EDITOR
Jason Bolduc
COPY EDITOR Naomi Kelly
PHOTOGRAPHERS Jason Bolduc Jim Smith
COLUMNISTS Jason Bolduc Jim Smith Juana Luck Mike Mccarthy
REVIEWS Mike Mccarthy
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Mike Magee/Stomp Records Melanie Kaye PR James Wright/Kersonse Pr Mike cubillos/Earshot Media Piston Head/Brutal Brewing
THE REAL McKENZIES
“Rats in the Burlap”
AVAILABLE MARCH 24
GERRY HANNAH “COMING HOME”
www.gerryhannah.com
6
Talks about Politics and the Terror State Anniversary tour
16 26 34 CONTACT
Pat Thetic
Gerry Hannah
Talks about Politics and Ideology of Punk Rock and his new album “Coming Home”
Reviews Power Through Knowledge
withinpunkzine
26 Houghton Ave N, Hamilton , ON L8H 4L2 www.withinmagazine@hotmail.com
ANTI FLAG INTERVIEW WITH PAT THETIC
@CLUB ABSINTHE HAMILTON,ON FEBRURARY 16TH,2015 COURTESY OF MELANIE KAYE PR INTERVIEW BY JASON BOLDUC
JB: Hey this is J.B from Within Punk zine and I’m here with Pat Thetic from Anti Flag talking about the new album and the current state of the Terror...State Tour... PAT: Wow That’s an illiteration there ‘the Terror State Tour’. JB: Okay thanks for taking the time to answer some questions. I’ve noticed there’s a select few Canadian tour dates in select venues this tour,I know there’s a more extensive tour to promote “Document of Dissent” PAT:Yes! JB: It’s a kind of all together kind of album? PAT: Yeah it’s a sort of best of, we’re doing Document of Dissent and we’re doing Terror State record tonight so it’s a little bit of everything, we’re right at the end of our last cycle. And the new record is coming out in May so we are doing all sorts of fun stuff that makes us happy before we go out and do touring just for the new record. JB: And the new album is titled “American Spring”? Is that correct ? PAT: Correct! I’m not sure how much I’m allowed to talk about it? (Looking down the hall) to be honest I’m not sure how much I know about it! JB: Ha! Ha! PAT:I think it’s called American Spring ? (looking down the hall) Ya It’s called American Spring!
JUSTIN SANE/PHOTO J.B
JB: Now does that have to do with the movement that fell through in D.C? With ah.. PAT: Actually no ..but it’s actually interesting see you are aware, American Spring - we are playing on the Arabic Spring which is Arab Spring which led to all the revolution in the Middle East. And talking about how revolution can happen here in the U.S and yeah there was a right wing movement in D.C but they failed so we are taking it over and
taking it back. JB: You guys do have quite a huge following. Do you feel that following is more influential in the stuff that is coming out to this day? PAT: Ehhh I don’t understand? JB: The following not only with the music but the Political base? PAT: Yes! JB: A lot of people do follow you for those reasons also, not only the music. Do you feel there’s a connection there? PAT:Ah I think there’s a lack of Protest music in the U.S right now I feel, and I think the people are looking for that and I wish there was someone else doing it but if they are not going to then we are definitely going to do it. PAT: So yeah there’s people looking for more than ‘she broke my heart’ and they’re looking for truth in music.
CHRIS HEAD / PHOTO J.B
JB: Kinda like the things that have been out in the past couple of years now? PAT: Yeah! JB: Ah in regards to the Canadian shows everything you guys have been playing at most of the venues and most of the cities have major University campuses that are Left wing. Does that have an influence on where you guys would like to play? PAT: Ah it doesn’t impact us we go where the people are,
but the people are definitely at the universities and when people put a value on education and truth they’re better at looking outside them selves and their own little biopic world. And when that happens they’re into things like punk rock and activism and those are the people we like to hang out with. JB: Ah the Terror State Album was known to be as the refined album do you.. PAT: You think so ? Ha ha JB: In a way ya I mean from the original and the first album I find it’s more the evolution of it.. PAT: Yeah! And the Terror State was a more refined... JB: And Yeah you found that groove and you guys kind of went with it. In regards to that situation do you feel that off the floor recordings are coming back again? Do you feel it gives it a more raw feel? PAT: Ah it’s a pendulum that swings all the time because people
CHRIS BARKER/PHOTO J.B
have access to recording themselves like the last two albums we recorded ourselves in our practice space with just the four of ourselves in the room. What we wanted to do at that time on the next record we’ve worked with some other people and that brought us some other ideas so Anti Flag is always lucky to do what we always want to do and
the pendulum is always swinging and we will be like, okay we’ve tried that let’s try this and go in a different direction. So I think there’s always a place for a guy that records his own thing or a girl preferably a girl but there was always be a place for a person that wants to make a polished record but it’s always on time and in key. JB: But it’s easier for them to get noticed I guess these days? PAT: To get noticed? I would argue that if it’s really out of key and off time nobody wants to listen to it and it doesn’t matter what ideas you’re trying to put inside somebody’s head. If it’s not listenable it doesn’t matter. But if you put it on time and in key and put lyrics in a chorus people are more interested in hearing what you have to say.
