It turns out I'm quite the dullard.
I've been in this city for 17 of the past 25 months of my life. I've been in and around this city that long with a genuine interest in the underground punk and hardcore scene. And I had, until this past Saturday never attended a show at 29 Custer St.
A show headlined by Syracuse thrash hardcore three-piece Ed Gein finally lured me. The most assured proof that I am completely lame comes thanks to the fact that I was so completely oblivious, I took my car to drive there from Heath Street.
Little did I know, Custer is about three blocks farther south down Main Street from Heath. I spent about as much time finding a parking spot as it would have taken to walk by Amy's Place and Queen City Bookstore and get there by foot. Lame.
The basement of 29 Custer really is so rock and roll, with noise-buffering carpets hanging from the ceiling that reek of perspiration dispersed at recent performances. The place has the nostalgic dour smell of a men's locker room in the fall when all the wet grass gets tracked in on the soles of cleats, pushed in the corners and left for weeks.
I discarded my paranoia of an elitist mentality on the part of the house owners when the doorman in the most polite of fashions greeted me. He was willing to take part in the pleasantries that most clerks and doormen will refuse. He in fact seemed grateful that was I giving him my $6. Modesty is apparently still a trait to which it is worth aspiring.
In the back of the musky basement, there hang dozens of bicycles and their pieces. Word has it the young entrepreneurs of the household are more than concert promoters. They apparently cruise from garage sale to yard sale and find all the old bikes they can. The shoddy old bikes are then refurbished and resold, having been pimped.
Between the bikes and the general standing room are the merch tables. It's the first merch table I've ever seen prepped with video copies of "Ben Hur" and "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Movie" along with Homer's "The Odyssey" and J.D. Salinger's "Catcher in the Rye."
The most charming thing about 29 Custer is the absence of presumption. That kid at the door who was willing to politely ask if I had a $5 bill instead of $10 affirmed this absence. Even when I didn't have the five, he thanked me anyway. That sort of treatment is hard to find, even in similar small businesses around town.
Even when you think you've got a city figured out, it will toss you a curve and show you something overlooked. I've realized it's a sin to assume you know the ins and outs of an entire city. I got into a groove of sticking to my favorite venues: Broadway Joe's, the Mohawk Place, Xtreme Wheels, etc.
I'm pretty sure there was a more entertaining and historic show to see in Walking Concert at the Showplace Theatre, but I'm glad I finally saw what I had been missing a couple blocks from my home.
