Why Spraying Pigs’ Blood Onstage and Shutting Down Great Venues Is Not Cool

A band of idiots that I'm sure are very proud of themselves recently splattered blood on the interior of an Asheville, NC venue long supportive of unique, independent acts in all genres. Their artistic effort temporarily forced the shutdown of the venue and associated restaurant. This action caused over 40 people to lose shifts and much needed pay. The band is called Young and in the Way. If you know any venue owners or anybody that books metal acts or bills on which a metal act might appear, please make sure they see this blog post.

Please Make Sure No More Nice People Book This Band

The news has already spread pretty widely on metal-related websites so most people seriously involved with metal and the music industry probably already know about this incident. But the folks at the LAB aren't known for metal acts and such venues may not have heard.

So if you know folks associated with alternative venues that tend to give weirdos the benefit of the doubt, you know the places that have made our lives a little better in a mostly fucked up world, make sure they don't get suckered into booking Young and in the Way.

If Your Life Is Of No Value, Why Not Throw Blood?

If you're not aware, Charlotte "blackened crust" band Young and in the Way trashed a performance space at the back of Asheville's Lexington Ave. Brewery (LAB).

Basically the band sprayed blood on everything, cleaned up their equipment and split. Here are Instagram pics said to be from the show:

Looking at these pics I am momentarily sympathetic to this band and their fans. They look awesome. And when you live in a time when you can't do anything new, in which every aesthetic move has already been made and you're doomed to be totally unoriginal for the rest of your life, then why not just pick the thing that is most likely to upset people that aren't in your small circle of friends so you can feel you had a momentary impact on the world. A statement that you were here and, even though you didn't matter, people felt your presence or at least read about it in a blog.

But please consider the fact that people who were trying to make a space that welcomed you got hurt and try not to be so incredibly self-centered the next time you pick your cliched tactic from the great grab bag of the 20th Century.

The Dismal Effects of a Cliched Aesthetic Assault

The LAB shut down for a few days. Apparently the kitchen was far enough from the performance space that there aren't any inspection issues but management decided to shut down and bring in a cleaning company after a day or two of going at it themselves.

LAB Co-owner Mike Healy stated:

""There was nothing in their rider (agreement with LAB) about what was going to occur..After the incident, they took all their equipment and wiped it down and left the place a disaster zone. Our staff was there until 2 or 3 in the morning cleaning and the next day."

The shutdown temporarily put "almost four dozen employees" out of work for a few days.

Outcome:

Band and fans are thrilled.

Supportive venue temporarily shut down.

Associated restaurant temporarily shut down.

Lost wages and cancelled shows.

Growing awareness that booking Young and in the Way is a mistake for most venues.

Bad look for metal more generally given that it gets little mainstream media coverage so incidents like this tend to define the genre for those of us who don't tend to otherwise pay attention.

There you have it. More people in it for themselves who don't give a fuck about the rest of us.

Hypebot Senior Contributor Clyde Smith (@fluxresearch) also blogs at DanceLand. Send news about music tech startups and services, DIY music biz and music marketing to: clyde(at)fluxresearch(dot)com.

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