Muddy Roots 2023 is officially in the books, and with this being my first trip out to Cookeville, TN for MRMF, man was it a hell of an introduction. If you aren’t familiar with what the Muddy Roots crew has brewing in the middle of rural Tennessee, think of a DIY version of Bonaroo, but […]
Muddy Roots 2023 is officially in the books, and with this being my first trip out to Cookeville, TN for MRMF, man was it a hell of an introduction.
If you aren’t familiar with what the Muddy Roots crew has brewing in the middle of rural Tennessee, think of a DIY version of Bonaroo, but way sicker and way more affordable. Free camping virtually anywhere on the premises and a wide-open BYOB policy have helped build a reputation valuing the music and community over large profits, something I appreciated just as much as the huge headliners they’ve attracted in recent years.
The huge headliners in question for this year’s installment were GWAR, Suicidal Tendencies, and Cro Mags, all of which were live firsts for myself. There wasn’t a drop-off in big names either after the top 3, with Amigo the Devil and DRI also playing. And, with the exception of Daikaiju and Night Talkers, almost all artists were, at least personally, live firsts.
The atmosphere was perfect, the music was perfect, everything was perfect. Whatever they’re doing out in Cookeville surely seems to be working. The shuttles to a nearby private waterfall help folks truly appreciate the gorgeous and unique scenery of Eastern Tennessee, while the music starts early and continues late into the night. From bluegrass to sludge-metal, punk rock to rockabilly, local act to international touring musician, Muddy Roots did as good a job as any in bringing people together from all over to celebrate the music we all love.
With the festival lineup growing larger and more diverse each year, I felt coverage of Muddy Roots would be most productive in highlighting some of the weekend favorites, rather than each individual performer. Below you’ll find the eight artists I most enjoyed seeing.
I’ve had the pleasure of seeing Night Talkers a handful of times, most recently opening for The Last Gang at Music City’s best punk bar, the Cobra. And when local ska-punk legends Stuck Lucky were a last minute Covid scratch, onlookers were graced with the Night Talkers signature style of shredding guitar solos and fast, in-your-face rock ‘n’ roll. Although it was a disappointment missing the always entertaining Stuck Lucky, Night Talkers very much filled their shoes, much to the pleasure of the packed-out Wood Stage crowd.
Unless I’m mistaken (which is always a possibility), this was Night Talkers’ Muddy Roots debut. They’ve recently, as of the last year and a half or so, emerged as a local favorite of mine and I’ve been glad to see some local dudes garner interest both around town and out of state.
Hans Gruber and the Die Hards was one of those pesky touring bands that has somehow alluded my radar for several years now. I’ve known who they were for a while, but it wasn’t until the Muddy Roots lineup was announced that I hopped on board with these guys. It sucks to think that I’ve missed out for this long on probably the most entertaining band of the weekend.
Between every song, it seemed someone was switching instruments, whether it was lead-singer Rosey Armstrong switching from saxophone to some sort of handheld percussion instrument, or her husband Kurt dropping the bass and grabbing the traffic cone trombone, these dudes were all over the place, both musically and literally. I couldn’t take my eyes off their set, not only for the fast, hard-hitting punk rock, but for the stage antics that I only managed to capture a fraction of in my shots.
I’ve found the band whose duty it is to fill the Masked Intruder void that was left with the hiatus of everyone’s favorite masked punkers. The Jasons have emerged, assless chaps and all, with their own unique blend of villanous attire and Ramones-core punk rock. Humorous, sexy, terrifying, they’ve got the look figured out, and the music is in no way lacking.
Their closing came in the form of a sort of response to the Menzingers‘ ‘I Don’t Wanna Be an Asshole Anymore’ titled ‘I Wanna Be an Asshole’. And it sent the crowd into nothing short of a frenzy.
Waxed was a band I decided to break my punk-rock-only policy for, and it was probably the best decision I could have made. The experience that’s been gained in their 10+ year history really presented itself with their mastery of stage performance. The crowd was as rowdy as any I’d seen all weekend, even keeping up with the obvious contenders in Suicidal Tendencies and GWAR (although I’ve gotta rank it behind Cro Mags saying as an actual ambulance had to rush to the pit during their set).
Trending more towards modern hardcore than the skatepunk I normally fancy, I did see shades of Turnstile in both sound and performance from these guys. It was obvious from the packed mob of onlookers that a group of fan-favorites was about to take the stage.
Not much else really needs to be said here other than Tim Barry did what Tim Barry does. He put on a hell of a fuckin’ show, split pretty evenly between being up on stage and down on ground level with the rest of the crowd. The sentiment and storytelling were there, giving meaning and insight to the ever-attentive crowd. All the favorites were heard, at least all my favorites, including ‘Fine Foods Market’ much of Rivanna Junction, all culminating with the obvious closer, ‘Avoiding Catatonic Surrender’.
If were going off of technicality here, I guess I had already previously seen Tim Barry’s Fest 20 set last October, but the view sucked and I was rushing off to another set before Barry was halfway through his. This was my first real Tim Barry show and it satisfied every live-show craving I had to see my favorite Americana writer.
I’ve covered multiple Daikaiju attacks, being that they aren’t merely live performances, but attacks. Prior to each show, I seem to forget why they are my favorite band to photograph, and maybe favorite live band overall. Fire always holds a prominent place in performances, almost as prominent as crowd interaction.
Every crowd interaction possibility that I can devise occurred at the Wood Stage, during the late hours of Muddy Roots night one. Lead guitarist Secret Man led the crowd onslaught, riding the shoulders of one crowd member, recruiting others to play instruments, and surfing the remaining spectators, all while playing seemingly neverending surf-punk riffs. The tattered remains of each member’s Hawaiian stage uniform makes a whole lot more sense post-attack. The only antic I had yet to witness (until this performance that is) was their ritualistic tour van arson, which was done almost ceremonially to close their performance.
Having lived in Tennessee for much of my adult life, Suicidal Tendencies and Cro Mags have been bands of legend, with my only hope of seeing live performances being out-of-state travel. So I was beyond stoked seeing the lineup announcement featuring two of the founders of Hardcore. What I was unaware of, however, was the amount of talent and musical experience that would grace the main stage late during the first night.
Beginning with Mike Muir and Dean Pleasants, Muir being the only original member and Pleasants’ now outlasting that of former guitarist Rocky George. The two veterans recruited their asses off, bringing in the next generation of great musicians in Ben Weinman, Tye Trujillo, and Greyson Nekrutman. Weinman, formerly of Dillinger Escape Plan, Trujillo, whose last name may be recognizable as son of RnR Hall of Fame Metallica member Robert Trujillo, and Nekrutman, a worthy replacement for current Offspring drummer Brandon Pertzborn.
