I’ve been unemployed for months. If there was ever a perfect moment to go on an adventure, it’s now.
When Washington D.C. punk lifers SEXFACES announced their very first West Coast tour, I hemmed and hawed over covering it formally. I could go to one show and enjoy myself; maybe take some photos! I could go to a couple shows and get a healthy dose of the band who made my favorite rock album of 2025 (the caustic, nasty fever dream BAD VIBES OST). Then, I had the above epiphany and thought to myself, “Why the fuck not?”
Singer/guitarist Sal Go asked me, “Do you want to ride in the van with us to Yakima?” My unofficial bonus parents Paul and Karen offered me their guest room after the band’s Tacoma date. I had a credit card available, just in case I needed to get a hotel room. What I didn’t have, however, was an excuse to blow off this self-appointed assignment.
BAD VIBES OST took the garage punk scene by storm, adding an avant-garde element to their barnburners named after Iggy Pop and rowdy tributes to Valerie Solanas. I’ve written a bunch of times that they sounded as if the Dirtbombs were really into Spacemen 3—even if drummer/vocalist Jacky Cougar doesn’t care for the Dirtbombs—but there is a distinct flavor to all the band’s members; a confluence of musical identities which created a group that equals even more than the sum of its awesome parts.
SEXFACES’ debut full-length has more than enough to make your ears perk up. The way Jacky shouts “Loooooooooord stop me!” at the beginning of “James Osterberg” (Iggy’s government name). Or how Hana Racecar’s electric viola squeals while Sal sneers about smashing the state and killing landlords. Or the grinding, gnashing interpolation of Carly Simon at the end of “Special/Lame.” Opener “Ultraviolence” is one of the best Side 1, Track 1s of the decade.
I first saw SEXFACES last fall, at the first Gonerfest afterparty I had attended in a decade. Taking the stage at about 2:10am, they played a trio set because their bassist couldn’t make the trip, sounding enormously shrill in a way that nobody who knows my music tastes would be surprised that I really liked. I knew at some point I would hear the band in full complement, and it only took a few short months for them to announce their maiden West Coast tour.
All in all, it was the feedback from my soon-to-be-spouse who’d be in charge of taking care of our chihuahua Rodeo for three of the five days the band would be in the state—”This might be the only time you’ll be able to do something like this”—that secured my participation in this idea: somewhere between Almost Famous and Our Band Could Be Your Life. Fate had chosen me.
In the famous words of pro wrestling Hall of Famer Booker T moments before he won his first World Heavyweight Championship, “Opportunity has knocked and I’ll be damned if I don’t answer the door.”
Time to gas up my subcompact Jeep and hit the road, I guess.
OLYMPIA, APRIL 20
4/20 is the St. Patrick’s Day of cannabis consumption. The rookies make too big a deal out of it and then overdo it, while the vets treat it like any other day—or they give themselves an extra treat, just because. As I parked on historic 4th Avenue in Downtown Olympia, I gobbled an edible and looked around the expanse that has generated some of my favorite music in the world. I had dinner at the food truck conclave with my musician pal Olivia. Realizing I was late for the show, I gave my friend a quick goodbye hug and walked the two blocks to Wild Child, only to find the band having dinner at the bar.
I warmly greeted Sal, Hana, and Jacky, and met Ben Schurr—filling in on bass for this tour since Neil Cobra couldn’t make this slate of dates. Within minutes, Ben and I are chatting about his theory regarding certain guitars being linked to gentrification patterns (a similar idea to my feelings about LCD Soundsystem fans). “If you see a Jazzmaster onstage, you know the rent’s going up,” he says.
Pete Menchetti, tour manager and owner of Slovenly Recordings—the label that released BAD VIBES OST and other obscure punk classics—is perched at the end of the bar, typing away furiously on his phone, trying to put out fires and handle business. The merch table is stocked with crates and crates of Slovenly LPs and CDs, as well as choice selections from the iconic Crypt Records.
Already, this feels like more than just one band’s tour. Not to spout clichés about “community,” but this run of shows carries hallmarks of collectivism and multiple parts of being in “the underground scene” coming together to make the whole, an interlocking network of bands, labels, venues, writers, and people looking for a dope rock show.
I could hear the opening bands through the doors that led from the bar/restaurant to the music space, and they didn’t sound all that remarkable, so I hung out at the bar with the band. Jack periodically went back to evaluate the bands for his “scene report”—off-the-cuff reviews he writes on his Notes app and posts to his Instagram Stories. The rest of the band hung out, and we caught up since it has been seven months since we’ve last seen each other.
