DEAD RAMONES

Astral Airfields Shirt

2011-05-02T09:22:00.002Z

VIPER COBRA

2011-05-02T09:05:00.000Z

No Turning Back @ W2 last sunday

2011-03-30T19:50:00.000Z

Steeped in work, no time to design this blog. Will get into it soon enough.

Checked out a review for the NTB show here:
http://www.roarezine.nl/2011/03/30/reflections-tour-w2-den-bosch/#

Here we go again

2011-03-26T19:59:00.000Z

So after noticing this blog is still getting views every month I decided to start it back up again. Obviously it's gonna be hard to put a bunch of stuff on here about MLIW so I'm gonna broaden my scope but it will still be music related.

So what's been going on? A whole lot. I been playing a lot with No Turning Back for the past year and also with my own band Viper Cobra. Actually we've got a release show coming up April 2nd, stoked to be putting out a 7" again. Also me and my girl have been doing a blog about renovating and decorating our appartment, it's doing really well with more viewers each month. Please check it out here: jivinsisterfanny.blogspot.com and if you like it please follow or like on stumbleupon or whatever.

So uhm yeah, this is just more like an announcement type post with me saying I'm gonna start this back up. So yeah, keep checking back as I will put more and more stuff up in the future.

Oh right, before I forget. Tomorrow I'm playing the legendary W2 venue again. They used to have classic hardcore matinees where hundreds of kids would show up and tomorrow we're headlining. NTB ofcourse. Pretty awesome and not bad for a 31 year old.

This is me now:

so close to being done.

2007-04-23T07:22:00.000Z

now this made me laugh

2007-04-19T06:12:00.000Z

recording day 17? I lost count...

2007-04-19T02:48:00.000Z

Yesterday we got done recording and today we started mixing, it's sounding so good it hurts my brain. I can't wait to unleash it on the world.

listening:
Crooked Fingers - Red Devil Dawn
Thomas Brinkmann & Heiko Lauts - Tyranids
Adam Beyer & Marco Carola - Fusionframe EP
Matthias Meyer & Sven Weiseman - Voltage
Shit Robot - Wrong Galaxy
Marek Hemman - Rory

Reading (not that there is much time to read):
Mary Shelley - Frankenstein

Frankenstein

2007-04-16T04:23:00.000Z

Me celebrating being done with my parts.

recording day 10

2007-04-15T06:05:00.000Z

Today John and me finished our guitarparts. Jeff finished all of his vocals except for 1 song. Tomorrow is a day off, I'm gonna sleep in and it's gonna be glorious. Brooks is coming monday!

Grindhouse

2007-04-11T05:20:00.000Z

Yesterday we had a day off from recording so John and me went and saw Grindhouse and now I urge you to go see it.
Today we tracked some vocals and tomorrow we will start tracking guitars. I'm excited I finally get to record for real.

Listening: The Knife - Silent Shout

538 Johnson

2007-04-08T05:52:00.000Z

thanks to everybody who came out.

Day 5 of recording

2007-04-08T04:50:00.000Z

Today we finished all the drum and bass tracks. Things are going nice and smooth and it's turning out awesome, I couldn't be more excited. J. is awesome, today he busted out some cool stories from his Government Issue days.
some pics:

I think this was the first day

the eichman cometh...

Tim keeping track of what's going on

TO is done. Naptime.

Also today our next tour got announced, check it out.

Modern Life Is War, Death Before Dishonor, and special guest Brooks Strause will tour together late this month through mid-May. Here's the schedule:

dates w/ One Dead Three Wounded
4/28 TBA
4/29 Lemoyne, PA @ Championship
4/30 Trenton, NJ @ Championship Bar and Grill
5/1 Brooklyn, NY @ Club Europa
5/2 Poughkeepsie, NY @ Club Crannel
5/3 Oneida, NY @ Awesome Fun N Skate
5/4 Altoona, PA @ Chevy Chase Community Center
5/5 Valatie, NY @ American Legion
5/6 Amherst. MA @ MercyHouse
5/7 Boston, MA @ Roman's
5/8 Nashua, NH @ Polish American Hall
5/9 Windham, ME @ Windham Veterans Hall

5/10 Quebec City, QC @ L'ANTI
5/11 Ottowa, ONT @ Montgomery Legion Hall
5/12 Montreal, QC @ LINCO
5/13 Toronto, ONT @ Holy Joes
5/14 London, ONT @ Call The Office
5/15 St. Catherines, ONT @ L3 Nightclub
5/16 Hamilton, ONT @ The Underground
5/17 Mt. Clemens, MI @ Hayloft Liquor Stand
5/18 Chicago, IL @ Knights of Columbus
5/19 Iowa City, IA @ TBA

In the little downtime I got I am
Listening: Bunny Rabbit
Reading: Swann's Way by Proust

Tour & Recording

2007-04-05T21:34:00.000Z

Thanx to everybody who came out and made our last tour a blast. Especially Milwaukee and Brooklyn were beyond ridiculous.
Today we started day 3 of recording at the magpie cage and things are going way fast. We're laying down drums and bass the next couple days before moving on to guitars next week. To bad we're hold up in the studio pretty much 12 hours a day so we haven't really gotten the chance to check out Baltimore. Tomorrow Girl Talk is playing The Ottobar and it looks like I don't get to go which is kind of a bum out. Oh well.

When we're done recording we will head out on a tour with Boston's Death Before Dishonour and Iowa's Brooks Straus. This is def the most interesting package we done in a while.

Minnie Irwin

2007-03-19T19:55:00.000Z

Minnie Irwin checks my bed for crocodiles and alligators every night.

St. Patties day

2007-03-19T05:53:00.000Z

Yesterday we played a show with Checkmate, Torpedo Darlings, Brooks Strause and Beat Strings in Cedar Falls for St. Patricks day. It was nuts. Here's what the people had to say;

"Bar Police Strobe Show.
it was like a white zombie video during MLIW.
the flashlights were swingin'
the only thing i could think was white zombie. MORE HUMAN THAN HUMAN!"

"new MLIW tunes are really good. Reverb Cody's face after DEADRAMONES was hilarious. he looked so angry and ran his finger across his throat to tell jeff eaton that they were done."

"MLIW's new shit is way sweet.
my legs got crushed into the stage during that whole show..
I sucked Jeff's cock for 30 seconds."

"I think i saw the frog punch matt gerstandt in the face during mliw, can anyone confirm"

"there was a man in a leather coat. I am going to guess and say he had black pants fairly short haircut and maybe a goatee? does anyone know who this man is. he walked up to observe mliw and stood right by me. he had a drink in his hand. he started spitting on the people who were performing in the white zombie light show. this was excellent. He looked very bad ass. then he walked back in the direction of the bar. he came back a little bit later with one other man. they ran up to the stage and did a quick little stage dive thing. this could have been god."

All the bands were amazing with my personal favorite being Brooks Strause. I love that man. This was one of the most fun nights in a long time.

Other news: we got all the songs for the new record done. expect 11 ragers. We're leaving M'town for a shirt tour on the way to Baltimore where we're recording. I will try to keep some kind of studio report going on here but you know how that goes. After recording we're going straight into what is sure to be this year's most interesting tourpackage. I will post it as soon as it gets announced, get siked.

oh, before I forget... Over the last few years there has been about 5 different unauthorized Modern Life Is War pages on myspace. Which is alright but the tourdates and information were never posted or kept up to date, so now we have an official fansite page. www.myspace.com/modernlifeiswar add us if you are into it. We are not running the page so don’t attempt to contact us through that. You can always hit us up on email modernlifeiswar@yahoo.com

Upcoming dates
3/24/07 TBD , Omaha, NE @ Christ Community Church Student Center
w/ TBD tickets: TBD $ advance/ TBD $ door

3/25/07 5:00 Iowa City, IA @ Picador
w/ Neon Hookers, Kingdom, In Remebrance, Killing Kings, High Five

3/27/07 TBD , Milwaukee,WI @ Shorewood Legion Hall
w/ TBD tickets: 10 $ advance/ 10 $ door

3/28/07 TBD , Evansville, IN @ Club 1123
w/ TBD tickets: 7 $ advance/ 7 $ door

3/29/07 TBD , Pittsburgh, PA @ Roboto Project
w/ TBD tickets: 10 $ advance/ 10 $ door

3/30/07 TBD , Rochester, NY @ AV Space
w/ Achilles, Borrowed Time tickets: 10 $ advance/ 10 $ door

3/31/07 TBD , Brooklyn, NY @ 538 Johnson Ave
w/ Mother Night, Paper Dragons tickets: 5 $ advance/ 5 $ door

4/1/07 TBD , Baltimore, MD @ Charm City Art Space
w/ Ruiner, Fighting Dogs, I Adapt, Pulling Teeth tickets: 10 $ advance/ 10 $ door

Tante Joke, bedankt voor de foto's!

it wasn't me

2007-03-16T08:40:00.000Z

Hey Chalie

2007-03-11T22:08:00.000Z

We're all working hard trying to get this record done in time so I kinda forgot to updat this. Last week I had my friends Ivo and Pieter over for a week and we didn't do much besides eating and drinking haha. It was great! Ivo celebrated his 30th birthday here with 40's and a cake with 20 something candles to make him feel good. Minni was so excited we had euro's visiting she decided to dress up.

More books I bought recently:
Petronius - Satyricon
T.S. Eliot - Wasteland
Gustav Flaubert - Sentimental Education
Marcel Proust - Swann's Way
Oscar Wilde - The Picture Of Dorian Gray
Hemmingway - For Whom The Bells Toll
Various - Classic American Short Stories. This one has stories by Hemmingway, Henry James, Mark Twain, Edgar Allen Poe, Herman Melville, William Faulkner and way more.

Back from tour

2007-02-28T16:55:00.000Z

Back home and getting ready to pick my 2 boys from Holland up from the airport. They're coming to hang out for a week and enjoy M'towns scenery which right now is all snow and ice.

Hit up the bookstore last monday and this is what I got:
The Bostonians - Henry James
Portrait of a Lady - Henry Hames
Washington Square and Daisy Miller - Henry James
Cousin Bette - Honore de Balzac
The Heptameron - Marguerita de Navarre
The Dubliners and Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man - James Joyce
The Complete Works - Alexander Pope
Mrs. Dalloway - Virginia Woolf

and yesterday at the antique's store I found Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman, it's been a good week. Also, check out my rocking chair, I'm such a grandpa.

here's me and the geeks caught with our pants on our ankles:

Day 2 of tour

2007-02-20T07:23:00.000Z

Kansas City and St. Louis were both awesome, thanx to everybody that came out.
The weather has changed dramatically overnight and it's nice out again.

This morning in Kansas City I saw this van sitting on the parking lot across from the house where we stayed so I decided to linger and see if Brit Brit or Tomkat were around but no such luck.

