L7, July 17, 2015 at the Fonda

L7 were yet another band I missed back in the day.  (Judging just from how times I’ve started entries with that line, especially lately, it might seem like there were a lot of bands I missed, which is approximately the case, except that there are a lot of bands I’ve been into in different periods so proportionately it doesn’t come to so many, but more the case that a lot of shows we go to anymore are to see bands I didn’t catch originally, with the trend of reunions by ‘90s bands, some of which I missed at the time and won’t make the same mistake again.)  They were on my radar from Bricks are Heavy, though at the time Nirvana was as much grunge as I could get into (if not sludge, as could be more appropriate), but I got attached to Triple Platinum: The Beauty Process, but too late, though I remember an ad for an L.A. show they did on that tour that I might have been able to swing (if I could have convinced myself that I might survive an L7 show.  When my brothers and I used to play a game in picking who on MTV would win in a fight against each other, L7 was always the trump card that ended it).  I might have even seen them for Slap-Happy, had they done an L.A. show for it, if they weren't already disregarded by then.  When they became yet another ‘90s band to reunite (and the third, in under a year, comprised of mostly women and that I loved but missed the first time), I was already in.  I would have taken the Echo show, of course, but the Fonda was just as good, and even better for being on a Friday night.  So I finally got to see “Shitlist” by its originators, which easily made the show a victory, even if they also didn’t go near The Beauty Process, which would have been disappointing if the show hadn’t been so representative of them at their snarling best, years be damned.  If they had or hadn’t aged well -- looking rough was always part of their visual aesthetic -- the music still stood up.  (Who ever thought they were really ever going to go major-label, mass-market big?  As if a band could make it big just on their music, especially something that heavy and pissy and, above all, female.  Their music was abrasive enough to stop their rise before they started, but it’s a testament to how badass and awesome they ever were that they went as far as they did.)  Which is more than I could say for myself, since I drank enough before and during to be only barely able to remember being at the show.  (The goal, as I learned, is not to go straight for the beer with the highest APV just to get your value in drunkenness.  Also, limit drinking while taking antibiotics (my next-day self exclaimed).)  Skating Polly opened, and maybe we could have checked them out -- and maybe we did -- but I could have been saving my coherence for the main act (or using the time to drink more).

L7's set-list:
"Deathwish"
"Andres"
"Everglade"
"Monster"
"Scrap"
"Fuel My Fire"
"Diet Pill"
"(Right On) Thru"
"Freak Magnet"
"One More Thing"
"I Need"
"Slide"
"Shove"
"Mr. Integrity"
"Shitlist"

"American Society" (Eddie & The Subtitles cover)
"Pretend We're Dead"

"Fast and Frightening"