BOWLING FOR SOUP: AN EXCITING BUT PREDICTABLE SHOW

LIVE REVIEW: Bowling For Soup – A Hangover You Don’t Deserve 20th Anniversary Tour, Aviva Studios, Manchester, 08/02/25 by Craig Harston

2024 saw pop punk veterans Bowling For Soup celebrating the 20th anniversary of one of their best albums, 2004’s seminal ‘A Hangover You Don’t Deserve’, by embarking on a huge tour of the US and playing all 18 tracks in full. Instead of playing a winter tour late last year, the Texas natives have listened to their UK fans and have brought the ‘A Hangover You Don’t Deserve Tour’ across the pond for a bunch of shows.

Hitting the stage in their matching jerseys after a ‘loading screen’ which seemed to last forever on the huge display at the back of the stage, the now three-piece (following the departure of guitarist and founding member Chris Burney earlier this year) got going with tracks from ‘A Hangover You Don’t Deserve’ – the excellent ‘Almost’ and ‘Trucker Hat’. Frontman Jaret Reddick then took some time to introduce the band and point out that this was Bowling For Soup‘s biggest Manchester show ever and that the show was being recorded for an upcoming live album! Due to the insistence of bassist Rob Felicetti that they play the album in order, Reddick admitted that this would be the earliest you would ever hear the next song – pop punk anthem ‘1985‘, which got a great response from the crowd and featured confetti cannons!

Realising he’d gone 3 songs without one, Reddick paused for a beer before an absolutely thundering rendition of ‘Get Happy’, which was followed by more banter before the ever-popular ‘Ohio (Come Back To Texas)‘. Wheatus keyboardist Brandon Ticer joined the band for a great performance of ‘Ridiculous’ which led straight into ‘Shut Up And Smile’. The next few songs went down well with the crowd, including ‘Last Call Casualty’, ‘Next Ex-Girlfriend’, ‘A-Hole’ (including John James Ryan on saxophone) and a whole “buncha fucks” on ‘My Hometown’. Yet more banter followed, including Reddick announcing ‘Smoothie King’ and then stopping to talk to the crowd about coffee(!), before a member of the crowd was invited on stage to spin a wheel to choose a random song. Landing on ‘You Pick’, ‘The Bitch Song’ was chosen which went down a storm (even though ‘Suckerpunch’ was right there!). Around ‘Really Might Be Gone’, Reddick plugged the bands summer headlining tours at Wembley Arena with Wheatus and Punk Rock Factory and promoted discussing mental health asking everyone to check in on people who might be struggling every once in a while.

Finishing off ‘A Hangover You Don’t Deserve’ with ‘Two Seater’ and ‘Friends O’ Mine’ (dedicated to Burney), the band relocated to the side of the stage before the encore (Reddick pointing out there were too many stairs to actually leave the stage!), then finished strong with ‘High School Never Ends’, Phineas and Ferb theme ‘Today Is Gonna Be A Great Day’ and the classic ‘Girl All The Bad Guys Want’.

Bowling For Soup clearly know how to draw a crowd after over 30 years as a band but they make it a frustrating experience. Known for playing it safe (with even Reddick admitting they may alienate some members of the crowd tonight with playing an album in full) it was absolutely fantastic hearing some of the deep cuts from ‘A Hangover You Don’t Deserve’ in a live setting but structurally, it was the same as every other Bowling For Soup show – if you’ve seen them once, you’ve pretty much seen them every other time! The seemingly endless banter also meant they overran, forcing many attendees to either miss the end of the show or risk not getting home – not the best way to thank the fans they told numerous times were the best in the world!

The A Hangover You Don’t Deserve Tour continues across the UK with tickets still available https://www.ticketmaster.co.uk/bowling-for-soup-tickets/artist/835888 and the album is available to pre-order on limited edition vinyl for the first time ever now https://slamdunk.world/products/bowling-for-soup-a-hangover-you-dont-deserve