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Strike Anywhere

2008-06-07T20:46:00-05:00

‘Laughter in a Police State’ is one of my favorite songs. Was there anything in particular that inspired this song?

I was working out by the river at a huge estate as a gardener and tending retired thoroughbred horses (sweet, sad, and some barely able to trot) when the owner asked me to help him shovel a ton of gravel into the foundation of his mansion. This entailed placing me, and a shovel in a cave of the foundation under the giant stairs. It was dark, dusty, and about a thousand degrees in the summer in Richmond, Virginia. I was coughing and sunblind when I finally got out, my boss handed me a soda, then he ran inside to his air conditioning and I passed out on the driveway for about five minutes. When this day ended, like many others back then, I rode my bike back downtown to drink on friends’ porches and eventually end up by the James River in the morning. A colorful horde of half sleeping, half drunken punk folks, men and women, would finally litter the long river rocks, falling out between conversations, skinny dipping, and absorbing the night sounds and cool air of the pre-dawn.
The often painfully desperate quest for beauty and honesty that fleshes out the small, subtle hours between work and sleep is what informed the lyrics to this song. It was my first foray into attempting to describe the spectacle of ‘citizenship’ and ‘a society’ as it truly plays out in our lives. It’s written from the point of view of the working poor of the earth who fight with images and prescribed identities as a part of the psychological trickle down of digital consumer hyperconnectivity fallout. This whole aspect, I feel, just further isolates us from our labors, their products, a collective human vision for the future, and each other.
Whew! That’s some dark stuff. But there is hope in there too. The song gets more prescriptive and in the bridge, as we like for them to do whenever possible!
The ‘House Divided’ is a nod to Lincoln and a retooling of the idea of secession as a (almost reversed from its historical context - don’t fret!) tool for reclaiming consciousness from the illusions of liberty we have, pumping out of every mouthpiece, of almost every media, reinforcing the work-consume-die dialectic until the end of time.... Or until we get angry enough, smart enough, and united enough to stop stepping in this choreography. Any day, any minute now.If such loftiness can be applied to as compressed and referential a piece of art as a hardcore punk song, the above would be the “goal” of ‘Laughter In A Police State’.

‘The Chorus of One’ seems based on a personal story. Is it?

Like many of us, I have been imprisoned and convicted wrongfully of crimes, shot through the system, taxed and vilified. ‘Chorus Of One’ is one of many songs I wrote during long hours of community service. Waiting for the few, smaller hours that were under my own steerage and vision. Seems like with most folks I run into who remain entrenched, attached, inspired and participant in this punk rock thing often cite a moment where they sometimes consciously, often subconsciously, make a pledge to themselves to continue beyond the fashion, the distraction, the temporary youth culture preoccupation with chasing trends and the static power plays of drifting from marketing construct to social clique and back… The song is a prescription to make all this rebellion and critiquing and trespassing and truth seeking stick past the crossroads of young adulthood, a way to move it all forward for the lifers in this, the folks who continue to inspire and transform, communicate and spit back at the world, never giving in or giving up. When we play this song, as we often still do, its crazy fun to see the thirty-something hardcore kids and punk rockers, often now teachers, social workers, parents, business owners, carpenters, dentists, journalists, etc. get into the pit, and pile on to sing with us. It’s touching, really. And sometimes a little scary!

In ‘Hollywood Cemetery’, who were you referring to when you said, “I found out all my heroes are just parasites”?

It would be difficult and dishonest to say this song was directed against one person in my life, or even one historic individual. Sometimes, especially when trying to approach punk songwriting as both a confessional booth and a parallel media for a counterculture, you utilize shared perspectives; other people’s stories that have transformed you for hearing them. This song throws two distinct narratives together in the verses and pulls out a bottom line of action and personal responsibility in the chorus and bridge. There is so much exhausting and dangerously reductive philosophical baggage in our community in regards to ‘selling out’, and sometimes there is a lack of quantifiable distinction between keeping the message and movement safe from usurpers and the superficial processes of mainstream culture, and the petty and precious leisure class radicalism that keeps ideas from getting to the people who need them the most. If I did it right, this song describes the tension between ‘purists’ and the adult crash of the agonized compromise… indicting neither, but telling the story of both.
Another aspect of this song is the shield of nonviolence used in the past by radical white kids in labor-intensive outfits (me, my bandmates, and a lot of our audience and this beloved, embattled punk community also fall into this category). In the late eighties, I had one friend who stood up and confronted neo-nazis while some of the CRASS peace punks refused to fight and left my friend to stand his ground alone against somewhat nightmarish odds. I’ve always wanted to tell this tiny weekend-in-any-punk-scene story, and open up the floor for a discussion on what the significance of nonviolence is in our present worldwide condition. Years after this, friends of mine who were entrenched in the Millenial Anti-Globalization Actions were tossing around ideas of rejecting their first world privilege to nonviolent protest and having these savage, passionate talks about Pacifism As Pathology.
Wow! All that in a 1:42 song! I guess efficiency is our goal these days.

There’s been a lot of resentment of the “American archetype” overseas. Despite the fact that we welcome immigrants and give billions of dollars in aid around the world, our very reputation has been overshadowed by the Bush Administration. Do you think any of the up-and-comers can repair our tainted image?

In some ways, it would be hard for our national image to recover from the past eight years, or from the precedent and quieter foundations built in administrations previous. The heavy handed military and corporate incursions of recent times are gonna still be raging and serving their purpose against the people’s will (ours and our ‘enemies’: those whom our government have occupied in various ways for a half century or more...).
Still, because I have always found that endless cynicism is a self-indulgent, smug, intellectually bankrupt, and emotionally tedious response, I read an article recently that made interesting points about the international P.R. value (that may be measured in human lives) of having a U.S. president (or even candidate) who has a Muslim name, African coloring, features, ancestry. One thing that I think is true, and not often heard about within the media and cultural borders of our country; is the difference in memory of world populations. When we travel outside of the U.S. and further than our Anglo post colonial historical cousins, we find that America has such a religion of forgetting, a collective amnesia so pervasive and entrenched, while other countries and cultures cannot separate themselves from the pasts of their mothers, grandmothers, and prophets. Europe always seems somewhere in the middle of this eternal adolescence vs. immortal racial memory, but each time we go over there we find more of the viral qualities of our own country affecting the intellectual and material spaces of the Old World…

GOP candidate Ron Paul has mentioned getting rid of all the following: the IRS, the Department of Homeland Security, the Department of Education, the Department of Energy, the CIA (any function other than intelligence gathering); which 3 systems do you feel need a major overhaul?

