Photos and Review by Mickey Renger
Ace of Spades in Sacramento, California, was rocking on Tuesday night! Fresh off the release of their highly anticipated seventh album, Skeletons, Pop Evil started on the final string of shows on the Spring Skeletons tour. Kick-ass Seattle rockers, Avoid, opened another enthusiastic night of the tour. This continues Pop Evil's trend of bringing young and energetic opening acts with them on their amazing tours. Making Avoid the opening act was an excellent decision! From the moment they walked on stage to the time they walked off, Chrispy Echols, Nick Olson, Benny Scholl, and Paul Jaton absolutely destroyed. With songs blasting on Octane and in video games, this is a band to watch out for, and it is certain that they will be headlining their own North American tours soon. Up next is a band that has gone through massive change recently, yet they still know how to rock out. With a new record label and new single, The Word Alive is on a mission. The band known for hits like Trapped and NO WAY OUT is hoping to reach the upper echelon with the aforementioned new single, New Reality, and if they keep playing like this Sacramento show, that should be no problem. Tyler Smith and Zack Hansen, backed by touring members Jose DelRio and Daniel Nelson, played a solid set and interacted really well with the crowd. It will be interesting to see where the band goes from here; hopefully, an album announcement will be coming soon, along with more shows to back it! Finally, the time for Pop Evil had come! With Leigh Kakaty taking the stage with his signature strut and a killer voice, the Ace of Spades crowd knew they were in for something special. Moments like this have been decades in the making. The journey from local Detroit rock act to national headlining act has been a long but well-deserved one for Pop Evil. With a sound that encompasses all of the great things that rock has to offer, they will knock the socks off of any music listener. Their set starts strong with Paranoid, off of the new Skeletons record. Although the album is only a month old, it doesn't seem the
Sacramento crowd got the message, as everyone already had the lyrics memorized and screamed them right along with Kakaty. This crowd was also in awe of the guitar work of both Davey Grahs and Nick Fuelling on songs like Deal With The Devil and Let The Chaos Reign. The band made sure to keep a lot of variety in the set, with songs from every album in the Pop Evil discography. Hayley Cramer continued to bang away on the drums as the band moved through the set. The final member yet to be mentioned is arguably the most stage-active member out of the five. Bassist Joey Chicago Walser jumps all over the stage so much that if you blink, you'll miss him, but don't worry cause he'll be back right before you know he was gone. After the conclusion of Waking Lions, the band walked off stage to the shouts of one more song, and it seemed that the crowd got more than they bargained for. Pop Evil came back on stage and put on a four-song encore before finally concluding with Breathe Again. This was an amazing show, as per usual, with Pop Evil. The great inclusion of Avoid and The Word Alive ties this tour together and makes it a great investment for a fun night in a city near you!
See more photos from the show here!
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