Ian MacKaye, photo: Pat Graham

 
Fugazi – ‘I’m so Tired’

 
Fugazi – ‘Waiting Room’

 
Ian MacKaye is somewhat of a ‘Doctor in punk rock’, the progenitor of the calculated use of sound to extend this aspect of punk culture. Founder and still-active owner of Dischord Records Ian is a musician himself and has earned respect through influential hardcore punk acts such as Minor Threat and Fugazi. He now forms half of indie punk duo The Evens with former The Wamers’ drummer and wife, Amy Farina.

You have been busy with Dischord putting up all the live Fugazi shows online. How’s that been going?

It’s an enormous project. It’s something I’ve been working on for over two years now. It’s involved having to catalogue all the tapes, make a database, build a website, digitize all the tapes, and edit all the tapes. We started out with over 850 recordings. We now have about 1200 different recordings of different shows that we have documented, so it’s a pretty enormous project. Maybe on a scale too large.

What prompted you to undertake such an ambitious project?

It struck me as an interesting way to turnover these documents, these tapes that have been sitting in my archive closet here at the Dischord house. Why do we have these tapes? What’s the point of them? Are they just going to sit there until they meet some calamity? Will a fire take them or will they just rot?

Will my son have to figure out what the fuck to do with all these tapes? So it was just clear to me; let’s just do this. Let’s create an archive online for people – if they’re curious about hearing the band’s sonic trajectory, then why not?

I am a fan of music, I am interested in the way people have worked and progressed and it’s something that I think people who are fans of the band would be quite interested in. It’s a huge project and it’s something that’s a little too consuming at the moment. But that’s the way I work. I do something to the point where I’m finished with them and then I’ll do something else.

Minor Threat, image: punkpaper.propagande.org

Fugazi, photo: John Falls

Do you have any comments about the whole SOPA issue?

The United States Government is essentially a corporate front and it has been so forever.

And the Lobbyists that are most effective in getting congress to pass laws are largely of the money variety and these companies, these giant corporations, have part of their quiver, these music labels. And they’re trying to come up with new ways of creating new revenue for themselves. They don’t give a fuck about anybody else. In other words, they’ll create these new structures to make sure there’s more money for them regardless of who gets caught in the net. It’s a little bit like tuna fish or sweeping up all the sharks and the dolphins. It’s just their greed. I think that since the internet and computers have become these vessels of communication and in many ways I really think the public domain. It feels to me like people should be able to operate how they want to operate as long as they’re not injuring other people.

So, I think that the whole SOPA thing is a bunch of bullshit.

Do you vote at all?

Well I live in Washington DC and we don’t have representation. Our votes are largely ceremonial. Furthermore, Washington DC is by far a democratic city. Having said that, I do vote every four years. My approach is pretty straight forward. I think whoever becomes president of this country, this country deserves. But the rest of the world does not deserve this president. However the rest of the world had no say in who got to take office of the United States. How does the American policy impact the rest of the world?

It seems to me the most profound habitual effect of the American policy is that it manifests in war. It manifests in the murdering of people in other countries by our machines, our weapons, and our people.

So my voting record is always vote for the person who is a potential candidate to be the person who is least likely to go to war. I think that is the best I can do. And in terms of a deeply unethical situation, I have to find someone who will murder less people in other parts of the world.

Artificial Peace, image: Koti.mbnet.fi

© Ian MacKaye, image: Dischord Records

Minor Threat

You and Guy Picciotto signed the Occupy Musicians list. Do you feel that the Occupy Movement will have a drastic effect on politics and how things are being run?

A part of society that is making enough noise that the media picks up on it? I think in that case it has already had an effect on society. The fact that you’re in South Africa and you’re asking me about it clearly means that the media has already picked up on it. So I’m assuming that you read about it somewhere, right? Then I would say that the media clearly embraced it. It also energized a lot of people. I think it’s already had an effect on politics and it will continue to. The thing about protest is that it’s an exercise. And you have to exercise your entire life. It’s not like you go out and protest and then, problem solved. It’s not that way. In my mind, there will forever be things to address. It’s a really important part of someone’s life to take a position that we want to think about what’s going on, because if you just leave power to run its own affairs, it’s going to step on people. Always. It’s just the nature of it. Surely you have heard the term we have, ’power corrupts’? It’s just that power corrupts absolutely. It’s just a trueism.

I was raised to question the government. Not because I’m anti-government. It’s because if you don’t question them then they become they fascistic in their own ways.

They just do whatever they damn well please. And because the government, as I said earlier, acts largely on the behalf of the people with the most money, imagine the things that they’re going to be doing? Poor people don’t get legislation, they get legislated. You follow? I’m in support of people who always question American policies. It seems so obvious, why wouldn’t somebody sign that?

 
So what do you think is next? What do you think will happen after the Occupy Movement?

Oh, I don’t know. I know that there are meetings going on. I don’t think about the future. I don’t like to speculate about these sorts of things. My impression is that the people that were involved with all of that, they were really energized by all of it. They learnt a lot about organizing. And it’s not like once they cleared the park, everyone’s minds went blank. And they were saying, ‘Let’s go back to work, let’s go back to our video games.’ I think that this was serious. And we’ll see other manifestations of this sort of thing.

