built up a following

The Locals built up a following in the East Bay . Not readily accepted by the entrenched punk rock scene based around the 924 Gilman Street venue in Berkeley , they instead become popular at Oakland all ages venue iMusicast , where they launched a series of shows called “L3: Live, Loud, and Local”. “We could barely play,” said Harris in 2016; “like we broke all of our amps at every show, I spent more time crowd surfing than playing my guitar. I couldn’t really tell you how to play a power chord at the time; we barely could play. But we put on this show that people came to and they freaked out, so I started focusing on lyrics and making songs have more substantial content.” They engaged in what they called “commo promo” tactics (short for “commotion promotion”), playing brief, unannounced acoustic sets outside schools, dormitories, shopping malls, restaurants, and music venues such as Slim’s . They would go to local high schools, enter classes that were in session, toss stacks of flyers in the air, and run through the halls strumming their guitars and singing their songs until they were chased off campus. These tactics were successful in drawing hundreds of young fans to their shows. “We didn’t mean to start a completely different scene,” recalled Harris a few years later, “but we ended up doing so. While I love punk rock, I also don’t love punk rock. I think it’s just as much of a dick as it is a savior. I love Bad Religion and Rancid and Green Day , but I’m not gonna throw my fist up in the air for the institution of punk rock.”