View, California. While not strictly a nostalgia play — there are up-and-coming bands booked alongside veterans, and plenty of fans are first-time Warped attendees — this year, the average age of concertgoers appears to be more than a decade older than it was at the tour’s height (15 or 16, as of 2006 ), and plenty of the once-wayward youth now have kids of their own in tow, keeping them a safe distance from the mosh pit.

This is how, on a Saturday in late June, I find myself on a crowded Jersey beach sandwiched between Caesars Casino and the Atlantic Ocean, belting out Simple Plan’s “I’m Just a Kid” with nearly 30,000 other people — many of whom, like me, were in fact kids when the song came out in 2002. High school may be a distant memory, but at least now I’ve finally made it to Warped Tour.

”Oh, my god, I am 12 years old again,” says the sunburnt guy in checkerboard Vans beside me as the crowd whines along with singer Pierre Bouvier: “Nobody cares, ’cause I’m alone and the world is having more fun than me tonight.”

The lyrics don’t exactly fit the setting — no one here is alone and everyone seems to be having fun — but the feeling’s still there. For a little while, we’re all our angsty teen selves again. Likewise, there’s a twinge of irony when Good Charlotte tear into their breakout single “Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous,” a middle finger to celebrity culture written long before Joel and Benji Madden (the band’s lead singer and guitarist) married Hollywood it-girls (Nicole Richie and Cameron Diaz, respectively).

Warped Tour itself is a contradiction — it’s a punk rock festival that’s also a prodigious marketing machine, sponsored from top to bottom by brands hoping to win over fans in between shows. This isn’t a knock on the tour, really: if it weren’t able to bridge that gap, it probably wouldn’t exist.

The idea for Warped began germinating while Kevin Lyman was working as a stage manager for the alt-rock-focused Lollapalooza in the early ’90s — back when that, too, was a touring festival. He had been immersed in SoCal’s hardcore and ska scenes growing up and wanted to bring some of his favorite bands to audiences around the country with a back-to-basics tour that did away with the music industry’s hierarchies and out-of-control egos: no headliners, no arenas — just a few thousand fans in a parking lot and an average ticket price of less than $30.

Even for the biggest acts, that DIY spirit shone through. “You feel more like a carnie on Warped Tour than you do on any other tour or at any other festival,” says Adam Lazzara, the lead singer of Taking Back Sunday, who are currently in the midst of a 20th-anniversary tour , “just because you’re literally there setting up and breaking down into the next town.” Lyman also tapped a handful of pro skateboarders and BMX bikers to come along, recognizing the crossover between extreme sports fans and punk rock’s moshing masses, as well as the fact that both subcultures were becoming increasingly mainstream.

In 1995, the same year Warped made its debut run in the summer, ESPN aired the inaugural X Games (then called “Extreme Games”), with athletes competing in action sports such as barefoot water skiing, street luge, and skateboarding. The year prior, the Offspring and Green Day — both bands with roots in California’s underground punk scene — released best-selling albums that catapulted them into popular culture.

The time was ripe for something like Warped to exist, though in order to get it off the ground, Lyman needed to buck one of the central tenets of punk and get a few executives to break out their checkbooks. “I grew up with that whole ‘eff corporate America’ mentality,” he says. “And then, for me, I just started looking at corporate America, and no matter how punk rock we were or whatever, we were still supporting it in some way. We were buying their brands; we were using their products.” He looked at the Rolling Stones pulling in millions through sponsorships with Jovan fragrance and Budweiser, and thought: Maybe we can get some money too.

It didn’t go seamlessly at first. After the 1995 run — which featured an eclectic lineup that included the ska-reggae band Sublime, a Tragic Kingdom -era No Doubt, and the grunge pioneers L7 — the tour was in dire straits financially, as the small sponsorships Lyman had landed from brands like Converse and Spin weren’t enough to cover the significant production costs. To keep it going, he was desperate enough to consider brokering a deal with the decidedly not-punk Calvin Klein to become the title sponsor. “I don’t really think that would have worked,” he now says, matter-of-factly.

Fortuitously, the meeting with the fashion brand was delayed by the devastating East Coast blizzard of 1996, and before they could go any further with the arrangements, Lyman got a call from Vans CEO Walter Schoenfeld.

Founded in 1966 as the Van Doren Rubber Company, Vans had engendered strong ties to the skateboarding community, which was loyal to the brand’s sneakers thanks to their grippy soles. The $300,000 check the company wrote turned the Warped Tour into the Vans Warped Tour, giving Lyman some financial runway while securing the festival’s ties to corporate America. (At the time, Vans was owned by the venture banking firm McCown De Leeuw & Co., thanks to a $71 million 1988 leveraged buyout .)

The Warped partnership was led by Steven Van Doren, the company’s vice president of events and promotions and the son of Vans founder Paul Van Doren, who saw an opportunity to give the brand national exposure beyond the Sun Belt states that at the time accounted for most of its sales. He also introduced amateur skateboarding competitions to the tour, giving contestants the chance to win pro contracts with Vans. “Having Steve involved really solidified our partnership,” says Lyman, noting that he turned down bigger subsequent sponsorship offers from the shoe brand Airwalk because he felt Vans was in it for the long haul.

