Like many of the best things in life, it started with a drive and an album blaring on a car stereo.

It was the Cure’s first record, and Joshua Vega and Brooke Envy — long before they teamed up as the heart and soul of Tacoma’s Paris Spleen — had an epiphany.

“We could do that,” recalls Vega of the moment of divine inspiration brought on by the Cure — also noting that neither of them even played instruments at the time. Back then, they were just friends from high school.
“We just knew we could do it, so we got some guitars.”

It would be tempting to follow such a moment with the cliché, “the rest is history” — but there’s more to it.

Specifically, a party in the suburbs when Vega and Envy were enrolled at The Evergreen State College in Olympia.

“We showed up to this party and they were playing a lot of hip-hop,” recalls Vega. “Then they started playing some funkier, danceable stuff and we started dancing on the coffee table. The girls all liked it, but the guys weren’t very into us dancing with their girlfriends.

“We knew we were onto something.”

And right they were. Glossing over plenty of what Vega calls “bedroom jams” during the band’s infancy, not to mention plenty of empty PBR cans along the way, what has followed is a nearly five year run for Paris Spleen as one of Tacoma’s most captivating and curious bands. Propped up with a funk-spliced, dance backbone and pimped out with all the psych rock and indie chic tricks, Paris Spleen has become one of a handful of bands responsible for Tacoma’s youthful rock and roll resurgence.

They’ve recorded some songs. They’ve played some amazing and notorious shows. They’ve engrained themselves in the scene. They’ve crashed on some couches. And in the process they’ve become a major part of this beast we call Tacoma.

So seeing Paris Spleen go — as will happen Saturday at O’Malley’s when the band plays its final show — is in many ways sad.

But it’s also the start of new possibilities. While bands come and go, as we’ve seen, the creative talent that fueled Paris Spleen — Vega, Envy and drummer Justin Arter — isn’t going anywhere. 

“Anything that’s danceable, that was our big thing,” says Vega. “It just feels like this incarnation has run its course.”

As to the future …

“Let’s just say that we aren’t done playing music together,” says Vega.

Which is a good thing, for a number of reasons. The most concrete reason being the band has a new EP, finished and ready to go, which will literally show up in a big box on their doorstep a week after the final show at O’Malley’s.

While that may seem like strange timing, for a band as fluid as Paris Spleen, and a scene like Tacoma’s where nothing is set in stone and most seem to be flying by the seat of their ultra tight pants, it’s really par for the course.

Vega says he’s currently working on a project with “a girl from Seattle named Heather” that borders on folk, and Envy has been holed up with Kyle Brunette of Nightgowns fame recording a new solo record. Vega describes Envy’s effort as “soulful” and “funky” — among other complimentary adjectives less fit for print.

The bottom line: Paris Spleen may be calling it quits, but the band’s cogs aren’t going anywhere.

As for what to expect at the band’s final show at O’Malley’s, predicting that gets a little dicey. I ask Vega if it’s been weird planning a final show.

“It’s always been weird, man,” he tells me. “Rock ‘n’ roll is a weird thing.”

Once again, Paris Spleen is onto something. 

[O’Malley’s Irish Pub, Saturday, Oct. 31, Paris Spleen’s final show, 9 p.m., free with costume, $5 without, 2403 Sixth Ave., Tacoma, 253.383.3144]