Looks like our boys had a jolly good time down in Iraq: they made people dance like Jacko, they tortured detainees, they beat civilians to death – nice! And you can bet your sweet arse this is just the tip of the iceberg.

Politicians and the media usually attribute such events to the presence of a handful of ‘bad apples’ in the army. But anyone who has experienced a war will tell you otherwise: this is exactly what happens in wars – permanently and on a massive scale, not as a matter of exception.

Contrary to popular belief, soldiers who commit such disgusting acts are no particularly evil or sadistic individuals. War is an extreme situation to be thrown into. It brings out the worst in us, laying bare all those dark undercurrents of our psyche that we’d rather not know about, unleashing all the cruelty that human beings are capable of. Every soldier is a victim and a victimiser both at the same time.

Americans had a hard time coming to terms with the massacres committed in Vietnam such as the one in My Lai, where the U.S. Army essentially didn’t act any different to the Waffen SS units the Allies had been up against in WW2. The thought of American boys systematically pillaging, raping and mass murdering their way through civilian settlements was a bitter pill to swallow.

One lesson was learned in Vietnam: all future media coverage of armed conflicts was drastically reduced and heavily censored, and ‘unpatriotic’ journalists were never again permitted to visit war zones. Another lesson, however, has not been learned: torture, rape, arbitrary killings of civilians as well as full-blown massacres are not the work of a few ‘bad apples’, but the very nature of war. Just ask anyone who lived in Yugoslavia in the 90s.

Today we all know that we were lied to about Iraq. The alleged weapons of mass destruction never materialised, Saddam’s alleged links to terrorism turned out to be a rumour at best, and the US regime disposed of the dictator before he could say anything inconvenient in public. The lives of all the men, women and children that were killed, crippled, raped and tortured in the course of this conflict were destroyed for one reason only: the profit of a wealthy elite of businessmen in the First World.

Six years down the line, American and British soldiers stationed in Iraq are still being decimated by the Islamic resistance on a weekly basis. For the families of those sent back home in boxes, it must be painful to know that their sons didn’t die to protect their people, but to to protect the business interests of the rich.

Instead of passing moral judgement on a few soldiers and then going back to business as usual, we should do everything in our power to prevent these things from happening again. At present, the eyes of war mongers are directed firmly towards Iran. Their goal: to find a pretext to invade and subjugate the country to their rule before the Iranian people can overthrow the Islamic regime and establish their own, sovereign democracy. Given the election riots and tense political situation in Iran, they might need to act very soon to achieve this goal.

What would you rather see, a sovereign democracy without Islamic dictators, established by the Iranian people themselves? Or Iranian civilians maimed and murdered for profit as was the case with Iraq?

Several punk, rock, glam and hip-hop acts from London are playing a benefit gig for the Iranian people on Saturday, 1st August 2009 in Dalston, East London (see flyer below). All funds raised go towards striking workers in Iran, oppositional student groups and the women’s rights movement in Iran, and progressive/secular Iranian groups that are in opposition to the Islamic regime as well as to imperialist intervention.

It would be great if you made it down, if only to enjoy a really cool (and cheap) night of music. Bands will be playing from 7.30pm to 2am!

It’s scientifically proven that Christina Aguilera is the sexiest woman on the planet. Unfortunately, most of her music to date has been rubbish. Now she finally got it right, even though it was probably just her management’s idea: British-Bulgarian electro pop act Ladytron -arguably the greatest band of the 00s- are currently in the studio with Aguilera writing and recording songs for her new album.

This collaboration could potentially result in the raunchiest, sleaziest, and at the same time most darkly elegant fuck-me pop record since Madonna’s “Justify My Love” EP. I’m certainly looking forward to it. Are you?

Punk rock didn’t have it easy in communist Bulgaria, a country in which all aggressive rock music was officially banned. That didn’t keep Novi Cvetya (“New Flowers”) from performing punk rock as early as 1979. Based in Kyustendi, a town close to the Serbian border, the lads benefited from the possibility of listening to punk rock on Yugoslav radio. Maybe that is why their sound was much closer to late 70s Yugo-punk bands such as Paraf and Pankrti than to anything British or American. Novi Cvetya’s songs are simple, snotty, and have a somewhat typically Balkanese tongue-in-cheek feel and sense of the absurd to them.

While Yugoslavia, a socialist country much more culturally liberal than Bulgaria, allowed homegrown punk talent to release records on the state-owned Yugoton label, there was no such option for Bulgaria’s Novi Cvetya. Even tape recorders were prohibitively expensive, but eventually the band managed to cut a demo tape, 10-15 copies of which went into circulation. These songs and all of the group’s further recordings resurfaced on a fantastic 2004 CD entitled Radiacija 1979-1995 in a limited edition of 1000, by now a collector’s item in its own right.

Formed in 1981 in Bulgaria’s capital Sofia, DDT played amateurish, tinny oi! punk influenced by UK 82 combos such as The Exploited as well as the obligatory Yugo-punk groups. Never the most likely band to be granted a release on the state-owned Balkanton label during communism, a retrospective record called Best compiled the bulk of their 1982-1992 material posthumously. Some songs can be heard on a myspace tribute page. File under “of historical interest only”.

In February 1984, vice president of the state council Georgi Dzhagarov declared that “the whole country has been disquieted by the muddy stream of musical trends sweeping away all the true values of music”. Bulgarian cultural officials launched a major campaign to eliminate rock culture, and punk culture in particular: anybody sporting punk or heavy metal fashions in public was likely to be stopped and have their subcultural signifiers removed by the police.

However, due to the government’s incompetent execution of cultural policy and the punk rockers’ indifference towards official decrees, punk continued to exist throughout the country. In January 1986, punk rockers scandalised an official New Year’s Eve celebration in central Sofia by appearing en masse with spiked hair, mohicans, and torn clothes. The Bulgarian press finally admitted their existence while bemoaning “serious aesthetic aberrations” on the music scene.

1987 saw a tactical liberalisation when Communist Party intellectuals began to realize that the suppressed youth subcultures could develop into a serious political opposition if no concessions were made. Party newspapers Narodna Kultura and Rabotnichesko Delo published articles calling for official acceptance and controlled support of Bulgaria’s punk rock and heavy metal scenes.

In the wake of these changes, Balkanton offered a selected few ‘punk’ bands to release albums on the state-owned label. The best of these were Reviu, a Sofia band fronted by the flamboyantly dressed and highly talented Milena Slavova, often referred to as the “Bulgarian Nina Hagen”. Punk rock this was not: Reviu’s music was more akin to New Wave as played by professional musicians. Presumably, the officials found this easier to handle than some rowdy bunch of street punks. But this shall not detract from the qualities of the band, whose self-titled 1989 debut album makes for recommended listening.

The youtube clip below features a 1989 performance of their song Ala Bala.

In 1987, the First Sofia Rock Festival featured Reviu and other new wave/cold wave bands such as Kontrol and New Generation, both of which secured album deals with Balkanton. Bulgaria’s first rock’n'roll movie Direktor na vodopad of 1989 documented Reviu, their fans, and the general public’s reactions to the new phenomenon (click here to watch the full movie in Bulgarian language). Today, Milena is an eccentric middle-aged lady who still lives in central Sofia and continues to be involved in various musical projects.

