The "poor young proletariat" scene is still going strong in San Francisco. Lots of shows (mostly variations of garage rock, straying into metal, rap, or experimental noise), and a pretty decent art scene. You kind of have to make an effort in order to be involved, it's not generally well publicized or anything, but is INCREDIBLY accepting as long as you aren't harming anybody.

This city has essentially a black market for low income renters, word of mouth room openings that never make it to Craigslist or anything. It's almost always in a real house or apartment, but some warehouse spaces still exist (RIP Ghost Ship). I'm currently paying $700 to live in a sunroom, it's fairly private but definitely seems weird to my parents/people with good jobs.

Oh yeah most of us have incredibly mediocre jobs. So that limits our options for dining, concerts, etc. There's a whole separate half of the city, people our age that work in finance or tech or medical tech. They're the same age (21 - 35 years old) but make $100k a year or more. We don't overlap much.