Soulcraft #4

Diemen/Amsterdam, NL, October 26, 2022 currently listening to ‘Ugly’ by Life Of Agony

Alittle bit less than 2 years later and Soulcraft is back! If you consider the fact that the last issue was released during the spring of 2021 and this one’s street date is Christmas 2022, it’s still one year difference, so I think we are good and consistent haha!

As you can figure out, I never managed to do that zine a biannually publication, it’s such a pain in the ass to schedule a thing like this. A fanzine needs motivation – first and foremost –free time and countless hours of work; writing interview questions, getting in touch with bands/ people, waiting for their answers, then waiting for pictures/logos/graphics, then proof-reading everything and at the end finalise the texts. And theeennn, it’s the graphic designer’s work; my old tyme hardcore (reference to his old band, I Want You Dead; if you haven’t heard of them, go do your research now!) friend Dimitris a.k.a. Ultra Grim, is taking care of the looks of this publication since the beginning and he is doing a hella good work!

So, a biannually publication? Nope. An annual one – check. I promise to do my best and deliver issue no.5 sometime in 2023, let’s see. At the Outro of issue no.2 I wrote ‘let’s hope Soulcraft 3 will be released before my 40th birthday, that means before the 20th of December 2022’, and not only issue 3 was out before that but even issue 4 will actually be out a few days before or a few days after my 40th birthday (depending on the workload of Kostas Kostopoulos Printing – another person that is very important to Soulcraft and the 90 percent of my publications the last 10-15 years or so). Big 4-0 baby!

So, what changed since the spring of 2021? The end of the pandemic?! Hm… First things first! Shows are back for good, lots of amazing records/tours/festivals, hardcore rocks. I dare to say that nowadays hardcore it’s in its best shape since years! Amazing, keep it coming! So many incredible releases in the last year; Terror, Mindforce End It, Speedway, High Vis, Punitive Damage, Raw Breed, Foreseen,

Regulate, Spark, Gridiron, Combust, Echo Chamber, Speed, Candy, Electric Chair, Warthog, Hellshock, Arma X, Lawfull Killing, Gehenna, Persona, Lethal Hate, Bulls Shit, T.S. Warspite, Spaced, Life’s Question, 3ND7R, Powerhouse, Mastermind, No Pressure, Mutually Assured Destruction, Exterminating Angel, Search For Purpose, New World Man, Instructor, Fugitive, Risk, Slon, Long Knife, The Executed, L.O.T.I.O.N., Yleiset Syyt, Wound Man, Prowler, Frisk... The list is never-ending… I am glad to have interviews with some of the aforementioned bands in this issue, already had some others in the previous issues and what’s left will gradually come in the upcoming ones, fingers crossed!

My active bands, currently, My Turn and Final Daze, managed to play some decent shows this year, too. By the time you are reading this, My Turn’s ‘Modern Life’s Massacre’ record will be out. Go give it a listen and spread the word, we put lots of work & effort in it and I think it’s

really good; even though I am never satisfied, I can say that this turned out to be great! I am glad that we are still in the game after all these years and cannot wait to play live shows to support this record! Final Daze are doing good, too; shows and maybe a new release coming in 2023. In between the last and this issue I did a band, based in London (I spent some time there in 2021), called The Big Takeover; we released a demo, played a couple of shows in the end of 2021 and in May 2022, but since then we are inactive as we live in different countries and sadly cannot prioritise the band. Maybe we’ll do something in the future, who knows! Last but not least, Ghetto Gospel (my 4th band) played 2 shows in 2021 and that was it, we haven’t rehearsed for a year now and I don’t know if the band is over, but it’s definitely not active at all, due to lack of time and everyone being busy with other endeavors.

This year, I had (or will have) the chance to watch/play with/work in lots of concerts and

festivals, varying from Manchester’s Outbreak festival to Eindhoven’s Revolution Calling (happening a couple of weeks after writing this) and catch on stage some of my all-time favorite bands like Integrity, Terror (twice!), Youth Of Today and Ignite (twice!), Sick Of It All, Cold World and Discharge and also watch some of the best contemporary ones like Turnstile (twice!), One Step Closer, Dead Heat, High Vis, Life’s Question, Scowl, Zulu, Counterparts, Chain Whip, End It, Bootlicker, Instructor, Violent Way and Berthold City. I feel blessed, no joke.

Moreover, my label World’s Appreciated Kitsch Records managed to release some – in my humble opinion – great stuff. Tapes from Mutually Assured Destruction (USA), Keep It Real / Wreckonize (Indonesia/Singapore), Winnerz Circle (Australia) and our locals Against All Odds (one of the best old school hardcore bands coming from Greece, hands down). In March 2022, I also put out, via WAK, the 2nd issue of the Still Life photo zine, with amazing typography by my friend Stavros (check his Berlin based band Krayat), printed in riso paper by the one & only Keda Press. Few copies are still available, check the WAK bigcartel (worldsappreciatedkitsch.bigcartel. com) for more info. Coming next through the label: Budapest’s Exterminating Angel ‘Ihnerited future’ and My Turn ‘Modern life’s massacre’ tapes (both in limited amounts, and out by the time you read this). More to come in 2023, stay tuned!

Besides all the hardcore information, as you can read in the first line of the intro, the big news is that I am based in Amsterdam since late August 2022; you didn’t expect this, right?! To be fair, I always wanted to get out of the shithole called Greece; even if my family and most of my friends live there and I also like certain parts of its everyday life, the situation lately is unbearable… Financial instability and insecurity, police oppression (the worst since the political transition of 1974), corrupted/rightwing government, no jobs, no money, no future, no hope (shout-out to Defiance).

The whole world is falling apart, capitalism has failed but there’s still fragments of resistance; check the demonstrations happening all over the globe, from Iran to Berlin and from France to Greece. People have had enough of it and sooner or later they will raise their voices and act against their oppressors and the system they conserve.

Ok, I stop the rambling now… So, yes, Amsterdam it is (actually it’s Diemen, a suburb in the South, 15-20’ by metro to the center or, better, half an hour by bicycle; everyone has a bicycle here, after a couple of months I got used to it, you wanna go somewhere – you bike!)! ‘Dam is a very nice city, with lots of cool people (if you leave the tourists and the weed / red light industries aside) and a beautiful landscape. Everything is so peaceful and calm here compared to Athens, haha! I am trying to get involved in the local scene but for now I have

only managed to volunteer a few times in the legendary punk venue of the city, OCCII (that recently celebrated 30 years of existence). So I forgot about the most important thing! Why I came here?! Almost a year ago, I met one of the most wonderful persons in the world, Sofianna; we lived together in Athens for 8 months and then since she was about to attend a master’s degree in the University of Amsterdam and I have already been working remotely for 1,5 years, I decided to join her! A new adventure (for a year, to start with) is always nice! So, WAK’s headquarters for the next months will be based in Amsterdam! Who knows, maybe I will reincarnate the Uprising Hardcore Distro, too, which is in a hiatus since August 2022!

SOULCRAFT 4 playlist:

MY TURN ‘Modern life’s massacre’ new record DYSTOPIA - everything DINOSAUR JR. - everything T.S. WARSPITE - Stop the rot LP SPEEDWAY - Paradise 7” GAG - everything COMBUST - Another life LP

THE STONE ROSES - everything G.I.S.M. - everything REGULATE - s/t LP TYPE O’ NEGATIVE - everything INTEGRITY - everything WARTHOG - last 7” SPARK - Supernova LP

Blood Sermon is one of my favorite European bands the last years. Coming from Stockholm, Sweden, and sharing members with Speedway (also featured in this issue) and Feels Like Heaven, among others, they have managed to establish a name in the worldwide hardcore scene by delivering their unique straight edge metallic hardcore.

I did this interview with Jens & Emanuel in the summer of 2021, since my original plan was to release Soulcraft 4 in the coming autumn, something that obviously never happened. When I got in touch again with BS about this issue, they insisted to use the same interview we did back then. There’s some Covid-19 references but in other terms, it’s still up to date. Enjoy and never stop the madness!

Photos by @andy_kungman

www.instagram.com/bloodsermon

Hey there! How’s life in Stockholm? What’s up in the Blood Sermon’s HQ?

Jens - Yo, what’s up. Right now life feels pretty dull with all the restrictions and what not. We just recorded a song for a Swedish hardcore compilation. Can’t wait for people to hear it.

When were Blood Sermon formed? I know that all of you are involved or used to play in other bands but BS is definitely the closest to metal you’ve been, ain’t it? Who’s in BS by the way, give us a short bio of the band and its members!

Jens - We first started writing songs in 2018 if I remember correctly and you are absolutely right, we’ve all played in bands before and this is absolutely the closest I got to ever playing metal. Emanuel used to play in a death metal band so he’s the one with most experience lol. I sing, Emanuel plays guitar, Big C plays bass

and Adam plays drums.

Emanuel - Yeee, I used to play in a death metal band but I have always been playing metal guitar at home too so it’s pretty natural. We all listen to a lot of metal.

I firstly listened to your music via Grim Reality Records from Switzerland (my band, My Turn, actually released a 7” via GRR a couple of years ago) and got blown away. 90s metallic straight edge hardcore the way it should be played. What urge you to play that kind of hardcore?

Jens - Cool, Grim Reality is great! As for the style we play there’s not really any bigger reason than just all of us being fans of that style I guess. We wanted to do a HARD straight edge band. Something that is very unusual in Sweden.

Emanuel - We had to make up for the lack of

hard bands in Sweden. From there it evolved to the hardest music ever written in E standard.

Lately metal has infiltrated our scene (I’m kidding ofc), so many bands doing the cross over but doing it our way, putting metal in hardcore and meanwhile preserving the hardcore ethics, what do you think about this? Do you think that all subcultures should be connected and united and fight against the real enemy?!

Jens - Yeah, for sure.

Emanuel - As long as the music is played by hardcore people with hardcore morals it’s all just hardcore punk rock no matter what it sounds like. If you want to play hardcore you gotta live by the hardcore.

‘Never Stop the Madness’ was released a year or so ago. A banger of a record. What’s

the feedback right now? I read in a zine that the secret behind releasing such a good record is by actually not giving a fuck, is that true!?!

Jens - People seem to like the record which makes me happy. Can’t wait to play some shows. And you are almost correct. It’s actually 50% not giving a fuck and 50% giving extremely many fucks.

Emanuel - Personally I give 4 fucks and it’s the opinions of the band members. No other opinion matters in Blood Sermon.

What’s the scene in Stockholm and in Sweden in general? Speedway signed to Revelation, and besides that you have bands like Existence, Outstand, Bulls Shit and Sidestep, crazy resume for Swedish hardcore the last years! I’m doing a podcast with a friend about urban history and the underground culture of a specific city each time, so we did an episode about Stockholm and were impressed of how great is the scene there and the amount of bands coming up.

Jens - The hardcore scene in Sweden is pretty small but very great at the same time, you should come visit some time. You have to send us the podcast, would love to hear it. And yeah, Speedway signing to Revelation is a dream come true. Hopefully people will check out more bands from Sweden thanks to that.

Emanuel - Hardcore in Stockholm is not the biggest but we have a great scene. People here work hard to make it as good as possible.

What’s your perspective towards the pandemic and how EU and more specifically Sweden managed the whole crisis? What’s your take on this whole situation? Is it gone for good?

Jens - No idea, I’m not a scientist. I’m just waiting for the vaccine so I can start doing shit again.

You are a straight edge band and also concerned a lot about politics. How important is being straight edge for you? Do you see it as a personal stance or a

movement with a strong socio-political background? Is straight edge still cool and / or relevant?

Jens - 100% personal stance and 100% still cool.

Emanuel - It is a personal choice with a political essence. For me it’s a survival tactic. I’ve seen far too many people destroy their lives because of drugs and alcohol. Straight edge is the coolest thing in the world.

Top 5 90s metallic hardcore records and top 5 of all time fav Scandinavian bands!

Emanuel - In no specific order:

Blood Sermon - Never Stop The Madness Darkside NYC - Ambition Makes Way For Dread Killtheslavemaster - The Artisans of Dominion, Pt 1 G.I.S.M. - SoniCrime TheRapy Day Of Suffering - The Eternal Jihad

Ant Wan The Tough Alliance Haval Lifelover Ultra Silvam

JensBlood Sermon - NSTM Kickback - Forever War Earth Crisis - Destroy the machines Integrity - Those who fear tomorrow Life of agony - River runs red

Blood Sermon Hårda Tider Stockholm Inkasso Kent Råby

Last words are yours! Never stop the madness!

Emanuel - Take it sleazy and I’m out #NSTM

Jens - #NSTM HARDCORE UNITY WORLD WIDE

Since I started working on the current issue, I had a plan to make it as diverse when it comes to geography, as possible. Last issue was full of US bands, which is great, there’s still lots of bands coming from that continent in this one too, but I would like to represent the contemporary hardcore scene in a much wider way. I think that Brave Out is the first band coming from Japan that I have ever hosted in the history of my zines or maybe I’m wrong, I have to revisit old issues, hehe! So, I first learned about this great band by reading an article in the hardcore’s leading online platform a.k.a. No Echo (shout-out to Carlos!) and I immediately fell in love with their music. Youth crew with a Lockin’ Out vibe in 2022? Rare and promising! Sago was kind enough to answer to my questions and also shed some light on Fired Stomp Records, a DIY label run by 2 of the BO members, and the Japanese hardcore scene.

Photos by Yahmaso and Lacoske, provided by the band.

www.instagram.com/firedstomprecords

Hey! I must admit that I haven’t heard of your band before reading that Echo article a few weeks ago! I was quite impressed to listen to a new youth crew band all the way from Japan! But then I figured out that Brave Out is not a new band! Wanna tell our readers your story so far?

Thank you for reading the No Echo article! Brave Out was formed 10 years ago. So we are not YOUTH, but middle aged, around 30 years old haha. In 2012, Yoshikawa(vocals) and Paddi (bass) were in different bands. Some 80s US hardcore styled bands, some fastcore bands, etc. But we wanted to start a new project playing youth crew hardcore. And after Sago (guitar) and our former drummer joined the band, Brave Out officialy started.

How did you decide to play youth crew / straight edge hardcore rooted in the late 80s? Metal seems to have prevailed the hardcore scene lately and you can hardly ever listen to any bands playing that kind of style (Berthold City comes to mind).

We have been into 80s hardcore deeply, before BO was formed. In no other way, there were the same people as us. So BO started at a small studio show outside the mainstream. We’re just a minor threat, haha!! As you say, metallic hardcore is still prevailing, but, enthusiastic friends always check youth crew/old school bands, and we can catch brand new bands, too.

I’d say that your sound is heavily influenced more by contemporary bands than the late 80s ones. I can hear lots of Lockin’ Out (Mental for sure!) and also React! Records tunes in your songs! Prove me wrong!

As you say, BO is strongly influenced by Lockin’ Out and React! Records. For example, bands like Justice, Mental, Mindset, Get The Most and Insist have a great influence on our style. And also… Boston hardcore is so sick; Step Forward, Rival Mob, Clear (ex- Have Heart). We draw many inspirations from their albums.

You come from Osaka, Japan. I definitely need a brief scene report! How’s the scene

doing over there? Do you play in any other bands or involved in organising shows, writing zines, etc.?

Osaka hardcore is popular for NYHC style and beat down, metallic hardcore. Especially bands like Numbernine, Sand, Palm are the centre of Osaka hardcore scene. The documentary of the Numbernine release show is so sick. If you watch this video, you can understand how cool is Osaka hardcore -> www.youtube.com/watch?v=E6ICMPYGNfo

Wrong State is another band formed by Numbernine and Brave Out members. Their sound is hardcore/punk and powerviolence mixed. You can check their roots on a web interview by Backyard Zine -> www.youtube.com/watch?v=TqCpoN6dELA

Backyard Zine is the project of SMD crew (Ex-C, Burning Sign, etc). In Osaka, old age scenesters (SMD crew, Sand, Palm, etc.) and young blood (West Side Unity) stick together. Also, check out Brightside Booking, managed by Hideta!

He had booked many hardcore shows, a whole tour for Odd Man Out and a tour for Krust & Regulate. He is the most important person in the Japanese hardcore scene right now.

You run Fired Stomp Records, too. Are all the members of Brave Out involved in Fired Stomp? Was it out of necessary to release your own records or it’s an attempt to represent and give exposure to Japanese hardcore?

Fired Stomp Records is run by Yoshikawa and Sago. The policy of FSR is releases only in analog format, like 7’, 12” and tape. We do a label showcase and a zine regularly. So FSR is a 100% pure hardcore label. It is noticeable in the Japanese hardcore scene.

Back to your musical influences! Which records / bands have influenced your style? Are you straight edge? And if so, do you think that straight edge is still relevant in today’s society?

I’m straight edge. I don’t know what straight edge means today. There was a time when I used to drink and play, but I think I lost interest in those things. And drinking and drugs have not been good for my life, especially when it comes to illegal drugs, which means I could get into trouble at any moment. I have to constantly worry and be afraid of such unnecessary things. It is better not to waste my time and mind on such things. But sometimes drinking can improve our relationships and social life. So it’s hard to maintain a straight edge lifestyle. I think it’s the same today as it was 30 years ago.

For the cover of your new LP you collaborated with Chris Wilson from Ekulu, such an amazing artist. Why did you choose specifically him? Do you think that having art of a member of a well-established band will give more input to Brave Out? It’s true that the US bands get all the hype nowadays, which also makes sense since the scene over there is top tier. Do you feel that being from Japan is an obstacle in order to get well known out of your own scene? I feel that being from Greece, to be honest!

Simply because I am a fan of his art style. He is as good as Sean Taggart or Pushead but it’s not a matter of popularity. He is great artist. And it fit with what we wanted for the artwork.

How easy is to tour in Japan? Are there big

scenes in other cities? Which place is the favorite for you to play and how often do you play shows or tour?

Japan is small island, so you can tour the main cities for a week. Everyone knows that Tokyo is the biggest city in Japan, and there are many hardcore bands and many hardcore shows. But, don’t overlook the other local scenes. Osaka is cool because it’s ‘not just boys fun’; many girls come to shows and mosh into the pit. There is no gender gap at hardcore shows over there. Ibaraki is cool too. We often go to Ibaraki, because my friends True Fight organise hardcore shows there. They are popular for young punk kids, who get excited for their local scene. If you want to listen to Japanese youth crew, don’t hesitate to check Brave Out and True Fight.

