Matt Costa - 9:30 Club - 3/5/2008

Review by Nicole Parisi-Smith. Originally posted to the Washington, DC Chapter message board on March 10, 2008 ---

We had a great Surfrider turnout! Julie Lawson, Chris Woods, Felipe Bermudez, Eric Dean and myself! Thanks, everyone!!!

The 9:30 Club was very welcoming from the moment that Julie and I arrived at 6:30pm, and set up a table (with their own 9:30 Club tablecloth) for us, in a great spot inside the venue.

We talked with a lot of Matt Costa fans, many of whom had arrived early in order to get a good spot in front of the stage, and had some time on their hands, and were attracted to our very prominently located table, and attractive table layout.

The people we spoke with - average age, early to mid 20's - fell into 2 catergories - had never heard of Surfrider before, or were members from other chapters rececently relocated to DC.

We spoke with a lot of people about the BEACH Act and collected signatures on a petition, educated people about sustainable fishing practices and seafood choices, and handed out the Monterey Bay Aquarium wallet-size seafood guides, and talked about marine debris and plastics in regards to human health. We also helped a VA resident register to vote, and distributed "I Surf, I Vote" stickers, as well as Chapter stickers and Trestles stickers and pins.

The most popular item was a small pocket-sized Chapter upcoming events calendar that Julie had prepared especially for the concert, that listed some of our events including movie night, chapter meetings and cleanups. If everyone who took one of these flyers comes to one of our events (or checks out our website, printed on the calendar) then we should have a large turnout of new folk at our next few events:)

We met members of other chapters who were just in town for Matt's show, who wanted to know what kinds of campaigns and activities our chapter is up to, most notably a member of Surfers Against Sewage/Surfrider Europe from the UK!

While we were setting up the table I ran into Mitch, a member of Matt's band. He was very familiar with Surfrider and was happy that we were at the show.

The show itself was really good. It wasn't sold out (unless it sold out the night of), but was near to capacity. Matt played one long set and an encore. The first set ended with my favorite song off of the new album - "Emergency Call". For the encore, Matt played the first song solo - "Astair", off of the first album. Then the band joined him for "Sweet Thursday" also off the first album. And they ended the show with what Matt said was a new song.

The band lost a lot of their equipment and instruments while on tour in Canada - it was stolen one night, from a venue, where the stuff was stored for the night. Matt is asking anyone with info about this to contact the Canadian police. It was good to see, at the 9:30 show, that this hasn't affected their senses of humor, or the music:) They put on a great show:)

Thanks to Matt and his band, and the 9:30 Club, and Matt's manager, Chris, for hosting us at the show!!!!

Thanks to everyone who came out to help out at the table, and to enjoy the show. It was a lot of fun!

Matt is on Jack Johnson's record label, Brushfire Records. Here is a BBC performance that tells some of the story regarding how they met: