THE USED with The Funeral Portrait
House of Blues
Boston, MA
04.09.25
LIVE REVIEW BY SAM COHEN
PHOTOGRAPHS BY JEREMY SAFFER
The Used kicked off the first of three nights at the House of Blues in Boston on their 25th Anniversary Tour. The first night of their celebration featured the band playing their debut studio album, The Used (2002), in full.
The venue was packed and the atmosphere was noticeably energetic when opener The Funeral Portrait took the stage. The band played a solid set—lead singer Lee Jennings had a clear, strong voice, and everyone put on an entertaining performance. It wasn’t long before they exited the stage and preparation began for The Used’s first stage setup, which featured the self-titled album cover in the background.
A nostalgic video kicked off the set and featured an emotional array of clips recapping 25 years of The Used and the band’s history. There were moments showcasing album signings and concerts, but the most touching of these were the clips of Bert McCracken talking about the unbelievable trajectory they were finding themselves on following the release of The Used. The entire thing was an homage to where the Utah-born group had come from, which was a sentiment that McCracken echoed numerous times throughout the night. Looking out over the crowd in between songs, he expressed his gratitude for everyone in the room, including his fellow bandmates. “We were just four dudes from Utah playing in a basement before this record came out,” McCracken said.
The video ended with shots of someone flipping through the lyric book for The Used’s original CD, interspersed with additional clips of the band, before the curtain dropped and the entire venue erupted into a burst of energy. “Maybe Memories,” the first song on the album, served as a warm-up for what the rest of the evening would entail. Though nothing could really prepare the audience for how magical it would be when they started playing “The Taste of Ink.”
Throughout the song, McCracken stopped singing and held the microphone aloft, inviting the crowd to sing along. Hearing an entire room full of people scream, “It’s four o’clock in the fucking morning!” was something memorable. There was also one beautiful moment when bassist Jeph Howard, drummer Dan Whitesides, and guitarist Joey Bradford all stopped playing, and the only sound in the room was the crowd’s collective voice. It was a goosebump inducing embodiment of the lyrics, and you could tell by the grin on McCracken’s face that he was truly “savoring every moment of this.”
The lighting shifts throughout the set amplified the experience and created a unique atmosphere for each song. The most special element, though, was the constant crowd participation. Every time McCracken paused to invite the audience to sing along, the electricity in the room notched up another degree until the air itself was buzzing. These instances were highlighted by his comments expressing how happy they were to be there, and what being able to celebrate this album in this way meant to each member of the band. It’s clear that being a frontman is what McCracken was born to do. Funny and authentically chaotic, he called out, “This song is the greatest song ever written,” before they launched into “A Box Full of Sharp Objects,” sending the energy back up into the atmosphere once more.
As The Used made their way through their debut album, it was rewarding to see and hear McCracken sing these deeply personal, painful songs from a place of healing. It’s clear that he has grown and changed over the years alongside the rest of us, but he is still authentically himself, which is what has always made The Used so exciting to follow. He, along with Howard, Whitesides, and Bradford, put on one hell of a show.
They finished off with “Pieces Mended,” and McCracken fell to the ground and laid there briefly as the chattering ending of that song played over the speakers. He jumped up again as they finished out the last of the screaming notes and walked offstage. It was an incredible performance, but even more so, it was a beautiful expression of over two decades of shared emotions and experiences that can be best summed up by one specific moment.
During “On My Own,” McCracken sang out the line, “I’m on my own,” before smiling and tapping his heart. It was this perfect little cue to the audience that he, like the rest of us, wasn’t really on his own. We were all suspended in time together, enjoying the feeling of not being alone for 47 minutes straight. And, really, that’s the gift The Used has been giving their fans for the last 25 years—the reassurance that they’re never truly on their own.
