Buckcherry
Village Green – Addison IL
August 22, 2024
Photos and words – Roman Sobus
Summertime in Chicago is music festival season, with a dozen or so events on any given weekend ranging from local block parties featuring local talent to large formal festivals featuring national acts, often on multiple stages.
One such opportunity presented itself this past Thursday for a local festival in suburban Addison Illinois, about twenty miles from the city. It featured California rockers Buckcherry and since I had never had the pleasure of seeing them perform, that was to be my entertainment for the evening.
I arrived as the band was preparing to take the stage. The park was quite full for a weeknight event with food and merchandise vendors doing brisk business, The line for Buckcherry merch was quite long with tee shirts moving briskly. Despite the Village advertising nsw lyrics as part of the performance, a pretty diverse crowd turned out to the fest, ranging from little kid to a senior crowd.
The area around the front of the stage fill in to the bursting point as hundreds more enjoyed the performance from seats on the grass. The band performed a solid sixteen song set playing “Bent”, Sorry”, “Good Time” and “Gluttony” among others.
Lead singer Josh Todd took control of the stage, opening with “Lit Up” followed by “So Hott”. He is a talented performer with equally talented musicians behind him. Guitarists Stevie D and Billy Rowe keep the temp high, interacting with Todd throughout the set. Drummer Francis Ruiz and Bassist Kelly LeMiaux round out the current lineup.
These guys have been around for a long time, more than two decades with varied personnel, have ten studio albums and have many nominations and awards to their credit including BDS Spin Awards in 2007 for “Everything” and “Crazy Bitch”, BMI Best Pop Award (2009) for “Sorry”. I’m looking forward to diving into some of their earier material and will definitely be wanting to see them next time they are in town.
