Are We Really Saying Farewell to The Vans Warped Tour?

The rockin' weekend of The Vans Warped Tour in Atlantic City is now a memory, and although there's still the July 20-21 stop happening in Mountain View, CA, we're left wondering if this is really the end of the beloved pop punk event.

A lot of talk about this being the final tour has been circulating, and one question that many fans have for Kevin Lyman (creator and owner of Warped Tour) and other Warped staff is “why”?

Perhaps some of the dates for Warped Tour have seen decreases in ticket sales and attendance, but canceling the entire tour doesn't seem like the answer. According to The Press of Atlantic City, a staggering 30,000 people were in attendance for both days of the event a few weeks ago. This obviously means that people still care about this music festival and more importantly the bands associated with it. In a heavily overpopulated music festival climate Warped Tour is an anomaly, because most of the music acts perform using live instruments, with only a handful relying on pre-recorded arrangements. Live music is so important because it gives audiences an entirely different experience than if it were pre-recorded. Each audience gets an experience tailored to them and the venue, and that's something that doesn’t need to go away anytime soon.

Punk rock clearly isn’t dead, so Warped Tour shouldn’t die either. Perhaps this is a critical time to rethink and restructure for the future. I'm hopeful that this isn't the end for the tour so many look forward to each year. Here's to another 25 years!

Check out some photos from Warped Tour's stop in Atlantic City.

The article was written by Jermaine Sullivan, a Summer 2019 Digital Intern at Townsquare Media South Jersey.