Rise Against's frontman, Tim McIlrath enjoyed himself so much talking to Bree for Marquee Memories where he talked about meeting Fugazi and seeing Nirvana, that he graciously shared some inside info about the band's setlists.
In today's episode you'll hear him talk about their first show 25 years ago at the legendary Chicago club, The Metro. He'll harken back to a Super Bowl Sunday show where they didn't expect anyone to come, so they fattened the set with covers of Black Flag and Minor Threat.
The singer also touches on how the group deals with introducing new material to their fans.
Here are some highlights from his chat with us.
Metro, Feb. 8, 2008
Tim McIlrath: If I remember correctly, this would have been Super Bowl Sunday. And it was a Gallows show. [In 2008, Gallows frontman was Frank Carter, who is now singing with the Sex Pistols.]
And as you can imagine, not a lot of tickets had sold. People were like, "we're not going to see a show on Super Bowl Sunday."
And talking to them, they were like, "listen, no one's even coming to this show. If you guys wanna come play, that'd be a lot of fun."
And we were like, "who cares if we rehearse here by ourselves or in front of 200 kids in the Metro?"
Obviously, we're having fun if we're doing a Black Flag cover. We're doing a Minor Threat cover.
Warped Tour, Tinley Park, IL, 2002
So we weren't on Warped for this. This is similar to the Metro show: we were just in town.
Death by Stereo were playing the Vulcan stage. They cut their set short and they gave us their gear, and then we played a few songs.
It was do-or-die, you know. And I think we really thrived in that environment.
Not every band is cut out for Warped Tour. Not every band is gonna succeed in a Warped Tour setting. We were sort of, like, built for it in a way. And like, we found that out in real time, like, "okay, we can do this."
And so I think that show started the talk of getting Rise Against on Warped Tour.
Skate Lab, Simi Valley, 2018
Skate Lab was a skate park in Simi Valley, California. It was closing down and a friend of ours named Steve, I don't know how he convinced everyone to do it, but he convinced us all to do it.
We started doing a lot of covers like Minor Threat.
Jeremy from Touché Amoré came and sang it with us.
Did "In My Eyes" by Minor Threat. Moby was there and sang with us as well.
Skated a little bit, ate some pizza and then went home.
Playing with Dave Grohl in 2015
We were in Australia talking about Dave's old punk band, Scream.
And we just kinda threw it out there like, "dude, it would be awesome - we should do a Scream song."
He was like, "if you do it. I'm there."
And we did it with no fanfare, no announcement. The middle of a Rise Against song we were like, "okay, we're gonna play a Scream song. We got the drummer of Scream."
Rise Against is currently on the road. In September they continue their Rise of the Roach Tour where they and Papa Roach are celebrating 25 years in the game.
They'll be playing North America through the summer and fall. Get tickets on Rise Against's website.
Rise of the Roach remaining dates
Sep 10 Bridgeport, CT Hartford HealthCare Amphitheater
Sep 11 Syracuse, NY Empower Federal Credit Union Amphitheater at Lakeview
Sep 13 Wantagh, NY Northwell Health at Jones Beach Theater
Sep 14 Mansfield, MA Xfinity Center
Sep 16 Washington, DC The Anthem
Sep 17 Virginia Beach, VA The Dome
Sep 19 Allentown, PA PPL Center
Sep 20 Bangor, ME Maine Savings Amphitheater
Sep 23 Cincinnati, OH PNC Pavilion
Sep 24 Maryland Heights, MO Saint Louis Music Park
Sep 26 Indianapolis, IN Everwise Amphitheater at White River State Park
Sep 27 Tinley Park, IL Credit Union 1 Amphitheatre
Sep 28 Clarkston, MI Pine Knob Music Theatre
Sep 30 Rogers, AR Walmart AMP
Oct 1 Franklin, TN FirstBank Amphitheater
Oct 3 Charlotte, NC Skyla Credit Union Amphitheatre
Oct 4 Tampa, FL MIDFLORIDA Credit Union Amphitheatre
Oct 5 West Palm Beach, FL iTHINK Financial Amphitheatre