JB: Coming back to the similarities between Canada and the U.S, we are still in distress economically. Do you feel things will be better? PAT: I know that rich people in the U.S right now are very happy because the stock market is up and that doesn’t mean that the American worker is doing better. It just means that everyone else in the world is in such shit right now that they are putting their money in the American stock market which is making the rich people really happy. JB: I’ve noticed that in advertising for this tour you had the original cover of his niece? PAT: Yes! JB: So that came back into play so it was kinda nice to
CHRIS BARKER/PHOTO J.B
see that! PAT: And that is the new theme that we are really dealing with on the new album that is the militarism of the culture. And how everything is seen from a perspective of violence and aggression. And there’s really no dialogue about peace or having reconciliation about violence and we’re seeing that in the situation in the Ukraine right now. The only answer is the U.S to arm the Ukrainians which just leads to more violence.
JB: Yeah the same type of thing they did in Afghanistan same situation in regards to Soviet invasion. PAT: Ha ha yeah it’s just in a different part of the world like, really? JB: Yeah didn’t see that one coming!
PAT THETIC PHOTO J.B
PAT: Yeah there’s people struggling to eat and they’re throwing weapons to them and there’s power struggles and you’re making it worse. JB: Ya different Theater! PAT: Yeah! JB: When you decided to do the Terror State in it’s entirety was it because of that influence that’s happening right now? PAT: Well it’s interesting, the U.S
left Iraq a year ago supposedly and now we’re going back in with drone strikes and soldiers. And it’s the same argument over and over again - if we bomb them enough they will live peacefully, and they will produce oil for us so that we can drive around in our S.U.V’s and that’s how the world works and why they haven’t figure that out.... JB: Canada has always been on the forefront with the political and activism in regards to policies abroad and now it’s come to
that position now that we don’t really want to go forward with it. So do you feel the imperialism of the United States is having an effect on other countries in the world in that way? Pat: I wish that other countries would stand up to the U.S and say that’s bullshit and there’s never UN sanctions against the U.S and that never seems to happen and they just rim shot out every body and that’s the way it happens so yeah! I don’t think Canada will ever stand up to the U.S there’s too much military and economic power to be able to say “No More”. JB: Starting at New Red records to your own A.F Records/Go Kart.. PAT: (Smiling) Ah you’ve done your homework, looking into the archives. You’ve done some research on that one! JB: Then from Fat Wreck Chords to R.C.A, a major label and now Spine farm? Is that correct? PAT: Yeah that’s right! Spine Farm JB: Spine Farm is a European label isn’t it? PAT: It’s Finnish,British European and American Label so yes! JB: So there is going to be American distribution through them? PAT: And yeah we should hopefully have a pretty big presence up in Canada also as well. We’re hoping that’s the plan the Spine Farm people came up to us with a lot of ideas and a lot of excitement so we’re hoping that it will come through. JB: It’s been known as a metal label so is the new album going to have a bit of a more heavier faster sound? PAT: It’s..I don’t know you will have to hear it. It’s like trying to describe if your kids are ugly or not! It’s hard to talk whether your kids are ugly or not (Ha ha) but it’s got a unique sound to it. JB: You guys have always been involved with so many organizations like Greenpeace and Amnesty .. PAT: We have Sea Shepherd out here tonight! We had an Australian tour and we got to see the boat and the operation out there and for me it was awesome. It’s really just a bunch of fucking punk rock kids that get to tell ‘fuck you’ to the Japanese government. Like that is the greatest job in the world, to be the hero of a species that can’t speak for themselves and tell the Japanese
government to fuck off. It’s the same thing here with the Seal hunting and stuff so it’s a similar situation. JB: So, freedom here in Canada and the U.S... more bills and amendments are being passed all the time. Here it was Bill C 36 most recently that took freedoms from people and in the U.S especially the freedom act. Do you think we are past the point of no return? PAT: I was having a conversation with one of the other guys in the other bands about this. I don’t think Obama is
CHRIS HEAD PHOTO J.B
Hitler. But I think the amassing power into one position is very scary and I think we are past the point of no return and I think as soon as someone comes into that position of power and wants to round up all the artists and intellectuals into camps because they’re causing too many problems, I don’t think it would be be very difficult for them to do. So that is a very scary position to be in and we do know that Germany in the late 1800’s early 1900’s was an intellectual and economical power house and then went into the first world war. Everything went to shit and then crazy people got into power and it wasn’t like a society of followers. Germany was a society of scholars and they all fell in line so there’s a realistic comparison to that and the U.S. JB: It’s almost to the point of a another Tiananmen square if the people do revolt they are oppressed, silenced, shot or jailed much
like the same here with the G20 where old war time policies were activated just to quiet and suppress everybody. PAT: In my twenty years of Rock n Roll and activism this is what I’ve learnt - is that change through violence never holds and institutions always have much more stomach for violence. So much like the Middle East when we have the revolutions, PHOTO J.B when they went violent they never went very well. And the ones that remained as peaceful as possible worked much better. And the U.S will always bring more violence than the people can bring. JB: “Woody” inspired one of the lyrical content on the “Terror State”. I was wondering if your going to pay any kind of homage to him tonight? I’ve also been noticing a lot of Neo Nazism resurgence in the hardcore scene locally and it’s disturbing. PAT: I haven’t seen that yet! But that’s what we grew up with and there was always a lot of violence at the shows and people beating each other up. So hopefully that’s very localized and stops because it never a good thing. JB: Last question, famous quote this time .. A house divided is a house that will not stand! PAT: Ah that was Abraham Lincoln talking about the senate I
believe but my quote would be ah...a quote from Bill and Ted and that’s “Be Excellent to one and another”!That sums up Anti Flag and everything we stand for.
