I'm goint to the Undertow/Unbroken show on Saturday!

To make a long story short, my wife clearly loves me, because I got a surprise email yesterday with a flight itinerary to California for the show! If you see me there, please feel free to say hi.

Jordan Cooper (Revelation Records) Interview

Once again, Jake Jacobs interviews one of the greats and brings us Jordan Cooper, co-founder of Revelation Records. While many can argue that Rev is much more of an 80's piece of hardcore history, Rev did release some great and important records in the 90s including releases from In My Eyes, Better Than a Thousand, Battery, Damnation AD, and Morning Again. I spoke to Jake and hes got some great stuff lined up so continue to check back...until then, heres Jordan Cooper

Let's first discuss the very successful recent Hardcore Reunion benefit show that took place at Chain Reaction in Anaheim, California on 3/22/09 and featured No For An Answer, a surprise performance by Carry Nation, A Chorus of Disapproval, Headfirst, Blackspot and ICE. Did you expect there to be such a big and enthusiastic crowd at this show? Why or why not?

That was a great show. I expected it to be a great show but what I didn't expect was that I wouldn't feel like such an old man the way I normally do at Chain Reaction.

Besides No For An Answer being on your Revelation Records label in the late '80s, how much involvement did you and Revelation have with the show?

None really. I think David "Igby" Sattani and Mike Hartsfield put it together, so that was as close as I got besides posting it on our website and going to the show.

Throughout the '90s, Revelation released a very wide variety of music. Besides liking the bands in question, why did you decide to put out records by so many different kinds of bands?

Aside from really liking the band, usually I knew someone in the band who I could talk to about doing a record or I knew one of their friends. Two exceptions to that were Sense Field and Shades Apart. One of them sent us a demo and the other one, I bought their demo and tracked them down to see if they would do a record with us.

You founded Crisis Records in the early '90s. Why did you find it necessary to create a whole other label?

Walter Schreifels from Gorilla Biscuits/Quicksand wanted to put out a record by Farside and another from Outface, so we started a label for them and then I had some other bands that were pretty far from what Rev was doing at that point and it seemed more fitting to put them out on a different label. Later on, Rob Moran from Unbroken was working at Rev and wanted to take the label over and put out some bands that he really liked, so that's when we started working with Shai Hulud and Will Haven and Chinchilla.

Even though Farside are technically not a hardcore band, they were very enthusiastically accepted by the vast majority of the hardcore scene in the '90s. Why do you think that is?

Actually, when their first 7" came out, I didn't think they were a hardcore band but by the time the album came out, I think my definition of hardcore had broadened a bit and they no longer seemed outside the genre. They were a great band, so a lot of people loved them regardless of what style category someone might put them in. We had part of a note that someone mailed to us posted on the wall for years, it said something like "PS: Farside may not be NYHC but they still kick ass! - The Management." We thought that was pretty funny but it does sum up how at least one person saw them.

During your 23 year career as owner and manager of Revelation, you've worked with major labels quite a bit. What has that experience been like?

We haven't quite made it to 23 years but I appreciate your confidence in the label. We actually haven't worked with major labels very much at all. The only real coordination we did with a major was when Sense Field signed to Warner Bros. Although almost everyone we talked to at Warner was cool and friendly, the result was not positive for Rev or the band in my opinion. The band's manager was pushing very heavily for Building to be sold to Warner but I didn't want that to happen. After that, their next album was never released by Warner and there was a long delay before they could get out of that contract and re-record the record for Nettwork. I wasn't involved in any other Rev band that went to a major that I can remember but most of them didn't have great experiences as far as I can remember. The only other thing we did a few times was press the vinyl version of a record that was coming out on CD through a major. Those usually were pretty simple and didn't have any problems.

In the late '90s, Revelation went back to it's roots somewhat and released albums by '80s style hardcore bands with former members of '80s hardcore bands in them (Better Than A Thousand and Speak Seven One Four to name a couple). Why?

Dan O'Mahony and Joe Foster did a band together which later became Speak Seven One Four. I've always liked what those guys did musically and lyrically, so I was interested in putting out their new band's records. Better Than A Thousand was Ray Cappo (who started Revelation with me) along with Ken Olden and some other guys who were great musicians,so that made sense to put out as well. I actually probably wasn't the person who found out about the band or even came up with the idea of putting it out on Rev but once it was presented to me as an option, I said yes.

