The Wonder Years Still No Closer To Heaven

All of those support acts will be at every show, so you can expect shorter, high-energy sets to lead into the headliner.

The tour kicks off Oct. 15 in Columbus, Ohio’s Park Street SaloonThe Fillmore in Philadelphia. Along the way the band has a two-night stand scheduled at Webster Hall in New York Oct. 22-23 and plays Houses of Blues in Dallas, Houston and Boston.

Tonight, The Wonder Years plays a show in Lima, Peru and has a few more gigs in South America through the rest of the month. Riot Fest & Rodeo in Denver Sept. 2 and The Fillmore in Chicago Sept. 18 are also in the band’s plans.

The 2015 album No Closer To Heaven will be one of the main sources of material for this upcoming tour. One of the group’s most successful releases to date, that album has everything one would expect from a pop-punk album: lots of layered electric guitar work from the band’s three guitarists; angsty lyrics sung in a half-scream; and lots of high-energy drums.

Many of No Closer’s lyrics go beyond the genre’s traditional themes of young love and frustration with social pressures. The album addresses themes of religion, personal growth and social inequality. That The Wonder Years plays pop punk long after the genre’s heyday has decidedly passed shows the band is committed to doing things its own way.

The Wonder Years is over ten years old and with the exception of former keyboardist and vocalist Mikey Kelly, who left, the band has retained its original membership.

“We’ve played every day of being in this band with a chip on our shoulder,” frontman Dan “Soupy” Campbell said in an interview last year with TeamRock. “We are the people that don’t belong in the Top Ten. We weren’t supposed to be there. We literally started our career as a joke and we spent the first five years of it playing basements. So it’s very vindicating. I’ve said this phrase a couple of times, but it does feel like we’re crashing a party we weren’t invited to.”

Here is the routing for the tour:

Oct. 15 – Columbus, Ohio, Park Street Saloon
Oct. 16 – Rochester, N.Y., Anthology
Oct. 18 – Stroudsburg, Pa., Sherman Theater
Oct. 19 – Sayreville, N.J., Starland Ballroom
Oct. 21 – Baltimore, Md., Rams Head Live!
Oct. 22 – New York, N.Y., Webster Hall
Oct. 23 – New York, N.Y., Webster Hall
Oct. 24 – Toronto, Ontario, The Phoenix Concert Theatre
Oct. 26 – Cleveland, Ohio, Agora Theatre
Oct. 27 – Royal Oak, Mich., Royal Oak Music Theatre
Oct. 28 – Sauget, Ill., Pop’s
Oct. 29 – Lawrence, Kan., Granada Theatre
Oct. 30 – Denver, Colo., Ogden Theatre
Nov. 1 – Portland, Ore., McMenamins Crystal Ballroom
Nov. 2 – Seattle, Wash., The Showbox
Nov. 4 – Sacramento, Calif., Ace Of Spades
Nov. 5 – San Diego, Calif., SOMass. San Diego
Nov. 6 – Los Angeles, Calif., The Fonda Theatre
Nov. 8 – Las Vegas, Nev., Brooklyn Bowl Las Vegas
Nov. 9 – Tempe, Ariz., The Marquee
Nov. 11 – Dallas, Texas, House Of Blues
Nov. 12 – San Antonio, Texas, Alamo City Music Hall
Nov. 13 – Houston, Texas, House Of Blues
Nov. 15 – Nashville, Tenn., Cannery Ballroom
Nov. 16 – Atlanta, Ga., Heaven At The Masquerade
Nov. 17 – Tampa, Fla., The Ritz Ybor
Nov. 18 – Fort Lauderdale, Fla., Revolution Live
Nov. 19 – Jacksonville, Fla., Maverick’s
Nov. 20 – Charlotte, N.C., Amos’ SouthEnd
Nov. 22 – Boston, Mass., House Of Blues Boston

Tickets to these shows go on sale tomorrow, Aug. 17 at 10 a.m. local time. VIP passes to watch the band while it plays requests during sound check are available. Check out TheWonderYearsBand.com for the latest on the pop-punkers.