[event] From The Back of The Room Asia Premiere // 10th Apr 2012 @ The Pigeonhole

Asia premiere of From The Back of The Room, a documentary highlighting women within the DIY-punk scene, this Apr 10 (Tues) at The Pigeonhole. Expect to see interviews with the women from KYLESA, BIKINI KILL, BRATMOBILE, SUBMISSION HOLD, and BLATZ, amongst several others.

$10 per entry, half of the proceeds go to the film.

Don't miss this!

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SYNOPSIS

In the early 1980s, American hardcore punk began to take shape in Washington, DC. This subculture blossomed in the United States, with bands like Minor Threat at the helm. Women, however, did not gain much visibility in this community until the 1990s, when Bikini Kill and their contemporaries spawned the riot grrrl movement.

Although Bikini Kill and riot grrrl made undeniably important contributions to underground music and culture, their peers and predecessors are often forgotten, both by music fans and feminists. From the Back of the Room aims to remedy this, beginning in 1981.

Cynthia Connolly, Tribe 8, Chris Boarts-Larson of Slug and Lettuce, and others take the viewer through these early years, exploring the development of the role of women in the national music scene through venues like ABC No Rio, and 924 Gilman Street. Kathleen Hanna and Allison Wolfe discuss the rise of riot grrrl, and the movement’s staying power in underground music is disputed by many of the women interviewed.

The film moves through the 1990s with interviews from Naked Aggression, Submission Hold, Look Back and Laugh, Sick Fix, and Detestation. Booking agents, zine authors, musicians, and artists are all featured, giving the film a well-rounded scope. Red Thread, Condenada and Bruise Violet bring the viewer into the present tense.

Although respect is given to the riot grrrl movement, the second half of the film focuses more specifically on the variety of issues that face women in underground music. Beauty ideals, sexuality, motherhood, race and sexual violence are all discussed. Hopes for the future, and advice for younger women close out this heartfelt portrait of women in music.

[shoutout] Blackhole Radio #9 March 2012

Blackhole Radio is back again! This time with a 9th edition (it appears that Hafiz Bastard was lazy in Jan and Feb, or busy... but whatever) that features a sick line-up of bands from around Asia. PLUTO and FUKK BAR CULTURE are 2 of the top ones, in our very humble opinion. Sometimes there're so many awesome punk bands in the region we can't catch up! So thank goodness for folks like Hafiz Bastard. Get into this.

[interview] Post-Tour Retrospective w/ RAIVORAITTIUS (hardcore-punk from Turku/Tampere, Finland)

It's been more than half a year since RAIVORAITTIUS were on our shores, and they might already be a distant memory in some of our minds, but as that old adage so omnipresent in DIY-punk goes: "better late than never"! This interview is the first of its kind to be featured on LIONCITYDIY, although we're pretty certain it's been done before elsewhere (although we are unclear exactly where... so if you DO know, show us, and make us feel very unoriginal). Expect more of these where they came from in spits and starts over the next months.

Introduce yourselves, please. Folks may have forgotten about you already!

Tuukka: My name is Tuukka and I play bass. My biggest interests are comics and music.

Jussi: Hi, my name is Jussi and I play guitar. I like riding my bike in the night time. Lately I've been really into R.A.M.B.O, HIS HERO IS GONE, and CATHARSIS (all American, hmm...), but generally I have a diverse taste in music.

Timo: Hi, folks! I'm Timo and I do vocals.

Janne:  Janne, I play drums. It's a new band, we just started to play with the current line-up beginning of 2011. I play in a couple of other bands too: guitar in d-beat crust band VELOITUS, vocals in grindcore band BÜFO and keyboard & drum machine in 1980's inspired synth-pop group PLEASE YOUR KNEES. Beside playing music, I'm a film director and producer. I study media management and work in a theater as a lighting and sound engineer.

The 4 of you did a month-long SE Asia tour in June last year. How did that come about? How did it fall together?

