Scream, Soulside, and Material Support at The Meadows
In 2007, a man threatened to fight me on the internet and on Friday, December 8, 2023 we saw Scream, Soulside, and Material Support together.
Sixteen years ago, I was on website that no longer exists and a guy I didn’t know threatened to fight me in Shanghai at 3PM. Was there a specific date for this fight? No date was provided. Where in Shanghai? He didn’t say. But during that interaction, myself (who lived in New York), and him (residing in the DC area) dedicated songs involving fighting to each other. Some were obvious, while others were not as well-known. He introduced me to Scream’s “Fight/American Justice” at the time and I introduced him to Shellac (I DMed him apologizing for initially overlooking this song but he wasn’t aware of it). This was the beginning of a long distance relationship where I would travel to northern VA about once a month to visit him until he relocated to New York City in 2008. He is now my spouse.
The two of us haven’t been to a concert together on Meadow Street since Shea Stadium closed their doors in 2017 and given our history, it made complete sense that the DC punk band known as Scream would be the reason we returned to experience live music on Meadow Street. The Meadows is the same location as a former venue called The Paper Box, which was directly across the street from Shea that I visited a few times in the past, and is only a short walk from our apartment. I didn’t realize that when we bought our tickets that The Meadows = The Paper Box until we were standing outside the venue waiting for doors to open and confirmed it once inside since the venue’s layout is pretty much the same.
The show kicked off at 7PM with a set by Material Support who are “Filipina-fronted agit punk band from NYC, agitated by state repression, government corruption, and patriarchy” per their Bandcamp description. The quartet from Queens began the night with a powerful set covering topics such as menstruation (“Cup of Blood”), the Palestinian struggle for freedom, knowing one’s rights when encountering the police (“Know Your Rights”), as well as informing the audience who arrived early that the Philippines has fought against colonialism like other nations around the world.
The second act on the bill was Soulside, a quartet from Washington, DC but I discovered 75% of their lineup in another band that was based in my hometown of New York City, Girls Against Boys, after Soulside disbanded in 1989 (I first saw GVSB live when they opened for Garbage at Roseland Ballroom in the fall of 1998). Vocalist Bobby Sullivan declared that they were taking us back to the 1980s, and started their set at 7:45PM with “Pearl to Stone” from their 1987 album, Less Deep Inside Keeps. The reunited band released a new album on Dischord Records in 2021 called A Brief Moment In The Sun, and we got to hear some of that release along with older songs in their discography. Soulside’s set came to an end with a cover of “Babylon’s Burning” by The Ruts and Skeeter Thompson and Gizz Butt of Scream joining them on stage. After Soulside’s set ended, I spotted the other member of Girls Against Boys, Eli Janney, in the audience.
Before I was introduced to Scream’s music thanks to the internet man nearly two decades ago, all I really knew about the DC band is that Dave Grohl was a drummer in that band for a period before he joined Nirvana. I could have never imagined that Scream would record brand new songs and I’d hear them live in 2023. The punk band included songs from their newest release, DC Special, along with older ones. “Fight/American Justice” was dedicated to their drummer, Kent Stax, who passed away in September just before their new album was released. Sitting behind the drumkit for their east coast tour was Jerry Busher (of Fidelity Jones and Fugazi) and their vocalist, Pete Stahl would leave the stage to sing on the floor in the audience during a couple of songs. Although the show was bittersweet without Stax, I’m grateful that I got to hear their songs live and that they are, well, Still Screaming all these years later.