Geezer Brigade

There’s been a somewhat disturbing trend over the past few years. Punk rock, long the haunt of the young, has seen more and more of its ancient, historic bands reform and start touring. Of course, very few of these bands are actually producing new material. Mostly, they seem to be cashing in on teen punx bucks. Making money off of an audience who are less interested in seeing something recent, relevant or even good, and more interested in trying to pretend like they are back in the nonexistent heyday of American punk music. Many of these bands seem to be simply shadows of their former selves. The Dead Kennedies without Jello Biafra or The Misfits without Glenn Danzig, for example.

A few weeks ago, I walked into the Satyricon with some of these concerns on my mind. The occasion was Final Warning’s second of two reunion shows. For those who aren’t cool and in the know, Final Warning was one the most important and 
influential hardcore bands in the Pacific Northwest during the mid-eighties along with fellow Portlanders, Poison Idea. I could go into a detailed account of all the songs that they played during the show and what parts were particularly good and what bits I thought were less good but, to be honest, I don’t really remember and it’s not all that important. The important part is that I needn’t have worried: they played a fantastic show. As skeptical as I may have been as to whether a bunch of old farts like the folks in Final Warning could really pull off their songs with any real energy, they totally did. Even though they may have been past their bedtime and were almost certainly arthritic, it didn’t seem to keep them from head banging, jumping about or generally thrashing around like they were in their early-twenties. It was an impressive comeback/ending and walking
 out of the venue, I felt good knowing that I’d just witnessed what was possibly Final Warning’s final show. 


-In other news, The Ergs! are breaking up. Yet another band breaking up before I ever get the chance to see them play. Godamnit.

-Also, I was gonna’ make a muxtape mix for this post, but it appears that Muxtape.com got shutdown since I last went on it. Bad luck strikes twice!


-Spineless