Allan McNaughton - Drop Out

Children Of July (MRR # 335 - April 2011)

2011-04-01T10:41:00.000-07:00

You might have noticed it’s been a couple of months since I contributed a column to this magazine. I’ve been doing a lot of soul-searching and have discovered a few truths about myself that I think I’d been avoiding, to the point that I debated whether or not I should really continue writing this column; whether or not I really have a place here. But I’ve discussed it with Layla and Mariam, and they’ve assured me that MRR is a place for diverse views and opinions, and that they welcome all sorts of opinions.

I’ve mentioned in this column before that I grew up in a Protestant household, and I went to church regularly as a child. I was a member of an after-school Bible study group called Scripture Union, and have read the Good Book cover to cover. In fact, even as I grew disillusioned with organized religion as a teenager (primarily due to the ugliness of religious sectarianism in the west of Scotland) I still have always turned to the Bible for support during difficult times. As I became a punk rocker and involved in the class struggle I soon learned to keep this part of my life a secret, as religion was extremely unpopular amongst the punks, but I consoled myself with the realization that who was Jesus, if not the first punk?

More recently, I have branched out; towards the latter half of 2010 I was having something of a crisis of spirituality. A lot of evil is said and done in the name of Christianity. I had a hard time reconciling the Jesus I thought I knew with so many of the acts done in his name. In something of a tailspin, I reached out desperately for solace. First, I studied the Torah and the Koran. Then, I attended introductions to Zen Buddhism and practiced yoga. I read the Bhagavad Gita, the sacred text followed by the Hare Krishnas. I devoured books on Rastafarianism. With each chapter, with each class, I was slowly realizing something that, deep down, I knew all along: at their core, all religions share pretty similar tenets, but each has seen their message distorted along the way to serve the needs of some human leader. Religion is not the problem: hierarchy, leadership, human frailty. The scales had fallen from my eyes.

My calling, then, seems to be to create a world religion that distills the natural goodness from the existing religions, but which has no hierarchy, no difference between the oldest sage and the freshest acolyte. Since the beginning of the year I have been holding daily prayer meetings with similarly-minded people I have met here in San Francisco: disillusioned Christians, alienated Muslims, angst-ridden Buddhists, and assorted soup-kitchen celebrities. We have been sharing ideas, thoughts, and fears. Fear is probably our biggest enemy, but the very depth of our fear tells us we have stumbled upon something righteous and holy. Something essential: something that will finally change the world for the better. We call our group The Children Of July, for reasons that will become clear later.

Anyone with any experience of working in cooperatives will tell you how difficult it is to run any kind of organization without a hierarchy. For the purposes of keeping things moving efficiently, the group unanimously voted to appoint myself as temporary ‘coordinator’, or de facto leader. Everyone involved has accepted my assurance that I will step down as soon as we feel we have a sufficiently strong grassroots organization.

The reasons I was chosen so unanimously are somewhat important to the story of the genesis of the Children of July. While the group started with around twenty members, the less committed among us fell away as the pressures of daily prayer meetings became too demanding; eventually we were left with a hard core of seven members. As I learned about the world’s major religions, I discovered that the number seven is significant not just in the Bible, where it appears many times over (Seven days of creation, seven days of famine, seven spirits of God mentioned in Revelation, the seven deadly sins, etc) but also in Hinduism (seven Chakras), Islam (e.g, seven levels of heaven and hell) and Judaism (the seven branches of the Menorah to give but one example). This felt especially significant to me, as I was born on the seventh day in the seventh month (July). In fact, I was born in 1970, so I turned seven years old on the seventh day of the seventh month of the year 1977. Therefore, the number seven has always carried a little extra weight for me. The more I read the holy scriptures of the world’s religions, the more I realized why: I was put on Earth to unite the people of the world under one umbrella of peace and love. I say that not as any kind of religious guru: I am just a regular guy. I’m not the second coming of anything. But I feel this as my calling and I can no longer fight the urge to share this with as many people as possible, starting with you, the readers of Maximumrocknroll. I hope that over the coming months I can use my column to disseminate some of the findings that come out of our regular prayer meetings, and to encourage readers to form their own chapters of the Children Of July.

So far, we have tried to distill the basics of what we believe to be the foundation of the future one world religion. We have come up with some basic tenets, but they are not commandments in the traditional sense. Being part of the Children Of July is a choice, and once you’ve made that choice, following the tenets is almost self-fulfilling. In fact, our tenets are more like group affirmations, with which we begin every prayer meeting.

1. We will honor our Mother and our Father.

By now, there can be no doubt as to the existence of some kind of deity, who for the sake of argument we will call God, or the Holy Father. However, we also feel strongly that there is a living, breathing force at the heart of all life on the planet; for now, we will call that force Mother Earth. This is central to the belief system of the Children Of July: we are all children of the Holy Father and Mother Earth. Everything we do must honor them. For two long, humans on this planet have disrespected our Mother, and as such have enraged our Father. War, famine, ‘climate change’, disease: these are our punishments for continuously mistreating our Mother. We feel that this can go on no longer. The first step in changing the planet is to adopt a completely vegetarian diet. All members of the Children of July are encouraged to follow this path.

2. We will drink the wine.

Unlike more orthodox religions, we see nothing inherently wrong with enjoying pleasureable foods and substances, as long as they don’t infringe on the first tenet. Growing up in Scotland, I was introduced to a particular brand of wine made by Benedictine monks at Buckfast Abbey in Devon. Acolytes of The Children of July find that sharing the wine leads to a more convivial atmosphere at the prayer meeting and will be an important factor in the future unification of all world religions. A word of caution, though: over-indulgence in the wine led to some heated arguments at early meetings and may be one reason our numbers have been so greatly reduced.

3. We will spread the word.

It took me a while, but eventually I figured it out: From the earliest Gospel singers, to the most conscious Reggae musicians, to the Bad Brains, by far the most intense music is made by those who are answering the call of a higher power. Each member of the Children of July has vowed to start a band as a way to get the message across, and we ultimately envisage COJ bands and musicians of all genres and types in each city and town across the world, spreading the word and unifying the people scene by scene, until we are all living in peace.

4. We will love each other.

It sounds so simple, yet we make it so complicated. Just love each other. Learn to forgive. Drink the wine (See no. 2). It feels good. The number seven crops up again here. As I said, there are seven core members of the Children of July. The possibilities, the miracles that can be achieved when seven people just love each other will blow your mind. I encourage anyone who is interested in anything I have to say, to go out and start their own chapter. Find six more like-minded people and watch the sparks fly.

5. We will actively seek the seventh son of the seventh son.

As I said earlier, the number seven is significant. While I have written a lot about peace and love, the truth is the world is at war, and unfortunately, no one is listening to you or me. What the masses respond to (besides TV talent shows) is a miracle. We intend to do all we can to bring one about. As we grow a grassroots network, especially one built on love and peace such as we are, I have no doubt that couplings will arise and families will naturally develop. We feel it is beneficial that male acolytes father as many children as possible, with the express intention that ultimately one lucky female acolyte will carry the miracle baby, the seventh son of a seventh son. The arrival of such a child will cast shame on those who continue to wage war and disrespect our Mother Earth. While it contradicts many Western codes of decency and morality, in order to maximize the chance of this happening, we have agreed that each male acolyte may keep up to seven wives.

This may sound as if we are emphasizing procreation over recreational or homosexual lovemaking: on the contrary. See tenet 4: We will love each other. If we can do it in groups of seven, all the better.

So those are our first five tenets. I have to admit, it is difficult for me to share this with the public so soon, but I feel that it’s time. I hope that at least some of you can appreciate what we are trying to do; with any luck, you’ll be inspired to get in touch and start your own chapter. I would like to host a gathering of all world chapters of the Children Of July here in San Francisco, if not this year, then hopefully in July 2012. See you there?

Stop Taking Me For Granted (MRR #328)

2010-09-12T23:32:00.000-07:00

7 Seconds may have sung “I Hate Sports” but in my experience punks do not hate sport. Punks may definitely hate jocks, but almost all punks I know love sport. In the US, baseball seems to be the punk sport of choice, from Tim Yo’s longtime love for the San Francisco Giants, to Al Quint’s die hard Red Sox fandom. I can get into a little baseball from time to time, especially going to see the A’s play the Red Sox at Oakland Coliseum, but really, there’s only one sport that punks the world over are really into, and that is football, or soccer. And, at least here in America, that is never more apparent than during the World Cup.
In Scotland, the passion felt by the majority of the populace for football is inversely proportional to how well our national team can play the game. From an early age my dad kitted me out in a Rangers strip and purely by default became a fan of that team. We never went to a game or anything; he was a regular at Ibrox before he was married but once the kids came along he had better things to do on a Saturday afternoon. Namely, spend all day in the pub. I’d have to go round the Pine Lodge at dinnertime and ask the old guys going in if they could tell Big Davey McNaughton it was time for his tea. “Aye right ye are young shaver!”
I digress. My dad was a Rangers fan so I was a Rangers fan, there was really nothing else for it. Motherwell were the closest team in proximity but strangely most kids chose either Rangers or Celtic, based on religion as much as anything else. If you were a Protestant, you were Rangers, if you were Catholic, Celtic. It’s stupid when you look back on it but the rivalry was ferocious. We had loads of Catholic friends so we avoided the Sectarian shit at all costs. Neither my mum nor my dad would go anywhere near an Orange walk, but my next-door neighbors Janet and Alec took me a couple of times. I just thought it was a parade. The colors, the marching; the flute bands sounded good although I didn’t really know the songs. The fat, red-faced men in the bowler hats and orange sashes looked really pompous and self-important. I didn’t understand why the march would pause outside the St. Brigid’s Chapel and the drummers would pound the big bass drums on their chests extra hard. I told my best mate Brendan Burns all about it later.
We played football every day. Me and my brother Ross, Brendan and Anthony, Greg and Kenny Aitken, Stuart Broon, and others. All summer, every day from right after breakfast til it got too dark to see: at the height of Scottish July, that could be as late as 11pm. We mostly played in front of the garages at the end of our lane, with a lock-up garage door for a goal. One goalie and two teams trying to beat him, or ‘World Cup’, which was every man for himself. We had two full football pitches less than five minutes walk away but if you went up there you ran the risk of encountering kids from other streets, which could end up in some territorial aggro. It was safer to stick to your own scheme, which is what we did.
Following in my Dad’s footsteps, I joined the Newmains Primary School football team, trained by Mr. Quilter, a stern teacher who later got arrested for public indecency in a public toilet well known for cottaging. We played at Dallie’s park, an actual football ground with terraces and everything. It was home to our local basement-league team, Coltness United, nicknamed The Dahlias. Don’t ask me how they got that girly nickname but maybe it’s because they never won a game. Still it was exciting to play on their ground. I’ve been back there since and in reality it was tiny and decrepit, but coming out of the Ralgex-smelling changing rooms onto the grass turf it may as well have been Wembley or Hampden to us.
I hardly got a game for the Bumble Bees (our school ties were black and yellow stripes) despite my best efforts. I tried to get my dad to practice with me and help me improve but he never found the time. My school report card was one long column of ‘A’s until you got down to a ‘C’ for PE. “Team games are not Allan’s forte” was the comment. Back then, not being good at football was basically akin to wearing a tutu to school. Luckily, my brother went on to become a star player, saving the family name from disgrace.
I half-heartedly follow the Scottish and English premierships throughout the season, but every four years the World Cup comes around and I once again get caught up in the youthful excitement I felt in the 70s for the competition. I grew up during a good period for Scottish football. It might be hard to believe from our poor showing in recent decades, but we qualified for five world cups in a row from 1974-1990. Argentina 1978 is the first one I have real memories of. Most of us boys were already fitba crazy: the World Cup pushed us over the edge to insane fanaticism.
My interest in the game waned in the early 80s, as I got into bikes, music, and girls. By the mid-80s though, something was in the air that almost drew me back. There was a fresh buzz on the street around football games that was pretty alluring. Football violence was nothing new: Old Firm games (Rangers vs. Celtic) were well known to be particularly brutal. But a new breed of hooligan was starting to emerge: gone were the shaved head, Docs, and team scarves of the stereotypical soccer thug, and in came the Casual, decked out in designer gear and fashionable sportswear. Although my friends and I were more into BMX and skateboarding, we had neighborhood connections with guys who were Motherwell Casuals. As it turned out, Rangers and Celtic were late to the party on the Casual thing. Their fans were probably too deep into the sectarian thing to see what was happening. Second-tier Scottish teams like Motherwell and Aberdeen ended up with the best-known Casual firms. We farted about on the outskirts of the scene, buzzing gas, breaking the odd window, and nicking designer gear from shops in Glasgow, but as someone with no stomach for violence I was more into clothes and girls than actually going to games and causing trouble. Just wearing the clothes would invite trouble though. What you wore sent a secret signal to other Casuals and if someone didn’t recognize you as one of their crew you were asking for bother. You wore the clothes anyway because they looked good and it was exciting to be part of this secret subculture that was so hated by society. The media had a field day over the Casual phenomenon and it was the common mainstream opinion that these thugs were ruining the game. So for a while we donned our Patrick and Nike cagoules, Pringle jumpers, Farah slacks and Adidas running shoes to ride our BMX bikes. Typical teenage fashion dabbling. We were looking for an identity.
Eventually we drifted away from the casual thing but continued to attract attention from the local hard-cases, even though we really just wanted to ride our bikes and be left alone. Mindless thugs don’t like to see people doing anything fun or creative.
Eventually most of us moved away, and now I’m watching the World Cup online on my laptop. We’ve come a long way since 1978 and obviously Scotland are nowhere to be found but I still get a buzz when someone breaks away from his mark and makes a burst towards the goal. Football fever is at an all-time high here in the States and it’s been a great time. The final is tomorrow and even though I’m all the way in California, in my head I’ll be watching it on a rare warm July evening in Scotland with Ross, Stuart, Greg, Kenny, Brendan, Sandy, Russ, Gib, Rab, and the late Chris Rooney (RIP). We will remember the good times forever!

Gang Of 40 (MRR #327)

2010-08-09T22:54:00.000-07:00

You can stubbornly avoid resetting the clock on your VCR after a power-cut, but the battery-powered clock on the kitchen wall ticks on resolutely. The idea of freezing time at a certain point in our lives has such allure; during those golden years of teenage freedom, or perhaps at that elated moment when our team scored the winning goal at the final whistle to bring home the European cup. In case you can’t guess, I’ve been indulging in bouts of nostalgia lately. Partially brought on by an impending birthday, partly from looking at old photos posted on the Internet, and partly from spending time reminiscing with my oldest friend. If I could once again recapture the feeling of that first band practice in a garden shed, or that first road-trip with friends to a BMX contest in England. How about that first time I saw Snuff and Leatherface, or my first trip to San Francisco and the pilgrimage I made to Maximum Rocknroll magazine, meeting the legendary Tim Yohannan for the first time?

I spent my youth without much thought for the future. When prospective employers or representatives of State oppression unearthed that hoary old chestnut about where I saw myself in five years, I could only lie and make up something that I thought they’d want to hear, something that would result in some kind of income-producing labor or at the very least a guarantee of continued dole money. I made choices by not choosing, by following whatever path seemed most interesting at the time. Not that I never took any risks or anything but I’ve managed to be pretty lucky so far. When I moved to San Francisco in 1995 I never imagined I’d still be here 15 years later, but I didn’t have an alternative in mind either. And so here I am. Could be a lot worse. I’m living many peoples’ dreams, I suppose. I could be drinking away my redundancy money from a long-gone factory job, or wearing the tinfoil cloak of smack addiction, or lying dead in a gutter, killed by hyper-aggressive Burberry neds. Perhaps that’s overly dramatic; it’s not like the only options open to me were A) move to America or B) fail at life. But the option to move to the US seemed the best thing at the time and it’s worked out okay so far.

Of course when I look back through the green-tinted bottom of the Buckfast bottle of nostalgia I don’t want to freeze time completely: there are a few changes I’d like to make… I may never have to jump in a customized DeLorean and go back to the late 60s to make sure that my parents actually get together, but I would certainly love to go back and make a few tactical haircut recommendations to my tonsorially experimental teenage self.

The aforementioned old friend, Sandy (who has enjoyed guest appearances in this column many times before) lives in Austin, Texas. So as well as our shared upbringing dodging gangsters and casuals in a small former mining village in the West of Scotland, we have the common experience of navigating life as Scots in America. We talked about this a lot during my recent trip to Austin. It’s funny, I don’t think either of us ever articulated a desire to live in the States when we were younger: it was unspoken but there was an unmistakable draw, fuelled by BMX and skate magazines, as well as American punk records and zines. I think I mentioned in an earlier column about how we imagined life in the US to be one endless sunset pool session, like an infinite JFA ad from Thrasher. I wish I was still that naïve and hopeful, but many years have gone by since those days and at times it definitely seems like the negative aspects of life can get the upper hand on the positive. I mentioned an upcoming birthday earlier in this column, and indeed, by the time this sees print I’ll have turned the ripe old age of 40. I once told myself I’d stop doing this column when I hit that age. I felt like there were enough old men dictating the ins and outs of punk rock on the pages of Maximum Rocknroll. However, I only just got back into doing the column after a self-imposed hiatus brought on by issues in my personal life. I don’t feel quite ready to throw in the towel just yet. Plus, given the demographic makeup of our esteemed and benevolent leadership cadre, it’s been a long time since the direction of the magazine rested solely in the hands of grey-haired white men. But I promise not to turn my column into yet another monthly orgy of nostalgic self-absorption. In these last throes of my thirties I have continued to experience new ‘firsts’ to add to those listed in the first paragraph: First, after years of BMX riding, I finally mountain-biked for the first time in my life on some technical single track one balmy sunset evening in an area of Austin green belt. I’d ignored mountain biking for years (even though I live only a few miles from Marin, where the sport arguably started) but it was a lot of fun, if hard work: my own fault for going out for the first time with a couple of hard-charging seasoned vets; Secondly, despite being a fan of their records, I never had the chance to see early 90s NY hardcore legends Rorschach live. I finally rectified this in Austin and they were even louder and heavier than their recorded output. Getting to see them was better than I could have imagined.

Okay, so seeing the reunited Rorschach had a certain nostalgia factor to it, but I saw many current bands that I’m excited about in Austin too, many of them for the first time. Some highlights for me included Give and Lion of Judah from DC, Brilliant Colors, Grass Widow, Wild Thing, the Young Offenders of course, Arctic Flowers, and The Marked Men. Notice how many of those bands are from the Bay Area too: there’s a particularly vibrant scene here right now with an amazing variety of bands. Hopefully MRR will have our ‘locals only’ Bay Area comp LP out fairly soon with a sampling of what’s been going on around here.

I suppose the purpose of this column is to say, OK, I’m going to be 40 soon, and despite maturing and growing up in a lot of ways, I’m determined to keep racking up ‘firsts’. Perhaps these days I do live my life with a thought to the future, and I’m always happy to reminisce about the happy times of the past, but I do have both feet firmly planted in the here and now. So let’s have it.

Ever Get The Feeling You've Been Cheated? (MRR #326)

2010-08-09T22:46:00.000-07:00

Public Image Limited were playing here in San Francisco on their way back from the Coachella festival, which takes place in the desert in Southern California. I’d never seen them live and to be honest I find their catalog spotty: while their many ‘hits’ are top-notch, their ‘misses’ can be downright unlistenable. Not to mention, tickets were $60. No opening band or anything. I’ve never paid that much for a show in my life. I’ve come to regret that though. If I look back at the times in my life where I’ve passed on a show because the ticket price was too high, am I actually richer now because I didn’t see them? Or would I be richer for having seen The Pixies even though it was eight quid (which was more than double the price of a DIY punk gig at the time)? Or Johnny Cash, James Brown, or The Stooges? Who knows? Anyway, as luck would have it, just as I was discussing the pros and cons of splurging on a ticket with Mr. P. Rooney, I get a call from one Sean Dougan, or (SD) of this very rag, and he’s phoning to offer me two free tickets to the Public Image Ltd concert that he scored off some beer rep in the pub, but can’t use. Back of the net.

We get to the gig and the venue is only three-quarters full, if that. Price you pay if you set the price that high Johnny. Once the lights go down it looks a bit more full. I buy my first and last $7 Stella at the bar and note that the T-shirts are $35. What’s the percentage markup on that? A ticket, a t-shirt, and a couple of drinks and you’re well over a ton in! What is this, arena rock? The show commences and the band is in good form. Lydon seems to be in a cheerful mood: something about playing in PiL agrees with him. He’s not the catty, sneering lout we’ve come to expect from his public persona. Just as well, considering how much most of these folk have paid to be here. They play most of the songs I’d expect (or want) to hear, and a lot more besides. The set lasted about two hours, which is an hour and a half more than I want from pretty much any band. They lost me, the momentum wasn’t there, but the bulk of the crowd (predominantly late 30s and up) was chuffed and loving every minute, so fair play. Still, I’m glad I didn’t pay for my ticket. I wonder if coming to San Francisco is weird for John Lydon, considering the Pistols broke up here?

***

The past couple of weeks have seen a number of Banksy pieces pop up around San Francisco. Banksy is famous for his distinctive style of graffiti, or ‘street art’. He was apparently in town to coincide with the premiere of his film. When I first caught wind of “Exit Through The Gift Shop” I was pretty excited. Banksy is one of the few street artists that I feel is actually saying something important with his work. The art itself, the way he goes about it, and his anonymity have combined to generate unprecedented interest in the work of someone society at large still considers a vandal. Not to mention the unprecedented sums of money the sale of his work has generated. I wasn’t sure what form a Banksy film would take: he goes at great pains to protect his real identity from the media, although he no doubt has a circle of friends, family, and co-conspirators (many of whom appear in the film) who know who he really is. I’ve read that his own mother denied having a son when confronted by a reporter from the Daily Mail.

As it turns out, there is footage of Banksy in the film, but with his features masked or blurred, and his voice distorted. The scenes of him and other artists working nocturnally in the streets are the best parts of the film. The story is less about Banksy, however, than it is about Thierry Guetta, the filmmaker who captured all of this footage, and his unusually fast rise to the top of the graffiti art world. Guetta, a Frenchman living in LA, is a street art hanger-on who happens to constantly carry a video camera with him. Eventually he starts dabbling in art himself, and if the storyline of the film is to be believed, Banksy suggested that he should have a little art show in order to get him out of the way while the film could be finished. At this point the film started to remind me of a very different movie.

