Warped Tour: 31 September 2010 – Chicago

The Warped Tour festival, the annual Vans-sponsored music and extreme sports fest, recently made its stop in Tinley Park, IL on July 31st. Over 70 bands played relatively short sets throughout the course of the day across seven stages varying in size spread out across the parking lot of the First Midwest Bank Amphitheater.

While the festival was originally oriented more towards punk rock in its early stages, more recently it has evolved into a much more diverse showcase of music, appealing to a much wider audience. Fans have had no problem finding acts across genres such as metal, punk, and pop, as well as the slew of other countless subcategories that have evolved from those.

Some bands on the line up certainly stood out from the others, one of them being The Dillinger Escape Plan. The band unleashed what may best be described as an unforgiving attack upon the stage, proving it challenging to keep up with which member was going to jump off from which amp stack next. Taylor Momsen’s band, The Pretty Reckless, also provided a set worth checking out, as Taylor proves that she can certainly hold her own when it comes to the role of a frontwoman. For pure rock, Andrew W.K. did not disappoint and released energy which you would not expect a rockstar to have during a midafternoon set.

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