Weezer, Citizen, IDLES, Knuckle Puck, Jawbreaker and more
Riot Fest 2025
Photos and review by Casey Lee
My first Riot Fest was in 2017. I had spent many of the preceding summers wishing I could make my way to Chicago (or Denver or Toronto at the time) because the lineups, despite what Twitter would want you to believe, ruled. Who the fuck else was putting Alexisonfire on the same bill as Tyler, the Creator? Or System of a Down, Ice Cube, Snoop Dogg, and Flogging Molly? No one. So when the 2017 lineup got announced, with Nine Inch Nails (who I had never seen before but listened to constantly while working my first job at a paintball field in Garland, Texas), Queens of the Stone Age (who I admittedly didn’t know heaps of their catalog), and Jawbreaker (who I had heard covers of from bands like Set Your Goals, and frankly just had a sense of the importance of their reunion) were announced as headliners, I knew I had to go. And I did. Obviously.
Helmet
I started this by saying 2017 was my first Riot Fest. I didn’t go as press, but just an attendee. I had to see this festival that all of my friends had raved about. Outside of tours I was on, I had never really been to a show beyond my home state. But ever since, it’s been a near-annual pilgrimage to Chicago in September. The 20th birthday of Riot Fest was no different than those years past. Delivering a lineup that scratched every music loving part of my brain. Exposed me to new artists, like every good festival should do, and let me revel in nostalgia with bands I’ve been listening to since as early as elementary school.
Big Ass Truck I.E.
Like many Riot Fest weekends, the weather forecast on this September weekend looked admittedly grim. Projections of heavy rain on Saturday and Sunday lingered in my head like a cartoon rain cloud. After 2024’s torrential downpour that pushed doors back and shortened sets, all I could do was hope that if it did rain, it didn’t rain like that. And, thankfully, Douglass Park was graced with no monstrous storms. No heavy downpours. And only a couple of hours of sprinkling rain on Saturday. The fest made a (relatively) smooth run all weekend, with bands cycling on and off stage like a well oiled machine. To be fair, I think that’s what’s to be expected twenty years and countless band change-overs later. But, when you’re trying to plan your day and catch every band possible, that goes a long way.
Barbarians of California
In what felt like a slight trend shift from the past few years, Friday felt like the fest’s hardcore and hardcore adjacent centric day. My afternoon kicked off with a run of Big Ass Truck I.E., Barbarians of California, Touche Amore, and Harms Way. One. After. Another. Riffs poured out from stage PAs and crowd surfers dumped over the barricades. A highlight for me was getting to catch Touche Amore’s set, playing a set that felt like the perfect balance of pulling from all of their records. Before closing, singer Jeremy Bolm alluded to the fact that somehow it’s already been (almost) ten years since the band’s acclaimed Stage Four came out, followed by posters appearing around the park mentioning the same. I think it is fairly safe to assume that there is some news on the horizon there.
Touche Amore
Another highlight was Harms Way. The Chicago hardcore heroes brought an energy that had me grinning from ear to ear as they plowed their way through their set. If you were there, and you were standing still. Well. You did it wrong.
Harms Way
The vibes got a bit lighter as the night moved on, with Senses Fail brining a Ferris Bueller’s Day Off theme to stage, with singer Buddy Nielsen dressing as the titular character. And speaking of Chicago heroes, Alkaline Trio stepped onto the Riot Stage to play Maybe I’ll Catch Fire, but before doing so also played a five song mini-set of songs from other records. No matter how many times I see them play, it is always a joy. Nothing quite amounts to hearing songs like “Mercy Me,” “Calling All Skeletons,” or “Radio” live.
Senses Fail
It may have been day two, but for almost everyone in attendance, there was only one person on their mind. John. Stamos. Uncle Jesse himself. Dr. Tony Gates. After over a decade of heckling and shit talk, and a hefty demands list that included a life-size pillow of Mr. Stamos himself, a guitar case full of hummus, and a John Stamos tattoo, he was on the festival grounds. But, we’ll get there in, well, a few sentences. First, we must start with Citizen. To say I was mildly stunned by their set opener would be putting it lightly, with the band jumping headfirst into “The Night I Drove Alone” before playing an eight song set with over half of the material coming from 2013’s hit Youth. I don’t think I had seen or photographed Citizen since 2015 while on tour in Nashville. Suffice to say I was happy with my decision to catch their set on Saturday.
Citizen
After catching their first three songs, I scooted my way to the Riot Stage for the English band James. To be honest, my knowledge of the band didn’t extend much beyond their contributions to the American Pie soundtrack, but there was enough from that, as well as press and fellow photographer hype to get me to spend some steps to catch their set. And what a set it was. The Manchester band had the crowd dancing, smiling, and for many, putting their phones away and just being in the moment and enjoying the festival. Singer Tim Booth took himself into the crowd, dancing through it and stirring up a delightfully positive energy before crawling back over and then onto the barricade.
James
Before we could get to the moment twelve years in the making, I had to run back for a dose of Knuckle Puck’s Copacetic. Chicago rarely disappoint, unless we’re talking about flights getting delayed out of ORD, and Knuckle Puck sure as shit didn’t disappoint on Saturday as the band worked their way through a ten year celebration of their record.
Knuckle Puck
And before I knew it, I was back at the Riot Stage, waiting to make my way into what was certain to be a very crowded photo pit for some of the most legendary legends. The Beach Boys. And, in a grand sense of irony, as we were about to embark on an hour long, 60s California, often surf-centric set, the rain began to fall. But not even that could tamp down the mood of the thousands amassed in front of the stage.