In “The Great Rock & Roll Swindle”, Malcolm McLaren attempts to deliver a how-to of sorts, a guide to ripping off the music industry for as much money as possible. McLaren was a genius at marketing, promotion, and hype. “Find yourself a group. Make sure they can’t play.” The Pistols obviously could play, but it certainly worked for Malcolm to market them as inept thugs. As “Exit Through The Gift Shop” plays on, it’s easy to imagine Banksy as a McLaren-type svengali. Thierry Guetta’s ‘art’ is shit: almost a pastiche of the work of the likes of Banksy, Shepard Fairey, etc. However, with the help of some promotional blurbs from the likes of the aforementioned artists, interest in Guetta’s (now Mr. Brainwash) art show reaches Beatlemania levels in LA. He’s on the front page of the paper, people are queuing up for days before the opening to get first look at this brilliant new artist on the scene. He ends up bringing in over a million dollars from his first ever art show.

It’s hard to believe, but it really happened, and the film definitely feels like a commentary on how easily something genuine can quickly become co-opted, hyped, and sold to an eager public. The question is, how much of this was engineered by Banksy, and how much of it is just an interesting coincidence that just happened to end up getting filmed?

Once I’d made the connection with Malcolm McLaren in my mind, it was hard to not see clues throughout the film. Banksy’s stencil work isn’t a million miles removed from the cut’n’paste detournement of Jamie Reid’s work for the Pistols, and Shepard Fairey has routinely used ’77 era punk iconography in his own work. Still, McLaren was a master manipulator whose own artistic output didn’t live up to his ego. Banksy is an accomplished artist in his own right already; if he did create Mr Brainwash, it’s hard to see how it would really benefit him.

YouTube: PiL Press Conference in San Francisco, 1980

Films, more zines, Barack Obama (MRR #308)

2009-02-14T18:06:00.000-08:00

I don't consider myself a film buff of any description. The wife and I have a Netflix account but have a tendency to keep a DVD for at least a month before returning it unwatched. A complete waste of money. I think watching films is an impulse thing for me: if something happens to come on the telly that looks interesting I'll watch it, or if I feel like watching a film I'll go to the video shop and see what tickles my fancy. Unfortunately the video shop nearest us closed recently (prompting the switch to Netflix) although there is a really good one that's not that far away. I hardly ever go to the cinema these days, despite living in a place where you can hardly move without passing a great art-house theatre or multiplex mall. You get the best of all worlds here, the latest special effects blockbusters play next door to the most obscure indie documentaries, so choice isn't the problem. Price might be though; it's ridiculous what they charge for films nowadays... when I was knee-high to a grasshopper you could go to the matinee and catch a Buster Crabbe Flash Gordon serial, the latest Charlie Chaplin, and a newsreel about good old Tommy knocking the Hun for six (all enjoyed while sucking on a bag of jujubes), for under a shilling.
Like most red-blooded boys growing up in the Seventies, I loved Bond films. The first ones I saw in the pictures starred Roger Moore as Bond, which was confusing because I was used to him on TV as The Saint. However, there is only one true Bond, and that's Sean Connery. There was the added thrill that he was from Scotland, so it wasn't totally unrealistic to think I could grow up to be like him. Like most red-blooded boys, I wanted to be a secret agent when I grew up. The fact that I am not a secret agent (or an actor) is probably the only department in which I am not exactly like either Bond or Connery. James Bond films shaped me into the hyper-nationalistic, violent, xenophobic misogynist I am today.
My next great love was kung fu films. Bruce Lee became another hero of mine and I had a massive poster of him from the final scene of one of my all-time favorites, Enter The Dragon, on my bedroom wall. I remember being really bummed out that I was blond and definitely not Chinese so I knew I wouldn't grow up to be just like Bruce Lee. I have a hazy recollection of seeing Enter The Dragon at the cinema but since it came out in 1973 (when I was 3) I'm either wrong or I saw a re-release of it. I definitely remember my dad taking me to see The Big Brawl (1980) starring Jackie Chan. I used to come out of films like that so excited and full of energy. The film wouldn't quite leave me for a while: part of me would believe that I was in fact a kung-fu master, and that any passer-by on the rainy Scottish night-time street was a potential enemy from a rival Shaolin temple.
I think I came to the realization that there was more to the pictures than action films around the time the UK finally got a fourth television channel. Channel 4 was initially started with a remit to focus on obscure, fringe programming. They also had a reputation for showing a lot more skin than the other channels. As my adolescent self stayed up far too late watching Channel 4 on my little black and white portable telly in the hope of seeing some tits (or even the odd patch of pubic hair) I was inadvertently exposed to all kinds of artsy-fartsy experimental film making, not to mention plenty of social realism, documentaries, and a lot more queerness than I was comfortable with at the time.
As I got older (right up to the present I suppose) my tastes have centered around the sort of gritty social realism exemplified by Ken Loach or the British kitchen-sink dramas of the 50s and 60s. I love Ealing Comedies. Film Noir. Bill Forsyth (Gregory's Girl, Comfort And Joy, Local Hero). What list of film favorites would be complete without Spinal Tap?
I almost forgot to mention one film that dominated just about every kid's psyche around my school: Quadrophenia. I wasn't a Who fan before I saw it and it actually took me a while after it to become one. I also was never really a mod, I wasn't anywhere near cool enough, but that film came along at just the right time for me and many others, shaping musical tastes, fashion styles, and aesthetics for years to come, in the UK at least. I doubt whether The Jam and other mod revival acts, not to mention 2-Tone, would have been anywhere near as big without the movie version of the Who's rock opera.
Do yourself a favor and seek out some of the stuff I've mentioned above, and now you know the sort of stuff I like, get in touch with your own recommendations.

The Loneliness Of The Long Distance Runner:

***
I'm writing this just after the voters of America elected their first non-white president, Barack Obama. It's still early days obviously (he doesn't take office for a couple of months!) and a lot of folk seem to have lofty and slightly unrealistic expectations for the man, but the mood is hopeful. I've said before in these pages that I don't put much faith in 'democracy' or party politics but at the very least it's encouraging that the leader of the free world is African-American.
Less encouraging is the success (by a slim margin) of Proposition 8 here in California. Proposition 8 contained an amendment to the California Constitution defining marriage as a purely heterosexual institution. This measure was sponsored by a cabal of conservative, right wing, and religious groups in response to the Supreme Court's ruling that same-sex marriage was legal in this state. As someone who's been married for over thirteen years I often tell my queer friends that it's not all it's cracked up to be, but in all seriousness marriage (rightly or wrongly) bestows certain rights on people and to deny those rights to a class of people is discrimination. 'Defenders' of the 'sanctity' of marriage insist that the Proposition was not about discrimination or about taking away anyone's rights, citing that gays could attain all the same rights as married straights by entering into civil unions. This is not just a smokescreen; it's an outright lie. While a civil partnership does bestow some of the same rights as marriage, some crucial rights are still left out. For example, the US Immigration and Naturalization Service doesn't yet recognize civil unions. I have been able to live and work (and pay taxes) in the USA for so long because my spouse is American. If I was gay, forget it. Still, the fight against Prop 8 isn't over: the Yes on 8 campaign was funded heavily by the Church of the Latter Day Saints (i.e. the Mormons, who not so long ago promoted polygamy), but as a religious organization with tax-exempt status, they're not supposed to use their money to try to influence legislation. At the very least they should lose their tax-exempt status, but let's face it, it probably won't happen.
***
As a result of writing about some of my old favorite zines a few issues ago I heard from my old friend Adam of Go! fanzine, who was pleased to be able to demonstrate to his girlfriend that he was once at least "a wee bit famous." Glad to be of help Adam. See ye in the Halt. I was also grateful to receive the latest issue of Seven Inches To Freedom, an entertaining read out of Florida. This issue (#6) is in fact dedicated to the best of the Florida scene. Considering that the only decent thing out of Florida is Tom Petty and I can only stand him in small doses, I expected a pretty thin issue, but in fact the zine is crammed with stuff, including an extensive discography of almost every Florida label since 1989 and an argument for the first Scrotum Grinder 7" being the best Florida record ever. I'm going to have to take your word for it on that one, boys and girls. If you want to check it out yourself I believe one US dollar will suffice (double it if yer forrin): Joe Lachut/SITF, PO Box 457, Fort Myers, FL 33902-0457)
***
While on the subject of zines, a recent visit to Issues (a great magazine store in Oakland) reminded me that I was remiss in not mentioning Chunklet when discussing my appreciation of mean-spirited humor. Although it doesn't come out very often, Chunklet never fails to entertain, despite the fact that it consists almost entirely of indie-rock inside jokes. Also, for some reason, they take a lot of digs at MRR even though none of the writers (and certainly none of the readers) have probably read an issue of Maximum since the mid-90s, if ever. The issue I just picked up, #20, is, predictably, dense with jokes in type so tiny you'll need a new prescription by the time you've finished it. I can't even begin to start listing some of the contents so just take it from me: you need it. It's a little pricey at $10 but one issue goes a long way. This will be in your bathroom magazine rack for months. Go to chunklet.com.
Wow, I think this might be one of the longest columns I've done for the mag. Still, I missed last month's deadline so I've got some making up to do. PO Box 22971, Oakland, CA 94609, USA. I surf my ego at www.allanmcnaughton.com. I've also been a somewhat irregular contributor to Bricks And Mortar, the music blog started by MRR's own cheeky mockney chappie Tim Brooks. See what Tim and I (and some other familiar faces) have got to say for ourselves at bricksandmortar79.blogspot.com. Cheers!

Skate Muties & Riot Grrrls (MRR #306)

2009-02-14T18:03:00.000-08:00

I was enjoying an after-work Stella Artois along San Francisco's scenic Embarcadero with young Timmy Brooks the other day when we got to reminiscing (as we often do) about the good old days. We got onto the subject of our favorite UK punk zines from the 80s and early 90s, especially the best of the bunch, Skate Muties From The 5th Dimension. It's been noted that they 'borrowed' a lot of their schtick (not to mention their entire layout) from Rev. Norb's (Sic)Teen zine, but no-one did a better job of skewering the UK punk and skate subculture at the time. That period was a grim one in the world of UK punk zines. I was obsessed with zines for a while. I wrote off for a new one just about every time I got a crudely mimeographed advert in a letter from someone (in those days every letter came in an envelope stuffed with extra dross in the form of distro lists, adverts for tapes, records, or zines, or pamphlets about animal rights - they would have cost a fortune to post if the entire British punk scene wasn't using the same half-a-dozen second class stamps, barely held together by the soap and glue used to render the postmaster's franking machine useless). A succession of flimsy, badly written, one-or-two issue punk zines found their way into my letterbox. I'd get something in the post every day, but for the most part there was very little worth wiping one's arse with. There must have been a list of rules and regulations somewhere about what you could or could not include in your zine. The first thing that had to be excluded at all costs was any sense of humor. However, as long as you had some reprinted Hunt Saboteurs pamphlets, articles on a woman's right to choose (written by a bloke, obv.), interviews with anarcho celebs of the day (our very own R. Kanaan of Political Asylum was a popular choice) and condemnations of any band that charged more than 50p to get into their gigs, you were alright. Screeds of poorly photocopied, cataract-inducing miniscule type were produced condemning so-called anarchist activists for putting milk in their tea. Debate raged over whether or not Colin Conflict was seen patronizing the local McDonalds. Hundreds of dour, insipid metallic thrash bands without a tune between them were celebrated in crudely stapled zines that appeared to be printed on the same paper used as toilet paper in Soviet gulags.
This was the environment that Bristol's Skate Muties attempted to liven up with their mean-spirited, irreverent humor. Although they themselves were skateboarders and punk rockers, they made no bones about pointing out and ridiculing the more embarrassing elements in those scenes. Students, crusties, shit bands, skate posers, BMXers, foreigners of all stripes, Welshmen, northerners, and southerners all came in for a well-deserved slagging, but it was all done in such a unique, funny way that even if you were the object of humiliation, you had to laugh anyway. I think there are issues of this on the internet to be downloaded if you want to see what I'm talking about, although I don't know if it would have the same impact today. I think someone should compile all the issues into a book though. After SM5D some of the Muties went on to start a magazine in a similar vein called Bugs And Drugs that was just as funny but less about punk or skating and more about British culture in general if I remember. I think they tried to capitalize on the popularity of the adult comic Viz but maybe they were a bit too clever to be that successful.
Naturally, SM5D wasn't the only zine that tried to inject a sense of humor into an otherwise tedious and boringly self-referential world. Some others that came up during my chat with Tim included the infamous Have A Good Laugh (even if you didn't always agree with him, Trev HAGL wasn't afraid to ruffle a few punk purist feathers), Raising Hell, and 666 1/2. One of Glasgow's three straight-edgers (though none of the three of us can claim it any more) Adam Johnston put out a funny zine focused on international hardcore called Go!
By the early 90s (with a few exceptions) most of these zines had called it quits, having been replaced by Riot Grrrl zines. The zines that weren't done by Riot Grrrls were very much influenced by that scene, so while there were many (no doubt worthwhile) articles on how to string together a couple of guitar chords, put on your own gigs, and take back the pit from macho white men (all while having a herbal abortion), there was a distinct lack of humor. After that the zine scene seemed to pretty much spiral into an abyss of introspective, naval-gazing 'personal' writing and I lost interest in it, bar the odd issue of Cometbus.
It might seem (yet again) that I'm just being an old man griping about the good old days, but I do think that there's nothing going on these days that has the element of wicked humor that was so good about Skate Muties, HAGL, etc. If there is, I'm just not aware of it. I think people are reluctant to say anything negative about each other, even in jest, for fear of offending the wrong person. Everyone takes themselves so seriously. Are people are all nicey-nicey in their record reviews and blogs because they don't want the free records to stop coming, or because they don't want to piss off their famous(!) friends? Come on, let's all have a laugh while having our say, eh?

PS I should point out that Trev HAGL continues to publish zines under the names Savage Amusement and Negative Reaction, so hats off to him. He must be the UK's longest-running zinester. Cheers!

Everything Turns Gray... (MRR #305)

2008-09-06T14:37:00.002-07:00

Except for the singer for Agent Orange's hair. Do you think he dyes it? He must be getting on a bit. Agent Orange was my favorite band for a while. They were among the first American punk bands I was exposed to, thanks to their skate-rock credentials. I had a skater friend called Campbell who subscribed to Thrasher and had an auntie that lived in America and would send him records and tapes of bands he read about in the Pus Zone. Thanks to this relative, Campbell was also one of the few people I knew who wore actual Vans shoes, not just the copy ones that only cost a fiver from the cheap shop and fell apart after one attempted ollie.
I'd lie on my bunk bed with the rain battering the window, blasting my Agent Orange tapes and reading Campbell's old Thrashers or well-thumbed copies of Freestylin' (the BMX magazine that Spike Jonze worked on before becoming a famous film and music video director). Agent Orange's beach-baked surf-punk sound promised the perfect, endless bitchin' summer that I was sure existed on the other side of the world. Sunset pool carving sessions with the Bones Brigade, Miami hoppers on Venice Beach with Woody Itson and Martin Aparijo, or airing out of the huge bowl at Pipeline Skatepark with Eddie Fiola and Brian Blyther. Agent Orange were my imagined soundtrack for all my teenage California dreams, as well as appearing on the soundtrack of many 80s bike and skate videos. They were also my introduction to surf music, leading me to seek out such surf classics as Dick Dale's version of 'Miserlou' long before it became a dorm-room staple thanks to the Pulp Fiction soundtrack.
Agent Orange released two albums in the 80s, several years apart and sounding quite different, trading in the buzzing SoCal punk sound of 'Living In Darkness' (Posh Boy) for a glossier 80s pop sheen on 'This Is The Voice'. When I first heard that album I thought it sounded like U2. It grew on me though and wimpy as it is, some of those songs are still favorites to this day. After that they seemed to disappear and I suppose I forgot about them. Their albums were squeezed onto the shelf and only occasionally got pulled out for nostalgia's sake.
When I moved to America I didn't meet many people who had shared my childhood love for Agent Orange. I got the impression they were considered a joke amongst too-cool-for-school hardcore hipsters. Admittedly, the early 90s was a time of us-vs-them, and admitting to enjoying a band with such brazen pop sensibilities could be considered a crime on a par with enjoying Green Day's major-label output. From time to time I'd see ads for Agent Orange shows in or around San Francisco, usually in weird venues that punk bands never usually played. I'd heard that it was just Mike Palm (singer/guitarist) and a couple of hired guns. People who had caught this later incarnation of the band hadn't exactly given them rave reviews. That, coupled with my reticence for reunion tours and nostalgia, prevented me from ever going to see them, although I always had a little voice in the back of my head telling me that I ought to at least get to see this band, my one-time favorite, at least once in my life.
So, a couple of weeks ago, Agent Orange was playing at the Uptown in Oakland, about five minutes from where I live, on a Saturday night. There was pretty much no excuse for not finally taking the plunge and seeing them.
The wife and I got to the Uptown (an unremarkable but decent-sounding black box of a rock club) too late to catch the opening band but in time to catch local streetpunx The Sore Thumbs. They were great, if somewhat derivative; some good guitar playing and catchy melodies. They played for too long for an opening band though. It seriously felt like an hour. I was a little bit confused by the crowd. Looking around at the amassed handful of skater bros, Burning Man hacky-sack types, and Hot Topic punk chicks, I felt like I was at a midweek bar show in a Northern California hick town, not seeing a legendary American punk band in a major metropolitan area.
Agent Orange took the stage and performed to a half-empty venue. I felt a pang of sympathy for Mike Palm that at this point in his career, after being a major part of one of the most influential scenes in American music, he can't fill a small venue in the San Francisco Bay Area. He didn't seem to care though; the band soundchecked with surf instrumental 'Mr. Moto', then launched straight into the classic 'Everything Turns Gray', and from there ploughed through a swathe of greatest hits from both albums, their EPs, and pre-'Darkness' demos, as well as a couple of tracks from their (unknown to me) 1990s self-released CD. Every song was tighter and faster than on record (sometimes to their slight detriment, especially on some of the poppier stuff from 'This Is The Voice', which could have benefited with a softer touch). The bass player bobbed up and down energetically like a Muppet the entire time, but was pretty harmless, except for screwing up the intro to 'Living In Darkness', which is the one time the bass has to take a really prominent role. The drummer stole the show though. Mike Palm is unquestionably the captain of the ship but the drummer was at the rudder that night. For all that it was small and somewhat unusual, the audience met the band's energy with boundless enthusiasm. The 'pit' was made up of computer-programmer types in Birkenstocks and glasses.
At their core, Agent Orange is a solid, tight live act with a repertoire bursting with timeless, classic punk tunes. So where were all the punks? I think Agent Orange just isn't cool enough for some people. I admit, the on-stage banter verged on the corny. I think that if the band had broken up just after 'Living In Darkness', or maybe even before releasing it, and then got back together right now for a reunion tour, punk scenesters would be wetting themselves at the thought of seeing them. They could have broken up after appearing on the Rodney On The Roq compilation, and they might have become another Middle Class or Rhino 39: ghostly touchstones that had faded into punk lore only to be resurrected by a future generation of hardcore historians.
So instead of stoking the loins of eBay-scouring message-board punk enthusiasts, with their sophisticated palates refined by copious obscure kbd rarities, Agent Orange play the Warped Tour or half-empty places like the Uptown, serving up 80s nostalgia to knock-kneed ageing skaters and a dose of what poppy punk could have sounded like before all those NoFX clones got hold of it to neophyte mall-punks. I'm not sure who's missing out more.
I'm not trying to make a case for Agent Orange's relevance in 2008. 90% of MRR's readership will think I'm lame for liking them or for writing this column about them, but too bad. I may never see them again, but I'm glad I went to see them this once, and that it wasn't a total bummer. Now that little voice in the back of my head has finally been appeased.

