Local punk label Kid Sister Everything released a five-song live EP by Fargo posthardcore band Animal Lover last week—its first cassette after four years of CDs and seven-inches.

via Three Beats: Bassist Harrison Bankhead finally releases an album of his own | Three Beats | Chicago Reader.

Cloud Mouth start their long good-bye with a round robin

via Three Beats: Cloud Mouth plays a round robin | Three Beats | Chicago Reader.

Chicago postpunk trio Cloud Mouth will break up in the fall, and their round robin show is the first of many good-bye celebrations. Read more!

Punk and karaoke, together at last. Here are some picks from Chicagoans for the second Punk Rock Karaoke Chicago.

Well, XLR8R and Exclaim! music writer and Grown Ups member Josiah Hughes has the t-shirt for you:

Or, rather, had the t-shirt for you. As of today, the shirts are no longer onsale at Etsy after Hughes received a cease and desist order from, of all places, SST:

Another odd twist in the “Bieb Flag” mini meme.

Perhaps what fueled the Internet popularity of the shirt, more than the combination, was what Hughes gave as the reason for the combination. In an interview with Hearty Magazine, Hughes explained his idea:

But then, when I started thinking about it, it was scary to realize there are some major similarities. Biebz got huge on YouTube, which is pretty DIY, and both of them cause riots. From the other perspective, I love that I’m pissing off punks on websites.

It sounds… well, rather solid. Sort of. Kudos to Hughes for “pissing off” punks online: If punk is about challenging the status quo, then the reinvention of a hardcore punk symbol as an ad for a pop sensation is, well, punk. At least in my book.

But, is Justin Bieber as punk as Black Flag, or as DIY as Hughes says he is? That I’m less sure of.

True, Bieber has been at the center of a riot. But it’s not quite the same as the riots surrounding Black Flag’s shows. Those were the riots of confused and angered music fans not expecting to hear what Black Flag brought to the stage. Those were the riots of police pouncing on some of the band’s earliest shows. Those were the “riots” of kids in a mosh pit, bringing the anger and fury that, well, they wanted to bring in a live setting.

Perhaps the last form of Black Flag inspired-riots may be the only tangible connection to the Bieber-style rampage. That being, fan reaction to a public appearance. Or, rather, how fans of these disparate artists are expected to express their adoration for these artists in our society. Somewhere along the line, people were told the proper thing to do at a punk show is to mosh and the best way to enjoy a pop idol is to scream bloody murder while clawing for the stage. Anyone is tempted to get hurt in either situation. Why these are seen as perfectly rational methods of expressing oneself at either shows is beyond me, but the Bieb Flag’s connection of the two iterations of fandom certainly puts them in a new perspective.

But is Bieber DIY?

Yes, I’m well aware Bieber was “discovered” on YouTube. Yes, I’m well aware that is Doing It Yourself. But, the iteration that this is the kind of “DIY” people fantasize about is something entirely different.

However, this interpretation does open new doors. As I’ve discussed in a link of comments, the methods of DIY punk as they were known are hard to apply to today’s musical practices. It used to be seen by some punks that major labels were the norm, that signing to one was giving up, that staying underground was the only way, etc etc. Sure, that holds true for some individuals, but hardly for the masses. Considering the state of the music industry, the big record labels are becoming less of a factor. In fact, relying on one’s own abilities to do it yourself is the way to get by, be it in finding a career as a pop star or simply touring an underground circuit with a spare few weeks of vacation you’re afforded in a day job.

Everyone, everywhere in the music world is somehow doing it themselves. It would be downright stupid for any up-and-coming act to not put themselves on YouTube or some social networking site if they either want to a) make a career out of being a musician or b) simply play music to people. The Internet provides excellent tools that are easy to use in order to get one’s name out there. Even if one decides not to enter the realm of MySpace and Twitter, that in and of itself can be a way to stir up interest in your group: You’ll be in the band that’s not on MySpace. How cool is that?

Justin Bieber is hardly the first person to use online tools to find fame and some level of fortune. Lily Allen famously used MySpace to generate buzz while her record label’s A&R people hardly did anything. It’s hard not to think of YouTube when OK Go’s name is dropped anywhere outside of the music media.

