Taking Back Sunday

For a couple of years in the mid-’00s, it was good to be Adam Lazzara. The Taking Back Sunday frontman ruled the burgeoning third-wave emo scene while being embroiled in a feud with scene-mates Brand New, former bandmates Shaun Cooper and John Nolan, and pretty much every ex-girlfriend he ever had. (And as we all know, controversy sells records — or at least T-shirts.) Now 28, Lazzara has put most of those ghosts to rest, and although his band is no longer at the top of the Warped Tour heap popularity-wise, it’s still topnotch from a musical standpoint. Exhibit A: this year’s brilliant New Again. Loaded with bitter lyrics aimed at ex-guitarist Fred Mascherino and ex-fiancée/Eisley guitarist Chauntelle DuPree (among others), the album finds Lazzara tossing insults aplenty, not for the sake of drama, but for the sake of vengeance. And as he proves onstage every night, mikes are for singing and swinging.