Jussi: Janne found the contact to 7x0x7 through Yeap from PISSCHRIST I guess. From there on, we can thank 7x0x7 and especially Cher for everything. And of course all the people who put up all the shows, gave us food and a place to stay or helped us in other ways. The whole thing was just a huge casserole of international punk-solidarity. Dodon, who came along with us in Java made touring there a lot easier. Without him, we would never have known when to get off the bus or which bus to get on. He also told us when to take a shower (yeah, thanks for acknowledging our maturity, D!) or when we needed to dress better in order to not get into trouble in malls or such. In the end, I'm rather surprised at how smoothly everything went. We didn't have any major problems I think.

Janne: I've always wanted to tour outside of Europe and as I had travelled in Southeast Asia before, I was thinking that it could be a interesting region to tour with a band.  My other band BÜFO was touring in Poland and Czech with an Australian band PISSCHRIST in 2006 and we also played a show with them in Germany in 2008. During the tour I got to know the guys from the band, we kept in touch and about a year later I asked Yeap, the singer of PISSCHRIST, if he had some contacts in SE Asia. I knew that they had done some shows over there and Yeap is originally from Malaysia. At that time, RAIVORAITTIUS, as it is now, didn't even exist, Jussi and I had just been jamming together a couple of times. Anyway, I was planning to tour SE Asia with BÜFO in 2011, and Yeap asked me to contact the 7x0x7 collective. So I did, and they promised to organize the tour for BÜFO. Schedule for the tour was almost ready when BÜFO's drummer Ilmari left the band. I think he wanted to concentrate more on his other bands: THE PHOENIX FOUNDATION, 1981 and XSPECIESTRAITORX. This was the beginning of 2011 and we didn't know who could replace him at such short notice and learn the songs before the tour. I thought that maybe a new band that we just started with Jussi, Tuukka and Timo would be able to do the tour instead if we had more material and more practice. Everyone in the new band was keen to do the tour and folks at the 7x0x7 collective were okay for changing BÜFO to RAIVORAITTIUS.

Tell us one highlight of the tour. Was it [the tour] like anything you ever expected?

Tuukka: There were many highlights, but for convenience I'll mention just one: dancing to local pop music with the crust-punks in Medan. Everyone was all smiles and we had a great time. Sounds corny but at the moment I felt like we were all one. It would have been impossible to expect the tour to be the way it was. The reception in all the cities and venues were just amazing. The hospitality and excitement the people showed was exceptional.

Jussi: One of the highlights for me was a solitary moment in Medan, Indonesia. I had been sleeping in this big room with a concrete floor and big windows. It was late afternoon when I woke up and it was completely silent. The sun was shining in low and I was lying at the edge of a shadow. There were a lot of wonderful moments and many of them were a bit more exciting than this one, but this was the first one to come to my mind now. I was really excited to see people in the punk scene who are also politically active. I'm a lazy sod, so I greatly admire people who get shit done. Oh, and I'm still proud of my one-hand-cartwheel-basketball-whoop I did in Pati, Indonesia.

Timo: It's really hard to choose just one highlight from the whole month of highlights. I guess I'll have to go with the honor of meeting with the Kendeng mountain resistance in Pati, Indonesia. Visiting the people living from and with the ecosystem of the mountain, whose lifestyle has been compromised by the greed of the cement companies. Check it out and show your solidarity!

Janne: The highlight was making friends with people and eating Indonesian food! That's two already!

How did the general response differ in the different countries/cities? How did kids react to your music, and to you, as people?

Tuukka: Generally, Indonesians were most excited about us both as people and as a band. I think the other countries had more opportunities to see touring bands so it wasn't such a novel experience for the people in those places. At some shows we didn't get any response besides some lazy clapping, but at other shows the whole crowd was a screaming moshpit. It's good to remember this if the first couple of shows happen to be really good -- the band shouldn't expect the rest of the tour to be the same throughout.

Jussi: Tuukka pretty much nailed this one already. In smaller places people were apparently more interested in us as people and as a band. In a lot of places in Indonesia, people were stopping us on the streets to take photos with us. I don't know if it was because we are white or if it was because we look like punks. It was weird. Pretty much everywhere we went the hospitality was overwhelming. The standard of hospitality was very high, which kind of made the places that were slightly less overwhelmingly hospitable seem not that good, but that's just psychological.

Timo: The people in Indonesia were mostly really curious about us as people and as a band. The "modern" style of hardcore is really big there and our blend of the 80's Finnish and American HC seemed to be something else. Some loved the rawness and others seemed disappointed that we were not playing metalcore. In other countries we didn't have the exotic value we had in Indonesia, but everywhere we went, we were positively surprised by the feeling of solidarity and equality in the DIY-punk scenes.

