Festival Review : Punk In Drublic @ San Diego
Punk In Drublic Festival
San Diego, CA May 13, 2023
Saturday May 13th started off as a typical May Gray morning in San Diego. The venue for Punk In Drublic located downtown waterfront in San Diego next across from the Bay waters.
Getting downtown was a bit difficult in the morning with the 163 freeway being closed down this morning, what are the odds? Well, it wasn’t that big of a problem because by the end of the day the venue would be packed with over 10,000 punk rock attendees.
With the gates opening and noon and the first band from San Diego, Urethane hitting the stage at 12:10pm it was a mad dash from the entry gates to the stage to catch the beginning of Urethanes set.
They came out and thanked everyone for making it to see the breakfast band. Urethane quickly got the show going and brought their punk rock with great melodies. A very tight band for being a relatively new band that formed in 2021. Urethane ended with a tribute to No Use For A Name front man Tony Sly with Redemption Song that went off and got the growing crowd ready for the rest of the day.
Western Addiction took the stage next as the crowd started to grow and the sun came out. Both the temperature and the crowd started to warm up! The lead singer Jason Hall had a great stage presence climbing out on the speakers and getting all over the place. The last two songs brought out some hard hitting on the drums, thrash and some more shredding on guitar.
The Bombpops would come out next. With the house music playing Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down) by Nancy Sinatra; the transition into the first song with the drummer Josh Lewis hitting it and getting straight to business. The Bombpops Jen Razavi slaying it on her nice shiny black guitar. The Bombpops have had a change in guitarist but that hasn’t seemed to make a difference in the way they play great song after song with Jen singing, Neil Wayne on bass and Josh drumming. It was great to see and hear just how far the Bombpops have come from their beginning days in San Diego.
Codefendants would take the stage next. I heard someone near me say, “damn I didn’t think was going to happen!!” After the Codefendants took the stage, I understood what that individual meant. They are a unique style of rap, hip-hop, thrash, punk & more. With the two vocalist Sam King and Ceschi Ramos
bouncing lyrics off each other. The big surprise was that The D.O.C joined on stage to up the already high energy and took it to the next level.
With the crowd packed in by this time and the beer sampling coming to the end the Mad Caddies would keep the party going with a solid set of their punk with horns. One thing that got my attention was drumming for the show was Sean Sellers from Good Riddance. Sean is a great drummer and it was cool to see him play with the Mad Caddies. While watching & listening to the Mad Caddies thoughts of just how diverse the sounds of punk can differ so much and the Mad Caddies were only the fifth band out of eight to play today.
The Vandals would take the stage next. They had a poster of San Diego legend Otis “O” Barthoulameu taped up on the equipment stack! A very nice tribute to a world wide legend! The Vandals come out with so much energy! Guitarist Warren Fitzgerld came out in his fluorescent orange and green clothing. I thought Aquaman had jumped out of the water and hit the stage. Warrens energy running all over the stage and body movements blow me away every time seeing the Vandals. The Vandals played a mix of newish songs and the classic songs we all grew up on like Anarchy Burger and Urban Struggle.
The Descendents, walk on stage, Milo took off his gray fleece to have a Beach Boys t-shirt underneath and his water bottle with the spiked strap. Milo did a real quick chat about how NoFx would be playing So Long & Thanks for the Shoes plus the Decline. Then the Descendents would jump right into their set and would play one hit after another with a song for everyone who has listened to the Descendents over the years. It was cool to see Sean Sellers (Good Riddance drummer) sit off to the side of Descendents legendary drummer Bill Stevenson and watch him though out the entire set. Taking a look at the crowd was crazy with a sea of punk rockers as far as the eyes could see!
A quick turn around after the Descendents set to have Nofx come out. With the sun pretty much down and gone the rest of the evening had now arrived for NoFx! Fat Mike made his entrance wearing a multi colored patch worked jacket with lots of bright colors. With his bright blue hair and the jacket he looked a bit like something from Monsters Inc. Mike took the jacket off and made his way to front to the stage to get the show going. Coming out to the Time Warp dancing around and immediately making a few jokes including how they (NoFx) practiced for this show which Mike claimed was a first.
The practice paid off because they played their hearts out playing so many songs including Stickin’ in My Eye, Linoleum, Bob, 72 Hookers and The Decline which was one of so many peoples highlight of the show. NoFx kept the songs flowing which seemed like it wasn’t going to end. They took a quick intermission / piss break. You could tell Fat Mike, NoFx and the entire crew were taking this show (and all the shows on this tour) super serious like it really could be the last tour. Fat Mike thanking everyone multiple times. He knew what town he was in and gave some shout outs to San Diego bands Battalion of Saints, Rocket from the Crypt, Blink-182 and local venue Casbah. Late in the set he would even stop and point out Wade Youman of Unwritten Law who was up front in the massive crowd. The set would come to an end with the “Theme From A NoFx Album”. Eric Melvin played the accordian while the rest of the band and crew were dancing and waving goodbye for what seemed like it would never come to an end. Eventually all the music would come to an end and the band would walk off stage leaving the massive crowd satisfied with 40 years of a legendary punk band NoFx!!
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