Rob PegoraroThis one part of my cultural life has barely changed in decades
I don’t get out to see bands play live music as often I used to, but when I do the cover charge is now much more likely to be $0, the venue probably won’t feature air conditioning, and the odds are that my fellow audience members will include babies, dogs and fireflies.
That reflects how most of the ways I used to check out local music in the 1990s and early 2000s have vanished from my life or from the D.C. area’s cultural life. Dad Life and the networking needs of full-time freelancing mean my calendar usually doesn’t have much free time to go to a bar and hear a new-to-me band, while many of the venues I used to go to, especially Iota, have hosted their last set.
And the more recent hope of Arlington’s low-power FM WERA appears to have been snuffed out by managerial incompetence.
But summers still feature free indie-rock concerts at Fort Reno Park in Northwest D.C. These sets on a stage in the middle of a park commemmorating one of Washington’s Civil War defenses have been a constant in the District’s life since 1968–except when the pandemic silenced them for that one still summer–and in my own life since, if I remember correctly, 1996.
(If only I’d gotten clued into these free performances sooner: They would have been a great cheap-date option in my cash-starved post-college days.)
I still try to get to at least one a year, which summer rainstorms can make difficult, and this year I made it to three: a July 17 bill of 504 Plan, Zipa, and Atoms Apart; Monday’s lineup of Bluem, Bohemian Waxwing, and Time in the Wilderness; and Thursday’s season-closing performances by Restives, TORO, and Trash Boat and the Ambush.
I had not heard of any of those bands two weeks ago, and now I feel that much less culturally illiterate.
In the bargain, I also enjoyed a series of takeout dinners (Bandit Taco, on 41st St. NW just south of Chesapeake, seems the best option nearby, but I’m open to suggestions for next summer) and the sight of indie-rock fans of all ages picnicking on the park’s lawn and wandering around between sets to explore nearby sights like the District’s highest point.
Plus, Thursday’s performances featured one extra sight that was not an option in the previous century: the International Space Station passing overhead, a light brighter than the stars and silently moving in front of them. It’s such a treat when my interests in music and space can intersect like that.
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Oren Levine