90s-influenced straight edge band

The 90s were a great time for music. Why have straight edge musicians not embraced this period? There is a wealth of material here to mine. Here are some examples:

XI Don't Mind Stealin BreadX

XHe Ain't Gonna DieX

XFaster Than a CannonballX
XFound out about YouX
XDo You Have to Let It LingerX

On the other hand, these are not acceptable:

XTwo PrincesX
XRun-AroundX
XAnts MarchingX

However, XStayX would be cool.

Please let me know if you are interested in pursuing something along these lines. I would be up for multiple coterminous bands.

Ozzy-influenced edge band

Straight edge metal is nothing new. It goes back to Judge and up through whatever garbage is around now. I heard a band yesterday that sounded like Pantera, and they weren't the first one.

Here's the thing: Pantera sucks.

Why is there no edge band that sounds like Ozzy? I want to fix that. I hereby announce my intention to form XBark at the MoonX.

If you or someone you know can sing like Ozzy or play guitar like Randy Rhoads, get at me. Lots of people can do those things, but I'm not sure that a single one Xes up.

Ian Mackaye is very insightful

Next in the series of responses to Gabriel Kuhn's Sober Living for the Revolution: Hardcore Punk, Straight Edge and Radical Politics.

Reading/listening to Ian Mackaye can teach you a lot about life. It has me. This is a guy who has really thought about shit his whole life and ACTUALLY FIGURED SOME THINGS OUT. That's the big deal. Lots of people think about stuff, but this guy got somewhere. It's really something. That's what it means to be wise, to actually reach conclusions that can help people, to which people can relate.

I don't know how many times I would have a car go by and someone would scream, "Fuck you, you fucking punk faggot!" But then I realized that if you do not speak that language, you recognize that they are not talking to you. Let's say that I'm in Sweden, and a carload with a bunch of guys goes by and they yell something at me in Swedish. I don't know what they're saying. As far as I know, they are saying, "I love basketball!" Who knows? So when I'm walking along the street here and some guys go by in a car, and they don't know me, I don't know them, but they say, "You're a fucking punk faggot, fuck you!" then it should have the same effect. They are not talking to me, they don't know me, and I'm not what they say I am, so they must have me confused with someone else. In short, if you don't speak the language of violence, you are released from violence. This was a very powerful discovery for me.

It's a discovery on which I'm still working, but at least I've got some directions on how to get there.

Here is the other quote that really struck me in his exchange with Gabriel Kuhn:

There was a certain period in my life when I was very angry, when I was really agonizing over things. It made me feel miserable, and I began to question everything: What is the point of all this punk rock? What is the point of me singing? What am I trying to do? Eventually, I realized that the reason I was so angry was because I want people in the world to be well. And I realized that it was a worthwhile project to pursue in my lifetime. But I also understood that I myself needed to be well to do that. So I figured that I would do my best to live a life of wellness. This doesn't mean that I'm trying to bask in my riches. It means that I'm trying to release myself from the anger and agony. Remember what I said earlier about someone going by in a car and calling me a "fucking asshole?" They are not talking to me - 'cause I'm not a fucking asshole.

Brilliant, just fucking brilliant. I cannot explain how deeply I relate to that. I burn for people, animals and the planet to be well and the ensuing certain frustrations make me so angry and hateful towards the bulk of the human population. I feel this every day. It is constant. I just don't feel that there is really anything I can do to make anyone or anything well. It's all a series of frustrating, crashing defeats. Over and over.

Releasing oneself from the anger and agony, that is the challenge of my life. If nothing else, it's very comforting to read this and only further cements the idea that Ian Mackaye is an exceptional thinker.

It's so important to realize that Ian did this stuff, this letting go and moving ahead, without giving up. He didn't get a stupid haircut and snazzy new jeans. He didn't lose himself in some empty fashion, he didn't immerse himself in an indulgent, vapid, solipsistic music scene. No. He has been vegan forever, he is still straight edge and punk as fuck. He still cares about people and animals in a serious way, but figured out how to do it without destroying himself. I need to figure that out cause you better believe I'm not going to go out like the rest of those pieces of shit. I'll die alone and in misery before that happens.

Dennis Lyxzén - what is he talking about?

Here's the next installment of my thoughts on what I read in Sober Living for the Revolution: Hardcore Punk, Straight Edge and Radical Politics. I read Dennis' interview with great enthusiasm. Some of it was pretty rad, but overall, I was not that into it. He's really image-oriented, which I am just so not about. He talks about how the Noise Conspiracy change their sound and their aesthetic every time they put out a record, saying crap like this:

I mean, we've been playing for ten years now with Noise Conspiracy, and you can look at our outfits throughout the years, and they've changed a lot, and so did the whole aesthetics. With every new record, we try something new - not only with the aesthetics, but with the politics and the music too. We maintain our ideas and our musical foundation, but we kind of switch and twist them a little bit every time and try to spice them up with something new.