Chicago tomorrow, I'm excited to see some people I haven't seen in a while again. I'm talking The Geeks (this South Korean band that's on this tour) into playing Sham 69's 'if the kids are united'.

Leaving for tour

2007-02-18T07:32:00.000Z

Leaving for tour tomorrow morning, pretty stoked. We also just got our tourdates for march so I'll post those on here as well.
Bringing with me besides the obvious:
- Pere Goriot by Honore the Balzac, almost done with this one and I wanna urge you to get into this writer
- A Keith Richards biografy this weird bird from Holland sent me, I'm stoked to read this, it looks promising
- Werewolves In Their Youth by Michael Chabon, I've never heard of this guy but people seem pretty stoked about him
- The Golden Bowl by Henry James, he's my favourite writes but can at times be pretty hard to get through
- A beard clipper that I just bought, I will be a non stop scruffy extravaganza from now on
- 7 cans of pringles barbeque flavour
- pictures of everybody I think about while away from home even though I have no clue where home exactly is
- my moleskine, get into it, they're huge for a reason

packing always takes me a long as time even though I like to travel light. I spend a lot of time deciding what not to bring so here's my playlist while packing, I wish all of you would listen to this even though some of these gems are a bit older. everybody who's complaining about a lack of exciting music going on should shut the hell up and that includes the guy from apparat himself. and yes, the new JT has some really innovating moments but I had to stop listening after the 'hi my name is bob and I work at my job' song which ruins that entire record. If I'm rambling it's because Kate at Corner's hooked us up with free going away drinks.
- trentemoller - the last resort
- digital mystiks - digital mystikz
- mum - summer makes good
- nathan fake - the sky is pink & drowning in a sea of love
- apparat - multifunktionsgebene
- lazy fat people - big city

Before I forget, I saw Will Whitmore yesterday and I got a gift for a special person. special. Also I just met Chef D'Micael who's the chef (as his name suggests) at the Tremont. True.

In other news, I just started a collaboration with my buddy Thorir from Reykjavik, Iceland who's doing My Summer In The Salvation Army, Gavin Portland and Fighting Shit amongst many many other things which I am wicked wicked excited about (the music he makes as well as this collab). It looks like me and him will be doing some really interesting stuff musically which I can't wait to share with the world, I will keep you posted. If it doesn't work out this was the last you'll hear off it and bootleg mp3's will go down in internet history.

I love music, it's my girlfriend. Here's tourdates, come say hi because I am playing the best guitar I ever have right now and MLIW is an unstopable rockmachine. While you're at it, say hi to Tim too and make him feel welcome (ladies...). for anybody who can't be at one of these show: I'll think about posting about them but don't count on it. I might post pics if somehow they find their way to me. I'm rambling again, thanx Kate. (ps: metal hammer thinks I'm an interesting fact, top of the world!):

Upcoming shows:

2/18/07 US , Kansas City, MO @ The Anchor
w/ The Geeks, Ambitions tickets: 10 $ advance/ 10 $ door

2/19/07 US , St. Louis, MO @ Lemp Arts Center
w/ The Geeks, Ambitions tickets: 7 $ advance/ 7 $ door

2/20/07 US , Chicago, IL @ Beat Kitchen
w/ The Geeks, Ambitions tickets: 10 $ advance/ 10 $ door

2/21/07 US , Indianapolis, IN @ The Underground
w/ The Geeks, Ambitions tickets: 10 $ advance/ 10 $ door

2/22/07 US , Dayton, OH @ The Water Front
w/ The Geeks, Ambitions tickets: 10 $ advance/ 10 $ door

2/23/07 US , Mt. Clemens, MI @ Hayloft Liquor Stand
w/ Bane, The Geeks, Ambitions tickets: 12 $ advance/ 12 $ door

2/24/07 US , Beloit, WI @ Beloit University
w/ tullycraft, decibully, nakatomi plaza, and dead town revival tickets: $ FREEadvance/ $ FREEdoor Open to Non-students.

3/17/07 Cedar Falls, IA @ The Reverb: St. Patrick’s Day Bash w/ Beat Strings, Brooks Strause, Torpedo Darlings and Checkmate. Doors: 7:00 Show: 10:00

3/24/07 TBD , Omaha, NE @ Christ Community Church Student Center
w/ TBD tickets: TBD $ advance/ TBD $ door

3/27/07 TBD , Milwaukee,WI @ Shorewood Legion Hall
w/ TBD tickets: 10 $ advance/ 10 $ door

3/28/07 TBD , Evansville, IN @ Club 1123
w/ TBD tickets: 7 $ advance/ 7 $ door

3/29/07 TBD , Pittsburgh, PA @ Roboto Project
w/ TBD tickets: 10 $ advance/ 10 $ door

3/30/07 TBD , Rochester, NY @ AV Space
w/ Achilles, Borrowed Time tickets: 10 $ advance/ 10 $ door

3/31/07 TBD , Brooklyn, NY @ 538 Johnson Ave
w/ Mother Night, Paper Dragons tickets: 5 $ advance/ 5 $ door

4/1/07 TBD , Baltimore, MD @ Charm City Art Space
w/ Ruiner, Fighting Dogs, I Adapt, Pulling Teeth tickets: 10 $ advance/ 10 $ door

More on the signing to EVR

2007-02-10T04:05:00.000Z

taken from Equal Vision Website

MODERN LIFE IS WAR signs with Equal Vision Records
Friday, February 9th, 2007 | 1:15PM

We are proud to announce that Iowa-based melodic hardcore/punk band, Modern Life Is War have signed with Equal Vision Records.

"We chose to sign with Equal Vision for a couple reasons," explains vocalist Jeffrey Eaton. "Number One, because they can give us the support we need to keep touring year round. And number two, because the label is driven by music and not trends, images and marketing schemes like so many other prominent record labels."

Modern Life Is War are currently at home writing the follow-up to their 2005 album Witness, but will be taking a break in February to preview some new songs on the road with Ambitions and The Geeks. Following the tour, Modern Life Is War has studio time booked with legendary indie/punk producer J. Robbins (Against Me!, Texas Is The Reason, Jets To Brazil) to lay down tracks for the upcoming album, which will also be available on vinyl through Lifeline Records.

Modern Life Is War

2007-02-09T17:08:00.000Z

First and foremost we are proud to announce that we have signed to Equal Vision Records. We will be recording our third album during the month of April at the Magpie Cage in Baltimore with J. Robbins. It will be out in late summer or early fall of this year. We will continue working with Lifeline Records and they will be releasing the vinyl LP version of our new album on the same day. The layout will feature artwork by an Iowa man of mystery who goes by the name Qojak. We will keep you updated on the details as they come.

Thanks to Deathwish Inc. for working with us for the last couple years on our most recent album “Witness” and the re-release of our first album “My Love. My Way.”

As some of you have heard our bass player Chris Honeck decided to leave the band for personal reasons at the end of 2006. Our friend Tim Churchman (Spanish Bombs) has joined the band and will be taking over the bass guitar duties from here on out. Our split with Chris was amicable and we would like to wish him the best of luck in his future endeavors and thank him for years of loyalty, friendship, good times and hard work.

We will be spending the majority of February and March writing songs and preparing to go into the studio. Here are our upcoming tour dates…more to be added soon…

2/18/07 US , Kansas City, MO @ The Anchor
w/ The Geeks, Ambitions tickets: 10 $ advance/ 10 $ door

2/19/07 US , St. Louis, MO @ Lemp Arts Center
w/ The Geeks, Ambitions tickets: 7 $ advance/ 7 $ door

2/20/07 US , Chicago, IL @ Beat Kitchen
w/ The Geeks, Ambitions tickets: 10 $ advance/ 10 $ door

2/21/07 US , Indianapolis, IN @ The Underground
w/ The Geeks, Ambitions tickets: 10 $ advance/ 10 $ door

2/22/07 US , Dayton, OH @ The Water Front
w/ The Geeks, Ambitions tickets: 10 $ advance/ 10 $ door

2/23/07 US , Mt. Clemens, MI @ Hayloft Liquor Stand
w/ Bane, The Geeks, Ambitions tickets: 12 $ advance/ 12 $ door

2/24/07 US , Beloit, WI @ Beloit University
w/ tickets: $ advance/ $ door

Equal Vision

Lifeline

www.deathwishinc.comDeathwish Inc

Merchandise at Merchnow

Merchandise at Crime Scene Merch

A new level of cold

2007-02-03T05:16:00.000Z

Tonight temperatures will drop to -13 degrees Fahrenheit, which is -25 degrees Celcius. I don't think I've ever been to a place as cold as this. Even Eastern Europe seems warmer.

We've been practicing every day for the past couple weeks and things are going well. We're probably playing a lot of new songs on the upcoming tour in February with Ambitions and The Geeks, check out the
MLIW website for dates.

I am still looking for a Rotterdam Terror Corps jacket so whoever left me a comment saying he/she has one, please get in touch again.

Besides practicing I get a lot of reading time in which is nice. Books I read over the past weeks or still reading right now:
-Pere Goriot by Honore de Balzac
-Cyrano de Bergerac by Edmond Rostand
-Lady Of The Lake by Walter Scott
-Swann's Way by Proust
-The Fables by La Fontaine
-A Math Compendium which I downloaded of some University's website
-The Ambassador's by Henry James
-The Golden Bowl by Henry James
-The Thing's They Carries by Tim O'brien

all come highly recommended except for the math compendium which is kinda boring and in Dutch.

Lotsa music too! while I'm at it here's a list of that:
The Southern Harmony And Musical Companion by The Black Crowes
The Greatest Hits by The Doors
Born To Run by Bruce Springsteen
Lingin In A Magazine by Zoot Woman
Astral Weeks by Van Morrison
Drunk At The YOT Reunion by Slumlords
Yield by Pearl Jam
My Dogan by Kettel
Coming From The Shower After A Late Night With A Failed Date by Joris Voorn
The Idiots Are Winning by James Holden
Drokrockcorkrod by The Ergs!
Band Of Gypsies by Jimmi Hendrix
Hardstyle Is My Style by DJ Pavol
Anniemal by Annie

Snowy Iowa

2007-01-22T21:08:00.000Z

Holland never gets this much snow. I'm staying inside. one pic is the view from our new house. Yesterday I saw a snowscooter on the streets of m'town.

Lots of snow:

View from my window:

New house:

snowscooter:

baybirding dot com

2007-01-19T19:22:00.000Z

the past weeks all my time has been taken up by working at the house john and angie bought. If all goes well I'm moving in tonight and first thing I'll do is post pictures on here because everything looks awesome.

While working I have been listening a lot to DJ Rush.

