The Aquabats, the West Coast’s resident superheroes of punk rock, are on a mission to the Jersey Shore. The band will perform Friday, June 26, at The Stone Pony Summer Stage as part of the North 2 Shore Festival, sharing a bill with Streetlight Manifesto and A Wilhelm Scream.
Lead singer Christian Jacobs, better known to fans as The MC Bat Commander, has spent three decades balancing the band’s theatrical antics with his success as a television visionary. As the co-creator of the Yo Gabba Gabba! franchise, Jacobs has seamlessly bridged the gap between underground music and acclaimed children’s entertainment.
The Aquabats celebrated their 30th anniversary in 2024, a milestone marked by the release of their fan-funded studio album, FINALLY! and despite the passing decades, the band’s unique brand of all-ages fun continues to attract a multi-generational following. Jacobs notes that the band’s longevity is rooted in a desire for human connection, with original fans now bringing their children and grandchildren to experience the show for themselves.
Ahead of their Asbury Park appearance, The Pop Break caught up with Jacobs to discuss the band’s enduring legacy and why, after 30 years, they are still having a great time on stage.
I can’t believe it, but it’s been 30 years since The Return of the Aquabats. Looking back, after all this time, how does it feel to know that the band has endured for 30-plus years and that this mission has continued for decades now?
You know, it’s pretty surreal, but, I mean, you’ve got to look at it a little bit like skateboarding or a hobby or something that you love to do and it’s so much fun – why would you ever want to stop surfing or skateboarding or playing music in general? I guess for some people, there’s golf and then for tennis players, there’s pickleball now, but it’s so much fun doing the Aquabats. And now, we’ve got generations of fans coming, people bringing their kids and in some cases, people bringing their grandkids to the shows that were there in the early days. And it’s pretty surreal, but it also makes sense because it’s always been about fun and connecting with people. And so, the fact that it’s flown by, what the old adage or whatever – time flies when you’re having fun? And time has flown. It’s been 30 years, but we’re still having a great time, so it’s a trip, for sure.
Have you guys noticed that kind of multi-generational appeal and really finding a younger audience correlated with both the original Yo Gabba Gabba! run and now the revival? Because the Aquabats are certainly present in both Yo Gabba Gabba! and Yo Gabba GabbaLand!
Yeah, absolutely. Obviously The Aquabats came before Yo Gabba Gabba! but, having our own kids and wanting to introduce them to new music and new art and styles and fun, I think that same spirit is still there in not only Yo Gabba Gabba! but also in The Aquabats, introducing new generations to live music.
And it’s cool, my youngest is 16 and he’s really into live music, rock bands and music from the ’90s (like) Green Day, and of course he’s really into Turnstile now and these bands that are the embodiment of human connection, where it’s everyone doing something different, but they’re connecting to make one sound, one noise, be one voice. And I think for us right now, in The Aquabats, it’s amazing to see a new generation of kids enthusiastic about live shows and connecting with people. And you’ve got some kids that had to wade through the whole pandemic when we didn’t know if we were ever going to be playing live shows again or being able to be around people again, and now here we are, six years later, people are really excited to come out of the isolation and and be connected to a human family again. It’s cool.
I’m bringing my kids and my wife to see you guys when you’re back in Asbury, so I totally get the whole multi-generational appeal. It’s awesome to be able to share something like that with your kids.
I think maybe in the beginning, for The Aquabats, it might have been a little more sarcastic and a little bit more like we were trying to get a reaction out of crowds that were not going to be excited about Saturday morning cartoon superheroes playing music. But then, it just made sense, I still read comics, I still watch cartoons, I still eat breakfast cereal with bright colors on it, so it just made sense like, “Wow, this works for our own kids and it works for young kids, and let’s just keep it pure and just keep doing it for fun,” so it’s exciting.
How has it been building a set list with such a back catalog, giving new songs their time but also fitting in plenty of classics?
It’s easier now than ever, because you can just look on your streaming platforms and see what are the highest-performing songs. So, it’s really easy to put together a greatest hits kind of thing. That’s maybe a buzzkill of an answer, but at our age as a band, people just want to hear the hits. And then we’ll get some requests for deep cuts, and I think we as a band would love to play more stuff off the new album, but I think people are still kind of getting accustomed to it and getting used to it.
So, we drop new songs in here and there, but I’m really excited about the new record. I personally think it’s our best record, and that’s kind of a cliche to say that as a band, “Our best record is the newest one available,” but it just feels like a full-circle kind of a thing. We started off one way, joking around, and then we’re now finishing it off in a more polished way and there are some serious songs on there, but then there’s a lot of joke-around songs on there. We cover a lot of different genres of music on the record and it’s cool. I wish we could play more of the songs, but the audience gets to pick because they’re the ones buying the tickets, so they pick and it’s usually based on what’s the most popular songs.
It’s funny. Sometimes you’ll meet kids and they’ll be like, “Are you going to play ‘The Shark Fighter?’” or “Are you going to play ‘Pizza Day’” or “Please play ‘Pool Party.’” It’s like, “OK, we will.” The popular ones kind of take precedent, but there are a bunch of cool deep cuts on Finally! and then there’s a bunch on the other records too that every now and then we get asked to play, but for the most part I think we’re just sticking to the popular ones and then trying to weave in a new one here and there that you feel like can fit into the set.
For tickets and more information for The Aquabats’ June 26 Asbury Park performance, visit https://www.stoneponyonline.com/calendar.