During the show, Muir’s years did not show a bit, while Trujillo portrayed a musicianship that didn’t seem to align with the mere 18 years he’s lived. Trujillo boasted some of the fastest, yet cleanest bass playing I’ve witnessed, while Weinman and Nekrutman’s speed was equally impressive. The current Suicidal lineup was, in many ways, the epitome of punk: a group from different backgrounds, genres, and even generations, producing genre-mending music.
While Suicidal Tendencies had gone through an evolution, Cro Mags appeared to be the fast, wreckless, fuckin’ insane punk band that I had pictured from 40 years prior. As was the case with Mike Muir, Harley Flanagan’s age was not a factor in his ability to utilize the entirety of the stage within a matter of seconds.
What was immediately obvious was these guys were veterans, they knew exactly what they were doing up there. The crowd excitement gave this the feel of a small-club East coast show rather than an outdoor festival in rural Tennessee.
There you have it, a pretty good wrap-up of my Muddy Roots experience in a nutshell. However, only so much can be portrayed through word and photograph. The community atmosphere was just as enjoyable as the big headliners, but don’t get me wrong, the music was as rad as ever, making me proud to live so close to something so special.
I feel it to be a punishable offense that the Nashville Dying Scene branch has failed to cover Muddy Roots in the past. I hope to have the privilege to cover MRMF far more frequently in the future because it really is as special as I hope I’ve portrayed. Scroll on down for a bunch of shots from the weekend. As always, thanks for checking out the site. Cheers!
San Francisco punk rock four piece Tess & The Details are gearing up to release their debut album Runaway next month on Double Helix Records. We’re stoked to bring you the music video for the brand new single, the album’s title track. Check it out below! Tess & The Details is fronted by Tess Stevens, […]
San Francisco punk rock four piece Tess & The Details are gearing up to release their debut album Runaway next month on Double Helix Records. We’re stoked to bring you the music video for the brand new single, the album’s title track. Check it out below!
Tess & The Details is fronted by Tess Stevens, with Gideon Berger (ex-Useless ID) on drums, Pity Party’s Dustin Galecki on lead guitar, and Lawrence Hood on bass. The band’s 12-song debut LP Runaway is due out November 14th. My fellow collector nerds can get the record on three different awesome vinyl color variants here here.
Upcoming shows:
Saturday, October 14th – Crepe Place, Santa Cruz Sunday, October 15th – Kilowatt, San Francisco Friday, October 20th – Tamarack, Oakland
The Riverboat Gamblers are celebrating the 20th Anniversary of its 2003 Something to Crow About. The band decided it was a good time to reflect on the significance of the record. I asked the below questions of two of The Riverboat Gamblers’ band members, singer Mike Wiebe (MW) and guitar player Ian MacDougall (IM). I also […]
The Riverboat Gamblers are celebrating the 20th Anniversary of its 2003 Something to Crow About.
The band decided it was a good time to reflect on the significance of the record. I asked the below questions of two of The Riverboat Gamblers’ band members, singer Mike Wiebe (MW) and guitar player Ian MacDougall (IM). I also spoke to the pair about how the Riverboat Gamblers came to be and where it is now. Along with Wiebe and MacDougall, the band also includes Fadi El-Assad on lead guitar, Rob Marchant on bass, and Sam Keir on drums.
On Something to Crow About:
(NOTE: The Q&A below has been edited and condensed for content/clarity’s sake.)
MG: How did the decision to re-release the record come about?
IM: “We’ve been wanting to have all of our releases available and we wanted to start with the one that’s been unavailable the longest.“
MG:Was it simply a matter of 20 years being a milestone amount of time?
IM: “This record is really special to all of us and to have it back is awesome. 20 years just happened to be how long it had been when we got it back. It sort of lined up perfectly.”
MG:How long have been planning/working on the re-issue?
IM: “I had met this great dude John Kastner over the years touring in other bands and he helped facilitate this so we that we could re-release this ourselves and have it distributed properly. Everything has been pretty in house here now which is at the time great.“
MG: What went into the decision-making as far as the artwork and presentation of the re-release?
IM: “As far as artwork etc. We brought in original bass player Pat Lillard that recorded on this album, to help update some things. We added a quote from producer Tim Kerr and changed some fonts around that had always bugged some of us.“
McDougall summed it up with:
“We got a great remaster from Jack over at Enormous Door here in Austin. He really woke this thing up and gave it a shower, shave and a hot pot of coffee.“
Mike Wiebe (vocals) “Long story short- after Gearhead went under it was tied up for a bit…“
MG: Reflecting on the album now, were you aware or did you have a sense of how special it was at the time and how important in might become in the future (and now history) of The Riverboat Gamblers?
MW: “I knew we worked really hard on it we were happy with it but no, I didn’t really know how special it was and that it would be such an important factor in our lives 20 years later. I knew people liked it at the time but it’s kind of hard to see or feel that stuff when you have nothing to compare it to. ”
MG: Was it simply a matter of 20 years being a milestone amount of time?
MW: “In editing the video for “Rattle Me Bones” a few weeks ago and looking at all the old footage of us playing I really started to feel the weight of all of it. I think for the most part I/we are always kind of moving forward and thinking about the next record or the next project and I don’t really take a lot of time to reflect on that stuff. So it was nice to look back and really appreciate how lucky it is to have the experience of a little magical pocket where everything kind of clicked at the same time.”
On the Past, Present, and Future of The Riverboat Gamblers
MG: How have things changed since you started the band?Have your goals been met and are there new goals?
MW: “I mean it’s you know it’s completely different. I mean we were little babies when we started. I know the band’s over like 25 years old I think. The band can rent a car. You know, the (band) living on its own, can vote and drink and everything.
Honestly my goal is just like I just want to see the band name on a screen-printed poster. I want to have a 7-inch out like that was that was the big goal or whatever.”
MG: What was scene like back when you started?
MW: “So, (back) then you know, we were in Denton, TX. It was really just like playing these house shows mostly, and the scene was really big and booming then. Right when Green Day was like blowing up and Rancid and all these bands.
My friend calls it the “Gilman Gold Rush.”It was something to sign all these punk bands. It was just this really exciting fun time to be a band in Denton Texas because Denton, this little suburb outside of Dallas where there was like one or two clubs.
So, there’s all these old houses that everybody lived in kind of, you know, just college kids and we were just throwing these house shows, and it became this really kind of like underground famous place to play a show at the time for touring bands. Touring bands, a lot of times, they would skip Dallas. They would skip a club show in Dallas to play Denton because – especially punk bands would do that – because that was such a popular place. It was just kind of like this known fact that like if you come, you do a show in Denton. A lot of times like this you’re like, you know, a smaller touring punk band. It’s going to be the best show of your whole tour and the word kind of got out.”
