Feb 25

Feb 25 Show Review: Knuckle Puck Bring High Energy Show To Sacramento, CA

Knuckle Puck
w/ Hot Mulligan, Meet Me @ The Altar, Anxious
Ace of Spades
Sacramento, CA
February 22nd, 2022

Photos and Review by Jared Stossel

With all the terrible things happening in the world right now, I personally think it’s very important that we can be able to turn to entertainment as an escape. Music, film, television, sports, whatever it may be, entertainment is the great oasis from all the bullshit going on in the world right now. I’m grateful that I’m able to have weeks where I’m doing nothing but covering concerts every single night, and I’m embracing those moments as the world gets darker. This is one of those weeks where I’ve managed to have a show on the calendar almost every single night, and Knuckle Puck’s headlining show at Ace of Spades on Tuesday night was a great kickoff for this marathon of shows.

The Midwest pop-punk quintet (with a slightly modified lineup, more on that later) brought their headlining tour to a packed house in Sacramento on Tuesday evening. The show was kicked off by Anxious, a group that meets in the center of a Venn diagram comprised of indie rock, emo and alternative. Their set was full of energy and emotion, proving to be a terrific start to the evening. Their set was followed by Meet Me At The Altar, a band that I really enjoyed. Their music falls under the category of pop-punk, but they are heavily influenced by “easycore”, a genre that consists of upbeat pop-punk verses and choruses with breakdowns mixed in throughout. I’ve been going to shows for almost fifteen years now (!) and they remind me so much of the acts I used to see when I first began going to local shows and working on the Vans Warped Tour. Both acts clearly have bright futures ahead of them.

There’s not much else I can say about the main opener, Hot Mulligan, other than that they were great, with yet another performance that was just as captivating as the headlining bands’ set that evening. I looked back at my archive and noticed that I’ve seen Hot Mulligan once a year, every year, since February 2020, and they keep getting better with each performance. The five-piece poured every last drop of emotion they had into their performance, with the audience latching onto every word.

Knuckle Puck closed the evening, bringing forth one of the best performances I’ve ever seen them give. I have seen them several times before, but they never really stuck out to me as they were emerging in the scene, for whatever reason. This show proved that they are still a force to be reckoned with, catapulting headfirst into a collection of songs from their decade-long career. A bulk of the material was comprised of songs from their highly-acclaimed 2015 album Copacetic, as well as songs from 2017’s Shapeshifter and 2020’s 20/20. There were even some tracks from their collection of EPs, including “Gasoline” from 2022’s Disposable Life, “No Good” from 2013’s The Weight That You Buried and even “Give Up” from 2012’s Don’t Come Home.

Now, I stated earlier that there was a modified lineup. Towards the start of the tour, drummer John Siorek broke his hand. This led to Siorek sitting out, while bassist Ryan Rumchaks moved to drums and vocalist Joe Taylor assumed both bass and vocal duties. Despite this amended lineup, their performance went off without a hitch. It’ll be exciting to see them next time they come around with their full lineup in tow, healed and ready to continue captivating audiences.

Knuckle Puck Set List
Want Me Around
Tune You Out
Double Helix
Gasoline
What Took You So Long?
Everyone Lies To Me
Swing
Wall To Wall (Depreciation)
Evergreen
Give Up
Green Eyes (Polarized)
Pretense
Earthquake
Gone
Untitled
No Good