Janne: All the places were nice, but the Indonesian crowd was the best and they seemed to be the most interested in us too.

There are obviously a lot of complex race and class dynamics when a Western band tours SE Asia. How do you think you navigated that?

Tuukka: Because we are from the West, people seemed to be very curious about us, but only in a positive way -- no one was hostile towards us. I guess people also thought we were rich because we could come all the way to the other side of the world, but the truth is almost all of us had to borrow money to go on this tour and we were on a really tight budget the whole time. It felt bad to say no to some of the people who wanted to trade their own shirts for our band shirts, but we really needed the money from the shirt sales.

Jussi: It was weird, being the white minority. I mean, it was weird that being white accounted for getting special treatment in some places, like not being security-checked in the promised land of security checks, the Philippines. Our Philippine friends were asked if they got paid for hanging out with us or for being our guides. I hope we navigated this and all the other situations without doing any harm. I think what is needed is just respect for other people. In the end, we are all equal, even though in the present (and past) fucked-up situations, we don't get treated that way. Equality should be obvious. That's my compass for inter-human-navigation and I'd recommend it for anyone and everyone.

Timo: A hard question! As a political-punk band we obviously had something to preach about, and our cultural background was vastly different from the crowds. We thought about the perverse situation of Western people coming to SE Asia to "spread the word", but I guess there are no clear solutions to the problematic dynamics of the whole thing. Luckily we had a friend touring with us with the most of Indonesia, helping us understand local customs and ways, as well as helping us out with our poor language skills. Without Dodon, we probably wouldn't have had nearly as much understanding of everything around us. I guess the key in approaching the race and class (as well as other) dynamics is to listen and to try to understand, to communicate equality in as many ways as possible.

Janne: Realizing that despite us being poor students back home, we still had a chance to travel to the other side of the world. The awesome people we met and the bands that we played with in SE Asia might never have enough money to do that, and it made me feel guilty sometimes, especially when travelling in the countries that have been in their history colonized and exploited by Europeans and Americans. Even now the exploitation continues, except that colonialists have been replaced by multinational corporations. I'm not a big fan of our destructive Western culture that has spread all over the world like cancer, but unfortunately I'm part of it whether I like it or not. I hope that people wouldn't see the materialistic Western lifestyle as something desirable. Even our DIY punk rock movement has its own idols that are looked upon. I guess I'm just trying to say that we should be aware of this kind of cultural imperialism even in the punk community. I hope we can get SE Asian bands to play in Europe sometime soon – punk rock cultural exchange!

Other bands have said that touring SE Asia is an experience in and of itself which is unlike any other. What do you reckon? Are there any differences between touring here and elsewhere, and how so?

Janne: The crowd in SE Asia reminded me of the Russian audience during BÜFO's tour in 2009. Everyone dancing and having good time with the music. In most parts of Europe it's more of people standing and watching the show unless it's a big and popular band. In central Europe like for example in Germany punx are spoiled with heaps of touring bands that go there, so it's not a big deal for them to see a foreign band. Financially, touring SE Asia was hard because we did not cover our expenses at all, but despite that the experience was worth it for sure! In my European tours with Büfo we almost always covered our travelling costs with the ticket income from the shows.

Were there any experiences that were particularly unpleasant that occurred while on tour?

Jussi: I was going through some emotional stress while touring. At home, I spend most of my time alone or with my wife, so it was tough not being able to do either. I snapped a few times and raised my voice. I'm sorry about that, for anyone concerned. I have trouble controlling my impulses when I get irritated and pissed off. One thing that wasn't really unpleasant for me but might be something to consider for bands who are considering touring in SE Asia: the sleeping conditions vary hugely. A lot of times we slept on the hard floor or shared a bed between the four of us. A lot of nice spooning there! The most usual thing was sleeping on a rug on the floor. So if you need somewhere soft to sleep, bring a sleeping bag with you.

Tuukka: Travelling on a train for four hours without the possibility to sit down and a ten hour bus ride that was supposed to take six hours and nobody spoke English so we were constantly thinking that we had already passed the city we were supposed to go to.

