Hardcore, and D.C. hardcore in particular, has a rep for being stuck in the past. But it stays fresh by continually creating new pasts to draw from. A few years back, bands like Coke Bust brought the early ’80s thrashy style of hardcore back into vogue. But there are others reviving the mid-’80s melody of Dag Nasty, the late ’80s aggression of Swiz and the late-’90s chug of Damnation A.D. Soon there will be late ’00s tribute bands to Coke Bust, too. The logical endpoint is to be, to paraphrase The Onion, nostalgic for bands that don’t exist yet.

This Was My Night & This Was a Lot of Other Nights is another chapter in the scene’s love affair with itself, though an entertaining and necessary one. Editors Tim Follos and Hussain Mohammed compile show reviews and interviews from Follos’ blog Day After Day DC, covering the past decade — the most recent era of harDCore. It reads like a blog, in good ways and bad: The energy of the house shows reviewed (though “lovingly described” is more accurate; Follos has hardly an unkind word for anyone) is palpable, and he draws from a depth of knowledge and eye for detail only a true fan could.

At the same time, the long personal asides, shout-outs and inside jokes (most involving Sick Fix‘s Pat Vogel) remind you this was written by and for a small group of friends who all hang out and play in bands together.

This Was My Night isn’t so much about a particular city or era, but rather a particular crowd of 20-something, group-house-dwelling, radical politics-having, dog-walking, (ex-)vegan straight edge punx dedicated to putting on shows in makeshift spaces on shoestring budgets.

So the 12-page review of the 2013 Damaged City Fest that opens the book is kind of overkill. And for a book aiming to document an era that produced hundreds of local bands, a lot of the same ones show up again and again — Ilsa and The Max Levine Ensemble, both terrific bands, but reflective of the authors’ personal preferences.

There are a lot of others from that period that don’t appear, either for taking a different punk-derived trajectory, or just being in different social circles. They include Deathfix, Mass Movement of the Moth, The Apes, The Shirks, The Cassettes, Medications, Imperial China and the whole Sockets Records roster. Today, as always, there isn’t one D.C. punk scene, there are many scenes, and they don’t always communicate well with each other.

‘This Was My Night & This Was A Lot of Other Nights,’ back cover

This Was My Night isn’t so much about a particular city or era, but rather a particular crowd of 20-something, group-house-dwelling, radical politics-having, dog-walking, (ex-)vegan straight edge punx dedicated to putting on shows in makeshift spaces on shoestring budgets. And in that sense, it’s really about one band, Coke Bust, whose members and fellow super-promoters Chris Moore and Nick Candela (aka Nick Tape, who’s since moved to Brazil) held this scene together mostly by themselves through sheer force of will.

Thus one of the best pieces in the book is by Nick Tape, in which he describes the benefits of booking shows at the Corpse Fortress, the famously filthy, hot, dilapidated Silver Spring house that put on memorable shows until the neighbors finally got sick of the ruckus and got them all evicted.

“As a promoter, access to a venue with no rules and no set fee is enormously helpful,” Tape writes. “The lack of a fee allows promoters of shows with mediocre turnout to still pay bands somewhat respectable amounts at the end of the night.”

The second half of the book is made up of interviews with familiar punk figures, some of which are more lucid than others (Bad Brains’ H.R. is, predictably, in another world). There’s a bittersweet chat with the now-deceased Dave Brockie of Gwar. There’s a theological discussion with Positive Force co-founder (and fellow scene historian) Mark Andersen. There’s the requisite Ian MacKaye interview — a surprisingly unique one given the man must give dozens of interviews a month — in which he takes a deep dive into the history of Georgetown.

Follos is a skilled interviewer, able to draw out rich personal stories without being too much of the fanboy that he is (and most of us who read the book are). He can also be mischievous, asking Brian Baker, “Why is it necessary for Bad Religion to have three guitarists?” and getting Ian Svenonius to accidentally agree with conservative columnist George Will.

