Option Paralysis

3.22.2010

Track Listing

Farewell, Mona Lisa
Good Neighbor
Gold Teeth on a Bum
Crystal Morning
Endless Endings
Widower
Room Full of Eyes
Chinese Whispers
I Wouldn’t if You Didn’t
Parasitic Twins

It’s been almost three years since the Dillinger Escape Plan released their last full length album, Ire Works.  DEP fans everywhere have been hungry for more chaos, and so they’ve graced us with Option Paralysis, which hits stores the last week of March.  I had the pleasure of checking it out early and I’ve got to tell the fans…. you WON’T be disappointed!

Any Dillinger Escape Plan fan will have a general idea how their albums are going to sound…. LOUD. There is rarely a dull moment on any DEP album, and Option Paralysis is no exception.  While the majority of the tracks are fast paced, loud and everything you could expect from these guys; they have their softer moments. I mean, Greg has to rest SOME between all the jumping and screaming, right?

Farewell, Mona Lisa starts the album off with a slow and steady intro. Then of course, the track (and first single/music video from the album), Farewell, Mona Lisa, builds into an epic bundle of metal joy. All the way to Parasitic Twins, DEP’s brutality never wanes.  With the familiar, almost violent, DEP chords we’re all used to, the band hasn’t strayed from their roots; yet they’ve brought us new, interesting and exciting shit to jump around to.

Grab Option Paralysis available 3.22.2010! Oh yeah, and go punch someone in the nads!

DEP live @ The Mad Hatter (2009)

DEP live @ The Mad Hatter (2009)

DEP interview with Punk World Views

MySpace

Dillinger Escape Plan

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Justin Sane (Justin Cathal Geever) - lead vocals, rhythm & lead guitar
Chris #2 – lead vocals, bass guitar
Chris Head – lead & rhythm guitars, backing vocals
Pat Thetic – drums, percussion

Anti-Flag is an outspoken foursome from Pittsburgh, PA.  They mainly sing punk rock anthems directed towards political issues.  They are widely known for disagreeing with Bush’s policies, and often speak ill of him at their shows. While half their fans probably don’t know two shits about politics, they sure love singing along! =)

The band formed in 1988, and while all the members aren’t original, I had the chance to talk with one of the founding members, Pat Thetic (drums).

Me and Pat (drums, Anti-Flag)

*interview is best viewed in browers OTHER than Internet Explorer. For some reason the text won’t show up nine times out of ten in IE.

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Pat live @ Warped Tour 2009

What do you say to people when they accuse you of being anti-America because of the name Anti Flag? I know you all probably get that a lot.

Yes, and it depends who’s asking. If it’s some redneck guy then I say “yeah fuck you, I’m anti-American” just because it’s more fun to say. If it’s someone is actually looking for some information, who’s actually questioning and not just attacking… We grew up during the era of the first Gulf War, when George Bush senior was trying to rally everybody to go to war in Iraq the first time. And we noticed that they wrapped themselves in the flag, figuratively, in the sense that if they put the flag around themselves, and say well, “I am in possession of the flag, therefore anything I say goes.” And we always thought that was complete crap, and we thought that was blind Nationalism and you should always question everything. People think that Anti Flag must be against America, but no, we’re against the idea that people in power use the flag and use patriotism to get young people to go off and do things that are against their own self-interest.

Is that where the name came from?

Yeah, that’s where it came from. I mean, what is a young person gaining from fighting and dyeing in the Middle East? Their fuel prices are not any cheaper, you know, they’re not getting better jobs from doing that, they’re not getting more food for their families. It’s amazing how people can say, “oh, well it’s for country, you should do it.” And the actuality is, it’s for corporations and you should do it. We always thought that was a pretty screwed up thing. So, when people ask “are you against America?” the answer is no, we’re not against America. We’re against the corporatization of America and the killing of people for their personal gain.

On that same note, has there ever been any riots at any of your shows, since you are very political?

We’ve never had any riots at our shows, but we’ve almost been beat up a couple of times. Actually, we were just in Russia and there were bomb threats?

At your show?

Yeah they brought the dogs in. The one show had already started and they had to clear all the kids out, and they brought the dogs in to sweep the room. So we don’t just piss off Americans, we piss of Russians too. So, no riots luckily.

Any picketing?

