The Offspring, Sum 41, Rival Sons, Lit and more at Sabroso Festival

The Offspring at Sabroso Festival

Sabroso Craft Beer, Taco, and Music Festival with The Offspring, Sum 41, Rival Sons, Lit, Unwritten Law, Metalachi, and Fused By Defiance. Doheny State Beach, Dana Point, CA, April 8, 2017

After a night of a Southern California rain, the clouds were clearing over the beaches of Dana Point, and Sabroso Craft Beer, Taco, and Music Festival was about to begin. Taking place at the picturesque Doheny State Beach, the sold old concert sponsored by local radio station KLOS featured some of the very best bands from the LA/OC music scene.

Headlined by The Offspring, the Sabroso Festival would also highlight 26 taco trucks, a free craft beer tasting, and a taco eating contest – all this and so more rendering Sabroso one of the most epic, original, and thoroughly entertaining music festivals to hit our local shores in quite some time!

Fused By Defiance at Sabroso

Kicking off the Sabroso Festival were locals Fused By Defiance, the Slidebar Battle Of The Bands winner, who clearly demonstrated why they earned their way on to the stage to open the festivities. Imagine a mighty amalgamation of Metallica and Rage Against The Machine, and you are just beginning to envision the sonic burst of energy Fused By Defiance has in store for you. Upcoming shows include opening for The Iron Maidens at The Cave on April 29th and supporting POD at The Observatory OC on May 4th!  Highwire Daze Online plans to revisit this band again in the future.

There is nothing in the world like Metalachi – a dynamic collective who bill themselves as The World’s First and Only Heavy Metal Mariachi Band. Performing blistering, wondrously mind-blowing covers from bands such as Black Sabbath, Motorhead, and Metallica, Metalachi was the perfect addition to the Sabroso beach party. All this, and their stunning cover of Slayer’s Reign In Blood had the early attendees holding their metal horns high and proud in the air. Do not miss Metalachi when they bring their captivating, wickedely entertaining show to your town!

Lit at Sabroso Festival

Unwritten Law made the brief trek from San Diego to entertain the crowd with their superbly infectious punk rock anthems, starting the party in the pit early on. California Sky was the perfect song to witness with the ocean waves shimmering in the background. Other Unwritten Law entreaties included She Says, Save Me, and Up All Night. Scott Russo and company are as wildly effective as ever in a live setting, and what a terrific crowd response they received!

Welcome To The Party was the call to arms as OC’s own Lit took to the stage, presenting a raging set of rocking anthems from their past, present and future! One unexpectedly poignant highlight was during Miserable, when a marriage proposal was made live onstage as the guy got on his knees and sung very persuasively “you make me complete” to the rather surprised girl. And she said YES! A few exciting new songs from their upcoming Pledgemusic release were unveiled as well as the classic tracks. The Lit set ended with the slamming one-two punch of Four and My Own Worst Enemy from their breakthrough A Place In The Sun album. 20 years later and the mighty Lit remain a tremendous force of in your face party rock and roll!

Rival Sons has been all over the airwaves at KLOS and presented a vibrantly intensive set at Sabroso. One could clearly see why KLOS and so many other radio stations across the nation champion this amazing hard working collective. Especially effective was their call to Burn Down Los Angeles as well as their many other mesmerizing songs. A supremely powerful set from this Long Beach-based collective!

A summer on the Vans Warped Tour reintroduced the world to the rapturous songs of Sum 41, and what a treat it was to see them again at Sabroso! Inviting three random fans up from the audience to witness the fun and devastation first hand from the stage, Sum 41’s trademark pop punk anthems thrilled the listener no matter where they were situated at the spacious Doheny State Beach. It was truly All Killer, No Filler as Sum 41 unleashed classics such as Walking Disaster, Motivation, In Too Deep, Goddamn I’m Dead Again and whole lot more!

Sum 41 at Sabroso Festival

Up next was an epic taco eating contest sponsored by Chronic Tacos and Gringo Bandit Hot Sauce. Consisting of how many tacos you could eat in 10 minutes, the winner included Molly Schuyler who took the $1500 second place price downing 139 tacos and the almighty Takeru Kobayashi who inhaled 159 tacos for the $5000 grand prize!

The sun had now set and the air was quick to chill over, and yet the rock was far from over – thanks to an outstanding set by The Offspring. Opening with You’re Gonna Go Far, Kid from their 2008 release Rise and Fall, Rage and Grace, The Offspring had the not tired at all throngs jumping up and down and ready to rage into the night. All I Want and Nitro (Youth Energy) would follow, with The Offspring performing with a massive amount of energy and enthusiasm. And once they burst into the legendary commencement of “You gotta keep ‘em separated” from their landmark hit Come Out And Play, the beach party transported into the stratosphere with excitement and pit action. Sabroso Festival was an all-out triumph, thanks to inspired band booking, imaginative events, and a clearly supportive crowd reveling at the gorgeous Doheny State Beach location. See you at Sabroso in 2018, where we will no doubt see competitive eaters Takeru Kobayashi and Molly Schuyler consume even more tacos than ever as the bands rage on!!!

(Review by Ken Morton – Photos by Jack Lue)

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