Mayday Parade will take the stage at Blue Moose, 211 Iowa, at 6 p.m. Saturday. The alternative rock/punk band — which rose to fame in the early 2000s — was last in Iowa City in 2011, also at Blue Moose.
Iowa City is the 10th stop on the band’s new tour, the Honeymoon Tour. The tour also features the bands Tonight Alive and PVRIS.
Mayday Parade formed almost 10 years ago in Tallahassee, Florida. Originally, the group consisted of six men, but the number has since dropped to five: Derek Sanders, Alex Garcia, Brooks Betts, Jeremy Lenzo, and Jake Bundrick. They have been together the last seven years, working on perfecting their blend of pop-punk music.
The band is known for its devoted fan base; its début EP, Tales Told by Dead Friends, was released independently without a label and still managed to sell more than 50,000 copies. The band has only grown since then, selling more than 3 million tracks total. Its fourth and most recent album, Monsters in the Closet, sold 30,000 copies the first week it was released in October 2013. The band members have announced their fifth album will be released sometime in 2015.
Live shows tend to be the band’s forte, mixing the energy of classic rock shows into its alternative-rock set lists. The fourth album keeps with its traditional style that just begs for sing-alongs that crowds love. Iowa City must still have a love for the group — tickets for the concert at Blue Moose have been sold out for weeks.
— by Justus Flair