A Couple of Punks Solo It
This was a night catching one of my favorite touring friends, and seeing more of the great younger musicians in our punk scene. There was a good energy to the room. A lot of fantastic musicians I don’t usually see play by themselves, just usually with their appropriate bands. Three of the four didn’t even use a microphone.
First up we had Dani Delarge, who comes from the super energetic band The Otos. His bandmate, Liam, I’ve watched go fearlessly into mosh pits for a few years now. Dani’s solo stuff gave me more of the anarcho-punk vibe I know from bands like Daze N Daze. A lot of energy to it, and, of course, this crowd was all in for it.
Chuck Arock, from our local Linecutters, was the next guy doing solo stuff. Chuck seemed to just be playing his set list off the cuff. He did a superb job up there despite his nerves. Plus an example of the great comradery of the local scene was Chuck playing a song for Dylan Starks, of the Crown Victoria Vandalism Committee, but he was outside for it so he shouts “Fuck you Dylan!” Then next song, Dylan is in and playing a song with Chuck singing along. He ended it being crowd surfed away.
The boundless energy of the crowd continued into Diego’s set. If you haven’t seen Diego play, then you need to find out his next show and head down to it. This dude writes and plays some of the best music in the scene here. Tonight he was joined the full set with Garyn on washboard. Garyn even washboard-ed his way around the circle pit. Diego pulled up his girlfriend to sing a song with him in a sentimental moment too. His set ended on the energized crowd leaning toward the stage, singing along with “Why Do Blue Birds Fly?”
Finally we came to my friend, and superb musician, Zach Quinn. Most people these days will know him from his punk band, PEARS. His solo album comes from time working with Joey Cape, for Joey’s label called One Week Records. With a couple songs in tonight’s set, Zach now has given me my first live performance of songs from his older band Little Bags, made up with three of the four members of PEARS. He made more sense of the name change of their song “Violins” for his solo album, where it is called “Pooh” under the advisement of Joey Cape. If Zach’s performance with PEARS hasn’t shown to you the scope of his music talent, his solo stuff and the breadth of his music knowledge should be what put that opinion over the hump. I had a fun night with great friends and excellent musicians.