Timo: The most unpleasant experience was probably the bus that broke down in the middle of nowhere in Indonesia, with no one around us being able to speak English. As we had no experience of the buses or cities there beforehand, we spent the whole ten-hour bus ride trying to ask people if the next stop was ours, and if the bus that we got into after the first one broke down was the right one. Haha. Our Indonesian language skills were also a bit lacking, so we probably pronounced the name of our destination really funny as well.

Janne: I love touring life but some of the band members couldn't handle stressful situations too well and were time to time physically and mentally worn out during the tour, which led to unnecessary arguments about stupid things. There were also some losing of tempers and mental breakdowns even. Seeing this side of the other people was surprising.

Favourite country/city to play in, and why?

Timo: I can't really choose. People were great everywhere and I love doing gigs. Hell, I'd even go to the "20 beatdown bands and us" gig (where the crowd left as they got a whiff of what we were about) again and love it!

Tuukka: My favourite cities to play in were Bekasi and Bandung in Indonesia. Those were our first shows on the tour and the people in both those cities were super nice and the crowds were really active and seemed to really like the music.

Jussi: I liked Pati, Indonesia most, because the show had an inspiring political agenda. It was part of a protest against companies trying to exploit the Kendeng mountain range. The audience consisted of not only young punks, but also a lot of farmers and their families, who came to shake hands and talk with us after the show. And also we heard later that some young punks had become more involved with the struggle after seeing and hearing us talk about it. Hearing that was one of the best things that ever happened to me.

Janne: It's hard to name just one place -- every show with an insane moshpit was good. Maybe the first show in Bekasi, Indonesia because I didn't know yet what to expect and then when we started to play it was just total mayhem, with people falling over the drum set, stage diving and all.

In your tour blog, Jussi wrote that there may be something that you had learnt at the end of it all. The blog has left us with a cliffhanger of sorts so we're clearly in suspense. What is it, what are they?

Jussi: It's not like I hadn't figured it out before, but going somewhere so far that's supposed to be so different made it clear, that it's ridiculous to be afraid of cultural differences or to protect national interests or to believe oneself to be better than others. We're all just people from the same planet... fuck, we aren't even that, we're just energy packed into a physical form. It makes greed look ridiculous. "I want to pile these shiny things into this area, which is mine, so they can't be used over there, which is theirs." It doesn't make any sense. And the world is dictated by that. I've always had the feeling that everything is going to end. But not now. No matter how bad the situation, we're not dead yet. There are still species not extinct, though they are getting scarce. There's still friendship and resistance. There's a tiny speck of hope, and I guess that makes living worth all the pain.

Janne: I've been setting up shows DIY style for more than ten years but I still learned a lot from the kids. Some of the venues where we played were totally random, and it made me realize that shows can be be organized almost everywhere. Something that we should try here in Finland too.

Timo: I guess that the biggest revelation to me was that punk and DIY is truly global. That people and cultures may be different, but that the struggles to do things outside of global capitalism and to treat others as equals help us connect with each other.

Tuukka: I have learned that people are 95% the same everywhere. The remaining 5% counts for cultural differences. I also learned how little possessions one needs to be happy. Travelling for two months with just a backpack with some clothes in it is a good experience. Also seeing how little material wealth some of our hosts had, but at the same time seeing all their social and mental wealth, it was easy to figure out which one is more important.

Thanks for letting us have a chance to do this retrospective with you. First of its kind, it seems! Or at least on this portal. Any last words?

Timo: Thank you for doing this! Peace, love and anarchism! Up the punx and all that!

Janne: Huge thanks to everybody who set up shows for us, hung out, gave us food, place to stay and danced the night away with us! Stay vegan and smash the state!

Tuukka: For bands, I'd like to say if you get the chance to go on tour in SE Asia you should do it! I also want to thank all the people who were involved with our tour, the aspect of the tour I think about now in retrospect were the people, not the places.