Coming from the background of a high school dropout, punk rocker, and not a political science scholar, I must say that I’ve seen a good deal of common ground between some theoretical anarchists and the ‘Love Revolution’ Ron Paul organizers. And, surprisingly, both of these groups come out to our shows, especially on this last East Coast tour in small venues and spaces with the RIVERBOAT GAMBLERS, and PAINT IT BLACK. And sometimes… these have been the same people....
It’s neat to see this election cycle, for all of its illusions and exploitations, bring so many ideas and distinct communities into contact. Even those in moral opposition to the process (like I often feel, along with some of my bandmates to varying degrees of passion). At the risk of getting some things wrong, I will give you my most pervasive questions and critiques of what I fear could emerge as an old model libertarian society. The compassionate and measured arguments that these libertarian folks have made to back up some of the more, on the surface to my cursory assumptions, er.. ‘tooth and claw’ free market worship, social Darwinisms, and mystifications have impressed me and educated me and my bandmates. Still we are not convinced completely that industrial global capitalism, and a ‘true’ free market has these perfect platonic economic forms, balancing physics, and that the ‘playing field’ as it were has the inherent capacity to defend ecologies, human life and liberty. I still maintain from both theoretical and emotional perspectives that our human invented and orchestrated economies need to work for the people and the planet. Not the other way around as it currently stands and has stood for too long.
Still, the amount of change and thought that local municipality control over federal functions in the wake of the abovementioned cancellations inspires is an exciting prospect in a lot of lights. The call to improvement of our Education system from the State level or ever-smaller, and the localization of Energy and Educational priority has the potential to push our society forward and help build consciousness. Of course, getting rid of the Dept. of Homeland Security, CIA, and the IRS all sound like fine ideas, but the retention of a nation-state, still playing in the world as an economic power, with its attendant military conquests and security protocols in service of resource/labor extraction and global market manipulations seems like a strange half measure, rather like a headless body with wildly flailing arms, kicking legs, and violent genitalia.
If Ron Paul supporters could start/continue building together and synthesize a new prescription with the paragons of ParEcons, L.E.T.S. adventurers, Green Anarchists and Social Ecologists, I [can] see a lot of the problems and dysfunctions of last century’s ideologies disappear. Plus a world-transforming amount of energy in community would be preserved as these folks would no longer be fighting among themselves. You know, that mythical place where the furthest right meets the furthest left. People are living this shit right now, and the potential is intoxicating. So let’s do this people, we’ll write the punk songs and bring the beer!

Having spoken to the homeless and “forgotten about” people that slipped between the cracks of the system, how do you feel the current welfare system, addiction programs, job banks, etc. have failed these people? What reforms could be made?

I have had the privilege of knowing some talented and determined people who have dedicated their lives to working with the chronically poor and homeless. I found my own experiences the most connected and salient, when the social work was itself reaching past the system to meet halfway those who live outside its classifications and comforts. Food Not Bombs in Richmond, Virginia, midwifed 15 years ago by the indomitable Adam Nathanson and Alyssa Murray, supported by the punk scene, Catholic Workers, Civil Rights leaders (civil disobedience in the City Hall!), provides a non hierarchical model where everyone eats, everyone serves, everyone helps everyone. This model also extends to addressing the fissures in the social foundations in our nation, our cultures colliding and exhausting their vision on the bottom lines of private and public institution alike. To me, this is one of the most exciting radical practices - enriching and building a community of mutual aid that transcends class, racial, historical, institutional and legal barriers to the inherent art of pulling each other up through these cracks.
Some long time friends and fans of STRIKE ANYWHERE deep in Brooklyn, had squatted an old warehouse, hooked up power and water, and BUILT A HOMELESS SHELTER where mutual aid, and non hierarchical counseling was practiced. Of course, within a year, the police found it and shut it down, but these two revolutionary street punk homeless advocates kept building their practice, their community, and checking in with us about their accomplishments. Soon, a documentary film of their experience will be finished, some of which even has one of our crazy outdoor benefit shows in the background.
So my answer doesn’t touch on reforms in this case at all. Good friends and family have had whole careers as social workers for various private and public institutions, leaving shredded and bewildered by bureaucratic paralysis and the cynical careering of managers. Instead of despairing within the system though, we can [be] inspired by the urgency, compassion, and creativity of our community - building a network of lay punk social workers who can challenge these structures which foster dependence and corral the city’s chronically poor and homeless populations ‘out of sight, out of mind’ into dangerous quasi-prisons which never remedy and seldom address the foundations of trans-generational poverty, mental health, street drug addiction, and family abuse.

There’s been a monumental change from the 1950s to 2007 in the way most people treat relationships, child rearing and marriage—leading to “the disintegration of the family.” How’d we get here?

I think that families were probably disintegrating, although through the course of a lifetime, silent and miserable, throughout and before, America’s Golden Age. And perhaps, although it’s still a mess of beautiful contradictions, there is an arsenal of choices and powers, at least for the educated first world, that can enhance personal fulfillment, individual safety and potential; to redefine what we mean when we say family. For example, there is a relatively modern cultural precedent for women and children to now escape abuse and domination through divorce. This can’t be a bad thing, although I am sure there are some examples where the fathers were only (or even less than) half the problem. There is also a trudging sense of progress as far as the post-modernization of family where traditional roles can be retooled, or done away with altogether in light of maximizing the most emotionally resilient, creative and harmonious aspects of relationships and child rearing if that road is taken.
I’m not gonna Pollyanna this death, though - This sense of options and social liberation also has its downside, and the perpetual material and impatient self-centeredness blasted back at us in the reflections of shop windows, media cultures, celebrity role models has also taken its toll on the development and health of new nuclear and nuclear-free families. If we can work toward evolving beyond enculturated breeding instincts, subordinating alpha-earner plantation models, and retrofitting the shrill, unresearched ‘think of the children’ mid-20th century sentimentality in favor of looking at community ecology, sustainability and self-actualization; we may be able to go the distance in balancing our civilization, changing our thirst for war and castle into a meditation on folding our species back into the world with grace and creative power. Also, I will eventually learn to break up my sentences with punctuation… sometime after the above is accomplished!

Do you feel our history education is a big problem, as Howard Zinn indicates in The People’s History of the United States or James Loewen in Lies My Teacher Told Me? Do you think kids are bored with history and thus bred to be almost apathetic about current events?

I think a lot of American kids are overwhelmed and tend to shut down in the face of the long-range moral and historical questions being asked under the flash of what they read and hear. I know I tried to. I think there is also a more isolated and homogenous sense of place in the suburbs, now, more than ever in most American cities, and, as much as the internet can dazzle with every specializing content and reflections, the real critical thinking that really living in this world in three dimensions demands is an intellectual and spiritual marathon that tests the will and personality in ways that are hard to predict or prepare for. I think the hardest won, but most prescient goal of self-education, is the ability to relate - to feel the dynamic influence of history in the lives of everyone, and your own place in all of it. I guess part of why punk can be as inspiring even as it is dystopian is to bolster us all against the paralysis of knowing just enough to know how little we know.

Bob Marley and THE SEX PISTOLS both caused a certain amount of controversy and inspired people to mobilize against the status quo. Do you feel music holds the same kind of power that it did back then?

