The FU’s: Boston Hardcore
Down below at the Stop Specter post, I got a comment from Jon Sox, and it made my day.
If you’re not from Rhode Island or Boston, or for that matter you’re not in your mid-thirties, or you didn’t grow up on hardcore and punk, that name probably doesn’t mean anything to you.
But to me, it’s New England Hardcore Aristocracy. Jon used to sing for a now legendary band called The FU’s, although they later renamed the band the Straw Dogs, since (if memory serves) the Boston peprs wouldn’t run ads for their shows.
The FU’s headlined the very first hardcore show I ever went to. if I get any of the bands wrong, or miss one, I’m sure Tim will correct me.
It was summer 1985, and I was just out of 8th grade. Tim Kelly and I were hanging out down at First Beach (Easton’s) when he reminded me the show was going on in an hour or so. We hopped on our skateboards (I think Tim was riding either a Powell Bones or a Sims Screamer), and headed up Memorial Boulevard, then along Spring Street to the Blue Pelican, a bar on West Broadway that has been thoroughly defiled in the past few years as a baptist Church. The Pelican was a dive, but had been there forever: my parents were friends with the owners, Jim McGrath and Grace Audette, and often went to see Jim’s band, the Irish reprobates. On weekends, the Pelican had all-ages shows. My first featured the FUs, Gang-green, Vicious Circle, and Verbal Assault. There was also a band called “Stop Calling Me Frank”: they sucked, and everybody kept yelling “Hey FRANK!” at the singer.
I had never been to a hardcore show before: until I got kicked out of private school, and into Thompson Junior High, I didn’t even know Newport had a hardcore scene. It was an eye-opener. It changed my whole life, transformed instantly from an isolated kid who liked loud, cacaphonous, distorted guitars to a kid with a whole community of friends who liked loud, cacaphonous, distorted guitars. Good times. Circle slamming.
So Jon, if you read this, thanks for that first show. And feel free to drop by brendancalling any time!
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