What Revelation releases are you most proud of and why?

All of them have different things I like about them and different memories that go with them. I'm proud of all the records we've put out and all the bands we've had the honor of working with but since I never had anything to do with the music, it's hard to use that word for any sub-group of the whole. Personally, I'm proud of some of the things I did for these releases: the layout for the Warzone 7" and figuring out all the stuff to get the printing done etc., the final mix for the Slipknot 7" because the band couldn't get back to Don Fury's to do that, so I worked with Don and actually helped mix the record, the layout for Farside's Rigged, Engine Kid's Angel Wings and a few others.

Revelation has reissued many classic hardcore albums and released discographies by many classic hardcore bands. Why do you think that there is still such a demand for hardcore product in general?

Hardcore means a lot to a lot of people and even years later, sometimes a band's impact is still there for people.

It's my understanding that many record labels are ceasing production of CDs and only releasing records in digital and vinyl formats going forward. Are you planning on doing this with Revelation? Why or why not?

We are putting things out at a pretty slow pace these days, so it's hard to predict what people will want the next time we're releasing something.

What are your thoughts on '90s and 2000s hardcore bands not on Revelation?

That's a pretty broad question, so I don't know how I can answer it. There have always been bands that weren't on Rev that I liked a lot. In the past ten years, I haven't listened to a lot of newer hardcore, so it's hard to say anything about bands that have come out since then.

One final question - how do you feel about the most recent Chung King Can Suck It LP eBay auction's reserve price being $4,000?

It's insane to me but I'm not a big record collector. The entire album is on the Judge discography, so anyone who wants to hear it can get it.

Update on the Disembodied compilation release

Jav has been kind enough to use us as the news breaker on this one. Suffice to say, I'm very excited to get my hands on this release:


My labor of love, pain, and ambition is finally drawing completion. This weekend, Disembodied puts the final touches on THE PSALM OF SHEOL, a collection of 14 songs. Some of these songs have only been available on vinyl, some on comps, and some have never been heard before. I had hoped to have the record out before the shows at Chain Reaction, but that seems improbable now. Expect a release in late June/ early July if all goes well.
The album will be packaged in a digipack cd. 666 copies will be pressed on vinyl, with 100 being in a special boxed set filled with goodies.
New and exclusive merch will be available at the Chain Reaction shows, as well as on www.hellfishfamily.com
Please check the blog for updates regularly. Also still looking for contributions. Thank you for allowing me to make this dream (or nightmare) come to life
Javier
http://ifgodonlyknew.blogspot.com

Joe Nelson Interview (ex-Ignite, The Killing Flame, Triggerman)

Once again, Andrew "Jake" Jacobs comes through and brings us an interview with Joe Nelson, former member of Ignite, The Killing Flame, and Triggerman. Again, thanks to him for going above and beyond as well as Joe for taking the time to do the interview.

You were the original singer for the Orange County, California hardcore mainstay Ignite. Did you have any idea back in '93 when you joined Ignite that they would still be going strong 16 years later?

Ummmmmmmmm no, because I always looked at that band as a fun little side project for the short time that I was in it. Don’t get me wrong, I am super stoked for those dudes and they definitely have put in the work to get some success over in Germany and whatever they have here. I have also heard that they are either the biggest band or one of the top 6 or 7 biggest bands in Budapest, Hungary, which must be really fucking cool. Seriously though, Brett Rasmussen is still one of my good friends, so I love the fact that he’s still at it as we approach 40 years of age, or at least as I approach that age.


Many people in the hardcore scene consider the Ash Return demo and the Scarred For Life record to be Ignite's best work and in large part because of your vocals on both. What are your thoughts on that?

I would say they’re doing too many whippets, or sniffing too much glue, or maybe a combo of the two. That demo is God awful, it’s painful to listen to. I haven’t listened to it in at least 15 years. So maybe it’s not as bad as I think. However, I remember thinking it really, really blew once it was finished.

