On Sunday night, July 27, Ben Burnley of Breaking Benjamin and Lacey Sturm of Flyleaf performed an acoustic set at Charlie’s Bar in Somers Point. Admission was $20 at the door and all proceeds benefited FACES 4 Autism, a local nonprofit that provides support for people with autism and their families.
Those who kept a pulse on what was playing on rock radio throughout the 2000s, those band names are likely familiar. After rising to fame in the early 2000s, the rock bands often toured together, drawing huge crowds to their concerts.
So, why play at a local bar, now that their gig days are done?
Well, Ben Burnley is a local. In fact, as he told the crowd on Sunday, he goes to Charlie’s all the time.
Burnley was born in Atlantic City and was raised in Ocean City. He moved to Pennsylvania as a teenager, where he founded the band Breaking Benjamin in 1999. In 2013, he moved back to the island and is a resident today.
Jimmy and Jeff Thomas, owners of Charlie’s, explained that they had been asking Burnley to play a show at the bar after noticing his frequent visits. Burnley replied that he would need to find someone to perform an acoustic set with him.
This year, Burnley and Lacey Sturm teamed up for an eight-date “unplugged” tour across the United States. Josh Sturm, Lacey’s husband and guitarist for her solo career, accompanied them with acoustic guitar during their sets. On July 17, Burnley and Sturm played at Borgata as part of that tour.
Now that he had been doing an acoustic tour with the Sturms, Burnley felt the timing was right for a performance at Charlie’s.
So, he contacted the bar’s owners to work out the details of doing a set for charity. The Thomases suggested raising funds for FACES 4 Autism because they had done fundraisers earlier in the summer for other local nonprofits that serve people with autism and wanted to spread the love equally. The plan was then set in motion.
On Sunday, July 27, Charlie’s was packed to the brim with hardcore Breaking Benjamin and Flyleaf fans, along with some of Burnley’s local friends. One fan explained that they had been waiting in the bar for over three hours, determined to make it into the limited-capacity show. Another fan showed off his Breaking Benjamin CD. The restaurant was buzzing with anticipation.
Charlie’s converted a dining area into a performing space and had the musicians enter through the kitchen. When they came out, the crowd roared. Mere inches separated the audience from Lacey and Burnley.
As Josh picked up an acoustic guitar, Burnley introduced his son, who took the stage with them. Burnley’s son is also named Ben, but goes by “Cheech.” He had his own mic and sang alongside his father and Lacey. The crowd loved the father-son performance and would go on to chant Cheech’s name at several points in the show.
Cheech was an instant hero to the crowd when he declared the band would play “three more songs” shortly after Burnley announced they would play one more.
At the tail-end of the set, Burnley’s mother came out as well and performed a cover of “Landslide” by Fleetwood Mac with Lacey.
The setlist was similar to what they had performed on their recent tour in much bigger venues. They alternated Breaking Benjamin songs with Flyleaf songs, before performing cover songs toward the end.
Burnley said he requested the specific Flyleaf songs in the set, mostly from the band’s debut self-titled album. He commented that the ballad “So I Thought” was a song he wished he had written himself. Lacey explained that a member of Flyleaf had met Breaking Benjamin at a festival and gave Burnley a CD of their songs before that debut album had been released. Burnley was impressed by it, and the vocalists have been friends ever since.
Rock ballads like “So I Thought” and “All Around Me,” the latter being their most commercially successful hit, constitute part of Flyleaf’s sound, which transferred over well into the acoustic setlist. Flyleaf’s genre rides the line between grunge and alternative metal, though casual listeners may not know of the band’s heavier tracks. For many Gen Z listeners, Lacey Sturm was the first female vocalist they ever heard perform screams and harsh vocals.
Speaking of which, Lacey did not disappoint in that area. The Flyleaf song “Sorrow” ends with Lacey screaming, “Joy will come.” Despite the acoustic accompaniment, Lacey performed the song as written, harsh vocals and all. The crowd adored the hints of metal in the otherwise mellow set. Burnley commented that she had been throwing in screams all tour, making him question whether he should scream as well on his Breaking Benjamin songs in the acoustic set.
Like Flyleaf, Breaking Benjamin is often categorized as hard rock, alternative metal and post-grunge. The band’s single “Diary of Jane” earned them wide recognition in 2006. In 2009, their hit single “I Will Not Bow” was well known to hard rock listeners at the time.
Breaking Benjamin is also known for “Dear Agony,” a particularly vulnerable rock ballad; In 2020, the band rereleased the song as an acoustic duet with Lacey Sturm. This collaboration sparked their recent “unplugged” tour.
So, of course, that song was performed as a duet at Charlie’s, while the audience sang along.
It cannot be stressed enough how impressive the show was, considering how impromptu it was put together. The musicians didn’t have their crew with them and had set up the instruments themselves.
At the beginning of the set, Burnley gave a disclaimer, “We don’t have any in-ear monitors, so no judgment. Sing along if you know it. Drown us out, please… We were in Columbus, Ohio, last night, and we just got in this morning. So, extra no judgment, OK?”
Yet, the vocals were spectacular. Josh did a great job accompanying them on guitar, even playing the bass parts with his thumb to create a fuller sound.
The audience also kept their promise to sing along. From belting out “Diary of Jane” at the top of their lungs to singing along to a cover of “Iris” by The Goo Goo Dolls, nearly drowning out the performers. The fans’ energy was contagious.
The concert at Charlie’s was magical, even more so because it was for charity. FACES 4 Autism was one of this area’s first nonprofits to provide resources and events for local families impacted by autism.
Courtney Corson commented how surreal it was for her two worlds to collide; She grew up attending FACES events as a sibling to someone with autism and credited Breaking Benjamin’s music for getting her through middle school.
If you see Burnley around town, maybe don’t start cheering and screaming when he’s just picking up wings from Charlie’s. However, this is a great reminder of the hidden talents in our community. Who knows? The person sitting next to you at your local bar might be a rockstar without you even realizing it.
Photos by Steffen Klenk