MW: “So, between all the houses we were living at, there was there was just plenty of opportunities to play and like kind of cut chops as it were. And so, we were just kind of like playing shows all the time and setting up shows and kind of making connections for when we were going to go out, ultimately later.
I would say, I mean, I would think this started up when I was like 20-ish, you know? Probably 20, like 19, 20… This is, this is before Something to Crow About. But yeah, this is maybe even before the Gamblers, like when the scene was just kind of getting started. But we were all in different bands and you know? Fadi and I were in a band together and then some of the other guys, we all, everybody kind of just started playing in multiple bands. And sometime, you know, over the course of a couple years, we all started Gamblers together.”
MG: I have always had an interest in the origin of band names. How did you come up with the name The Riverboat Gamblers?
MW: “I don’t remember exactly all except for kind of It was at the time, band names were really, and felt like, you know, our purview that, like a lot of bands were…there’s a lot of very…emo at the same time. The emo movement was like, really kind of up-and-coming. It was kind of like the pre, before emo kind of became what it is like now. Or what it would become.
But the emo movement was very like pretentious long-winded names, you know? I mean you know you name your band after some obscure French poets. Then there’s like a band called something like – and they might have been great, I don’t mean to disparage them – but their name was Fall into the Seer and the Yellow Leaf, and there was always very like very and on the flipside of that, the pop punk bands would kind of be like The Veronicas! or you know, the Choppy Boys or whatever. And so we were, The Riverboat Gamblers seemed like it stuck out in a weird way. At the time I think we liked it kind of sounded like a little bit more like oh this could be like a country band or like a classic rock band.
Yeah, it kind of fits there. Texas swagger to it which ultimately, it’s fine, but there was a period where it kind of bit us in the ass, because it was like everybody just assumed because we were from Texas and called The Riverboat Gamblers that we were like a stand-up bass rockabilly band. And everywhere we go it would be like ‘what rockabilly band in town are you going to play with?’ Rockabilly can be great and all, but at some point it was it was like…it was a little bit of effort in like no, that’s not, you know, that’s not what we want to do. We’re not in that world you know, and that was what it felt like and can’t accept it, that people the world kept trying to put us into that universe and was a little bit of effort to not stay in there.
But there was a lot of that in the Dallas area. There was at that time, especially.
IM: Yeah, Dallas had the Rockabilly thing. I feel like Dallas has like a huge skinhead thing too here as well but…Because there’s also less of a line between. But it was. It was. I remember being a kid and being freaked out going out to shows for sure for a while there. It was kind of a mix. I feel like there was. I feel like with any of that stuff, there’s always going to be some sort of, you know, people coming out of the woodwork. “
MG: Ian how did you get involved with the Gamblers?
IM: “I met the guys when I was probably like, the guys in Gamblers. I met them when I was probably about 15 and I caught the tail end of what Mike was talking about. Like the house shows, and the Gamblers were already a band. They were kind of playing around and yeah, I would go and see them. And then eventually, like, go up to them and I met all the guys. There was a record store across the street from my school [in Carrolton, TX, where MacDougall lived at the time] called CD Addict. And I’d go there after school and I bought a Buzzcocks record from, you know, it’s just like, oh, I’ve always wanted to check this out and I bought a Buzzcocks record and the guy behind the counter was like, oh man, well if you like this, you might really love my brother’s band. And that band was The Marked Men. And it was Jeff Burke’sbrother. [Jeff Burke plays bass player for The Marked Men. His brother, Mark Burke, opened CD Addict in Carrollton, and now owns Mad World Record Shop in Denton] And so, I came back, and I was like, I love this. He was like, well, they’re actually playing this weekend. He gave me a flyer and I got my buddy to give me a ride and we both went up to the show and saw The Marked Men. And I don’t remember who else was on the show. It might have been The Marked Men and The Dirty Sweets.
For me, when I was a kid going there like Mike, I had a little bit different of an experience with it because I didn’t live there and so I would come up. [Carrolton is just under 25 miles southeast of Denton] I mean, I spent like all of my time up here though and it was really cool to come up. And we had a really cool little group. I would come up whenever I got out of school, and everybody else is still working jobs or not working, and we would just all hang out at somebody’s house and then there would be a show there or something like that at night. And because it was a college town, every house would be having some party or something and so we would just like walk around and go in just like party hop and then eventually go to some show and then you end up back in somebody’s house staying the night or hanging out staying up listening to records and stuff.”
MG: Mike, what was Ian like, with him being much younger? Do you recall what you thought of the kid at time?
MB: “I was 10 years, yeah, about 10 years older. You could say who you know who you are. Again, kind of game meet game as far as like somebody that’s into the same type of music. It’s still, you know, even though that was defined as a cool Bohemian (place), Denton it wasn’t like this is the sort of specific style of punk music style of. Punk music and stuff that we were into was a little bit more obscure. So, you know, Ian kind of came in and like kind of had the same background of genres of rock and roll and punk music and stuff like that. So, it was really easy. Old soul too. And I’m very immature. So it was easy to kind of meet there and then when we recorded Something To CrowAbout and he didn’t play on that but right after, right after we recorded it, we started touring a whole bunch. He hopped in the van with us and our guitar player couldn’t do it because it was looking like an extensive amount of touring, and it was more than he could do for work and stuff. That’s when the band kind of went from being a weekend warrior band to kind of like a full-time deal. Ian was just graduating high school.“
MG: Ian, what was it like to tour so young, and being too young for some of the venues?
IM: “That was around was in the mid -90s. Around the first tour that I did with Gamblers, you know I was pretty young. I wasn’t 21. We toured with this band Burning Brides for the first tour that we did together and Burning Brides they had that advance money where they got money. We were still in the van and trailer but they had a bus on this tour. And so, there were a lot of shows where I couldn’t go in. I could go in and do sound checks, play the show, but I couldn’t hang out. And so they would let me come and hang out on the bus. I just watched TV in the back with Dimitri [Coats] the singer in Burning Brides. It was, you know, just hanging out.“
MG: So now you both are in the band. How long before you starting hitting the goals, like you had the 7 inch and next…
MW: “It felt pretty natural, but there was definitely some huge buzz surrounding Something To Crow About. We toured and toured on that record for a long time and shortly thereafter it was time for the next record. And so around then it’s when things really started changing because, you know, we wanted to do something bigger scope and to get out there. I don’t know, there were demos that were floating around that we had done and then there were, you know, we started working on songs and so we actually were talking about working with all these different producers and labels and you know, the people that really came out and really went above and beyond to show us that they cared were Volcom. Volcom Entertainment. They had a really great team of people, and you know we were kind of like gonna be their first dance. They were kind of basically treating us like it was going to be their first real big like “we’re going to go all in on this” (thing).