In our defense, we recorded it in Brett's apartment on a 4 track. That is an extremely difficult way to get a decent sound, since you are compressing all the drums into one track and then each instrument, including the vocals, gets one separate track. I’m sure we used Radio Shack quality mics as well. So for what it was, maybe it’s not so bad. Maybe in some ways, it’s like the Pet Sounds of hardcore 4 track recordings.

The funniest part of that era of Ignite, or my stint in it, is one night at some party in L.A., guitarist Joe Foster actually gave George Harrison of The Beatles a copy of that thing. I wonder what he thought of it? He must have been in a state of shock if he ever actually put it on and listened to it. He’s like, "wow I wrote songs like 'Eleanor Rigby', 'Blackbird', 'Sgt. Pepper', etc. times infinity and these blokes wrote some sort of noise called 'Ash Return'." Can you imagine?

As for Scarred For Life, it is what it is. Like I said before, I never took that band seriously. I didn’t write any songs except for the few songs you find on the first EP and probably about half of Call On My Brothers. To me, that thing is Zoli Teglas' and Brett’s band 100000%. I don’t consider myself a part of it in any way really. I’m sure Randy Johnson, the vocalist in between Zoli and myself, would have more of an opinion on Scarred For Life since he sings on most of it.


In the late '90s, you formed The Killing Flame with ex-Ignite guitarist Joe Foster. Like Ignite, The Killing Flame was a very '80s O.C. hardcore style band. Why did you decide to front another band similar to Ignite?

Whatever summer we formed that band, I was surfing a lot with Foster. We seriously were in the water 5 or 6 days a week for about 5 months straight. It was a really awesome time. Anyway, he had some songs left over from Speak 714 which were actually recorded. He also had about 10 unrecorded songs from some failed Unity reunion he was trying to “Ignite”, get it?

I thought the songs were pretty good for the most part. Like I said, that Speak stuff had already been recorded with Randy from Pennywise and some other dude, which I believe was Mark McKay (ex-Slapshot). I could be wrong on that one though. Basically, all I had to do was go into the studio and finish the vocals. Once again, it seemed like a fun little project to do. I think we banged out my contribution in two nights.

We called it The Killing Flame because it seemed like the perfect trilogy for Foster's hardcore life - Unity, Ignite and The Killing Flame. For those who don’t know, Ignite is a lyric in a Unity song called “Blood Days” and the end of the line is “The Killing Flame”. "I ignite… I ignite… I ignite… The Killing Flame”.

Neither one of us planned on doing a real band with The Killing Flame but soon enough, we were wasting our money at some $10 an hour rehearsal spot trying to learn those 10 unrecorded Unity songs and rounding out the line up to start playing live.

Getting Gavin Oglesby was a huge part of the equation for me. There’s no way that band would have made it past The Dream Dies EP if Gavin hadn’t taken the reigns and focused us on finishing the songs and adding some of his own songs into the mix. In the end, half of the Another Breath record are those old Unity songs and the other half are Gavin's, except for “Survival”, which was written by Chris Lisk during his 6 month sentence inside the band.


Another Breath, the first Killing Flame album, is literally a who's who of both '80s and '90s hardcore/punk talent. Some of the many people who appeared on it include Pat Dubar (Uniform Choice), Dan O'Mahony (No For An Answer), Alex Barreto (Chain of Strength), Popeye (Farside) and Brian Balchack (Eleven Thirty-Four). Why did you decide to pack the record with so many guest appearances?

I wanted it to be like a rap record in the sense that everyone was a part of it. I was hoping to make a record that had a true hardcore family feel to it. Getting Pat Dubar obviously seemed like a total coup to a lot of people. At the time, Dubar was so missing in action that nobody in hardcoreville had heard from him since Mind Funk. He really was a true friend and stand up dude to come in and sing on that record for Gavin and I. To be honest, I was actually the most stoked to get Tony from the Adolescents to be part of it. I know for both Gavin and I, that was our favorite guest star appearance. The Adolescents' "Blue” record is still one of the top 5 greatest punk records of all time.

Anyway, the point is I wanted to have everyone I could grab be part of that record. I also asked everyone from Mike Ness to Zach De La Rocha to be on it, so just think what it could have been like if I had locked down everyone I asked.


What are some of your favorite Killing Flame songs and why?

