The All-American Rejects are cool again and there is NOTHING you can do about it

Photo courtesy of Nicole Mago for Rolling Stone

We live in an age of concerts being seemingly inaccessible due to the exorbitant cost of tickets as a result of ticket bots/brokers buying up the majority of tickets at face value from artists like Taylor Swift before reselling them at ridiculous rates. With a ton of frustration boiling over on this matter from the general public, many wonder if concerts will ever be affordable again–especially with mainstream artists like Sabrina Carpenter, Travis Scott, and/or Morgan Wallen. 

I once had a coworker who told me that in ‘95, he saw the Foo Fighters at Newport Music Hall in Columbus, Ohio, for $10. I’d be lucky to see fees that low on concert tickets now. 

But there is now a band that represents the common man. The man unwilling to shell out over $150 on a nosebleed ticket to an arena concert. That band is none other than The All-American Rejects. 

After an uninspiring performance in Los Angeles to music industry executives to showcase their upcoming album, “Sandbox”, the band decided to put on an impromptu show for a college radio station at USC (no, not you South Carolina, I'm talking about the University Will Ferrell went to in LA). They put this show together and felt the infectious energy of inebriated college students when they are given free entertainment. The rest was history. This month, they put together a week-and-a-half-long pop-up show tour in obscure locations like a bowling alley in Minnesota, a barn in Iowa, and college house parties in Missouri and Wisconsin. 

Frontman and Bassist of the band known for their 2000s alternative/indie hits such as “Gives You Hell” and “Dirty Little Secret”, Tyson Ritter, recently spoke to Vulture about the tour in these unlikely destinations and wanting to provide a profit-free show. He explained, “I recently read something about people financing festival tickets, the complete inaccessibility of the concert experience in 2025, and how it’s juxtaposed against these wild and weird economic times. It blows my mind that our shows can still work.” 

With their humble roots growing up in working-class homes in Oklahoma, The All-American Rejects felt inclined to play for cities and people “in the middle-of-nowhere America who keep the lights on for our country” as Ritter described in the same Vulture interview. 

Charging just $5 at the doors of these shows to donate to local businesses and college radio stations, the Oklahomans are doing the so-called “lord’s work” and giving Americans something to smile about once again in these uncertain economic times plagued by inflation and tariff talk. In fact, according to Ritter, the owner of the bowling alley, Memory Lanes, in Minneapolis, Minnesota proclaimed with tears in his eyes that their pop-up show saved their business. 

Memory Lanes in Minneapolis hosted an unexpected 2000s-style rager. Photo by Nat Jacobs

These down-to-earth Pop rock icons also had their pop-up show at a University of Missouri college house shut down by the Columbia, Mizzou Police. The assistant chief of the Columbia Police Department, Mark Fitzgerald, actually admitted in a statement to CNN that he knew who the band was and listened to them in college. Before kicking them out, being men of the people, the cops allowed the band to play one more song before they officially shut down the pop-up show on the front lawn of a now legendary college party house. 

“The Police Department would be happy to have the All-American Rejects return and play in Columbia, hopefully with the proper permits and approval”, stated Fitzgerald to CNN. 

How badass is that?? You get your show shut down by the cops and yet, leave a lasting impression and have that same police department telling a major news organization like CNN they are happy to have you back in their community. That's the equivalent of your boss firing you but telling you they'd love to have you back again.

I, for one, am thrilled there is a band out there looking out for the common man and being in touch with their Middle American roots. And, according to Ritter himself in the same Vulture interview I’ve quoted twice already, these pop-up shows aren’t going anywhere. “This is going to be a feather we fly in our cap, and we’re going to Yankee Doodle as far as we can go”, said Mr. I haven’t aged in Twenty Years and still have majestic shaggy hair. 

With these middle American pop-up shows not going away anytime soon, perhaps it is time that I move back to Ohio. That way, maybe I can give $5 to see The All-American Rejects and help save a local Ohio business or witness a college party I’m way too old to attend get shut down in Athens (Ohio, not Greece). 

*This article was written while listening to The All-American Rejects and only actually knowing 3 of their songs*