By the time SEXFACES took the stage, the room was more or less clear. The only people who remained were me, Sal’s friend Lauren (whose home the band are crashing in tonight), Pete, and a couple of teenagers from the opening bands whose parents were in the bar. The band ripped through “Ultraviolence,” and by the time they launched into a new song, “I Hate Living in the USA,” the parents were telling their kids it was time to go.
The quartet finished their set with a pummelling version of “James Osterberg,” closer of BAD VIBES OST—its coda a gloriously unhinged breakdown instantly reminiscent of the immortal second side of Black Flag’s My War; threatening, in and of itself, to double the length of the song’s recorded version.
After the show, probably because I was stoned, I thought the band was standing in a well-lit dressing room instead of an alley behind the venue, until Sal motioned for me to join them. Outside, in spite of being disappointed by there being no turnout, the vibe was chill and lighthearted. I told the band that they played well and, if anything, they could count this show as a top-notch rehearsal.
Ultimately, we talked about the fall and Jack’s other group with Hana, Jacky Cougar and the Vampyres from Africa, to distract ourselves from the disappointment.
TACOMA, APRIL 21
For all intents and purposes, this is my first true day on the road. Sure, I drove from North Seattle to Olympia and back last night, about 140 miles in total, but I slept from the comfort of my own bed at the end of the night. And I’ve made that drive many times before. For the better part of the next three days, I’ll be lugging around my Hill-Side weekender bag with a couple nights’ worth of clothes and a toiletry pouch, sleeping in the downstairs of Paul and Karen’s house, and springing on a hotel room in Central Washington when I ride with the band to Yakima.
I invited my longtime friend Emily—one of Karen’s actual kids—and her partner Jason to the show; in the early 2010s, Emily was my primary show buddy, so it was nice to turn back the clock in a way. We had dinner with her (our) parents, I dropped off my stuff, and she drove the 10 minutes from the Lincoln District to New Frontier, the Downtown-ish venue a stone’s throw away from the Tacoma Dome.
This feels noteworthy because back in those days, I was a fledgling music journalist who didn’t know many people in the scene I dwelled. Much of the time, Emily is the only person I knew at shows; as opposed to tonight, where I’m flitting around, chatting with all three members of support band Semisoft (more on them in a minute), Tacoma punks like Del and a few others I don’t see as often since I moved to Seattle nearly five years ago, all of SEXFACES (who I found sitting at a table eating two plates of loaded fries), and Pete, while browsing the ever-present crates of items marked with Slovenly and Crypt catalog numbers.
Now that I’ve reached the tragic comedy of being a forty-something-year-old rock journalist, I’ve thought a lot about the ways in which members of very specific music scenes grow up together—or grow up separately and come together, the latter of which has happened more often than not in my case.
The members of SEXFACES are all in their forties, all have day jobs and/or side gigs, and are all on tour to keep a sense of adventure in their lives; most certainly not as a lucrative endeavor, as evidenced by the attendance (or lack thereof) in Olympia. It’s funny when people call the scene a “network” or put the term community in scare quotes, because not many of the bands in the global landscape of underground punk are financially solvent. I suppose it is a network, but not in the capitalist sense of the word.
Most of us—and that includes the one-person label operations, photographers, writers, etc.—are just hoping to just make enough money to break even for getting to do this stuff. The best of us know we aren’t owed a living for “cultural production,” that it’s a wild privilege to get to do this at all. When I “broke into” the formal world of music journalism, I was working the graveyard shift at my neighborhood supermarket.
This global community of underground rock weirdos, we meet people based in other cities at shows or music festivals, hear about each other through our friends, set up cheeky group chats, and if we’re extremely fortunate, become pals if we see each other in person enough times.
I’ve known Alina and Malia—respectively, guitarist and bassist for Tacoma trio Semisoft, both sing and write for the band—for years. Alina worked at Alma Mater, one of the handful of great Tacoma music venues, before owner James Walton—the youngest son of Jim Walton, heir to the Walmart fortune—pulled funding for the venue and donated the building to the Indigenous Puyallup Tribe. At various points, she’s helped organize events, tended bar, and played solo-electric country sets on its rooftop.
As the cliché goes, it takes a village.