He was right: By 1999, Spin reported at the time, Vans owned a 15 percent stake in Warped and was paying $1 million per year “to strengthen [its] presence with ‘Generation Y’” (or, as we’d call them today, “millennials”). Two years later, it stepped up its investment, paying $5.2 million for a 70 percent controlling stake, according to Forbes .

Today, Vans is a $3 billion brand — current parent company VF Corp bought it for $396 million in 2004 — and a household name for most Americans, including those who have never set foot on a skateboard. Even as it has grown well beyond its fringier roots, though, the brand’s relationship with Warped has endured, and at the 25th-anniversary show, seemingly every other fan is wearing Vans sneakers: Sk8-Hi’s , Old Skools , the ubiquitous checkerboard slip-ons .

(Airwalk fizzled by the early 2000s and was reborn as a Payless brand; its current owners — the same company that recently acquired Sports Illustrated — are trying to stage a ’90s-nostalgia-fueled comeback .)

Even with the Vans investment, Lyman had to hustle to keep the tour afloat in the early years. “We had to raise nearly $4 million in sponsorships to make the ticket price what it was, to give you the show you wanted, to bring all those side stages that developed young artists,” he says.

In 1999, he signed a partnership with the brand new surf label Hurley and got up-and-comers Blink-182 — then still a year out from the explosively popular Enema of the State — to wear the brand’s clothes onstage in exchange for free seats on one of the Warped Tour’s buses, since the band couldn’t yet afford their own transportation. It was a turning point for both band and brand: Blink had just replaced its former drummer with Travis Barker, who’s still with the group today, and Hurley’s founder Bob Hurley had left a successful career with Billabong to start his namesake clothing line earlier that year. Four years later, Blink was selling out arenas and topping Billboard charts, and Hurley had grown into a $70 million business, which Nike acquired in 2002 .

It wasn’t just hormone-addled fans going through an adolescence of sorts at Warped. “I always said Warped was a developmental spot, not only for bands but for crew people to learn how to tour and learn how to be good citizens in the music community, as well as brands,” says Lyman. “A lot of brands got their starts in those parking lots.”

One of those was Monster Energy, which has been a tour sponsor since it launched in 2003, back when it was made by a California soda company called Hansen’s Natural Co. The company set up a portable rock wall, became “the official energy drink of the Vans Warped Tour,” and embarked on a wildly successful rebrand that has seen its stock soar more than 72,000 percent since its public debut that same year. According to Lyman, Monster also came up with the idea of “Tour Water” — specially designed cans of water that make it look like bands and crew members are chugging energy drinks all day onstage without the risk of cardiac arrest; the concept is now an industry standard, and cans from early tours go for more than $75 on eBay .

Another was Jeffree Star Cosmetics. Before Star was a beauty mogul, he was a MySpace-famous scene kid who performed on the tour as a solo artist in 2008 and 2009. In the following years, he came back to host meet-and-greets with his YouTube fans and, when he launched his makeup empire in 2014, set up shop among the merch tents.

The Warped Tour also forced more corporate brands to loosen up a little: After the PlayStation team showed up in uniform polo shirts their first year on the tour, Lyman told them they’d have to change, citing a life motto of his: “Never trust a person in a golf shirt unless you’re at a golf course.” (They’re either a douchebag or they don’t know what they’re talking about, he says.)

When the tour created a “reverse day care” for parents on-site in 2001 — complete with air conditioning and noise-canceling headphones — Lyman convinced Target to put its bull’s-eye logo on top, sans brand name, citing the symbol’s history with ’70s mod bands like the Who and the Jam. He even dug out the Ramones’ tour rider to persuade the makers of Yoo-hoo that the chocolate drink was, in fact, kinda punk rock, and by the 1998 tour, fans were climbing a rock wall shaped like a giant Yoo-hoo bottle and competing for branded skateboard decks .

Walking around the grounds in Atlantic City, there’s a near-endless array of stuff to buy at Warped this year: limited-edition Vans, commemorative 25th anniversary bracelets, T-shirts reading “Mall Goth Trash” and “SadBoy Crew,” henna tattoos, water bottles, skate decks, and beer koozies (plus $14 Pacifico). There are also plenty of freebies: branded coupon wristbands from the teen retailer Journeys, which has been the tour’s presenting sponsor since 2014; T-shirts from Truth, the anti-smoking organization; stickers from PETA.

Among the panoply of shoppable teenage rebellion are booths with a cause, like Hope for the Day , a suicide prevention organization, and A Voice for the Innocent , a nonprofit that offers resources to survivors of rape and sexual abuse, which was brought on board in the wake of a series of sexual assault and harassment allegations involving artists who had performed on the tour.

”The Warped Tour is really interesting because it jumped early on the idea that crowds could be commodified,” says Gina Arnold, a former rock journalist and the author of Half a Million Strong: Crowds and Power from Woodstock to Coachella . “They were able to widen out the notion of the festival as a marketplace — not so much of ideas, but a marketplace of actual things.”