[event] Night of Circle Pit 3 // 10th Feb 2012 @ Apsara Asia Dance Studio A

Night of Circle Pit 3
Friday, 10th Feb 2012
7pm till 10pm (*note: show starts at 7.30pm sharp and ends on time so please be on time, you fuckers!)
$10 at the door
The Substation Gallery
45 Armenian Street

with:
TAKEXONEXSTEP (fast posi hardcore, Indonesia)
VIDEO NASTY (nasty thrash, Australia)
PLUTO (young, fast, and brash)
VAARALLINEN (Scandi-hardcore worship)
2FOLD (hardcore youth)
ANALDICKTION (beach boy grindcore)
RECOVER (wall-breaking hardcore)

Brought to you by Prohibited Projects. See you there!

[tour] TakexOnexStep (ID) Singapore/Malaysia Tour (Feb 2012)

More tours! It's been so long since we've had that bit of xposicorex we're starting to think it's making the scene regress a little bit! We kid, but next month sees us West Java straight-edge hardcore kids TAKExONExSTEP storm through Singapore and Malaysia for a short 3-day tour. We don't always see Indonesian DIY hardcore-punk bands getting out of their home countries so we're in for a rare treat! They will also be releasing their The Future Value EP on this tour so look out for that.

Definitely for fans of the likes of CARRY ON, CHAMPION, and HOLDxTRUE! Let's get that index finger (or thumb! or pinky!)  ready for some finger-pointing action soon, kids.

Brought to you by Learn To Trust Records. Singapore show organized by Prohibited Projects.

[tour] Clowns (AU) SE Asia Tour (Feb 2012)

This is as literal as it gets. Punk rock clowns CLOWNS (AU) will be doing a quick 2-week tour covering Singapore, Malaysia (Borneo as well!), and Indonesia so look out for them in your city.

Imagine punk and hardcore at its purest: fast, intense, and with a punch that'll snap your head back. Mosh it up, kids! Just be careful of that whiplash.

More details a-comin' your way, so watch out!

Brought to you by 7x0x7.

[interview] NIGHT HAG (blackened hardcore from Adelaide, Australia)

South Australia's hardcore workhorse NIGHT HAG are set to tour SE Asia in January 2012. The first trip overseas for the band will see them bring their brand of blackened hardcore to Singapore, Malaysia, and Indonesia, in support of their debut album Gilded Age. Gilded Age is the band's most consistent work to date, venturing from anxiety-inducing black metal to threatening doom, the only constant being the hardcore energy.

2011 has been a huge year for the band. Relentless Australian touring and multiple releases have seen NIGHT HAG develop into one of the most exciting heavy bands around, with a live show not to be missed.

We're going to cut the shit now. Check out the interview (originally posted on The Ricecooker) and hold your breath! We're anticipating this tour as much as some of you are.

I must admit, I’ve never heard of NIGHT HAG before, so help me out here and do tell a little something about the band. It would be great if you could add in on how the band came about, previous bands and what other things the band members are doing, jobs/hobbies etc.

Joe: There are five people in NIGHT HAG. Dave and I play guitar, Nathan is our drummer, Mark plays bass and Dale sings. We’ve been playing shows for about two years now. When we first jammed we wanted to make a dark but melodic punk band.

When the band started I had known Nathan for a while. We’re both the same age and we both played a lot of shows together while we were growing up. I knew Dave and Dale also from playing with bands in Adelaide, it’s not a big place really. It’s quite a small-knit music scene compared to bigger cities. I even met Mark by chance in a university lecture- in only minutes we found out we possessed many mutual friends and were even employees of the same bookstore. Not a big city. It was at this lecture that Mark schemed the first jam with this line-up. A few weeks later we got together.

We all play in a lot of other bands, and we collectively wanted to make something we weren’t used to doing. Dave and Mark used to play in a band called THE RIVALRY, Mark plays bass for another sludge band called SEX WIZARD, Dave also plays with bands SPACE BONG, GOD GOD DAMMIT DAMMIT, DEATH CULT JOCK (and close to a dozen more). Dale used to have a band called LASER DEATH RAY, he sang. He also played trumpet for GOD GOD DAMMIT DAMMIT for a while. Nathan used to play in hardcore band THE WEIGHT – they’re still going strong, excellent Adelaide band. I play guitar for another band HYDROMEDUSA and sing for a band called PRISONBITCH.