That’s hard. I’m sure like most dudes who are in bands, I don’t listen to my stuff or think like that. I think there are some good songs and some bad songs but I haven’t listened to any of the released Killing Flame stuff since before it was even released. I don’t even own a copy of the last two CDs, Another Breath and Nine More Lives.

To try and answer your question though, I will say that some of the unreleased stuff that’s coming out on the Double Cross site soon is pretty decent. There’s a song called “Welcome To Los Angeles” that I like and I feel is strong lyrically and performance-wise. There’s also another song called “Save Yourself" which I think is cool but maybe only because I say “Hail Satan” in the bridge.

I can also add this about The Killing Flame, which is I did feel that I was finally able to match the aggression of hardcore with real honest and heartfelt lyrics. This was coming from a person of 30 at the time too, which isn't easy. Writing lyrics that made sense was really difficult with Ignite as well, which is maybe why I blow it off so much. At the time, I was 23 or whatever and wasn’t pissed about much. I wasn’t’ being backstabbed by friends, the skinheads weren’t ruining the scene, I wasn’t angry that the kids in my high school were drinking or whatever. You know, the traditional hardcore lyrics. Therefore, I just kind of winged it for that band. Well, lyrically anyway.

However, with the Killing Flame and especially Another Breath, I really had some sincere rage to front the music with. I was extremely political at the time and I think it shows on that record. I was also consuming everything Chomsky, Vidal, Naomi Klein, Hermann, Bakunin, Zinn, Karl Marx, Mao, even Nietzsche. Their fingerprints are definitely on my lyrics and thoughts during that time.
Do you have any funny or interesting Killing Flame tour stories that you'd like to share?

The best thing I ever did with any band was a 2004 or 2005 tour of Brazil done with The Killing Flame. We were there for 3 weeks and just had an amazing adventure. We played several shows with this amazing band from Vitoria called Dead Fish. Imagine a faster Quicksand but sang all in Portuguese and you have Dead Fish. At the time, they were huge there, so the shows supporting them were great.

The shows were all crazy, It felt like a tour of the U.S. in the '80s, just total Wild West type stuff. The biggest show was a festival in Belo Horizonte where we played in front of 10,000 people. The two shows in Sao Paulo were at this sick club called Hangar 110. There is, or was, a half pipe next to the stage, so the whole time we’re playing, kids are skating next to you. There’s a video for the song “Nine More Lives” that was on MTV Brazil for a while compiled of those shows. You can probably find it on YouTube. We also played with The Lemonheads and the stories from hanging out with Evan Dando are all time classics but
nothing I can share on a blog.

When that tour was over, I remember the other dudes saying “oh man, we gotta play more shows”, which of course we did. However, for me, I was like “Why? It will never get better than this”.


Prior to both Ignite and The Killing Flame, you were the singer for Triggerman, which also included punk/hardcore album cover artist and former No For An Answer guitarist Gavin Oglesby. What was it like going from being a regular at NFAA shows to fronting a band with one of it's members less than two years later?

I knew Gavin before that band but he was such a quiet dude that we never really talked at shows except for a “what’s up?” nod maybe. I never really liked NFAA though. I thought they were way too serious, too preachy and kind of corny. I also was a Uniform Choice dude, so that song “About Face” bugged me. My crew and I even made sure when we were out fire extinguishing people in Huntington Beach to spray any dude we saw in a NFAA shirt, which probably happened only once but it still emphasizes my point on how little we respected that band.

However, after a while, I got to actually know Gavin and Dan O’Mahony better and became good friends with them. Both of those dudes are razor sharp and have a terrific sense of humor, which are really the only criteria on my friend application. Dan was probably even my best friend in the early '90s with Gavin being a close second.

Everyone knows of Gavin’s incredible art talent but I also feel he’s a pretty fucking talented guitar player. He would be the first to admit that he’s no Joe Satriani or even a Brian Balchack. However, Gavin definitely has a talent, for taking a basic chord progression and making it more dynamic. He’s not going to throw key changes at you BUT he’ll take that old bar chord and get more out of it than seems possible.


Triggerman generally got either a very positive or a very negative response from those people who heard it. Why do you think Triggerman illicited such extreme responses either way?

