Destiny Turned On The Radio: A journey through Sonoma County Punk Rock Past, Present & Future - All in one night.

Destiny Turns on the Radio is the title of a terrible little indie film from 1995 that stars Quentin Tarantino as the real life embodiment of Destiny. QT is known as a great director, but he’s a terrible actor. The less said about this piece of “so bad, it’s bad” 90’s schlock, the better. 

However, the title has wormed its way into my brain and I often find myself thinking of that film when Destiny shows its pretty little face in my real life and takes me on an adventure. 

I’ve thought about that silly little movie the past two Friday nights in a row.

This past Friday, April 17, I left the house not knowing what it would have in store for me. It was the kind of night where everything hits right. I went out looking for something special, and I’ll be damned. I found it.

Looking back at the night and where my modest journeys took me, I found three very distinct visions for the music community. It was as if I was visited by three Ghosts Of Sonoma County Punk: The Past, Present & Future. 

Ghosts Of Sonoma County Punk Past: Museum of Sonoma County.

My first stop was the Museum of Sonoma County to visit the opening night reception for their newest exhibit, Disturbing The Peace: Sonoma County’s Early Punk Underground. (Last week I shared a conversation with KQED's Gabe Meline and Museum of Sonoma County's Jon Del Buono about the exhibit.)

The place was a buzz of activity. The crowd looked like concert goers, rather than the usual museum goers. A woman working the door of the exhibition said to me in passing, “I just love all the cool t-shirts everyone is wearing!” 

As I checked in and entered the museum I was overwhelmed by the massive amounts of people in the exhibit.

The exhibit was wall to wall of paraphernalia from days of punk rock past, and packed to the gills with the folks who helped build the community or were directly influenced by it. 

It was hard to make it through the room, everywhere you turned was someone with their jaw open, grinning and/or pointing at something on a wall or in a case. 

Even as crowded as it was inside, most people had gigantic smiles on their faces as they traversed the tight aisles of the exhibit. 

There was no way to properly soak it all in, but what I did soak in was the energy in the air. It felt alive and electric.

I ventured outside to find some fresh air and a cold beer and found old and new friends. I chatted and enjoyed a cold Henhouse. I watched the massive crowd of punks. Having spent the last four years in Napa, where there isn’t much of a counter-culture community, it felt like heaven to be surrounded by so many like minded people. I’m a stranger in this place, but at the moment I felt like I was coming home.

As the clock grew closer to 7pm and the end of the party, I was finally able to sneak into the exhibit and have a little more breathing room to explore. 

I ran into Gabe Meline, the curator of the exhibit. He greeted me with a big handshake, a half-hug and a “Welcome to Sonoma County,” and excused himself to run inside. I would later find Meline inside the exhibit with a staple gun in his hand and stapling flyers to the wall. The work of a curator is never done. 

There was a stage set up in the corner of the room with a small set up of drums, guitar and bass. I was overjoyed to find a group of teens, younger than I was when I first discovered the world of punk, playing a set of impromptu covers. It was sloppy in the best of ways. 

As I made my way around the room. I was buzzing so much from the energy in the space, I couldn’t properly concentrate on deeply exploring the exhibit. I turned a corner and stopped dead in my tracks when I came across a photo of the band Tsunami Bomb from the late 90’s hanging on a wall of the exhibit. 

I was so confused looking at this photo because… This was MY PHOTO! “Wait? What? How the hell did this get here?” were some of the many thoughts rolling through my head. 

It was a photo I took of the band many years ago at a VFW style music venue in Longview, Texas! They often played in our area and actively were spreading the gospel of Sonoma County. 

 I had shared the photo in last week’s email newsletter and talked about how Tsunami Bomb was a large influence on my group of friends. Meline liked it and posted it on the wall!

Here was a photo I took when I was 17/18 years old, and it was hanging on a wall in a museum as part of an exhibit! It was such a surreal moment. My poor little brain still can’t quite comprehend it all. I felt so overwhelmed and welcomed and holy shit. I was a part of the exhibit! “Welcome to Sonoma County” indeed! 

At this point the exhibit opening was coming to a close. Folks filed out of the museum and wandered down the street to the Barrel Proof lounge for a concert with the long running Sonoma County punk rock band, Victims Family! 

The show had been sold out for weeks, and we had been told there would be a small amount of tickets at the door. When I asked about the chance of getting in, the young woman at the door laughed at me. There would be no tickets available after all. 

At this point I could have headed home, but there was a feeling in the air that the night was not yet. There was a tune playing on the metaphorical radio in my head. So I continued on into the night on a quest to have more adventure and to discover more community. 

Luckily, the spirit of destiny took me just a few blocks away...

Ghosts Of Sonoma County Punk Present: The Lost Church.

The Lost Church Santa Rosa was hosting a small house warming party in their brand new home in the heart of downtown Santa Rosa at 545 Mendocino Ave. This was a small gathering to allow the locals to stop by and see the new space. 

The Lost Church is a listening room music venue.  This isn't a space for background music while you chat with your friends. This is a place where the artists and the music are put front and center for intimate concert performances and community building. 

I had previously stopped by the Lost Church a few weeks earlier for a chat with the General Manager Bryce Dow-Williamson. That chat will run in next week’s newsletter, so I won’t get too deep into the details of the physical space.

The universe once again smiled upon me. I walked up and was warmly greeted by Dow-Williamson, who promptly started introducing me to the handful of people in the room. I met and chatted with a number of other wonderful locals. I set out to make more friends on this Friday evening, and here was the universe responding to my wish. 

One of the individuals Dow-Williamson introduced to me was musician and music promoter Travis Hayes. Chatting with Hayes, we talked about a number of our mutual friends from the alt-country/americana circuit. 