INTERVIEW WITH GERRY HANNAH DECEMBER 20,2014 COURTESY OF MELANIE KAYE PR JB: Okay so from the first generation of Punk Rock to Folk usually old school punks have a philosphopy and a background usually of country music. What are you thoughts on that? GERRY About Punk Rock being from Country Music? Is that what you are saying? J.B Yeah the basis of it being as you grow older you tend to go back to your roots so is that your approach to Coming Home? GERRY Ah I see what you’re saying. Well ah well some people do! Some people do all sorts of things when they grow old and some people get more conservative as they do grow older! (Laughter). And I don’t think that’s happening to me I hope not anyways,But ya well I think it’s partly that I think it’s partly just an aging thing and it’s true, it’s harder to keep a Punk band together as the members grow older. I think Punk Rock is a younger person’s kind of game and the audiences don’t really want to go see a bunch of aging guys on stage particularly. You know I just don’t think it’s sexy or whatever it’s not just through the Punk Rock, it’s rock in general. I think it’s rock in general wither we like it or not, it’s kind of sexualized format of music and as people get older - according to society standards it’s less sexy so it only makes sense that people are less likely to go and see older rock bands you know. I think people are interested in going out to see cute guys and cute girls on stage rocking out that seems to have a lot of power rather than older guys that seems to have less power. In my case I was really into the music of the sixties even though I was too young, I missed the sixties. My generation growing up in Highschool (that was the mid-seventies) and at that time the mainstream music scene really sucked so that is why I jumped into Punk Rock so wholeheartedly. I
GERRY HANNAH
really liked some of the stuff that came out of the late seventies - I mean late sixties early seventies - the bands were really writing about important things, both folk bands and rock artists at that time were writing about important things in their lives. They were talking about the war, they were talking about society, the inequality and all sorts of things right? The mid-seventies became more of a focus on more personal things and other things like dancing and recreational drug use and sex. And that was the huge focus and lyrcis became dumbed down in my opinion totally, so I was always drawn to that older era and then Punk Rock rejected the newer era. So when Punk Rock came around I jumped totally on it because it made sense it was rejection of the bullshit music that was happening around us it was the music of the mid-seventies. But Punk Rock was like to hell with Hippies and all that music scene and if you mentioned one of those bands from that era you know people would jump on you (Laughing). I still appreciated that music though and I kept it alive all the time that I was in Punk Rock. And Punk Rock for me was a necessary tool to shake people out of their complacency in their views and politcs. So it was really important for me to be really involved into it, to be right into it to adopt it as a lifestyle and make it in the music scene and all that. As it went along I felt that Punk Rock as the initial movement became less of a movement for political change and less of a presence in society that was making change to the reaction of the rock music of the seventies. And the music industry of the late seventies I became less interested in and I was like, I don’t see the movement anymore but I still like some of the bands that are playing Punk Rock music. So that is why it wasn’t that hard for me to make that transition to Folk music. I don’t
know if I’m making sense - for me Punk Rock was a reaction to something, it wasn’t a lifestyle. JB: I agree with you the sixties were the beginning of the movement where people started to become more aware of their surroundings. If it wasn’t for the sixties society in general would be far worse I think? GERRY: We would be way worse! Society would be way different if it wasn’t for the sixties music. The Sixties is what gave us the idea of a protest song. And then look a protest song like the Sex Pistols’ ‘Anarchy in the U.K’ which is bascially a protest song or ‘White Riot’ by the Clash - another protest song - and actually the first people that were doing protest songs were folk singers. So that is where the idea of protest songs came from in North America at least places like Ireland and the Middle East were doing songs way back then. In North America that is where social conscience and political protest came from, so Punk Rock came along as reaction to the dismal scene of the music scene of the time and the political scene of the time and rebelled against it. In the sixties you had mainstream radio stations playing protests songs like “Creedence” that had songs protesting the Vietnam war which was sending off only people like African-Americans and poor whites - you know rich people don’t get sent off to die they get sent off to College or business school or something and that’s part of the message too. Then where bands like Steppenwolf that wrote songs like “The Ostrich” which is like “look our society is basically a dead end”. What they want is for you to run to the suburbs, buy a little cute house and have kids and buy consumer goods and work like crazy and be a slave for them till you drop dead at the age of sixty nine. I think Punk Rock at that time was very zealous and I think people wrote off things that happened in the past and that was a mistake and they forget about a lot of protest music that meant a lot. So I don’t think me putting out a Folk album now is just a consequence of me getting older and I do think it was important to me all along. I did release a recording when I was in jail that has some of these songs on it and that was way back in ‘85. And in prison I released a tape cassette called “Songs from the Underground” which was more folk than the new one “Coming Home”. So I was doing Folk way back then I was always listening to Punk at that time like Husker Du and stuff also. JB: Did you ever get that Fender Rhodes Keyboard? GERRY: No actually I never did end up getting it. I started learning piano way back when I was younger I did write another Album in prison called “Whereabouts Unknown” which was all synthesizer tracks. Actually when I left The Subhumans I did buy a Synthesizer and I had plans to write movie scores for documentaries and movies that I liked and try and do a smaller scale soundtrack thing and I had a small recording studio at that point. And at that time I was living with Julie Belvis which was my girlfriend at the time and she was involved with Direct Action and she convinced me to give up that