I definitely still feel that music, and perhaps music alone, has an energy that transcends the individual’s status, historical position, and the evolving media of its delivery to inspire, uplift, and counteract cultural stagnancy, injustice, and malaise. The emergence of Bob Marley and his music did something to the world that still needs to be fully comprehended. We as a band tend to reference THE WAILERS and a lot of other revolutionary reggae in often, unconscious ways. We also have a Bob Marley tapestry hanging in our box truck touring vehicle/living space. In a completely different, and certainly more specialized and precious way, the working of cultural dissonance, shock value as art, and media spectacle by THE PISTOLS and McLaren was a cool yet strange and probably incomplete, but utterly appropriate (including its appropriations..) midwifing of punk. Since then, the conversation/argument that this subculture has had with the status quo, and within itself has been a testament to it’s strength as a purer product of the power of music. As much as there exists static musical forms within punk, it’s still hard to see how it’s level of popularity, no matter how superficial, as a dead end street. There is as much inspiration and articulation coming out of creative bands in response to mainstream commercialization of the subculture, as there ever was, and now, at least in the U.S. there seems to be a real understanding of who the real enemies are, and how to empower the positive common ground between bands who choose different approaches to getting the same message out there. With this said, I definitely think that the independent and DIY Punk and Hardcore scenes generally have more to offer the world as the bands on the mainstream radio, and there can, should, and will be both a ‘trickle down’ of impact and visibility from the popular groups who bring their roots and rage with them, and a ‘trickle up’ of creative power, activism, and integrity from the Underground bands who have their heads out of their asses, know what time it is and care about liberating people more than defending their status as righteous college town prophets.

Experiences:

How has growing up in the Reagan era shaped you?

The constant threat of Nuclear Armageddon during the entirety of my conscious memory of childhood cannot be overstated. I remember nightmares from prime time television movies events like ‘The Day After’, and hours of rapt household paralysis while Reagan spoke, bellicose and winking, about the necessities of a war most of us didn’t understand we were fighting. Also, there was a cartoonish duality to life while in middle school and early high school which may have just been adolescence, but I also think that the greed and artifice of the Eighties society was perhaps, the least deep of a cultural experience, even in American life, that will ever happen. Also, growing up in the South in the Reagan era was definitely something insane, and will probably fuel my anger and analysis of media manipulation; historical deception; and the oppression and attempted economic obliteration of black Americans by the white Southern Aristocracy in both rural and urban communities, for the rest of my life. So what’s a sensitive Eighties child to do in Richmond, Virginia when faced with such potential psychological and moral decay?
Lose yourself - then find yourself - in Punk Rock!
I remember an art school ghetto in a section of Richmond named Oregon Hill with lots of backyard parties, and crazy fire breathing punks. My first show was a free GWAR event, when I was fifteen, in 1987 when they had no label, no budget, just loincloths, roller skates, foam battle axes, and disturbing home-made masks… A lot of SST Records jazz-punk; UNSEEN FORCE, WHITE CROSS, thrash bands; and rasta-core brought to us by radiation from D.C. and THE HUMAN RIGHTS (H.R.’s more-reggae side project) BAND. I also remember a thriving skinhead scene of nazi’s, traditional’s, and the occasional brave SHARP. Me and some brilliant dropout punk friends fixed up (mostly with graffiti) an old two story Reconstruction Era barn on the western edge of town, and started having shows that were often near-riots, these weird parties with rednecks, non racist skins, punk kids, furtive goths (these would be eighties goths!) trying to get along and build something, just to tear it down. It was really a brave new world as far as D.I.Y. was concerned, and the band that tied it all together was FOUR WALLS FALLING, Jade Tree’s first LP, and a righteous and musically untouchable political hardcore band. This was my ‘dual consciousness’ turning point from exclusively being into underage drinking, trespassing, and running from police and skinheads. It taught me that there was something to engage in, to build and articulate further than just leather jacket paint, and homemade tattoos.
In the Spring of 1988, FUGAZI came to town, playing at the reggae club, New Horizons, with Guy as a roadie and occasional back up singer. This was thrilling and revolutionary to my punk experience, no doubt, but the final hinges came off the doors when… that Summer, I saw the BAD BRAINS with CORROSION OF CONFORMITY in VA Beach…
By the time AVAIL moved to Richmond in 1991, a second generation of positive hardcore bands and creative punk kids were gaining confidence, and the scene was starting to get a new character, changing from the dark, impressionistic Mid-Eighties. On New Year’s Eve 1990, in a house on Cherry Street, I met Beau and Tim Barry, I think they were pissing in random beer cans, and watching gleefully while wasted, pompous frat people would drink. I liked them instantly. They established the first Avail House, and added just the right amount of numbers and intellect to push the scene to its tipping point; we then organized and happily kicked out the remaining Nazi skins, started INQUISITION, and a dozen other bands, all with character and a singular sense of mission, and the third generation of Richmond Punk came into its own.

What kind of activist projects are you involved with now?

As any good intentioned touring punk band can tell you, there is still a bit of distance between what we do with our time and talent, and the activists with whom we communicate and trade inspiration. In the past, when we could, we would use our shows as platforms for this community, organizing anti war marches in our hometown and DC, and supporting both monetarily and with art, groups who were doing the real courageous work that we are only singing about. The Richmond (Virginia, our hometown) Coalition for a Living Wage, an anti-poverty group growing in the rich soil of the Civil Rights Movement, are people who we give back a bit to. Also, I have been pretty involved with animal rescue and front-line animal rights organizations both locally, and with the PETA stalls at our shows across most of the U.S. Vegan Action, a Richmond based activist non-profit, has also been a part of our community. We are always happy to have folks with good ideas share their time and passion with us at our shows, it helps to flesh out and sustain what we sing about and what we believe beyond the boundaries of a hardcore show. Of course, in the recent and past years, we have played benefit shows (both loud, fast and acoustic) , made connections with and been inspired by: Food Not Bombs, Iraq Veterans Against The War, Jobs Not Jails, the Animal Legal Defense Fund, Industrial Workers Of The World, Wetlands Environmental Activist Collective, Syrentha Savio Endowment (A Women’s Cancer Awareness and Research Fund), Positive Force DC/All our Power, The Coalition For A Living Wage, The Virginia Fair Wage Alliance, Stay Vocal, Music For America, and we have contributed songs (and whole recording sessions) for records and compilations benefit various legal defense funds for anti-globalization activists and imprisoned animal liberators, PunkVoter, anti-police brutality organizations, and other groups.

Have you been to any cities that seem to embody a healthy sense of multiculturalism, or do you see segregated diasporas pretty much everywhere?

It’s hard to figure out what real multiculturalism looks like. Many of the places we’ve been blown away speechless by the city-center whirlwind of many languages, cultures, sounds and colors, (Bilbao, Spain; Toronto, Canada; London UK; Sofia, Bulgaria; Wellington, New Zealand ; Paris, etc.) may only be a timed surface illusion, and the moment the shops close, people might very well corral themselves back into homogenous neighborhoods. We have had the good fortune and absurdity to travel to many cities, some famous, many forgotten (except by their residents), and it does seem like, even within our eight year span of touring, that the world is getting smaller, and people are getting more inspired to make connections across ancient barriers. Of course, there is also a scary, isolating social defense mechanism that triggers sometimes when people feel overwhelmed and powerless. And we’ve recently visited places which felt like they were running against this global trend, including a lot of the central Midwest, the inner South, in the States; and some of the more economically challenged eastern European countries where ethnic tensions and historic feuds are being reinvented by the morally deficient and politically ambitious to control people through violence and terror.

