17
May
“Punk in 2013 is obsessed with nostalgia perpetuated by festivals where if you pay enough for a 6 day all inclusive pass and book your flights and hotel rooms in time you can see any punk band that ever existed, albeit older and uglier and with their “classic hits” funneled through a fancy sound system manned by the shitty sound guy employee of whatever club or productions company is “making punk happen” at the moment. Way too many current bands exist mostly in the hopes of playing these festivals, or of “taking the next step” and putting out records on a larger “indie” label. (…) We are happy when we hear about punks playing generator shows and blowing up abandoned cars at abandoned strip malls in New Orleans or flipping cars and shooting fireworks at cops in Boston.”— From a Gas Rag interview in an upcoming MRR column.
Punk’s not dead; punk’s sleeping drunk. I reject the above assessment in its entirety. Even five minutes of SLC Punk, the mall food court of cultural punk statements, should have taught you better than that.
Consider the ‘nostalgia’ trip of the modern punk festival a function of the natural aging process of its most enthusiastic adherents who, in our youth, gave life to the careers of those musicians still touring. We are now conveniently of prime commercial interest as an adult marketing group and can’t be faulted that you haven’t kept our movement alive for yourselves with fresh talent from your generation… since you’re so damn obsessed with ‘not selling out’ that you actively DISCOURAGE people from contributing.
The above description has its place, just not here: it sounds as if it were of a festival like Coachella, which is indisputably a marketing monolith of all filler and no substance. So let’s talk about a festival actually featuring punk acts that I’ll be attending this summer:
Amnesia Rockfest in Quebec. I’ll be penny pinching for flights and crashing my friend’s couch to get there. But guess what? Tickets are only $79. $79 to see all the punk acts I never got to when I still had all my piercings in because a minimum wage job kept me grounded. I finally get to see Rancid, Anthrax, Dropkick Murphys, Transplants, Lagwagon, Millencolin, Bad Brains, Screeching Weasel, Biohazard, Cro-Mags, Subhumans and Agnostic Front (and those are just the ones I haven’t seen! Look at this list and tell me this isn’t honest: http://www.pnrockfest.com/en/2013-lineup/). for seventy nine fucking dollars. conveniently priced to serve as an invitation to people on a limited budget to come get into something real.
don’t fucking tell me punk’s dead when your favorite band is fucking Rise Against. When Bad Religion opened for them in my town I wanted to cry. look what you assholes did to punk. do you think Bad Religion ever had a song on the fucking RADIO!?!??
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