twenty odd years now

Opinions are like arseholes, those who claim not to have one are usually full of shit. There’s a wonky aphorism that I just made up, but wait a minute…

Not that controversial, but I’m pretty into people having opinions. Like, proper ones. I think debate, lively discussion, and disagreement is bloody super. I reckon it’s productive, stimulating is as exciting and as enriching, if not moreso, than the buzzy feeling of totally agreeing with someone. I’m talking about spats away from the easy drama of the messageboard. I’ve been reading old issues of MRR and a bunch of accounts of this rag’s legendary status as opinion former/breaker/battleground. Theres a nice full circle, then, in resurrecting that difficult tradition and giving some people an extended right-to-reply in this here column..

Not that many UK bands are featured in MRR, but not that many UK bands are any good. Mob Rules are based in Leeds, England, and play great, thunderous, heavily dynamic hardcore, but you might not have got that from their recent interview, a platform as it was, for some of their more esoteric channels of verbal witticism. Conor, the drummer, is a funny man. He and I have disagreed, in the aforementioned manner, a few times before, as anyone who remembers the last time he said ‘I literally have no idea why girls would like hardcore’ – See? Such a card! Anyway, his musing about Wales, including some comments about how it’s ‘five years behind’, intrigued me, not because it was ill-informed, although I think it was, but because it was both funny and dismissive at the same time. Being funny and dismissive at the same time is interesting. Its an often unconscious social tactic, we all do it, and it is clever and, in a way, dangerous. Why? Well, think about how many times you’ve been lost for words because someone’s said something you’re not into, but everyone laughed. The only space it leaves for those who disagree is one where they’re easily dismissable, again, as either humourless jerks, or overly-PC, or feminazis, or just not ‘getting it’, or whatever reactionary reduction works depending on the argument in question. These universal forms of dismissive humour end up the polar opposite of the buzzy awesomeness of open debate I mentioned above. It’s the ultimate shutdown.

In a similar vein is the outcome of my column-before-last when I wrote about girl bands and London, lazily using a mesh of different observations out of context, to basically be a bit scathing. I had a point but I think I buried it. Suffice to say it pissed off a number of people, some of whom wrote to me or got in touch in other ways, but through the magic of communication, we all pretty much got to an understanding, even if it was agreeing to opposition. This included one friend who recognised an experience I’d had watching her band in there. I was ashamed of myself as it was only a semi-conscious inclusion, but moreover, for me to write about the dire need for challenging our own representation whilst effectively putting words in another girl’s mouth, well, sucks to be me on that one. Sure, we can all admit to an ill-judged turn of phrase, I hope I definitely did then, but its especially easier if you’re not starting from a position of supposed untouchability. All too often I see this, no room to debate because opinion is predicated on that kind of liberal nihilism that has come to the fore in some punx attitudes. This, of course, is a world away from Mob Rules (their singer is perhaps the most switched-on person I know) but its an attitude that’s all too prevalent, I’m sure you know someone who’s working this steez, or trying. It’s the ultimate shutdown to any kind of ideological challenge, a boring, bland brick wall that has no space of possibility or change or ‘fuck yeah!’ or ‘fuck no!’ about it, just pure ‘nothing matters’ or worse still an insinuation that somehow, to think that you can affect your own environment is so horrifically behind the curve that its actually sort of embarrassing the person you’re challenging to the point where they’re cringing. It’s a hopeless language without any words, all shrugs and sibilants, and it’s everywhere. I blame the hipster media conspiracy, but that’s another story. Critical thought isn’t a hangover from the 90s, fer chrissakes, okay some chumps didn’t do their research and it became part of a bigger cliché, but aren’t we over the backlash from that yet? Calling ‘bullshit’ is badass, and I hope to god it becomes ‘cool’ again, or otherwise, hey, when the context of this newfound nonchalance is lost, as it doubtless quickly will be, we might just find we’ve all ended up back in Wetherspoons* School of inter-personal politics with the dickheads from school and someone’s racist, wasted uncle. Bummer, non?

Back to the topic of that throwaway comment about the punk scene in Wales. It’s a small country, part of the UK, and traditionally, i.e. in all sketchy comedy or tabloid press, lampooned for being ‘backwards’ and in-bred. This brought up some interesting ideas, not least the issue of what it might mean to reproduce mainstream cultural prejudice, even casual racism (same goes for classism) in punk. This is where everyone screams ‘God, she really can’t take a joke…’ but roll with me here..of course I’m not saying I would lay those crimes at the friendly feet of Mob Rules. However, as I was incapable of leaving my thoughts on this to remain only a dissatisfied tut, I thought I would include my fellow countrymen, and ask Alex B.

