The long awaited debut LP from NYC’s FLOWER “Hardly A Dream” is finally set to arrive.
FLOWER’s tedious approach to writing/creating/drawing their debut LP was carefully thought out and the result is a monumental anarcho punk /crust record.
“Hardly A Dream” Takes us on a bleak journey through the dark side of society. As soon as you drop the needle a dark atmosphere is immediately created with a slow intro featuring arpeggio guitar work that builds into pummeling d-beat crust. The albums vocals then leave you with a feeling of being crushed by the ever-present weight of living through our modern world of late stage capitalism that was built on the falsehoods of the so called American dream, religious hypocrisy’s, nationalism, and the greed of humankind.
FLOWER take many cues from predecessors and are most often (and rightfully so) compared to NAUSEA but they also take a heavy influence from ANTISECT, SACRILEGE & other greats. The artwork has a very RUDIMENTARY PENI feel and the record comes with an amazing 24.5 X 34.75 CRASS style poster jacket. All art work was meticulously hand drawn and overseen by the guitarist Willow in true DIY style and spirit. Willow was also cool enough to draw up a special shirt for the record release featuring an alternative PROFANE EXISTENCE backprint!
Dark, heavy, galloping crust from the streets of London. AGNOSY is back to present us with a ferocious beast of an album that can only be forged by the anger and frustration of living in today’s world. “When Daylight Reveals The Torture” aggressively attacks evils such the current rise of fascism and animal abuse. It intelligently and passionately touches on the Afrin invasion and the revolution in Rojava and shows nothing but utter disgust toward the arrogance of humankind’s lust for greed and power that will inevitably lead us down paths of war and environmental devastation.
AGNOSY – Live at SCUMFEST in London. 2011
While lyrically AGNOSY are much more politicly straight forward this time around than on previous releases, musically they have expanded on their sound to create a dark and moody atmosphere while at the same time staying crust as fuck. To say they know what they are doing would be an understatement from this band of vets whose members have played in HIATUS, HEALTH HAZARD, and BEGINNING OF THE END.
Long galloping intros are followed up by traditional d-beat, fierce solo’s are then meet with vicious vocals and pulverizing bass in a brilliant recording captured by Lewis Johns at The Ranch Production House and was mastered by Brad Boatright at Portland’s legendary Audiosiege. We then pressed on deluxe heavyweight 150-gram vinyl, printed on reverse board jackets, and included an 11in x 22in gatefold insert to bring you a high quality and truly epic record.
PROFANE EXISTENCE – PO BOX 647 – HUNTINGTON WV – 25711 – UNITED STATES
The legendary crust classic is now available once again!
Authorized and released in cooperation with MISERY, S.D.S., & MCR Japan & Remastered by Jack Butcher at Enormous Door Studio we are beyond proud to make one one the most rare and sought after crust records available once again.
Fuck the scavengers charging punks exuberant amounts of cash on ebay and discogs. We worked meticulously with both bands and with Jack at Enormous door to bring you an updated version that kicks major audio ass while maintaining the original authenticity.
Released on deluxe 150 gram vinyl. With an 11×11 inner sleeve. Black Paper Jacket. Reverse Board Jacket.
Earlier this year we re-issued this legendary LP and sold over 950 copies in just 4 short months. For this second pressing we pressed 490 copies on Krystal Clear & 485 on Grey Vinyl with Black Mist.
Crystal Clear (Bullet belt no included) Grey With Black Mist (Bullet belt no included) PROFANE EXISTENCE – PO BOX 647 – HUNTINGTON WV – 25711 UNITED STATES
Stench crust the way it was meant to be played!
The UK crust scene of the 1980’s inspired band after band but no other band has ever reincarnated the sound of that time as well as SWORDWIELDER. Quite simply if you like crust, then this the album you have waited decades for.
Review by Craig Hayes from “Your Last Rites”… Swordwielder – System Overlord Heavyweight punk fanatics take note: System Overlord is a fucking triumph. The long-awaited sophomore album from Gothenburg stenchcore band Swordwielder is a brooding behemoth, constructed from the filthiest and heftiest strains of punk and metal. System Overlord shimmers with apocalyptic visions, and it’s overflowing with all the grim atmospherics and intimidating intensity that defines consummate crushing crust.
Too much hype? No way… And no apologies, either. Swordwielder deal in definitive stenchcore on System Overlord, and much like their full-length debut, 2013’s Grim Visions of Battle, the band’s latest release is a knockout. Swordwielder’s harsh, gruff and dark sound owes a significant debt to old school icons like Amebix, Axegrinder, Deviated Instinct, and Antisect, and they mix and mangle their influences and leave ’em to rot on the battlefield.
Plenty of hammering rage drives System Overlord tracks like “Violent Revolution,” “Savage Execution” and “Cyborgs,” and thundering epics like “Corrupt Future” and “Northern Lights” exhibit subtler strengths, mixing guttural growls and clean vocals with crashing percussion and dirge-laden riffs. Connoisseurs of corpse-dragging crust will love the brute-force belligerence of “Absolute Fear,” “Nuclear Winter,” and “Second Attack,” which rain down like merciless mortar barrages. As a rule, all of System Overlord‘s mammoth tracks chug and churn with grinding muscle, while reeking of squalor and decay.
Swordwielder exudes tightly coiled aggression from start to finish here—songs rise from the ashes of desolation, and resounding calls for action and resistance ring loud. If you’re a fan of heavy-hitters like Fatum, War//Plague, Carnage, Zygome, Cancer Spreading or (insert your favorite hefty crust crew here), System Overlord‘s trampling tempo and strapping sound are bound to appeal.
WILT combine old school metal and crust in a perfect hybrid that very few others have ever achieved. Prepare for a LP thats equal parts galloping d-beat crust reminiscent of bands like HELLSHOCK, and INSTINCT OF SURVIVAL, meets old school death metal in the vein of BOLT THROWER, MEMORIAM (old) SEPULTURA.
Here is a track from the upcoming LP
“Sermon for the Bootlickers”
Despite the inculcation of helplessness within each there remains great power. Ill at ease with such makes us ill. Learn to see the hand that feeds for what it is. You’ve been fooled if you think you’ve got no power. Refuse to be reduced to a consumer you’re a human being. Define yourself by more than wealth. Define yourself as a human. You don’t need what you’re being sold. Bend your knee to no authority but your own mind. You have the power to avoid the gilded trap. Avarice is what you’re conditioned for. Break the mold discover what’s really valuable to you.
