By The first annual Bamboozle Left kicked off with a bang last Saturday at Cal Poly Pomona. Bulk-loading the lineup with pop-punk powerhouses like Dashboard Confessional, Jack’s Mannequin, Hello-goodbye and Sugarcult promised a passionate turnout of preteen girls elbowing their way to the front to lay eyes on their favorite emo boy.
The 37 bands that played were separated onto five stages. The MTV2 stage was the main stage, Epitaph Records stage was the mid-size stage and the Elmo Sez, Smart Punk stage, and Linc’s Special stage were the small stages.
The Matches kicked the day off on the Epitaph stage. Their eight-song set consisted mostly of songs off “Decomposer,” with a few old favorites thrown in. Their high energy on “Salty Eyes,” “Sunburn Versus the Rhino Virus” and “What Katie Said” scared the rain clouds away.
Red Jumpsuit Apparatus was next. The screamo band from Middleburg, Fla. has hit the radio charts with the single “Face Down.” They too had a great energy and got the circle pits going early.
Sugarcult played surprisingly early too. The band has had a handful of radio singles since “Start Something” came out in 2001, and they mixed them all up in their half-hour set. Starting off with “Memory,” the band got the crowd jumping with the new single “Do It Alone” and old favorite “Pretty Girl.”
Upcoming indie band Big Japan played next on the Elmo Sez stage. A mob of teenage girls pressed themselves against the tiny stage in hopes of getting a glance at “The OC” star Adam Brody playing the drums. Vocalist and guitarist Nathaniel Castro and Cal State Long Beach student Brad Babinski played some great music, but it’s doubtful that any of the girls noticed.
Former Midtown front man Gabe Saporta hit the music scene with his solo project Cobra Starship earlier this year with the “Snakes on a Plane” theme song. He danced around like a rabid cobra to the new tunes off his recent release, “While the City Sleeps, We Rule the Streets.”
Hip-hop group Gym Class Heroes was up next. This group is the first group to fuse emo with hip-hop and make some amazing anthems like “The Queen and I,” “Cupid’s Chokehold” and “New Friend Request.” MC Travis McCoy’s lyrics are heartfelt yet smart and he comes alive on stage.
Huntington Beach locals Hellogoodbye hit the MTV2 stage next. Despite some technical difficulties, the group played an amazing set of old hits and new favorites. “All of Your Love,” “Here in Your Arms” and “Shimmy Shimmy Quarter Turn” kept the crowd dancing even though they had been on their feet for nearly seven hours.
Crowd favorite Jack’s Mannequin was up next. A darker project for Something Corporate front man Andrew McMahon, the talented vocalist and pianist, sang most of the debut album “Everything in Transit.”
Most of the festival’s breath was taken away when members of Something Corporate joined McMahon on stage and reunited for the “Bamboozle Surprise.” Something Corporate had been on hiatus since 2005 when McMahon started working on Mannequin, but when they hit the stage with favorites “I Woke Up In a Car,” “Hurricane” and “Konstantine,” you could see tears in concertgoers’ eyes.
Cute Is What We Aim For closed up the Epitaph Stage. Still in awe of the Bamboozle Surprise himself, singer Shaant Hacikyan kept the set short. They played five songs off the debut “The Same Old Blood Rush With a New Touch” before finishing up.
Dashboard Confessional closed up the night. Chris Carrabba at 31 is nearly old enough to be the father of some of the younger bands that played earlier, but he can still write about breakups and heartache just as well as the teenagers.
Playing a good mix of new songs and old favorites, Carrabba was often hard to hear over the crowd. His passionate followers make themselves known.
The Bamboozle Left made for an extremely long day, but a lot of talented musicians came together. The stages were well spread out and everybody seemed to enjoy themselves. The promoters have already announced they will be doing it again next year.