Your lyrics are about the everyday routine. You talk about discrimination, poverty and the absence of justice in the Japanese society, too. How’s the political situation over there? And how much did Covid affect the local communities and the underground counter-cultures?

The political situation in Japan is not good, and I think it is going to get worse. I don’t see any signs that it will get better. I don’t think the

political situation in Japan will get any better in the future. I try not to think too negatively, but… I don’t know how much influence COVID-19 has had on the underground culture but it is no longer possible for foreign bands to come to Japan. This is a very big problem for the Japanese youth. I think it will be a while before we see the impact of this. However, I cannot see the near future without COVID-19.

What’s next for Brave Out? Any plans for

shows in Europe or the States? And what should we expect from Fired Stomp Records in the future?

Whenever we are able to go outside of Japan, we hope to visit Europe and so on. I think that the European scene around Youth 2 Youth Records is sick. I was so excited to see the full set video of Speedway from Sweden (ed. featured elsewhere in this issue). Youth crew is back on track! Recently I released the tapes

of No Excuse and Numbernine through Fired Stomp Records. So, I haven’t decide what to do after that, but I wanna release something of the hardcore kids, for the hardcore kids by the hardcore kids.

Thank you very much! Last words are yours! Stay safe!

Best regards!

Chain Whip’s discography in spinning regularly on my Spotify (and not that much on my turntable, like most of the music I listen to lately, let’s be honest!). ‘Two step to hell’ is definitely among my favorite hardcore EPs of the last couple of years. I had the chance to catch Chain Whip on stage in Amsterdam in early September 2022 and, even though as you can read below, the band wasn’t satisfied by the sound, they blew my mind in that gig.

I got in touch with Josh Nickel, band’s singer and also Bootlicker’s guitarist and asked him a bunch of questions about CW, Vancouver hardcore and the current financial and political climate in Canada. I found out after the interview that Josh is doing Neon Waste Records and webzine, both really, really cool, you should check them out!

Band picture taken from their bandcamp page. www.instagram.com/chainwhipband www.neonwaste.com

Hello! Please introduce Chain Whip to our readers! How did you meet each other? Did you play in any other bands before?

Hey! We’re Chain Whip. We’ve known each other from various bands and being around the Vancouver scene. Patrick put out records for both Joel and I before this band started. We’ve been in a bunch of different bands in Vancouver; Nervous Talk, Night People, Corner Boys, Stress Eating. Tough to say exactly when we all met as it’s been a long time for some of us.

You recently got back from a month of shows in Europe. First European tour, right? I had the chance to see you ripping in Amsterdam. How do you experience the whole tour?

The tour was really good. Amsterdam was actually one of the worst sets of that tour. The soundman with his hair in a bun did a 4 hour soundcheck which sounded terrible the entire time and kinda set the tone for the evening. I

was miserable. He was even wearing a t-shirt that said “Ill fix it in the mix” - he did not. I love Amsterdam and really wanted to check out the city again but this dude ruined it for me by holding us hostage while he fiddled with knobs. He miked up every single piece of drum equipment. Never seen such a thing. I should have left but we are stereotypical, polite Canadians and just dealt with it. OCCII was a great venue though and the band we played with, AFK from Germany, was cool. The whole tour was really, really good. Seeing the DIY network and how things are run and organized was great. Inspiring and very welcoming. Quite different from the posturing and me-me-me attitude of North America.

In some of the shows (Amsterdam included) you were accompanied by Bootlicker, with who you share a member, too. Obvious choice for a band to tour with I guess?

I play in both Bootlicker and Chain Whip and we were both going to play the Static Shock

fest. We decided to do the run up to the festival together to save a bit on van and equipment costs. It was nice having all of my friends in a van together too. They’re both different stripes of hardcore/punk that mesh together easily though I’m not too keen on doing two sets a night again for a while.

Your style takes us back to the early to mid 80s. Bands like The F.U.’s, The Dicks, Zero Boys, The Fix and the likes come to mind. Why did you choose to play such a specific style?

Because hardcore rules. I don’t like the really thuggy/macho sounds of much modern hardcore evolution so the bare bones, sped up version of punk is my sweet spot. The later metallic/ heavy hardcore tends to have more in common with pretty bad heavy metal than with sounds that I actually like. Early American hardcore is distinctive in its style but has so many different variations in it to keep it interesting. All those bands you mentioned sound different to me

personally but they’re all hardcore. We started as a Halloween cover band doing California punk tunes from the early 80s and had a quick lineup change and started writing our own stuff. It’s just honest music that felt very natural. I don’t know what else to do at this point.

What did you grow up listening to? When did you discover 80s hardcore and punk rock?

I grew up with like, bad Christian punk and metal because my parents were idiot Evangelicals. It was awful. I gave up the (holy) ghost and dove into music as escapism from my terribly lonely and isolated upbringing. Shortly after we got the internet at home in my small town and I was able to dig into stuff that really hooked me in. TSOL was an important one to me. Adolescents. Minor Threat. 70’s punk was also a big deal and I got really into some power-pop and rock ‘n’

roll stuff as well but punk/hardcore has always been my first love. It took a long time before I was involved with any kind of DIY scene. I’d say that most of that happened in my town while I was kinda aging out of it in my 20’s with booze and bars. Some younger kids started stuff in my hometown and I was just lost at the time. That in-between age where you’re not sure if you’re growing up or just becoming an alcoholic. For me it was definitely the latter and I needed to get out of that city and moved to Vancouver and a few years later Chain Whip started.

You come from Vancouver, Canada. What’s the scene over there? Is the spirit of SNFU, Nomeansno and D.O.A. still omnipresent? How’s the scene over there these days?

Vancouver is a weird city. There are lots of punk bands and they kind of stay position in their own

respective cliques. Sometimes I think it’s getting better and sometimes I think that there is a level of competition that is detrimental. I’m not sure. From my chats with older people from back in the day, there was always a level of competition which is lame but I think it poisons most scenes. No single thing is free from toxicity. There are always neat bands popping up here and there though.

Canada has a very well established economy and is considered one of the wealthiest countries in the world. How is everyday life in Vancouver? Has your economy been affected by the downslide of the world’s financial situation?

Vancouver is fucked. We are in a massive housing crisis. The police have been putting an incredible amount of pressure on the poorest neighborhood and doing street sweeps with regularity. It is brutal and disgusting. Canada is rich the same way most other places become rich. Worker exploitation, resource extraction and oppression and violence against Indigenous people. People can’t afford rent in this city and it brags about being voted one of the world’s most livable. It’s a neo-liberal hell-hole the same as everywhere else. Vancouver is fucked. Canada is fucked. People can cite the “nice things” about Canada/Vancouver but you’re going to have to get them from someone else. We have the same financial issues as everywhere else, inflation and other economic buzz-words that essentially mean some motherfucker wants more money so we all have to pay more. We’re not exempt. There are people doing really great things in the wake up the overdose epidemic here which kills thousands of people a year. If you want to know more about those actions check out the Drug User Liberation Front (DULF) as an example. I love those bands you mentioned but we need a different spirit right now. Musically and otherwise. We can’t continue looking to the past for current solutions.

How easy or difficult is to tour in Canada? What about US bands playing Canada? I’ve heard some weird stories happening in the border with bands denied access or held for interrogation!

Touring Canada is tough. Very long drives from town to town. You don’t get much traction with

small towns as you used to so you end up staying closer to the big cities. That being said, I played in two smaller towns just last week and the kids were off the hook. Maybe it’s turning around a bit. Bands USED to get turned away from getting into Canada with regularity. Usually to do with criminal records. It’s far easier to get into Canada than to get into the States at this time.

Your latest release ‘Two step to hell’ is a sonic ‘fuck you’ to ‘city’s cluelessness, white supremacists and major news corporations’. Wanna share some of your favorite lyrics of the record with us?

All of the lyrics are in the record! Haha! I don’t want to write them out a second time. The songs are written about local politics, my declining mental health/diagnosis, racism, pandemic uncertainty, trauma and hopelessness. A real pick-me-up of a record. I try to frame my negativity and outlook from a point of humor. Add some levity to it so it’s not just a sadbastard re-hash of other songs you’ve heard a ton of times. I’m not sure I succeeded in that on this record. It’s certainly angrier than ‘14 Lashes’ both in music and lyrics but that’s what happens in a global crisis I guess. There’s a lot of pressure and I felt like I was going to explode. I’ve been off work for 6 months because of a mental condition and still feel like my head is going to cave-in every now and again.

How important is imagery in punk and hardcore? Who’s taking care of your graphics?

We’ve been lucky in finding Ken Mclaughlin out of Ottawa as an art guy. We can present any idea and he seems capable of whipping up a version of it. Art is important and we argue about it all the time. That’s why you ended up with two versions of cover art for ‘2 Step To Hell’.

Anything else you wanna add? Any plans for new tours and releases? Cheers!

We’re looking forward to a future record and some more touring. We’ve already started writing for this and I think we’re going to come up with a cool follow-up. Thanks for listening and sending out these questions!

Iknow Justus since 2013-2014 or so. My Turn toured with his other band Tides Denied (that sadly called it quits in October 2022, R.I.P.) Scandinavia & Germany for 10 days in early 2015. Tides Denied has become one of the best current European hardcore bands and they will definitely be missed. When I first listened to Echo Chamber, I did not know that Justus plays in the band, neither did I know that EC’s line up is an all-star one, but yes, it makes sense! EC’s 6-song demo 2022 was released by DBNO Records and it’s the best hardcore demo I heard in 2022, hands down. Definitely in my top20 list of the year. I am really happy to see that EC are getting lots of exposure and people embrace the band; they are even playing FYA fest in Florida in January 2023, insane! Thanks to Justus for the chit chat!

Photos by Matthias Schmidt. Logo artwork by August Beetschen (Couple2tree).

www.instagram.com/dbnouniverse

Yo! Echo Chamber is Fabian on vocals, Yannick on guitar, Jonas on drums and me, Justus, on bass. Members of EC also play(ed) in Spark, Domain, Suspect, Night Force, Exposure, Tides Denied, Coldburn, Skaggs… the list goes on.

What was the driving force to start a new band amidst the pandemic?!

I think the idea for EC was born even before the pandemic started. We all moved to Cologne sometime before 2020 and started hanging out on a (more or less) regular basis. We were all into the idea of starting a band in the vein of late 80s NYHC/New Breed Comp. Good thing Yannick had some cool riffs and song ideas lying around. So we looked for a rehearsal space and finally started jamming in February 2020. Of course, the pandemic slowed things down a bit and it took us almost 1 ½ years until

Hi! Who’s in Echo Chamber? I have a suspicion that some familiar persons are behind EC!

we played our first show and more than 2 years to finally release a demo.

It seems that the European hardcore scene didn’t manage to cope with the explosion of hardcore in the other side of the Atlantic. Not many bands are really active and tour and even less release new stuff, especially in Germany. EC is an exception. What’s your perspective on this?

This probably has to do with the fact that for a long time the regulations for organizing live shows did not enable any proper hardcore shows – at least in Germany. And even when the strict regulations were dropped, people were very cautious about setting up shows at first. So instead of a sharp kick-off, we had a slow paced start. Of course, it is also worth noting that DIY Hardcore in mainland Europe is much smaller than in the USA, if you draw this comparison. To be honest, I don’t think Echo Chamber is the most active band by any means. Sure, we got some cool shows lined up, but there are no

plans for touring yet. However, there’s a bunch of new(ish) bands like F.O.D., Phiz or Slon that really push things to another level. I would even say that HC in Germany hasn’t been as good and diverse as it is right now since I started going to shows.

On the other hand, there’s definitely great bands in our side of the pond! And it’s amazing that they are starting getting discovered by big labels from the USA. If you were to put an all-dayer with only EU hardcore bands, which would you choose?

Yes, of course it’s cool. But I’m also a big fan of the idea of building a more independent identity/tradition in European Hardcore without leaning on American bands all the time. Current mainland bands would definitely have the potential to do so. Here’s a mix of bands I’d love to see: Phiz, Lethal Hate, Instructor, Pressure Pact, Foreseen, Feel Likes Heaven, Speedway, Condor, Worst Doubt.

Your demo was released by DBNO, a label that has definitely a good taste for hardcore (check out the Phiz demo). Was it a natural step for you to release the demo via a German label? By the way, do you plan a reissue or vinyl release since it’s already sold out?

Indeed it was a natural step in that sense that Fabian is the guy behind DBNO. We’re planning on doing a re-issue for the tape which should see the light of the day by the time this interview is released. We were also talking about a US release, but nothing’s fixed yet.

Your music leans towards the late 80s / early 90s NYHC bands like The Icemen, Killing Time, Sick Of It All and Breakdown. Which other bands have influenced you?

I think everyone in Echo Chamber brings some of their own musical preferences in the mix. Jonas is really into 90s NYHC. Although I don’t know much about drumming, I think you can hear how bands like Crown of Thornz or E.G.H. influenced his style. In terms of guitar playing and riffing, we certainly have some metal influences that I however cannot pin down to specific bands. Also, bands like Outburst or Shrapnel are always thrown into the room when writing songs.

Would you like to give us some insight concerning your lyrics? There are lots of though provoking and deep messages and I really like it when a band takes the effort to write good lyrics!

Fabian writes all the lyrics, so here’s his answer: It would be too difficult to sum up all the lyrics here. But basically I tried to put my personal and political thoughts, emotional experiences and general observations on a level that is more universally understandable, if that makes sense. All in all, the lyrics are about life in latestage capitalism and how it affects both the way we interact with each other and our individual psyches. Many of the strongest lines in the lyrics are directly or indirectly influenced by things I’ve read while working on the lyrics. I think they reflect all the stuff I find interesting, from Erich Fromm to Guy Debord and Camus, and up to authors like Lovecraft and Frank Herbert. My favorite lines in ‘On This Side Of Death’ are from

a Twilight Zone episode, for example. I think people can put their own interpretation into the lyrics and that’s dope.

You are playing the next edition of FYA, one of the world’s best hardcore festival, how did you manage to do so? Only a few European hardcore bands have played the fest before, if I am correct! Do you plan to go on an extended US tour?

To be honest, I still can’t wrap my head around how that came together. They just sent us a DM asking if we wanted to play and we agreed. We had briefly thought about playing a few shows on the East Coast leading to FYA, but we settled on one show being enough for now.

Cologne is one of my favorite German cities. Are Sonic Ballroom & AJZ still around? How’s the scene over there? Would you like to describe your city for our readers that have no clue about Cologne? Where to go, where to eat and what to see!

AZ is still there, but it’s moving to some other part of the city within the next few months. There are also punk shows happening at the Sonic Ballroom from time to time, but it’s rarely anything that I’m interested in. The infamous Club Scheisse right next to Sonic is the go-toaddress for anything DIY related. Unfortunately, there aren’t many DIY venues at the moment where shows take place on a regular basis. There are shows happening here and there, but hardly a place where everything is concentrated. This situation may also color the structure of the ‘scene’. I have the feeling that many people are settling down in their microcosm and many things are just happening in parallel without even noticing each other. I’m not really sure if that’s too bad, though since in the vast majority of cases shows are still well attended and the HC shows that took place this summer were really sick.

Without getting too metaphorical, Cologne in general feels like a big puzzle whose pieces don’t really fit together. It starts with the architecture, which doesn’t reveal a consistent style in the slightest. Same with the people living here. You got a lot of (alleged) progressive thinking upper class yuppies who can afford the rent here, as well as many, mostly older, people

waving the flag for kölsche tradition (eating Blutwurst and drinking Kölsch). Somewhere in between, though, you can always find some cool places to have a good time. There are plenty of good vegan restaurants here. Be sure to check out Warung Bayu for neat Indonesian food, Nennillo for pizza, Nobiko or Bun Pho for Vietnamese noodles and pho and Vegan Junk Food bar for… well, junk food.

Top Madball song?

For purely nostalgic reasons I choose ‘Can’t Stop, Won’t Stop’. It may not be their best song, but I love how catchy it is. And I believe ‘Holding It Down’ introduced me to the band. ‘Set It Off’ certainly is the better album, though.

‘Victim in Pain’ or ‘Cause for Alarm’?

100% ‘Victim in Pain’, never really got into CFA.

Madball or Agnostic Front?

Agnostic Front.

Killing Time or Breakdown?

‘Brightside’ is probably my favorite HC LP ever and I like the Raw Deal Demo better than anything Breakdown put out before Blacklisted.

JJ or Harley?

Both suck in their very own way. If you’d put a gun on my chest, I go with Harley, though.

Best The Icemen song?

‘Shadow Out of Time’ because the whispered vocals are fucking sick. And it doesn’t lose my attention despite its length.

Worst NYHC band ever?

Low hanging fruit but definitely H2O. I kind of liked them when I was a kid, but somewhen had to admit that everything about this band –especially Toby Morse – sucks.

Thank you very much! Cheers!

Baltimore’s End It grabbed my attention with their ‘One way track’ EP in 2020, amidst the lockdowns. Their latest record ‘Unpleasant living’, released by Flatspot Records, it’s an 8-minute long fast break of hardcore attack. After getting in touch with Akil (vocals) for a Tales from the Hard Side podcast session (check it out if you haven’t done already) in 2021, it was a natural progress to invite them to Soulcraft 4. Check also ‘Up The Blunx’ podcast, curated by Akil and dedicated to the Black American people/bands in the hardcore scene. Listen to End It on your headphones and enjoy the interview!

Photos by @kennysavercool / provided by the band.

www.instagram.com/enditbaltimore

Hey hey! Welcome on board! Give us a short biography of End It please! Who’s in the band, how old are you, do you play in other bands, how did you meet, etc. You know the deal!

End It is an American hardcore/punk band comprised of 5 members:

Akil Godsey: vocals, age 32, once sang for a band called Malicious Code.

Chris Gonzalez: drummer, age 32, drummed in Alarmed and Piece Keeper.

