Pinhead Gunpowder Announce Fall North American Tour With 12 Dates

Pinhead Gunpowder are back on the road. The East Bay punk outfit featuring Billie Joe Armstrong, Aaron Cometbus, Bill Schneider, and Jason White just announced the Bum Rush Tour, a 12-date North American run kicking off in October and stretching into November. If you've been waiting for this band to tour behind their comeback record, this is it.

For those who might not know, Pinhead Gunpowder has been around since 1991. Formed in the East Bay area of California, the band has always operated outside the massive shadow of Green Day. It's scrappier, rawer, and deeply rooted in the DIY punk world that Billie Joe and company came up in. The name itself comes from a brand of green tea Aaron Cometbus found during a dumpster dive at the Arcata co-op. That tells you everything you need to know about the energy here.

The Album That Brought Them Back

The band dropped their album Unt on October 18, 2024, via 1-2-3-4 Go Records. That record was a massive deal for longtime fans. It was their first full-length since 1997's Goodbye Ellston Avenue and their first new music of any kind since the 2008 EP West Side Highway. That's a 16-year gap between releases. They recorded it in 2023 with longtime collaborator Chris Dugan, and honestly, the record sounds like no time passed at all. Just pure, fast, catchy East Bay punk.

Now they're finally taking it on the road. I'll be real, I wasn't sure we'd ever see Pinhead Gunpowder tour like this. These are proper venues in major cities, not just one-off Bay Area shows.

Full Tour Dates

Here's the full routing for the Bum Rush Tour:

Oct 7 – Minneapolis, MN — First Avenue

Oct 8 – Chicago, IL — Metro

Oct 10 – Detroit, MI — Saint Andrew's Hall

Oct 11 – Toronto, ON — Danforth Music Hall

Oct 14 – New York, NY — Irving Plaza

Oct 16 – Philadelphia, PA — First Unitarian Church

Nov 3 – Seattle, WA — The Showbox

Nov 4 – Portland, OR — Roseland Theater

Nov 7 – San Francisco, CA — August Hall

Nov 8 – San Luis Obispo, CA — Fremont Theater

Nov 10 – Los Angeles, CA — Pacific Electric

Nov 11 – Garden Grove, CA — Garden Amphitheatre

Support Acts

The tour has two different openers depending on the leg. Night Shop, the songwriting project of Justin Sullivan (who you might know from Kevin Morby, The Babies, and Flat Worms), is handling the East Coast and Midwest dates. Constant Insult, a Minneapolis-based punk band known for cathartic harmonies and frenetic tempos, picks up the West Coast run. Both are solid picks that fit the vibe perfectly.

Tickets and What You Need to Know

Tickets go on sale Thursday, May 21 at 10 AM local time. You can grab them through AXS.

Look at these venues. First Avenue, Metro, Irving Plaza, First Unitarian Church, The Showbox. These are iconic rooms. Seeing Pinhead Gunpowder in a place like First Unitarian Church in Philly is going to be a completely different experience than catching Billie Joe in a stadium with Green Day. This is stripped down, loud, and in your face. These rooms are going to be packed and sweaty and exactly what this music calls for.

Don't sleep on this one. A band that went 16 years without releasing new music and then dropped a full album doesn't tour like this very often. If you're anywhere near these cities, get your tickets tomorrow morning before they're gone.

Cover photo courtesy of Ticketmaster