Do-it-yourself punk is music with politics and passion - but without the sex, drink and drugs, writes Fionola Meredith
The unmistakable smell of old hassocks and prayer books hangs heavy in the air, but this is no Sunday-school event. I've arrived at the church hall in Belfast's university area to attend a punk gig - and I've brought my two children, aged seven and 11, with me. The band we've come to hear is Washington DC duo, The Evens, fronted by punk luminaries Ian MacKaye (formerly of Minor Threat and Fugazi) and Amy Farina (of The Warmers). The Evens aren't a Christian band, but they are part of an anti-corporate movement that believes music should be accessible to people of all ages. So they don't play in bars or rock clubs, instead choosing schools, snooker clubs, cinemas and churches.
Some parents might balk at the idea of exposing their infants' tender little lugs - and minds - to punk rock. But while The Evens - with MacKaye on baritone guitar and Farina on drums - play with enough vitriol and volume to satisfy the audience's expectations, they're not exactly the Mohican-sporting punk rockers of the popular imagination. In fact, the fortysomething pair look more like they're dressed for a Sunday afternoon trip to a garden centre, in sensible T-shirts and beige shorts. But their music is uncompromisingly political, a passionate onslaught on the stranglehold of US neo-conservatism and the apathy of the MTV generation.
Audience participation is actively encouraged - part of the punk ethic is to erase boundaries between performer and audience - and my 11-year-old son is visibly exhilarated by joining in a cacophonous song about civil rights abuses in a deprived district of Washington DC.
MacKaye believes children shouldn't be shielded from the harsh reality of politics, or patronised by blandly soporific pop music. "If you think back to when you were 10, 11, 12 years old, kids are just coming to grips with music and they're engaging with the music that's being spoon-fed to them. Music has been so confined and corralled by the record industry, but to me it's sacred, a form of communication that predates language."
MACKAYE AND FARINA have even appeared on Pancake Mountain, a Washington-based children's TV show where bands such as Scissor Sisters and the Arcade Fire perform alongside an audience of tiny frolicking fans. The Evens contributed a specially-written and irresistibly catchy number, Vowel Movement.
MacKaye says, "My entire musical career has always focused on the idea of all-ages shows. There should be no discrimination in terms of who can come in. So we don't play too loud, and we start earlier in the evening - after all, most little kids are in bed by 8.30pm. Music shouldn't just end up being an assault on the senses. Most gigs are smoky, loud and dark - by the end of it, you just want to get home. But I think of music as a gathering point: the ideal is that we're cumulatively making a show. And what I really love about these shows is the fact that you've got the mildly jaded 32-year-olds standing alongside the kids."
As the teenage frontman of Minor Threat in the early 1980s, MacKaye is credited with coining the term "straight-edge", a kind of punk asceticism which explicitly rejects alcohol, drugs and casual sex. It was a rebellion against a rebellion; a critique of the phoney subversion of mainstream punk.
But while few punks will admit to describing themselves as "straight-edge" these days, there's no doubt that elements of the movement linger on. Niall McGuirk, who arranged The Evens's recent appearance in the St Nicholas of Myra Parish Centre in Dublin, is the author of Please Feed Me, a punk rock vegan cookbook. Married with three children, McGuirk worked for many years with the Dublin-based Hope Collective, a popular non-profit punk venue.
The cookbook features recipes from many of the bands who performed at the club, such as Fugazi Chocolate Cake and Bikini Kill Chilli Non Carne. McGuirk says, "The book illustrates the connections between community, art, activism and health. It tells the story of an underground community and network created and maintained by a collective of organisers and hundreds of musicians at a time when most punk bands were signing to major labels for the highest dollar amount."
That do-it-yourself punk ethic is inspiring a new generation of young men and women across Ireland to form their own collectives, motivated by anti-capitalist ire and youthful social idealism. Dylan Haskins (18) from Greystones, Co Wicklow, is part of the Basta youth collective, "a radical non-profit youth group", who organise alcohol-free, drug-free, all-age gigs in their local area. According to the group's mission statement, "Basta is a Spanish word, meaning 'enough is enough' or 'stop'. In our context, it means enough is enough: we're going to take action into our own hands and utilise all means possible with the intent of educating communities to better, more sustainable and fulfilling ways of life."
Chatty and enthusiastic - the antithesis of the stereotypical surly and anti-social punk - Haskins is a Leaving Cert pupil at Presentation College, Bray, Co Wicklow. He also plays in a band called Disko Traitor. "We play anywhere that is not a smelly corporate venue," he says. "We've all grown up with that rock-star stuff, and we've no appetite for it now. We're not into getting famous. What we do is reliant on energy and atmosphere - we're not for profit and we're not out to exploit people."
DYLAN AND THE Basta collective rely on an extraordinary network of contacts that stretch across Ireland and even further afield. "We can organise a tour for a band right across the world. Okay, the band won't be guaranteed payment, but they will get a place to stay. It's insane how global it is! The whole thing works through friends of friends."
"It's all about people taking things into their own hands," agrees Bernard Keenan, a law student in his early 20s, who is part of the same sprawling underground network. "We rely on each other and make things happen." Keenan set up The Evens gig in Belfast, and afterwards gave MacKaye and Farina a bed for the night at his mum and dad's home in the south of the city.
He thinks that a big part of DIY punk's attraction is its very resistance to definition. "We're just a bunch of people putting on gigs, because we don't like what's coming out of the TV. Punk is as big or as small in people's lives as they want it to be. Punk is an attitude, a sense of possibility, a new way of relating to the world."
It's all very far from Sid Vicious and safety pins through the nose.