Pat Martin: bassist, age 42, played bass in Never Enough & Neolithic. He is also the tour manager for Thursday.

Ray Lee: lead guitarist, age 32.

Johnny McMillion: rhythm guitarist, age 33, played in Whisteria Cottage and Piece Keeper.

We have all known each other for ever, cause Baltimore is small. We’ve all been friend adjacent from working at and going to bars/ clubs.

End It is a relatively new band and ‘Unpleasant living’ is your 3rd release, right? How did the deal with Flatspot Records happen? I follow the label since its inception so, to be fair, I learned about End It via them!

We’ve all been friends with Che since the early 2000s. Flatspot Records dropped the Trapped Under Ice demo in 2007, so when we got this band together it only made sense. Che actually got Akil to come audition for End It while he was still singing for Malicious Code. We’ve got some really talented bands on the label these days. The future is bright for Flatspot. You deliver a blend of heavy yet groovy hardcore that reminds me a lot of bands

like Bulldoze and in general the whole East Coast 90s / early 00s vibe! Do you agree with this? What bands have influenced your style both as a band and as personalities while growing up in the scene?

That’s a totally accurate observation! Most of the bands we really dig, in terms of hardcore/ punk, are from that era so it makes sense. For me, Akil, I always put bands with Black people on the mic to the front and 9/10 they rule. Notice I did not say P.O.C, I said Black, so Burn, Absolution, Wisdom In Chains, Stout, Scream. As for the rest of the dudes, for sure Bulldoze, Slayer, Dying Fetus, however we all really like yacht rock and singer/songwriter stuff. It’s really a mish mosh of stuff that creates End It.

All your releases are short EPs, not exceeding 8’ or so! I really like that in your face vibe, no fills, no thrills, just simple and straightforward hardcore. Do you intent to

continue playing short songs or you may want to experiment a bit in the future?

We’re working on a full length that’s got longer songs, but we are a big fan of short and to the point hardcore. No need to have a lot of choruses or long bridges. Get it out and move on.

What are your lyrics dealing with? How important are lyrics for a hardcore band in your opinion? I know this question sounds cheesy and generic, but I am really into band’s lyrics and lately I hardly ever find a band writing some good, thought provoking lyrics…

A lot of our lyrics deal with suicide and depression. As I’m getting older and growing to understand the world more through touring and maturation I’m starting away from that theme.

Politics are always at the forefront. There’s always gonna be the fact that I’m black so all of the lyrics are from the perspective of a Black American. I, Akil, think the lyrics are first, then rhythms come second.

You are based in Baltimore, a city with a strong hardcore scene, now and then. How are things over there? Any cool spots / venues in the city? How do you like it living there?

Baltimore is doing better than ever. Got a lot of new bands popping up and a young scene that will hopefully stick around and grow. In terms of venues we got The Ottobar, Metro Gallery, and there was a Mexican restaurant called Holy Frijoles but they’ve stopped doing shows. I enjoy living in Baltimore.

It’s true that the last decade Turnstile

represent Baltimore’s underground/ independent scene in the best way. How do you feel about this? Do you like Turnstile?! Are there different/segregated hardcore scenes there? How do the rest of the bands perceive Turnstile’s success?

Interpersonally there’s multiple factions of what compromises Baltimore’s underground scene but all you and the world need to know is that Baltimore is a gang. We’re friends with Turnstile, been knowing those dudes for years. We’re happy for their success; those dudes been working at it for years now, outside of that band. Being a musician is fucking hard so anyone who sticks it out has my respect.

Shows are back since a year or so now! Besides being active for just a few years

before Covid hit the world, you managed to play shows with artists varying from Life Of Agony to Lil Ugly Mane! What does it take to accept or not accept a show offer? Which would be your dream line up?

In order for us to accept a show offer we first gotta play with bands we respect. If we think your band is wack we will probably not play a show with you. After that part we have to see if our schedules are open. I couldn’t tell you what our dream lineup would be, but I can say we’ve played shows with a ton of bands we have admired for years at this point in our band career.

I know that you are a fan of Comedy! Wanna elaborate on this?!

I’ve been what I could call a student of comedy since about 1996 when I was old enough to watch Comedy Central and I really would study the stand up and be able to retell entire bits verbatim. I love comedy and would love to transition to stand up / acting at some point in my life.

You are also doing a podcast dedicated to black people in hardcore! Up The Blunx! Give us some more info!

My podcast is called Up The Blunx and is sponsored by “The Hardtimes”. It’s for everyone but it’s a Black American perspective on punk/ hardcore.

That’s all I guess! Ready for your first European tour in November 2022?! Share

with us your future plans! Shows? More tours? A full length maybe?!

We may write a full length, we haven’t decided yet. Big stoked on our first time to Europe. I never planned to live past 18 so being able to do all the things I’ve done in life is badass. We got put onto the Reading, Pennsylvania Holiday Jam at Club Reverb earlier today. Hopefully a full US at some point.

And to finish with a bang, what’s your top5 of Baltimore hardcore records?! Thanks!

Gut Instinct - Disturbing The Peace Stout - CCS/NGMF EP Next Step Up - Intent To Kill Trapped Under Ice - demo End It - One Way Track EP

Back in November/December 2020 I released the ‘New Wave of Hardcore’ tape featuring contemporary hardcore bands from all over the world. One of them was Ben’s Spirit Flaw and besides that Ben Stuckey was one of the first to order a tape from the States. I keep listening to his name and learning about his music endeavors by regularly checking the Joe Hardcore podcast. It seems that Ben is one of the most active youngsters involved in the Philly hardcore scenes, playing in bands like Fools Game and Last Man Out, booking lots of shows in the area and even giving a helping hand to the latest This Is Hardcore Fest. Got in touch with him in midSeptember 2022 and talked about his resume and Philadelphia hardcore.

Photos by Danielle Dombrowski Photography, @bby_internet and Carl Gunhouse Photography.

www.instagram.com/foolsgamehc

Hey Ben! What’s up dude? How’s life treating you?

Hey man thank you for having me! Life is great. Introduce yourself! How old are you, what do you do for a living, what’s your favorite football team and top movie?!

Yo, I’m Ben Stuckey, I’m 23 years old, I just landed an insurance job, my favorite movies are Good Will Hunting, Superbad, and Goodfellas. Favorite footballs teams; American Football: Eagles, MLS: Red Bulls, Premier League: West Ham United.

You are super involved in the Philly hardcore scene, you play in a few bands and you also organise shows. Let’s start with Fools Game, since this interview is kinda based around FG & Last Man Out. Who’s in the band? When did you start? You know, the usual!

Clemo our singer, Bailey from Fading Signal, and Andrew & Nick from Shackled. When the pandemic happened everyone got too busy but Clemo wanted to keep it going so he got me, Big Jake and Old Ty, and we began playing shows like mad men in March of 2022. Now we’re writing a 5 song EP that should be out in Nov.

I think that lately you are more active with Last Man Out, or is it because you recently released a new split? Would you like to give us some info about LMO and your new release? Do you share members with Fools Game?

Yeah that’s fair to say. Not intentional just excited to be fronting a band finally, and with Fools game in the studio it just works out well. LMO and the two songs on the split have been written for about a year. Last Man Out started as a Snubnosed side project and has almost all the same members. The other side of the split,

Life Cut Short, is actually all the same people, too. We just switched the lineup around so I play bass on that side and the drummer of LMO, Kutz, sings. And I brought the Snubnosed/LMO/ LCS guitar player Young Ty, into Fools Game before This Is Hardcore as our second guitarist.

You are also in Spirit Flaw, right? I remember putting one of your songs in a tape comp I released 2 years ago. And I think you were one of the first to order a copy! Do you have plans for a new record with SF? The single ‘Here to stay’ you unleashed in the summer was rad!

Yes! Spirit Flaw was my very first band and I remember that comp! It was great and we were happy to be a part of it. Sadly, Spirit Flaw is on hiatus at the moment but it’s just the way it goes. People get too busy sometimes.

I think we have covered the bands you are in! Or do I miss anything? How did you find about hardcore and what made you take the oath to serve the scene forever?!

I think that’s all I’ve ever been in.

Past: Spirit Flaw/Snubnosed Present: Last Man Out/Life Cut Short/Fools Game.

Future: ???? Some things on the horizon…

I found out about hardcore through punk bands like NOFX when I was 12 or 13. From them I found classic hardcore like Minor Threat, Negative FX, Black Flag etc., then I got into more modern hardcore through bands like Trash Talk, Blacklisted, Code Orange and Paint It Black. From the second I found punk and hardcore, though I’ve never thought about anything else. I dedicate myself to this subculture because it is truly the one thing I believe in. To me hardcore and punk are the closest we can get to truly escaping the normal world at large.

Let’s move to booking shows! Tell us everything we need to know!

I booked my first show with two friends last October at a VFW just outside of Philly. After that I booked a show in Feb. to celebrate my birthday and since then I set to do at least one show a month and ended up doing even more. My goal with booking shows outside of Philly is just to rebuild the Burbs and get more youth into the scene. For years it’s felt like not enough kids outside the big city had a scene they could call home, this is why I give students a discount price at shows, to give an extra motivation. At this date I’ve done 13 shows between Bethlehem and Philadelphia. Booking first shows is my

favorite thing to do.

I used to and occasionally still book some shows in Greece, and I know how much a pain in the ass is, plus also risky, to take care of everything. I got fed up with shitty band’s behaviours and people not giving a fuck about all the work you do, and I have also lost tons of money, so right now I only do some local shows and occasionally give a helping hand to touring bands featuring friends. Have you encountered any similar problems? What keeps you motivated to continue?

Sadly yes, a few times I’ve had to eat a good bit of money or a band or venue will make things difficult, but honestly I’ve been very lucky with how well things are going right now. I have an amazing team of friends and mentors who’ve helped me out and give me advice to prevent any major problems and I couldn’t be half of how successful I’ve been without them. What motivates me is my love of hardcore and my larger goal of getting more kids into hardcore.

I listen to Joe Hardcore’s podcast and I think that almost in every episode Joe mentions you, haha! Did you work at This Is Hardcore, too? How big is Joe’s influence in the Philly scene?

Hahah, that’s definitely possible. He’s the best, I got nothing but love for him and all the Philly dudes, they treated me with nothing but kindness even when I probably didn’t deserve it. This year I helped set up for This Is Hardcore which was a very surreal feeling to have just a small part in making something happen that means so much to so many people. And his influence is indescribable. Without him the scene here literally would not be half of what it is.

What are your favorite bands coming from the area? You had Punishment, you had Dysphoria and you even had Blacklisted and Kid Dynamite. All top tier bands, in my opinion!

I mean you just named some of the best of them haha! But yeah Blacklisted will always be one of my favorite bands. Punishment, Krutch, Dysphoria, No Retreat; all legendary PA bands.

Some other PA favorites are Strength For A Reason, Mother Of Mercy, Agitator, CDC, Paint It Black, Cold World, Bad Seed, Aus-Rotten. From my very specific home of the Lehigh Valley about an hour and a half north of Philly there’s Carpenter Ant, Snowing, Mr. Yuk, Bad American.

How’s the scene over there nowadays, by the way?

In Philadelphia it’s incredible. Shows on a Monday and Wednesday night can have 100s of people. Outside the city it’s slowly building. But there’s so many amazing bands from the area. Be sure to listen to Fixation, Chemical

Fix, Killing Me, Off The Tracks, Struck Nerve, Garrote, Reaching Out, Crashing Down, Life’s Question, Never Again and more.

Anything else you wanna add?

Don’t break edge. Don’t Drop Out. Shave Your Head. Start A Band. Don’t try to be normal. Fuck Popular Culture. Fuck the Government. Only Hardcore is Real.

Thanks so much and hope to meet you in person anytime soon! Stay safe!

Thank you for having me man I really appreciate it. Good luck to you and your scene.

Carl Gunhouse Photography

Iam a photographer in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. I picked up a camera to participate in hardcore almost thirty years ago. While not making pictures at shows, I’ve done bodies of work on American politics, suburban landscapes, indie wrestling, and gentrification all subjects fitting an aging hardcore kid. To get pictures out into the world, I’ve published fanzines, books and have been fortunate to have work in The New York Times, Vice and Maximum Rock N Roll. I am lucky enough to teach photography to college kids to pay the bills. In my free time, I

am also part of running an art gallery I helped start in Brooklyn called Transmitter, which has been featured in The New Yorker, Artforum and The Brooklyn Rail. I still go to shows regularly, do my best to participate as much as I did at seventeen and of late tried to push myself out of my comfort zone by making more portraits at shows. I am still straight edge, still vegetarian and have a wonderful wife and two cats.

www.carlgunhousephoto.com @carlgunhouse on IG / Twitter

Well, to be fair, I still regret selling that rad Foreseen long-sleeve I got during the Helsinki D.R.I. show in the summer of 2019 (hell of a tour, by the way, could elaborate on this some other time…), but after all I have gained weight and L is not my size anymore, haha! Anyway! Foreseen straight out of Helsinki lads and gents; the perfect blend of thrash & hardcore, crossover, or however you wanna call it. It’s already been 11 years since I got the split 7” they did with Upright (from Finland, as well), and this band never disappoints. Their new album that was released a couple of weeks ago (or maybe months when you read this!) via Quality Control Records is soooo good! Give it a spin and read what Mirko has to say about the band’s history, the Finnish scene and today’s hardcore!

Photos by Liro Koo, Niko Velkman and Teppei Miki. www.instagram.com/foreseenhki

Hey! Welcome to Soulcraft 4! Give us a short bio of Foreseen, who’s playing what, when did you form, etc. You know the drill!

Hey! Thanks for the opportunity. Foreseen started in late 2009 by me, Mirko, on SM58 and our ex-guitarist Erkka, who left after the ‘Grave Danger’ LP. Our drummer Mårten joined in 2012. We got Jaakko on guitar who started as a fill-in on the 2015 US tour and joined officially a bit after that. Next we got Ville on other guitar and he’s been in Foreseen for four years now. We recorded the last LP, ‘Untamed Force’ with Jaakko doing both, his own guitar tracks and bass, because our bassist Joonas left in 2021 to focus on his adult life. Since I’ve been the youngest member of Foreseen for our whole existence and I’m turning 30 very soon, it was time to get some fresh blood to grease the gears, so we got Tuomas aka Stögä on bass who’s in his early 20s and is a hell of a bass player. Can’t wait to see what he brings to the table when we start writing again.

You play pummelling heavy hardcore combined with heavy metal. I’d say it’s 50% hardcore and 50% metal. Your song ‘Oppression fetish’ even has an epic part in it! Where did you draw influences from? What’s more important, heavy metal or hardcore, for Foreseen?!

The influences come from many different places. Obviously it’s mostly metal and hardcore/punk in this band, but there’s tons of smaller things buried in there from various genres. Mårten is very into Yes and Deicide, Ville loves Black Sabbath and New Order, Jaakko is digging deep in obscure jazz and other stuff I don’t understand, and I’ve spent most of my money in G-funk vinyl lately. So, what I’m trying to say is that all of that must have some effect in the final outcome of our songs. Speaking of that

Oppression Fetish track; for example we were influenced by and made references to Whiplash, Dio era Black Sabbath and Totally Insane, 90s gangsta rap group from East Palo Alto in that very same song, haha!

Your new record is about to be released soon! Any info on this? Do you have a street date? I’ve read that Quality Control from London is going to release it. How did it occur to collaborate with Ola’s record label? You also play Damage is Done later this year.

30th of September. A week away as I write this. Quality Control HQ lives up to its name. We dig the label and we admire all the effort put in all the QCHQ releases. Also the lady behind it all, Ola has been a friend of ours for many years, so we thought it would be a good fit. We already

did ‘Power Intoxication’ 7” with her and it went smooth. Yeah, it’s gonna be good to be back in London after a long break!

It’s been 5 years since ‘Grave Danger’, why did it take that long for you to release new material (besides the 2019 2-song single)?

Well, we did a US tour right after the release of ‘Grave Danger’. Also another tour in Europe, another one in US, a bunch of one off shows here and there, that DIY 7” and a tour in Japan. Looking back at it, I think we got a good amount of shit done with this band. Our members are

also involved in different bands, such as Kohti Tuhoa, Death Toll 80k, Kaleidobolt, Violent Spirit, Killing Frost etc. etc., that also released records during that time.

I have the chance to catch you live when I was touring with D.R.I. and we visited Helsinki 3 years or so ago. I still remember that your performance was very eye catching and struck a nerve on me. Did you miss playing shows the last couple of years and how do you feel now that everything is back to ‘normality’?

Thanks! Actually I didn’t miss the playing at all. It was a well needed break for me personally. I’ve been doing this band since 2009 and the band has always had at least some shows coming up and plans to do new shit. So it felt pretty good to actually use my holidays to charge my batteries instead of going on tour and focus on other stuff for once. Two years of break was enough and now that we have brand new material coming out it feels like a new start and I’m excited to be back at it again.

affect your everyday lives? There were threats by Putin against Finland in case the country joins NATO. What’s your take on all this?

Damn, what a question... First of all, fuck Putin and all of his puppets. Of course it’s been stressful on a national level to share the border with Russia, especially with our history, at the times like these. Do we even have a good choice? Honestly I don’t know. All I know is that we couldn’t stand a chance alone if we would be in Ukraine’s position.

How’s the political situation in Finland? And how did the Russian invasion to Ukraine

Back to the musical side of things, what’s your favorite crossover period and what are your favorite bands both in hardcore and metal?

To be honest I’m not a huge fan of the sound many consider “crossover”, but I definitely dig some albums where NYHC bands dipped their toes in metal and the other way around. AF’s ‘Cause For Alarm’ is one of my favorite example, even though I like their first LP even more. Favorite bands? Damn that’s hard. Let’s say Negative Approach, Agnostic Front and Slayer.

Foreseen is not a new band, you already exist for more than 12-13 years if I’m right. How’s the scene in Helsinki and Finland in general?