Hidden Driver, the first band of the evening, were very good—immediately reminiscent of indie rock’s current wave, where Gen Z bands attempt to interpret the greats of ‘90s alternative rock from cellular, indistinct memories beamed from their parents’ stereos into the womb. But these Tacoma youngsters go a little off the beaten path, opting for Where You Been or Without a Sound-era Dinosaur Jr. rather than the same ol’ shit their contemporaries take cues from.
The roadside dive bar atmosphere of New Frontier emitted a hopeful vibe for the night. It helped that the venue was bustling and getting fuller with each passing song played by the bands and the DJ—whose name I forgot to write down but impressed me verily when they played the Pleasure Seekers’ “What a Way to Die”—a far cry from the previous night. SEXFACES, sharing several plates of loaded fries, naturally felt much better about the evening.
A full house and a lively mood is really all a band can ask for, as far as the things they can’t control go.
In the past year, Semisoft have become one of the buzziest bands in the area, which would normally bring me a healthy pang of suspicion, but Alina and Malia are incredibly talented songwriters individually, so why wouldn’t their combined efforts turn out to be fruitful?
Described as “dreamy post-grunge” in their press materials (and thus, half the sites online which have covered them), I would say Semisoft is more of a very good iteration of contemporary alternative rock. Alina’s guitar was heavily treated with effects pedals, but it wasn’t on some boring neo-shoegaze shit. There’s quite a bit of surfy guitar, but it’s not a retread of any band of Washington State’s past that used that style to good effect in different ways—of which I could name quite about a dozen offhand from the Seattle-Tacoma area. They had moments that clearly showed a love for Black Sabbath, like “BDS.”
Jacky favorably compared Alina’s guitar work to that of the Birthday Party. He told me the next day that he said this to her but she had never heard of them. Celia, Semisoft’s drummer, is the band’s secret weapon; pummeling, intense, just a monster on the kit. It was an incredible sight to see her play and I made sure to tell her when I saw her later in the evening.
Thanks in no small part to the local draw of Semisoft, SEXFACES played to a full room in Tacoma. I’m sure their Olympia experience had something to do with it, but they hit the stage with fierce determinism and launched into a scalding rendition of “Ultraviolence.” It was fated for SEXFACES to leave the stage in obliterated debris on this night.
At every show on the West Coast tour, Jack deploys a joke before the band plays “Babies.” It’s about an aborted (no pun intended) idea for the song’s music video, where he and his friend kick around a baby doll with the face of Adolf Hitler superimposed on it. I’m not going to give away the punchline here, partly because I think it’s more interesting to gauge the reactions of people without most of the people reading this aware of the context. (Another part of it is that I’m conscious of SEO and such, and I don’t want this piece to scan like Westside Gunn’s HWH series before he had the good sense to stop using its full title.)
Anyway, the Baby Hitler joke got a smirk from me last night in Olympia and I didn’t catch Sal’s friend Lauren’s response. In Tacoma, the joke was followed by nervous laughter and awkward silence from people who were deeply unsure if it was okay for them to laugh.
Of course, “Babies” itself is a funny and slyly political song, rife with cynicism, righteous indignation, and self-skewering in equal measure. One of my favorite things over the course of this week will be chant-shouting “I DON’T WANT A BABY WHO LOOKS LIKE ME” along with Jacky and Sal.
After chatting with the band for a bit (who were pretty elated about the night) and exchanging numbers with Pete to set up a pickup for the drive to Yakima, Emily, Jason, and I went to Top of Tacoma for a nightcap and late meal. I turned down food because Paul cooked burgers for dinner and I was still full, but took up Emily’s offer to buy me a drink and got a vodka soda. Her and Jason dropped me off at their parents’ place at about 1am, picked up their 60lb bull terrier Ripley—named after Sigourney Weaver’s iconic character from Alien (1979)—and it didn’t take me long to fall asleep in the guest room.
YAKIMA, APRIL 22
I sat at the dinner table eating leftover burgers while Karen did some online administration work for her business; she’s a glass artist with a kiln in the same converted garage space where Paul keeps his record collection. I’d estimate that he has somewhere in the neighborhood of 5,000 records. At some point, and I hope with all the might in my heart that it’s not anytime in the next quarter-century, I will be the beneficiary of a decent number of these records, as per Paul’s last will and testament.
Glass art was supposed to be a retirement hobby for Karen, but now she goes to markets and can clear a couple thousand dollars on a good day.
