HARDCORE REIGNS SUPREME

I don’t really go to whole lotta “old school” hardcore shows.  But lately, my buddy Gary Suarez has been inviting me to some, and I’ve discovered a couple bands that I actually quite like.  Last night we went to Killing Time’s record release show at the Knitting Factory in Brooklyn.  They had one opener I really dug, which was Deathwish’s own Reign Supreme, who consist of members of a bunch of other legit hardcore bands like Blacklisted and such.  I feel mad late jumping on this bandwagon, but…whatever. Anyway, you’ll never guess what happened…

At the very beginning of the set, Reign Supreme’s singer (whose name I can’t seem to find anywhere) noted that he had an injury: a strained rotator cuff, I believe is what he said?  During one song, a fan was up front singing along, and ended up punching the RS dude in the face.  (I guess he was THAT into it.)  The singer announced that the next person who did that would be punched back.  (He had an injury, after all.)  So…during the next song, a fan (I’m not sure if it was the same kid) got in the guy’s face again.  The singer was apparently just THAT paranoid about getting punched again, that he ended up whacking that dude in HIS face.  And oh man….that kid was KNOCKED OUT.  They rushed him to the hospital and everything.

Now…I don’t bring this up in any effort to “talk crap,” because I think the band is awesome and they were EXTREMELY apologetic after the whole thing happened.  I’m just telling you what I saw.  I’m not one to think that violence is “cool” or whatever, but hardcore is a very violent genre altogether and stuff like this happens.  Not necessarily because of the band on the stage, but pits can get rough, and people get hurt all the time.  It’s just something you gotta roll with.  However…I wonder how the crowd would react if it was say…me, a girl?

-Elise