What level of DIY do any of these acts rise to? Granted, the essence of DIY, like so much of punk, was created to rebel against a set of rules. So the idea of applying a standard of practice to DIY poses one of the many “ethical quandaries” that people have been wrestling with for years. The funny thing is, DIY is a term tossed around so much it’s almost rendered useless. With the omnipresence of the Internet, it might as well be: If you’re not doing something yourself, you’re not doing much of anything.

What does that mean for little bands across the country folding vinyl record covers themselves, packing broken-down equipment into some van to play a basement show somewhere? Nothing. It shouldn’t make a difference to them, or to the pop star who happened to launch a career on YouTube. It doesn’t negate any of the work either party has done, nor does it change their attitudes about music. It just shows their perspectives on music are more flexible than a term like DIY can afford one or the other.

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Actually, it wasn’t so much an article as it was a screenplay.

Ebert opened his vault and unloaded part of the script he wrote for a Sex Pistols-focused movie. Originally titled “Anarchy in the U.K.” and later retitled “Who Killed Bambi?,” the idea certainly sounds interesting. But I was a little put off by the first few lines:

One by one, each alone, we see the FOUR SEX PISTOLS walking along these mean London streets. In CLOSEUPS, each one turns while still walking and addresses THE CAMERA.

STEVE JONES
We don’t make music – we make noise.

PAUL COOK
We’re so pretty vacant and we don’t care.

SID VICIOUS
We like noise – it’s our choice.

JOHNNY ROTTEN
We want to destroy the passer-by.

STEVE JONES
Passion ends in fashion.

PAUL COOK
We’re the blank generation.

SID VICIOUS
We don’t make rock and roll – we make chaos.

JOHNNY ROTTEN
Got a problem, and the problem is you. What you gonna do?

First thoughts: Pretty vacant. Gotta admire the way Ebert pulled the all-things-1977-punk card, even dropping “blank generation” into the conversation despite that idea having been a thoroughly American punk concept (via Richard Hell.)

Still, I’d be curious to see if something were to happen with this script in the future… The intro’s a bit much, but it’s certainly piqued my curiosity.

You can read the rest of it here.

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A pulsating portrait of wasted youth that invokes all the standard genre conventions — bring on the sex, drugs and rock ’n’ roll, please! — only to transcend them through the power of its music and the artistry of its execution, the show is as invigorating and ultimately as moving as anything I’ve seen on Broadway this season. Or maybe for a few seasons past.

And bad [via The New York Observer]:

But it’s also, amid all the booming rock, a little dull. You’re diverted, but you’re not moved. There are archetypes and themes, but there aren’t really characters or a plot.

The American Idiot musical will most likely be a smashing success. Whether or not it got any critical acclaim, or win any Tony awards, is almost an afterthought. Just as movie-to-stage adaptations became all the rage on Broadway, American Idiot may very well be the start of a wave of rock-themed musicals.

But is that a good thing?

As much as I would love to see Say Anything’s brilliant 2004 debut, …is a Real Boy, get transformed into the musical it was meant to be, I’m skeptical about the idea.

Why?

Well, American Idiot sounds neutered. I remember stumbling upon the YouTube “teaser” for the musical and feeling befuddled:

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“Is this for real?” I thought. It sounds more like Kidz Bop than a living, visceral stage interpretation of a pretty solid pop-punk record.

Literally, you can compare the two. Below is a clip of the Kidz Bop take of “Boulevard of Broken Dreams”:

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And then the musical version of the same tune:

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The big difference is that the musical version has more trained singers and actors than kids.

Gone are the very things that made the Green Day song so appealing. Billie Joe Armstrong’s nascent snarl has evaporated, the switch between heartfelt strumming and three-chord bombast replaced with beautifully constructed Broadway tunes.

To say this is not punk could be considered an oxymoron. Those who seek to place punk within a set of rules tend to box it into a specific time, short-sighted frame of mind and make it adhere to a style. Which is exactly what the musical version appears to do. No longer does it appear to be something that anyone can do, but this version of punk rock is brought to you by all the beautiful people with great singing talent. No one in Green Day would have ever made it onto that stage for American Idiot, though they could qualify for the rock-orchestra.