Seven Inches of pure pleasure (MRR #304)

2008-09-06T14:37:00.001-07:00

I know it's a far from controversial opinion, even in the era of the digital download, but the seven-inch single is by far the superior format for recorded music ever invented. That's not to say that all seven-inch singles are great, but done correctly, e.g. one perfect, two-and-a-half minute pop nugget on the A-side, and a carefully chosen B-side (especially an equally great non-album track), it cannot be beaten. (Due to the comparative shortness of most hardcore songs, the EP naturally becomes the preferred format, but still on a 7" please).
That said, I came to this realization pretty late in the game. My introduction to collecting music came via cassettes, as we didn't have a record player in the house. I went through a succession of cassette players that my dad bought off some guy in the pub. The first one came with a Johnny Cash tape, the first piece of music I ever owned. My wee brother and I played it over and over again. I don't know if it occurred to us that we could go out and get more tapes. Those songs are embedded in my memory, never to be forgotten. It could have been worse I suppose. The mind boggles at the thought of the utter garbage that could have been on a tape deck bought off some random boozer in the Pine Lodge. (Later, in a moment of desperation for blank tapes, I recorded The Stupids' Peel Session over the Johnny Cash tape. Still got it though). Eventually I got a cassette player that also had a radio, exponentially expanding my musical exposure. I spent the summer listening to BBC Radio 1 all day, and taping the hits off the Top 40 rundown on Sunday afternoons. Inevitably, I ended up listening to the radio into the late evenings, when the pop DJs went home and the night shift came on–Tommy Vance with his metal, Janice Long with her weird indie stuff, and of course John Peel. I'd hear all sorts of stuff that I didn't understand or thought was too weird (or, in the case of 'White Riot' by The Clash, too fast. Too fast? Have you listened to that song lately? It plods along).
At some point a record player turned up in our house. It was a behemoth of a thing. It probably weighed fifty pounds and came equipped with a non-functioning 8-track player, which were already completely out of vogue by then. So much for taping records for friends.
I had started buying albums on tape, but now I could finally purchase vinyl. I continued to buy LPs though. For a while, I was especially fond of singles collections, greatest hits albums, and 'Now That's What I Call Music' compilations. I viewed these releases as offering the best value for money. All hits, with minimum filler. Given that I was spending my hard-earned paper round money, that was a huge consideration. Singles just didn't cut it. Two songs for a quid, when you could get a whole album for a fiver, or sometimes less? Do I look thick? It took several years of buying albums with two or three good songs (the singles, naturally) and a bunch of tossed-off piss takes for me to realize the error of my ways. I still couldn't bring myself to spend a lot of money on records though. Luckily, I discovered the joys of the Woolworth's 50p record box. The slightly out-of-date hits of the 80s at 1970s prices! I snapped up singles by Madness, The Jam, and Adam & The Ants, as well as a few guilty secrets I won't mention. And while you were in there you could help yourself to as many Kola Kubes and Strawberry Bon-Bons as you could stuff in your mouth from the Pick'n'Mix (or Pick'n'Nick) aisle. (After a considerable dry spell in the mid-80s, Woolies' cheapo box later yielded scores along the lines of Public Enemy and Run DMC singles).
Once I started getting into harder-to-find punk and hardcore, my main sources were taping stuff off the John Peel show, and trading tapes with friends, both locally and through the post. Amongst the few of us in our area that shared similar tastes, it was unheard of for all of us to buy the same record. One person would buy an LP and at least five of us would get a tape of it. There are some albums that I consider among my favorites to this day that I still only have on the tape someone made me in 1985. It still throws me off to hear some of those records played somewhere and not hear the extra tracks tacked on by Sandy at the end to fill the space on the C90.
This process of acquiring music led to many disappointing purchases, and the discovery of second album syndrome. Someone would tape me a copy of some band's blistering first LP, and then I'd see a later record by said band in the shop. Since I liked the album I had on tape, I'd dutifully purchase this later release, only to get home and discover that the band 'crossed over' in between the two records. Suicidal Tendencies' 'Join The Army' and 'You Got It' by Gang Green are two purchases that particularly smarted at the time.
I was still passing up any singles that weren't in the bargain bin at this time, on the grounds of value for money. I did eventually start gravitating towards singles and EPs later, but only when they were fairly cheap. I've never really been much of a record collector. For most of my music-loving life, I've been pretty happy to just have the music, in whatever format. Nowadays, that's become easier than ever. For a while, I found myself 'sharing' (ahem) the complete discographies of bands I already liked, filling my hard-drive with album after album I already possessed in some form or another, whether on a cassette dub, CD, or LP. I also downloaded records I'd always wanted to own but had never seen available for a price I could (or would) pay. Once the novelty wore off, and I got over my excitement at finally getting my (digital) ears on some of those long-lost or forgotten gems, it really felt kind of empty. I could listen to 3000 songs in a row on shuffle on my iPod, but most of the time I'd really rather just listen to one perfect single on my record player. So nowadays, if you're looking for me, you can find me in the 7" racks, indiscriminately picking up any old shit on 45 that I passed up first time around when I was skint. Most of what I pick up is still under $3 and I rarely go over a tenner though.
If you've got 70s/early 80s punk and post-punk for sale/trade, send me your list: PO Box 22971, Oakland, CA 94609, www.allanmcnaughton.com

Chaos In Tejas 2008 (MRR#303)

2008-09-06T14:35:00.000-07:00

Sandy and I sat up until 4am, out in the shed in the garden of his Austin home. We chinwagged long into the night to a soundtrack of John Peel Session tapes recorded many years ago on a cheap ghetto blaster in a Newmains bedroom. The Prong peel session was they best thing they ever did, and that night it sounded like some kind of sonic bulletin from the distant days of the mid-80s. Yeah that's right, I said Prong. Blistering, is how I'd describe the guitar sound. We also jammed the HDQ Peel Session. HDQ were a funny band: starting off as spiky-topped Discharge noiseniks and turning into Sunderland's answer to Dag Nasty. It wasn't until Dickie Hammond twinned those Brian Baker guitar riffs with Frankie Stubbs' dreary, rain-and-gin soaked Coronation Street songwriting that melodic hardcore finally reached its true potential. Listening to that HDQ session in the shed was definitely a heavy nostalgia trip, but it was ultimately more satisfying than watching Dickie (in full Eric Bristow darts regalia) back on stage with Frankie and turning in a greatest hits set. Leatherface weren't bad at all, in fact both sets I saw at the Texas fest were solid, but it's not 1988 any more, for us or for them. The nostalgia just felt empty. Memories; ghosts of passions first stirred in the bloom of youth.
The next evening we set out on bikes. A twenty mile party on wheels, through the hills above Austin with a messenger bag of beer. The circuit ended with a swim in the creek amongst ducks and turtles. Two little kids asked us to keep an eye on their fishing poles - bent safety pins tied to two tree branches and a slice of Wonder Bread for bait. You should have seen the one that got away. Huck Finn was hiding in the bushes.
At sunset we dodged sightseers and rode past clouds of leathery bats as they began their blind riot charge into the warm Texas evening. Secret samosas were consumed before stopping at a bar called the Hole In The Wall. It's unlike the Hole In The Wall in San Francisco: different dicks hang out in this one. The bartender stood Sandy and I to free whisky beverages, which we enjoyed just before local alt-country act Lonesome Heroes took the stage. I can't stand the term 'alt-country' but the band was really good. They call themselves psychedelic country but I couldn't tell if any of them were actually tripping. In a town whose musical legacy includes the Thirteenth Floor Elevators and the Butthole Surfers, everyone has to be a little psychedelic, right?
We spilled onto the street after the show and went for more tasty samosas at the secret samosa spot. There wasn't anything that secret about them, they were right there in the counter display. I suppose it's the fact that you don't expect to be able buy a samosa in a donut shop at 2am.
Maybe I should backtrack a bit, to the actual fest itself? Do you really want to hear about the bands and who played what? Roky Erickson was basically the same as the first time I saw him last year in San Francisco. It's still amazing to get to see him play those old songs. People were stoked that Billy Gibbons from ZZ Top joined him onstage for the last two numbers. I have to say, although I'm aware of ZZ Top having a respectable body of work prior to their 80s MTV video fame, I basically only know them from that era. Sorry, but that stuff is shit. All of it sounds like it was programmed by a sleazy, bourbon-drinking robot. Which, now I actually type that, sounds like a recipe for the best music ever. Maybe they got the wrong software for the robot or something.
Anyway, I didn't mean to go on about ZZ Top. Let's move on to London's answer to ZZ Top, minus the beards, Hard Skin. Blistering set of classics on the Thursday night, straight off the bus after another short tour bringing the sounds of fake Oi to spoiled Yanks. Best line from Fat Bob: "I liked Los Crudos when they were just Mexican, but I like them even more now they're gay." The next day they played on a party boat out in some Texas lake to a 100 unhealthy, sunburned miscreants. It was like a recovery program for people with regrettable tattoos. Tall Dan from punk HQ (eg the MRR house) took a tumble on the kiddie chute, sliced his arm, and stirred up some chum for the freshwater sharks. Later that night he was all stitched up and putting on a brave face. After Hard Skin played on the barge the coast guard had to come out and spirit Johnny Takeaway back to shore so he could jet back to jellied-eel land. Genius can't hang about getting a suntan. Criminal Damage just about managed to get through an impromptu set as a three-piece with the drummer throwing up into her mouth all the way through. As soon as they were done she heaved her ring over the side, only to hit some poor unsuspecting punk swimmers. Oops!
Back on dry land there was more punk nonsense to take in. I managed to miss a bunch of bands I'd wanted to see but what can you do? There's too much to take in. At my advanced age I can't see ten bands a day any more. Afternoon shows. After-parties. Inside shows. Outside shows. Bloody hell.
Once things calmed down a bit and most people had gone home, there was a wee gig at a pizza parlor with The Young and Social Circkle, who were both brilliant. It turned into a mini-fest of its own, with just about every band still left in Austin jumping on the bill. Crude and Fy Fan played two of the best sets of the fest, and even Los Crudos turned in a few songs. It ended up being one of the most fun parts of the weekend, because it was so much like a normal show.
That's when my real holiday started, and where we came in at the start of the column. Thanks to Timmy for organizing the fest, and to Sandy & Jen for putting me and the missus up for all that time.

Cut The Crap: The Clash on PBS (MRR # 302)

2008-09-06T14:34:00.000-07:00

I suppose it should come as no surprise to me at this point that whatever small element of danger or revolutionary potential that punk ever had is long gone, but every TV commercial or Hollywood soundtrack featuring the incendiary music of the late seventies serves as a fresh reminder that it has more or less become the classic rock for my generation. It was par for the course then when I was flicking through the TV channels the other night and came across a PBS fundraiser centered around the broadcasting of some recently released compilation of Clash performances called "The Clash Live: Revolution Rock." For those readers outside of the USA (or without a TV), PBS is public television, funded by subscriptions and donations from the viewing public (as well as, increasingly, from corporate sponsorship). The channel usually features the kind of programming (documentaries, BBC costume dramas, etc) that let smug middle-class people feel smarter and better than the kind of people who watch American Idol and Survivor. Their pledge drives are usually built around four-hour specials of the protest music of the sixties and shit like that. PBS is all about the sixties–most of their donations probably come from millionaire ex-hippies. At least, they were all about the sixties.
Picture the PBS studio, with its rows of phone banks for accepting donations, decorated for the evening with flashing police lights, camouflage webbing, and blown up Clash album covers. In between songs, the hosts encourage viewers to call in or go online to make donations of anywhere from $75 to $250. Guest 'experts' have been called in to expound on how important the Clash were to rock history: hippie DJ Pierre Robert, and "rock critic" Alan Light (of Spin, Rolling Stone, Vibe, etc). The PBS host comes on to give us the hard sell. "As an intelligent person, you appreciate and enjoy all different kinds of music, and we're happy to bring it to you." In other words, the Clash are just one more group that can fit on the PBS viewer's CD shelf alongside other PBS-approved fare like Bob Dylan, Joni Mitchell, or Buena Vista Social Club.
The film itself is a mixed bag. Documentary sequences pair a clueless, sensationalist voiceover ("taking their name from the headlines of the day" ... "they changed the musical landscape forever") with the same hoary old recycled Don Letts footage you've seen a hundred times. Cue the banner being unfurled at Bond's in New York, then Joe Strummer with his ridiculous 80s Mohican taking a photograph from the back of a convertible. Repeat ad nauseam. There are some cool performances though: what looks like a promo video from 1976, shot on a soundstage with amateurish lighting. Mick's out of tune, and the band perform intensely for the cameramen and probably a couple of mates. You can imagine Bernie Rhodes behind the scenes, exhorting his boys to give it all they've got; The band performing "Radio Clash" on the Tom Snyder show with a genuine NY graffiti artist getting up on the corrugated iron backdrop.
Don't get me wrong. I like much of the Clash's music and I think that Joe Strummer was a genuine and thoughtful man. But they were the first punk band to really milk the revolutionary posturing and political rhetoric of the early punk scene and turn it into a massive cash-generating industry. I'm not saying they didn't mean it, maaan... Just that whatever they may have "meant" was probably lost on the crowds at Shea Stadium.
I'm sure that the smiling happy TV presenters were or are fans of The Clash, as are probably a lot of PBS viewers, and obviously The Clash don't represent the be-all and end-all of punk rock in any way whatsoever. It's just that the fact that someone at PBS thought that this was a good way to try and raise money is another nail in the coffin for punk as a movement, for punk as something that stands apart from the rest of society. I've spent a large chunk of my advancing years feeling like an outsider, so it's weird when I hear the music that gave me something to believe in used to sell cars, cruises, retirement plans, or PBS subscriptions.
***
To contradict myself in the first part of this column, I'll go on record here as saying that the new 'reality' TV show following NOFX on their recent world tour is one of the best shows currently on the box. The best part of the program is their manager Kent. He gets totally plastered all the time but still manages to hold it together enough to string together a sketchy tour that takes in places around the world that bands rarely get to. I doubt these guys could make it to the corner liquor store without Kent holding their hands. Well, actually, I think Fat Mike seems to have his shit together, but watching this I can't help thinking that the two guitarists are lucky they ended up getting into a successful band, because it definitely seems like their alternative would be flipping burgers. I mean, they've been playing for over twenty years but in the first episode one of the guitarists has a problem with a pedal and basically just gives up, like he's helpless. I think what warms me to the show is that despite all their success, for the most part they come across as pretty average normal punk guys that any of us might know. They seem to have their hearts in the right place and for the most part appreciate that they are pretty lucky to be in the situation they're in. The show might be more for readers of Punk Rock Confidential than MRR, though. TiVo it yourself and see what you think.
***
By the time you read this, Chaos In Tejas 2008 will have come and gone. I don't usually do 'fests' but I'm making an exception. Actually I've wanted to try and get to this one for the past few years but other commitments have always gotten in the way. There are always good bands and Austin is one of my favorite places in the US. Mostly I'm looking forward to hanging out with friends I haven't seen in a while, going swimming, and eating some good food. The main musical attractions for me this year are Hard Skin, Leatherface (with Dickie Hammond back on guitar!), the Marked Men, and especially Roky Erickson. Can't wait.

Wire: Read & Burn 03 (MRR #300, May 2008)

2008-09-06T14:26:00.000-07:00

WIRE - "Read And Burn 03" (Pinkflag)
It will come as no surprise to anyone who knows me when I say that I am a huge fan of Wire. It started, for me, with the song "12XU", which appeared on some punk compilation a friend of mine had and was my first exposure to the band. The record that song came from, Pink Flag, is a perfect album, and still my favorite of theirs. In fact, I put off listening to anything after that record for years. I would pass on Chairs Missing and 154 as they turned up in the record bins, suspicious that they originated from the 'lost years' I'd heard about, when Wire got derailed a bit. I think this worked to my advantage. By the time I got around to picking up those albums, not only had my tastes widened (mellowed?) a little, but I feel like I'd absorbed so much of the band's earlier music that I could pick out the essential Wire-ness of even the least Pink Flag-like of their tracks on the two subsequent records. So there I stayed, for a long time. I adhered steadfastly to those first three albums, eschewing all later output. Sure, I dabbled in bootleg issues of 77-79 stuff like their demos and the Live At The Roxy tracks, but no Wire sounds from those dark detested 80s every graced my ears. Since then, I have grown to appreciate some later stuff: if you can get beyond the slick production of A Bell Is A Cup Until It Is Struck you can detect the strain of controlled tension that run through all their work.
Which brings me to the controversial subject of Wire's production. I think Harvest knobsman Mike Thorne did a great job with the first three records, although the earlier, live, stripped-down versions of the Chairs/154 songs as they were performed on German TV and released on the Wire On The Box DVD/CD package (highly recommended by the way), I can't help wondering if maybe he wasn't a bit heavy-handed with the synths etc.
Wire broke up and then got back together again a couple of times, at one stage with only three of them so they called themselves Wir, which I remember thinking was a bit strange at the time. Then in 2000 they reformed once again and have been a band ever since, although they don't seem to play or release records on a very aggressive schedule. Their post-reunion recordings, for the first two "Read & Burn" EPs and the "Send" album, were hailed as something of a return to form, and while they did mark a renewed and welcome readoption of both velocity and volume, something about the production was still a bit off. They (or at least Colin Newman, who appears to handle most of the post-production these days) seem fascinated with processing sounds digitally, so that guitars sound not so much like individual instruments played by humans, but like some robot supercomputer's nano-engineered idea of what the perfect guitar should sound like without any messy interference from pathetic inhabitants of meatspace. It's almost the opposite of the too-lush production of the 1980s but it serves the same purpose: it dilutes the band's core strengths, which are to be found in its superior songwriting, structure, minimalism, and kinetic energy.
Which brings me to their latest release, something of an appetizer for their upcoming eleventh(! - really?) studio recording. I don't recall seeing it in our review section since it came out, but then the chances of me actually making it all the way to the "W" section of any issue of MRR are pretty slim. I've found myself listening to at least the first track of the EP on the way to work almost every day, so I thought I'd talk about it here. Coming in at roughly the same length as Pink Flag even though it's only got four songs, Read & Burn 03 could almost count as an album in its own right. The first track, "23 Years Too Late" nips under the wire at just under ten minutes long. The remarkable thing is that once it's over I want to listen to it again right away (and have), and I usually get bored if a song goes over two minutes. It's almost a spoken-word piece set to music (usually the use of the term 'spoken word' is a massive red flag, I know): bassist and lyricist Graham Lewis reads a long piece describing a decadent continental scene as a three-note guitar and synth figure builds tension behind, exploding into a propulsive, angry Colin Newman-sung chorus and a squall of bass, guitars and drums. Lewis's terse, pointed delivery could earn him a spot doing voiceovers for documentaries about serial killers, while Newman, quite simply, is still the second best vocalist to come out of the '77 punk era (Rotten of course, since you asked) and is possibly the only one still putting out interesting, exciting music. Of course, the record's not perfect: the processed production makes Robert (Gotobed) Grey's already robotic, metronomic drumming sound like a drum machine most of the time. In fact, I think there might be a drum machine in there as well at times. Still, for a band that's been around for as long as they have to still be producing music this good, skirting the edges of pop with the vitality of much younger men and no small dose of intelligence and wit, is quite a feat. Especially while contemporaries seem content to mine the revival circuit.
***
It has to be added that as a group Wire seem to be a little far up their own arses much of the time. Don't get me wrong, I think they come pretty close to genius but in interviews it sometimes seems like they do as well. There was an amusing snippet of an interview with Colin Newman in the Minutemen documentary We Jam Econo (Mike Watt has often cited Wire, along with The Pop Group, as one of the biggest musical influences on the Minutemen, especially for their short songs) where it looks as if the producers have collared him on the street unawares. His body language resembles someone trying to extricate himself from a pair of Jehova's Witnesses. On apparently being asked about Wire's influence on the Minutemen he expounds on how much Wire influenced American hardcore bands, saying something along the lines of "especially the way we would do a whole song of just one note." It's here that he demonstrates how out of touch he is with how Wire actually affected people. I'm going out on a limb but I'd guess pretty much the only Wire song that influenced US hardcore was the aforementioned "12XU", and even then probably more because Minor Threat covered it than anything else. That "one note" quote shows that he probably hasn't even listened to very much hardcore, since I can't think of many hardcore songs that stay on one note for very long. Hardcore is about fast riffs, not exploring the sonic possibilities of deconstructing a chord down to its essential spatial coordinates or something. The American bands who really owe a debt to Wire are the 'post-punk', artier bands like Mission Of Burma. In fact, Burma have said that it was only after seeing Wire reform as older men and not look stupid up there that they decided that they might be able to get back together as well. So there's that to thank Wire for too.

April fool...

2008-06-01T17:39:00.001-07:00

So yeah, that last post/column about the iPhone was an April Fool.

iPhone Punks are real though:

Maximumrocknroll #299 April 2008

2008-04-01T07:35:00.000-07:00

I have seen the future and it is now. Technology has changed DIY punk rock forever. One single technological breakthrough has revolutionized punk, bringing it into the 21st Century with a bang. Not since Iggy stepped from behind the drums in '67, or since Dee Dee learned to count to four in '76, or since Discharge popularized the d-beat in the early 80s, has there been a development that promises to affect punk rock so profoundly.
What is this groundbreaking advance in punk technology I hear you ask? Is it online radio? Is it the mp3? Is it the availability of cheap home recording on PCs? No, it's not any of those things, but you're getting warm.
The single most important event for the future of DIY punk rock as we know it was the introduction last year of the Apple iPhone.
"He's lost his mind", I hear you say. "The iPhone costs four hundred dollars, how can anything that expensive be punk?" Well, punks have been known to buy guitars (and records!) that cost several times that amount, and an iPhone is five times more punk than a Flying V with a GBH sticker, and ten times more hardcore than a Fix 'Jan's Room' with insert. Bear with me.
Apple's iPhone allows you to go about all your punk rocker business, anywhere you want, any time you want. You're on the bus home from work and you want to check on the status of your eBay auctions? No problem! You can also surf message boards to keep up on the latest punk and hardcore news. No longer do you have to wait until you're home in front of your computer to enjoy the benefits of Terminal Boredom, Shit-Fi, or even Maximumrocknroll.com! You can stream your favorite punk podcasts, or download the latest hardcore hits right from iTunes.
No self-respecting punk rocker is without a MySpace page these days. Keep track of your friend requests and comment wars 'round the clock via the iPhone's wireless Internet access.
Going on tour with your band? Touring will never be the same again. From your iPhone, you can connect with other bands on MySpace to book the tour itself. Keep up with the bookings as you travel, and alert fans to any changes via MySpace bulletins–again, sent from your phone. Getting lost on the way to the show is a thing of the past: some hippy bands may prefer to 'wing it'... not so the modern iPhone-equipped touring unit. You've got maps and directions right there in the palm of your hand. And when you're onstage, don't worry about going out of tune - you can download an application that turns your iPhone into a guitar tuner. That saves you $100 on a regular guitar tuner right there. The iPhone just became an even better deal. (I realize that many punks regard tuning your guitar to be an unnecessarily frivolous show of rock-star like 'chops', so if you fall into this category, feel free to ignore that last part). Using the iPhone's 2-megapixel digital camera, you can document the tour as you go, and post the best pics to your blog. And speaking of blogs, let's face it–zines are a relic of the past. Rather than writing a zine about sitting in the 24-hour diner drinking muddy coffee all night, then wasting hours of your time at Kinko's trying to scam copies, wouldn't you rather just publish your thoughts and feelings directly to thousands of readers AS THEY HAPPEN from the diner itself? Talk about revolutionary.
I haven't even gotten to the mp3 player part yet. Your iPhone can carry thousands of songs. That's way more songs than anyone but the most pretentious of record collectors could ever need. (In fact, according to a list on Amazon.com, there are only ten essential punk albums. Those are:
1. RANCID - "And Out Come The Wolves"
2. NOFX - "Pump Up The Valium"
3. FUGAZI - "Repeater"
4. PENNYWISE - "Land Of The Free"
5. BOUNCING SOULS - "How I Spent My Summer Vacation"
6. RX BANDITS - "The Resignation"
7. BLACK FLAG - "Damaged"
8. GREEN DAY - "Dookie"
9. BOX CAR RACER - "Box Car Racer"
10. OFFSPRING - "Smash"
Shit, I'm only 2 for 10. But fire up the iPhone, and I could download the ones I'm missing from iTunes and complete my punk collection! See how easy and convenient Apple has made it to be punk? CRASS said pay no more than 2.99. Apple says pay no more than 99 cents (per song)!)
I don't think there's any aspect of the life of your average punk rocker that couldn't be improved by the use of an iPhone. In fact, I'd go so far as to say that if it's not already, in very short order an iPhone will be essential for any truly DIY punk. With the technology of the iPhone at our fingertips, there's nothing we can't do. We can finally and instantly mobilize to make a punk takeover of the online airwaves a reality. We've been waiting for this a long time. The struggle has been long and many have been lost along the way. But with the introduction of the iPhone, we have finally won.

Technorati Tags: iPhone, iPhone Punks

Top Ten Punk Records of 2007

2008-02-07T18:33:00.001-08:00

My very first attempt at podcasting: I decided to make an audio addendum to my year-end top ten that appears in the latest issue of Maximumrocknroll. You can listen or download by clicking this link.
The playlist includes The Tranzmitors, Criminal Damage, Loser Life, and the Young Offenders. It was fun making it so I might do more of them, but I'm not going to get on a regular schedule or anything.

