Neon City Festival gets off to a wet and wild start — PHOTOS
The canopy doubled as a pixelated umbrella.
The massive roof of lights didn’t entirely shield the crowd huddled beneath it from all the raindrops, which watered down plenty of Coors Lights. But it did provide enough coverage for the three-day Neon City Festival to kick off as scheduled despite intermittent thunderstorms at the Fremont Street Experience and the Downtown Las Vegas Events Center on Friday.
“We’re gonna dance all night because we say so,” sang Sean Foreman, one-half of Colorado electro-pop duo 3OH!3, as his band opened the Third Street Stage. “Let’s do this outside. Shut down the whole block.”
The whole block was indeed shut down, with nearby Casino Center Boulevard closed to traffic and filled with revelers and food trucks as thousands flocked downtown to see a dozen acts perform on four stages.
The setting was an unusual one for some — “I keep getting distracted by the ceiling,” confessed Ryan Rumchaks, bassist for Chicago pop punks Knuckle Puck, gazing up at the screen above him on the First Street Stage — and a source of caution for others.
“Hello, people up there,” Foreman said as he greeted passengers flying by on the Slotzilla Zipline. “Don’t puke.”
Now there’s some sage advice for the weekend.
Singin’ and screamin’
The six-hour concert, which continues Saturday and Sunday, boasted a wide range of acts both local and national on Friday, with a pair of Vegas punk bands standing out as early highlights.
The dressed-to-impress Pure Sport — clad in business attire, satirizing corporate America — blitzed onlookers at the First Street Stage with high-velocity shout-alongs, their fuming “Take It All Away” registering as the most intense 100 seconds of the night.
At the same time on the Main Street Stage, sibling trio The Dollheads aired a concussive “Teenage Runaway,” their ode to femme punk trailblazer Joan Jett and her enduring influence on “all the girls that are rockin’ and rollin’ / Singin’ and screamin’ / Always dreamin’.”
As they played, a young girl in glasses and a black leather jacket rocked out hard next to her father, and it became evident that The Dollheads weren’t just honoring Jett’s legacy, but building upon it.
Around this time, the rain started up again, making the trek to the Downtown Events Center a wet one, and many sought shelter at the covered Neon Market, whose wares ranged from punk rock jean jackets for kids to Beetlejuice plushies to extravagantly painted portraits of former “Jackass” star Steve-O.
Going back
After the showers subsided, emotive rap-rockers Gym Class Heroes took the stage to navigate hits like “Cupid’s Chokehold” and “Clothes Off!!” with frontman Travie McCoy often sounding as if he possessed a punching bag for a heart.
“I was feeling a little (crappy) today,” he acknowledged in between songs. “You guys are bringing me back to life. I appreciate it.”
Hip-hop greats De La Soul countered on the Third Street Stage with a mix of jazz-informed, genre-defining and genre-defying classics — the irrepressibly loopy “Potholes in My Lawn”; a seismic “Stakes Is High” — and new cuts from their ninth album, “Cabin in the Sky.”
Released that day, “Cabin” is De La Soul’s first new record in nine years and their first since the passing of group member Trugoy the Dove (David Jolicoeur), who died in 2023 after years of struggling with heart problems and whom they dedicated multiple songs to, among them “Run It Back!!”
“We the sons of the beat,” rapper Posdnuos rhymed on said cut, “and we stay on our toes,” still living up to his words after nearly 40 years on the mic.
Headliners Good Charlotte then closed the evening at the Downtown Las Vegas Events Center with some ecstatically received pop punk nostalgia.
“We’re going to go back,” singer Joel Madden informed the crowd early in the band’s 90-minute set. “Remember the good times; remember the bad times.”
The crowd clearly placed the emphasis on the former, turning the band’s performance into an open-air karaoke session as they bellowed along to fan favorites like “The Anthem” and “Girls & Boys.”
“Good Charlotte and Vegas go together like peanut butter and jelly,” Madden observed at one point.
And no one seemed to care if the bread had gotten a little soggy on this night.
Contact Jason Bracelin at jbracelin@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0476. Follow @jasonbracelin76 on Instagram.
