I first saw L7 in 1994 at Lollapalooza at Star Lake Amphitheater in Burgettstown, Pennsylvania. By then my friends and I had “Bricks Are Heavy,” “Hungry for Stink” and the rest of the band’s early catalog on incessant repeat. That punk sound grew out of the goth and new wave scene of the 1980s, with a heavy dose of Patti Smith and, later, Joan Jett, and I spent my waning high school years and early college days soaked in it. Later that same year, I caught L7 again at Metropol in Pittsburgh’s Strip District, with the Melvins opening.
I remember one thing from that Melvins set. Someone in a black hoodie and a black beanie, dressed head to toe in black, stood just off the edge of the stage with a film camera pressed to her face, photographing the entire opening band. I later learned that person was Jennifer Finch, L7’s bassist.
Finch died July 18, 2026, of brain cancer, five days after the band put out a statement about her health. “The Last Hurrah Tour was planned along with Jennifer when all four of us were in good health and spirits,” it read. “Although she will not be able to join us for the upcoming U.S. dates, Jennifer has asked us to continue with the tour as planned.” The band honored her request and brought in Janis Tanaka, who toured with L7 from 1999 to 2001.
The last time L7 came through Phoenix, I missed them because my daughter was graduating from high school the same evening. When this tour was announced, I bought tickets immediately as a super fan.
Minneapolis punk band Vial kicked off the night at 8 p.m. at a sold out Walter Studios with fast, sharp, heavy punk. The band has been on the road with L7 since San Diego and runs through Michigan. Guitarist KT Branscom and drummer Katie Fischer traded vocals, but Fischer was clearly the band leader and the most engaging presence on stage. Gabs Semansky, normally the second guitarist, played bass at this show.
Vial formed in Minneapolis in 2019 and built a following online before live venues reopened after the pandemic. The band’s catalog includes the 2021 album “Loudmouth,” the 2024 release “Burnout,” which drew a positive review from Pitchfork, and “Hellhound,” a harder, more aggressive album that arrived in March 2026 on Get Better Records. The band cites Babes in Toyland, Nirvana and 1990s riot grrrl as influences, which helps explain the Nirvana cover later in the set.
Vial’s kit and monitors were pushed right up to the front of the stage, which left a tiny photo pit and made for an in-your-face set. Fischer worked the room between songs, telling a guy yawning in the front row he was boring. He did not look bored for long. The band tore through a dozen songs, including an awesome cover of Nirvana’s “Territorial Pissings.”
As L7 prepared to take the stage around 9 p.m., the floor filled quickly with middle-aged rockers in dark clothes, fishnets and black eyeshadow. These were people who had followed the band for 40 years or more and wanted to catch them one last time. Some I chatted with before the show had seen L7 more than 50 times and were crisscrossing the country to hit multiple nights of the Last Hurrah Tour.
It didn’t matter how long this band had been playing together. L7 still has the spark that made “Pretend We’re Dead” and “Wargasm” staples of alternative radio. Suzi Gardner stood on lead guitar with bangs in her face and Ray-Bans covering her eyes, bantering back and forth with Donita Sparks, the singer and rhythm guitarist. They have the kind of chemistry you only get from women who have worked together and known each other for most of their lives. Dee Plakas pounded the drums, and Tanaka held down the low end like she was born to rock it.
The night was a striking balance of deep cuts, rarities for the die-hards and favorites like “Mr. Integrity” from “Bricks Are Heavy.” Early on, Gardner’s guitar was too low in the mix, and someone fixed it fast. By the second song of the night, “Andres,” it was cranking. Between songs, the band’s guitar tech, Remmington Pearce, stepped in on guitar for “I Came Back to Bitch,” and then Sparks introduced everyone in the band but herself. A mention of the Pentagon’s plan to livestream the execution of Fort Hood shooter Nidal Hasan earned a boo from the entire room. That boo was punk doing what it has always done. It pushes back against the establishment, and it belongs to all people, no matter who they are or how long they’ve been coming to the shows. Gardner then introduced Sparks as the “flying vagina.”
The loose mood came in handy a couple of songs later, when “Off the Wagon” needed a do over. A tech was on cowbell, and it was way off. Sparks stopped the song and restarted it. “Your cowbell was fucking off,” she told the tech, to the delight of everyone in earshot. With the kinks worked out, the band was ready to dig deeper into the catalog.
“We got a deep cut,” Gardner said, and launched into “Bitter Wine.” The song comes from the 1997 album “The Beauty Process: Triple Platinum.” Abstract projector art, all inkblots straight out of a Rorschach test, washed over the stage for a mellower vibe. Gardner sang in the gravelly voice that has only grown more pronounced over the decades. “Bad Things” followed, with Sparks bantering with the crowd as friends at the front of the stage shoved each other around. A full mosh pit never really started, though it was encouraged, and Sparks noticed and said so. With a mostly Gen X crowd, the joke wrote itself: we’ve been there, done that and now we’re tired. It’s a rad song, sung by Sparks, and a great one.
Then came “Crackpot Baby,” with Tanaka on supporting vocals delivering the lyrics with a casual, easygoing cool. Just when I figured it couldn’t get any louder or faster, the band slammed into “On My Rockin’ Machine,” all repetition and fast, furious chords. Gardner was beating that guitar like fire was shooting from her fingertips. Incendiary.
After all that fury, the band took a breath while Pearce handed Sparks a different guitar before “Livin’ Large,” which she introduced as the story of the band’s career. It started mellow, with clean, polished, clearly defined guitar work on a deep cut from 1999. Next up was “Uppin’ the Ice,” and no, not that ICE. You could tell how much they love what they’re doing after all these years, and how much it means that this is the last hurrah.
As the set wound down, the band turned to the songs I grew up on. “Slide” was my favorite L7 song, and I remember driving around in my folks’ minivan, shouting along to it at full volume with my brother and friends. Playing “Slide” and “Shit List” back to back before the encore was a nice nod to the more mainstream, and the room turned “Shit List” into a sing along. Sparks said thank you and goodnight, but nobody believed her.
The band came back for “Pretend We’re Dead,” arguably their most recognizable song by radio play. Sparks remarked on how popular it is, and the band seemed genuinely thankful to all the fans whose gateway into L7 was that 1992 single. She even said she wished we weren’t still dealing with the bullshit of politics, since the song was about apathy under presidential control (back then it was Reagan and Bush, now Trump).
“Lorenza” followed, with the room shouting “I love you, I love you” right back. Sparks noted that L7 first played Sun Club in Tempe, called the night “a beautiful farewell” and then launched into “Fast and Frightening.”
That was Phoenix’s goodbye. The tour ends Nov. 14 at The Wiltern in Los Angeles, the band’s hometown. Standing in that cramped photo pit with a camera pressed to my own face, I thought about the person in the black hoodie at the edge of a stage in 1994. Finch is gone, but she was in every note. To borrow the band’s own words, I’d call it fast, frightening and a beautiful farewell.
Vial
L7
Encore