Karen is by no stretch of the imagination a punk rocker; she’d probably relish in telling you this herself. And as much as this tour diary is about 40-something punks sleeping in guest beds and packing four people into hotel rooms and driving across hell and Earth to play to literally nobody—or, concurrently, being self-(un)employed and dumping money onto one’s credit card just to hope to break even when one gets paid for filing the piece—it’s also about expressing yourself through art and playing with the idea of commerce on a DIY level; it’s about adventure (a word I’ve used a few times now) and artistic fulfillment and being your own boss at least some of the time while you do so.
And so while the identities are different, the experience is incredibly similar. While I’m waiting for Pete’s Sprinter to show up in Karen’s driveway, I delight in hearing about my bonus-mom’s stories of setting up at makers’ markets, sending stern messages to people who take pictures of her piece and try to pass them off as their own, and getting a commission from a client who wants their parents’ ashes fused in glass.
It’s certainly akin to a process a punk can understand intimately.
Soon enough, I see a road-worn-but-not-completely pulverized Sprinter pulling up and my phone vibrates from the text Pete just sent me. I say goodbye to Karen, letting her know I’ll pick up my car tomorrow, grab my bags, and toss them in next to me in the free seat—front row next to the sliding door.
I realized I had rather unwittingly participated in Earth Day by agreeing to ride with the band to and from Yakima rather than driving myself.
The difference between a good interview and a great interview comes down to chemistry. And even if you have a great interview with someone, it doesn’t always translate to spending an entire day with them and having a good time. When our route along Highway 18 led to eastbound I-90—about an hour from Tacoma—conversation topics ranged from pigfuck and true crime to where we were on 9/11 and childhood Adderall prescriptions. Sal was fast asleep in the back row, but the rest of us were engaged in lively chatter.
“It’s like a film canister,” I said. “Like what they used to carry movie reels in.”
Jacky is pitching ideas to Ben (who works in record manufacturing) about the forthcoming Jacky Cougar & the Vampyres release—he’d later reveal to me that it’s a covers album—and came up with the notion to pay homage to Public Image Ltd.’s masterpiece second album, Metal Box. Ben was sort of unclear on what the packaging looked like, so I chimed in and he and Jack discussed potential alternatives.
I’m not saying I take the majesty and beauty of the Pacific Northwest for granted; it’s a large part of why I’ve lived in this region for close to three decades. But it’s a much different feeling to see the wonder of the natural world through someone else’s eyes. As we drive through Snoqualmie Pass, Sal has awakened and every member of SEXFACES is looking out of the window as high up as they can. Jack asks, “Are we between two mountains right now?” I answer in the affirmative while everyone else takes in our surroundings in awed silence.
The funny thing about the immense natural beauty of Washington State is that once you get to Cle Elum (about an hour past the pass), the rolling foothills and 100-foot-tall trees are replaced by farmland, a sprawl of sagebrush, and dead grass as far as the eye can see. There are spectacular views in the highlands near the Gorge Amphitheater—the most scenic outdoor concert venue this side of Red Rocks—but we headed south for Yakima before we got there.
“Martin Douglas just put a shitload of barbecue sauce on his pulled pork,” said Jacky to his partner on the phone. I was starving when we finally made it to the Bearded Monkey in Yakima, what appeared to be a music gear shop with a performance space tucked away behind double doors in the lefthand corner. That’s not a dis; apparently their setup is working for them, as they had a fully-stocked fridge of beer and water, sparkling and still. There was pulled pork in the slow cooker, baked beans and rice in a hot pot, and plenty of buns for sandwiches.
I helped Pete unload the records from the van, and one of the members of the opening band, Nevins, recognized me. She apparently came to the Marnie Stern x Wimps show where I DJ’ed…and played Thee Oh Sees’ cover of Ty Segall’s “The Drag”—a 45—at 33⅓RPM. I recognized her too, because she complimented me for it when everybody else just thought I fucked up.
Nevins were great; after Semisoft, they were my favorite I had seen all week up to that point. They were two young people on guitar and drums, playing an alluringly odd combination of (at least in my mind) Butthole Surfers, Modern Lovers, and a dash of the Frogs. It gave me a sense of pride that young people were doing something refreshingly weird in a place like Yakima.
I only caught a couple of Picket Lines’ songs; they seemed like perfectly serviceable Oi! (or Oi!-adjacent) punk. Not my thing, but I was in the minority because the room was full, spilling out into the showroom lobby. I was fairly comfortable being in the minority, specifically due to the fact that Jacky and I were probably the only Black dudes within miles of this place.
