This Memorial Day Weekend in New Jersey, an extra slew of cars made their way down the Garden State Parkway to Exit 38 in Atlantic City for the very first Adjacent Festival. The emo/pop-punk leaning festival drew a huge crowd to the beach for a perfectly hot summer weekend of sun, sand, and music.
Kicking things off on each of the three stages (appropriately named after the Atlantic City-inspired board game Monopoly) on Saturday were Jersey Calling, Playing Dead, and Well Wisher. The long entrance lines meant some fans didn’t make it in quite early enough to catch these sets, but by the time acts such as Drug Church, Pinkshift, and The Linda Lindas started their sets, the crowds were full and spirits were high.
Saturday’s lineup really leaned into the beach setting, as Slaughter Beach, Dog and Beach Bunny played back to back sets on the Boot and Top Hat Stages. Other Saturday highlights included PUP, Jeff Rosenstock, and Meet Me At The Altar. Andrew McMahon brought the nostalgia working songs like “Dark Blue” and “I Woke Up In A Car” into his set and Jimmy Eat World played the always-beautiful sunset slot on the main stage before Paramore brought night one home.
Sunday’s lineup made space for hardcore on the main stage, with Knocked Loose and Turnstile drawing huge crowds, who probably still have sand in their shoes a full week later. Headlining Sunday, and brining the entire festival to a close, was Blink-182 in their original lineup with Tom DeLonge, Travis Barker, and Mark Hoppus.
Across both days, the festival had a huge number of Jersey natives sprinkled throughout the lineup. This included The Front Bottoms, who played Talon of The Hawk in full as the festival fell in the midst of a 10-year anniversary tour for the album. Extremely on the nose, Thursday opened their set with a cover of Bruce Springsteen’s “Atlantic City”, while later on in the night Jack Antonoff asked the crowd at Bleachers’ set how many bands had covered that song so far.
All around, Adjacent absolutely left their mark this first year. Hopefully the festival will become a staple for kicking off the summer on the beach, and we can’t wait to see what next year brings.
All Photos: Dana Gorab
