Images: Punk Rock Bowling 19 feat. Iggy Pop, Bad Religion, Cock Sparrer and more May 27-29, 2017 at the Downtown Las Vegas Events Center

Now in its 19th year, the 2017 Punk Rock Bowling music festival continued to do what it does best: reminisce on punk’s illustrious past. And considering the future is three and a half more years with Trump (wait, has it really only been 130 days?), I can’t blame them for looking that direction. In fact, this time, the fest looked all the way back to 1969 with day one headliner Iggy Pop.

The shirtless wonder laid the groundwork for punk rock with his time fronting The Stooges, so it was fitting that he kicked off his set with the band’s bluesy “I Wanna Be Your Dog.” The song, with its menacing and perfect-for-PRB three-chord guitar riff, still sounds fresh nearly 50 years later. Similarly, Pop, who turns 71 this year, was more spry than most musicians a quarter of his age, diving from the tall stage to the photo pit to sing right into his fan’s excited grins. Pop definitely gets the award for best four song batch of the weekend, going from “Dog” right into “Gimme Danger,” “The Passenger” and “Lust for Life.”

Bad Religion made their second PRB headlining appearance (the first being in 2013) closing out the second night. The harmonious punk band was representing both the 80s Southern California scene that birthed them and that scene’s 90s radio heyday that they in turn helped launch through their Epitaph label. “All the songs we wrote ended up coming true,” sadly exclaimed frontman Greg Graffin, referring of course to Trump, before his band launched into nihilistic anthem “We’re Only Gonna Die” (with NOFX’s Fat Mike taking over bass duties from Jay Bentley). It was a bittersweet moment, as it’s hard not to listen to favorites like “Atomic Garden,” “Suffer” and “Fuck Armageddon…This Is Hell,” all played with the type of album-perfect precision we’ve come to expect from BR, and not think about how truly awful our current President is.

Their music at least offered some emotional release to the thousands of punks gathered at the Memorial Day weekend festival. A bit more catharsis came from Indecline. The Vegas-based anarchist art collective made national news this past year thanks to their guerrilla installations of naked Trump statues across America. One of those “The Emperor Has No Balls” statues was brought on stage before the weekend’s final Cock Sparrer headlining set. “If you are a Trump supporter, fuck you, get the fuck out of our scene!” shouted an impassioned Fat Mike, before taking a baseball bat to the statue like a disgusting pinata where the only prize is epic sadness. Shawn Stern’s daughter and a few others took a swing and then it was time for Cock Sparrer to close things out.

First things first – oi fans absolutely rule. Instead of the traditional circle pit, much of the day show’s third incarnation had a beach ball soccer pit. Second, I can’t get over how absolutely joyful the members of Cock Sparrer look every time they play.  Anthemic classics like “Watch Your Back,” “One by One” and “Because You’re Young” were sung through frontman Colin McFaull’s face-splitting smile.

The political sentiment carried over through the majority of the festival’s opening sets as well. Keith Morris spent a good portion of his band’s set (OFF!, this time around), encouraging every single person at the festival to vote. “If you’re paying even a little attention” he cried, “If you’re concerned about your parents and your grandparents, you’ll register to vote and change the world.” While not on stage screaming lyrics to “I Got News for You,” “Crawl” and “Now I’m Pissed,” Morris appeared at the festival’s voter registration booth, putting his money where his mouth is, which I have the utmost respect for (though I did lose some respect for his treatment of mental illness, blaming Soundgarden frontman Chris Cornell’s suicide not on depression, but on the depression medication he was taking).

This was Pennywise’s first time playing the day show with original vocalist Jim Lindberg and surprisingly, many of their best known songs – “Same Old Story, “ “Perfect People” and “Alien,” to name a few, were left off the setlist. In their place was something better – a punk rock cover mini set. Greg Hetson joined the band for a cover of “Wild in the Streets” by his pre-Bad Religion band Circle Jerks and was then joined by Fat Mike on lead vocals for a cover of Bad Religion’s “Do What You Want” and ending things with a spot on cover of “Minor Threat” by Minor Threat.

