The Aquabats - Live Performances

Live Performances

Since their formation, The Aquabats haved earned a reputation for their theatrical live performances featuring a variety of comedic antics based around the band's superhero persona.

During the 1990s, when their concerts were at their most elaborately staged, a typical Aquabats performance would often include such theatrics as choreographed fight scenes, giant inflatable props, food fights, acrobatic stunts and varying degrees of pyrotechnics, ranging from shooting fireworks to The MC Bat Commander fire breathing. While many of these elements were eventually phased out of the band's concerts in the 2000s, the one consistent staple of every Aquabats live show has remained the band's onstage "battles" with costumed villains and monsters. These villains, typically played by The Aquabats' road crew, will crash the stage and exchange humorous banter with the band before engaging in a mock fight scene. These fights have ranged from short, improvised fistfights to fully choreographed stage combat utilizing breakable props, maneuvers such as flying kicks and back flips, and sometimes spreading out into the audience, with The Aquabats ultimately winning most— but not all— encounters. At some shows, in place of a villain, The Aquabats will feature a sketch with one of their "allies": for example, to segue into their song "Magic Chicken", the titular character— a man in a chicken suit— will come onstage to hand out fried chicken to crowd members.

Audience participation is a common element of The Aquabats' concerts. Both the band and their onstage characters regularly interact with the crowd, including initiating mass games of beach ball volleyball or spraying them with substances like Silly String and fire extinguishers. Additionally, some of The Aquabats' enemies are known only to be "defeated" by the audience from being pelted with projectiles supplied by the band, usually large quantities of plastic balls. Acknowledging the younger members of their fanbase, The Aquabats often incorporate any children in the audience as part of their shows, inviting them to dance onstage with the band at the end of their sets. With parents' permission, these children also take part in onstage games and activities with the aide of the audience. The most common of these have included "pool floatie races", where two selected children and members of The Aquabats mount inflatable pool toys to race across the venue via crowd surfing, and assisted stage diving, in which between songs the MC Bat Commander will gently throw children into a waiting audience so they may experience their "first punk rock moment".

On the visual end of these performances, keeping in line with their cartoon and pop culture-inspired aesthetic, The Aquabats' stage shows are accompanied by a large video screen backdrop which plays montage clips of various cartoons, movies, TV shows, and stock footage specifically edited to match each song. This screen also plays prerecorded comedy videos starring the band which introduce and close each show, as well as fake commercials for fictional Aquabats-brand products which serve as impromptu "commercial breaks" between songs. These visuals, along with the band's props and costumes, are regularly changed to accommodate special seasonal performances, in particular The Aquabats' annual holiday shows.