The room mostly cleared out for SEXFACES, but thankfully, the other bands stayed along with a few attendees. It’s common courtesy for the opening bands to stay and watch the headliner—and useful to study as many live bands as possible if you’re a live performer yourself—which is what bugged me so much about the Olympia show. Staying for the whole show is basic etiquette.
The soundman (who I assumed was also the booker and venue owner) was a burly, cowboy-strong dude with a big beard and a straw hat. His professionalism particularly shined in the soundbooth, as SEXFACES sounded the best they have all week on the Bearded Monkey stage. They might just sound like a noisy punk band to most people, but SEXFACES are a sonically rich group, and it’s pretty easy to misinterpret the sophistication of their sound if you don’t get it. At Bearded Monkey, all of the moving parts worked perfectly in sync and sound.
Hana wasn’t turned up too high (or worse, too low), Jacky’s vocals were as clear as his kick drum, Sal’s guitar and voice were right in front of the mix as they should be, and Ben’s bass was right in the middle; neither too muddy nor overpowering anything.
Whether or not the band knew the sound was perfect from the crowd, they turned in a perfect performance in spite of the meager attendance.
A handful of new songs have been sprinkled into the set list for this tour, including the aforementioned “I Don’t Want to Die in the USA,” sung with extra vitriol by Sal, and “Vero,” an absolute banger with Jack on vocals. Unsurprisingly, given the locale, Jack didn’t lead off “Babies” with the Baby Hitler joke. They played the song without incident, and then Sal goaded him into telling the joke after, maybe not realizing why he was reluctant to tell it in the first place. The joke landed well, it got pretty good laughs, which is also not surprising.
Getting to know Jack over the past couple days, I’ve learned that he gets a kick out of jokes that make people uncomfortable—so everyone who laughs heartily at the Baby Hitler joke is telling him who they are a little too easily.
After the show, we hang around for a bit and then load out. Ben exhibited his prowess in stacking the gear in the van, Jack was watching English football on his phone in the passenger seat, and after Sal and Hana smoked cigarettes and drunkenly teased each other, we went inside to chill out for a little bit. I shared one of the couches with Pete and Sal, who pulled out a pocket breathalyzer to my particular amazement. Then she told me an amazing story about it, along with a lot of drugs, in a hidden shoebox; a wild story of friendship, betrayal, and retribution.
When I was a service porter at Jaguar of Tacoma, one of the shop’s customers owned an XJ8 which always smelled like stale cigar smoke; he had a Colt .45 in the side panel and a breathalyzer attached to the motor. The hose you were supposed to blow into was as long as the one used for colonoscopies. Anyway, after all these years, I didn’t know they made breathalyzers that can fit in your pocket.
Such is the ignorance of a man who came from a fair lineage of highly functioning alcoholics and addicts.
“I like dogs. I hate dog owners,” Jacky says from the passenger seat, some time during the 45-minute drive between Yakima and Ellensburg, where we’ll be staying at a mid-level Marriott just off I-90. I had just offered to put Jack up in our guest bedroom in Seattle after their show in Bremerton tomorrow night (I forgot that it is currently inundated with wedding decorations).
“I would lose respect for Martin if I saw him being all [says in dog-baby-talk] ‘Thatssuchagooooodboooooy Rodeo!’,” says Jack. Hana protests by reminding the van that Rodeo is the cutest and goodest boy ever.
I essentially agree with Jack, “That’s exactly what I’d do. But if you want to crash at my place, I can make that happen.” Jack just wanted to go on the Bremerton-to-Seattle ferry.
We chat about the new songs and Jack seems particularly enamored with “Vero,” asking me what I thought about it as everybody—except Sal, who is taking a whiskey-induced snooze—discusses which of the new songs could and should be released as singles. I chime in, saying “Vero” is a no-brainer for a future A-side. Jacky half-jokes that the song is gonna buy him a house.
Not incredibly long after, we’re in the lobby checking into our rooms. I pay for my own room, the band shares another room between the four of them, and Pete decides to sleep in the van. Within about 45 minutes, I’m falling asleep to ESPN’s late-night NBA coverage.
BREMERTON, APRIL 23
I woke up with the television still on and tuned into ESPN; Stephen A. Smith hollering in my dreams and all—and switched it to ESPN2 as soon as the theme music for The Pat MAGAfee Show started blaring. I took a hot shower, checked out, and waited in the lobby for the band.