Today, the concept of festival-as-shopping-mall is well established — so much so that this year’s Coachella attendees could have Amazon orders delivered same-day to lockers on site — but in the ’90s, it was still a novel idea. Before then, it was all “bad food and band T-shirts,” as Arnold put it. (The exception: the parking lot of any Grateful Dead concert, long a thriving marketplace of tie-dye tees , beaded jewelry, DIY taco stands, and any drug you might fancy, collectively known as Shakedown Street .)

Band T-shirts still make up the bulk of the merch at Warped, just as they do at most concerts these days. As album sales have dropped off a cliff and services like Spotify have taken their place, paying a fraction of a penny per stream, merchandise has become an increasingly essential part of artists’ income. A superstar like Taylor Swift or Kanye West can gross $300,000 to $400,000 in merch during a single show, according to a Billboard interview with licensing exec Dell Furano. Warped artists aren’t coming close to that, but especially at the tour’s peak, they were pulling in a good amount of cash.

Taking Back Sunday made a reported $20,000 to $30,000 per show on merch on the 2004 tour; My Chemical Romance set the record the next year, selling $60,000 worth of black T-shirts, sinister-looking posters, and fingerless gloves at a single stop. 2005 was also the only year Warped made money on ticket sales, according to Lyman. Headliners Fall Out Boy and My Chemical Romance were regulars on MTV’s TRL thanks to crossover hits “Sugar, We’re Goin’ Down” and “Helena.” Teens who hadn’t heard of most of the “authentic” punk bands the tour had booked in prior years were turning out in droves. By the end of the 48 dates, 700,000 fans had bought tickets, and the tour grossed an all-time high of $25 million .

”That was a pretty wild year, with all the bands exploding,” says Lisa Johnson, who’s been photographing Warped Tour since its first run. “I’m not gonna lie, it was a little frustrating in the photo pit because it was so jam-packed. And a little dangerous, because there were so many kids coming over the barricade constantly. But at the same time, how fantastic is that?”

Of course, not everyone agreed. From its inception, Warped provoked criticism from punk purists who argued — not without reason — that the corporate-sponsored festival was antithetical to the values of the genre. It also ruffled feathers with the bands it booked, particularly as the rise of “mall punk” and emo put bands like Good Charlotte, Blink-182, and My Chemical Romance alongside punk mainstays like Rancid, Pennywise, and Bad Religion.

”You go to the Warped Tour and walk around and you’ll hear 100 bands that try to sound like Green Day or NOFX. It’s just disgusting,” said Mike Avilez, a vocalist for the California punk band Oppressed Logic, in the book Gimme Something Better: The Profound, Progressive, and Occasionally Pointless History of Bay Area Punk from Dead Kennedys to Green Day . “They’re missing the angst. To me, punk rock is supposed to be angry and pissed off.”

The tour has also caught flak from within over the years. In a 2004 Chicago Reader piece , “Punk Is Dead! Long Live Punk!” the music critic Jessica Hopper chronicled a clash between Lyman and a band called the Mean Reds: “It was only the sixth day of the tour, and they were already on ‘probation’ for running their mouths onstage about what a sold-out capitalist-pig enterprise Warped is, how it isn’t really punk, et cetera.”

Even Adweek, hardly a voice of the counterculture, said in 2005 that the influx of corporate cash “does somewhat undermine the legitimacy of the event, even as it introduces groups of men in tight pants to new audiences.”

Among those who’ve been along for the ride since Warped’s early days, though, ambivalence about the scene’s brushes with the mainstream is tempered by ideas both idealistic — that the tour provided a platform to bands that otherwise might not have made it, and a community for kids who didn’t always fit in elsewhere — and practical.

”There’s always going to be critics,” says Shira Yevin, who’s performed at Warped as Shiragirl since 2004, and for a decade produced a stage at the tour dedicated to promoting women-fronted bands. “But they’re the same ones bitching because they only got paid $100 for the gig and they don’t have enough money to get to the next state, you know?”

In 2019, the idea of “selling out” seems like a product of an earlier generation — one without climate change or student loans or school gun violence to worry about. And anyway, the purists may be getting their way for now, since even pop punk isn’t popular these days. Instead, the top 40 charts are ruled by Lil Nas X’s boundary-pushing country trap, genre-fluid acts like Billie Eilish , and mumble rappers like Post Malone. The loud, fast, guitar-driven sound that Warped is known for? “In top 40, it’s very rare,” says Nate Sloan, a musicologist and the co-host of Vox’s Switched on Pop podcast . “Even the bands that sort of assert that look and that style and may throw a guitar around their shoulder, the actual sound doesn’t necessarily have that.”

On the second day of the Atlantic City shows, in one of the festival’s seemingly endless meet-and-greet lines, I meet 20-year-old Sam and 14-year-old Tori, friends from Philadelphia who made the trip down for their first Warped Tour. Sam has rainbow hair and rainbow gauges in her ears; Tori’s wearing a Set It Off band tee. They met at the Hot Topic where Sam works, a store that itself has transformed from mall-goth central into a haven for geek fashion .