That was a weird time for music for me. We were all pretty much over hardcore when we started that band, or at least I was. I don’t mean over it in the sense that we thought the newer hardcore bands were lame or hardcore in general was lame, I just mean that we were in our early 20s and going to college or whatever. To me, hardcore was a young man's world. The feelings you experience as an adolescent get so amplified in the arena of hardcore. The music and the words really speak to you during that time in your life. So by the time I was in Triggerman, I never listened to hardcore at all. I was a huge fan of post-hardcore stuff like Jawbox, Girls Against Boys, Fugazi, Pavement, Superchunk, etc., plus I was constantly listening to The Cure, Depeche Mode, The Smiths and Joy Division, etc. It obviously shows in the style of music Triggerman was and also comes across in the lyrics. Triggerman lyrics are gloom and doom, man. They are extremely fucking depressing, which is funny because I didn’t consider myself a depressed person back then. I also think that I wasn’t spiritually aligned with hardcore during those years, nor was the band. That definitely brought on a dichotomy at our live shows.

The flip side of that coin is all of our ties were to hardcore. Whether we still felt connected to it or not as young men, we were still in that arena. We also wouldn’t have been able to play shows in front of more than 10 people at some lame Hollywood bar if it weren’t for our connections to hardcore. Bands like Sensefield just broke from that mold and did it 100% their own way, which is such a credit to those dudes. We were more chicken shit, or maybe prideful, to build up our following from the ground up like that.

However, no matter how anybody felt about that band, Triggerman was a great time in my life. I was either touring with Quicksand, working the door at some Hollywood club or playing in Triggerman with bands like Wool, Farside, early Pennywise, early Offspring, Into Another, Quicksand, Down By Law, Insted, Gorilla Biscuits, CIV, Shelter, Inside Out, early Green Day, Gameface, 411, Chorus, Strife, Headfirst, etc. and it really doesn’t get much better than that for a dude in his early 20s.


Prior to your stints in all 3 bands mentioned above, you roadied for the '80s hardcore band Insted and the '90s post-hardcore band Quicksand. What were those experiences like?

I was touring with Quicksand smack dab in the middle of my Triggerman and Ignite days. Those were amazing times. Thousands of stories. The stories from touring with Anthrax and White Zombie alone would take weeks to re-tell. I was also on the first Warped Tour for a bit, which was like being in a traveling zoo. Every time I run into a dude from the first Warped, we just about die laughing at how insane that tour was.

Touring is touring though. Anyone who’s ever done it in any capacity has thousands of amazing memories and stories. I toured with bands like Rage Against The Machine and No Doubt but the experience and the feeling was the same, more or less, as when I toured with Insted or Gorilla Biscuits.

You and a bunch of other dudes in the O.C. Sloth Crew recorded a rap for Insted's 1990 album What We Believe that was ultimately not used. Discuss that.

I don’t know where you heard that one. I know we all did backups and there were lots of funny outtakes on that record that never saw the light of day, but I don’t remember a rap per say.


How did you become a contributor to the Radio Silence hardcore book that came out last year?

Anthony is a friend. I had been talking to him for a long time about that book, even when it was just an idea inside his bearded little head. I think it was even called something else for a long time. Anyway, when the time came to round up California people to be interviewed for it, he called and I helped him out. That’s a great book, by the way. I recommend picking it up if you’re at all interested in '80s hardcore,

As a writer, who or what are some of your influences?

The answer is Satan for both.


Feel free to shamelessly plug any of your current musical and/or non-musical endeavors that you feel like plugging here.

I got nothing for you. That’s not my style. (bottom photo taken by David “Igby” Sattani)

Hellfest 1999 Pictures

My girlfriend, Crystal, grew up in Syracuse, NY and started going to shows in 1994. Basically she saw every good band of the era numerous times. She was going through some stuff in storage and came across these pictures that were taken at Hellfest 1999 in Syracuse. Ive got more pictures of various shows to scan but heres what I found so far.

