Punk rock show

Recently, and friend of mine I coach with, a little older than me, called me up and said his son was having a show at some dive bar down the street from my house. He was going and wanted to know if I was in. His son is a great drummer (and actually can coach jumps for Track and Field, too). He's played with pretty big local Irish punk bands and the like.

I told my friend I would get back to him. I wasn't sure I wanted to commit to this. After researching the place, I was really unsure. I saw the flyer for the show on Facebook. There were several band names attached. They worried me. Names like Skidmark graced the flyer. I asked my friend which band his son was in. The answer... GUTS. All caps. Again, none of this reassured me that I should go to this.

The venue looked gross and beat up, the bands seemed sketchy, and I wasn't sure this was how I wanted to spend an evening. But then I thought about it all differently.

For starters, I felt bad that my friend might be sitting in this place alone with a bunch of crazy people and dirty teenagers listening to nonsense while waiting for his son. I thought maybe I should just go for support. Secondly, I hadn't been to see any live music in awhile, especially a local band. I used to love going to local shows in college, especially punk band shows. They were almost all bad, but always pretty fun. The people watching was superb. I thought maybe I should get in touch with the old me and go. Lastly, I am always talking about taking chances and going to try new things and I almost never do. I just stick with my routine. I decided I would go, if for no other reason than to do something different (after my wife gave me permission that is... we do have an infant).

Upon arrival, the place was as I predicted. It was dirty and had a bunch of weird stuff all over. they had Bud or Bud light on tap. It was an 18 or over show, so there were a bunch of punk rock teens there with big black X's on their hands. I found my buddy at a table in the back. We ordered a beer and it came in a giant mug... 2 bucks... at least we had that going for us.

Random picture I found googling the place. This makes it look nicer than it was.

I will save the description of each band as they played. You can image it for yourself if you've ever seen any local teen punk rock. It was a bunch of poorly played Misfits covers and hard-to-tell-the-difference originals they learned that morning. The mic stand had been stolen the week before and had been replaced my an Oreck vacuum cleaner with the mic taped to it. There was a mosh pit of 5 in the front. Once in awhile someone would run up to the main mic and start singing with the lead. At one point the bar owner made an announcement about not bringing in outside alcohol or he would kick you out and kick your ass. When my friend's kid finally played, the crowd had thinned some. It was getting late. They were actually pretty good. Noisy and crazy, but they could actually play their instruments. The kid killed those drums. He was awesome.

The point of this whole story is not to tell you to go to your local punk scene shows or dive bars, (though you could). The point is that I embraced a sudden question and invitation as an opportunity (after permission from my wife and thinking it over for an hour). It was fun! I won't do it all the time, but I might do it again. It was new and different from staying home and watching Netflix. I felt like I was experiencing another small chance of humanity and I enjoyed it. I hope to embrace opportunities more going forward and I encourage you do the same. Even if it seems like its something that might not be that great, if its it low risk.... go. Why not?

Plus, you know what? Being in a punk rock band as a teen or early twenties kid is awesome. Its just fucking cool.