GERRY HANNAH
plan and become a revolutionary with her and quite literally I ended selling my synthesizers and buying an Assault Rifle. JB: Did you feel that “Songs from the Underground” was done in raw because of the limited resources
you had so you decided to redo the songs on “Coming Home” to give them a cleaner sound? GERRY: Ya that’s basically it. I wanted to redo it because they didn’t have the equipment or the proper setting and sound or resources for the musicians helping out on it. I was always interested in producing so I wanted to revisit it and produce it the way I intended it to sound. So that was the reason for redoing those seven songs from “Songs From the Underground” and the other seven songs to hear them in that way. JB: So that explains the collaboration of musical talent on the album, ranging from Flute to Cello to Banjo? GERRY: Ya I did shows of “Songs From The Underground” with a band I had back in the nineties and I wanted to add to the rock music at that time and change the sound of Folk at that time and merge the two together. And that is where I was trying to go with that there was this Punk Rock kind of bass line then some acoustic Folk guitar tracks. It was almost Punk Rock acoustically that is what I was kind of thinking but it evolved into something completely different after that. JB: It’s kinda like Ian Mackaye of Fugazi doing the acoustic thing now? GERRY: I haven’t heard that but would assume it to be super fast acoustically ? JB: No actually it’s more folk like strong chords! GERRY: It’s like young blood punk bands these days playing at the speed of light and then going acoustic and you don’t have the distortion or power of the amps yet it still oddly sounds the same. If you’re doing it that way it does become different and unique so it would be interesting. I haven’t heard that album though actually. JB: Did you find a learning curve going from bass to acoustic guitar? GERRY No I started out on acoustic actually that and piano lessons when I was a kid so it was easy going back to my first instrument that was mine was
a old classical guitar with nylon strings actually. And that was back when I was a teenager and I played with Ken Montgommery doing Dylan and easier Pink Floyd songs. I never became very developed on acoustic back then and even to this day I’m still very rudimentary but I don’t do a lot for finger picking or those cool country rhythms like those old punk rock guys that go into country you know that have those old country rhythms. I learned bass after working on the railroad to save up money for gear and that Fender Rhodes and then I came back and was told there was no room for a electric piano in the band or actually for me in the band by Joe. But they told me about Punk Rock so that was in ‘77 and I went out and bought a base cabinet and bass and started playing. So going from rudimentary keyboards to bass isn’t that hard because you’re actually doing bass lines on keyboards. Most of the time your left hand is usually playing bass lines so it wasn’t that hard picking up the bass for me. I never really became that great of a bass player either but I definitely got the feel for it you know. I actually tried to learn Violin because I was really into the Pogues and I had my great uncle’s violin that he made so I worked really hard at that and practiced that a lot putting a lot of hours on it - it was really hard but I learnt a lot more about playing guitar by learning it though. JB: The content on “Coming Home” is in depth and meaningful on your beliefs and things that happened along the way. So is that how you kind of approach your writing? GERRY: The way I write music is the same way that a lot of people write music and that is I come up with a melody or rift or progression of chords that I like or work together and then I will think of a couple of words or phrases or a sentence or main chorus that goes with that rhythm and then once I have that I will start molding those chords in the way that I think those lyrics are going. Often that becomes a political comment on things I see around me or things that are going on in the world. I’m not writing just a political song I’m trying to write a song that has some kind of meaning. I don’t want to write a song that has no meaning just for the purpose of putting songs out there or because I want to make some money - in my case that isn’t going to happen!(Laughing) The predominant musicians out there these days are just trying to put out songs that are going to make money, you know, songs that are going to be a hit. They are writing the songs that people will drive along in their cars and sing along to you know that’s what they are writing mostly these days. Not everyone is writing like that but I don’t want to write a song like that. If I ever write a song like that I would hope someone would come along and say hey that song sucks and throw it away. And I hate that shit. That is what we were rebelling against way back then back in ‘77 with these songs that really said nothing you know. Something that is equally important in songs to me are not only Political views and opinions but songs about people that are struggling or lonely or having problems with self esteem, because to me that is the crucial part of politics and that’s really important to me too. Really important because I