”I basically live there,” says Tori.

”We vibed about the music we listen to,” says Sam.

”I don’t really have any other friends that listen to this kind of stuff,” explains Tori. “I almost kind of get made fun of, because it’s like, ‘Oh, emo music, what do you do, cry all day?’”

At Sam’s high school, most guys listened to trap or rap, while “angsty music” was mostly the domain of girls or “the guys who had a bad upbringing.”

”It was just divided,” she adds. “Like the way the country is right now.”

While genres may separate fans into factions in high school, Sloan says they’re not necessarily as diametrically opposed as they seem. “A lot of the sensibility of rock ’n’ roll has gone into the sound of SoundCloud rap and mumble rap,” he says. “This genre is sort of the spiritual heir to a lot of the acts that first kicked off the original Warped Tour. Sonically, it feels like a world apart in a lot of ways, but in terms of the intense emotional affect, it’s very clearly picking up the mantle.”

Part of the transformation may be technological. “Maybe 20, 30 years ago, if you were an angsty teenager, the easiest way to express yourself would have been by installing yourself and your friends in the garage with a couple of crappy guitars and a battered drum set,” says Sloan. “Today, the easiest way to express your angst would be through a pirated copy of [the music software] FruityLoops and a USB microphone.” This evolution may also help explain why punk’s communal, anti-commercial spirit seems to have fallen out of favor while themes like alienation and disaffection (which Gen Z artists like Eilish mine extensively) have endured.

Shifting musical tastes are just one factor contributing to Warped’s decline. Most people I talked to had similar theories about what’s behind the drop-off in teen attendance: It’s not just that today’s rock bands can’t compete with the colossal forces of hip-hop and pop; they’re also up against YouTube, Netflix, TikTok , esports, and social media, all of which are pouring billions into the race for young people’s attention. Plus, parents are warier about sending their kids to live shows because of tragedies like the mass shooting at the Route 91 Harvest country music festival in Las Vegas and the bombing at an Ariana Grande concert in Manchester, England .

Lamenting the changing habits of teenagers has always been an adults’ game, though. For the current generation of fans and artists, the end of the tour is, inevitably, the beginning of whatever comes next. Not Ur Girlfrenz was the youngest touring act at Warped last year, and now at ages 13 (bassist Gigi Haynes) and 14 (lead singer and guitarist Liv Haynes and drummer Maren Alford), the trio is on the cusp of what was once the festival’s prime demographic. They also just released their first EP, the title track of which, “New Kids in America,” riffs off the Kim Wilde hit with bouncy pop-punk energy and lyrics like, “When did the trend of no one ever having fun / Spread throughout the land infecting everyone?”

Still, they’re more optimistic about the future of the kind of music they play. “Kids our age these days just aren’t really exposed to it anymore. It’s not exactly like they just don’t like it. They’re just not exposed to it,” says Maren. She’ll introduce her friends to a new band or tell them to stay and watch whoever Not Ur Girlfrenz has opened for, “And they’re like, ‘Oh, my gosh, this is my new favorite band!’”

Plus, with early-aughts nostalgia already trending heavily among Gen Z (so much so that this year’s VidCon — a conference for online video creators and their mostly teenage fans — featured a meeting room decked out in Lizzie McGuire posters and blow-up furniture), a musical comeback seems timely. “You hear the 1975 bringing back the ’80s sounds, so I think now’s the time to bring back the 2000s,” reasons Liv.

At their Sunday set, it’s easy to see why they’re hoping for another Warped Tour next year — even if Lyman insists that, for real this time, this is the last. Fans are yelling their names and singing their lyrics back at them from the crowd.

”I did the whole thing where, you know, someone points at you and you look behind you and then you’re like, ‘Oh, wait, it’s me!’” Liv says with a laugh.

At a signing at their merch tent after the set, the screaming starts again. “We were like, ‘Is somebody famous here? Oh, my god, is it Blink-182?’” recalls Gigi.

”Yeah, we saw this huge group of people,” says Maren, “and we were like, ‘Ooh, someone important is giving a signing. I wonder who it is.’”

”Nah, it was just us. Psh ,” Gigi sighs.

Will you support Vox today?

We believe that everyone deserves to understand the world that they live in. That kind of knowledge helps create better citizens, neighbors, friends, parents, and stewards of this planet. Producing deeply researched, explanatory journalism takes resources. You can support this mission by making a financial gift to Vox today. Will you join us?

We accept credit card, Apple Pay, and Google Pay. You can also contribute via

What a Zoom cashier 8,000 miles away can tell us about the future of work

How do i stop living paycheck to paycheck, boeing’s problems were as bad as you thought, sign up for the newsletter today, explained, thanks for signing up.

Check your inbox for a welcome email.

Oops. Something went wrong. Please enter a valid email and try again.