Perhaps encouraged by these liberalisations, or perhaps in opposition to the officially sanctioned ‘punk’ groups, a hardcore punk underground also began to grow in the late 80s. Kokosha Glava from Kurdziali, a small town near the Turkish border, played fast and rough oi/hardcore from 1988 onwards. Song titles such as Kill Kill Police ensured they would not be mistaken for a state-approved Balkanton band. A retrospective entitled Punk, Anarchy, Nihilism 1989-95 compiled all their early tapes but is now out of print. Other bands from this period include U.Z.Z.U. from Gabrovo, a female fronted band who foolishly lost their only master tapes when passing them on to none other than John Peel; Abort from Varna, another Exploited type oi! troupe; and Taran, also from Varna, who liked their punk rock with a more ‘77 flavour.

Then it was all over. In February 1990, the Communist Party voluntarily gave up their power and a new era began. After two years of ’smooth transition’ provided by the moderate Bulgarian Socialist Party, a new government led by the right-wing Union of Democratic Forces left no stone unturned when it came to privatising the country. Soon enough, Bulgaria encountered the ‘blessings’ of full-blown capitalism and the kind of uncontrolled free market imposed upon most ex-Eastern Bloc countries: uncompetitive industries went bankrupt, unemployment figures skyrocketed, wages reached an all-time low. Bulgaria was thrown into a huge crisis, some typical symptoms of which included empty shops, a high crime rate, and the sight of abandoned children in the streets. Another cancer sore of cutthroat capitalism followed suit: vast amounts of Nazi skinheads began to terrorise Bulgarian streets, kickstarting a problem of fascist violence that persists to the present day.

Many veteran punk rockers drifted into heroin addiction, others had bigger worries than keeping the music scene alive. Balkanton went bankrupt, which effectively meant the death of the Bulgarian record industry. The few punk bands of the 90s either played new school hardcore, or alternatively succumbed to the corporate US punk influence of the Green Day and Offspring variety. None of them produced anything of interest or lasting value.

Things have been picking up steadily in the past years particularly in Sofia and Plovdiv, Bularia’s second largest city. This is largely due to the efforts of Endless Party Booking of Sofia, who are in the process of turning the capital into an unlikely glam punk mecca of the Balkans, as well as the work of their friends of Plovdiv’s Amplifire Magazine. Equipped with an impeccable music taste, a record collection that would make New York and London scenesters blush with envy, and with Johnny Thunders as their spiritual patron saint, Liubo and Vicky of Endless Party can be credited with double-handedly creating a new Bulgarian rock’n'roll scene based around the shows and parties they promote. In January 2008, London glam punks Bubblegum Screw and Oregon’s Rock’n'Roll Soldiers played Sofia under the Endless Party banner, followed by bands such as Finland’s Black Magic Six and Denmark’s President Fetch. An end is not in sight – they aren’t called Endless Party for nothing.

Some of the mascara-eyed kids in the audience are themselves active in bands inspired by the seedier side of punk and glam. With their psychotic Suicide and Nico inspired junkie post-punk, the femme fatale fronted Pucks no doubt walk the weirder edge of the Sofia scene. Their demo features four numbers as stylish and cruel as the Charlotte Rampling image gracing the cover, including a cover of Devo’s Mongoloid that beats the original.

Blank Generation seem to be somewhat of a tribute/party act, their 2008 demo Four Filthy Anthems featuring covers of Ramones, Adicts, X-Ray Spex and Iggy and the Stooges songs. Their cover of Search and Destroy sounds great, and one can only hope they begin to write their own songs soon. My humble suggestion would be to expand on the Stooges direction as far as music style.

The freshly formed Alley Sin serve as a good bridge to the sleaze end of the spectrum. This is where members of Blank Generation act out their more hair-tastic instincts, and their marriage of punk and Sunset Strip rawk is a good representation of the current Sofia scene where retro-punks and neo-glamsters join forces to satisfy their hunger for pure rock’n'roll. Their demo Rock’n'Roll Sluts is out now.

Veterans by Sofia standards and punk only by virtue of inhabiting the same tight-knit scene, the Daily Noise Club have been bashing out their sweat and Rakia drenched cock rock since 1998. Informed by the likes of Sonic Temple era Cult and Dr Feelgood era Motley Crue, they hail from an age when men were men, and men wore bandanas. Their debut CD Dirty Dress features such subtle ditties as Dildo, their signature tune. But hey, nothing is ever 100% serious in the Balkans.

It’s an exciting time for punk rock in Bulgaria, and for rock’n'roll more broadly. While the rest of the European continent is still sleepwalking through its 90s garage punk hangover, Bulgaria is making its own laws, creating a glam punk scene that is bound to overcome years of drab hardcore and ska-punk sameness while at the same time resisting to simply follow the well-worn garage rock path. And one thing’s for sure: the energy and passion of the Bulgarian crowds is something that jaded Westerners can only dream of.

There’s something strangely fascinating about radical skinhead music. We’re not talking Oi! music or ’street punk’, that politically unadventurous football hooligan variant of punk rock that cropped up in the UK around 1980. We’re talking angry young men who have dedicated their music and their lives to a cause and are not adverse to using physical violence to advance it. Sadly, the majority of these are of the far-right variety. Radically left-wing skinhead bands were a rarity in the 80s and 90s, but they have seen a steady growth in the past few years.

Non-Servium are a skinhead band from Madrid whose music has little to do with celebrating working class stereotypes as laid down by the tabloid press. Instead, they are members of ‘RASH‘ – Red and Anarchist Skinheads, an international movement founded in 1993 in response to the conservatism of the traditional skinhead subculture.

Musically, their first two albums ‘Orgullo Obrero’ and ‘N.S.A: La Santa Familia’ are pure, heavy brickwall Oi, sometimes fast and furious, sometimes slow and plodding. The standout track Anti-Nazi is a fine example of the latter tendency:

It’s hard to deny musical similarities to nationalist bonehead bands such as Condemned 84 and Close Shave, but where Close Shave act “hard as nails”, Non-Servium sound like they eat nails for breakfast.

What Non-Servium have in common with their adversaries from the other side of the political spectrum is a tendency to drift towards more metallic musical terrains once they have mastered their instruments. Perhaps it’s because metal offers a better outlet for fantasies of hypermasculinity, a feature of the skinhead aesthetic that all the different factions are affected by to some degree?

Luckily, Non-Servium’s 2007 album ‘El Imperio Del Mal’ never degenerates into the cheesy ersatz metal so often produced by the right-wing bonehead brethren, instead offering a powerful oi-cum-hardcore racket with occasional chugga-chugga metal breaks. And while the album may still sound a bit clumsy in places, two excellent, brand new tracks posted on their myspace profile (Sangre Per Sangre and Bendita Locura) indicate that Non-Servium have now geared their new sound towards perfection and found a voice all of their own.

And because it’s not style but content that defines their raison d’etre skinheads, they took the liberty of growing little mohicans as of late, which makes them look like a funny punk-skinhead hybrid:

“The right band at the wrong time” is how young Boston punks Red Invasion refer to themselves. With their straightforward Dead Boys-meet-Heartbreakers 70s sleaze punk they might not be in the process of reinventing the wheel, but their songs are infused with a passion rarely found in music these days. Underneath their aggressively nihilistic surface, songs such as Tomorrow Never Comes contain a subtle melancholy akin to the greatest Hanoi Rocks material.

Red Invasion’s terrific debut album I’m Not Too Young To Die was released on Pelado Records and is a must-buy if Young Loud and Snotty is your bible. The follow-up should be out any second; until then, enjoy my interview with frontman Joey.

What inspired the name Red Invasion? Any communist leanings?

The name has been kicking around longer than the current band has… if that makes any sense. In about 2003, Red Invasion became what we basically will always be known for. But when I named the group, I was really intrigued by McCarthyism and shit. As the years have gone by, the reactions are always funny. We are not political, and if you’re still pissed off by the name… good, cause you’re ignorant and I enjoy making ignorant people angry. If anything, the name just stands out… and it somehow works with us as a band… there’s obvious irony.

