Craig Ahead: Straight Ahead Reunion, Sick of it All Hiatus, Quitting Youth of Today, Agnostic Front

How fondly have you looked back at Straight Ahead for the last 40 years? Sometimes I would occasionally put it on like to end the war zone thing and it would give me goosebumps. I'd be like, wow, like listen to what I was doing when I was like a little kid. I was like, I was like no wonder everybody likes this so much. It's really good. Like from an outside perspective, I'm pretty damn happy with it. It pops. Pops like crazy, you know. Is there any hope in ever seeing Straight Ahead again? April 25th, we're playing in Brooklyn at the Brooklyn Monarch as main support for Gorillabiscuits. Yes, we've decided to play again. It feels like something we can do. It feels right. Like when we rehearse, I get like goosebumps. It's like really fun. So I'm excited for it, you know. Hello, welcome. It's hard work time. How you doing, Bo? I'm doing good. New Me, New Year, you know. That's right. New Me, New Year, exactly. First episode of the year and we've got a very special one. It is our honor to introduce a New York hardcore legend. There's no other way to say it. Iconic bass player, prolific, a man whose discography spans multiple generations and we're going to get into all of them. Quite a resume. Quite a resume. One of the greats. Ladies and gentlemen, Craig Ahead, first known as Craig Satari. How are you, Craig? Hey guys, what's up? Nice intro and thanks for having me. I'm excited. Thanks for being here. Unbelievable. I'm a fan of the shows. Oh, wow. I'm a fan of the show, so I'm excited to do this one. That means a lot. I know that when we spoke on the phone, you said you would forgive me for Warzone beating sick of it all in the 80s brackets. What are you going to do? I used to go see Warzone play. Smell the clothes, cigarettes, the pyramid club. I got some memories and some, the heartstrings go when I think about Warzone a little bit as well. So it's a ladies. Okay. So we all understand, you know, but I did. If you go back and review the footage, you'll see me going, I think it should be the thing at all. But here we are. Let's dive in. Yeah, sure. Sure. What can you do? Before you were Craig Ahead, you were Craig Satari. You were born Craig Satari. Tell me about that guy and your early life, life before hardcore music. All right. So as a little kid, I grew up in Queens, you know, the north end of Queens town called Bayside. Actually, I'm nice. One of the nicest parts of Queens. I was raised by my mother and I have an older brother. We grew up in a small apartment with no money. I had an alcoholic father that left when I was very young, but came around just enough for me to see some really bad stuff as a kid. And, you know, we all say when we talk about Harker, we all say we're here for a reason. You know, those type of memories are probably my reason. And, you know, I was just a normal kid growing up, getting into trouble and doing the wrong thing and hanging out in the streets and, you know, running around with my friends. But I, my mother is very loving and my brother's a great guy. And, you know, I always had a really good strong family unit, but no father in the house, you know? Sure. So that's pretty much my childhood. Bad influences most of the kids I grew up with. It's a cliche line, but they're dead or in jail. And I found music when I got to be a teenager and that's what sort of pulled me out of, you know, I was never a criminal at heart. I wasn't one of those guys, you know, I was friends with a lot of these guys, but the music is really what opened my eyes to the world and having a better, more fulfilling life, I think. It really, it really usually is one of two things. It's sports or music. Sometimes both. Both. It was both for me. I like baseball a lot when I was a kid. I played baseball. I wouldn't have been a pro baseball player, you know? Yeah. But, you know, what can I tell you? I actually heard that you've got some crazy baseball stories from your youth. I don't know about crazy baseball stories, but I played on a couple of championship teams as a kid and then as an adult, I played in an adult league and we won the championship and I made some plays. I was in like the local paper for making a player too, but there were guys in my baseball league that were like so good, they were like way better than me. I wasn't a standout. I was, you know, an average to good player. Where was this? This was in Bayside in Queens. I played in Bayside Little League. It was fun. And now forgive me if I don't know my geography, but being from Queens, does that make you a Mets fan? Well, technically, yeah. I mean, I'm a Mets fan because I grew up in the New Shoe Stadium, but, you know, the Mets over the years haven't given that much to really love, you know? It's outside of a few years, you know what I mean? But technically, I'm a Mets fan, yeah. Who was the catcher? Mike Piazza, you're talking about? Oh my God. I loved that guy. Yeah, he could play. He was good. He was a good power-maker. He had a terrible arm. He couldn't throw the ball at all. But he was tough, you know? He was tough. He was good defensively and he could hit really well, but his throwing was horrible. The dude couldn't hit the side of a arm from 10 feet away. Like he would throw to second base and we'd go to center, you know what I mean? I mean, look, you only got to do one thing great, right? We can't all be a ton. You got to, I mean, listen, you know, you do what you can, you know what I mean? Yeah. You need, the world needs our Dennis Rodman, you know? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Growing, I know we're not going to talk that much about baseball, but growing up, I was a Cubs fan, so we would root against the Mets, obviously. And, but my dad, he was like a big Cubs guy. He would always be like, I like Piazza. All right. Yeah. He's got awesome. You know, yeah, it's one of those guys. So you said music was the thing that got you out of a bad environment, rough environment, a rough crowd. Was it hardcore music right away? Not right away. I'd say when I was about, you know, 10 years old was when I really started digging into music. I started playing bass around 10 or 11 years old. You know, when I was a little kid, my brother would bring home some records like, you know, Aro Smith and, you know, like Black Sabbath. And I love that stuff. And I still do. I still love that. And, you know, I got into that. And then my brother started going to high school. And I, he, Danny Loker was his, his classmate. They had music class together. First thing in the morning, they became friends of Big Charlie Hankins, who was the, the bouncer at CBGBs, rest his soul. He would come over too, because my brother played on the football team. My brother was like the last bench warmer on the football team. And Charlie was the star of the team. So they were friends. And Danny was the connection because Danny was into like metal and punk and hardcore. And Charlie would go to CBs. So those guys came over and brought me records. And it just turned, Danny started, you know, show me bass and all that. And it just turned into this thing from when I was like 10, 11 years old, where I just, did he give you your first base? He did. He actually gave it to my brother. My brother was going to play bass for that band Anthrax back in like 1980. And because they were just starting and they were just starting to play. And my brother didn't really care about that. You know, he wanted to like drink beer and pick up chicks, you know what I mean? So, uh, I would just sit home every day and play the thing. And I got good pretty fast. By the time I was 12, I was like in bands and stuff. Was Danny Locke or somebody who was around hardcore in its infancy? Yes, he was. He was. He was like into rock and metal and hardcore. And, you know, he was a fan of everything. He was like a, he was like the first crossover guy. So he turned beyond to, you know, everything from, you know, lack Sabbath to the exploited. You know what I mean? Oh, wow. He would give me seven inches back in the early 80s. And I was like, let's go to show. Let's go to show. He's like, all right, wait, wait to get a little older, wait to get a little older. You know, before we get there, when, when, when you're picking up the base, I'm just curious, are you, because like really early on in your discography, you're doing, you're doing little bass runs, you're doing stuff that a lot of guys weren't necessarily doing at the time. The base was more of like mimicking the guitar, you know, but you're kind of playing a little more traditionally, which I would imagine comes from some of the stuff you're finding, some of the records you're getting. Are you playing with your fingers? Are you playing with a pick? Like, how are you approaching this instrument that's new to you? The first, the first, like I'd say from 10 to 12, I pretty much played with my fingers. I learned how to play everything with my fingers. I was a big fan of John Nets, Russell from the Who. The Ox, baby. Yeah, the Ox is great. So I learned all of that stuff and all early Sabbath, I was a big fan of Giza Butler. He's kind of like one of my main influences. So I was doing that. And I then when I first started playing shows with bands, I played with my fingers, but certain stuff when I started playing more like punk and hardcore, certain and even some like heavy metal stuff when I was a little kid, some of it had to be played with a pick. So I worked on my picking and I got really good with a pick. So I pretty much play hardcore with a pick, but I played with my fingers as well. It just depends what I'm, what I'm playing and who I'm playing with, you know, when I jam with certain people that have nothing to do with hardcore, I'll play with my fingers a lot. You know, that makes sense. Just a true baseman. Yeah, I was a bass player before I was a hardcore guy. It kind of came together in a way, but I didn't start playing bass because of hardcore. I was a bass player that found hardcore. I think you can tell in a lot of your choices in songwriting. I mean, we'll get there, but like in Straight Ahead right off the bat, right off the bat. Yeah. It's the first thing you notice. Straight Ahead was pretty unique musically. Like it goes by so fast that it's hard to really pick it apart. But if you listen to the actual parts, some of it's just very basic, but a lot of it's like very musical. It just happens so fast and it's so like eclectic, I guess is a good word for it. It's pretty eclectic stuff. Like I listen back to it. I'm proud of it. I think to myself, this is some of the best stuff I ever wrote. It's totally like, it's very unique. It sounds like nothing else really. You could hear the influences of other things, but the actual, the riffs and the way they go together, there's weird timings and there's all kinds of like strange musical stuff. It's insane how much happens efficiently in so little time. 100%. Yeah, that's a good way to put it. I look back at that with a lot of pride. And the way the sound I got, like on my first End of Wars recording, it was just straight into the board. I was playing red, my red bass, it just, it just, it just all fell together. I was like, I kind of found my way and I'm not recording. I feel like that was, that was like me. You know what I mean? In order to get there, I want to, I want to know how you met Tommy Carroll and other key bands and figures in your early life in hardcore. I went to my first hardcore show in 84. It was warm weather. So I did somewhere of 84. I don't remember the exact date, but I went to a show and I started every week I went to shows and right away, pretty, pretty quickly, I met Tommy at a show at like a Sunday matinee and we were talking and he was saying, Hey, you know, I play in this band, this NYC mayhem band with these other guys. And, you know, like I kind of, it's good, but we need a new bass player and I don't really like the direction, you know, he was like finding his way as well. So I wanted to play with him. So Tommy and I became fast friends right away. We were friends and he was cool. You know, he would give me tapes. I would listen to these new bands. He would give me, I would give him some stuff and we would go back and forth like that. And he invited me to go watch one of the rehearsals I did and then shortly after I was in the band. So Are any of the, were any of the songs on the violence demo written before you were in the band? All of them. Okay. So you didn't, you were not part of that writing process? No, the really metal sounding stuff. I didn't write when I came in, it was like Tommy was like, Hey, I want to play hardcore. And so when I joined the band, we used some of those songs still, because it was like a transitional period, but I wrote a bunch of other songs. And Gordon also wrote songs that were more like the direction we were going in. So like a lot of, so a lot of that mayhem stuff, the mayhem stuff that we would play were straight ahead songs. We took them for straight ahead and adopted them and just sort of like, we didn't really even change them. We just played them, maybe the arrangement switched a little, but a lot of later mayhem later, it's like six months later, six months later, but six months when you're 14 or 15, 15 is a long time, you know, but a lot of that stuff was used for for straight ahead as well. Something so, so Tommy played drums and sang and NYC mayhem and the demo came out in 85 I think the one you're talking about probably came out in 84, I think. So that's even crazier because if that came out in 84, it's got blast beats on it starts with blast beats. Yeah, we were that band was one of the first blast beat bands. Maybe the first maybe because if it's 84, the alleged first blast beat in recorded history is milk by SOD. Yeah, but they got that from Danny and from, I don't want to say for me, but they got that from me and Danny jamming in my house and recording stuff. We used to take, I had this plush bass amp and we would hang a microphone down over it and hang it in front of the speaker. I would sit on a milk crate with a tape, a cassette thing and we tape them like a can, a beer can to it. I had a drum stick and a screwdriver with tape around it and we would play off the cabinet and play the thing and hit the little thing as a symbol and he would play bass distorted through a wah and we would switch back and forth between him drumming and singing and me doing it. We did this thing called the Crab Society. It was like a joke and that became like something that SOD did later and it was Yeah, their demo was Crab Society North. Yeah, we did something like that. We did that like a year before or whatever and it was like it was like a joke. It was so fun. You know? But then, but so that means NYC Mayhem is the first recorded Blastbeat. In the context of Punk and Metal and Hardcore? I think so, yeah. Because the guys from Napalm Death, they always say you're the first Blastbeat. Your thing was, you know, your band, NYC Mayhem and that early Crab Society was the first Blastbeat. So that's what the guys in Napalm Death say and they're like the next Blastbeat, I guess. Yeah, yeah. Colin, when was like Hellhammer going? Well, that was okay. Okay. But that would be 81 or 82, 83 because Celtic Frost started in 84. Right. So if I had to guess, I would have said Hellhammer, you know, right? I would have assumed. But that's the that's a you're right. You're right. That's not a blast. Whereas Tommy is going. You was doing a lot of drum rolls. Yeah. A lot of drum rolls off the hi hat and then later straight ahead was was punches, you know, off the riffs. So we're doing more like, like almost like straight ahead did the scissor. Yeah, constantly. A symbol cue is bad. But like, like Tom stop almost like, like, I call him like circus beats. Sounds like a circus sped up. So where where would he have gotten? Did he was he getting that from like jazz? Yeah, you know, he he he played drums and he liked jazz when he was a little kid because his father was into jazz. So he always says to me, I had like a jazz influence, but I didn't realize it was jazz. But also he said, All right, these guys do this, I'm going to do a snare roll to make it even faster because he wanted to play really fast when he was a kid like that. Unbelievable. That's what we call hard lore. That's hard lore. So NYC mayhem coincides with the the explosion of extreme metal. Yeah, four years after Slayer or three years after Slayer, two years after possessed the first death metal band a year after Celtic Frost starts or the same year, if you're saying the demo is 84, that's insane. It is straight up proto generation one death metal. So we played like they played that and then I joined, but we then we turned more into a hardcore band because we, you know, like I was more into hardcore and so was Tommy and we kind of morphed. Okay. And that's why we eventually broke up because Gordon didn't want to play like that. So he left and then straight ahead one of the forming down the line. Okay. By down the line, I mean, like eight months later, straight ahead probably formed in December of eight. Was it like no, no, December 85 December or something? Yeah, like December of 85 or maybe even earlier. It's hard for me to say mayhem was like the end of 84 through most of 85. We played with the psychos at CBs on October 6th of 1985. And that might have been the last mayhem show. I'm not sure. And as you're doing that, you're thinking, fuck this, I just want to play hardcore. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, you know, we played with this. It was the numskulls, which was Richie's band before that he called it true blue, but then it was underdog. And they played and I'm token entry played mayhem played and the psychos played. It was like a matinee at CBs. And, you know, we were like Tommy, you know, you should be Tommy wanted to be a frontman. We wanted to be the frontman. We were like, yeah, having the drummer behind the drum sucks. We won't have pylons and simulons. We wanted to increase the fun factor, you know what I mean? So we, you know, Tommy came out behind the drums. So we were like, who's going to play drums? And one day we were sitting outside of CBs and I was telling our mom this story. I was like, yeah, Tommy wants to, you know, sing and we're going to change it up. We're not sure what the name's going to be. And our mom was like, I want to play drums. I was like, but you play guitar. Because he was a guitar player, really good one originally. And he was like, I want to play drums. And I'm like, you don't play. He goes, yeah, but I always wanted to. I was like, okay, we're going to rehearse and, and like, you know, whatever, we're going to rehearse on Thursday. We rehearsed and we had a gig. Like the first gig was like two weeks later. So he played a rehearsal like a handful of times and played the first straight ahead gig. Holy shit. And Billy Psycho was the guy who tried out. He tried out, but we didn't take him because you did. You did Armand playing hitting stuff for the first time over Billy Psycho. Pretty much. Yeah. Yeah. You know, Billy was, Billy was more of a traditional drummer. You know what I mean? It didn't, it wouldn't really work. It was too, it was so fast. Was, was Armand already not singing in Rest in Pieces at this time? He was, uh, at that point, I think he was just playing guitar for Rest in Pieces and he switched over to guitar and vocals. Because originally they had a guy named Rob Calhoun rest his soul singing and Armand was a guitar player. I think at that point Armand was singing and playing guitar. So Armand is just getting greedy. I gotta do it all. Yeah. He was like, you know, he was like a real, he was into it, man. He was like so into it. I love about the stories about any bustling beginning scene is it's pickup, it's their pickup games. It's like who's around. Like what was around. Totally. Totally. Let's get him in. Before we move on too far, uh, Craig, do you remember, you mentioned going to that first CB show. Do you remember who played? Uh, AOD adrenaline overdose. Bedlam. And, and no, no, it might have been bed. It was either, no, it was either bedlam or it was bodies and panic, maybe. I don't remember. Might have been bodies and panic. And, uh, this band opened up, um, Malignant tumor. It was like that first show, maybe. And it was this guy, Jimmy. He had a big scar over his eye. And you know, when he came out, he's like, Hey, you guys, you know me from hanging out in the park. I'm Jimmy and friends with Roger and those guys, blah, blah, blah. And they played and I liked them. They were like real simple. They had like three chord songs, was single. It was like early, it was like 84 hardcore, three chord songs, like, you know, like mental abuse, AOD, you know, like with these bands, like, like, um, like the tumor opening up. It was like early hardcore. The whole place smelled like clothes, cigarettes, early, 84. The clothes, cigarettes, everything. So, like, love cigarettes. And we either had a shaved head or a Mohawk and they all had on trench coats and Doc Martins. Sick. That's totally. And you're, you're in. I mean, I'm in. And the Rock Hotel show is really smelled like clothes. You go to the Rock Hotel and like 84, it just smelled like clothes. Cigarettes, 84, 85, everything smelled like clothes. Cigarettes. Now, Craig, do you hate the smell of clothes, cigarettes so much that you become straight edge? I don't know about that, but it definitely reminds me of like being like a, a scared, but thrilled little kid. Yeah, sure. Just mashing, but being like, God, it fucking stinks. Yeah. You know, the first show, the first show I ever went to, I went to CBs and I walk in and there's like maybe 40, 60 people there. Everyone's got the trench coats. It smells like clothes, cigarettes. And I walk in and I see big Charlie Hankins and he looks at me. He goes, kid, kid, you finally came to the show, to a show and he grabs me and he goes, good thing. He's hugging me saying hello. And he says to everybody, he goes, yo, you see, it was in between bands. He goes, you know, before the first band started, he goes, you see this kid? This kid's my friend. He goes, we all look out for this kid. He's a good kid. So then during that show, I was mashing and he took me on his shoulders and we did chicken fights like old school chicken fights. And right away, everybody was my friend and I became friends with stigma. I don't know if it was that day or the next time I went, but right away, I was friends with everybody. They took you under their wing. Big Charlie gave me his blessing. I mean, the opposite of Mark Porter's experience showing up with metalheads getting his ass kicked. Wow. That is really beautiful. So you're 84. You're in. A year later, same year you're doing in NYC mayhem. A year later, 40 years ago, straight ahead is born. Yeah. Yeah. And remains to this day, one of the most beloved, influential, and still underrated, short-lived hardcore bands of all time. You know, we never, we never really, it happened then and it was never really pushed again. So it was like very much that time period, you know? Yeah. I'm sorry to interrupt. No, no, you're, I want to hear it. You did this right here. Oh, I love that one. And then you did one more record and basically called it a day. Craig, is there any hope in ever seeing straight ahead again? April 25th, we're playing in Brooklyn at the Brooklyn Monarch as main support for Gorilla Biscuits. Yes, we've decided to play again. And we, we are doing that. We've rehearsed. It sounds great. Tommy totally has his act together. Vocally, he's been practicing for months. We've been talking about doing this for years. And we always were like, I was on tour and me and Armand were like, we don't really have time. And, you know, Tommy was busy with work and it just, it never really worked out. And now that Lou God bless him, you know, is, is, is, is not