New Year's Eve

2006-12-31T18:26:00.000Z

Cody and Adam of the beatstrings are Iowa's Pete and Carl and I consider myself lucky I get to see them this often. Tonight they're playing Cedar Falls and John, Angie and me are going and when the beatstrings are bringing the party shit gets wild.

To everybody who reads this, Happy New Year!

Harm

I am down with the sickness

2006-12-31T01:28:00.000Z

My cold turned into an earinfection (worst pain ever) and now I'm on antibiotics and vicodin. So I guess no drinks for me on new year's ever. Great!

Listening to:
Madball - Hold It Down
Mouthpiece - What Was Said
Stiffie - Je Bent Nu Jarig
Felix Da Housecat - Tweak
Dj Rush - Shit 'n Bricks
Orange Sector - Tanzbefehl!
Mauro Alpha - Palette
Mathew Johnson - Marionette
Lindstrom - I Feel Space
Alexander Robotnick - Strobo 122
Aeox - Under Fire

So much great music, I can't keep up.

Get yours today!

2006-12-30T09:40:00.000Z

PIGNEY SPEARS

Spanish Bombs

2006-12-28T05:05:00.000Z

Check out my sweet Spanish Bombs shirt and while your at it pick up their awesome debut EP on Chunksaah and Lifeline.

MLIW in Revere, MA

2006-12-28T00:00:00.000Z

december 3rd 2006.

photo's taken from getintothepit. december 3rd 2006.

Check this

2006-12-26T19:27:00.000Z

WANTED!

2006-12-26T01:58:00.000Z

I'm looking for a Rotterdam Terror Corps bomberjack, I will pay good money for one.

Merry Christmas everybody!

HIstory of NYHC

2006-12-15T18:47:00.000Z

By Uncle AL from Murphy's Law.

Click Here!

JULES!

2006-12-15T07:34:00.000Z

This ain't a blink 182 show

2006-12-15T07:01:00.000Z

Haterz be Damned!

2006-12-15T06:59:00.000Z

Charles Bronson

2006-12-15T06:56:00.000Z

Monster X

2006-12-15T06:55:00.000Z

someone needs to finish this

2006-12-15T06:28:00.000Z

youtube is great!

Harley Flanagan

2006-12-15T05:57:00.000Z

Since so many people always ask about all that old NYHC L.E.S shit
Heres some shit about some old school LES NYHC shit
it will be out on 4 CD's SOON!!! Hahahahah just kidding...

just for the sake of it ill start with The Park Inn.

The Park Inn was originally across the street from Tompkins Square Park, right there on Avenue A. It was the spot where we would all hang out and drink. Its funny; me and my friends were fourteen, fifteen and sixteen,in a bar drinking pitchers, no questions asked! [laughs] When you think about
it, its like, "What the fuck is wrong with this picture?" Theres a bunch of fourteen and fifteen year olds with tattoos, drinking pitchers in a bar full of adults. And then all of a sudden a fight breaks out, and theyre on somebody like a bunch of fuckin little freaks. It was nuts. But we were friends
with the bartenders; the guy who worked the door was this crazy old black dude Ike the Dike, who used to be a pimp and a gang-banger back in the old days, and now hes just a crazy old drunk motherfucker. It was our bar, you know. The whole neighborhood was full of little spots like this. Avenue A,
that strip from 7th to 12th, from A to C, we had all our little spots.

[Im guessing there wasnt much in the way of police presence

There was none, dude! None, none! I remember brawls that would literally go on for twenty minutes, running up and down Avenue A with like groups of people fighting. I remember one time getting in a fight with a bunch of Puerto Ricans, chasing them from Avenue A all the way to the projects down near
2nd Street, then realizing that everyone else that was running with me had stopped running a few blocks back. Im in the projects, throwing bottles and going, "Come on, lets go, motherfuckers!" And all of a sudden I see all these Puerto Ricans coming out of different doorways, and I look back and realize that its just me and my friend. [laughs] Were running back, like, "Aw, fuck!" Bottles crashing, bricks are landing fuckin next to you
But that;s what Im saying: People have no fucking clue, none whatsoever.

And if you go down to the Lower East Side now

Its fuckin; yuppie central, man! It makes me sick! Back then, I was one of the first people who, yeah, I used to beat up all the artsy-fartsy faggots and this and that, but it wasnt because they were gay, it wasnt because they were arty. It was because I felt that Id earned my way into that fuckin neighborhood, and I wasnt just gonna fuckin roll over and just let this neighborhood disappear without holding onto it. Because I was watching it
happen slowly but surely, the neighborhood was gentrifying. We hardcore kids, we made that neighborhood safe for white people! by standing our ground And then the fucking floodgates opened, and all these fuckin weird motherfuckers started coming down. I definitely did a lot of that shit that was uncool; I cant pretend otherwise. But once again, we were young, we were on a lot lot of drugs; we used to huff glue; you do stupid shit. And In my own child-like way, I felt like I was trying to
save the neighborhood from turning into what it finally turned into. It was wrong, but goddamn if my intentions werent good. I was trying to keep that neighborhood pure, and now its just full of yuppies, and aint nobody down there whos actually from there. Its lost everything that made it cool

Tell me about A7

A7, the stage was less than a foot tall. From the outside, it was just a door with a couple of steps up; you wouldnt know that there as a club in there unless you heard music coming out of there. The actual room where the concerts were in was smaller than most peoples living rooms; and then there was a bar, and in the back of the place there was a little lounge area. They
would cram a lotta fuckin people in there. A lot of crazy things happened in there, like Mike Ness getting his ass kicked. That was pretty funny! One thing people dont seem to realize is that the New York scene, up until was very open to outside bands and outside people. We were very welcoming; there wasnt that many hardcore bands in New York yet, so we were always thrilled when bands would come from out of town. DC, LA, Canada, anywhere we were always very psyched. I had played in DC a bunch of times with the Stimulators, and I was friends with all those DC guys. But when they came up to New York with that "Fuck New York" attitude which I still to this day dont know where they pulled that out of their ass it really took the
New York kids by surprise. Because back then, the scene was still very innocent. We werent trying to be tough; we were just trying to have fun. We werent trying to say that our city was harder than anywhere else; we were just glad to hang out and have a good time. All of a sudden, you have a group of guys comin in together, trying to strut like they were hard, and it kind of confused us, because up til that point, it was like, "Hardcore kids, punk kids we figured you know we where all in this together ya know, but they felt they had to prove something i guess or make some kind of a statement i didn't understand it, but boy did that start something hahahah they kinda came down hardrocked a little and in a way made a impression on me and my friends,
We loved all the slamdancing and shit but a lotta people where scarred by it i guess. So that happened once or twice i guess where they came down and tried to hard rock a little; I didnt
get it, but I was still friends with those DC guys. I just figured, "Yeah, theres a lot of assholes in New York, whatever." so their just trying to fuck with all the old school old head punks and throw backs, But then the Boston guys came down and tried to hard-rock that shit, too!

Are you talkin about SSD?

I;m exactly talkin SSD. but by now, me and my friends were a year or two older, and had started having our own street fights in our neighborhood with all these crazy fuckin dusted Puerto Ricans who really wanted to fuck shit up. And all of a sudden, these suburban fuckin jocks coming to our neighborhood was just not fucking cutting it. I dont think I need to explain that they got served. I remember Al, the guitarist from SSD that big nosed motherucker walking into A7 with a "Kill New York" t-shirt on,
and my boy Paul walked up to him and said, "Yeah, you wanna kill New York, motherfucker? Why dont you start with me?" The New York guys spent the rest of that night giving the Boston guys an ass-beating on the dancefloor. But Im saying this just to show how stupid it was. Yeah, New York had the reputation
of being the hardest city for hardcore, but that was because New York was a hard city; we had to be tough. We did not start this war between scenes; this whole gang war vibe between scenes, it never existed back then. I think
over the last twenty years, people have gotten confused about what it was really like back then. So yeah, A7, that was the battleground where we first started disciplining out-of-towners. Me and my friends, we pretty much became the regulators; when bands came in from out of town and got out of line, they would get their ass kicked, even if it was onstage. That happened quite
a few times, even bands from New Jersey. I remember U.S. Chaos got beat real bad onstage; the bouncers had to drag them out through the back door while
they were getting beat.

[What did they do to deserve that?

They hit one of my friends, or something. The scene was like that if you hit the wrong person, or you started a fight with the wrong person, you got jumped. But thats the way it;s always been.

The Cro-Mags definitely had one of the most contradictory images of any band on the scene.

Oh, yeah. Absolutely. We were a living contradiction, in every way and shape.
The idea of a Hare Krishna skinhead is absurd; theres no other way to describe it.

[Did it seem bizarre to you at the time?

It made total sense at the time! [laughs] The funny thing is, by the time I quote-unquote got into the Hare Krishna thing, like really started to speak publicly and preach about the philosophy, I had pretty much already walked away from the quote-unquote skinhead thing. I still had a shaved head, and I was still getting in fights a lot I was trying to be more peaceful, I had stopped eating meat and was trying to change my ways, but a lot of the
new-jack skinheads on the scene who were trying to be all boots and braces and real serious skinheads, started trying to dog me. "Oh Harleys a vegetarian, he got soft, blah blah blah." A lot of people used to try and pick fights with our friends; a lot of people tried to fuck with John. But it would always end up the same way; we would always wind up beatin their ass. There
was never any other result.

[But because you were still fighting, you couldnt shake the skinhead reputation.]

Yeah, thats why we were called Hare Krishna Skinheads. I always thought it was funny.

did you guys set out to take hardcore music to another level?

No, I just had been playing music a lot longer than most of the kids on the scene. I had been playing in bands since the 70s, so I was a little bit better at what I did. Our influences, Bad Brains is what I grew up on; to me, they were the end-all-say-all. Having grown up on bands like Minor Threat, and all that classic stuff. And then Motorhead, I got influenced by them, and my friend turned me on to Venoms first single. A little bit of metal started
slowly creeping in to what I was listening to. In 1980, I got turned onto Black Sabbaths Master of Reality; up ;til then, I had never really given any metal a chance at all. Black Sabbath changed every fucking thing for me. They changed the way I wrote my lyrics; the lyrics of Master of Reality made me think that music without a message is just noise. "Have you ever thought about your soul/Can it be saved?" I was like, Holy shit, these guys
are seriously talking some serious shit, here! [laughs] SO thats why I felt that the Cro-Mags had to have more to them than, "Skinhead! Avenue A!" I felt like theres more to life than trying to have the biggest boots and the most skinned head, you know? [laughs] So our music was destined to be a little bit better, because we grew up on all the real stuff, back in the
day. Like, I always look at the Cro-Mags as one of the last hardcore bands from that first generation. I had started working on the band when I left the Stimulators in 1980; I went through a lot of different lineups of the band. The band didnt really start dominating on the scene until;85 or 86.To me, that was already after the original era had started to fade. We were fortunate to have grown up on all the real stuff, and that was our foundation.
Up until that point, a lot of New York bands were really in their fledgling stages. I mean, Agnostic Front had Raybeez on drums back then, so they could never have really gotten too good because he wasnt a great drummer. They were a great band live, they were a lot of fun now theyre a really good band. But in the beginning, most of the New York bands were not really that
good. The better bands were from DC and the West Coast. Thats just the facts.
But New York took all the best elements of all those different scenes and turn it into our sound. And thats what became New York hardcore.