struggle with those things and I have a lot of problems with depression and feeling isolated from other people because my thinking is different than other people that I find around me. And especially where I live. People here think a the idea of good time is to rush down to Walmart and buy a bunch of things they saw in the flyer you know. To me that’s weird so it’s easy to feel isolated and different in communities where that’s the predominant thing where people are trying to acquire things that are knick-knacks and gizmos that they think will make them happy and they spend all their time talking about the latest TV reality show you know. And we don’t even have cable TV we gave it up years ago, we have movies and books. So I have a hard time keeping up and fitting into mainstream society and like many punk rockers I feel isolated you know. I’m also interested in reaching out to people that like my music and things that I am interested in and don’t know what to do or who turn to or where to go. I really think it’s important for music to approach those people and art reaches those people and includes them. That’s one of the things I wish Punk Rock was more able to do but I don’t see it happening and if it does it’s rare. I mean some of the reasons are it’s hard to understand the lyrics in what people call Hardcore these days - what we used to call Thrash. You know we called it that because it was a really fast Punk Rock that had that Do.ta.do.ta. do.ta.do.ta beat (Laughing).That format of music is great for saying how much you hate Stephen Harper or something, but when people are down and stuff and they’re looking of some kind of inclusion and looking for some kind of answers in their life I don’t know how well that format addresses that problem. That’s where I think folk can do that it can reach out you know and reach right into that person’s chest and say look you’re not alone, there are a whole bunch of us here that feel like this. We are part of an alternative family you know and we can give each other support as long as we keep talking about the truth and following each other as we support the truth and we will be okay and we will be alright you know. So that’s really important to me in song writing to me not necessarily with that message just genuine emotion and passion reaching out to other people saying this is how I feel, this is really how I feel, if you feel like this here’s something that might help you and make you feel better. That’s something that I’ve been thinking about over the past few years that’s really important to me in song writing to not just beat someone over the head with a political message but to actually try and reach them on a more emotional level. JB: Is the Generation lost these days in regards to living without necessity? Get back to simplicity back to the land? GERRY: It’s not cool you know what’s cool is to buy someone’s product and somehow immerse your self in that product mostly technological products. Most of have computers most of us have Smart cell phones and are directly linked to the Internet. We’re all running around reading things that people are sending us on Facebook and emails and so forth and while all this is happen-
ing have the Palestinians been liberated yet? No they haven’t been! It hasn’t changed anything in my opinion the point is all this information is supposed to set us free it’s supposed to help us and be better human beings in a better place with all this technology and all this information that’s available. What are people looking at when they go for information they are usually looking at distractions or things that take their minds off how much their boss is a jerk at work or how their relationship isn’t going very well or stuck in traffic. People are looking for distractions so they go and watch some video of a kitten playing a piano on a video right? Is this going to liberate us somehow, is this going to make a new society that somehow make us more happier and free and more quality time in our lives? I don’t see it at all I see quite the opposite I see it because we believe in happiness of these trinkets, we work longer and harder hours to acquire them and we have less and less down time. And it’s crazy you want incredible things that will blow your mind and set you free you don’t have to buy it at Walmart or Canadian Tire or Future shop, it’s not there, you have to walk out into the woods and see it’s there for free miracles and crazy things. People have turned their backs to nature, they don’t even see the link anymore they want to be a cyborg with all these cyborg surgically implanted machinery and implants and think it’s cool. Years ago people fought for all of humanity to be free and treated equal and be free and be treated fairly and now we don’t want to be human beings anymore we want to be machines. What the Hell? And how can that end in a good way? Does it look like it’s going in a good way? Our environment is still mind boggling and while we are texting and looking at Facebook clips they’re finding microscopic plastic particles in every part of the ocean, in every ocean mingling with sea creatures and no one has any idea how this is going to affect the food chain. Genetically enhanced food all over the place now, chicken and turkey farms shutting down all over the place because of viruses. It’s not because people have chickens it’s because people have factory farms that’s why it’s spreading through. We don’t know a virus can go through and kill all the livestock in these factory farms and then what are people going to eat? I think we need to look at what worked in the past and combine that with some new ideas. You can accumulate as many things as you want it’s not going to make you any happier. JB: It’s amazing what happens in by-pass feeding these days in regards to livestock and pet food. GERRY: There are good people that are doing work to bring information forward to make people aware, but people still don’t care and I think people need to simplify our lives. I think if we divorce ourselves from being Human and living this way without change and stay this way on this planet then we are doing so in peril. It’s going to lead to our destruction at least as a society and break down and have really hard times ahead. The trend is reversed right