What do you think of communism?

As for me personally, I tend to have a very slight socialist view on things. I think there should be a salary cap in this country at like 500 million dollars or something. I just don’t think that there should be multi-billionaires and poverty-stricken people living in what is supposed to be a free country. But I’m not naive, this shit will always be the same. Call any government what you want, there always be peasants and royalty… and unfortunately for me, I was born into peasantry. But to me, pure democracy (not what we call democracy) is the best way to govern, if I had to choose.

The “influences” section on your myspace profile reads like you guys are very angry and depressed. What are you so angry and depressed about?

Everyone in the band, even past members, has some sort of demons they struggle with. Personality defects, self medication, prescribed medication, depression… the works. Being the lyricist, I just decided to keep it all very personal, but at the same time, broad enough for anyone with a fucked up life to relate. I’ve dealt with abuse, depression, dysfunction, substance abuse, paranoia, being poor, all while trying to maintain a certain amount of stability. I’ve had to learn all my lessons through my mistakes and never had anyone looking out for me, so my realizations (mostly negative) are conveyed with this band.

I’m just trying to turn all this misery and shit into something productive. The world is going to shit, I don’t believe in God or heaven, I’ve been dealt a shitty hand in life… and nothing is going to change that. I’ve been stabbed in the heart and back by girls I loved, best friends, and even family… so that definitely has inspired me lyrically… trying to make sense of it… or finally admitting that no sense can be made from it, whichever you prefer.

You carry influences from both 70s American punk, especially the NYC stuff, and 1977 UK punk. NYC punk was more of a bohemian scene all about drugs, cheap sex, and poetry while UK punk had a more social, often political conscience. Which one do you feel is closer to your mentality?

Great question. Over the years it would go back and forth. This sort of loyalty to the UK punk ethic but at the same time, we’re all open-minded and realistic enough to understand the freedom and street-art sensibility of the original NYC scene. I’d say overall, we relate more with NYC. We’re Americans, and I have an obsession with 1970’s NYC, not just musically, but the whole Martin Scorcese thing and whatnot. But Iain and I grew up on a healthy dose of UK punk, especially the UK 82 stuff, so we always carry that with us as well.

I read somewhere (probably Please Kill Me) that Johnny Thunders focused on his pain and John Lydon focused on his anger.. We would be somewhere right in the middle, but leaning more towards the pain. The pain in my life has caused a healthy combination of depression and anger. But anger can fuel you… depression just cripples you.

Joe Strummer of The Clash hated Generation X for being an apolitical punk band. He said: “Bands like Gen X make me sick. They’re just a bunch of wimps who stand for nothing, say nothing, mean nothing” Do you agree with him, and do you think politics and music mix well?

Well, having learned as much as I have about Strummer, you have to take every judgment of his with a grain of salt, especially in the punk days of The Clash. He was trying too hard to start his revolution and used politics and art in an almost opportunistic way to pop stardom. Is there anything wrong with that? No, as long as the artist is being genuine. Just like Billy Idol singing about girls and just being young and crazy is just as acceptable.

The beauty of the 70’s punk scene was the diversity of the ideas and statements the bands were making. The Damned and their darkness, The Buzzcocks and their love songs, The Clash and their revolution, The Boys and their tongue-in-cheek attitude, and Wire was just being Wire haha….but it was all punk rock.
With Red Invasion, I think I’ve always tried to be more on the personal side of things… love, hate, pain, depression… but not doing it in a bubblegum way. The way post-grunge and emo have bastardised genuine emotions like depression and desperation into a fucking fashion statement or a shitty pose at that mall, makes me want to wretch.

See, I love how militant and ferocious The Clash were, but I also love how reckless and fun-loving Gen X was, so I always wanted that balance with Red Invasion. Joe Strummer wrote his lyrics because he felt had to convey these messages… he had to put it out there. He felt like it was his duty to connect with working class kids who were being fucked over. Myself, on the other hand, I desire to connect with the people of this world who feel abandon by things we all take for granted, friends, family, and love… and the consuming feeling of utter negativity. As I get older, I find myself paying much more attention to politics and social issues, and I know those things will creep into future songs. But I’m speaking on behalf of the band as of the second record.

As for politics and music… fuck, it’s so complicated. It’s so difficult for me to take modern day political bands seriously… especially when it’s almost become a good career for so many (I don’t have to name names). The key is to find the bands and artists who fucking mean what they are saying and are not just hating Bush to get on Warped Tour or whatever. A band like Rise Against, I don’t buy it. But when Tupac rapped about the war on drugs and the struggle in the streets or Joe Strummer spoke of working class desperation, you can’t help but believe it. These days, I do not trust many modern political voices in music… just because of the music industry itself.

You guys remind us of the Heart Attacks in the way you look very styled: straightened hair, new creepers, accurate clothes. It’s in fact a strong contrast to the original NY punks like Stiv Bators and Johnny Thunders. Those guys always looked like they’d just crawled out of bed and had thrown on any old man’s suit jacket and filthy pants they could find. Do you feel that the ‘Hot Topic’ visual style of the new generation of punk rock’n'roll bands reflects that they’re less authentic than the 70s originals?

I’ve always been into looking stylish ever since I was like 10, ha ha! We do have a similar style as the Heart Attacks, but that’s cause we came up at the same time as them and share some similar influences. In like ‘03 the 70’s punk look was catching on and all of a sudden younger bands are spouting out looking like us and the Heart Attacks and whatever. It was pretty flattering and weird at the same time. Of course the Heart Attacks took off, so they’re sort of at the forefront of that look now. But I’ve always taken my style from the 70’s punk style of UK/NYC mixed with a little Cosa Nostra. But each member of Red Invasion really has their own thing going.

In terms of authenticity, most of today’s bands are laughable. But it’s ok, what are you going to do? Of course, there are people who look at us and probably question our deal, but fuck it…I’ve had Cheetah Chrome of the Dead Boys tell me I’m the real fucking deal after singing Sonic Reducer with him….Walter Lure really dug Red Invasion… I mean… I don’t have anything to prove to anyone. And if some ass clown decides to play dress up with a hair straightener and a leather jacket, that’s just great… he’ll get laid for a year and then start dressing like another townie. In the end, Red Invasion may have a look, but we walk the fucking walk… and clothes are not the most important thing to this band by any means. It’s about the fucking songs. Anyone that has had a conversation with any of us knows that to be true.

Boston had an excellent punk rock scene in the 70s and 80s: The Real Kids, Nervous Eaters, DMZ… even GG Allin lived there for a while. Has the Boston punk rock tradition been a huge inspiration to you? Do you bump into a lot of survivors from that era?

Absolutely. Honestly, we’re definitely more into the NYC thing, if anything, because Boston bores me a lot of the time, probably because I lived here my whole life….or maybe it’s because I grew up on NYC gangster movies haha. DMZ, The Real Kids, The Lyres, The Modern Lovers, La Peste, Unnatural Axe….those bands are all fucking classic. Members of Unnatural Axe, Billy Borgioli from The Real Kids, The Lyres, and The Classic Ruins are all fans of ours. This again gives us the stamp of approval from the original scene, which means more to me than record sales, Warped Tour slots, and any other punk rock-as-an-occupation accomplishment. The Jabbers are good friends with our bass player also. It’s great that those bands stuck around. We learn a lot from them in terms of keeping our music pure and roots based.