Through all of us there is lot of bands. I think we all wanted to do NIGHT HAG as a side band for a little while before we started getting organised. We realised we could do a lot as a band if we all kept the momentum up and kept constantly writing. With that, our sound has evolved since our beginnings. I think we come across as more of a metal band now, I think Dale hates this but that keeps me amused. We’ve all kept a big part of our normal lives open for whatever this band will throw at us.

I work two jobs, I sell books and soap. I used to take my clothes off for an art school. It paid alright.. Dale is a researcher/computer, he also works for the university. Bright fellow, he’s the real organizational brains behind us. Mark is a student (homeless person), Nathan is a businessman but still poor like the rest of us. Dave bangs furniture together, I think. You can also catch him playing high-paid gypsy jazz gigs.

There’s a distinct mix of harsh black-metal sounding guitars, drumming and a maelstrom of power-violence in your songs; do tell where are all these influences coming from; what are the lyrics about?

Joe: We all do different things in writing the songs. It can be a bit retarded. For instance we’ve done things very quickly in the past. I learnt the song Cynic from Gilded Age the day of the recording. As a credit to the hasty succession of the recordings it’s everyone’s style mashed up together that makes NIGHT HAG sound like it does. Dave and I write most of the riffs. We listen to a lot of metal and punk but just as much as anything else. We didn’t really take any direct list of bands we wanted to sound like when forming the band. Any creative vibe for the band is best cooked up with us verbally discussing how we want an overall release come across as. Such planning is most fluent in the album. Dale’s vocals run almost independent to the songwriting phase however. He’ll normally practice with pre-prepared lyrics- work he’s done at home. His lyrics are a bleak look at the present and the future. I’d let Dale give you a better run through on his writing though.

Can you list out how many releases have Night Hag put out and where to get them?

Joe: So far we’ve released a Demo ourselves in 2010. Then we did a lengthy EP New Tourists at the start of 2011, before releasing our debut album Gilded Age in July 2011. Demo is sold out. The other two can be sold through Capitalgames Records. You’ll also easily find all three releases for free download on the Internet, we 100% encourage this free listening*.

And how is the Adelaide or South Australian punk/HC scene nowadays; compared to what’s happening in other big cities in Australia?

Joe: Adelaide is slowly becoming an interesting place for bands again. It seems the few venues that are keeping their doors open to live music are being well received. I’ve been running a DIY warehouse venue called Animal House for over a year with a few friends. It’s also our home. We’ve tried to facilitate a space that’s helping bands rehearse (including NIGHT HAG) as well as serving as a DIY venue. For a sometimes sleepy city I’m enjoying myself here.

I’ve been to Adelaide a couple of times and went to a few shows, but where would a DIY hardcore punk band play over there nowadays? How often are there shows there and how does it work, in terms of getting the venues and such.

Joe: I’d recommend Animal House to anyone. Getting venues has gotten trickier in the last half a year even. A lot of new bands, a lot of gigs, a lot of sub-genres are getting their own following and it can all cause a few months wait in trying to book anywhere. More bands is still a good thing.

I have seen Adelaide change quite a lot these days; from quite a warm, sleepy, art-friendly little town with a lot of excellent bands, to a rather indifferent, consumerist place with lots of the old, homely hang-outs turned posh streets. What’s your take on that?

Joe: Adelaide is a bizarre place to live at times. It’s probably the most boring place to live if you can’t entertain yourself or you don’t smoke pot. There’s a lot of pot. A few arts festivals too – they’re ironically held at the same time as V8 car races. There are also a lot of old people. I think our average age is 60… Friendly people at times, cheap place to live, a little over-fed and conservative in places but equally poor and isolated in other areas. A lot of suburbs, a lot of boring people.

Are there old punks there still active? I don’t mean the usual fashion-punk horde but the ones who worked hard in the scene since the days of yore.

Joe: There are always old cunts. A lot move to Melbourne and a lot become social workers but there’s still a few. A crew of them run a pub together in Adelaide called The Squatters Arms. Great food.

Give us a list of local bands which we should check-out.

Joe: There are too many, ROBOTOSAURUS, THE WEIGHT, VAGINORS, NO ACTION. The rest of Australia also has some awesome bands going on at the moment – SUFFER, EXTORTION, WARTHREAT, DROWNING HORSE, ENCIRCLING SEA, LOOKING GLASS, KROMOSOM…

What compels the band to do this upcoming tour; what have you heard about touring SEA and what are your expectations, if there are any?