[When Age of Quarrel came out, metal had sort of already started to creep into the
NYHC sound.]

Yeah, because that;s when metalheads started to understand what we were doin I guess. We were definitely one of the first bands to bring a lot of metal heads to our shows. The Carnivore guys would come see us; the Crumbsuckers were big fans of ours. In the beginning, the metal guys used to get picked on a lot, but they were persistent.

When the straight edge thing came in, is that when the scene started to
get really fractured?

I think it was more Maximum Rock and Rolls fault, and I think it started before that.

[Im talking about Youth of Today, stuff like that.]

Oh, yeah, I never took any of those kids seriously. Really, that whole generation of upstate New York hardcore kids that pretended to be from New York, I never paid em any mind. If I said boo, theyd jump ten feet in the air. All those kids were so scared of the old-school hardcore kids, we never paid em any
attention. The only people who paid attention to them were the kids who were younger than them. I couldnt tell you one fuckin Youth of Today song, even if I had to. I couldnt tell you one Gorilla Biscuits song, or CIV, or whoever.
Me and my friends were the ones that mattered to me on the scene back then; I really didnt give a fuck. I thought it was cheesy that straight edge kids were telling everyone else how to think. Thats why me and my friends kind of protested by getting twice as fucked up. I never had anything against the idea; I thought it was a very positive concept, and I have a lot of friends
that dont do drugs who I respect a lot. But I just find people like that annoying.

Did drugs contribute to the Cro-Mags rough spots?

I would say individually, yeah. But not as a band. The rough spots the band hit were just destined to be. You had four very conflicting energies as people. Although we all had some things in common, Id say we all had a lot more things not in common. But yeah, everybodys gone through their rough spots,
even the people that claim not to have.

The straight edge kids, were they even from New York? As far as I knew, New York was all about getting fucked
up!

[laughs] I think that elitist straight edge thing is something that comes from being rich were better than everybody, even though were just a bunch of fuckin nerds. I think that just comes from being raised in the suburbs. "My daddys got a bigger fucking car than yours!"

[At what point did the NYHC scene begin to decline?

Id say that the hardcore scene pretty much came to a halt at the end of the decade. It started in 80, and ended in 89. Everything in its beginning stages is great, because theres no rules to it. But down the line, it starts to lose touch with itself. Hard music is now mainstream bands, all these tuned-down, fake tough-sounding bands that are on MTV and have shaved heads and tattoos, but are really just metal bands. Hardcore used to be hardcore punk we took punk rock and turned it up a notch. Now, I think hardcore
is more like hardcore metal. The difference is that punk was a street thing, whereas metal, even in its early stages, was always about trying to be decadant. The goal was decadence; the goal was to have the big hair and spandex and
all the fucking groupies. Hardcore, the goal was to bond. We didnt have any clue what getting signed was, you know? I think that, when the wall went down between hardcore and metal, hardcore started to die. And Im partially to blame for that. I brought the violence in, I brought the metal in, I brought
the fuckin Hari Karishnas in with help from JB hahahah; Jesus, I just wrecked everything! [laughs]

[What was the scene like by 89?

You know, I really dont remember so much, because youre talkin like, tenth generation hardcore at that point. Another club comes and goes, another band comes and goes; its like, who gives a fuck? Theres only a few bands that actually came out in the late 80s, early 90s that kept it real on any level. Theyre keeping it real in their own way, now, and thats cool. I respect that.

[What motivated you to start the Hardcore Hall of Fame website?

What motivated me to do that is, when I read Steven Blushs book, I couldntbelieve how many ridiculous statements he made. I thought most of the quotes
that people gave could have given a pretty good and accurate story of hardcore. but whenever you take somebody whos like a journalist or a writer who wasnt really part of what was happening, and they start putting their own spin
on it, I think that it starts becoming his story. He has no place to interpret
these things, not having been an actual participant I mean he was around but theres a difference btw being around and being actively a part of something from its begginin. It takes more than having been a third, fourth or fifth generation hardcore kid who was in the audience to be able to pass judgement on all these people who actually did something.
So I said, Im going to give all these people a place where they can actually speak for themselves, create a forum for the people who actually were part of the scene to give props to the people that they like, instead of someone
like Blush ( who I do like) or anybody saying who were the important bands. Who gives a fuck what he or anyone else
thinks who wasnt in one of those bands? Im more interested in who Daryl thought were the important bands,
who Henry Rollins thought were the important bands. Im more interested in who influenced Jimmy. What was Roger listening to before he discovered punk rock? What made these people the people they were? What caused hardcore to happen? Its just a way for everybody to tell their story without an editor.
Its a place for everybody who was around back then to have a forum. I went online a few times, and I saw all these idiots talking shit about people that they never met; people talking shit about me, people talking shit about Raybeez, people talking shit about this person and that person. Im like,
"Who are all these asshole?" So I decided to create a place for the people who were a part of it to actually tell what it was, and put up their collections of flyers, their collections of photos, and tell their stories. The criteria
is that you have to have been documented on the scene for at least fifteen years, just to be asked anything. You have to have made a significant contribution to the world of hardcore that has to have lasted for your opinion to matter, as far as Im concerned. Everybody has a question on their page "Who are
your favorite hardcore bands? Who do you think should be inducted into the
Hardcore Hall of Fame?" And thats how we actually induct people. The people
get inducted by their peers. It;s basically just a way to give props, you
know?
Anyway...

Nobodys talked about the Park Inn?

Nobodys talked about the Park Inn? Wow. Has anybody talked about C Squat?
[Nope.]
See, thats the problem; the majority of the people that were a part of the scene back then werent actually from my neighborhood, the Lower East Side. Most of them were from Queens and Brooklyn, and eventually from Jersey and upstate New York, and so on.

Tell me about C Squat.

C Squat was one of the many squats in the early 80s on the Lower East Side,but this one was predominantly taken over by mostly skinheads and hardcore kids. Like, Chaos punks, not really peace punks. Back then, there was a pretty big distinction in New York, at any rate between the two. The Chaos punks used to hang out more with the skinheads; the peace punks were more into Crass, and getting together and being hippies with mohawks. The other guys were more into slam-dancing and getting fucked up and getting into fights. More like the Exploited, you know? So C Squat was great; I actually wrote
a song about it on my last record; its called "Urban Screams". Me and John, we lived in one apartment. Basically it was an burned-out building. There was one old Puerto Rican dope dealer on one floor, who had been there from the start; we were never really able to get rid of him, because he had alot of pull in the neighborhood. The building was really gutted; you basically
find a door and attach it to the door frame, and hold it up with a frame to keep people outta there when you weren;t around. It was basically a destroyed, demolished building; but somehow, in everybodys minds, we were gonna live there and fix the place up, and eventually get control of it. That was the mentality back then, you know? The Lower East Side was a very different place.
So yeah, skinheads were living in that building; Raybeez lived there for a long time. For the most part, it was party central. Eventually, we got burned out by slum lords that were trying to get the property, and three people died in the fire. They were always trying to get the neighborhood gangs to get us out; they would hire cops to come and harass us. A lot of heavy shit went down there.

Where was it?

It was located at Avenue C and 9th Street. People dont realize how hectic that neighborhood used to be. There was always friction and tension between the punks and skinheads and the local Puerto Rican gangs; they never liked us being around there. It was really like the wild west back then. It was not a big thing to have gunshots in Tompkins Square Park, or people getting
jumped with hockey sticks and golf clubs and bats and shit like that; it was pretty frequent. People take for granted that they can walk around that neighborhood with their tattoos and stretched-out earlobes lookin all freaky and shit; but back in the day, you would seriously be flaunting your shit and asking for some problems. [laughs] And unlike most of the hardcore kids,
I lived down in the middle of it. The main neighborhood gang, The Hitmen, were on my block. So at night wed all be having fights on Avenue A, getting jumped by neighborhood guys; and then the next day, I would have to go to school with their younger brothers and shit like that. Thats part of the reason why I wound up getting as tough as I did, and why I wound up doing a lot of the fucked-up shit I did. If you werent a fucking maniac, you really
didnt stand much of a chance for survival. Even Jimmy, at the end of the night, had the safety zone of going back to Astoria, and most of the kids back then did of course as apunk though you really stood a chance of getting fucked with everywhere back then hahaha. But eventually, C Squat began to change that. And then Rob from Cause for Alarm, he had an apartment down on 2nd Street. There were always a few apartments that were like hardcore central; one person would have their shit together enough to have an apartment, and everybody would
stay there. There would be like twenty people in there, with curtains up as dividing walls. [laughs] There was Apartment X, where we all lived for a long time, Rob from Agnostic Front, me, John, Tony from Ultraviolence, guys from the Psychos there was always groups of us. It was like a little community.

The hardcore scene back then was really a community. Before things got all segregated, before Maximum Rock and Roll started dividing everybody up into categories and groups, there really was a lot of unity on the scene. You could go to another city or another state and see hardcore kids, and know that you had a support group; you knew youd find places to crash, people
to hang out with, shows to go to. Back then, the hardcore kids, it was really a subculture. It was before the internet and all this shit; you had to seek it out to be a part of it. See, I come from an even earlier generation; I was a punk rocker when I was ten, in 1977. I got the Sex Pistols album, and I;ve been a punk rocker since then. I saw the emergence of the hardcore scene;
Ive seen John and Jimmy and all those people make their debuts. on the scene I go pretty far back and Im still in my 30's [laughs]

[So you saw the New York scene make that transition from punk to hardcore.

Absolutely! When I was in the Stimulators, the whole first New York punk rock era was still going on. Unfortunately, when the Sex Pistols were in America, I was in London, hanging out with the Damned and shit like that. So I missed their limited tour of America, but I was hanging out with Rat Scabies backstage at the 100 Club and shit like that. My mother, basically, its her fault! [laughs] She went into some record store in London, and she
asked the guy behind the counter, "Whats new? What are the kids buying these days?" Because she was always very into music. And the record that had just come out that month was Never Mind the Bollocks.

Before hardcore came in, was there a lull between the CBs punk scene and
the hardcore scene?