now, it’s for people to move into urban areas. In the sixties and seventies it was opposite to move into the rural areas and live off the land. Now it’s a big push to get people into cities and you hear about small communities all over Canada basically closing shop all the time. What are we going to have, major super sized agriculture facilities in the country outside of the cities with one person running the facility with all the millions of people in the city at the mercy of this select few of farmers running the plant. JB: It’s like farmers losing their land to tax arrears and residential development. GERRY; Ya exactly it’s the same thing all these people moved out to start micro farming and along comes this big massive sub division with these god ugly huge monster houses and your taxes go up and then the property asset goes up and you lose your farm to those taxes and another subdivision goes up. It’s all about how much money these people can make the fastest and then get the hell out and the government tend to them because everyone wants to make money. Now they are trying to get people out of the woods and into the cities. It used to be about hard working people working five days a week then taking the family up into the country and mountains to relax, unwind, have a picnic and recharge their batteries with meaningful life. But with government they have let all the back country fall into despair. Whenever you ask someone about the parks or for information no one knows anything. There’s user fees for everything even though the facilities have gone down and roads that used to lead out into the country and stuff are being closed and shut down you can’t even access them anymore or go out to them. It’s as if they are actually saying, ‘hey where you want to be is in the city buying consumer goods you don’t want to be out there, that’s our domain we’re going to have mines out there, we are doing forestry and operations and Agro farming out here we don’t want you out there, we want you in the city working and buying stuff ’. JB: Back to the Album half the album was recorded at Profile the other half at Tractor Grease is Tractor Grease an independent studio that somebody owns? GERRY: Yeah it’s a small studio in Chilliwack B.C owned and run by a guy named Jeff Bonner - fantastic Engineer. JB: Did you find there was two different feels to the Engineers?. GERRY: Ya definitely very different studios, different approaches. Each has it’s advantages and stuff over each other. I was in charge of the production on both of them so I mixed them down after they were both done. So each studio may have had a different sound in the beginning but in the end it was digitally mastered after so it ended the same I think we didn’t want one song to sound glaringly different than another recorded at a different studio. JB: Digital or Analog? GERRY: I like old school analog but it’s hard to come across that equipment because it’s so crazy expensive. The Hive used to have a huge old Soundcraft
board then filtered into a digital station. There’s more and more off the floor recordings using digital equipment because no one can afford studio equipment but now there’s less studios because of it. So I think it’s a vicious circle now because people have “Home Studios” now you know, so there’s less and less studios surviving and actually remaining around. When you’re walking down the street with an mp3 player and shitty headphones you’re not really listening to the music as it was intended to be heard, you can’t hear that sound anymore. I’m not really sure what people expect anymore it used to be about that hi fidelity and clear sound and recorded really well and is it really about that over produced super fine sound that you hear on the radio anymore? People just want to hear it well you know, all the instruments clear and blended well no weird little distortions on acoustic part or what ever. I don’t know if people even listen for that anymore I listen to that stuff and I admittedly have stuff in there that I didn’t like but it was too late so I cleaned it up the best I could and stuff. Sometimes if we go back to earlier recordings people hear those things and they loved the song because of them so does it really matter if it sounds shitty or not anymore? Some of the earlier blues recordings were like that and people loved them. We are at a point where people are less interested in the story now then how the story is packaged and that worries me. Maybe we should be less concerned about the packaging and more concerned about the substance and what’s behind it. It’s like that also with movies, people care less about the story now than big explosions and Hollywood special effects. Think about some of the old movies you saw as a kid - was the story diminished because of the format that you saw it on? If you saw some movie that really inspired you in some way that really inspired your life somehow and partly made you who you are today. I highly doubt it mattered if you saw it on a LCD digital TV or on a cathode tube TV. I saw three of the most influential movies in my life on not super 8 but the next film up on a projector on a screen. One was about a battle about the peoples park which was a park in Berkley California on university land. And the university decided to develop this vacant lot and