Snapcase

Disembodied

Buried Alive

Brother's Keeper

Another Victim

Hate5six.com filmed EVERY set from Burning Fight. Trial footage up now

Heres a statement from hate5six.com:

After a 15 hour drive home, a towed car, and a speeding ticket, my friends and I finally made it home. This weekend I was privileged to cover the Burning Fight book release show in its entirety. This was a once in a lifetime experience and opportunity and I would like to extend my deepest thanks to everyone who made it all possible. Congratulations to Brian Peterson for completing his written documentation of the 90's hardcore landscape and thanks to Jim Grimes and Caitlin Lipinski for all their hard work. I'd like to send a special thank-you to Caitlin for answering all of my pestering e-mails and for not strangling me this weekend; I can't even begin to think how much of a nuisance I was to her.

The goals of this DIY project of mine have always been:

1. Deliver the highest quality live videos
2. Share all footage in its entirety
3. Publish videos as quickly possible

I believed Burning Fight needed to be covered in this manner. For the thousands of people unable to attend, and for those who were fortunate enough to be there, I wanted capture everything and deliver it while the excitement and passion from the event was still palpable. I am generally very thorough in terms of presenting my work (proper titles, setlists, etc), but in the interest of getting the footage out there as quickly as possible, I've decided to release all the footage in three phases:

Phase 1: Each set will be posted as raw footage with little or no editing/labeling. I'd hate to keep people waiting to see the footage solely because I'm attempting to satiate my anal retentive standards.

Phase 2: Each set will be edited and properly parsed/labeled. Videos in this phase will also be dubbed over with audio from the soundboard. Many thanks to Mike Gam for sharing the audio and Rusty Aggacid for manning the soundboard all weekend. Mike and/or I will also be sharing the audio source for anyone who is interested. Soundboard audio was captured for Ringworm, Guilt, Underdog, 108, Killing Time, Trial, Disembodied, Harm's Way, The Killer, Blacklisted, Have Heart, Threadbare, Split Lip, Reach the Sky, Bane, Converge, and Unbroken.

Phase 3: Each set will be available, in its entirety, for free download. I plan on spending a considerable amount of time determining the best way to achieve this. More on this to come...

How Can You Help?

I will need a lot of help with this...

1. I ask that everyone be patient as I work to get this all up. Roughly speaking, an hour's worth of video takes an hour to transfer, approximately 2-3 hours to encode, and a very long time to upload (this is just for Phase 1, too). There were 22 bands this weekend (all with varying set lengths) so this will take some time. My plan is to have at least 1 set up each day (possibly more on the weekends starting some time this week). The order in which the footage will be released is undetermined. The mathematician inside me is wanting to use a random number generator; any other order would presumably cause people's heads to explode due to anticipation.

2. My overall knowledge of the setlists is incomplete. Some bands provided setlists to me, some bands said the names of the songs during the set, and others played stuff I never heard before. If you're familiar with a band's catalog to the point where you can identify every song they played (hell, if you're in the band), please contact me (hate5sixproductions@gmail.com). This will expedite Phase 2 and Phase 3 considerably. As you're watching the sets, just note the name of the song and the approximate time stamp. I'm sure I can figure it all out myself, but there are just way too many gaps. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

3. Please don't request a DVD of the show. I feel bad saying no to the numerous requests I've received about this, but at this time I cannot grant such requests for a myriad of reasons. As I said above, I will make everything available for free download during Phase 3.

This is going to be a long project, but it will be undeniably well worth the wait. I appreciate everyone's patience in advance and I assure you every song from every band will see the light of day in the relative near future. As Jim Grimes said before Unbroken, "this is your show." Thanks again to everyone who made this weekend unforgettable: from the organizers to the bands to the amazing people I met to everyone who donated money for tapes--you are the reasons why I love hardcore.

Please repost this message everywhere you can in its entirety. Follow me on Twitter for updates and progress reports: twitter.com/hate5six

hate5six.com
burningfightbook.com

You can watch the unedited footage of Trial's set here:
http://hate5six.com/player.php?album=89580

Empathy - I Need

This was requested so here we go. Great release from one of the best Emo-core bands of the 90s. Members went on to By the Grace of God, Elliott, and 32 Frames