WILT will be on in Europe this July / August will ELECTROZOMBIES From Chile
Wed, July 12 Hanover / Germany / Confirmed Thu, July 13 Bremen Fri, July 14 Mulhem / Germany / Confirmed Sat, July 15 Gent, Belgium / CrustPicnic / Confirmed Sun, July 16 Paris / France or Amsterdam / Nederland July 18 North-East France or West Germany July 19 Freiburg / Germany TBC July 20 Winterthur / Switzerland Fri, July 21 Zurich / Switzerland Sat, July 22 Biel / Switzerland July 23 Lausanne or Geneva / Switzerland
July 24 Geneva / Switzerland or Grenoble france
July 25 Treviso (or Milano or Bologna or Verona) / Italy
July 26 Ljubljana Slovenia Confirmed
July 27 No Sanctuary chilling day
Fri, July 28 NoSanctuary Confirmed
Sat, July 29 NoSanctuary Confirmed
July 30 Ilirska Bistrica/Slovenia or Vienna/Austria or Budapest/Hungary.
July 31 Wiena / Austrai or Budapest or / Slovakia
August 1 Brno / Czech Republic.
August 2 Prague / Czech Republic
August 3 Finsterwalde / Germany TBC
Fri, August 4 Leipzig / Germany TBC
Sat, August 5 Berlin / Germany / confirmed
August 6 Dresden
August 7 Wroclaw / Poland
August 8 Warsaw / Poland
August 9 Poznan / Poland
August 10 Szczecin/Poland TBC
Fri, August 11 Rostock / confirmed
Sat, August 12 Hamburg TBC
For this in the Seattle or surrounding area you can catch WILT this Saturday April first at Highline Bar with NOOTHGRUSH from Oakland.
If you’re bored at work/driving/sitting home rotting then tune into Worst Case Scenario/Epicus Apocalytpus Friday(NOW) on http://www.brutalexistenceradio.net. Playing the greatest crust/grind/dbeat/anarcho new and old. This week Rapturous Grief,Kromosom,Wat Tyler,Phobia,Self,Oiltanker & more. Come join the chat room
In April of 2013 I went on my first major tour with Reagan Youth where I met Mike Defendant. He was opening for the band in Louisville, Kentucky. This was where the Rustbelt Tour 2013 ended. We have since been in touch regarding music, touring, life, etc… more recently his solo debut “Iron Bars”, his involvement with Profane Existence, and life as a troubadour.
-By Trey Oswald
*Profane Existence: Tell us a little about yourself. What influenced you to start playing music? What bands did you play with before becoming a solo performer?
*Mike Defendant: I played hardcore until things just slowed down. I started a side project with a friend, played a few shows, then decided that I was not meant to jam with a full band. I wanna do way too much and the schedules and personal lives of others interfere.
*PE: What are your plans as a solo performer? Where do you think the songs and performances will be well-received?
*MD: My current plans as a solo performer are to keep doing what I am already doing – writing, gigging, touring, etc. I feel my songs will be best received in the south. From my experience, I learned that the southern punk scene is very accepting of acoustic openers, unlike other places.
*PE: Your album has a sense of optimism as the troubadour life awaits and home is far behind. Is there a sense of wanting to escape or a desire for experience in your writing?
*MD: Yeah. Haha, I really hate the place that I currently live. I put in too much work in a scene that lacks people and support. The few people who support what I’m doing back me to the fullest… but i can’t even get half of them to come to half the shows I play… But wait! RANCID comes to town and watch every punk drive an hour to see the show. Haha.
*PE: When did Profane Existence show interest in your world and how did that come about?
*MD: I have been a fan of P.E. for a while. I discovered In Defense through my buddies Reagan Youth. I saw ‘em on tour with The Casualties where I met Ben Crew (Vocalist of In Defense/Owner of PE). I gave him my info and a few months later saw them play with Toxic Holocaust. We chatted after the show and weeks later we were talkin’ about a release. The rest is history!
*PE: What inspires you to write songs? Lyrically and musically?
*MD: Life in general really… I just kinda go with the flow of how I feel.
*PE: Folk Punk seems to be the label used these daze. What drew you from electric to acoustic punk?
*MD: I wanted to progress on my own, but i still wanted to play punk… it just came out folky due to my blues and folk influences haha. i really enjoy Against Me! Evan Greer (the entire RIOT FOLK Movement) and anything that has to do with PAT THE BUNNY!
*PE: Do you feel a great deal of the bands who form in Ohio tend to leave and never come back or do they remain and reprazent the Buckeye State?
*MD: Some of ‘em kick it here. I’ll most likely be coming back after my tours and what not in the future. It’s a good place to live.. but not a good place for music. This does make it a little hard but I love my family too much. There are a few sweet bands around here though – Legbone, FBS, Sub X…
*PE: Not everyone is familiar with Ohio or the Midwest. Have you noticed a central hub for music in Ohio?
*MD: I would have to say a lot of good music comes out of the Columbus, Ohio area.
*PE: What are your feelings about the Midwest scene? Has it broken out to the coast and into the collective punk consciousness?
*MD: It seems alright although.. I really don’t have much support out this way. I want to relocate to the durty south very soon to play a few shows (if I have it my way).
*PE: Would you mind sharing a story from the road or an experience that has stuck with you as a vagabond musician?
*MD: When i went on the road with my old band (Some Kind Of Nightmare – LOOK EM UP!) we met another band in Arkansas (THE DEAD RANGERS). The venue screwed both bands out of a show. These guys wanted to do EVERYTHING in their power to assure us this was not a good representation of their punk rock scene. We were invited back to their place out in the sticks and got us a ton of beer. We played in their barn to a gang full of rowdy, redneck, punkers. They showed us such a good time! I also played an acoustic set and sold EVERY piece of merch that I had. If that already was not the best show I had been a part of… the next day they made us a homemade breakfast and invited us to hang around for lunch.
Those two days taught me that PUNK ROCK is a family and no matter where you go and there are people who will have your back. People I had never met before welcomed us in. Even though I was so far away from home, that night I felt reunited with old friends and family. It was an amazing feeling knowing that I would return the favor one day by hosting bands myself. Not just punk bands, but anyone!
*PE: OK, enough with the Circus Magazine questions. Time for the fun part.
*MD: Ahhhh Yeahhhh
*PE: Do you have any shout outs, name you want to drop, album releases, venues, bands, shows, etc. that you want to shamelessly mention?
MD: Shout to BEN CREW for putting out my noise and dealing with my lack of skill, Trey Oswald for letting me party at his house where I met Hank and some new friends. SHOUT OUT TO DA VILLE PUNX, OHIO RIOT, all the bands that stick around to watch my sets. A huge shout out to RANDY RAY PATTERSON, SOME KIND OF NIGHTMARE, AMY LYNN, INFESTED RECORDS. SHOUT OUT TO EVAN GREER, and anyone who I will tour with in the future. Last but not least my parents! (Verl and Shelly Wilson), and grandma (Sadie Kelsey)
-PROFANE EXISTENCE -CLAYTON USA -REAGAN YOUTH -THE CASUALTIES -GREEN JELLO
I probably forgot some important people… but they know I love em!
