In the house

In basements and lofts, a music lover explores the DIY scene

As I traipse around the front of the house, down the driveway along the side, and up the back stairs, then make my way through the smokers haunting the porch, I really have no idea what I'm about to walk into.

As usual when I go see bands play in people's homes, I don't have much information. A friend of a friend had posted a few details about the event on my MySpace profile, and so I had come to Dorchester to see Dana, an experimental electronic group made up of two Bard College students.

The duo decided to hit Boston on a whim, and this last-minute decision - and lack of connection with Boston's music scene - meant they couldn't book Great Scott, or T.T.'s, or even a low-key spot like the Lily Pad. Nor did they want to. Dana prefers playing house shows. Lucky for them, some friends had organized a basement concert, so Dana packed two backpacks full of musical gadgets and headed to Savin Hill.

Public shows that take place outside the typical club or bar environment are becoming more and more prevalent. They're being held not just in houses and lofts but in galleries, warehouses, schools, parks - anywhere performing artists can organize shows for friends and fans. Some are more like parlor shows, with a bunch of hippies sitting in a circle playing folky banjo ditties. Others happen at Elks Lodges that cost 50 bucks to rent. Do-it-yourself dance parties are being held in lofts in the South End and in small college venues like Tufts' Oxfam Café.

The porch screen door squeaks and then slams behind me as I walk into the hallway. The sloppily tuned chord progressions and muffled snare hits of a thrash-y punk band leak out from the open door leading to the basement. I put one arm out to navigate the sea of partygoers, who range from 17-year-old high-schoolers who took the T in from the suburbs to heavily pierced college-age hipsters to Dorchester natives who live down the block.

As I pass through the doorway to the kitchen, there is no bouncer checking my bag or asking for my ID to see if I'm 21. There is no bar charging supply-and-demand prices for a skunked bottle of beer. Most of the house shows I've attended have been free, especially low-budget B.Y.O.B. shows like this one, which require no massive soundsystem, no flashy blinking lights, and no security.

Wes Kaplan, a member of the local indie-rock outfit the Craters, a psychedelic two-piece that incorporates hip-hop samples and off-kilter beats, has seen his share of club shows and DIY events. The plus side of playing house shows, Kaplan says, is that "you're not dealing with strict set limits . . . [annoying] sound guys," or steep cover charges. The downside is, the bands don't get press, and they don't get paid. But they do have the freedom to experiment in front of a small crowd, often largely made up of their friends.

"House shows are even more intimate than club shows," says Egan Budd, who plays in the Boston noise band Xiphoid Dementia and attends a lot of DIY events. "It allows a much more direct connection with the artists and audience, which are often one and the same."

To get the word out about these underground shows, artists and organizers rely on word-of-mouth promotion and fliers, as well as local listings websites and social networking sites. The best way to find out about these events, though, is to start attending them.

It turns out the bands on the bill in Dorchester don't have much in common - a punk act, two experimental acts, and an avant-hip-hop producer - except for the fact that none of them mind playing in a smoky basement with itchy pink insulation poking out of the walls and a pitch-black single-file entrance down a creaking stairwell. By about 10:30 p.m., 40 or 50 sweaty audience members are crammed into a basement meant to accommodate 30, and there are another 30 upstairs waiting for the headliners to come on.

On the other side of the river near Somerville's Sullivan Square, underground events like this have long found a home in a former industrial building populated by artists' studios. Because they keep their shows guest-list only, building up a loyal following and keeping out drunk partygoers who might tear the place apart, the organizers have been able to accumulate decorations and impressive sound equipment. Blinking, neon gizmos hang from the ceilings and walls, gigantic subwoofers rattle the floors, and bubble-machines fill entire rooms with soapy suds. Their two-floor parties, featuring DJs and live electronic music from around New England and beyond, have been known to wrap up at 4 a.m., two hours later than any club on Landsdowne Street or bar along Commonwealth Avenue.

Encanti, a local DIY event organizer, DJ, and gifted electronica producer, began putting on electronic music events during his time at Berklee. "No one was hosting those sorts of parties at a pop-oriented college," he says. The freedom to curate styles of music that you want to hear, where you want to hear it, without any rules, is truly empowering. "Within a DIY environment," he says, "I get to make my own celebrities, my own memorabilia, my own language of self expression."

Back in the Dorchester basement, the environment shifts as the punk band finishes its set and disappears into the crowd. The two members of Dana begin pulling out the paraphernalia necessary to their create odd, psychedelic dance beats. Using samplers, loopers, ring oscillators, and vocoders, they create live what many other artists would have simply loaded onto their laptops.

Twenty minutes of writhing, enthusiastic madness ensues. Overwhelmed by the number of people trying to find wiggle room around me, I scurry back up the stairs and find a place to sit, dangling my feet off the staircase and leaning my head against the railing. It's a perfect vantage point for the next two acts - another electronic experimental pop duo by the name of Truman Peyote and unique hip-hop producer Guatemala City, both local.

As the night goes on, I meet a dozen new friends, some of whom I talk music with, others I just chat with as we stand in the long line to the constantly occupied bathroom on the first floor. The party shuts down at midnight (unhappy neighbors means no more shows), when the owner of the house yells, "No offense, but you guys all have to leave!"

I exit the party exhausted but satisfied, and on the way out, someone hands me a slapdash black-and-white flier for a house show the following week in Jamaica Plain. It reads: "Free. All ages. Public transportation accessible." I'll be there.

Show and tell

To find out more about DIY events, check out these sites:

617Noise A listings website devoted to unique all-ages DIY events around Greater Boston. www.myspace.com/617noise

Lemmingtrail An events-listing forum and message-board for music, art, and culture in the area. www.lemmingtrail.com

Amherst Punk Constantly updated calendar for DIY listings around Western Massachusetts - certainly not just punk.www.amherstpunk.com

WMBR Experimental listings The listings page from MIT's official radio station. These guys find out about everything. wmbr.org/www/cr_red