The problem with punk bands today is they form bands without doing their homework. A lot of punk bands today probably don’t understand the importance of the Stones, Chuck Berry, and the Dolls on what became punk… don’t get me fucking started. It’s sad and it’s why punk today is starting to sound like one big fucking video game commercial.

Name some contemporary American bands that you feel you’ve got something in common with. Is there a real nationwide glam punk scene in the US where people know each other, or are there just local scenes?

Eeek. This is a tough one, haha. We honestly can’t totally relate with a whole hell of a lot of bands, which is a good thing, in terms of being an artist. But I’d say similar bands overall would be The Heart Attacks, Vengeance 77, The Fishnet Stalkers, Richard Bacchus and The Luckiest Girls, The Sleazies, but then again, all those bands are different. We’re definitely darker than those bands (as of the second record), and definitely more militant in our own insanity, hahah. But if I had to name some bands we feel very comfortable on a bill with… it would be them.

We don’t really consider ourselves part of any glam-punk scene… I’m not sure there really is one. We’re just a punk rock band with rock’n'roll roots at the forefront. I think I was more into having the glam-punk label years back cause it differentiated us from the Boston punk scene. But then people start missing the point and they’re thinking you’re trying to be Motley Crue, instead of seeing the Dolls/T Rex factor.

What music were you into before you got into punk (be honest!), and how did you get into the stuff you’re into now?

Before punk? Well, like most kids of the 90’s, Green Day and Nirvana led to Rancid, which led to Bad Religion, Minor Threat, Exploited, and so forth.

In terms of punk rock, I was much more into the UK hardcore, but as I got older I started focusing more on songwriting… so then I became very into the 70’s punk stuff. The Dead Boys, The Clash, the Pistols, and the Ramones were the biggest influences for a while. Then I traced it back to the Dolls, The Stooges, the Stones, Bowie, T Rex… even back to Dion and The Belmonts and The Ronettes.

What can we expect from your next album – in what ways will it differ from I’m Not Too Young To Die?

Much darker, better songwriting, and more diverse. On the first record, we really accomplished our goal of paying honing our Dead Boys, Stooges, Heartbreakers sound… the reviews were great. What I do like about our new record is the diversity. Some songs are dark and haunting, some are melodic and catchy, some are just straight from Chuck Berry’s testicles, and we tried to keep the balance of snot, melody, aggression, and honesty. Our many other influences came into this record on top of the prerequisites, Hanoi Rocks, T Rex, The Replacements, D Generation, Generation X, Iggy’s solo stuff, The Stones… it’s a pretty broad spectrum… there’s powerpop, garage, glitter, punk, early hardcore, post-punk, and straight up rock’n'roll.

But with this record, life got harder, my past really caught up to me as well as everything… so the lyrics are even more dark and personal. On the first record, I wrote “No More” using a fake name to tell my story. With this record, I’m basically saying, “I’m a fucking mess, this is who I am.” The record is titled “Ugly To Know So” which is a play on words. People always say “Isn’t it pretty to think so?” referring to some pipe dream or whatever… and I’m basically saying…”Yea but isn’t fucking ugly to KNOW your dreams and 95% of the world is full of shit?” Hahah, I’m a happy guy. But seriously, I’m doing a lot better in terms of my perspective on life. But during the writing and recording of this record, I can’t count how many times I thought about being dead and wanted to be dead. It’s probably one of scariest and most trying times of my life. And this record is the document.

On your myspace profile you call your music “a celebration of the individual”. But in a Western society based on individualism and everybody ‘looking out for no.1′, how is that different to mainstream mentality? Wouldn’t it be much more rebellious to celebrate values such as solidarity, loyalty, friendship, even compassion?

Very interesting question, my friend, haha. Here’s the deal though: coming from a blue collar Italian background, I am the most loyal person I know. Anyone who knows me personally knows my compassion knows no bounds… which usually ends up with me feeling let down.

But in terms of art, society, and in punk rock. the group mentality is not something I support. Whether it’s social cliques keeping different bands out of the scene, whether it’s some tough guy/gang mentality which ends up turning rock’n'roll into a fucking frat party: that’s what I’m spitting on. I pride myself in listening to many kinds of music and having friends in all walks of life. I respect individuals. So when I see sheep out there in society or in any sub-culture, it makes me sick.

In any music scene, it is so difficult to find loyalty, compassion, and true friendship. Cause you actually have people who shit on other people because they like a certain band, have a certain haircut, or don’t buy into a certain uniform or mindset. I remember like 6 or 7 years ago, a couple of Boston punks were shit-talking me because my leather jacket had no studs on it and cause I wore Stooges shirts instead of Discharge shirts, hahah. Of course, that quelled fast, and I’ve seen so many of those kids change with each punk rock fashion trend.

When I’m in a group of like-minded people, it’s my natural instinct (or neurosis, haha) to have to somehow feel like I’m going against the grain. If I’m in a room full of liberals (which I consider myself to pretty much be one), I’ll find a way to stand out, using intellect. Maybe I’ll question their authenticity, their own experiences and knowledge, and if they’re just some sheep saying “fuck George Bush”, then I will call them out on it.

Bottom line, unity in any walk of life is complete bullshit. Whether it’s punk rock, a street gang, a corporation, whateverthefuck… in the end there are shitheads, there are selfish people, there are people with substandard morals. So if you blindly align yourself to something 100%, you will feel the ugly truth via a knife in your back. Be yourself, always find a fucking way to make your unique stamp on this world. That’s what I’m about. The first wave of punk was about being creative, questioning EVERYTHING, and just taking on bullshit with anger and intelligence. That’s the individual I want to connect with through music and in life. Unity through individuality perhaps? Is that possible? Hahah.

You also mention that you hate rock’n'roll cliches. Which ones do you hate in particular?

Well, there’s no avoiding cliches in anything. If you want to rebel with a mohawk, you can be called a sheep, if you dress socially acceptable, people can say you don’t have the balls to make a statement. So basically, it’s all bullshit.

But in regards to what I hate… I’d say when a band says they’re into sex, drugs, and rock’n'roll, it just makes my head spin. NO SHIT YOU’RE INTO THAT! Most fucking bands enjoy that, but is that the only statement you wanna make? Is that it? Bands that ONLY exist to bang as many girls and do as much drugs as possible can fuck off. And I’m not trying to sound like Joe Strummer here, but in this so-called glam/punk scene, it seems like TRYING to live hard is the new trend. People acting like they have drug problems when they’re busting out lines of every 6 months, people saying they have drinking problems when they are wasted off a Bud tall boy. Come on now. I’ve done my shit and I continue to, but I don’t run around acting like I’m the second coming of Nikki Sixx or Johnny Thunders. Grow the fuck up. If you’re gonna do drugs, do it, but don’t fucking brag about it to me. Same with girls: I don’t care how many girls you’ve banged. It doesn’t impress me. These people should put on football uniforms and go fuck a cheerleader as far as I’m concerned.

It just seems so pre-fabricated with some of these bands. Whenever you have this so called punk or rocknroll lifestyle and you just see someone living it like it’s their bible, it’s fucking retarded. Then it becomes a cliche. Of course, the irony in this is that we have a look, we have a reputation for partying hard, and girls are also an issue in our lives… in some way or another. I guess it’s just that we don’t walk around throwing it in people’s faces, and we actually love music and have something we want to accomplish with it.

How high do you estimate chances to make it big with your type of music nowadays?

No way in hell, man. We’re too real and too unorganized, haha. We don’t sound like Rancid, we don’t play screamy/post-hardcore, we don’t kiss ass, we drink too much on stage, and frankly, I’m too tied down in life from debt to really have been able to do that. I put myself through college and shit… I’m in no shape to just be able to live off the fat of the land touring the world.