playing right now because he's recovering. We just figured, you know, if we're ever going to do it, now is the time and Tommy's in a good place. He's family man. And he was like, he wanted to do it so bad. He's like, I want to do this. I want to do this. We didn't close that outright. He's like, I want to do it. We got to do it. He goes, I want the opportunity to set set it straight so that it is right for forever. Like in other words, we ended, we broke up, we should have kept going. We never did any, we didn't really continue in any manner. So he was really excited. I said, listen, Tommy, here's the deal. Work on the material, we'll rehearse. We'll see how it sounds. And we rehearsed and Tommy sang every song without it without any problem. Good timing sounded great. We ran through the set like three times. He didn't, his voice didn't fail. The next day I called him, he talked fine. He's like, when you told me there's a possibility we can do this, I've been practicing like multiple times per week for the past bunch of months. So he's in shape. We sounded really good. Robin Armad is the original lineup. I think it's going to be really good. It just feels like something we can do. It feels right. Like when we rehearse, I get like goosebumps. It's like really fun. So I'm excited for it. You know, for the first time since 1988, straight ahead is back. You heard it here. And, and it's, I think it's going to be really good. I guarantee it's going to be really good. So it's you, Tommy, Armand and Rob. Yeah, same exact group, same setup. We sound good. Like we play those old songs way better than we used to. It sounds the same, but it's more, it's more, it sounds like clearer. You can like hear the parts. We're not rushing through it as much. We're still playing super fast, but the backup sound clearer. Yeah. We, the sounds are nice and crisp. I think it's going to be great. I'm so excited for this. I can't wait. I mean, you and you and I wanted to say it here first with you guys because I love the summer fan of the show and you guys get it. We do. That means the world. We love straight ahead. Yep. Obviously, you know, it's well documented. We got to get it on streaming now. The people need to working on that need to have it. I was waiting till, you know, the show was announced, which is happening earlier, which happened just earlier today. It got announced today. Got announced today. And so I got the streaming in the works and all kinds of stuff I'm working on. We have social media that we just set up. I set up a Facebook and an Instagram straight ahead NYHC. Beautiful. On both of them. Unbelievable. Let me ask you, this is something I was, I was wondering about Little Insider baseball for everybody out there. We knew all that coming into the show. Come on. But I was wondering part of straight ahead's appeal, at least back, especially back before streaming was even the thing, was the fact that you kind of had to know to know about straight ahead. It was like, you had to be pretty into hardcore to know about straight ahead or rest in pieces or like some of these bands that were pretty short lived, but were really, really fucking cool. And I'm just curious, are you at all like worried about, because like obviously you have to go to YouTube or something to listen to the EP, you know, like, is that, are you worried about losing any of that like mystique or the mysteriousness or anything like that? I put this off, people all throughout the years have been asking me, put the record out. I always say, no, I want to leave it where it is. It's special. It's going to be the unsung thing, like, you know, almost like a minor threat, but less known. You know what I mean? I'm not going to compare it to minor threat, which is like the ultimate, but you get the idea. I was like, no, I'm just going to leave it where it is. It's going to be one of those rare bands that never, you know, that you had to be there and it's hard to find. But honestly, like, this feels right. It never felt right. Now it feels right. It just feels like it's going to work. I know we're going to be really good. Will it be exactly the same? I don't think so, because we're not little kids anymore. But like, I know that I'm thrilled to play that material, and I can still play it with that. I still get that adrenaline rush where I feel coming out of me. That stuff just gets me. You know, I always, it's my own band and I wrote the songs, but I still love that stuff, you know. And you've been Craig ahead for 40 years, you know? Tommy always called me Greg, with a G, still to this day, Greg, Greg, Greg. But one day he went up a show and he goes, he goes, Arm and Hammer on drums, and he goes, and on bass, and he looked at me and he started laughing. He goes, Greg ahead, and I just laughed, and it's stuck ever since. Wow. Let's get into the discography here, straight ahead. Started with, was there a cassette demo before those songs were on the End of War Zone 7-8? No, that's the recording of the material. That's it. We did it. We did it. Why? On a seven inch comp. Every other band here has got one, two, one band has four songs, they're very short. Straight ahead's got nine songs on a seven inch comp. Why? Hardcore. That's why. Hardcore. Hardcore. That's why. We were like, yo, who puts out two songs? That's like what rock and metal bands do. Let's put a whole bunch of stuff on. We just blasted it out. We recorded 12 songs, but we put nine in a month. Right. Yeah. 12 songs are on a cassette somewhere. 12 songs were in that session. That session was three hours in a studio uptown, and it was the guy that, the guy, what's his name, that did the bad brand stuff later on. What the hell was his name? He did some sick of it all, stuff to a good guy. A little tiny place, little singular room behind in a little glass booth, and we just sat up and played and we, you know, the band played. Tommy actually played drums on that because Armand, I just, you know, just triple X X X drums. So that's Tommy playing. You get to look at your face. You get it. No credit for Armand. But he didn't play on it. Tommy played on it. So Armand, you know, we looked like, we'll just do it with Tommy because, you know, Armand was so fresh to drumming. And three hours, 25 bucks an hour, 75 bucks. We played the songs like all pretty much in one take. We might have went over, oh, let me do that one again. We did it. And then as soon as we were done, Tommy sang and Robin, myself, we stood on the side, Tommy's side and just yelled into the mic, the backups as we went. So you're going, straight ahead. Yeah. Right next to him yelling and spitting his face. You know what I mean? Scream it out. So being an early straight edge band, how straight edge was this band? Did anybody in hardcore in 1986 look at straight edge as a concept as like this a big lifetime commitment like it is now? You know, the old like straight edge was like, uh, youth of today had their seven inch out. We love minor threat. And that was like Tommy's thing. Tommy would like uncover. He'd get really into an aspect of the scene and he'd go in all the way and then he'd find something else and he'd go into that. He wouldn't like leave behind what he did, but he was one of those guys that like dug in with both heels. So, uh, you know, the straight, I was like, I don't want to call the band straight ahead. I'm not straight edge. Like, I would drink beer and I was like, what are you doing? And he's like, no, it'll be great. Trust me. I was like, well, you know, I like straight edge stuff. I'm cool. And then like I, you know, within three months, I wasn't drinking beer or back then probably three weeks. So I was technically straight. I was straight. I'm straight edge now. So it kind of worked out, you know? Okay. How long were you straight edge at the time? Uh, for a while. Probably I was, I was straight edge. Once I started becoming straight edge, I was straight edge for years until, uh, Stigma had me smoke a joint with him. Uh, He'll do it. Stigma. That'll get you. You know, probably got me drawn to, you know what I mean? Who is one step ahead records? That was a guy named Mike Rubin from California. Tarzana. That's the valley baby. Yeah. He came to New York. He came. He was a friend of Tommy's like a tape trading pen pal. He came to New York and, uh, came to all rehearsals. And Tommy was like, yeah, we're going to put out a record with him. We're going to do a seven inch comp. And I remember he came to New York and he came to a rehearsal. He rehearsed the old giant on 38th street. It was back with like 85 or whatever. And, uh, he came in and I met him off the train because I took the seven train in from Queens or the F train, seven to the F. So I took maybe, maybe back then 38th street was probably just the, uh, just a seven train, whatever. I don't remember, but I met him at the train and we walked to the rehearsal and there was a guy, a kid, a young guy doing the shell game, you know, with the three shells and he stopped and the guy goes, yo man, which one's it under? And he looked at the guy I go, don't talk to him. And the guy looked at me and he goes, yo man, don't speak for him. He's a grown man. Maybe we're like 15. And, uh, I go, Mike, I go, Mike, don't, don't answer him. And he's like, the guy got like a little louder three. And I was like, I was like, yeah, yeah, I go, I know this, you know, I like, I, the guy was trying to bait him. And I was like, yeah, I know what's up. And I said, Mike, just walk away. And Mike was like that one. And he won. And the guy handed him like, you know, five bucks. And I was like, I was like, Mike, he's got you now. I go, I go, I go give him the five bucks and walk away. Just give it back to him. And the guy was arguing with me and, uh, he wound up losing like a hundred bucks and like, you know how that goes? Like a minute and a half. That's like 800 bucks now. Back then. Yeah. And I was like, I mean, he was all upset. I go, Mike, man, what did I tell you? I go, don't, you don't do that. I go, but anyway, really nice guy. Those guys are good. Fell into it. The guy was an expert. You know what I mean? Like I was a skinny little 15 year old kid. It was like, you know, three dudes with them giant dudes. I was like, sort of like, cheering on. Yeah, he got it. Yeah, he got it. Yeah. That's, they got me at the Berlin Wall bad one time. Analog slot machines, dude. That's all it is in Germany. Huh? Wow. Oh yeah. And he was good. And I, at the end, I was like, you're good. And he went, I am very good. You know, I remember too. I remember like when you were young, when you first, when I first started going to England, the guys would hang outside like the strip clubs and they'd be like, come in, come in, have a drink. Oh dude. I knew that. And these other bands we would tour with these kids. I'd be like, whatever you do, don't answer that guy. Don't engage him. Just keep walking. And one guy in a band went in sat down, they gave him a drink and you know, you got to give me 800 bucks or 500 bucks or whatever. And they took him to the ATM and they like beat him up. And I was like, you know, what did I tell you? Like I was like, you, you're going to lose all your Michael. It's like giant German like gangster guys. They're going to be what are you going to do? You know what it means? Like a little kid. He was like, what? I was like, I told you, man. Don't do that. So simultaneously with straight straight ahead is, is existing. You're, you got the end of the war zone stuff. You're riding breakaway simultaneously. You're playing bass in a little band called Youth of Today. Tell me about this time of your life. You played bass on breakdown the walls. Yeah. You know what's crazy about that? Like back then, like from 80, from the middle of 84 to like 87 was, you know, whatever, a couple of short years, it seemed like a decade or two. Things happened so fast back then, back then a summer into the fall was like four years as now. Yeah. Just it's so insane. What happened was Tommy was, became friends with Ray. I met Purcell when, uh, when violent children played C.B.s. They were, uh, they were main support for a big New York band show at C.B.s. And, uh, I met Purcell and he was cool. I liked the way you marched. I was like, you got style, you know? I like that. I feel that way today about some people. And yeah, he was, you know, he was, I was like, check this guy out. Like, I thought he was cool. And, uh, so what happened was they became friends with Tommy as well. So they said, hey, we need a drummer. So Tommy started jamming with Youth of Today and Gavin was going to play bass. Gavin, Gavin Burn was going to play bass because he knew all those guys. He knew Purcell from upstate somehow. They, he lived upstate for a while. Gavin, what happened was Gavin was going to play bass for whatever reason. Gavin didn't play bass and Tommy said, Hey, look, if I'm going to play drums, get Craig to play bass. Craig, you know, he, he knows the seven inches. Tommy is your fucking boy. Tommy's my boy. Tommy's one of the best guys in the world. People that don't know Tommy. He is one of the coolest guys ever. He, he is so, you can, Tommy could do something wrong, right? Tommy could like do something. You know, most people when your friend does something and messes up and you go, yo, what'd you do? We tried to get out of it. Tommy will be like, yeah, I fucked that up. And I'll be like, why'd you do it? He'd be like, you know, back in the old days, he'd be like, well, I was drunk, you know what I mean? But he will, he'll like mess something up and own it. Like he, he doesn't, the guy doesn't lie. I've seen him protect people when they were wrong, but he'd say to the other people, this guy's all right. He made a mistake. He got to let him go. Like he's, he's your friend. Tommy's a friend. He's honest. He'll take fault when he does something wrong. Tommy's one of the most straight up honest people I've ever known. Like he's a no bullshit type guy. And he, he looks out for you. Tommy's great. I love him. That's why when I, when we were talking about this and I saw the state he was in and how enthusiastic he was and how his life is, I was like, as long as his voice, if he can sing and physically sing the songs, now's the time to do it. I'm glad to hear he's in, he's in a good place now. So he gets, he gets you in youth today. It's me in youth today. So Ray writes me a letter, right? I have a letter somewhere from Ray and he's like, it's a long like two or three page letter. Saying how we can do great things together. You know, you join this band, we'll be a one strong force. We're all on the same page. It's like a really nice letter. Yeah. He writes me like this inspirational letter. It's almost like a sermon in like by a deacon in a church or something. And I wound up playing in the band. So that's what happened. Yeah. Try it out. How long were you in the band and did you contribute to the writing on Breakdown the Wall? I was in the band for probably a year. It seemed like a lot more. I think I started playing with them in like maybe March of 86 or at least that's when Ray moved to New York and we started playing shows and I played with them all through 87 or went to California. I thought it was the summer of 86, but Brazil straightened me out on that. We went in the winter of 86 into the turn of 87 or maybe right when it turned to 87. We were out in California and I played with them then and Breakdown the Walls had already come out. So I played with them for about a year. It was fun. So did you write any of Breakdown the Walls? No, but what happened was I didn't write any of it because I already had all the material. I wrote a song that was going to be on Breakdown the Walls. It was called New Beginning and originally the label was going to be called New Beginning and said they went on Wishingwell. So the New Beginning thing never happened. So I wrote a song called New Beginning. We played it two or three times at shows, but we wound up dropping it. They didn't put it on the record. So New Beginning is a straight ahead song because it was never played live, but we had the song and when we started playing again in 87 after they broke up, New Beginning was a straight ahead song, but we recorded it without vocals. At that point, there's like a weird demo somewhere that nobody's ever heard. So New Beginning is one of the songs we're going to actually play at this show. Okay, cool. It's like a fast, hardcore song with a big, big Breakdown, big SSD type Breakdown. Sing a word. Yeah, what more do you want? So let me ask you a couple questions. I know you said it was already prepared, but I gotta wonder with your style in straight ahead, the song stabbed in the back. It's got a little bass run in there. Did you bring that to the table or was that already written? Actually, I was already written. Ray wrote it. He wrote it kind of with the bass run. I tailored it a little bit. I put a little tail on it. It's basically something that Ray wrote. Ray wrote pretty much all of those songs musically. He wrote all of them. Wow. Wow. Break it right. He can write. Yeah. Good for you, Ray. And he knows his way around an instrument a little bit. He's like, oh, that's major. That's minor. Oh my God, you know that. Okay. There is a one of my favorite. It seems real early youth today, but when we're talking, as you said, how seasons go by in the span of years, it's you guys playing at Seabees. And you are as skin-hend up as possible. I think you're x'd up and you're skanking to all the parts and it's just like the coolest style. It's the coolest style I can connect with personally while being the oldest version of it. Do you want to be like the first example? I can pinpoint of like that's a guy. Oh, that's what all my peers and I'm trying to do. That's what I'm trying to do. So I want to know where are you getting that from? How are you being like, I'm going to skank during this what we now call youth group part on stage. First, let me say I love your enthusiasm and that's why I wanted to be on this show because you guys have that little kid enthusiasm. I have the same thing. I was like these guys, we'd be playing in the sandbox. You know what I mean? Oh, I'm still in the sandbox. Hey, this episode we're going to call Spirit of YouTube. You know what I mean? Because we have studied these things. This is the sandbox. This is it. You know, like I love that that can't close my eyes seven inch and I saw them when they played Seabees. The first time they played in New York, they opened up for, I think it was a Gnostic front. And I thought they were great. And I moshed and sang along the whole show, you know, and I was like just excited like, and these guys like they would go off on stage and I was off on stage and I just wanted to like, I would get on stage even later with Sick of It All. And we first went to Europe like in my mind, I was like, I'm from New York hardcore. I'm going to show these people what this is like people, they're not going to, they've never seen this. We're going to represent where we come from. It was like pride. I was like, this isn't, I was like, this is New York hardcore. They're going to see what this is. Now, is that because people are like, these guys are from Connecticut and then to some extent? Well, I don't know about that. I mean, they moved to New York and they were into it. So I wasn't really thinking like necessarily where they're, I'm just talking in general, you know what I mean? But that band, I was like, well, I was like, we're going to, we're going to come out like on fire. You know what I mean? Yeah, but not to necessarily impress everyone, partially, but to impress ourselves, to be the hardcore bands. You know what I mean? Yeah. So did the breakdown, the walls recording process give you a perspective to which to approach breakaway? Recording breakaway? Was it like, damn, this is what this could be. I need to take this next one. Not really. I feel like with youth of today, when they were in the studio, but the one record I did with them, they didn't really care too much about, they didn't really know much about recording or getting sounds in the studio. They were just like, yeah, let's just play and make a record. They weren't. It sounds insanely good. Well, it worked out well. But like, I think with straight ahead with like Rob and Armand and Tommy, we were more like, we understood the studio a little better. We were a little more like, I don't want to say we were more musical. We were a little more on, we were more players, I think. Sure. You know, we were more like players, I guess. So Armand quickly became good enough to record drums? The first show we played, he was pretty good. I mean, he's crazy. It was weird, but Armand's like a very talented guy. Armand's one of those guys, he's a great guitar player. He plays bass really well. And like, they're like too sick of it all songs where he actually played bass and nobody knows it on records because they were songs he wrote and we didn't, he wrote them at the last minute and he was like, you want me to show you the song? And I'd be like, just let's not take the hour to do it. I go, you just play the bass track. You know what I mean? So he did that on like two songs over the course of Sikovil. Dr. Midnight coming in. He's a guy just pops right in. He's very good at everything. So he picked drums right away. They drive me crazy. Good at guitar, singing, drums, podcasting, co-hosting. They drive me nuts. They're the worst. I'm not done with you to today though. Yeah, I got a couple more questions. Yeah, this guy's a drummer, but he's a guitar player, but I think of him more as a drummer. He's one of those guys. He's one of those guys. One of those guys. Was it the breakdown the wall session where Ray stopped singing and people opened the door and he was passed out? Yes. I was there when he passed out. He was jumping up and down and I was like, why is this guy jumping up and down and just sing the song? You don't have to jump up and down, but he was into it. I was like, all right. You can hear it in the session. Yeah. He jumps up. I want, he's jumping up and you can see him from the chest up, you know, because he's in the booth and he's jumping. All right, he's jumping up and down and all of a sudden he jumps up and he doesn't come back up and he doesn't sing the rest of the song. I'm like, what's this guy doing? And he's like, got lightheaded and went down. It's great. And now, right? And then it's funny. Oh, it's funny. My last question for you today. As people who were not involved at the time and you were in what, what, like, because we obviously, we talked to Stigma, we talked to Dejan and Tom and we did a small bit of our New York Hardcore episodes. The, but they were kind of like, Stigman was already around and like some of these guys were already around, but you were there during a period of time that like a lot of us, and my peers consider like the New York Hardcore, Golden Age, like the starting of all these bands and all these stories and all this shit we know with Youth of Today specifically, we're going to talk a lot more about all other New York Hardcore with Youth of Today specifically. Did you feel as though this was a band because they seem in hindsight to be starting a movement to be doing the youth crew, to be doing a thing? Was that a feeling that was happening at the time? Where you felt as though, oh, they're doing, it's more than just music. It's this vegetarianism, the straight edge thing and the youth thing. The symbolism. Yeah, it kind of just built slowly. It was like, you know, like, oh, I'm vegetarian. Oh, yeah. Well, let's eat. Okay. And, you know, we eat something vegetarian. And then like, hey, like the kid from bold would be like, I'm going to cook and he cooks on vegetarian. I'd be like, Oh, I'm going to make that. And I'd like go home and make it for my mother and brother. And he'd be like, Oh, that was really good. Cook again next week. Okay. And it just took like a, it took its