Once upon a time, I would roadie for the band Drag The River, a kind of punk rock goes country supergroup from Colorado. The bass player for Drag The River was JJ Nobody from the punk band Nobodys. He also owned the punk rock dive bar, the Triple Nickel Tavern where I worked as the music promoter.

Through our conversation, we figured out that Hayes had booked Drag The River at Thee Parkside in SF for one of the tours I had been their roadie. It was a life changing night for me in SF. Not only did I meet future New Noise Magazine editor Lisa Root, kickstarting my music journalism career, I also fell in love with Thee Parkside. 

After that tour, I would work to build the Nickel into more of a Parkside-like environment. I even took large chunks of the booking information from their website, along with Bottom Of The Hill’s website, to build my own booking practices. 

That night in SF had a profound effect on my own music career and here I was chatting with the guy who helped make it happen. It was another wild coincidence that destiny put in my path on this mighty fine Friday evening. 

I loved watching as the Lost Church’s Director Of Development, Josh Windmiller wandered the room with a guitar in his hands. He was soaking up the space and I feel like he was trying to discover the room’s magical sweet spots.

This place is run by the folks presently working to make sure the music community has a future. They are the heart and soul of the Santa Rosa and Sonoma County music community. 

The new space oozes with potential. This is a place for folks to hone their skills and grow. This place is about to become the epicenter of original talent in Santa Rosa. There’s already magic in the space, and you can feel that this space is hungry for more. 

As the low key open house event ended, I found myself back on the streets of Santa Rosa. At this point I could have headed home and turned in for the night. But the magic was still buzzing in my veins. I could still feel something else out there in the night calling my name.

Ghosts Of Sonoma County Punk Future: Vista Francisco & The Arlene Francis Center

I might not have gotten in to see Victims Family at Barrel Proof, but I was still craving a punk rock experience. I could still feel the tugs of destiny. 

So I punched the directions to the Arlene Francis Center into my phone and started walking into the night.

Embarrassingly enough, this was my first visit to the AFC. There have been plenty of shows there that have popped up on my radar, but for whatever reason I had yet to visit. 

I’m no stranger to DIY community spaces, but I must admit that I was still a bit nervous walking into the space. Sometimes these event spaces or house shows can be a little cliquish, but as I walked into the front door of the AFC and paid my cover, I was warmly welcomed by the staff.

I had missed the first two bands, Lean-To & Strawberry Farm, but I was just in time to see the headlining band, Vista Francisco from Santa Rosa.

I wandered the rooms soaking it all in. It felt so familiar. Once again, I felt at home in what should feel like a strange place. I loved the art on the walls. I loved the collections of flyers, posters and other punk rock paraphernalia.

In the spirit of the night’s earlier museum exhibit, I decided to pull a flyer for the night’s event off the wall and add it to my own collection. 

I made my way into the back room. I feared being the oldest person in the room, but I was happy to see lots of excited parents and young adults. 

I stood back and watched the crowd. I saw bright and excited faces. Everyone looked happy to be here and you know what? So was I. I left my apartment and went out into the night looking for something and I found it over and over again. 

Before I knew it the lights dimmed and the four piece band took the stage. As they ripped into their first song, I took a very simple note that read, “Holy fuck this is soooo good.”

I was absolutely delighted. I had no idea what to expect and I was blown away. 

Vista Francisco brings a pop-punk influenced indie rock with a healthy dose of shoegaze. The singer sings through a microphone made out of an old telephone receiver, giving a disconnected and raw feel to his vocals. 

I find a lot of Joyce Manor in modern punk and indie bands, and Vista was no exception. But they also reminded me of a number of up and coming bands from the bay like Teens in Trouble & Grumpster. They’d be right at home with the current crop of bands coming out on San Jose based Asian Man Records. 

Not to mention, they were so tight. They all played so well together. Their drummer was a damned delight to watch and was maybe my favorite part of the band. They’re one of the most solid bands I’ve discovered in recent memory. Their talent is absolutely bonkers.

I didn’t realize it at the time, but this was an album release party for the band. They just put out their new 5 song EP, Few Years, Few More, released by Don’t Flunk Me Records. It’s a solid release and a really great document of the band’s live sound, but live they sound so much larger, fuller and just more powerful. If you’re a fan of young ultra talented indie flavored emo-punk, you can do a lot worse than this! (Listen or purchase their new record on their bandcamp)

At the show, there were only 25-35 people still left when Vista hit the stage, but if I have it my way, there will be hundreds showing up for their shows in the months and years to come. 

Before me was the future of the Sonoma County music community.  

I saw a number of folks documenting the night. They can sense that this band is something special. How many photos and paraphernalia from this night will one day make its way into a future museum exhibit on Sonoma County music community?

Vista Francisco are just one of many young bands here in Sonoma County. They’re building on the foundations of those who came before them. These are the folks who will be paving the way for Sonoma County music for years to come. 

The show ended and I wandered back to my car. This whole night I got to explore the past (and somehow find myself within it) at the museum, explore the present with the Lost Church and now get a glimpse of the future at the Arlene Francis. It might sound like a boring night, but I can promise you I left the AFC and felt elated at my experience. 

On the walk home I texted my life-partner, Claire, a sweet message. We packed up our cat and moved west in February of 2022 and it’s been one heck of a challenge ever since. But in these moments on my walk home, I wrote her a sweet little message that went a little something like this: 

“Tonight was so much fun. I feel like we are finally in the right place. I’m meeting fantastic people. Thank you for bringing us here. ”

Destiny turned on the radio and god damn did I like what it had to play for me.