Mutant Pop Fest '99

One of the best shows I have ever played or watched. Someone mentioned this show today...I had almost forgotten how amazing it was.

Here was this completly random assemblage of people, brought together only by a shared love for underground pop music. Anyone in attendance, band member or fan, was the kind of person that lived not with music, but for it. You couldn't help but get caught up in the spirit of things; there was this incredible, immediate connection between everyone there. This happened not gradually but instantaneously; the moment you arrived at the show, you were one of us, one of the few people who "got it". The bands were all great, and through it all, there was this awesome kinship and a collective disdain for everyone who wasn't us. This is precisely the sort of scene love I've railed against in this very blog...but it was great.

If you were at Bernie's in Columbus, OH in October of 1999, you know. You get it.

Back then, we were still in our drunken sloppy poppy phase. We released 7" records (already a dying format), and played (under the influence of PBR, usually) primarily punk rock shows.

I can't even listen to that stuff anymore. Once your band gets better, you want more...or, at the very least, you want more people to hear it. It's hard to retain that we-suck-so-what-fuck-you punk rock ethos when you don't actually suck...

But it's precisely that mindset makes music fun. Our band got a LOT better, but I don't know if I ever had more fun playing music than I did that night.