PACIFICA, Calif. — Show promoters upset potential attendees last week by billing a show held in a garage at street level as a “basement show,” multiple sources trying to figure out what the fuck is going on confirmed.
“I moved to the Bay from Boston a few years back, and I miss some of the basement shows we used to have in Allston, so I was psyched for this,” said punk transplant Jemina Boldt. “I brought a 30-rack of beer and walked around the back of the house, looking for the basement door or bulkhead, but there was nothing. I felt like a fucking moron. It turns out everyone was around front, in the goddamn garage. No dirt floor, no water heater, no low ceilings where the insulation falls down the back of your shirt and makes you all itchy. It was bullshit.”
Rory Yates, the show’s primary booker, defended the basement show’s labeling.
“I don’t see what’s so hard to comprehend here. It’s clearly not a house show — you can see that, right? It’s kind of outside, it’s not climate controlled, and we store stuff out there,” an angry Yates stated. “Have you ever heard of a fucking ‘garage show?’ No, because it sounds fucking stupid. So I called it a basement show because that’s what it is. Nobody is allowed in the house so the cat won’t get out, and if you need to shit, then drive to the Taco Bell down by the beach.”
“And, yeah, we have to work around the car that’s parked in there. It’s my dad’s, and I don’t know where he hid the keys,” he added. “If anyone dents that thing, I’m fucking dead meat.”
For their part, bands playing the show admitted that the garage was a welcome surprise.
“I’ve played a lot of basement shows, and it usually means you’re lugging a bass cab down a rickety set of stairs and playing in a smelly room lit by a single string of Christmas lights,” said Samara Reed, vocalist of touring punk band Face Eraser. “Playing in a full garage is way better than the ‘basement’ show we played in St. Louis, which was actually just a crawl space. None of us could stand up, and a family of raccoons living there bit our bass player pretty fucking bad.”
Meanwhile, in nearby San Francisco, another promoter faced criticism for promoting a “Comedy Show” that only featured improv.