Weezer w/ Modest Mouse, Momma at Azura Amphitheater, Bonner Springs, KS (2023-06-11)

MODEST MOUSE Setlist
Dramamine
Teeth Like God’s Shoeshine
Gravity Rides Everything
Float On
Back to the Middle
Wooden Soldiers
Satin in a Coffin
Fire It Up
Dashboard
Out of Gas
We Are Between
The World at Large

MOMMA Setlist

The ride everyone wants to join this season, Weezer’s Indie Rock Roadtrip pulled over at the Bonner Springs, KS exit, just outside Kansas City, to play a lively outdoor show under the stars and clearing skies at Azura Amphitheater.

Momma is a rising Los Angeles indie rock band and opened the evening with a thirty-minute-set, in support of recent record “Household Name” and more recent single, “Bang Bang”. The band would make a return appearance as well, jumping on stage to join Weezer for a song during their set.

Modest Mouse has managed to carry…err, Float On, despite the devastating death of their drummer Jeremiah Green at the end of last year (we caught the band last Sept w/Green and in December without), with the sun emerging from cloudy skies, just as the band took to the stage.

Latest LP is still 2021’s The Golden Casket, with a supposed 9-track follow-up EP, due soon and their hour-long set would wrap with 2004’s “The World At Large “and singer Isaac Brock crooning, “My thoughts were so loud.”

Weezer would begin as darkness filled the skies, illuminating the car dashboard stage set, themed around road trips and a large backdrop screen that showed animated versions of famous landmarks that could be visited on a road trip, as the band dipped into their entire three decade-plus musical catalogue.

Singer Rivers Cuomo gained instant applause, sporting a I Heart KC t-shirt and at one point early on, Cuomo said “something is wrong” and he “turned up the volume” on the dashboard stage to keep the road tunes and fun atmosphere going.

The young producer of their recent Van Weezer and SZN EPs, Suzy Shinn is from Wichita, first collaborating with on 2016’s “California Kids” and the band performed the song they wrote with her, acoustically around a central mic stand.

As the band performed “Island in the Sun” they all donned sunglasses and Cuomo would later say, “Every road trip needs a family photo” so he took a Polaroid photo of the 15,000+ people that were along for this ride. For whatever reason, Cuomo kept shouting out Wichita throughout the show (hey, this is KC!) and the encore of “Surf Wax America” and “Buddy Holly” put a solid end to a very entertaining musical road trip. 

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Billed as Weezer’s Indie Rock Roadtrip! This spring and summer touring package is among the best out there for the season. Weezer’s latest releases were a string of seasonal—or Sznz—EPs: Spring, Summer, Autumn, and Winter. Their last full album, Van Weezer, arrived in 2021.

The band was forced to cancel a planned Broadway run earlier this year, “due to low ticket sales and unbelievably high expenses” but the plus side to that, is they’re on the road again with another local date. Our coverage with them dates us all the way back to 1994, when they were a wee opening band!

As for Modest Mouse, we remain huge fans, seeing them live in September AND December of last year, and despite the death of founding drummer Jeremiah Green late last year, still remain on the road.

The Portland band’s sometimes temperamental appearances have seemed to have leveled out as singer Isaac Brock ages, and they’ve become a more consistent band to again always see live. 

LA indie rockers Momma have a new single, “Bang Bang” out now.

WEEZER Tour Dates

(All photos by Brandon Clasen; Click on any image to enlarge and see in full)