Pennywise explain Warped tour bus fight

By John Ritchie

In an interview with Altpress, Pennywise guitarist Fletcher Dragge told his side of the story surrounding the events of the Warped Tour Sunday night fight in Denver. Dragge and Pennywise bassist Randy Bradbury were involved in an altercation with members of Alesana. Dragge says the incident stemmed from a misunderstanding and had nothing to do personally with Alesana. Dragge explains: “We were coming back from a bar across the way from the Warped buses in Denver after the show had ended. We saw what we thought was the RV of Rev. Peyton’s Big Damn Band. We’d been hanging out with those guys and since it was our last night on the tour, we wanted to drop by and say goodbye. They were driving a very distinctive RV, and I thought it was the only one on the tour. Apparently Alesana have the exact same van. We walked in and nobody was there, so we sat down thinking somebody’s gonna pop up or something. That’s around when [Alesana’s] tour manager came onboard and said, “What are you guys doing here? Who are you? You need to get out of our vehicle.” He was totally in the right. It was a situation where we thought we were in one place, and the tour manager for Alesana didn’t recognise us. Of course, if the roles were reversed and we found people on our bus, we’d tell them to leave, too. ” When asked how the confrontation started Dragge stated:

“Their tour manager said we had to go, and I think I said, “I’m gonna make a sandwich real quick.” That’s typical, smart-ass drunken Fletcher behaviour. He went outside to get some of his team members to get us off the RV. This isn’t a bus; we’re talking about a pretty small area. All of a sudden, there’s me and Randy and six other guys in this kitchen area, and I think someone grabbed Randy’s arm saying, “Let me escort you off the bus.” It wasn’t violent. But everybody had been drinking and push came to shove. It’s kind of a blur, but it turned into a little bit of a melee. For us, we felt a little bit trapped in there because there was only one way out and there were people in the door way and people coming at us. We were in the wrong. We were in the wrong place and [Alesana] came to get us off their territory. It turned into a situation where we felt like we were outnumbered, even though we’re obviously older and bigger than those guys. It turned into self-defense mode. It went on for a little bit, and everybody took a couple bumps. In the middle of it, I think their TM realized who we were and that we just didn’t know where we were. Then it became about getting Randy off the RV. That’s when the cops rolled in and took control of the situation, or I guess, me, with the taser. All I saw was more people coming up the stairs who I thought were gonna do some more damange, and they wound up being officers of the law. They blasted me with the taser about five times, but I used to be an electrician, so I’m used to it. [Laughs.] We weren’t looking for a fight. We were just looking for the Rev. ”

Alesana and Pennywise will be be on the Soundwave tour this year but according to Dragge we are unlikely to see repeat of events.

“It’s just that with Warped Tour, there are so many people crammed in such a small space for six weeks. That’s part of the fun of it. But in the morning, you dust yourself off and start another day. We have nothing against those guys and we’re thankful they dropped the charges. I’m sure we’ll end up on tour, having a beer with them and laughing about it”.

Share article

A Guide to Every Australian Music Festival Happening in 2023/24

A Guide to Every International Tour Coming to Australia in 2023/24

The Top 50 Australian Songs of 2023

AJ Tracey, RAYE, Faye Webster + More Announce Laneway 2024 Sideshows

Golden Plains 2024: The Streets, Yussef Dayes, Cymande + More

WOMADelaide Announces 2024 Lineup: Gilberto Gil, Arooj Aftab, Yussef Dayes, WITCH + More

triple j’s Like A Version – The Complete List

Triple J’s Hottest 100 of 2023: 100-1

In Hearts Wake Part Ways With Clean Vocalist Kyle Erich & Announce Final Tour Together

Nabihah Iqbal Review – London Musician Wraps Up Sold Out Australian Tour at Sydney Festival

Greg Puciato Names His Five Favourite Songs to Perform Live Ahead of 2024 Australian Tour

Coldplay Announce 2024 Australian Tour

Flip through today’s papers

AMNY Newsletter

Tackle the city, with our help..

Manage your settings.

East Villager reflects on rock band tour life on the road before COVID-19 hit

Lisa Brownlee has had quite a ride, earning her living on an endless series of tour buses that came to an abrupt halt due to COVID-19 and left her to spend a summer at home for the first time in almost 30 years.

Instead of traveling with the likes of Justin Bieber, Willie Nelson or the huge caravan that was the Warped tour, she’s been hanging with her two cats, making art and trying to figure out what she’s going to do next (spoiler alert: she’s solved that problem and, having gotten to know her, we’re not surprised).

Brownlee’s professional career began as a hairstylist in at “a fancy salon in Florida,” where she “did perms for rich moms and Tony Hawk cuts for their kids.” The late 80s found her in Los Angeles, working in a high end clothing store, dating a tattoo artist and “running around with the Sunset Strip crowd.”

After making friends and connections there, she moved back to Florida where she started producing backyard concerts for skateboarders, making a few bucks selling beer. A job at the door of a “super cool club,” Masquerade, led to a gig selling t-shirts for visiting bands.

She did her job well enough to be offered a gig as a production assistant for the band Ministry on the Lollapalooza tour in 1992, but quickly realized that she was in way over her head. Luckily, she was noticed by Kevin Lyman, who was only a couple of years away from creating the Vans Warped Tour. He placed her as a rep for Smart Drinks and then took her with him to his next venture.

