Brand-Spanking-New PHOTOSET & REVIEW:
SAVE FERRIS (Vans Warped Tour) at Merriweather Post Pavilion (Columbia, MD), July 16th, 2017 [x]
Confession time: nearly six hours into my first Warped Tour experience, I made my first big mistake… I missed the first ten minutes of Save Ferris’s set. (All because I nearly forgot to apply more sunscreen before I left the pavilion to head all the way across the lawn and the woods to the Journeys Right Foot stage! At least I didn’t get sunburned, which, with my translucent complexion, was quite the feat.)
I knew I was in (extremely mild) trouble when I got a playful staredown from bassist Gordon Bash as I walked up to Stage Right at 4:40pm. “How could a staredown be playful and troublesome,” you ask? Well, “Gogo” was playing an upright bass, tilted, with one leg in the air, and the other leg balancing his entire body weight on the side of the bass itself. He gave me a look that said, “Oh, hello, purple-haired girl, can you believe this shit right now? Yeah, I’m rockin’ on top of this upright bass on just. One. Leg. Want photos? You better hurry!” (Spoiler alert: I was not fast enough. My apologies, Mr. Bash.)
If it were any other set with any other band, my face would’ve have flushed bright red without help from the sun, but Queen of the Right Foot Stage, legendary vocalist Monique Powell, stole my attention with her distinct voice, and stole the flushed color from my face with her stage hairdo! The sole surviving band member from their ‘90s lineup owned the stage, finishing off the song “Goodbye” with a hip shake in her pinup-inspired attire.
“This next song is about when you love someone so much, you wanna kill them!” said the singer, and whipped the band into the break-neck pace of “Anything.” With a wild grin on her face, she joyously sang lyrics about a love who buys her “trips to Disneyland,” and how her cats “think that you are the shit!” However, between the song’s lyrics from the revamped band’s 2017 EP, Checkered Past, Monique rattled off in her speaking voice all of the kooky ways she would torture/murder her beloved. “I love you so much, I wanna eat your liver with some fava beans and a nice Chianti, like in The Silence of The Lambs!” was just one of the hilariously disturbing possibilities at play.
The set never let up on the tempo or the groove! With Gordon back on electric bass, guitarist Patrick Ferguson, drummer Brandon Dickert, and the brass duo of Christian Robinson (trumpet) and Jeff McCollister (trombone, keyboard) staying right in-sync with Monique, the redhead asked the crowd if we were ready for them to “Turn It Up!” while wiggling and humping her cord-bound microphone in front of her crotch. The skanking on-stage and in the crowd went into full effect, as the cloud of dusty dirt from previous circle pits on the grass lot was quickly kicked back into the atmosphere. With the final two songs of their performance, “Can’t Stop,” and their classic ska cover of “Come On Eileen,” Monique belted and beckoned with contagious joy.
Anyone who didn’t know that much about the history of Save Ferris before witnessing that set was won over by her dueling characteristics of vocal control and theatrical abandon. For those who were already familiar with her hypnotizing performances from the band’s stints on the Warped Tour during the ‘90s, they were able to breathe a sigh of relief, knowing that their favorite singer found brilliant chemistry in the five bandmates that have joined in on her journey. Save Ferris has been saved!
If you want to see the rest of my photos from the Vans Warped Tour’s stop in Columbia, MD, visit my Flickr or my Facebook!