It feels pretty good. Judging of the very few shows I’ve seen during the last two years. The gigs have been quite well attended, even though there’s usually few different shows happening the same night in typical Helsinki fashion. It also seems like there’s a bunch of new faces at shows, which is cool. More and more women starting new bands, and death metal kids getting into other type of heavy music. Our scene mostly runs on local bands, because touring bands don’t come over here that often due to our not-so-ideal geographical location. Probably even less now that playing in Russia is out of the question. Check out G.A.Z.E., Raamattu, Cageless and Gray State!

One of my favorite hardcore bands ever was and is Endstand. Is their influence still present in the Finnish scene? Do you like Endstand? Did you have the chance to see them live? I managed to make it to their last ever show in 2010 and was such an experience!

Hard to say really. I haven’t seen that melodic hardcore sound being that popular with younger kids yet. There’s a good amount of people between 30-40 who still dig them a lot but, like usually with that age, people tend to move on to new things and the younger kids are starting to take their place. I saw them few times I think. That Combat Rock thing was big when I was a teen and it played its part in getting me interested in punk on a local level.

You also had a thriving scene in the 80s with bands like Rattus, Riistetyt, Kaaos, Destruktions, etc. How important is their legacy for Foreseen? I get it that NYHC and crossover is more of your thing, but I can definitely say that I can hear some old Finnish punk/hardcore influences in your music!

To bridge your two questions together, I bought my copy of Destrucktions LP from Janne of Endstand, hah! Those bands are definitely influential for sure, especially in Ville’s playing. You better check out his other band, Kohti Tuhoa to know what I mean. Those bands you mentioned are so raw and aggressive and at times catchy too and that’s definitely something that we aim for as well.

By the way, what’s your view on today’s worldwide hardcore movement? Any standout bands? Are you involved in the scene anyhow besides playing in Foreseen?

I think there’s a good amount of interesting records coming out, so that’s a good sign. The Chisel, Game, The Flex and Big Cheese have put out great stuff lately for example - I’ll assure you the UK scene is not paying me for that answer! But yeah, I’m very curious to hear those new Savageheads and Long Knife LPs too. Also I gotta give shout-outs to our friends in Germany and Sweden putting in a lot of work in their local scenes!

I’m not that active these days, outside Foreseen. I booked a lot of shows from my teens to midtwenties. Sometimes I draw gig flyers and be part of releasing friends’ records, but that’s it really. Paying in at other shows and buying records from time to time are self-evident and doesn’t really need to be mentioned, right? These days I’ll rather do less and likely be more satisfied with the outcome. That being said, Killing Frost will have a 7” out in 2023!

Last words are yours! Is hardcore more than music?!

As cliché as it is, yes. However it’s naive to think that we all will have something more than the music in common. Otherwise you’ll end up being disappointed.

Gag?! What a band! I am so happy that I have them in this issue. The first time I really paid attention to them was a few days before the 1st lockdown, at the Turnstile gig in Berlin (March 2020). They delivered such a great and intense show that it blew my mind. I mean I have listened to them a bit before, but never delved into their music, to be honest. So, the months that followed that gig I got their records and since then I concern myself a big fan of the band! Their latest opus ‘Still laughing’ is a hell of a record, from the cover to the last song, can’t wait for their next record! I don’t

know if ‘Gag are the America’s new hardcore heroes’, as Vice wrote a few years ago, but they are undoubtedly great ambassadors of America’s hardcore scene nowadays. Thanks to Jose for answering my questions, check out his other bands (Apex Predator rules) and if you like movies, don’t forget to check his podcast, too (at its 5th year already).

Photos by @daggers_for_eyes, @robcoons, @in2thewayside www.instagram.com/gagguys

Hey hey! What’s new at the Gag HQ?

Just touring and trying to plan for what the next move is after this West Coast tour is done.

Why Gag? What does it stand for? Who’s in the band and when did you start playing? Are you involved in any other hardcore activities (bands, zines, labels, etc.)?

Gag is Jose (me), Adam, Jeff, Ian, Paden, and a few homies who fill in, Kevin and Casey. Jeff is in Odd Man Out and Change, Paden is in

Death’s Door and I’m in Apex Predator, Sun Spots and Crawl Space, and I do a podcast called Every Movie Is Good.

First time I got in touch with Gag was by reading a Vice article that grabbed my attention. ‘Gag are America’s new hardcore heroes’. Do you feel like this?

No hahaha, we can be whatever you want us to be and I think even separately we have our own meaning and reason to do Gag. Plus we’re not into the idea of being America’s anything.

Your sound is so different from today’s hardcore, reminiscent of 80s hardcore / noise punk bands like The Germs or even G.I.S.M. but also modern but now defunct bands like Hoax. Which bands helped you mold your music style and which are your all-time favorites?

We’re not really concerned with what the rest of hardcore is doing in regards to our sound at all. We just wanna do what we want. As for influences and all-time favourites, we must mention the key bands; Rudimentary Peni and SSD. Contemporary hardcore bands are mostly influential to us in the way that when we see a band that loves what they are doing and they push themselves, it fuels our fire to go harder too.

‘Still laughing’ is one of my favorite hardcore releases of the last years. What influenced your writing and how easy was the whole process? Where do you record? Your records are released by Iron Lung Records, a label that I think suits you the best! Do you plan on moving to a bigger label sometime?

Ah thank you that’s really cool of you to say. My writing process is the same for every band and is extremely annoying and tedious. I obsess over one song for days then bring it to practice and we play it and I continually change riffs and structure up until the day we record. We recorded with Cameron Heck in Seattle and got it mixed by the big homie Arthur Rizk. Iron Lung is our dads. They have help sculpt us and shown us huge love how to conduct our band from early on.

Who’s responsible for that amazing cover with the guy with the bicycle for ‘Still laughing’? How did you come with such a great idea and what do you want to demonstrate?

I took the picture actually and the story behind it was we were at a Snake Festival in Eugene Oregon when I watched this guy get his face painted, he was singing the national anthem and hissing… I followed him with my camera and he turned around and I snapped the photo and he said “come closer child”. Saw him in a pizza spot hours later just staring at me. Chilling stuff. Couldn’t make that story up.

You come from Olympia, Washington. How’s the scene over there? Favorite bands / venues / whatever?

Yeah Olympia, Tacoma. Seattle is our home base. Favorite bands going right now personally gotta be Physique, Lexicon, Electric Chair and Dead Family Dog.

You have already toured North America, Mexico and Europe. What differences do you spot between touring in those places? Any memories and funny or not so funny stories you want to share? What’s next on your calendar?

Mexico actually never happened, we got turned away at the border hahaha. The big difference between Europe and America is that in Europe they really take care of your food and lodging. I’d say the second is a significant less atmosphere of “cool guy” bullshit. I really appreciated that about them.

‘Ha ha ha, blah blah blah, either way you die’. Wanna talk a bit about your lyrics? There’s a provocative irony that I really like.

I want everyone to interpret the lyrics their own way. I will say a lot of our bands collective coping mechanism is through humor.

Is Gag a pro-crime band like it’s stated in your ‘Nobody’s smile’ video?! What’s the definition in crime for you? Is breaking the law always a crime?

You gotta get it how you live. Law means nothing really, no one is looking out for you, you have to do what you have to sometimes.

I was at a Turnstile show recently and one of the guitarists was wearing a Gag hat with the ‘No cops’ slogan on it. Besides that, I saw you in Europe for the first time as support to Turnstile, days before the first lockdown. It’s amazing that this band still gives space to smaller hardcore bands to perform in big crowds with them. How important is Turnstile for the contemporary hardcore scene? Do you still consider them a hardcore band?

Hardcore is an ethos. Turnstile is a hardcore band through and through. Turnstile has such

a huge platform and them helping promote hardcore bands is amazing. They run Pop Wig and put out records too. They are incredible people with love to share with everyone. We have been embraced and show only support and respect from them. Shout out Turnstile, I love watching the team win. It’s Olive Garden.

I like asking bands about their top-5s, bands, records or songs. But for you I have something special. What are your top

5 favorite things / situations / etc. in the world?!

Okay this is hard but I’ll do top five pertaining to music. No particular order.

1. Hearing the final mix of a record you recorded on.

2. When you’re playing and you see people as excited as you are to be at the show.

3. Needing out with fellow music obsessors. Nothing like finding another person who is gonna dig deep into bands’ discography, after hearing one EP, their lore or all the other bands they had members of.

4. Working and supporting artists. Shout out Soloman, Legfarmer, Foie Graphics, Riley Kerr, John Vanacore and so many more.

5. When you go on a tour and nothing fucked

up happens to your van. We have only maybe gone on three of those.

Thanks for the interview, it means a lot. Any shoutouts?

Yeah, no problem, hope it was fucking boring, haha. Shout-out NWHC and any scenes pushing and building.

Lately, I had the pleasure to take care of the European (but also available globally) edition of the split tape between Indonesia’s Keep It Real and Singapore’s Wreckonize, released in South East Asia by Greedy Dust and Divided We Fall. A few months prior to this, I discovered Greedy Dust Records, an Indonesian hardcore label with such an impressive back catalogue. As I wrote somewhere else in this issue, I wanted it to be as widespread as possible and try to represent the worldwide hardcore scene, and the interview with Delpi from GDR adds to this.

I am glad that this issue feature bands/labels from Australia, Japan and Indonesia. I would love to have South Korea’s Slant, too, but they never got my message (I guess), maybe next time. So, fuck the mainstream, there’s lots of great underground scenes of our counterculture in the whole world to explore. Welcome to the Indonesia hardcore scene, these coming pages belong to Delpi.

Logos & photo provided by GDR.

www.instagram.com/greedydust

Hey hey! Please introduce yourself! Who’s behind Greedy Dust Records?

Hello, big love from Indonesia! My name is Delpi Suhariyanto and I am the owner of Greedy Dust Records. For now, Greedy Dust have 4 main powers; Jaka Permadi (Bizarre Voc) as Designer, Aziz Nurfata as Operational & Finance Officer, Denise as Admin, & me as Marketing & Production manager.

What was the urge to start a hardcore label in Bandung? I must say that GDR’s discography is impressive!

Actually, Greedy Dust was formed in my hometown called Blitar, in East Java, as a distro (distribution store) in 2015. We were selling anything about music & art but because I love hardcore I released my friends’ band. First release we had was Deluded, they play hardcore/punk music with an aggressive stage act. Meanwhile, I had to continue my bachelor studies in Bandung. So, I declared Greedy Dust bankrupt in 2017 and then I run it by myself as a record label from 2018 and on. All this stuff happened because I love hardcore & want to make it sustain, especially in my country.

I am not familiar with the Indonesian hardcore scene, so as you can imagine, we need a scene report! How’s the scene over there?

As everyone knows hardcore comes from America and I think every hardcore kid in the world has the same idea, to make their scene as cool as hardcore in U.S.A. Almost all bands from Indonesia want to become like their hardcore references in U.S.A. But I think this is not a problem, because basically hardcore, and music in general, is a universal language to deliver messages about how we appreciate everyone in our society and to make all our minority friends feel safe in our scene. But you can make this idea come true if you do it alone. Indonesia has a big problem in sexual harassment, especially to women, and this happens in underground scene, too. Ini Scene Kami Juga!, a documentary movie about women in the hardcore/punk scene, directed by Hera Mary (Oath Voc) can represent Indonesia’s scene today. As time goes on, more hardcore kids will make this scene safe and fun

for everyone. So, right now, you can find many interesting bands in Indonesia with their political statements and absolutely their music and art.

Any legendary local bands? The predecessors of today’s scene? Any bands from the 80s/90s that are still around?

One of the biggest influences, based on the artistic achievement, is Puppen from Bandung, one of the best hardcore bands from the 90s. Although they were active for only a short period, some of their members, like Arian 13 (Seringai) & Marcel Siahaan, are still active today. I would also like to mention Straight Answer, a true youth crew living legend from the 90s.

Are there separate local scenes? Which cities are the most active when it comes to hardcore/punk/metal shows? Do you often have touring bands from outside Indonesia over there?

Nowadays, the internet is very helpful to connect scenes. But as a country, Indonesia has a complicated problem in Papua, so in my opinion it’s hard to find connection in Papua or in any area near there. Big cities have good infrastructure and a creative ecosystem to keep their scenes alive. Jakarta, Bandung, Jogjakarta, Surabaya, Malang & Bali are some cities that have intense programs & art events about hardcore or other art movements. So there are more possibilities to organise events for touring bands there.

Is the scene connected to other scenes from nearby countries in the South East Asian region? How hard is for an Indonesian band to tour?

Yes, of course, especially with Malaysia and Singapore, because they are really close to us. Greedy Dust have some vision to connect the whole South East Asian hardcore scene through our collection, and for this reason we release an annual compilation called ‘Out For Blood’ that includes newcomer bands from Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore. We hope that next year we can include bands from the Thailand hardcore scene, too. Basically, Indonesia is a big country with many islands, so it’s harder to tour in another island because it is very expensive. Usually, we make tours in one

island; Java and Sumatra, for example, host lots of hardcore tours. Another reason is that our country is one of the most corrupted ones. That shit makes our country poor, so it is hard to establish an international movement.

What problems do you have to cope with running a D.I.Y. label in Indonesia? I guess it’s expensive to import records or even ship outside of the country, so I think that your target group is the local scene, right?

Yes, like I said before, the main problem is money, our currency rate is relatively low. So, it’s hard to ship outside Indonesia. But we can overcome this if we make good stuff, good music with great artwork, so other people from

other countries will help us to send it outside Indonesia. For example, we were very happy that Quality Control Records from the UK bought some stuff from us and one band of our roster, Crucial Response, managed to get their EP, called ‘Puppet’, re-issued by the US label Not For The Weak Records. And, absolutely yes, our target group is the Indonesian scene.

Tapes are back for good the last decade! I really like the format and since it’s so much cheaper and faster than pressing vinyl, most of my label’s releases lately are on cassette format. Do you only press tapes or other formats, too?

Yes we press on vinyl sometimes, if there is a great demand for a band, or if we have good material (both music & artwork).

Everything concerning the artwork, from your logo to your releases’ covers is so cool! Do you work with local artists? Anyone we should check out?

Thank you! We have worked with a lot of great artists. Our logo using the Old English font was designed by Tiny Studio (Jakarta). Some artists we often work with are StoneGag (Kendal), Conbini (Malang), Eye Dust (Bandung – ed. check his amazing work on the cover of this issue), & Fr3lan (Palu).

As I mentioned before, GDR’s discography is amazing, all releases are of great quality

but they are also so diverse! From Defy to Keep It Real and from Wanderlust to Dazzle, all hardcore styles are covered! How do you choose the bands you work with and what are your stand-out releases so far?

Yes, we have our own curation, but it’s quite flexible. One of the best bands from our roster is ZIP from Jakarta.

One of the best hardcore websites around is the Uniteasia.org, you are lucky to have a platform like this, since as far as I know there’s not any other major hardcore online platform besides No Echo (Idioteq and DIY Conspiracy are doing a great job, too). But Unite Asia focuses strictly on Asian extreme music. Are you anyhow involved in this? Are there any other sources of hardcore information you follow?

No, we are not involved in Unite Asia, but we quite often send our press releases to them. Personally, I am active on Instagram and follow many music platforms, and also hardcore bands that I like, so it’s easy to get all the hardcore information I need.

Hardcore is in great shape nowadays! What are you favorite current bands and releases? If you were able to release a non-Indonesian band, which one would you pick?

Turnstile is always on top when it comes to hardcore releases, but I think they are in

another level anyway. Never Ending Game, Pain of Truth, God’s Hate, Despize & Gridiron are in my playlist for a few months already. But if you ask me who will I pick for a GD release that would be Whispers from Thailand, I want to make Greedy Dust Records home for the South East Asian hardcore bands and represent Indonesian hardcore, as well.

Terima kasih! Let’s finish this with your top 5 of South East Asian hardcore bands ever!

It’s really hard for me to pick the best S.E.A. hardcore bands ever. I will pick 5 of my top bands for now; Sial (Malaysia), Zodd (Singapore), Losing End (Singapore), Whispers (Thailand) and Crucial Response (Indonesia).

TYPE O NEGATIVE

Discography

Albums:

Slow, deep and hard (1991)

The origin of the faces (Not live at Brighton beach) (1992) Bloody kisses (1993) October rust (1996)

World coming down (1999) Life is killing me (2003) Dead again (2007)

Singles, promos & EPs:

Unsuccessful coping with the natural beauty of infidelity (1991) ? (1993) Christian woman (1993) Black no.1 (1993) Summer breeze (1995) Rust cuts (1996)

My girlfriend’s girlfriend (1996) Love you to death (1996) 3 track sampler (1996)

Ozzy Osbourne / Sepultura / Type O Negative on tour (1996)

In praise of Bacchus (1997)

Pictures of matchstick men with Ozzy Osbourne (1997) Cinnamon girl (1997)

Présentation Multimédia (CD-Rom, 1997)

Everything dies (1999)

World coming down cassette sampler (1999)

Radio only sampler (1999) Everyone I love is dead (2000)

Static-X / Type O Negative - Levi’s spark radio broadcast (2000)

I don’t wanna be me (2003)

Life is killing me sampler (2003) Santana medley (2006) Symphony for the devil (DVD, 2006) September sun (2007)

Iced Earth / Type O Negative / Engel - Setian massacre (2007) Highway star (with Deep Purple, 2013) I don’t wanna be me (with Trivium, 2018)

Compilations:

The least worst of (2000) Absolutely live High Voltage (2004)

The Least worst of / Blood kisses (2001) Slow, deep and hard / The origin of the feces (2002) The best of Type O Negative (2006)

None more negative (2011) The complete Roadrunner collections 1991-2003 (2013)

Collage by Slam Jameson www.instagram.com/slamjameson

Ihad the chance to spend almost a day with the Instructor guys, specifically Dario & Bert in the first days of September 2022. After having moved to Amsterdam for 10 days or so, me & my girlfriend decided to travel to Brussels and check out the Instructor / Verzet / Burning Kross gig at Cobra Jaune. Dario and his girlfriend were super kind to host us at their house, cook us and show us around. Such a great night! Prior to this, I have listened to the 3 Instructor tapes and watched them live in London in November 2021 in an ultra-fun and great set at Damage Is Done festival, with lots

of stage-dives and high-fives! When I started planning the new issue of this zine, Instructor were one of the first bands in my list, no second thoughts. Check them out, new record coming out soon by (guess who?!) Quality Control Records! If you like late 80s NYHC, a la Killing Time & Breakdown, with a noisy/punk vibe, do not sleep on this!

