From bands like Reel Big Fish to the Aquabats, Orange County has a tradition of producing some of the greatest American ska bands. Find a list of them and you’ll see a roster of talent. Even the bands that sold out and you now consider mediocre still have at least one solid album from beginning to end. While there are many unsung heroes from the scene, they all started somewhere. Chudson is another band to add to this list.
Chudson is a ska punk band from Newport Beach, California. Despite what you’ve heard about that particular area of Orange County, don’t let that affect your opinion of them. To quote another Orange County band, The Kids Are Alright, but really they’re more than alright. They’re pretty damn good, but you can judge for yourself by listening to their first full-length LP, The Future of Unemployment. Chudson brings nine tracks in twenty-two minutes of ska punk bliss, with songs that sound closer to 1990s ska punk than their contemporary peers.
What shines through the most in these songs is the love the members have for their music and the scene they are working hard to cultivate. Colin O’Connor, guitar player and songwriter of Chudson, was kind enough to share the origins of the band, some tour stories, and his attempts to rebuild the scene.
Dying Scene (Forrest Gaddis): How did Chudson start?
Colin O’Connor: Chudson was kind of like an amalgamation of a couple of other bands. I’ve been in bands since I was thirteen. I was always trying to make a band with someone new. We decided that what we were doing before wasn’t working, and we really wanted to hone in on one genre.
I had all these songs where I was playing lead lines on the guitar. They were cool, but then our friend who played trumpet was hanging out with us, and he started playing the lead lines. We’re like, “Yeah, this is what we’re going to do instead.” That was kind of how it started.
What’s the average age of the band?
I’m usually the oldest. I’m twenty. It really ranges. The bassist we just took on tour was sixteen. It really ranges. We’re kind of like a collective at this point, so there have been like fifteen members that have been going in and out. It’s just anybody who wants to do it.
That’s a good way to do that. Tell me about The Future of Unemployment.
It started out as we were just going to put out another EP, but then we wanted a full kind of experience. I feel like EPs don’t really give you that because by the time they’re over, you kind of want a little bit more. We have been really influenced by, like the Arrogant Sons of Bitches and anything Jeff (Rosenstock) related, anything Operation Ivy. We wanted an album with no brakes.
The name Future of Unemployment comes from us quitting our jobs to tour. That was kind of where our heads were at with this. We want to live our lives with no brakes. I think the vibe we were trying to capture with the album was that. We wanted to show people how we’re not taking a break. We’re just going to keep going.
It felt very much like My Superhero and The Impossibles.
I know both of them very well.
I wasn’t expecting to hear 1990s ska-punk from people your age. It was a great surprise. When I saw you in May, you guys closed with “Rock and Roll McDonald’s.” I was kids don’t like “Rock and Roll McDonald’s.”
The weird kids do.
How did you get introduced to these bands like The Impossibles? Were your parents into this type of music?
A little bit. They definitely helped me. My parents are really cool in that when I was growing up, they wanted to take me to as much live music as possible. They never forced anything on me. If I didn’t like something, they wouldn’t make me go see it. They would always take me to see genres that even they didn’t particularly like, but they just wanted me to experience it.
What kind of clicked with me was, I think it was either 2018 or 2019. I saw Streetlight Manifesto, Goldfinger, Real Big Fish, they’re definitely not my favorite ska bands. I didn’t really know anything about ska. Then on top of that, the audience like, there was a guy in a full checkerboard suit. I remember asking my dad, “Why the hell is he wearing that? It’s like ninety degrees out here.”
I Was just kind of hooked on ska when I saw that. In terms of like The Impossibles and all that stuff, I would attribute that to the internet. The internet has been really good for music discovery. Streaming platforms really screw over the artists, but the one thing they are good at is definitely music discovery. I just stumbled upon them. They’re probably the number one band in our rotation when we’re on tour. We hear little Star Wars references, and we fucking love Star Wars.
I saw that the last song is called “Watto’s Revenge.” I am not a Prequels fan. I’m that old curmudgeon that does not like them. Was George Lucas right? Does your generation love those prequels?
Personally, I’m not a huge Prequels guy. I like The Phantom Menace. Actually, I like Jar Jar. That’s a rare opinion. The other guys in my band love the Prequels; what we love is the alien designs, like the weird aliens in the Prequels. We watch it just to see Watto and Jar Jar and the Trade Federation because we love CGI and practical effects. That’s like our whole thing.
Our van had the Trade Federation, Watto, and the Cantina band; we would tape up the action figures on the mirror. After every show, we’d ask, “Where’s the closest comic book store?” Then we’d go get action figures after the show.
Is there a song off the album you would consider the single or do you just kind of present the record as a whole thing?
We put out two singles, “Frat Party” and “Headphone Splitter.” The reason those were the singles wasn’t because we thought they were the best or anything; it was because they were kind of done first and they were the easiest to make. Genuinely, all those songs got done and uploaded the day they were finished. The album got uploaded an hour after it was done. We work up to the last minute; that’s just how we do it.
If I were to choose one as a single, I would probably say “Drag Me Down.” That’s my favorite song on the album, but that was done last, so it wouldn’t have worked out.
It’s a really strong opener. Are you guys going to do any type of physical release of the record, or is it just digital for now?
Right now just digital; we’re probably going to do CDs pretty soon. We’re not sure if we’re going to make them or if we’re going to get them from a third party, because we’re all about DIY. We make all our merch ourselves, but we can’t make quality CDs. A lot of people have been asking for vinyl, but I don’t think we’re going to do vinyl for this.