It’s fair to wonder whether a book like this needs to exist, especially for a genre saturated in self-documentation — and especially today, when many of the bands documented still exist, and a lot of the material is already accessible online. But I’d say it does. Given the book’s ultra-insider perspective, the target readership seems to be the 50 or so people who already appear in the book.

But only an insider could tell the story of the Bobby Fisher Memorial Building, another DIY space that the Borf graffiti collective jury rigged and briefly put on art installations and punk shows before it inevitably got shut down: “Towards the end, they cut our power, because we were stealing power from a neighbor who was also stealing power,” writes Chris Moore. “We ran over 15 shows on generators. Cops never shut down the shows… Seeing 20 people installing soundproofing and insulation… that’s awesome.”

The authors of This Was My Night & This Was a Lot of Other Nights host a book-release party Monday, April 25 at Black Cat with Scanners and Mirror Motives.

Flip through the jukebox at the Black Cat in Washington, D.C., and you’ll find The Modern Lovers’ self-titled album, The Best Of The Ronettes, the No Thanks! ’70s Punk Rebellion comp (for The Undertones’ crucial “Teenage Kicks”), and some recent music from the area’s finest, like Ex Hex and Priests. Since May, however, you could also spend a few bucks on something that wasn’t even out yet: The Max Levine Ensemble‘s first album in eight years, Backlash, Baby. With his tongue in his cheek, guitarist and vocalist David Combs told DCist, “Sorry it’s such an expensive stream,” giving a little something to the friends and fans that have heard these songs live so many times. Now released from its five-plays-for-$2 preview, Backlash, Baby is a desperate, full-tilt pop-punk record that’s just trying to make sense of a backwards world.

Formed in the D.C. suburbs as high-schoolers in 2000, The Max Levine Ensemble’s members witnessed the last years of punk bands Q And Not U and Black Eyes, and remained steadfast with a handful of others when the city moved on to other music. Their songs were snotty and short and silly, but also earnest, catching the attention of pop-punk tastemakers (with releases on Plan-It-X and Asian Man) and the ire of ornery pop-punk musician/podcaster Ben Weasel, resulting in some cheeky revenge.

Like the the near-decade it took to make, there’s no rush to Backlash, Baby: Songs stretch past the three-minute mark, the production is robust, and the concise-yet-lush arrangements bely the band’s guitar-bass-drums format. The 1-2-3 punch that opens the album is a good indicator of how far The Max Levine Ensemble has come, with the title track swinging wide and hard into the anthemic “My Valerian.” The mid-tempo rocker chases bliss in tongue-twisted herbal sedatives (“Kava kava chameleon / Boswellia geranium / They call her the setting sun / But she’s my valerian”) and a beefy hook somewhere between Pixies and The Rentals. Like its excellent Bond-inspired music video, “Sun’s Early Rays” is taut and action-packed, spiraling downward in frantically struck chords and Nick Popvici’s dramatic drum rolls.

In eight years, Combs has developed considerably as a lyricist and songwriter under the name Spoonboy. That venture is decidedly more pop, split between solo acoustic numbers and full-band orchestrations while exploring identity and politics with insight and curiosity. (He retired the name in June while promising new projects.) He continues that thread on Backlash, acknowledging that the personal is political. The songs engage rather than point fingers at what it means to be American, hitting hardest in “Fall Of The Constellations.” That track’s rhythmic urgency is akin to Ted Leo or the late Jay Reatard: “If we are the core, the uninformed / We are the ones whose votes are counted / We still do nothing about it.” The piano-driven “American” swells like a ragtag Bruce Springsteen rallying cry, delivered by Combs’ nasal tenor and bassist Ben Epstein’s hearty shout, each spurred to furious punk-rock speed as they question the wars that have shaped the country.

Where Combs makes sense of the world in clever and affecting lines, Epstein — who tends to write about parties, pizza and euphoria — closes Backlash, Baby on a bittersweet note. “Going Home Part I” is a quiet, campfire-intimate song that’s over before it begins, but it sets the tone for part two and a happy-go-lucky Bo Diddley beat that’s at odds with the melancholy themes at hand. “Things will get better once we leave the winter far behind,” Epstein sings with a gang of friends, a sentiment echoed in a charming documentary about his efforts to make the most of a summer. It’s a sentiment that captures how we grow from our silly-yet-earnest teenage years into people with age and hurt and triumph. Here’s hoping it won’t be another eight years before The Max Levine Ensemble returns for another round.