It wasnt really a lull; it just wasnt documented so much by the media. The media had already declared punk rock dead; as far as they were concerned, punk rock no longer existed. But there were still a lot of kids who were not done being punk rock, just because Sid was dead. There was young kids who were just coming up, kids my age who, unlike me, were just discovering
it. Thats when people like Jimmy Gestapo and all those cats would start coming out. When Sid died, that kind of signified the end of that first period. And then, in between that and the hardcore thing, there was bands that werent hardcore, but they werent traditional punk. Thats when bands like the Bad Brains and the Stimulators and The Mad, they were three bands that kind of kept that scene going in that interim. There was other bands too, like Pure Hell they were a black punk rock band from New York. There was a lot of bands that were still trying to do that whole Sid Vicious junkie era punk rock, but that was all dying out. And then there was our scene, which was like younger kids who were full of life, full of positive energy. Those were the kids who would eventually be dubbed hardcore kids. The media didnt start to catch up with it again til a little later, but it never really died. There was always a group of us. I was always in the center of something.

[Were the Bad Brains that got everyone playing faster?]

to me They definitely were the band that changed the sound of punk rock. I will say that without a question. Bands like the Dead Kennedys were playing faster, but the Bad Brains took what was punk and changed it; they made it street again. To me, there was a very distinct period where the Pistols were done, the Clash were lost in the fucking supermarket somewhere, and Billy Idol
was being a fag dancin with himself at a fuckin white wedding. All the old punk rockers were selling out. Im an old friend of the Clash, but Ill be the first person to say that I couldnt give a fuck after Give Em Enough Rope. There was a couple songs on London Calling for me, but it was them trying to be pop, trying to cash in on what America wanted. But we still had our diehard scene going, and then the Bad Brains came to town and the Stimulators became good friends with them. And Ill tell you, the first time
that I saw those guys, it was confusing I didnt know what the fuck was going on! It was completely from another fucking planet! It was fast, it was noisy, it was explosive; my body didnt know how to react to it. Me and my friends, our energy level was so up afterwards, we stormed over to the Mudd Club where all the poser punks hung out and threw garbage at them, because
we were just so on fire. We were all just a bunch of little kids, and we didnt know what the fuck to do; we were jumping on the hoods of cabs, throwing garbage cans in the streets. It brought out this energy in you, you didnt know how to react. They definitely changed things; they turned it up a notch, and they kicked all the DC boys in the ass, too. They turned all those little
suburban fuckin rich kids onto the real stuff. We already had a scene going; there was already what you could call the roots of the hardcore scene. Kids like Jimmy had started hanging out, kids like Doug Holland; these were kids whod been coming to Stimulators shows, and they were like, "If that kid can do it, and hes only fuckin twelve, I can do it!" That was a big part of the reason why the Stimulators had such a young following. I was like
a legend, kinda; people heard about me, like, "Wow, theres this twelve-year-old kid in a band!" They even mentioned me on that show Square Pegs they were like, "This kid named Harley plays in a band" There was a while there where people knew of me; looking back on it, its really funny. So we had this really young following, and a lot of girls in our following, because there were two chicks in the band. Our scene was great a lot of girls, everybody was young, it was fun. Jimmy and all these guys, they were a little bit older than me, they started coming and hanging out, and it just started growing. And then the Bad Brains came to town and fucked everybody up.

Tell me about 171A

171A was a block away from where I lived with my mother, so I saw everything that happened there. I used to hang out there every day. The Bad Brains lived there for a long time; Black Flag auditioned Henry over there. There was also a record store, the Ratcage, where we all used to hang out. Dave used to sell acid, and we all used to fuckin dose we were twelve, thirteen,
fourteen years old and trippin our fuckin balls off! It was ridiculous. When I look back, me and my friends really were fuckin maniacs. It was like the Little Rascals gone fuckin berserk. Youre talkin about twelve, thirteen year old kids runnign around on the street, pickin fights with adults and shit. It really was kind of nuts.

Jimmy told me about the cueball

Yeah, that was actually something I started. I learned that when I was in Northern Ireland with the Stimulators; there was a bar fight in a club we played one night, and people started picking up cue balls and throwing them at each other and hitting each other with them. Just grabbing balls off the table and winging em. And it dawned on me that, man, you could hit someone really hard with a cue ball and not break it. [laughs] So I put one in a
sock and started carryin it around. It really was a good weapon, because the sock would give a little, so it had that stretching thing; you could use it kinda like nunchuks. I definitely perfected the cueball-in-a-sock; that was my weapon of choice as a youth. If theres such a thing as innocent destruction, or innocent chaos You gotta understand people hear about how quote-unquote violent I was, but really it was just a symptom of the neighborhood that I lived in back then. Im almost embarrassed about it now, that Ive generated this mystique that so many generations of hardcore kids have tried to emulate this tough guy bullshit, where they feel obligated to beat each other up at shows to prove whoever has got the fuckin biggest
balls. And I really think theyre a bunch of faggots, for the most part. Because back then, you had to be tough to be on the scene, just because the scene was always in a bad area. We were refugees from the world, in a way. Hardcore kids, punks back then, we were outcasts from everywhere; thats
kinda how we got together as a group. We were constantly being victimized by the surroundings, whether it was cops Puerto Rican gangs or Black gangs whatever. Not
to sound like the white boys always got picked on, but thats what it was like in the fuckin ghetto hahaha, period. And one of the ways I learned how to deal with it was you had to be as hard, as crazy as the next motherfucker; and the next motherfuckers on my block were a bunch of dust-smokin, golf club-wieldin, gun-totin Puerto Ricans. I really had some hard-ass motherfuckers to compete with.

The bar was raised

Yeah, the bar was definitely raised. And for a lot of the kids on the hardcore scene, who were a lot of middle-class fuckin pussies,And to some of them I was this real terrifying character. And I guess that they were just out of their element, because
I was in mine. And then Maximum Rock and Roll wrote a lot of negative shit about me and my friends, when they really didnt know anything, and were getting a lot of their information from people who really werent a part of what was happening.

It seemed like Maximum Rock And Roll was pretty anti- the whole New Yorkscene in general.

They were anti-New York. I think they, just like everybody else, needed an enemy to unite their forces. And we became that, because basically we really didnt give a fuck about what anybody said. Let me just say, once and for all: I was never a Nazi. Im a quarter American Indian, Ive got Dominican blood in me; Im of mixed blood, and thats just American. But when I was fifteen years old, if somebody called me a Nazi, Id be the kid that would
throw up my hand and go, "Seig Heil! Fuck You!" Just to be an antagonistic individual. But I grew up in the generation where Punk rockers like Sid Vicious was running around with a swastika on his shirt; the Sex Pistols had shirts with an upside-down
Jesus, and the Queen with her head cut off! Thats the generation I grew up from. We were all about, "Fuck you! Yeah, you dont like it? Fuck you twice!" So I had all these politically correct, pseudo-hippie punks pointing the finger and throwing stones. For the longest time, I laughed at it; but then, you get outside of your city and state, and you find that people actually
believe that shit.

[Roger Miret said the same thing happened with Agnostic Front people outside
of New York thought they were actually promoting white power.

Well, there was some of that shit in New York Im not gonna say there wasnt but it was mostly bridge and tunnel motherfuckers who would come down, strut their bullshit, get their little fuckin skinhead nut off and go back to the suburbs. Then theyd leave me and whoever else was a regular to fuckin deal with it. Id be the first to say that, back then, I definitely was all about white pride But that was it PRIDE, even though by no means am I any kind of blonde haired blue eyed motherfucker. [laughs] But I was all about white pride, because I grew up in a neighborhood where Puerto Ricans were all about being Proud of bieng
Puerto Rican; all you ever heard was salsa music, all the signs were in Spanish All the blacks in my school were all about bein; black; And they always used to fuckin pick on the white boys, and I just got sick of white people bein fuckin cowards. I decided to take the other route, especially when I went to Ireland and it was like, "Damn, there are some hard-ass motherfuckers!
White boys dont all have to be fuckin pussies, you know?" And it was funny, because when I took that stance, I actually got respect from all the black kids in my school. They actually defended me and made me part of their circle. And finally, after years of being fucked with in my neighborhood, I finally
got respect in my neighborhood. In my world, I got respect for bein a hard-ass but on the hardcore scene, I was a bad guy. Which was ironic.
but hey Life is ironic...

To be continued IN MY BOOK!!! hahahah This is only a very small part of it..wait till u see all the Old pictures photos etc etc...
All the best
Peace
NYHCOG
HF

you can ignore this post, scroll down to the hardcore post.

2006-12-15T03:26:00.000Z

just posting this on here because I will want to read this whenever I get bored with trying to educate myself. I didn't keep the mp3. I'm done with the drama, whatever SG.

"Even to bring everything full circle, it's like with our existence as a band. It's like we're on this tour where you have like, I mean, it was just mindblowing tonight to see white males so pissed off and aggressive and just going apeshit for other bands and then I'm stoked on this tour because people look at us like we're lepers or retarded or something. It's like 'fuck you people I don't relate to you, I'm not.' I wanna relate to the intellectuals, I want someone to, I wanna go hang out with someone like, you know we... whatever. Like a friend of ours said we were 'a smart band'. Like that's a great compliment I'd rather be a smart band that a typical band. And then even though beyond that it's like we have all this critcism about our band and our live performance and how I'm coked out of my head it's like I've never even done coke in my life! I won't even touch that! * And you know the band that opened before us? Coked out of their mind, playing the worst shittiest music; the drummer sucks, the bass player... the bass playe seriously is like moving when there's no rhythm, they'll break a string and it's like the dude is rocking back and forth to the same tempo."
"And they play like mediocre music that's so formulaic and yet kids freak out for them, cause they're like... they can relate to them. But those are the dudes that do coke every night and that's why there is no creativity in their music.
"And that's why there's not another revolution. Because we have idiots liking... I don't know, whatever."
" Anything."
"That's why we're supposed to be the progressive community, but unfortunetly it's the stupid ass community. You know? It's a drag. That's why I wanna go hang out with dudes who have bazookas and drive around and shit."
"It's like preaching the choir but the choir's deaf and doesn't fucking matter."

hardcore

2006-12-14T23:06:00.000Z

Some Girls on MLIW

2006-12-13T07:00:00.000Z

So we ran across this interview while hanging out back home a few days after tour. This is a clip from an interview that Justin Pearson and Wes Eishold of Some Girls did after the show in Revere, MA on 12/3/06. While we don’t mean to create unnecessary drama…this is simply too funny not to post. The only thing that we feel the need to defend ourselves on is the comment that we went on stage “coked out” as none of us stepped on the stage under the influence of any drug outside of caffeine, nicotine or alcohol at any point. That aside…click the link to hear these great thinkers dropping some knowledge about Modern Life Is War and while you are there check out the debut single from the Iowa Rave Syndicate “coked out of our minds”…a remix of the Some Girls smash hit “Deathface”

www.purevolume.com/iowaravesyndicate

So as not to be biased and take things out of context…you can find the entire interview here…

http://www.revereradio.net/e107/e107_plugins/autogallery/autogallery.php?show=2006%20Archives%2Fsyg%2F12.December%2F12.08.06%20-%20SOME%20GIRLS%20-%20interview%20with%20Wes%20Eisold%20and%20Justin%20Pearson.mp3

Enjoy!