You know, a lot of people try to decide what exactly it is that people should like about their band. We just figure that people can dig the politics, they can dig the snazzy outfits, they can dig the music, they can dig whatever - it's up to them to decide what to take with them when they leave our show or listen to our record. So while many bands are like, "This is what we are and this is what you should like about us," we just say, "Whatever you like is cool with us. If you don't like the politics, we're sure you find something else that you like."

I am just so turned off by that. It's like a fucking stage show. Politics is fun everybody. Whoo whoo, revolution rules! Slogans and marketing, fashion and image. Fuck all of that. Empty shit. Judging by people's responses to the last nine Noise Conspiracy full-lengths, I would say that lots of people realized that they are full of shit. Then he goes on to say something that made me like the dudes in Refused a whole lot:

I was always into this concept [changing images and ideologies], so with Noise Conspiracy I got a chance to realize it. Actually, when we did the last batch of touring with Refused, I tried to get the band to wear matching outfits, but the guitar players just happened to "lose" them. After a week of shows they were just like, "Eh, these jackets that we had tailor-made are gone..."

Good, fuck those jackets. What a bunch of boy band crap. Fuck.

Speaking of changing images, up top is a very recent picture of Dennis. He's punk as fuck these days, looking like it's 82. I guess it's appropriate, now that he's got his matching band.

So anyway, this is what Dennis has to say about his ideological and philosophical inspirations:

Personally, I like to mix different sources and hope that something cool will come out of it. Anarchism and socialism I've always been into. Situationism - which is as much an art movement as it is a political movement with an amazing critique of capitalist society, right at the breaking point of modernism and postmodernism - is just really well suited for lyrics, especially if you look at Raoul Vaneigem. And poststructuralism helps you understand how the world works today. Then you throw in some surrealism and some dada, and everything becomes even more interesting.

Interesting indeed. What a fun political collage life is. Anarchism and socialism? Situationism is not just well suited for lyrics, but also verbose, dense and largely irrelevant to those who aren't highly educated or pseudo-intellectual.

I guess he really does want revolution with a catchy phrase. What's after that? A bunch of well-dressed revolutionaries speaking to one another about a bunch of esoteric ideas? Way to be practical. So intensely privileged.

It's not like there's really any hope in anarchism (or socialism, or anything else he references), but come on, this guy is just making a mockery of it all and yet somehow has stood as an icon for radical music for years. People who are so into crafting their public self image really bum me the fuck out.

Shelter - Mantra

Fuck yes. Mantra. This is kind of the best Shelter record. Not the best as in the most pure from the heart (although, at that point, maybe that's really all that Ray Cappo was feeling), but holy shit are the songs good. The whole thing is just so solid. Every song rules and is memorable. The album benefits from being bookended by two amazing songs, with excellence in between.

Musically, it's fairly different from all the Shelter records before. It's a lot poppier, and at points, it's also a bit rappier. Really, Ray has always been somewhat of a rapper. It's just that there are more songs with rap-style vocals on Mantra than on previous records, which is fine by me, cause it works. I am generally not into mixing rapping with hardcore (New York in the 90s), but sometimes it rules. I think it also helps that it's not cheesy wannabe hip-hop over shitty riffs (again, New York in the 90s), but rather an adoption of hip-hop vocal stylings. Ray will not shoot you.

Fact - "Message of the Bhagavat" is an amazing opener. "We've got...We've got...We've got...THE MESSAGE FROM THE BHAGAVAT!" Hell yes you do. That shit always gets me going.

It's also a lot happier sounding than any previous Shelter material. That's ok though. I like both kinds of Shelter. Older Shelter had a decidedly more austere aural aesthetic, but I enjoy that at least as much.

Fact number two - "Metamorphosis" is an amazing closer. THE LYRICS ARE SO GOOD: "Told what is best for me but I've seen their destiny. Our leaders' ignominy reconfirms my concern to rearrange and change my life."

There are no crappy songs on this record. Some are fast, some are mid-tempo, some are catchy as hell ready for radio punk that never was(specifically "Here We Go" and "Empathy" - could have been a hit in another time), but it all rules. No excuses need be made.

Fact number three - Mantra is out of print. That's what happens when, in a time of hardcore bands briefly crossing into the mainstream (Sick of It All, Civ, Bad Religion), you foolishly, vainly jump the ships you built for a piece of shit label that offers you a couple of dollars. The mid 90s were a strange time for hardcore.