shape, you know, Ray was very much like a guy always experimenting with what's next. And he was very much people listen to him. He had like the cult of personality thing going on. So he had a strong personality. So he was basically driving force behind a lot of that type of stuff, you know, and I realized it was happening. But when you're in the middle of it, you don't see it as how it looks, how it's going to look. There's no hindsight. Yeah, there's no hindsight yet. But um, yeah, that was like a big thing. And a lot of people were for it. And a lot of people were against it. A lot of the old New York heads would be like, What are you doing in that band, kid? You know, like, I, you know, you're like, you know, you're like a hardcore guy, like one of us, you're doing, I go, Listen, man, I'm not shutting the door on anything. It's great. I love it. I go to bands great. But you know, this guy's saying this and that. And I was like, he can say what he wants. That's why we're all here. You know what I mean? There was a push and a pull kind of, you know, there was like some varying things going on, you know? So was it like the old heads being like these new guys coming around and setting all these rules? People weren't against them, but they were like some little, sometimes the envelope got pushed a little too far. You know what I mean? Like one time you said today, played and Murphy's Law was playing and they were like, they love Murphy's Law, but they kind of almost talked shit on Murphy's Law. And I was like, yo, do that. It was my favorite band ever. I'll be up there with an X singing about fucking, you know what I mean? Yeah, I'll be up there with an X, like, you know, watching Joe Bruno do burnt toast. I was like, this is the greatest band ever. And they would laugh because they were all friends. There was no like actual beef. But I was like, you know, like, come on, now let's not go. I'm not getting involved in that. Murphy's Law. Come on. Straight edge kids with X's singing along. You know, Murphy's Law. It's like 100%. To me, that's like the most hardcore thing that could ever happen. And you know, at the same time Murphy's Law is later, they're wearing floor punch shirts later. So they're doing the same thing, you know? And lastly, Craig, Craig ahead, were you part of the youth crew? I was for 8086. Yeah, I was 80. But then after I quit the band, I remember it said on the wall at the anthrax, not the one, not the little one in the little basement one, the next one, the kind of bigger one. And it said on the backstage on the wall, it said Craig ahead, put an X on his hand, but didn't take the oath. Oh, everyone pointed at, oh, look, that's like Purcell talking shit on you. And we would just laugh. Yeah, but then so do you quit youth today to like take straight ahead more seriously? Yeah, what happened was I was playing with those guys, you know, it was a little bit of the how, you know, it was getting a little more closed, like we're like this, and this is what it is. And I was like, well, that's cool. But I was a little more, you know, it's hard to explain, like it felt like it was turning into like, more of a dress code and like a way it had to be than a way it was. It had a little bit of that vibe. And I went to California with those guys and we had a good time. But you know, I didn't really fit in with them back then. I was a little younger, and I was a quieter. So I felt like I wasn't really what I brought to the table. I think they appreciated it. But I had more music in me. And I had a lot. I felt like, okay, this isn't really my band. And I'm the kind of guy when I have a band I write, I'm like very, very involved, you know, the man I'm like musical, so I'm always doing music and doing all, you know, very like, if I'm in your band, like I'm totally involved. Yeah. I mean, so I just said, hey, I'm going to concentrate on straight ahead. And I left. And I remember this at the same time. I think Richie would leave to do the same thing with underdog. Basically, yeah. Yeah. What did the community think of underdog at the time? Because people in bands played so many different roles. Yeah. Do you guys, do your peers hear Richie sing and think, yo, where did this beautiful voice come from? Well, Richie Richie's was always a good writer and a good player and wrote, you know, it had a good voice. Richie's great. And his stuff is really good. Like, I remember like, I love the numbskulls. The numbskulls were great. They were like a stripped down underdog. And then they called themselves True Blue when they first came out. The demo was originally like the True Blue demo. Yeah. The True Blue song. Yeah. And then it became like underdog. But I loved underdog so did everybody. Everyone was like, underdog's great. You know, but Richie was like a part of the scene, obviously. He was embedded in the scene. So, you know, that was beautiful back then. People had different styles. You know, you had Murphy's law. You had agnostic front. You had sheer terror. You know, you had your void and you had, you know, like what's a band to describe like a light poppy band in hardcore. I run a tip in my tongue. But anyway, we had thick bands like void. And then you had like, you know, a lot more light bands. And that was the beauty of it. Everyone did their own thing. So yeah. When you heard, what were your first thoughts when you heard Into Another? I thought it was good. And they're experimenting. You know, I feel like it danced around a lot. But I understood what they were doing. They were, they were feeling themselves out to see what they could do was brave. And I was, you know, I was as well. I was an agnostic front at that point. And being an agnostic front, we were like locked into what we're doing. So yeah, I was still locked into like straight up hardcore. But being able to do that, it's a good thing. You know, I write a bunch of material still to this day. I have tons of acoustic songs and stuff that's like almost like, like pop anthems. I write all kinds of weird stuff. You can hear that in Sick of It All. Yeah, I write stuff that nobody's ever heard that, you know, I like write acoustic songs that are just like really like dreamy and soft. Like, I like to play the instrument. I'm like a musician, you know what I mean? Sure. So like, I get it. They're basically just saying, hey, all this stuff that I do on my own that would never fly in hardcore, I'm going to go out and play it to the world, which is pretty fucking cool, man. Yeah. So let's let's go back to straight ahead mode here. You leave you today, you're taking straight ahead seriously. So let's talk about the breakaway 12 inch. Tell me about memories that come to mind writing and recording it. Do you have any memories from from the actual session? Totally. I just remember Tommy being like, he's he would spring stuff on you, Tommy. Like, hey, we're going to record. We're going to do we're going to do an EP. We got to do an EP. And I'd be like, what do you mean? He'd be like, no, we're going to do we got to do it at night, though. I'd be like, what do you mean at night at three in the morning? I'm like, what? So Chuck Val rest is so beautiful, beautiful person. God bless him. Chuck Val worked at Chung King. So he was like, listen, you guys can record at Chung King, but it has to be after the place is completely closed down. I'm going to do it on the slide. You know, yeah. So so like, all you got to pay for is like the tape, you know what I mean? You got to like buy the reel. So it was like a few hundred bucks or whatever it was back then to be able to buy the reels, you know, it was like, it was like, you know, two inch to half inch or whatever. Okay, old school. So we, we went in three in the morning and we were like exhausted. And I remember like arm on being like, I'm so tired. I can't play drums. I should be sleeping. We did it and, you know, we recorded it and we were like super, super tired. And we did it over a couple of nights. We'd go in for like an hour or two and then we went in like one other time for an hour or two and did it maybe two times. And is this Armand's first time recording drums? Yes, first time recording drums, but he'd been in the band for, I don't even know when that, I can't remember when that was recorded, how much, how much later have been the end of war's on sessions, but can't have been that late. I mean, it all happened so fast. That was probably looking within a year. Yeah, right. But it seemed like a lifetime back then. But so we recorded at night and I remember Chuck was doing it and Chuck was a guy that like when I was a kid, like before that and during that time, he called me and be like, what are you doing? I'd be like, nothing. He'd be like, you playing that show on Sunday? I'd be like, yeah, he'd be like, I'm going to bring my amp. And I'd be like, but you're not playing. He'd be like, I'm going to bring it in anyway. And I'd be like, I'll borrow an amp. He'd be like, no, I'm going to bring my amp. He would just, he knew I didn't have gear and he would bring me equipment and he would always make sure that I was like, I had stuff. He was like, you okay with that show? He would like, call me to ask me and he would bring the gear to help me. He was such a good guy, great guy. And he just looked out for everybody. He was like the sweetest, greatest guy ever. And, you know, I have this thing called the BM, which is the bass mafia. And it's like an organization I have with bass players and we bring people in and it's like, it's like, not really a secret organization, but we always say, Oh, BM, like, it's bass players looking out for bass players. There's tons of people. We got tons of people all over the world. Let me was be union. It's like a base union. You know, I mean, we had some big guys and you know, it's mostly hardcore guys, but Chuck was the original guy that like embodied the BM. Like he was, BM just means like, I help you, you help me. We look out for each other. You know what I mean? Yeah. Bass players for bass players and bass players for drummers and whoever else is cool. You know what I mean? So Chuck would always like, he was original BM. Like, you wouldn't even ask him and he would take care of you. Wow. How much of the tone, the bass tone in particular on breakaway is one of the most iconic parts of this record. How much of that was you? How much of that was Chuck? We had an SVT and I just got a sound and Chuck, we played it. We played it. And Chuck would be like, Hey, come in here and listen. Armand played the bass. Armand would always like reference and I'd listen and Armand, we always say he would goose it up because it would feel greasy afterwards. Like he killed my strings because he's got sweaty hands. So he would always goose up the bass. I'd have to like change the strings. So we just honed it in. He like, all right, it's a little thin here. Let's do a little bit here on the board. He kind of taught me how to work through the board a little bit, Chuck. And we would like mess with the amp and like, Hey, I'm going to pull the, I'm going to pull the mic back a little. So we just kind of both honed it in together because he was a bass player until we got the sound that I wanted. I really love the way the end of wars on stuff sounds as well. I think that it's like my actions a little too low and I'm playing a little too hard. You know, it's so funny that you can just hear that. You can hear it. Yeah. And still think about it 42 years. Yeah. Yeah. I can totally like I, you know, read. I just got read set up before we started rehearsing straight ahead and it feels and it sounds exactly the same. The actions, the actions not too low, but the pickups are a little too high. So it has that like hot sound. Yeah. It sounds great. So we will be hearing straight ahead in its purest form. I believe so. Yeah. I mean, I think it's going to be really good. I mean, the show has to happen still, but yeah, the way it sounds in rehearsal, it's going to be great. You know, we need to rehearse more, you know, sure. But we have months until it happens. We're going to rehearse like crazy. It's interesting too, because in a, in a genre that you might think is super guitar driven, the guitars on this recording are the quietest thing. You do a low pass. You don't hear guitars. You hear drums, bass and vocals until it's gone. Yeah. Yeah. Sure. But like there's, there's a couple of times where it's only guitars. The dynamic change is crazy. Doss can play. Well, first of all, Rob, his nickname is Doss, D-A-S, we call him Doss. Okay. Shredder. He's been his nickname, but Doss can play like crazy. Doss is such a good guitar player. I've covered straight ahead and there's shit I can't do. So I just don't do it. Playing guitar, you mean? Oh yeah. Yeah, he does a little stuff. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I played with Rob back in like 1983. I played, I used to jam with Rob. I met him through like an ad in a music paper, like the Long Island press or whatever the hell it was, whatever he put an ad looking for bass player. And I answered it, like to play like punk and metal or whatever, you know what I mean? And I answered it. I met though, I met up with him and Richie, the first bass player from Sickledall. Richie was the other guitar player. And when I took the train to Long Island City to rehearse at the old Roxy Studio, Mike Sankiewicz and Pete, Sickledall, Pete Kohler picked me up at the train. And I was like, what are you guys doing here? Because I knew them from the neighborhoods. I was in a band in like 82 with a guy that lived down the block from Pete and Lou. I used to, this guy John Perdini, he's the jam in his basement. I was like 13. I was like, what are you guys doing here though? Like, you know, we're friends with these guys. I can't believe it's you. And I was like, yeah. And I was like, are these guys good? They're like, wait till you see these guys. And I was like, wow, okay. So we had this band, Smegba, early on. And we never played a show, but we rehearsed, you know? Okay. We didn't have like a real singer or drummer. We kind of almost did, but it was like, it never really panned out, you know, we had shows booked, it never happened. Wow. Cleaned it clean them out. So six songs, six minutes, that's breakaway. Do you want to talk about the writing of the actual songs? Is that you and Tommy together for the most part? Yeah. That was the Tommy actually wrote. He came up with the idea for right idea. And breakaway Tommy came in with the both of those kind of and he didn't really play an instrument, but he was like, talking it to Armand. And I wasn't there or something. I was like doing something. I think I was playing a show or maybe I was away or something. And Armand was like, Tommy wrote these, the bulk of these two songs, they're pretty good. And I was like, oh, cool. I listened to them. I was like, that's good. So I came in and I like changed them around a little and messed with them a little, but you know, he basically came up with the, the, the basic idea for breakaway and right idea. And I added in parts and arranged them and stuff like that. Whose idea was it to rewrite? What song is it that is straight ahead again? Is it? Think right, which is think right. Whose idea was it to turn think right into straight ahead? You know, Tommy, when he did that, it was like a new song when we recorded it. It was like a fairly new song. So Tommy just was like, he just wrote that. Oh, think right. Like that was the working title. But you know, the band was called straight ahead and it said straight ahead. And so I was like, so straight ahead. Why, why, why does he say think right? He goes, oh, I don't know. I just wrote that. Like I was like, go straight ahead. He's like, yeah, you're right. Okay. It was just like a mess up. You know what I mean? But it's weird, but the song is like musically different on the OG version. Right. It's like the, like the straight ahead song is, is inside of it. Yes. In the beginning, right after the slow part, it comes in with the punches back, back, back, back, back, back, back, back. And then on the EP version, we ring it back, back, back, back. So we just did that. We did an extended ring out like a, like a youth of today, like Priscilla doing the fist down thing, you know what I mean? Yeah, totally. American hardcore. I really do. Sometimes I play, sometimes I play bass for judge. These days here and here and there when they, when Matt can't play, I fill in for them. And I always when I see Priscilla, I always say American, he does that thing where he hits the cord, like, you know, when his arms down like that and he's looking at the ground, I'm always like American hardcore. Yeah. The bringing it, the bringing it down. Cover. I always say Michael, that's, that's the American hardcore move. I go, you're like pure American hardcore. And he just laughs. I'm like, and I like say, me joins in, say, maybe like, oh, this guy's pure American hardcore. I'm like, look at this guy. This guy is like the quintessential American hardcore guy. I do that move once a set every harm's way show. It's a great move. It's just one of the moves was, was Chuck the same guy who engineered the Chung King version of bringing it down? Yes. Oh, no, I don't know if he did the chunk. I don't think he did the, I don't think he worked at Chung King, but I don't know. I don't think he worked with it because he worked with Joe. They wouldn't have paid it if he worked with judge. Gotcha. Gotcha. That makes sense. Gotcha. How close are you and Armand almost 40 years, 40 years later? We're still very close. He's one of my closest friends, but you know, Armand's the kind of guy, he's like, you know, the kind of guy like, you know, don't touch me. Don't say that. You make me, he gets away from you. He's like, very, he gets, he gets very uncomfortable and stuff like that. He's very like a cold, but like in reality, like he sends my mother, him and his wife, his wife, Brina sweetheart, they send my mother a Christmas present every year and they send their a Christmas card, you know, a separate from the present. So I'm always like, I'm like, I'm like, you're not a bad guy. And he's like, stop, stop, stop, leave me alone. You know what I mean? You're not a bad guy. He's like, leave me alone. I'm like, I'm like, you're a bad man, but you're not a bad guy. You know what I mean? Sick of an old humor is, has a lot of layers. So, you know, sir, like I'm the talkative guy and sick of it all. The one that's an open book, the other guys are more quiet and a little more about home bug. So the dynamic is pretty fun. We have some, some real comedy go that goes on sometimes. Yeah. I mean, you go back to his first time playing, he learned drums to play in a band with you. Yeah. I mean, musically, Armand and I are like very, it's just, it's like somehow like before we were born, it was like, all right, I chose to be this guy, you chose that guy, we're going to see a lot of each other. It's like just happened that way. You know what I mean? I feel like we all have those people. We all have a, the other one. Yeah. You know, always. That's beautiful. He could, he could very easily be a guy though, that I don't hear from him for five years. That could happen too. Cause he's like, you know, but it hasn't, he's a little psychotic. You know what I mean? It's a little crazy in there. But like, he's not a bad guy, but he's not a bad guy. He's not a bad guy. Now, how, how fondly have you looked back at straight ahead for the last 40 years? I think back to that. Sometimes I would occasionally put it on, like the end of war zone thing, and it would give me goosebumps. I'd be like, wow, like listen to what I was doing when I was like a little kid. I was like, I was like, no wonder everybody likes this so much. It's really good. I get excited. You know what I mean? Like from an outside perspective, I'm pretty damn happy with it. It's so energetic and there's so much, it's got like a bright, it, it, it, it, it pops like crazy, you know? So there's never been any resentment on your end towards straight ahead? No, I would be resentment. I agree. These are, these are just questions we've always had. You know, these are just, I mean, I resent people look back at their old bands and they're like, ah, that sucked. No, I love it. But it defines them. Tommy was like, uh, he was when he was younger, he would like, he was like more of a hothead. So he would like, we'd be all getting along and he'd be like, I don't want to do that and get mad and something would happen and it would mess us up for a little bit. And we'd be like, oh, I don't want to deal with this. He's going crazy again. You know what I mean? When he was young, because he was like a, like a hyped up kid. So he would go crazy and be like, oh, what are you doing? Stop, you know? So that kind of messed it up. But even when he would do that, once he calmed down, he could be like, yeah, I messed up. He was like, always honest like that, you know? So is that so allegedly you broke up in the studio recording with Don Fury? Correct. Yes. What were you recording? We were just rehearsing and playing new songs and Don for like five bucks. He had these two mics in the corner and he would like put a cassette in and for five bucks, he would record the session. So we would like play the songs and record them. So it was like a, like a rehearsal demo kind of thing. And I remember the GB rehearsed, they had the session before us. They were rehearsing. And then when they hung around and like, I remember like Walter was like listening to the stuff and he had like his look on his face. And I was like, what are you doing? He goes, I want to hear the new stuff. And he was like, I was like, thinking of myself, oh, he really likes this band. He's excited. Like I am about this. So like, I looked like everybody in the bands loves this band. I kind of just knew it was good. It was good. And you look at the live videos. Yeah, you can see straight ahead live videos. It's a who's who of Mossers. And like he was like listening to like, we played like knockdown for the first time, like at that session probably, and with a song called more important than under Bohemia, like that's a new one. It's really good. There's fast snappy changes. Like we were talking a little bit and I remember it was cool. But then at the end of the session, Tommy got mad about something and he argued with like me a little bit. And then Rob, Tommy was like, I'll just stop doing this right now. And Rob was like, okay, we'll stop. And I'm plugged this guitar left. And that was kind of the end of it. Weird as it was. It just kind of was like a typical argument we'd have. And not that we argued a lot, but it was one of those like little things where everyone gets heated. We're all excited, you know, and that was just the end of it. You know, and then what year was that? 87 87. Yeah, that was 87. I probably like the probably like the spring or summer of 87 spring late spring, maybe, I guess it all happened so fast. So should we get to the reunion or should we go move on to what he's doing in between? You know what I mean? No, I mean, the reunions one year later, like a year and some change. What are you doing in that year? So what happened was that stopped happening. And, you know, like a little bit of time went by where it wasn't in the band, like a few months. And Todd, I was good friends with Todd youth, rest his soul, you know, we used to hang out all the time. And we'd hang out in the park. And I remember a little side story, we'd hang out in the park all the time. And I'd sleep at rabies house, you know, because I got stay in the city all the weekend and sleep on his couch or whatever. And we'd always see the guy handing out the pot of soup, the guy with the long straight blonde hair sitting on the other bench or the hardcore kids were on one side. And like the homeless kind of guys, not really homeless, but like the les like guys. And there was this guy, Daniel Rackowitz. And