“I hated being a sponsor rep,” recalls Brownlee. “When my booth closed, I would go straight to the production office and help out with anything I could – answer phones, deliver pizza – anything.”

After evaluating the scene for awhile, she was given a new position – which she created. “I became the bus driver manager, which no one had ever done before. I kept the drivers happy, prevented financial issues and made sure that they had a place to sleep. My nickname was ‘Momma Duck’ because the drivers followed me around like ducklings.”

We are talking about a crew that consisted of a diverse group of 80 bands (yes, 80) plus 21 production buses: a grand total of 850 people that had to be moved from one location to the next. And when they got there, 8-10 stages had to be set up in about three hours.

Problems ranged from bands who incited violence during their set to severe weather to getting the entire entourage into Canada and back. One notable hip-hop crew was instructed by Lisa to be totally honest with the border agents, who already knew the answers to the questions they were asking.

So when the guards asked the musicians if they had any contraband – as in guns or drugs – the guys replied, “Yeah, we got those!” Luckily, the star of the group was big enough that the guards were happy to pose for pictures with him, get some autographs and let them go in.

Warped was a summer tour, leaving Brownlee free in other seasons to work with a variety of other talent, from bands you’ve never heard of to the “top of the food chain talent,” Justin Bieber.

Brownlee was one-third of the security team for the “Believe” tour, in charge of the meet and greets. It was there that she learned “the difference between fan and fanatic.”

“I’d never seen that level of hysteria before,” she muses. “It was great watching people meet him, having their dream come true. And he’s a wonderful, caring, super cool artist.”

Now all of that is on hold, and Brownlee is back in the East Village, where she was initially a roommate of her friend, the late Arturo Vega. Not content making daily collages or doing the occasional DJ gig, she attached herself to the computer long enough to start a new career as a COVID Compliance Officer, which means that she’ll be overseeing various projects to be sure that everyone involved is tested and obeying the rules that will make it possible to produce new work during the pandemic.

Being a health safety supervisor is not her ideal job, but she’s got the necessary skills and already has a few gigs on the books, including a tv shoot for a major country artist in Nashville. Not surprisingly, she’s got a plan, too.

About the Author

The Villager

The Villager, founded in 1933, is an award winning weekly newspaper serving New York City’s West and East Villages, Soho, Noho, Little Italy, Chinatown, and Lower East Side.

Jobs in New York

Add your job.

• MMC Group Spanish Speaking Communication Services Representative
• Prolog NYC Creative Coach
• Alpha Phi Alpha Senior Center P/T Bookkeeper

View all jobs…

Related Articles

Things to do in NYC

More from around nyc.

Nearly 250K Bronx households to lose federal internet subsidy unless Congress steps in

Free Disney-themed concert coming to Kissena Park, courtesy of Council Member Ung and QPAC

Historic stable-turned-parking garage in Bed-Stuy transformed into modern condo development

Boy Scouts of America is rebranding. Here’s why they will be named Scouting America

The 2013 Vans Warped Tour Lineup

• Alternative Music
• Classical Music
• Country Music
• Rap & Hip Hop
• Rhythm & Blues
• World Music
• Heavy Metal
• Latin Music

The bands slated for the tour were:

