Strikes Again: Call Me Lightning

LIKE THE OUTLAW GANG in Sam Pekinpah's film "The Wild Bunch" who struggle to find a place in a world where people drive cars instead of ride horses, Call Me Lightning is a band comprised of old-time punks ill at ease in a world where they might finally have to hire a booking agent.

The Milwaukee, Wis.-based trio, whose name comes from a B-side by The Who, plays music that is refreshingly anachronistic. It's raw and heavy post-hardcore that recalls a time when the lines between basement punk and indie rock were a little blurrier — this is largely because Call Me Lightning was there.

"We've been playing in bands — me and the drummer particularly — and touring since we were pretty young. You know, teenagers," said singer-guitarist Nathan Lilly.

Those tours frequently brought them to the D.C. area, and Lilly's old band Akarso even released a split EP with D.C. group Faraquet.

"[Akarso] played one of Faraquet's first shows," Lilly said, "back when Hillary [Soldati] from Smart Went Crazy was still playing cello [for them]."

With two LPs to its name — one of which was released on New York label French Kiss — Call Me Lightning is still going strong and touring regularly. But over a decade the nature of that touring has changed.

"I'm not necessarily tired of touring," Lilly said. "Just tired of certain aspects of it. Or maybe it's more being discouraged by new developments in it. There's definitely a real change in indie music going on and it can be discouraging. There's a system you have to fight against now that resembles the mainstream music industry more than punk rock at this point. It's a little bit more highly organized now — people have streamlined indie-rock and punk touring."

That is, it's harder to go out and do the classic D.I.Y. thing.

"We've always booked ourselves and that can be difficult these days for sure," lamented Lilly. "I'm perfectly capable of booking a show at a small venue where I know the people, but at this point you need people with some credibility larger than your own to get any shows."

Not that it's all sour grapes, although Lilly seemed unsure where to locate the positive side.

"There's always good with the bad," he admitted. "The independent music press, 'zines — it's really just highly developed and really well organized, which is good. I guess. But there's kind of this much more stable hierarchy in place as far as independent music goes."

Still, Orwellian wall of indie-rock bureaucracy or not, Lilly isn't quite ready to sell the van and dump his guitar in the basement.

"I love going on tour. It's exciting to play every night," he said. "Everywhere we go we have some friends that we're stoked to see. The worst day on tour is better than the best day at work — and that's always been the case."

» DC9, 1940 9th St. NW; with Carol Bui and The Coats, Tue., 8:30 p.m., $10; 202-483-5000.

Written by Express contributor Aaron Leitko

Photo courtesy Call Me Lightning