Oh, yeah we’ve definitely had people picket. Actually there was this great show, back in the day. This was in Oklahoma City, playing at a fire hall somewhere, and there was this lone guy out front with this sign, an American flag, and so pissed off that we were there. And in that environment, that intrigues me and excites me, because I’m like, this kid is thinking about things. He is charged, he has a vision about the way the world should be. And I’m thinking, I have a vision about the way the world should be. We have a lot in common, so we should talk. And we tried to talk, you know. He was not as interested and willing to talk as I was… but yeah there are always a lot of people out there who are not real happy with us doing what we’re doing, and you know, I’m in favor of that. We are here to say what we think is important, and you’re welcome to come out and say what you think is important. What’s not helpful, is when there’s “fuck you,” “shut the hell up,” “I’m gonna kick your ass.” That doesn’t help anybody…

talking with Pat in the laundry room

Do you feel like this happens more often when you’re outside of America?

No actually, it’s in the U.S. that people are most tweaked by us, and on some levels, we understand the American culture, so we understand what tweaks people. And we all have to feel uncomfortable to change, so I think it’s an artist’s job to tweak people to some extent. So when we go to Europe, we don’t understand the culture enough in order to tweak people as much as we do in the States.

Do you think people outside the U.S. understand the political message?

They do, I think they understand it on a simpler level. There’s all those nuances here of whether Obama is better than John Kerry. There’s all the nuances here, but when we’re in Europe it’s more that people deserve to be taken care of, and that we all deserve human rights.

And they probably don’t take it as personal.

Exactly, and that’s the other thing. People in Europe are not as emotionally attached, say to George W. Bush, as some of the people in the South were, or in Texas who actually voted for the guy, thinking he was going to do good things, but then he turned around and became a complete bastard. Then they’re like. “oh fuck, you’re commenting on George Bush is also commenting on my decision making.” You know, it makes people uncomfortable.

Anti-Flag live @ Warped Tour 2009

So with that said, where does anarchism fit into all this?

I’m not an anarchist in the strict sense of the word, I’m more of a socialist. I believe that we all need to put the wealth and the resources into a pot and divide them up, so that everyone gets a fair share. And I realize that in the world we live in that’s not possible right now, but we can move toward those ideals. I would love to be in a world where I come and play music for you, and you make me dinner and give me a place to stay, and we’re all giving what we can and taking what we need.

Because you all are so political, do you play in places like Texas?

Yeah we just played in Texas last week.

Do you ever get nervous, like, “Oh God, people are going to kill me.”

In the world that we live in right now, people know what we are about. When we were younger we’d go to cities and they would be like, “oh we booked this band called Anti Flag.” And then we’d come in with this big upside down American flag, and we’d talk about these issues. And people were like, “now we’re going to kill them,” because they didn’t know, they came to see a punk rock show, and we just made them feel uncomfortable… then they wanna kick our ass. Now people are much more understanding of what they’re getting. They sort of have an idea of what to expect. We’ve been a band for a fucking long time.

I know you all don’t like cops very much..

Not always my favorite people…

Do you all know any cops personally?

I do, haha, and this is the unfortunate thing about the police that I know. My uncle was a cop… complete dick. And guys I knew in high school who became cops… complete shitheads. And I’m sure there’s definitely good cops, but it’s funny because people always ask me, “don’t you know any cops?” And I’m like, “yeah, I know them and their complete dickheads.” But I know there are good cops out there too.

Anti-Flag live @ Warped Tour 2009

Do you ever listen to Leftover Crack at all?

I love them! They’re one of my favorite bands.

I wouldn’t compare you all in sound, but you have the same message, you know?

Yeah, I love them, they’re all good dudes.

How do you think Pittsburg has changed over the years? Do you still live there now?

I do.  It’s definitely got a lot more ‘white collar’ work going on. It’s weird because in the seventies it was only blue collar work, and then the bottom dropped out, so there was no work. Now it’s definitely coming back as white collar.

Were you in Pittsburg for the Super Bowl?

Unfortunately I was. I was there for both the Super Bowl and the Stanley Cup, and I don’t care about either one.

Are you involved in local politics?

Not a whole lot, because we’re not really around enough to be in on the grass roots stuff, but we know a lot of the players who are in the trenches doing the local work and local activism. We’re friends with them and whenever we can get involved, we like to be involved, but it’s just that we’re not home enough…

Anti-Flag live @ Warped Tour 2009

So you don’t drink, but was there ever a time when you did party?

No, no I come from a long line of alcoholics and fuck ups, so I made that choice to not continue that.

So what is the grossest thing you’ve ever seen on tour?

We were on tour in our RV and we would load it up with all our gear and all the people and you know, RVs are designed to carry a couple of old grandparents around and not eight to ten dudes and a bunch of gear. And in this RV, if you peed in the toilet, you’d actually have to empty the toilet out, which just sucked and nobody wanted to do that, so we all just started to pee in plastic bottles. This is before we realized that plastic bottles were the devil and we shouldn’t be using plastic bottles… but this was like eight or nine years ago, so we were all peeing in plastic bottles and you could just take them, and get rid of them. So we were going up this mountain in California and the truck started to overheat, and the transmission fluid as it expanded, would get on the manifold and lit the manifold on fire. So the whole bottom of the truck was on fire. Our driver realizes this, and says “everybody out, the truck’s on fire.” The only thing we had to put the fire out was bottles of urine, so we were underneath the truck throwing bottles of urine on the fire, so the whole RV didn’t burn to the ground to kill us all.