I’ve seen what bands have done and still do to get to that next level, and that’s fine for them. I’d much rather have my band’s memory curl up in a ball and die somewhere near bands like the Dolls, The Stooges, the Dead Boys, The Replacements, Hanoi Rocks and so forth. I’d rather be one of those bands that were real, didn’t make it, but made such a fucking impact while they were there. And what’s making it anyway? When Monoman from The Lyres tells me he’s excited to see my band, or when some kids from Europe start a band after hearing our debut record… fuck.. that’s success to me. If there’s one thing I hope people will say about us, is that we were real and honest and our live show conveyed that.

What is Boston like in general? Have you managed to establish a strong following in Boston, or do you feel you need to get out of there?

It’s taken Boston a long time to warm up to us, and even after a lot of help, promotion, a manager with tons of connections it’s still not where I would have liked it. We are just too different and we’re all socially moronic, haha. Boston’s punk scene is very divided, and any success is centered around the bigger bands, and it’s much more difficult than ever for a up-and-coming band to catch on (unless you have ex members of big bands). And kids from the suburbs aren’t looking hard enough for the bands below the Warped Tour radar. Plus we don’t fit the mold of a Boston band via our sound and style. We do have a young following, and a few years back, whenever we were given the chance we could draw a great all ages crowd. But as time goes on, it’s tougher to drag kids away from youtube, myspace, the iphone, or some 18+ dance night where they play shitty-ass fucking electro. Sad.

We have random followings in different pockets of the country, parts of GA, TX, Chicago… but touring is a whole other deal. We’ve gotten our fair share of radio play, some write-ups, and great reviews, so people sort of had to realize that we were here haha.

I wish we would have a little more acceptance in Boston, but at the same time, I’m proud of where we stand… we don’t kiss ass, we always put on an intense live show, and we walk the walk. We’re never gonna be a big Boston band… but honestly, I’m ok with that.

Have you ever been criticized for playing music that is retro, “outdated”, or “nothing new”? What’s your response to such accusations? And what do you think of bands that want to sound new?

Absolutely. But what’s new? Drum n bass? Hipster-metal? post-hardcore? Cookie cutter Rancid riffing punk? Moppy haired d-bags screaming and crying over awful “metal” riffs? Or how about ANOTHER garage band? Please… we do what we love. I don’t give a fuck if we’re not modern. After the late 90’s of rap/metal, awful pop punk, and the last piss dribbles of grunge… what was left? We do have a dated sound, but we’re also influenced by music that pre-dates punk by 20 years and music that came out of punk (goth, new wave, hardcore). We are part of a tradition that dates back to the blues and I’d much rather be part of something fucking concrete, something real, than be some ultra-innovative d-bag playing with machines or a band whose roots go no further back than 1997. Please.

If some whitebread, shitstain DJ with a pink polo shirt wants to think that he’s innovative with his drum n bass and jungle sound, that’s great. There will always be more stupid, plastic people out there than not.. and those people will flock to synthetic sounds of unjustified egos and retardation. And if that’s what modern is? Well, cool… I’m all set. They should all be fucking smashed into a fine paste and poured down the fucking sewer. It’s all trash.

How satisfied are you with the sales of I’m Not Too Young To Die and with your label Pelado Records? Will you be touring Europe any time soon?

Hey Pelado, mind telling us how many record we sold?? Hahaha. I know we did well. For a debut from a band that came out of nowhere just as the whole 70’s punk thing was catching on with kids… it was good stuff. The record sold internationally and I’m very proud of it. As for Europe…..ohh I’d love to. I’d like to think that down the line… it would happen… but I’m so fucked financially right now.

Name the 5 bands in music history that mean the most to you.

The Replacements – some of the best songwriting of all time, lovable fuck-ups, with deeply personal and heart wrenching lyrics… that also kept rocknroll fun. You just couldn’t be a meathead and like The Replacements. There was too much humanity going on.

Dead Boys – these guys got me through a lot of dark times with their desperation and intensity. These guys took what the Stooges did and rid it of any and all psychedelic or post-hippy vibes… a band that spoke directly to hopeless kids. Definitely my biggest inspiration on punk rock.

Sex Pistols – style, snot, thinly-veiled intelligence, and just great rock’n'roll songs.

Iggy and The Stooges – attitude, intensity, absolute recklessness, and songs that haunted you as they smashed your face into a wall. The first punk band, in my opinion.

The Clash – these guys changed my life with their style, their radical politics, but also with their traditional outlaw attitude. They wrote anthems, they never allowed themselves to be painted in a corner… they were extremely open-minded. This was both their genius and their biggest flaw.

You can say whatever you want now: last words, last thoughts, anything.

I want to thank you for this very thought-provoking interview. And keep on the lookout for our next record called “Ugly To Know So”. It should be out in early August ‘08. And try to support some homemade rock’n'roll. As technology increases, as things get more and more watered down… you need to keep your hand on the pulse of genuine music. This doesn’t just apply to rocknroll… it applies to all art.
Thanks again.

(c) Zuri Z

Once upon a time, electronic acts were routinely dismissed for fetishising sounds at the expense of musical substance. It’s ironic, then, that Ladytron have written some of the best songs of the 00s while the 21st century rock’n'roll brigade, largely concerned with approaching various sonic blueprints from yesteryear, have rarely managed to pen anything memorable, let alone lasting.

Ladytron’s latest strike Velocifero is their best so far: 53 minutes and not one weak track. The opening ‘Black Cat’ appears to merge three distinct Dario Argento soundtracks into one: a gothic keyboard motif reminiscent of Profondo Rosso, the mechanic 80s beat of Tenebrae, and the stomach-punching synth drum accents of Suspiria. Wow.

‘Ghosts’ is essentially an electro glam rock shuffle. That concept isn’t new, but where Goldfrapp were trying, Ladytron do it effortlessly and emerge with a much more natural sense of melody.

‘I’m Not Scared’, the album’s standout track, features more of Helen Marnie’s typically ethereal vocal lines, so idiosyncratic they leave you under the impression the band have patented their own scales.

While on earlier efforts Mira Aroyo’s harshly spoken vocals exuded the charm of a communist border guard from a 1980s Stallone movie, she utilizes her native Bulgarian in a way that makes the language sound genuinely sexy on the sublime ‘Kletva’. Oddly enough, the song is an old Bulgarian children’s TV tune.

From 2001’s innocent 604 through the soft-focus lensed Light and Magic (2002) and the rock-tinted Witching Hour (2005), Ladytron’s journey has been one from self-consciously naive quirkiness and melancholy-lite towards more intensely bleak scenarios. Velocifero peaks as their darkest album so far, a quality further carved out by a harsher and harder production. Parallels could be drawn to Depeche Mode’s gradual transformation from new wave synth popsters to industrial rock flavoured gloom merchants in the 80s – a band whose outlook was not a million light years away from Ladytron’s.

At the beginning of the decade, the NME granted Ladytron their 15 minutes of exposure. Maybe that was the problem. Ladytron’s slick, detached image seemed to signify style over content, especially in contrast to the simultaneously bourgeoning ‘new rock revolution’ – a random selection of garage punk Johnny-come-latelies and “scruffy” indie rock combos hailed as the real thing. While Miss Kittenesque ditties such as ‘Seventeen’ found some resonance with the electroclash crowd, it went largely unnoticed that Ladytron were capable of writing classic songs such as ‘Blue Jeans‘, an understated tune that would have made The Velvet Underground and Nico proud. To this day, Ladytron has not achieved more than a very solid cult following.