What’s one issue you feel more Americans should pay attention to?

The human and historic cost of multinational industrial capitalism as it operates in the real world. It seems that everyday Americans are still romanced (or...date raped...) by this laizzes-fare lottery sense of siding with the ‘cool kids’; the winning team of the 2% who continually take, through corporate tax breaks and a rigged playing field, the resources, wages, and future sustainability from the other 98%. It’s almost like we suspend our reason; our belief in the earth as a common treasury for all and somehow saddle up to whichever corporate/political/religious racehorse we think will carry us out of our miserable, managed existence. The intense penetration of these bankrupt and adolescent versions of the American Dream also fuel the distortions of religion, citizenship, patriotism, and the general reactionary squalor of our national conversation through bewildering and insulting media channels.
It’s not a matter of Left Vs. Right, Asses Vs. Elephants, Coastal Elites Vs. God-fearing Patriots, in fact IT NEVER HAS BEEN. We’ve all been angry but not angry enough at the right processes, under-educated to frustration, blinded by debt and the career traps that our system provides as opportunity, and deaf to the smaller voices of conscience, balance, and progress that speak within each of us. Once we can all grasp this and shake ourselves loose from this paralysis of submission and exploitation disguised as self-interest and democracy, then many, many other social and political pathologies will show themselves as interrelated and very mortal enemies: Justice for the environment, Animal and human liberation from production and industrial slavery, and an end to war and the international system of economy and profiteering from genocide and corruption.

There’s a lot of talk about what’s wrong with the world today, but not as many proposed solutions. Have you read or come across anything that’s made you feel hopeful or inspired lately?

It’s sometimes hard to get a grip on what many Americans are doing with themselves. There is so much ignorance and exhaustion passing for consensus and activity, but I don’t believe for a second that this is all people expect from their country, or their lives. We get a steady stream of 24 hour news overwhelming us with surface mediocrities and really dumbed-down, infinite hysteria. Couple this with an under resourced education system, and the sense of unsustainable, adolescent entitlement which trickles into all of us as an affect of this cultural deprivation, and I think we can begin to address the solutions.
I believe the intelligence and outrage that flickers underneath all of these disguises and placebos will break though, and many more folks in this country will start waking up from their slumber. Whether this effects electoral politics immediately, or another kind of change in consciousness needs to sustain us first, I am down to see it happen, and, in whatever small way we can as a punk band, increase the pressure and help save lives wherever possible. Local Economic Exchange Systems, Participatory Economics, Social Ecology (Rest in peace Murray Bookchin), hell, even this cool micro-secessionist movement in Northern New England and Maritime Canada called ‘The New Atlantic Republic’ are all newer, inspiring theories and practices that are harnessing human potential in communities right now as I type this. These bad ass theories in action that show that, along with economies, nation-states themselves need to be reclaimed by their inhabitants, shriven of their godhead status and utilized as liquid, flexible fabrics in which to continue our evolution beyond their need. There are a lot of well-researched and efficient ideas out in the world… It’s up to us to use our creativity and collective will to synthesize new movements, new alliances and new hope from the past century’s overflowing toolbox of ‘isms, and ‘ologies.

What advice would you give to some of your fans who are disgruntled and frustrated with current politics?

As my answers above may reveal, I feel that the solutions are way beyond elections.... It’s about changing consciousness, or building ways of life around the numbness, isolation, and false competitions that are sold to us in pretty packages. But! It’s also still about voting, too - a process so maligned by radicals for it’s imminently corruptible dependency and ‘confessional booth’ moral compartmentalization. No doubt, the modern attitude, the ‘fantasy sports league’ approach held by large populations on voting proves radical theory on point with its critique, but there is still a community moment, a third theater of connection and public potential even as elections get stolen, primary votes (like mine here in Los Angeles) get mysteriously lost and uncounted, private corporations monopolize voting technologies.... It’s still important I think to look at and participate in this fucked up and dehumanizing system, if only to repeatedly educate the individual on their own powerlessness. The sense of ‘is this all we get?’ from the process of choosing who will run the world; the absurdity of a two party system; the losses to our humanity and the future we endure if we ONLY vote for presidents.
As far as getting inspired and engaged with your life at the community level (this is what I would recommend to inoculate against the National Election Blues, and the ‘fuck politics’ flu) - - - Follow your curiosity, research the rebel histories of your hometown, and stay open to the radical community in its many forms… A quick search of your hometown’s Indymedia.org will start this fire in most cases. Hell, I found out about a protest against the Minutemen happening in Richmond on a day after a tour when I as just visiting friends and family, waiting for a flight. It was great to roll down to the Capital and represent for Immigrant Rights and Human Rights in the face of the ridiculous theater of misguided nationalism and their dangerous reading of (and mind blowing costumes regarding) Colonial America. The Minutemen are so whack.

Okay ! I guess I’ll leave you with that .

Solidarity,

Thomas
Strike Anywhere.

Benefit For Cal Robbins

2008-04-16T17:30:01-05:00

AMPMAGAZINE.COM is far from finished. We are expecting an ‘official launch’ next week or so, but this is something that we could not wait for.

Last week, our friends over at No Idea Records launched an Ebay auction for a friend, and trailblazer of our underground community, J. Robbins, of JAWBOX, BURNING AIRLINES, GOVERNMENT ISSUE, CHANNELS, and producer and engineer as such essential bands as JAWBREAKER, AGAINST ME!, CLUTCH, JETS TO BRAZIL, and many more. Var and Jennifer over at No Idea are two people who have been inspiring me for over a decade now, and this was no exception!

Below are a couple interviews we did this weekend. The first is with J. Robbins, father of one our bravest family members, Callum Robbins, with subsequent interviews with Var (No Idea Records), Zach Barocas (ex-Jawbox / Cultural Society) and Gordon Withers (cello player who released Jawbox On Cello: A Benefit for Cal Robbins).

If you would like more information on Cal’s daily life, SMA in general, or to see what you can do to help, there are links either below take you to J.’s blog page, one of several SMA info web sites, the No Idea auction page, or even just a link to a PayPal site that is set up. Please do what you can. It’s what this community is based upon.

For more information about Callum, please visit:
www.callumrobbins.blogspot.com
www.desotorecords.com/cal

For more information about SMA, please visit:
Spinal Muscular Atrophy Foundation: www.smafoundation.org
Families of Spinal Muscular Atrophy: www.fsma.org

Auctions To Benefit Cal: EBay

On a side note, AMP Magazine will be acting as a hub for some of our friends in the industry to be able to help with this cause, and others that we are faced with in our extended family. Much like this web-site, this is something we have been working on for several months now, but this just needs to be implemented sooner than later. I sent out a letter to some of our friends the other day telling them that I would love their help in raising money for Cal’s situation. The response has been amazing, and we will be launching our own Ebay auction in the next few days. THIS IS NOT AN AMP THING! We are merely a hub for our friends support. We will be launching our auction site with test pressings from NOFX, THE LOVED ONES, THE DWARVES, THE EXPLODING HEARTS, a gold record from HAWTHORNE HEIGHTS, REAL BIG FISH stage clothes, symbols from Zildjian signed by VELVET REVOLVER, art from friends like Horsebites, and so much more. This is directly from them, their own actions, and their concern for this situation. We are merely a hub for this. Please know that, and thank them directly for their help, if you feel so moved.

