Bad Religion Rocks Fillmore

by Tim Wenger

As cliché as it might sound, things change as we get older. Priorities in life shift around, and nothing seems to make as much sense as it did when you were younger. If you look deep enough within yourself, you learn what really makes you happy and what is truly important. With enough hard work and dedication, even though your life may have changed a great deal, you are still able to hold on to the values that made you who you are in the first place.

Bad Religion is no different. Their music has evolved, they have grown older and are no longer the teenage trouble makers that they once were. But the punk rock legends keep their message, as well as their passion, the same, and it rang true throughout their performance at the Fillmore Auditorium in Denver on April 10.

The band has, at least in the fifteen years that I have been attending shows in this fair city, maintained a steady draw and loyal fan base here. They know what they are going to get from the band- aggression through a strong punk rock message, and a passion that can still bring a tear to your eye as you scream out the lyrics to the songs that keep you coming back time after time.

The band’s new album True North is not as well known as a lot of the stuff they put out in the eighties and nineties, when they spawned anthemic hits such as “Sorrow” and “We’re Only Gonna Die” among many others (none of which were left out of the set on this occasion). Greg Graffin and company threw some new songs in with the old throughout the show, describing the new tunes as they launched into them without interrupting the fast-paced force that kept the circle pit at a constant, heavy flow on the large floor of the Fillmore.

The crowd seemed as into the new stuff as the old, which surprised me as I had heard mixed reviews of the band’s new material prior to the show. No matter how you may feel about it, when you see one of the band’s that has helped to define punk rock for over three decades, it is hard to keep yourself cynical when the energy surrounding you is so positive.

Bad Religion played a healthy set followed by a good encore, leaving the crowd mentally psyched (even if physically exhausted) as the show came to a close.

Online: badreligion.com

Tags: Tim Wenger, bad religion, greg graffin

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