Given the quality of their subsequent efforts, however, and especially with Velocifero upping the ante in the songwriting department once more, there really is no reason why Ladytron shouldn’t be one of the biggest acts in the world.

Zuri Zurowski

Scary things have been happening in South Africa over the past days. Anti-immigrant riots have left more than twenty people dead. Some have been hacked to death, some burned alive. It’s funny how to some fascists it’s your ‘race’ that determines whether you’re friend or foe, while to others -usually the ones closer to the political mainstream- it’s your citizenship. National Bolsheviks in Russia claim dark-skinned Russians can still be ‘good Russians’ as long as they’re nationalists and not immigrants. Despite their antisemitic history, the British National Party in the UK now have a couple of Jewish councillors while agitating against Muslim and Eastern European immigrants with old-school fascist fervour, clearly aiming for the Jewish vote. This just shows how arbitrary the fascists’ targeting of minorities is.

As for the scumbags who participated in the riots in South Africa, I suppose people are always happy to find someone even lower in the social hierarchy than themselves who they can shit on. Right-wing politicians and media know this and are very adept at directing the mob’s anger at defenseless minorities rather than at those who are really responsible for their economic problems.

This BBC video doesn’t provide any in-depth analysis as it’s rather short, but it still offers a decent visual interpretation of the events.

Here’s a South African’s gut reaction that takes into consideration his experience of Apartheid.

The South African Anti-Privatisation Forum have scheduled a solidarity march through Johannesburg for Saturday.

Click on this for a statement on South African xenophobia which was written a month before the pogroms. Active Resistance, the Johannesburg anarchist group who published the article, are currently trying to build up an anti-xenophobia campaign. Hopefully, the anarchists will get something done for once.

Click here for a statement by the ZACF (Zabalaza Anarchist Communist Front ) that draws particular attention to nationalism as perpetrated by the corrupt ANC.

THE DOGS D’AMOUR: the state we’re in (Kumibeat Records, 1984)

An euphoric power pop riff, a chorus that could have been written by Slade in 1972 had Slade been a little less ham-fisted, and we’re diving head first into the what could have been the definitive glam punk statement of the 80s. Unfortunately, it was marred by the most abysmal production job in history.

Like the opener ‘How Do You Fall In Love Again’, most of the album’s first half are in-your-face glam hits with catchy hooks in all the right places. ‘How Do You Fall In Love Again’ was released as a single and promo video. Nobody took notice. Have a look and tell me they don‘t look super cool.

As for the production: to turn out a muffled mess like this is almost an achievement in its own right, even by 1984 amateur standards. If you can get past it – and boy, will you have to try – you’re bound to discover a lost treasure and masterpiece, the unknown soldier of glam punk. In fact, it’s so obscure that I yet have to meet a person who ever saw the original vinyl record. It was put out by a Finnish label called Kumibeat, whose only release it remained. Kumibeat went bankrupt shortly after and thus spared the world a planned 7” single by local hardcore punk troupe Maaseudun Tylevaisuus.

‘Don’t Ask Me To Say I Love You’ sounds like something Keith Richards might have sung on an early 70s Stones record, and for ‘All About You’, I imagine the band miming on Top Of The Pops circa 1972 with multicoloured balloons swirling around a dancing crowd of platform-heeled teenyboppers. There’s a lot of Faces in here, but the boys add a subterranean dandyness as they drunkenly stagger the line between lad rock and glam.

‘The State I’m In’, a wasted ballad remniscent of Let It Bleed era Stones, is the track I probably like the least, if only because the drums have that big, compressed 80s quality that strikes me as even more ludicrous given the lousy recording.

“I wanna make love to you in an elevator later, I wanna get drunk with you like there’s no tomorrow”, lyricises a young Tyla clumsily. See, that’s the difference between the Dogs d’Amour and a cock rock band like Aerosmith: women are not faceless items to stick your cock in, they’re drinking buddies first and foremost. Tyla would expand on such drunk male-female Bukowskisms on later releases, ceaselessly invoking alcohol as the greatest equalizer of all.

Sometimes, tacky 80s keyboards accentuate the choruses. Rumours are that the producer overdubbed these against the band’s will, and consequently the 2003 CD reissue is keyboard-free, although the overall sound quality remains shitty as ever. To be honest, I like the keyboards because they neatly put the music in a time context. With keyboards, the band sound like a bunch of glam obsessed punks in the mid 80s. Sans keyboards, they just sound like glam obsessed punks at any point in history.

‘Heroine’ is the absolute stand-out track. It starts off innocently enough with a psychedelic motif reminiscent of early Marc Bolan, but as the song gains structure to a pulsating beat, Tyla’s voice feels increasingly desperate and tortured as it pierces its way under your skin. Despite the bad mix, ‘Heroine’ is so intense the music almost becomes tangible. I dare you to find another glam band capable of writing such an intimate, soulful song. Too bad they converted it into somewhat of a power ballad when re-recording it for Straight??!! (1990), but not even that could ruin a composition of this much substance.

With its Ramones, Dictators and surf references, ‘Wired and Wide Awake’ is notable for being the only track to make use of (stereo) typical Johnny Thunders lead guitar action. Elsewhere, the band unfold a specifically English glam punk style creating a universe all of their own. In the process, the Dogs d’Amour come across as so natural and authentically wasted, they make Hanoi Rocks look like a bunch of tryhards.

While there were certainly faster and harder bands at the time, the Dogs’ attitude and realness makes them punk as fuck. At the same time, it’s the only Dogs d’Amour album I would call glam without reservations.

Lead guitarist Dave Kusworth, who later left to form the Jacobites with Nikki Sudden, wasn’t a forming member of the Dogs d’Amour, so it’s hard to say how much creative input he had into these songs. The album does appear to walk a middle ground between Tyla’s sleaze rock and Kusworth’s lazy ‘gypsy’ rock, yet without ever getting as dozy as The Jacobites.

After four years of bad luck, The Dogs d’Amour would come back a different band in 1988, releasing In The Dynamite Jet Saloon and some fairly successful singles such as ‘How Come It Never Rains‘. They would become much more professional, and therefore perhaps ‘better’ in the conventional sense. Tyla’s voice became rougher and more whiskey-soaked, and his alcoholic Bukowski fixation sometimes manifested itself in borderline Joe Cockerisms. As much as I like In The Dynamite Jet Saloon, I much prefer the punkish youthfulness and immediacy of this debut.

The Dogs shot another promo clip for ‘The State We’re In’ – check it out below.

Another year, another project for Lydia. This time around, she teamed up with James Johnston and Ian White of lounge lizards Gallon Drunk to play a few European dates in celebration of her new book The Gun Is Loaded. While in the past fifteen years or so Lydia seemed to continuously get better with age and always managed to bring something genuinely new and intriguing to the table, this was the first time the live experience felt like Lydia-by-numbers. The deconstructed tribal rhythms and screeching guitar with Lydia rambling poetry and profanities atop seemed like a pastiche of tried-and-tested aural signifiers for ‘experimental music’ rather than anything truly experimental. Perhaps I’m doing Lydia injustice, though, and my inability to enjoy the set simply had to do with the ugly shadow of London’s full-scale right-wing shift hanging over the weekend. Suddenly, Lydia’s world of self-indulgent sexual exorcisms seemed oddly irrelevant. Quite frankly, I didn’t give a damn about “dirty sexy cigarettes”, to quote a lyric, neither did the band’s studied exercises in dissonance particularly draw my interest. Instead, I yearned for something simple, aggressive, and tough to accurately express the way a lot of us felt given the background of a BNP neo-fascist elected into the Greater London Assembly and a rich kid Tory yuppie deciding our fate. The moment demanded something to push everybody into a less arty and more militant frame of mind. This was not Lydia’s fault, of course.