*PE: Tell us your favorite (Mike answers after each selection):
-Guitar player- Paul Cripple
-70s muscle car- Uhhhh… I really don’t know too much about cars but I like the one from Grease. Haha does that count?
-Beer/Liquor/other if you don’t consume alcohol- Uhhh I like alcohol… but… what really keeps me alive is WATER! Haha I am a big fan of some water but when it comes to booze? PBR or some kind of vodka.
-Discharge song- NEVER AGAIN!
-Favorite city/state to play- GREENVILLE, NC
-Favorite place to visit or party- NOLA!
-Best movie or documentary about punk- I really like “The Other F Word” a lot… or “American Hardcore”, “What we Do Is Secret” , “Slc Punk!” The list goes on… oh and if you don’t like “Rock N Roll High School” you can suck it.
-Best Anti-police song- Evan Greers, Children Song!
-Dystopian novel or story- What does that even mean?
-You have to pick one. Miley or Billy Ray Cyrus?- Hmm.. I have always been fascinated with horrible parenting and mullets.. so Billy (plus that achy breaky song is catchy- there I said it).
-Your most prized piece of rock memorabilia you have (t-shirt, record, ticket stub, zine, etc.)- Recently I had the opportunity to open for Glen Matlock (Sex Pistols) and he signed the flyer for the show.
-Words of hope (or hopelessness)- NEVER GIVE UP! NEVER GIVE IN! If you have a dream FIGHT for it. Be willing to put yourself in uncomfortable situations. Be willing to hit rock bottom. You will make it some day. Most importantly, remember when you feel like no one believes in you- MIKE DEFENDANT does! Hit me up! I want to listen to your band and wanna see you dreams come true!
LAST BUT NOT LEAST!!!
You will never fail until the day you stop trying! Stay positive! Stay true to yourself!
Appropriately named “Iron Bars”, Mike Defendant plays acoustic punk, which is alive along with the folk spirit. Songs of pain have never sounded so hopeful, making the listener want to travel the world, using music as a vehicle. The theme of the album is escape, leaving home, heading into the unknown. However the singer is not running away, but searching for the unknown, ready for what awaits. Songs like “Afraid” tell of venturing out along the highways and the into the towns. He may be unsure but is confident because troubadour life is what he knows. Prepared for sorrow, pain, or even death, as Mike boldly states “I’ll have to pick me one last tune” writing his own Eulogy.
Venturing away from where he grew up is mentioned in “Iron Bars”, describing how there are only has two venues, behind bars or six feet below. There is certain sorrow in Mike’s music but unfolds as he has found a reason to live a fuller existence by escaping and opening his heart. “Nice Knowing You” Mike sings “is there a spot in his heart and will he still care”. Jaded but open he will soon find out as the listener can only assume. Maybe you can catch his guitar playing the perfect riffs as Mike sings and even screams at times about how he won’t conform to their rules and regulations or how the only family he needs is his guitar and a voice to sing.
Optimism over desperation aka Living on the run they’ll never take Mike out alive.
“-Peace, Love, n’ Unity to Mike, Profane Existence, & all the punx worldwide”
2 posts in a day. What’s the world coming to. I was perusing the internet and saw people lined up at record stores feeling like they’re doing something cool. Like most holidays/’special’ days,etc.,I tend to avoid them. Since today is Record Store Day, I will voice my opinion why this is another bunk day. I read 1 article where the store owner said he’ll see faces he’ll never see again because they came in for that 1 piece of vinyl that’s only available today. To me it defeats the purpose. It’s 1 thing to be a record collector because you like the music, but to buy something knowing you’re going to make money off of it is as Poison Idea calls these folks out ‘Record Collectors are Pretentious Assholes’. People line up for blocks, yet where are a majority of these people on any given Tuesday when new releases come out at their independent record store? I’m sure it makes them feel better about themselves because they’re ‘taking a stand against the major labels’. Pshaw I say,because you’ll be back downloading iTunes or however else you get your music, probably later today. I’m all for independent/underground stores, but to bank on 1 day catering to douchebag/baggettes to make some extra dough is, and maybe this is just the punk mentality in me, but corporate sell out bullshit. And I know RSD didn’t start out being this way,but it has. If you really want to support independent stores/labels, shop them year round instead of sitting behind your computer and clicking download for your favorite releases.
After a few weeks dealing with finding a new place and moving. WCS/EA have returned to the airwaves. If you missed the live show on Friday, catch the replay Sundays starting at 7pmET/0100CET. Don’t forget to check out Doomed Society(4pmET/2200CET) & Brothers Grim Punkcast(6pmET/MidnightCET) onhttp://www.brutalexistenceradio.net. For the WCS/EA setlist and link to stream or download go to werstcasescenario.tumbrl.com.
AHNA are a force to be reckoned with, combining elements of sludge metal, grind, death metal, crust, with a heavy dose of anti-authoritarian politics.They have never fallen into any trend or relive-the-past nonsense. AHNA are truly doing their own thing, making a hell of a lot of noise, and keeping it super real. Profane is proud to be a part of their new split 12″ with Winnipeg crusties CETASCEAN. To celebrate this new record, Damien Inbred sat down and had an email exchange with AHNA drummer/vocalist Anju.
First off, can you give me a bit of the history of AHNA? We started as a two piece doing doom-drone and later had Graham on bass, Anju on drums, and a vocalist for a bit doing primitive doom stuff. We decided to go back to being a two piece and take on vocal duties ourselves and wrote our demo “The Confederation of the Cult of One” which led to our first record (s/t) that we also just recorded among ourselves. We have been a band for about 6 years and our focuses as musicians and writers has grown and changed throughout those years, with right now it just being an obsession with a variety of crust, old school death metal, primitive black metal, and other stuff in that realm. We basically just try to execute the ideas in our heads as best as possible and obsessively work on it. This might be why we started playing music together, we are both really committed and constantly work on music pretty much every single day. And I think this is also why it might seem that our music is often evolving or changing, since we are always challenging ourselves to do what we are inspired by. There is rarely a time when we are not writing.
Right now Graham and I write all of the music and lyrics and that’s fine for writing and even recording, but we feel that being just a two piece is really limiting in terms of what we can do live. Traditionally, we have always played all instruments on our records ourselves and Graham and I would do all guitar etc.. overdubs, but live it would be challenging to do what we managed to achieve in studio. Now Graham has moved onto playing lead guitar and we have a bass player (Derek) and a second guitar player (Taylor) to try to get a sound that is as close to what comes out on our records as possible for when we play live. The people we have playing with us are our friends and the lineup might change from tour to tour based on who is available for what tour or recording and this lets us continue with the level of commitment we both have while getting some help live and in the studio from friends who are stoked and wanna do that stuff with us. On this split with CETASCEAN, our friend Taylor played bass on the recording which meant that Graham could focus on guitar and then guitar overdubs and it was definitely way less pressure and allowed for more interesting guitar parts to come out. Having a third person record with us was a totally new approach and it worked well. It was great to have him there and he will be playing 2nd guitar on our LP and Derek will be on bass.