Minutes later, we’re outside, gathered around the Sprinter. Sal takes a swig from her plastic pint of Jim Beam, assuring me it soothes her throat and preserves it for singing. Pete tells us about sneaking into the hotel pool at 6am for a swim. The group asks for lunch suggestions. It’s shortly after 11am, so I tell them if we hit the road now, we should get to North Bend by lunch and we could eat at Twede’s Cafe—famously depicted as the Double R diner in Twin Peaks.
Ben is the only real Twin Peaks fan in the group (myself included), but everybody seems game to have lunch at a local diner.
After stopping at the same gas station we visited yesterday, I noticed Pete’s GPS speaks in Italian yesterday but didn’t say anything, and now someone else in the band has finally acknowledged it. Sal says, “You know, Pete could take us anywhere and nobody would notice.”
“I’d notice,” I reply.
“Do you speak Italian?”
“Uhhhh, I live here?”
The band bursts into laughter. I hold it in for as long as I can, but ultimately succumb to chuckling as well. This is the first time Jack recites what will become a running joke between us for months, “That’s off the record.” With a laugh, Sal asks me to leave it out of the piece and then changes her mind. We all laugh about it intermittently for the rest of the two-hour drive to North Bend.
At some point, Jack was concerned that the band’s caustic sense of humor and penchant to occasionally have a laugh at each other’s expense was potentially too mean-spirited for my tastes. When he asked if I was feeling comfortable hanging with the band for the better part of 24 hours, I replied, “Like a hand in glove.”
Naturally, we all take photos in the parking lot of Twede’s and cross the street to get photos with the Cascades in the background. Inside the diner, Hana sets her work laptop on the table, we each name our favorite David Lynch works—Eraserhead, Mulholland Drive, Wild at Heart, and my favorite, Blue Velvet—and order our meals before Ben steps out to take a work call. While perusing the menu, he noticed there was a peanut butter and jelly burger and wondered aloud if that was what Elvis ate the night he died on the toilet, to which I responded that Presley had a burger with peanut butter and banana and bacon slices. [Writer’s Note: Research has shown Elvis’s actual last meal was four scoops of ice cream and six chocolate chip cookies.]
As the sun tries to emerge from the thick afternoon clouds, I’m finally dropped off at Karen and Paul’s house to pick up my car after a heavy spate of afternoon traffic. (We passed the time discussing Sharp Pins.) I chat with Karen for a few quick minutes before I leave, go to the Costco off of 38th Street to fill up my gas tank, and crawl through traffic up the Narrows Bridge and Gig Harbor, getting farther up the Olympic Peninsula as the sky clears.
On Monday while in Olympia, I ran into noise/avant-garde/punk musician Max Nordile while shopping at Rainy Day Records, and after telling him my plans for the week, he recommended a Bremerton shop called Beats & Cats, which specializes in (hand-carried) Japanese imports. After a traffic-elongated drive, I stopped into the shop and was initially disappointed by the lack of shop cats.
Seconds later, two big cats wander cautiously through the shop while the owner wordlessly minds the counter, barely acknowledging my existence until I walk up with an Albert Ayler live record and a Nigeria 70 comp—and even then, it’s just a semi-polite greeting, giving me my subtotal, and a goodbye.
After a dinner of fast food in my car—to my surprise, only the second of such meals I’ve had this week—I roll up to the Charleston, affectionately known to locals as “the Chuck.” I stumble upon Jack and Hana having an impromptu Vampyres from Africa meeting in and around the van. Inside, a steep flight of attic stairs led us to the green room, which had a window offering a view of the stage.
Watching the bands from the bar, I take a photo of Ben while he’s dozing off—with the flash on—while Sal takes video of me doing it and laughing heartily about it after. The opening band was a very young group from Bainbridge Island called Fuck Everything; the sound was akin to what people would term “post-hardcore.” I feel the same way about “post-” genres as Elmore Leonard feels about semicolons; they just tell me you went to college. Little flashes of Unwound appeared in their aesthetic, a dash of At the Drive-In too. Their singer was growly and mumbly, which didn’t appeal to me at first, but then I started to get it by the end. I have to admit, Fuck Everything were very promising and possessed loads of untapped potential.
Hemmed Up was a grouchy punk band very much in the spirit of Social Distortion; likely a popular act in the hometown of MxPx. One of the members of SEXFACES told me this is their least favorite punk subgenre, and I replied, “Same.”