he's just turned out he was a serial killer, right? You can look him up, he was a serial killer. And he would always have like a big pot with a ladle and like some like paper bowls or whatever. And he would hand out like super stew, whatever. And he'd always like look at us, he didn't really say much because he looked crazy, but he'd be like, you know, he'd like nod his head and offer a soup. And we'd always say no, he was handing out soup to the homeless. And it was homeless people that he killed, he would make soup out of them. And if you look them up, he would hang, you know, he got arrested and like whatever, 87, 88, he would hang out in the park and like 86 and like feed homeless people soup to people. Holy shit. So like me and Todd, but I always see him, you know what I mean? Like giving everybody knows everyone from back up knows about this guy. Yeah. Daniel Rackowitz. And nobody, nobody ever had a bowl. Nobody on the hardcore kids side. Nobody I know had a bowl. Like I looked like this guy, this guy was like, he looked like a nut. Like if you look at him, he looked like like like blond, blondie Jesus. You know what I mean? I was like, this guy said, no, no. So any, any rational person would be like, well, clearly I'm not eating this man's soup. Yeah. Yeah. But he would hang out with all the old time, like Lower East Side, like homeless guys and street guys and just, just, you know, like back then it was like a whole kind of cultural thing, I guess. Yeah. Craig, can I ask you what was the Lower East Side like at this time? We hear tales, we hear legends. My mom went to NYU 80 to 82. She was petrified. You know what I mean? Like she, she would go to CBs, but it was scary. It was like the scary thing to do. What was it like at that time? My mom went to NYU in about 80 to 79 to like 82. Look at that. I wonder about that. Wendy. My mother was the president of the student council and the student senator at the same time. Oh, they knew each other. They probably knew each other. She, yeah. She was a little, our new age, new age. Bad egg. Was she, was she, was she was she young at the time? She was very young at the time. Yeah. Okay. My mother was 40. So my mother was like going to school for her own enjoyment. So she got straight. Wow. 4.0 grade average. Yeah. Sure. Yeah. So my mother was like the older lady going to school for just because like, you know, midlife enjoyment. Yeah. Sure. Totally. Sure. Your mother might, your mother might be like, Oh, I remember that lady. Well, it's funny. With the German accent, you know, she like ran the whole thing, you know. Oh, interesting. So it's funny. You should say that because she, she would, when she would tell me about this time in her life, she said, I remember to agnostic something in the band with the black guys. Wow. But she said, she said, she would go to like Blondie. She would see, you know, kind of, she wasn't like a punk or anything. She was a kid and like a new wave kind of kid. And she, she said, I remember the hardcore guys, they were scary because they lived on the street and you just, you avoided them. Yeah. She'd see Blondie to Ramon's Talking Heads. Talking Heads. Yeah. Yeah. Dead Boys maybe, you know, kind of like that kind of thing. That's hard. Yeah. But what, uh, the bands that people romanticize playing CBGBs, but not the ones that kept the door. The place open. Yeah. Right. Yeah. So, you know, she would tell me stories. I want to, I want to hear from you. Like, what was it like being a young person at this time? Well, it was scary. You know, I was like a little kid and, uh, I would hang out like Ray had his finger on the pulse. So he worked at the pyramid club just across the street from, from the park. So I kind of had like people there, you know what I mean? Like I kind of had like an inside track, but it was dangerous. You had to be careful. It was, uh, you know, I always had a group of friends I was hanging out with, but you had to be careful. It was definitely dangerous. You know, you could, if you did the, if you didn't know how to carry yourself and I'm not talking about being tough because I was like a 15, 16 year old kid. It was nothing tough about me back then. But you know, you just got to like know to not stick your nose where it doesn't belong and let things develop how they happen. You know what I mean? Sure. So, uh, it was, it was, it was a, it had a vibe to it. There was like stuff happening. It was like a Petri dish, music, art. There was so much happening all over the place. We'd like walk down the block. You'd go to this club, you go to that club, you go to this place to eat, you would go here, there'd be something popping off. There was things happening everywhere all the time. Like the summer of eight, the whole summer of 86, I just basically lived in the city and every night I had something to do. There was always something happening. New York city in the eighties was incredible. I mean, what a beautiful place. I mean, it was like everything was blossoming. It was so great. And you know, people say to me that don't know about this music, people I know in like regular walks of life, they're like, oh, you're this like musician. They say like, oh, my brother, my brother, I'm a rock star. And I'm like, it makes you feel weird. But I'm like, how did you do that? Like, how was it you that got popular in these bands? I go, it's time and place. I was in the right place at the right time. And I was drawn to something that was about to explode. And I was one of the few guys that was a good, that I could express myself with the instrument pretty well. You know what I mean? And so like that, you know, it was just time and place, man. Everything was popping off. Like it had a smell. Old New York, Old New York. It had a smell. It had a feel. The tallest buildings in the world. So says Roger Merritt. I get guys. No, I don't get me so good at that if you want. Hey, no, that's coming. That's coming real quick. Because you know, it's a little trauma. I got to kind of keep my hands up a little bit. But like back then, there was so much happening. It was such a beautiful time. And it was time and place, man. I forget what else I was going to say. No, no, that's beautiful. You always hear horror stories. You hear, oh, it was there were cars on fire and buildings burned out. And that was happening. If you were that kind of guy, you'd be in that. But as you know, as somebody who was going into Chicago when I was 13, 14, going to shows and doing stuff and going to places that were like my dad would take me to like Colin, where we went to the fire side and it was like, you're going where, you know, it's like, no, I have such happy nostalgia. I'm not comparing 80s New York to Chicago in any way. But there's there's I like hearing the romance about it from your point of view from from because I can I can understand that, you know, it's all. Chicago was good when I was young and so I went to Chicago first on like 86. I remember the food was good and the shows were good and everyone was cool. But there was there was there was an undertone there as well. You could tell bad things could pop off. I had a couple situations in Chicago over the years where I was like, okay, this could really get crazy really fast. You know, so you got to like, you got to mind your piece in cues. Like I was never a guy. People saw me when I came to hardcore. I was this little kid with like wide eyes. All I wanted to do was play music. I wanted to play music and I was I was like a freak. I was a kid from a broken home in Queens. I didn't want to play music like I wasn't cool. I wasn't a cool kid. I was like a misfit. And when I came to hardcore, people just looked like, Hey, kid, come here. Hey, oh, you're enthusiastic. You play really well. People embraced me. And they really looked like, Oh, this kid's special. They saw me for what I was trying to do. They saw my heart. So it's the only place I ever went in the life where I was really recognized for my talents. I don't mean talent as a player. I mean, like, they saw and appreciated what I was what was coming out of me, what I was trying to give. And that's what's beautiful about hardcore. That's what makes it so unique. It's simple music by misfits. And there's a lot of a lot of beauty that comes through with this pain. There's everything, you know what I mean? That's what makes it such a beautiful movement, the way I see it and the way I came into it. It's the only genre where if you stick around long enough, and if you work hard enough, you will go from the pit to the stage or somewhere, some higher echelon in music in your life. If you're just, if you're cool and you work hard and you're pleasant to be around, you're going to be fine. Being cool is the thing like, everyone talks about New York was so dangerous. You were a little kid hanging out in the park at 3am. I was just you got to be a cool kid. I wasn't making trouble. I was right. People saw who I was. I was a kid that wanted to I wanted to play music and I was I was there for good reasons. So I never had problems with people. You know, I mean, I had a fighter to an hardcore couple of fights over the years, but that was never like something that really I was involved in. Have a leak. So it was dumb. I was like, yeah, you're going to ruin the show. What are you doing? I want to play the show. Sure. Jenny, you want to have a disrespect to anybody. I was always nice to everybody. I didn't have no respect. Even people that wound up being enemies to me. I was like, I was not enemies, but I was always nice to everybody. I never disrespected anybody. That's the truth. Beautiful. Can't be friends with everybody though. Hey, no, friend, friend to all friend to none. You know what I mean? Before we get into AF straight ahead, decide to do a reunion show in 1988 at CBGB is one of my most watched YouTube videos of all time having to do with music. I saw the episode. It's like Metallica 89. Yeah. And then the straight ahead video in like Bad Brains in 82. What how did the ball get rolling with that? Like how you guys moved over the spat? You just decided, fuck it, we'll do one more. Like what was it? We were always friends. It wasn't like, you know, it wasn't like after that happened, like we didn't talk, like Tommy called me the next week, like, yo, what are you doing? You know, we're still friends. And like, you know, it just didn't turn into like, Hey, we're rehearsing this week. I think Rob was like kind of on my, well, like, ah, this is too volatile, you know, what happened was it was like the benefit was that the Roger benefit or the Pete benefit. Pete's Pete's sake. That's right. Yeah. So all these bands were playing and we were there. And you know, it was sort of like, yeah, we'll get up and bust out a couple of songs. So like we just got up and we're like, okay, let's go, like grab whatever entrance were. Not on the bill. You just, I don't think we were on the bill. It might have been talked about as, Hey, you want to jump up and play a few songs like, yeah, okay, we'll just pop up and play three, three songs or whatever. And I just, you know, I couldn't even move. I was like, the place is packed and explodes. Everybody everywhere to this place down. Tear and they did Tommy accidentally really said the right thing. That's kind of iconic. I gotta say, I was going to ask about that. Like was that something he would, how many shows did straight ahead play? I don't know exactly, but I'm going to guess he played a few doffs, 10, 20. Okay. Is that something he would intro sets? Before or after? Unbelievable. Just came out of nowhere, you know, change the world by accident. Yeah. I mean, as far as memorable sets go, where does this sit in your mind and your, in your roll adex? That was the era where when you play a show, you had no room to move and it was kind of frustrating because I want to jump around. But yeah, that was pretty classic. I almost felt like, wow, people are pushing me out of the way to play my own song. You know what I mean? It was a little weird in a way, but it was, people were so enthusiastic. I was like, this is pretty cool. Like it didn't feel as good as you might think it felt because it was so crowded that you were just trying to like not get knocked over and finish the song. But yeah, that was a great time. Like, you know, it's like the one guy, the guy that was on stage, what was his name again? He was like a cop in Arizona years later and I saw him when we played out there. It was like sick a little mad ball playing. I saw him. I'm like, yo, what's up? I think he was the eight. And he was like the last time I saw him was probably at that show. We were chopping it up about it. It was, it was pretty. I was like, you're in the video. You're like the guy standing right there, like holding people classic, classic stuff. So what you see this reaction and you guys are like, all right, let's never do that again. I just think that we were like, oh, that was great. That was fun. Yeah, it was, you know, like, it's just made you feel like, yeah, that band was really good. Okay. The reason we never did it again is because I was like, was I in AF then? No, no, I was 88 and that was 92. I joined. I joined. I joined AF in 87. So I was probably in AF. 87. Well, we joined AF in the fall of 87. So were you on Liberty and Justice? I joined right when they came back from the studio recording Liberty and Justice. Okay. So they came back from the studio recording Liberty and Justice and I said, Hey, let me redo the bass tracks. And Roger was like too cheap to pay for you. They didn't want to pay for it. It would cost them a few hundred dollars, you know? So when, when recently Mike Dejean described playing for AF as the, for the first time as getting his wings. That's a nice way to put it. Is that how you looked at it at the time? All right. So I went into AF with sneakers and I came out with boots. There we go. I made a man out of me. That's why I learned like quote of the episode right there. That's why I learned like a lot of stuff. I learned like, you know, you can take some, you can be cool, but don't take too much shit. You know what I mean? Yeah. And if you got a punch in the face, make it count. You know what I mean? Like, not to sound negative, but like, those are the kind of lessons you learned in that band. You know what I mean? Don't take too much shit. AF has obviously existed at this point for a while. They're a legacy band already. They are, are they the New York band to you? Or is it Murphy's law at this point already? No, to me, when it comes to New York hardcore, the flagship, like, you know, when you see the video of the flag being planted on the moon, allegedly, I don't know. Yeah, who knows? Whatever. We could get into it. Not my bag. Not my bag. That is my bag, baby. I'm just saying it for anyone to see. I know one of your bags that we're going to talk about later. Okay. I'm excited. I'm just saying, like, you know, however you want to do that's your business. But, uh, victim in pain is like the flag of New York hardcore on the world. The victim in pain is the ultimate representation of New York hardcore. So when, when you get the opportunity to play for them, getting your wings or whatever, getting called up to the, like, does it feel like, oh, shit, this is big news or anything? I mean, back when I was, this is what happened. So I was trying to tell this earlier when we were talking about Todd and hanging out in the park, but, you know, we're moving fast and I'm feeling good. So it's happening. So Todd, one day Todd, like calls me, he goes, Hey, you play bass for Murphy's Law now. You know, like, you know, you're gonna play because they need a bass player, you know what I mean? And Russell, I guess, wasn't in the band anymore. I don't remember exactly what happened, but he's like, you play in Murphy's Law now. So come down to the studio. We're gonna try it out next week. I go, Okay, great. You play in Murphy's Law now. Yeah. He's like, you play in Murphy's Law. You play with me in Jimmy. I was like, Yeah, okay, great. So I was super excited. Now back when I was from when I was little, the first time I like Stigma was at the first show I ever played at Seabees. And I played a show at Seabees and I think it was 84 and Stigma was there and he was singing along and piling up to the songs, the Mayhem songs, even though we didn't have a frontman, people like grab my mic and sing. Right. So I was like, afterwards I was like, how do you know all the words? Like I bought you a demo outside like a couple of weeks ago. Tommy was selling the demo. I think he gave Tommy a game one. So Stigma, the first time I played Seabees was sang along and to Mayhem, to Mayhem, Stigma, OG death metal hit. No, this was Mayhem. Mayhem was like, this was Mayhem when I was in the band. So it was like crossover. It was like hard core mixed, you know, it was like heavy hardcore. It sounded like, you know, like the offenders or something. Right. The lack of a better whatever. Sure. So Stigma sang along and then he said to me, he goes, kid, you played at bass, great. He goes, you jump high. I could see how much you love this. He's like, one day you're going to be in my band, kid. So he would always whenever he'd see me, that kid, kid, what are you doing? He goes, kid, you're going to be in my band one day. I'm telling you. And I'd always be like, yeah, yeah, yeah. And like, he'd like stomp his foot and yell, skin it. And I'd like jump back. I'd be like, what? And he's laughing. He'd be like, I like you. You're good. You know, you're my friend. So I was always friends with Stigma. He always told me he was going to be in his band. So I tried out from Murphy's Law and Chuck tried out the same night. He tried out both me and Chuck Vow, the late and very great Chuck Vow. And let me say, I've said this before, I say with the utmost pride that the better man one, Chuck got that gig. And it was the only time I ever tried out for a band and didn't get the gig in my life because the better man one, Chuck Vow, rest in peace, my friend. Rest in peace, Chuck. So I was coming home from the rehearsal and they hadn't said anything yet. They said, Hey, we're going to do another rehearsal. We're going to try you both out. You both sounded great, you know, blah, blah, blah. And you know, like, you know, I didn't smoke a joint at the end of rehearsal. Chuck did. I think that might have something to do with it. So I'm coming home and back then I kept my bass on a cardboard box with an open top cardboard box that I didn't have a case or anything. I'm carrying on the subway on a cardboard box. So I'm coming home. And I'm walking up the stairs. I lived in like an apartment, you know, like a garden apartment in Queens, like second store. I'm coming up the apartment and my mother opened his door and she's like, she's like, Craig, Vinny Stigmas on the phone for you. And I'm like, I'm like Vinny's on the phone. I go, Hold on, I'm coming up. I grabbed the phone. I go Vinny, what's up? He goes, ah, kid, you know, he goes, I know you were just with Jimmy. I think he goes, I just talked to Jimmy and you're with me now, kid. He goes, he goes, the other, he goes, they go, Chuck, the other Katie's with Jimmy. And you're with me now, kid. He goes, I told you he'd be in Ignacio Front one day. And I was like, oh shit, I'm in Ignacio Front now. Wow. And that was it. And I rehearsed. You're, he just said, you're with me. Yeah, you with me. That's a, that's like the ultimate good news, bad news. You know, well, here's, it was all good news because Vinny's, you know, great. And let me just say before I even have some fun with this, I love Roger, he's my friend. Roger's my friend. They'll do anything for him. They'll pretty much do anything. I love the guy. Don't tell him I said that, Roger. Don't tell him I said that. But, um, so I, you know, I went and rehearsed with him and it sounded great. And you know, Roger gave me a hard time. He was like, ah, this kid, he's too clean. Look at how clean this kid is. He's like, this kid's a pussy. Look at how clean he is. And I'm like, I'm like, yo, I'm like, he was always cool with me. I'm like, what are you being an asshole for? He's like, nah, nah, you play good. He's like, it's good. It'll work out. Vinny wanted you in the band, not me. I'm like, what? And he's like, he's like, talking shit to me the whole way. And, you know, Vinny's like, ah, shut the fuck up. This kid's great. I'll have him kick your ass. So it's the dynamic turned into like a comedy three-way kind of thing. Right off the, out of the gate. It was fun and funny. They were, the ball busting had to begin right away. Right away. And Roger would always be like, I didn't want you in the band. You were like a clean cup pussy. I was like, that's great. But you know, and so, so, you know, I played with them and we went on tour and Stigman made me smoke that joint with them. Tell me about these first, this, the touring on Liberty and Justice and with AF these first few years. Is this the most touring you did with the band? