I gotta admit: having played in a semi-popular 90s band has ended up being a pretty good gig. Decades later, you can play in a town where you did relatively well and bring a decent crowd. People sing along. People take pictures. People stick around after the show to tell you how you haven’t changed in 30 years. And, the best part, you get to play your own songs.

On Saturday, July 15, 2023, Collapsis reunited for a show at Motorco Music Hall. The Mad Starlings and Alex Lawhon opened the show and the night was well attended. Originally, I had planned a much longer night of music, but after we got together to rehearse, the consensus was to pair down the set a bit. As the show ran, we played for 75 minutes, which is still fairly hefty.

The set that emerged in rehearsal took the basic order from our album, Dirty Wake, but substituted a few songs here and there. Rather than open with our single, “Automatic,” we saved that for second to last. In its place, we put an unreleased rocker, “Crocodile.” On four of the songs, Mike Ivanitch from the Mad Starlings played percussion. He rounded out “Wonderland” and “Dirty Wake” quite nicely. We closed with a cover of R.E.M.’s “These Days,” which most of us have been playing at the Maxell 90 R.E.M. tribute shows.

Most of the things about playing in a club band are still the same. For me, it never gets old seeing that your band is headlining a venue. It’s a bonus when someone takes the time to write your name in chalk on a massive chalkboard. I always like to read the backstage dressing room walls, too. Most of it is either dirty talk or band promotion, but it’s also like a crossroads. Every line tells a story. Every story has at least a pinch of truth.

The most interesting part of the night happened towards the end of the set. I heard someone in the crowd shouting for “Clay Pigeons,” a song we did for the film of the same name. We don’t play it often, if at all, because on “Clay Pigeons” I play piano and Ryan plays acoustic guitar. It’s a completely different posture for the band and we weren’t set up for it. So, as a spur of the moment thing, I played a vamp of “Clay Pigeons” before kicking into the heavy part of “Chartreuse.” Usually, a tease is enough to assuage a random request. But then, after the show, the woman who requested “Clay Pigeons” told me that it was her favorite song of all time and was disappointed that we didn’t play it. So, I grabbed an acoustic guitar, Carlos grabbed a snare, and we played a version of it on the club risers.

Collapsis will return.