Birdy’s
Tuesday, Jan. 29, 8:30 p.m., $5, 21+

You can find plenty of punk bands whoring themselves for commercial gain. But groups like Kansas City’s Bent Left are still holding true to the movement’s fundamentals.

Independent and D.I.Y. as they can be, the trio is constantly on the road, inflicting their raucous, unstable agitprop on any audience that will have them.

Booking their own tours, they often end up playing in basements and other unlikely settings, which is fitting, since those types of “venues” gave birth to punk some 30 years ago. Bassist William Malott says that the best show of Bent Left’s current tour was at a house in Ann Arbor, Mich.

“The kids there were just incredible,” he says. “Everyone was there for the show, to support the band. The people who own the house are doing this for the kids. It was a great community effort. You run into that fairly often.”

Some of those house shows are arranged out of necessity: Drummer Josh Nelson says many club promoters hesitate to book punk shows that they don’t think will have national appeal.

“It makes it difficult when you’re trying to stay on the road and you need money for gas,” Nelson says. “The D.I.Y. effort is a safety net for the punk scene. Regardless of how venues want to treat bands, we can work around that. That’s what allows for our survival.”

Having an education helps too. Though Bent Left doesn’t advertise it, the members all earned scholarships after high school and used them to earn a post-secondary education – Nelson in biology and Malott in political science. Guitarist Jeff Speak is wrapping up a degree in audio engineering. Impressively, they’ve managed to get an education and keep the band going.

“The support you get in school is kind of what made it possible for us to keep doing this when we weren’t making any money,” Malott says. “Having that college degree sort of gives you a safety net.”

But don’t think that exposure to ivory towers will bring about the end of Bent Left. Though house shows and living out of a van isn’t everyone’s forte, these three aren’t ready to walk away from what united them in the first place.

“We were best friends before we were in this band,” Malott says. “We’re not a band made of musicians; we’re friends that turned ourselves into musicians and a band. We’re just not ready to throw that away yet.”

More information on the “Stay Vocal” tour at http://www.stayvocal.com/