The Wonder Years | Chicago, IL

There is always something magical about seeing one of your favorite bands perform an album that means a lot to you from start to finish, and that is exactly what brought so many people out on an incredibly chilly Sunday night in Chicago for The Wonder Years on their The Greatest Generation 10 year tour.

We had the hometown boys Action/Adventure kick the night off for us. With this being the biggest hometown show the band has ever played, they got the crowd moving from the first beat of the first song, setting the tone right away for the rest of the night as the audience opened up into multiple pits and kids were climbing over each other to crowd-surf throughout the set. Grinning from ear to ear, they stopped mid-set for their drummer, Adrian, to snap a quick photo of the crowd on his phone before sharing the message of how they went viral and never giving up on your dreams, regardless of how long it takes to get there.

Up next was Sweet Pill. They started the set off immediately with an anxious energy that made you want to move with them. The band didn’t leave an inch of the stage untouched between interactions with each other and the crowd as they played their eight song set, which included their newest single, "Starchild", released just about two weeks prior.  

Anxious kicked off their set instantly demanding the attention of the room and calling out anybody that seemed like they weren't having fun in the crowd in front of them. In the middle of their eight song set, they took a second to stop and thank The Wonder Years for putting out music that means so much to everyone, & also taking the chance on bands that are newer than them to get to be part of such an incredible tour. The band made sure to get right back into the music, making every single person in the room get off their feet for the rest of their time on stage.

You could feel the excitement in the room build as crew members set the stage for The Wonder Years. They walked on stage to audio of what the album means to them before opening the set exactly how the album begins. The crowd took off by the time we hit the very first “I’m sorry I don’t laugh at the right times” in the opening track “There, There” and the energy never stopped from that moment on. Anyone who has seen this band already knows that they put on one hell of a show and that didn’t change in the slightest on this anniversary tour, including during the least played songs on the album that vocalist Dan Campbell asked the crowd to help make them regret not playing more often. 

After playing the 45-minute album in full and closing their first set of the night off with "I Just Want to Sell Out My Funeral”, The Wonder Years came back on stage for another eight-song set. The second set features a The Greatest Generation b-side track that they revisited and brought back to life for the anniversary of the album, a handful of songs from their latest release, The Hum Goes On Forever, as well as the expected tracks like “Local Man Ruins Everything", “Cardinals”, and “Came Out Swinging”, during which they brought out Brompton and Blake of Action/Adventure to close the song out with them. The band gave the crowd everything they could want and then some, all while promising that The Wonder Years still has a hell of a lot more music in them and they aren’t going anywhere anytime soon.