the students turned it into a giant Garden of Eden they had going on with vegetables and trees and people would hang out and study for exams and stuff. And you know hang out, make love, drink wine and smoke pot and what ever they wanted to be happy and the university decided to develop it and make it into housing and cash in on it. Some of the people of Berkley and the students revolted and there was huge riots and The National Guard was sent out and people were killed and so forth. I saw a documentary movie about that shown by the SubHumans ex manager and he showed that with a projector and on a screen. Did that make that story less mezmorizing and less important? Not at all. If the story is important and engaging then it is, it doesn’t matter what the format is. Now we have surround sound and digital speakers and run down to Future Shop and get big screens and have some horrible job to pay for all this shit!. We have to Simplify! It should be in the very back of our minds “well how can I downsize, what do I really need in
life”? What is really important to me and what is not important to me? JB: Well I usually end interviews with quotes but this time we will do books my favorite three are “Animal Farm” by George Orwell; “Brave New World” by Aldous Huxley and “1984” by Orwell. If you had any kind of literature that changed your life what would it be? GERRY: ‘Living my life’ by Emma Goldman, a two volume book about the famous Emma Goldman anarchist from the late 1800’s into the early 1900’s who fought for women’s rights and rights over their own bodies and fought for birth control rights. She believed workers also needed to own themselves instead of corporate bosses who ran the show and we needed to run things as co-ops and workers would have control over production and their own destiny. She is the one that coined the phrase “If I can’t dance I don’t want to
http://www.gerryhannah.com/music/ http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/gerryhannah/
Montreal,Quebecs own four piece Punk rockers “East End Radicals” have done it again on their upcoming release “Zero Hour”. This latest release from East End Radicals features a full 12 track full length album plus bonus tracks from their 7” inch “Generation Checkout”. East End Radicals have done it again with a well infused album ranging in street punk to Celtic infusion to a solid old school upbeat sound. Zero hour brings you on a nonstop feel good vibe right off the start with a Celtic folk punk anthem “Back to the Start” sounding heavenly influenced by old school Dropkick Murphy’s, followed up with a even faster “Agony”that will make sure to get you going or drinking faster. The album does have it’s groove tracks that are heavenly influenced by earlier Rancid with tracks like “Dolce Vita” “Forgotten Society” and “across the Ocean”. The switch up to faster street punk tracks shine through seemingly after the feel good tracks with faster old school “The Casualties”or old Dayglo sounding tracks like “Let’s get back” and Ylpd” with faster rhythems and crustier vocals. Lyrically “Zero Hour” touches with everything from political to street punk life to personal views and objectivity. Very few albums are actually worthy of staying constantly in your playlist but by far this is one to be added that will keep you going from start to finish. The Album art on “Zero Hour” is pop Culture “Lichtenstein” influenced kind of giving it’s roots of the Montreal music sub culture.
“NON STOP FEEL GOOD UPBEAT STREET PUNK!”
UPCOMING SHOWS
MOTIVANTIONAL CORNER
HAMILTON,ON
NUCLEAR STRIKEZONE
RELEASE DATE FEBRUARY 17,2015
The Elaine Mae Theatre : 25 Dundurn St.N Hamilton, ON
Cabin Fever : Patient Zero May 22/2014 Director:Kaare Andrews /Jake Wall
8/10
First come the sores...Then come the blisters and puss... By the time the blood comes and your skin starts peeling off your body it’s way too late. The infection runs rampant with Cabin Fever:Patient Zero... Sean Astin stars in the third
installment of the Cabin Fever franchise. The skin melting beautiful effects are back to take your brain further into the gore that comes with a beautiful perfect flesh eating virus... Porter(Astin) is the only know immune carrier of the perfect disease that turns flesh into a puddle of goo. Captured and held in a secret abandoned island facility he is tested and tested to try to find a vaccine to the virus that could take down all mankind in a pandemic the world has never seen... Four friends out on a bachelor cruise searching for beauty, peace, quiet and virgin sand land on the beach wanting to just get high and celebrate, unknowingly swim into the deadly virus contracting the absolute biggest fear any of us have seen...When their friend gets sick two of the friends start looking for help finally coming upon a secret bunker laboratory where they are trying to contain and test the virus... Do I really need to spoil this for anybody that hasn’t seen it...No I don’t and no I won’t...If you are like me and totally live for this shit this movie will get you going...I started gagging at one point. The effects and make-up are phenomenal..The story is great...The acting...Well who really cares about acting when you crave blood, gore and guts...It does not disappoint!! All in all I fuckin loved this movie...It really doesn’t get any better for me...If I’m gagging I LOVE IT!! If you’ve seen it, watch it again...if you haven’t...DO IT NOW!!! REV
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT: Nominated : Fright Meter Award : Best Makeup Indomina Group Make Up : Andrew Freeman/Gage Hubbard
