Commitments

 "Because it's a school night."

That was the excuse I had been making for all the months leading up to the night. I couldn't possibly go to San Francisco after dark on a Sunday.

Not even if it meant going to see the Fiftieth Anniversary DEVO show.

Until a friend and constant reader of this blog emailed without provocation to inquire if I was going to be in attendance. 

Two days before the show. 

When I read the email, I felt that nudge I needed to get me off the fence and into the online box office. My wife and I bought tickets, and on that Sunday Night, we drove into the big city and went to a concert. 

It was a celebration of the decades I have spent lugging around an energy dome and my yellow radiation suit. Waiting for one more chance to have the word passed along to me one more time. The word: Devolution. As I have each previous time I have been in attendance, bassist Jerry Casale asked the assembled Devotees, "How many of you think devolution is real?" I roared along with the crowd in assent. "You don't have to look far for examples," Jerry continued. 

We knew what he was talking about. 

Since 1980, when I bought my first DEVO album and hopped aboard the Spudboy Express and didn't look back. These gentlemen from Akron, Ohio have informed my world view and kept me dancing since way back when my high school sweetheart fretted that I would "get into punk rock." The good news was that I did. A world of crashing sounds and dangerous ideas. And somewhere along the line, my wife and I chose "Freedom of Choice" as one of our wedding songs. When the question came up, "When is a good time for our young son to see his first DEVO show?" the answer was obvious: As soon as possible. 

My wife and I were a little chagrined when we realized it would just be the two of us attending the show in San Francisco. We needn't have worried. We were surrounded by Beautiful Mutants. After being bombarded by hits and misses with a massive video screen as their backdrop, Boojie Boy appeared to remind us all "It's A Beautiful World." And he asked us all to promise to return to that very theater in fifty more years for the one hundredth anniversary of Devolution. 

I promised.