Aside from the split 12″, what releases do you have coming out in the near future?
We have a split 7″ with raw d-beat punks CONTORTURE from Sweden that is later than expected, but should be arriving any day now. We also have a split 10″ with Canadian gore-grinders G.O.D (GROTESQUE ORGAN DEFILEMENT), and then we will be recording out next full length LP that we hope will be out in time for our tour in late July. A Danish label is also going to be doing a Discography cassette of our stuff in Denmark ideally for when we get there for our tour.
You did a tour of Europe last year with ISKRA – how did that come about? What was the tour like? What were some of the positives and negatives?
ISKRA are good friends of ours and we wanted to tour with a band that was like minded so we all talked about it and it happened. As a band they are incredible to watch, night after night they played crushing sets. They are one of our favorite bands going right now and I believe they act with integrity and their music shows their sincerity and dedication. Everyone in that band is great as people and Wolf (guitarist) is someone who I respect and have learned a lot from. The tour was long and we had a total of 2 days off in 45 days or something and it went really well. The best part of that tour was watching our friends play to receptive crowds every night and having the chance to see them over and over. It seemed that people all over Europe really appreciated ISKRA and of course it’s the best feeling when you see your friend’s bands do really well. It’s hard to pinpoint any negatives, I guess not having any time off sucked but the idea that tour is a vacation is a misleading concept that even after many tours we have to remind ourselves is not the case. That said we wouldn’t be able to handle not playing music for longer than a few days very well anyway, so the lack of time off isn’t a huge deal for us. It’s hard to find negatives on a tour when we already spend our regular life playing music everyday, taking work out of the mix is the only real change and that’s always awesome.
What are some of the differences that you’ve noticed between touring in Europe, and touring in North America?
We haven’t toured the US yet due to a criminal record but Canada versus Europe is quite different. First the music we make seems to have stronger communities all over Europe. Smaller cities in Europe have a longer history of DIY squats and venues where that seems to be rare and newer in Canada. Quebec is probably the best province for that stuff here. And of course when planning a Europe tour we can tell our bandmates that they will probably be fed, get some drinks and a decent place to sleep whereas in Canada that mostly only happens when you plan ahead or know people. This all said, touring Canada is important to us since we now have a lot of friends and a strong community across the country. And especially since a lot of our friends and punks have moved to spaces off the grid, we visit and remind ourselves that there are options to live without being a wage slave.
Vancouver has long had a vibrant and active punk scene of all stripes. Where does AHNA fit into the Vancouver scene?
We have a strong connection to a lot of different bands and communities in our city. Genre is not the defining point of how we participate since we appreciate punk and metal from a variety of genres and perspectives. We have a strong community of friends in bands in and around the city including ISKRA, HAGGATHA, HOOPSNAKE, MASS GRAVE, COOKED AND EATEN, FAMINE, SIXBREWBANTHA, OSK, WAR HERO, OBACHA, SHOOTING SPREE, CHAPEL, RADIOACTIVE VOMIT, KOSZMAR, HYPEREMESIS, POOR FORM, and so many more. Just based on that abbreviated list it’s clear that what’s happening here is really diverse, and so it’s hard to say where we fit in when we participate in a lot of it. It’s kind of a small scene so it’s crucial to support everything from raw punk to grindcore to black metal to crust if you’re into it, otherwise that shit dies out and then there’s nothing interesting left in the city. People in bands in our community tend to end up at shows you might not expect to see them, because people are supportive across genres. And obviously we have a lot of respect for our friends bands that we play with who have been keeping punk/underground metal going in this town for 10+ years like MASS GRAVE, ISKRA and HAGGATHA and I think that helps keep punk “vibrant and active” as you described it here, or “alive and thriving” as someone has described it in town before, ha.
Since we both also do harsh noise we also have a strong connection to local projects like THE RITA and RUSALKA as well. As a drummer, Anju’s main influence was Matt Wood (HAGGATHA/BISON) from when she first saw GOAT’S BLOOD years ago and that really totally started a path to where we are now. Now she takes a lot of influence for drumming from Nick (BAPTISTS), Brett (MASS GRAVE), Goat (EXPRESSION OF PAIN) and Bina (CAMBODIA). There is a lot of dialogue between musicians in Vancouver because we all love what we do. MITOCHONDRION is another local band that is slightly outside of the community we usually connect with but their originality and unique approach has inspired us though we end up with a different sound in the end. Of course close neighbours being Kamloops, we have a strong connection to bands like BRIDGEBURNER, SKUFF, CHANGE and also a new anarcha-feminist space in Kamloops called The Femme For All Collective which is run by Athena, Freja and Sian, all of whom now play in bands. It might be easier to ask how we fit in the BC punk community rather than just Vancouver since it’s pretty much impossible for our band to separate ourselves from the influence and relationship we share with Squamish, Kamloops, and Victoria.
Is there much of an anarchist punk scene in Vancouver these days?
We strongly support anarchism and play fundraisers with our band and our other bands and harsh noise projects often. All of the bands in our community may not identify explicitly as anarchists or political bands but the people involved all have an interest in maintaining a non oppressive community. People like Brett from MASS GRAVE, and Dave Mccrea from OSK have always shown me a lot of support and respect as a female drummer in a predominantly male dominated genre. Tommy Wilson who runs fastcore fest has traditionally supported politically focused bands like RAPE REVENGE and opens up that dialogue within the fastcore community by attempting to bridge those gaps. I bet these people may not even be aware of the importance of their subtle contributions. That said, we don’t have a unified specifically political punk scene here but I don’t believe that labelling something makes it more legitimate. If you listen to bands like SIXBREWBANTHA’s lyrics you will definitely find strong political ideas, though they do not identify specifically as a political band. So, I guess I would say that while we don’t have a labelled anti-oppression community in Vancouver, it’s happening and co-operation between people with slightly different viewpoints and perspectives is important to us.
Aside from AHNA, are you involved with any activist or political organizing? We have been/are part of a couple projects that are focused on expressing anti-oppression ideas in punk and underground music by running physical spaces or events. The newest project is a radical space that is opening in the city in early March. We support political organizing in the city by working in collaboration with groups who are interested to have our band or projects play or contribute in a specific way.
Where did the idea for the split with CETESCEAN come from? Will there be a tour to coincide with the split?
We are about 27 hours away from Winnipeg and yet both of our bands have made efforts to tour back and forth between one-another’s cities and play together. This created a strong friendship and we have influenced each other’s bands in the process as well. I don’t remember exactly how it happened when the decision was made to do the split, but it made absolute sense and it seemed to be at a good time while we are taking a break to record a few records before our next tour. They are an incredible band and we have a great personal relationship with all of the members.
