O Pioneers, Damage Done & Requin 2night at Galway Arms

This is easily the best show going on tonight in Seattle:

The Damage Done at Funhouse last Friday!

Chest tattoos, barefoot singers, fingers pointing in the air, and pure emotional driven melodic hardcore. Each and every time, The Damage Done bring it live. Remember the first time you heard, or better yet saw live, a band like Against Me? That kinda energy and emotion that the band has and the crowd feeds off? Yep, these guys have it, even at the smallest show they win their audience over and they have an every growing group of fans. Seriously one of Seattle's best punk bands these days, don't sleep on these guys!

I'm DJing a great show at Funhouse tonight!

Sadly another great uber-fan and local music supporter died recently before Bob Kondrak. Ben Russell was a kid I was just getting to know, having just hung out talking and drinking with him at a few shows, house parties and Shorty's during this past year. I call Ben and uber-fan because he went out to shows and events almost every night of the week, his support for local music was practically unparalleled. His main haunt was Funhouse, if you've been to a show there in the past month you may have seen the memorial pictorial on one of the tables there. Besides Funhouse I'd see him at house shows, other clubs, at the Pencil Fighting Championships, he came to my photo show opening... the guy was just fantastic at supporting local music and arts events. He died at home pretty suddenly due to complications with his diabetes, taking everyone by surprise. Tonight's show at Funhouse isn't meant to be a sad event though, it's supposed to be a celebration of Ben's life. Most of the bands playing were either friends with him or he was big fans of, Bobcat and I will be DJing, and the money raised at the door will go to his parents to offset their funeral costs.

Not only is it a good cause, all these bands rock. Dragstrip Riot always put on a great show, they'll be doing it acoustically tomorrow night. Smokejumper is an up-and-coming pop punk band featuring many ex-members of the band Dateless. And The Damage Done is what I consider one of the best melodic punk bands in Seattle right now. They will also be collecting blanket and coat donations for the homeless at this show.

The Damage Done

It happens too infrequently to me these days. Those times where you show up to the show early enough to catch one of the opening bands you've never heard of and they totally blow you away. Or you go to a house show to see a touring band and a local band you haven't seen before just ignites the crowd and has kids bouncing off the walls singing along. The rarer those moments are, the more magical they are. Especially when you're an old and jaded punk rocker that's seen thousands of bands over the years.

I had one of those moments the first time I caught The Damage Done. Within the first song, I was wondering why these guys weren't huge yet. And I think a lot of it has to do with the band's attitude. They don't really seem to give a shit about kissing up to the clubs and promoters to make things happen, they're moving at their own pace and genuinely seem to favor house shows over the punk bars and clubs I tend to frequent a lot of the time.

From The Damage Done website:
The house show, #1. An art perfected by hardcore heroes of the past. When combined with enough beer, the loudest PA possible, and a basement or living room packed with far too many sweaty, singing, dancing friends, the house show is guaranteed to provide the touring band with a great time and enough gas money to make it to the next town. In a time when the community is oversaturated with egotistical bands, all-ages venues that last six months at the most, and nation-wide conglomerate booking agencies specializing in pay-to-play shows, the house show is one of the last free and humble bastions of awesome ear-splitting rock.

I love that. I love bringing it back to where it all started -- DIY punk values and having fun.

Musically The Damage Done can have the intensity of hardcore one song and then a melodic group sing-a-long the next, the constant in the mix is an energy, positive and pumped up, that gives the band a little something extra that a lot of bands lack these days. They have one EP out, a few comp cuts, and have recorded an album that is yet to be released. You can hear a few songs over here, but this is really the kind of band you want to catch live. Upcoming Seattle shows include:

July 19th at The Bit Saloon w/ In The Red, Bastards of Young, & Poverty Bay Saints
Jul 24th at the Barnhouse w/ the Pillowfights & Chris Crusher solo
Aug 7 2009 at The Bit Saloon w/ Heroes Amongst Thieves & Random Orbits
Aug 16 2009 at Studio 7 w/ Cobra Skulls & the Copyrights