Show Journal 2000-09-16
First things first … tonight’s show wasn’t really a “local punk showcase” as advertised. In fact it was actually a contest between 6 local bands to see who gets to open up for Good Riddance next month. I’m not knocking contests or anything but I think this one was total bullshit. First off you weren’t actually judged by how well you played you were judged by how many people you brought in. At least one of the bands tonight brought in half of their high school class so no matter how well we or the other 4 bands played we all had already lost the “contest” before anyone even played. The other thing that sucks is that the Pine Street Theater usually has between 5 – 10 good punk shows a month. Shouldn’t all 6 of us get a chance to play there at some point? Anyone who knows Portland knows that probably won’t happen. In fact I can probably list off about 30 – 40 really good bands in Portland that deserve a chance to play there. They always argue that we “don’t have enough of a draw.” If you gave some of these bands a good slot on a big show and I’ll bet we would all have a draw in no time. Anyway, politics aside the show was actually pretty fun. The band changes were all pretty quick and it certainly didn’t feel like 6 bands which was nice. We finally got the see Looking for Link who gave us a tape back in ’97 and has been eluding us since. Also we got to see Thirty-3 who practices down the hall from us and totally rocks. The Deadlines were the big surprise for me. Imagine the Misfits and the Murder City Devils complete with fire and blood. Somehow we ended up playing after them but I think we held our own. By the time we played all the high school friends of the other bands were long gone so from what I could tell every one still there was really into us or really into seeing a new band. In fact we even had a few guys who saw us with All come out and hang out the whole night just to see us play. I think we caught a few people off guard with the new and improved version of our show which evolved on tour. Most of the people who had seen us before weren’t used to seeing us jump around so much and seemed impressed which was cool. I like it when we get compliments for things that come naturally. Anyway the show was fun and I want to thank everyone who stayed the whole show (4 hours!). I still think the contest thing was total crap but it was still a fun night.
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