3OH!3 (6/30-7/14) Action Item (Full Tour) Alvarez Kings (Full Tour) Allstar Weekend (Full Tour) The Amity Affliction (Full Tour) Anarbor (Full Tour) The Aquabats (7/19-7/22, 7/26-7/29) Architects (UK) (Full Tour) Art of Shock (Full Tour) Attila (6/15-7/11) August Burns Red (Full Tour) Bangups (7/2-7/14) Beebs And Her Money Makers (Full Tour) Beware of Darkness (6/15-7/3) Big Chocolate (Full Tour) Big D And The Kids Table (6/26-8/4) Billy Talent (7/19-8/4) The Black Dahlia Murder (Full Tour) Black Veil Brides (Full Tour) blessthefall (Full Tour) Bowling For Soup (8/2-4) Bring Me The Horizon (6/19-8/4) The Chariot (Full Tour) Chiodos (Full Tour) Citizen (Full Tour) The City ShakeUp (Full Tour) The Cleopatra Complex (7/12-8/4) Crizzly (6/16-6/22, 6/26-6/27, 6/29-7/12, 7/14-8/4) Crossfaith (Full Tour) Crown The Empire (Full Tour) Defeater (7/12-8/4) Dose of Adolescence (7/16-7/25) Driver Friendly (7/5-7/21) The Early November (Full Tour) Echosmith (6/15-7/12) Emily’s Army (6/15-7/3, 7/6-7/11) The Exposed (6/15-6/29) Five Knives (Full Tour) Forever Came Calling (6/15-7/3, 7/6-8/4) Forever the Sickest Kids (Full Tour) For The Foxes (Full Tour) Goldfinger (6/15-6/23) Goldhouse (6/15-6/23) Go Radio (Full Tour) Handguns (6/15-7/3, 7/6-8/4) Hands Like Houses (Full Tour) Heritage (7/23-8/4) Ice Nine Kills (6/15-7/3) The Indecent (7/13-8/4) I See Stars (Full Tour) Issues (7/23-8/4) Itch (Full Tour) Stephan Jacobs (Full Tour) Kairo Kingdom (Full Tour) Gabe Kubanda (6/20-6/28) letlive. (Full Tour) Like Moths To Flames (Full Tour) Lionz of Zion (7/6-7/21) Lost In Atlantis (6/20-6/28) Mac Lethal (Full Tour) Madchild (Full Tour) Man Overboard (Full Tour) MC Lars (Full Tour) Memphis May Fire (Full Tour) Middle Finger Salute (Full Tour) Mixtapes (7/23-8/4) Mighty Mongo (6/15-7/12) Motion City Soundtrack (Full Tour) Never Shout Never (Full Tour) New Beat Fund (6/15-7/3) New Empire (7/6-8/4) New Years Day (Full Tour) No Bragging Rights (6/15-7/3, 7/6-8/4) Oh, Sleeper (Full Tour) Outasight (Full Tour) Pacific Dub (6/15-7/3) Psycho White (6/15-6/30) RDGLDGRN (Full Tour) Real Friends (6/15-7/3) Reel Big Fish (Full Tour) Relient K (7/3,7/18, 7/24) Run DMT (Full Tour) Secrets (7/6-7/21) Set It Off (6/15-7/3, 7/6-8/4) The Sheds (7/26-8/4) Shy KidX. (Full Tour) Silverstein (Full Tour) Sleeping With Sirens (Full Tour) Stick To Your Guns (Full Tour) Story of the Year (7/9-7/23) The Story So Far (Full Tour) Strawberry Blondes (6/15-7/3, 7/6-8/4 The Summer Set (Full Tour) Super Water Sympathy (7/13-8/4 The Swellers (6/15-7/12)) Texas In July (7/23-8/4) Tonight Alive (Full Tour) Upon A Burning Body (Full Tour) Wallpaper (Full Tour) We Came As Roamns (Full Tour) While She Sleeps (Full Tour) Gin Wigmore (Full Tour) Woe, Is Me (Full Tour) The Wonder Years (Full Tour) The Used (7/5-7/17, 7/25-7/31) Volumes (7/6-7/21) Young London (Full Tour)

Acoustic Basement Lineup for 2013

I Can Make A Mess (Ace Enders of The Early November) (Full Tour) Alcoa (Derek of Defeater) (7/11-8/4) Allison Weiss (6/15-7/10) Billy The Kid (6/26-7/6) Charlie Simpson (7/13-8/4) Austin Lucas (6/26-7/12) Craig Owens (Full Tour) Kevin Seconds (6/19-6/21) Matt Embree (RX Bandits) (6/15-6/23) Monte Pittman (6/22-6/23) Owen Plant (6/15-6/23) The American Scene (Full Tour) Vinnie Caruana (7/7-8/4) William Beckett (Full Tour) Brian Marquis (Full Tour) The Tower and The Fool (7/11-7/14) Charlotte Sometimes (7/6-7, 7/10, 7/16) Joey Briggs (6/15-6/21, 6/23-6/28) Travis Alexander (7/11-7/14) American Opera (7/17-7/20) Tidewater (8/2-8/4) McDougall (6/15-6/16) Mandolyn Mae (7/23-7/24) City of Ghosts (7/31) Tess Dunn (6/22) Tyler Matl (7/25)

The decades-old Vans Warped tour is officially the longest running festival tour in the States, and it has helped to launch the careers of countless bands from a wider and wider array of genres each year.

Originally launched in 1995 with a lineup that was predominantly punk, the tour has expanded to include a variety of pop and hip hop acts. It has helped to launch the careers of bands like My Chemical Romance and Katy Perry . It has also served as a forum for bands that merge sounds, including 3OH3! and the band that holds the title for worst band ever - brokeNCYDE with their painful creation, crunkcore .

In addition to the official announcements, we kept tabs on all of the rumors.

In an interview with with Kerrang! magazine, Warped Tour founder Kevin Lyman announced that British metalcore band "Bring Me The Horizon's going to be out with us all next summer," something that in this writer's opinion counts as an official announcement. Update: They'll were there but not for the whole summer.

According to another interview, California pop punk band Forever Came Falling was the first band officially confirmed for the 2013 lineup, as Warped Tour founder Kevin Lyman announced that the band was the first band confirmed for 2013 when they played at a screening of No Room For Rockstars.

The internets were saying that Orange County hardcore band Stick To Your Guns had confirmed that they would be appearing on the 2013 Vans Warped Tour. Update: This rumor was officially confirmed.

In addition, a handful of other rumors were circulating, including speculation that bands We Came As Romans, The Wonder Years, Memphis May Fire, and blessthefall would be appearing on the tour, but much of this seemed linked to survey results about who folks wanted to see and may or may not have had any bearing on the actual lineup for 2013. Update: blessthefall, Memphis May Fire, The Wonder Years, and We Came As Romans were all confirmed.

