Twenty-seven years after the arrival of the Sex Pistols shook up the music world, punk rock is still going strong, thanks to each new generation of kids discovering the music's honesty, immediacy and vibrancy. The scene in Wisconsin is especially rockin,' thanks to venues like Green Bay's Concert Cafe and dozens of bands, many of the best right here in Milwaukee.
Two Badger State bands -- Milwaukee's Modern Machines and Green Bay's Fragments -- recently teamed up for a split CD on San Francisco's New Disorder Records. To find out more about the punk scene here, we hurled some questions at Modern Machines guitarist and lead singer Nato Disgusting.
OMC: Tell us about the birth of the Modern Machines?
ND: Myself, Dan (bassist Danny K) and (drummer) Jon Hands-On had been playing in a three-piece punk rock band called The Shrubbers since high school in Washington County, where we grew up, as did Ben (guitarist B.J. Oihawk), who actually was a Shrubber at the very start of things, in late 1997. In 1999, Ben and I moved to Milwaukee, followed by Dan and Jon. The Shrubbers started out as a pretty generic group, but by the end of that band we were ripping off early '80s hardcore pretty effectively!
The Shrubbers were sick of trying to chop down the mightiest tree in the forest with a herring, so we broke up in 2000. At the same time, Ben and I had begun working on some songs that I and he had written. We were going to seek out a new bassist and drummer, but Dan and Jon were just so obvious of a choice that the transition from Shrubbers to Modern Machines was so fluid, the name change serves only to really indicate a stylistic move away from hardcore towards a more rock and roll-ish, poppier sound, which likely would've happened with the Shrubbers.
OMC: What kind of punk scene is there in southeastern Wisconsin these days? Who are some of the best bands?
ND: There's a very, very good underground punk scene in southeastern Wisconsin, with all manner of bands, each one sounding different from the next. It's a really creatively fertile time around here.
The punk scene isn't just music, by any means, and there's a very strong and very active radical movement which I feel reflects the general mien of your average punk rocker around here, but music is always going to be my chief involvement in the scene because that's what I do best. And who are some of the best bands?
I would like to say that the Apologetics, Fragments, Motorcycle Prom Dates, Catholic Boys, Holy Shit!, TxAxBx, Doombuggy, IfIHadAHiFi, Panic Attacks and Pelvic Thrusts, Leghounds, Shutups, Mystery Girls, Tears, Blackwall Hitch, Cobra, Blue Balls -- all these bands are great, there are more that I haven't heard yet. On the kickoff show of the most recent tour we did (with the Apologetics), a band I'd never heard called My Underwear played, and they were rockin' and hilarious!
OMC: Are there enough places to play in Milwaukee?
ND: The answer is complicated. There are places to play, but a lot of them -- in particular the two or three smaller clubs which sometimes put on all-ages shows -- give off a very negative, artist-unfriendly vibe. There are lots of great places to play that are completely underground; often literally, in basements.
A few bars in town are cool, too, but it goes without saying that you can't have a strong music scene unless the kids can get into it at an early age, and no established Milwaukee venue seems to recognize this. And while basement shows are by far the most fun to play, they are unfortunately a little too "insider" and a lot of people seem intimidated by them. Unless you're in your 50s, there's no reason to be intimidated by basement shows!
OMC: Do the bands tend to prefer the original punks bands of the late '70s or the next generation of bands from the '80s? Maybe I should also include the '90s bands? Should I?
ND: Without getting too esoteric the best bands seem to be the bands who listen to the widest variety of music. Defining "original punk" is tough. Ask Rhino Records or any of the surviving rock writers of the '70s they'll tell you punk was invented by the Wailers or Sonics or Standells or Shadows of Knight in the mid-'60s bowels of Garagey Americana.
The Ramones invented the original punk rock sound, and you'd have to search long and hard amongst the bands I named before you found someone who wasn't a Ramones fan. Original '70s punk rock records still get played all the time at parties; the Stooges seem to be hard to avoid, but in particular The Clash, Buzzcocks, Pagans, Dead Boys, Rezillos, Saints, Radio Birdman, Blondie, great moments from Killed By Death comps, more wave-y stuff like Devo, Elvis Costello, Cheap Trick, even the good ol' Sex Pistols -- these bands are pretty universally admired.
I'd say there's plenty of folks involved in the scene who don't agree, but in terms of hardcore, there's really not much that isn't washed up and generic after 1984. The first wave of North American hardcore from the East Coast and Midwest absolutely blows my mind: Minor Threat, SOA, Bad Brains, Negative Approach, the Necros, Zero Boys, Articles of Faith and the first Husker Du records ... genius! The West Coast isn't particularly my bag of core, except Black Flag, but in terms of non-hardcore, there's X, Descendents, Minutemen, some of my favorite bands and stuff that everybody in the Modern Machines, at least, listens to over and over.
A lot of people really like LA hardcore, Agent Orange and whatnot, but I think that stuff is tepid and contrived. There's no passion! The '90s was a great decade for punk rock, from hardcore (Los Crudos, Gordon Solie Motherf***ers) to pop (Muffs, Screeching Weasel, Figgs), to a garage resurgence. I mentioned garage just then, and I feel this is worth noting: in the early/mid '90s, there were some bands that somehow got tagged as "garage" like the Devil Dogs, Teengenerate, Rip Offs, several more.
