Pagans
So why did Hudson act like he’d been dragged out of bed to play the show? His voice sounded the same as ever–a snotty, torn-up, nasal squawk–but he sang like he was nursing a sore throat, rarely pushing a syllable, never straining and convulsing like he does on the Pagans’ recordings. He lingered at the back of the stage between songs, even between verses, and though he complained about the heat, I’m not sure he would’ve broken a sweat if he hadn’t been wearing a suit jacket the whole time.
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He interrupted the crowd’s screaming and applause to tell us, in a tone more sardonic than gracious, that we were “too kind”–which didn’t strike me as out of order, because I know that punks, especially old-school punks with nothing left to prove, are expected to react coolly when a couple hundred people are going crazy for their band. And I know Hudson has called playing out a “chore.” But he’s also referred to the Pagans as “four guys melded into one projectile.” I guess it’s hard to feel like much of a projectile when all your bandmates live in different states and the only rehearsal time you arrange for your first gig in years is an extra-long sound check.
The crowd was more than happy to do all the work, however. They pumped their fists in the air and shouted along with the lyrics, and there were digital cameras and video cameras and cell phone cameras held aloft everywhere. Many brave souls insisted on moshing, though the spilled beer underfoot and the dozens of bottles rolling around on the floor made it less like dancing and more like a physical challenge on a humiliating Japanese game show. People dropped left and right, but nobody hit the ground too hard–the crowd was packed so tight that it was impossible not to fall into someone else.
One of the night’s openers, a French four-piece called the Fatals, had taken that road–listening to them was like being rolled down a hill in a metal trash can, except with chord changes. Three of their members are in their 30s, but their desperate, unhinged blues punk sounded like something you’d get from postadolescent dropouts on their third baggie of model-airplane glue. They were up to their eyeballs in it–no self-regard, no self-awareness, no self-control. The bassist ended the last song by plunging backward through the trap set from atop a combo amp, leaving the drummer’s bare stomach running with blood where a wayward piece of hardware had carved a flap into his skin.
To get up in front of a crowd again–even a sold-out Bottle crowd–after reaching that point, long after the verdicts have come in and the “important” bands in punk have been officially enshrined, must be a lot like visiting an ex you’ve been out of touch with for years. Hudson and Metoff’s strange, halfway-there performances make a lot of sense viewed in that light: they’re the onstage equivalent of the bemused, protective distance you might put on while you wait for your once-upon-a-time beloved to open the door. Part of you doesn’t really want to know how she’s been doing since she left you, but you can’t make yourself turn around and leave. There’s another part that wants so badly for her to say she still misses you, that she’s never had it so good since, that she’s lived her whole life wishing she’d known what she had with you before it was too late–and so you put yourself out there anyway.