Photos by Emilie Desir, Bobby Annihilated, Call Me Killer and Kevien Pictures.

instructorbxl.bandcamp.com

Hello Dario! Hope you are fine brother! How’s Brussels?

Hey Apostolis, I’m doing well thanks. There’s not much happening in Brussels at the moment I must say, let’s go to the next question haha.

Tell us a bit about Instructor; when and where did you start, who’s in the band, where have you played till now and the usual titbits!

Instructor is Charlie, my brother, at the drums, Bert at the guitar, Xavier at the bass and me singing. We played our first show in 2019 and had our first demo tape released by QCHQ a few months later. Since then, we’ve released 2 more tapes on our own via Maximum Labour Records. We played quite some shows here and there, including London, Toulouse, Paris, etc. Besides that, our stomping ground is the infamous Cobra Jaune bar, located downtown Brussels, where we started booking hardcore/ punks shows in 2018.

Brussels has a rich hardcore history with legends like Arkangel and Length of Time still being active there! How did you first get in touch with hardcore? What was your first show and how big was the influence of the aforementioned bands on you to get involved in the scene?

I got into punk via my father when I was pretty young and then quickly got into the Belgian hardcore/punk scene. Back then I had more interest in thrash bands like Reproach than Arkangel or LOT. This Brussels metalcore scene mostly had an audience of people in their late 20’s-30, so it wasn’t the same, you know. This being said, Arkangel and LOT are 2 bands that I love now and it’s always cool to see them live.

You have released 3 demos so far but as far as I know your first full length is on the works! Give us some more info about it! What should we expect?

We recorded this LP in March 2022 and we are pretty happy about it. Some of its tracks sound like our usual stuff, but there’s a few surprises as well. It took us some time to finish writing every track ‘cause we had high expectations about

this release. QCHQ offered to release it and we couldn’t have hoped for a better label to work with for this release. A single track has already been released on the QCHQ Bandcamp, but the full thing should come out in fall 2022.

I dare to say that your music style is something between 80s NYHC and late 90s Euro-core! What do you think about this? Which bands or scenes have influenced Instructor?

Yes, that’s correct, I guess one of our biggest influences is Breakdown. All in all, we’re mostly inspired by 80s NYHC but try not to have a too narrow vision on influences, as we also all listen to other styles of hardcore/punk.

Instructor is a new band but you have already managed to play lots of shows in Belgium, France, UK, etc. What was your best moment till now and what was the worst one? I feel that you have a strong connection with the London scene. Your show last year in Damage is Done was fire!

It’s true that we have a strong connection with the London scene, or UKHC in general. We’ve been to a lot of shows in the UK and made some good friends over there. Also, QCHQ has been supporting Instructor since the very beginning of the band.

The first Damage is Done fest in 2019 was one of our coolest gigs for sure. We hadn’t played a lot of shows before that and were stoked to be featured on such a bill. This gig and the whole fest were beyond crazy, as soon as the opening bands played their first notes. Coming from Belgium, this whole stuff seemed surreal to us.

I really like your artwork, too. All 3 demos has this kind of dirty yet eye-catching and definitely old school artwork. They have that urban feeling that is so distinct! Who’s responsible for your aesthetics? Is it true that Spoiler is taking care of the artwork of your new album?

For these 3 tapes we’ve worked with Max Lab, Nicky Rat and Dave Decat. They’re our friends and knew what we wanted to do, but of course they did it with their own touch and we’re really happy about it. I guess you’ve already seen

Nicky Rat’s work, but you should also check out Max Lab, who did some artworks for bands like Culprit and Domain, and Dave Decat, who’s a great illustrator and made dope record covers and stuff, including artworks for Hangman’s Chair and Sheer Terror. For the new LP, it’s planned that Spoiler will work on the cover. We all love his art and are really looking forward to it.

I also dig the covers you are doing! CroMags, G.I.S.M., Cockney Rejects, what

else? I think that the covers represent your influences, too. Would you try any nonharcore/punk cover in the future ?

Those 3 cover tracks were featured in our latest tape, ‘Private Execution’. We’ve never played them live, except the Cro-Mags track, ‘It’s the limit’. Besides, we’ve already played covers of the 4 Skins, Side by Side and Sheer Terror. I think ‘Wonderful world’ from the 4 Skins is my fav cover to play live. We never wanted to play any of these cover songs too much though, we

prefer playing new cover tracks a few times and then to go on for something else.

Besides Instructor, almost all of you are active in other bands like Terre Neuve & Verzet. Please give us some more info about them!

Terre Neuve is a side-project with ¾ Instructor (Bert is the one missing in action), in which Charlie sings in French. We have a 7” coming out soon on the amazing Mendeku Diskak from

Basque Country.

Bert is filling in at the guitar in Verzet, a new band from Antwerp and Brussels. He’s going to be busy with them for a few more months, since their guitar player is still recovering from a bad elbow injury. They just released a sick demo tape on PMT records from London, go check them out!

Tell us the story behind Cobra Jaune Skins! I recently visited the CJ place and even

though is not the regular place you would expect a hardcore show to take place, I can truly say that the atmosphere was so welcoming and that you have a strong crew working on shows!

Cobra Jaune is a dive bar where we started booking shows in 2018. It’s located in a really sketchy area of town. Back then, the place was only hosting darts competitions and Congolese or Brazilian parties, so it was probably weird to start doing stuff there but for some years we couldn’t find any other place in Brussels, and thus decided to give it a try. It quickly caught the attention from people and bands and in a few months we could host some solid bills. As you say, it’s not really the usual place for shows but I think most people enjoy coming to our shows and like the vibe, and so do the bands.

What was the best show you have organized Cobra Jaune! I cannot even imagine how was the Arkangel show there!

I’ll probably start with the Big Cheese/Illusion show in August 2018. That was one of the first gigs we ever put up at Cobra Jaune and it was the first time we had such big bands coming over. I remember seeing a lot of people coming from far away and discovering this new place. It was really cool to feel something was happening at our local shithole, and that we were putting Brussels back on the map. A few months later, Game/Stigmatism played a sick show and that was also our first show as a band and we were stoked to be able to play at Cobra Jaune. Lately, the Rixe and Arkangel shows were crazy with everybody going wild, because a lot of locals know all of their songs. And luckily, there has been only 1 K.O. during the Arkangel set.

How’s the Brussels scene now? Any standout bands? And what about the rest of the Belgian scene? It seems there are lots of active bands in the last years. What’s the thing you love and what’s the one you hate in the scene?

As for the Brussels scene, you should check out Fucked Up Minds, they’re a bunch of younger kids who play fast hardcore/punk. Tesson are our close friends and will soon release a demo, they’ve already played a few shows and sound really cool.

As for the Belgian scene, there’s a lot of active bands in Flanders, which is the northern part of the country. Flanders has a rich scene, as it can be seen on the bills of Ieperfest or, since last year, Return of Belgian Hadcore fest. All in all, it’s a decent scene for such a small country, but I think it definitely lacks some newer bands with a real DIY/punk attitude.

What’s next for Cobra Jaune, Instructor and all your other bands? Any plans on touring excessively?

We should play some shows in the UK soon, early next year or something. Also, a small tour through France, Basque Country and Spain is in the plans for the spring. The first EP of Terre Neuve should be out by then, so it would be a great occasion to play some shows with both bands over there. Also, we’re putting up a fest at Cobra Jaune on the week-end of March 17-19th 2023. More info will follow soon.

What’s your favorite H8000 record and why?!

To be honest I’ve never cared that much about the H8000 scene. I’d probably choose ‘Blackened persistence’ by Congress, even if I’m much more into the 2 first Arkangel LPs, which were recorded only 100kms east of the H8000 area haha, does that count? Also, if you’re into H8000 and don’t know about Backstabbers, which were also from Brussels, you should definitely check them out !

You are not on social media, why is that? Do you want to keep Instructor underground? How can someone get in touch with?!

We don’t feel the need for a social media account, I think people usually know where to find us and then where to get our releases. Besides, I think that some bands spend way too much time building their Instagram reputation and I’m happy not to be among them.

Thank you very much! See you soon! Last words are yours.

Thanks for the interview, I’m looking forward to reading the new issue of the zine when it comes out. Cheers to everybody who’s helped us as a band.

My first ever zine, Keep It Real, hosted an Integrity interview at the pages of its last ever issue (no.10), that was released on 23rd December 2010 (according to issuu.com). Well, to think that 12 years have passed, and I am still here, doing zines, it’s something, at least... On the other hand, time flies unbearably fast, but that’s another discussion, I guess. So, what I remember the most from that Dwid/Integrity feature back in 2010 is his short answers, and when I say short, I mean short. ‘Funny’, ‘intelligent’, ‘shitty’ – was some of the feedback I received back then for the Integ interview. Go check it out at issuu and find out yourself.

Fast forward to September 2022, and here we are again with Dwid as a guest in my new endeavour! Integrity is one of my favorite bands ever, period. It was about time for good ol’ Dwid and his straight, to the point, shorter than short answers to my questions! By the way, I had the chance to watch Integrity live in Rotterdam a few weeks ago (mid October 2022), during their European tour – as mentioned below – and the band still riiiiips; don’t miss them if they visit your town!

Photo & logos provided by Dwid. www.instagram.com/integrityofficial www.integrity.band

Hello Dwid! Welcome to Soulcraft IV! What’s going on in Integrity’s headquarters?

I am preparing for 2 Integrity concerts next week in the USA, followed immediately by a European tour. My early Integrity albums have started being reissued by Relapse Records and I am working on a new album.

I have interviewed you for my previous zine, Keep It Real, 12 years ago and I remember everyone getting pissed off because of the short answers that you gave, which on the contrary I definitely loved! Actions are louder than words, right?

Haha

You are still based in Belgium as far as I know.

Yes, I have lived in Belgium since 2003.

How’s life there?

The region in Belgium where I live is a rather calm & quiet place to live.

Do you miss the States?

I am frequently in the USA for concerts. I fly to the USA about 5 or 6 times each year.

What’s happening with Integrity when you tour outside US? Do you bring the guys over here?

There are 2 live line-ups, but on this upcoming tour the lead guitarist from the USA line-up will be performing on the EU dates as well as the USA dates.

Who’s in Integrity right now, by the way?

I assume that you mean on albums? Domenic Romeo and I are currently writing the new album.

It’s been more than 5 years since your last release ‘Howling, For The Nightmare Shall Consume’, do you plan on releasing something new soon?

Yes, Dom & I are currently working on a new

album.

Relapse Records has been reissuing my early albums with enhanced mixes and updated artwork. At the time of this interview, my first two albums are available, ‘Those Who Fear Tomorrow’ and ‘Systems Overload’.

You have several other projects besides Integrity, wanna give us some updates? It seems you are always busy with something!

Psywarfare performed in Chicago (USA) for Dreary North Fest last Saturday.

I am working on a new full-length album for Psywarfare which will be also released by Relapse.

Your lyrics always deal with parallel worlds, the supernatural and the hate towards humanity. Do you still believe that humanity is the devil, especially in the context of the last years with the pandemic and wars going on?

The pandemic certainly did not make my opinion on Humanity soften.

And if humanity is the devil, who’s God? Wanna elaborate a bit on your religious beliefs? Let’s talk about Holy Terror and the Church of Process if you don’t mind! I bet that you are being asked about this all the time, but please spare some moments to let us know!

“Humanity Is The Devil”, as a title, was intended to imply that humanity generally behaves with evil intentions. Whether its actions are conscious or unconscious, the outcome remains the same, selfish and soulless.

It would appear that we are living in a Hell and that God is no longer interested in hearing your pleas for salvation. The Devil holds the key.

You have been using the image of Charles Manson a lot. What does Charles Manson, or his image, mean to you?

Actually, I have not used Manson imagery in about 10 years. But, to answer your question, when I was growing up in the 1970s and

1980s Charles Manson was portrayed as the living embodiment of the Devil. This depiction of a living Devil imprisoned in a cell on earth intrigued me. Manson’s involvement with The Process Church also captured my attention. There is also an interesting component to all of this where Manson’s court trial was corrupted by a book deal offer to Vincent Bugliosi, the prosecutor of the case.

Manson’s public persona was that of an outlaw Devil, a Devil which held the United States population in a constant state of inescapable fear for decades.

How do you connect with his philosophy?

This is a complicated question. The short answer is, I do not connect with Manson’s philosophies nor do I connect with the imagined philosophies of Manson as misrepresented by Vincent Bugliosi.

You recently did a cover of Motörhead’s Ace of Spades along with other musicians from the metal/rock spectrum. You like doing covers, varying from Donna Summer to Septic Death. What’s a guilty pleasure you haven’t been able to cover yet?

Nothing that I do is a guilty pleasure. Those insecurities lie upon other people’s allegiance to conformity which they project onto others. I live without constraint, fear or confinement.

To address your question, I might enjoy recording a Meat Loaf song someday.

Do you follow today’s hardcore scene? Any bands that you really like? What’s your top hardcore band, by the way?!

I enjoy listening to music, I do not conform to any one genre nor comply with the restrictions associated with any one genre.

Some current musical groups that I enjoy listening to are: Devil Master, Full Of Hell, Choir Boy, House of Intolerance, Duma.

Is G.I.S.M. one of the best bands ever?! What’s your favorite song / record?

G.I.S.M. is one of my favorite bands. G.I.S.M. released 3 albums and I enjoy all 3 albums as well as their compilation contributions.

If you were to erase from history one Integrity record, which one would that be?

Integrity was not created to appeal to everyone’s taste.

You are also a great artist, doing paintings and artwork. Who are your all-time favorite artists and who are the contemporary ones that you admire their art?

Max Ernst, Felicien Rops, Francis Bacon, Sakevi Yokoyama, Pushead.

Integrity is almost 35 years old, what empowers you to keep going after all these years?

I do not dwell upon nostalgia. I unleash musical sermons which manifest within me.

Is music paying your bills? Have you ever thought of the vanity that goes hand in hand with playing hardcore/metal music while getting older?

I try to not pay attention to what other musicians do, so I am uncertain what you mean about their general vanity.

Seeing almost every band from the 80s reuniting makes me happy on one hand (because I have the chance to see some of my ‘heroes’ for the first time), but on the other hand most of the times saddens me a lot because of their sloppiness on stage. What’s your view on reunions? Have you watched any decent one?

I have never attended a reunion concert, so I cannot comment on this.

Are we just before the dawn of a new apocalypse?

With each generation, the world is always seen as coming to an end. Humans desperately clinging to the notion that their time is the single most most important era of history.

Merci, see you out there!

JONATHAN BUSKE

Not only is he a legend of NYHC but Jonathan Buske is a great person to talk with. Hard-working, always on the spot, a hell of a graphic designer and an amazing musician. His CV includes performing and recording for bands like Another Victim, Terror, The Promise, Maximum Penalty, Manipulate, etc., in no chronological order. He is also responsible for some incredible graphic work for Terror, Sick Of It All, Vans and Jedi Mind Tricks, among others. Since 2018, he is taking care of An Attitude Exhumed, a fanzine that celebrates hardcore, punk, metal, and underground culture.

He also runs an incredible online archive website, dedicated to the Syracuse scene. You can’t imagine how happy I was when he ordered Soulcraft & Still Life zines. To be honest, I couldn’t think of a better interviewee for this issue. Go check his work, but first read what he has to say!

Graphics provided by Jonathan Buske.

www.instagram.com/anattitudeexhumed buske.bandcamp.com

Hello Jonathan! Would you like to introduce yourself to the Soulcraft readers?!

Hey, what’s up? Thanks for reaching out, and for reading. My name is Jonathan Buske, or just Buske. Born in 1976. Son, brother, father, friend, husband, graphic designer, bass player.

You are born and raised in New York, right? Do you still live there?

I was born and raised in Auburn, NY, a small city about a half an hour outside of Syracuse, NY. Moved to and lived in Syracuse from 19992003. Spent a year in Philly before meeting my wife which led me to Queens, NY from 20032009, and we’ve been on Long Island since 2009. So yeah, currently still in New York after a lot of bouncing around for several years there.

At what age did you get into hardcore and how did you stick with it?!

I got into Hardcore heavily around the late-80s into the early-90s. Was into a lot of Thrash, Death, and Heavy Metal before that but with my interest in skateboarding got a subscription to Thrasher Magazine around 1988 which opened a floodgate of new Hardcore, Punk, and Crossover soundtracks, as well as the skateboard videos which soon flooded the culture, too. I think I stuck with it because it was/ is an organic interest. No one had to convince me of any of this underground culture, it automatically just made sense to me, then as a kid and now as an adult. What some of the kids and people around me thought was cool just didn’t seem cool to me, and as I’ve grown older, none of those sentiments have necessarily waned. I think I’ve grown to become more accepting and tolerant of popular conceptions and mainstream culture, however, I always look to the underground to connect and find inspiration and motivation.

You have an incredible resume, having played in bands varying from Terror to Rag Men and from The Promise to Manipulate. Could you write down all the bands you have been involved in one way or another?!

Thank you, I’ve been lucky. Another Victim was the first notable band I played in, followed by Santa Sangre, then The Promise and Rag Men

at the same time, followed by Terror, Maximum Penalty, and Manipulate. I also played in a band called Unholy (with JD from Another Victim, Santa Sangre, and The Promise) for a little bit, and did some fill-in stints with Final Word from Canada and Blacklisted at one time. Also once learned a bunch of songs in the parking lot at a Posi Numbers Fest to fill in for Stand Accused from Boston, and was blessed when I got to fill in for Hoya once at a Madball show here in Long Island. Again, fortunate, and lucky.

Another Victim was your first band, a project that made a big success in the late 90s. You even released a split with Shai Hulud. What memories do you have from that period?

Another Victim was an amazing learning experience and a time of flowing creativity. A lot of youthful energy with passion, vision, and drive. I was a fan of the band before joining, having heard the demo and then seeing them live, so I was especially stoked when I eventually joined and now was able to be a part of it all.

