Belltown Messenger - Documenting Belltown Since 2003

I grew up in upstate New York and was straightedge in the mid-'90s, along with all the things that entailed. When I wasn't spending my time not drinking and thinking about not drinking, I was at the shows, and I saw a lot of bands that were forgettable even without chemical encouragement. But that was fine because hardcore isn't just about the music (thankfully); it's the message, the scene, and the opportunity to beat the hell out of your friends in a semi-public setting until the floors run red with rich vegan blood.

It wasn't called "moshing" anymore (if it ever had been), it was just "dancing," and while some of the kids were ironically athletic and graceful, highlighting the sharp edge of danger inherent in all beauty, most of us were just underfed, clumsy, and violent. There was dancing: Kicking, punching, attempted kickboxing moves, occasional biting-but always dancing.

And then one day a long and effeminate shadow fell over the scene, and the dancing stopped. Some whispered "emo," a foreboding of dark, tightly-pantsed things to come, but I could smell the smoke and didn't want to hang around to get burned. After seeing the Pietasters open up for Snapcase at the Armory in Rochester, I swung by the liquor store, and my life has been somewhat better or somewhat worse or basically the same ever since.

Now I am (still technically) in my twenties and live on Capitol Hill. I never go out, and when I do, I never pay 15 bucks to see a show, and even when I do, I never, never, leave Capitol Hill. So what the hell was I doing at the Crocodile on Sept. 15, waiting for some band from Boston to come on? Don't worry, good people of Belltown. Capitol Hill views you as a staunch ally in our struggle to eradicate Fremont.

OK, truth time: Despite my ostensible scene credentials, I don't know dick about music in general, or Mission of Burma in specific. Plus, I got there just in time to catch the last deafening note of 50 Foot Wave's last song. Why is it always so loud at the Crocodile? I mean, I know I am too old-that goes without saying-but is it not possible that I am not only too old, but it is also too loud? Why are these things mutually exclusive?

So, MOB (ha! cool!) is playing, I'm drinking, and people are... moving in a way that looks like... could it be... a remote precursor to dancing?! And I'm not talking the cross-your-arms-bob-your-head motion that shows that you are cool enough to reveal how uncool you are... these were the awkward, jolting thrusts of arm, leg, and pelvis of intoxicated youngish people with fifteen bucks of expendable income. Legs moved to slightly different positions; shoulders got into the act. A guy in a tweed jacket lookin' kinda Bukowskiesque started shaking like epileptic seizure... a rhythmical, ecstatic, and for me, nostalgia-inducing fit. Post-college, post-punk, post-modern post-people, and we were all kinda close to moving, all almost expressing ourselves in the most primal, physical way that doesn't involve viscous bodily fluids.

Almost.

Some day, dancing will come back. Mustaches will come back, for real, not just ironically. Excess for its own sake will come back. Jumpsuits never left. Maybe the point of music is to capture some primal wordless human emotion, something deep and visceral. Maybe it just gets us to do things we normally wouldn't, like alcohol for the soul. But a good show can bring that madness out in us. I'm glad I got to see.