I Wonder, What do They do with the Bodies?

Good evening! Good news, my baseball team won their game today (Wednesday)! Bringing our wins to a grand total of ::drum roll::

1!

That’s right ladies and germs, the Long Island Hitmen have finally put a mark in the win column. By the way, today is still Wednesday as I’m typing this, but since I don’t know how to adjust the time to Eastern Standard yet, the blog says it’s Thursday. Just trust me on this one, OK? I’m still a Monday through Friday kinda guy, I KEEPS IT REAL!

Moving on to what I really wanted to talk about.

It’s been a while since a band has spoken to me like Defiance, Ohio has recently. Probably the last band that I really felt connected to was Millencolin and that was junior/senior year of high school. It seems like everything they say in their content is exactly how I’ve been feeling/thinking recently: afraid of the rest of the world, feeling out of place in your own hometown, needing to escape your situation and finding it exceedingly difficult, all the while remaining strong and defiant (no pun intended) till the end.

Defiance, Ohio is by far the best example of folk-punk that I’m familiar with. Whenever i bring up the sub-genre in conversation and people ask me to describe it, I always find it impossible and just tell them to listen to these folks. With their instrumentation including upright bass, acoustic guitar, violin, cello and drums, blasting their music can transport you to a place where all your friends have crammed themselves into a small basement, picked up some instruments, had a little too much to drink, and screamed in unison about everything they hated, feared and loved. That, by the way, sounds like the sickest party I could ever go to and someone I know and like should throw it SOON! It makes you feel connected to people who are as uncomfortable in American society as you are and that its OK to not be like them. Always consuming, always following, exceedingly egocentric.

I also am in love with the way they write and record their music. Most of their songs seem like they’re almost written on the spot. The music is chaotic, like an old steam engine screaming down the tracks on its last trip before being scrapped, making a last ditch effort to be noticed, all the while being seconds away from falling apart. The band plays like its the last time they’ll ever get to play their instruments, which is the mindset I try to put myself in every time I play live. The lyrics seem spontaneous as well, like the band started playing and whoever felt like singing just vented about however they felt. In my opinion, this is music in its purest form, made up of raw emotion, revealing everything inside the artist while the musicians play like their lives depend on it.

Another awesome thing about these guys is they give all their music away for free, presumably because they hate capitalism and the music industry and

ART IS NOT MEANT TO BE PUT ON A PEDESTAL!

The way I see it, and many will disagree, is that no one should have to pay to experience art, as if the people who can’t afford it aren’t worthy of listening to these sequences of random noises.  It makes some music inaccessible to people.  This may be the red in me, but having more money shouldn’t mean you get more access ideas. This goes back to the idea of original folk music, the music of the people, where it was played merely to get others to feel emotion, whether it be happiness, sadness, or something in between.  No one was forbidden to perform these songs because all these musicians wanted to do is say whatever they had to say and have people hear it.

All music should be made like that.  At least that’s how I feel.

So everyone should go listen to them and you have no excuse because its FREEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!

Tomorrow may be a late post as well because I’m actually doing quite a bit at work and my 45 minute lunch break may not be enough time to finish it.

One last thing, feel free to leave comments about bad grammar or spelling, I sorta rushed this one because of how strongly I feel about it. Thanks!

Stay angry,

tim!

Tags: art, Defiance Ohio, folk, Music, punk