The audience was a diverse mixture of veteran bohemians, goths, and assorted misfits, as well as younger, trendier kids whose attendance was symptomatic of the recently renewed interest in the No Wave. They seemed to enjoy what was, in a way, a return to Lydia’s musical roots, even though Lydia would probably hate to think of it that way.

I felt comfortable in this colourful crowd, and luckily no one poured Zyclon B granules through holes in the ceiling. What do you mean I’m paranoid?

A reasonably enjoyable evening, even though hanging out and drinking at Elephant & Castle roundabout with like-minded folks afterwards seemed to have more relevance than the actual gig.

Shane MacGowan’s 70s punk band The Nipple Erectors will be playing a reunion set at London’s 100 Club this coming Tuesday 6 May, supported by cult ‘77 punk rocker Johnny Moped and Seattle power pop band The Cute Lepers.

Years before rising to fame with The Pogues, MacGowan raised hell as a first generation London punk. Notorious for his heavy drinking even then, he was furthermore an embarrassing example for ‘what not to wear’ in the fashion-conscious Roxy Club punk milieu. When forming the Nipple Erectors in 1978, he donned the amateur punk outfit for a teddy boy look to suit the 50s-rock’n'roll-gone-punk concept of the band. After only one single (King Of The Bop, Soho Records 1978), they changed their moniker to The Nips and went for a more Pretty Things influenced 60s garage and rhythm & blues style. This Tuesday, Frenchman Eric Ulcer of garage scenesters King Salami and the Cumberland 3 will play drums for The Nipple Erectors.

Johnny Moped’s 1978 album Cycledelic is punk rock as seen through the eyes of a drunk Croydon geezer. It features a cover version of Chuck Berry’s Little Queenie sung with an annoying falsetto voice and a song called Wee Wee, but also the absolutely ripping Incendiary Device. The inner sleeve (see below) is testimony to the fact that political correctness was not Johnny Moped’s forte.

A classic in its own right, Cycledelic is the nightmare of academics who seek to attach a deeper social and cultural meaning to the punk movement. Watch an incredibly rare 1974 pre-punk live performance of the Johnny Moped Band (with Captain Sensible, later of The Damned, on guitar) here.

Although Moped was offered good money to tour some European countries in the 80s and 90s, it proved too difficult to get him out of his local South London pub. If MacGowan and Moped both manage to show up on Tuesday, this will be a rare treat indeed.

Whether you want to celebrate London’s most unfashionable 70s punk bands or are simply interested in this event as a case study in alcoholism, you are advised to hurry as there are not many tickets left.

Yesterday, a festival under the banner ‘Love Music Hate Racism’ took place in East London’s Victoria Park to mark the 30th anniversary of Rock Against Racism and raise consciousness about the racist BNP in the run-up to the local elections. 1978’s Rock Against Racism in the same location featured The Clash, Steel Pulse, X-Ray Spex and the Tom Robinson Band. This time around, several stages were graced by the likes of Paul Simonon’s new band The Good, The Bad and The Queen (with Damon Albarn of Blur), The Paddingtons, Jay Sean, Jimmi Pursey of Sham 69 (now in Day 21 with the Rev, ex-Towers of London), Poly Styrene of X-Ray Spex, Don Letts, Jerry Dammers of The Specials, and many other acts.

The main problem was that even the £2 “schedule” booklet did not state any stage times. You had to run from one stage to another in the hope of eventually catching a particular act that you wanted to see. I heard Poly Styrene sing her bondage tune somewhere in the distance, I missed the Paddingtons, and I caught the last few minutes of Jimmy Pursey doing White Riot as he had done when he joined The Clash on stage at the 1978 event.

A propos Sham 69, it was surprising to see how many skinheads were present, and not only during Pursey’s set. While they were legions of skins at RAR in 1978, they’re an extremely rare sight in London these days. The anti-fascist badges most of them were wearing for yesterday’s occassion betrayed a certain level of commitment: they had not just showed up to singalong-a-Pursey.

Paul Simonon’s new band The Good, The Bad and The Queen had enormous problems with the sound, but the man is still one of the best movers on stage. Hailing from an age when punk stood for more than just a particular music style or haircut, Simonon played for the same cause 30 years down the line, and as in 1978 with The Clash, he did it for free.

While some hear similarities to English 60s psychedelia, The Good, The Bad and The Queen veer a bit too much towards Adult Contemporary for my liking. But given the purpose of the event, this is not the right moment to discuss my musical preferences. Let’s talk politics instead.

I do have to say that the permanent chants of “Fuck the BNP” and particularly the cheesy slogan “Love music – hate racism!” that speakers and artists tirelessly prompted the crowd to repeat after them were getting close to mind-numbing after a while. While the intentions were good and the cause noble, the preaching to the converted was getting a bit too much for the crowd to take in. As for some of the the slogans, I had the impression that the speakers had estimated the lowest common denominator of the crowd a little bit too low, to the point of being patronizing.

What I find more problematic is the exclusive fixation on the BNP. Fair enough, it’s election time, and the BNP are a particularly sad bunch of scumbags who should be verbally confronted at the very least. One veteran RAR speaker stated that back in the 70s, the National Front used to blame blacks for everything that was wrong with the country while today, their successors in the BNP blame Muslims and Eastern Europeans. That is fair enough too, and it’s a good thing that the speakers made an effort to address current manifestations of racism rather than just nostalgically celebrate the 1970s “black and white unite” consensus.

I just wonder why Love Music Hate Racism, the SWP, the Anti Nazi League, and similar organizations are so fetishistically obsessed with the BNP. I’m not so sure if it’s helpful to act as if the BNP had invented racism and held a monopoly on it. Is a vile rag such as the Daily Mail, for instance, not infinitely more influential and successful at poisoning ordinary people’s minds than the BNP ever could, let alone has the budget to? This newsrag -which I wouldn’t even use as toilet paper because it would leave me still feeling dirty- prominently championed Adolf Hitler in the 1930s, as well as Hitler copycat Sir Oswald Mosley of the British Union of Fascists. When antisemitic pogroms began in Germany, the Daily Mail campaigned against the immigration of Jewish refugees to the UK. It was only when Britain declared war on Germany that the paper’s rabid British nationalism ultimately outweighted its Nazi sympathies. Today, the Daily Mail continues their “proud” tradition by being one of Britain’s prime xenophobic agitation organs. And yet, it remains one of the most widely read British newspapers.

I would love to see Love Music Hate Racism stage events which expose the racism of the Daily Mail and of other such ‘mainstream’ agitators that target the average scared Middle Englander. I would love to hear them chant “Smash the Daily Mail” for a change, not always just “smash the BNP”. The permanent pointing at an unpleasant yet comparatively marginal phenomenon such as the BNP gives the impression that racism and xenophobia are their exclusive domain. Hopefully, Love Music Hate Racism will broaden their subject matter in the future instead of projecting all evil on one particular far-right boogeyman.

Here’s your only ever chance to watch someone kick the shit out of somebody else while shouting “since when do you give a fuck about Beethoven?!”

Daniele Luchetti’s movie My Brother Is An Only Child tells the story of two brothers growing up in an Italian smalltown in the 60s. Manrico gets laid and joins the local communist movement while his younger brother Accio doesn’t get laid and becomes a neo-fascist bully. So far, so familiar, but changes are underway.

