punk's not dead (a story about true love at first sight)

i was a late bloomer to punk rock. i didn't have my first true punk rock epiphany till age 18. but when it happened, it happened hard. and it became one of the greatest nights of my life.

i knew of punk rock. i even listened to a little punk rock, especially the ramones. but i wasn't passionately into punk rock. i didn't know of or listen to a lot of punk bands.

i always had friends that listened to punk rock though. and for that i'm grateful cuz without at least some introduction to punk rock, i would've never did what i did that one night in montreal. i owe a great deal of gratitude towards my friend kevin especially who showed me who the dropkick murphys (and countless other bands) were when we'd drive around new jersey on crazy, all night road trips.

i went to montreal with my brother phil and a few of his fraternity brothers. there's two great reasons to go to montreal, especially for fraternity dudes... the drinking age is 18 and montreal is packed with strip clubs... tons of strip clubs... an absolutely ridiculous amount of strip clubs.

i might've been a little over my head on this trip. i wasn't certain if i'd mix well with frat dudes. the 8 hour van ride up wasn't too bad and we got to know each other a bit. but i'm also not crazy about strip clubs. i wanted a getaway, didn't matter how... but everyone else in this van packed with testosterone wanted lap dances.

when we first got there we hit some bars, got hammered, had fun. then we hit a strip club and i was immediately the odd man out. i find the whole thing awkward. i don't really know how to put money in a g-string without feeling somehow bad about it. i didn't go for any lap dances. i mostly sat there, watched women dance from afar, and drank beer.

the next day we hit a bar called peel's pub. it's this great, wide open place that's more like a school cafeteria than a bar and they had a ton of cheap drinks. we were sitting there doing the drinking thing. off in the distance i see a dude and a chick at another table and they looked like a couple of punk rock kids. the dude had a shirt that said 'lookout records.' at the time i didn't know what 'lookout records' was. but it didn't matter. lookout records would be semi-responsible for the adventure to follow.

punk chick and punk dude get up and go to leave. they're walking towards my direction. and in a moment without much thought i say to the dude as he's passing, 'hey man, cool shirt.'

he stops and says, 'oh thanks man. hey, are you going to the dropkick murphys show?'

i told him i wasn't, that i didn't know they were in town. him and his girl look at each other and tell me that they're on their way to the show now. if i wanna split a cab with them, i could.

i looked at everyone at my table, and quickly said, 'i'll see you guys later. i'm gonna go see the dropkick murphys.'

i got up and got in the cab with them. it's to this day one of the greatest fucking decisions i've ever made in my life. we got to the venue, 'club soda,' and they still had tickets. i bought one, went in and hit the bar.

the punk couple went their own way inside the venue. lars frederiksen and the bastards were on the stage. at the time i had no idea that lars frederiksen was also a member of rancid. i was that fresh to all things punk rock. i did my best to get lost in the crowd. i moshed it up and bounced around a bit.

when the bastards left the stage, i went and got another beer. i made some small talk with some canadian punk rockers. for the record, from my experience, canadian punk rockers are really cool and friendly. even the moshing was fun. there wasn't a lot of face punching, fist swinging aggression. it was a lot more bouncing around and bumping into each other. very cool scene.

the dropkick murphys hit the stage. i knew nothing about these guys except that a bunch of my friends loved them and they were irish. i didn't let my lack of knowledge stop me. as soon as the music started, i jumped around, moshed, screamed, clapped, smiled and had a hell of a time.

by the end of their set, i was a sweaty mess. i felt awesome, awestruck, and alive. but the best was yet to come. murhpys hit the stage for an encore. i can't remember how many songs they did exactly... but somewhere around their cover of ac/dc's 'dirty deeds,' shit got wild. people started rushing the stage. when i saw that, i rushed the stage. i got up on there and people were moshing and running around and singing and screaming all around the band on the stage. i got lost in the fray and did my best to keep bouncing into other people bouncing into other people.

and then it ended. the music stopped. the band was leaving. and there i was with what felt like a hundred or so other people on a stage looking out onto the rest of the venue. there's no words to describe this moment.

i got off the stage and made my way to the merch table. picked up a shirt and a cd and i was out, it was time for me to find my way back to the hotel. i was alone on the streets of a new city i knew nothing about and i felt totally cool and complete about it. i got back to the hotel room... drenched in sweat i excitedly told the others about my adventure.

i was in love.

a couple days later there was an oi fest in montreal. i read about it in a paper and i decided i was gonna go meet the new love of my life once more. i told the others about it and the super cool thing is one of phil's friends, michael, said he wanted to come with me. i thought that was totally cool and it definitely beat going alone.

we took a cab and watched a bunch of bands neither of us knew nothing about. but michael didn't care. he was there to have fun. we drank beers and moshed it up a bit. it was cool to have a buddy to hang with and it was really cool that he was into it.

the headlining band was a band called the hudson falcons. after the show was over i bought a hudson falcons cd and asked the lead singer to sign it. i told him how i was from jersey and i just fell in love with punk rock and he thought it was great. and it turned out he was from jersey too. we spent some time joking around and trading jersey stories. and then we were off.

we were leaving back to jersey the next day. i was ready to go back home. i got my getaway. i had my happening. shit would never be the same. i loved punk rock and i'm pretty sure punk rock loved me back.

thank you look out records. thank you dude with the look out records shirt. thank you dropkick murphys. and thank you montreal. my love for your city will always burn. your soil gave birth to the punk rock seed in my soul.

and michael, if you ever read this... every time i saw you after the montreal trip, you'd always say, 'josh, when we going to another show?' we never did go to another show but if you wanna hit something up, let me know. i'd still be totally down.