Meet Our Summer Intern: Micah D!

Hello ANTIGRAVITY readers, I’d like to start off by saying how glad I am that you have taken the time to read this. This is my first article so I’ll just be introducing myself to you. I’d like to consider myself an active member of the New Orleans’s all-ages community. I try to attend as many shows as I can. Some bands I find myself listening to often are: Ceremony, Trash Talk, Modest Mouse, Thursday, Elliott Smith, Andrew Jackson Jihad, the Shins and Pavement. Ceremony is actually my favorite band: everything about them completely rules. I don’t read novels as much as I used to but some great ones I’ve read are Catcher in the Rye, It, Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy and The Hobbit. I really like old horror films and indie flicks, thanks to Netflix. I also enjoy playing piano from time to time.

If I were asked the rather generic, yet informative question “what got you into music in the first place?” the answer would be two words:  the Shins. I started listening to the Shins in March of 2010. They really took the little appreciation of music I had to the next level.  As soon as I was given the chance, I bought a copy of Chutes Too Narrow (the Shins’ sophomore album), which was totally worth the money at the time. Sooner than later, I was jamming to any other indie pop and indie rock band you can think of. Somewhere along the line (I think about a year later) I discovered punk rock and hardcore. While indie rock is usually great, it lacks the aggression and energy that punk possesses. I’ve always known about punk from my dad, but I never listened to many bands past the Ramones, Clash and the Sex Pistols. That’s the case for many people.

I’d definitely say punk is the reason I started going to shows. Punk shows in New Orleans are much more likely to be all-ages than any other type of music, thanks to some people I’ll mention later on.The first show I went to was actually 18-plus at Siberia to see Keith Morris’ latest band OFF! play with Cerebral Ballzy, Retox and  Classhole. I went to this show in October of last year with my cousin Michael and my dad. This show also happened to be the biggest show Siberia ever had. It was an awesome first show experience to say the least. An X was drawn on my hands by the bouncer that symbolizes straight-edge. From the second Classhole started their set, slamming was in. I of course was slam dancing the whole entire night. By the time I knew it, California mathcore band Retox was playing a rather chaotic set. Right before the midnight hours, Cerebral Ballzy made their way to the stage. The highlight of their set was vocalist Honor Titus climbing on top of the bar and the intense circle pits that coincided throughout their set. Lastly, OFF! ripped through 20 minutes of old school hardcore punk. One last song was played as an encore, closing their set with a bang. Any punk rocker from the ‘80s would have been proud of this sweat-and-beer soaked show. That show was just plain crazy, at least 300 people went. Since then, I’ve been going to some great shows. Some great places to see all-ages shows are: the Big Top, community punk house Nowe Miasto, the Cypress located in Fat City, a new space in Bywater called United Bakery and Hey Café located Uptown. Some music highlights since that October show were: Block Party in April, Thurston Moore’s avant-garde set at the Music Box and a really fun ska show at the Cypress that local ska band Angry Banana headlined. I really like what Community Records does for the local punk scene of course, whether that’s releasing solid music, putting on great shows, just being awesome people, Block Party or a combination of all. My kind words go out to Caddywhompus, the Lollies, Glish and B L A C K I E who ended up playing my favorite sets at Block Party. I also think what Bryan Funck from Thou does for the local scene is fantastic; $5 all-ages shows with some of the best touring bands. A few events I’m pumped to go to this summer are: the WTUL fundraiser punk fest at the Big Top on June 16th, Ceremony playing the Cypress on June 4th and a pop-punk show with Spraynard and the Sidekicks at United Bakery on June 20th. If you happen to see me at shows, I’d love to talk and chat a bit. On future articles I’ll be doing coverage on all the latest all-ages show. Thanks for reading.

You can check out Micah’s last.fm profile at last.fm/user/skippingboy123 and his channel on Youtube at youtube.com/user/skippingboy123; he’s also set up an all-ages forum at facebook.com/NOLA.AllAgesShows