Take No More

Take No More is a new hardcore band from Bucharest, Romania. I saw a huge potential in them, and even though they are still really young, they’re definitely a band to watch out for. After all, hardcore is not present only in USA & mainland Europe; hardcore breathes & exists in Eastern Europe, too.

www.facebook.com/TNMCREW tnmcrew.bandcamp.com

Hey! Introduce yourselves to our readers! How old are you, who’s doing what and when did Take No More take shape and start being active in the hardcore scene?

Hi! I am Rares, most known as Tzana and i play guitar and do some backing vocals. Unfortunately some of the band mates are not here so I’m gonna talk for them a bit, haha. Take No More is also Mihai Parchisanu on vocals, Robert aka Dante on bass guitar and Malin Neamțu on drums. We are a young 4 piece metallic hardcore band from Bucharest, Romania. Our band joined the hardcore scene in August 2014 with our first gig with the powerviolence band Sickmark (check them out, great band), although we started making songs and covers in March 2014.

You come from a country which is not that well known for its hardcore scene, even though you have a lot of shows going on lately. How hard is to be a hardcore band in Bucharest and Romania in general?

Well, we had a great scene back in the days; there were a lot of bands based in the west part of our country and in Bucharest but the strongest scene in the kind of DIY hardcore/punk was in the west, although, unfortunately that didn’t last much. Nowadays the scene is pretty weak regarding hardcore as a genre, but on the contrary there a lot of bands influenced by metalcore/deathcore etc. or even powerviolence/ sludge/crust. When it comes to straight hardcore bands or bands like Take No More (we are influenced by the USA metallic hardcore scene, bands like Merauder, All Out War, Stigmata), there’s only a few. Being a more traditional hardcore band in Romania is not that hard; we get along with all the bands of the metalcore/ deathcore/post-hardcore scene, there are many great guys and we have the same crowd at every gig so I think nobody really cares what are you playing, since we are a small, underground scene. Of course I would love to see people at my gigs because they are digging our kind of sound as a band (a sound we are trying to bring

Any other cool bands coming out of Romania? I know some legendary punk bands but it seems it’s a totally different scene…

Some very cool bands from Romania are our good friends from Drop Out Of Life (powerviolence/metallic HC), the boys from Killer Viktim (crust/d-beat), First Division (beatdown/spinkickyourtable-core) and Rock N Ghena (good straight hardcore band from Constanta). Sorry if I’m forgetting someone, hahaha. Killer Viktim and Drop Out Of Life just released a split on 0331 Records (also our label) check that out now!

Your new EP ’Shackled’ is coming out in the next months. Probably it’ll be out by the time this fanzine is printed. Give us some info about this. Do you work with a label or it’s gonna be self-released? What are your main influences both musically and lyrically?

ex-vocalist of Mediocracy and current vox of Killer Viktim). On the first EP the artwork and logo was made by our friend Bony.

You’ve played a bunch of cool shows with bands like Madball and so. Have you done any tours? If so, where did you play and what’s your favourite city to visit & play? By the way, I first learned about your band from my brother Georgi from Expectations. He told me you played some shows together and he was very enthusiastic about you!

Shout out to Georgi and Expectations, great great dudes and great band, saw them live first in 2013 and by the end of the gig I was standing at the merch table, great band, don’t sleep on them! No, we didn’t tour yet, we’re planning on this... but first we need to get our school stuff done. I would like to play in UK the most, that would be like a life goal for now hahahah. But mostly it would be sick if we could tour the East Europe and the Balkans area; for example, Sofia the strongest HC scene!

Yes, our second EP “Shackled” will be released via 0331 Records by the end of this summer I hope, stay stoked. Our musical influence, as i said, is from bands like Merauder, Kickback, All Out War, Obituary, mostly OG death metal and metallic hardcore. On the first EP “The Real Deal” we have a more straight kind of sound and a positive lyric writing influence; it’s mostly about unity and enjoying this genre at full force… but on “Shackled” there will be a ton of anger, thats all I can say.

Your artwork is sick. Who’s responsible for it? I’ve seen lots of cool designs in your FB page.

Our artwork was made by our friend Dragos Bere from Cluj Napoca and the fine logo was made by VZR Graphics by Catalin Oltei (also

Tell us some more things about the hardcore scene in Romania. Is there a lot of people attending shows? Any straight edge? Are politics involved? Do you ever have problems with nazis during shows?

We don’t have any problems with nazis at our concerts, we see once a year 2-3 of them at a gig but mostly they know that they are not welcome. From what I know from my older friends involved in the scene, they used to have more problems with them in the past, unfortunately. I think we have like 10 people in Romania that are straight edge, I used to be too but yeah I’m weak, still appreciate the movement and culture though. There are politics involved.

is awesome. On the other hand, I know you had (or maybe still have) IMF like Greece and I know a lot of people are poor & desperate. I have friends in Romania for 5-6 years now and they are striving to find a job and make a living. How’s the current situation there and what’s your opinion about the world crisis going on the last years?

Well this is a very sensible topic. In Romania there are a lot of corrupt politicians that are ignoring a huge part of the necessary needs for the population, and unfortunately every time people see a potential in a new politician, he ends up like the others. Most of the teenagers want to go out of the country because to make a living here is very hard, there are people with college degrees that don’t have a job.

mixtape? By the way, do you listen to any other music styles?

The united scene, the angry music and the passion of creating music is what got us together; we love playing and making music, playing gigs, sweating and feeling the music on stage. For me the ideal mixtape would include Negative Approach, Straight Ahead, Cro-Mags, Breakdown, Merauder and Cold As Life. And we all enjoy other kinds of music; Malin is into oi! and jazz, Mihai into some pop punk and old school hip hop, while Dante and I enjoy most of the west coast scene of hip hop, old school and new age trap, soul, g-funk. Music = life.

Thanks a lot for the interview! Keep up the great work!

Let’s get back to hardcore! What motivated you to get into this music & way of life? Which bands will you include in the ideal

Thank you VERY much for the interview, it was a pleasure, keep on supporting the hardcore scene!