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Until later. Before that, I went to the West Coast with Youth of Today and I played, I played in East Coast and Southern tour with Youth of Today. I did the West Coast with them straight ahead. The Tri-State Area gigs. So I had played in California down south and, you know, Florida and the East Coast. And so I toured with them and we'd go in a van and it was just shenanigans, just complete fun. Willie was playing drums. Steve Martin was playing guitar before Matty Henderson. And you know, I would meet up with Steve a lot and we'd go pick up Vinnie. And it was a lot of fun. I mean, we had a lot of fun, a lot of ball busting, a lot of comedy. And I don't remember what the first show was, but I just remember going on tour in like a van with gear in the back and a pit bull. And it just, it was like a lot of touring. We just toured nonstop. We went to Europe for the first time in 90. So that's when Europe kind of started breaking open. And we just would, we'd play like do whole U.S. tours where we'd play beyond the road for two months, you know, in a van, old school. Is it being booked like on the go or is, how is this working? It's being booked before, but some of it's taking shape as you go. You know, most of it is pre-set up, but there's a lot of like, you know, this fallout, this came in, you know, I remember like going down to Florida and, you know, Roger's Cuban. So we'd stay with his family and his mother would cook and we'd have like Cuban food that was just incredible. And, you know, we'd hang out with the Cuban people down there that his family knew. So we'd always be eating well. And that was really nice, you know. Is this the era of like calling cards? Yeah. And all that, that kind of, you know, about the calling card scams, Colin? Yeah. So the way it worked with that was, you know, you do guys know Dave Stein, Rest of Soul? Yeah, R.P. Dave Stein. Dave Stein was a great man, good friend. And so he was the guy who basically put Albany on the map for hardcore. He would book shows and then Steve Reddy was like his understudy. So Steve Reddy was his understudy and those guys would book Albany shows. And I knew those guys from straight ahead and mostly youth of today playing Albany. So he would get the calling cards. He would get the lists and he'd give bands across the country the lists so they could book their tour on pay phones. And yeah, it was like old school and you'd get the list. And like, if I got the list, like since he was in Albany, I'd get the list like maybe a little late, like Roger would get it and then give it to me or like Ray would get it and give it to me. So I would get the list like two days later and three days later as long as it took to mail it down and whoever gave it to first would like already. So you'd start the list backwards or you'd start the list in the middle and work your way down and then back. So you had to like be creative. You got to beat the other guys. You got to beat the other guys to book. But he would hook up West Coast. He'd hook up bands all across the country. He was just doing it for the scene. So now is this this is like Kevin seconds out here? Yes. Yeah, etc. Everybody's like the guy in each city. The guy in each city, he was like, you know, would use the Dave Stein Cullen cards. Wow. Dave Stein, RIP, changes the guy. Great guy. And Steve Reddy was his understudy. So Steve Reddy is basically the same kind of guy. Steve Reddy is one of the greatest human beings in the world. So one voice is right around the corner, which means they recruit Matt Headers. Yeah, what happened was we played 87 88. And then Roger had some legal trouble. So we stopped playing for 18 months. He was incarcerated for 18 months. So during that time, I played in rest and pieces with Armand. So I was doing that and I played a few sick little shows where Richie couldn't play. So I'd fill in on base. So I was a rich. Yeah, I played like a week. I played like two or three shows on a weekend. And maybe one of the show was a hand just a couple of shows. We were all old friends. So I jumped in on that. And that kind of set the tone for that later on, I think. Yeah. So rest and pieces you do under my skin at this time. Yeah, we did under my skin at that time. And I cannot okay, I just feel like it did, you know, it was like one of those recordings that really just didn't do we there wasn't magic in the studio. You know what I mean? It just was captured on a bad day. It just didn't really come. I mean, not that it's a bad record, but it's not as like the first record, you know, it's like, I mean, it's not on streaming. And the first one is basically they. Yeah, right. And let's do what's interesting is it's like, so opposite to straight ahead. If you even look at just like the song lengths, it's like four minutes, four minutes, four minutes, five minutes. But that's the beauty of hardcore. Armand had his way of writing songs. I had my way of writing songs. It was like a different he was a little more like writing more traditional songs, you know what I mean? Structurally, structurally, yeah, structurally, a little more intricate, like more traditional verse chorus verse bridge lead, you know, sure. Where straight ahead was like, you know, the structure was straight. The structure was whatever I felt would sound good. I wasn't worried about like verse chorus. I've written songs that are verse chorus throughout my life, a lot of them. But at that point, I just wanted to write just just fucking blistering hardcore. You know what I mean? Yeah, that's awesome. Part of this interruption. We hate to interrupt one of the greatest episodes in the history of the show, but we have some very important news. This month is independent ad month. New year, new ads. That's right. They're all independently owned by friends, friends of friends, and hardcore kids. And honestly, we wish every month on the show was independent ad month. So if you want to sponsor the show, hit us up. Just let us know. Yeah, it's down there. It's out there. It's right there. First up, timeless coffee. Brand new. We're very excited about this. This is first time, long time here. I've been drinking timeless for many years, because as many of you know, many of you may not know, timeless is the very first all vegan, roastery and bakery in the country. They sent us a little little care package, tried the cookies, tried some beans. My place smells great. Everything was delicious. Dude, the cookies, you kidding me? The cookies are baked and shipped within 24 hours of being ordered. That's right. And if you use code hard lore, site wide, you're going to get 15% off. And if your order is over $40, you're going to get free shipping. Guess what? That's a medium sized bag of beans. You're going to get that free shipping. Also, for anybody who lives in the Bay Area or really just kind of anywhere around any either of the timeless locations, you can place an order and just go and pick it up. Just go and enjoy. Go and check it out. Tell them hard lore sent you. Not only for coffee, not only for cookies, but they do these beautiful custom cakes. Really? Oh my God. Look at some of them here. It's insane. I want one right now. I may take a drive. I'll let you know if I do. They also offer coffee subscriptions. You can get one for yourself or you can give one for somebody else. You know what I like is the fact that if you already have the subscription, you can still use code hard lore and it you still you get even further savings. It's unbelievable. They offer multiple blends, multiple grind sizes, multiple bag sizes, multiple frequency options, timeless coffee, DIY hardcore punk ethics run through the bones and the DNA of this beautiful company. Even some of the vocalists of some of your favorite bands have also worked there. Joseph from Tsunami roasted there for six years. I didn't even know that. Brandon from Big Boy, Coffee Head. Yeah. He was there, dude. Can I tell you something? Can I tell you something? Please. He was there. I can tell you something. Timeless coffee, hard lore 15% off. This episode is also brought to you by Mills Vintage, the greatest collection of vintage hardcore punk metal memorabilia on the internet in existence. Also just an incredible archive for old hardcore designs. Very often for reference. Very good point. Mills Vintage is one of the most curated collections of vintage shirts I've actually ever seen. It's incredible. It's for ball knowers by ball knowers. Vic, I've known for half of my life now. He's a hardcore lifer. He's put in the work. He knows everything about every shirt. So if you have a question, just send the shop a message. He wants to buy your stuff too. So send him some picks. He'll take it off your hands. We'll get it from you. If you're in New York or LA, stop by the store. Get something in person. Try it on. That's right. For anybody who saw our episodes with Speed or Chappelle Lacey, we visited the varsity location in California and we visited Mills Vintage. We went through everything in there. I've given this man my life savings. I don't have a 401k. I have 401,000 shirts from Mills Vintage and our beloved Mad Vintage. So visit Mills VintageUSA.com and use code hard lore to get 15% off site-wide on some of the greatest hardcore punk metal shirts ever made. Tell me about Matt Henderson getting into the fold because this man's brain. Yeah. So Roger went away and Roger went away for 18 months and Roger actually, his case was overturned. It was considered a wrongful conviction. It was overturned and he was let out because it was like it was a very famous case actually. Roger's case is like cited. It's like a legally cited case of imprisonment that was overturned because it wasn't legally it wasn't adjusting. Was it the state going after him or was it? It was the state going after him. It was the state. But it turns out it was like the procedures were done illegally and he should not have went to jail. So this is like a law and order SVU where they're looking back and they're like, actually, if you look back at New York versus Roger Merritt, you'll find that this sets a precedent. Eight names is eight names you don't know. Eight last names that you don't know. Straight from Cuba, you know what I'm saying? Yeah. Wow, that's amazing. So that's rare. It's rare. Yeah. Right. So, um, so Roger comes back and Steve Martin wasn't doing it because Steve Martin had started his own PR company. And, um, so we tried out a million guys and we didn't take anybody. We were going to take this one guy Andre, who was a painter, a nice guy, South Pole guitar player, played lefty, cool guy, but, you know, he was he had his painting business and he wasn't the perfect guy for the thing, but he was a cool guy and he played well. So what happened was Matt, the whole time Roger kept saying, no, no, this kid from from Minnesota blind approach, this kid Maddie, he's the kid. But like six months went by and I was like, yo, this guy doesn't exist. Like what do you, like you keep talking like this doesn't matter. And he was like, don't worry, the kid's going to come in. I was like, this kid doesn't even exist. Like we were arguing with him. Me and Willie would be like, what's this guy talking about? Where's the guy, you know, produce him already? Yeah. So at one point he's like, Oh, you know, like it was almost like he was fumbling his words. I got Thursday, you got to meet this guy over here at the Staten Island Cherry. I was like, what's it's like, what are you trying to do? Like, what are you going to somebody going to like stick a knife in my back? Like what's what are you setting me up for? It didn't seem right. You know what I mean? I was like, what? But it turns out Maddie came in and I think he came to Stingman's apartment. We all met him. We got some pizza. We hung out and talked to him for a little bit. So we had to take the rail, the subway to the Staten Island Ferry to rehearsing in Staten Island. That's where Roger was in Staten Island. So we take the Staten Island Ferry there and we're talking the whole time. And I'm talking to him a lot. You know, he's asking me a lot of questions and stuff. So we rehearse and it was kind of up to me. Vinny would always say, kid, when we try these guys out, you let me know if he's right. You know, Vinny would always kind of lean on me for the music part of it, you know, and obviously Willie. And so we played the Eliminator, I think it was, we played the Eliminator and you know, we finished the song and Vinny looks at me and I just shook my head and I looked at Willie and Willie just smiled. And I was like, all right, so you want to be in the band? He was like, you know, he was like, yeah, Vinny's like, hey, the kid says you have a guy. And he was like, yeah, okay. And here's a little joke. But Maddie always talks about he goes, you know, that day, I didn't know because, you know, my life was going to go down a different path. He goes, but I said to my mother when I called her, I go, well, the bass player seems like a reasonable guy. So I think I'm going to do it. And I'm like, I'm always like, Maddie, I'm sorry. I shouldn't have ran. I should have warned you. You know, we laughed, you know. Yeah, but dude, that day, I mean, defined almost like what hardcore sounds like now. Yeah, he can really play like we played with him. I was like, oh, he's like, I was like, he's, he they're a handful of guys you play with, you guys probably know this, you musicians, you play with certain guys where you're like, oh, this guy fits with me. Perfect. Armand was like that. Armand and both Rob, do so like that. They just fit perfectly. Willie's another guy. When I play with Willie, it's just, I play with him in that band to take now. It's just, he's so easy to play with. It's just we fit together. It just sounds right. Maddie Hendens is another one of those guys. When you play with them, it's just there. You don't have to worry about his writing style. Yeah, it's perfect. You don't have to worry about writing one voice. It was basically me and Maddie locked up in Staten Island for months with Roger, like, you know, like shutting the door. I mean, no lunch for you guys unless you finish two songs. I'd be like, yo, shut up, get out of here. You know what I mean? But he'd be like, yo, you know, sometimes Roger can pull some shit and you can't really stop him. You know what I mean? So he, I mean, it worked. It worked. He did. And a bunch of crazy stuff happened. Like stuff, some, it took some weird turns here and there, but in the end we finished the album. And me and Maddie basically wrote the whole album. Roger wrote one or two songs that were really good. And Todd Youth, Rest of Soul wrote a song or two. And it came out really good. I mean, I'm not, I'm not happy with my bass sound on it, but it was a fun time, you know? You didn't have the Chuck doing the SVT and the board and big red there. The bass sound I got, it was Don Fury doing it. Don Fury is great as he is in his own element. Normandy, it was a little clash between him and like Tom Soares or, you know, or that didn't really work too well. The combination. Man, Don did, Don did one voice. He was involved in it. Yeah, he like produced it, but Tom Soares was engineering and, you know, the two of them didn't really see eye to eye on technique because, you know, Don Fury had his way from his basement. Yeah. Tom Soares is like a, you know, a Grammy award winning radio producer. You know what I mean? Yeah. Two different like levels and approaches, you know what I mean? But both had their own way, but the two approaches didn't mix too well, you know? That's why my bass sound like that. I mean, it sounds great. Mine doesn't like my bass sound, but I like the album. The album is fun. The songs are pretty good. You know what I mean? I think it's people in Europe love that record. Oh yeah. People in Europe. And then, and then Mad Ball stole him and then the rest is history, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah, you know, Mad Bull, it's a whole other thing, you know what I mean? Yes. I was in the original Mad Bull, like they would play in Europe and I would like play, Roger would play bass, right? So Roger played bass and they'd use my bass. So they said to me, they go, Scully, they called me Scully. That's what my nickname and I have. They go, Scully, bring Red to the recording. You're going to play bass, right? I go, I'm going to play on the first seven and I go, cool, I'll bring Red. So I show up at Red and I show up and the stigma goes, he goes, kid, kid, you're out of the band. We're throwing you out of the band. I was never in the band. They go, you're not playing on the record. Roger's playing on the record. We just wanted to use Red and I'm like, you know, Red, my Red bass is on the first Mad Bull seven. Really? Wow. And that's the straight ahead bass? Straight ahead bass. So ball destruction is the straight ahead bass? Yes. And Red is on all the straight ahead stuff. Red is also on like a bunch of the sick of it all albums and like, you know, I played it through, not every album, but most of them. You know what I mean? I love tales of these instruments that have names that are like Red, Reds, like Game of Thrones or something. Listen, I just hung on to Red, blowing in the wind throughout my entire career. Red's the one that did it all. I'm just like, I'm just hanging on. Yeah. Yeah. So, and then I was like, I was like, shit, I was in the band for a minute, but they kicked me out. And like I'm laughing, Mark Ryan was there from Super Touch. So, you know, stigma is like, don't worry, kid, you and Mark are going to sing back up. So me and Mark Ryan sang back up, so they used the Red bass. All right. All right. You're still on there. Somebody I want to give their flowers to that I'm hoping you can tell us about is BJ Pappas. She's great. I love BJ. I have one of my dear friends. That's like the goat hardcore photographer of all time. BJ is just a, she's a girl. She was living in a storage, old school hardcore girl, friend of ours, sweetest, sweetest girl in the world, sweetest pie. I love her. I still talk to her to this day. She just loved photography and she was at every show and she would take photos all the time. And she was like part of the crew. You know what I mean? She was everybody's friends with her. She mixed all those different groups of people together. Back then it was all one group, but you know, she was AF. She was, you know, straight ahead. She was sick of it all. She was killing time. She was everything, you know. She took 90%, 99% probably of like iconic hardcore promo photos from New York. Yeah. Brooks Smith also did a lot of photography. You know, Brooks Smith? Yes. She was the girl that was in, she was an actress. She was in Silence of the Lamb, but she was the girl on the pit. She was one of the war zone women, right? She was in Grey's Anatomy as well. Yeah. She was the one on the pit when she's going, when the guy's going, when it puts the lotion in the basket. She's like, I'll kill you, dog, Mr. Yeah. That's Brooks. She was a doctor. Catherine. Arizona Robbins. Yeah. She's like old school hardcore girl. She's great. Yeah. I think, I think, uh, Silence of the Lamb, she's Catherine Martin is the Yeah. the character. Senator's daughter. Senator's daughter. Wow. She gets captured. Yeah. And put in the pit, you know. And, uh, yeah, it's like a strange, strange, well, but you know, it was all back then. It was, it was all musicians, actors, artists, like we were talking about earlier. That's the scene we were all part of. It was all mixed, mixed up scene. You know, everybody was together. It was, you know, it was melting pot, you know, every race of person, every ethnicity, every style that nobody discriminated against anybody. Everybody was welcome. And that was a beauty. We were all misfits. We were all part of this scene. And everybody had something to contribute. It was a beautiful thing. Art, music, it was all mashed together, you know. Quick sidebar, uh, or yeah, sidebar before we jump in as sick of it all. Were you running into Peter Steele at any point at this time? I'm imagining so. I remember him coming around. I saw carnivore play, uh, when I was young at like LeMors or something like that. I went to one of those shows probably in 80s. I don't know. Maybe, I don't know what year that was. It was mid 80s at some point. And, uh, he was coming to CBs when he was doing that cause for alarm album with those guys. I never really spoke to him outside of like, Hey, maybe in a group of people pass a word or two. But, uh, you know, he was, he was very tall. He was a really big guy. But everyone says he was a really nice guy, but I never sat down with him outside of a passing a few words in a group of people talking. He's a guy we would love to talk to that we obviously never get the chance to. So anytime we get the opportunity to ask, we ask, you know, yeah, I didn't really know him, but I hear great things about him. I've run love, you know, and he was in 85. He was coming to CBs for the whole summer pretty much when he was, he was pretty skinned up. Yeah. Yeah. I was like kind of like a hardcore, weird hardcore band. Yeah. Yeah. Cross over. First gen crossover. Brooklyn is Brooklyn. Brooklyn is very adjacent to hardcore. They're not hardcore, but they are hardcore at the same time. It's like this. It's just like brother. It's like this adjacent brother scene, you know, I've always wondered about that. Nobody can play a slow groove like Brooklyn guys. I got to give it to them. You know, like, I mean, biohazard was so much that stuff. Yeah. Biohazard was so popular so fast that like death, death, every genre started doing the like, yeah, I never met a guy from Brooklyn. I didn't like, I mean, like biohazard life agony. I love these people. All right. Let's get into it because throughout all of your time in AF, Sick of It All is touring the world on Blood, Sweat, and No Tears. And just look around and is, and is this group of people you've known forever? Yes. Basically setting an example of what New York hardcore is capable on, capable of on a worldwide scale. I mean, yeah, they're putting in that work. That's for sure. They toured with AF. When I was in AF, we toured together, played Canada. It was like sub zero freezing cold. Like we played a lot of shows together AF and Sick of It All. And those are my boys. You're filling in for them every now and then. Yeah. I played a few shows with them, you know, like when they recorded Blood, Sweat, and No Tears, they were like, Hey, we're doing our album. Like Howie Abrams, you know, he did that in effect thing. And that was like, because Howie always was an industry guy with his finger on the pulse, but he's a hardcore guy first and foremost. You know, I know Howie since probably 1984, since I was little, he used to come to my house and I'd like play him my little songs. He'd be like, Oh, that's great. Like, you know, when I was like just starting playing in bands, he'd support and sing along. He'd hang out with all of us and be at every show. Sick of It All was doing the in effect thing. And they were going to do the album. So the Blood, Sweat, and No Tears album, they're like, we don't have the budget small, we have three days at Normandy. So I was like, Hey, listen, I'll go with you guys. I said, and I'll like help you guys. I said, like, I'll change strings. I'll tune everything. I'll do like, you know, and hang out and I'll sing backups. Yeah, like I was just doing like the same thing I did with the Medville seven inch like, I'm gonna, I'm gonna set a hands, you know, it's a voice, you know what I mean? Sure. So I went to that. And like, it was a kind of thing where like they, they were like, damn, we don't have lyrics for these like two songs. So like, I wrote lyrics, like I wrote the lyrics to Blood and Sweat, the title track of the album. So I wrote the lyrics to that song. And people probably don't know that. And like, like Bullshit Justice, the chorus of Bullshit Justice, I wrote that riff that was a Smegma riff. Hey, we're coming back. Yeah, it's all dividends, baby. Oh, Smegma always comes back. So that that riff in Bullshit Justice that like jobbo, wow, Bullshit Justice, I wrote that riff. And I wrote lyrics to something else. I wrote a couple of lines in some other song or a verse maybe. And like, you know, they were like, busy, like singing and playing. And I was like, I'll write this. I'm like, I'd be like the Tom source, I'll be like, do the other four songs first. So you're producing the record basically producing, no, but like, I'm like writing a little I'm like doing, I'm helping them like finish, get it out, get it ready. You know what I mean? Like, they're like, oh, shit, we don't have this, we don't have that. So like, like me and Armand, like Armand's the drummer, but he's also like, all right, so they call me Q, my nickname and cigarette, oh, it's Q. Not the Q, Greg, not the Q. Okay, they're like Q, just like, you got to do this because Lou's got to finish it, you know, tonight. So you got okay, okay, and Armand to be like, yo, when you write that, how does this sound for the chorus? I'd be like, yeah, that's cool. And he'd be like, just think about that. And he's like, I got these two lines, like it was like very fast, like, so finish it, we got to finish this now. Like it was very quick. So you're already in your mind, you're already part of this camp. I was always first. I booked their first show. I booked the first sick of it all show at the right track in it was 86. I think May of 86, maybe I was booking was the first show I ever booked myself. It was at the right track in it was Youth of Today, Straight Ahead, Crippled Youth, and Sick of It All. And I was playing in Sick of I was playing in Straight Ahead and Youth of Today, Crippled Youth couldn't play, they were later changing it to bold as you know, because it was not PC, but back then nothing was PC is this way it was. So Sick of It All played in the first flyer. I said to Lou and Pete, I go, Hey, I'm booking this show. I want you guys to play first. It'll be a first show. And they were nervous. They were like, Oh, we're not ready. We're not ready. And I so I said, check it out, man. I said, just you'll be ready. I said, you got to be ready. And so on the first flyer, I put special guest. And then I like, I handed the flyer out at the CBs. And then like a week or two later at the matinee, I like put the little piece of paper over and went to the Xerox machine. And it said Sick of It All. And I was like, and they were like, What are you doing? I was like, Well, now you have to play. And they were like, Oh, they were scared. And they played and there was some first show ever. Sick of It All was born and students in their shirts would be terrorized by teachers for the rest of their lives. I booked that first show. So I was like, it was like destiny that I was involved with them. I was always friends. I'm