Overrunning Of The Orifice Region

2008-01-29T16:28:00.000-08:00

Browsing YouTube late the other night, as you do, I luckily happened across a hitherto unviewed (by this writer) promotional video for Stretchheads. One of my favourite bands of all time, I was luckily enough to see this band many times in Glasgow. You know those local bands in your town that you like a lot, but you know that you don't have to go to every gig, because there'll be another one round the corner? With the Stretchheads, you made it to every one you could. Every one was different and every one was a total multimedia experience. 'Singer' P6 had a flair for the dramatic and a barely suppressed desire to be confrontational. He brought the concert to the audience one at a time and at close range. It felt moderately uncomfortable for this particular 18-year-old to be screamed at by a large, bald man in a tinfoil suit less than an inch from my face, but it was an experience I went back for time and time again. Musically, they were like nothing I'd ever heard. As time went on I became aware of the groups the were an influence on the Stretchheads but at the time I had been subsisting on a pretty strict diet of American hardcore and punk. The Stretchheads were hardcore alright, but in a completely different, twisted way. After the first LP, when they started to get even more experimental and incorporated samples, loops, and dubby effects, they just got better and better.
I remember going in to Rat Records on Buchanan Street and buying Five Fingers, Four Thingers, A Thumb, A Facelift, and a New Identity off of drummer Richie, without realizing he was in the band. When my friend Sandy and I drew up the list of must-have interviews for our new punk zine, Stretchheads were top of the list. Bassist Mofungo answered just about every question with references to The Ramones or The Sweeney, as I recall.
At any rate, thanks to the wonders of 21st Century technology, rather than just tell you about this amazing band, I can also direct you to sites where you can see and hear them for yourself. Enjoy!

Stretchheads on YouTube:
Overrunning Of The Orifice Region - Part 1
Overrunning Of The Orifice Region - Part 2
Live In Stockwell, 1990

Stretchheads on MySpace

Vocalist P6 and drummer Richie have a new(ish) act called DeSalvo that continues their fascination with brutal sounds and theatricality. DeSalvo on MySpace

Technorati Tags: Stretchheads, Stretch Heads, DeSalvo

Maximumrocknroll #297 February 2008

2008-01-22T17:54:00.002-08:00

The other night I went out to see Naked Raygun with a few friends. I would have missed it because I forgot to get a ticket but luckily Timmy Brooks from SF's finest over-30s pub rock act the Young Offenders phoned me up cos he had an extra. The doors were set to open at 7, with Chicago's Shot Baker and legendary 90s Frisco street-punx the Swingin' Utters set to open. No mention of Johnny Peebucks in any of the advertising literature unfortunately. At any rate, we got to the Elbo Room in the fashionable Mission District at about half eight, thinking the gig would be well under way, to be met by a queue that reached almost to the end of the block. Long story short, in the end NR didn't take the stage until about quarter to twelve. On a Tuesday night? I know at least one person who had to leave before they even played and two more left during the set. Doors at 7, three bands, you're expecting to be tucked up in your scratcher and sawing logs by half eleven. Instead I was dragging my carcass up the stairs about 1:30 am and trying not to wake the missus. Did I mention I was up at 7 for work the next day? Christ, I'm not going to maintain my youthful good looks for long at this rate.
Anyway, performance-wise, Naked Raygun were a mixed bag, but I enjoyed their set immensely. As I understand it, singer Jeff Pezzati apparently has some kind of chronic illness and he certainly seemed to be in pain at times, or at least very uncomfortable, and his voice was kind of weak. I got the impression that he was trying really hard to perform in less-than-ideal circumstances, and I was rooting for him the whole set. Naked Raygun were one of my favorite bands at one time, but I never got to see them live - they toured the UK, but never made it to Scotland. For a long time, it was pretty common for American bands to come over and tour England, while completely ignoring Scotland and Ireland. They might make it to one or the other, but rarely both. The excuse was often distance, which I used to think was fair enough. However, now I live in the US and I know that bands routinely drive ten hours to get to a gig. Typically, the longest drive a band might have to make in the UK is about four hours. Worst-case scenario would be driving from London to Glasgow, about six hours. I think the real reason is that the English tour promoters didn't think their bands would make much money in Scotland. Still, we were always grateful for the bands that did come, despite the lack of huge guarantees.
Back to the Naked Raygun show. It was a surprisingly social affair, which made for a nice change. I'm picky about the gigs I go to these days and usually if I go, I decide on the night and shoot out the door. Turn up by myself, maybe chat to a few folk, leave right after the band plays. This time, I actually planned to go with people in advance. At the gig, we met up with more people, including out-of-town visitors and MRR coordinators-du-jour. In between sets we nipped out to a quieter pub down the street for a swifty and I attempted to enlist a new columnist to our roster. Hopefully it will pan out. He or she will have probably forgotten all about it by the next morning.
Swingin' Utters played and all their old fans had come out of the woodwork (with the exception of one Mr. Bruce Roehrs, conspicuous by his absence). Every coiffed Fonzie with a swallow on his neck (tails as long as you like) for miles around had got suited up and cruised down to Valencia for the occasion. After they finished, there was a skunx exodus. Post- shift change the crowd looked very different: Naked Raygun's fans were mostly clean-cut late 30s software engineers. Some tech dudes with ponytails came on stage, set up their gear, and tuned up, so we all moved towards the front, thinking it was about to start. Half an hour later (seriously) the band actually came on. They didn't display much energy on stage (I don't think they ever really did) and the sound wasn't the greatest, but from the first 'whoa-oh' the crowd were singing along and the room was buzzing. They played a lot of their hits but the highlight for me was the encore of 'Rat Patrol', even though I had to help break up a bit of a handbag fight during it. As mentioned earlier, the show went on a bit late for a school night but I'm glad I went and I'm glad I stayed for the whole thing.
***
Naked Raygun were known to play Stiff Little Fingers' 'Alternative Ulster' as part of their live set. They didn't play it the other night, but as coincidence would have it, young Brooksy (mentioned above) happened to furnish me with a much-anticipated DVD copy of the Irish TV documentary 'Shellshock Rock', which features SLF performing said tune. I'd been hearing about this doc for years, but had never managed to lay my hands on a copy. I finally got to see it and it's been worth the wait. Not as polished as I would have expected from something that was actually on TV, it's actually pretty random. There's footage of some of Ulster's finest acts, including Rudi, The Outcasts, Protex, and of course The Undertones, as well as interviews with some interesting Belfast characters. They touch on the unique situation of how punk rock in Northern Ireland managed to bridge the sectarian divide, which definitely seems to have added a different edge to the proceedings there. It obviously meant a lot to these kids to have a place to go where the only thing that mattered was their shared music taste, not where you were from or how you pronounced the letter 'H'. I don't think this film is readily available for sale but I'm sure if you do a bit of digging on t'internet you can track it down. If you're a fan of melodic Northern Irish powerpop/punk rock it's a must see.

Technorati Tags: Naked Raygun, Shellshock Rock, belfast punks

Maximumrocknroll #296 January 2008 Lance Hahn RIP

2008-01-22T17:54:00.001-08:00

Back in the early 90s I played guitar in a band in Glasgow. We wrote some songs and played some gigs and did some demos, and as is the way these things happen we got around to recording and self-releasing an LP. We'd been writing and working on our songs over the course of about two years. Besides our regular weekly practices, the bassist Angus and I met up several times a week just to play our parts together, over and over. Finally it came time to record the album. We booked two consecutive weekends at a new studio that some friends of ours had just opened. Our friend Richie (local hero and drummer in Dawson, the Stretch Heads, Fenn, and now DeSalvo) was at the mixing desk. We worked long into the night, recording and mixing fourteen songs with minimal overdubbing. Listening back to it now it's not the greatest album in the world but I think we were pretty proud of it at the time. An artist friend, Tim Goldie, designed the cover art, and we had the record cut at Porky's in London.
When we got the records back I don't think we could quite believe we'd made an album (I also don't think Angus could quite believe he'd got himself into so much debt, either). Naturally, we send copies to MRR for review. Around the time I thought the issue with the review would come out, I would go down to Tower Records (the only place in Glasgow still stocking Maximumrocknroll regularly at the time, I don't think anywhere does now) to see if it had come in yet.
After a couple of weeks of checking there was finally a new issue on the rack. I flicked furiously to the review section, scanning for our band name... nope. Not in this issue. I waited another agonizing month until it was time to start obsessively checking the newsstands again. At last, the new issue arrived, and there it was: our review. Surely this masterpiece we'd created would take MRR by storm, earning us rave reviews and coveted top-ten placings, skyrocketing us to the stardom we so obviously deserved? I skimmed the review: "sorta like FUEL, but sped up to hardcore and without the melody... "; "like straight edge kids grown up and gone to art school..." The reviewer didn't say he hated the record, but it didn't sound like he liked it, either. Who was this cloth-eared critic, who obviously had no taste and probably hated music, or at least didn't understand it? At the end of the review, those telltale initials: (LH)
***
Later when I moved to San Francisco and knew Lance personally I gave him shit about the review. Of course, he didn't remember it, but he did remember a time around MRR where the culture was such that there was almost a competition between reviewers to see who could write the meanest reviews. In that context I suppose Glue got off lightly. Lance's review certainly wasn't the worst one we ever received. Coincidentally, he also later introduced me to his roommate Jim, a member of Fuel with whom I ended up trying to start a band. We never really got it going but whenever I would go round to their apartment Lance would be in his room with the door closed, playing guitar. I remember hearing him play along to Queen and being impressed. For a guy in a punk band, he could actually play guitar.
***
Despite Lance's long-term health problems, the news that he had fallen into a coma and subsequently passed away seemed to take everyone by surprise. You just felt like he'd always be around, you know? There'd always be another J Church split 7" coming down the line, or another article about some long forgotten anarcho band. Even though I'd been following his regular email updates about his medical travails, I just figured he'd get better. He was only 40 for crying out loud. I can't help thinking he'd still be here if the American healthcare system wasn't so fucked.
***
Although Lance was obviously poor, had no health insurance, and had to work a shitty video store job to support himself, over the course of his short life he released dozens (hundreds?) of records, performed countless shows all over the world, made friends in every city and country he went to, and had made serious headway on what was shaping up to be a great book. He lived his life the way he wanted to. He was still taking his band out on tour and making records in the midst of his debilitating health problems. It's safe to say he didn't die thinking "I wish I'd worked that 9-to-5 office job instead." It's just criminal that his life was cut so tragically short.
***
The day after Lance died the word went out about a possible gathering of his old friends somewhere in the Mission. In a flurry of emails, message board posts, text messages and phone calls it was finally deduced that yes, the gathering was happening. 9pm at the top of Dolores Park, near where the J Church streetcar passes by. A few old Epicenter and former (and current) MRR workers hung out at a bench, drank a beer or two, and traded Lance stories. It was pretty low key. No one could figure out who instigated the event and no one took responsibility. It was decided that Tim Yohannan probably organized it. After I said goodbye to everyone I walked down the hill to my car and got in. I turned the key and the radio burst into life with a KUSF DJ playing a J Church song.

Technorati Tags: Lance Hahn

Maximumrocknroll #295 December 2007

2008-01-22T17:50:00.000-08:00

Bedtime for Mediocrity

Does punk rock inherently breed mediocrity? Looking at the glut of shit-looking, shit-sounding records that we manage to churn out year on year, I'd have to say it does. Obviously, not all punk records look or sound shit, and there are vast differences in aesthetic tastes. Personally I appreciate rawness in a recording and a certain rough and ready graphic style. But as a whole, I think we have learned to tolerate an unacceptable level of shittiness. Unintelligible flyers. Boring zines. Unimaginative (or simply stolen) record art. Shoddy musicianship. "It's cool, it's punk, right?" When did "punk" become an excuse for doing something half-assed?
There are, of course, often very valid financial reasons for doing things low- (or no-) budget. One of the best things about punk is that you don't need a lot of money or a lot of musical skill to get started, but just because something is cheap doesn't mean it has to look or sound that way. I know you've got a shitty guitar and borrowed amp because it's all you can afford. It costs nothing at all to figure out (or ask someone) how to get a good sound out of what you've got. "Nah dude, it's punk." Turn up two minutes before your band is supposed to play, ask to borrow someone's amp, plug in a crappy Metal Zone pedal, and you're good to go.
This attitude is crippling us. No wonder attendance at punk shows is dwindling. People are reluctant to spend even a nominal fee of $5 because let's face it, the chances are three out of the five bands on any given night are probably going to be mediocre. The preferred venue for punk is now the basement or house party, because while the crappy bands howl and squawk away to their five friends, everyone else can drink their 40s in the backyard or kitchen and talk about single-track bikes or some new trust-fund art-gallery-slash-clothing-store that their friend opened or something.
And that five dollar thing. People complain that $5 is too low these days, what with the price of petrol and everything. I couldn't agree more, but bands are lucky if they can even get that much now. The best they can hope for is that someone at the filthy punkhouse they're playing at has the wherewithal to aggressively hit up the crowd for a "donation for the touring band." People's expectations for punk bands are so low now that bands play not for a guarantee, not for a cut of the door, but in the eager hope that they will please a group of jaded underage drinkers enough that they will spill a few coins from their beer fund into a hat at the end of the night. That's not touring, that's busking.
For other styles of music, people queue up to buy tickets in advance. They get excited about going to shows. They don't toss the bands a couple of crumbs as an afterthought.
I dunno what the answer is. In the long run the good bands seem to do all right and the bad ones either break up or keep plugging away without really going anywhere. Again, they're not really harming anyone but they are diluting the gene pool, know what I mean?
I feel like I get quite curmudgeonly in this column. One could get the impression that I don't like punks or punk rock. Far from it, I just think we should hold ourselves to a higher standard. I judge myself the harshest. I've come to realize that I have accepted mediocrity in my own life for far too long. All my life I felt different, and then punk came along and showed me there was another way. I didn't have to follow the established path. I successfully avoided the pitfalls of a normal life but along the way I defined myself by what I didn't want to be. So I never became a square, so what? Now what? Everything I learned I taught myself. Never went to school, never had a career. I'm approaching middle age with little to show for my years than a woefully inadequate record collection. "What did you do with your life?" "I was a punk". What does that mean? Am I an idiot for wanting it to be something to be proud of, instead of feeling like I'm (we're) selling myself (ourselves) short?
It's confusing when you devote so much of your energy to something that most people get into, pass through, and get out of in the space of a few years, graduating to hipster bar DJ nights. Those punk tattoos used to keep you out of the corporate workplace but now coolhunting ad agencies, design studios. etc fall over themselves to show how edgy they are.
I never picked punk up like a new outfit to try on and throw away when fashion changed. It was already well out of fashion by the time I found it (or rather, it found me). Punk was there when I had nothing else so it's not something I can easily forget about. I don't know what brought on this crisis of confidence. I'm trying to start speaking up for myself. When (non punk) people ask what I do, rather than mumble something about whatever dead-end job is currently paying the bills, I'll say I'm a musician, and a writer. Eagerly, they'll ask about the music or the writing. "What's your band called? I'll look for the records in the shops!" "You're a writer? Where have you been published?" "Ermm, well, the records are all out of print because we only pressed 300 but it might be available either through the post from some distro in the Midwest or maybe on a stall at a twelve-band thrash festival in someone's shed. The writing, well, all fifty copies of the last issue of my zine are sold out but I've still got the originals somewhere so I can photocopy it for you if my mate is still working at Kinko's..."
I'm being negative, I know. On the positive side, I'm extremely lucky that I've even managed to put out records at all, and been in bands that have toured the US and Europe. I guess right now it just doesn't feel like it's adding up to much. I'm not sure what's missing but stick around with me while I try to find out. And above all don't accept mediocrity, from yourself or from those around you.
Technorati Tags: DIY punk

Maximumrocknroll #291 August 2007

2008-01-22T17:48:00.000-08:00

Is this what winning looks like?
We know what it's like to be a small-town punk. The cool kids spat on us. The cops moved us along and poured out our beers. We're not going to forget. We've paid our dues. We've been run out of dive bars by rip-off promoters and greedy owners. We've played to empty clubs and had to call home for gas money to get to the next show. We deserve this opportunity. If we sign to this label, we can get our message out to a wider audience. Man, isn't it totally subversive that our song was used on that car commercial? And anyway, it was for a hybrid. I know our ticket prices are expensive now, but those tour buses don't run on air.
The platitudes come down like a spring rain. This time it'll be different. But time and time again, bands build a following and grow up in the DIY, underground punk community, only to leave when the money starts to come in. All of a sudden, the horrible corporate venues that you wouldn't go to unless you could sneak in for free become the only game in town. "We hate this place, but where else can we play? It's the only place big enough." Warped Tour, media whore, sadly this has become your life. All that crap about getting the message out there, it was all bullshit, wasn't it? Or when does it start? Is there a dollar amount, once you get to a certain point, then you start giving back to the community that spawned you? Or was it all just a ruse, a pose, saying the right things to climb that ladder? Because it just looks like business as usual. You said you were punks, but now you're no different. You play the same rock biz games, play the same high-door-price venues, hide behind the same violent bouncers. You've got a street team spreading the word about your gigs when you used to have street cred.
Punk rock is on MTV and in the shopping malls. Mainstream punk is getting bigger but the infrastructure is shrinking. Why is it that after all this time, there are still only a handful of reliable punk-operated music venues in the world (Gilman Street in Berkeley, The Smell in LA, ABC No Rio in NYC, Mr. Roboto in Pittsburgh, and the 1 in 12 in Bradford, England are the ones that spring to mind)? OK, I know that there are tons of punk-run squat venues throughout Europe but that's a slightly different situation. Either you're big enough to play the huge, corporate, beer-company sponsored venues, or you have to rely on people who are having shows in their living rooms and basements. Don't get me wrong, house shows are almost always more fun than bar shows or other regular venues. But it's hard to build a scene around a venue that could get shut down any minute by angry neighbors or disgruntled roommates. Also, sometimes it's nice to actually be able to hear the vocals.
I guess what I'm getting at is that if we had our shit together, there would be a network of punk rock venues/community centers, one in every medium-to-large size town. Bigger bands would play there and that would subsidize the smaller shows with less of a turnout. The bigger bands would have local bands on the bill, so that those bands could build a following and grow the scene, so that more people would come out of the woodwork and help keep the venue going. I realize it's a pipe dream - just about all the venues I mentioned earlier exist by the skin of their teeth. The kids are mostly just users who take a lot of stuff for granted, and even most of the people who do want to get involved and do more end up getting burned out, either by in-fighting and status-jockeying, or by the constant uphill struggle to keep things going in the face of apathy.
***
I got to thinking about this stuff when a local art space/venue, Balazo Gallery, was shut down by the city for permit issues. It was one of the few places in San Francisco that was available to rent for all-ages shows. I'd had a show booked there for months (in fact, the final show for my band, Giant Haystacks. I've never mentioned the band in my column before, but since we've broken up, I suppose it's OK), and when they had to close down I had to find a new venue, for a Friday night, at extremely short notice. In the end we split the show between two smaller places: an early show at a bar on Mission Street called The Knockout, and a later, all-ages show in the basement of Thrillhouse Records across the street. Both venues came through in a pinch, although unfortunately many unlucky people got turned away from the second show. I couldn't help daydreaming that if SF had a decent, reliable all-ages venue, we'd never have had the problem in the first place.
***
In the Mailbox: Along with my long-awaited copy of the Down & Outs "Minneapolis" EP on Rat Patrol Records (Reviewed in this mag by Andy Darling a few months ago), I received a four-track EP compiling some of the output of Randy 'Biscuit' Turner, to benefit the Health Alliance for Austin Musicians. The record has two Big Boys songs performed by the Slurpees/Texas Biscuit Bombs, as well as a Cargo Cult tune and a live version of "Identity Crisis" performed by the Big Boys in 1981. The cool little package is rounded out by some of Biscuit's artwork. Not sure how many were pressed, but check www.ratpatrolrecords.com for details. While you're online, take a look at www.austinmusicianshealth.com.
My fairy godmother was really looking out for me, because she also saw fit to guide a copy of the Fucked Up/Hard Skin split 7" my way. On the Hard Skin side, genius Johnny Takeaway gets to do his best Jonesy impression on a note-perfect cover of the Professionals' 1-2-3. Someone from Fucked Up did a bit of digging and unearthed a candid snap of Fat Bob with a Neil-from-the-Young-Ones barnet on some hippie peace march. Can't tell when it was taken but it looks to be from back in the sixties or something. The Fucked Up song, "Toronto FC", is another work of genius on their part. Don't know if I'm picking up the theme but it makes me think of those American skinheads who bend over backwards to be as authentically close to their imaginary ideas of working class British life as possible - right down to forming little hooligan gangs and following their favorite Major League Sawkir teams. It's quite cute really.