Occupy Musicians, image: occupymusicians.com

Occupy Musicians, image: pitchfork.com

You’ve mentioned before that if people don’t support the arts they risk not ever having any new music again. Is this something that you worry about with running Dischord?

No. What I said was that if people want everything for free, they should be prepared to only have old music. If you can’t help pay for the music, then how could artists afford to make the music? I don’t think that’s really going to happen. I’m just pointing out to a certain part of society. And they are a minority that insists on not having to pay for anything. They’re just spoiled children, like people who are not thinking well. And I just want to give them a way to think about the situation and to realize that by supporting the arts would be to their benefit because then you actually make it possible to create new things. And art is. On the face of it people just think that it’s just a silly pass time, but art is real and it plays a profound role in our societies. In terms of the label, I don’t worry about these things at all. People support the label or they don’t. If they don’t, then we shut down. That’s alright. It’s been 30 years. I didn’t even want a record label, honestly. I just wanted to document the music I was making. And the actual music business is disgusting. If people are like, ’We’re done with you.’ I’m like, ‘good, I’ll do something else now.’

Can you explain the reason why you guys decided not to ever sell any merchandise or make any music videos?

I can sum it up in one sentence – we are a band and we play music. That was our idea, the rest of it is just this carnival surrounding the music business.

image: pitchfork.com

Fugazi, image: cultureshock.bangordailynews.com

Are you recording any new acts for the Dischord catalogue or are you focusing on previous records you guys have put out?

I think at the time the label was created, it was to document what was going on in Washington DC – we felt connected to our community, but a lot of people have stopped playing music, or moved on, or whatever, so its really quiet on that front. There are a few still making some music but they do it really slowly, there’s not a lot of new stuff going on right now. This is typical, I think, with a label that has been around for many years. Dischord is 30 years old in December, but at this point I am starting to realize that’s my job [to document what was going on in DC]

How have you managed to keep Dischord afloat for so long?

We did the work with what was in front of us, and we did not pretend that we knew what was going to happen in 10 years. Also we were not expansionists… a lot of people say you’ve gt to grow – there is this idea that if you don’t grow a business you will die. I don’t agree with that, you know, if you are a baker and you make this nutritious wholesome loaf of bread, and people like it, why can’t you just do that? Why do you have to start making marshmallows and burritos? Why can you just make the bread? And keep on making it.

Fugazi live, image: thechive com

You once quoted in a previous interview that ‘in the 1970s when I was a kid, I felt like I was being ridiculed for being straight-edge.‘ Do you still feel as if you are being reduced for being straight-edge?

Yes! I mean I am 50 years old and people still ask me about it as if it’s some weird thing. Many people still think I am a fundamentalist. I still pretty regularly get calls from drunk girls in the morning, ’I am fucking drunk dude.’

For me, I don’t take personal offence; my worry is it reveals a deep pathology in our society, you know, that we feel it is somehow necessary or appropriate to attack people for being otherley. In my mind people think of the way I live as a lifestyle, like that’s your lifestyle. It’s not a fucking lifestyle, it is life. Last time I checked when we are born we are not using anything, we are not doing anything, we are perfect. I understand there are exceptions, like if there mothers were drinking or using drugs.

My point is, by and large, that when we are born what is necessary is food and water and air? I would just say I am being normal – its celestial to the fucking lifestyle. But the thing is I am not judgmental of people – a lot of people I love engage in all certain things I don’t do.

I have known drugs since I was a baby. I am not trying to create a perfect world, I am just trying to live my life.

Minor Threat

© The Evens

What about pharmaceutical drugs? Is this age of Ritalin, Prozak – of consumption – perhaps a result of living in such a demanding, fast-paced lifestyle and a constant effort to succeed?

Yeah I would agree with you, what we have experienced in the last 10 – 20 years is an incredible rise in terms of the power of pharmaceutical companies, and people are being prescribed so many chemicals now it’s crazy, to me. I mean I am a guy that won’t take an aspirin to break a fever, I don’t even take vitamins. Food, water, air and fucking – that’s pretty much the four things that we need to keep this show going, everything else is by choice. In every other aspect of society – people choose that, these four things there is not choice. I feel like what happened is people became over medicated, and its an enormous profit centre I am no talking conspiracy theory, I am being straight up, I don’t think its always wrong to take medicine, I think people have grown to accept it…

A profitable acceptance

We should be suspicious of the companies that are play upon us, subconsciously playing with our insecurities. Playing upon our fears! Cause that is a big deal. They make a business, a lot of fucking money. I think that some of these things if not most of them are for the corporate good. I mean I feel you have to suspect a corporation an industry that is putting peoples heath so far behind their own pocket book. I think if you are being forced to pay for something or there is money being generated, its your job to look at it for sure

You get conditioned to it…

Right and like I said: Take invitatory to examine the things [you] have and [you] believe and to make sure they make sense when you step back. Change the source of the light and see if it is what it is cause a lot of the times its not, and we have just grown accustomed to it.

