There was music. Mistakes were made. It was awesome.
We (execs Emilia and MB) went to the Wavves show at the Black Cat in DC. We arrived 5 minutes before Wavves went on, after disastrous car, metro, shuttle, and cab rides to get to the venue. At this point it was nearly 11pm and we were out of our minds. We immediately moved up the front and shoved our way into the center of the mosh pit, which should’ve been more difficult considering we are nonathletic girls, but the mosh was made up of the hipsters of DC. Wavves started with King of the Beach, the best summer anthem of the last few years, and everyone went wild. The room was soon a spinning and uncontrollable fury of messed up twenty-somethings throwing themselves in every direction. Emilia was holding my arm for support as I considered whether I was going to pass out while standing directly in front of Nathan Williams. I looked at Alex Gates, realized that he was probably either on heroin or was tripping face based on the look in his eyes, and decided that if he could play for this crowd while he was in that mind state that there was no way that I couldn’t take a few people out in a mosh pit in my own mind state.
The band was able to keep the energy at a pretty consistently high level as they progressed through their set, and the energy was excellent. During Idiot, everyone was shouting “I’d say I’m sorry, but it wouldn’t mean —-” as though Williams were some kind of indie deity who would only respond to the anger of the youth who can’t reconcile consciousness and reality. Through the whole show, I’d say the whole band kept up an almost bored demeanor. It was a good thing though, perfect for the mood. It was like everyone was losing their minds while the band could not care less but was going to push them further without even trying. At one point the girl next to me started making noises like “bee boop boop boo beep beeeeeee” and grabbed me as though I were going to save her from whatever was happening in her head. Another girl near me had her nose broken by some guy, who literally picked her up and removed her from the crowd. At some point, I left the mosh for a minute to get a drink, and next to me at the bar was King Tuff (former WDCV featured artist) buying a shot for himself and the bartender. We sat there for a minute until he had to go chill at his merch table.
Wavves played for a little over an hour, and at the end of the show they announced that they’d be drinking downstairs after the show. Apparently the crowd was full of imbeciles, because everyone left. We went downstairs, and I ended up hanging around with Stephen Pope and chatting with Nathan Williams. From what I remember, Pope was way more personable than Williams, but my perceptions were pretty skewed at that point. We also took a selfie with Williams, who has publicly voiced his disapproval of selfies, but who also posts them regularly. Then I got kicked out of the bar. #blessed
