The Evens, April 17 at the Vex

I didn't know Fugazi back in the day. But Carla did, and not only was she a fan but she was an avid one. When a group of us would play the game of trying to out-impress each other with concerts we've seen, Carla plays the Fugazi card and usually wins. Shortly after we met she got to working on me to get into them (including one New Year's car trip to San Diego when she put on an album or two and my mind was blown). Now I realize what a grave mistake it was to have overlooked them. I had heard their name but back in the '90s I was into the mainstream alternative scene (yes, that existed) and real punk rock was still fairly beyond me. But I corrected that mistake by gobbling as many of their albums as I could from Amoeba. Now they always appear on my concert festival wish-list, as much as Carla says they would never do that. So we only have the ghost of what is left of Fugazi, namely Ian McKaye's projects. The Evens were playing the Coachella '14 we didn't go to but they played a local show on the other side of L.A., in a non-conventional warehouse space that usually hosts art shows. It was a big, empty space, large enough to hold shows, and the sound was good, so it's a shame they don't do more there (or at least anything that we would get out to see). The Evens are just McKaye on guitar and his wife on drums, which was enough for a fine performance. I didn't know any of the songs but there was that formidable punk spirit, not raging and angry so much but rough and forward enough to dispel the notion of a quiet and complacent floor-gazing singer-songwriter you might expect from such a minimal set-up. Though it all only makes me want to seek out more Fugazi stuff. Then the kid in the back who kept heckling the band, who turned out to be their son. And it was a fairly special show, as apparently they don't tour much (there were less than a half-dozen shows they played before the end of the year). Also a great value, with tickets being $8, though I'm told that was a Fugazi thing too, to make their shows as accessible as possible. I've been to cheap shows before but I'd never been to one, and not too many for any price, that was done before 10, as that one was. We were back home in the time before we have dinner on some weeknights. Though it was welcome in our age and lifestyle of needing to be in so we could make it to work the next day, it was fairly un-rock n' roll. But Fugazi never followed rules anyway. So I'm learning.