Grange Hall off of Broad Street in San Luis Obispo stood solemnly on Oct. 22, shrouded in mist and dim streetlights with blocky red letters spelling out the name of the longstanding venue.
The front of the building was lined with people shielding their lit cigarettes from the rain under the slim overhang protruding from the white-and-red striped concrete haven.
Piercings graced the faces of almost every person in attendance, along with selvedge denim, cadet hats, distressed boots, waffle long sleeves, tattoos and First Day Back merch. It was clear everyone put on their very best outfits for the big night.
The music was so loud that even trying to chat with friends outside was tough. We yelled into each other’s ears until we finally gave up on the small talk and entered through the brightly lit, yellowed hallway.
Cupertino basement emo band Allure was shredding away, playing so loud I gave in and grabbed a pair of $1 earplugs found in a bucket near the door.
After a high-energy set from Bakersfield band The Pine, attendees filtered in and out of the venue. Some escaped the heat, sweat and mesh of human bodies, while others camped out in the merch line.
As the clock struck 9:30, everyone piled back into the hall that was reminiscent of an auditorium where a high school dance in the ‘80s occurred. A disco ball hung in the middle of the ceiling, projecting incessant blue shimmers that spun around the walls.
Vocalist and violinist Maggie, drummer Spencer, bassist Luke and guitarists Nathan and Zion all took the stage. Maggie began soundchecking her violin. The first few swipes of the strings put the crowd into a frenzy.
After ensuring that their equipment was in tune, Spencer rattled his drumsticks together, counting off the beginning of “Sure, Ok.” The track is the first off their debut album, “Forward,” and has become one of their most popular.
It immediately rolled out into a wave of harmonic dissonance, creating space for Maggie’s guttural vocals to shine through.
The crowd began to scream the first line of the song in unison; the words “I walked by without a sound,” reverberated throughout the auditorium. Drawn out and agonizing, the middle of the crowd descended into movement.
The mosh wasn’t much of a mosh, but rather a space for people shoving and pushing to get to the front. Some danced and flung their limbs around in proper mosh fashion, but the majority of people who didn’t were apparent.
People flew off the stage consistently throughout the entire set. The presence of phones came in tandem, with divers taking videos and pictures of themselves as the crowd lifted them above the ground.
Stage diving is a culmination of adrenaline, a rush of movement and an act of freeing the mind through the shoving of oneself into the hands of people who might not catch you. Yet, here were so many people who seemed to do it only to get video evidence of it.
Were they really enjoying it? Or just trying to show people on their phones that they did it?
In the days following the show, on Oct. 25, the band posted a PSA, expressing frustrations over damaged gear, injuries to audience members and a lack of boundaries.
“Going to a show is not a contest to see who can jump off stage the most,” they wrote in the Instagram post. Going on to say, “Every show, we have to dodge people running onto stage. Our equipment is continually getting stepped on, hit, unplugged and damaged. We’re worried about the wellbeing of our audience and band members.”
It was a gentle reminder of concert etiquette, what it looks like and the ways it might have gotten lost in translation.
Although the mosh continually pulled them away, my eyes floated back towards the stage as the jumpy rhythm of “Passport” filled the room. The unreleased song has made an appearance throughout the band’s current web of shows.
With Maggie on the harmonica during the breakdown, the song pauses briefly before it lets out into a stream of drums and guitar that seem to make a wall of sound.
Their dedication to their craft is evident in the band’s lyrics, sound and crisp production. Hailing from UC Santa Cruz, the band met after Maggie and her freshman year neighbor, Spencer, had an unexpected jam session while Maggie was staying with Spencer in Oakland, California, according to an interview with KZSC.
After the two returned to school, they put up posters and eventually brought in Zion. They found Luke when Maggie came across a poster he had put up, soggy and wrapped around a pole, with a list of musical influences including Smashing Pumpkins, Modest Mouse and Title Fight.
These most recent shows have proven to be unique, not just in audience behavior, but also given the fact that four weeks ago the band announced that they dropped out of a tour opening for British emo post-hardcore band Basement to focus on creating more music.
“Paint” came next in the setlist. One of the opening lines, “true presence can be achieved through escape,” has a spontaneity to it that places its meaning in the perception of the listener.
The ambiguity of First Day Back’s lyrics makes their meaning something extracted out of hindsight, as if their conception is born out of specific memories and details. Their combined significance is only fully realized after the fact through the full sound of the song.
Performed shortly after, “Us” presented a quality of troubled nostalgia riddled through lyrics like “Course I feel bad, it’s been 15 years of just the three of us. I don’t blame you, but I do” and “Why are you screaming at virgin ears relying on your tone?”
With such vulnerable lyrics, it’s all on display. Fragments of memories and experiences that listeners know nothing about are suddenly being perceived. In that process, they are given a different meaning depending on who hears it. Yet the band stood there on stage, somehow still floating above it all, still shrouded in a kind of mystery.
After the sprinkling in of a few unreleased tracks that sounded like an even more developed limb of the band’s current sound, “Lines” had an especially invigorating effect on the audience. Stage diving was resumed and the ground shook with the reverberations of guitar, drums and stomping feet.
The crowd’s heads moved in one simultaneous current, swaying back and forth, back and forth. Hands raised above heads, thrusting towards the stage like disciples praying to their leader.
The stage diving appeared over the top now; people running on stage, with little to no awareness of the fact that there was a band performing.
People tripped on wires, stumbled and eventually hurled themselves off stage.
The band closed with a beautifully lengthened version of “Twelve Mile Train Tracks.” The crowd headbanged in unison to the drawn-out screeches of violin, the pop of the drums, the melting of guitars and bass into the rhythm of it all.
Cheers erupted. Standing in the back, the scene seemed silly. The room was only half full, but the crowd was so loud you’d think the sound was coming from an audience twice the capacity.
As I made my way outside, the raindrops cooled me. I was sweaty from dancing, my hair was gross and I was thankful I hadn’t been wearing a jacket.
The collective energy had a restorative effect. It was a shared wavelength, as people excitedly talked to friends and took the last drags of their cigarettes before turning in for the night.
First Day Back continues their slew of shows, opening for Endive and Jejune on Nov. 14 in New Jersey, then coming back to California in December for shows in Berkeley, Pomona and Los Angeles.
