In the midst of chaos and confusion, things often find a way of coming together more than you could ever expect or imagine. Thursday night at the 9:30 club, Anti-Flag, Rise Against, Against Me!, None More Black and New Mexican Disaster Squad (NMDS) took punk rock fans, food-not-bombs activists and friends to the edge of the world and back.
Fifteen minutes before doors opened at the club, things got even more confusing in one of the dressing rooms. Tom Gabel - Against Me!'s founder, vocalist, song writer, lyricist, silk screener and all-around good guy - sat down on the sofa in the room and dropped the bomb.
"So we might get kicked off the bill tonight," he said.
Because Against Me! sells its T-shirts for $8, the 20 percent cut the club customarily receives would have cut profits down to zero and below. After a rash decision on the part of a band member led to more bedlam, and after the band apologized profusely and gave its word that there would be no onstage bad mouthing of the club, Against Me! was allowed to play the show and not have to sell T-shirts.
NMDS, supporting its self-titled A-F Records debut, opened the evening. By the middle of the first song, the crowd was shredding up front. Then fate showed its hand and bassist Alex Goldfarb fell to the floor grasping his knee halfway through the intro to the fourth song. It turned out he had only aggravated an old injury, and with the aid of Joe Principe of Rise Against, NMDS finished the set with two outstanding covers, Bad Brain's "Banned In D.C." and Minor Threat's "Minor Threat."
None More Black's set was pop-punk meets hardcore. Unfortunately, Kid Dynamite, former members of which make up None More Black's line-up, was such a key influence in the musical history of nearly every person in the room, that it was impossible for None More's set to be anything better than a light beer - they got the job done, but without the body.
The crowd went into a frenzy of fists as Against Me! tore through a handful of old songs off of "Reinventing Axl Rose" and nearly all of the tracks on its debut Fat Wreck release, "As the Eternal Cowboy." Against Me!, feeding off the energy of each other and the crowd's response, was the diamond in the rough of the night.
Rise Against was the first band of the night with more than one Fat Wreck album under its collective belt, and the fan base showed it, as "Black Masks and Gasoline" whipped the masses into a frenzy of flying fists and circle pits. Other highlights of the set included "Blood Red, White and Blue," "Like The Angel" and "Generation Lost." By the end of its set, Rise Against had the energy level at a peak and the crowd anxiously awaiting Anti-Flag.
Anti-Flag, touring in support of "The Terror State," had to come out blazing after Rise Against upped the ante with its cathartic set. Expectations were even higher for friends and family of Andrew Burr, who were in the crowd in support of each other and to revel in Burr's spirit, as Anti-Flag was one of his favorite bands. The band churned the crowd into a melee with classics like "Underground Network" and "911 For Peace," as well as its fiery political rhetoric. As the initial set came to a close everyone was roaring "Anti-Flag" in unison, hungry for more. Chris No. 2, bass player and vocalist, came onto stage with the rest of band, and the crowd went crazy.
As he took the mic he thanked everyone for coming together to celebrate the spirit of punk rock with each other and then dedicated the encore to Burr.
"This goes out to Andy Burr who recently lost his life and was an important member of the punk community," he said. "This is called 'Turncoat."