And that’s really where it started to feel like things were changing because all of a sudden we’re living in an apartment at the Oakwoods (Apartments in Los Angeles), which like actors and other bands and were there for like a month and we have an allowance and where So, all of a sudden we’re in LA for like, you know, for a month or more. I feel like it feels like so long that we were out there, but we all lived in an apartment together and we were out there, you know. It wasn’t uncommon. This was, like, a super common thing for bands to go out there and live at this giant apartment complex, that was for like entertainment industry folks. So, there was a lot of actors there. Here was I remember like being in a swimming pool with Pat, our old bass player and like all the kids from Malcolm (In The Middle) on the grounds. “
IM: “Like that, like sort of that thing where, yeah, like we go to the gym and there would be like Garrett Morris from Saturday Night Live. It’s crazy, but around then you know, and then afterwards, we were working on a record with this guy Andrew Murdock. Same things, as he went above and beyond to really prove that he wanted to do this record and because of that, we knew that we wanted to spend more time on Confusion. You know this is my first experience. I had recorded stuff in the past, (but this was) my first experience like, you know, working with the guys and Gamblers in the studio and it was a lot of fun. We had a lot of fun working on that record.“
MW: “During that was that was that during a time it was a cool experience. Not that I thought like oh it’s going to be like this every time. I think I knew it was kind of special but now in retrospect like wow what a unique experience.”
IM: “Cool, weird, lucky thing that we got to do that. A lot of bands maybe don’t get to do that. And you know, we didn’t really get to do it yet. But it was, yeah, it was what years were those? That’s when there was still money in the music industry. Remember that one, 2005 maybe? [Mike adds: “yeah something like that “].”
MG: When did you notice the crowds getting bigger. When the floors where you were earlier on the bill were filling up? Was out slow or all of a sudden?
IM: “It was at around the time that we started this touring constantly and there was headlining stuff, and also a lot of like support act stuff. But for big bands, where we were actually playing, we went from playing little clubs to getting to open up for bigger bands in really big rooms. And noticing the people were staying for the early acts and I think that was just like from touring.”
MW: “It took a really long time to get to get used to that. I think maybe it was everybody else acquiesced easier. But for me, it took a long time to get used to, like figuring out the animal of those big stages far away from the crowd. There’s like less people to try and figure out how to translate that. To do what we had been doing, what I had been doing in those little clubs, and to try and translate that to giant things. Well, it was slow. Like you notice here and there in some towns, I mean there’d be little pockets of like ohh wow we just kind of leveled upin this one area.
For us was really slow. We never really had an overnight kind of thing you know and never any like real…umm… navigating all of it was pretty confusing and weird and still is just the business side of music. The business part is something we’re still kind of, you know…I mean I think we’re more aware of it now but now of course it’s changed so much but back then it was, like, confusing. Really confusing.“
MG: How soon did you get out of Texas and start doing national tours, criss-crossing the country?
IM: “That was like immediately. I mean like the first tour that I did with Gamblers like we, it was a full U.S. tour and all of these things that we did when they were all like we would go out like everywhere. And that’s one thing. It’s like getting out of Texas. I remember that always being like, oh, we got to start this tour in New York. So, we would drive 24 hours from Austin or Denton and go straight to go and meet some tour out in like. New York or like Morongo, California…that’s where we started the X and Rollins tour. And these things would go all over the place We would go all over the place and then we’d hop over to Europe and play everywhere you possibly could over there too.“
MG: What was the first huge tour and was there any nervousness or sense of starstruckness?
IM: “I think you know like we the the one of the like one of the bigger ones that we went on early on like we toured with Flogging Molly and that was like that was a pretty big one…but there was no like starstruckness with that. I think when we had when we toured with X and the Rollins Band. That was when it was like, like, holy shit, there’s that dude from Black Flag. And then that’s X Oh my God.
And then it was cool to the eventually like befriend these people. Like, I remember an experience in DC and being at the 9:30 Club and sitting there and talking with Ian McKaye and Henry Rollins, like about about Eater. You know, this old 70s punk band. I was wearing an Eater T-shirt and they were like, “Can you believe that there’s kids wearing an Eater T-shirt?” We were talking about that. And I was like, Oh my God, this is so crazy. I got pictures from that still from that night and I look like I’m a child. And then we toured with Joan Jett and that was another very like, wow. “
MG: And were they all pretty cool with you?
IM: “Yeah, everybody, we got along with pretty much everybody we’ve toured with. Yeah, yeah, for the most part. That’s the cool thing with this bandandits experiences. Not only are you meeting all of these band people, but you’re meeting the crew as well that worked for these folks. And like the world is so, so small, you know. Because I mean, like eventually, I started working in in crew stuff, doing tour management stuff. And you know, lifer types, you’re going to run into these people like 10 years from now. And it’s been pretty neat because it’s all been from, you know, our time with Gamblers. And I’ve worked with some of these crew members that we met in the early days when I was a teenager and, you know, worked with them like, you know, 10 or 15 years later.“
MG: Looking back have your views on the scene changed? Are you still as eager?
MW: “Yeah, well, I mean like I think for me it’s, you know, getting older and still doing it and still feeling like there is no room and stuff to say. And the goals are a lot different, like all that hype and stuff is not…you know we’re not young anymore. So, the only reason to keep doing it, not that we were doing it for any other reason before, but the only reason to do it really when you’re older is because you still really love it, and it’s you like creating music and performing it and stuff like that.
I mean, you know, it’s less about like, well let’s get out there and conquer the world, touring and stuff. It’s more like let’s keep it real pure, like let’s just make some cool shit because there’s not any pressure of like being super, super full-time with it in that way. There’s not any you know…we’re kind of on our own right now. There’s just not that like vice-like pressure of like, well, we gotta tour six months out of the year and we have to, you know, fulfill this record, by this date, by this time for these people. It’s more just like, no, we wanna do it. So, no time limit. It’s just, it’s just for the for the love of the game.
IM: As we got older, people go off and do other things and start families, but we’ve always been writing music together. We had all this time, like our last record came out in 2012. And I mean, we have songs from back then that didn’t get released, that only for the sheer fact that they didn’t really fit kind of the vibe of the record. It wasn’t like they were kind of throwaway things.
