ALL with Naked Raygun - TLA (Philadelphia) - September 24, 2011

I only caught one full song of Naked Raygun‘s opening set for the official Riot Fest East afterparty. I love them, but honestly the energy just wasn’t there, even though it was nice to see them in a much smaller setting than the afternoon’s huge festival stage.

ALL, on the other hand, were amazing. I’m not a huge fan of them on record except for 1989’s amazing Allroy’s Revenge, their first Lp with singer Scott Reynolds, who was the singer on this evening, but they’ve always been a great live band. Luckily, we got tons of songs from Allroy’s Revenge as well as the B-side “Can’t Say”. Reynolds, self-effacing as ever, introduced “Frog” from Allroy Saves as one of their worst songs (I disagree) though he correcty identified bassist Karl Alvarez‘s “Can’t Say” as one of their best. It was like seeing them in 1992 at City Gardens opening for Bad Religion. Wow!