What are your simple truths?

Ian: well I think I have addressed that; air water food and fucking

 
interview by: Loucas Polydorou and Sarah Claire Picton
images: Dischord Records, Pat Graham, The Evens, punkpaper.propagande.org, John Falls, selectism.com, banner image by Glen E Friedman

South Beach Fashion Shoot from one small seed on Vimeo.

To be more candid, the narrative is a screaming homophile manifestation; typified by the model’s oiled body glossing the pages and a fluffy rat-like companion complementing the pink midriffs and sailor paraphernalia. This man drenched in feminine inflections got me thinking about the androgynous nature of pop culture and the first iconic gender-benders who upset the conservatives in the early ’70s.

We have moved into an age that transcends the onset of metrosexuality, past the point of David Beckham assuring everyone that it is cool to frost their hair and decorate their ears. I’m talking about the engagement of boy/girl and the fading distinction that still makes the backline of first-team rugby shudder.

One can trace the infiltration of androgyny quite simply throughout the decades. It was first hinted at during the cultural revolution of the ’60s – that era where flowers had powers and we had our first glimpses of long-haired men in flared pants. The general mood of the day was in keeping kaleidoscopes in your eyes, anti-war protests and loving thy neighbour as thoroughly as possible. It wasn’t until the ’70s came swinging in through the svelte hips of Prince and Michael Jackson that new meaning attached itself to the idea of androgyny. Even David Bowie was reincarnated in the form of his androgynous exemplar, Ziggy Stardust. Bowie’s biographer David Buckley declared that Ziggy Stardust ‘created perhaps the biggest cult in popular culture’.

As one would expect, the mainstream puppet masters of the ’70s and ’80s tried to rally the population into a climate of fear – in the name of national interest, of course – as their normative values of gender role and behaviour were being challenged. This new league of expressionists were criticised for emulating offensive, communist and even demonic values. And when the folly of those claims were overshadowed by the avalanche of success and popularity of these icons, people felt uncomfortable and quickly eased their awkward selves by equating high-pitched notes and lacy attire with homosexuality.

Isn’t irony the best? Its timely smugness points out that these ‘homosexuals’ have been linked or married to a catalogue of some of the most beautiful women in the world such as Iman, Carmen Electra and Brooke Shields – not to mention the legions of female fans that go to bed at night wishing their love would be requited.

Despite sexy being a word that can no longer be thrown around too liberally (since its decimation as the tagline of advertisers and the C-rate songstress), this celebration of the human is an exception. It has been proven that people who embrace the natural features of masculine (instrumental) and feminine (expressive) traits are more mentally healthy then those who invest solely on one end of the spectrum. Neither manhood nor the idealisation of the lady is under threat. There is simply a shift on consciousness as we begin to realise that emotion has no gender.

words by: Megan King

Southern Comfort, the brand from New Orleans which represents a distinctive ‘joie de vivre’ has launched Southern Comfort “Creative Exchange”. Drawing from the success of the international campaign, Creative Exchange invites local young creatives to design a striking interpretation of the brand and its provenance. The competition is  now open for entries… So read on to find out how to get involved!

Drawing from the success of a similar campaign held in Germany last year, Southern Comfort South Africa is appealing to all local designers of legal drinking age. From students to up-and-coming creatives – as they say in New Orleans, “come one, come all.” Participants are required to design a two-dimensional piece of artwork which includes an element of the Southern Comfort brand and an expression of its birthplace – New Orleans.

New Orleans is one of a kind. Its music, cuisine, architecture, cultural traditions, neighbourhood bars and wide-ranging mix of people passionate about those things sets the city apart from the world as a place devoted to the lifestyle of “Always for Pleasure”. Martin Wilkes Heron followed the pleasure-centric New Orleans when he invented Southern Comfort in 1874. Using a special flavour concentrate of fruits and spices, he made the harsh tasting whiskey of the time taste delicious. Studying the secrets of modern-day Southern Comfort makes it clear that M.W. Heron’s invention is still all about pleasure.

“Create Exchange” Competition

Through a panel of locally renowned design fundis, the entries  for Southern Comfort’s “Creative Exchange” will be shortlisted to the top five pieces. These pieces will be uploaded to the Southern Comfort SA Facebook page, where brand fans can vote for their favourite design.

What’s in it for the winner? The opportunity to showcase their work on a promotional range of branded Southern Comfort merchandise, a R12K cash prize and exposure in local design publication one small seed. Second place will receive a cash prize of R6K, followed by R3K for the third best design.

The competition opens this week and runs until 15 July 2011. Entrants are required to create a 2D design, which needs to include an element of the Southern Comfort brand and tap into the modern spirit of New Orleans. For more information about the design specs, terms and conditions and judging process, visit  Southern Comfort SA Facebook page or email: southern_comfort@pobox.southerncomfort.com

Puma Fashion Shoot from one small seed on Vimeo.

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Photographer: igor polzenhagen
Models: martin pieterse, tyrese bani, laura scott, naomi king

Music: ‘anything new’
digitalism