Bowling For Soup hit a strike in Cardiff Castle
Words: Matthew Moore
Photos: Nadine Ballantyne
★★★★☆
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There are two types of people who write gig reviews: those who write about setlists, and those who are searching for real answers. My primary objective isn’t to review the songs, the vibe of the crowd, or the atmosphere. It’s to find out the real answer to the classic question that’s been posed to this band for over 30 years, which apparently has been answered before, but I need to see the truth in front of my very eyes.
Are they bowling in exchange for soup? Or bowling on behalf of soup? Surely tonight, alongside American Hi-Fi, and Frank Turner & The Sleeping Souls, we may finally see and hear for ourselves.
Photo: Nadine Ballantyne
American Hi-Fi
After we made our way into the scenic Cardiff Castle, American Hi-Fi started very shortly after our arrival. Pop punk isn’t really a genre I’m super into; I appreciate the appeal, but I’m pretty much an outsider, save for the mainstream bands. That being said, you can tell American Hi-fi are good at what they do; it just wasn’t entirely for me. They bring out the classic underdog Pop Punk / Punk Rock songs about breakups, small towns, and self-sabotage.
They’re pretty cookie-cutter for the most part, but you can tell they have a little bit more of that 2000s grunge to some of their playing. For one of the songs, Gary, the drummer of Bowling for Soup, joined them, which served as a nice introduction to the theme of friendship and camaraderie that would permeate the entire event.
For their final song, much to my surprise, I found myself singing along to some of the words. I was unaware that they had written ‘Flavour of the Week’, which had heavy rotation in the early 2000s on Kerrang and similar TV stations. Despite the frontman, Stacy Jones, calling out that he had forgotten the words 3 lines into the song, it was a good send-off to the start of the show. Assuming you’re into Pop-Punk, that is.
American Hi-Fi are a classic Tomato and Basil with a side of crispy grilled cheese.
Frank Turner & The Sleeping Souls
The next act on is Frank Turner & The Sleeping Souls, a high-energy Folk-Punk act bringing a no-barriers, deeply confessional, and emotionally raw change of pace. I’ve unfortunately never had the pleasure of watching a performance by Frank Turner, and I’m pretty annoyed at that fact. Despite starting with a song which I dubbed a little ‘Millennial Core’, bringing those stomp-clap cliches that I tend to find rather cringe-inducing, I found myself enamoured by the rest of the performance.
As Frank Turner put it, “I’ve been in Hardcore bands for most of my life”. You can tell, as his stage presence is unmatched for the tour he’s currently found himself on. The much higher energy and crowd interaction are a very welcome change for the night. The stage show and lights are also of a decent quality, with light strips dotted around the stage, as well as a few classic-looking amplifiers giving it more of a smaller club vibe rather than the giant outdoor stage they’re playing.
Frank Turner has a very diverse musical style that’s hard to pin down, Folk, into Rock, into Punk adjacent but the lyrics and the messages of the music are the driving force. Frank Turner sings about ageing, power struggles, anti-authoritarianism, screw-ups, and everything in between. The set is curated for the stage; Frank structures his music with heavy audience interaction and participation. At one point, he organised a slow and almost adorable circle pit. Later on, he spoke about his time in Hardcore bands where a Wall of Death would happen on stage, but before letting the crowd run into each other, he said that Punk Rock is not just about noise and being angry; it’s about love and community. He then invited the members of the wall of death to turn it into a wall of hugs.
Frank Turner is a brilliant songwriter and an even better performer. During his last song, he ditched his acoustic guitar and ran straight into the crowd, climbed up on top of them and continued to sing while crowd surfing. A callback to his hardcore roots, which he just can’t seem to shrug off, to the delight of the audience and himself. At the end of the set, he stated he’s performed 3164 shows. And to be honest, with how well he commands the stage. You can absolutely tell.
Frank Turner is a hearty lentil & vegetable soup with a side of thick sourdough.
Bowling For Soup
The headliners for the show opened the stage with a very different atmosphere from the previous act. Bowling for Soup are known to be a ‘Goofball’ tongue-in-cheek pop-punk band, and I wasn’t expecting to enjoy the set as much as I did. Part stand-up comedy and part pop-punk classics, the band began the show with a comedic video with cartoons and, to my surprise, quite a lot of Welsh words on a few slides.
Bowling for Soup have been around for 30+ years, and you can tell. They seem to love what they’re doing, and despite their often saying that “They’re getting old”, which they even have a song about, they still sound great. The visuals, jokes, and interaction played off very well for the Cardiff crowd. After their first song, ‘Almost’, they played a fan favourite, ‘High School Never Ends’, and that would be one of the highlights of the set for me, as well as for a fair amount of the crowd.
It seems like a Bowling for Soup set is more like improv stand-up comedy, where pop-punk accidentally happens sometimes. Their self-deprecating and banterish humour plays off really well. I’m actually surprised there weren’t more fart and dick jokes. They play off the crowd and pick out members to become running jokes while they play. At one point in the show, they stopped playing entirely and pointed to a guy in a cowboy hat and continued to shout him out multiple times during the show, creating an in-joke and connection with the crowd.
Halfway through the improv set turned rock concert, they stated they had a ‘Mid-Show Photo Opportunity’ to the surprise of at least 98% of the crowd, a person in an elaborate Dragon costume came on stage, with smoke billowing out of its mouth. They then conversed with the dragon and posed for it, making up a story about how they found the dragon flying around the castle and invited it onto the stage with them. Huge thank you to Dheansaur, Mythic Adventures and Rage PR for this one - without them FOMO would have never been able to collaborate opportunities like this and get a dragon on stage in Cardiff Castle!
It’s not all poop and dick jokes with Bowling for Soup. The frontman Jaret spoke about his struggles with mental illness, much like his co-headliners, who told the audience that you’re not alone and that there is always help for you. He then began the song ‘Turbulence’, which is a song he wrote about struggling with mental health, anxiety and depression.
After another classic ‘Girl All the Bad Guys Want’, ‘The Bitch Song’ and a cover of ‘Stacy’s Mom’ (which I’m sure half the world thinks is a bowling for soup song anyway), they said they were supposed to walk off stage and pretend like they’d left, to come back and play one more. Apparently the stairs were a problem, and they just didn’t really bother. After some more waffling and banter, in the darkness and shadow of the castle, they ended with the song ‘1985’.
Bowling for Soup are a band that are deliberately uncool, unserious and unpretentious. They are incredibly silly, and after 30+ years of playing, you can tell they still love making people laugh and smile while making fun of everyone and themselves.
Bowling for Soup are an Alphabet Soup with a side of Doritos and a can of Red Bull.
I guess we’ll never find out if they’re bowling for or on behalf of soup.
TK Maxx presents Depot Live at Cardiff Castle 2026 – which sees a record 24 headline shows from some of music’s biggest and best-known stars – continues on Thursday with a headline show from Billy Ocean.