The Generators are no strangers to the punk scene. Their singer Doug Dagger made a name for himself in the scene when he was just 16 years old and was vocalist for one of the first American Oi! bands The Slugz. The Slugz were heavy influenced by English Oi! bands like Blitz, The Last Resort and The 4 Skins. Later he sang for the highly successful punk band Schleprock; a band that took Dagger off the streets, out of gang life and saved his life. Schleprock had it made in the 90s touring with greats like The Offspring, Green Day and Bad Religion. After Schleprock disbanded, The Generators formed and have been kicking out awesome tunes ever since.
Dagger has a very colourful and often violent past but rather than dissassociate himself from it, he embraces the life he’s lead and the choices, good or bad, that have made him the person he is today . The punk rock veteran was kind enough to participate in an interview with me recently. We discussed the evolution of the LA punk scene, being a “skinhead” in the 80s, running in gangs and the prevelance of drugs in the 80s compared with the modern day. Dagger also talked about The Generators song-writing style and their latest (and 8th) album “The Last of The Pariahs.” Check out the interview here.
Can you tell us about the recording / song writing process you undertook for “Last Of The Pariahs?”
Well I think we had some hurdles to get over with this latest record. After releasing 7 previous albums I was hoping to try and find a way to connect the early Generators sound with where it has been in the last 2 or 3 years. I was not sure if we were going to be able to make that happen, but when it was time to go into the studio to record everything I was a bit more confident that we were going to achieve what we had set out to do. We also distributed the song writing homework to each member as in the past it would normally fall between one of the guitar players and myself, but this time around everyone was really involved. I think the new record is less musically one sided for us. I can actually say I am really happy with the final outcome of “Last Of The Pariahs”.
I really like the song “Tears Of Repentance” off the new album. It sounds like a song about wanting to start over or just not having regrets. Can you tell me about the background behind that song?
Tears of Repentance is about starting over again and burying the past. I normally write a lot about that subject, as you probably know. It’s more of a story telling song, as it holds no actual truth to my life. Sometimes I like to get outside of myself and put myself into someone else’s shoes. I have never written about Child Abuse, and I have known people very close to me that were extremely abused as kids. I thought if I were in their shoes, how would I deal with that trauma? I thought of the anger, or shame that those people would have, and how they might want to seek revenge for the things that happened to them. I pictured a person like that going back to the house where these things might have taken place, and they set the house on fire with no remorse. What ever it might take to set things straight with themselves again. To even the score regardless of the outcome.
What’s your favorite song off the new album and why is it your favorite?
Oh man that is a tough one! I treat all the songs like if they were one of my kids. I try to respect all of them I guess the same. There is a time and place for each one of them I guess? Some songs grow on me, and some songs do not hit me the same as they might have the first time I heard them. It is strange I guess, but If there is one that has remained constant to me, then maybe it would be “You Against You”. It captured something for me, and I always feel the energy from that song. It’s actually kind of a basic, simple song, and to me it just speaks for its self. I love the simplicity of it.
In your time in The Generators what is the most personal song you’ve written and what is it about?
Oh man, good question! In 2004 on the record “Winter Of Discontent” I wrote a song about losing my child, and then losing my wife to the trauma that occurred, as well as all the self-destruction that took place after those things happened. The song is called ‘Lost In Transition” and it’s hard for me to listen to that song, as it reminds me of those times. The song is not the most amazing musically, but it reflected a traumatic time in my life. Music can be extremely powerful sometimes.
You’ve lived in L.A for most of your life. What is your favorite and least favorite thing about the city?
Oh I love Los Angeles. I was raised as a young kid in New York City, but I consider myself a Angelino. I love my city a lot, and I love it’s great diversity. I love the fact I can be in the mountains in the morning and I can be at the beach by the end of the afternoon. I have lived very close to Downtown L.A. for most of my life. I wouldn’t trade it for anything. The City has made me who I am, and I believe that The Generators music is a reflection of Los Angeles. I think if there is anything that sucks about being in L.A. would be the traffic jams on the freeways, or the how L.A. people can be at times so fake. The money, the celebrities and all the insanity that comes with that, sometimes can be so disappointing. Regardless there are always two sides of the coin, and I have traveled all over the world, and to me there is nothing better then being here in Southern California.
