YA talks with Andrew Hinton, vocalist of VILE GASH. This is a previously lost interview conducted in June, 2011.
In what ways does the life perspective of someone involved in the hardcore scene differ from that of “conventional” people?
I think that conventional people are just looking for the easiest way to get through every day. They’re completely content with just accepting what is given to them. They lie to themselves, associate with the people that they claim to hate and engage in the same acts as these people. They are just as bad as the people they despise. I would like to think that the people involved with hardcore are different, but I know that most are not.
For several years prior to The Repos, Craig, Joe, and Aaron all played together in The Mushuganas. Describe the transition between bands and your decision to switch from playing traditional punk rock to fast hardcore. How did Adam come aboard?
Aaron: The Mushuganas were kind of being forced to its end due to personnel issues. Basically, we were without a drummer. The three of us had been friends for quite a long stint at this point and really enjoyed playing music together. Not only was it a matter of enjoyment, but we clicked musically. We all connected on a level that I have found rare in playing music with others throughout the years. I don’t think we were ever stuck on playing a certain style of music since all of us have a vast background of musical interests. The transition felt like if you and your best friends lost a job working at a restaurant and all found a new job together at a construction site. I was fond of Adam from his time playing in a band with Sutfin and Arends back in the DeKalb/Sycamore days. I remembered him as having a good sense of humor and a variety of talents in art and music. I arranged a meeting with him at a now defunct bar in Chicago owned by Chuck Uchida of the great Attica Studios. The three of us had already recorded the demo so I came equipped with a tape and a plan to hook him. We talked over a couple drinks and I convinced him to try it out.
From SQRM’s confrontational live sets, crude lyrics, and left-field cover songs, it seems clear the overall message is FUCK OFF. Why such hostility? What does an audience represent to you?
Mike: We’re in a time where people are more alienated than ever, i think it’s a logical reaction to that. Also it’s important when playing subversive music to challenge everything around you. Not just the obvious things, but also your friends, and even yourself. If your not challenging yourself and those around you what you’re doing can’t have much value as a subversive art form. For me the hostility is mostly just an embrace, or a celebration of carnality and an affinity for ignorance.
YA talks with Ralph Rivera and Ryan Lowry of RAW NERVE.
Hardcore is definitively reactive music. It does not seek solutions, but instead seems to linger in frustration for the sake of itself. Does RAW NERVE have any particular agenda with regards to authority? What sorts of reactions, in your opinion, evoke lasting change?
Raw Nerve is an entity which stands for objective truth. We believe strongly that right and wrong are not intangible ideas incapable of being grasped, and furthermore we do not believe that these are concepts that descend from some supreme being on high, itself intangible. Simply, we are against any and all actions, organizations, individuals, etc. that seek to murder, steal from, degrade, or otherwise harm us.
YA talks with Jeff Jelen, Kirk Syrek and Frank Hanney of MK-ULTRA:
MK-Ultra was instrumental in the development of the 90’s Chicago HC scene. How did the band form and what was the social climate like then in terms of music, attitudes, ideas, etc.?
J: Jeff Bachner, Gary and I knew each other from being in a band in the late 80’s/early 90’s. Jeff joined the Army on a dare and I ran away from society by living in DeKalb. After many drugs and psychiatric sessions I managed to wipe those years out of my head completely, but I do have a vague memory of creating Kirk a la Weird Science from an issue of Kerrang! Magazine. Eventually Jeff B. decided he did not enjoy being cannon fodder for the system so he got himself a nice discharge and headed back to the US to start a band with us.
Does religion play a particular role in Salvation? Despite the band name and some of your imagery, I get the sense you aren’t always referring to Christian doctrine in a literal sense.
Religion does play a large role in Salvation, but is most definitely not the single driving force. Not necessarily Christianity, but any belief system. It’s the manmade quality of any core belief that I find ingenious and at the same time, terrifying. Whether it be a safety net to ensure an afterlife, reincarnation; an “atheist” or “agnostic” point of view – all is nothing. Salvation is self-realization.
SQRM
RAW NERVE
MK-ULTRA
SALVATION