The demo was as solid as you could get in terms of a new breed of Syracuse Hardcore, so they came out of the gate swinging right away. They recorded a bunch of songs that would become the “A Portrayal Of Vengeance” EP after Jamey Jasta from Hatebreed heard them and released them on his newly launched Stillborn Records label, which is when I joined the band, in late 1997. He hooked us up with a ton of great opportunities right off the bat, including a run with Pushbutton Warfare and shows with Death Threat, Biohazard, Entombed, and Hatebreed. We then released the “Apocalypse Now” EP on Equal Vision Records in 1998, the Shai Hulud split on Trustkill, and self-released the final 3 songs, “For The Liars And Cheaters”, in 2000. For the short amount of time we were around, we did a couple of great tours with One King Down, Turmoil, Brother’s Keeper, Earth Crisis, VOD, Fury Of Five, were given a ton of opportunities, and had a great support system of labels through it all. Like many bands just starting, I think Another Victim suffered from an unstable line-up which ultimately led to the band’s premature demise.

Santa Sangre was next, then The Promise and then Terror, right? How much time did you spend in Terror? How do you feel now

when after all these years Terror not only still play but they are considered one of the best, if not the best, hardcore bands of the last 2 decades? Do you miss playing with them?

Correct. Santa Sangre was very brief in 2000, only about a year and a half or so, then The Promise started up and became the priority in 2001 until 2005 when we broke up and I then joined Terror from 2005-2008. Of course I miss playing in Terror, they truly are the best Hardcore band of the past 2 decades and I was blessed to be a part of that journey at one time.

However, they remain some of my closest and dearest friends to this day, and recently did a couple of tours filling in on bass with them— so even though I’m not in the band, I’m never very far.

What was next? Do I forget anything? Oh Maximum Penalty!

Yeah, MP! After Terror, I got a “real job” as a graphic designer at a big merchandise company called Bravado and planned on trying to shift mental gears away from a band/music/touring mindset and more into an art/design/career

mindset until I went and saw an MP and Killing Time show in 2009. They had just recorded the incredible “Life And Times” LP and needed a bass player, so I jumped at the opportunity being a longtime fan and joined Maximum Penalty in 2009.

Are you still active in any bands? Is Manipulate over?

Currently not active in any bands for the first time since 1997. Maximum Penalty is sidelined without a local drummer, and Manipulate is no longer a priority. I wouldn’t say Manipulate is over, as we’ve never agreed to disband or break up— we’ve just let sleeping dogs lay, I suppose. Have talked with some people about starting something new. Nothing has come to fruition with any of that just yet, but it will.

Of all the time spent on the road, what was your favorite period, and with which band? Do you regret anything?

Each one was great in and of itself, as each one was a learning experience and building block. Plenty of regrets because of hindsight, but I’m grateful and fortunate for each opportunity given to me through them. That being said, Terror was the highlight of them all for me though, as it gave me the chance to travel the world and fulfill several dreams and personal wants and needs. It’s where the years of work in all the “failed” bands prior felt like they were starting to pay off in so many ways.

You have an incredible archive focused on Syracuse hardcore. Tell us more about it! There is a big history of hardcore in the city. How did you experience the early 90s? I guess you were too young to attend any shows in the 80s…

Thanks! Yeah, Syracuse has a really cool history of music before the Hardcore scene it’s most notably known for. There were a bunch of great punk/hardcore bands in the early / late 80s— The Catatonics, Milton’s Disciples, Shit For Brains, and 1Death2 to name a few, but as you said, I was too young to experience that era and by the time I got into the Syracuse scene in the early 90s, these bands/people were pretty much gone— so we built our own scene which became the 90s Syracuse Hardcore scene

many people came to know.

You even run a label and recently re-issued Santa Sangre’s ‘Feast For The New Gods’ cassette. Do you plan in releasing more forgotten gems or even re-press out-of-print Syracuse hardcore records?

The Santa Sangre cassette release on An Attitude Exhumed came as a spur-of-themoment thing as we were reissuing the vinyl through Closed Casket Activities, but I would love to grow to include more audio output as well, and your suggestion is exactly what I was thinking. We’ll see.

You are working as a graphic designer. Did you start by designing hardcore records and logos? Once again your resume is impressive, having designed posters for Agnostic Front and even that Vans limited edition shoes for Sick Of It All! Where do you draw inspiration from and who are your favorite hardcore artists?

Thank you, again. Yeah, I started like most kids, probably… drawing band logos on your school books, sneakers, pants, etc. which then led to an affinity for graffiti, tagging, and hand styles. Fumbled my way through helping do some fanzine layouts early on, followed by a few years of doing actual graffiti until focusing on learning the computer and teaching myself all of these different design programs. Did a bunch of flyers and work for a local tattoo shop that helped me cut my teeth until tackling the original version of the Santa Sangre, “Feast For The New Gods” layout in 2001 as my first official design project. As far as inspiration, shout out to PK, Grez, Ian Adams, True Hand Society, Jeremy Dean, Winston Smith, and anything cut and paste and xeroxed with very little thought process. Some other names to note; Simon Tripcony / @onetricpony, True Colors Creative Group / @truecolorsusa, Edgar Regalado / @ edgarzilla, Matt Worthey / @wortheydesign.

You released an amazing fanzine dedicated to Earth Crisis called ‘Smash Or Be Smashed’. How important is Earth Crisis for you? Are you vegan and / or straight edge? What’s your favorite EC record? Any other fanzine on the works?

Earth Crisis are dear friends and a very important band for me on many levels. To preface this, I am no longer Straight Edge or Vegan, but feel that that should have no bearing on one’s opinion of the band. ExC is responsible for teaching not only me, but an entire generation of kids about compassionate and thoughtful living choices, respectful tolerance, and most importantly self-worth and self-preservation. Those are core values I learned a lot about life through, carried with me into adulthood, and are also instilled within my children. “Forged in the flames of chaos, hammered by trials to tempered steel”. That shit is poetic to me.

Currently working on another issue of An Attitude Exhumed print zine and have a few other print projects started that need some more work and devotion, but yes… more fanzines in the works.

Having spent so much time in hardcore, how do you feel about today’s scene? How relevant to modern society is hardcore nowadays?

I think it’s incredible to see how far the Hardcore scene has grown, and on a global level. I understand the word and the bands sometimes associated with it vary based on who you ask nowadays, but there are a ton of new bands I love that are keeping to the more traditional and metallic style of Hardcore I’ve grown to favor over the years. Shout out to Never Ending Game, Pain Of Truth, Combust, Gridiron, Downfall, New World Man, Mongrel,

Deal With God, Live It Down, Berthold City, Echo Chamber, and Killing Pace— all great new bands. As much as it’s grown and changed over the years, I think there will always be an organic network creating something original in the underground (that may eventually seep out into the mainstream), but that’s where a lot of the relevance is found— in the youth movement or people in the trenches creating it. As more of an elder in the Hardcore community now, I see (and respect) the vitality in the energy of youth that the Punk and Hardcore scene thrives on and how much ability it has to change, grow, and enrich people’s lives— musically, socially, and artistically.

Top-5 Syracuse hardcore records please! Earth Crisis, “Firestorm” demo Godbelow, “Painted Images…” Blood Runs Black, Demo 1994 Framework, “Justice Coming” The Catatonics, “Tied Down”

Thanks so much! Keep on doing great stuff!

Thank you! Appreciate the interest and time checking it out. You can also see my design stuff at buskedesign.com and @buskedesign on Instagram, and An Attitude Exhumed online at anattitudeexhumed.wordpress.com and @anattitudeexhumed on Instagram.

Also check out An Attitude Exhumed on Spotify for a bunch of different style playlists updated daily and weekly.

Ialways like to include at least one Greek band in this zine, trying to represent my country’s hardcore/punk scene. This time I reached out to Malignant, one of the most hard-working local bands right now. Those youngsters have managed to release a great record and even play lots of shows abroad in 2022. To be fair, I did not expect such long and deep answers but at the end I really love how this interview turned out to be; definitely the best interview ever featured in this zine, hands down. Shout-out to Malignant for all the effort! The stage is theirs!

Photos provided by the band.

www.instagram.com/malignantmhc

You just got back (September 2022) from your first European tour! Tell our readers everything we need to know! Best place to play? Best band to play with? Most beautiful city? Best food?

There’s so much to say honestly, the tour was unbelievable and so much better than expected. Good turnouts, lots of moshers and great hosts/ promoters. The best and most underrated place to play is surely Arras, close to Lille in France (places like Zurich and Lyon also deserve more love, those scenes are awesome). The show there was packed and everyone went completely crazy for our set even though it was a Tuesday, great folks from all over nearby towns/cities, too.

We had the pleasure to play a ton of dates with Times of Desperation and xUntold Sufferingx and they both absolutely ripped it apart every night, it was also beautiful to see them grow as live bands during the tour. We had the pleasure of playing with tons of amazing bands, like the fantastic Path of Resurgence and Sorcerer. Some other examples are Calcine, Sentience, Woodwork, Iron Deficiency, Affliction AD, and the best surprise was Divine Sentence who we fucking LOVE and can’t wait to cross paths with again.

You are all very young (with an average age of 20 if I’m not wrong), one of the youngest hardcore bands to tour out of Greece! How did you manage to organise everything

yourselves and how proud do you feel of what you have accomplished?

Yes, most of us are 20. Honestly, it was a lot of very hard, stressful and tiring work. There were many setbacks and trying to organise a DIY tour with the current economic and pandemic crisis was difficult. We are one of the dozens other hardcore acts trying to tour after 2 years of cancelled plans, most venues have closed, many promoters stopped booking and the rest are overbooked from years ago, so for a young act out of Greece to find the shows we needed was sometimes tricky.

Somehow though we managed to put together a 10-day tour with 9 shows (which is around

or most than what most bigger underground hardcore acts with a booking agent manage to get in Europe in 2022), with a very good routing plan (we mostly had 2-4 hour drives), good guarantees and great turnouts and we are extremely proud of all of that. At times it felt very difficult to keep pushing for it because of the issues we had (cancelled flights, cancelled driver, cancelled gear, lost gear, etc.) but getting to actually play the shows (and to see so many people come through and have fun at every date) was a very empowering feeling and made all the stress and work worth it so much. So yes, we feel proud of this tour and we honestly did not want it to end at all, we felt like we could have kept going very easily, we had found a good rhythm on tour and without neglecting ourselves.

When did you start the band by the way? Who’s in Malignant and what do you do besides the band? Do you play in any other bands or are you involved in your local scene any other way?

The band started in mid-2018, when we were 16 years old and played our first couple of shows late December of that year.

Mario (guitarist): I also play bass in RECLAIM (hardcore band with members of Iron Deficiency, Dodge This!, Changes, etc.) and I study biodiversity and ecology in the university of Lyon, alongside working part-time as a children’s English teacher. I am preparing some other music projects and I want to get more involved with organising shows here in Lyon, like I did back in Athens by putting up some house shows. Lastly, I would love to start a DIY label to press some tapes and CDs for friends’ bands, this has been an idea in Malignant for a while, our first release is also a “MLGNT” label release despite that entity not existing just yet haha.

Paris (drummer): For the past couple of years, I’ve been playing drums in Never-Trust (we have a new record coming out soon). I also play guitar in Detestment, drums in Snap and I’ve been writing lots of stuff for another project which will hopefully be announced soon. Besides that, I just finished studying Audio Production at SAE in Athens and I would love to work with local hardcore bands in the near future.

Michalis (bassist): Besides Malignant I also play bass in Detestment and Kiss Me Cleopatra. I’m also really involved with dubstep/bass music, I have a solo project called Vrodex which I’m producing my own songs and DJing in a few clubs. I just finished my studies in Music Technology and the plan right now is to try and live my dreams.

Giorgos (guitarist): I’m also playing guitar in Never-Trust, Detestment and Snap. I’m very excited about all these bands and I can’t wait to release some new music with them! Also, I really want to start a brutal death metal project with Mario and Michalis. We have some riffs in the works but it’s going very slow because we all lack free time. Lastly, I’ve been studying Graphic Design for the past 2 years and it’s going great so far, I love it.

Aimilios (vocalist): Other than the band, I am studying in the university for a French literature degree in Thessaloniki and I have started pursuing a career in cooking which is going great at the moment. I am also the bassist in Snap with Paris and Giorgos, and there have been some talks with some friends about starting a screamo band soon, I hope.

Athens used to have a great hardcore scene in the early 90s, circulating around the squat and anti-authoritarian movement, but as of lately there is not a big hardcore scene,

especially representing the style of music you are playing. What influenced you to form Malignant? Any local bands that motivated you or were you mainly inspired by the US scene?

What influenced us was, as you described, the lack of the styles of hardcore we preferred in our local scene, except from a couple of mostly inactive beatdown/heavy hardcore bands in the North (shout-out Overpain, Swarm of Rats, etc.), but that wasn’t what we wanted to do exactly.

We wanted to start a band built around the radical and political values found in hardcore and especially in the 90s/early 00s scenes, and the 90s metallic hardcore/metalcore boom, and beatdown acts have also influenced us for sure. We grew up really admiring the bands from the US and Europe that were resurrecting the 90s metallic hardcore / early 00s metalcore

sounds we loved and mixing it with some newer influences, because we are very fond of that era and sound of hardcore that we never experienced first-hand. With time, we started bringing more influences into what we wanted this band to be, the beatdown side faded a bit and the euro-core/edge metal/90s metallic hardcore side grew bigger in us, as well as the incorporation of everything from sludgier sounds, to melodic riffing (in the styles of Prayer for Cleansing, Undying, etc.) to myspace grind stuff. We all grew up with all of these different parts of hardcore, punk, metalcore and metal, so it’s only natural that we want to mix things more.

There were some locals that motivated us, mainly by inspiring us as live acts (Kalpa) or by showing us heavier hardcore sounds can work in our scene (Kin Corruption), but this band exists in part because of the void of our style of hardcore in the Greek scene.

You play a mix of 90s European metallic hardcore with lots of modern touches. Kickback meets Judiciary?! Dunno! What’s your take on it?

That’s a specific combination that we haven’t heard before haha but it’s not wrong, we love both bands and are influenced by them, especially Kickback at times. We’ll elaborate further on what we answered before, since you’re indulging us.

The 90s US metallic hardcore and the European edge metal / xvx metalcore scene between ‘95 and ‘03, and especially the H8000 scene are our main influences. There’s just so many amazing and differing sounds that came out of hardcore in the mid/late 90s metallic hardcore and consequent early 00s metalcore waves, and the last 7-8 years of bands building on that, that there’s so much to inspire you. Specifically, some of the bands that influence us the most are

All Out War, Reprisal, Sentence, Morning Again, Harm’s Way, One King Down, Year of The Knife, xRepentancex, Hatebreed, Arkangel, Kickback, Rain of Salvation, Foundation, Undying, Point Of No Return, Simulakra, etc. Furthermore, we grew up with a lot of the weirdness of myspace grind and metalcore and a lot of sludge and extreme metal, so we try to bring some of that into our sound sometimes, in our efforts to create a sound that is both interesting, more ours and coherent. We hope that with everything new we put out, our different influences will show even better.

Your first LP ‘With daggers between our teeth’ was released a year ago. What’s the feedback till now? Give us more info on the record!

Firstly, we wrote this as an EP, but it was too long so we see it more as a mini-album (in true 90s spirit haha); but given that anything past 18

minutes in hardcore can be seen as an LP, we purposefully never really called it anything but a “record”, so that everyone can decide what it feels like to them. Some interviewers call it an EP and others an LP, which is kinda cool to be honest, because we see that people do perceive it differently.

The feedback has been honestly amazing. There are so many incredible and unique but underrated bands coming out of the Greek hardcore/punk scene, because it’s so difficult to break into the broader scene, since the Balkans (and especially Greece) are never in the spotlight of the scene, which is too US-centric (understandably) or at best pays attention to UKHC and some Western European hardcore acts. With all that in mind, we didn’t know what to expect but we definitely wanted to push this record to gain some traction in the underground, and honestly it has gone much better than what we expected. It’s crazy to still see 450+ people listening to us on Spotify monthly, or to see so many people come out to our shows across the continent, or have bookers contact us for shows in the UK or US, or to see our records sell out in legendary Japanese hardcore record stores, or have interviews like this.

I can’t think of many acts coming out of south/ east Europe that manage to get attention like this so fast, simply because most people don’t care or don’t even know there’s hardcore in these areas; we are very grateful for it and we think others deserve it more than us, but we have worked hard to achieve this relative relevance in the hardcore underground. We just hoped a couple hundred people would listen to us and we could play some shows across our area, but seeing thousands of people listening to our record and hundreds buying it is crazy to us. We hope this all doesn’t sound like bragging, but looking back to the last 9 months, it is very difficult to take all this in, it feels very

unreal, and we are so thankful to every person that has checked out “WDBOT”, shared it, sent it to a friend, talked about it or bought a copy. It has been a surreal experience so far and we absolutely want to keep pushing it further, so thank you, everyone, and thank YOU for giving us a platform.

A super generic question that I haven’t asked for ages, but what hardcore means to you? Why did you choose this path?

Hardcore is so much more than just a music genre. The music is extremely important obviously, but usually it is a means to an end: the words being spoken and the bonds being formed are so valuable. Hardcore is a home and it is also a vessel. This scene can truly be such a warm and beautiful community, it can be a shelter, a place of acceptance and camaraderie and a force to bring about change in a very troubled world. As with everything else that exists within a faulty society, it can very often be a microcosm of those same issues, but we believe there’s so much effort to fight against that (be it sexism, racism, homophobia, egos, etc.). It is our best tool of inner expression and also the best platform to speak upon open minds and act to bring meaningful change within our communities. There is so much collective power because it’s mostly a horizontal structure, where we all need to take part in to push towards any common goal. As well as being a space to feel heard, to create meaningful relationships, to express and shed in a healthy manner all the weight of negativity that we all carry in us daily, alongside familiar faces that also need the same physical and emotional release.

To us, hardcore, is a rare place of liberation, both for the individual, and for the collective. And that is why we chose this path, because it’s a place where emotion and will to act are at the forefront. It’s a place where you feel

right and you feel heard and you feel powerful and not lost, alone, helpless and incapable of participating towards bringing change in your life or in your community, like this world often makes us believe.