On your last record, you did a song with Tom Morello. Do you all feel like you have an obligation to fill the shoes of bands like Rage Against the Machine, after they’re gone?

We don’t have big enough egos to feel like we have to fill Rage Against the Machine’s shoes. However, we were happy, because we were a band for a long time before RATM became the huge band that they were. And it was great to see bands who were out there and talking about that stuff. The more bands, and the more higher profile bands that are talking about these issues, the better for everybody. Tom is an amazing dude, and I would love to be anywhere close to his shoes, but that’s not what we’re doing, that’s not what we’re about.

Is there anything you’d like to add, anything coming up in the future?

Well we had a record come out a couple weeks ago, and that’s called the People are the Gun. Every record has some great moments and some moments that aren’t as great. This record has some moments that are really great, because we were just four dudes in a room, making it happen.

Do you have a favorite song of all time? I mean of your band.

I have a couple favorite songs. “Smartest Bomb”, we did today is a strong song, just in the idea of we’re always talking about smart weapons and how these weapons are going to stop war. And if we only have this one weapon, it’s going to stop people from attacking each other from now on. “Smartest Bomb” is about, “I am the smartest bomb you’re ever going to have,” because I can blow myself up and fuck everything up, but I can also stop, and make the choice that violence is never going to stop violence from happening.

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Official Site

MySpace

]]> http://punkworldviews.com/anti-flag-interview/feed/ http://punkworldviews.com/iron-age-album-review/ http://punkworldviews.com/iron-age-album-review/#comments Thu, 04 Mar 2010 18:41:53 +0000 Admin http://punkworldviews.com/?p=4593 Iron Age

The Sleeping Eye (Tee Pee Records)

Track List

1. The Sleeping Eye Of The Watcher
2. Dispossessed
3. Burden Of Empire
4. Materia Prima
5. A Younger Earth
6. Arcana pt. I
7. Arcana pt. II
8. The Way Is Narrow

Texas brings us Iron Age, and this band has successfully combined metal, thrash and hardcore to create an album any metal head will enjoy.  Check out The Sleeping Eye, Iron Age’s newest release on Tee Pee Records. While only the band’s sophomore album (after their 2006 debut, Constant Struggle), the doomy, thick metal riffs show a deep talent and passion for the genre.  Iron Age remains to be modern metal while still appealing to old school metal heads.

Iron Age

As most metal albums, it begins with roughly 25 seconds of unnecessary noise, but then turns into inspiring riffs and breakdowns that make you want to hear more. Just when you may get the flow of the album, the track Materia Prima comes in to wake you up. Some are thrown off, but I enjoy being kept on my toes.

The Sleeping Eye is new, but doesn’t forget it’s [metal] roots. It’s a sound the crosses over boundaries and explores the doomy side of metal.  It’s hard to even choose a favorite track, but if I had to pick, I would say don’t skip over Dispossessed, the second track on the album.  After a thick, long first track, this piece slides into your ears with ease while still satisfying your metal cravings.

For a metal album, the length is significantly shorter, which only gives you LESS of an excuse to not go check it out! For fans of unconventional hardcore and nu-metal, definitely check out The Sleeping Eye and be on the lookout for a west coast tour this summer.

MySpace

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“As of 4 weeks ago, My Chemical Romance and Bob Bryar parted ways. This was a painful decision for all of us to make and was not taken lightly. We wish him the best of luck in his future endeavors and expect you all to do the same.”

My Chemical Romance

Beginning as the drum tech, Bryar became the official drummer mid-2004 after Matt Pelissier’s departure. The band has said they’re writing their fourth album, however there is no expected release date or album title as of now.

Full Article

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http://www.goldengodsawards.com/vote.html

I’m not sure when the voting ends, but soon I’m sure! Get in there and vote for your favorite metal vocalist, drummer, chick and overall band. Stay tuned for the results!!

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As any Pennywise (and/or Ignite) fan knows, Jim Lindberg, the bands longtime vocalist left the band a few months ago.  Since his departure, they have been searching for a replacement.  Meanwhile, to fill in for their tours that were already lined up, Zoli Teglas (front man for Orange County hardcore band, Ignite) stepped up and did an AMAZING job.  It was obviously enough to convince the band he should be their new lead man, and he was just announced as their offical new lead singer.