The musical seems to present an image of punk that hasn’t evolved since 1977 [via The Chicago Tribune]:

Stuck in filthy beds and La-Z-Boys and doped up on soda pop, Ritalin and somebody else’s cocaine, the furious, alienated and unshowered youth…

Sounds perfect for Johnny Rotten and co. circa 1977, but even John Lydon himself would dismiss that in 1980. If the purpose of punk is to challenge the status quo, why on earth is it being re-created in a sanitized version of itself.

Of course, the very act of doing a musical, whitewashed version of a pop-punk album is a challenge in and of itself. Punk? Sure. But it doesn’t appear to work. The worlds seem to collide more than than work with each other. It may make for a great musical, sure, but is it a particularly strong reflection of the feelings and emotions behind the original work?

Perhaps. The band appears happy about it [via MTV]:

With opening night of the “American Idiot” musical officially in the books, the guys in Green Day can officially focus on something else that’s important: enjoying their natural high.

“This is the highest moment I think we’ve ever had as a band, in the 21 years we’ve been around,” frontman Billie Joe Armstrong told MTV News at the “Idiot” afterparty, held at New York’s Roseland Ballroom on Tuesday night.

“And we’ve been pretty high,” drummer Tre Cool interjected.

Still, I couldn’t help but cringe when I watched the New York Times “Anatomy of a Number” interactive, where director Michael Mayer discusses how watching mosh pits at Green Day shows helped with mapping out the show’s choreography. It essentially summed up a lot of my discomforts with the basic idea of the musical.

Mosh pits are a chaotic, violent mess. Some people love them, get their aggression out in them, find them to be a place of communal catharsis. They are, in essence, the very antithesis of ritualized dancing, until, of course, it becomes an expectation at a punk show instead of a sign of a real emotional reaction to the music. Transforming that into a neat choreographed dance just seems, and looks, downright silly. Kind of like American Idiot.

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And then I stumbled upon something that support Almond’s point 100 percent. I still don’t agree with what Almond wrote, but this piece of “music criticism” by Impose’s Jason Diamond meets Almond’s criteria for pointlessness.

Impose is a fantastic music site that covers an array of artists that normally don’t receive the slightest bit of attention on many a blog, all with a nice bit of insight and a sharp voice. Diamond’s piece on Refused’s The Shape of Punk to Come, a mind-numbing rant loosely related to Epitaph’s reissuing of the album, is the opposite of insightfulness.

I appreciate unusual methods of reviewing an album, strong voices and critical opinions that are different than mine. Yet, Diamond managed to mess up that entire pretense with his utter load he tried to pass as something resembling a takedown.

Just how does he do it? Let’s take a look:

First, Diamond introduces an article bashing Refused with the pretense that he’s a “fan” of hardcore punk:

I’m not ashamed to admit that I liked mid to late 90s hardcore in high school during the mid to late 90s.  Despair, early Integrity, Unbroken, etc. That’s good shit I won’t hate on for a second.

This is meant to show the reader that Diamond knows what he is talking about, that he’s thought about this review long and hard. Eventually, it just reads like a pitiful excuse for his lack of providing anything resembling actual criticism.

Then Diamond makes the first big error. Breaking down music fans into easily-manageable categories as to hyper-generalize their reaction to hardcore music. Or, “lumping” as he calls it:

1. You never had any cool hardcore friends. You probably were under the (correct) assumption that most hardcore was fucking terrible and by default, so were the people that listened to the music.

2. You’re a total pussy. Sorry.

3. You’re a liar and you sold all your hardcore records on eBay as soon as you started art school.

Here, Diamond is showing the reader his “voice,” which appears to be nothing more than an “irreverent” and “ironic” sense of humor that runs deep through so many hipster blogs. Oops. Was that too much of a generalization? Perhaps. But, as Diamond didn’t give anyone a choice of, say, taste when it comes to their thoughts on hardcore, cramming his writing style into a stereotype is the least I can do. Actually, it’s not all that hard to cram in.