Some of you are straight edge, too. How did you discover the movement and what is your perspective towards straight edge? Do you link it to politics? Athens (and Greece in general) is not that famous for its straight edge scene. On the contrary, I’d say that alcohol and drugs are widespread among the local punk scene. Did you want to make a difference and abstain from all this or was it just a choice for you?

Mario: I think Minor Threat is what introduced me to the concept of straight edge when I was in elementary school, and then a billion others followed. I claimed edge when I was still very young, after seeing many others around me (and myself, as young teens tend to start drinking early on in Greece at least) how shit, stupid and pointless getting drunk is.

Your questions are very interesting and multifaceted, so I apologise for the long reply. It’s difficult to answer shortly, because it draws on many different aspects (personal and societal) and subjects so I will do my best to be concise and not over-analyse.

Drug abuse is a big problem in Athens, that is vastly and purposefully undiscussed and overlooked, and that has always shocked me. The fact that the scene in Greece too has a big, undiscussed issue in its relationship to substance abuse, definitely played a role in my decision. I didn’t find it (and still don’t) at all coherent with the values we preach as a scene and with the political changes we are supposed to seek to bring. I definitely wanted to abstain from all of that and make my difference. I am

very happy that my choices played a small part in other youngsters in the scene to claim edge too, without me pressuring them or anything. I don’t like that side of being straight edge. I’m not gonna say “fuck you for drinking or doing drugs”, I want to be compassionate, understanding and accepting of each person’s struggles or choices. When friends have told me it was helpful and encouraging to see me being unapologetic about being straight edge and not give a shit about people making fun of me for not drinking and proving them I can enjoy myself without all that, and encouraging others’ struggles towards sobriety, I know that I’m doing my part in being the change I want to see around me.

So, being straight edge is a choice I took firstly for myself, secondly for those around me, and thirdly for my community. It started as something rooted in my need to feel healthy, in control of my life and my choices. PMA is obviously one of the goals of being straight edge, and it’s a tool towards being healthier both mentally and physically. I want to push myself to fight against my internal struggles (especially my mental health) and everyday life without unhealthy crutches and to hold myself accountable for my growth and efforts to be the best version of myself. It’s definitely part of a bigger outlook on life and my personal goals.

With time and nuance I clearly understood the political link there can be to being straight edge, especially thanks to many bands’ lyrics or various books on the connections between sobriety, hardcore punk and anarchist/radical politics. Growing up I educated myself (and continue to do so) on the strong historical and current connections between drug addiction, drug markets, alcohol consumption, poverty and the state, capitalism, authority and the various weaponizations of the previously mentioned to keep any revolutionary elements, any divergent elements, or any sectors of society

under further oppression and control, and as an excuse for brutal and continuous crackdowns. It’s a weapon against the poor to keep them in poverty because the system feeds off of that. Or of course the link between big pharma and the opioid epidemic. It’s yet another tragic result of unrelentless capitalist greed. Drug and alcohol abuse are clearly connected to a classist societal structure and it’s in the state’s best interest to keep a big majority of the lower classes

“sedated” with substances. Exacerbated by the extremely problematic trivialisation of alcohol, cigarettes and certain drugs for young adults/ teens or as coping mechanisms, it’s clearly a weapon used against our own best interests.

I want my mind to be clear and conscious. I see the strength in self-control and the results that staying level-headed bring. I see it in my political activity, I see it in my health and my

everyday life and I am sure I will need it in the future, especially if we want to be realistic about bringing any sort of radical changes to this world - I feel that we need to be ready to do so without being dragged behind by substance addictions and similar distractions that only hurt us and those around us. My conviction only grows stronger with time, the more I see the more certain I am of my commitment. Some folks take any statements on being straight edge as if it’s

attacking them, so I’ll be clear: If someone else wants to live differently, that is fine by me, as long as they don’t harm others. Live and let live, as we say.

Paris: I was in High School when I discovered the straight edge movement. At the time I wanted to dive deeper into Hardcore and its history and soon enough I came across the straight edge movement, the band that got me

interested on it was Youth of Today. Eventually I claimed edge in the Summer of 2018. My perspective on straight edge is simple and it has been the same since the day I claimed. It’s not a trend or something to make me feel special, it’s a choice to be free from the influence of alcohol, drugs etc. and all the bullshit that follows it.

The connection between straight edge and politics had not crossed my mind earlier to be honest. Nevertheless, I believe the two matters are connected but I do not have anything else to add to the matter (Mario has covered me on this one).

When someone talks about the Greek scene the thought of straight edge bands or people does not even come to mind. It only takes a quick look at a local show to understand the influence of alcohol and drugs in the scene. At shows half of the fun for most people is getting wasted and throwing beer cans on stage. Also, in my opinion the consumption of drugs and alcohol is so widespread within the Greek scene that you could be frowned upon for choosing not to partake in such activities.

Of course, this extends to more than the scene. The preferred way of having fun for most people is by consuming alcohol and/or drugs and sadly teens are being dragged into this more and more each day especially because of the influence of the trap scene. Through that constant exposure, drug and alcohol consumption is regarded as mandatory for being seen as “cool” and “acceptable”, especially for younger generations. People also tend to lose control over their actions when drinking/doing drugs and as a result they can hurt themselves or, even worse, their friends, family or anyone around them.

acted, I made a choice. The choice was for me, I simply didn’t want to be part of that anymore, I wanted to have fun without all the nonsense and I wanted to be able to control my actions at all times. Finally, as mentioned by Mario, people often get offended by us just mentioning that we are straight edge; I got that at school back when I claimed edge and I still get that now. I’m not being preachy, you can do whatever you want, just don’t hurt anyone in the process.

The political situation in Greece has been in a downward spiral the last 10 years at least. Do you think that hardcore can provide an alternative or is it out of reality to talk about a hardcore scene when lots of people can’t even have the basics? Is hardcore for the privileged ones?

Being barely out of our teens, we’ve lived most of our life within the current depressing disaster that is the political situation in Greece. So we’ve only seen hardcore within this framework, and we don’t think it is unrealistic to see the hardcore scene as a tool for revolt and change. Quite the contrary. It definitely plays its small part. Any niche that can galvanise people to work together towards common goals with the sheer passion and conviction that the hardcore scene does, is important. The fact that most people in hardcore have some level of political activity and hold radical ideals speaks for that. Growing up in this scene we’ve seen so many events organised to raise awareness around certain political issues, to raise funds for political prisoners, migrants, squats, political struggles and initiatives, etc., that we’ve seen first-hand how hardcore/punk can be a positive tool in a problematic, bleeding society, and we have been influenced greatly by that as a band and as individuals.

So after I got a taste of all that and after I saw how people under the influence around me

It can be something more for the privileged ones when it’s allowed to function within those limits. A good example is shows with a fixed price

entrance and shows with a donation: both are absolutely valid for their own reasons, but only one allows for complete inclusivity regardless of socioeconomic status. But that again, is influenced by how much free time one has, and when most people work multiple jobs to make ends meet, it’s clearly easier for those with more time on their hands to get involved. But despite that, the scene in Greece is vastly from the working class, in our opinion. It really depends on how someone goes about it, and especially in Greece, it’s mostly been a horizontal, from the bottom-up logic, mainly due to the massive influence of the much bigger DIY/anarchist punk scene. There’s many folks, students like us or workers, who bust their ass off and somehow still find the time to be completely devoted to this scene, and that’s rare.

What are your lyrics about?

We write about whatever is happening around us that we see as important or impactful (positively or negatively) on our lives. On the Promo we dealt with police brutality, rampant and always unchecked in Greece (and beyond), and animal cruelty/ecological destruction in the name of profit.

Lyrically, “WDBOT” deals with the harsh realities of anguish and pain in a decaying, latecapitalist world especially in an economically and politically shattered, corrupt country. The aspects explored are on the one hand on a personal level with themes varying from the crushing mental struggles with anxiety and depression, to the empowerment of overcoming said issues. On the other hand, the main themes take a step back to talk about the blatantly tragic issues facing our societies and ecosystems, crushed, scorched and oppressed in the name of the economic gain of the few, and how it is our turn to show compassion, solidarity and humanity to one another, in order to inspire and bring about change.

Overall, the goal is firstly to creatively express in a liberating, cathartic and emphatic way everything that we feel around us, as part of a youth disgusted by the system imposed on us all and the way it affects us and our planet, a youth that naturally wants to change that, and secondly, and ideally, to light the sparks to continue the personal or socio-political struggles and fight back against a world clearly at war against human and non-human life.

I know that you follow the contemporary hardcore scene on a daily basis. What are your favourite bands and records of 2022?

It’s a good moment for the scene, there’s great bands in different niches of hardcore/ heavy music all across the globe. So let’s give a huge-ass list of some bands that are killing it this year. Obviously, we still haven’t heard everything coming out and there’s much more to come after September. These are just some of our favourites so far. Firstly, all the homies that released some incredible things: Path of Resurgence, Times of Desperation, xUntold Sufferingx, Escalate, Expectations, Iron Deficiency, Sorcerer, Moral Law, Calcine, Caged, fragmentsofaprayer and Chronoboros.

Regarding LPs, some of our favourites so far have been: Simulakra (NO. 1 BABY), Vein, Soul Glo (strictly god tier), Mindforce, Terror, Malevolence, Gridiron, 156/Silence, Piri Reis, FFAA, foxtails, Yearning, Anxious, Candy, Temple Guard, Deep x Cut, Gates to Hell, Orthodox, Lifesick, Age of Apocalypse, Greyhaven, Tribal Gaze, Rolo Tomassi, Excide, Wormrot, Downfall, Raw Brigade, Warfare, The Callous Daoboys, Port Noir, Kendrick Lamar and Rancore.

Lastly, for demos/EPs/others some of our favourites so far are: Foreign Hands, Contention, World of Pleasure, Cauldron, SPEED, Mortality Rate, Inclination, Envision, End It, Weapon X, Whispers, Abrasion, Broken Vow, No Cure, Rough Ground, xDeliverancex, Twist of Cain, Kublai Khan, A Knife In The Dark, Terminal Nation/Kruelty split, GEL, Invoke, End of One, Carbonite, Naedr and A Mourning Star.

We definitely want to tour more, we have some plans (UK, central/eastern Europe) we have to work on, but for now we just really want to put out some new music. We have written a lot since we finished with “WDBOT”, and haven’t had any time to record any of it, so that’s the priority. We want to put out some splits or smaller EPs (friends/good bands get at us). We really want to manage to work with some bigger DIY hardcore labels we respect a ton that for one reason or the other (heavy schedule, being a young band from an obscure scene, we suck haha, etc.) couldn’t work on us on “WDBOT”.

Please hit us up if you want to book us anywhere so we can talk about it, we want to take every opportunity thrown at us if possible, right now, nothing felt better than touring.

Lastly, we ask that people pay some attention to everything going on in Greece, the political situation is terrifying and has been for a long time, but seeing the state’s unrelenting authoritarian fascism grow these last few years, to crush any radical movements (especially the students’ movement) has been depressing and enraging for us all.

The same can be said for so many areas around the world, and it’s scary, but it’s up to all of us, especially the youth, to stay informed and work together across borders for our common goals towards human liberation and the protection of nature. We live in extremely crucial times, and if we don’t change this world drastically, WE will be the species going in the shitter.

What’s next for Malignant? Do you aim to conquer the hardcore world?! Last words are yours!

Thank you so much for giving us a platform to ramble on and including us in your always fantastic zine, we appreciate what you do for the scene in general so much.

MALIGNANT IS YOUR ENEMY - SOLIDARITY IS OUR WEAPON.

Mastermind is one of those newcoming bands that drew my attention from the first note of the first demo back in 2018. NYHC with lots of crossover vibes and a Black Sabbath influence; what else could you ask for? I had the chance to watch the band live a couple of times and I can definitely assure you that they deliver! Had a talk with Jon (their singer, also in Antagonizm – check their new album, it rocks hard!) about the band’s new album (out on Quality Control), UKHC and their tour with Combust, among other topics. Enjoy!

Photos provided by the band.

www.instagram.com/mastermind_ldn

Yo! What’s up? Mourning for the Queen?! In other news, how was the Static Shock weekend (took place in mid-September 2022)?

Hello! Mmmmm I’ll take the bank holiday, let’s just say that. Yeah it was great! Don’t think I partied as hard as many people I know but I had fun. Not sure my opinions on the Garage as a venue or their security staff but apart from that it was great. Few personal favourites; WARTHOG, ANNIHALTED, VERZET AND SUBDUED

What’s the master mind behind Mastermind?! Who’s in the band, how old are you and

what football team do you support?! Tell me everything our readers need to know! When did you form and did you play in other bands before or do play in now?

So Mastermind is Jon Osborne (me), Sean Cooper, Rory Oneil, Thad Anderson King and Karim Newble. I pretty much write all the music and lyrics apart from drums and the odd part. Our ages range, I’m almost 30, Sean’s 28 and the rest of the boys are between 22 and 25. Haha think me and Sean are the only avid football fans, me being a Fulham lifer and Sean chose to be a United fan around the age of 5 or 6 if I remember correctly. So other bands is a long list, but here’s some of the bands the members are involved in; Imposter, Lawful killing, Island of love, Antagonizm, Sterile and Layback.

UKHC is on a rampage! Lots of great bands and records and most importantly an amazing camaraderie. I had the chance to live in London for a couple of months last year and I was very impressed of how diverse is the scene and how big is the sense of unity that you can feel it in the air. What do you think about this?

Yeah it’s on a tear for sure. The bands are fuckin quality and there’s a shit ton of young people playing in new bands. I can’t speak for every individual pocket of the scene but the parts I’m involved in are on a high right now.

Mastermind is definitely one of the most NYHC bands not coming from NY the last years! Your modern take on Breakdown, Underdog, Cro-Mags or Rest In Pieces is sooo good! Which bands have influenced your music (I will ask you later about your favorite NYHC records, haha) and why did you choose to play this specific style?

bands who can do it well. Call me cocksure or whatever you want but I’d say there’s a handful of bands in America/UK that have done the NYHC thing with success. Us being one of them. As to why I play that style… Probably just my heavy metal upbringing and appreciation for groove. Besides, NYHC, I feel lots of thrash metal and even some Black Sabbath riffs! Am I right?! Metal was always present in the hardcore scene but I think that lately there’s an 80s crossover revival, which I definitely approve! For me, crossover at that time was just a precursor for that last boom of late 80s NYHC bands. So, Crumbsuckers, Agnostic Front and Nuclear Assault they really don’t differ much from Killing Time and Judge. Sabbath is one of my all-time favourites, so yeah for sure.

You have progressed a lot since the ‘Bad reaction’ EP and the promo 2020. I can say that now you have undoubtedly found your sound. What happened in between? Where did you record and how did you shape your style?

It’s just cramming all my favourite bands into a ball and trying to pull out something original. We recorded at Fuzzbrain studios, shout out to Ben Spence.

Who’s to credit for the brilliant cover of ‘The Masters orders’? What did you want to represent with the cover’s scenery?

Eye Dust (ed. Eye Dust is responsible for this issue’s cover, too). Check his Instagram it’s pretty insane! We could have went with a way more traditional hardcore cover but I think we just decided to do something a bit silly. The cover was inspired by Terminator, War of the Worlds.

Yeah, I mean I don’t think there is that many

What topics do you cover lyrically? How important are the lyrics on hardcore?

Anything that gets to me. Racism, sexism, mental health problems. On the new record there’s two songs that have more of a metal style in which I’m just writing fiction rather than about social issues.

You recently toured Europe with one of the best bands coming out of NY’s contemporary scene, Combust. It was your first tour outside the UK? How was it? Any incidents you want to tell us about? What was your favorite city and favorite city to be? Do Combust sound as good as they

sound on the record? Did they make you Polo RL fans, as well?

Yeah first time in Europe. We got through the whole thing without any real issues which was a miracle. Fuck! We went to a lot of cool places. Vienna was cool, they looked after us really well there. Paris and Switzerland were both really beautiful. Combust are real pros at what they do. No ifs or buts. Definitely not. Andrew showed up one day in a multi coloured polo shirt and short combo and all I’m saying is I’m glad I was wearing sun glasses. That shit to me is

really fuckin funny but respect. I’Il stick to buying second hand dickies and bootlegs.

What’s on your schedule concerning shows & touring? Hitting the States maybe? What’s your dream band to tour with?

Dizort or Firewalker, I’d love to hit the states with Pest control, some UK east coast invasion perhaps.

Top5 NYHC records released between 1985 and 1990?!

Scowl is one of the best bands to come out of hardcore/punk the last few years. Their shows are so intense and full of energy; I had the chance to watch their set at Outbreak fest last summer and I can assure you that bands like Scowl are rare. I originally reached out to them in the summer of 2021 (like with some other bands in this issue) but this is a totally up to date interview, conducted with Malachi (Scowl’s guitarist). We talk about the band’s history, their shows with Limp Bizkit, their influences and the contemporary Cali

hardcore scene. Watch out for Scowl if you are looking for the next big thing in our scene. By the way, I really love that more and more women are getting involved in bands, and Scowl is a great example of this. Shout-out to Gel, Crucial Thought, Punitive Damage, Spaced, Year of the Knife, Firewalker, Slon, etc. etc. and never forget that ‘female fronted is not a genre’.

Photos by Rebecca Lader.

www.instagram.com/scowl40831

Hey hey! Please introduce the band to our readers! How did you choose the name Scowl and what do you want to represent with this?

Hi, I’m Malachi and I play guitar in Scowl and we are from Santa Cruz/San Jose. I’m not sure if the name was meant to represent anything, my Grandma always said I had a scowl and Kat has pretty wild scowl when she sings so I thought it would be a cool name. I think over time it has taken on many meanings though.

How do you feel about today’s scene? Everyone’s thirsty, everyone’s touring; it seems that the pandemic after all regenerated the movement! What’s your opinion about this?

I think it’s so awesome and I love seeing all the new bands. I love seeing everyone out on the road.

