October 24 [10:00 EDT] -- Chumbawamba pulled out and dusted off the old concert-on-the-rooftop trick just prior to their show at the 9:30 Club in Washington, D.C., last night. The band played four songs on the roof of a 6th Street NW parking garage late Thursday afternoon before their soundman was told to shut it down.

A few hundred fans showed up in the streets for the event plus hundreds more were on hand watching from a sports bar across from the way. The sponsoring radio station announced the event not long before the 5 p.m. start time and broadcast the set live. The building, close to the station's headquarters, was off the beaten track, thus the show wasn't a major disruption to traffic. The police came in right on cue during "The Nazi Song." The band still managed to squeeze in their hit, "Tubthumping" [1MB QuickTime].

Sound familiar? The roof gig, of course, was pioneered by the Beatles in their last performance all those years ago and later championed by U2 on "Where The Streets Have No Name."

Chumbawamba, 15-year veterans of the protest ilk, is loudly projecting the same white-hat punk image. As we reported yesterday,the band has been oozing attitude during interviews and participating in such British protest projects as the fired dockers benefit and a double CD compilation called "No Compromise," supporting the Campaign for Free Education. The Chumbawamba track on that project, not so oddly enough, is a version of U2's "I Still Haven't Found What I Was Looking For".