Initially attracted to the fascists by their radical posturing, uncompromising methods, and the strong sense of social justice they seem to espouse, Accio eventually learns they aren’t the revolutionaries they claim to be. When local commies perform a hilarious leftist take of Beethoven’s Ode To Joy in concert, they face a violent attack by a fascist troupe (“leave Beethoven alone!”). Accio recognizes the fascists for the scared little arch-conservatives they really are, anxiously holding on to brittle myths of European male superiority when the zeitgeist threatens to kick them off their imaginary pedestal. For a little while, he then dabbles in his brother’s communist group. But ultimately, he cannot seem to muster up enough faith in the revolutionary potential of a working class of which he preceives his God-fearing, Christian Democrat father as a typical example. Meanwhile, Manrico proves that he really means it by becoming an urban terrorist in Turin and has to face the consequences of that choice.

A love triangle is thrown in for good measure, and the disappointingly limp and family-friendly message at the end seems to be: political radicalism leads to no good, your family is what really counts because blood bonds never fade. When Accio stages a petty rebellion against the corrupt housing council, the movie seems to say that with a bit of courage and initiative, you can change little things for the better without actually having to go ‘too far’.

Vague links are drawn between Accio’s sexually repressive Catholic upbringing and his later turn to far-right politics, such as fascism generally seems to serve as a sort of psychological life raft when heterosexual manhood fails. The local wannabe Duce is stuck in a sexless relationship with a woman that married him out of pity. When the inexperienced Accio gets to shag her, he begins to drop his fascist attitudes very quickly. If this looks simplistic on paper, it’s because it is. Maybe the film should have taken the time to examine such aspects more closely in order for them to appear more plausible.

What My Brother Is An Only Child really succeeds at is making us root for its protagonists no matter what politics they espouse. Because Accio seems righteous enough as a character, I had no difficulties mustering up a great deal of sympathy for what looked like naive, taboo-breaking rebellion. Which of course begs the question: where exactly is the point in this kind of wishy-washy liberal fimmaking that prompts us to look at fascist activism from an understanding, even sympathetic “boys will be boys” point of view? Are we supposed to conclude that fascists are people too?

That said, My Brother Is An Only Child is a persistently high-energy movie. It draws most of its steam from the first rate performances -aside from the two leads, Angela Finocchiaro as Accio’s mother stands out in particular- and the sheer Italianness of it all. If you’re prepared to look at the political backdrop only in terms of its entertainment value, you will find a classic coming-of-age story with huge chunks of 60s nostalgia thrown in. My Brother generates a genuine warmth in an old-fashioned way and only turns a tad sentimental at the end.

Based on the novel ‘Il Fasciocomunista’ by Antonio Pennacchi and shot in 2007, My Brother Is An Only Child is out in UK cinemas now.

(c) Zuri Z 2008

Budget rock pioneers The Trashwomen are reuniting to play a show at Mr T’s Bowl in Los Angeles on July 12th. It’s their second gig since their breakup in 1995 (they played one at last year’s Budget Rock Fest).

Formed in 1991, San Francisco’s Trashwomen were one of the earliest -and best- bands to kick off the garage rock revival. Their repertoire consisted of obnoxiously screechy rockabilly and garage punk tunes, as well as instrumental surf numbers.

The Trashwomen released tree legendary seven inches, namely Lust (1992), Three Birds (1994) and Invade Chinatown (1994), followed by three fantastic albums which all sounded the same: Trashwomen Vs. Deepspace (1995), Spend The Night With The Trashwomen (1996), and Live At The Purple Onion (also 1996).

Aiming to bring back fun and amateur spirit in an era of dreary, corporate grunge, the Trashwomen played sloppy but well.

After the breakup, Tina Lucchesi went on to form the good-but-not-great Bobbyteens.

It is unknown as of now whether there are any plans to play more gigs after the LA show -possibly even in the UK- but I will update this entry as soon as I find out.

Noize Punishment aka Jindrich Brejcha is a one-man act from the Czech Republic, and as the name suggests, an absolutely punishing experience. Do you remember Atari Teenage Riot? Gabba techno beats, distorted hardcore/metal guitars, shouty political lyrics? Noize Punishment takes the concept a few steps further, mixing grindcore and breakbeats into a infernal racket that will make your neighbours think construction works are taking place in your bedroom. Hearing Noize Punishment for the first time gave me a buzz similar to my first exposure to Napalm Death’s From Enslavement To Obliteration or Einstuerzende Neubauten’s Kollaps, except there’s a lot more structure to those. Noize Punishment is, in contrast, a noise collage without vocals: you get a few seconds of disjointed breakbeats, followed by moments of absolutely bestial grindcore, crunchcore, and probably gnashcore too, interspersed with white noise and political samples, and then back. You feel like you’ve been thrown into a blender.

According to his myspace, Brejcha is involved in several related projects, “Noize Punishment being for digital hardcore and punk breakcore, Unsane Virusez for hardcore dnb with MC, Forbidden Society for dark dnb/techstep, Mental Output for total sound annihilation and Desert Storm Breakcore Squad for oldschool digital hardcore punk.”

Now noise music has been done a million times and is -despite the delusions of art students still out to destroy music/rock’n'roll/Western civilization- in fact older than rock’n'roll itself: Luigi Russolo’s industrial noisefest Gran Concerto Futuristico dates back to 1917. But I promise it hasn’t been done the Noize Punishment way, and I’d be extremely curious to witness the noize production process live. Maybe I’m demented, but I actually get a kick out of listening to these aural violations, which is more than I can say about most self-consciously “arty” racket merchants. This stuff makes Slayer sound like the Beach Boys.

Judging by his milieu and the imagery he uses, I can only conclude the man is an anarchist, and I mean anarchist in a political, left-wing sense rather than just someone who “breaks the rules”, let alone a – hahaha – “National Anarchist“. The one quote about anarchism that rings the truest to my ears is Stewart Home’s claim that anarchists “can’t even organise a piss-up”. This is absolutely the case. A while ago, I had the misfortune of witnessing the formative stages of an ‘undogmatic’ anarchist group in London. Over four successive weekends, the aspiring members failed to meet up in the correct pub at the correct time. Some never showed up at all while others kept missing each other, even though the directions were crystal clear and the venues fairly small. Then everybody got into email arguments with everybody else and the project was called off.

I considered inviting Noize Punishment to play in London last year, but he asked for £200 on top of the return flight fare, and I’m not a professional promoter. I couldn’t help wishing back the days when punk bands were happy to have their coach fare paid and spend the night in a filthy squat.

I would have also loved to present you with a few quotes from the great Noize Punisher himself. Unfortunately, he was too busy to reply to my interview questions. In true anarchist style, he kept confirming he would eventually get around to email me his replies, until one and a half months later he decided he didn’t actually have the time. Even my suggestion of doing it telephonically didn’t meet with approval. To me, it was the first time someone turned down an interview, but then I had never set out to interview a real anarchist before.

Perhaps he just didn’t like my questions. I will leave you with those three that I was particularly eager to hear an answer to (see below). Maybe you can try and answer them instead? Or maybe the Noize Punisher en personne will eventually stumble upon this and reply? It might help to restore my faith in the future of libertarian politics and prevent me from becoming a Titoist, which I’m on my best way to. In the meantime, check out his noise. It’s excellent!

1. Loud, noisy music can express a variety of things, i.e. aggression, sexual frustration, neurosis… What do you think does your music style express?

2. Was it a conscious decision to make music that nobody could dance to, and why would you want to do that?

3. Listening to music produced by anarchists (anarcho-punk, grindcore, digital hardcore, yours), it strikes me that most of it is completely asexual. Do you think this reflects that anarchists prefer to sidestep or deny sexuality rather than deal with it?