MLIW news:

2006-11-27T04:00:00.000Z

Today's Rythm Den fest got cancelled which is the biggest bum out in the history of this planet. I was looking forward to finally share the stage with Agnostic Front but sadly it didn't happen.
Also, the New York and Philadelphia show got cancelled but new shows are being booked as we speak. any info on that I'll post on here and other people will post it all over the world wide web. keep looking out.

We're enjoying this unexpected day off in a holiday inn in Poughkeepsie with a couple beers and a movie. Tyler is beating everybody's ass in poker in the lobby, don't go down there.

update: I got served a great meal by a flock of hot waitresses at red robins. Edward 40hands went down while I was gone. we went to a grocerystore too! right now Big Bucks is killing Young Shooter in dice. I shaved my head, I'm bald now. We found Chris wondering by the side of the road. I hope this day never ends.

for pictures of this year rythm fest click here. they are awesome.

Music and Words

2006-11-27T03:45:00.000Z

Been listening to:
Van Dyke Parks - Song Cycle (why did nobody ever tell me how awesome this record is? thanks a bunch world!)
The Twilight Singers - A stitch In Time (I love this band to death, every record is so good it makes me afraid of picking up any instrument)
Spank Rock - Yoyoyoyo (finally gotten round to this after it was recommended to me a million times, it's awesome! a great hiphop/ idm mix)
The Hold Steady - Boy and Girls in America (the soon to be biggest band on the planet)
Joanna Newsom - Ys (produced by Steve Albini, Mixed by Jim O'Rourke and arranged by Van Dyke Parks, this girl is unbelievable)
Guillemots - Through the window pane (I fall asleep to this)
Lindstrom - It's a feedelity affair (2006 has been an awesome year for club music and I'll rank this record second to all the Ed Banger stuff that came out this year)
Uffie - everything (boys call Uffie when they feel freaky hot)

New awesome music is coming out so fast I can no longer keep up. these final couple months of 2006 make this a year to remember.

Been reading:
Henry James - Portrait of a lady
Jonathan Swift - Gulliver's Travel's
Homer - Odyssee

Who has ever read anything by Thomas Pynchon? The more I find out about that guy the more curious I get. He seems such a weirdo but also something I would be totally into... any info is welcome.

Been watching:
Deadwood
I started watching The Devil and Daniel Johston (finally!!) but halfway through the disc gave up. Anyway who could burn me this?
I watched Brick the other day and I think I'm in love with Nora Zehetner now.
next up are Pan's Labyrinth and Darwin's Nightmare.

Mom: I just cut my hair, I look like a decent young man again.

World, get into it:

2006-11-23T06:04:00.000Z

it's time to take back what's ours. support these guys in their struggle to make money. (oh guys, I won't ask for royalties or credits for the content stolen from this blog if you send me a free t-shirt)

give us back new york

New tattoo

2006-11-17T01:43:00.000Z

A couple days ago we did a show at the inkspot in Jackson, Mississippi (where honkey tonk women was written!). Good times and after the show they pulled out the tattoogun and this is what I got.
The guys at the inkspot are great and should you ever find yourself in that area you should defenitly stop by there.

I can not...

2006-11-12T01:47:00.000Z

...stop listening to Uffie.

Florida's wildlife

2006-11-07T00:12:00.000Z

This morning Josh and me went for a minihike to take a look at some lagoon, and 30 seconds in we almost stepped on a cottonmouth snake. the creature was vicious and out to harm us with it's ferocious speed and razorsharp fangs. It's poison would have killed us within second. We escaped death by running like little girls.

Converge/ Some Girls/ MLIW

2006-10-30T14:00:00.000Z

I'm leaving for tour in 1 minute. this is gonna be a long one so wish me luck. I'm looking forward to this because I have two pairs of jeans now instead of one. Also, I have made a commitment to listen to no other band ever for the rest of my life besides The Hold Steady. See how long I can stick to that.
Here we go!

Rythm Den Fest

2006-10-28T18:53:00.000Z

SATURDAY NOV 25TH 2:00PM (pop punk day)
CHIODOS
BAYSIDE
JUST SURRENDER
I AM THE PILOT
THE DISTANCE
ENVY ON THE COAST
ALL TIME LOW
JOSHUA
THE TAKEOVER
PARK RANGER
SEARCHING FOR SKYLINES
FASTER THAN FASHION
ASTERIA
ENDWELL
THESE GREEN EYES
RIGHTFULLY WRONG
MORE BANDS TBA

SUNDAY NOV 26TH 1:00PM
CONVERGE
AGNOSTIC FRONT
100 DEMONS
SOME GIRLS
MODERN LIFE IS WAR
TONY DANZA TAP DANCE EXTRAVAGANZA
#12 LOOKS LIKE YOU
ED GEIN
BLACK MY HEART
ON BROKEN WINGS
BLACKLISTED
AMBITIONS
VERSE
HAVE HEART
ONE DEAD THREE WOUNDED
SEVERED TIES
MY BITTER END
BLESS THE FALLEN THE IMAGINE
THE EMBRACE
TOMORROWS END
MORE BANDS TBA
2 MORE SPECIAL GUESTS TO BE ANNOUNCED

Needless to say I am wicked excited about sharing a bill with Agnostic Front.

PLAYLIST

2006-10-21T06:33:00.000Z

all of this comes highly recommended and gets me excited about music:

pinch -qawwali
pinktronix - elettrica 002
nathan fake - the sky was pink
analog fingerprints - ep
apparat - multifunktionsgebene
extrawelt - soopertrack tools and remixes
mathew dear -ep 1
slag boom van loon - slag boom van loon
underground resistance - dark energy ep 1
mathew jonson - return of the zombie bikers
speedy j - the entire collabs series
uffie - everything of her I can find
mum - everything they do
asobi seksu - citrus

last week I been to a wedding, i will post pictures soon! tomorrow a show in madison, wednesday is kinda the start of the tour. I can't wait to go back out and play. we will maybe play some new songs.

Dear mom or dad...

2006-10-17T10:31:00.000Z

could you please ship me one (1) Jack Russel? I will do dishes forever and ever.

i quit

2006-10-16T10:03:00.000Z

i can no longer compete.

tourpics (click for more stuff from max, it's worth it)

2006-10-10T20:17:00.000Z

us standing at the edge of the ocean

this is wat chinese watercups or something will do to you

jeff and me listening to justice vs simian

jeff, me and a gorilla

me and tyler

Me in Toronto

2006-10-09T07:49:00.000Z

Pic by Max.

History 101 with Dr. Papa Bear

2006-10-06T07:55:00.000Z

Das Oath's Dr. Papa Bear gave me a little lesson on the influence of The Netherlands on parts of the US' east coast. you better recognise, here we go!

-The Dutch settlers of Nieuw Amsterdam were called Yankees by the English, because the most common Dutch male names at the time were Jan & Kees.
-When New Yorkers are talking about the stoop in front of there house, they are actually talking about their 'stoep', which is a sidewalk
-brooklyn = breukelen
-flushing = vlissingen
-staten island, named after the 'staten generaal', our old form of government or something
-the bronx, named after the farm of Paul Bronk, a Dutch immigrant
-Before New York was New York it was New Amsterdam, and a Dutch pirate named Blauveldt lived there. NJ has a town named after him.
-In NJ you can find a bunch of other towns with Dutch names like Hoboken and Orangeburg
-Near Alabany there's a ton of towns with Dutch names such as Kinderhook, Rotterdam, Amsterdam, Renselaer, Watervliet.
-Speaking of OKinderhook, in the days of old the apples that were grown there were called Old-Kinderhook apples and shipped of in crates stating O.K. apples, thus coining the term O.K.
-Martin van Buren, a US president who had Dutch as his first language was born in Kinderhook and was nicknamed Old-Kinderhook, so his campaign had the catchphrase Vote O.K.!
-Furthermore in Booklyn and the Bronx you can find a lot of streetnames like Ten Eijck, Havemeijer en Boerum, which are Dutch names.

-Tales like Rip van Winkle and Sleepy Hollow all take place in Dutch immigrants settlements.
-Hudson discovered the Hudson river, coincidence? I think not.
-The Bowery is named after Peter Stuijvesant's farm named De Bouwerij.
-Harlem is Haarlem

Thank you Dr. Papa Bear!

Tour's over

2006-10-02T07:17:00.000Z

Last wednesday we played the last show of tour in Iowa CIty and afterwards I went with Josh and Beth to stay at their house in Des Moines for a couple days. It was great, I slept in, did laundry, hung out with their puppy and Benji and Allison. Allison gave me a new pair of white converse shows! Saturday Josh took me to the Omaha zoo which was pretty awesome. Oh, and we ate ate Hoo-hut. I can never get enough of Hoo-hut, ever.
Thank you Josh and Beth!

Back in Marshalltown now, I got waaaay into morrowind again. I'm such a nerd.

playlist:
the residents
nurse with wound
pfadfinderei
the junior boys
pissed jeans

race to the oven

2006-09-28T06:18:00.000Z

tired and bored

2006-09-27T06:35:00.000Z

playlist time:

dopplereffekt - linear acceleration
U-ziq - billious paths
Akufen - Quebec Nightclub
Autechre - Peel Sessions 2001
My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult - I see good spirits and I see bad spirits
Boyd Rice/ NoN - Terra Incognita
DJ Hell - Muscle
Mates Of State - Team Boo
Drive By Truckers -
Legowelt - Wirtschaftswunder
Sisters Of Mercy - Kiss the Blade
Coil - Love's secret domain

It seems I'm slowly more getting into old noise stuff so any advise on this welcome. Also, I need more 80's waxtrax stuff and since I don't get to be on the internet all that much I don't really have time to seek it out, any advise on this is welcome too. Last... anything Boyd Rice....

Quit stepping on my dreams

2006-09-26T06:51:00.000Z

She looks like Axl Rose

2006-09-25T23:32:00.000Z

Tour with Strike Anywhere is over. Too much has happened since my last post and I don't feel like typing a whole lot so in a nutshell: I've seen human suspension, lots of partying, an agent orange show, lots of people I hadn't seen in a long time, Isis, did I already tell about that mastodon show we went to? I don't know.
We are now on our way back to Iowa, 3 more shows and I'll have a couple weeks off before the converge tour starts.