Diamond reveals his hipsterai-borne sense of the need to be cool through the next sentence where he states that, basically, his cohorts cannot speak honestly about their music taste, presumably because of a fear of losing cool points (“Aside from a few friends who are brave enough to admit that they were Phishheads in their past life…”) Anyway, he uses this as an introduction to the article, Refused’s The Shape of Punk to Come, otherwise known as Diamond’s method of “outing” former hardcore fans:

One way to get somebody to fess up is to bring up The Shape of Punk to Come by Refused. Nine times out of ten the person you are talking to will end up pissing themselves all over that album, possibly using terms like “game changing”, “revolutionary”, or even better: “Second coming of Nation of Ulysses”.

Great. finally we’re getting somewhere. Diamond explains the importance of the record, and somewhat makes up for all that idiotic posturing that began his dreadful piece. Don’t get too comfortable. It’s all downhill from here:

I’m here to tell you that if they say any of those things, please feel free to tell them to shut the fuck up.

Oh, finally, thank you! Jason Diamond, the authority on all things hardcore because he can name drop Unbroken! Thank you, good sir, from freeing me from the tyranny of people who love Refused. I’ve been trapped for years, unable to form my own opinion and try to express it well, but finally, someone to do all the work for me! Let’s see what he says:

The Shape of Punk to Come (T.S.o.P.t.C. henceforth) is the single most overrated album to come out in the late 90s.

Ok, why?

You know what T.S.o.P.t.C. really is?

An album… right? Awww, come on, tell me already!

It’s a bad attempt at combining Born Against and N.o.U with a bunch of techno music thrown in — …

Hmm… OK, that’s an opinion. But why is that? Give me a reason you think it’s a “bad attempt,” Mr. Diamond!

that upon any listen today, seems incredibly dated — …

Actually, I happened to be listening to T.S.o.P.t.C. on a consistent basis the past two weeks and happened to be enthralled and found it refreshing. But that’s just my opinion. We all can’t agree on everything, but at least we can give some solid reasoning behind why we like or dislike a record and/or band, right Mr. Diamond?

…and it’s perpetrated by a bunch of Swedes with government art grants and books on Situationist International.

I’m sorry, what? Did Diamond out himself as a xenophobic with a particular fear of Swedish people, all while decrying government grants for artists and people who read about European revolutionary theory?! I think he did! Well, that totally explains why this album is so terrible… right? It doesn’t? Riiiight…

And then Diamond falls down the rabbit hole of ranting, with his “strongest” “argument” against Refused routed in frontman Dennis Lyxzén’s post-Refused work:

And while it doesn’t have anything to do with the album in question per se, lead singer Dennis Lyxzén’s post-Refused project, The (International) Noise Conspiracy, exposed him as nothing but an Ian Svenonious wanna-be. All posturing and no product. If Refused was an attempt at being Nation of Ulysses, The (International) Noise Conspiracy was a pathetic attempt at pinching some magic from The Make Up.

Right. Because no one in pop music has ever made a career on basing their oeuvre on the work of other musicians and received acclaim for that. (Nobody tell Diamond that The White Stripes exist, otherwise he won’t know what to do with himself!) Diamond’s biggest argument for hating Refused seems to be based not on that band, but Lyxzén’s overall career, which, last time I checked, doesn’t quite synch up with Svenonious’ output. Lyxzén must form a Weird War rip-off group and Chain and The Gang rip-off group before Diamond can make that claim!

And then Diamond makes another fatal, and quite idiotic, move:

Where does the whole scam get uncovered? Unlike everything Svenonious has ever put out (in terms of music), all of Lyxzén’s “seminal” work was issued on what we might as well go ahead and call a major label, Epitaph.

This is a pointless and incorrect argument on many fronts. For one thing, what does the band’s label have anything to do with how an album sounds? A major label may have more creative control over a band than an independent label, but that doesn’t affect how the record sounds. And Epitaph isn’t a major label: It’s an independent record label that’s distributed through the Alternative Distribution Alliance, an organization created by Warner Music Group and Sub Pop strictly to help manufacture and distribute records produced by independent record labels. Would Diamond say the same thing about Big Black or The Jesus Lizard, who released records on Touch & Go, another independent label that has distributed records through the ADA?

