P.O.D. & Hoobastank
August 21, 2015
House of Blues- Anaheim, CA
House Of Blues is not only a great venue because it lies a short walk away from Disneyland, but it is also phenomenal for all kinds of acts that grace the stage on a weekly basis at a cheap price for concert goers. Friday night was no different when P.O.D. & Hoobastank tore up Anaheim by giving fans an unforgettable show.
Walking into the House of Blues, fans had the building packed from side to side with no standing room for late comers. Beers being sold, concert goers becoming hot and dehydrated, and people continuously coming through the security checkpoint had this show pointing towards a perfect Friday night.
Hoobastank was the second band to open for P.O.D. with lead singer Douglas Robb making it clear to both Hoobastank’s and P.O.D.’s fans that their job was to raise the energy of the crowd before P.O.D. took the stage, while ensuring fans had one of the greatest nights of their lives. A large mosh pit opened briefly after Robb claimed, “It’s gonna get fucking crazy”. The band followed that up by playing some crowd pleasers such as Remember Me, This Is Gonna Hurt, and Inside Of You.
Robb, Dan Estrin, Chris Hesse and Jesse Charland poured a lot of energy and love into their performance and the fans let the band know they received it by returning both the energy and love. Most notably when the band slowed down their set with The Reason, which had fans from not only the standing area, but also the upper deck cheering and singing along. As Robb stretched out his hands, as well as the mic, out to the crowd and rose them as if he was raising the voices of everyone — fans began to sing “..and the reason is you!” at the top of their lungs. The band played around ten songs, totaling out to be roughly an hour set. They finished off the set with Crawling In The Dark.
After 21 years of being a band, Hoobastank had nothing but thank you’s, handshakes and slaps to give to the crowd at the end of their set. This band is definitely not one to miss.
P.O.D. undoubtedly made the most noise of the night when they opened with This Goes Out To You, which raised the crowd into utter chaos of cheers, singing, dancing and jumping. Following up with Boom from their second album titled Satellite with Traa Daniels on bass and Marcos Curiel on guitar laying out their lines, lead singer Sonny Sandoval spoke out to the crowd saying “Ok, ya’ll know the rules. One, we’re here to have a good time. Two, nobody gets hurt. Three, if someone falls, you pick them up. Four, if I point at you someone’s coming over the top of you and you better duck, alright? Five, I wanna see you move around!”. With that, the lights began to flicker and the band began to play in full force. The largest pit opened, fans began to jump and when Sandoval said “Anaheim! BOOM. Here comes the BOOM!” everyone in the crowd began to get crazier, louder, and harder. The highlight of the song is when Sandoval surfed on the crowd and continued singing “..is that all you got? I’ll take your best shot!”. Besides all of the great P.O.D. hits being played like Youth Of The Nation, which also had a large crowd reaction, fans were impressed and constantly energized by this bands energy and hardcore style. P.O.D. continued to play out the crowds Friday night for a total of around two hours.
Review by: Dane Burns
P.O.D.
Hoobastank
