LIVE: New Found Glory @ Empire Live, 06/02/2022

Pop Punk Pioneers New Found Glory brought their Sticks and Stones 20th Anniversary tour to Empire Live on Thursday night. By showtime, the room was sold out with over 1000 sweaty, mostly middle-aged punk fans in attendance. NFG hit the stage with the opening track of Sticks and Stones, “Understatement.”

As is pretty much standard at all Pop Punk shows, the singing from the crowd was almost as loud as the band. Singer Jordan Pundik knows this very well and took advantage of it on the bigger notes throughout the night. It was a two-hour sing-along. “My Friends Over You,” the second track is arguably the band’s most successful single. They brought out a confetti cannon and covered the Empire Live audience with red white and blue confetti. As they worked through the record in order, they made note that many of the fans probably obtained Sticks and Stones illegally, off of peer-to-peer networks like Limewire. The fans did not object.

After the closing track “The Story So Far” the band took a brief break and returned with an eight song encore made up of mostly hits and a few covers. There has been a resurgence of pop punk in the past few years and it was great to see that one of the forefathers of that genre can still draw a huge mid-week crowd.

There were two opening acts. Be Well and Four Years Strong both delivered solid, heavy sets. I recommend getting out to see any show where either band is on the bill.

Photo Gallery by Claude Sawyer