We’re back in business with some of the usual Scheme updates and an interview with niche internet micro-celebrity Ben Ditto….
SCHEME REPORT:
We're one day late but we ain't sorry...we were out supporting the beauty that is Labor Day by joking off and drinking coffee with our squadron. Next time you see him, dap up your local blow up Union Rat for holding it down and keeping the line safe from scab motherfuckers like Scanlon from THE FIGHT.
All outstanding mailorder is sent out - thanks to all who ordered. Some true stalwarts of the scene purchase some distro copies, so in the future keep an eye out. If you'd like to order some wholesale copies of the ALMIGHTY WATCHING and WRECKAGE tapes for your distro, bang thy line and we can get you situated.
We received shocking and alarming news earlier this week. It was starting to look like hell was going to freeze over before it would be completed but the four song 7" from ALMIGHTY WATCHING is now complete and about to be sent to press. It was only about May when we thought it would be done in a week or two. Time flies.
Records are forecasting to be done in early Spring of next year.....as always, more news in time as it develops. We're trying to finagle some advanced copies so perhaps there will be an earlier record release at the end of Winter....who da hell knows with plants all being fucked up.
We also gotta remind you that next Friday, September 17th, is the first ALMIGHTY WATCHING with MINDFORCE, AGE OF APOCALYPSE and LIFE's QUESTION in Poughkeepsie. Will the set be epic? Will it be horrible? Or will it just be a solid "oh that was kinda cool?" Only time will show - get your ass there to find out for yourself.
In other ALMIGHTY WATCHING and WRECKAGE show news, we now direct you to the infamous SCENE REPORT...
SCENE REPORT:
The year is 2021…the wasteland we once called US of A is devoid of food, drinkable water and most fatal of all…bands playing hardcore music in VFWs. Just as you make your solace with your last sundown, the flyer for this show blows into your face on a heaven sent easterly wind and hope for the future is reborn like a phoenix. A new future of no bouncers or guest lists or merch cuts or managers just hardcore bands playing on the floor in a suburban neighborhood and on a weeknight to boot.
Now you don’t have to waste a precious weekend day where you could be meeting a nice girl or guy, or drinking coffee somewhere for 5 hours. Get out of work, drive to the hamlet of Wallingford Connecticut (less than 2 hours from NYC / Boston / Worcester / the Hudson Valley / parts of New Jersey / Albany? / if you take the ferry Long Island / Rhode Island) and not even to mention this show will be over well before 10 PM even if that means having to make a blood offering in the name of show expedience. $10 show also. The best show price ever penned, not too much .. not too little (no cheap skates), just enough to make you feel satisfied with your patronage and just enough for us so I’m not walking Grady to the ATM at Walgreens at the end of the night.
KYLE’s PLAYLIST:
ON THE MIGHT OF PRINCES - Where You Are...
Turned Out A Punk w/ Tony Molina and Nick Woj
CHUBBY AND THE GANG
SUPERTOUCH
SUN KIL MOON / JESU
Where the Wild Things Are Comp
GLASSJAW - El Mark EP
RIVAL SCHOOLS - Found
RESURRECTION
ALBIN’s PLAYLIST:
SUPERTOUCH - WNYU
BIG BODY BES - Tears Of A Tiger
MERAUDER - Master Killer
TURNSTILE - Glow On
PORTISHEAD - Dummy
KOMMAND - Terrorscape
CROWN OF THORNZ - Train Yard Blues
JAPANESE HOUSE - Good At Falling
Listen to these songs and others here:
You might know Ben Ditto from his work with Dazed Beauty, working with THE 1975 on some of their videos or his publishing company, Ditto Press, which released Skinhead: An Archive - perhaps the best book documenting the skinhead subculture in all of its different facets.
However, I first came across him as a guy who wore ONE LIFE CREW shirts and posted weird and funny shit on his Instagram account.
After seeing him post an EKULU song on his IG story, I knew I had to dig and find some more info about him and what his thoughts on the core are (I was happy to find out that he appreciates a funny mosh IG account like any true cultured savant) and to just poke his brain on innate shit.
One of the beauties of the internet is that you can just hit someone up out of the blue via IG DM and see if they’ll answer your dumb questions, so s/o to Ben for being a real one and answering em. You can follow him on IG at: @ben_ditto2.0
What was your introduction to hardcore? What bands were around during your initial involvement in the scene and what shows stuck out to you? Do you feel like the nineties UK techno / club scene and hardcore scene ran parallel together or was it completely separate?
