Pierce The Veil live at Cascades Amphitheater, June 23, 2025
Cascades Amphitheater was a sea of brightly colored hair, fishnets and band tees on June 23, 2025. Having seen both Pierce The Veil and Sleeping With Sirens at 1300-1500 cap venues in recent years, I couldn’t imagine the two together would fill an amphitheater that fits 18,000 people. Or well, maybe I did imagine it — since I bought my ticket immediately during the presale just in case. The two post-hardcore powerhouses brought a multi-generational crowd to Ridgefield, Wa. on Pierce The Veil’s “I Can’t Hear You” world tour, a tour celebrating every era of the band, playing songs from each record to date. In front of the barricade, I spotted a mother and daughter in matching Pierce The Veil shirts in the distinct early-2010s Hot Topic-era style. The Gen Z crowd showed up in scene attire reminiscent of my middle school and high school years. There were the “cool grandmas” and the millennials with their school-aged kids. Dedicated fans even dressed up in costume, with many taking inspiration from Pierce The Veil’s first album, A Flair For The Dramatic, and donning wedding attire with tear-streaked black eyeliner.
As fans eagerly waited, the Mexican ranchera anthem “El Rey”, popularized by Vicente Fernandez, began blasting on the speakers. “Llorar y llorar” fans sang as they waved mini Mexican flags. The recording ended and the large black curtain dropped to reveal 5 black drapes, each with a red emblem signifying each of the band’s 5 albums. The backtrack to “Death Of An Executioner” started and drapes dropped to reveal the band. Fans cheered loudly, hands raised. Bassist Jaime Percado immediately spun in circles as guitarist Tony Perry headbanged on the opposite side the stage. After “Death Of An Executioner” from their 2023 album The Jaws Of Life, Pierce The Veil went into an old favorite, “Bulls In The Bronx”, from their arguably most popular 2012 album Collide With The Sky, a song that pays homage to their Mexican roots with its mariachi-style breakdown. Percado and Perry took full advantage of the large amphitheater stage, running from side to side and leaning over to make eye contact with fans at the front of the barricade. Touring drummer Loniel Robinson smiled as he smashed the cymbals. The audience sang along loudly with vocalist Vic Fuentes.
Pierce The Veil’s 18-song setlist also featured songs from earlier albums that hadn’t been heard live for several years, such as “Wonderless” from their 2007 debut album A Flair For The Dramatic, which, up until this tour, the band hadn’t played live since 2010, as well as a snippet of “She Makes Dirty Words Sound Pretty” from 2010’s Selfish Machines, which also hadn’t been played live since that album’s tour in 2010. Though no album was left out in their setlist, I did feel that Selfish Machines didn’t get enough attention, with the band only playing two songs from that album and one of them being a snippet (“Disasterology” being the other song played from Selfish Machines). Upon further research, some of the earlier shows on the tour got to hear “Caraphernelia”, “Bulletproof Love” and an acoustic rendition of “Kissing In Cars”, songs that were unfortunately later dropped from the setlist.
Nevertheless, Pierce The Veil still gave a grand performance of their entire discography, with the finale being the song many had been eagerly waiting to hear — “King For A Day”, with Kellin Quinn from Sleeping With Sirens joining the band on stage to perform his parts live. I’m almost certain getting to hear this pinnacle emo anthem with its featured vocalist was a huge part of the draw of this tour for many attendees.
Sleeping With Sirens treated the crowd to a set of songs from different iterations of their career as well, playing several hits from their 2011 album Let’s Cheers To This as well as songs from 2015’s Madness and 2019’s How It Feels To Be Lost, and of course, the ever popular emo love anthem “If I’m James Dean, You’re Audrey Hepburn”. Sleeping With Sirens switched up their setlist for Ridgefield as well — something we can thank Quinn’s family being in attendance at the show for. The band played “Agree to Disagree” and “Scene Two: Roger Rabbit” for the first time during this tour — “Agree To Disagree” because it is Quinn’s son’s favorite song and “Scene Two: Roger Rabbit” because “we’ve been getting a lot of requests for this one”. A native of Medford, Oregon, Quinn made it a point to shout out his family during the set and show his love and appreciation for them.
Joining Pierce The Veil and Sleeping With Sirens on tour was Beach Weather, an indie rock band from Massachusetts. I first heard Beach Weather from their feature they did with The Maine’s song “thoughts I have while lying in bed” and of course, had heard their platinum single “Sex, Drugs, Etc.,” but beyond that hadn’t listened to them much before the show. However, from what I had heard of their music, I was surprised to see them on the bill with Pierce The Veil and Sleeping With Sirens. Their indie dream-pop vibes contrasted with the heavier emo side of the headlining and main support act on this tour, but nonetheless their catchy rhythms got the audience smiling and dancing. Considering the genre difference, many fans may not have been familiar with Beach Weather before the show, but I’m sure the band ended their set having won over many new fans, myself included.
Photos and review by Jax Lamont