Copyright 2015 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.

On a record full of fast-paced, catchy shout-alongs, “My Valerian” is the chunky, mid-tempo rock anthem with the perverse melodic sweetness of Pixies and the clean-cut backbone of The Rentals. While guitarist David Combs has always been an earnest lyricist, his long-running (and recently retired) solo vehicle Spoonboy has taught him to convey more with less, clipping the first verse with the terse, “I woke up in transit, panicked, and screaming.” Combs plays with words, twirling herbal sedatives (“Kava kava, chamomeleon / Boswellia geranium”) around in his mouth as a sort-of love song to escaping anxiety and chasing bliss, “My valerian.”

In the band-directed video, its members are captured by evil doctors and Combs’ brain is replaced by a doomsday device. Ben Levin, writer for Steven Universe and creator of the web series, Doris & Mary Anne Are Breaking Out Of Prison, provides some trippy animation when things get weird. It’s the second of a three-part series, the prequel to the thrilling video for “Sun’s Early Rays,” which not only features Priests‘ Katie Alice-Greer and Ilsa‘s Sharad Satsangi as your next Bond and Bond Villain, but also a whole crew of D.C. friends and musicians plotting The Max Levine Ensemble’s demise.

Backlash, Baby comes out Nov. 20 on Lame-O and Rumbletowne.

Copyright 2015 NPR. To see more, visit http://www.npr.org/.

The party decor doesn’t feel out of place. This is a celebration. It’s the first anniversary of Babe City Records, a D.C.-based record and cassette label that captures the new sound of the city’s indie-rock scene — and the show is nearly sold out.

Formerly associated with Chimes Records, Babe City was spearheaded by musicians and fans who wanted to carve out a place for themselves in independent music. Now the label is on a mission to help other local bands do the same.

The label’s Jon Weiss, 24, and Peter Lillis, 28, are also musicians: They both appeared onstage during the anniversary show, handling guitar in Jules Hale’s band Den-Mate. (Weiss also sings in Babe City group The Sea Life.) Weiss and Lillis play major roles behind the scenes, too: They quite literally live Babe City, which shares its name with their group house and DIY venue in D.C.’s Dupont Circle neighborhood. The guys moved into the house in August 2014 and started hosting shows the following month.

Co-founded by Erik Cativo (aka Erik Strander) and Weiss, Babe City is now operated by a small group of friends. Cativo and Weiss handle key roles behind the scenes, including production and booking, respectively. Lillis serves as the label’s publicity guru. More help comes from Kevin Sottek, a member of Babe City signees Witch Coast, who’s the label’s art director; Jen Pape, who recently joined as a project manager; and Michael Andrade — an occasional Bandwidth contributor — who’s Babe City’s official photographer.

“We’re all nerds about something,” Lillis says. “Everyone comes into it with their own background and passion and it fills out all the space in between.”

Babe City likes to be inclusive. For the 9:30 Club gig, the label roped in D.C. bands The Max Levine Ensemble and The El Mansouris, poppy rock ensembles with no official tie to the label. With the slogan “everyone’s a babe at Babe City,” the imprint doesn’t want to be thought of as male-oriented or sexist (though the anniversary gig’s lineup was heavily male).

Weiss says David Combs, the longtime leader of The Max Levine Ensemble (and also a Bandwidth contributor), was his first musical role model when he first started to probe the D.C. music scene at age 16. “Having him on this show was awesome,” says Weiss, a Rockville native who’s only eight years younger than Combs.

In an indie-rock scene as transient as D.C.’s, it doesn’t take long for scenesters to become elder statesmen. Weiss has been involved with The Sea Life for eight years, and he thought his experience could be helpful to rising bands like Young Rapids. The musician says his desire to support other local groups was a major impetus behind Babe City’s creation.

