They Light A Way That Only Leads To Shallow Graves

Click on the photo and head over to AltPress.com to stream a brand new track from ANTI-FLAG off of their forthcoming album, “The General Strike” due out 3-20-12!

Being on the road with White Wives last month, we heard the mixes to the new AF record every other day as they were being completed.  In Seattle, #2 had me join him at the front of the van to help in grading the songs as we heard them.  It certainly wasn’t an easy task, but it was humbling to know that I was still considered a part of the targeted audience.  

I started listening to AF ALMOST 10 years ago.  I was around 15 or so and just starting to go to Warped Tour. That was in 2003. It was also during a time where I was trying my best to figure out what punk rock WAS.  I remember going into the local bookstore/record shop in town and finding “The Terror State” on the shelves. The name Anti-Flag sort of rang a bell but I couldn’t remember where I had heard it from.  Growing up in a small conservative town with a conservative family, I was rarely exposed to new music in school.  My entire high school was made up of about 500 students. My graduating class, around 50.  You do the math.  There were MAYBE 5 of us total that made up the “misfits” in the school.  And quite honestly, half of us (myself included) were pretty straightforward when it came to the rules.  I was in the top of my class and never got into trouble.  But I was still labeled differently due to the way I dressed and only hung around with our small group.  The main thing we had in common however, was the music.  When I finally started making the effort to go out and buy records, I was hooked. Anti-Flag’s “The Terror State” was probably one of the first records I purchased once I had discovered that new sound.  Once it had all seeped into my brain, I wanted more.  So I’d go out, and start buying records left and right from bands recommended to me in magazines that “rocked like:” Anti-Flag etc. That’s how I found NOFX, Rancid, Against Me!, The Bouncing Souls and a ton of the bands I listen to today.  Though never quite adopting a “punk” way of life, I was completely taken by the music and the messages conveyed in it, and in some way, I’d like to think that it molded me into who I am today.  A free-thinker. A grown-up. An Individual.  It definitely played a huge role in the musician I am today, that’s for certain.

And now, almost 10 years later, the same band that played a big role in the beginning for me, is about to release their next record, and I play in a band with 1/2 of them.  It’s a mysterious world we live in, but the first time I heard this new track, “Neo-Liberal Anthem” I couldn’t help but notice subtle nods to “The Terror State“‘s legacy and sound and the impact it had on my life. Even if the world is a little crazy, it all comes back to us full-circle every now and then.

That’s something worth holding on to.