We are not touring together to support the record, but we will be going to Kamloops and Edmonton on March 21st/22nd to play with CETASCEAN and HEAD HITS CONCRETE, and then doing a record release show in Vancouver on March 28th. We are touring ourselves on the way to the ROAR festival in Montreal in August and then we will head to Europe in late August to tour starting with a festival in Denmark. Our tour dates are approximately late July to early October and go from Vancouver to East Canada and then to Europe and back.
The split with CETESCEAN is called “Imperial Decline”. Who came up with the title, and what does it mean in the context of this record?
It’s hard to remember who exactly came up with it, but i’m pretty sure it was collaborative between the bands. The themes that both of the bands are interested in relate to the title directly, which is that people and systems in power are fucked. Both of our bands have had lyrical themes about oppression, genocide, and treatment of humans by other humans on other records as well. The title seemed fitting to sew the two sides of the record together.
On this split with CETESCEAN, what subject matter do the songs tackle?
The first track War Games is about a person at the top of the colonial food chain. Master of War was another title we were considering for this track, and it might explain some the ideas behind the lyrics. The song is comparing the war mongering person’s role to someone playing a chess game and not thinking about the lives they destroy, only ever thinking about it as a game because they never have to deal with any consequences.
The second song, Massacre describes the use of “total war” as a common tool in colonizing efforts throughout history in many countries. Graham was especially inspired by a particular event in a biography he was reading about Goyahkla (Geronimo) when writing these lyrics in which it was described how the army would wait until the men were out hunting and go in and slaughter all those who were unlikely to be able to fight back. There is also General Custard and the massacre at Wounded Knee. American history made this man a hero for going in and slaughtering woman children the sick and the old. The last lyrics are about the soldiers marching on to glory but actually marching on to their own massacre like the one at Little Big Horn. “March on brave soldier your penance awaits…..”. When we wrote about hell and penance we were talking about the reality of the payback that is due for such cowardly acts: the violence that begets violence and the nightmare of retribution.
The third song (Death Sentence) specifically uses anecdotes from victims and observers of the effects of the use of White Phosphorous by the American army on Iraqi civilians in Fallujah. The chemical would burn its victims and cause incredible pain, suffering, and damage. In the lyrics the “rain of fire” refers to a common description made by residents of Fallujah of the day that the US army dropped WP on the city. The vision of the chemical dropping was described as being surreal and horrifying, and the aftermath showed that the only function the chemical had would be to torture, harm, and destroy. Most of the victims were civilians, many of whom were unable to evacuate the city in time before the chemical assault. Many of the victims were children. The lyrics don’t focus only on this particular event since they are a more general description of the use of fucked up weapons like this, but images and descriptions from Fallujah have stuck with us and were used in the lyrics.
Hey pals, Damien here with another new episode of Doomed SocietyRadio.
Spring has sprung, the grass has riz, and I wonder who those fucking oogles on my goddamned porch is?!
Anyway, nevermind that now. I’m celebrating the first extended bout of decent weather in Calgary of the year with a pretty badass show featuring classics by THE DICKS, DEAD SILENCE, FLOWERS IN THE DUSTBIN, MANKIND?, CONFLICT, and SPITBOY, plus future classics by CETASCEAN, FEMACOFFIN, CONTORTURE, PUSSY RIOT, VAIN COLLAPSE, and the RESTARTS. Plus a hell of a lot more.
Long time activist and defender of wildlife Rod Coronado (Pascua Yaqui Nation)
This interview was conducted over email by Comrade Black. Information on upcoming tour dates can be found at the end of the interview.
PE: For those unfamiliar with your past, could you introduce yourself?
YES SIR, INMATE #03895-000…oh wait, sorry, old habits…
Hi my name is rod and I’m from the desert southwest, but live in the great lakes bioregion now. I’ve spent my life fighting for the earth and animals and have just finished a 5 year period of federal supervision that prevented me from being involved in environmentalism or animal issues. I’ve spent a total of 6 years in prison for actions related to the protection of animals, and am now moving forward in my life with new strategies and tactics, that are both effective and legal. Though I walked a controversial and radical path, I no longer advocate illegal activity. That’s a personal decision that I made before with very intense personal consequences, so I’m not doing that anymore. I’m doing what a lot of people are doing now, and that’s struggling to find a way to help stop some horribly violent federal and state policies that currently are allowing for the killing of wolves and other wildlife.
PE: What have you been doing these last 7 years while on probation? Other than helping wolves, what else are you doing these days with your life?
Trying like hell to stay out of prison. When you’ve made a mark for yourself like I have in the law enforcement community, it gets real easy to get back into trouble. So I did what I had to do, I severed all contacts with the activist world, didn’t email, phone, write or do any social media with anyone with an activist past history and just worked my job at a brewery where I’m a server. I also was a big part of my children’s lives. I wasn’t in prison. I was a present father, raising children, teaching them to love life and nature. Loving life myself. I went kayaking when I could. We played in lakes and rivers, camped. I did what Geronimo and others like him had to do when they were forced to surrender and live on the rez. I will still be a father, but now ts time to stand up for the wild once again.
PE: It seemed for a while like every time you moved they were trying to put you in jail again. I had thought you retired to raise your child, What have you actually been doing during all the years where you seemed to disappear from the public eye?
No one will deny that federal law enforcement agencies had identified me as a target. Not only had I already spent 4 years in prison for Animal Liberation Front actions in the 1990’s, but in the ensuing years I had become a spokesperson for the group while continuing to organize with Earth First! And Stop Huntington Animal Cruelty. I even made it easier for them by hanging out with other suspects of federal investigations. So while I did have to go back to prison as part of a non-cooperative plea agreement, at least I didn’t get the 16 year sentence they threatened me with in trial. So yes, it was time to lay down my arms and think about my children and the future. I spent the last five years just keeping my head low and not traveling or seeing any close friends and only very restricted travel to see my family. I wasn’t allowed to visit my elderly parents in Portland, because my probation officer said all of the Northwest was off limits due to its history of radical environmentalism and animal rights activities.
Like so many other men recently released from prison, I focused on the financial survival of my family. I also got involved with my children’s school and met other parents raising children nonviolently who became friends. We tried to start a community garden near the school and introduced a zero-waste program that survives today. The last five years allowed me to be a part of my kid’s lives rather than only hear about it in letters.
Now that my federal supervision is over, I can think about acting as a responsible human being and organizing against the destruction of the wild. Here in Michigan that means stopping the recent sport hunt for wolves. That’s where the tour came in. Folks from the Hunt Saboteurs approached me offering to help build a broader grassroots campaign drawing from several movements. Not just against wolf hunts in the six states where they are now being hunted, but against contest predator hunts and control efforts by the USDA’s Wildlife Services program.
PE: A lot of people seem to see animal liberation and anti-colonial work as opposed. But to you they seem to be very deeply connected?