Many wished for a solid punk rock lineup from Lyman and co. in upcoming years. (Seriously, how great would it be to see Warped return more fully to its punk rock roots, leaving many of the other offerings from recent years to spawn their own tours that cater exclusively to the 14-year-old girls that love them?) You can help prepare by making sure you already have everything you need for next year's Warped Tour and keeping your thoughts Warped.

• 2014 Vans Warped Tour Lineup
• Find Your Chinese Zodiac Sign
• The Warped Tour 2009 Lineup
• Shawn Michaels WWE Career Timeline
• Hulk Hogan WWE and WCW Timeline
• 2020 European Tour Schedule
• PGA Tour Schedule: Tournaments in the 2020 Season
• The Boxing Career of Mike Tyson
• The Top 40 Christmas Oldies Songs
• Bernard Hopkins Fight-By-Fight Career Record
• Days of Our Lives Comings and Goings
• Boxing Career of Larry Holmes
• The Bands Scheduled to Play the Full Vans Warped Tour
• Muhammad Ali's All-Time Fight Record
• Korn Ferry Tour Schedule: The 2020 Season Rundown
• 2020 Champions Tour Schedule

• Get Involved
• Become a Sponsor
• Make a Donation
• Host The Bus
• About the Bus
• Host the Bus
• Become a Partner
• Press Coverage
• Press Releases

Search our store

Music and video creation.

The John Lennon Educational Tour Bus is a non-profit mobile production studio.

MOBILE PRODUCTION STUDIOS

Dedicated to students.

ABOUT THE BUS

Since 1998, Lennon Buses in the U.S. and Europe have impacted millions of students while delivering unique experiential programs at schools, colleges, universities, community events, festivals, and on tour with headlining artists.

JOHN LENNON

John Lennon; 1940-1980. John Lennon was an English musician that co-founded The Beatles; the most commercially successful band in the history of pop music. John's music with The Beatles and as a solo artist left an indelible impact on the world.

PRODUCTIONS FROM THE BUS

Music Videos, Short Films, Documentaries

“The presence of the Bus ignited the imaginations

of students, teachers, parents, and most

importantly siblings.

“For the past two decades, the John Lennon Educational Tour Bus has been traveling across the country, bringing music and media education to our children and teens in public schools.”

HOW IT WORKS

Each Lennon Bus has a crew of 3 producer/engineers that works intensely with local youth; making music, teaching digital media production, creating original content, and giving voice to the often unheard stories and perspective of people from all walks of life.

Lennon Bus is making a difference.

Lennon Bus U.S. & Lennon Bus Europe create over 5 billion exposures annually across TV, radio, print, web and social media.

The John Lennon Educational Tour Bus has always been made possible by a community of artists, educators, and companies who want to inspire the next generation of creators and peacemakers including:

Fort Washington Florist

Flower Delivery by John Sharper Inc Florist

Copyright 2006. All Rights Reserved.

John Sharper Inc Florist – Trusted Professional Florist in Fort Washington

John Sharper Inc Florist offers beautiful, fresh flower arrangements in Fort Washington, MD. Our expert florists create the perfect floral gifts to suit any special occasion and offer quick and easy floral delivery throughout Fort Washington for your convenience. Need flowers delivered across the country? John Sharper Inc Florist’s trusted network of florists deliver nationwide! John Sharper Inc Florist also offers same-day flower delivery services for any last minute gift needs.

Make the right impression with fresh flowers from John Sharper Inc Florist. Trust your local Fort Washington MD florist to find the perfect floral gift. We offer the freshest, most beautiful bouquets to fit any budget – for any holiday or occasion. From lovely Mother’s Day and romantic anniversary flowers, to special birthday flowers, exquisite Valentine’s Day flowers, to sympathy funeral flowers and thoughtful get well flowers, John Sharper Inc Florist offers the best arrangements and gifts for the ones you love.

John Sharper Inc Florist can deliver beautiful floral gifts in Fort Washington or anywhere nationwide. Pick out the perfect flowers on our website and conveniently order online or over the phone. Our professional florists will expertly arrange your bouquet of fresh flowers and can even create a custom gift basket for your special occasion. When you choose John Sharper Inc Florist, your trusted Fort Washington florist, your gifts are sure to please.

Trust John Sharper Inc Florist for Lovely Flowers in Fort Washington

For the best flowers in Fort Washington, John Sharper Inc Florist has exactly what you’re looking for. Check out our wide selection of gift baskets and plants to find the perfect present for your next special occasion. Flowers from John Sharper Inc Florist are expertly arranged and hand-delivered to each recipient.

John Sharper Inc Florist delivers freshly arranged flowers that will never arrive in a cardboard box. As a top florist in Fort Washington, each of our floral gifts get the time and personalized attention they deserve. Our hand-arranged bouquets are personally delivered to your recipient so they are guaranteed to receive fresh, beautiful flowers every time. Rely on John Sharper Inc Florist for quality flower delivery in Fort Washington or anywhere in the nation.