This is not a laptop set

2006-09-17T04:24:00.000Z

Quick post. All of us came down with the plague at one point or another and a couple days ago it was my turn to get sick as dog. So yesterday I did the only thing there is to do which is drown all germs in hard liquor and besides a serious hangover I seem to be getting better. Chicago always shows me a good time. Three days ago the Mastodon/ Converge tour hit cleveland on the same day as our tour so as soon as we got done we went to see them and arrived just in time to catch Mastodon. Pretty awesome.

This tour is a whole bunch of fun. After this one we got a couple weeks of before we go out with Converge and Some Girls for six weeks.

Playlist:
The Hacker
DJ Skinhead
The Notwist
Miss Kittin

Van Kempen <3 Sjarm13

2006-09-12T20:23:00.000Z

BAND OF THE WEEK: THE HOLD STEADY

2006-09-12T19:03:00.000Z

great music, even better lyrics. New album coming out soon and I'm way excited. I don't wanna say to much, dig and find out about this yourself.

Me in CBGB's

2006-09-09T16:59:00.000Z

Holland kids were thinking this show didn't go off?

Canada

2006-09-09T16:46:00.000Z

been up in canada last couple days. not much going on... shows are good, parties are good. I bought the Decameron and Tristan which I'm pretty excited about. I'm hungry.

Sitting in the laboratory, conducting experiments

2006-09-04T11:47:00.000Z

Yesterday I went to go see The White Suicide, the band I was in before this one and they tore off the roof. It restored my faith in music from Holland. After that show my mom and dad took me to the airport.
I flew into Baltimore where I got my first taste of the new van. It's got a couple bonus features that'll make long drives a whole lot more bearable.

Did you know the 9:30 club is huge? I didn't. Strike Anywhere packed it to the brim and killed it. They restored my faith in good punk rock played in front of tons of people. There's a been whole lotta restoring going on last couple days however it won't get me to change my playlist which still has no guitars in it:
Dopplereffekt
Legowelt
Chris Clark
U-ziq
Felix da housecat

Advise me on more good stuff people

Because I'm planning on staying in the US after this tour I brought one suitcase of books. It's kinda nerdy.
Tonight's the CBGB'S show. I'm incredibly siked I get to play this venue before they move to Vegas. I'm also excited about seeing my friend Ellen in NY.

BAND RELATED QUESTION 3

2006-08-23T23:46:00.000Z

The other day I saw a Primal Scream interview on MTV and their bassplayer looked a hell of a lot like The Stone Roses' bassplayer. Can somebody confirm or deny it's that guy?

BAND OF THE WEEK 3: THE AFGHAN WHIGS

2006-08-22T11:38:00.001Z

This is one of my favourite bands of all time since about 95 when I saw their set at the Pinkpop festival on TV. Immediatly their raw mix of rock, r&b and soul struck a chord with me and instantly Greg Dulli became my first true rock hero, even more so than sid vicious or kurt cabain ever were. For the next two years or so I was pretty much obsessed with the band and I taped every live set on tv or radio until I got more involved with hardcore and gradually lost touch. I missed the black love album but got back into it briefly when 1966 came out. In 2002 I saw gentlemen in the discount bin and my love for the whigs returned with full force and within a couple days I bought all their albums.
My top 3 would be:
1.gentlemen
2.1966
3.black love
the older work is great too but their last three albums are defenitly the best. Below is a video from one of their songs on the pinkpop fest. I just to watch this shit over and over and over. Watch him smoke while singing.
The second is from a song of the black love album and it's at some german fest after the release of 1966 when the band started getting smoother and smoother. They toured with a huge backing band with back up vocalists, keyboards and horn players. Watch how Greg Dulli gets some punk thrown out, it's awesome. I could talk about this band forever but I don't feel like typing so just sit back and watch.

BAND OF THE WEEK 3: THE AFGHAN WHIGS

2006-08-22T11:38:00.000Z

This is one of my favourite bands of all time since about 95 when I saw their set at the Pinkpop festival on TV. Immediatly their raw mix of rock, r&b and soul struck a chord with me and instantly Greg Dulli became my first true rock hero, even more so than sid vicious or kurt cabain ever were. For the next two years or so I was pretty much obsessed with the band and I taped every live set on tv or radio until I got more involved with hardcore and gradually lost touch. I missed the black love album but got back into it briefly when 1966 came out. In 2002 I saw gentlemen in the discount bin and my love for the whigs returned with full force and within a couple days I bought all their albums.
My top 3 would be:
1.gentlemen
2.1966
3.black love
the older work is great too but their last three albums are defenitly the best. The video I will post here is from a song of the black love album and it's at some german fest after the release of 1966 when the band started getting smoother and smoother. They toured with a huge backing band with back up vocalists, keyboards and horn players. Watch how Greg Dulli gets some punk thrown out, it's awesome. I could talk about this band forever but I don't feel like typing so just sit back and watch. Make sure you also check out some of their Pinkpop set, it's on youtube.

Mark is awesome...

2006-08-20T04:52:00.000Z

...and offcourse I already knew he's awesome but every other day he proves it again. So today he got me this, it's awesome:

NEW FEATURE 2: BAND RELATED QUESTIONS THAT KEEP ME UP AT NIGHT

2006-08-16T11:12:00.000Z

My question about the killers got answered, thank you colin. So it looks like that question marks the birth of a new feature: band related questions that keep me up at night.

So yeah, last night another one popped into my head which kept me up. What the hell is wrong with that guitarist from London Beat, who is that guy? Are London Beat still together or has that guitarist moved on to bigger, better things?

check him out, he's the blond guy:

VISA

2006-08-15T13:35:00.000Z

Today I got word my visa will be granted. Now I gotta go pick it up at the american embassy which is gonna be a huge pain in the ass plus that's gonna hurt my wallet again. but when it's all taken care of I'll be able to stay on tour for a year straight. it's kinda scary but tours for this fall are gonna be amazing.

Question

2006-08-14T14:49:00.000Z

do the killers actually have a synth player? If so, why isn't he/she in any of their videos?

BAND OF THE WEEK 2

2006-08-14T14:36:00.000Z

Sorry I'm a bit behind on this weeks band of the week, I been partying at White Mark's place, London and Sittard last weekend so I hardly been home. On top of that they gave me the night shift at a potatoe factory so I work all night and sleep all day.
This week's band of the week is not actually a band but it's DJ/producer DJ SKINHEAD.
DJ SKINHEAD shook the world in the second half of the nineties with his track Extreme Terror, which was faster and more importantly way loouder than anything that was going on in the hardcore/ gabber scene at that moment. DJ SKINHEAD was an alias for Oliver Chesler, a New Yorker who also produced tracks under aliases such as DJ Cybersnuff, DJ Silence, Horrorist and The Narcanosis but most important is the fact he runs Things To Come Records, one of the most respected techno labels.

Since there's no real video of this song you'll have to do with this video of these two young gabber kids dancing to this song. I recommend listening to the song all the way through, it's brutal as fuck.

Links of interest:
Things To Come Records

VOKUHILA

2006-08-11T02:39:00.000Z

Vor Kurz Hinten Lang

proof germans are among the world's most crazy people.

mliw @ jerry's pizza

2006-08-07T14:03:00.000Z

NEW FEAUTURE: BAND OF THE WEEK

2006-08-03T12:24:00.000Z

I'm starting a band of the week feature on which I will share my love for certain bands with you guys. Here we go!

DUNE

Obviously taking their name from Frank Herbert's sci-fi series Dune took the world by storm with the release of their 1995 single Hardcore Vibes, but it wasn't until they added vocalist Verena Von Strenge, a former background dancer, that Dune finally caught my eye as a serious force in Raveland. Their songs Rainbow To The Stars, Hand in Hand and of course Million Miles Away From Home, written for Star Trek's 30th birthday are all still engraved in my eardrums as the best ravesongs ever written. What always appealled to me that amongst the 'happy hardcore' wave of that era, Dune always managed to have a certain melancholy, or sadness buried just underneath the surface that only became apparent after more than one listen. Ofcourse, this is in most part due to Verena's unbelievably clear voice.

1997 started off with a big shock for Dunefans worldwide, Verena decided to leave the band. Luckily just before she left they recorded a coverversion of Queen's Who Wants To Live Forever, which was somewhat of another shock since it feautured no synths, no beats and Verena's voice wasn't pitched at all. It was just the London Session Orchestra and Verena. The single reached top of the charts worlwide but after all that Dune's fame quickly dwindled. Verena left, weak singles, other member leaving, Verena's solo career failed, she came back, more weak singles and now in 2006 Dune is still around, however they haven't really been in the public's eye for almost ten years.

I still have fond memories of being sixteen and waking up with Rainbow to the Stars or Million Miles Away From Home, so I will rejoice the world by posting one of their videos below. I strongly suggest to check out Youtube for more amazing Dune material.

DUNE WEBSITE:

I laughed...

2006-08-03T11:51:00.000Z

when I read this. it makes a lot of sense.

“Americans just aren’t gullible enough to believe that they came from a fish”

Another new project

2006-08-03T00:42:00.000Z

I will soon be recording a bunch of new songs I wrote under the name of Sjarmpie Gazastrook. It will be kinda like Johnny Jordaan but opposite. Musically it will be comparable to Wesley or Jannes, or Franske Bauer.
Here's some titles (lyrics will be posted later when all the fuzz is over):
-Met m'n kanon naar libanon
-Israel, ze komen wel (terug)
-schieten, schieten, schieten op die israeliten
-beiroet ist kaput

this post must make no sense to non dutch speaker.

Ellebelle.punt.nl

2006-07-28T10:26:00.000Z

yeah, my friend Ellen's got a blog too now!

Ellebelle's blog

Playlist....

2006-07-20T07:34:00.000Z

to 45 minutes of running through cornfields (and a couple runs around the cloister), 10 minutes on the stepping machine, 10 minutes abs work out and 40 push ups:

Calexico - feast of wires (warming up and running)
Bright Eyes - I'm wide awake it's morning (running and cooling down)
JW Roy - laagstraat nog iets (the stepping machine, abs work out and push ups)
Joe Strummer - rock art and the x-ray style (stretching and vacuum cleaning my mom's house)

ps. Holland has the best meat replacement products in the world.

Back home

2006-07-19T09:45:00.000Z

culture shocked. thanx to Jeff and the boys in Chicago for making my last night a great one.

I need a job bad so hook me up. I'm good at landscaping and carrying boxes from a to b. If necessary I can also be a decent party director.

Magnus Enquirer

2006-07-14T23:18:00.000Z

everybody check out Tyler's blog, it's in the linksection to the right.
from now on you can follow MLIW's every move from 3 different camera angles.