What were some of the most memorable punk shows that saw growing up?
I saw a lot of great punk shows in the beginning of the L.A. Punk scene. I was just a little kid who was out in the street and sneaking into half of the gigs but I remember in 1981 I saw Black Flag, DOA, The Misfits, 45 Grave, Husker Du, and The Descendents for $5.00! The show was great and all the kids were having a blast! I think some of the punk shows where the riots happened were pretty crazy too. The Exploited Riot in Huntington Park was extremely violent, and the TSOL Riot on Sunset Blvd, was pretty memorable as well. Those days were intense, and going to a punk show was an entirely different thing then it is today. You really had to be mentally prepared to be thrown into a bad situation. By the 1984 the scene was just completely out of control, and going to a show was like going into a knife fight for me, literally.
You’ve written a pretty informative bio on your site. You mentioned being in one of the first American Skinhead gangs and Oi! bands in the early 80’s. Initially what drew you to that lifestyle and music scene?
I became seriously inspired by the Oi Skinhead scene going on in London in the early 1980s. By the end of 1982 along with some of my closest friends we started Doug & The Slugz, which was my first punk band. We were listening to bands like The Last Resort, The 4 Skins, and The Business. I was actually sending Mark Brennan, the original bass player,letters about wanting to come visit London to see his band play, as well as sending The Last Resort Skinhead Clothing store/hang out demo tapes of our band, and they were writing me back telling me they loved the band! I was only 16 years old when all this was going on. This was an exiting time for me in my life, but all of that would quickly take a turn for the worse when all the violence came into play.
The gang that I ran along side of was called The North Side Firm, which was a group of punk rockers and skinheads from North East Los Angeles. It started out to be just a few of us, but by the end of the gangs history there was over 100 so called members. What started out as typical teenage street fighting, wound up turning into numerous stabbings and shootings, as well as one of the main gang members getting murdered. Lots of kids wound up turning into drug addicts, or wound up going to prison. O
riginally I connected with the anger and the rebellion of being a skinhead. In LA at that time there were not really any Boots and Braces Skinheads. In 1982 there might have only been less then a dozen kids who listened to those bands that I mentioned, and dressed like a skinhead. Once I heard a band like Blitz, or The Last Resort I was instantly connected. Bands like Black Flag or The Circle Jerks who initially were everything musically to me, but the all of that got surpassed by these British bands. I felt that the bands out of England were just more in tune with the things I was feeling as a teenager.
“Skinhead” is a term that is commonly associated with the negative stereotypes. Can you tell us more about what it was to be a “skinhead” in the 80s? What it meant within the scene, socially etc?
Well it still was considered a bad thing even back then to be a skinhead. At first most people who would see us out on the street had no idea of what we were. The look was much different then walking around with a mohawk and combat boots. Most people were probably not sure what we were even into; even some of the punkers at the local shows were a bit confused as well. It did not take long for the skinhead movement to take off in Southern California, and that lead to many more problems because the whole right wing Nazi thing grabbed a hold of part of the movement. I grew up with black kids, latino kids, white kids and asian kids, so any kind of racism played no part with in our group. The main leader of the North Side Firm was half black and was the first black Oi Skinhead in Los Angeles, and most of the other guys were latin.