To try and make up for his argument, Diamond pulls this:

I don’t want to pull the “what’s punk and what’s not card”,…

This is the weakest argument in the book. Diamond tries to have it both ways, trying to retain his “open-mindedness” while balancing his “punk cred.” It’s a cop-out, and it continues:

…but to me, this fact helps to further debunk the legacy ofT.S.o.P.t.C., and pretty much the entire Refused/Lyxzén catalog as a bunch of crap we’d already heard before, but by people who did it better and had more integrity.

And there’s the most idiotic argument against an album in a nutshell. It doesn’t prove anything about Diamond’s taste in music, aside from the fact that he probably prefers 8-track-based noise labels operating out of Greenpoint. Nor does it actually critique the content of the album.

What’s worse is Diamond makes the worst error, something that Almond spoke out against. He basically holds his opinion over the heads of others:

Sorry to burst your bubble. I know you thought you were really part of something special with this one.

I’m sorry I didn’t check in with you first, Mr. Diamond. I’ll never make that mistake again.

Except I will. If that’s a mistake, I’ll be happy being an error-prone music listener instead of short-sighting bands and people like this:

Maybe you can rest easy knowing that at their best, Refused were simply a thinking persons Rage Against the Machine, and that right now, somewhere in Ohio, a bunch of Juggalos are wigging out to this song and thinking “man, if only this band didn’t break up, they could totally play the Gathering next year.”

Here, Diamond hops on the “we-hate-Juggalos-bandwagon,” possibly the easiest hater-trick in lazy music criticism today. Real creative.

And then Diamond signs off without ever really providing any insight into why he dislikes the record. And he does it by shoving his foot in his mouth:

Yeh, sorry. Your favorite record that is going to be given the “deluxe reissue” treatment on Epitaph in June is at best nothing but a really good nu-metal album that you will defend to the death because you’re a sentimental bastard and you need to fight for what’s right.

What’s that? People who are “sentimental bastard[s]” and “need to fight for what’s right” are somehow, as Diamond insinuates, on the losing side of this argument? Well, that puts Diamond right there, as his sentimental fight for “hardcore with integrity” has resulted in this terrible, terrible piece of… well, who knows what.

This is an example of an exercise in pointlessness, and an example of Almond’s thoughts on the purported nature of music criticism. Diamond is welcome to his opinion, but he managed to hit all the worst points in all the wrong ways.

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*As an aside, I do not write this as an authority, but merely as an observer. I’ve certainly found myself sabotaged by some of the same mistakes that entrapped Diamond in his review. Yet I like to think I eventually explain myself, or attempt to in the least. I’m only human, I make mistakes just like everyone else. I just hope none are as erroneous as this example.

Though Nelson has typically listed his items at relatively affordable prices, it has been something of a gold-mine. In December, Nelson sold a test pressing of Minor Threat’s Out of Step EP for $5,899.99 after putting it on eBay for a modest price of $50. (For the curious folks, the winning bidder paid nearly 118 times the original asking price.)

Some may consider that an infraction of DIY punk rules, but really, it’s the fans who were willing to pay extravagant amounts of money that made the price, well, just that extravagant. Nostalgia seems to be taking hardcore punk fans by force, and Nelson just happened to be in the right place at the right time.

Now, Nelson’s not the only musician from hardcore punk’s original class on eBay. Black Flag’s original bass player Chuck Dukowski jumped onto eBay in January, and has begun to unload some of his personal collection online.

Dukowski has a pretty solid collection on eBay. Of course, a lot of it will really appeal to the rabid SST Records fan. Still, there’s an unopened copy of Negativland’s recalled U2 album, and test pressings of BLAST, fIREHOSE and Black Flag albums. While the test pressing of Black Flag’s Wasted Again is currently going for almost twice the original price of what Nelson asked for when he put Out of Step on eBay (that’s $99 to $50), it’s still considerably cheaper than what some fans would be willing to spend on such an album. Especially with Dukowski’s description of the item:

This is an ultra rare “Test Pressing” of BLACK FLAG’s “WASTED AGAIN” compilation.

Not to many of these out there. Definitely under 100 probably in the 20-30 range.