So, we’re kind of revisiting a lot of stuff and we’re also. I mean Mike and I and Fadi and Rob, you know, like we constantly have these ideas that we’re in little song demos and stuff that we’re shooting each other. It’s a cool thing.
Everyone’s like, you know, the guys with kids, the kids are old enough now that that, you know, they can kind of get away for a little bit to hop in the studio and knock out some stuff or we can go and do these weekends. And so right now it’s sort of like, you know, picking up the pieces a lot. For things, you know, because all of our labels that we had releases on, they’ve all dissolved.
So going back and getting these records back available for everybody that want them and making sure that you know…like Something To Crow About was out of print for, you know, over 15, close to 20 years. And you know, it’s kind of like a shame that nobody could buy it at the merch table, because it’s still like 80% of our set are those songs.
And so we got that back together and we’re going to rerelease Confusion as well, or repress it. And we’re also just like we did a 7-inch last year. Over this last year for the songs, one of them is super old, but you know, nobody heard it, so it’s brand new. There’s that new generation and hopefully you know hopefully also reading Dying Scene will help our little tiny bit but just getting out there and yeah word of mouth.
MW: You know, like what is? I’m just excited to make new stuff. You know it’s always…this band has been around for so long and there’s like a core of what we are, what we keep. We’ve always kind of evolved and tried to do a little bit different stuff and you know now being so old and like it’s kind of like I said like I feel this real…there’s no… I don’t really feel a lot of pressure that I might have even like 10 years ago of what a record should or shouldn’t be. Like I have in my head some stuff that I want, some parameters that I think that we should kind of be, that the Riverboat Gamblers are in my opinion. But it’s still it’s still really open and it’s really like the thought not that we were ever like, you know, overthinking like well what what are people going to like? But now the thought doesn’t really necessarily cross my mind so much. It’s more just like, man, let’s just get in there and make some cool stuff and that feels pretty good.”
MG: Mike, I was incredibly impressed with your energy level at the show at Reggies [late 2022). Are you finding more aches after a show and are you more careful now about that type of thing?
MW: “I find aches and I’m 48 and I find aches without playing a show. Like, I’m definitely stretching. I’m stretching as we’re talking right now because I’m about to go into the studio and just knowing that I’m going to be on my feet for a long time, I’m making sure I get my stretches in.
I’m just a little bit more careful. I think, when the mood strikes me, I’ll do whatever I feel like. here’s a little bit more like, let me look and see where I’m going to fall. Well, there’s a little voice in my head that says, like, how we can’t recover like we used to. Yeah, you know, the Wolverine’s healing factor. And now? Not so much.“
The Riverboat Gamblers recently announced its Inaugural “AC Hell Festival” set for October 14, 2023. The band will be playing Something to Crow About in its entirety. The bill also features, amongst others, The Starving Wolves, The Get Lows and User Uauthorized. Further information on the event and tickets can be found here.
Day 2 of Riot Fest had a slew of big names (including Queens of the Stone Age, Death Grips and…Insane Clown Posse!?) and up-and-coming artists. We are featuring the Viagra Boys, PUP, Steve Ignorant Band/Crass, Rival Schools, Warpaint and Enola Gay for today! Irish post-punk noise rock band Enola Gay made their US-debut in Chicago […]
Day 2 of Riot Fest had a slew of big names (including Queens of the Stone Age, Death Grips and…Insane Clown Posse!?) and up-and-coming artists. We are featuring the Viagra Boys, PUP, Steve Ignorant Band/Crass, Rival Schools, Warpaint and Enola Gay for today!
Irish post-punk noise rock band Enola Gay made their US-debut in Chicago for Riot Fest, and performed a late night after show with the Viagra Boys. They will be back touring in the UK and EU in November.
Walter Schreifels strikes again! Post-hardcore group Rival Schools did a full-album performance of their 2001 debut, United by Fate.
LA-based indie-psych-rock band Warpaint played a dreamy set to mellow the mood before jumping back into the mosh pits.
Steve Ignorant co-founded the legendary anarcho-punk band Crass in 1977 from Epping, Essex, England. In 2019 Steve started the Steve Ignorant Band with Carol Hodge (vocals & keys), Jay Bagnall (drums), Peter Rawlinson (bass) and Pete Wilson (guitar). They played a complete set of Crass songs, psyching up both old fans and new.
PUP (abbreviation for Pathetic Use of Potential) is a Canadian punk band formed in Toronto, Ontario, originally under the name Topanga. They have quite the following and energetic fans!
A little rainy set for the Viagra Boys did not stop them from giving everyone the eccentrically weird and fun performance we’ve come to expect from the Swedish punk rock band. Dying Scene covered their show in Chicago earlier this year when they played at the brand-new venue, The Salt Shed, and it is still one of my favorite shows I have seen so far this year. They played all the fan favorites (“Sports,” of course) and had no shortage of crowd surfers (see the surfing Pikachu in the gallery below).
Check out the full gallery below! Did you miss day one? Take a look here!
What better than a deceptively upbeat collection of raucous guitar, mandolin, trumpet and even occasionally a washboard to shine a light on our Insta-Tok-fueled collective existential dread? In their latest offering, the 4-track EP Pyrrhic Victory, Loveland, Colorado’s Doom Scroll deliver cautionary tales of modern-day electronic disassociation with a healthy dose of ska and […]
What better than a deceptively upbeat collection of raucous guitar, mandolin, trumpet and even occasionally a washboard to shine a light on our Insta-Tok-fueled collective existential dread?
In their latest offering, the 4-track EP Pyrrhic Victory, Loveland, Colorado’s Doom Scroll deliver cautionary tales of modern-day electronic disassociation with a healthy dose of ska and folk to help the medicine go down.
A uniquely varied crew themselves – Elliot Lozier (We the Heathens and Atrocity Solution) and Taylor Dittman (Broken Bow, Hermit Stew) are joined by Chatterbox and the Latter Day Satanist’s singer-songwriter Micah Butler, Jon Pizarro of the black metal/folk project Dead Work and Marissa Sendejas, who has pursued a longtime solo career and has been a member of CLDS, Chad Hates George and Days N Daze – their collective sound results in an upbeat, addictive collection of songs destined to make you put down the phone or computer and dive into your local mosh pit…with other humans, you know…interacting…in person!
Building on themes from their previous album, Immoral Compass, the first track, “Anoxic,” reminds us that, while the virtual world keeps our minds entertained, it is also void of elements to support human life. But, lest you fall too hard into a spiral of despair, the delightful mandolin melody suggests that there may still be an iota of hope after all.
