Mesh, Zillas On Acid, Sweeping Promises
First Unitarian Church
2125 Chestnut St.
Philadelphia
Nov. 12, 2026
If I’m driving in Philly and I’ve got the radio on, I’m spinning WPRB. The radio station made its presence felt at last night’s show at First Unitarian, tabling (with free swag and cheap shirts) and DJing between sets, and best of all, the show was a delicious top-to-bottom reflection of the spirit of WPRB’s excellent, unpredictable eclecticism. It was especially on display with the local one-two punch of openers Mesh and Zillas On Acid (LIVE), each approaching punk from their own distinct angles.
Mesh kicked things off in pulse-quickening style, with a powerful twin-guitar attack (18-strings strong, counting Allison Durham’s PHANTOM-style 12-string) and absolutely pummeling rhythm section. They had me hooked from the onset with “Quit My Job,” a song about quitting your job so emphatic and infectious it made me want to quit jobs I like. “Boots on the Pavement” announced itself with a pure WIPEOUT!-style floor tom fill before congealing into catchy surf-rock work, the drums working their incessant rhythm alongside growling bass and octave-apart dual unison vocals, perfect for a song about the punk pastime of dancing in basements; art imitating life, right then and there! They closed their set with “Violent Peasant,” a highlight from their debut album No Fun At All (a misnomer if I ever heard one), which you might know if you listen to the Midbrow newsletter playlists I make – it’s a tune with an instant-classic three-against-four riff on the 12-string, Durham slaying it, the guitars sounding wire-y and scabrous in the best way.
I was especially excited for Zillas On Acid, a band I’ve wanted to see live for ages, especially since they’ve become a four-piece unit on stage featuring my friend Ari Ratner on vocals. Ratner is a contagiously enthused, unselfconscious and fun performer, completely throwing herself into her duties as musical rabble-rouser, her vocals generally unintelligible and heavily affected with pitch-shifting and delay throws, but the feeling fully communicated: move your body, get your head in the game. Zillas – veterans of the Making Time scene – does the acid-house thing as good as it can be done, and the live drums and bass add so much to the energy, basically taking a post-punk formula and swapping it for a guy with enough table-top effects and synths and knobs that he looks more like an IT technical installation dude having an especially good time. Four-on-the-floor pounding kick-drum beats with heavy, deep syncopated basslines that slowly shift and evolve, dance excursions lasting over ten minutes and never getting static or dull, Ratner howling and screeching with an seemingly-endless supply of punk zhuzh, and an unexpected cover of Paul McCartney’s “Temporary Secretary” that triple-underlined how ahead of its time and eternal that song is: what more could you want? (I looked around the room to see if anyone else recognized the cover, and seemingly few did, but someone I spoke to after Zillas said when they started playing it she "did a triple flip in my mind." Relatable.)
