BOOK SPOTLIGHT - PUNK FACTION

PHOTOGRAPHY BY ALAN SNODGRASS

“I THINK WE'RE ALL LIFERS. I DON'T KNOW THAT ANY OF US HAVE OTHER OPTIONS, SO WE KEEP DOING IT.

INTERVIEW WITH VOCALIST/ GUITARIST JOEY CAPE BY JOHN B. MOORE

Joey Cape and his band Cape talked to the band about this played. The experience, according didn’t intentionally set out direction and they all seemed pretto Cape, was liberating. to make another classic ty stoked about it, hence the goofy Lagwagon album. album cover and a lot of the lyrics. “When you decide not to second “It was really fun,” he adds. guess things, it can go one of two “I had just finished my last solo reways,” he says. “It could just as eascord, Let Me Know When You Give Up,” The album was released on Oct. 4 ily have gone to being uninteresting says Cape, vocalist and guitarist via their longtime label, Fat Wreck and not innovative. But I think, in for the pop-punk mainstays. “There Chords. Also on-board with the this case, it went the right way, and were some delays in that process, throwback nature of the record ended up working somehow. I'm still and we had already scheduled a was Cameron Webb. The producer a little bit surprised. I like the record writing and recording period for was first suggested by Lagwagon a lot, but it was sort of miraculous. the Lagwagon album. So, when I drummer Dave Raun, a big fan of Just a few weeks from when we were was sitting in the studio trying to the Motörhead records that Webb learning the songs, and the next come up with stuff, I started going produced. thing you know we were recording through old Lagwagon songs, trying them. I don't think we've ever made to jar my brain into getting back to “I had a meeting with him [Webb] a record this fast.” that mode after working on someat his studio, and I knew he was thing else for so long. And I think the right one,” Cape says. “I said to Over the past decade, Cape has the result is that [the new album] him, ‘I kinda wanna do a throwback managed to deftly handle the sounds a lot like the old stuff.” thing with this,’ and he was thrilled. dual commitments of his longtime The albums of ours that he was a love Lagwagon and his solo efforts. That doesn’t mean that the songs on fan of were the earlier ones. I think While there is a striking difference Railer, the band’s latest LP and their it made him really happy and he between the full-blown distortion first in five years, didn't come natproduced accordingly. But I can't punk rock of the former, and the urally. “At first it wasn't something speak for him.” subtler, acoustic sound of the latter, that was intentional,” Cape says. Cape has not taken either for grant“But then, as I started working on One of the ways Lagwagon recaped. He admits that each project, for the songs and started to see what I tured the spirit of those earlier relack of a better phrase, manages to was putting together, I realized that cords on Railer was by tightening scratch an itch. And while ‘solo-reit sounded that way. Then I thought, the timeline it took to write and cord’ in most bands’ cases is short‘well shoot, you know, I'm just going record each song, and not overhand for ‘the end is near,’ Cape to go all in on this.’” thinking every word written or note says he has no intentions of seeing

“I always say ‘til the wheels fall off,’ you know what I mean? When you've been a band for as long as we have, it would just seem so unnatural if it were forced out of our lives. If we chose to depart from making music with each other that might be a little bit heartbreaking. At some point something will happen, but this is easy because we've been doing it for so long. The chemistry is so natural, and we still enjoy it, so there's kind of no reason to stop.”

Cape and his bandmates realize how lucky they are to get to play their songs night after night, to fans that have been coming out for over twenty years.

“Everyone that is in our band has been in this business for so much longer than Lagwagon has been a band,” he says. “I think we're all lifers. I don't know that any of us have other options, so we keep doing it. I do believe that if any one person in the band truly hated doing this, then they would leave. But I think that everyone still has fun doing it.” �� �� ��

cases by the very people that think they are defending it. The ability to say anything and debate it is vital, so I didn’t want to change or censor anything. That would hardly be punk rock. So, we just put it out there as is, that way it is an honest snapshot of history.”

“The zines pulled it all together and helped create a community that could interact more easily,” he says. “Selfishly, I suppose, I wanted to run a zine as I put on shows and ran a tape label, and I also played in two bands, so [I] wanted to publicize all that and get more gigs too. The U.K. hardcore scene did have a lot to say, though, and it was good to be producing something and be part of its creativity, not just consuming.”

Gamage eventually ended the zine around the time he changed bands and moved from a cassette label to a full-on record label, working harder on both endeavors. Even though this was still in the infancy of the internet, e-mail had become commonplace, and it was getting easier to stay in touch with the punk world.

He is currently in the process of writing a new book about his time in the U.K. hardcore scene - the bands he played in and with, the tours, the record labels, and a slew of other experiences.

“My opinions and remembrances, but looked back on from now,” he says. “This will be more of a novel, and I think a far more complete book, and possibly more relevant to people now. Not sure if anyone will want to read it, but it’s important to me and will be a decent book, I think.” �� �� ��

"PUNK FACTION"

INTERVIEW WITH AUTHOR DAVID GAMAGE BY JOHN B. MOORE T he idea of a tangible, inkThe zine was distributed primarion-paper zine dedicated ly at gigs and eventually through to punk music seems almost the mail. BHP started with a 500- quaint nowadays, with our ability copy run, but doubled in size to access info on every conceivquickly thanks to positive word-ofable niche genre in a matter of mouth. And reading Punk Faction, seconds. it’s easy to see why. From interviews with bands like Green Day, But there was a time, pre-interRancid, and Bob Mould’s Sugar, to net, when dedicated punk rockmusic reviews and essays on poliers actually had to hunt down tics and preventing animal cruelty, this reading material. And if it the zine had sharp opinions and didn’t exist, they had to create it witty prose. on their own. “I was a teenager then and just “I was inspired to start BHP zine glad to be doing something,” through necessity,” says David Gamage says. “I ran most of what Gamage, who created, wrote we got sent and created, just to and distributed the punk- and get something out there fairly reghardcore-focused fanzine in the ularly. Looking back at it now, I’d U.K. from 1991 to 1995. “This was have far more quality control, and before the internet, and it was a there would have been better ingreat way to contact new bands terviews for sure. Better questions, and promoters, and interact with even more useful reviews, maybe other people in the hardcore scene. even different articles. But wisdom It was vital. The only other options in hindsight is easy. It was what it were letters and phone calls to was, and it represented a young people you already knew. Or chatU.K. hardcore scene at that time.” ting at shows, which there weren’t enough of, and it was hard to find There are things Gamage admits out when they were.” to wanting to change, but he is a strong advocate of freedom of Some of the best pieces from BHP speech – even for his younger self. are collected in Punk Faction, a new book out now through Earth Island “[Freedom of speech] is being masBooks. sively eroded right now, in many