Not every night drips with transcendental ephemerae. Sometimes you show up, see the rock'n'roll, and go home. Especially when you've had a day when the gods of technology have seen fit to visit upon you the kind of vengeance normally reserved for those who have trespassed on their demesne. I just wanted to read my e-mail, I don't think that was so unreasonable. Getting out of the house was definitely necessary, the destination was less important. So I found myself at the Hemlock, standing outside the back room at 10 p.m. reading Haruki Murakami's South Of The Border, West Of The Sun while the bands finished soundchecking.

Here is the entire essence of Nigel Peppercock boiled down into one gesture: midway through their set, the guitarist reached behind his amplifier and pulled out a full-size surfboard and asked the crowd, "Anybody want to go crowd surfing?" Prop gags are a sign of creative bankruptcy in music as well as stand-up comedy, and Nigel Peppercock attempt to combine the two. They're a jokey, sophomoric frat-punk band who also, somewhat surprisingly, make pretty entertaining music. The music is a lot more doomy and propulsive than the lyrics, which is good, because the lyrics follow from the titles, which are sophisticated fare like "My Dad's Going To Kick Your Ass". At least they've given up on the homoerotic/homophobic Village People homages for the time being, opting instead for a loose Fast Times At Ridgemont High vibe tonight.

400 Blows are a 3-piece of guitar, drums, and vocals. They play simple/complex pattern-based music, with the faintly echoing ghost-voice of grunge. Not the grunge of Nirvana or Pearl Jam, more the scary heavily reduced blues of Mudhoney or early Soundgarden, only much more tense and grinding and much, much faster. The taut interplay between the guitar and drums was mesmerizing, and the singer is genuinely enthusiastic and happy to be in San Francisco, which goes a long way. I think if I'd been in a better mood I would have been fully into their set and the sloppy punk-style pit, but as it was, I just kept my ass planted on the stool and bobbed my head appreciatively.

Heroine Sheiks didn't include ex-Swan Norman Westberg, which was a disappointment, but the weird, twitchy, barely-contained threat that is Shannon Selberg is still in full force. Although the entire band is talented to a fault, the show is all about Shannon and his unpredictability — he reached into his pants and groped around for a while, finally producing a rubber hand giving the crowd the finger. I was prepared for pretty much anything, and since he'd been eyeing the drunk passed out in the chair in front of me, I was getting ready to dodge if any urine started heading my way. It pays to be prepared.

Tonight, however, he seemed to have met his match in the crowd, which was raising inebriation to a fever pitch. They were pawing at him so much that at one point I really thought he was going to brain one particularly persistent drunklord with his microphone stand. Danger was in the air — for somebody. When Shannon was in Cows, it would have been the entire audience, but either he's mellowed with age or the Heroine Sheiks are different enough that he's less interested in random confrontational insanity. I stuck around for their entire set even though I was tired, just because the vibe I was getting really reminded me of the kind of scummy, ugly avantgarde shows I used to love when I was a teenager in Portland. But I didn't stick around for the encore.