Ska-punks The Interrupters implored the crowd to take stand against racism, sexism and homophobia before inciting the largest skanking pit thus far with “Take Back The Power.” That pit grew even larger when they paid tribute to their Hellcat Records boss Tim Armstrong with a spot-on cover of Operation Ivy’s “Sound System” (fittingly played on the actual 30th birthday of the ska/punk legends).

Of course, it was a reunited Choking Victim who had the most political venom in their set. Playing adjacent to two large tv monitors playing scenes of abusive police officers was fitting for a band whose lyrics take aim at police brutality, among other social injustice (though it was somewhat ironic to watch the rambunctious ska-core band play “Money” in the shadow of the Bank of America building).

The politically-tinged sentiments didn’t make up the only memorable moments of this year’s fest, though. Plague Vendor looked absolutely thrilled to be playing Vegas, and the California band admitted how much they’ve wanted to play here between howling out songs from last year’s BLOODSWEAT. The songs were short and sweet and made all the more fun by the launching of toilet paper into the early afternoon crowd.

Meanwhile, Celtic punks The Real McKenzies, appearing at the same time the following day, had people dancing all the way over to the PRB PBR bar after making the claim that while drugs are bad, alcohol is always awesome.

The Dickies, like Cock Sparrer, are just a joy to watch. Frontman Leonard Graves Phillips is basically the punk rock Wonder Showzen, with his off color humor and liberal use of puppets and props perfectly complementing quirky pop punk gems like “Manny, Moe and Jack.”

Though in terms of spectacle, it’s hard to top The Adicts. With his clown makeup and giant white wings, frontman Keith “Monkey” Warren looked like the child of Batman and The Joker. Few bands possess the kind of stage presence of these British punk legends, as they pranced around to classics like “Joker in the Pack” and “Viva La Revolution.” The only people in attendance I imagine weren’t stoked were the cleaning crew after the glitter explosion.

Me First and the Gimme Gimmes were fun as always, with Frontman Spike Slawson, dressed to the nines in a beautiful(ly tacky) white suit. Between his guttural and plentiful “yeahs!” the former Swingin’ Utter crafted stories of John Denver’s ace flying skills or Simon’s pre-Garfunkle days hooking up with “Julio” (hard “G”) in the school yard. They also, unsurprisingly, played a set comprised entirely of their hits (and covers) to a crowd far more receptive than that of their last mainstage appearance (maybe Jay Bentley in the Fat Mike role gave them more cred?).

Also in the “pure fun” department was The Bouncing Souls. Beach balls went flying through the air as the band made their triumphant PRB return, and the circle pit erupted as soon as Greg Attonito said those magic words: “I put that record on just to make a sound.” Attonito calmly strutted around the stage while the rest of the band thrashed around to classics like “Lean on Sheena,” “Kids and Heroes” and “True Believers,” all with big smiles on their faces. “Punks in Vegas,” appropriately, received one of the biggest reactions of the entire fest (I like the sound of that one) but seeing punks of various types and ages lock arms to sing “Manthem” was just a little bit better.

I recently found out that FIDLAR stands for “Fuck it Dog, Life’s a Risk,” so that should tell you something about the band’s attitude. They were the youngest band on the bill and also the band with the most recent radio airplay, gaining them a spot higher than many of the older PRB goers would have expected. I personally would have rather seen the longer time go to someone like the Bouncing Souls, but I do appreciate the fact that there is a young band out there playing punk and actually getting kids excited about it. Live, the band was high energy and pretty much defined the word “stoked” during “Stoked and Broke,” “Sober,” “Why Generation” and “Video 5 to 9.”

The Vegas scene had slimmer representation this year, with only one band on the main stage. Good thing that band was The Quitters. Their combination of tight and fast playing made them a natural fit for the final day’s more old school leaning lineup. They’ve been in the game for many years and definitely deserve all good things that come their way (and then some).

-Emily Matview

Photos by Lawton Howell | http://www.vegasshooter.com/