The Academy Is…
The Fillmore
29 E. Allen St.
Philadelphia
Sunday, November 23, 2025
Just about 20 years ago, my mom drove me to Atlantic City to see the “Truckstops and Statelines” tour at the House of Blues. There was a nor’easter rolling in that night (which would leave us stuck in AC) but I was freshly 13 and determined to see The Academy Is… perform their debut album, Almost Here. Reluctantly, my mom packed up the car and we rolled out of Philly and over the Ben Franklin Bridge, listening to a burned CD of all of the bands playing that night: Acceptance, Hellogoodbye, Panic! At The Disco, and of course, TAI.
That snowy night, as Philly’s then-Mayor John F. Street called for folks to stay off the roads and over a foot of the fluffy white stuff accumulated on the ground, my mom and I had the time of our lives. And so once The Academy Is… announced they’d be touring to celebrate 20 years of Almost Here, I knew I had to be there. The album reminds me of a specific time and place in my life, and brings back both the sweetest and darkest of emo memories. While my mom is way beyond her era of joining me in going to concerts, I went with one of my childhood best friends, Megan. For both of us, the night was nostalgic and therapeutic. It was a way to appreciate our lifelong friendship.
The author and a democratic curatorial setlist strategy.
In all honesty, I couldn’t be sure if The Academy Is… still had it. And with tickets on StubHub going for $24, I wondered if they could even fill the room. Before this Sunday, I hadn’t seen them live since they were on “The AP Tour Fall Ball” in 2009. The members of the band – William Beckett, Adam T. Siska, Mike Carden, and Andy “The Butcher” Mrotek – had obviously lived a lot of life since regularly performing this music. But I had too, and I hoped we’d meet each other in a place of understanding.
As it turned out, I had nothing to worry about. TAI drew a huge crowd to The Fillmore, and the band sounded as good as ever, if not better with more mature vocals. The fan turnout was mostly of my same generation – OG fans wearing vintage TAI merch and with cat makeup on as a callback to the antics of the fandom in the 2000s – but some fans were younger, either there with their parents or somehow having discovered the band on their own. The scene isn’t dead!
While TAI is in no way an emo band, Almost Here is their most emotional album, and the one that always resonated with me the most as a teenager. The album is largely about wanting to push yourself to do the things that scare you in order to escape a difficult situation. In the case of the band, they desperately wanted to break out and begin touring. In my case, at the time, I wanted to be a music journalist. It’s almost too mushy to be true, but I achieved my dream alongside this band touring the 20 year anniversary of an album that meant something different and special to each person in the room; the nostalgia factor was off the charts.
The band played Almost Here front to back, starting with “Attention” and ending with the title track, with new songs and hits from their other albums mixed in. All of the classic TAI performance pieces were there: Beckett (the lead singer) strutting across the stage, his voice like crushed velvet; the energy from the band and their interactions with each other; and conversation with the crowd.
Between songs, Beckett reminded us more than once that he was wearing Eagles green. He noted that we needn’t worry about the frustrating score of the game, and that Jalen Hurts is one of his Fantasy Football quarterbacks. This may have been a bit of entertaining damage control, as the show’s opener, Little Image, was from Dallas and lightly gloated about the game before apologizing and saying they “didn’t mean to start a riot.”
Corny only-in-Philly crowd pleasing comments aside, the band really knew their audience. The setlist was hits only, and attendees definitely appreciated it. Even the two new songs, “Miracle” and “2005,” were graciously received. For me, a new song never hits when I’m hearing it live, so it’s unclear right now whether or not I’ll love them the way I love songs from their earlier albums. But the songs felt like a smooth continuation of where they left off, rather than a complete diversion. They were significantly poppier than what we came to hear on Almost Here, but much of what comes later in their discography also sounds that way. TAI promised that their new album is complete and coming in 2026, along with a tour that will be stopping in Philly next year.
The only disappointing part of this show came not from the band, but the crowd. Fans were given a QR code to vote for the special encore song they’d play that night. The options included “Summer Hair = Forever Young,” “We’ve Got a Big Mess on Our Hands,” or “Snakes on a Plane (Bring It).” For Megan and me (as a person who had recently sang all three vocal parts of it at karaoke), the obvious choice was “Snakes on a Plane.” But for the majority of the crowd, the choice was “Big Mess.” I have to respect the democracy of it all, but I certainly would have given “Snakes” my all.
Leaving the show, Megan and I felt high on the memories of our youth. Some sad, some weird, some beautiful. What it all boiled down to was that much has changed, both for better and for worse, but we still had each other and one of the bands that brought us so close together. We still had Almost Here in all of its angst and hopefulness. And for one night, we got to release some demons side by side, all while singing along to an album we’ve loved for two decades. Now, all we need is a blizzard.
