AN OPEN
LETTER TO THE NWHC COMMUNITY CONCERNING THE DAMAGE & GRAFITTI THAT
JEOPRADIZED OUR USAGE OF THE WEST SEATTLE LEGION HALL.
On August 14th there was a show @ The West
Seattle Legion Hall for XIBALBA / ALPHA & OMEGA / POWERTRIP etc... About
160 people paid and it was a great show. We did the show in the small room,
expecting it to be a smaller turn out because it was on a Tuesday. I was
expecting about 120 to attend and ended up with closer to 190 with band
members. Due to the large amount of people and the aggressive nature of the
music, several holes were put in the walls. This was my oversight. This show
should have been in the large room.
During the course of the evening, 4-5 graffiti artists
bombed the adjacent business in the alley next to the Legion Hall, covered one
of the company box trucks with tags on the windshield and hood and continued
around the block tagging and bombing work vans and trucks. At first glance I
assumed it was one of the touring bands leaving their mark, but on closer
inspection I realized I knew these tags. All were done by Local NWHC folks,
most of whom, are in local bands. I have seen these people do the very same
tags in person before. I appreciate the anonymity of Graffiti and the purpose
of this letter is not to name names.
The West Seattle Legion Hall has been a consistent show
space for our community for ten years now. Bands like Damnation AD, Mental,
Internal Affairs, Ceremony, Outbreak, Gaza, Hope Conspiracy, Have Heart, Wisdom
In Chains, Trapped Under Ice, Pressure Point, Down To Nothing, Death Before
Dishonor, The First Step and the list goes on… have all played inside it’s
walls. Most of these were HUGE shows, and miraculously most of them never ended
in damage and especially never covered in graffiti. In ten years of booking
shows at this space Matt and I have never seen or heard the kind of diatribe we
received from the Legion Hall Manager. We were accused of being anti-veteran
among other things and our entire generation was accused of disrespecting
veterans. I was told multiple times during the course of the night that we
would never use this space again. We have had holes in the walls many times
before, but we have always shown up to fix them the next day or paid the legion
hall to have their person come fix them.
In the end,
I had to pay twice the Legion Hall’s rental fee just to get them to consider
letting us keep the show going. We also had to agree to contact the neighboring
business and clean up the graffiti.
At the show a collection was taken and the people that
donated the most were the people that had been moshing all night long. They
took responsibility for their actions and donated money to help repair the
damage they had likely caused. Even with the collection taken, $200 that would
have gone to bands had to go towards the increased rent for the evening. These
things happen, but we should all be aware of our actions and the spaces we are in
as well as the fragile relationships we have with buildings willing to host
hardcore shows. Our community functions on it’s own terms. We create and carve
out spaces for our shows that do not typically happen in clubs and concert
halls. The money taken from the door at these shows isn’t going to promoters
and middle people. It is going to the bands. Any money going to the legion hall
covers their costs to run and operate their building. I know it is 2012, but
punks and hardcore folks are still a pretty menacing bunch, to have a hall consistently
open their doors to us for ten years is pretty cool and should show how
respectful and responsible our community has been while using this space.
The graffiti is a serious problem. The legion hall felt like
we couldn’t even police our own group when they saw the graffiti and called
into question whether our events needed paid security. What is so fucking
annoying about this to me, is that 4-5 LOCAL hc kids put our community’s use of
this space in jeopardy; people whose bands have played there before. I think we
can all agree our music scene is anti-authority, and I am not trying to take an
authoritarian approach here, but I truly believe that the people responsible
for the graffiti disrespected our entire group. I believe our use of the space
is more important than not addressing the issue of graffiti in and around our
show spaces. I would encourage the people responsible to admit that they did it
to Matt Weltner or I and amongst themselves come up with the $85 that it cost
to buy primer, painting supplies and exterior paint. We reached out to the
people we knew for sure were involved. One fessed up to it and is willing to
work with us. One flatly denied any part of it. I am not against graffiti or
anything like this. I just think our community can be above lying about shit
and use common sense and think about our actions before negatively affecting
the whole group.
We paid for
the paint supplies with money we had been keeping aside from my Legion Hall
shows in a fund that is eventually going to be purchasing a nice PA for the
shows we all do around Seattle. It would be cool if the individuals responsible
paid this money back so we can eventually make that happen.
If you can’t
be honest about this and take responsibility, I don’t think your bands need to
play any shows or show spaces that we have a hand in. I don’t think this is
being a cop or a fascist if you clearly don’t have any respect for our
community. At this time, the NWHC community does not have use of the West
Seattle Legion Hall. We are trying to fix this. Thank you
Respect each
other
Brian Skiffington
