I interviewed Blake Schwarzenbach after last night’s Thorns Of Life show at Thrillhouse Records in San Francisco. I’m not very good at introductions, read the next post down to understand why this matters if you don’t already, but being that Jawbreaker tattoos outnumber any other symbolism among my social circles, an introduction really shouldn’t be necessary.

Photo credit: Ham N’ Beans

Not only has Jawbreaker had a profound impact on my life, but so have the writings of drummer Aaron Cometbus (and the music of Crimpshrine, Cleveland Bound Death Sentance, Pinhead Gunpowder, The Blank Fight, and too many of his other bands to list), and the music of The Gr’ups, the previous band of bass player Daniela Sea.

Read on for Blake’s thoughts on house shows, cocaine-addicted indie rockers ruining the English language, drunken bike riding, Barack Obama, and even some upcoming plans for his new band, Thorns Of Life.

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Thorns Of Life, the new band featuring Aaron Cometbus (Crimpshrine, Pinhead Gunpowder), Blake Schwarzenbach (Jawbreaker, Jets To Brazil) and Daniela Sea (the Gr’ups, and Showtime’s The L word), is playing Saturday at 924 Gilman Street in Berkeley for Punk Rock Joel’s birthday party. I’m still after-sex-glowing at seeing them twice so far this week around the SF bay area, and recommend you do anything in your power to make it out, they are every bit as good as their lineage would make you have sonic wet dreams about.

Photo credit: Ham N’ Beans

Let’s talk about this birthday thing for a minute. Joel has been a local punk rock fixture for as long as I can remember, taking pictures, pogo’ing around, confusing my parent’s, and just being an all around sweetheart. His birthday party is a 924 Gilman street tradition, two days of Joel’s hand-picked top notch bands, free cake, surprises and good times.

Our very own Secretions are playing Friday night with Pansy Division, Kepi The Band, Boats and holy fuck — The Avengers! Now this show is already enough to give us major quivers over the entire weekend, but holy fuck, have you seen Saturday’s line up?? Not only do we have the previously mentioned Thorns Of Life, but Off With Their Heads and the Re Volts too! This means that you are a fucking moron if you don’t make it to these shows, even if your left side just got eaten by meat bees, trust me on this one, come the fuck out!! It doesn’t even matter that Off With Their Heads are incapable of playing longer than 14 minutes, since 14 minutes in heaven is better than 13 minutes in heaven. Comadre and Hunx And His Punx are playing too, who I haven’t heard yet but hear good things about.

Silver Sprocket will be hosting a free vegan BBQ for folks waiting in line before Saturday’s show, and in Cometbus-Bands-At-Gilman-Tradition, we are providing lots of chalk for your obscene sidewalk endeavors.

Speaking of Secretions, Sacramento’s smelliest are working on their new album coming out this summer, which they threaten to call Hotgreasymeatcheezy. I really wish this were a joke, but they seem serious. If you are someone the Secretions listen to, please convince them to come up with a less gross album title. More Secretions tour dates and news coming up too!

Big ups to Razorcake for putting our boys Shang-A-Lang on the cover of their brand new issue #48! This is the most relevant zine being published today focused entirely on the punk rock I actually give a shit about. Ballsy too, the zine’s reputation is strong enough that they can put a relatively unknown band on their cover and still sell enough to be fine.

This issue also has 24 reviews of Dillinger Four’s latest, and an interview with the fucking rad That God Damn Doo Wop Band, whose pint-sized singer I had a disastrous drinking contest with one night at The Triple Rock when her other band opened for The Epoxies and Phenomenauts tour.

And hidden way in back, a historic add for Silver Sprocket featuring the wreckage of when Brooke and Amber got kicked out of an Avengers‘ show in Sacramento for being to drunk and ate shit into a lawn on the attempted ride home:

This zine is rad, pick it up. Its not on Interpunk or Razorcake.org yet, but should be in a few days? will be Feb 1st when it comes out.  Or fuck that noise, subscribe.

Speaking of Shang-A-Lang, the test pressing for their split 7″ with Brickfight just came in from the plant and sounds amazing, we’ll have those finished records in February, then sometime after that will be a CD collecting Shang-A-Lang’s pile of singles in one spot.

Also coming this February is the eagerly anticipated split between The New Trust and Pteradon, and re-issue of Filth’s Live The Chaos.  The Blatz re-issue had a problem with the plates, but will be here as soon as that shit gets fixed.

That’s right, I’m linking to Blatz and Filth’s Wikipedia pages instead of some MySpace.

Jesse Michaels says:

Our new band is called “Classics of Love.” The members consist of Jesse Michaels on Guitar and Vocals, Mike Huegenor on guitar, Morgan Herell on bass and Max Feshbach on drums. The three guys besides myself have another band called The Hard Girls. They are from San Jose which is a large city about 60 miles south/east of Berkeley. They have also individually played in other local bands including Pteradon and Shinobu.

Damn fucking straight!!!! I speak for everyone here at S.S.B.C. when I say that I can’t begin to imagine how different my life would be right now without Operation Ivy.  Unlike a lot of our early heroes, Jesse has continued doing amazing shit to keep us inspired, and I am so incredibly stoked that my good friends Mike, Max and Morgan from the Hard Girls get to be a part of it.

Photo Credit: Backstabbers on Flickr

Check out the Hard Girls record on Silver Sprocket, and we have some Pteradon stuff coming up soon too.  Click below for the rest of what Jesse wrote.  I’m in Israel right now where a bunch of shit is exploding but will be back soon for more of the usual ruckus. (more…)

I’m watch​ing a six year old episo​de of the Simps​ons right​ now, ‘​Bart to the Futur​e’​.​ It takes​ place​ in the futur​e.​ It talks​ about​ all kinds​ of great​ thing​s:​ Econo​mic Crisi​s,​ Femal​e Presi​dents​,​ India​ v Pakis​tan,​ Forei​gn Debt,​ and Futur​e Beer.​ Way to hit the quant​um nail on the head (or not)​,​ Matt Groen​ing!​

In other news, =Phenomenauts= Jackets, version (?).0 now exist. They will be shipping with an updated patch to replace the obsolete one already on the jacket. With some careful stitch removal/light surgery, you can be riding on the cutting edge of the knife that is cutting the brownies that are fashion. Maybe we can get Annie Deranged to give us a Sewing 101 lesson in the future. Or not. Drinking all day Making clothes is really hard work.

Also: Fuck YooOOOOOUUUUUU, 2008 (aka 2007 part II)!!!! Most of the Sprockets (Eoin and I, also Caitlin) rang in the new year in dignity at Ye Olde Command Centre. Lots of Blondie, few regrets. Without naming names, here’s an artist’s rendering of what (basically) happened:

And fun was had by all. Especially by Orbit.

Andrew Fuckson Fuckhad is tearing through town and ripping out your vocal chords. Check the last post for specifics.

Avi was last seen aboard the RMS Lusitania, circa late April 1915. He was with a man identified only as ‘The Doctor’. The one that kind of looked like a skinhead. I liked him.

Please spay or neuter your pet.