Warped Tour
Verizon Wireless Music Center
July 31

I’m sure most managers at Steak ’n’ Shakes, Pizza Huts and other establishments that provide “summer jobs” for the youth of Central Indiana noticed that a lot of employees under the age of 25 (and a few above) were taking off and probably made nothing of it. But a few of the sharper bosses must have correlated the increased amount of dead grandmothers and stomach flu to the Vans Warped Tour making its annual Indy stop July 31.

The oppressive grounds of the Verizon Wireless Music Center were swamped with band shirt-clad high school punks and bikini-flaunting jailbait. Thousands of kids congregated to hear tried-and-true punk staples like Against Me! as well as flash-in-the-pan ring-tone pop-tarts like Cobra Starship. The day started out with the infectious pop-ska sounds of Japanese sextet ORESKABAND: six tiny Japanese girls who, if stacked on top of each other, would not have reached the 30-foot mark. Their peppy Save Ferris-meets-The Suburban Legends sound was accented by their adorably broken English (“Shaking your Booty!”) and cheerful dancing.

The underdog of the tour this year was Los Angeles’ The Bronx. The Bronx have two great albums of hardcore rock ’n’ roll under their belts, but the sun-bleached stages of Warped Tour were no place for them. Despite playing on the main stage, they had fewer than 200 watching, which is a shame considering how good they were. Hopefully, if they return to Indianapolis, they will play where they belong: a dirty bar.

The Street Dogs, from Boston, delivered a set of brutal, honest street punk anthems that would have pleased fans of AC/DC or The Chieftains as well as die-hard Rancid fans. During their set, bassist Johnny Rioux noted the diversity of the Warped Tour: “You got hip-hop bands, pop bands, hardcore bands, bands that love Jesus and bands that hate Jesus, but we’re proud to be one of the few punk bands on the Warped Tour.” He and lead singer Mike McColgan then proceeded to change the band’s name to “Drunk Is What We Aim For,” an ode to their inherent punk rock alcoholism and a jab at un-listenable, teenyboppers Cute Is What We Aim For.

Of the slew of new dramatic, pretentious pop-rock bands on Warped Tour this year, the only band worth a second listen was Say Anything. Say Anything’s debut album, “… Is a Real Boy,” was a pop masterpiece, but last year’s follow-up, “In Defense of the Genre,” was a muddled mess. Luckily, the band played mostly songs from their debut. Not even their awkward stage presence could overshadow the brilliance of songs like “Belt” and their concentration camp love song “Alive with the Glory of Love.”

The poster boys of the Warped Tour, however, were Gainesville, Fla.’s Against Me! After years spent as anarchist minstrels championing the underground, the band got bigger and louder, moving up the record label totem pole until eventually releasing their watershed album “New Wave” on Sire/Warner Bros. last year. Much like the Warped Tour itself, Against Me! caught flack from an old fan base that called them sellouts for being profitable and reaching a new audience. But it was apparent that despite the detractors, there is nothing wrong with having a great time and no punker-than-thou blogger snob should be able to stop you. As the band bounced through killer tracks like “Thrash Unreal” and “Walking Is Still Honest,” the swollen crowd of true fans pumped their fists and screamed along with every line.

Maybe I should have outgrown the Warped Tour years ago, but I’m still down for getting slammed in a mosh pit, being burnt to crisp, paying five bucks for a bottled water and having the time of my life undergoing a sacred punk-rock rite of passage summer after summer. I can’t wait for next year.