Who are these guys? Oh, they’re in those bands?

When you look at the lineup for the Where’s the Band? tour that kicked off at the House Café, 263 E. Lincoln Highway, Wednesday, the names on the bill might not jump out, until you see where they came from.

Dustin Kensrue of Thrice, Matt Pryor of The Get Up Kids, Chris Conley of Saves the Day and Anthony Raneri of Bayside decided to ditch their bands for two weeks and play acoustic shows. Raneri kicked off the show with a rocky start when his guitar wouldn’t work for the first few songs of his set, a common theme of the night. After trading his guitar for Kensrue’s, he continued his set by alternating between covers and Bayside songs. Raneri covered artists from the Smoking Popes to Bad Religion. Raneri seemed admittedly nervous, which was sensed by the overly hostile crowd who wandered in and out of his performance. The performance was respectable and he ended up winning over all the Bayside fans in attendance.

After a short transition, Conley came onstage to an ovation from the crowd. Having never seen an acoustic Saves the Day set before, my hopes were high after repeated listens of the “Bug Sessions,” and Conley didn’t disappoint. He admitted that he had a set list, but he played requests nearly the entire set. The moment of the night came when the crowd belted out every lyric to “Rocks Tonic Juice Magic.” Conley’s high-pitched voice was barely heard as the crowd screamed, “My heart is on the floor / Why don’t you step on it?” He even brought the audience back to 2000 with his impromptu rendition of “I Want It That Way” by the Backstreet Boys.

The crowd went from excited to borderline hostile as Pryor took the stage. Why? Because people wanted to hear Get Up Kids songs. Pryor almost exclusively played his solo material since the band folded. At first, I felt bad for the guy; this is a man who was the frontman of a band who inspired so many people and he received no respect on the stage.

But, then I realized something; he’s not very likeable. Pryor had a condescending tone with the audience throughout his performance and just didn’t deliver as expected.

If anyone on this tour would seem to be out of his element, it was Thrice frontman Dustin Kensrue. Thrice is a band that thrives on pure power from double bass to ripping guitar solos. However, it seems like Kensrue was born to be on his own. He captivated the crowd with his folk-rock songs, even without Teppei Teranishi finger-tapping behind him. The singer played “The Artist in the Ambulance” as the audience sang in unison, “Rhetoric can’t raise the dead.” Kensrue delivered a very emotional and powerful performance from behind his acoustic guitar. And no, he didn’t play “Deadbolt.”

As the doors opened and people flooded Lincoln Highway after the show, steam was coming out of the building, which is always a sign of a good show.

The best thing about the Where’s The Band? Tour is it started in DeKalb and ends in Chicago, never going further East than Pittsburgh or any farther West than Memphis.

Those people on the East and West coasts get everything. Let us have this one.