Pennywise (2008)

Zoli has been a longtime friend of the band, and everyone (including me!) is stoked that he’s the permanent singer. They want to reiterate that he has NOT left Ignite, he’s simply taken on the new project, so don’t fret! Those of you that went to the Smokeout Festival or some their recent SO Cal shows have already had the chance to see Teglas sing in his new spot.

The band is currently in the studio working on new material, according to a recent press release. They have a few West Coast dates beginning March 17th. He will also join them for a European tour starting in April! He gets to jump RIGHT in!!

Pennywise bassist Randy Bradbury says, “What started out as a temporary position was just too good to put an end to.  Zoli brings to the table a tremendous vocal ability, creativity and a die hard work ethic.  There is a bonf that makes this change feel like it was simply meant to be and considering the recent unforatunte events, having Zoli join the band is a well needed shot of positive energy.”

Teglas has said, “I’m stoked to be singing with Pennywise.  I’m a huge fan of the band and am super grateful to share the stage with my longtime friends Fletcher, Byron and Randy.”

Zoli Teglas

Pennywise is a band that has always been hated on for being “So Cal Punk”  or whatever, but I have ALWAYS been a huge fan and I think they’re going to be around for just as long, if not longer, than they’ve already been here! They were playing punk rock even when it wasn’t the “cool thing” and have kept true to their sound ever since.

Hopefully you’ll have a chance to check them out, now that their lineup is finalized with such a talented and down to Earth singer! (Not that Jim wasn’t! haha, I loved him!)

To keep up with Pennywise updates and tours, check out their MySpace.

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Vote For Your Favorite Idea Here!

During the Pepsi Refresh Project, the company will be giving up to $1.3 million in grants monthly to fresh and new ideas!

Go to Pepsi.com to vote on ideas that can change the world.

Pepsi is investing more than $20 million this year to fund great ideas, big and small, that moves the community forward and allows ideas to turn into reality! They’re looking for people, businesses, and non-profits with ideas that will have a positive impact. Ideas can be submitted monthly. The ideas with the most votes will receive grant funding. Look around your community and think about how you want to change it.

Celebrities such as Kevin Bacon and Demi Moore are part of the new project, and they’ve already released videos with their ideas to refresh the world!

You can also check out the facebook page here for more information.

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Of Mice & Men

Austin Carlile - vocals
Jaxin Hall - bass, backing vocals
Phil Manansala - lead guitar
Shayley Bourget - rhythm guitar, keys, clean vocals
Valentine Arteaga - drums

Phil being metal!

When you hear Of Mice and Men, you may not automatically think of a band (but a book.. pftt!)…. but you SHOULD! These guys can play and you need to start listening.  In their short duration as a band, their upcoming album (set to release March 9, 2010) is already highly anticipated by post-hardcore and metal fans everywhere.

Ex Attack Attack! vocalist, Austin Carlile, and foreign cutie Jaxin Hall, came together to form the band, later bringing on the other three members (with only one member change since their formation). They’ve been impressing hardcore and metal fans ever since, and people just can’t get enough of these boys!

Jaxin singing Lady Gaga... Yes!

While the band was on tour with A Skylit Drive and The Word Alive, I got to catch up with Jaxin and Phil and talk about everything from the upcoming release of their debut album, touring, Lady Gaga… and more! Check it out!

Phil (guitar) and Jaxin (bass), Of Mice & Man

Joining the ranks of bands like The Devil Wears Prada, The Bled and From First To last, they signed to Rise Records in just their first year as a band.  There’s definitely no denying these boys’ talent.. and they haven’t even released a full length album yet! Be sure to check out their debut self titled album, Of Mice & Men, coming out March 9, 2010.

Available 3.09.10

Be sure to also check out some of the live footage I got from the show, including the Lady Gaga cover we discussed in the interview!

To learn more about Of Mice & Men, visit:

MySpace

Rise Records

Jaxin, me and Phil cuddled in the van!

Too sweet <3

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Be sure to take a few minutes to go check out BareBonesMusic.com for interviews, music news and more.

Check out their interview with Suicide Silence:

Be sure to check out BareBonesMusic.com for tons of other music news, interviews and updates!

Agent X of BBM and Suicide Silence

BareThreadsClothing.com is another branch of Bare Bones Music, which features music related shirts for both chicks and dudes. Be sure to check it ALL out and show some support!! Friends of Punk World Views should be friends of YOURS! <3

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Be sure to check out the entire article on the official Alternative Press website:

AltPress.com

This isn’t the first time Bolmer has filled in for a band’s missing vocalist- toward the end of the 2009 Warped Tour, he sang for Scary Kids Scaring Kids.

Bolmer on stage with SKSK @ 2009 Warped Tour

Whether he is the permanent replacement for Owens is yet to officially be announced. You’ll just have to stay tuned!

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