I noticed everything seems very DIY. You guys seem like you’re just booking everything yourselves. I follow you guys on Instagram. It feels like you have a show every weekend. If you aren’t playing at a venue, you’re playing a party. I haven’t seen a band, for lack of a better term, whore themselves out as much. When you’re playing in a band, you should be whoring yourself out.
Absolutely.
As an elder punk, It’s very nice to see.
Thank you.
It seems that you guys were touring all summer. Where did you guys go?
I think we played in 18 states, but I might be wrong. I think the farthest east we went was either Alabama or Atlanta. Atlanta was the farthest east we went. We had to cancel that show because I was in the hospital. We went from Atlanta and went up to Seattle, and then back down. We played shows all along this stop. It was three and a half weeks.
Are you guys just sending emails or messaging Instagrams for any club that you can?
I do 90% of the booking. I send emails out, and I send texts out. If they don’t respond to my text, I text them again. Then I call them because I’m annoying like that. I want to do the show. We have a form that we send out to fans because we get a lot of people messaging us to come to this state, come to this place, come to this place. It’s nice to know that someone wants you to play there.
What I do is, when somebody does that, I have an automation that sends them a form that they can fill out. Where do you live? What are the other good bands and promoters there? Can we sleep on your floor? I look at all that. Okay, we have ten responses to play in Sacramento; we should definitely play in Sacramento. Then I make my calls or whatever. We don’t really like dealing with booking agents or anything. There’s not enough money to give a cut to someone, so I’d rather just handle it.
Do you have any so you have any crazy stories from touring or playing house parties?
Oh, man, we have a lot of both. Not necessarily funny. We got hooked on NBA Jam on tour, and for some reason, we couldn’t win a game. Me and our trumpet player Noah, we stayed up till 3 a.m. two different nights in two different states playing NBA Jam and couldn’t win. One time we were up till two in the morning. I’m like, “Dude, I’m so amped up. I’m not gonna be able to sleep.” He’s like, take this sleeping pill.
It turned out to be an antidepressant, and I reacted so badly to it. I passed out on the floor and I was screaming in the morning. I’ve never thrown up that much in my life. We go to the hospital. I’m there all day. We have to cancel the show. At the end, I’m like, “What happened? Is there anything I gotta do?”
Oh, no, you’re fine now.
We played a show the next day. I think.
I miss playing. I used to play in a ska punk band growing up called Donkey Punch, and content-wise, we shouldn’t be playing those songs anymore, most of them anyway.
I get it. We always talk like, like I can’t say some of these lyrics when I’m forty.
Can you give Chudsonman’s origin?
He came from the planet Chudson. He was looking for a band that could save the world, and he stumbled upon us. The real-life origin of Chudsonman is my cousin Hudson. We kind of named the band after him. He would always come to our shows and wanted to be part of the band, but he has no musical talent. We have tried so many times, but it’s not happening. So we’re like, you can be our hype man. It started where he would just hold up signs with the lyrics and dance around, which is pretty fun. That kind of evolved into him doing dances and leading the pit. On tour, we would get bored. We would go find something new for him to dress up in.
The first one was like a box. He would just dance in a box up there. Then the second day, we found a sheet and he was ghost Hudson. We all found matching shorts and wore Chudson shirts. We were the Chudson basketball team. He was doing tricks like the Harlem Globetrotters. He couldn’t actually do them, but he was trying his best. We saw Superman on tour and wanted to make our own super suit. We went to a bunch of different thrift stores, got a cape, and a bunch of shirts. Basically, all he does is heroic poses on stage. Then if he sees someone crowd killing, he’ll go up to them and say, “Heroes don’t crowd kill. Stop that immediately.”
We’re pretty big in our little friend group, even though we seem bigger than we are in the scene. People think we’re weird, and we don’t get invited to a lot of shows, but that’s fine.
That’s so weird. I’m going to date myself by saying this, but back in the day people would have loved that type of thing. I’m from Orange County, also. Do you get any pushback from being from Newport Beach or does nobody care anymore?
I don’t think I’ve ever gotten any pushback from that. We don’t particularly like Newport. We are the only band that does shows in Newport. We make jokes that we are the Newport Beach scene. My cousin Hudson’s house is on Google Maps as a venue. We’ve done many shows there. We’re very inclusive. We’re very straight edge. I think people give us a pass for that. We don’t seem like we’re Newport people when we talk to people. That’s what I was surprised about.
Our bands are also from all over. Our trumpet player is from Yorba Linda. We have horn players from the Inland Empire and in LA. I think it’s changed a lot. There’s not a lot of animosity, at least from our point of view. We try to be as inclusive as possible in any context we can. We’re also not super proud of being from Newport. It just happens to be a pretty city, but the people here are kind of assholes. That’s why we call ourselves OC ska punk. It’s generational, and it sounds better than Newport ska.
They’re some of the worst people I’ve met in my whole life. Their parents give them everything they want, and you’re like, what are they going to do when they get out of school?
Yeah, well, that’s kind of how the country got in the mess we’re in. Are you guys playing anytime soon?
We just played in Burbank. I’m booking for October right now. We’re not really doing anything for September. There aren’t really any all-ages venues that we can hit up anymore. Chain Reaction is really hard to book. Programme is really hard to book. I called a restaurant that was in Anaheim, asking if we could play there, and they said they’d get back to me.
We’re trying to build up new venues because there’s nowhere to play, and it’s getting really lame because we don’t like driving to LA or the Inland Empire to play. We want to play in OC. We want to build up the OC scene. Every show is a backyard show where everyone’s getting way too drunk and high. It’s not even fun for us anymore. I mean, we are genuinely the only band that does DIY shows in Newport Beach, maybe ever.
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