Empathy - I Need

http://www.mediafire.com/?weyj5gjmwnw

7 Generations Calling It Quits!

While I havent given my recap of Burning Fight yet, I felt this was more important at the the moment. I may not know all the members of 7 Generations I did finally meet Chris this weekend (in the airport of all places) and I am truly saddened that they are calling it quits. They have plans for the rest of the year to be as active as possible until October when they play their last show. Check out the 7 Generations Myspace for up to date info. Crossing my fingers that Ill get to see them before they break up. Heres what Chris had to say in regards to the decision:

Dearest friends,

For the last six years, I have had a most cherished and enriching opportunity; to take part in something that I have truly believed in. When Seven Generations first began, in what now feels like a thousand years ago, I had not the slightest notion that it would prove to be such a monumental advent in my life. It is an experience that has brought me more joy and sorrow, more unexpected triumph and foreboding defeat, more sacred optimism and profane cynicism than any other endeavor or epoch that I have ever experienced. It has been a great source of simultaneous pride and humility for which I will never have anything but the utmost gratitude. However, lamentably, at this moment in the short and passionate journey through mortality, I feel the time has come for this effort to come to an end.

Naturally, I am aware of the fact that compared to the majority of other groups that have come and gone through our little community, Seven Generations has been quite small and insignificant. There are a great many things that we have never had the fond circumstances of taking part in and additionally, there are really such a miniscule number of individuals who have a place in their hearts for our band. However, looking back on our short time together, it is hard to feel anything but an overwhelming love for everything that I have gotten to feel and participate in as a result of our small and poor band.

When we were writing our first songs, I thought that perhaps we would be offered one or two shows a year by someone who took pity on us and that we would end up playing to a largely empty room of people tapping their feet anxiously waiting for us to finish. I never would have imagined that we would have been offered the kindness, support and love that have come our way in these last six years. To think that individuals, not only across this country, but also in Europe, South America and Asia would extend themselves to us and express such wonderfully encouraging sentiments is nearly inconceivable. Furthermore, we have had the joy of finding out that our band and our efforts have enriched others lives the way many bands of our youth enriched our own. We have had individuals who have told us that our band has helped them overcome the torments of having been abused or raped; who have found consolation in our music that has helped them deal with the disenchantment of losing faith in religion and find pride in their new found heretical existence; who have discovered the ability to care for other living creatures and thusly taken up the cause of animal, human and earth liberation; who have risen above the confines of intoxication to develop a view of life so much more vivified and vital than that which was there before. We have been able to use our band to raise money for legal defense funds for political prisoners, for battered women’s shelters, for efforts to feed and shelter the poor and for organizations that strive to end the destruction of the environment. We have been able to share the stage with some of our heroes from the past and with contemporary bands that are both inspiring and exciting. We have been fortunate enough to form friendships both at home and abroad that will be a source of comfort until our dying days. Lastly, we have had the experience of discovering that underground hardcore punk is still a potent, meaningful and thriving culture. There are no words to express the profundity of all of these experiences, save to say that if I never again experience such emotions, I will be nourished for the rest of my life on the memories of these times.

Our last show is not yet scheduled, but we intend to say farewell sometime in fall 2009, most likely in October, at the legendary and hallowed Che Café. Until then, we would like to spend as much time with you as possible, so please do feel free to contact us and we will do as much as we can to make sure our final months together are active and meaningful. Thank you so very much for all that you have given us. We will love and cherish all of you, our friends, forever.

“Hate on and love through unrepining hours…”

Chris Rouse, on behalf of Seven Generations

Burning Fight recap

As we're getting ready to leave our hotel, I feel it's time to do a small amount of reflecting on the Burning Fight weekend.
The wife and I had some flight issues, which resulted in her not being able to fly into Chicago until Saturday morning. I still got in Friday evening though, and hit up the Indecision show. Wait In Vain played a great set. They got more love in Chicago than they seem to in their own hometown of Seattle. Timm's voice has gotten much stronger over the years, and it's great to hear him step out in front of a mic, as opposed to being behind a guitar all the time. Having not seen Indecision with Tom on vocals in a little over 10 years, I was really excited to see them again, and they didn't disappoint. They played a stellar selection of songs, although they did leave one out that I was dying to hear (you're dead to me now, Tom!).