“Boss Fight” features Lozier’s brother, Zack, on the trumpet, and a rousing anthem asks us, “When will we see this is all fake? It’s all a show, a masquerade.” And, again, we’re swept into a unique, circus-like sound that promises a good time can still be had, and damn the Sunday Scaries.
Rest assured, the band’s punk roots run deep, and the track “Felled Spirits” is perhaps the most pessimistic of the bunch, and, appropriately, is also the most hard-core, musically.
Legend has it that the band played on, even as the Titanic sank. Doom Scroll wants us to know that, though the spoils of human innovation may eventually be our downfall, we might as well enjoy ourselves along the way.
Mustard Plug’s ‘Where Did All My Friends Go’ Album Release show with special guests The Toasters, Half Past Two, and Malafacha at Reggies! This entire show is a great showcase of talent using a variety of instruments from horns, bass, guitar, trumpets, vocals…everything sounds RAD and you will end up having a blast! Mustard Plug […]
Mustard Plug’s ‘Where Did All My Friends Go’ Album Release show with special guests The Toasters, Half Past Two, and Malafacha at Reggies! This entire show is a great showcase of talent using a variety of instruments from horns, bass, guitar, trumpets, vocals…everything sounds RAD and you will end up having a blast!
Mustard Plug is a ska punk band from the Midwest specifically Grand Rapids, Michigan. They came to Chicago to promote the release of their new album ‘Where Did All My Friends Go’ (Bad Time Records, 2023). The band consists of vocalist Dave Kirchgessner, trumpeter Brandon Jenison, trombonist Jim Hofer, drummer Nate Cohn, guitarist/vocalist Colin Clive, tenor saxophonist Mark Petz and bassist Greg Witulski. The band have toured all over the world since they formed in 1991from the United States to Europe, Japan, South America and beyond. This ska punk band that will have you “skanking” into the night and having so much fun. Check them out here.
The Toasters are one of the original American second-wave ska bands founded in New York in 1981. The band is comprised of vocalist/guitarist Buck, bassist Tim Karns, keyboardist Dave Barry, drummer Art Zamora, saxophonist Nathan Koch, trumpeter/trombonist Adam Birch, and trombonists Gilbert Covarrubias. They have more than 19 albums behind them and released ‘Live at the Ska Fest 2021’ LP Album (Supernova Records) in 2023. You’re in for a real treat and be sure to check them out here.
Half Past Two is an amazing 7-piece ska band formed in 2006 in Orange County, California. The band consists of vocalist Tara Hahn, guitarist/vocalist Max Beckman, keys/guitarist/ vocalist David Parris, bassist Mark Anderson, trumpeter Max Maynard, trombonist Luis Gracia Alonso, and drummer Savannah Tweedt. The band is full of so much energy and you will not find yourself standing still. Find them here.
Malafacha is a Ska band with Reggae and Latin rhythms that was formed in 2003 in Pilsen’s Hispanic Bohemian neighborhood in Chicago, IL. Malafacha is conformed of 8 members, vocalist Moises Bello, drummer Alejandro Cruz, saxist Ivan Bello, bassist Ezequiel Cruz, trombonist Juan Abad, percussionist Armando Pescador, guitarist Roberto Carlos Tovar, and keyboardist Martin Orosco. With this many band members you are bound to have different personalities and musical tendencies between the band members. This has brought the band together to obtain an original sound with a base of Ska, Reggae and Latin rhythms mixed with Punk, Metal, Cumbia, Rock, Disco and an endless fusion of genres that makes of Malafacha a unique band. Follow them on their social media pages to see where they will be next.
In case you haven’t already heard, London (England, not Ontario) punks Old Chase have a new record coming out later this year on Cat’s Claw Records and Punk Rock Radar. To tide you over, we’re premiering the video for their brand new single “Until the Bitter End”. Check it out below! And stay tuned for […]
In case you haven’t already heard, London (England, not Ontario) punks Old Chase have a new record coming out later this year on Cat’s Claw Records and Punk Rock Radar. To tide you over, we’re premiering the video for their brand new single “Until the Bitter End”. Check it out below! And stay tuned for more to come on the band’s upcoming Showtime Split LP, also featuring their countrymen The Upshot.
Near as I can tell, Jawbreaker first came through Boston as a band in the Summer of 1990 on their “Fuck 90” US Tour. That show took place at the legendary Rat in Kenmore Square (RIP) and found Jawbreaker playing alongside Rise and Chinchilla Whiplash (lol) and Full Nelson Riley (LOL). Here’s the show flier. […]
Near as I can tell, Jawbreaker first came through Boston as a band in the Summer of 1990 on their “Fuck 90” US Tour. That show took place at the legendary Rat in Kenmore Square (RIP) and found Jawbreaker playing alongside Rise and Chinchilla Whiplash (lol) and Full Nelson Riley (LOL). Here’s the show flier. Oh, and no, that is not from my personal collection, sadly, as I was not there, because even though I like to think that I was a cool kid growing up in southern New Hampshire, the reality is that I was not cool, and even if I was, “cool” meant that I had a pretty gnarly rat tail and could do a mean tight roll on my acid washed Bugle Boy jeans and I actually had a Champion pullover sweatshirt and oh by the way I was ten years old.
I didn’t really start making my way to Boston for shows until April of my junior year of high school, which if you’re keeping score at home was 1996. Jawbreaker were on their Dear You tour and I really liked Dear You because I wasn’t old/cool enough to know that you weren’t supposed to like that album if you were “a punk,” but also funds were limited so there was a bit of a coin-flip situation that found me going to the Bad Religion show that month instead of the Jawbreaker one, because the former was during school vacation and the latter was on a school night, and remember I was not what you’d call “cool.” Plus, it was still close enough to 1994 that punk was still in and so punk bands came around semi-regularly and so we’d just catch them next time around. If you’re still reading this, it means you’re probably familiar with Jawbreaker and so you know how that decision to catch them next time would be a colossal tactical decision on my part. (For the uninitiated; they broke up in rather catastrophic fashion the following month and didn’t play together again in public for another twenty-one years. Oops.)
And so fast-forward essentially a generation and a sold-out reunion tour show at Boston’s House Of Blues in 2019 and another on the Dear You 25th anniversary tour last year, both of which I had to miss for what we’ll call “reasons” and we get to last Friday, when the band returned to the Kenmore Square area for a date at the cavernous new MGM Music Hall at Fenway or whatever the official title is. Not only could the House Of Blues fit comfortably inside MGM with plenty of room to spare, I’m pretty sure The Rat (R.I.P.) could fit in the men’s room (which is super conveniently located on the second floor of the 5000-capacity theater but that’s another conversation for another time).