Technorati Tags: Hard Skin, fucked up

Maximumrocknroll #288 May 2007

2007-05-20T11:59:00.001-07:00

Claws.
There's a cat living in my house just now. She's not allowed out, she's an indoor cat. She's been de-clawed, so even if she did go out she doesn't have the tools to defend herself. She is always trying to make a break for it though. You have to be careful not to leave the door open too long when you're coming or going. It's a terrible shame. She sits at the window and looks at the exciting world outside. Birds, squirrels, dogs, other cats. It's almost cruel to show her the freedom she's missing. She retains some of her natural instincts though. She paws at the furniture¬–in her imagination I'm sure she's shredding it with phantom claws. At night she goes on the prowl, padding from room to room on the trail of imaginary prey.
I watch her and I feel a common bond. We're all a little like de-clawed cats. We sense there is something better out there, but at some point along the line someone closed the door on us and took away our ability to defend ourselves. Or maybe we willingly gave it up in exchange for the comforts of domesticity.
Heroes.
From an early age I wanted to be a cartoonist. I read the comics in the paper every day, and used to check out collections of cartoons from the library. I used to draw all the time, copying popular characters and trying to come up with my own. I managed to get a couple of cartoons in school newspapers and such but my own efforts were always unoriginal and derivative. Still, I could adequately recreate all the greats and was always getting requests for Popeye, Snoopy, etc. As a youngster, the Peanuts cartoons were far and away my favorite. I would get completely swept up in their world, devouring collection after collection of Charlie Brown strips. Naturally, I related to Charlie Brown: the morose, awkward, and unpopular, but reliable, down-to-earth, nice-guy hero of the comics. The funny thing is, I think everyone relates to Charlie Brown in some way. Isn't that the key to the strip's massive and enduring popularity?
The point of all this is to somehow illustrate what a hero Charles M. Schulz was to the youthful McNaughton. As time went by and I got older other interests took over. As you can probably tell, I never became a cartoonist. But I remained a fan of Peanuts all along. One time after I had moved to California, I read in the paper that he actually lived just an hour or two North of here. The article talked about the ice rink he built so that the kids in his adopted hometown of Santa Rosa would have the opportunity to enjoy skating and hockey as much as he had as a boy in Minnesota. Apparently he often ate breakfast in the cafe attached to the ice rink. I always told myself that one of these days I was going to go up there and meet my childhood hero face to face. I'd read that he was a fairly private person, but all I wanted to do was shake his hand and thank him for the years of pleasure.
Of course, you've probably guessed where this was going. I never did get around to going up to Santa Rosa and trying to meet the great man, and in February 2000, he passed away. I was too late.
Today I finally did make that trip, to visit the Schulz Museum that was built to celebrate his life and work. There were some great original cartoons on display, as well as Peanuts-inspired works from many other famous artists. One of the highlights for me was the recreation of his studio. The room had his desks laid out with work on them, as if he'd just stepped out moments before. The shelves are lined with what I imagine were his books. On one shelf sits a nice turntable with a Brahms LP on it, ready to play (or just finished). I couldn't help but check out the small selection from Sparky's record collection that sat next to the turntable. Among the jazz and classical sat two Buck Owens LPs and the Best Of ABBA. I couldn't picture Charles Schulz sitting there sketching away to the strains of "Knowing me, knowing you", but it probably happened.
Demons.
I never thought I'd see the day. But when Empress Carolyn informed me that the one and only Roky Erickson was going to be performing at this year's Noise Pop festival in San Francisco, I knew I had to secure a ticket as soon as they went on sale. In the 12 years I've lived in the Bay Area, I think this is the first time I've actually attended a Noise Pop event. It's just never appealed to me - usually the headliners are big time indie rock acts that I don't care about. If, by some bizarre instance of mate-rock nepotism actually coinciding with decent musical taste and a band I like makes it into the lineup, I would generally prefer to see them the next time they play, when the ticket price isn't $25 and the venue isn't full to bursting with 'industry' bottom-feeder laminate monkeys.
Anyway, I digress... Roky Erickson. I was not cool enough to be rocking out to the 13th Floor Elevators in my nappies. I first heard Roky after my mate Angus (as mentioned a few columns ago) heard me listening to the Minutemen's cover of "Bermuda" (as recorded over the telephone) and told me what it was. I dispatched myself to his record collection forthwith and taped all the Roky records he had. I've been a fan ever since, but after reading up on a bit of Roky's bizarre history, I'd long given up on the possibility of ever seeing him live. Even after I started hearing about his sporadic performances in his hometown of Austin, it seemed unlikely that he'd get a full-time band together again and go out on tour. Well, he did, and am I glad. Roky Erickson brought the house down at San Francisco's Great American Music Hall the other night, and while the set list wasn't my dream collection of hits from his back catalogue, I was in no way disappointed. When he and the band kicked in to "Starry Eyes", the smile on my face was splitting me in half. He didn't say much up there; he looked a little bewildered by the adulation at times, but he managed some decent guitar shredding and his singular voice was in strong, if not perfect, form.
I saw many familiar faces in the audience that night, as well as many more I'd never seen before, but by the end of the show they all shared the same elated expression. It almost felt like we'd all witnessed a miracle. In a way maybe we had. From the sounds of things, Roky Erickson has all but recovered from decades of mental illness, and is back to share his music with us for good. Let's hope.
***
"Bermuda/The Interpreter" singles and signed, original Peanuts strips to: PO Box 22971, Oakland, CA 94609. Email me at allan@dropout.cc. Columns are archived on my blog at www.dropout.cc (now RSS-enabled!).
(For more background on the strange tale of Roky Erickson you can visit some of the many excellent websites that exist, or you can wait for the release of the new documentary on his life, "You're Gonna Miss Me.")
For the record, I am against de-clawing cats. But at least she won't kill any songbirds...

Maximumrocknroll #287 April 2007

2007-05-20T11:56:00.000-07:00

My Rules.
Flip-flops should not be worn unless you're at the beach or pool. Girls have a bit more leeway but not much. I don't have too many rules but that's one of them. I know that in warmer climes even the punks wear flip-flops. In New Mexico I've seen punk bands rock living room concerts in footwear that is ordinarily only appropriate for sand-bound applications. I'm not a haberdasher or tailor but some things just have to be said. Enough with the flip-flops. Israeli combat boots, Goodwill penny-loafers, topsiders, sweatshop-free Adbusters gutties, box fresh ltd. ed. kicks etc, I don't care. Just put some proper shoes on. And no sweatpants either. OK the more I think about this the more rules I apparently have. I suppose it's about being casual. Casual=hippy and not in a good way. I'm not talking about football casuals, obviously they are far from being hippies. Not a lifestyle I'd recommend emulating either.
I realize I'm talking about fashion here and punks are supposed to be anti-fashion. Of course, that's total bullshit and everyone knows punks are as into fashion as anyone else, if not more so. I don't think it's a bad thing at all. Style is hugely important. Would the Ramones have been as iconic without the leather jackets? Would Discharge have been as enduring without the charged hair and bullet belts? The Misfits without the devil lock? Even the supposed 'non-style' of the flannel shirt around the waist suburban skatepunk hardcore vanguard became a fashion pretty quickly.
I suppose I equate loose, casual clothing with loose, casual thinking. As Joe Strummer allegedly had it, "like trousers, like brain" although you could read that to imply that narrow trousers equals a narrow mind, which is the opposite of what he was getting at I'd guess.
To me, looking like you think about what you are wearing demonstrates that you actually think about things. I don't mean that you scour the pages of fashion magazines looking for the latest craze, but the way you dress says something about you whether you like it or not.
Years ago my mate Colin suggested I dye my hair bright red. He had some leftover dye. At the time I thought of myself as a serious political activist punk rocker and wouldn't consider anything so frivolous. He called me out on this. "Of course, you can't be constantly thinking of the problems of the oppressed peoples of the world and have dyed hair" or words to that effect. He was right, I took myself way too seriously. Since then my hair has been a few different colors but now it's back to its normal mousy brown with bits of grey. I'm 36 now and I'm through with dying my hair.
What the fuck is a 36-year-old man doing writing in a punk fanzine about clothes? I know it's ridiculous but it is something I think about. I've been through some embarrassing stages. Someone sent me a photo recently of me from about fifteen years ago with a short Travis Bickle mohican and baggy chinos. What a combination. Baggy trousers will be to nineties punks what flares are to anyone who grew up in the seventies. I wish I'd had the foresight or self-possession to forego that fashion disaster but we all make mistakes. Unfortunately both flares and baggy jeans are still with us. "Like trousers like brain," remember it. Live by it.
The Correct Use Of Soap is the title of an album by Magazine, the band started by Buzzcocks founder member Howard Devoto when he left the band after recording the Spiral Scratch EP. It is also the name of an instructional pamphlet that may or may not exist, but which ought to be handed out with the membership cards at Gilman and maybe slipped into mailers with crusty distro orders. You're not too busy thinking about the world's problems to take an occasional bath or shower. Or to shave, while we're at it.
What's with the beards? I've been boycotting Gillette since before I was old enough to shave. Got some leaflet about them testing on animals off some crusty at a gig once and never looked back. All my post-pubescent life I've used the crappy shop brand of razors and my poor beautiful mug has suffered as a result. As if whatever faceless Taiwanese manufacturer Superdrug gets their blades from doesn't test on animals anyway! I tried tracking down the PETA-approved razor blades and while they might be okay for hippies who hack their beards off once a year to visit mummy and daddy and ask for another loan they don't stand up to the rigorous frequent shavings of the manly McNaughton beard. On a recent trip to Los Angeles I forgot my shaving kit and was forced to purchase the predominant brand for once. The scales fell from my eyes! It was a revelation. Gillette really IS the best a man can get. The smoothest, most comfortable shave I've experienced. Over twenty years of inferior shaving products. Well I've learned my lesson.
I've just re-read this column and it's ridiculous. All 20 readers are now nodding their heads in unison, in agreement with the previous statement. However, it's deadline day and I've been late a few times lately. I'm determined to get this one in under the wire. I know it seems frivolous but what we wear is part of who we are, it's part of our culture and it's something we have in common, whether we're serious political punks or crusties or bike punks or garage punks or bandana thrash skate punks or ageing bmx riders with a knack for tracking down discount mod clothes or whoever. Maybe I'll write about something serious next month. Or maybe I'll dye my hair and write about that, who knows?
***
If you've got any green size M Paul Weller limited edition Fred Perry shirts you don't want you can send them to PO Box 22971, Oakland, CA 94609. For fashion advice or shaving tips email allan@dropout.cc or check www.dropout.cc. I know what's what. Or you could make it easy on yourself and just go to www.maximumrocknroll.com and click on 'merch' to buy a Maximumrocknroll t-shirt. P.S. This column goes out to MRR's consistently most stylish shitworker, Sean Dougan, with Shane White a close runner up.

Maximumrocknroll #286 March 2007

2007-05-20T11:55:00.000-07:00

I can't believe it was seventeen years ago now but it was. I'd gone to King Tut's Wah Wah Hut in Glasgow to see Snuff, who were probably the best band around at the time, if not in the world, then certainly in the UK. Their first EP, with all the coppers on the sea front, had been getting constant play at home since I'd heard them on John Peel and picked it up. The support band for the night had a familiar name but I'd never heard them before. Leatherface they were called. Seemed like a pretty stupid name and a guy I knew told me they weren't that good. Still, I decided to check them out. One guy had a dodgy spiky-topped mullet and the drummer looked like a bit of a bruiser. Visually not very arresting, but when the first guitar kicked in it was instantly familiar. Then it registered that the mullet guitarist was out of HDQ, who I really liked. This was something else again though. I was instantly swept up in the power and melody of Leatherface, and was blown away by the gruff intensity of Frankie Stubbs' voice. Snuff were also great that night, but it was the surprise discovery of a new favorite band that marks the night as special in my memory.
I'd borrowed a clunky VHS video camera from college to shoot Snuff that night, and I managed to get a few Leatherface songs as well. At some point I think I lent the tape (the original!) to a guy from Preston called Frosty and I've never seen it since. There's one other copy that my friend Sandy's got somewhere. After the gig Sandy and I interviewed Snuff (with the members of Leatherface present) for the second issue of our zine that never actually appeared. How many zines never make it past issue one? That first issue was like a cry for help from a small town–there were about four punks in our village so we started a zine, doing through-the-mail interviews with bands we liked (Doom, Cowboy Killers, and Stretch Heads) and a star-struck in-person interview with Joe Lally from Fugazi (he was star-struck by the way, not us). Once we'd put the zine together (nicking layout ideas liberally from the Skate Muties, who had nicked their ideas from Sic Teen) and photocopied it at our mate's mum's office after hours, we brought it to gigs in Glasgow to sell. In hindsight the zine was crap, but through trying to sell it we met a few other zinesters and people in bands–in other words, it had the desired effect of putting us in touch with the wider punk scene around us. Once we had established those acquaintances and friendships, the zine had lost its raison d'etre. We did a bunch of interviews for #2, including DOA, UK Subs, and Snuff, but we were too busy going to gigs, socializing with our newfound punk scene friends, and communicating with other punks around the world via flyer-stuffed re-used envelopes and glued stamps.
I don't really know where I'm going with this. I suppose I'm just writing this down so I don't forget it, so we don't forget. It's pretty unlikely these days that I'll randomly see a band and they'll become a lifelong favorite. Not because there aren't great bands playing today, but that my tastes are pretty developed by this point, and also because I tend to find out about bands long before there's any chance to see them live. Some of us still find out about bands via the radio and through mags like MRR and The Big Takeover, but I think we're increasingly in the minority. I confess I hear a lot of bands for the first time now via the Internet, and it's usually less than a few clicks, if that, from reading a mention of a band on someone's blog or on a message board to listening to their music on their MySpace page. Convenience-wise, this is just unbelievable, but I really hope that one day I'll be pleasantly surprised again at some random show.
Similarly, with all these online communities and such, will isolated kids in small towns feel the need to start zines to reach out to the world at large? Should they? Should I care? I dunno, there's just something endearing and romantic about it. It would be a shame to see that sort of thing disappear for good.
***
Writing this stuff got me nostalgic so I went on YouTube to look for footage of Snuff and Leatherface. It's amazing how that site just sucks you in. It's a fucking goldmine. I never even knew that Leatherface had made a video, yet here they are, messing about in a scrapyard to the strains of their track 'Peasant In Paradise'. Quaint and wonderful.
If you live in an isolated small town and do a zine, good for you, but don't send it to me.

Top Ten Punk Rock Records of 2006

2007-02-21T15:42:00.000-08:00

It might seem a bit late but the issue of MRR with the year-end top tens has hit the newsstands. Here are mine, with the non-print benefits of hyperlinks. To read what I actually wrote about each record, as well as to learn the top records of 2006 for many other MRR contributors, you'll have to actually buy the magazine, which you can do here.

FUCKED UP - Hidden World 2XLP (Jade Tree/Deranged)
THIS IS MY FIST - A History Of Rats LP (No Idea)
CRIMINAL DAMAGE - s/t LP (Feral Ward)
NIGHTINGALES - Out Of True CD (Iron Man)
LOVE SONGS - Behind Enemy Lines In G# Major CD (625/Wajlemac)
TRANZMITORS - Bigger Houses, Broken Homes 7" (Deranged)
THE VATICANS - Little Jimmy/Digital World 7" (Pure Filth)
HARD SKIN - We Are The Wankers 7" (Rudeness)
LOSER LIFE - Things Will Never Change 7" (Bakersfield)
DECONDITIONED - Big Act/Compartment K3 (Beginning Era)

Technorati Tags: fucked up, this is my fist, criminal damage, the nightingales, love songs, tranzmitors, the vaticans, hard skin, loser life, deconditioned

Disillusioned Youth

2007-02-19T18:45:00.000-08:00

This band have been around for a while (since the 80s I think) but for some reason, apart from a demo I first heard in the early 90s, they've never had any vinyl. They seem to be happy enough with that and are content to just poke fun at the punk scene while writing some of the funniest hardcore lyrics ever. They have a few songs on a MySpace page now.
I recommend 'Bad Feedback', a mid-paced later-BLACK FLAG rager. Check out the lyrics:

BAD FEEDBACK
Took you for your money, now you're gonna cry
Postman never came, I wonder why
I never sent the records, but I got your check
Cashed it when I got it, I got fuckin' wrecked

Bad Feedback
See if I give a fuck
Bad Feedback
You're shit out of luck
Bad Feedback
I just don't care
Bad Feedback (x2)

I don't know what happened, they got lost in the mail
Send me some more money, scam never fails
I'm not your paypal ,so don't bid on my past
Stick to what you know, Chemical People and Blast

{Monday! Tuesday! etc, everyday!}

Poseur wants to bid, I'll take the money
You say it's criminal? I say it's funny
I'll do it again and I'll do it some more
Someone should've told you, you can't bid on hardcore!

Maximumrocknroll #285 February 2007

2007-02-19T18:42:00.000-08:00

Killer.
Paul and Jason shared a flat on South Van Ness. It was an old Victorian and in a bit of a state but the landlord was never about so they could do what they liked. They'd painted the walls some decent colors and there was loads of Jason's art lying about so it looked OK. They worked at a yuppie health food store so money was pretty tight. They always seemed to know someone who was DJing somewhere but hanging out in bars required buying drinks. They spent a lot of time on the couch, drinking 40s of malt liquor, watching afternoon TV meant for old people and stay-at-home mums. Columbo was their favorite programme.
There was this one guy they'd always see around the Mission. Tall and skinny but with these dark, serious eyes. He frequented the same thrift stores. Everyone was looking for the same shit. Velvet paintings, kitsch ashtrays, 70s McDonalds glasses. This guy was always hunched over the stacks of used vinyl. What was he looking for? Everyone knew there was nothing good in those stacks. If someone had something good to sell they went over to Berkeley and sold it at Amoeba. (This was before they opened up the massive Amoeba in an old bowling alley on Haight Street). The other thing about him was he looked exactly like the murderer on an episode of Columbo that seemed to come around on TV every other month or so. It got to the point where Paul and Jason were calling him 'Killer' to just about everyone except the man himself. "Saw Killer at the corner store today, he was buying Anchor Steam. Must have dough." It got so that just about every white, gay hipster in the Mission knew him as Killer, although he was none the wiser.
Well back then the neighborhood was like a tiny desert island. People hardly ever left. The beach? That was miles away, the streetcar took like an hour, are you crazy? Especially for artists and musicians, and the people who dressed like artists and musicians. Rent was still cheap and you could work in a pizza place and hang around the rest of the time trying to look like an artist or a musician. No one remembered how it happened but one night Jason went home from the Uptown with Killer and soon after that they began dating. Eventually the rest of us got to know him too and he turned out to be not that scary. The name Killer became ironic as it couldn't be further from the truth. I forget what his real name was actually.
One night everyone went back to Killer's apartment on 18th Street after the bars closed and he played records 'til 4am. We found out what he'd been looking for all this time in the thrift stores - absolutely anything. He had wall after wall stacked with albums, the kind of stuff you find for 25 cents in any thrift store in America. You know, some of it was good and some of it was shit but it was all there. Genesis "Invisible Touch" - check. Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass - check. Michael Jackson "Bad" - Check. Plus the obligatory marching band, gospel, and classical Christmas themed compilations. He wasn't a discerning record collector, like I was used to, he just collected anything, so long as it was cheap and he couldn't recall having it already. Fair play to him. Statistically, there had to be something amazing in those stacks, but I wasn’t going to spend hours inhaling dust-borne germs trying to find it.
Not long after that people started drifting away. Paul moved back to Boston and Jason moved to New York. Last I heard he was making music videos. I still see Killer around from time to time. Word must have got to him about the nickname because now he has it tattooed on the back of his neck.

Technorati Tags: mission district, record collecting

Maximumrocknroll #284 January 2006

2007-02-19T18:40:00.000-08:00

How old is old?

The other day someone asked myself and a few other (over 30) friends what it felt like to be the older person at shows. He was thinking about the shows he used to go to when he was 16 and there would always be a couple of weird older guys there (probably in their 30s, which must have seemed ancient at the time). He remarked that he thought to himself back then, "I don't want to still be doing this at their age."
I don't want to turn this into another rant about "the kids"... it's true that I have a hard time relating to teenagers these days, and that's only right. If I'm old enough to be your father, I shouldn't be able to relate to you. It's like those 'cool' parents that try to be their kids' best friends - the kid doesn't need another friend, he needs a parent. However, there are plenty of people in their 20s that I can relate to on a number of levels. Working at MRR brings me into contact with plenty of cool folk, both younger and older, that are an inspiration. So yeah, I often feel a bit out of place at a house show with a bunch of underage punks, or at Gilman. The alternatives for people my age seem to be to either stop going to shows altogether, to only go to reunion concerts of old bands, or to only go to bar shows, where everyone will be over-21 and you can drink overpriced beer or cans of Pabst Blue Ribbon. And to be honest, those over-21 shows are starting to be a lot more attractive. Some of my absolute favorite shows of 2006 (Fucked Up and Hard Skin) were at the Hemlock Tavern, a cool bar/venue in the Tenderloin. I'm not ready to give up on the DIY all-ages shows yet though, especially because I believe in principle that all shows should be all-ages. In practice though, either can be fun.
When our first band Teenagers From Mars broke up because the bassist and drummer didn't want to ever play shows, Sandy and I put an advert up in Rat Records in Glasgow looking for new people to start a band with. The only person to respond was this guy Angus. He was pushing 30, about ten years older than us, and the first cool older person we'd ever met. He had as much energy as anyone else we knew. He was an amazing bass player, he loved skateboarding, and he was one of the few people we knew with a full-time job (which he put to good use, eventually using his savings to put out our records). He also had a large record collection, through which I was exposed to loads of great stuff I am still into to this day. He dedicated himself to booking tours, putting on gigs in Glasgow, having bands stay at his house, etc. Eventually, he even bought a van and used it to drive other bands around on tour. Angus is a father now and I don't think he's in a band any more, but I think he can still be spotted occasionally at the new skatepark in Kelvingrove Park. He was the first person to demonstrate to me that there was an alternative to conforming to expectations as one gets older. I know he felt frustrated that many of his friends abandoned their youthful passions once they hit their thirties. I can certainly relate. I think he also felt a certain amount of frustration that we (the younger kids) were squandering our time and energy, not realizing how finite it was.
In the years since then I've encountered countless other older people who have been an inspiration, many of whom still inspire. Tons of people from MRR's 'Punks Over 30' issue (from 1992!) are still active, maybe not in punk music, but in some kind of creative pursuit. So let's hear it for the OAPs. If Mike Watt, Nomeansno, The Stooges, The Ex, Mission Of Burma, Bruce Roehrs, Al Quint, etc are still going strong, I've got a few good years in me yet. I also draw inspiration from the many people close to my own age who show no signs of slowing down. This doesn't necessarily only mean those who are 'lifers' in the punk scene, but also people who have grown up as punks and are taking the lessons of independence into other realms, whether it's art, journalism, education, whatever... just not turning their backs on their options. Cheers!