The connection for me comes with the concept of seeing an animal, person or mountain as part of something bigger, or whether they are just a resource to be exploited and dominated. That is the foundation for the invasion of planet earth and for me I’ll work with anyone fighting against that destruction. Here in the Great Lakes, the wolf is a sacred animal to the indigenous people. So you ave not only animal welfare and animal rights people opposed to the hunt, but the tribes as well. Combine that with environmentalist and even sportsmen against hunting and trapping wolves and you have the potential for a lot of solidarity which equals strength. The Idle-No-More movement s amazing and supporting indigenous peoples engaged in struggles against colonialism is vital or they are going to be marginalized and silenced. All us parties affected by the same Invader need to build stronger alliances and push back in the legal channels we have left.
PE: I asked David Barbarash, a former ALF spokesperson what he would want to ask you if he was interviewing you. He wondered if you regret any of the actions you participated in over the years?
Ahhh, the regret question. Who doesn’t have regrets? But if the interviewer is evading asking me more directly if I regret my illegal actions on behalf of wildlife, I’d have to say no I don’t. I could be cheeky and say I regret not sinking the third whaling ship with the watchman aboard, or finding more lion snares, but that’s kind of how I feel…I’d never want to hurt anyone, but with so many victories like wolf recovery being reversed, I wonder whether its less about “winning” and more about simply standing for what you believe even when its unpopular to do so. It wasn’t popular to take the actions I did, but I did them not with the intention of winning any popularity contests, but to save some lives…however temporarily that might have been. And I don’t regret that.
PE:David also wondered if you would share your thoughts on whether people’s activism may be motivated by past experiences of trauma or anger, and how that affects their actions?
I think this has to do with what I said about the connection between animal and Indigenous issues. A lot of people relate to animals and nature because they are ground up by the same machines. In that way, I think a lot of people are empathetic to animals and can relate to them because we all have a bond with animals some time in our lives and like children, we believe it is wrong to abuse them. But if your saying that such activism attracts unhealthy or unstable people, well I’ve seen that too.
PE: I have read that you became vegan and started working to defend animals after listening to punk music, in particular the song This Is The ALF by Conflict?
That’s kind of funny because its only partially true. Here’s the real story. I began working to protect animals when I was 12 and listening to Paul McCartney and John Denver. Punk music didn’t come until I went overseas on Sea Shepherd in 1985. I started fighting against whaling and the Canadian harp seal hunt after being exposed to both through dramatic direct action campaigns by Sea Shepherd and Greenpeace. In England, the Sea Shepherd crew included hunt saboteurs who were also vegetarian and vegan. They were the first ones to lead me to question my beliefs about all animals. I had tremendous respect for members of the American Indian Movement who were still fighting colonialism, then I witnessed nonviolent civil disobedience used in anti-nuclear protests, but these people exposed me to the principles behind the Animal Liberation Front, and that’s where “This is the ALF” comes in. After working on Sea Shepherd in port one day, some hunt saboteur volunteers had me over to listen to music. I couldn’t understand a word of what sounded like screaming, but they handed me the album cover which had the lyrics and I wanted to join. That’s when I went vegetarian and convinced I would start an ALF group.
PE:Did you grow up around animals? When did you learn your love for animals from?
I believe everyone has an inherent compassion for animals. It’s just the question of whether it gets repressed by institutionalized thinking that convinces us to see animals another way. I guarantee that if you switched babies between hardcore hunters and vegans, each child would be raised with the corresponding parent’s worldviews, at least while they were children. But if nature is allowed to prosper, compassion for animals will come to anyone. The only thing unique about me s that I chose a path of action that made my compassion more noticeable.
PE: Do you still see punk or other music cultures today as having radical potential to radicalize youth
I’m sure that’s true, but I don’t have my finger on that pulse. I’ve always had my movement musician favorites, Dana Lyons, Alice DiMicele, Jim Page, Joanne Rand, Casey Neil and many others whose music was a kind of soundtrack for my life in the 80’s and 90’s, but I don’t know who is leading that charge anymore. I believe that music is a sacred medium to reach people and I still love listening to any new song with a story sympathetic to animals or nature, because you know that we are not a minority and those kinds of songs are received well.
PE: What is hunt sabotage?
Hunt sabotage has evolved for me over the years. It began with my English friends who sabotaged British hound foxhunts with false scent trails and horn calls, then it evolved to similar tactics in America to interfere with desert bighorn sheep hunts. I’d say hunt sabotage is nonviolently interfering with the recreational killing of wildlife. I was arrested in 2004 for sabotaging a mountain lion hunt and went to prison for 8 months. Now hunt sabotage means something different for me. It means utilizing any channel you have available to stop not just individual hunts, but entire hunting seasons. Its very dangerous confronting armed men in the woods, but we can sabotage hunts by getting involved with the agencies that establish hunting seasons and begin to lobby to have the views of the non-hunting majority represented. These agencies are supposed to be following principles of conservation that recognize that wildlife is a public trust resource and as such the opinions of non-consumptive “users” matters. Presently the states where wolf hunting and
A picture of some bait that was found, this is cheese blocks with nails through them
trapping was recently enacted, the state wildlife agencies have cosy relationships with sportsman’s groups. It’s not a unique situation. The hunters through payments for licenses and tags provide the budget for those agencies, so they tend to manage wildlife with the needs of hunters as a priority. So for me, hunt sabotage is any tactics or strategy that aims to stop the recreational killing of wildlife.
PE: What is the reason they are intending to kill the wolves? Can you talk a bit about the campaign?
In Michigan, the justification for the wolf hunt is that wolves are preying on livestock and hunting dogs as well as being seen in the neighborhoods of some rural towns. This is what was said leading up to the hunt and then when it began, we discovered that 90% of livestock depredations in Michigan were at one farm where the farmer practiced horrible farming practices. Cattle that died were left in pastures and when wolves were attracted they were blamed for the deaths and permits issued to kill them. This one farmer also received over $60,000 in compensation for his livestock losses and was recently criminally charged with animal abuse. One of the other justifications was the killing of “pets” which means dogs trained to chase down bears. Bear hunters place bait piles to attract bears, but they also attract wolves too sometimes or are placed in areas where wolves have their dens. These hounds are released to chase bears through wolf territory and occasionally get killed when they do this. But that’s not the wolf’s fault. Then we have the state’s wildlife agency lying to the media about the level of danger wolves were posing to humans in one town and those lies being repeated by a state representative to justify the hunt to the legislature. And on top of this, we have laws in Michigan which already allow hunters or farmers to kill a wolf they witness attacking their animals. In addition, the USDA’s Wildlife Services has been called in to kill over 20 wolves in recent years in Michigan. So that’s what we are fighting. We are opposed to the indiscriminate killing of wolves and we want to see wolves returned to endangered species listing.
