Oi! Oi! Oi! Last night was a fantastic sold-out night of old-school SoCal Punk. On the first of their two nights in Toronto, the lineup of The Chats, Descendents and Social Distortion treated 2,500 rowdy fans to an entertaining evening, capturing the essence of the genre and its history.
While The Chats are not actually from Southern California, they still fit in extremely well with the other two SoCal legends on the bill. Hailing from Queensland, Australia, they lent some youth to the lineup. Formed in 2016, straight out of school, the trio have 2 albums currently and showed up to deliver a solid opening set to the surprisingly full venue (for the first band of the night!), made up of 14 songs. Everyone was set up for the rest of the evening.
The first of the legends for last night’s show were Descendents. Formed in 1977, the band has seen a few different iterations over the years, and while their road has been a bit rocky, the feel has always remained the same. They have a die-hard following and were a fabulous complement to Social Distortion on this tour. Blasting through a setlist of 25 songs, covering the vast majority of their discography, the band was in fine form, and the mosh pit and crowd surfers were keen to agree.
With great anticipation, at 9:45 p.m., the headliners took to the stage. In recognition of their most recent album release, Born to Kill, Social Distortion took to the stage to the crowd screaming and a completely packed house. Formed in 1978, Social Distortion are, arguably, one of (if not “the” most) well-known bands of the SoCal Punk scene. Much like their peers in the last band, this is a group that has been performing and creating music for nearly 50 years. They must be doing something right! While this tour is in support of their most recent album, and the setlist included 6 songs off this release, they also incorporated a number of their older singles, including their cover of “Ring of Fire”, and crowd favourites like “Story of My Life”, finishing strong with “Don’t Drag Me Down.”
The Born to Kill world tour continues through mid-November, and my advice is to go see these misfits on tour if they come through a city near you.
See the photos from the show here: www.heartofthepit.com/photo-albums