Given that travel to – and parking at – the venue is tricky at best on Red Sox home game days (the MGM shares a common wall with the bleachers at Fenway Park), showgoers were very much still filling in the lower GA bowl when Grumpster got the evening kick-started promptly at 7:00 sharp. If you haven’t seen Grumpster live, you’ve been doing yourself a disservice. The band is fronted by Donnie Walsh, a Massachusetts native who headed west to the Bay Area in search of the sort of melodic pop punk rock sounds that that scene put on the map thirty-plus years ago (so, in the time of Jawbreaker). Walsh is a human pinball on stage, frantically bouncing around the massive expanse of a stage while still maintaining bass and lead vocal duties (at least when he’s not given a reprieve by the band’s newest member, Alex Hernandez, who was officially added to the original three-piece lineup of Walsh, guitarist Lalo Gonzalez Deetz and drummer Noel Agtane over the summer to add depth on guitar and vocals). I can’t really say enough good things about Grumpster and their performance on this show and, I imagine, this whole run. They’re fun, funny, energetic, inspiring, at times painfully honest. They made a large and potentially intimidating setting feel a bit like an Elks Lodge punk rock show in all the best ways. Check out tracks like “Crash” and “Better Than Dead” and “Misery” off their latest record, Fever Dream, and you’ll get it.
The California punk rock party continued with Joyce Manor hitting in the number two spot in the order. Joyce Manor’s history dates back to the very early days of Dying Scene; near as I can tell, they were one of the very first bands we covered pretty extensively a dozen-or-so years ago, and I remember writing a lot about Of All The Things I Will Soon Grow Tired and Cody upon their respective releases, and yet in digging through the annals of DS/JM shared history, I couldn’t find another instance of us shooting them live. Strange!
Appearing as a five-piece on this run (with the one-and-only Neil Hennessy still manning the drum kit!), Joyce Manor tore through a twenty-song set that leaned heavily on their 2011 self-titled record and 2014’s Never Hungover Again. The crowd, which had by now filled to a respectable level, was primed and ready to go from the first notes of set opener “Gotta Let It Go.” We had ourselves not only a circle pit (in fairness, not a California-style circle pit, but still a pit in the shape of a circle so it counts) but enough crowd surfers coming over the abnormally tight barricade that a few backup security guards were called in from the front of the house to serve as backup. If it provides any context to how amped-up the crowd was for Joyce Manor, from my perch in the photo pit before and in between sets, I overheard more than one conversation that centered around showgoers being surprised that Joyce Manor was opening for Jawbreaker and not the other way around and that it must have just been a Jawbreaker show because they were the OGs. Kids these days…
And so finally, at 9:00pm sharp, after a thirty-minute wait for set changeover but really close to a thirty-year wait, it was Jawbreaker time. The foursome (Blake and Adam and Chris plus Mitch Hobbs, longtime guitar tech, on second guitar) hit the stage and dove into “I Love You So Much It’s Killing Us Both.” Like much of Dear You, it’s a song that resonated in a particular way when it came out the week I turned sixteen. But when you add to it the context that Dear You became the last album before Jawbreaker self-destructed and then when you add to THAT the context that I’m now forty-four, it’s a song that hits like a sledgehammer.
From there, the band plowed through about a dozen-and-a-half songs that leaned heavily on the once-maligned-but-now-adored Dear You, but still managed to cover the duration of the band’s five-year history of recorded material. (Side note: think about that…as influential and genre-defining a band as Jawbreaker was, their entire output of recorded full-length records was released in a five-year span from 1990 to 1995.) It seemed like it took the band a couple of songs to hit their stride, but once they locked in at probably the “Seafoam Green” or “Condition Oakland” part of the set, they were as tight and focused as ever. The gravel and snarl in Blake Schwarzenbach’s voice, which people for years lamented had disappeared, seem to have returned only in a more weary, road-worn fashion.
Bass player Chris Bauermeister stayed pretty well rooted in place in his place at stage right, his focus firmly placed on his Antigua Fender P bass. Fitting, I suppose, since his playing style always served as a pretty solid foundation from which the traditionally single-guitar attack could wander. Adam Pfahler, as always, provided the gas pedal for the whole thing. This is a bit of a rudimentary comment to make, but on more than one occasion, I couldn’t help but think “damn…Adam is a REALLY good drummer.” It’s one thing to hear his playing on recordings that are 25-30 years old, but it’s another thing to see it live circa 2023, and to gain a new respect for the sort of groove and feel created and to see how his influence has carried forward in myriad bands since.
And of course, at the front of the operation, is the inimitable Blake Schwarzenback. Schwarzenbach has always been known for his emotionally honest, drunken poet lyrical style, and his vocal stylings lent authenticity to his words. Thirty-plus years of experiences paint many of those songs – like set-opener “I Love You So Much It’s Killing Us Both” and “Save Your Generation” and “Unlisted Track,” the latter of which Schwarzenbach performed solo accompanied by only his trademark white late 80s Les Paul Custom which has yellowed with age – in a different light and provide newer, deeper context. What had sounded like high school or college-age scorned love songs take on more gravity with the passing of time and adult relationships and societal dysfunction in the years since the words were first sung. Much of the set felt cathartic in a way a lot of shows haven’t in a while, but the post-“Unlisted Track” three-song closer of “Basilica,” “Kiss The Bottle” and “Accident Prone” was just about perfect. And so do I wish that my first Jawbreaker show occurred on that infamous “Fuck 90” tour? No…I was 10 and it was at The Rat and I probably would have died. And especially no, because I think it means more now that I saw them for the first time after just turning 44 and Blake’s words and the band’s sound have carved such a deep and indelible path in my brain. Thanks, Blake and Adam and Chris (and Mitch!). More than you know.
Check out photo galleries from each band’s set below!
This article is going to start the same way Night Surf‘s 2017 debut EP Blasted! does; straight to the point. The opening song “So Long” just fires into this EP while painting amazing apocalyptic imagery, which I am a huge sucker for. Call me old fashioned but heartfelt descriptions of the end of the world […]
This article is going to start the same way Night Surf‘s 2017 debut EP Blasted! does; straight to the point. The opening song “So Long” just fires into this EP while painting amazing apocalyptic imagery, which I am a huge sucker for. Call me old fashioned but heartfelt descriptions of the end of the world shouted over catchy pop-punk guitars just gets me fucking jacked. The execution in “So Long” is so perfect that you can’t help but scream along:
And I want you to know That I don’t need to go And we can stare at the dying sun and wait for nuclear winter! As long as you’re by my side I’ll be ready when it’s our time to die Say so long to the falling stars So much for being so lucky!