As I said in my letter I sent out to labels and bands, I am a little older. I grew up at Gilman Street. I remember, and believe, that a community acting together can do a lot of good. I have seen it happen, and been a part of it too many times to not. I am excited to see how much good we can do with this in the upcoming years. Things like No Idea’s Cal Robbins auction, and what I have seen our friends at Sub City / Hopeless Records do, along with countless other actions and reactions in the underground have been just beyond inspiring.

I wish that we had had the capacity, and ability to do this for my friend Lance Hahn. I am excited to jump in and see how much good we can do for our littlest friend, Cal right now. There could be a cure for this a year from now. I want to make sure Cal is around to see it. Please read the amazing inspiring interviews below, and please, click on the links. Find out about SMA, find out about Cal and his fight, and please check in on the auction that No Idea has going on. Thank you to everybody involved. Thank you to Kim, Bill and Nick over at DeSoto Records for being such a strong hub for this effort. And thank you to J. and Janet. To be more inspiring to the underground through your fight and actions outside of the bands that you have both been a part of is a statement unto itself.

Brett, and all at AMP Magazine

An interview with our friend and amazing father, J. Robbins-

How is Cal? How are you and Janet doing?

We are all pretty good. We just got back from a family trip to a small town in Mississippi for a special physical therapy course (www.futuresunlimited.com) that’s been really good for Callum, and those trips are also always really good intense family time. He is really growing, his vocabulary and imagination and intellect are totally blowing up. He is a hilariously funny little guy. Really shy with people he doesn’t know though (he is 2 years old after all). He is also doing pretty well health-wise - though a statement like that always comes with a lengthy explanation attached ... I think we’re all doing as well as we can imagine given the circumstances.

Happy belated Birthday to Cal. I know 2 is a special age for you to see him hit. Would you care to explain?

Something like 90% of kids with Cal’s diagnosis (SMA Type 1, also known as Werdning-Hoffman Disease) don’t live to the age of 2; many of those who do make it are already dealing at that age with things like feeding tubes and heavily assisted breathing, have little or no lung power or voice ... I have to knock on wood when I say this, but Callum has a powerful voice and is eating, digesting, and breathing all under his own steam. He’s strong.

How has SMA affected your little one?

Callum can’t walk, stand, crawl, or even sit unsupported, and according to all the current knowledge on SMA, he will not ever be able to do any of these things. He has OK head control when he is seated correctly, but he can’t lift his arms from the shoulder, and he has almost no grip in his hands or “push” in his arms. He can feed himself finger foods if they are lightweight enough and his arms are properly supported. His speech and the muscles in his face seem to be unaffected, so he is very expressive, but he is largely immobile otherwise - except when he’s in water, where gravity has much less effect and he can actually move his arms, legs, and torso around quite a bit more.

Would you care to give a brief (or elaborate if you wish!) description of SMA, what it entails, and what is happening in the world of SMA research?

SMA is a genetic disease that severely impairs the brain’s ability to communicate with the major voluntary muscle groups. It’s the result of a recessive genetic mutation - if both parents carry the mutation then their child has a 1 in 4 chance of developing SMA. 1 in 6,000 people carry the mutation. It’s hardly ever tested for in pregnancy because SMA is so rare and the test for it is very expensive - genetic counselors usually only test for it if there is a known history in either family. This is a pitch for anyone reading this who may be about to have kids to please find out more about SMA testing and your possible risk of being a carrier of this mutation. This is one disease that could eventually be wiped out if people are informed.
SMA can develop at several stages in the child’s life. Onset in infancy is Type 1 (Cals’ condition) and that is the most severe. Onset later in childhood is Type 2, typically slightly less severe; Type 3 shows up in adolescence, and there is a much more rare adult-onset version as well. SMA is a degenerative condition, like ALS or Parkinson’s disease. There is no way to predict the progress of the condition; the worst losses typically happen early, and then the following decline can happen relatively quickly, very very slowly or in some cases hardly at all - if a kid with Cal’s diagnosis makes it past certain milestones (like turning 2), there is a greater chance as time goes along that the disease will behave more like a stable birth defect (like severe muscular dystrophy) instead of a degenerative disease that continues to take function away. Some people with SMA die before age 2, some live well into adulthood. There are even middle-aged adults out there who had Cal’s exact diagnosis.

The biggest killer of kids with SMA is pneumonia, which can and often does develop out of any kind of cold or infection - the child doesn’t have the strength to cough stuff up and the infection just hangs around until it becomes pneumonia and the child is overcome. Cal has already been through this cycle once, after his 1st Christmas, but he came through a week in the hospital and recovered without losing any additional ground (it makes getting him together with other kids into even more of a challenge, because we basically have to just keep him away from anyone who might be sick. Fortunately our friends with kids know and understand this).
Stem cell research seems to be the big hope for SMA treatment or a potential cure right now. In fact there is a bill going around in congress now called the SMA Treatment Acceleration Act, which if it’s passed will free up a lot more government money for SMA research. There is a lot of belief in the scientific community that a cure may be possible soon, because they have traced the cause of this disease to a single gene. But “soon” in the world of research is not the same as “soon” in the life of one kid. We’re talking about years.

You were talking to me yesterday about a special sling that you had made for Cal. Do you care to talk about that, and what you and your son were doing with it? I loved hearing it.

This was actually a gift from a friend whose daughter had SMA. It’s just a frame with a couple of slings that hang down, so he can lay on his side, we can put his arm through the sling so it’s up off the surface, and with his arm supported like that, we can roll a ball back and forth on the table and play “catch.” He is well into it.

So, a lot of people in the underground are really rising up and helping one of our own. I know you well enough to know that in your heart there are no words to describe what that means to you. I would like to think that something like this would happen in any self governed small community, but I think it’s really inspiring to see people like Var & Jennifer at No Idea put auctions together, people like Gordon Withers put out a whole cello CD of JAWBOX songs, bands step up and play benefit shows, etc. That’s an underground that you have spent a lot of time building, and being a part of. That has to feel great to know how big your extended family is.

I can’t sum it up. I can’t even begin. But the support we’ve had from friends - and from people we never even met - has been immeasurably uplifting for our family. This is an incredibly expensive condition to deal with so of course there is a practical side where benefits and donations have been an enormous help, but there is also (for lack of a better word) a spiritual side, an energetic side, where knowing that people are sending good energy this way, wishing the best for Callum, whatever .. we can feel it and it is an unbelievable help from day to day. I can’t imagine it’s not part of the reason he is doing as well as he is.