PE:It seems a lot of people see wolves as a pest, or a threat to be afraid of. Do you find it is hard to convince people wolves need to be protected?
I don’t think its hard for people to get this issue. We’ve learned it before after we eradicated wolves the first time. Society as a whole has changed, but the agencies responsible for livestock and wildlife refuse to evolve and reflect those changes. And these agencies have little accountability. People understand that predators play a vital role in maintaining the health of prey animals like deer and elk. What I’ve been hearing is people asking, “why are people still killing wolves?” In addition to the role predators play in the ecosystem, I also believe they should be protected because we still don’t know a lot about them. The campaigns of persecution have continued literally since Europeans first arrived, and I think we should demonstrate a little human evolution by no longer waging such a war on wildlife. Wolves returning to the landscape is a success story in endangered species preservation that desperately needs to be defended right now.
PE:Anthropologist Layla Abdel Rahim writes about how the idea of a predator is a problematic construct, because the animals don’t see other animals as prey all of the time – but rather just as other animals most of the time and only as prey when they need to feed. I wonder what you think of this and if you think using scientific categorizations such as apex predator is at all problematic?
Well, let’s see where else do we use that word? To describe sexual predators! So undeniably, there is a negative connotation for some people. But yes, we allow science and taxonomy to frame our relationship to animals when the relationship can be so much more sacred. It’s a agreed upon concept to call some animal relations “predator” but we should also question our personal and spiritual relationship to animals. Not just because I am indigenous, but I also gravitated towards the way native people viewed animals. It was never demeaning, it was always on an equal standing. The animals were (and still are) people too, or people are animals too…Wonderful stories of mysticism and magic that sounded better than Bible stories to me.
I love to be educated and read wildlife agencies reports on wolf management, but at the end of the day I choose to see the wolf as my sacred relation. And as a resident of Maa’iigan’s homeland, I feel an obligation to speak up among the humans when the wolf’s future is at stake. Yes, because they are a apex predator who helps hold the ecosystem in balance, but also because they are the sacred brother/sister to the Anishinaabe who still call this place home, and wolves and coyotes and other predators are just mega-cool…
PE:How can we build bridges between Indigenous resistance and movements for animal liberation?
By first, not being so fucking judgmental of people who eat animals. Long before there was an animal rights movement, there were indigenous peoples defending the earth and her animals with their lives. And they still are! Just because they eat meat doesn’t make them the enemy. Until we learn tolerance we will continue to be disenfranchised. It doesn’t mean WE have to be like them, but there’s such beauty in diverse worldviews that all hold nature and animals on the same level as us. It is the oppositions worst nightmare for us all to be unified against their policies that destroy the same world we all love.
PE:How does being a parent change things now for you?
I heard this story where a young warrior wants to be at the front of the war party, in the thick of any fighting, but when you’re a little older, you let the younger warriors lead the battle, and then when you’re a little older, you’re fine being in the rear guard and when you’re a little older than that, maybe you’re crouching behind a tree or rock watching to see how things are going before jumping into the fray… I think it’s like that for me. I’ve been in enough battles, I’m not an adrenalin junkie doing this for the thrill. I’m a middle-aged man with kids dammit, and I have to take care of them to be a warrior, that’s why indigenous resistance exists, to protect our families and communities. It’s always been about protecting the vulnerable, the young and elderly, it’s the same way in our struggle.
We are trying to protect people and the environment for the good of all, so that we may simply maintain our right to exist. Being a parent has given me a deeper understanding of the need for a long-term sustainable strategy for fighting and living. I also know that those I might come into conflict with are also trying to do the same thing, eke out a living and protect their families. So that means not being so adversarial, and being less willing to fight, and more willing to try and work together first.
Having children has made me a better warrior, because I’ve realized when you’re willing to defend something with your very own life as many father’s are prone to feel, you understand the motivational power as it exists in nature where many creatures are driven by the same strength of love. Because that’s what it’s about for us, about defending what we love. And if we can’t experience that raw passion and love for something close to us, then we’re dead already. I’m not ready to give that up. It’s also why no struggle can be real unless its inclusive of people raising children. People with dominating, destructive worldviews have been breeding like crazy, we need some kids to be raised in the new old ways…
PE:You spent a lot of time in prison, and on probation over the years. Can you talk from your experiences about what is effective prisoner support, both when people are in prison and when they get out? Is there any advice you would give to people who might be looking at doing time?
First, advice to people looking at doing time. Don’t have children. Going to prison doesn’t just effect you, it effects those who love you, so be prepared to put them through incredible trauma and suffering too. Don’t think you can maintain relationships while you are in prison. The best you are doing is sharing your traumatic experience. There is nothing good about going to prison. It should be avoided at all costs.
Once you are in the system, your purpose is no longer the survival of your family and community, its about your own survival. That’s what I experienced and that’s why I’m grateful to be able to be organizing again and am very conscious to not step over that line into anything even remotely illegal. It’s simply not worth it. We have to constantly be doing a cost/benefit analysis of our modes of resistance and weigh whether its a sustainable strategy or not. If our tactics result in our bravest warriors being imprisoned for years, then its time to rethink. It doesn’t mean we condemn our past tactics or strategies, it just means we evolve to our changing environment. Like coyotes or wolves.
PE:There has been a dramatic rise in ALF actions over the last year, bands like Los Crudos and Earth Crisis are touring again, and now Rod Coronado is back on tour encouraging activists to get active; kinda feels like the 90s again. How do you figure the current state of radical movements compares to past decades?
I don’t think it’s a resurgence, it’s the survival of our struggles. Some of us might have gone to prison, but the need for organizing never went away, and thankfully brave people are following a very dark time for the radical environmental and animal rights movements and pushing forward. I don’t think we can compare this to past decades because twenty years ago 9/11 hadn’t happened and we weren’t labeled as terrorists. We have to evolve and recognize that there are strong forces out there that want to treat us like criminals rather than the harbingers of social change. So in that way, I can’t say what the state of radical movements is like because I don’t consider myself radical anymore, nor am I up on their progress. I hear about infighting, the debates on issues that distract us from being a broader more public movement that focuses on solidarity building issues with people we too often call the enemy. I’m just trying to share with the new generations of activists out there what I’ve learned and help them realize the cost-benefit analysis of doing actions that won’t lead you to prison. There’s a time and place for everything, but right now its time in the US to reclaim the public process in regards to wildlife issues and do something completely different. In a way, organizing in these old fashioned traditional ways can be very radical because its a strategy that has been left to very conservative people.
PE:Can you talk a little about your history with wildlife defense and hunt sab?
My first hunt sabotage actions were in England targeting foxhunts and badger baiting back in 1985. In 1987 we started a hunt saboteurs group in California to interfere with trophy desert bighorn hunts. A lot of my ALF actions were on behalf of predators, the most prominent being our actions against the fur farm industry and our Don Quixote-esque raid on the USDA’s Predator Research Facility in 1992. We destroyed the laboratory, but they just rebuilt it bigger, but at least a few coyotes got away that night.