Fact number four - it is quite common in used sections, as lots of people mistakenly sleep on it. Or just download it here.

A quote from Ian Mackaye:

"I’d eat a piece of meat just as soon as I’d eat a piece of shit."

Right on, sir.

I found this two-part interview in Satya while looking for a picture of the man for the previous post.
He always makes for an interesting read.

THIS IS WHAT VEGAN STRAIGHTEDGE LOOKS LIKE

in a tux.



My sister got married.

Show

Saturday, October 25th.
2826 Cambridge Street, Philadelphia.
7:30PM
$5
Costume required.

Oh, and it's a tofu-eating zombie. I didn't make it.

show

Verse - Aggression

Verse. Fuck. I wasn't expecting this from them. I have such a love for Rebuild. That record came at the right time in my life. I, too, wanted to rebuild a sense of community. Finally, a straight up American-style hardcore band (with emo parts!!) that cared about stuff and said so - "I give a fuck about the world, so why the fuck don't you?" Still, I got the impression that they (Sean) didn't want to go too far with their lyrics and alienate all the hardcore bros. Cause, for real, the music on that record is dead fucking on and def drew a lot of people in. So, so good. And Sean's voice, goddamn. "Saying Goodbye" is one of the more wrenching songs I have heard in a long time. It still gets me. A lot. It's so real.

Two years down the line, they put out From Anger and Rage, which I found to be musically disappointing, overall. I certainly appreciated the more explicitly social/political tack Sean was taking with the lyrics, but they seemed to be lacking; not as compelling or honest as Rebuild. I felt that this was a band that was coming undone, separating from itself. From Anger and Rage definitely has its moments, but it just doesn't cut it when held up to its predecessor.

So here we are, another two years later. I heard that Aggression was coming out soon. I checked the song "The New Fury" on their myspace. Sounded pretty good, better than expected. Then Punknews or some other site was streaming the whole record for a bit before it came out. I listened to it once through and felt it. I immediately ordered the LP. When it came, I opened it up, put it on and sat down with the insert, reading the lyrics along with the record. I was so moved, touched and impressed. He doesn't give a fuck about catering to the bros anymore, if he did in the first place. He wants to reach them. He wants them to learn.

Sean's voice, somehow, is more emotive than ever. The "No more control" during the drum break in "The New Fury" is so intense; it packs so much feeling, earnestness and meaning into three words. At that time, three words they are not any more, but a litany of stories and experiences that converge to produce that tone from a man's body. That's the thing about Verse, especially when seeing them - it becomes clear that Sean has this visceral earnestness about him, something that is preciously rare in my world.

The music is fucking brutal in ways that Verse never has been before. Overall, it's not nearly as fast or as punky as Rebuild. But that's totally fine. It's just different. It's definitely still Verse. They are taking parts of what they have done before, things they have always done, and bringing them to new levels. Fuck, half of "The New Fury" sounds like a mid-90s emo song, with its octave chords going this way and that. They have really done well with the pretty parts on this record, as well as the crushing chug. The last thirty seconds or so of "Suffering to Live, Scared of Love" (starting with "Right!!") demonstrate both of these points, as well as the band's deft execution of merging them, excellently. It all comes together so well. Every song is excellent. There are no throwaways or boring passages here.

And as for the lyrics, fucking christ. Everything. All over the damn record. Gone are the songs about hardcore or "the scene." It's all social and political now. Here are some of my favorites: "All of my heroes have been ruined or written out of history" ("Scream") - "New wars, new kings, the pigs came here to take everything", "I've read about Hampton's murder by the state while he slept" ("Old Guards, New Methods") - "You're raised for profit and you were born to fail" ("Sons and Daughters") - "Sleep one night under this bridge in this man's shoes and you'll learn there is no god" - ("Story of a Free Man: Chapter One"). There are so many other lines and parts of songs that I could not possibly contextualize adequately in this medium. They need to be heard in their original state to be appreciated. This is particularly so with the several songs which are stories, some even replete with quotes. This works really well, and not just with the three-part "Story of a Free Man." Accordingly, they do not lend themselves to quoting individual lines without losing a whole lot of meaning.

AND the band put together a reading list for the insert of progressive and revolutionary books that cover a variety of topics and perspectives, touching on America's rise to global dominance, veganism, the "war on terror," domestic resistance to state oppression, such as the Black Panther Party and the Weathermen/Weather Underground Organization and more. And they made a documentary list. This doesn't happen with this kind of hardcore. I love it. I never thought Bridge 9 would put out a record "dedicated to the revolutionary spirit and radical thought of oppressed people worldwide." Listen up, white kids. You NEED this shit. Throw out the Dunks.

our new song

is called "bullet belt." cause we're fucking punk.