“When you have this album that you’re proud of and you can’t put it out, or you don’t know how to put it out, or you don’t have direction for it,” Weiss says, “it’s very defeating.”

Lillis agrees. He says Babe City is here to help.

“Bands can get bogged down in the non-music stuff from recording, to booking shows, even finding a place to practice,” Lillis says. “There are so many logistics that can be a detriment to bands. We want to let them be the musicians, and we’ll get the rest of it done for them.”

Now Babe City wants to take its mission a step further. They want to work on getting their music licensed for media, sign more out-of-state bands and grow into a national — as well as local — label. And they’d like to expand into vinyl.

“[Vinyl] is our favorite format,” Weiss says. “We don’t want to be just a cassette label. Most of the labels we look up to are primarily vinyl. To be viewed by them as peers would be an awesome goal for us.”

But while the 9:30 Club gig felt like a party, both Weiss and Lillis say the work has just begun.

“We’re happy and excited, but we’re not patting ourselves on the back,” Weiss says. “We’re not ready to do that yet. We want to just use it as motivation and validation to work harder.”

Second photo: The Sea Life at 9:30 Club, by Michael Andrade

The original version of this post contained errors and imprecise language. Due to a reporting error, it incorrectly identified Peter Lillis, who works on the label, as a co-founder. (Jon Weiss and Erik Cativo are co-founders.) Second, due to an editing error, we described Babe City as a cassette label, but that’s not entirely accurate: It has released music both on vinyl and cassette. Third, Babe City is better described as an affiliate — not a direct descendant — of Chimes Records. Finally, we first referred to Young Rapids as “younger” than The Sea Life, but that wasn’t the best word choice. We meant the band has existed for less time. The language has been corrected.

It was on on a camping trip, says Combs, and a member of the Brit band Onsind seemed a little squeamish about jumping into the river. Naked on a boulder, Combs’ friend Dru Edmondson wasn’t having it. He bellowed, “Free your mind, square!” and leapt into the water.

For Combs, who performs under the name Spoonboy, the moment became a song title and the idea for a new music video, premiered here on Bandwidth today. The track is a declaration of independence fueled by an enlightened approach to gender identity; the music video is a sun-drenched celebration of that.

“I’m diving in and coming up for air, and I’m not scared or unaware,” Spoonboy sings on the cut. It’s just one pop-punk blast from a fast-paced series of three split records he recently released with poppy acts The Goodbye Party, Martha and Colour Me Wednesday. (“Free Yer Mind, Square” appears on the Martha split.)

Combs is already a fixture on the D.C. punk scene from his years of output with The Max Levine Ensemble. But Spoonboy on his own is just as hooky and politically charged.

When he wrote the song, Combs was thinking a lot about queer identities, a subject he’s explored in previous songs and public forums. “I think a lot about how much we’re prescribed particular narratives about what gender and sexuality are supposed to look like,” Combs says. He says even progressive-minded people can fall into traps around what gender conformity—or nonconformity—should look like.

On “Free Yer Mind, Square,” powerful guitars charge in as Spoonboy announces with a slight sneer, “You wanna know what I want / You wanna know who I love / Well, I don’t care.”

The loud-quiet-loud structure of “Free Yer Mind, Square” was exactly what video director Ben Epstein had been looking for. Epstein had been sitting on an idea for a music video that would be half forwards and half backwards. He merged the idea with Spoonboy’s song—reversing the video’s action around the track’s halfway point—and the giddy, gleeful and puzzling music video was born.

When Combs and his pals dive into the swimming pool in the video, the image bears a particular significance. “What I wanted to get across is, ‘Look. I’m not going to worry about it. I’m just going to be who I am and not look over my shoulder all the time.'”

Both of the Spoonboy tracks on the Martha split are what Combs calls “pep songs.” That good-natured self-assuredness seems to be paying off; a new Max Levine Ensemble album, which Combs says is his best work yet, will arrive sometime this year.

Spoonboy plays Friday, June 6 at DC9.