On a rainy Sunday Night (All Hallows’ Eve, to be specific) Philadelphia’s Underground Arts hosted a punk show made up of bands that are rapidly growing into formidable musical entities: Bad Cop/Bad Cop and The Interrupters.
Philadelphia’s The Up Up Ups started things off and were certainly an energetic four-piece. As an added bonus, the bass player was dressed as a pumpkin. Along with their own upbeat songs, they played a cover of Blondie’s “Rip Her To Shreds.”
Bad Cop Bad Cop
By the time Bad Cop/Bad Cop took the stage, the venue had begun to really fill up. This was bassist Linh Le’s first time back in the city since she had moved away in 2010 and there was clearly some extra love in the room.
The set was largely made up of selections from their debut full-length Not Sorry. Beginning things with “Like, Seriously” the band was clearly there to be taken seriously and with those three-part harmonies, all in attendance were powerless to resist. All jokes aside, they represented many of the songs you would hope to hear at a Bad Cop/Bad Cop show: “Nightmare,” “It’s My Life,” “Sugarcane,” “Joey Lawrence,” and (personal favorite) “Support” among many others. They also dipped into selections from their Boss Lady EP.
A familiar face in the Fat Wreck Chords world emerged throughout the set: Cokie The Clown. Along with running around on stage behind the band, Cokie made his way into the crowd, at times, to further stoke the pit which was becoming rowdier by the second anyway.
The other especially noteworthy occurrence at this show (and presumably, throughout the tour) is that the band premiered a song that will be officially released in the very near future called “Get Rad.” If that’s any indication of the quality that we can expect on the next full-length, do your pants a favor and put a diaper on ahead of time.
The Interrupters
Seeing The Interrupters at this past Warped Tour was both a highlight and an appetizer which made me hungry for a larger portion.
With significantly more time to play with, they dove headfirst into their self-titled debut and 2016’s Say It Out Loud. “A Friend Like Me” started things off and the energy continued from there with other bangers like “White Noise,” “Jenny Drinks,” “She Got Arrested”, and much more. Acknowledging Halloween, guitarist Kevin Bivona introduced “Phantom City” as the closest thing they have to something particularly appropriate to the holiday. With the massive (artificial) spiderwebs overhead and the skulls (also artificial) flanking the stage, it certainly worked.
Toward the end, the band opened it up for requests which created the only significant lag in the evening’s consistent pace. This proved to be largely unproductive as there was no clear consensus on what that should be. They eventually decided on “Good Things” at the request of a young fan up front.
For an encore, we were treated to an impromptu Aerosmith medley from Kevin Bivona in a wig and giant sunglasses. They then launched into a live staple, their cover of Operation Ivy’s “Soundsystem.” They then did “Last Call,” another fan request (“The Valley”) and polished things off with “Family” as Bad Cop/Bad Cop and the Up Up Ups came back out on stage to bring it all full circle.
Before all of that, I was lucky enough to speak to all four ladies of Bad Cop/Bad Cop. Guitarists/vocalists Stacey Dee and Jennie Cotterill, bass player Linh Le and drummer Myra Gallarza were all able to join the conversation and lend their perspectives and insights. We covered lifestyle changes, food, music (duh), art, world domination, social media, and more! In fact, this conversation was so packed full of goodies, we had to redact some information! Things were said that only those of us in the room (and a select few others) will ever know! *Evil Laughter*
This was a record-setting, hour plus chat, so sit back, get comfy and enjoy.
www.badcopbadcopband.com
www.jenniecotterill.com
www.bcandy.com
Words by: JJ Ellis
Photos by: Jared Lagler
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