There’s always something special about seeing an artist perform in his hometown. There’s also a little extra energy on tap when a rock and roller hits the final show of a long tour. Friends and fans of Jack Kays got a double whammy of that juice when the Cincinnati transplant wrapped up the six-week North American leg of his Washed Up Dried Out tour at Washington’s 9:30 Club on Wednesday night.
With Kays’ active encouragement, the mosh pit grew over the course of the 90-minute set. It began with some regular midweek slam dancing but developed by the end into a tidal wave of crowd surfers who threatened to overwhelm the enthusiastic staff assigned to catch them as they reached the stage.
But like everyone leaving the show, no one was dropped, and all were smiling.
Jack Kays leaves the crowd at the 9:30 Club with lots of smiles
Kays released his first full-length studio album, DEADBEAT!, last year and has seen a huge uptick in his popularity. Part slacker, part straight edge, and all showman, he hits the stage with his four-piece pop-punk outfit wearing a backward baseball cap and strums the quiet, yearning “Throwaway” before kicking into gear on “Get a Job.”
“You say I need to get a job – But I hate working for a guy named Bob – Who can’t get laid, so he takes it out on me.”
The baseball cap gets flung into the crowd, revealing Kays’ shaved scalp. More on that in a moment.
Most of the night is given over to DEADBEAT!, a double disk teeming with 17 tracks that expose Kays’ hopes, dreams, anger, and regrets with astonishing detail. All the while, it is carried along by a melodic punk groove that often begins soft and sweet before kicking up to pulse-pounding, foot-stomping power.
Kays, who wore a “Drugs Suck” tee shirt for his final show, has divided his set into three rough sections. The first ends with the heartbreaking “Plan B.” It begins as emo as it gets, recalling childhood dreams that have long since vanished, and builds anthemic volume as it develops.
He then puts down his electric guitar for “Deadbeat!,” an aggressive slacker anthem that he said broke open a door on his latest burst of creativity. A few songs later, he explains one of his major inspirations – the overdose death of a childhood friend referenced in “Plan B.” “My Promise (90 Days)” is a direct letter to that same friend.
After telling the story of his friend Sam, he asks for and amazingly gets a moment of silence from the raucous crowd, which makes for a haunting intro to the acoustic number. As with many of Kays’ quiet, introspective numbers, it seesaws easily between acoustic intimacy and electric explosion.
Then it’s back to full electric for a nonstop race to the end, which included his infectious “Caffeine” and the only cover of the night – Katy Perry’s “Hot n Cold.” For that one, he ordered fans on the floor into the pit.
Then came one of the staples of Kays’ early stagecraft. Before playing “End of the Road (DC Version),” Kays selects an audience member to come on stage for a haircut. It being the end of the tour, on Wednesday he chose two eager fans – Jay and Marco. He sets them the challenge of shaving each other’s heads before the band finishes playing the fairly fast, fairly short song. And Marco had a lot of hair.
They didn’t finish, but Kays accommodated Jay and Marco by playing the song again. Then, both newly-shaven fans surfed their way back into the crowd.
Kays returned for one encore, alone. “Morbid Mind,” from his 2021 EP Mixed Emotions, was one of the numbers that first attracted the attention of Blink 182 drummer Travis Barker, who helped launch the young punk singer-songwriter’s career back in 2021.
The performance was Kays in perfect microcosm. Melodic and confessional, it combines hope and desperation and allows for the rest of the band to hit the stage and do a joyous little line dance behind the singer as the crowd sings every word.
Kays signed off with a short, sharp political message that is particularly resonant in Washington, DC, right about now. The crowd roared their approval one final time. Then Jack Kays was off to sleep in his own bed for the first time in six weeks.
Kays now has a little time off before traveling to Europe for two weeks at the beginning of May.