One thing I notice about our scene is that some of these garage/punk '90s groups get played at parties, with everyone singing along -- speaking from experience, this is kind of unheard of outside of eastern Wisconsin! I credit the Concert Cafe in Green Bay with fostering the interest in this particular little sub-subgenre of punk rock, which as I said elsewhere was pretty much just the domain of the 30-something set who never fell out of the scene. It's one of my favorites, for sure.
Hmm. I guess maybe it was a bad idea asking the Modern Machines this question, seeing as how we all basically live in used record stores!
OMC: I know from what I've read that a lot of people compare the M-Machines to The Replacements and Husker-Du, but I wonder if that's more to do with geography than sound?
ND: I think geography plays a lot into it, but I can't deny that we listen to that stuff all the time. It definitely rubs off. At their best, those two bands were the best. Utterly timeless. Too bad they became what they did! Although, Paul Westerberg's new record is alright. You know, we also listen to a lot of Rolling Stones, The Who, CCR, Byrds, more obscure great music from the '60s that 95.7 won't play. From what I gather, that's what the Huskers and Mats (Replacements) listened to a lot, too, so maybe there's also a common source.
OMC: To me the songs on the split disc with Fragments sound more like some of the lesser-known British punks bands from 1977, like Eater, The Flys, Menace and the Cockney Rejects. Are those among the bands you guys like?
ND: Wow, this is a compliment! Although I'm not sure I hear the Cockney Rejects in our sound (we're not very "street," so to speak), that's my favorite of the bands you mentioned. You know, Eater had some great moments. I can definitely see that comparison, more than Menace. I haven't heard the Flys enough to be able to name a song of theirs. How about the Lurkers, or the Vibrators, or The Jam, or the Boys? Especially the Boys! If someone ever compared us to the Boys, I'd serenade them with "First Time" on banjo! The Boys' first LP is so great, I can't believe they're not as well known as some of the other bands.
OMC: With the Rejects, I was thinking more sonically, than attitude. Just that sort of churning "Flares and Slippers" chug. I'd agree with The Lurkers and Vibrators, definitely. The Jam was a different ball of wax, I think. To older punk fans it may seem a little hard to believe that the scene continues to speak to so many people so far removed from New York or London in 1977. What is it that keeps drawing young bands to punk?
ND: Kids keep getting drawn into punk because, at some point in the evolution of punk rock from the exclusive domain of New York City hipsters and London fashion moguls/media leeches, into the current massive and often very not underground subculture which it is in America, somebody integrated anti-authoritan political views into the mix. But then again, true rock'n'roll has always been individualistic and anti-establishment.
Also, speaking as a musician of questionable skill, there's no music that's more fun to play at the ground level! You don't need to be Yngwie Malmsteen to play "Blitzkrieg Bop." Yngwie probably couldn't play "Blitzkrieg Bop." He'd get two-thirds of the way through, and then start wanking and playing all kinds of wacky jazz scales and stuff, thereby screwing up the song.
OMC: The band seems to spend a lot of time on the road, playing all over the state, but also beyond in places like Oklahoma, Missouri, Florida. Can you survive playing music alone?
ND: Oh yeah. We wouldn't have a band if we didn't love playing shows, and playing them as often as possible! As far as survival goes, we've all got day jobs, but with the exception of rare mechanical calamities, the tours pay for themselves. Especially since we've had the split CD to sell. Previously, we were touring and only had tapes to sell, for like $3 a piece; I hate to say it, but tapes are going the way of the dinosaur, and people don't really want to buy them. I still love tapes, but I seem to be in the minority on this one. We sell more CDs for $8 than we sold of tapes for $3.
OMC: How did you hook up with New Disorder in San Francisco? Are you doing more with them?
ND: Ernst, the guy who basically runs the label, saw us at a show in Berkeley at the infamous Gilman Street Project, I might add. Evidently, he must've been pumped full of prescription painkillers at the time, because he suggested we do a record with him! We suggested a split, with our friends the Fragments, and he agreed. Nothing's definite as far as future plans with New Disorder go, but I think everybody's happy with the current state of affairs, so don't rule out future New Disorder releases by any means.
Modern Machines play at the Monkey House in Riverwest with Fragments, The Apologetics and others, Fri., Feb. 7.
Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., where he lived until he was 17, Bobby received his BA-Mass Communications from UWM in 1989 and has lived in Walker's Point, Bay View, Enderis Park, South Milwaukee and on the East Side.
He has published three non-fiction books in Italy – including one about an event in Milwaukee history, which was published in the U.S. in autumn 2010. Four more books, all about Milwaukee, have been published by The History Press.
With his most recent band, The Yell Leaders, Bobby released four LPs and had a songs featured in episodes of TV's "Party of Five" and "Dawson's Creek," and films in Japan, South America and the U.S. The Yell Leaders were named the best unsigned band in their region by VH-1 as part of its Rock Across America 1998 Tour. Most recently, the band contributed tracks to a UK vinyl/CD tribute to the Redskins and collaborated on a track with Italian novelist Enrico Remmert.
He's produced three installments of the "OMCD" series of local music compilations for OnMilwaukee.com and in 2007 produced a CD of Italian music and poetry.
In 2005, he was awarded the City of Asti's (Italy) Journalism Prize for his work focusing on that area. He has also won awards from the Milwaukee Press Club.
He has be heard on 88Nine Radio Milwaukee talking about his "Urban Spelunking" series of stories, in that station's most popular podcast.