You tour relentlessly, playing with bands varying from Drug Church to Limp Bizkit! Of course, I want to know more about the latter! Any cheesy moments? How did it feel to play with such a big non-hardcore band? By the way, you did a European tour in the summer of 2022 (was great to see you at the Outbreak fest), any stand-out moments or differences you spot comparing the EU/UK tour with the USA ones?

Touring with Limp Bizkit was great. They are all really nice people and have their ear to the ground. They pay attention to newer bands and they treated us very kindly. I don’t think there were any cheesy moments, just really fun and memorable ones that I’m very grateful for.

was one of the most fun sets we’ve ever played. I wish I could relive that moment over and over.

In 2021, 2 years after ‘Reality after reality…’, you delivered an amazing record called ‘How flowers grow’. Want to give us some more info about it? How was the song writing and the record processes? Was it easy to write and compose amidst the pandemic?

The record came about because of having down time in the pandemic. I was laid off so I just sat on the couch and wrote music and we ended up with “How Flowers Grow”. It all came together pretty quickly and it was really fun to do. I think it helped us take our mind off the pandemic. That time in my life was pretty depressing so I wanted to do something positive.

Scowl is getting bigger and bigger; besides the aforementioned big tours, you also have featured covers in magazines, interviews in the mainstream media, etc. Hard work definitely paid. And I have to say that you seem super down to earth despite all this success. What’s your take on this?

We really are just very happy to be playing shows. We always just wanted to play straightforward hardcore/punk and over time some of our other influences have trickled in musically. We haven’t really changed who we are because we got into this for the love of it. I’m really happy to be able to tour and I think if you let ego come up then it’s not fun anymore. I think if anyone in our band got a big ego we would make fun of them because that’s not what we are about. When we are home we go to shows here and help book them. It’s just about being part of the community and having fun as cheesy as that could sound to some.

Touring Europe was awesome. I think the main difference for us was that finding ice was a lot harder. I really like iced coffee. Outbreak fest

What are your influences music wise? You play pretty straight forward hardcore/punk

but I can definitely see some influences from contemporary hardcore bands from Cali. What bands did influence you to form Scowl?

All of the bands around us influenced us in some way or another. The bands that influenced Scowl sonically were like Negative Approach, Rival Mob, Sheer Terror and a lot of 80s hardcore. All of our friends playing in bands here helped by just getting us inspired. I saw them playing

shows and touring and we all wanted to do the same. I think we all have our own style and take on things musically.

There’s a big hardcore scene in Santa Cruz lately including bands like you, Gulch (R.I.P.), Drain, etc. How’s your perspective of the scene? What do you love and what would you change?

I love the scene here and I think it’s amazing.

I think the only thing I’d change is that I want more bands to start from here and get out there on the road.

hardcore’s agenda?

We had a lot of protests here and the cops were beating people in San Jose and shooting them with rubber bullets. People were driving into protestors and really fucking them up. It was a chaotic time and I think that people should continue to protest and not let the topic ever fade. A lot of work still needs to be done surrounding police brutality and its blatant racism. Hardcore has always had politics involved and I believe that it should always address social issues, political issues, and strive to educate people in a positive way. I learned a lot from hardcore lyrics that helped me grow in a very positive way. I don’t think that should ever stop.

Kat is singing for Scowl. I hate the term ‘female fronted’ but it still exists and I definitely believe that this should change asap. In your eyes, is hardcore still a macho, male-driven scene? What should we do to improve and get a more open-minded and inclusive scene?

The majority of the hardcore scene participated in the Black Lives Matter movement 2 years ago, with most bands releasing benefit merchandise, supporting the demonstrations or just spreading the news. How was the situation in your area? Are you happy that politics are back to

I can’t imagine what femme people go through in bands because I’m not one and am just a dude playing guitar. What I see femme people go through in hardcore is pretty disgraceful to what I always thought hardcore was about. There is so much bullshit that goes on that’s just blatant misogyny. The comparison of all bands with femme members is a major one and people trying to put bands with femme members in a genre or box is just narrow minded. Hardcore and punk was about the music and supposed to be inclusive of everyone unless you’re a racist, or a bigot of some sort. The insults and weird bro mentality that people have online behind anonymous accounts could go away and that’d be a nice start to changing things for the better. Maybe people listening to the music and not trying to compare every femme person they see in bands would be a step in the right direction.

A lot of people need to look inside themselves and ask why they are so hateful for no reason towards others.

passion just another kind of job then the magic is gone. What do you think about this?

What do you do outside of Scowl? How do you pay the bills? Any hobbies? Have you ever thought of doing the band fulltime? Some people think that if you do your

I used to run a few homeless shelters in Santa Cruz and since we started touring a lot I don’t do that anymore. Right now we all do part time work in-between tours because we are touring

so much. I don’t think if this became a fulltime thing that it would take away the magic. I think it would just inspire me to do more and I’d have all the time I’d want for it. I really enjoy playing shows and music, it’s the only time I feel normal.

Favorite hardcore lyrics ever?!

“We’ll shout it strong, shout it loud We are the ugly and proud And if you don’t like what we say Then you pay us no mind and stop wasting my time

And like it or not we are here to stay”

Sheer Terror

Prove me wrong but I think that Speed is one of those newcomer bands that could be a major player in tomorrow’s scene. Blending heavy hardcore with urban countercultures and delivering quality music along with great graphics and visuals, the Sydney based combo has managed to establish a big fanbase all over the world. Their set in the latest Sound & Fury was fire, go to youtube and watch it if you haven’t already! I had an all-

around and nice conversation with the brothers, Jem and Aaron, and of course I asked them about the famous photo with Shaquille O’ Neal, haha! Speed’s last record is out via Flatspot Record and it’s already in my top-20 for 2022!

Promo picture provided by the band. Live pictures by Aidan Griffith.

www.instagram.com/gangcalledspeed

Speed! What a gig in Sound & Fury?! That was ground-breaking for your band! Do you want to elaborate on this?

Jem - It was the most surreal, mind-blowing experience of our lives. The thought of playing shows in USA was a dream in itself so to be invited to play this was almost unbelievable. I don’t think any of us realised the magnitude of the show and how we would be received there. We just feel so privileged to represent Australian HC on that stage.

Who’s in Speed? You are based in Sydney, right? When did the band start and why did you choose to form another hardcore band?!

Aaron - Speed is based out of Sydney, Australia and is comprised of 5 members - Vocalist Jem, Guitarists Dennis and Josh, Bass player Aaron and Kane on drums. Speed was a band that started with a number of different goals - during a time where our scene was at a lull, one of the primary goals was to be another band on the bill and to grow the Sydney (and Australian) hardcore scene that we know and love.

You managed not only to overcome Australia’s super strict lockdown but to rise even stronger after this. Was the lockdown a great opportunity to work on band issues and deliver the best outcome?

Jem - I think COVID was the best thing to happen to Australian hardcore. I mean, globally hardcore is having a renaissance right now so I feel there was a similar thing happening worldwide. I think the absence of shows threw the rulebook out the window and forced us (Speed) to think outside the box. On a broader scale, I feel this period made people reflect on the outlets and circles that are most important to them. It seems like hardcore has been emboldened through this.

Australia has a vast music scene, from AC/ DC to Parkway Drive. What did you listen to as a teenager? How did you get in touch with the hardcore movement? First show and first record you bought?

Jem - We all mostly grew up on Australian hardcore. The first show I ever went to was to see Parkway Drive in 2006. The show had Stronghold, Jungle Fever and Her Nightmare and was my first time experiencing real hardcore. It obviously changed my life!! I think a lot of people from my generation found hardcore cus, at least in Australia, it was more broadly connected with heavy music in general back then. First CD I ever bought was the Wheatus single ‘Teenage Dirtbag’ when I was like… 8 years old?

Speed is far more than just a hardcore band. You intent to represent the city and its countercultures. This is present in your videos, too. Can you please give us some more info about this? How’s the underground scene in Sydney?

Jem - Sydney is a big city with a lot of talent that’s often unrecognised on a global scale. Especially for hardcore, it’s never really been a place recognised in that way. So it was intentional for us to put on for the city we are from, that we love (and hate), and that we’ve lived all our lives. It represents our friends and family; the values these stand to embody our pride in this place. It’s definitely an exciting time to be involved in the community here, I think there’s a shared sense of enthusiasm and excitement amongst multiple subcultures cus we all feel the rise of a new, more united generation. Sydney shit is bands like J.O.Y and Primitive Blast, rappers like Bayang (The Bushranger) and 1300, brands like 108 Warehouse and Killjoy.

Aaron, you run a streetwear called Del Saato.

You are also the artistic mind behind this and responsible for Speed’s merch designs. Do you want to follow a specific stylistic pattern? How important is it for you?

Aaron - Starting Speed, despite being a hardcore band, we didn’t want the band to be just that. In doing this project we wanted to show our members’ individual interests, style

and character - all the shit we think is cool and fresh - as well as to use it as an opportunity to work with friends and people whose work we admire. Whilst I am primarily driving the merch aspects, as most things with the band, it is still a communal effort with ideas thrown between the multiple members and we work with a number of great, local and international, artists to create the product and aesthetic that

we want. We’re quite deliberate with what we do, whilst this is the same for our merch, there isn’t a specific stylistic pattern that we followwe’re just making things that we think is fresh and make sense for the aesthetic and sound of Speed. This is incredibly important for us; for me, Speed is an extension of Saato and in that is another avenue to be exploring my creative endeavors. On top of this, it’s another means

for expression for the band as a whole - we’re a very visual band with a lot to say, having fresh merch which shows our outside influences, is just another way we hope to reach other people who fuck with what we’re doing.

2022 is the year of Speed. As I mentioned in the first question, I definitely believe that the Sound & Fury performance has opened

many doors for your band. Have you ever thought that one day you’ll play in the States with thousands of people going crazy?

Jem - Absolutely not. As I said, it was completely mind-blowing and we’re still processing it all months later.

What’s the story behind the picture with Shaquille O’ Neal?!

Aaron - Some crazy shit… it’s a funny story but in short - a clip of us playing at Sound and Fury went viral, Shaq commented on it. This got some eyes and we were hit up to see him at a meet and greet whilst he was here in Sydney

recently - the timing of it all was crazy and very funny to say the least.

Lately, your shows in Australia are sponsored by Vans. Is this a steady collaboration? You were also featured in Rolling Stone magazine. What’s your opinion on major brands and media ‘infiltrating’ the scene? Should ‘hardcore stay out of big business’ or it should get integrated in the music industry and try to change everything from the inside?

Jem - Everyone wants a piece now. Everyone loves hardcore now. And fuckin’ oath they should. All we care about is hardcore growing

and all our friends eating as they deserve. If a big brand makes sense culturally and wants to support that vision, send me an email.

Your latest album ‘Gang called speed’ is inspired by your heritage and culture. Give us some more info about this!

Jem - The ‘Gang Called Speed’ EP embodies who we are as people and what we stand for as a band. It’s about championing who you are in this world and not looking back. We feel fortunate to confidently express ourselves this way… maybe that can help empower someone else who hears this.

Influence-wise, what are the bands that have played a big part in your song-writing and lyrics?

Hatebreed, Biohazard, Madball, Trapped Under Ice.

Best bands from Sydney to look out?

Primitive Blast, J.O.Y (Jokes On You), Rapid Dye, Mood Swing

Last words are yours! Thanks so much and keep on doing great stuff!

Peace and love to the world.

Paradise’ is maybe the best hardcore 7” of 2022. It doesn’t come as a surprise that the legendary label Revelation Records chose Stockholm’s Speedway as their first European signing ever (if the UK is considered Europe, too, then Violent Reaction was the first). I mean, there’s many great bands in Europe nowadays, but Speedway is top tier (and style-wise closer to Rev). Talked to their singer Adam (also in Blood Sermon & Feels Like Heaven) about Speedway, their lyrics, the local scene, etc. It’s a rare thing to have 2 bands (the other one is Blood Sermon) from the same city featured in this zine, but that shows how good is Stockholm’s scene right now. Go read!

Photos by @alexandra.zvv, @andy_kungman and @inskramz

www.instagram.com/speedwaymusic

Hey there! Thanks for taking part in the new issue of Soulcraft! How’s Stockholm?

Adam: Hey, thank you! Stockholm is great, summer just kinda ended and the cold weather is creeping up on us.

When did Speedway start and who’s in the band? How did you choose a motor racing term for a band name? Do you see any comparisons between riding a motorcycle and playing hardcore? Is it the adrenaline maybe?

Adam: Speedway started kinda for real in 2019; Jens, Emil, Anton and Gabriel started the band and wrote a few songs. I was chilling with them at a rehearsal and it sounded sick. After that they asked me to join the band, and of course I had to join! Especially when I heard the band name. I wasn’t involved in choosing the band name but

a fun little side note is that my first imaginary band I started was actually called Speedway. I was like 6 years old, couldn’t play anything but we all just pretended. And Speedway was one of the few English words I knew at the time.

Stockholm, and Sweden in general, always had a strong hardcore, punk, d-beat and metal scene. These days we watch an

explosion of the modern hardcore scene, too. Lots of bands including Bulls Shit, Blood Sermon and Existence playing gigs out of the country, too. You share some members with the aforementioned bands, right? Do you see that as a renaissance of the scene or just as a continuation by getting the torch from the older generation?

Adam: Yeah Speedway shares members with Blood Sermon and Existence and some other bands. My take from my perspective is that every time we do something new we want to improve. So we always try to do better and take a step forward.

Speedway is the first European bands that Revelation Records has ever signed. How

do you feel about being in one of the most legendary hardcore labels of all time? How did the collaboration come into fruition?

Adam: At first it was kinda unreal but now you’re kinda used to it, which is also a bit fucked up, haha. But it’s really cool and a big honor to be a part of Revelation!

It started with us doing our first show together with Shelter here in Stockholm. We didn’t even have any songs out at the time. But we were the opening act and Youth of Today played a show at the same venue the day before. We got in contact with Sammy Siegler who thought our set was really good. We started talking about doing a tape on Rev, which we later did. And that was how we started working together.

You recently released an EP called “Paradise”. Give us some more info on it. Where was it recorded and how was the whole process?

Adam: I think our first show with Shelter was a Wednesday or Thursday night, and the following weekend we went and recorded “Paradise” if I’m not mistaken. Cause when we realized that this whole Revelation thing actually could be for real we really wanted to level up our game and be a few steps ahead. Also our first 7” ”Speedway” was already recorded at the time, we were just waiting for the final mix I believe. Anyways, we wrote and recorded ”Paradise” at our own studio, SBU HQ. It’s crazy to think that almost 3 years has passed since the recording of ”Paradise” but I remember the whole process being really smooth, good times. I had almost forgotten, but we actually re-recorded the EP after a while. A nice little side note!

Speedway is one of the bands that were born a bit before the pandemic. But it seems that the lockdowns gave you time to compose and release great stuff amidst the whole stagnancy. Did hardcore give you an outlet to overcome all this and be creative?

differently. Like how can you be an active band when you at the same time cannot be an active band. It was really weird. But we had some really good sessions where we wrote banger riffs and songs. But after a while when you’re always in the studio, just writing and recording, it at least kinda bored me out a bit. Cause when you write a riff you wanna try to imagine how it is playing it live, not just in the studio. And in the end it was impossible to imagine that. Hardcore is energy. So in the end it kinda took away some of my creativity. But I can say that now that I’ve been on tour again and we started playing some sick shows, the inspiration and energy is definitely back!

To celebrate your signing to Revelation, the label released the live 5-song cassette ‘When If Not Now’, including a cover from the Swedish emo band Far Apart. Why did you choose that song? Does it mean something special to you?

Adam: That song doesn’t really mean anything special to me. To me it’s just a really good song and we thought that we could pull it off and do a good version of it.

By the way, which bands have influenced your song-writing? I was checking your Spotify list for Revelation Records and there’s a diverse range of bands, from The Hellacopters to Blink 182 and from Kiss to 86 Mentality. Pretty good taste, in my opinion!

Adam: In Sweden we didn’t really have a proper lockdown like a lot of other countries had, so we were kinda ”free”. But we couldn’t play shows which gave us a lot of time in the studio to write songs and whatever. So we had to think a bit

Adam: Hey thank you! I agree, a high quality playlist! We take inspiration from all different places and then we combine it. Personally, bands/music with a lot of energy catches my attention. To name a few from the list I would say that bands like The Hellacopters, In My Eyes and 86 Mentality have inspired me when writing riffs in Speedway. I have to add that The Hellacopters are a big influence for me when

it comes to the new material we’re working on.

‘A brief second of clarity before I let it slip again I’m going through changes but I just can’t embrace them’

Your lyrics are very personal and selfreflecting. Definitely not the typical hardcore lyrics. Would you be into explaining furthermore to us? What are your favorite hardcore lyricists?

Anton: Yo! It’s funny you should say that, because I feel like the roots of what I tend to write comes from a very run-of-the-mill hardcore place. But yeah, I work pretty hard on putting my own spin on it, so I’m glad you feel that way. Even though lyrical themes vary, everything I write is personal because I want it to feel 100% authentic when I’m up there doing my thing. When it comes to favorite hardcore lyricists I always gravitate towards Orange County for some reason. Pat Dubar of Uniform Choice, Zach de la Rocha of Inside Out, and Jeremy Stith of Fury are all people whose work I admire a whole lot. Shout-out to those guys.

By the time this fanzine will be out, you will have completed your first full Euro tour. But for now, what do you expect from this? Where else have you played out of Sweden? And what are your plans for the future?

Adam: Hopefully we’ve done some good shows and played for some new people who’ve never heard of us before. Also this is my first tour which is not a summer tour. Can’t wait! A few months ago we played in Paris which was a craaazy show. Shout-out to Konstantin! We also played at a fest in Odense, Denmark not too long ago. We are working on some things for 2023. We are planning for some shows and tours, don’t know what I can say and not say.. But we’re working on a record. We have a lot of material, but we keep on writing new stuff all of the time. We just try to collect as much as possible. But when the time has finally come to do a record, the world will know.

What’s your perception of Paradise? Thanks so much for the interview.

Adam: Thank you! Shout-out to the Swedish scene right now and everyone supporting us! Paradise - A state of mind...