I stayed in the bar while SEXFACES took the stage; I had just ordered a vodka soda and couldn’t take it to the lip of the stage because this was an all-ages show. After a false start and some sass from the sound guy, who Jack took pleasure in correcting when he identified Hana’s instrument as a violin—”It’s an electric viola”—the band was off, ripping into “Ultraviolence.”
SEXFACES looked and sounded great on such a big stage. I mean that literally and not figuratively, as the Charleston is not necessarily a large-capacity venue, situated in the Navy town probably most famous for being the birthplace of Quincy Jones. The songs they have been playing all week were given heft, which isn’t better or worse than playing in a small room—I kinda prefer the latter, but that’s just a matter of taste—but a nice alteration to their sound.
Hana is the band’s secret weapon, especially in this space; her electric viola adds a significant amount of art damage to earworm punk songs like “Can’t Do That.” Her instrument—to reiterate, not a violin—cuts through Sal’s radical, humanist manifestos and fantasies of liberation through violence; through Jacky’s mordant wit and “post-punk”-inspired misanthropy. The first line of “Babies” finds Jack singing, “The kids today, they’ve got nothin’ to say,” with Hana’s viola screeching over her bandmate’s words like a chainsaw trying to breach corroded steel.
Speaking of “Babies,” Jack told the Baby Hitler joke prior to playing the song (as usual) and a guy in the bar laughed REALLY FUCKING HARD. The only other time I had felt as uncomfortable witnessing art alongside people with sketchy views was when a scattered mass of people laughed at the use of the N-word at a screening of The Hateful Eight.
Before launching into “James Osterberg,” Jack dedicated the song to Fuck Everything. The two of us were chatting before he went onstage and he asked what I thought of the barely post-adolescent Bainbridge Islanders. He loved them and was very enthusiastic about their set. It became clear to me that he has a deep compassion for weird kids who start bands, and he has a clear investment in the future of the scenes we dwell. The late-set shoutout was really endearing, and felt to me like he was telling them (and all young oddballs playing music) to never give up expressing themselves.
I stayed for about half of the headliners’ set, because I had to make sure I wasn’t late for the midnight ferry to Seattle, the last one of the night. A couple members of Hemmed Up asked Sal and Jacky to sign their freshly purchased copies of BAD VIBES OST, which was a very cool show of support for a fellow touring band. Life Rips was not my thing but certainly not bad. I used the time to say goodbye to the band and Pete, thanking them for letting me ride in the van with them.
Downtown Bremerton was eerily quiet on this Thursday night, as if the city’s residents allowed the ghosts of sailors and brothel workers to have a chill night as the living prepared for the last day of the workweek. After a long day of marching across a third of the state, I put my seat in full recline and fell asleep in my car instead of hanging out in the seated passenger floor of the ferry.
SEATTLE, APRIL 24
After getting home at about 1:40am, my day started way earlier than usual, as I dropped off my fiancée at the light rail stop so she could take the first train to the airport for a weekend trip. I decided to gorilla press the day on about 2 ½ hours of rest.
Just kidding. I put Rodeo back in bed with me and went the fuck back to sleep. I woke up at 10:30.
About eight hours later, I enjoyed a gorgeously sunny drive down Highway 99, across the West Seattle Bridge, past my future-in-laws’ house down Delridge Way, and to White Center—celebrating a half-decade of the formerly unincorporated King County suburb being gentrified into Seattle’s hippest neighborhood.
I had a burger and a Cheerwine at trendy-ish and relatively affordable (for Seattle, notoriously one of the most expensive cities in the world) “elevated fast food” chain Lil’ Woody’s, bought their McDonald’s homage shirt, and walked the two blocks to the venue, past one of my favorite spots in town, the wrestling-themed Lariat Bar.
After showing my ID and getting into Tim’s Tavern, I caught the band at the end of what I was told was a “long and unproductive” soundcheck—in front of a bunch of older people who were likely just there for Friday night dinner-and-drinks.
A gentleman who appeared to be in his fifties, who was identified later as a member of one of the support bands (and a former member of deep-cut Sub Pop band Cat Butt) struck up a conversation with me. He had white hair and a black and white striped shirt (think “cherubic French sailor” or an extra in a Jean-Luc Godard movie) and we were talking about musical projects for a little while. It took me a minute to realize he thought he was talking to Jacky, and by then I felt too awkward and embarrassed to correct him.