Very quickly our biggest enemies became the first Nazi Skinhead gangs that formed in the suburbs across Los Angeles. The violence did not stop with fighting with just the Nazis, as we were literally fighting with everyone. We had battles with many of the other punk gangs in L.A. and after 3 or 4 years we were in disputes with a local L.A. Crip Gang, numerous different Mexican street gangs, The Armenian Mafia, Jocks, Stoner/Rocker gangs, etc. The whole thing got so out of control I could not even go home to my fathers house with out people waiting out front to attack me. It was horrible and on top of that the police were constantly arresting me. My life was a complete mess by 1986, and I spun further out of control and wound up on the street and was jumped into a Mexican street gang. That was the lowest part of my life and I am so thankful that I was to make it out in one piece from those times.
Growing up in Los Angeles at the time you did what lead you into the particular life choices you made? Were drugs and alcohol more prevalent in the scene at the time, was it peer pressure based etc?
I think that in the eighties there were not as much drug and alcohol prevention as there is today. Most kids that I knew were smoking pot, and drinking alcohol all the time, and that lead a lot of the same kids to just doing harder drugs. That stuff happens today just the same, but there were not as many commercials on television, or ads in magazines or billboards talking about drug abuse. Ronny Reagan’s wife Nancy was the first person to start that campaign, but kids wanted to get all messed up, and they did. The punk scene in LA was filled with drugs or alcohol. Most of the shows that happened half the crowd were out in the parking lots of the venues just getting wasted. It was actually more fun just to hang out on the street outside the clubs and drink or do drugs. That what was going on back then. I remember many times where all the kids were out in front of the clubs hanging out drinking and the LAPD would drive by and the kids would start hurling bottles at the cop cars. That is the way things were back then
Do you think living in a large metropolis like Los Angeles made you (or anyone) more likely to make self-destructive choices due to greater exposure to this kind of stimuli?
Oh yeah, I think growing up in the city you see a lot more despair, and you become more de-sensitized to so many bad things. All my friends were so self destructive, and looking back on it all its really so sad. I am not really sure why so many people, as well as myself saw self destructing ourselves as some kind of normal thing. It is hard to change that kind of behavior when most of your life that is all that you really knew. It takes a lot of determination, and discipline to change those bad ways, but I do think that living in the city can be a great thing as well as a dangerous thing for young people.
It seems like playing music in your former band Schleprock lead to you getting back on your feet. What was it like playing with acts like Green Day, The Offspring and Bad Religion in the 90s as they were becoming commercially successful?
In the early nineties it was an exciting time. It was something new again, and more positive then the last wave of punk. It became a bit strange when Green Day went from being a cool little band from Berkeley to the biggest thing on the music charts, but I was a friends with them before all their success and they were always really great people and I was happy to see them have such great success. I was also frequenting West Beach studios and hanging out with Brett Gurewitz from Bad Religion years before they blew up too. These bands all worked hard and put out great music, and I have always felt that they deserved the good things that they received. For myself just being away from gang life and off the streets was my own success. I was travelling all over the world and releasing records, and no matter what anyone else had to say about Schleprock, and our own quick moment of fame, I would not change it for a minute. It saved my life and I had a great time.
Do you think that the commercial punk explosion of the 90’s was a good thing or should punk stay in the underground?
Everyone has there own opinions on that subject. I see it like this…if a kid picked up an Offspring record, and got into punk rock, and one year later was buying records from bands like The Subhuman’s or Black Flag then that is a positive thing. Everybody starts somewhere when it comes to getting into some kind of music or art. We are all beginners in the beginning. Most of us did not go from 1 to 100 overnight, so I never looked into it too much. I mean the first punk records I listened to and bought were the Sex Pistols “Never Mind The Bullocks” and The Buzzcocks “Singles Going Steady”, and both those records were on major labels, so I never really understood all of that. I feel it’s necessary to get kids to hear real music, even if it starts in some kind of commercial way.
What are the future plans for the Generators? Are you planning on doing a full U.S. Tour in support of “Last Of The Pariahs?”
Tour, Tour, Tour! I hope we can get out as much as possible over the next 6 months. We want to play the east coast again as well as the mid west, so hopefully we can make that happen. We already have dates planned for the southwest USA as soon as we get back from Europe in October 2011. Thanks for the interview
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