After Midnight Project Warped Tour 2009 Review
If you are not a big name band on Warped Tour, you have to beg, borrow, and steal fans from other hard working bands who might be playing at the same time you are. These other bands may even be your friends or your mortal enemies. The fact remains for that 20 minutes you are on stage it is you vs. everyone else on the Warped Tour.
It is important to pull as many people over to your show as possible so you can sell records, tee shirts and build up your fan base. Some bands employ fans to graffiti the venue sidewalks with chalk and tell fans where that band is playing. For instance, Madina Lake used this method to tell fans what time and what stage they were playing. Other bands put up flyer's in the hopes that the fans will come.
The life of a Warped tour support band is always hard work and just as much marketing and promotion as it is luck and location. What the hell am I getting at here? Well After Midnight Project isn't playing the main stage so we got to see the true drawing power of the band. This is what the crowd looked like when they started their set.
What is that like 15 people at most? Yea, it was a dismal start and lead singer Jason came over to us and said "I hate this when we have this many people at the start. It makes things hard." He's right.
The landscape of the punk scene has changed. The kids these days want screaming vocals, detuned guitars, no guitar solos and no falsettos. And what are After Midnight Project? Not screaming vocals, normal tuned guitars, guitar solos, and falsettos. So it is an uphill climb. But does this stop AMP from doing their thing? Hell no.
My apologies for not knowing the set. I had only received the album about a week prior. The band took the stage blistering with their brand of fast paced rock and catchy hooks. You could see the handful of women, who can be seen in the above picture, were eagerly awaiting the arrival of Jason. He came busting out stage left and those girls had their O-Face on. You could see the music and the sight of Jason pushing them closer to orgasm. It didn't help that Spencer was in a sleeveless shirt.
The band didn't stop. They didn't have time to, they only had about 20 minutes to impress us and get out. They ripped into another fast paced song, with Christan and Spencer dueling on the guitars.
You could see a slight ring form around the stage. Kids watching the performance from a distance, they were enjoying what they were hearing, but didn't want to seem like a pussy to their friends because they liked quality music over screaming slop. You could see them being pulled in by AMP like the USS Enterprise being pulled in by a Vulcan tractor beam. The kids couldn't help it.
Jason could smell victory and demanded them to come closer to the stage like Hannibal Lecter talking to Clarice. He even did a few screaming bits to show that AMP could hang with the other bands on the tour.
The more the band continued to play, the more people started moving toward the stage. Each kid was flipping up the devil horns and were pushing closer to the stage. I am sure the girls along the barrier enjoyed the sausage on their skin tight jorts. They could close their eyes and pretend it was the band behind them.
The band closed with their current single Take Me Home and the crowd that gathered went crazy. Moshing and having a good time. Some kids were even singing along, so the word is spreading about the band. The final crowd shot we took was this one and it was full in front of the stage.
After AMP left the stage, the line at their merchandise booth was long and winding. They must be doing something right. An explosive live act, charismatic and talented musicians, and a solid first album, you can't really ask for much more.
As with all our pictures, you can click on them and see the larger version. Thanks again goes out to Rick who took all of these shots. Also check out our review of After Midnight Project's Let's Build Something to Break here.
It is important to pull as many people over to your show as possible so you can sell records, tee shirts and build up your fan base. Some bands employ fans to graffiti the venue sidewalks with chalk and tell fans where that band is playing. For instance, Madina Lake used this method to tell fans what time and what stage they were playing. Other bands put up flyer's in the hopes that the fans will come.
The life of a Warped tour support band is always hard work and just as much marketing and promotion as it is luck and location. What the hell am I getting at here? Well After Midnight Project isn't playing the main stage so we got to see the true drawing power of the band. This is what the crowd looked like when they started their set.
What is that like 15 people at most? Yea, it was a dismal start and lead singer Jason came over to us and said "I hate this when we have this many people at the start. It makes things hard." He's right.
The landscape of the punk scene has changed. The kids these days want screaming vocals, detuned guitars, no guitar solos and no falsettos. And what are After Midnight Project? Not screaming vocals, normal tuned guitars, guitar solos, and falsettos. So it is an uphill climb. But does this stop AMP from doing their thing? Hell no.
My apologies for not knowing the set. I had only received the album about a week prior. The band took the stage blistering with their brand of fast paced rock and catchy hooks. You could see the handful of women, who can be seen in the above picture, were eagerly awaiting the arrival of Jason. He came busting out stage left and those girls had their O-Face on. You could see the music and the sight of Jason pushing them closer to orgasm. It didn't help that Spencer was in a sleeveless shirt.
The band didn't stop. They didn't have time to, they only had about 20 minutes to impress us and get out. They ripped into another fast paced song, with Christan and Spencer dueling on the guitars.
You could see a slight ring form around the stage. Kids watching the performance from a distance, they were enjoying what they were hearing, but didn't want to seem like a pussy to their friends because they liked quality music over screaming slop. You could see them being pulled in by AMP like the USS Enterprise being pulled in by a Vulcan tractor beam. The kids couldn't help it.
Jason could smell victory and demanded them to come closer to the stage like Hannibal Lecter talking to Clarice. He even did a few screaming bits to show that AMP could hang with the other bands on the tour.
The more the band continued to play, the more people started moving toward the stage. Each kid was flipping up the devil horns and were pushing closer to the stage. I am sure the girls along the barrier enjoyed the sausage on their skin tight jorts. They could close their eyes and pretend it was the band behind them.
The band closed with their current single Take Me Home and the crowd that gathered went crazy. Moshing and having a good time. Some kids were even singing along, so the word is spreading about the band. The final crowd shot we took was this one and it was full in front of the stage.
After AMP left the stage, the line at their merchandise booth was long and winding. They must be doing something right. An explosive live act, charismatic and talented musicians, and a solid first album, you can't really ask for much more.
As with all our pictures, you can click on them and see the larger version. Thanks again goes out to Rick who took all of these shots. Also check out our review of After Midnight Project's Let's Build Something to Break here.
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