Adjacent Festival Is Bringing The When We Were Young Experience To Atlantic City
This past weekend, tens of thousands of people descended upon Las Vegas for the first iteration of the When We Were Young Festival, a two-day marathon of ’00s emo and pop-punk nostalgia. (It was supposed to be three days, but the wind had other plans.) Next year, When We Were Young is coming back with co-headliners Green Day and Blink-182, now with Tom DeLonge back in the fold. And today, we’re learning that the East Coast’s gambling capital is getting its own version of When We Were Young next summer. That one will have Blink-182, too.
Atlantic City’s Adjacent Festival doesn’t have the gallingly ugly poster design of When We Were Young, and it’s not quite as nostalgia-focused, but it’s definitely chasing the same demographic. The festival is all loaded down with bands that would’ve played the Warped Tour in the ’00s or, in a few cases, the late ’90s. Blink-182 and Paramore will headline, and the bill also features Coheed And Cambria, Jimmy Eat World, Midtown, Thursday, Motion City Soundtrack, the Starting Line, Wheatus, Phantom Planet, and the Movielife.
But the Adjacent Festival also has a whole lot of rock bands who are currently relevant and who are working the intersection of emo, pop-punk, hardcore, and indie rock. Turnstile, Blink-182’s 2023 tourmates, are the third band on the bill, which is saying something. The lineup also features festival acts like Bleachers, Japanese Breakfast, the Front Bottoms, IDLES, Beach Bunny, PUP, Knocked Loose, Jeff Rosenstock, Mannequin Pussy, the Linda Lindas, L.S. Dunes, Meet Me @ The Altar, and Pinkshift.
There’s a little area of the poster that features all-star old-school hardcore punk crew OFF! and reunited Jersey ska-core band Folly, as well as some of the biggest and best bands from the current hardcore zeitgeist: Drug Church, Incendiary, Soul Glo, Candy, Zulu, and Gel. It’s like the Adjacent Festival is trying to stage its own little Sound And Fury on a sidestage somewhere. Crazy lineup! The show goes down 5/27-28 on the Atlantic City beach. Check here for more info.