Thankfully, Sal was there to cut through the bullshit. With a hint of amusement, she told him, “That’s not Jacky, that’s our friend Martin. He’s a writer. From here.”
Just when I thought every member of every band in Seattle knew who I was, I get served a slice of humble pie, mixed in with some “Black people look the same” / “There can’t possibly be more than one Black person here” type of nonsense. To his credit, the musician profusely apologized for his mistake. To his discredit, Jacky, among other distinctive qualities, is at least four inches taller than me.
As many different places as I’ve been in this state this week, the very last place I expected to be confused for another Black dude was the city where I live and work.
Sal and I resumed our conversation on the patio, where she was getting into her professional background; she was a video game designer before leaving to freelance and write. In the van, she had just received information about a translation of her second novel, Way of the Walker. We chatted about marketing books (“I’m sure fantasy fiction is easier to market than music nonfiction,” I quipped)—and she talked about hustling up a little extra cash by selling handmade posters.
Inside Tim’s Tavern, where there are so many tables it almost felt like a supper club, the first two bands were actually pretty stellar. Toxic Thrust were a very good garage band and Bug Nasties were like an ‘80s indie (or even “college rock,” if you will) group preserved in amber. Chico Detour was also notable, potentially even the best band of the bunch; a cocktail of Tex Mex country twang and krautrock rhythm; the septet was led by very strong songwriting.
They also played forever; it seemed like they were onstage for over an hour, even though they were the third band out of four.
During the openers, I had a deep conversation with Hana about astrology, as we have two of the same planets in different major placements. Jack told me he’s a Gemini—his merry prankster smartassedness was a clear indicator—and then immediately afterward, told me that this was off the record because he was considering lying about his sun sign because of how much grief Geminis get. That comment was also “stricken” from the record.
One of Jacky’s pals was in on the conversation, and I reminded him in front of her, “Again, that’s not how ‘off the record’ works!”
After Chico Detour’s set, the venue weirdly turned the house lights on; maybe they were confused by their set length, which was basically that of a headliner. SEXFACES, the actual headliners, seemed confused by the lights coming on. People started leaving. And then the house lights were mercifully turned back down.
As with many of these shows, the local bands drew the house and only a handful of openers and attendees, Seattle musician Emi Pop (a friend of Sal’s), along with myself, my friend Ray, and his wife, stayed for a killer set.
“Ultraviolence” set the tone as usual, but the vibe was different. The less-than-half-full room burst open with people jumping around, whipping their hair, and really getting into the music. “Vero” banged like a future underground hit and a song they’ll be playing live for years to come. Late in the set, the band banged out the motorik pulse of “Feed Machine” like the cavepeople who invented the wheel plowing down the Autobahn.
When the band played “James Osterberg” on Monday, they finished it off with a My War-style breakdown; all slow, heavy drums and dissonant guitars, going on for about three to five minutes. After that set, I told them the story of how basically every Seattle punk went to see Black Flag on their My War tour, and while every other city in the nation notoriously hated the album’s Side 2 and reacted viscerally to it, the Seattle crowd reacted viscerally in a good way. Side 2 of My War was one of the building blocks of Seattle’s most enduring musical export: grunge. I told them Seattle would flip out if they played the coda to “James Osterberg” like they did that night.
SEXFACES did the breakdown, maybe even extending it by another two minutes. The Seattle crowd did indeed flip out. Greg Ginn, and maybe even Iggy Pop himself, would have been proud.
I hung around for a bit after the show, chatting with people, shooting the shit, meeting a very cool DJ in town named Carmella (who spins under the name “DJ Glitterous”), and making jokes with friends new and old. I said goodbye to the band, passing hugs all around and wishing them well on the remainder of their tour. Sal told me to be “brutally honest,” but there was nothing to be brutally honest about when it came to characterizing SEXFACES. We shared a good time, relatively few disappointments, and many miles across this wondrous stretch of land.
For a five-day workweek, I caught a glimpse of what it’s like to be in a punk band in 2026. To make new jokes that turn into inside jokes and laugh all the way to the nicest highway-stop hotel you can find after a long drive that put about 200 miles on the odometer in a day. To take in arguably the most scenic region in the country in a van full of human bodies and Trader Joe’s detritus.
A touring punk band is part chosen family, part traveling circus. They have a secret musical language onstage and humorous shorthand offstage. It’s a group of people working hard toward a final goal: the euphoria of about 40 minutes onstage.
And if you break even financially, that’s just a bonus.