Technorati Tags: aging punks

Maximumrocknroll #283 December 2006

2007-02-19T18:39:00.000-08:00

Common Sense Ain't That Common

Thursday night, 11:30, somewhere on the edge of West Oakland. Someone took it upon himself to push a drum kit out into the middle of the intersection on a trolley. He began to play, to the amusement of the punks gathered in front of a nearby house, where a show was taking place. Like most punk shows, the excitement all took place outside. Not all the punks were into it, some people asked him to stop and were laughed off. Eventually a woman appeared and berated the drummer for waking up half the neighborhood on a work night. "You wouldn't try that in a white part of town!" What the fuck was he thinking? The answer: he wasn't. Maybe he was rushing on the excitement, the freedom that comes from being away from home for the first time, living in a punk house in "the ghetto", being a fucking punk, man, and fuck the rules. Fuck the squares that have to get up for work in the morning. They need to hear these drums, need to be woken up from their materialist stupor! Of course, I'm projecting. He was probably just drunk on Old English and thought it would be funny.
It's glamorous, in a way, to emphasize the shitty nature of your surroundings. A badge of honor, to proclaim that you live in a crime-ridden, violence-prone part of town. I understand the allure of cheap rent, tons of space, a place to have shows. Hell, punks and artists and musicians (and people who just like to dress like punks and artists and musicians) need places to live too. At least make friends with your neighbors, be respectful of them, keep the noise to a minimum on work nights. What is merely slumming it for you is matter of fact for them. Do I sound like your Grandpa talking? It seems like it should be common sense.
By now, for all intents and purposes, the gentrification debate is done and dusted. Everyone knows the cycle: the stormtrooper brigade of low-income artists, musicians, students, etc move into an historically working-class, immigrant, or poor community for the cheap housing and gritty, ghetto-chic appeal, then create a culture there that makes the area attractive to more affluent middle-class types, who then move in, buy up property, and push out both the original inhabitants and the very people who created the culture that made the place attractive to them in the first place. I've seen it happen (or rather, been part of it) in the West End of Glasgow (resulting in the cycle starting all over again on the South Side) and the Mission in San Francisco, but punks and artist types have set up camp in Oakland for years without much in the way of gentrification taking hold. Recently, though, the Oakland art scene (predominantly, but not exclusively, that created by twenty-something white hipsters) along with the city's vibrant culture of underground music venues has started to garner some mainstream attention. Not to mention, the thousands of high-rise 'loft apartments' being built all over the place. To be honest, it would be great to see some positive economic development coming to Oakland, but it looks like it's going to be more of the same: gated communities separating the haves and the have-nots, and the only opportunities for most of the original inhabitants will be minimum-wage service industry jobs catering to the newcomers. You can't fight progress.
***
I was moved by fellow resident alien Timmy Brooks' review a couple of issues back (along with gutter-minded long-time shitworker Shane White's enthusiastic recommendations) to pick up 'Cockney Reject - My Life of Music, Football, and Blood' by Jeff Turner (better known to fans as Stinky). This won't be a proper review as that would be redundant after Tim's comprehensive appraisal, but I have to say I did find it a rollicking good read. Could hardly put it down as they say. One thing that I thought was particularly funny was that through all the stories of getting thrown out of studios for stealing, getting in fights, brushes with the law, etc, it's always someone else's fault! Stinky Turner must be the unluckiest bloke in the world; he's always in the wrong place at the wrong time with the wrong guy. Also, while it was entertaining to hear about some of the more spectacular rucks the Rejects and their entourage got involved in, a lot of the violence made me pretty uncomfortable. Basically, if you so much as looked at Stinky or his brother, guitarist Mick Geggus, the wrong way, you were on to a kicking. Turner puts this down to some mythical East End 'code', but I've known people all my life who were on a similar hair trigger. The kind of people it's hard to be around because you know they could snap any minute and you'll have to deal with the repercussions of their actions. It's a quandary – to enjoy the Cockney Rejects' music, do you have to accept the glorification of a violent, football hooligan lifestyle?
***
Recently, the West Coast was graced by a tour by those redheaded (sorry, bald-headed) stepchildren of the Medway sound, the Armitage Shanks. I managed to catch them in the salubrious, genteel surroundings of John Patrick's, a cinderblock haven of cheap beer sandwiched between car dealerships on the Oakland side of Alameda Island that was previously the location of Maggotfest 2004, when the rumblings of the music shook live maggots (the remnants of years of BBQ leftovers tossed onto the roof) down from the ceiling and into unsuspecting revelers' hair and pints. Luckily there were no maggots this time, only a rousing evening's entertainment, whereby two actual Shanks (ably backed by San Jose's The Runs) plodded through an hours worth of original material and classic covers, including songs by The 101ers, Television Personalities, The Mekons, and more. In fact, I think the Cockney Rejects were one of the few bands left out. After the show I picked up the band's cracking new four-song 7" on Cock Energy, which includes a tasty parody of my new best mate's band, The Fall. Get it at www.cockenergy.com.
***
(A Google search attributes the title phrase to the folksy Oklahoman cowboy wisdom of Will Rogers.)

Technorati Tags: gentrification, cockney rejects, armitage shanks

Maximumrocknroll #282 November 2006

2007-02-19T18:33:00.000-08:00

Where are the ideas?
I was indulging in my latest hobby, browsing the YouTube website, when I came across a trailer for Made In Sheffield - The Birth Of Electronic Pop. This film deals with the influential music scene that blossomed in the northern English steel town immediately following the explosion of punk rock. For the most part, the punks of Sheffield took the influences of punk and applied them in unorthodox ways, forming synth-pop bands like The Human League and Heaven 17 or avant-garde groups like Cabaret Voltaire and DAF. It's a side of post-punk that I'd never paid too much attention to – I hated those new wave bands when they appeared on Top Of The Pops. If you'd told me they had come out of the punk scene I'd never have believed it. Later on I was vaguely aware that those bands had put out their earliest records on punk labels etc but it was only when I read Simon Reynolds' book Rip It Up And Start Again - Postpunk 1978-1984 that I became fully aware of those bands and their members' connection to punk. Of course, like a lot of punks, post-punks, and new-wavers, they saw the opening of the floodgates of independently released music as simply a new way to get on the first rung of the ladder of success. The Sheffield contingent also believed, with their synths, drum machines, and lack of guitars, that they were destroying rock'n'roll. For those who actually liked rock'n'roll, this didn't go over very well.
At any rate, the trailer excited me enough to send off for the documentary. It came out last year and was produced and directed by Eve Wood, a Dutch immigrant to Sheffield. She uses archive footage along with current interviews with scene participants and band members as well as journalists and notably, with veteran BBC broadcaster John Peel (RIP), who gave most of the bands their first exposure.
As in provincial towns the length and breadth of the UK, Sheffield saw its share of bands starting up after the infamous Sex Pistols vs. Bill Grundy incident on television. It seems that because of some unexplained experimental, artsy strain that was running through the outsider kids of the town, though, they expressed themselves in different ways, rather than just aping what the Pistols, Damned, Clash etc were doing. One could argue that the musical fruits of this labor might leave something to be desired when compared with, say, what was happening in Manchester or Leeds at the same time, but questions of musical taste aside, watching this film I was struck by the way the bands all seemed to be striving to do something new. They were competing with each other to be the first to come up with a certain sound, to play something that no one had ever heard before. Now, I should add the caveat that I don't necessarily enjoy all the sounds they did come up with, but I can't help being impressed by the commitment to innovation and creativity.
It makes me wonder what happened to that creativity within the punk scene. I'm not saying that everyone should be trying to come up with sounds that nobody's ever heard. I like songs, and rhythm, and hooks, and structure. I've listened to noise music and frankly I can do without it. But it seems like these days, people are happy to just pick an already-popular or overdone style, ape it, and sit back and watch the records fly off the shelves. I'm not talking about mainstream pop music here. I mean in just about every genre of punk, from pop punk to power violence, the focus seems to be on how authentically a band can recreate a style from yesteryear, rather than add something new to that style. Again, I'm not saying that people should give up on punk or hardcore or whatever and devote themselves to inventing some kind of space music from the future. I'd just like to see bands express themselves through their music a little more, lend their own voices and creativity to the massive collective output of the punk scene month after month, rather than trying to make their records look and sound as if they came out in 1982.
I can't tell you how many times I've had a conversation with someone who was getting a new band going. "What kind of stuff are you playing?" - "Just generic early 80s thrash." Fair enough, but why? Why would you sell yourself short? It's the generic part that particularly bothers me. I mean, you can only play the music you want to play - if it's early 80s thrash that makes the hairs on the back of your neck stand up, then go for it. But don't be generic about it. It seems like a lot of people are starting bands not out of a compulsion to create something, but because it's so easy to put together a set, shit out a poorly recorded 7" with a xerox sleeve, and go on tour all summer with your friends. It might be fun, but it contributes to the glut of crappy punk records coming out every month, and makes for some packed and boring bills at gigs.
***
One band that I think is an example of someone doing it right is Fucked Up. They take the basic ingredients that go into making a good hardcore or punk song, and somehow manage to come up with something that sounds totally classic yet amazingly current at the same time. You know how when people try and 'challenge the boundaries of punk rock' they end up watering it down, or becoming too (nu-)metal? Fucked Up have managed to expand upon punk and hardcore without losing any of the bite, anger, or power. Listening to them, you get the feeling that they have really thought about their songs, actually sat down together and talked about ideas. Why is that refreshing? Why isn't that the norm?
In case you haven't figured it out yet I can't say enough good things about this band. I just wish I could make it to Toronto for their three-day record release extravaganza. If anyone who goes wants to pick up the limited records for me, it would certainly be appreciated!
***
For more information on the Made In Sheffield DVD you can go to sheffieldvision.com.

Technorati Tags: fucked up, postpunk, sheffield

Mark E. Smith interview, MRR #279

2006-10-23T00:24:00.000-07:00

I was going to post the Mark E. Smith interview I did earlier this year, but someone has gone and scanned it, so you might as well go over there and look at it. The interview was an enjoyable experience and I found Mark to be a very pleasant chap.

Maximumrocknroll #281 October 2006

2006-10-14T17:38:00.000-07:00

Another Pleasant Valley Sunday
We'd just strolled back from the new farmers market with some organic veggies and handmade avocado soap. Unusually warm for August. Everyone was out enjoying the nice weather on the leafy avenues of semi-suburban Oakland. We were shooting the shit with some of our neighbors when one (a mother of three unruly but loveable boys) mentioned how bored she was with summer. The other neighbor essentially shot her down, although I doubt she intended to be quite so forceful. She pointed out that we (meaning us affluent Westerners, I suppose) had nothing to complain about compared to all those suffering in the world. We have it so easy compared to, for example, the mothers losing their children to Israeli bombs in Lebanon. To say it was overkill as a response to an offhand remark from a tired mum wishing her kids were back at school is an understatement.
The first neighbor isn't totally insensitive to the problems of the world. Nor is her biggest problem the fact that her kids are home all day during the summer, not by a long shot. She was just making conversation. That's a luxury many of us enjoy, but that none of us can really afford. We can turn off the TV, put down (or never pick up) the newspaper. But like the mother (a different one) that I heard about recently, who has recently decided to hold her son's Bar Mitzvah in Israel, our ignorance has the potential to make us look very silly indeed. This is one reason I try to be aware of what's going on in the world, though it often makes for depressing reading.
***
Later that same day we crossed the Bay to drop off some birthday presents for a young friend who's turning nine. She's into football (or Sawkir as these Sherman Tanks call it) so we got her a book on the subject penned (or ghost-penned) by football's Mr. Nice Guy, Gary Lineker. It was a British book but had obviously mucked about with for the US edition - in other words, they'd put a girl on the cover. The rest of the book was devoid of any reference to the idea that girls might want to play the game. And it's been twenty-five years since the release of Gregory's Girl! Did Bill Forsyth teach the world nothing? Luckily, my young acquaintance is growing up in America, where she can have upstanding female football role models like Mia Hamm. If she was born on the other side of the pond, her only avenue into the world of football would be to hang around shit upscale nightclubs with her gear hanging out in the hope of achieving the ultimate in status positions in tabloid Britain, that of Footballer's Wife. Unfortunately, this means she'll probably never have her own line of $400 designer jeans like Victoria Beckham's got.
***
A mate of mine told me he and an accomplice used to drive around LA late at night in a beat-up '75 Mustang deliberately crashing into parked cars. They would only pick new, expensive cars and obviously didn't hang around to witness the outcome of their actions. Apparently there's a right way and wrong way to trash parked cars: you don't want to hit the bumper straight on because you run the risk of getting tangled up on it. The best way is to drive perpendicular to the target, or to arc into the car in a sort of sideswipe.
Now whenever his car breaks down he remembers stupid shit he did when he was young and wonders if he's being punished. A sort of Carma if you'll allow that terrible joke. I don't really believe in superstitious shit like that but I know a lot of people do. I can't help thinking that if karma existed a lot more people would get their just desserts. There are too many cunts getting away with too much evil shit for karma to be real. Maybe they will pay for it in the next life or whatever but I'd much rather see them suffer for it now. Besides, I would hope that if there is some kind of cosmic force or being controlling everything they've got bigger fish to fry than punishing some forty-year-old dude for some juvenile destructive shit he pulled when he was a teenager. I have to hope that because otherwise I'm in big trouble myself.
***
I turned 36 last month. Anyone who knows me will tell you I'm a young 36, but I'm no spring chicken by any stretch and I'm not getting any younger. It wouldn't bother me in the slightest except I'm starting to notice a disturbing trend in people that stick around here for any length of time - they get health problems. Right now at least two longtime MRR contributors are suffering from debilitating illnesses. It seems that if you're a punk and you don't live fast and die young, you're going to end up getting really sick. So I'm starting to look for an exit strategy. I don't want to join the corporate rat race because those over-fed fucks just get heart attacks and I'm Scottish already so I don't need to increase my chances of that. I'm looking for a new lifestyle that I can get into where I'm not going to get sick. A secondary benefit to jumping ship will hopefully mean that whatever new scene I adopt, the only other men my age won't be the sort of people who post photos of their record collections online and are unable to hold a conversation with the opposite sex.

Technorati Tags: soccer, karma, ageing punks

Maximumrocknroll #280 September 2006

2006-10-14T17:36:00.000-07:00

The Ziekenhuis was a huge abandoned hospital building on a canal. Someone had been watching it for quite a while and it had been determined that it was ripe for squatting. A building that size would require the mobilization of a lot of bodies to occupy it. A fair amount of reconnaissance was done and plans were hatched.
You'd be forgiven for thinking that squatting is something best done under the cover of darkness. On the contrary, in Holland at least, it's usually done on a Sunday morning.
The morning of the occupation there must have been a hundred people trooping alongside the canals and over the humped bridges. I took my favorite job, driving the bakfiets (a sort of combination bicycle and wheelbarrow) stacked with the necessary props to make a squat legal in its early stages - a mattress, a chair, and a table.
Once we arrived at the Ziekenhuis the locks were quickly changed and everyone poured into the building and started exploring. The working group who had discovered and researched the empty hospital and planned the operation started scouting out which rooms they wanted to live in, and which rooms would be good for some of the other communal uses planned. Within the hour the police had come around and confirmed that we'd done everything according to the law, and we set about turning the shell of a building into a home.
For the initial days of a squat, there's usually some extra people staying over, to help keep watch, defend the place in case of a sneak attack by either the cops or henchmen of the building's owner, and to help get the place up and running - building walls, getting the water running, turning on the electricity, etc. I don't remember the Ziekenhuis needing much work, although we had to barricade off a few rooms that were badly contaminated by asbestos, and we couldn't get the heating to work at all so it was freezing. It wasn't long before we had opened a café/bar, serving food during the day and hosting parties all night. We had an open house where we invited the neighbors in to look around the behemoth of a building that had been sitting empty for such a long time. People told us how they were born in that hospital, while other people remembered having children or saying goodbye to loved ones for the last time there.
There was so much free space. Plans were being made for a radical bookshop/lending library, daycare center, gig venue, and more. It seemed like there was room for anything you could imagine. The excitement created by the potential of the place was infectious, and for a while the Amsterdam squat scene, which had been experiencing a long spell of evictions and setbacks, seemed energized.
Of course, you can guess where this is going. It couldn't last. I don't remember the specifics of the arguments and court battles, but after a few months the courts ruled against the squatters, and there was an eviction.
I had gone traveling and missed the actual eviction, but I'd heard about it. When I got back I once again crashed with friends and went back to work at my construction job (renovating old run-down apartments into luxury flats - the irony wasn't lost on me. Although I did occasionally manage to appropriate 'leftover' building materials to use in various squat projects). A new guy had started in my absence, the son of a friend of the boss, hired as a favor. I think his dad must have made him take the job in order to build character or something but he certainly didn't seem to be familiar with the concept of labor. In a misguided attempt to gain some street cred or something he told me he lived in a 'squatter-house' (no-one at work knew that I was a squatter - I told them I sublet an apartment from a friend) and out of curiosity I encouraged him to reveal more about it. As he went on to describe his amazing living situation it dawned on me that he and some of his friends were living in the Ziekenhuis! They were anti-squatters, tenants (usually students or long-term tourists) placed in vacant buildings at artificially low rents in order to keep squatters out (Properties had to be vacant for at least two years before they became squat-able). I was livid, and discussed the possibility of taking action against the anti-squatters with some of our group, just out of frustration and some desire for revenge. More experienced squatters who had seen the same thing happen many times before talked me out of it. Indeed, I went on to experience the same thing again too.
All of this happened about thirteen years ago, and I'm recounting it from memory, so some of the details might be a bit hazy. I bring it up now because it's come to my attention lately that squatting in Holland is under attack. I don't know much about it because it's hard to find the information I need in English, but it seems like there's an attempt by Parliament to make squatting illegal as part of a general 'liberalization' of the housing laws in favor of landlords and developers. To many people, especially in the USA, the squat scene probably means little more than a convenient way for American bands to tour Europe, but that's actually (to me at least) squatting's least important (and probably most dubious) achievement. Apart from the most basic aspect, i.e., providing housing for those who otherwise could not afford it, the contributions to Dutch culture – art, politics, music, literature, etc – that were born out of squat culture are innumerable. Sure, probably quite a few of my fellow squatters were simply taking advantage of the free housing to live a 'punk' lifestyle that also included being on the dole and staying up all night drinking, but most people I knew were actively engaged in creating a life for themselves outside of the system. Squatting performed the valuable function of pointing out to society at large that all this property was being kept intentionally empty for purposes of speculation, while there were people with nowhere to live. It took those empty spaces and gave them a purpose: homes, community centers, theaters, recording studios, dance studios, cafes, you name it.
Of course, squatting is not for everyone. It's actually very hard work. In the year and a half that I lived in Amsterdam, I spent more time looking for a place to live than I actually spent living in any one place, although I did have a couple of cushy house-sitting situations that took the edge off. Eventually I moved to sunny California and joined the bourgeois world of the renter, with all the luxuries that entailed. No heat though, not in San Francisco. I did, however, balk at the extortionate (though quaint these days) $300 a month my wife-to-be and I paid between us for our shared room. Less thrilling was the experience of having a junkie for a roommate and having her steal our rent money, but that's a story for another day.
***
There's a campaign to fight the criminalization of squatting in The Netherlands and you can find more information at www.squat.net, or at www.krakengaatdoor.nl (in Dutch, go to babelfish.altavista.com to translate).

Technorati tags: squatting, amsterdam

Maximumrocknroll #279 August 2006

2006-09-04T17:08:00.000-07:00

"The advancement of Christ's Kingdom among Boys and the promotion of habits of Reverence, Discipline, Self-Respect, Obedience, and all that tends towards a true Christian Manliness."

When I was a young lad I really wanted to join the Boy Scouts. It ran in the family - my Papa had been a Scout leader (Akela or something) and my uncle had been a Scout. My mum and aunt were Girl Guides, and their whole family used to go to camps and jamborees together. When it was my turn to carry on the tradition, religious sectarianism got in the way. In Newmains, the Scouts met at the Chapel hall. Protestant boys instead joined The Boys Brigade, a less-popular group that actually predated Baden-Powell's Scouts by about twenty years.
While the Scouts seemed to do all kinds of interesting and fun activities in pursuit of their merit badges, the Boys Brigade seemed to think that the best way to pursue The Object (that paragraph in quotes at the start of this column) was to force us to march. Week in, week out, we marched. We marked time. We saluted. I wanted to be out in the countryside learning stuff. Instead I marched round and round the same hall where I did PE at school, dressed in a uniform befitting the Hitler Youth, with some weird Christian tie-in that I wasn't into either.
The whole thing seemed designed to get us started down a path that would end with us joining the regular military. In fact, the BB was started by a soldier-turned-Sunday-school teacher who thought it would be a good way to instill order and discipline in his unruly students.
It wasn't all marching. There were also the occasional homoerotic episodes that seem to occur whenever you put a group of grown men who are overly fond of 'discipline' in charge of a bunch of young boys bursting forth with the bounty of impending manhood. Like the time we all had to dress up in cheerleader outfits (complete with wigs, makeup, and pom-poms) and mime along to Toni Basil's hit "Hey Mickey". I wish this was a joke.
We did make it out into the fresh air and the countryside once a year. It had been years since the BB uniform had included imitation muskets, but once off at camp, the boyish fascination with weaponry of all sorts was allowed free reign. For a wee fanny I was actually a pretty good shot with a bow and arrow or an air rifle, but the one time I had a living thing in my sights (a rabbit) I deliberately aimed high and missed, only to be met with scorn and ridicule.
If I could go back and talk to the 12-year-old me, I'd ask me why a boy who was bullied incessantly at school would willingly join and then choose to continue to attend an organization where he would be routinely bullied outside of school as well. I doubt my 12-year-old alter ego would have much of an answer, but I suppose I must have thought it would build character or something. Actually, I must have got something out of it, but whatever it was, it escapes me now.
Eventually, I got a paper round, and it was the type where you had to go round on Friday nights and collect the money. This meant extra work, but it also meant you got tips. If you worked for a newsagents where people dropped in and paid their bill at the shop, you never saw any extra money. But faced with a fresh-faced, hardworking young lad on his own doorstep, what upstanding citizen isn't going to say "keep the change", or even dip into his pocket for an extra ten bob? (The actual answer is, quite a few people, especially from the posh houses, and they're the bastards who get the big heavy papers as well!)
At any rate, having the paper round meant that I could no longer attend the Boys Brigade on Friday nights. Now I had extra money in my pocket, and I was free from the shackles and the uniform of the junior fascist Christian bullyboy league! Result!