I returned to opposing trophy hunting in 2002, going into the Kofa National Wildlife Refuge in Arizona to interfere with desert bighorn sheep hunts. We spent winter weekends searching out a handful of trophy hunters across a huge desert mountain landscape. The bighorn sheep hunt sabs were the perfect balance of effectiveness and experiential bliss, because the desert is beautiful in winter time.16 mile hikes looking for hunters, seeing the sheep themselves, and other wildlife, you are literally seeing what your fighting for. We also began going to wildlife agency meetings, giving testimony on hunts we were opposed to and documenting illegal hunting in the field.
It culminated in 2004, with the very public hunt interference against attempts to remove mountain lions from the Sabino Canyon National Recreational in the Coronado National Forest outside of Tucson, Arizona where I lived. Public opposition to the hunt was overwhelming, and the whole city knew the only thing standing in the way of the state and federal lion hunters was us Earth First!ers. We spread false scent trails with mountain lion urine, and I was chased down with a helicopter after we sprung a lion snare. I was sentenced to 8 months in federal prison for that one.
The most effective campaign we did was against the hunting of sandhill cranes which winter in southern Arizona. We would lay in cornfields between hunters in blinds and incoming cranes who upon seeing us waving our arms or reflective mylar would veer away from the hunter’s. The best part about it is that never once did we get caught. When we did interact with hunters, it was as fellow hunters as I always have the appropriate tags and licenses. We also documented the hunt, including cranes attempting to aid their wounded relations. We also solicited public comment on the hunt at birding events and repeatedly testified against the hunt on ecological grounds that it wasn’t sustainable or necessary. Once again, it was amazing just to be in the fields watching thousands of cranes flying overhead.
I had wanted to continue the campaigns against trophy hunts in Arizona, but then I was overtaken with my legal defense on not just the lion hunt front, but for a lecture I gave defending arson the same day an ELF fire caused a $60 million fire in San Diego. So that’s why now I’m jumping on board to help wolves now, because I think the same strategy can work, to participate in the process of changing policy by attending public meetings and calling on these agencies to reform to reflect the interests of citizens who appreciate wildlife as a working component of the environment, not only as some kind of resource.
Thursday February 27th Troy NY X’s to O’s Vegan Bakery 97 4th St.
Friday February 28th Brooklyn NY at the BASE 1302 Myrtle Avenue @ Stockholm.
Saturday March 1st Philadelphia PA, at Wooden Shoe Book store. 704 S. st 7:pm
Sunday March 2nd Philadelphia PA 6pm at the Grindcore House.
Monday March 3rd Saratoga Springs NY, TBA
Friday March 14th at the Kalamazoo PeaceCenter
Thursday March 20th Oakland CA. 7PM at The Holdout: 2313 San Pablo Avenue, near 23rd ST.
Friday March 21st San Francisco CA. 7pm at The Eric Quezada Center for Culture and Politics: 518 Valencia Street, near 16th Street BART.
Saturday March 22nd Animal Liberation Forum in Long Beach CA at 12pm.
Sunday March 23rd Animal Advocacy Museum in Pasadena CA. at 6pm.
Thursday March 27th Humbolt State University.
On February 25th- March 28th 2014 The Hunt Saboteurs NW and the Hunt Saboteurs Association will be holding a speaking tour with long time Earth/Animal activist and former prisoner Rod Coronado.
***EAST COAST-
Wednesday February 26th Buffalo NY 7pm at Burning Books
420 Connecticut St.
Thursday February 27th Troy NY X’s to O’s Vegan Bakery 97 4th St.
Friday February 28th Brooklyn NY 8:30pm at the BASE 1302 Myrtle Avenue @ Stockholm.
Saturday March 1st Philadelphia PA, at Wooden Shoe Book store. 704 S. st 7:pm
Today, February 22,2014, live on http://www.brutalexistenceradio.net, it’s Worst Case Scenario’s 4 year anniversary. For this show, it’s the best female fronted crust/grind/dbeat/anarcho bands. It all begins at 1pmET/1900CET. It replays Sunday on BER beginning at 7pmET/4pmPT. The set list will be up after the show and set lists for older shows are available at http://werstcasescenario.tumblr.com
I was asked to contribute to PE what seems like forever ago and I made a few posts promoting my show, but that’s about as far as it went. Sometimes life and lack of motivation get in the way. I don’t do resolutions, just act, so this year I,with circumstances permitting, be contributing more here.
I ended the year by getting stuff off my mind that bothered me. Seems some people were offended. Do I regret what I said, no? People used to complain how PC the 90s were. At least people got called out and those people people had to answer the claims. Jump to the 21st century. You call someone out for being inept,a thief,a nuisance and basically a detriment to community/society and those who do the calling out are labeled a bully. And people defend those who are the ones committing the offense, and they don’t even have a clue how wrong the person is and that the facts support themselves. This was just in my personal life recently. But, the scope is universal. Phil Robertson from Duck Dynasty spouts bigotry and homophobic statements and people defend him. The media does it on an almost daily basis. We’ve become a society of victims,but that blog is for another time. In this day and age, information is flying by in milliseconds and you pick and choose what you see, and so much of it isn’t based on fact. And that’s what scary about the people who are quick to defend. People see a post on a social network site and automatically accept it as fact. There are also the parody sites like the Onion,the Daily Currant and others that people see the headline, or even if they read the story, don’t realize it’s a parody, then spreading it as fact. It’s sad and scary that this is how information is getting passed around. Not only that, someone finds a story that is a few years old, posts it and people, once again don’t even pay attention to anything more than the headline and it’s accepted as current and factual even if it’s been refuted. I can ramble on and on and give examples of how globally these things spread, or go ‘viral’ as they like to say these days, but I won’t. Just testing the waters and getting back into writing and posting regularly. There’s enough misinformation being spread these days and some of it intentionally, that our brains sometimes can’t fathom the amount of information and we get lazy and just post away thinking we’re enlightening the world, when in fact we’re just adding to the sheer amount of garbage we see/hear every day. So, I ask of you readers of this blog/zine, to actually read the entire whatever it is, whether it’s a blog,news article, quote,etc, to find out all the information before you run it up the flagpole.-Stussey
contacts with the activist world, didn’t email, phone, write or do any social media with anyone with an activist past history and just worked my job at a brewery where I’m a server. I also was a big part of my children’s lives. I wasn’t in prison. I was a present father, raising children, teaching them to love life and nature. Loving life myself. I went kayaking when I could. We played in lakes and rivers, camped. I did what Geronimo and others like him had to do when they were forced to surrender and live on the rez. I will still be a father, but now ts time to stand up for the wild once again.
Profane Existence 