Alex B has been putting on DIY Gigs on in two cities in South Wales for eight years or so under various banners. He’s been fucked over plenty of times, lost money, put on hundred of bands (including Mob Rules…) and has been instrumental in literally building the community there from the ground up. Again, this may be all rose-tinted because I learnt everything I needed to know from finding out what that metaphorical cover song was and trading tapes at his early gigs. Not enough girls around and thats still a problem, and was part of the reason I left, but still, for all the bad metal and the basketball vests of the earlier days, those gigs are part of the reason I am here, for better or worse jamming Biohazard as hard as Delta 5. Anyway, objectivity here is impossible due to my irrational, weird, slightly shameful pride in the hillside, but the idea of being ‘behind’ in terms of punk trends is an interesting thing to be brought up, I think. Especially coming from an interview with what has come to be the closest band England has to ‘mysterious guy hardcore’ (due to no engineering of their own, I might add.) Hardcore punk in South Wales has endured ‘lean years’ like you wouldn’t believe, as lifers like Welly Artcore could sagely tell you. For me, it has a certain kind of specificity that yeah, probably did once come out of being slightly removed from touring circuits of bigger bands and what not, but since I was a teenager has had a lot to do with a thriving scene that is insular in a good way, not without problems of course, but with a dedicated venue which ‘gets’ DIY that many other towns dont have (Le pub in Newport, although R.I.P TJ’s, where I and many others cut their teeth metaphorically and physically) Should we all attend to the hype train and the cyclical trends of hardcore punk that can basically be boiled down to whether people in other parts of the country are choosing to display or hide their Youth of Today records this month? I say no. Alex puts all this better than me…

MRR: Hi Alex, hows it going?

CCHC: Good thanks, just enjoying Cardiff City FC making the playoffs, another reason for the English to hate the Welsh, and all that.

MRR: How do you respond to the charge that hardcore punk in south Wales is five years ‘behind’ the rest of the UK?

CCHC: All hardcore is backwards anyway. Like, if you are honest, when was the last time you truly heard something original and new in hardcore punk? It doesn’t really work like that. What our friend Conor and his Northern buddies actually mean is: Five years ago, the North was the cool place to be. At that point, the whole Dead & Gone records, Straight edge, Youth Crew thing was simply the ‘in thing’. But then if you go back three more years, it was the Canterbury scene, and bands like xCanaanx, November Coming Fire and whoever else. I suppose you could just say that right now, it’s been South Wales’ time. Kids look to us for what’s good and that’s awesome, because 7 or 8 years ago – Wales was a bit of a joke. Maybe, because we are Welsh, and differ to all the aforementioned scenes (We’ll never have a big straightedge or vegan interest for instance) so to some people we still are a joke. But, I can assure you, it’s just misguided jealousy. And in a few more years it’ll be exactly the same somewhere else.

MRR: Does it matter? And what should people check out from Wales to prove/disprove this?

CCHC: To be honest, no, it doesn’t matter. I don’t need to start selling people the good and bad of Welsh hardcore punk here. If you like what we’ve been doing awesome, and if you don’t that’s fine too. But at least give it a chance instead of creating some preconceived notion of what it’s about. At the end of the day its just music, it isn’t something to be intellectualised to death or something to be treated with such elitism. Come and check out a show at Lepub in Newport, you’ll be treated to a much friendlier and fun hardcore show atmosphere than a local show in say, I don’t know, Leeds?

MRR: So, is it bad to support your friend’s bands or like a band more based on where they come from?

CCHC: Maybe I missed the point of hardcore somewhere along the line – but isn’t that partially the idea? You know, the whole self containment thing. Friends and like-minded people with a common interest, supporting each others bands, Zines, labels and so on? Did DC hate New York, because all those kids supported each others projects? Then again, if some of my friends recorded some crap demo, I’d tell them it was crap. It is possible to be alert to what’s good and what’s bad, even when it involves your friends. It’s just funnily, in recent years, South Wales has been quite good at getting things right.

Alex had some more to say that can be summarised for reasons of space in an invitation to check out some bands and shows, which can be done here (.myspace.com/cardiffhype.) In conclusion, Mob Rules, Wales Rules, everyone’s happy.

While we’re on the subject of current or recent Welsh bands, there is more than just the straight up hardcore vein going on and it is once again underrated and beastly good quality. We’ve just come back from a tour with Facel Vega, from Porthcawl which is a little further west than Cardiff, who sound like the best parts of Rites of Spring mixed with Born Against. I also have to mention The Take who split up three years ago, on April 4^th 2007 I think. I remember the date because I would find out that at the very moments I was watching their last show, my then-boyfriend was doing the do (the old ‘in-out’, the rudes, etc etc) on someone that wasn’t me. So, their LP – Dolomite, which I was carrying back on the Megabus home when he called to say so, had such bad associations for such a long time that I even considered throwing it out. That would have been a total boon for my doorstep rubbish collection man, cos even without resonance, the lyrics and riffs with this band are singularly incredible. It has bits of a lot of the angular later DC stuff like Bluetip, or Jawbox and reminds me in places of Samiam in the pointed sadness of the vocals, but with a slight trace of a Cardiff accent ! Just brilliant DIY indie-rock with massive angry choruses. I think you can even still get it from Bombed Out records – nice proof that not all northern initiatives can’t hack the Welsh! – try www.bombedout.com. Also check out Harbour, The Keep, Bedford Falls, Threat Manifesto and Saturday’s Kids.

*Oh, non-Brits, you could substitute Wetherspoons, a well-known chain of cheap pubs, for any Sports bar, I think.

Ps. I typed the words ‘Baby, Baby, Baby, won’t you come to me as a horse?’ at the beginning of this column as it came out of my speakers – misheard Sacred Love by Bad Brains of course, and hoped to include it in all its ridiculousness somehow. Now this column’s all over, word-count-load all shot, and its stayed irrelevant, but I can’t bring myself to delete, so here it shall stay, in honour of HR’s lovely payphone timbre, a voice so great as to persuade even the strictest non-animal lover to join some fantasy legion of Lower East Side Horse Fanciers…. I’m tired. What a bunch of nonsense. One love. bryonybeynon@gmail.com // bigtakeover.co.uk