So, what does the immediate future hold for you?

We are going to the zoo on Friday with a group from the Baltimore County Infants and Toddlers program (which provides some great services for kids with disabilities). Otherwise, we are just settling back into our home routine after 2 weeks away. We are hoping to go back to Futures Unlimited in late June or July.
Fight SMA is also having their annual conference in DC April 23 & 24, we’re going to that for the first time this year.

Are you doing much recording and mixing ?

Yeah in fact I am working a lot. There’s been no time whatsoever for my own music, but I have a studio here in Baltimore about 25 minutes from the house, and making recordings is my full-time job. Though as any freelancer knows, it is cyclical, feast or famine type thing. I do mornings with Callum from 7AM to noon, so I like to think I get more quality time with him than if I was working some hypothetical 9 to 5 job and only got home in time to put him to bed. Janet is home with him full-time and I am the “breadwinner” (as much as that word applies to someone who does what I do). And of course when we go to Mississippi I just don’t work for 2 weeks, which is a little scary ... but so far so good.

If you could send our readers to three websites right now, what would they be?
www.fightsma.org
www.curesma.org
www.SMAfoundation.org

Any last words, my friend?

Just many thanks.

To read more about people involved in the Cal Robbins effort click below.

Interview with Var From No Idea Records
Interview with Zach of Jawbox
Interiew with Gordon Withers

An Interview To Remember

2008-04-16T17:28:00-05:00

When I first heard A Day To Remember’s latest album ,For Those Who Have Heart, I didn’t know quite what to think of them. The record is a unique mixture of hardcore riffs mixed with poppy influences. If you haven’t heard of this band yet you will soon. Despite horrible phone reception I was fortunate enough to have a brief conversation with Josh, the band’s bassist. He blew me away with his friendly demeanor and his great taste in music.

A Day To Remember mixes so many different elements to its music. How would you describe your style?

It’s weird because we have always liked a lot of hardcore and pop-punk stuff. We basically just started to play the stuff we liked to listen to and it kind of came out the way it does. We have never really had a genre. I still tell people we are just a rock band. I guess kids and other people started calling us pop-punk, which I don’t know if it’s a gay thing or cool I don‘t know. But, that’s what people are calling us and to me that’s better than a pretty good description, because its pop and its punk.

Who are some of your influences?

Definitely, New Found Glory, Blink 182, some of the heavier types of things like some of the older Bury Your Dead, Saves The Day, Alkaline Trio, bands like that. A lot of like pop stuff a lot of pop-punk. Then I just got interested in some heavy bands like Bury Your Dead. I’ve listened to that band like forever. Just like heavy bands the ones that play mosh music and stuff. That’s what I came from.

So your latest Album (For Those Who Have Heart) was just re-released are you guys currently working on a new one?

Yeah, actually we are not exactly taking our time but, we are working diligently on this latest record. When we have time we are working hard on it. We are the road from now until mid-August. So it’s going to be kind of rough to find time to write while we are on the road, but it is necessary. We are knocking it out. We have Warped Tour coming up and we have friends on the tour that bring recording gear with them so I think we are going to demo some stuff out. We are ready to have a new record out later on in the year or maybe early next year.”

You guys tour incessantly. What are some of your tour essentials?

Honestly, when I first started touring I used to bring a humongous bag on tour. Just thinking I was never going to be prepared enough. I’ve definitely learned you don‘t need as much stuff as you think you do. I need like a pair of basketball shorts, a few shirts, a couple pairs of jeans, a couple pairs of shoes and my little bathroom bag. That is about it.

So I see you guys will be heading out on Warped Tour this summer. Is this going to be your first time?

We have never played the whole tour. We have played one date in the past. Like in 2005 or something we won some kind of contest and got to play on the Ernie Ball stage. We are so excited though, because we grew up going to Warped Tour. We originally were only invited to do half of the tour, but then just recently (like a week ago) they called and asked if we wanted to do the entire thing. It is just such an honor because it is something we have always wanted to do. We have always looked up to the Warped Tour so we are really excited, it’s just really amazing.

Any Warped Tour bands you are looking forward to playing with?

You know I’m not even sure. I know Paramore is doing a few days, and I’m kind of in love with Haley so I need to see that band. Other than that, to be honest I don’t even know who is doing Warped Tour this year. Do you?

As far as I know, Angels and Airwaves, All Time Low, Four Year Strong, Set Your Goals, a lot of good stuff.

Of course! Those bands rule so I’m going to love to see that. I know there is going to be tons of bands that I love. Clearly I have been just so wrapped up in this tour that I don’t know what is going on. I haven’t even had a chance to look over the roster.

Are there any cities you are particularly excited about playing in?

Yeah , well we love like California and Florida. It’s going to be cool to play the Florida dates because those are the ones we used go to when we were younger. We would always go to the Jacksonville, Florida dates. So to be on the stage that I used to watch is just unreal. We also love the Northwest, the West coast, we just love a bunch of different places so it’s going to be a lot of fun.

Do any of the band members have girlfriends?

Yeah a few of us do. Not the whole band, but like two or three of us do.

How do you handle a relationship being on tour so often?

It is definitely not easy. Most people think to have a healthy relationship you need to spend an adequate amount of time with each other. I don’t think it is necessarily true. As long as you have an open relationship and are really honest with each other and talk well then you are fine. As long as you guys are talking then it is going to work out.

I really like the Kelly Clarkson cover. What made you guys choose that one?

You know people either think its lame or love it. There really is no explanation or secret to it. Like, a lot of people think our label made us do it, but it is nothing like that all. One day we were driving down the road and someone put it in and we were like this is a great song. We listened it so much we decided why not cover it. We just love the song period.

At this point, the bad reception got the best of both of us and brought the conversation to an abrupt end. Unfortunately, the world will never know if any of the band members will ever try out for American Idol or what their parting words were. However, If you really need to know don’t hesitate to get in touch with any one of them and ask. The guys from A Day To Remember are extremely nice and personable. They offer fans both links to their personal Myspace’s, as well as their AIM names to keep in touch. Also, rest assured A Day To Remember will be tearing up the stage at a town near you come warped tour. So be sure to check them out and don’t forget to keep an eye out for the there new album coming out late this year, which will indeed be another eclectic ass kicking mix.

Gordon Withers: Cello For Cal

2008-04-08T00:50:07-05:00

Gordon Withers is a cello player who has recently released a CD of JAWBOX covers on cello to raise money for Callum. Info about his record can be found here (http://catlickrecords.com/callum/)

How do you know J. Robbins?

Actually, I had never met him until recently. Growing up in Pennsylvania in the 90’s, my friends and I loved the DC music scene and listened to JAWBOX and other DC bands endlessly. We’d form our own indie or hardcore bands and try to imitate them. I eventually went to college in Boston, but JAWBOX and the music of that scene always held a special place in my heart. Recently I moved to the DC area, and have been honored to finally meet J. and play cello on a few of his recording sessions, most recently with KNOT FEEDER (ex-Don Caballero).