The start of Burning Fight has been something I've been anticipating for so long now, but it ended up exceeding my expectations in most ways. There was good ventilation in the venue, and enough room to breathe, but there was one major bummer: a fucking barrier! Nothing is a bigger drag at a hardcore show than a barrier. From here, I'll just recap my favorite sets from the weekend.

Damnation AD - I'm not so sure why they played so early in the day, but they sounded incredible. Damnation always had a great ability to set a dark mood, and they definitely did that on Saturday as well. They opened up with No More Dreams of Happy Endings, and followed with a strong set of some of the heaviest hardcore the 90s ever saw.
Trial - Holy shit! Pandemonium might be the only word to describe Trial's set. I've seen them more times in the Northwest than I could possible count, and I attended all three of their reunion shows in 2005, but this was just plain insane. Kids were packed up front, and singing along like I never expected off of the West coast (they always seemed extremely underappreciated out East). They played a shorter set than I expected, but it was great as always. No band can make me feel quite the way that Trial can, and I was having a blast until I got kicked right in the eyeball, and then only had one contact lens for the rest of the weekend.
Disembodied - One of the most anticipated sets of the weekend for me came in the form of Disembodied. Definitely in my top 5 hardcore bands of all time, I was craving their downtuned sound since I last got to see them in '99. For the longest time now, Disembodied have been the soundtrack to every depressed, fucked up era of my life, and being able to hear the songs that got me through so many rough patches in a life setting again was well worth the wait. Each and every song they played is a classic in my eyes/ears, but the peak for me was when they played Gone. The duration of their set was about as nuts as Trial's was. Kids were piling on top of each other like something I haven't seen in years. Here's to hoping that they get back together, and bless us with another record.
Threadbare - Without a doubt, Threadbare were the most underappreciated band of the weekend. So powerful, and so emotional, it's a real shame that more people weren't in the building when they played. This doesn't happen very often, but I got goosebumps as they played Midas. Seeing as how Threadbare never made it out to my town in the 90s, I'm thankful they played Burning Fight.
Unbroken - Another band that never played Portland in the 90s, I was chomping at the bit to see how Unbroken would be live after all these years, and I was not let down at all. The sing alongs during their set damn near could have been deafening outside of a music venue. They ran through all the songs I wanted to hear, and their singer had a lot of great things to say about how priviliged they felt to be playing something like Burning Fight.

Overall, it was a great weekend, and a perfect fest. Normally, I really hate fests, but this was put together really well, and the attendees were all great people for the most part. Not having to deal with lameos in flat brimmed hats all weekend was awesome. There are so many people that it was great to see again, even if just briefly, including: all of Trial (as always), all the Seattle and Bellingham friends, Tom from Indecision, Tara from Disembodied, Rick from Ferret, Jason Shrout, Jeff Jawk (awesome to finally meet that guy after all these years), Jav, Norbi from Budapest, Ben from Redding, Clint from SLC, and so many more. Of course, it was great to see my partner on this site, Chip (move to Portland ASAP!). Anyone I met for the first time this weekend, feel free to shoot me an email, so I don't forget about you.
I'm leaving Chicago feeling inspired again, and I hope to take that with me, and apply it to all aspects of my life back home. Everything from my marriage to my band can benefit from the feeling that 90s hardcore gives to me. I know it can never be the same again, but I hope that the intelligence and raw emotion of the 90s comes back like a flood to hardcore. I'll end this with the quote of the weekend, which was supplied by Greg Bennick (surprise, surprise):
"There are 1100 of you, and 1 barrier. You do the math."

T minus 24 hours and counting

Im less than an hour from leaving for the airport to head up to Chicago for Burning Fight and Im pretty excited (outside of my usual flying anxiety). Justin is currently boarding to head there as well so between the two of us, we should have a pretty comprehensive retrospect of the weekend. I also know that a site (the name escapes me) is recording the sets and will have them available to stream for FREE on their site in the near future. He said he is going to record all of the reunions and then some of the other bands as well, time provided. We'll update you on that as soon as know more. Being the huge merchhound that I am, Ill have pictures of merch when I get back and Im sure Justin is going to track down some vinyl so we'll try and update this as each day ends but I dont know if Ill have access to a computer while Im there. If you are reading this and attending the show, please come up and say hi. Looking forward to a great weekend...

Chip XXX