Punk-Rock Calendars

So R5 Productions, Philadelphia's premier indie-rock concert organizer, promoter and booker, has a new, more professional-looking Web site. Disappointingly, it now takes at least one extra click through the concert calendar to find the site's endearingly fanatical, stream-of-consciousness, gramatically indifferent descriptions of bands that are coming to town. The March 5 bill with Cymbals Eat Guitars, Bear in Heaven and Freelance Whales is a great example. On Freelance Whales, R5 begins: "Oh shit - Internet hype alert! Freelance Whales found one another in late 2008, amidst a strange amalgam of unfamiliar instruments, and precariously composed pop songs." All of the show's other blurbs are equally visceral, though my favorites are the ones for hardcore metal quadruple bills where each band has a name like "EyeInjuryBlood," and R5 raves about them as though it were normal to be a giggly teenager about this.

The Web site's redesign matters because R5 is very sensitive about staying true to its scrappy, independent roots. On the site's "Frequently Asked Questions" section, much of the space is devoted to defending the company against charges that it doesn't book enough local bands, charges too much for tickets and uses too many 21-plus venues, blocking kids from the fun. Unfortunately, any time something is "By the kids, for the kids," as R5 says it is, there's an ever-present, constant tension between sincerity and dilution once the phenomenon grows beyond its original crowds. R5 seems to genuinely struggle with this.

Really though, R5 and Sean Agnew, its founding CEO (if such a term were appropriate for the company), deserve every bit of credit and money they earn. About 10 years ago, Agnew noticed a gaping hole in Philly's music scene and filled it so well that while the shows only used to happen in a Unitarian church's basement, R5 now occupies nearly every important venue in the city. The shows catch great bands before they explode, present them in interesting, smaller spaces, have good and respectful security, and care about the fans. Everyone goes and everyone cares in return.

Two personal R5 memories:

1. The summer before my senior year, my friend and I, who ran WSRN's rock department together, cleaned out all of the thousands of excess CDs in our office and bought a booth at R5's annual flea market to sell them. With 30 minutes and hundreds of CDs left, one of Agnew's friends, a wholesale record collector of sorts, came and offered us $100 for everything left. We took it, smiling. Two months later, on a Sunday morning, we saw him eating breakfast in Swarthmore's cafeteria with one of the super-indie girls.

2. The last R5 show I saw was M.I.A., on her first U.S. tour, in the spring of 2005, in the basement of a Ukrainian social hall. If ever I start to doubt that I lead a life that should only be cherished, I remember that concert: Me, a Ukrainian social hall, a Sri Lankan rapper who was the world's hottest at the time, my Lebanese Jewish friend, his Korean girlfriend, their Chinese friend, their Indian friend, a Sunday night, escaping from Swarthmore's campus and dancing past midnight.

Anyway, to the good times, here's an example of the kind of shows R5 hosts -- Mum, a strangely delicate Icelandic group, last fall: