“Thank you for listening to my mediocre music skills,” Zach Johnson said to the crowd of people that packed the studio space adjacent to Directive, Logan’s local board shop. The audience enthusiastically chanted “one more song” as he bashfully moved through his set.

This sense of comradery was nearly overwhelming at Directive’s 16th birthday party, a celebration of the boarshop’s current location done in a style that overlapped sweet sixteen and 90’s nostalgic house show. The establishment was decked out in pink balloons and guests dawned sparkly party hats and mini tiaras, that were passed out by owner Zach Shepard, while in the space connected to Directive people gathered and danced to live music.  

Johnson opened the show with a mellow set as he accompanied himself on guitar, attendees moving back and forth between the space and the shop’s main room while he crooned in dim lighting.

L’oreal Kids/Sarah Hill

Followed was L’oreal Kids, a band whose style is that of a sporadic nature, both in the way they perform as well as the way in which they prepare. This being that they play a show once, maybe twice, a year and they start practicing for it maybe at most a day in advance. The group, comprised of Wylie Rupp (bass); Austin Rupp (drums); Logan Winkelaar (guitar) and Alex Brown (vocals), is one that exudes pure punk energy.

During a brief moment of tuning and remembering notes before their set, Brown beckoned the crowd to move in, coaxing that “We won’t bite…hard at least.” He went on to yell lyrics from a legal pad, shared the mic with friends that floated in the front and chanted in unison with the audience about whatever concept or object captured their attention between songs (at one point, “legal pad” was chanted for a solid 10 seconds).

The amplitude was kept up, if anything heighted, as Boise surf-rockers The Love Bunch closed the festivity with a 16 song set.

The Love Bunch/Logan Winkelaar

“It was Directive’s 16th birthday, so it just made sense to play 16 songs,” Marcus Haslam, guitarist and vocalist of The Love Bunch, said. “Plus, each one of our songs is coincidentally about a year or Directive’s history, so it was a natural fit.”

By the end of the night, the windows of the space were entirely fogged up. The result of heavy breathing and the body heat that emanated from the bands and audience members, a mass of sweaty, happy, dancing people.


Information about upcoming shows and events can be found on Directive’s Facebook page or Instagram.

For more on The Love Bunch, they can be found on Spotify and most social media platforms.

— lydia.velazq@gmail.com