How did a cello version of JAWBOX songs for Cal come to mind?

In 2000, I wanted to record an album of cello arrangements in the style of APOCALYPTICA (the Finnish heavy metal cello quartet who started off playing METALLICA covers). This was for a special project as part of an Artist Diploma in Cello Performance. My cello teacher was really cool and liked the idea. I ended up choosing JAWBOX songs, because they rocked but they also had great melodies that translated well to cello.

The original album was recorded on my four-track in my bedroom. However, in early 2007 after hearing about Cal’s diagnosis, I got the idea to revisit those old JAWBOX cello versions as a benefit for Cal.

How did you go about putting it together?

Once I knew I wanted to make this happen, I found a great producer (Alex Nelson of FRENJEN) who really believed in the idea too, and donated a lot of his time to recording the new versions. We tracked the 12 songs on the CD over weekends in early 2007. A few of them were ones I had not done before ("Savory", “Motorist”, and a couple others). Throughout the process I’ve had incredible help from people with all aspects of the recording. Kim from JAWBOX introduced me to the Independent Online Distribution Alliance, which helped get the album on iTunes and other sites. Zach from JAWBOX hooked me up with Rare Form Mastering, who did a great job making the record sound really polished. I was fortunate to have an awesome publicist, and lately I’ve been working with Planetary Group trying to get the album airplay on college radio.

How has the response been so far?

All the feedback I’ve gotten so far has been incredibly positive. A few people are confused at first (JAWBOX? on cello?), but once they listen to it they get it. I haven’t gotten sales figures yet from online sales, but I’m hoping that they will be good. I’ve sold a lot of CD’s through Paypal, and Dischord (who has graciously agreed to distribute the album) has run out of their copies at least once so far. Adam from JAWBREAKER bought three copies, which was really cool.

The most rewarding part of this project has been the live Cal Robbins benefit shows. Before I left Florida last year, I played a few solo benefit shows—but since moving back North, I’ve organized two benefit shows with a live cello quartet. One was in Brooklyn, opening for a friend’s band, and the latest was in DC. Both times, the reception was incredible. There is absolutely nothing like playing in a live cello ensemble—and to be playing JAWBOX songs on top of that is just an amazing experience. I can’t wait to do more of these!

How does somebody go about picking up a CD from you?

You can get the CD direct through Paypal or at Dischord’s site. You can also download the album from all major online retailers. The paypal link and links to online stores are all at gordonwithers.com or my MySpace page. I would hope that people wouldn’t file-share this, since it’s a freakin’ benefit album, but I know it’s going on—all I ask is that you donate to Cal’s fund if you can!

Any last words?

I am honored to be able to give a little something back to a musical family that has given so much. The tragedy of SMA could happen to any family—Cal Robbins could be anyone’s son—but through the enormous outpouring of support this past year, in a way he is now everyone’s son. Us musicians need to stick together and support each other—not just because none of us have decent health insurance, but because it’s the right thing to do.

For more information about Callum, please visit:
www.callumrobbins.blogspot.com
www.desotorecords.com/cal
For more information about SMA, please visit:
Spinal Muscular Atrophy Foundation: www.smafoundation.
Families of Spinal Muscular Atrophy: www.fsma.org

Zach Barocas, drummer of Jawbox talks about Cal.

2008-04-08T00:46:14-05:00

Zach Barocas was the drummer for JAWBOX, and now runs The Cultural Society with his wife Kimberly. They had compiled and released a great double CD to benefit Cal Robbins. That can be found here (http://catlickrecords.com/callum/).

What is “For Callum”?

‘For Callum’ is a 2CD compilation I coordinated in order to raise money for Callum Z. Robbins’ care fund.

Tell me how the Cultural Society, Catlick Records, and Letterbox came together to put “For Callum” together.

The Cultural Society is currently mostly me, though it also involves my wife, Kimberley Yurkiewicz, & our friend, the poet & scholar, Jon Curley. Letterbox is the stationery store Kimberley & I own. Catlick Records is a local label run by the West brothers, Dave & Dan, the latter of whom played in THE MILLION with me. In early 2007, some local bands were putting together a benefit show with 7th Street Entry for Callum, & we thought it would be a good idea to put out a record featuring the bands on the bill. That idea quickly became one of a compilation of Twin Cities bands. At Dan’s suggestion, we decided to simply get as many contributors as possible in the little time we had. I contacted bands & musicians I knew from when JAWBOX was active, as well as bands that had recorded with J. whom I had never known nor heard. The alacrity with which the artists responded was unreal. That was January & February of 2007. The CDs were available by March 17th.

Comps can be a pain in the butt to put together. How hard or easy was this one’s formation?

My only experience with compilations prior to this was as a listener or contributor. In both cases, they did seem to take a long time to become available. Our situation was different from some, however, in that we had no idea how soon Janet, J., & Callum would require this kind of help, or, sadly, for how long. It remains an unbelievably urgent situation. In any event, we had to get it out immediately, a circumstance which was implicitly understood by everyone involved. So it was never a question of it being hard or easy. It was something we all had to do.

How has the response been so far?

The response has been wonderful. It has achieved at least one of its main goals, to raise awareness not only of Janet, J., & Callum’s plight, but of SMA as a condition with which thousands of families live. I’m also pleased to see that the compilation is part of a fundraising continuum: there have been several benefit shows, Gordon Withers’ Jawbox-on-cello CD, Drew O’Doherty’s auction—all kinds of efforts & each one a success.

How do you know Cal and his family?

I’ve known J. since June, 1990, when I booked a JAWBOX show in my hometown of Rochester, NY. I moved to Maryland 1 year later, & 1 year after that, joined JAWBOX (I was the second drummer in the group). Since that initial meeting, J. has been a brother, mentor, & friend to me. We’ve together been through a range of experience that is, if I can speak for both of us here, unique in our lives, & as we’ve developed families of our own, the range has commensurately expanded. I think about Janet, J., & Callum every day. They are central.

Var from No Idea on Cal Robbins

2008-04-08T00:08:32-05:00

An interview with Var, the biggest No Idea nerd!! I love you man. You and Jennifer have proven to be some of the most inspirational and important people in our generation’s underground, and you continuously remind us through your actions.

Tell me how this auction came about?

I have known J. for years. I think I first met him in 1990 or thereabouts. We have never been close, just due to proximity, but anytime I have ever been around him, I have felt an instant connection. If we lived in the same area, we’d probably hang out and /or find ourselves in the same places often. He is a great guy and has put a lot of energy into the little microcosmic world we live in, both as an active musician and as the hands and ears behind the mixing board, recording other bands. Anyhow, every few years we would end up in the same place. The last time he was here with Burning Airlines, I found out that he had been married within days of Jennifer and I being married. Freaky! A few years later, 2006, and whata ya know? Jennifer and I have twins and we find out that J and his wife Janet have a little boy… born 3 days apart! So there have been these connections, both in the work we’ve done and in our lives behind the scenes. When we first heard that the Robbins family needed help, it really hit home. We contributed to the cause. Now that a little time has gone by, Jennifer was feeling that it was time to pitch in again. We figured that even with a large amount of support initially, the expenses would quickly eat that up… and there would need to be a round two. And a round three. Examples being AGAINST ME! playing a few benefit shows, and someone recently organized a run of benefit auctions. Both of these raised a fair amount of money. So we just stopped what we were doing one day this week, dug through a few boxes, and up went our own auctions. It feels like a small thing that we are doing. But much like the obscure 7” that really gets you through the day, it is these small things that make all the difference.

