Photo + Words: Caitlin Mellors

Saturday night saw the penultimate gig at Lincoln Castle for June and it was an absolute belter. Pop-punk enthusiasts and elder Emos all stormed the castle for the ‘Bowl My Bones’ tour. It was a night of flying beach balls, toilet humour, and pure nostalgia. You really had to be there. 

American band American Hi-Fi were up first, finally back on a UK stage after being away for over a decade. But if anyone was looking for a chink in their armour, there was none to be found. The band gave their all, and front man Stacy Jones really sold it with his stunning vocals. In a great parallel with the World Cup, Jones called for a quick hydration break, stating that there is “…a lot of singing going on, not enough time for wine.” With a smile and a raised glass, American Hi-Fi continued their set, the crowd really waking up when they played ‘The Art of Losing.’ But the real catalyst was ‘Flavor of the Weak.’ A song every pop-punk enjoyer has in their early 2000’s playlist, it was the best song to end on.

Frank Turner & The Sleeping Souls played next, making this their first appearance at Lincoln Castle. Turner took to the stage with his usual high energy and a presence that made the entire set look effortless. A set that nearly didn’t happen as Turner confessed to the crowd early on that he had a brutal cold and had been told not to play (cue the booing), but he had ignored that advice and was doing it anyway (cue the cheering).  

The set was a sort of orchestrated chaos. You had Turner commanding the crowd into multiple circle pits, a beach ball flying around, a wall of death (that Turner dubbed a “Wall of Hugs” because we’re all friends), and a steady stream of crowd surfers – some of which had multiple goes over as I kept seeing one dude with a huge pink mohawk. The banter was also great. Turner thanked the crowd for coming “just to see me” and kept joking the headliners Bowling For Soup were a “new band” he’d met earlier that day at the Magna Carta pub just outside the venue. He even extended a hand of charity, offering the “newcomers from America” to play a set after him. 

I have to say that musically the highlight was that bass solo from Sleeping Souls bassist Tarrant Anderson during one of the newer tracks ‘Letters.’ When do we ever get one of those? Exactly. Turner hyped Anderson up for it, telling him to get on the “ego boxes” up front to play it, to which Anderson deadpanned “I wanna see a risk assessment first.” (He did end up doing it and it was awesome).

Big hitter ‘Four Simple Words’ ended their set and Turner went full rockstar as he got down from the stage to sing with the crowd at the barrier before he jumped over and crowd surfed whilst still singing. Somehow making it back to the stage before the song ended, he lead the crowd one final time, asking them to put their hands up and twirl in a sort of pop-rock ballet – and to be fair to the crowd, they did do it, and it was oddly charming. And then they departed, and the wait for Bowling For Soup began.

When Bowling For Soup took to the stage the atmosphere shifted. Anticipation gave way to shock, awe, and unadulterated giddiness. After 32 years in the business, it’s safe to say that BFS know what they’re doing – they brought pyro, they brought classic hits, they brought dick jokes. 

They started off strong with classics ‘Almost’, ‘High School Never Ends’, and ‘Emily’. From the get go I don’t think there was a person that wasn’t singing or dancing along. During ‘Getting Old Sucks’ their crew threw a whole load of beach balls into the crowd, prompting front man Jaret Reddick to start chanting “Balls are fun, Gary’s got one!”

That chant set the tone for the whole night with the banter between each song. It was a barrage of non-stop toilet humour (literally), dick jokes, and random gags. My personal favourite was from bassist Rob Felicetti, on the topic of using and drawing arses – “It’s ASS and crafts time!” It was a night of music, but it also felt like a night just hanging out with friends. 

Between the fun and getting distracted by the local pigeons, the Texas legends played even more hits ‘Today is Gonna Be a Great Day’, ‘Punk Rock 101’, and their cover of ‘Stacey’s Mom’. But behind all the fart jokes, BFS have massive hearts. Reddick gave a really moving mental health talk before he played ‘Turbulence’ with a guest cellist. The crowd threw up their phone torches and lighters, and for just a while we had a really touching moment. 

Another whirlwind of antics ensued shortly after with the custom and signed guitar giveaway. A fan got to come up on stage with the band to claim it and they even got a photo with them. We then had a football segment, where BFS acknowledged that we could be at home watching England play Panama, so they put it up on the big screen for us and got us to chant “It’s Coming Home” (which was very loud). 

After teasing a new album coming out next year, they played their last three songs of the night – arguably their best. We got to sing along to ‘Girl All the Bad Guys Want’, ‘The Bitch Song’, and their cover of ‘1985’. The night was what one might expect from a huge band and then some. It was big, it was loud, and it was stupidly fun.