One Step Closer & Anxious confirm debut LPs for 2020, touring with Knuckle Puck

As mentioned, Triple B Records labelmates One Step Closer and Anxious are both gearing up to open pop punk band Knuckle Puck‘s upcoming tour (alongside Heart Attack Man), and that’s a great opportunity to see the makers of two of 2019’s best melodic punk/hardcore EPs at once. If you haven’t heard them, One Step Closer’s From Me To You is a killer dose of emotive hardcore in the vein of Have Heart and Defeater (both of whom OSC opened for last year), while Anxious’ Never Better explores poppier hooks, classic-style emo, aggressive post-hardcore, and more throughout its four genre-hopping songs. (OSC may hail from Title Fight’s hometown of Wilkes-Barre, but Connecticut’s Anxious sound most indebted to TF’s early 2010s era.) Both are very good, very different examples of what’s going on within melodic hardcore right now, and you can stream both below.

Since announcing that tour with Knuckle Puck, both bands also confirmed they’d release their debut LPs in 2020. Anxious broke the news on Friday, just in time for us to include their album in our list of anticipated albums for 2020, and OSC announced theirs the next day, and that one’s now one of our most anticipated albums of the year as well. OSC say the LP will be out in late summer, preceded by an LP promo in February, and they’re promising to announce more tours soon too. Stay tuned! (No release date info for Anxious just yet.)

As mentioned, the Knuckle Puck/Heart Attack Man/One Step Closer/Anxious tour includes a Long Island show at Amityville Music Hall on 2/27 and a Brooklyn show at Rough Trade on 2/28. Those two shows and several others are already sold out, and a few of the other dates currently have low ticket warnings. Get your tix while you can, and if you’re already going to one of the sold-out shows, be sure to get there on time for the openers.

One Step Closer also play Richmond’s United Blood festival alongside Converge, Cold World, War Hungry, Vein, and more.

For more Anxious, listen to the live session they did on the Axe To Grind podcast (Dinosaur Jr cover included):

Knuckle Puck — 2020 Tour Dates
02/21 – Chicago, IL @ Beat Kitchen
02/22 – Detroit, MI @ Sanctuary
02/23 – Cleveland, OH @ Mahall’s
02/24 – Toronto, ON @ Sneaky Dee’s
02/26 – Boston, MA @ Once Ballroom
02/27 – Amityville, NY @ Amityville Music Hall
02/28 – Brooklyn, NY @ Rough Trade
02/29 – Philadelphia, PA @ Warehouse on Watts
03/01 – Baltimore, MD @ Metro Gallery
03/03 – Carrboro, NC @ Cat’s Cradle (Back Room)
03/04 – Orlando, FL @ Will’s Pub
03/05 – Atlanta, GA @ Masquerade Purgatory
03/07 – Austin, TX @ Barracuda
03/08 – Dallas, TX @ Club Dada
03/10 – Mesa, AZ @ Nile Underground
03/11 – Anaheim, CA @ Chain Reaction
03/12 – Los Angeles, CA @ The Echo
03/13 – San Francisco, CA @ Bottom of the Hill
03/14 – Sacramento, CA @ Holy Diver
03/16 – Portland, OR @ Holocene
03/17 – Seattle, WA @ Vera Project
03/19 – Salt Lake City, UT @ Kilby Court
03/20 – Denver, CO @ Larimer Lounge
03/21 – Kansas City, MO @ The Rino
03/22 – Indianapolis, IN @ Hoosier Dome
03/22 – Chicago, IL @ Beat Kitchen

all dates with Heart Attack Man
2/21 to 2/27 with One Step Closer
2/26 to 3/1 with Axious
3/3 to 3/23 with Better Love