Soulfly

2006-07-14T23:14:00.000Z

Soulfly's website has a band of the month thing going on and MLIW is July's band of the month!

here's what they had to say, check it out at www.soulflyweb.com:

To most fans of aggressive music, hardcore is all but a dead genre. Originally developing right alongside the thrash scene in the early 80s, hardcore was a fast version of punk that was synonomous with a do-it-yourself attitude, inventive, fast paced song stuctures, and a purely punk rock ethic. In all honesty, true hardcore bands don't even exist today. The genre has been reduced to million different second rate subgenres and brand-names, none of which capture the true essence and what traditional hardcore meant to achieve. Still, a very few handful of bands are still making progress in the small scene, and Iowa's Modern Life Is War is one of the greatest hardcore bands to come out since the genre "died" in the early 90s. Nothing that Modern Life Is War does feels like typical hardcore music, yet at the same time, it feels more authentic and punk rock than any other band that releases music under the "core" tag today. Their latest release, 2005's Witness, is an ugly recount of small-town American life; the type of place where you know everyone and everyone knows you. The lyrics are the best (and most believable) to be put to hardcore music in years and the hoarse vocals do well to communicate the hopeless stories of a midwestern youth. The dynamics of the album are unbelievable as well; a faint layer of distortion surges and sears through chord progressions that are unparalled on a record with songs of only 27 minutes. But perhaps the most refreshing and amazing aspect of this album is the actual structure of the songs. There are no breakdowns, now token sing-along moments, and no prefabricated point-and-yell-go setups. In fact, there are no verses, no chorus, and no typical song structuring at all. Just amazing artistry, and unbelievable concepts and talent. The guys of Modern Life Is War are onto something truly brilliant, and their future output should be very welcome to the ears of anyone who has enjoyed the hardcore music of past, but cringes when the repititious styles of metalcore or emocore are brought to mind.

Pictures from Nashville, TN

2006-07-13T19:30:00.000Z

This show was ridiculously hot.

Counting down

2006-07-11T10:40:00.000Z

a week from now I will be sitting on this exact bunker in the sun with a beer, Heldro icecream and a book, staring at the Maasriver waiting for my friends to take me out fishing. Being there it's gonna be weird looking back at the past months, but it will probably feel great.

and this is the view from the other side of the river.
href="http://hans.extern.kun.nl/pasp/20051001_cuijk_maas_kerk_vanaf_cuijksesteeg/600_r_200_06.jpg">

sitting there 2 sold out shows in a row in LA, or a crazy night in vegas or bourbon street will seem so far away it's ridiculous.

Zen Arkade

2006-07-09T09:32:00.000Z

I know it's shitty but I don't know how to host mp3's so I think I got a pretty good excuse. well actually I can't find any reason not to do it this way since I got no content or money for a website anyways so here it is...

Zen Arkade

Messages sent to that page will be replied by my buddy Bakkie Beekstraat who's one of the most interesting people you'll ever talk to so hit him up. He's the drummer and real good at it.
all of it is in dutch so the rest of the world can't understand any of it (besides half of Belgium). Next week should see a new song up which in my opinion is better but since I'm in the US I had no say in which song was to be mixed first.
Besides entering our local highschool's bandcontest Zen Arkade has no real future plans right now. If you have any please hit us up, maybe we can trade places.

Tour's over

2006-07-07T00:17:00.000Z

Yesterday our van blew up and we had to cancel the rest of the tour, big bum
out. We left our van somewhere in colorado and drove back to Iowa in a Uhaul
truck, which was kinda funny.
The last week has been very interesting like that. We did 2 sold out shows
at the Chain Reaction in Annaheim which was awesome, both shows were insane.
After that we did a show in vegas where kids tried to ruin the fun by
punching Uncle Bobby, and then had the guts to complain about the bands not
wanting to play. Way to make us feel welcome Vegas.
After the show we went and got a couple beers and hung out at the strip all
night where I lost all my money playing roulette. The next day we drove to
Denver and went to Bill Stevenson's 4th of july barbeque. Me: starstruck. We
blew 2 tires to get there and had to call some guy in the middle of the
night to fix us a new one.
and then after the denver show our engine blew out so no I'm back in the big
M and I'm tired so I'm off to bed!

Oh, I got a first mix of a Zen Arkade song and things are looking good.
Expect MP3's soon!

_________________________________________________________________
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http://www.join.msn.com/messenger/overview

Duran Duran Duran

2006-06-30T23:28:00.000Z

I just got word Duran Duran Duran is doing a set in holland at nighttown, rotterdam in august. needless to say i'm gonna do everything in my power to be there. yeeeeha!

youtube

2006-06-30T06:28:00.000Z

search MLIW on www.youtube.com and you'll get footage of this tour.

(i don't wanna be that guy but there's a new song up there)

late news breaking, this just in

2006-06-30T06:18:00.000Z

the dutch government resigned, hopefully I'll be back home in time to vote. fucking harry potter and his politics was driving me insane, for real.

yesterday I hung out with johannes from holland, it was great seeing him again. he got implants now and they looked awesome... I want!

I love outbreak so much I licked chris's sweat straight of his body, it was real salty, really.

what else... uhm... long drives are driving me crazy. I listened to every single song on my ipod a 100 times now, I need new stuff so i'm taking suggestions now, advise me on new music , please. I like everything.

one of my friends is expecting a baby in august, that blows my mind, and yesterday johannes told me this other guy I know is gonna be a father too. I guess I reached that age... that same age where everything I eat puts on wheight.

today daXmila made me an awesome proposition I will tell all of you about it later, but I just wanna say i'm supersiked. I told my mom so if you really wanna know drop her a line.

the zen arkade songs are being mixed as we speak, I hope i'll be able to put mp3's up here soon.

my body finally doesn't hurt anymore. it kinda was another wake up call that i'm not 16 anymore but i'm back in shape now. nerdie fact: I got 12 jumps in during dead ramones. I had to count 'm haha.

tomorrow and the day after we play two shows in a row in annaheim and presales are amazing. this'll be my claim to fame.

allright, gonna watch bane now. this tour is the best one I ever done where I love every band on it.
keep posting comments people.

Oh! I forgot to tell you...

2006-06-28T17:00:00.000Z

...some of the guys from Only Crime came to one the shows in texas, and turns out one of those guys was in GWAR. that's awesome right?

wooooohooooooo!

2006-06-27T04:14:00.000Z

free drinktickets in albequerque, new mexico! woooooooohoooooooooo!

jeff looks like bayou billy and nate outbreak looks like axl rose. he's so hot right now.

ya'll want a bite of my corndog?

2006-06-26T07:23:00.000Z

The more I think of the game the more it pisses me off. 14 yellow cards and 4 red ones is just ridiculous.

in other news: while playing my cabinet lit on fire. there were literally flames coming out of it, big flames. we had to use water to put it out. Zach from Bane tried to blow it out which was kinda funny, if my cabinet wasn't actually on fire. John's cabinet to be more precise, it's his but I was playing it. I don't know what caused it, I never seen anything like that before. If anybody knows why this could've happened let me know.

Other cool stuff that happened.... uhm, we went to bourbon street in New Orleans. New Orleans so far is probably the most beautifull american city there is and it looks totally european. Bourbon Street is in the french quarters, you may have seen it on Mardi Gras video's. It was a cool mix of stripclubs and bluesbars, and me and chris watched this bluesband play while having some beers. They did Howlin' Wolf, Muddy Waters, Otis Redding and Marvin Gaye and way more stuff. Plus their classic originals 'Going Back To New Orleans' and the tearjerker 'Phonecall from Memphis'. In the near future I definitely wanna try and spend more time there, like a weekend or something.

Yesterday in Corpus Christi after the show me, Chris and Mike (bane's merchguy) decided to go to a bluesbar before going to the hotel and at the bar we met some people who invited us to their afterparty. When morning came they decided to take us to the beach to watch the sunrise. So somewhere between seven and eight we were on the beach by the Gulf of Mexico watching the sun come up while Abel was passed out in his car, Mike and Kadie were swimming and me, Bobby and Chris were in the back of his pick up truck, it was beautifull.

These girls from Orlando decided on a whim to get in their car and follow us. weird. They're wrestling eachother in a room down the hall right now.

Josh got the most intense sunburn I ever seen. His skin looks all blistered and crazy, it hurts a lot to he says, he screams when putting aloe vera on it.

Oh, I started a European straight edge band with the Outbreak guys, we're called XcrucialfingerjumpingX, expect a 7" soon.

Aight, I'm off to bed, gotta sleep now if I wanna wake up on time to catch my free continental breakfast tomorrow morning.

Holland's out

2006-06-25T22:43:00.000Z

The portugese fought dirty, the ref didn't let anyone play and now Holland's out. What am I supposed to do now?

...

2006-06-19T05:39:00.000Z

I got a hat that says made by, paid for by, worn by....Americans!!!
that's right, three exclamation marks. all that over the american flag.

The dirty south is great. we met the (supposedly) guitar player from Lynyrd Skynyrd. he offered us drugs and then he went to get us girls in the projects. we never saw him again. Southern Belle's are truly Southern Belle's.

I love outbreak.

Other bands I saw on this tour besides the package:
-tarpit
-when tigerZ fight
-ruiner

Listening to and why:
Daniel Lohues (for obvious reasons)
Opgezwolle (wie behartigd je belangen? uhm..)
Winne (pomp die shit net als een lekke band)
The Shins (put me to sleep)
The Doves (just got this from John)
Mew (I love their latest record, I can't stop listening to it, amazing)
Twilight Singers (the new record which is unbelievable)

I want you to find out about The Beatstrings, Old Scratch Revival Singers and All Rattle And Dust. I know there's people reading this so do it allready.

I wrote a bunch of folksy songs in dutch again, can't wait to play 'm for my boys back home.
MLIW is roadtesting some new songs, I love playing those, it's a lot of fun. On that note: I started doing back up vocals which is fun too. Other fun stuff: I party a lot, I'm not letting my back stop me. My back hurts, seriously.

There is no better life

2006-06-18T17:05:00.000Z

Right now I'm in Atlanta, Georgia. last couple days were interesting and fun, been to florida, saw lizards, we thought the van was stolen but it turned out to be towed, had party's, I won a dance-off, my back is killing me, outbreak are crazy, the airco in the van is broken, we got it fixed but it worked for only about 10 minutes and I wasn't even there.

not much else going, my sister got her first tattoo. sorry mom.

oh yeah, anybody that has any pictures of any mliw shows, hit me up!

Comfortable chairs, comfortable temperatures

2006-06-13T15:34:00.000Z

not much time to update this. I'm having tons of fun though. Holland won, US got crushed. 3 more days till the next game. Check out the new sticker on my guitar. All this pics taken from the B9 board. Search mliw on there and you'll find tons more.
In other news, the van smells like shit.