Technorati tags: boys brigade

Maximumrocknroll #278 July 2006

2006-09-04T17:07:00.000-07:00

A parade of expensive-looking single-speed track racing bicycles zipped past me down Market Street in San Francisco, like a stampede of gazelles startled by a hungry Cheetah. A cavalcade of toned calves with clever tattoos formed from likenesses of bike chains, sprockets, and punk logos glistened with sweat. Italian caps perched just so, the peaks upturned in a parody of Suicidal bandana chic. Messenger bags bulged with dumpstered muffins and Slingshot calendars. Suddenly the lead rider appeared to see something on the ground below – some sort of clue, perhaps? Too late. As he craned to read the word on the street he failed to spot the tram track just ahead – the sworn enemy of San Francisco bike rider and skateboarder alike. Too late to see what was coming – even if he had, this bike has no brakes – his front wheel jammed into the slot in the street and buckled. His near-weightless aluminum frame crumpled like a Pabst Blue Ribbon can. One by one he took the others with him. By the time the emergency services made the scene it was too late. It was a gory sight and many still weep small, wet tears at the thought of the hundred-bike-punk pile up of '06. That night This Bike Is A Pipe Bomb played a free memorial show. Thousands of bearded, underfed countrypolitan punks from college towns across the USA made the pilgrimage to pay their respects. A pyre of discarded eighties Alva skate decks with Life's Halt stickers burned long into the summer evening.
***
Did you know there's a holiday in the US called National Boss Day? I just found out about it myself. I'm reading all about it on Hallmark's website. Curiously, I've never seen anyone give his or her supervisor, manager, or CEO a card on Boss's day. I wonder why it doesn't seem to be catching on?
People like to talk about the evils of faceless corporations and the way they're taking over America and making life impossible for the small local businesses. I am not going to argue that Wal-Mart (for example) is not utterly evil, but I have to say that one of my better working experiences has been within a large-ish corporation. I was paid better than I ever have been before or since, I received full health benefits and paid time off, and I was treated like a responsible adult – no time clocks to punch – as long as my job was done well and within a reasonable timeframe, no one really cared what time I came or went. Of course, this freedom was ripe for abuse but apparently if you treat people like adults they are apt to behave in kind. I'm not saying I didn’t leave early here and there but over the course of the four and a half years I had that job I think I probably ended up putting in slightly more time than was expected, not less. Of course it wasn't perfect (I quit didn't I?) but I'm only mentioning it to compare it with some of my other job-related experiences, almost all of which have been working for small businesses, with bosses that consider themselves to be 'cool' or right-on or 'one of us'. This type of boss likes to stress how little money they're making and how badly the business is doing as a smokescreen for paying you shit money and giving you the bare minimum of benefits and time off (if any at all).
I used to try to spend as much time unemployed as possible, simply because I feel I have better things to do with my time than selling my labor for buttons so that someone else can get rich. Don't mistake that statement as a sign of laziness or a lack of a work ethic – when I do have a job I take it seriously and work hard. I find it pointless to half-ass things especially when it's my coworkers who will have to take up the slack. Every job I've had in at least the past ten years has told me I'd be welcome back when I quit. Anyway, once I left school and fell out of further education after two years with nothing to show for it, I settled in to life on the dole. Unfortunately they were starting to crack down on that kind of behavior and soon I was dispatched to various youth training schemes under the threat of my dole being cut off if I failed to attend. Luckily one evening a friend of mine who worked at the local recording & rehearsal studio/music venue/vegetarian café told me they were going to take on a Youth Employment trainee, and would I be interested? I immediately dropped out of the 'start your own business' trainee scheme I'd been on (at the end of the scheme you got a thousand pound loan to start your own business. I think the guys from Sedition did this to put out their first 7", "Dealing With Clichés - Or Dealing With Death?" and never paid back the loan, claiming the business failed. Brilliant!) and started working at the studio. The deal was they were getting paid by the government to teach me a skill (recording) and I was getting an extra tenner a week in my dole check. The important thing to note is that the right-on groovy business wasn't paying a penny out of its own pocket for me to be there.
Week in and week out I showed up, booked bands in and out of rehearsal and recording sessions, hoovered practice rooms, and soldered guitar leads. Despite regularly asking to sit in on recording sessions just to watch and try to learn something, I didn't see the inside of the recording studio until my band recorded there. I guess I made too many disapproving noises about soldering leads all day, because eventually my friend who 'hired' me (not any of the three vegan, 'anarchist-sympathizing' owners) took me to one side and told me they were letting me go. The reason? Apparently I wasn't keen enough.
Ironically, the studio/bar was destroyed by water damage when one of the units upstairs caught fire. Despite how it might come across in this column, I was heartbroken at the loss of what was still the epicenter of my life in Glasgow even though I no longer worked there.
I only use that as one example of how small-business bosses aren't necessarily better than the corporate variety. Given the exploitative nature of almost any boss/employee relationship, I have to think that if you actually want to be a boss, you must be kind of a dick. Why would you want to be a boss, and why do we need bosses? Or do we just think we do? How did we get to this point, where we volunteer to be told what to do? OK, there's a certain amount of coercion and force involved - for most of us, individually, it's a case of get a job or starve, or get a job or live on the street. But how did we ever let society get set up this way, for the work of the many to benefit the few?
Of course, it's been proven that we don't really need bosses. There must be thousands of worker-owned cooperatives and collective businesses currently running worldwide, some of them for many years, and their numbers are growing. Here in the Bay Area one can buy everything from pizza to organic vegetables to vibrators from companies that operate without bosses. Co-op workers have no bosses but at the same time they are all bosses, and as such they have a lot of extra responsibilities. As it turns out, they are up to the job. Are you?
***
OK, so I've never actually worked in a co-op, and the experience I've had with collectives hasn't been stellar. I know it takes a lot of work and commitment to do it and I'm not sure I can get along with other people enough to make it work for me. But it's a nice idea, no? I'm sure the many MRR shitworkers who work at some of the local co-ops could chime in with more informed opinions. For more information on worker-owned cooperatives you could start at the US Federation Of Worker Co-Operatives, www.usworker.coop.
As for the first paragraph of this column, who knows? Blame it on the caffeine.

Technorati tags: fixies, fixed gear, bike punks, worker's co-ops

Maximumrocknroll #277 June 2006

2006-09-04T17:05:00.000-07:00

They say travel broadens the mind. But tourism is a multi-million dollar industry and there are still a lot of pretty narrow minds out there. Still, one of my fellow columnists has traveled the world (for free!?), and can also boast one of the broadest minds around, so maybe they do go hand in hand. I haven't done much in the way of exotic traveling myself (unless you count traversing continental Europe or a good swathe of the US in the back of a van) but there are certainly parts of the world I'd like to see before I die. To give you one particularly ludicrous example, I've lived in California for ten years and have never visited Mexico. I never got that urge to grab a backpack and a Lonely Planet guidebook and 'do' Central America, or Thailand, or India, or wherever else you might find intrepid twenty-something blue-eyed westerners gripped with an unquenchable desire to visit the world's Internet cafes. I guess it's the "cheap holiday in other people's misery" syndrome, or just white male guilt, but there's something unsettling about the idea of plopping oneself in the middle of some third world country to 'absorb the culture' and ogle the natives. It's not that I necessarily think there's anything wrong with traveling per se, I just have a hard time with the imbalance of it all. The western tourist (or traveler if you prefer) has the agency and privilege to visit just about any country he or she pleases, but often, the people of the visited country barely have the means to make it out of their immediate town, never mind their country. Again, I'm not trying to condemn anyone for visiting other countries or whatever, but maybe someone who has done some traveling can write and tell me if they thought about this stuff before or during their trip, and how they dealt with it?
I read an interview in the new issue of Herbivore Magazine with writer Inga Muscio, who says she only goes places she's been invited. That struck a chord with me – perhaps that was why I felt so much discomfort at the idea of being the privileged western traveler. If you have been invited somewhere, then presumably you have made some sort of personal connection with someone living in that country. This goes a long way towards solving the dilemma. Of course, it's rare for the average person to come home from work one day to find a note on the doormat from a random stranger in Costa Rica inviting him down for a two-week stay, all expenses paid. There's still a certain amount of privilege implied in being a writer or artist who is invited to foreign countries to share his or her work – or worse, to experience exotic places on our behalf, and report back in their art on the cultures they 'discover'.
While it might be unrealistic to expect everyone to nurture personal relationships with locals from any country they might be planning to visit, it might be a way (for the hopelessly guilt-ridden, like myself) to be able to travel and actually feel okay about it. (Note: whatever it seems like, this column is NOT a thinly veiled solicitation for invitations to your country. Honest.)
Actually, with the growing popularity of communication and networking tools like MySpace and Skype, there's a lot of potential for traditional geographic boundaries to become less important. It certainly makes it easier and cheaper for people to foster international friendships – assuming one has access to a computer with an internet connection (that problem of privilege again.)
Actually, perhaps the most pragmatic and honest way to approach travel is to acknowledge the economic realities of the situation – "I can go to this country because I can afford it, and the economy of this country depends on tourist dollars." Accept the fact that the locals probably see you purely as a vehicle for bringing your western wealth to their impoverished area. Stay in a luxury resort, get plastered on cheap margaritas, tip generously, and have a blast. A few shots of Sammy Hagar's Cabo Wabo tequila probably goes a long way to alleviating that liberal guilt, huh..?

****

If all is going according to plan this issue of the magazine extends last month's focus on punk business. With your permission, I'd like to address the topic a little more.
We punks are quick to get up in arms when one of 'our' bands signs to a major label or sells their music to be used on a TV show or in a commercial. It's one of the unwritten principles of punk rock that it cheapens your art when you use it to sell things. In recent times though, the mainstream media and commercial culture have sought to incorporate even the 'edgiest' and most rebellious strains of art and music into their efforts to market consumerism and materialism. Maybe instead of being pissed off that they're using the Stooges to sell luxury cars, we should ask ourselves why they're using the Stooges to sell luxury cars. The answer is, because it works. At this point, I doubt there's a style of music out there that couldn't be used to sell something, and if there is, it's certainly not punk rock as we know it. Almost any song by your favorite bands could be played over a commercial for something – maybe not luxury cars, but some disposable consumer product or other – and used to market that product so some demographic. These days, it's become almost the point of making music for some people.
I guess what I'm saying is that at any given time, your favorite band could be offered an unthinkable sum of money for one of their songs to be used in a commercial. If they're a super-political, DIY band with no interest in making money from their art, or at least no interest in being exploited for corporate interests, they'll probably say no. If they're a somewhat political band who could use the money, they might say yes. They may justify it to themselves and their fans by saying they deserve the money because they need health insurance (and why not?) or that they are getting their message out to a wider audience via that 30 second spot between Desperate Housewives and Law And Order SVU or whatever (I don't even know if they're on the same network, never mind the same night…). If they're a pop-punk or skate thrash or metalcore or whatever band with no politics in the music to speak of, they might just take the money and be glad of it, fuck anyone who complains. These are just three scenarios, but the fact is this situation probably plays out differently for each and every band that finds itself offered such an opportunity. Whichever reason your favorite band gives for taking the money and doing the commercial, you will probably feel slightly betrayed.
As members of the punk scene, we derive much of our collective identity from what we perceive as shared values. When we discover that someone we respected didn’t share all those values after all, we feel abandoned. However, we all have different ideas of what those shared values are – generally speaking, the one thing that seems to unite us is this: "we are into bands that don't sell out." Obviously, what 'selling out' means is open to interpretation but I think the basic point is true. And when we tie ourselves, our community, our values, our sense of who we are to the whims of individuals in rock and roll bands we sell ourselves short. Maybe we need to readjust our values and beliefs, and devote more attention to the facets of our culture that are less easily defined.

Maximumrocknroll #276 May 2006

2006-09-04T17:03:00.000-07:00

This column originally appeared in an issue of Maximumrockroll tackling the 'business' side of punk rock.

The funny thing about re-reading the original major-label theme issue from twelve years ago is marveling about some of the bands that were getting snapped up in the bidding frenzy but either went nowhere, broke up, got dropped, or came crawling back to their previous indie homes. OK, Green Day are now one of the biggest rock bands on the planet, and we all know what happened to Nirvana. But it's a fucking joke now that anyone cared about Seaweed, Jawbox, or Samian, for example. I'm not making a judgment call on the quality of those bands, but with hindsight, it's clear that their signing to majors wasn't really worth making a fuss about.
The majors don't need to bother snapping up the hot indie bands any more anyway. They've got a conveyor belt of starry-eyed youngsters with no greater ambition than to get on the Warped Tour, sign to a major, make a video, and get on MTV Cribs. They got their claws into Against Me! (anyone running a pool on how long 'til they break up?) but even if they hadn't, they'd have got someone who sounds just like them before too long.
All of that stuff happens outside the punk scene these days, pretty much, but the more insidious threat is the way so-called punk labels and bands are adopting the tactics of the majors. On the surface, their efforts are transparent and hilarious, but it's the sense of competition where there used to be a spirit of cooperation that is sapping punk of a lot of its potential, it's power, and a great deal of what makes it fun.
The world at large would think it bizarre to say the least that we even think the issue of major labels is worth discussing. It's generally accepted that bands only put out records on indie labels (or by themselves) as a means to get noticed by majors. It's seen as a sign of astute business acumen when an independent label sells out to (or strikes some kind of deal with) a major label. The owners of independent labels who do this are held up as true American success stories.
The labels that churn out the bulk of the punk rock product on the CD racks at your local (or online) record store, including many (if not most) of the labels that advertise in this very magazine, have adopted sleazy major-label tactics and even collude (sometimes grudgingly but rarely unwittingly) with major labels under the banner of 'getting the message out to a wider audience' (At this point only a cynic would point out that bands have been using that argument since The Clash and the revolution still isn't imminent). Actually, the true grounds for playing the game the way the majors do seems less about spreading some spurious message and more about simply surviving. The music press is constantly (if prematurely) heralding the death of the music industry and it is true that record sales are in decline (although sales of music downloads threaten to make up the difference). The combined sales of all independent labels (including those with some sort of major-label distribution or P&D) probably amounts to less than 20% of an already shrinking pie. So there's a lot of competition for a pretty small prize. At some level, these labels might think that anything they do is justified to help them compete with the majors on a more level playing field, but they're kidding themselves. They are only competing with each other, and every step they take that gives the majors a taste of their action just makes the imbalance even more pronounced.
A couple of specific tactics that are (on the surface) pathetic and amusing but that are also pretty depressing are the prevalence of street teams and publicists. Independent and major labels willingly sucker their bands' fans into doing free promotional work for them, in the guise of making them feel like extra special insiders and probably in exchange for a free CD or concert ticket. Then there's the whole magazine publicist thing. There's very little chance that a band on a true independent will make it into the pages of Rolling Stone magazine. However, tons of glossy, 'alternative' magazines have sprung up to fill the void that RS has left by only covering acts in the Billboard Top 40. You only have to go to your local Borders or Barnes & Noble to check them out. You'll notice, though, that by some strange coincidence, they're all covering the exact same bands, and all those bands happen to have a new album just about to come out. Now do you suppose that twenty different magazine editors got up one morning and thought, I know, I'll put (current indie pants-soakers du jour) on the cover, because they're my favorite band right now!" Not on your life. Most articles you see in those alternative magazines on the newsstand (and almost certainly all the cover stories) are there because the label paid someone to suck up to the editor and/or because the label advertises in the magazine. Actually, these days even those cutting edge indie magazines are more than likely to have major label bands on their covers – you know, the cutting edge major label bands. "Hey, Death Cab on the cover equals guaranteed sales man, and then we can turn even more people on to the truly indie shit in our mag. It's all in the name of getting the message out…" It would be almost tolerable, or at least respectable, if these people were getting anything out of shilling themselves to the machine, but most of these mags, even the glossiest ones with the ridiculous advertising rates, are basically voluntary concerns, just like MRR. The editors and contributors work day jobs and then put their creative energy, spare time, and sweat into producing what is essentially free publicity for the major labels (and the best kind too, the kind with street cred). They do this in the hope that the magazine will grow and they'll be able to command increasingly high ad rates and will get enough juice with major-label publicity departments that they'll be able to conduct backstage interviews with today's hottest stars, and eventually their mag will be the next Spin.
So yeah, NEWSFLASH! The music industry is sleazy and fucked! Punk rock as we know and love it developed over almost 30 years as a true alternative to the ego-driven, fame and publicity hungry, cutthroat, competitive world of the conventional music industry. It's still the case that a lot of the best music is being made on truly DIY independent labels. So let's just keep enjoying it. Let the people who are content to put themselves up for sale go on their merry way, and good luck to them. But when it's obvious that bands or labels are obviously keeping one foot in the punk camp for the credibility while simultaneously chasing mainstream stardom, let's withdraw our support, expose them, and mock their ridiculous presskits.

Maximumrocknroll #275 April 2006

2006-09-04T16:59:00.000-07:00

It's all Valerie McMillan's fault. When I was a nipper I was a bit of a swot, always in the quiz team and stuff like that. I don't remember putting myself forward for this stuff, but I was pretty compliant. If the teacher told me, "you're in the quiz team. Practice is at 4." I just turned up like I was told. Valerie McMillan was a year or two older than me (it was primary school, so I was probably 9 or 10). Mrs. McMillan, her mum, was my teacher, and she was brilliant. Valerie, on the other hand, was snobby and mean. I don't know if she thought she was special because her mum was a teacher, or because they lived in a nice house in the nicest part of the village instead of the grey council schemes that most of us lived on, or what. Anyway, one day at quiz team practice I got a question about flowers or something. The answer was "anemone", and I knew the answer even though I'd never seen an anemone or heard someone pronounce the word. I answered it correctly but pronounced it wrong, like "ani-moan" or something, so I didn't get the point. Valerie Watson jumped in to poach the goal, triumphantly enunciating the word while looking smugly in my direction. Looking back (and don't ask me why I remember this crap) it seems obvious that Valerie must have had something lacking in her life if she felt it necessary to vaunt her superiority over a wee boy two years her junior (age wise – probably more like five if we're talking physical and emotional development. I was a late bloomer) but all I can remember is feeling crushed. The incident was just one more reason to feel inferior. How was I meant to get on in the world competing against these folk that no doubt spent their lives up to their ears in anemones, and probably rhododendrons and camellias as well, when all we had was a balding square of grass and a tiny rhubarb patch?
The phenomenon of class is a strange one. Before I developed any kind of class-consciousness, I was ashamed of the hand-me-downs my brother and I would often wear to school. In certain circles (usually around the other 'clever' kids, most of whom lived in houses in nice areas that their parents actually owned and whose dads had white collar jobs) I was ashamed that my dad worked in a factory or that we rented our house from the council. At the same time, I still managed to feel superior to the kids who came to school dressed worse than me, or not clean, or who got the free lunch. Load of shit, eh? Now I'm just ashamed that I ever felt ashamed. Of course, most of the time none of this stuff mattered, it didn't plague my thoughts or anything, but I can see where this stuff might have made its mark on me and how it affects the way I've lived my life and the choices I've made.
When you're working class you learn to keep your head down. It doesn't do to appear too ambitious. If you are seen to be trying to improve your lot or get ahead, people will talk shit behind your back. "Who the fuck does he think he is?" On the other hand, when someone from a Scottish working-class background becomes world famous (Sean Connery, for example), everyone thinks to themselves, "ah, he's one of us."
Is the above really true, or is it my perception of what happens? Maybe it's just my guilt at wanting to escape my surroundings. I didn't want to get out because I thought I deserved better than everyone else. I believed that everyone deserved better. I just created the opportunity to leave for myself.
To this day I have an aversion to speaking up for myself. I keep my modest achievements to myself to avoid sounding like I'm bragging, because I don't want to sound like I'm getting ideas above my station. I'll sit in a restaurant and eat something that's cold or tastes rubbish rather than speak up and send it back. I'm mystified by the air of self-confidence and entitlement that surrounds people that grew up with money. Actually, at first I didn't always realize that's what it was. I'd meet these people who seemed to believe that they could do anything, that the world was their oyster. I'd be in awe of them, wishing I could be like that, and feeling that there was something lacking in me. Eventually someone pointed out to me that a lot of the time, people carry around that self-belief because they've been told their entire lives that they deserve to have anything they want and that every opportunity is open to them. Whereas I'd never seen evidence that anyone from round our way could amount to anything much.
I feel like things are slightly better now, but when I was young the only representations of working class culture you got in the media were total stereotypes. Never mind Scottish working class culture. At school, there were no authentic Scottish voices represented in the literature we studied, with the exception of having to learn a Robert Burns poem once a year. Even this they turned into a chore. No attempt was made to relate Burns' poetry to modern life, we were just supposed to learn a particular piece word for word and the student who could best recite it would go off to a national competition. I never won that privilege. Ironically, Burns was a bit of a radical and I actually enjoy his work now, but I was completely turned off of it by the ham-fisted way it was taught. It was made patently clear that literature was something created by and for the enjoyment of the middle and upper classes, preferably those in the southern counties of England. Turn on the television and you got a similar message – successful people (lawyers, doctors, politicians, actors) were well-bred graduates of the finest private schools and universities. Blue-collar types (when you saw them at all) spoke with 'regional' accents and were generally cap-doffing supplicants. I spent many of my formative years reading books about the heroic exploits of upper-crust English types, like the Famous Five, Just William, Jennings, Bertie Wooster, and Sherlock Holmes. Luckily I later discovered James Kelman, Alasdair Gray, Iain Banks, and of course Irvine Welsh, among many other amazing Scottish authors, although I do feel that my earliest influence can still be detected in the way I write today.
I don't really know why I'm going on about all this, except that I was recently reminded of the quiz team story so it's been on my mind. I don't mean this as any kind of exertion of working class pride or some such spurious notion. These are just hang-ups I was born into. It's true that on the rare occasion I find an affinity with someone they often turn out to come from a similar background, but I try not to hold onto any prejudice. I feel very strongly that to feel proud of something that you were born into and had nothing to do with (your class, your race, your country) is treacherous territory and has been known to lead down a rather dangerous path.

***

I wholeheartedly recommend checking out any of the authors I mentioned above, but particularly the newer Scottish ones. While you're at it, have a go at Alan Bissett, Laura Hird, Alan Warner, Tom Leonard, Ian Rankin, Janice Galloway, or Duncan McLean. Actually, Laura Hird (author of Born Free, one of the best books I've read in the last ten years) has a pretty impressive website at www.laurahird.com, which, although named for her, also includes a host of material from other writers, as well as a section on her favorite punk bands (phew! Against all the odds, the boy McNaughton manages to slide a punk reference past the bewildered goalie and brings the column back under MRR guidelines as the Ref looks at his watch) including Crass, The Undertones, The Ruts, The Buzzcocks, and SLF. There's hours of reading on this site and I won't pretend I've even started to make a dent in it.