The Beach Boys
The vibes continued to build through Jack White’s set as the singer, guitarist, and baseball enthusiast brought the crowd to a roar and dropping jaws along the way. And of course, White had to be certain to drop in some White Stripes songs, with “Icky Thump” and “Seven Nation Army” drawing out thunderous responses from the tens of thousands watching.
And then, from the man who’s eponymous work is most closely associated with the color blue to the band who’s self-titled record is simply called the blue album, Weezer launched a (figurative) rocket from the middle of Douglass park on a journey to the blue planet, as singer Rivers Cuomo put it. And while the set was billed as a blue album play through, and it was, that didn’t occur until, well, much, much later in the set. The blue voyage first took on songs like “Hash Pipe” and the song that will forever make me think of Out Cold, “Island in the Sun,” plus a Pinkerton set, before ultimately getting into the heart of the matter, playing what some would argue might be the most beloved Weezer record, ultimately playing through a 21 song setlist hitting eight different albums.
Weezer
While Sunday originally promised even more rain, the only moisture had on Sunday was the remaining humidity from Saturday and a healthy dose of cloud cover. After a weekend heavy with coverage of the Riot, Roots, Radical, and Rise stages, I finally found myself spending some more considerable time at the Rebel stage after catching Big Ass Truck IE there on Friday. This time, I started my day with the Long Beach, CA trio Chase Petra. Admittedly, I started my day unfamiliar with their music, drawn in by remembering they were on tour with a personal favorite, Pool Kids, in 2023. Suffice to say, I left a new fan. The energy was solid, the songs catchy and fun, and a solid jumping off point for the final day of the festival.
Chase Petra
After making my way to Riot Feast to grab myself a classically unhealthy lunch of hot dogs and fried pickles I meandered back to the Rebel stage to catch what feels like everyone’s high school (or college, or post-college, or middle school) favorite, The Ataris. As an aside, as if that’s not what 90% of this is, The Ataris hold a special place in my walks down memory lane. In 2015, when I was hopping in an Uber at the Jones Beach Amphitheater on Long Island, the first song that came on as I rode away from the tour bus I had called home for two weeks was the band’s cover of “The Boys of Summer.” It felt remarkably on the nose, but nevertheless drew a tear or two from my eyes. Anyways, back to it. The band was one of a score slotted to play full records, and they delivered with So Long, Astoria, albeit in a non-serialized delivery, but to be fair, singer Kristopher Roe made that clear before he even played the first note of “In This Diary.” Any day I can spend singing along to a song I love in the photo pit? That’s a good one. This was a good one.
The Ataris
After hearing Roe recount visions of his summer, it was time to deviate from the Rebel stage to the Rise stage where the UK’s Lambrini Girls were set to let loose their (accurately) self-proclaimed political punk. The energy was probably the highest it could have been for 3 in the afternoon, on day three of a three day fest, but the three piece made certain to get every ounce out of those in attendance with ferocious songs and taking time between those songs to stir the crowd further into a fervor with discussion of the most relevant and pertinent of social and political issues.
Lambrini Girls
And from a new generation of punk to some of their predecessors, off to Bad Religion I went. The San Fernando Valley punk stalwarts, fronted by legend Greg Graffin brought forth Suffer in its entirety for the crowd, who brought themselves over the barricade in droves, giving the security staff a healthy workout while Bad Religion played with the energy and enthusiasm to warrant the response. And for those math-doing folks wondering how they filled a one hour set with a 26:07 running time record, they supplemented those fifteen anthemic songs with a nine song prologue, ultimately pulling from an additional eight records. If you left that set disappointed…I think you were probably just at the wrong stage.
Bad Religion
To follow would be one of my favorite sets of the weekend, and one I had been looking forward to from the moment the lineup was released. IDLES. After catching them at a festival in Pasadena a few years back, they had quickly found their way onto my personal must-photograph list (check). They delivered exactly what I remembered from that first show I saw. A relentless energy that drew out chaos but also couldn’t help but put the biggest grin across your face. And you know what else will make you smile? Jack White playing with IDLES. How do I know this? Because that shit happened. And it was just as magical as you would imagine it to be.
IDLES
After wrapping up the IDLES set, it was time for Jawbreaker to provide their Bay Area support for headliners Green Day. Their, if I recall correctly, third…but also maybe fourth? appearance at Riot Fest since reuniting there in 2017, then as Sunday headliners themselves. Playing a mix of 24 Hour Revenge Therapy and Dear You heavy set had fans thrilled as the weekend wound down, before ultimately passing the baton…err…mic, over to Green Day to close out the weekend.
Jawbreaker
20 years of Riot Fest being in our lives. 20 years of lineups that get nothing but complaints despite being some of the best in the festival scene year after year after year. 20 bands playing 20 records in their entirety (but not always front to back). An unknown number of John Stamos (alleged) look-a-likes. One Riot Fest. There truly aren’t many others out there, if any, like it.
Rico Nasty
Where you can start your festival with a band from the Inland Empire called Big Ass Truck, and end it with Bad Religion, IDLES, Jawbreaker, and Green Day. Or where you can eat your weight in Reggie’s bratwurst. Every year I walk out of Douglass Park on Sunday night exhausted, achy feet, hungry (even though I have eaten my weight in less than healthy but delicious foods), and longing for another year back in Chicago watching my favorite bands and finding new ones with friends new and old, taking in one of the best festivals you can find.
Hanson