I grew up in the early 90s and my early exposure to hardcore was for sure DEAD KENNEDYS, BLACK FLAG and MISFITS because I was mainly in the industrial / goth scene and there was a whole “Alternative Tentacles” Venn diagram overlap, an AT courier bag was the thing to have, you see. And I loved LARD, the prototypical industrial / early hardcore crossover band. Perception of hardcore at the time was a kind of whiney American take on punk. I am not a massive fan of punk rock style or ethos but did love more Oi! bands like THE BUSINESS. Harder edge basically. In the UK in the 90s, it felt to me like everything was hybridised, clubs always played a variety of metal / punk / indie / etc, and we had a very influential radio DJ called John Peel who was the conduit for most of us to discover new music, and he was very eclectic with his tastes. In terms of scenes, I would say early rave scene was populated by crowds from many different smaller scenes as it was more of a meeting place, and I knew very little of a hardcore scene in the UK beyond a few shows in pubs with like 5 people in the audience.
What were some of the first DIY zines that caught your eye and what were their content? What drew you to them and does that feeling still stick with you today?
The zines that most inspired me were Watermelon, Bugs + Drugs, and Answer Me!. Watermelon was an insanely detailed comic (like amphetamine art style), my favourite issue had a strip of the Son of Sam killings. This was back in the early 90s, I found a copy in a record store and read it when I was on acid. Bugs + Drugs was also insanely detailed, lots of tiny hilarious drawings. It was the successor to Skate Muties from the 5th Dimension, but I missed the boat on that one. And most influential of all was Answer Me!, Jim Goad’s extremely misanthropic zine. I loved it for the quality of writing and execution and art, and it went on to inspire early Vice (back when it was actually funny and good).
In your opinion, what is the best depiction of a skinhead, be it a photo or illustration, in media?
Probably Tim Robbins in Made in Britain, particularly resonant as someone who remembers the UK in the 80s. Highly non-glamorous and bleak, directed by Alan Clarke who I think was a genius. He directed Elephant about the troubles in Northern Ireland (which Gus Van Sant remade about Columbine|), and Scum which is one of the most bleak and powerful films in existence. The UK in the 80s was a much darker place, and though I was young I caught the tail end of the conditions in the book. I remember violent skinheads on trains after football matches and when I started clubbing, we socialised together. There was less delineation in the punk / goth scene in those days as social media didn’t exist and people didn’t have much choice of where to go out. So frequently we were on dance floors and in pubs where members of Combat 18 and others with extreme far right ideologies mixed with people who were violently anti-fascist. I remember getting lifts in rusty old cars with a couple of neo-nazis and a couple of members of the Anti Nazi League. It was surreal but common in the scenes I grew up in. Romper Stomper is an incredible film but I have less experience of Australia, I think it is an excellent piece of work and the love story is very resonant, more for the attraction of violence to the innocent and vice versa. Ultimately I think that Trevor as a character has more nuance than Hando.
What was the first hardcore record that stood out to you? Was it the aesthetic, the typography, an image or something completely different? What was the last record layout you saw that stood out to you?
If we can class it as hardcore, I’d say The Power of by LARD, which is still one of my favourite covers of all time. I have not cared about an album cover for a very long time.. I am not a vinyl consoomer so my exposure is 50px squares on apps, probably the last genuinely interesting spate of album artwork to me was the GENOCIDE SHRINES / TETRAGRAMMACIDE / NYOGTHAEBLISZ stuff a few years ago. BLOOD INCANTATION artwork was pretty great but boring metal elitists would disagree.
What bands do you feel broke out the atypical mold of hardcore, be it sonically or by their imagery? Do you think hardcore bands should try to break out of that mold? Or do you think they should stay to the tried and true sounds?
To be honest, I am not a massive hardcore geek. And some things like death metal and hardcore benefit from tweaks instead of massive changes. Like I can always get down with a TERROR / Snapshot style big black outline college font and some tough guy photo, I don’t need hardcore to reinvent the wheel. I love MERAUDER in terms of imagery and style, and I guess I gravitate to more metal crossover stuff like HATEBREED, RINGWORM and INTEGRITY. I like deathcore, don’t care what anyone says. I do NOT like whiney high-pitched voice hardcore or emo or whatever. CRO-MAGS Best Wishes cover is amazing / unexpected. I get a lot of my best new hardcore tips from a page called Down Before the Beatdown, where a guy downs a pint before the beatdown (as the name suggests).
An average, normal person walks up to you on the street and asks you to explain what your shirt is - it's a ONE LIFE CREW shirt. How would you describe the lore of OLC, Chubby Fresh and Mean Steve to someone that has no clue?
Obnoxious.