Maximumrocknroll #274 March 2006

2006-09-04T16:56:00.000-07:00

When I was but a young lad I used to lie on my bed listening to Agent Orange and reading BMX Action and Thrasher, dreaming wistfully of California. Ahh, California: the endless smooth concrete of the sidewalks; the bountiful skateparks like the Pipeline and Uplands; the California of Bones Brigade videos and JFA adverts (I know JFA aren't from California but I associated their adverts with the lifestyle I coveted. I actually think I prefer those old Placebo ads to any of the records.) Every day would be spent carving a fullpipe in the desert with your mates, followed by the Black Flag/Minutemen/Hüsker Dü triple bill, and then if you were lucky you might cop a feel off some blonde-haired surfer vixen in the back of her VW van.
Eventually I did move to California in search of a better life and discovered that it wasn't the place of my daydreams. Still, I've definitely had it better than most. The California I imagined from TV and the rest of the media was indeed different from the reality I experienced, but I believe that there are some people who do live in that glamorous reality. There actually do exist people whose lives resemble an episode of 'The O.C.' (if you've never seen that, it's a TV soap opera revolving around the lives of rich, spoiled teenagers in a wealthy beach town in Southern California, and something of a guilty pleasure of mine.)
When people visit the US from Europe or Japan they often marvel at how cheap everything is here. Just as Americans have gotten used to being able to buy gas at artificially cheap prices, just about everything else we buy is subsidized by the low wages made possible by cheap overseas labor and a tacit acceptance by industry of illegal immigration. Oh yes, Republicans and Democrats alike will make noise from time to time about stamping out illegal immigration, but capital needs a steady flow of labor, and there's nothing it loves more than labor that's willing to work with few legal rights, no benefits, and below-market wages, and that won't make waves for fear of being deported.
Which brings us to the Minutemen. Not the seminal San Pedro band that you might generally expect to hear of in my column, but the loosely-organized bands of vigilantes that have sprung up in Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, California, and even on the Canadian border from Washington to North Dakota. Armed and dangerous, they have taken it upon themselves to patrol the borders and round up illegal immigrants, and have garnered publicity for videotaping migrant day laborers and those who hire them and reporting them to the INS and IRS. They've focused a lot of attention lately on the business owners who hire the day laborers, claiming that they are taking advantage of the workers when they ought to be hiring people legally and paying for benefits and healthcare and such like. I don't disagree with this, and I certainly don't think that people who hire illegal immigrants are doing so out of a sense of charity. But the fact that the Minutemen's tactics have served mainly to victimize people who are far below poverty level and are struggling to provide the barest of necessities for themselves and their families is mean spirited to say the least. They have denied charges of racism but such people always do. They want to be seen as decent people doing their civic duty to defend their way of life, but goad them a little and the teeth start to show. The terminology favored by anti-immigration activists is designed to elicit fear of some catastrophe or other. They often talk of a deluge of immigrants, of a flood of people coming over the border. I certainly don't equate the dangerous activity of trying to make your way from Central or South America to a new life in the USA, with the hazards of border guards, vigilantes, coyotes, exploitative bosses, human traffickers, foremen who routinely rape their female workers, with a flood. Anyone who risks these dangers - risks their life – just to provide a better life for their family, has earned, at the very least, better treatment from their new neighbors, if not the bare minimum of human respect.
As an immigrant (albeit a honky whose transition to this country went fairly smoothly) this issue is very close to my heart. I find that borders provide nothing but trouble. I don't like them and think it would be a better world if all borders were opened immediately. I have, however, noticed that not all borders are the same. As a youth I traveled back and forth across the border with England frequently. No one bats an eyelid although one's accent might invite comment, or a ten pound note from a Scottish bank might draw a suspicious glance despite being completely legal tender (Maybe the suspicion derives from the unlikelihood of anyone from Scotland actually having ten pounds.) Similarly, driving around Europe, the borders are policed, but for the most part, it's rarely more than a matter of routine. Workers from anywhere in the European Union can legally take their labor wherever they like within the Union (not that I'm suggesting that Europe doesn't have its own problems with immigration – the recent riots in France demonstrated their lack of egalité.) There's a palpable difference between borders (such as those between wealthy Western European nations) that aren't really policed or contested, and borders (such as the one between the USA and Mexico) that represent more than just the point where one country ends and the other starts. Drive along US 10 from El Paso, TX towards Las Cruces, NM, with the Rio Grande on your left and beyond it, the slum villages of Juarez, and it becomes clear that this border represents a life of wealth and opportunity that many will never see. It's a pretty barren expanse of land, no fences or armed guards that I could see, at least during the day, but the simple knowledge that the imaginary dotted line that can only be viewed on a map is there feels like violence. It feels like goading, like bullying, like a dare.
Like most problems, it's complex, and there are no quick and easy solutions that will satisfy everyone. Too many people have a vested interest in maintaining a façade of strict border control and resistance to immigration while turning a blind eye to the exploitation and modern-day slavery of those who do make it over the border. The American middle-class lifestyle of cheap consumer goods, cheap food and cheap gas depends on this exploitation, so it will probably continue until the masses become bored and disillusioned with the ease and luxury of their consumerist, TV-driven lives and turn instead to the betterment of society as a whole, and particularly the lower classes. So, probably in the next couple of weeks then.

***

I do realize that messrs. Boon, Watt, and Hurley named themselves the Minutemen ironically, after the '60s militant anti-communist group, who in turn named themselves after the elite Revolutionary War militias, but it is still jarring to hear the name I so closely associate with the band that could be our lives linked with something so negative and hateful. I've read that D. Boon wrote the following lyrics (to Corona) on a trip to Mexico. Note the use of the words "our South" to refer to Mexico. Sure, there's a border there. Sure, it's technically another country. But the people over that border are humans just like us, so it is exactly that – "our South," as much as we are their North. North America, South America, these are just words.
The people will survive
In their environment
The dirt, scarcity, and the emptiness
Of our South
The injustice of our greed
The practice we inherit
The dirt, scarcity and the emptiness
Of our South
There on the beach
I could see it in her eyes
I only had a Corona
Five cent deposit

Maximumrocknroll #273 February 2006

2006-09-04T16:52:00.000-07:00

I began 2005 at a party in Glasgow. The party was in a bar/restaurant that's been around in one incarnation or another for many years, and has been a backbone of the music scene the whole time. I went to the party with my wife and a couple of old friends but I also ran into a bunch of people I used to be fairly close with but had lost touch with over the years. The party was crowded and a little bit boring, even though my friends' band played, but it was good to reconnect with some people I shared fun memories with. One acquaintance that happens to sing in an extremely famous band was there and he was asked about his New Years Eve in the morning paper. My wee brother thought it was impressive that even in our advanced years we were still cool enough to be at a party that was mentioned in The Sun the next day. It hadn't really felt that glamorous at the time but I don't suppose the parties that get written about in the papers probably ever do.
I thought of that particular venue because I found myself back there again in October. (You know, the trip where I broke my elbow. By the way, thanks for all the get-well-soon messages that flooded my MRR mailbox after that – NOT! And I thought you cared…) The occasion was John Peel Day, a national day of mourning the loss of the world's greatest broadcaster a year earlier, and a celebration of his legacy. BBC Radio and MTV (UK) dedicated the day to Peel, playing songs and videos associated with him all day. I saw many videos on MTV that day that I didn't know existed, videos that probably have never been aired and probably will never be aired again, except maybe next John Peel Day… CAPTAIN BEEFHEART, CAN, THE FALL, THE WEDDING PRESENT, to name just a few. It was pretty surreal to sit there and see video after video of bands you didn't realize actually even made videos. Some really low-budget stuff, but still miles better than the five videos they still show on MTV these days. It gave you an idea of what music television could actually be like if it wasn't just a twenty-four hour commercial for the most generic, commercial, soul-destroying aspects of mainstream 'culture' imaginable.
Anyway, I digress. Just about every music venue in the country was promoting a special John Peel tribute night. The one I went to featured some non-MRR approved bands, but they're bands I quite like anyway. It was especially thrilling to see MOGWAI play to less than 200 people, since they normally play stadiums and the like now I think. I'd never seen them live and probably never will again. Though I'm not a huge fan, I like their music okay, but they have this one song called Christmas Steps that just crushes. It follows the quiet-loud template of most of their stuff but for some reason it stands out for me. I first heard it on a mix CD that my cousin made for me and I'd say it's now one of my all-time favorite songs by any band. Luckily they played it that night, which is why I now no longer need to ever see them again. That particular Peel Day party was broadcast live on Radio 1, so my wee brother could sit at home and listen, and marvel that his ancient older brother is cool enough to be at a party that's on the radio. Again, it didn't feel that glamorous, especially since I had my arm in a cast and sling.
It was a bit odd to see the mainstream media of the UK embracing all things Peel for a day, especially since most of those outlets seem to spend the other 364 days of the year actively trying to suppress anything that doesn't fit the mainstream model of ambition and success. Even then, most of them missed the point by trying to define Peel in their terms – claiming that his importance stemmed from all the successful bands and artists that he 'discovered', from PINK FLOYD, TYRANNOSAURUS REX, and DAVID BOWIE to THE SEX PISTOLS, NIRVANA, and THE WHITE STRIPES. Journalists tripped over each other to prove how cool and with it they were, and betrayed their age when they let us know just exactly when they'd been turned on to their favorite band by Peel late in the night, almost without fail tuned in on a little transistor radio under the bedclothes. I'd bet none of these wankers (speaking of late-night under-the-bedclothes activities) had listened to John Peel since they'd got out of college, and they probably now think that COLDPLAY is the cutting edge of underground rock. There was no mention of the fact that Peel had told his friend and BBC Radio colleague Andy Kershaw that he felt marginalized and underappreciated at the BBC after they'd moved his show from 10pm to 11pm. The sycophantic backslapping and self-congratulation that marked John Peel Day only served to make it even more apparent that the void left by his death will never be filled.
The last day of my trip home was spent walking around Glasgow with an old friend with whom I am, thankfully, in fairly regular contact with. (Recent conversations with this friend had prompted the column on violence I submitted a couple of months ago). Our walk took in, among other things, an abandoned, derelict Charles Rennie Macintosh building hidden down an alley slap bang in the center of town, and the monument to the soldiers of the Spanish Civil War down by the river that I'd walked and ridden my bike past many times over the years but hadn't realized was there. The subject of violence came up again as we contemplated the monument. We agreed that there could be different kinds of violence, that the violence of an imperialistic crusade on foreign soil wasn't necessarily the same as a violent reaction to oppression, and this set my mind at ease a little on the questions that had been plaguing me.
My friend, a native of Glasgow, had recently moved back there after a few years away, and was trying to adjust to the changing city while at the same time trying to avoid falling into the rut of slipping back into the same patterns and routines that he was getting away from when he left. Looking at the city for a moment through his eyes emphasized the changes that had occurred since I'd been gone. I had to rethink my opinion of the place and the homesickness that is always at the back of my mind, tugging at me to return one day. It's a fact that I subconsciously deny, that the Glasgow I left twelve years ago is actually no longer there. There's still plenty of exciting stuff to discover, like ignored architectural gems down forgotten alleyways, but for how long?

Maximumrocknroll #272 January 2006

2006-09-04T16:49:00.000-07:00

Where we lived there was no way to get back from Glasgow after about eleven at night. Even then the last train would only take you so far, Motherwell probably, then you'd have to get a taxi, probably about a tenner. Out of the question. So Sandy and I decided to just stay out all night after the GBH gig, sleep in the bus station and wait for the first bus home in the morning.
I don't remember much about the gig. Can't even remember who the other bands were. Toxic Ephex maybe? We hadn't been to many punk gigs at the time and they could be quite intimidating for young kids like us – from small towns, and not particularly streetwise – lots of scary-looking big skinheads, and pissed-off looking crusties that would demand your spare change. This was in the venue, not outside on the street. Anyway, the bands played, people pushed each other about a bit, and frankly, it wasn't all that impressive. GBH were loud and fast and all that, but in their punk clothes and 'charged' hair, it all seemed like such a cliché, even then. We drifted out of the venue and out onto the street. Time passed pretty slowly. We just walked around Glasgow's darkened streets, unfamiliar at nighttime, with all the shops closed. We looked in shop windows and planned what our band would sound like, once we'd managed to get some instruments and other people to play with us. We got to the bus station and took turns lying along the bench seats. Neither of us could really sleep. Sketchy people kept checking us out, especially this one total pedo looking guy in a trenchcoat. We eventually legged it out of there.
Down towards the river we found a comfortable alcove to hang out in. The sun was starting to come up and the prostitutes were finishing their shifts as the bin men and street cleaners were starting theirs. One scantily clad but worse-for-wear working girl crossed the street shakily, only to be accosted by a cop. He couldn't see us and probably assumed he was alone on the street with her. It looked like he was asking her some questions, and his face betrayed his utter contempt and disgust for the creature before him. He grabbed her bag and looked through it. He obviously didn't find what he was looking for, but he scattered the contents into the gutter anyway, then turned and walked away. The woman bent down to her knees, gathered up her belongings as if this was just another day, and then tottered away on her high heels. As she passed by, she noticed us, and came over.
"Got any Valium?" she drawled. We didn't. "Know where ah could git some?"
No. Sorry. She went on her way. One night on the street and we looked like the type of people you could score Valium off, or at least, like we'd know where you could get it? Hey, at that time local family doctors were handing it out like sweeties to any housewife that had the odd bad day, so I suppose it wasn't out of the question that we'd nicked some from our mum's medicine cabinets.
We hung out there for a while until we were sure we saw the trenchcoat pedo from the bus station coming down the road, and we took off back up to the station. It was almost time for the bus anyway.
I'll always remember my first and only GBH gig, but not for anything to do with the band. The self-righteousness, the hatred on that policeman's face during his brief interchange with the prostitute, his total disregard for her as a human being, was palpable. Alright, by society's standards, you don't get much lower than a middle-aged drug addict Glaswegian prostitute, but it was clear that this man felt the need to make himself feel better by belittling her. It wasn't my first (or last) experience with the heavy-handedness of certain bad apples in Her Majesty's Constabulary, but it's one that I'll never forget. The message was loud and clear. On one side, all the power. On the other, none whatsoever. That side can do whatever the fuck it wants. This side just has to take it.

Bad Luck Dept: I filed my last column from my brother's house in Scotland. I was home for my Gran's 90th birthday celebration. A couple of days into the trip, I fell off my bike while riding at a skatepark and broke a bone in my elbow.
"You fell off your bike? How old are you?!" I heard countless variations of this question at the hospital, or when people inquired about my cast. Maybe it isn't common for a 35-year-old to break his arm falling off a BMX bike, but is it really such a big deal? The implied meaning in the question is that by 35 you're supposed to have put that sort of thing behind you. Not to mention that many people who asked that question didn't even know I'd been riding a BMX bike in a skatepark – for all they knew, I could have had a bike accident riding a ten-speed to work or whatever. The point is, by the time you're my age, you're supposed to be driving everywhere, and any recreation you take part in should be passive – preferably watching one of the mainstream sports.
There is something of a double standard, though. If I'd got my injury playing 5-a-side football, no one would have batted an eyelid. Similarly, if I'd explained it away by saying I was hammered and fell down the stairs, I'd have been greeted with a chuckle, and a "could happen to anyone."
Maybe I am just clinging to my youth, unable to let go. Some might say the same about my continued attraction to punk rock. Maybe it's true. Aching muscles and ringing ears aside, when I'm carving the bowl at Alameda skatepark or down the front watching This Is My Fist at Gilman, I still sometimes feel like the kid who stayed up all night after a GBH gig in the mid-80s. Is there really anything wrong with that?

Maximumrocknroll #271 December 2005

2006-09-04T16:46:00.000-07:00

I was waiting at the bus stop for a friend of mine when a couple of local boys I recognized but didn't know came up to me. One of them got up close to my face and said, "You beat up ma wee brother." I protested that I didn't even know he had a brother. (I should take this opportunity to point out that I have never in my life beaten up a soul.) "Ye did, ye beat up ma wee brother!" It was pointless to argue. For all I know this guy didn't have a brother. It was a fabricated reason, an excuse to start in on me, why I don't know – wrong place at the wrong time, wrong trousers, wrong haircut, looking stupit. I don't know if convincing themselves that I had somehow wronged them made it easier or more fun or what. Anyway, after a bit of back and forth on the issue of whether I had or had not beat up this guy's wee brother that may or may not exist, he stuck the head on me. I've never been very physical, or much of a fighter. Well me and my brother used to knock lumps out of each other but family's different. Basically I just leaned over and protected my face with my arms as the punches and kicks came. Eventually a neighbor came running out of the supermarket nearby and yelled at them until they ran off laughing. I was more embarrassed than sore. Every time something like this has happened (did you think this was going to be an isolated incident?) I end up kicking myself for not fighting back, because it's almost never as painful as you think it's going to be. I just never had a stomach for violence.
It seems like pacifism would be a natural fit for someone who can't stand violence. As a teenager I got in an argument with someone over them putting 'The Only Good Fascist Is A Dead Fascist' on a flyer. My politics were still developing (still are!) but I was definitely, by that point, a committed anti-fascist. I just couldn't put myself behind the trigger.
It's romantic to think of all the artists and poets and leftists who rushed to fight fascism in the Spanish Civil War, to imagine that we might have fought alongside them. Or to answer the call to fight Hitler in the Great War - A noble cause, but could I have answered?
I experienced the dubious thrill of potential mob violence chasing Nazis through the streets of Glasgow when the BNP would try to march. It never came to much because the Fash were always so pathetically outnumbered that they had to have heavy Police protection. So we just screamed at each other across a human barricade of boys in blue. What would I have done if the cops hadn't been there to protect us all from what might happen? In that type of pressure-cooker situation, who knows?
I don't think I really am a pacifist when it comes down to it. It's hard to reconcile though. I think war is wrong. I will not take up arms against another living creature. But I do think it's sometimes necessary for a group to use violence in one form or another to resist violence that's perpetrated against it. Can you feel that way, but refuse to fight? Is it right to let those with the capability for violence handle the dirty work? How is that different from the hawks in the White House sending working class kids off to Iraq to advance their NeoConservative agenda?

Maximumrocknroll #270 November 2005

2006-09-04T16:17:00.000-07:00

One day in Mrs. Watson's class Raymond Broon showed me the Blondie badge on his stookie. I don't know how he broke his arm but it was probably in the course of administering a violent beating on an unlucky acquaintance. "Punk's the best!" he says. "Ye like punk?" At this point in my life I associated punk with thugs like Broonie and his pals, who spray-painted Sex Pistols graffiti behind the supermarket and hung out at the chippy to make my life a misery when I went to pick up the fish suppers on Friday night. Naturally, this was something I distanced myself from. The Blondie badge posed a quandary though. The alluring image of Debbie Harry on Top Of The Pops haunted my pre-pubescent psyche the way Pan's People (the TV dance troupe of leggy lovelies that accompanied chart hits that didn't have a video) never could. If this was punk, maybe it wasn't so bad after all. "Are you a punk or a mod?" was a common interrogative opening gambit in the playground of Newmains Primary School. The wrong answer could result in a kicking but when everyone wore school uniforms it was hard to guess which one was right.
When a neighbor showed up at the lockups at the end of our block and put the soundtrack of "The Great Rocknroll Swindle" on the tape deck it just sounded like a comedy album. We'd fast-forward past the actual Pistols songs to hear "Friggin' in the Riggin'" and snigger at the swearing. We didn't really know who Ronnie Biggs was but we could sense that there was something bad, and therefore exciting, about his association with the record. By the time punk had made its way to our neck of the woods (post-Grundy and the resulting tabloid sensationalism) it was basically a magnet for violent schemies that believed what their parents read in the paper. As a swotty little smurf that spent more time at the local library than pogoing to the Lambrettas' version of "Poison Ivy" at the community center disco, I didn't really get exposed to it. Round mates' houses we'd listen to their records by The Specials and The Jam but I had neither a record player of my own nor the wherewithal to obtain records. I used to sit in my room on a Sunday afternoon and tape the latest songs off the Top 40 show on Radio 1. (Later I'd do the same with the John Peel programme but I hadn't discovered that quite yet). My absolute favorite at the time was Adam & The Ants (me and millions of others… although I'm not sure how many of them tried to duplicate Adam's make-up with tubs of poster paint).
From the ages of about 9 til 13 my tape collection consisted of everything Adam & The Ants put out after Dirk Wears White Sox (if I'd managed to get my hands on that art-punk masterpiece at my tender age it'd have blown my mind), one or two Madness albums, some Tchaikovsky my mum had left lying around, "Switched On Bach" from the library (classical music played entirely on Moog synths, the first electronica album!), a Johnny Cash tape that had been in my tape deck when my dad bought it off some guy in the pub, and several tapes of Top 40 rubbish off the radio. All this while a musical revolution was happening in bigger cities and towns all over the country. Who am I kidding though, I can't blame where I'm from – it's not like if I'd grown up in Manchester instead I'd have got my twelve-year-old arse straight down the Hacienda to catch The Fall and Joy Division after football practice.
Maybe if I'd been reading the NME and Sounds instead of hammering BASIC games into my ZX81 out of the pages of Your Sinclair I'd have had more of a clue what was going on. As it was, the finest years of UK punk passed me by. It wasn't until a bit later, when my interest in BMX widened my circle of acquaintances to include a skater in the next town over with a subscription to Thrasher and a music collection to match, that I got turned on to American hardcore, or Skate Rock as it was quaintly known in those innocent times. Soon those Top 40 tapes were getting dubbed over and the rest, as they say, is history.
There's a tendency to mythologize the good old days – in their eagerness to help the new kids understand what they missed out on, older people can sometimes over-state the importance of bands and scenes of yesteryear, and sometimes this emphasis on nostalgia encourages younger people to spend too much time looking back and not enough time creating something new. I think it's important to honor the pioneers of this stuff that means so much to us, but don't let it become the noose that hangs us. Let's not just sit around talking about how good things used to be. Maybe it's easy for me to say since I wasn't "there". Maybe it's because I wasn't at the birth of any important scene that I've always tried to appreciate the validity and importance and value of what was going on immediately around me. Maybe that's why I'm still interested in what's happening right now while a lot of friends my age are content to retreat deeper and deeper into their record collections. Who knows?
Speaking of the good old days, I just finished watching the Don Letts documentary, 'Punk: Attitude' that I TiVO'd off the Independent Film Channel. It's the same old boring talking head after talking head, although fewer and fewer of the usual suspects are still alive to tell their side of the story, so they've had to dredge up less photogenic and articulate players (like a slurring Glenn Branca). Don't you get sick of seeing these boring old farts trying to make sure we're constantly reminded of their place in rock history? If only Letts had talked to someone like John Loder or Randy Biscuit Turner. They'd surely have done more than try to emphasize their own importance. Now it's too late.
For the most part, it follows the usual timeline – MC5-Stooges-Television-Ramones-Sex Pistols-Clash. Unlike any other punk doc I've seen though, it does at least acknowledge Nuggets-era stuff like Question Mark and the Mysterians, Count Five, Standells, and The Sonics. It's also the first film that doesn't leave a huge gap for the entire 80s – you know, "The Winterland show would be the Sex Pistols' last. And then, in 1992, a little band from Seattle hit the spotlight…" Post-punk bands like The Pop Group and Magazine get a little attention, and there's some discussion of hardcore, including Minor Threat, Black Flag, and Bad Brains, but the bulk of the discussion of hardcore focuses on Agnostic Front. Agnostic Front! There's a brief mention (I think by Jim Jarmusch) that bands were pressing their own records, and people like Henry Rollins and Thurston Moore talk about the underground scene of the 80s, but mostly as some sort of precursor to the huge success of Nirvana, not as any kind of alternative to the major-label homogeny of the time.
I found the film interesting for the snippets of footage I'd never seen before, and to see what some people (like Poly Styrene) look like after all these years. (There's one word for Ari Up – Tanorexic). Unfortunately, at a time when punk rock is more mainstream than ever, younger kids looking to find out about the history of the music they're just discovering are going to get a pretty narrow version of it, mostly from people who haven't put out a good record in 25 years, telling them that it was better in the old days. If I was 16 now that shit would put me off punk for good. Boring boring boring. I wish they'd just shut the fuck up and show the footage, play the music. Really, that's all that matters.