You can berate Dukowski all you want for the pricing if that’s how you choose to spend your time. I, however, would rather compare and rate Dukowski’s item descriptions against that of Nelson’s. And Nelson wins by far. Whereas Dukowski gives short, informative descriptions, Nelson weaves entertaining yarns. Check out Nelson’s description of a Minor Threat/Meatmen/Negative Approach flyer (current asking price: $1.26):

RARE, mint-condition black & white xeroxed flyer (8 1/2″ x 11″ [216mm x 280mm]), for crazy show at The Freezer in Detroit, Michigan on June 18th, 1982. While The Meatmen are listed on the flyer as playing, my notes do not list them as having played. Instead, lineup for that night was Minor Threat, Negative Approach, Whipping Boy, and The Allied. Fighting outside show, cops swarmed the place, and our singer Ian had to chase the concert promoter several blocks to his apartment to get paid.  Flyer features life-affirming Pushead illustration, of a punk with good bone structure but bad teeth doing party tricks with a guillotine to impress his girlfriend.

As the flyer information shows, eBay item description writing is an art form that few understand quite like Nelson.

You can check out Jeff Nelson (hommedegomme) and Chuck Dukowski’s (rarepunksst) hardcore memorabilia at eBay.

Black Flag (sans Dukowski):

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Minor Threat:

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Malcolm McLaren, the former manager of punk group the Sex Pistols, has died in New York, aged 64, his agent has said.

There have been a lot of famous pop music managers over the years, but none like McLaren. Though the veracity of who-created-who when it comes to The Sex Pistols debate rages on in some circles, there is no question that McLaren played a dominant role in the life of the short-lived British punk band.

Johnny Rotten may have written the lyrics, Glen Matlock may have written (a majority of) the tunes, but Malcolm McLaren helped them achieve their vision, gave them their stage and told the public why it was all relevant, and why they should be afraid of a handful of snot-nosed kids from London.

Of course, McLaren did a lot musically besides working with the Pistols. He helped build a career for British pop act Bow Wow Wow in the ’80s. There was his short stint with the New York Dolls. And then there was his own recording career, which included the 1983 album Duck Rock and the 2005 song “About Her” (a riff on The Zombies’ “She’s Not There”) that was prominently featured in Kill Bill Vol. 2.

These days, indie bands rely on hype to get some semblance of a career off the ground. Yet, no one quite understood the relationship between hype and art quite like Malcolm McLaren.

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The Dillinger Escape Plan‘s reputation precedes the band. The mathcore quintet is (in)famous for their chaotic live sets, which are known for hosting waves of crowd-surfing and leaving members of the crowd and/or band with a broken bone or two. Such a legendary live performance might explain why the crowd Friday at Reggie’s Rock Club in Chicago was teeming with a sense of frantic energy before the group took the stage.

Yet, the energetic propulsion of chaos hardly gives the band enough credit, nor does it really help explain the rabid fandom DEP has garnered. Any group worth their weight in fast guitar trashing can set a crowd into a mess of moshing. It’s being able to morph a sound on the verge of chaos that’s truly impressive, and Dillinger Escape Plan has shown their ability to do just that on record and in a live setting.

Dillinger took command of the stage Friday and refused to relent for a full hour, blasting their way through songs garnered from their growing discography. DEP mixed four songs from their newest album, Option Paralysis, into a set of fan favorite songs and technically-difficult tunes.

It was a sight to behold. Between the kind of stage antics that would send most folks home in stitches, somehow guitarists Ben Weinman and Jeff Tuttle managed to string together an impressive amount of finger picking that would make the most worked-over finger calluses burst at the seams. All the while, drummer Billy Rymer sped through hyper-fast jazz-styled change-ups with ease and bassist Liam Wilson injected a bit of funky pazzaz into crowd-pleasers like “Black Bubblegum.” Greg Puciato pulled the package together, screaming like a maniac and hitting the highest notes at all the right points, all while comfortably guiding the band through ballads (“Mouth of Ghosts”) and melody-mashing songs (“Farewell, Mona Lisa.”)

Weinman took to Reggie’s rafters like a set of monkeybars at the end of Dillinger’s set. Though his leap to the crowd evokes his band’s death-defying challenge to put on a visceral and electrifying live set, even that act could not compare to the experience of seeing a Dillinger Escape Plan concert.