Just as we were influenced and reminded by others’ actions to raise money for Cal, our actions have already influenced others to do the same. It’s like a snowball rolling down a hill: it gets bigger and bigger as it goes. We make an even bigger difference together. (Okay, so I’m from Florida. I don’t really know much about the physics of snow. But you get the idea!)

What items are up on the auction right now?

We grabbed the first box we saw and pulled a few things out of it. It’s a pretty good assortment of bands, from one end of the spectrum to the other. Both hardcore and Thrash… haha! But seriously, we pulled some of the heavy hitters and a selection of bands, top to bottom, left to right: HOT WATER MUSIC, AGAINST ME!, LESS THAN JAKE, SMALL BROWN BIKE, LATTERMAN, OFF WITH THEIR HEADS, PLANES MISTAKEN FOR STARS, ASSHOLEPARADE, FIFTH HOUR HERO, AMPERE, RINGERS, THIS IS MY FIST, THE DRAFT, CHUCK RAGAN, BRIDGE & TUNNEL, GRABASS CHARLESTONS, RIVERBOAT GAMBLERS, WHISKEY & CO., and more to come. We will add more every few days over the next week or two.

CLICK HERE TO CHECK OUT THE AUCTIONS

What items do you envision going up?

It really depends on what we find when we dig through the boxes. Certainly a couple more HWM records, THE HOLY MOUNTAIN, at least one more AGAINST ME! test, and other random test pressings. I expect that we will find something unique along the way as well. We’ll see!

What are your thoughts on the collector nerds, and their sweating?

I always like to get a cool version of a record that I really like, if I can. It is just a facet of records that is unique and makes them so special. I appreciate this drive in other people, even though the lengths that some go to are absolutely INSANE, haha! What is cooler than die-hard music fans? They are oftentimes some of the most committed people, who spread new music and new bands to their friends and the world. It’s all about that word of mouth. The fact that we can have fun and make records on a bazillion different colors, while at the same time making some people really happy… that’s amazing. In regards to making the collector nerds sweat by putting these rare records up for auction… well, I’d like to think we were not melting anyone’s brain in the process, and that everyone participating is excited to get their hands on something they really want… and they know that it is going to help a friend in need.

Any last words?

Do what you can, when you can, someday you will need a helping hand. (Wait, is that a lyric?) Anything, even the smallest gesture, makes a difference.

Our Last Night: The Ghost Among Us

2008-03-07T17:52:00-05:00

More Underoath influenced Metal for the kids! However, these guys are better at it than most. Solid vocal and guitar harmonies can be found through out “The Ghosts Among Us” the young act’s first record with Epitaph.

Songs like “Recovery” have beautiful epic chorus’ but lack that pure hardcore punch when singer Trevor Wentworth decides to let the screams fly. If you’re into The Chariot, Underoath, or Haste The Day, you should definitely check these guys out.

H20 Video: “What Happened?”

2008-07-08T20:32:20-05:00

CLICK BELOW TO CHECK OUT H20’s new video “What Happened?”

H2O What Happened feat. Lou Koller and Matt Skiba

Portal

2008-07-03T20:29:35-05:00

Portal (PC) [T]

Publisher: EA – Developer: Valve Corporation

Rating: 9 out of 10

After wowing gamers who purchased Orange Box last year, Portal finally saw a solo release on PC in April. Gamers that passed up the incredible value that is Orange Box, waiting on the release of Portal, should know this—the buzz is true; the game is fan-friggin-tastic.

The puzzle element introduced by Portal is hard to comprehend without seeing it in action. Ultimately, there is a blue portal and an orange portal, both of which the player can eventually control. Going in either allows the player to pop out of the other. It’s a simple mechanic that is put to increasingly complex situations. Momentum becomes a factor (“speedy thing goes in, speedy thing comes out”), and numerous obstacles make the tasks progressively harder.

The story is that the player is helping test the portal technology in the Enrichment Center of Aperture Science Laboratories under the direction of a computerized voice. And though the game’s unofficial catch phrase has permeated the internet, it would be unfair to spoil the plot but to note that the game’s story is brilliantly scripted with an awesomely wicked humor. That’s a lot of modifiers, but they are well-deserved by Portal.

The only real gripe one can make about Portal is that the experience is so damn short (just a few hours, depending on how quickly one grasps the concept). The later areas of the game are also not quite as aesthetically pleasing as the early stuff. Still, the minor flaws are easily overlooked by the revolutionary gameplay and humor, and extras such as “advanced” levels and a commentary track extend the fun.

For anyone interested in even one other game in Orange Box, it would be better just to purchase the entire collection, but for those that haven’t yet got their fix of Portal, the game is one of the freshest gameplay experiences to be created in the last few years.

Echochrome

2008-06-23T06:54:00-05:00

Echochrome (PSN) [E]

Rating: Maybe Later

Price: $9.99

Publisher: Sony Computer Entertainment – Developer: Sony Japan Studio

Echochrome is a prime example of an absolutely brilliant idea hurt by somewhat mediocre execution.

In the world of Echochrome, the simple idea for complex puzzles is that perspective becomes reality. With an art style that would make the simpler side of MC Escher proud (it is a lot of black lines forming angles on a totally white background), the player is tasked with leading a character to shadow people.

The player can only stop and speed up the character, and guiding the marionette-esque being to the goals is carried out primarily by rotating the camera. If two separate pieces are made to appear connected by the angle of the camera, then for all intents and purposes those pieces are connected and the character can cross the platforms. The game gets more intricate with holes in the platforms that drop down to whatever appears to be underneath with tilts of the camera, and jumps that work the opposite way.

It is a great idea, in theory, and for the most part it works. It may be initially hard to get one’s head around the concepts employed, but once the gamer accepts the rules set forth, Echochrome should prove a great time. The controls can be a bit finicky, however, where certain drops that should work do not, and jumps never feel quite right. The snap-on feature also fails to snap as it should on many occasions, causing more situations that should work to become a hassle.

The subtle differences between making it happen and falling into the unknown abyss make the game feel as if development was rushed. Still, for what can quickly become an annoying fault, the game’s visionary puzzles are well worth the occasional frustration. The game supplies a wealth of developer-created puzzles (56 of varying difficulty) and a mode in which to make puzzles and share them via the Playstation Network, though the user-made puzzles lean toward the ridiculous side in many cases.

Echochrome is an incredibly imaginative puzzler, but for the casual experience and flaws $10 may seem much. Gamers would be doing themselves a disservice passing this one up, but waiting for a PSN sale would not be a bad idea.