Go with Elmo Lovano 81. Kevin Lyman: Building Warped Tour, Breaking Bands & Bringing Punk to the Masses
Episode 81: Kevin Lyman. The Vans Warped Tour is the longest-running touring music festival in North America, drawing over 750,000 fans every summer at its peak. And it all started with one guy — Kevin Lyman.
In this episode, we sit down in person with the man who turned parking lots into punk rock playgrounds, helped break some of the biggest names in music, and built a generation-defining cultural movement.
Warped Tour was the first concert I ever went to at 13 years old, and a few years later, I was lucky enough to play the tour multiple times, including full runs, and again in 2010 with Skrillex. It was a big contributor in shaping my life. In this conversation, I finally got to ask Kevin everything I’ve wanted to know for years.
We dive deep into:
- How Kevin started Warped Tour from scratch
- How he landed the sponsorship deal with Vans
- The behind-the-scenes details that kept it running for 24 years
- How he gave stages to artists like Sublime, No Doubt, Blink-182, Eminem, My Chemical Romance, Fall Out Boy, Avenged Sevenfold, Paramore, Deftones, Katy Perry, The Used, Good Charlotte, New Found Glory, Sugar Ray, and MXPX
- How legends like NOFX, Bad Religion, Rancid, Pennywise, and Less Than Jake helped anchor the tour
- Why set times changed daily, were never announced in advance, and who set them
- Working with Sublime, what Brad Nowell was like, and how Brad's death led Kevin to focus on helping people with recovery
- Kevin's personal mission, values, and work ethic behind it all
This 90-minute deep dive is the ultimate Warped Tour tell-all. We recorded it right after the first Warped Tour returned in Washington D.C. in July 2025 — with Long Beach and Florida still to come.
Kevin Lyman is a punk rock pioneer, a cultural architect, and one of the most influential figures in live music. I’m honored to share this one with you. Here’s my conversation with the amazing Kevin Lyman. Let's go!!
‘Go with Elmo Lovano’ is a weekly podcast where Elmo interviews creatives and entrepreneurs in music on HOW they push forward every day, got where they are in their careers, manage their personal lives, and share lessons learned and their most important insights.
(0:00:00) INTRO
(0:05:04) WARPED TOUR 2025 D.C.
(0:09:12) WARPED TOUR 1998
(0:12:30) WHY KEVIN CREATED WARPED TOUR
(0:15:54) VANS
(0:16:30) WARPED TOUR YEAR ONE
(0:19:29) BLINK-182
(0:19:56) HOW VANS GOT INVOLVED
(0:26:10) BECOMING PROFITABLE
(0:28:06) CREATING DAILY SET TIMES
(0:29:35) SET TIME LOTTERY
(0:32:28) HOW TO SETUP WARPED TOUR
(0:34:34) MAKING PEOPLE HAPPY
(0:35:33) BRINGING FRIENDS ON STAGE, SKRILLEX (SONNY MOORE)
(0:39:35) LEGENDARY BANDS
(0:41:32) THE PUNKS
(0:44:51) BLINK-182, TOUR BUS STORIES
(0:50:06) KEVIN’S WARPED TOUR DAILY ROUTINE
(0:54:16) SUBLIME
(0:55:39) KICKING OUT SUBLIME IN 1995
(1:00:22) BRADLEY NOWELL
(1:03:30) 2019 WARPED TOUR, BRINGING IT BACK IN 2025
(1:05:24) NOFX
(1:07:19) NO DOUBT 1995
(1:08:23) CRAZY STORIES
(1:10:05) KEVIN’S DREAM WARPED TOUR BILL
(1:12:04) LONG BEACH 2025
(1:13:04) BIGGEST WARPED TOUR MOMENT, BECOMING A PROFESSOR
(1:14:13) HOW TO WALK AWAY
(1:17:53) HANDLING HEALTH
(1:19:21) L.A. WILDFIRES
(1:21:44) HOW TO SKIP THE 2025 WARPED TOUR LINE
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