The Dik Diks & Nogoodnix

Starting at around 9:45 PM (instead of 8 PM, as was mistakenly advertised), the Nogoodnix crammed themselves into the corner of what appeared to be somebody’s four-foot-by-four-foot basement bedroom, invited around 40 or so friends, and started the punk rock mayhem while the collective body heat pushed the temperature into the mid-thousands. Par usual, the Nogoodnix were fast, violent and full of screamed punk lyrics and extreme rocking out, though the action was subdued due to limited space. The crowd’s moshing abilities were checked also, and energetic head-bobbing and jostling were traded for the usual flying bodies and punk suplexing.
A Nogoodnix set is similar in some ways to a punk newscast, and frontman Jimmy Lo is like an overzealous news anchor, keeping his audience informed on recent events regarding world corruption. Between songs during this particular set, he informed the crowd of Nike’s alleged buyout of the Converse shoe company, which I hope is a lie. Either way, the news fueled the crowd for the last few songs, raising the temperature a little more and causing just a little more stifled movement among the sardine-like audience members. The end of the set brought a flood of sweating, panting concertgoers pouring into the fresh air outside while the Dik Diks set up.
This being the last show as a Chico resident for longtime scenester and Dik Diks frontman Micah Warren, he came dressed in German Lederhosen, or something almost as funny, to commemorate the event. Not necessarily needing anything to boost his stage presence (he has been known to get naked…), the outfit might or might not have influenced the fact that Chico punks watching the last Dik Diks show were going to get fucking hostile, no matter what.
For anyone unfortunate enough never to have seen the Dik Diks, their brand of ’70s rock is vaguely similar to the Rolling Stones, with a dose of reckless stage rage that is much scarier — though it is not particularly geared for moshing, especially when its audience is crammed into a low-ceilinged basement cubicle. But space limitations flew out the window during this set, and full-scale moshing took place anyway. Those on the fringes became wall smudges, more than one head went through the drywall on the ceiling, and even Warren found room to thrash around in the crowd — albeit not completely naked. The bassist lost his pants as punishment for a botched song, and Warren’s demon-possessed convulsions during the band’s slow churner would have put the fear of God into any scene rookie. Two Squire Telecaster guitars served to make everyone blissfully deaf, and the two girls freaking each other in the back of the crowd made a fun visual aid. When the temperature began to melt the solder in the instruments, the Dik Diks called it a set and everyone poured out into the air once again.

– Words and photo by Peter Kimmich

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