“Why can’t we collect all the signals, all the time?” General Keith B. Alexander, Director of NSA ‘05-’14 The legally contested but none-the-less multiple awarded documentary film “Citizen Four” by Laura Poitras is based on the uncovering of the NSA spying scandal. Its counterpart, written by the journalist Glen Greenwald, is a book called “No Place To Hide” and delves deep into the story of Edward Snowden and its repercussions of the NSA surveillance state. In June 2013 Laura and Glen worked together with Snowden to publish his story and it makes sense that both retell it in their own words: Glen through a book and Laura with a documentary. Reading the book “No Place To Hide” by Glen Greenwald was a steady learning curve for me and I can only recommended it to anyone who is even slightly interested in personal freedom and rights. While I reflected over Greenwald’s arguments, I played the devil’s advocate and tried to find reasons for all the invasiveness and deception the people of the USA and the world in general are subjected to. If you think about it, tribes and cultures have arguably always been in competition with each other in order to either protect themselves from other nations or secure resources and space. Therefore it could be argued it is only natural for a country to strive for advancement in order to protect themselves against nations who may not be peaceful. The US has vast resources and advanced technology available to them, thus it makes sense for them to use these to their advantage. It furthermore makes sense to keep this information undisclosed to the public so that the NSA can gain the most insight into criminal people’s plans through open email conversation and the like. As so often argued, terrorist attacks can be prevented or at least considerably slowed down by policing ‘Intelligent Communication’ (e.g Internet and telephone communication). Furthermore, I would like to point to Harrold Innis (1948) and his notion of the effects of communication technology on a society. The Internet, besides making us stupid as some academics have pointed out (Carr, 2010), has surely other effects on a civilization with its promise of almost instant and free communication for a large segment of the world. With this tremendous change brought upon us through the dawn of Web 2.0, I can honestly say that I am unsure what exactly the repercussions would be, positive and negative. Looking at how society works however, I will admit that I do believe in law and order. The Internet being policed makes as much sense to me as Hamilton possessing a police station. Therefore, theoretically, I am not opposed to someone keeping watch over Intelligent Communication. Problems to this arise of course when this power to police is abused. While optimistic at the beginning of reading Glen Greenwald’s account of the story, I soon understood that the NSA was not using their powers solely to keep terrorist attacks from happening. Instead they used their spying abilities to gain economic, diplomatic, “and an all purpose global advantage” . Greenwald’s mention of operation “SIGINT” exemplifies this, as it elaborates on the spying on UN Permanent Representatives to find out about their personal positions regarding a ‘vote on sanctions against Iran’. Through this, the US had a diplomatic advantage since they knew when representatives were bluffing and what their real intentions were. The text also outlines various operations which could be considered economic espionage , such as spying on other nations’ technological
developments. All these things aside, the biggest problem for me arose once the book explained that the US government used their extensive surveillance system in order to maintain the status quo. Many people are perhaps indifferent to Intelligent Communication surveillance because they know their life is somewhat boring and insignificant to the NSA since they ‘don’t do anything wrong’. However, what needs to be considered is how the people in power define ‘wrongdoing’. According to Greenwald, a ‘state will view any challenge to its powers as wrongdoing’ and it goes beyond illegal acts, violent behavior and terrorist plots. It comes to now surprise then, that Greenwald himself was considered a terrorist since his reporting on the Snowden files led to a public uproar and had an irreversible effect on the US government. “The true measure of a society’s freedom”, Greenwald discerns, “is how it treats its dissidents and other marginalized groups, not how it treats good loyalists”. Having considered the United States of America a free country where people have the right to voice their opinions freely and without fear of prosecution, this was definitely surprising to me. As Angela Merkel, the chancellor of Germany, said: “the NSA is very much reminiscent of the Stasi, the secret police of East Germany.” As studies have shown and which Greenwald quoted throughout his book, government surveillance has psychological effects on people and inhibits their freedom of speech. I would argue therefore, that through the uncovering of the Snowden files the USA now exists in the next phase of the surveillance state, in which the surveillance is no longer hidden but overt and citizens know that their Intelligent Communication is being observed. The fact that the documentary maker of “Citizen Four” Laura Poitras now lives in exile in Berlin due to her reporting proves that the government is oppressive towards citizens’ freedom of speech rights when they collide with their own agenda and pose a threat to their power. You may wonder and ask “What can be done about this”? Well, for one it is important to keep these things in mind and not adopt a position of indifference. Secondly, by supporting companies and software which do not hand over your private information to the NSA, you are indirectly voting for people’s rights to privacy. The boycott of Skype, Google, Yahoo and Facebook would send a powerful message to these companies saying that people value their rights, do not want to be surveilled and will take active measures to protect their freedoms.
If you want to learn more, check out alternatives to Skype such as ‘Tox’ or ‘SIP’. By Juana Luck M.A. Candidate at McMaster University
JUNE 18-21 2015
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