like, you know, I had been playing shows a lot already for years. And they were like, you know, they were into the scene. We all went to shows. I knew those guys before I even went to CBs. They picked up the guitar a little later. Lou tried to play bass at first. So as a band, they came like two years later. You know what I mean? Yeah. So are you thinking like, why the hell am I not in this band? Well, you know, I was in AF. So what am I going to do? Quit like the biggest, the biggest hardcore band in the world? Right? You know what I mean? Like, I want to quit the biggest hard to the middle playing Sick of It All. Not that they're not my friends, but I was in the biggest hardcore band in the world. I was touring nine months out of the year. You were in ACDC. Playing ACDC out playing in huge shows at ACDC. So many people when AF would play when I was in AF, people on other bands, we'd go to the West Coast. I'd get like four offers to join. They'd be like, play, play bass in my big bands. They'd be like, play bass in my band, you know, play bass in my band. The guy from gang green was like, you got to play. I'm just in Boston. Play with us. I'm in this band, you know what I mean? But people would always ask me that, like, you bass, they let everyone like my bass sound. Like, I like your bass sound, but I like my bass sound too. You know what I mean? I get it. Is it true that you asked Mark from Floor Punch about his bass sound? And he said, I'm just doing straight ahead. I think I did. Yeah. I can. Not have to feel good. I can write. That's nice. I can recognize a good bass sound. You know what I mean? Yeah. I know. I know what you're doing. Are you? I always tell people, I go, I go like when people like, Oh, this is not the other thing. I go, I'm good at two things. You know, I'm good at bass playing and boxing. But boxing, you know, when I was young, I was good at boxing. So I'm like, I'm good at two things, bass playing and boxing. I was like, and you know what that makes me? That makes me a bum because I'm a guy that when everyone else was getting a career, I was like having fun doing the things I enjoyed playing bass and boxing. So like and what about one of them is your career? And what was my career? You know, the other one, I made some money in the other one too. I was pretty good at that too. You know what I mean? There you go. So, so tell how does it happen? We're talking about sick of it all. So what happened was AF was touring and AF broke up. We did a last tour of Europe. It was 92, I think. And we toured Europe and the plan was to end the band. Roger was going to go to school in Florida for motorcycle repair. We had some some stuff going on with the band that we needed to take a break for a little while. Roger needed to do that. Stigma had some stuff going on. So it was time for AF to to end. We thought that was the end of AF and it was the end of it. So what happened was AF plays that last show and breaks up. And before that tour started, Arman called me and said, hey, Richie's, Richie's quitting the band. You got to do your you got to do Europe with us. I thought I was going to become a chef. I was going to go to culinary school in New Ireland. Yeah, I like to cook. I'm interested in cooking. You know, never happened, but I like to cook. So I said to Arman, they go, okay, he goes, you got to learn all these songs. I kind of knew him already. And I go, all right, listen, AF tour ends on this date. He goes, our tour starts the day, you know, not the next day, but the next day after that. And that was the sick of it all bio hazard tour. And I believe it was 93 maybe not 92. I think it was urban discipline. So they're the biggest band on earth. Yeah. So we were doing we were doing sick of it all bio hazard. We were like flip flopping every night or whatever it was, you know, and I wound up coming home. It was AF tour was seven weeks. So I did seven weeks in Europe in a van, came home, had one day off, and I did all my laundry, you know, I did all my laundry. And I left the next day for an eight week tour of the States in the middle of winter. So I did 13 weeks straight with like one day off, maybe sick of it all tour had one or two days off AF tour have like one day off. So I basically the 13 week run, which was Jesus, that was the longest run I ever did. I think that's 15 weeks, which is even crazy. Just never again. You did 15 weeks. No, you did seven weeks, eight weeks into five weeks. Oh yeah. It's okay. Great math. That's crazy. So I played play bass. So okay. So after that during that tour, is it just like six and a half and seven and a half, but it was something like that, you know, too, too damn many. That's for sure. So on that tour, is it decided? You know what happened? I said to these guys, like, I'm going to do this tour and I'm going to go to culinary school, blah, blah, blah. And by the end of the tour, I was like, you know, we didn't even say it officially, but I was like, yeah, I'm in the band. What's next? You know what I mean? It just was like, what are we doing? You know, Armand Armand, they, you know, they knew like Richie, like Richie, I talked to him on the phone with him from a pay phone on tour. And he's like, it's you. Who's it going to be? Of course, it's you. He's always you. He's like, you know, I'm like, yeah, right. Yeah, I get it. You know what I mean? It's going to happen. So where it is, we're friends. You know, beautiful. Let me ask you something, Craig. You have a best friend? I think you might know best friend. After me. It's hard to say. I got a few best friends. I can't, I'm on the spot now. I have a few best friends. I want to hear about because, you know, we're talking, the way you talk about Tommy and Armand, it's like these guys are just, it's fated that you're going to be together. I got my childhood best friends. I got to show my friends, showing Graham, his uncle was a famous boxer in the 50s. That's how I got into boxing from the Graham family. But anyway, his uncle was Billy Graham, a famous welterweight from the 50s. Yeah, I know that name. You know superstar Billy Graham. Beats, Sugar Ray Robinson and the Amateurs. Sugar Ray Robinson only lost twice in the Amateurs. He was one of the guys that beat him. Sugar Ray Robinson never fought him as a pro. Wow. Sugar Ray Robinson was under the name Walker Smith Jr. for two fights and those are the two fights he lost. So I'm Sugar Ray Robinson never lost. Yeah. That's how they get away. Yeah. That's how they get away with that. Technicality. Yeah. But anyway, he's like my best friend from childhood. I got to say Armand's one of my best friends. You know what I mean? Pete Lew and Armand are some of my best friends. You know what I mean? Like, you know, I like, like AF guys, those guys are some of my best friends. Like, I've been through such life experiences with them like Willie, Maddie, Roger Vinnie, you can't, you know what I mean? Like, all of these guys, you know, I mean, the Manball guys, those are some of my best. Like, I don't talk to these guys every day, but like, I like, I could be 85, 90 years old. I could run into these guys and we're going to be crying, hugging each other. You know what I mean? Yeah. Like, no matter what happens, no matter what happens between people, I love these people. There's no way around it. You know what I mean? Love to hear. Now, here's, I have a question, because I suspect it's soon in this timeline. Craig, you are synonymous with the base strap that doubles the double base strap around your neck. You know what I'm talking about? Yes. When did that make its appearance? That was probably like 94. So I knew it. I knew it. I blew a disc in my back when in the 80s. I broke a disc in my back. I was a furniture mover. I worked on arm. I've worked that job with me as well. So I was like doing furniture, furniture moving to make a living when I was in AF and you get to today and all that. And I blew a disc in my back. And after a while, you know, I couldn't walk for like a year, right? And I just like laid the mattress on my mother's room in my mother's house and just like peed in the bottle. I was like, so fucked up. And I didn't know what was wrong. I had no medical insurance. So the disc just kind of, you know, I have no, I have a bag where the disc was, there's no fluid in it really. It just is messed up. So years later, like 10 years after that, I started when I was playing shows to jump up, I started getting a lot of numbness. Like my face, half of my face would be numb. My hands would start getting numb. My foot would be numb. And I was like, I don't feel right. Everything feels numb. Like I'm half of my body. Like it was like a little lazy to have like, I was like, am I having a stroke? So I went to the doctor and they gave me an MRI and they were like, you have no, your disc is completely ruptured. It's not desiccated. They were like, it looks really old though. I don't get it. And I was like, 10 years ago, I hurt myself on a moving job and I couldn't walk for a while. You know, I spent like a two months laying on mattress and they were like, yeah, that must be it. So, wow. So I, so I invented the double base trap because it put the weight on both sides and it stopped me from getting numb when I would play shows. No kidding. The thing that was weird though, the doctor, when he did the MRI results, when he ran him to me, he goes, it's really weird though. He goes, you have scar tissue built up on the left side. That's like mimicking the size of a disc. He goes, it's so strange that it did that. And I go, well, I go, if I would have put a weight on one side of my body and jump up and down repeatedly, jump over down repeatedly, would that make that scar tissue? He goes, in theory, yeah, I go, that's what I do. And he's like, still, the guy was like kind of confused, but he was like, it's really weird. He goes, but none of the, it's not touching the nerves. So I have like scar tissue there, which is like a callus. It's like a spinal callus or something. Yeah. That's the first time I ever saw you. The singer in my band is a bigger guy. He was playing bass in a band at the time that we played in together. And you told him, cause you saw the bass strap falling off of his traps cause he's pretty built. And he told him, you got to get this double one that doesn't, that used to happen to me. That won't happen to you. That was, that was, that was the like, that's Craig. Since we haven't been playing sick of it all, I'd been doing some, uh, playing with different groups. You know, I had like a run with a, one of the guys that was in the Ramones and then I played with George and stuff like that. And I, well, one of the guys, the only guy that's left, Markey, but I'm, I was using single, single strap with those guys cause it wasn't like every day until we weren't playing, you know, a 20 show every day run six days a week. So I was using a single strap and it works out okay, but it kind of hurts after a few shows, you know, but those shows weren't like back to back to back to back to back to back. So it worked out, you know, interesting. Some guy patented that. Scumbag. Scumbag. And I think I know who he was cause he came to a show and he was asking me about it one time. He's like, look, and he was with another guy and they were like, kind of like treating me like a, like an animal in a cage. They were like, look at how he did it. You did it like this. And the guy was an engineer. So yeah, there you go. I mean, you can, you can prove yeah, right of ownership. Nobody, no, the guy's patent has long since worn out and he made no money on it. Nobody. We'll get you. We'll get you going. The, the, the Krega head strap. Bo's a lawyer. I guess. Let's get this thing going. Bo's a half a lawyer. That's right. Wendy. That's what she was doing at NYU. Patent technology. All right. It's time for you to finally do a record with Sick of It All. That record is scratch the surface. Let's talk about it. Okay. You know, I joined the band and a lot of people were like, Oh my God, how's it going to sound with you? Like how he was like, I can't wait to hear what it's going to sound like. Cause you know, I was like a songwriter, you know what I mean? I wrote a lot of material and we got a rehearsal space in Chinatown on the top floor of a building right off Canal Street. And we shared it with like six other bands and like a magician. It was like this weird spot in this like Chinese building and they had like all kinds of stuff stored helmet rehearsed there also. So it was a, there was like all these crates that were rats everywhere. So we kept our gear there. It was like this weird spot and we would just go there every day and work on material. So we would just practice and write material. And I just, you know, at the time I was talking about how I was going to be a chef and I was going to go to culinary school in Rhode Island because I was dating a girl there and I had broken up with her. So I was full fledged back, you know, like, oh, I'm not going to go to culinary school, whatever. And, you know, like, I was like kind of like, you know, like a little pissed off because it was kind of like, you know, like not a great situation living there. And you know, I was like some ugly neighborhood shit. Anyway, so, you know, I wrote a bunch of good songs because I was a little agitated, you know what I mean? A little felt a little disrespected. So it helped with the process, you know what I mean? So it made it made it what I think is a great album. So it was, you know, in retrospect, it was a good thing. You know, I'm glad it was it entirely collaborative start to finish this whole record. Yeah, we all wrote on that album. That was like, you know, Armand would be like, Hey, I got this song, and we'd mess with that song that day. And Pete would be like, Hey, I got this other song, and we'd mess with that like the next two days. And I'd be like, I got this song. So every song, we completely, completely all worked together on that. It wound up being even like Ernie Parada was involved in that like the song step down, we were touring with before black chainjack, it was maybe it was black trainjack, we toured with them in Europe. And Ernie was the drummer for token entry. So one day we're set up outside because we're playing a festival and somehow we had power. I don't remember how that worked out. But I started playing the step down riff. And Ernie was playing drums. I was like, Oh, look, it's like an oyster song. This is cool. And it turned out to be like the biggest hit, sick of it all over the head. Wow. And then we were like playing that when we got back. We were like, yo, that's so I'm you were doing with Ernie. Let's do that. And they were like, a little bit like, ah, can we do an oyster? And I was like, Yeah, we can do whatever we want. You know what I mean? And let me tell you something, Craig. There's a lot of little steps in my journey here that and my brother and I that molded our interest in hardcore music and and got us to where we are. And the step down music video is a gigantic stepping stone in that journey. Thank you. I loved that video. See it on your face. Oh, watch the damn show for the enthusiasm. I loved that video and that song before I knew that songs had titles. I didn't know that songs had names. I just knew I liked there's a there's a book report I wrote when I was in third or fourth grade, where I note that my favorite song is in the underground. That's hard. Because I didn't know what the hell stepped down was. I didn't know what that was. Let me ask you something though. How the hell how the hell did we tour together and we didn't hang out every day and talk like this? I was 18 years old, bushy-eyed little fucker. And I didn't know anything about nothing. But if you were into it, didn't you look like, Hey, tell me about this? Like, it wouldn't I just I was too shy. It was my it was the so this is you didn't ask me any questions about that stuff because I would have told I was too shy. I didn't. It was my first time. No, not at all. You guys were great. But also, I think it was three days long. And we probably three days. And I think we were driving and you guys were flying. So it wasn't really like we didn't have time. No, no, we didn't have time to really do this. This is my when I played drums and Alphano Mega we tour we're sick of it all for maybe five shows. Yeah, something like that. And like I was I was very young, but I loved straight ahead. I loved rest and pieces. I loved sick of it also this it was just very cool for me to take that all in. And I wasn't like a an extroverted kid, you know, I played my songs and I went on my way. So this is Craig and I's first real time talking about this stuff. But that the step down video is my first exposure to slam dancing. Oh, wow. Okay. And I imagine many others. Sure. Who are all the moshers in this video? Yeah. It was myself. I think eight 108 was in that was she she's doing the pizza maker. Yeah. And who else Tim Shaw was the guy who fell down right? He's doing the California. Thanks for that, by the way. There was a couple of other guys, you know, I mean, like, no, California used to do these days today, like big time circle pits back in the day. Oh, yeah, that's our we got that. And now dude, California now is forsaking the circle pit. How so? They think they don't like it. They think it's for for metal and weird stuff. And it's like, dude, this is like, as the circle pit is as core as it gets. Yeah, I mean, like before there was mosh, there was skank. Straight up. And then skank in a circle. Yeah. And here we are. Strange. It's strange the way things respect the circle. It's like, it's like, it's like evolution, de evolution. You know what I mean? Exactly. So you see the guy turns into a human, then he just like devolves back down back to monkey. You don't want to go back to monkey. So it's you are you speaking of, are you doing the gorilla mosh in the video? I think I was the guy doing the classic New York style. Okay, first few set it off. Yeah. I just kind of I just kind of did like a low swing. Nothing, nothing, nothing with a particular no particular stamp on it, just a generic old school New York. I used to mosh, you know, when I was young, of course. So this this music video got hit so far and wide that Beavis and Butthead would also review it. That's right. Stating these dance, these dances are pretty cool, they said, and then invented a few of their own mosh moves. And these mosh moves were called the dill hole. Yeah, I remember that. The bunghole. I remember the bunghole specifically. And the fart knocker double inverted NAD twist. I don't remember at all. I think he's making that one up. No, you'll see. Here's the footage. Mike Judge made that one up. Pretty good. Not Mike Judge. No, different Mike. You think they ever met? No, no, I don't think so. Shame. As far as I'm concerned, I mean, there might be two Mike Judges, but for me, there's one Mike Judge, my friend. That's right. Beautiful. He played drums in youth of today when I was in youth of today when Tommy left. That's right. There we go. That's right. And that's how we got to be friends. I mean, I met him before I was friends with Mark Ryan. He was the drummer for youth of today, the second half of maybe in the youth of today. All these drummers, man. Well, it makes sense because it's all, it's a rhythmic genre, right? Yeah. It's all it is. It makes sense. And then Mike says to me, he goes, I'm going to start a new band. I'm going to sing. I go, you're going to sing. And he goes, we kind of want to do like hardcore, but we're like metal guitar. He goes, I want to make it sound like heavy. He goes, you know about all that stuff. He goes, you're into that metal stuff. He's like, what records do I get? And I was like, uh, he's like, give him to Purcell. I was like, all right, take the Killamall Metallica, the first Exodus album. I go and maybe listen to a Slayer album. I was like, I guess that'll work. You know what I mean? I was like, I'm talking to the Craig from, from NYC, mayhem, photo death metal band. He wanted like, yeah, he wanted the 80 to 83 Craig. You know what I mean? Yeah. Deep cuts. Deep cuts. That's from the, from the band that invented the Blasphede. He had the deep cuts, deep cuts. Scratch the surface. Your first song with the, first album with the band, and you still play seven to nine songs from this thing every time you play. Yeah. Yeah. Great job. There's a couple of songs I wanted to play that they would never play though. They would like, cause like Louie though, what are you doing? What's the matter with you? He'd like, you know, he turned it into a joke. He'd like act like a grumpy, you know what I mean? He'd get mad at me. I want to put like stick together, like the real generic songs, the ones that almost sound like bad scape punk. I wanted to play those type of songs. Could you do me a favor next? When, when Sickle, it all plays again. I know that, you know, just look around. I like the way you said that. Okay. But when you play again. Thank you. The pain strikes. Yeah, we used to always do that. Give it to me. That's a powerful, that's a jump. You know what the problem with that song is though? That's a hurt your skeleton song. That song hurts a lot. What? Like the verses and stuff? It's like a jump up and down, break your bones. That song is like you get to that end part and you're bringing, when you're cut coming in, you got to go off. Yeah. Yeah. So I get it. The first half of the song is jump up and down and like my skeleton, crushy skeleton. Then the second half is like wave back and forth. I'm like hurt your neck. And then the end with the lead. It's like a weird song. It's like, it's like, it's like, it's like, that's like Brooklyn Stomp Meets like 70s punk. It's like a weird confused song. And I need it back. We always did it. You know, we always did it. I last time I've, the last four or five times I saw you, I don't think you played it. So I need it back. Yeah. That we used to do it years ago. It hasn't been back in a long time. Pete loves that song. He's always like, do the paint strikes, do the paint. He's always pushing for the paint strikes. Me too, Pete. He gets to hurt himself on that. So he likes to hurt himself. So and he gets to do the fucking. That's fun. Yeah. He, he, he, uh, his skeleton hold the hell it's up pretty well. You know what I mean? I mean, he's fucking been jacked the whole time. It's this is this is scale. He's got like a titanium skeleton or something. The broken back doesn't work well with the knee operations, you know, but that's hard to do. Exactly. I remember Jimmy used to wear the, he used to wear the knee pads. Stone Cold. He'd always be like, yeah, I got hardcore knee. I'd be like, I got hardcore knee too. Hardcore knee. I got like call operations, hardcore knee. It's like a fun. When does Europe as a second home to New York hardcore really become a thing? I think the first New York band that went there was GB and 89 actually. No shit. GB went there. It's people don't really know that but GB went there and 89 that AF went there and 90 and sick of it all went there and 92. So I went there with AF from 90 to 92 a whole bunch of times. And then once I joined sick of it all on like 93, they had already went once. And then we just like went nonstop. You live there. Yeah. You're Europe had European bands playing. Other bands didn't play there much. You had bands come through some West Coast bands, but it wasn't like a big thing. And basically we just lived in Europe for like a decade and it got really popular over there. No, not to be, not to be contrarian, but I know that youth today went really early too because they got, they got stuck at the Russian border and the TM convinced them that they were a soccer team because they looked so sporty and let them, and they got through. That's a great story. Dude, Porcel used to have true till death.net and it was an amazing website for a nerd like me because all these things were out