Yeah. That hits the spot. Thankfully, there’s more where that came from. “This Is What It Takes” follows up with the same raw energy that’s felt throughout the EP. The harmonized shouted/sung vocals fit so well together and give a very sincere feeling to the albums’ lyrics.
“Straight To” continues with the directness and just blasts open. There isn’t any time to relax during the opening 3 songs on this EP. I mean, if your trying to relax and looking for rest periods between songs, an album named Blasted! is probably a bad place to start. That should be a given, really. But I digress. They all hit one after another and, along with their shorter run time, it adds to the chaos presented by the lyrical content. It’s so good to sing along to!
And I’m alone in an echo chamber Living completely under the radar And if I escape I hope I never See your face again.
My hope is wasted on you!
Alright. I have to keep it down. My wife is trying to sleep and all of my shouting is getting the dogs all riled up. Whatevs. This EP rips. The closing track “Lungs and Throat” finally gives you a moment to catch your breath before it goes on another tear. It feels like the final act compared to the blistering and slammed opening track “So Long” and gives the album a feeling of closure and completeness. Bleak closure and completeness. Not triumphant but defeated yet accepting.
So far from home Hoping for the best all alone I’ve lost my direction I gave up the ghost I’m waiting for this moment to go. With no one around to hold my hand I’m heading to the dark all alone. I head into the dark all alone.
And now you die alone!
Fuck it. It’s too good not to scream along to and I don’t care if it’s late. I’m screaming Night Surf in my office and I will apologize to no one!
This was a self released EP by Night Surf in 2017. I can’t remember exactly how I found it but I was hooked on it the first time I heard it. Since Blasted! was released in 2017, they have released 1 EP and 1 full length album. Blasted! is the perfect introduction to this Brooklyn based pop-punk band and is an album punk forgot.
I came to this job thinking that I wanted to have a little fun and do things differently. I can’t be arsed doing album reviews as I just want to enjoy new music without having to analyze or think about it too much. I thought I’d just empty my brain out through my fingers and […]
I came to this job thinking that I wanted to have a little fun and do things differently. I can’t be arsed doing album reviews as I just want to enjoy new music without having to analyze or think about it too much. I thought I’d just empty my brain out through my fingers and into your brains and only worry about the opinions of the people that enjoyed it.
Of course, that clearly meant that one of the things I should do was a crappy biopic of the Sex Pistols in Lego. Whilst drunk. You can find it below.
I’ve read most of the decent books about the Pistols, and (I think) all of the ones that they were closely involved with. John Lydon’s first autobiography is pretty decent and at the point he wrote it, it was the first attempt at telling the story of the Sex Pistols from the inside. It came out at a dip in his profile, when Public Image Limited wasn’t really doing much. It was two years before the Filthy Lucre reunion tour, and only fifteen years after his friend, Sid Vicious, died after murdering his girlfriend, Nancy.
At that point, the movie Sid and Nancy had come out, as well as The Great Rock ‘n’ Roll Swindle – the Malcolm McLaren-approved version of the band’s history and how he was responsible for its every success as part of some sort of masterplan.
Both were, and this is me being kind, highly problematic.
Sid and Nancy is relatively accurate in terms of how other accounts corroborate the sequence of events, at least.
The Great Rock ‘n’ Roll Swindle is McLaren’s onanistic fantasy version.
Rotten: No blacks, no dogs, no Irish (by the way – he’s quoting a common sign on boarding house and bed and breakfast windows there, and his being Irish in London, is referring to how black and Irish people were considered on the level of dogs in terms of how welcome they were in some areas) feels honest, and it utterly slates Sid and Nancy, and The Great Rock ‘n’ Roll Swindle.
The GRNRS (can’t be arsed to type all that out again, the initials will have to do from here) is dismissed as an egotistical fantasy that outright lies about how Malcom McLaren had a plan, and has led to the accusations of the Pistols being some sort of manufactured boyband.
Sid and Nancy is criticised for romanticising the deaths of two young people. One of whom was John’s best friend. I’ve since heard John talk about heroin, and whilst he does admit he tried it, he described in disgusted terms how a certain band’s ritualised way of taking it, in the shittiest of conditions, as if it were a Japanese tea ceremony, bemused and repulsed him. Regardless of anything else that happened, he lost his friend to it.
It was that honest and heartfelt commentary that led me to initially feeling that the two irredeemable figures in the Sex Pistols story were Malcolm McLaren and Nancy Spungen.
Rest assured, I still think Malcolm McLaren was a complete cunt.
However, in doing this fucking moronic little video, I had to rethink Nancy.
Now, I should say that Sid and Nancy does somewhat romanticise their relationship. And some people do regard them in the bullshit terms of being some sort of star-crossed lovers.
My unreconstructed feeling was that, I had no great attachment to Sid, Nancy was his downfall, and she took advantage of him, thinking he could and would be a star, but dooming him by getting him hooked on heroin, with their eventual co-dependence ruining Sid’s chance of a further music career, and leading to both their deaths.
I didn’t really think of her much, except as a groupie and an addict.
But the fact is, Nancy was murdered.
And when I went to look up a couple of facts, in order to get some sort of semblance of a straight timeline for this, I saw that she’d likely got schizophrenia and other conditions which she didn’t have any sort of proper help managing.
I was also reminded that Sid was a violent wanker, who attacked people without reason, blinded someone, and showed some of the traits associated with people who later went on to become serial killers, such as torturing animals. That line in his version of “My Way” possibly wasn’t a joke.
Yeah, I did hear John Lydon talk about his regret at losing his friend, and his feelings about heroin, and that affected me.
There’s possibly a narrative tract to go down which says both Sid and Nancy were pretty irredeemable figures, with Nancy being the one to set him on the path to where he ended up.
But yeah, this piece of drunken arseholery did make me think that maybe a whole load of that was down to misogyny, and that whilst it’s a real stretch to say that Nancy was misunderstood or misrepresented, she wasn’t around when Sid was being needlessly aggressive and glassing people, or killing animals.
Yeah, he had his own early issues, and his upbringing was fucked up, too. He wasn’t even sure what his real name was.
So, it’s possible to see them both as deeply damaged, and ill, kids. But that’s not really what the movie Sid and Nancy was doing, and I think John’s right in how that got it wrong.
And I’m not the person to do it, and this is probably as far as I’ll get in terms of making the case, but Nancy isn’t the smack-syringe-wielding harridan that I causally portrayed her as here. She’s a mentally ill kid who was sexually abused and murdered.
So, yeah, whilst I’m not really the person to try to rehabilitate her (in a manner of speaking), perhaps someone could have a look into that?
Oh, there’s a couple of funny bits in the video I made, I think, so don’t hate me for it completely.
