By Ross Ketchske
The Alternative Press 2016 World Tour brought two of the biggest names in modern pop-punk to the Paradise Rock Club on Saturday March 12th. Fresh off of their sophomore albums, State Champs, and Neck Deep filled Paradise to its capacity, stretching a line around the block on Commonwealth Ave.
Supporting the two pop-punk powerhouses was Canadian band Like Pacific and Chicago’s Knuckle Puck. Like Pacific opened their song “Distant” off the band’s debut full length album Distant Like You Asked. Despite being a young band, Like Pacific brought all the energy of a world famous headliner to their set in front of a capacity crowd at Paradise Rock. Knuckle Puck took the stage next, making their first appearance in Boston since their November headlining show at Royale. After releasing their first full length record Copacetic last year, Knuckle Puck has toured the U.S. and U.K. nonstop, and showed off their newfound experience to Paradise Rock Club’s intimate stage. Among a sea of crowd surfers and screaming fans, the Illinois based band brought a powerful emotional element to the show, gripping the attention of old and new fans alike with songs like “Disdain” and an old favorite “Gold Rush” off their 2012 Split EP with Neck Deep.
Following a short intermission, State Champs took the stage and immediately skyrocketed the already intense crowd energy. Just four months after their second full length album Around the World and Back’s release, the Albany pop-punk band rode into Boston on a massive wave of recent success, and the sold out crowd was more than ready to share in the excitement. The band performed old favorites from their debut album The Finer Things including the fan favorite “Remedy” and even took the time to perform a few acoustic songs off their 2015 EP The Acoustic Things. After energizing the crowd with newer hits like “All You Are is History” and “Breaking Ground” State Champs closed their set with an old favorite “Elevated” leaving the crowd wanting more and more.
Finally it was time for the U.K’s Neck Deep to take the stage. Following an explosion of success off their album Life’s Not Out to Get You, the British five-piece pop-punk band capped off the night with a combination of high energy drums, catchy lead guitar, and lyrics that had the entire crowd singing (screaming) along to every word. Opening their set with their song “Citizens of Earth” Neck Deep brought introduced a refreshing taste of classic pissed off punk to a packed Paradise Rock. They also set aside time in their set to play an old acoustic favorite off their 2012 EP Rain In July “A Part of Me” and even performed a full band rendition of their acoustic track “December”. Neck Deep closed out the night with an encore of the first single they released off their latest album, “Can’t Kick Up The Roots”
The four bands will conclude their tour with one final performance in New York, and an appearance at Texas’s So What Musical Festival.