there. Yeah, that's pretty cool. That's pretty cool. He's an American hardcore. He's a welcome. He's an American hardcore. I think that was 88, 89. Like around there. So, So that was right when the doors opened. Right when the door closed. Straight edge got that first. Hey, it always does. It always does. All right. So built to last. Electra records, Madonna got you. She got you. She got me. Hook, line and sinker. Tell me about what you remember from this record and the timeframe. I remember being like, we scratch the surface had gotten really popular. I remember playing like on our like a Wednesday, Tuesday or Wednesday night somewhere in like the Pacific Northeast. And they were like 6, 800 people at the show. And I was like, it's like a Tuesday night and we're playing some like second tier Northwestern spot. And there's like at least 700, 750 people there. I'm like, what's happening here? It got really big. Like we were playing these shows that were like 1200 people here, 1500 people here, you know, a small show would be like 600 people. I was like, wow, what the like when it's happening, you almost don't realize, but I'm sort of like, wow, we're like, this is doing really well. What's going on? Like, you don't know. You just know that you want your clothes to dry. You got to hang them up because they're wet. I got to play in wet socks and underwear. I hate that. You know, you know exactly what I'm talking about. Yeah, that's your worry. You know what I mean? I'm like, oh, I'm hungry, but I can't eat because I got to eat afterwards. I hope the sandwich will still be good after I play. And it's not. So it's not never was good. So let me ask you, what do you what would you accredit that to? I think that scratchy surface just came out at a time when New York hardcore broke and we had been putting in so much work for so many years. Like, well, scratch surface wasn't so many years, but it just hit. Yeah, it just it just hit and like the MTV thing picked it up a little bit. So it was on the air in Europe. We were like busting out. I just think it hit and we were like kind of like the New York hardcore kind of broke with that. We were one of the bands that like kind of got it big time and like almost almost like weirdly semi commercial, I guess. But did scratch the surface go gold or anything like that scratchy surface broke the top 100. That's right, which at that time is insane. It's insane. Unimaginable. Yeah, that album sold over a quarter of a million copies. I know that so certified silver. Yeah, I was like over 300 by now, you know, so yeah, whatever they call it silver or whatever. I got a silver record at my house. There we go. So Bill Tillast hits. How is that received? Is it like, are you reaping the benefits of scratch the surface now? Yeah, well, Bill Tillast was like sort of like, oh, wow, that last album, people really loved it. And I was like saying, guys, I know for this next album, I want to bring back the old pile up. Because, you know, you play seabees and they'd be like a chorus and everyone would pile up on the singer and it'd be a big pile up. Like people don't really do pile ups that much anymore. But I was like, I want to bring the pile up back. I want to bring the pile up back. I want to have more chorus. I go, the last album, we hit hard. It was a little dark for us even. I go, I want to bring back the pile up and like the a little more of a punk aspects of our sound. And step down hits so hard that why would you not naturally? Okay, let's let's do that. So we, so we, you know, kind of like, you know, end of the song Bill Tillast, you know what I mean? It has that like, you know, it's almost like Pirate Sound, Swachbuckler, whatever. We always say it's a real Swachbuckler when we left, you know, but it's like, it's like a pile up. You know, I won't go away. It has that like, people jump on the stage and pile up by. So we were going for that and like us versus them. And we went out to California. We recorded it in LA up on the hill. What's the name of that area? Up on the hill in LA. Yeah, that area up on the hill, right in LA, you go up the hill and it's like a nice little area up the hill in LA. It's like the hill, not the hill, but it's like, when you're in downtown LA and you go past like the whiskey and all those places and it goes up and back there. Oh, are you in the valley? No, not in the valley. We're in like LA. Come to the valley. Come on over. Come on, man. I mean, if you're past sunset and you're going over a hill, well, it's just, well, he says in the hill. So what's the, in the hill? Yeah, I don't know. I never got there. We had like one of those like apartments, those long stay apartments, like a long stay apartment. We stayed there and we recorded at a studio up there on the hill with Garth Richardson. And the thing that was weird was he was like, I have enough drums and I was like, I didn't even play the song. He goes, I'm just going to take the parts and come together. Where he was like, I don't play like that. And the guy wanted to cut everything together. And we were like, yeah, that's not how we play. He goes, it'll sound better. Trust me. And I'm like, ah, so we tried a little bit of his way. And we've done that. We did that. We've done that, you know, but it's like, we kind of want to get a good take. And then maybe if we have to like edit a little punch and punch. Yeah, like if the second verse, he's falling apart or we'll cut the first verse in, but usually the second song, it's not always the same. Like everything that's what's good about hardcore, everything kind of has like a jerkiness dynamic. Yeah. Yeah, of course. The imperfection is what makes it. So he would like, I'd come in early, like I'd come in a lot. And I was in the suit in the room with him a lot. And he's like, he's like, all right, I got it's ready to go. I go, okay, play it for me. And he play like a song. And I'd be like, that's not it. And I'd be like, no, it cuts here. And I'd explain it to him. And he didn't really know the material that well. So I had to be like, look, man, you got to let this guy play through. This isn't working. So he did a lot of cutting, but we also, he also let arm on play through for reference. And then took the parts, some of the parts and move them around. So we had to kind of like get them off of his ultra production stuff. Yeah, that's crazy. It's a kind of understanding the vibe that we recorded that album. We were in there for a while. It was a lot of fun. We had friends out there. And we had like kind of like wild time is there in the recording of that? Some funny stories I won't get into here. It's not really for sure. But like, we were young men. Yeah, we were having fun living here in LA for a month or LA. You know, like, you know, it was fun. It sounds like you're in like Laurel Canyon area. That's what I might be. Which is, you know, it leads to the valley. So it's good. Yeah, it's like, it's like the top of LA. And then you go over there. Yeah. That's good. Yeah, exactly. When, when do you guys start playing mafia on tour? Oh, that's way later. So, so we're on tour like, you know, out of how long ago, probably early 2000s, later 2000s. And like, I think, I don't know, we might have started playing with Mad Bull. But I think it was on Earth guys, but I know the on Earth guys were kind of the guys responsible for that whole thing. And they brought it to Mad Bull. And I think Mad Bull brought us in. And we would play and it was a lot of fun. The problem is like, you get with my personality, I have fun with it. Like, you can see I'm smiling now. I some people would be like, I didn't like you when I first met you up. Can we play mafia the first time I met you? I'm like, oh, that's just a game. Yeah. That's how you become an expert mafia. So, you were yelling at me and like, you know, the one who's one sound man in Europe, he's like, you were yelling at me. I wanted to punch you in the face. I was like, it's a game. We're friends. You know what I mean? I'm winning. Yeah, I'm winning and playing. You want me to lose? I haven't played that in so many years. It was so much fun though. Colin, we should organize a game of mafia with us and a bunch of these New York guys. Sounds incredible. Just was a lot of fun. Dad, so are we. We'll make it work. Hey, you never lose the mafia spirit. The guys from Unearth. Buzz. Buzz slow was incredible. The bass player dude was such a good player. I saw him one time play a game. But the problem is when you have new guys, they're way more dangerous because they kill people that know what they're doing. Yeah, it's just like reckless. But I remember slow. He was like a game of like 20 people. And at the end, he's all quiet. Everyone's like going after him. And he goes, okay. And he points to this one kid. He goes, you said this and round three. And now you just said this. So that proves and I was like, Oh my God, how did this guy, this guy, he's holding on to it that long. I was like, this guy's incredible. And they voted slow out because the kids that they started yelling and they didn't really understand what he was saying. I was like, this dude is like a legend. This guy's like a legend. I can't believe it. I don't even know that. Don Corleone. Yeah, he was like, you know, like, yeah, he was like, Don Corleone. Yeah. So how are you, how are you guys passing time on tour from like 94 to 99? A lot of jokes making fun of each other a lot. Like, I'm like doing crazy stuff left and right. I'm like doing all kinds of shenanigans and they're like laughing at what I'm doing. You know, they're like enjoying my stuff. Further herniating that disc. Yes, terribly. Armand is like being Armand. So he's bringing a lot of comedy to the table. Lou is complaining and yelling. And in the middle of yelling, like acting like he's mad. He starts laughing like he can't even keep it in. You know what I mean? And, you know, Pete's just like vomiting. He's laughing so hard the whole time and he throws in like a good one liner here and there. You know, it's like, these guys are like actual comedians. Their thing is like slapstick humor and just have fun. You know what I mean? Beautiful. Call to arms 99 fat wreck, baby. Love that record. Great. Great. For me, that record for a fall. Top 10 sick of it all. That record to me, it's just like a straight up fast hardcore record that like served simply. We didn't try it. I was like, let's just write a record. Let's just write a fast aggressive hardcore record. Let's keep the songs short. We don't need to expand any more. It's me expanded a little bit on scratch and I'm built. We're like, let's bring it. Let's hone it back in elbows and tight and short shots. Keep it. Keep it simple. This is 16 songs in 32 minutes, which, you know, they may be two minutes now, but that proves that there's still some straight ahead. I remember, I remember the first song, Let Go. I wrote that song and when I wrote it, I go, this sounds exactly like adrenaline overdose. I was like, this is a total AOD song. That's what it sounds like. AOD to me. And I remember, I was like, I was like, I wanted the record to start out because, you know, it just starts with guitar. I wanted the record to start out where you hear like, like the buzz of the cable on the road. And he picks it up and plugs it in and then starts playing it. And they were like, no, that's like so amateur. I go, no, that's what's supposed to be the start of that song. But they didn't want to do it and we didn't do it, but it still came out okay. But can you hear that? Like the way that riff is like, it's like a thin, fast riff. It sounds like AOD. Like I hear that. 100%. I hear that. I mean, this is, this sounds like you've been in the band for three records now. Yeah. And you've got your, you've got your process down. I really like the bass sound. I got on that record. I got a nice bass sound. You remember what you used? I used a bass I call Wally Brown. It's a Shector body with a walnut neck. It had a walnut neck, which is pretty rare. Yeah. It was a little, it was kind of heavy. It had the EMG. It had the EMG PJ split, which is my thing. I use active EMG, EMG PJ split. And I put a badass two bridge on it. And I bought it like used from like beer truck, who's a guy that was a roadie for bio hours that he worked on 48 street. So I bought it from beer truck and I got it like whatever he would get. He got a bass that you're gonna like, and he'd be like, I'd be like, how much? He'd be like, uh, $262. He's like, that's what we paid for that. I'd have to give him the cost. And he actually, my red bass, he found a bass of like, call white. It's a white red. It's red, but white and a little different, but made by the same guy that made those. So it's the only two other to sing. So you have both? Yeah. That was like $245. No money at all. He's like, has red ever come close to a ticket? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Has red ever come close to having to be put down? Well, you know, back in the 80s, I was like, I was gonna sell red. I was like, oh, you buy it. Oh man. So I was just had this weird idea that I was going to sell red to this kid I went to school with. And I let him use it for like the high school talent show. He was like a bass player and he went up and did some weird stuff on bass. And he like play, I think he played like this like Seinfeld, maybe Seinfeld probably didn't exist back then, but whatever he did, he played some like weird bass stuff. And then I was like, no, just give it back to me. And I was like, took it back and that was it. I always regret selling guitars and amps. And shirts and shirts, pedals and cabs you can sell all day. Yeah. I actually wanted to ask you about that Craig before this mid 80s stuff, the straight ahead youth of today around that time. There are shirts and merchandise that exists, but they are printed in someone's little brothers high school. They're all medium. They're all size medium. They're all crooked and crazy. How conscious were you of like, oh, we're making a shirt and this might be around or we're making sure let's make sure it looks good or like I was never a record collector or a collector. Those youth of today guys were totally like that. And I always be like, ah, what am I going to do? Like, I was like not organized. I just wanted to play. So like those guys were record collectors. They had all this stuff. I just looked like, yeah, whatever. I didn't care, but I have an opened and the war zone with the sticker on them a whole bunch of still sealed and everything. I think Tommy has two test pressings of the 12 inch breakaway. I think he has breakaway test pressing first one off the presses. We were talking about selling some of this stuff. Maybe we were like, yeah, maybe we'll sell some of it. Somebody's going to want it. You know what I mean? Don't do it. Don't do it. Keep it. Don't do it. Okay. Or give it to me. T-shirts. Yeah. T-shirts. Yeah. My friend had a thrift shop in Queens. I'm like Bell Boulevard in Queens back in like the early 90s. And I had all these 80s shirts and he got as my good friend, my friend Stevie G. He was in the step down video. They got with the blonde flat top tattoos. And I'm like, he's like, I got the thrift shop. I had a thrift shop on the second floor. I go, ah, you want to sell my hardcore shirts? He's like, yeah. So I brought them like a big bag of the crackdown shirt, AF victim and pain shirt, like everything you could ever imagine, like everything. And I gave him all these shirts and like he sold them for like five bucks, 10 bucks, eight. But back then five bucks was like 20 is now 15. Yeah. But now that those are a down payment on a house. Yeah. Now those would go for like 800 to 1000 bucks each, which is insane. Insane. And I just let all that stuff go. Like I think like, ah, what was I thinking? I was like, who could have predicted? Yeah, no. You know, you know, you know, you live something, you don't think of it like that. You think of it as, oh, that was a great time. Something I didn't ask earlier, why is the original, the first batch of breakaway 12 inches? Why is it just the sticker instead of the artwork? Because it was, you know, oh, like we didn't have a place to get this, like to get the sleeves, to get the record pressed with artwork was like too expensive and too much work. So we just went with like disco old school, like disco 12 inches with the cut out in the center. And then we got a bunch of stickers made and just put them on there, like just DIY, like ghetto, just like you have a copy with the sticker. I got like probably 10, 12 unopened ones. That's what I'm talking about. I have a whole bunch of those. You know how much those sell for? How much? $502,000. So buy a new car. Yeah. Jesus. With this, with this, if they got the sticker on them. Yeah. That's crazy. Yeah, I got all that stuff. Because the blank one with no sticker, like where the sticker fell off is $350 to $500. That's crazy. Where do you sell them on? Like what's the what's the? Disguise. Disguise or we got guys we can connect to. I have like a gatefold original victim in pain with Rogers copy and it has like a hole in it because he like dropped something on it, like burned a hole in it. I have like that. I got like the bad brains pay to come seven inch. I got like a bunch of stuff. You're going to be having some people reach out about these breakable. All right. I wasn't even a collector. I just was, you know, involved. I wasn't like some guys I know like I kept it. My stuff's probably not pristine. Some of it might be because it's just sitting in a box and like my mother's like closet probably. Amazing. Unbelievable. You're like, where did she live? Queens. Queens. Let's talk about call to arms real quick a little bit more before we move on. All right. Any fond memories of this era in sick of it all? That was like fun. We hooked up with Fat Mike to do the record and Fat Mike was always a really cool guy. We're all friends with him and it was weird because the West Coast always had their act together. They were like businessmen dialed in East Coast. Never the hardcore scene. We never like pulled it together. Everybody was sort of like doing their own thing. So it was nice to deal with him. He got me when we went there and he had like the big metal, the big like tin tray filled with those, you know, the clear wrap like the Vietnamese spring rolls. I was like, we got to do the record with him. Yeah. Yeah. Big trails. I was like, yeah, Mike, we're doing the record. Give me some orities. There's like a hundred. And then you did two more. So it must have been pretty good relationship. Yeah. The relationship was really good. He was a very, very honest. He is a very honest man and very, very fair. He gave us a deal financially that it was unbelievable. He basically like, you know, like he he's like, I already have a lot of money. I'm not too worried. I'm going to make sure you guys get paid. So that was cool. The dream. The problem was like his label hardcore kids, I wouldn't say they discriminated against it. They disregarded a little bit. So it was at that point labels kind of mattered, you know what I mean? And he's doing pretty much everything else he's doing is not hardcore. Right. Yeah. It's like West Coast punk. But you know, great. I mean, it's all hardcore. Listen, I first met Mike on tour when I was touring with I think Youth of Today. And I remember meeting him at shows when I was young. Like he was always drunk. And like one time I pulled him out of a at the farm in San Francisco. I pulled him out of a puddle. He was like in a puddle of mud, like half drowning and people were laughing at him, flicking cigarettes at him. I was like, yeah, what are you guys doing? I pulled him out of a set of muppets. I was like, yo, we were he was always a good guy. But like, you know, he back then hardcore and that it was all one thing. Yeah, of course. Those all these West Coast guys are coming to play like they're coming to play. It was all the same thing, just different parts of the same same scene. You know, that's kind of where we are now again. Yeah, I love it. That's everything is one. It's true. Mob deep using the sick of it all dragon. Tell me about that. They I guess they were, you know, in their friend group, they'd all get it on their hands. So it was like some like tattoo they'd all get because, you know, it was originally it was flesh. Okay, but we wound up getting the ownership of that flesh from using it. So it became our symbol legally. Yeah. So they used it and then they put it on their record and we had a little conversation with them through friends and people that worked with their label knew us. So we talked a little bit with them and they were cool. And we wound up doing that song together that and that was one of the songs where online play based that mob deep track because he wrote it. It's like, I have a song. Let me just play it. I was like, yeah, go ahead. So he did that. And and they were cool. And just recently a few years ago, they started using it again. And we were like, Hey, we went through all this, you know what I mean? Like, and it was through, what's that company that? Whatever, Supreme Supreme. Oh, yeah. And they were like, kind of like, yeah, whatever, whatever, they were like, kind of like, you know, not taking it seriously. So like, you know, we were like, yeah, you got to stop using it. And they they played a game with us and we wound up suing them and getting a little bit of money for it. So, you know, like, hey, we already went through this, you're going to make it happen again. And then just recently I saw an interview, they were using it again, like one of the guys, I guess, like, there's only a couple of those guys left. And this is one of the guys that maybe didn't know back then how it went. But I saw one of the guys was was using it. And he I saw in the comments, he's like, Yeah, this band, this band from Queens, like, nobody ever heard of them, they probably have like four followers. I was like, are you, I wrote something like, you kidding me? Like, we got like a half a million followers. Are you like, what are you doing? Like, I'm running from you for you doing. Yeah, I was like, yeah, I was like, and it's our thing, we've been through this a couple times already. Like, what are you doing? I didn't write directly to the guys wrote in the comments. I was like, yeah, what are you doing? Like, you know what I mean? It's crazy. It's becoming an ATM. It's just weird. Keep on going, I guess. When do you move out of the city? I still got a place in Queens. I still have a color. That's what it's up. But I moved 2010. I bought a farm upstate couple hours ago. Beautiful. Now, at this point in your life, as a farm man, as a farm man, I tell people up here, one friend of mine up here, he saw an interview where I go, you know, I'm a farmer in upstate New York. And he next time I saw him, he was laughing. He's like, you're a farmer in upstate New York. I was like, all right, I go to everybody else. I'm a farmer upstate. He's like, he's a farmer. He's like, you're a farmer. You're a bass player in a fucking punk band. He slapped me around a little. It was funny. As somebody who is farm adjacent, yes, farm adjacent. Is this when you get into Bigfoot? Well, I've always been into Bigfoot. The first time I started with sharks. I was being on the sharks thing when I was younger. I like sharks and the sharks thing. Arm on those guys. They say there are three slides with me. Boxing slide. Yeah. Bigfoot slide. Pretty girl slide. They're like the three slides. Like, oh, the slide switch. Now it's, you know, now it's boxing. Oh, now we're back to Bigfoot. Oh, look, a pretty girl walk by. This is what I just opened the big foot slide. Bigfoot's interesting to me. Let's talk squash. You're a squash guy. I could listen. I think it's fun. It's like a fun fantasy, but I think it's real, probably. It's perfectly reasonable that something there are so many square miles in North America that it can't be explored. There's caves. There's dense forest. There's all kinds of shit. I think it's perfectly re, and we discover new species every day all the time. Indians and the first settlers that came over here, they all talked about it and wrote about it. And you know, it's probably a very, it probably stays way in the background. It's probably very scared. And I'm sure that there, there is, I'm sure it's been discovered, but just for whatever reason, maybe it's kept kind of quiet. Probably I would think for the most simple answer would be because of regulations and, you know, that would have to happen to protect a species like that, that would mess up the logging industry and things like that. I mean, I can't really say for sure, but on the surface, that would make sense, you know? Do you think there's only one? No, how could there be one? If there was one, it would die. I think there's little pockets of them, but I think they're very, very, very deep. I think there's like little family units. There's probably not a lot of them, but you know, I don't want to say I could be wrong because with all the sightings and all this, I think it's definitely there. But how much of it and what exactly it is, I can't tell you. There's like big other, there's other like fauna rhinos and certain kinds of like Siberian tigers and stuff like that where there's less than hundreds of them left. It's perfectly reasonable. I don't necessarily believe in it, but I'll say this, if they just, if they actually discovered it and there was definitive proof, I wouldn't be that surprised. I think they probably already have discovered that probably is definitive proof, but they're not putting it like, okay, let's talk about this because they probably weighed the pros and cons. And it's, you know, okay, so our forest resources stop now a lot because this thing that we can't find is deep in the forest. So the logging industry screwed a lot of natural resources. If you want to, like, you know, but like, if you want to really go out on a limb and talk about dogmen. What's that? Tell me about dogman. Michigan dogman. It's supposed to be like a werewolf. They say it's Michigan and land between the lakes. Supposedly a family was killed there, whether any of this is true. I have no idea, but people see it allegedly. Another cryptid? Yes. It's like a giant, like a giant, like dog that goes on two legs, like a giant, like werewolf thing. Pretty cool. Listen, when you're watching YouTube and I'm not watching the hard lore, I'll go to dogman a big foot because it's fun or I'll watch some like early hardcore footage or I'll watch some like nerd based stuff because I actually like, you know, I watch like mathematical bass to get better on the instrument. I got two questions for you, Craig. Are you a Victor Wooten man? Victor Wooten, I think is really, really good. I think he's great. I think the guy's like a phenom and I think he's a great player and I like the things he says. Stylistically though, I don't really. It's very weird. Yeah. He's very foreign to me. Yeah. Ask me your other question. I'll tell you who I do relate to. Well, my next one's going to be Mothman. Oh, Mothman's cool. Yeah. I mean, there was a sighting. I went over where that bridge was when I played in Virginia with the Taekwondo. That was cool. There was a sighting a couple of years ago at Lollapalooza in Chicago. Dozens of people saw a Mothman fly by. That's crazy. Yeah. And it was reported. It was reported at O'Hare. Someone at O'Hare reported it too. I feel like, I feel like, like you're going to see me on like some kind of show talking about that. And I'll give you credit and people are like, oh, this guy's a nut. I used to like his music. You talk with a Chupacabra? I don't know much about it, but you know, that's my favorite. That's like another one that like, I may watch like a short, but as far as Victor Wooten. Yes. Yes. Victor Wooten, you can play. But the bass player, if you want to talk about one of those like really big bass, obviously I'd say James Jamerson from Funk Brothers, my favorite. But the guy I relate to is Marcus Miller. He's from Queens. He's from Jamaica, Queens. And I watched a video of him laying tracks on an album and he brought him in and he played and his sound was, you know, thick and he's doing this stuff and it sounds like nasty and there's like a heavy beat behind it. And I was like, yo, I go, this is like me laying tracks on an album, but he's 100 times better. I go, but it had that, it felt like a hardcore, it felt like if you were playing in a studio and it was a good session where it sounded thick and you're like banging and you're like, oh, I'm crushing on this track. I can relate to it because it wasn't just like plucky and big biding. It was like, you know, it was rocking. I was like, Marcus Miller is a man. My dad, my dad growing up, my dad's a bass player. I was always a bass player. So it was always Victor Wooten and Jaco Pistoro. He loved Jaco. Those guys are very, very technical. Technical, yes. Very, you know, like I dig it. You know what I mean? Like I figured out some stuff I watched when he does it. But the way they present is more flowery. I'm more of a hard rock. Hard rock. I can play, I can play smooth acoustic and all that, but like, you know, I feel like there's more, like when I watch Marcus Miller play, there's more ass. There's more weight to his playing. I like some weight in the playing. It's why I like like Antwistle, G-Zero. You know what I mean? Yeah, I'm a Claypool man myself. We are two hours and 47 minutes into this. It feels like five minutes, fellas. That's what I'm saying. And we've got seven Sick of It All records left. But I think that just proves that Sick of It All has been one of the most consistent bands in the genre ever. Never stopping, constantly evolving, but never changing and leaving what you've done behind. How much has changed for Sick of It All in this now kind of back half of the band story? As far as we just, we always said this amongst ourselves, like no matter what we play, we always play it like us. So even when we do like a song that's a little weird, it still sounds like us. It still has rough vocals, heavy drums and thick bass. And we just kind of have that weight to the way we play, I guess. So like what you're saying is like, even when we do something, every album sounds different, but it still sounds like us. So it's in the way we play, I think, that makes that happen more than anything. You know, there's like a way we kind of present like that, you know? The back half, there's not much of a, I mean, it's the same kind of thing. We were touring a little bit less, not a lot less, but enough so that we don't, you know, people have kids, so they need to be around a little more. Not that much of a difference, you know? Trying to strip it down the last bit, try to keep it simple. We're trying to keep, I started tour managing the last bunch of years. So I was handling the Armand was the, Armand was the administrator and I was the live tour manager, you know what I'm saying? Yeah. So we brought things in a little closer the last bunch of years, you know, and everything was going great. And, you know, the situation with Lou, you know, has temporarily put us on a hiatus. You know, he's doing okay. It's one day at a time. I don't really have much to report from his last, the last time he went on and talked, you know, he had the sea. They completely got rid of it. Three months later, it came back. And it's in a spot that they can't really operate. They can't cut him in those spots because there's a sack around his stomach. They can't cut into it. So they're doing some treatments and they've stopped the progress, but it's still there. But, you know, they had to stop the treatments temporarily, because when you get all this stuff done to you, your liver has to filter all the stuff. So your liver, your liver readings can get a little skewed. So if they get skewed past a certain point, they have to back off and let him sort of adjust to it. So right now, you know, it's one day at a time, we're going to see what happens. I pray every day, my brother, I love him, I hope he's okay. And, you know, this isn't an overnight thing. This is a thing we got to deal with. So it's one day at a time. And I'm just trying to keep a good head and still stay out there playing music. And, you know, with the whole straight ahead thing going back to that, the fact that this tragedy happened, if straight ahead comes out and we, you know, do some nice stuff, pick up on some good, fun, spirited stuff, you know, it's the activity and keeping the spirit going is a good thing. That's because you got to stay positive at a time like this, you know, 100%. Absolutely. And, you know, like, Lewis, I'm pretty sure front and center in that straight ahead video. Oh yeah, Lewis all about it. Kid me. So I hope he gets to see it. Oh yeah, Lou and Pete were like the straight ahead guys, you know what I mean? Like, you know, and then I would be when they would play, you know, we were all friends, you know. Were you at the Killing Time last show at Seabees in 1990? Last show? I don't, I might have been on tour. I don't know. Because Pete and Lou are on stage mashing the whole time. Yeah, I was probably, I loved Killing Time. Great. I just saw Anthony as his father passed away, unfortunately. So his father was a good, good man. His father and my father were friends back in the old days. So I ate at Anthony's house when I was four years old. Wow. And that's old school Italian. Yeah. And then when I met him, my father and him used to play cards together. And then I met Anthony's, I went to Anthony's house for Christmas when I was like maybe 15 in hardcore. He'd have the best Christmas gatherings. All the hardcore kids would come over and his mom would cook, rest her soul and his father would tell jokes. And, you know, his sister and him would argue was like the funnest, the funnest thing ever. So I went to his house when I was 15 and I came in, I go, I've been here before. And he said, what do you mean? And I'm like, there was a dirt bike, like an RM250. I go right by the fireplace and there was plastic on the ground. He's like, what? Cold as father over. He's like, tell him, I go, there was a dirt bike there. It was, you know, maybe, maybe 10, 12 years ago. And he's like, yeah, that was my cousin so-and-so. And he goes, he goes, how do you know that? I said, I ate here. And then Anthony goes, yeah, it's father, you know, it's Craig Satari, his father, Rocco. And, you know, Anthony started telling, talking jokes, like, I was father was this and that, you know, they knew each other very well. You know, back in the 70s, everybody was a hard guy, I guess. So Anthony's cracking jokes. Oh, his father, his father that. And Anthony's father looked at Anthony, gave him a straight look and he goes, he looked at me, he goes, he was my good friend. I loved your father. And, you know, he looked at Anthony like, don't say that, don't say anything, even though you're joking. Old school guys. Old school town. Anthony's father was a good man. And every time I saw him, he's like a totally courteous guy. He was a great guy and may rest in peace, Mr. Conellum. Absolutely. We were talking to Mark from Floor Punch a few weeks ago on the show and he noted that there was a killing time Floor Punch show booked, but that Anthony canceled the show because his father had a dream that Anthony died in New Jersey. So they canceled the show. All right, fair enough. Fair enough. That's old school Jersey. That's old school Jersey. Old school Italian. I've had, I've had the premonitions that have come true in weird instances. I won't get into it here, but maybe, maybe another time we'll talk about that. Sounds good. Either privately or whatever. But like, yeah, that's off, off the record. When you have, you know about Sugar Ray Robinson, the boxer, you heard of Sugar Ray Robinson, the original. I heard that I heard a, you've heard of Sugar Ray Robinson. Yes. I'm talking about Sugar Ray Robinson. Okay. He's the greatest pounds of pound boxer of all time. Sugar Ray Robinson. He's the guy who my friend's uncle beat in the amateurs. Sugar Ray Robinson was defending his title. He had a dream that he killed the man he was fighting, right? So he wakes up in the morning and he says to the commission, the boxing commission, he says, I'm not fighting. I had a dream. I killed him. They go, what are you talking about? It's a dream. They brought a priest in, priest talked to him and he finally said, okay, I'll fight, right? I'll fight. Fights the guy, catches him with a left hook. The guy drops and dies right there on the spot. Wow. Yep. So when you had a dream like that, you are man. Yeah. The guy he dreamed it. I've had dreams that have come true. I've dreamed outcomes to things where the next day or two days later, it happens. And I was like, that's what I saw in my dream. So how that works, I don't know, but it can happen. One of these days, my power ball dream is gonna work out. There you go. Yeah. It's gonna be true. So you guys have not put out a record since 2018? Yes. Once Lou heals up, is that in the plans? Then the cards, is that something you guys are already kind of writing? Yeah, that would be in the plans. Pete has like 26 songs or something. Holy shit. Fuck yeah. All right. Yeah. I don't know how many they'd actually turn into because we'd have to chop them apart. But I know there's a few good ones in there. Actually, we rehearsed on those years ago. You know, I have songs. I actually wrote like a new straight ahead song, which could be a signal song weirdly enough. I wrote it. I just wrote the song one day. I get up in the morning, a lot of days, most days, I get up in the morning. As soon as I have my eyes, I grab my acoustic bass and I start playing the second I wake up. And that's how I write songs. And stuff comes out of me. If I like put if I put on a TV in the morning, it's like a wasted morning. But if I pick up the bass, so I wrote this song one day a few months back. And I was like, wow, that sounds like a straight ahead song. And that would be that could be a sick of it all song or whatever. I'm just saying like it just stuff just comes out. You know, I mean, I love it. So there's straight ahead songs. We never got to hear. There's the down down fury session. Yeah, we got to hear it. And there's a demo with no vocals that we did also. Let's finish it up. So there's a a sick of it all would will do an album when we lose. When we lose recovery. That's right. If it's right, God bless, let's hope, you know, but the point the point we were working on an album and then this happened, you know, yeah, first. Yeah, I like will do. Yeah, when he heals up. I like that too. I like that too. Could you tell me off the top of your head, some modern bands in the last 25 years you've seen or toured with that made you think, holy shit, hardcore, still rocks? Yeah, I'm going to say like turn style, even though they're the biggest band in the world. In the world. Like when I saw them, like when they played with us in Europe, and they were just really good. And they were like, they had their own sound, which was kind of refreshing. I like the way they sort of had their own thing going on. It was like kind of bright. It had a lot of energy. So I and they're such nice guys, you know, they're such respectful guys. They love hardcore. It seems like that whole generation of guys, they all love everything Mike DeGionne ever did, which I can't really argue with that. You know what I mean? Yeah. Speeds a good band speeds grass. Absolutely. What else? New bands like, you know, I love like in the last 25 years, I'd say I'd say wisdom and change. If you're going to go back 25 years, I love that band. They they they use the chorus. They knew how to use a chorus, which is pretty rare. Like like savoring a chorus is like very, very hard to do. Most people don't savor choruses, you know, like to find a band that's like a songwriting band and a chorus band that's a little bit of melody, you know, a little bit of a hook just to get you. Yeah, absolutely. I toured with wisdom and chains without ever hearing wisdom and chains. Really? By the end by the end of this three day tour, I knew every word to every song. Pennsylvania. I fucking love you. It's great stuff. Great answers. Well, you guys got anything else for me? You got any new bands? Yeah, we got some. We got a little bit more. We got a little bit more. We're almost done. Could you tell me a single show you went to or played at CB's that sticks with you the most? Great question. I don't know about sticks with me the most, but I remember we played the guillotine benefit. It was an 86 and there's actually a recording of it. There's an audio. I think there's a video and there's an audio recording. And we played the song weird. We played like we were so busy then we were everything sounds like very unique. Like the songs almost sound like different versions of the songs. But I remember at the end of our set, I'm walking outside with red and I had a real case for red at that point. And there was a riot with the homeless people that were living upstairs. So they all started throwing bottles. They were raining bottles down on everybody because some kind of fight happened or something. So hundreds of bottles, everyone's like running. So I left red on the sidewalk and ran across the street because I was getting hit with bottles, you know, everyone's gonna hit with bottles. And red was there and all the homeless guys came out and they had like sticks and stuff. And red was right there. I was like, shit, I got to get red. And I remember one of the warzone women ran across the street, grabbed my base and ran it back across the street before I could even do it. And I just stuck in my head like, I think the fight might have happened. I think that maybe I might be confused with a different fight. But I think Russell Underdog had a fight with a guy, a skinhead from Jersey, and then Todd Youth hit him in the face with the skateboard trucks, broke the skinheads nose, and then a riot broke out. I don't remember if that was the same thing or not. But you ever see a guy- Red lift, red lift because of this wonderful- A skateboard held over like this. And a guy's laying on a car hood, laying- he's pinned on a car hood and the skateboard trucks just go like this. And the guy's nose just goes, boom! And there's blood everywhere. And the guy's just like out. And it made this sound like it was like this deep crack sound. I was like, oh, everyone was like, oh! Everyone made like a big, big like, like belly aches sound. Everyone was like almost throwing out. So that's your most memorable CBT? That's just the one that sticks in the top of my head. Not the most memorable, but that one sticks in my head. Just because it was so wild, what happened, you know? Yeah, yeah. Two more quick things. What is Sick of It All's fast food of choice? That's really hard to say. I can't- One in the world, where you- no matter where you are, you have every single one at your fingertips. You can go to any of them. Where are you guys so psyched to stop? Armand's going to go to the- You know, back in the day, it was that Australian hamburger joint, Lord of the Fries was- Lord of the Fries. Lord of the Fries. Lord of the Fries, yeah. We used to go to Lord of the Fries. We used to go to that back then, you know? I was vegetarian back then. So we'd go to that and fast food like- It's hard to say. Like nobody's really that into fast food. When we're on the West Coast, we go to In-N-Out. Come on. Yeah. I mean, that's a no-brainer. You know what I mean? It's pretty easy to- And for me personally, maybe not a Sick of It All one, but a hardcore one, Del Taco. Oh. Dude, Del Taco is like what Taco Bell is supposed to be. That's crazy. It's a good tasting, clean, simple like fast food Mexican. Like Taco Bell is gross, but you go to Del Taco, you get that green or the red bean burrito. The green burrito. The green burrito, make it bold, baby. Eat like a salvia, though, and you're like, who's not happy? Exactly. And then let me ask you, Craig, as somebody who likes to cook and who's into cooking, what's your favorite thing to cook? It's hard to say. I always love just a simple pasta, pomodoro with tomatoes. One thing I do is I, you know, when I- In my garden, I grow a little grape cherry tomatoes with them, little cherry tomatoes. When the cherry tomatoes come in, I take a clove of garlic and I put it a little olive and I put the cherry tomatoes just straight into that. And I put a little pinch of salt in it and I put a lid on it until they pop. And they just all burst. And when they cook, they start to cook down right, right toward the end. I'll just put in a bunch of fresh basil right at the end and just have that with some very al dente pasta. And the key to making pasta is you make it al dente, but that starchy cooking water, the salted cooking water, you save a little bit of that. And when you put the pasta with the burst tomatoes, you add a little of that cooking water in it, it starches it up and sticks it together. And you just eat that fresh tomato with the basil and baby tomatoes. They're naturally sweet. It's like one of my favorite things to eat. Oh, I love that. I'm so hungry. I'm so hungry. Could you be hungry? Yeah, I'm hungry as hell too. It's like three hours. All right, let's get out of here. I got one more question for you. Yeah, it's a big one. Craig, ahead. Landmark hardcore musician, could you tell me and Bo and the world, your top four hardcore records of all time? Okay, we're going to say the first two minor threat, the seven inches. We'll count that as one. We'll count that as one. That's the way it has to go. The bad brand Rorca set is probably number one. It's one or two. The bad brand Rorca set crushes it, crushes it. Four, it's hardcore spirit and capturing the new, if you were going to make a time capsule for a thousand years in the future and you wanted to explain New York hardcore, agnostic front, victim in pain goes in that time capsule. So victim in pain is on that, is definitely in that. And four, there's a lot of ways I could go with this, but I'm just going to keep it traditional and keep it rudimentary. Negative approach tied down. Great answers. Where would we be without tied down? I think two would be. What AF have ever written, your mistake or friend of folk? Because those were, those were, you know, negative approach songs, titles at least. Wow, unbelievable. Craig, this is an all timer. Instant classic. I watched you guys and I was like, I was like, this show is great. I was like, you know, I'd love to be on the show. Hey man, we thank you so much for your time and your patience and your many hours, but this was, this was great. Unbelievable. I want to eat with you guys. You guys live far from each other, don't you? We do, but we make it happen. We make it happen. That's right. If not, we'll do two separate ones. You know what I mean? There you go. Yeah, no problem. Zoom meal. Zoomed in. Well, thank you for having me. Thank you for your interest in Straight Ahead and all that. And hopefully I'll see you guys at the show, at the GD and Straight Ahead show. If you guys want to go. I hope so too. It's, you know, April 25th at the Brooklyn Monarchs. It's going to be great. I'm very excited. April 25th, Straight Ahead is back. And if you sell it out fast, maybe in some point in the future, they'll be inspired to do it again. Craig, truly thank you so much for joining us. All right, fellas, thank you. You'll receive some random texts from me once in our pictures of food. Food porn. No problem. No problem. Absolutely. I want a picture of a breakaway 12 inch with a sticker on it too. That's like actual porn. You know what I mean? It is. Oh. All right. Thank you all for watching. Thank you for having me, guys. Absolutely. Have a good night. You too. See you all next week. Bye. This episode is brought to you by Mad Vintage.