Joe: We want to play to another part of the world. SE Asia is an awesome place, and the people are cool. We’re all familiar to various parts and are feeling it’s the next step in this year’s heavy touring. We’re riding the release of Gilded Age and look forward to playing some heavy and energetic shows. I hope this trip will bring a lot of experiences I’ll keep forever. We’ve all seen it as a great honor to play this tour.

Anything you wanna say to the locals here awaiting the storm that’s coming?

Joe: I look forward to meeting a lot of new people, making friends and seeing new places. Don’t be a stranger, say hello and please show us around. 

--

*Yes, that's right -- it's FREE listening, you poor punx! Download the New Tourists EP here, and the much-raved about Gilded Age full-length here.

For more info, please check out Night Hag on these platforms:

http://nighthag.tumblr.com/

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Night-Hag/148355551854563
http://soundcloud.com/wearenighthag
http://www.myspace.com/nighthagband

Tour brought to you by 7x0x7.

[shoutout] Blackhole Radio #8 December 2011

We're a bit late on this, but y'know, better late than never and all of that. Blackhole Radio closes the year with an 8th edition, as usual chock-full with hardcore-punk goodness. Where do we even start? One band we can't stop raving about at the moment is THE SECRET PROSTITUTES, which has one track in this podcast. Hailing out of the US, this 3-piece band features Indonesian lyrics courtesy of their Indonesian drummer. Expect some catchy but straightforward fast hardcore-punk! We're lovin' it.

[tour] Night Hag (AU) SE Asia Tour (Jan 2012)

So, here's another bunch of highly-combustible, pissed-off Australian kids coming your way. What's new, you ask? We say PLENTY! Hailing from Adelaide, Australia, NIGHT HAG play a style of dark melodic hardcore, known in most circles as "blackened hardcore", a term which has been slowly but surely creeping into the excited vocabulary of many voracious ear-punishers in the scene -- first originating via bands such as the States’ own ravagers TEEN CTHULHU and then Canada’s anarchos ISKRA; and lately utilized by the earwax-removing BLACK BREATH and YOUNG & IN THE WAY.

This label may be alien to some. Why 'blackened' hardcore? Do you mean dark hardcore? No. All of the aforementioned bands come out with something which is like a cross between the hellish, cold brutality of Norwegian black metal and the harder, bleaker sounds of hardcore-punk. Imagine crust and black metal, powerviolence and black metal, grindcore and black metal, and even d-beat and black metal! At this point in time, the genre is still fresh and very encouraging for those who want to see a bit musical progression in the hardcore-punk scene. That said, not many are that successful in blending the many disparate influences into a cohesive free-flowing unique blend.

And NIGHT HAG does it well. They will be blazing a trail through Singapore, Malaysia, and Indonesia in a blitzkrieg 2-week tour so if you already like what you are hearing, you won't want to miss this!

More details for the Singapore show soon enough.

Brought to you by 7x0x7.

p/s: They've got a Soundcloud here, too.

[tour] Milisi Kecoa (ID) and Hårda Tider (SE) SE Asia Tour (Dec 2011)

Known for their energetic sets and heartfelt singalongs, the widely-loved MILISI KECOA from Indonesia are finally venturing outside of their home country to do a tour of Singapore and Malaysia, and then coming back full circle to Java to do an island-wide tour. And if this didn't sound good enough, their mates HÅRDA TIDER from Sweden are coming along with them!

Already, we know heaps of Swedish hardcore-punk fans are beyond stoked, as this is the first time any band from that region has stepped over to our shores. Imagine some tough-as-nails hardcore with mosh parts, except, y'know, played by punx coupled with a distinct Swedish Käng influence.

Singapore show (handled by Blackhole212/Pathetic Ape) details round the corner so keep your eyes peeled!   

This could potentially be one of the best closing tours of the year yet.

[event] Youth of Today (US) live in Singapore // 14th Oct 2011 @ *scape Lab

YOUTH OF TODAY was formed in Danbury, Connecticut in 1985 by two members of the hardcore band VIOLENT CHILDREN, Ray Cappo (vocals) and John Porcelly (Porcell) (guitar) were aiming to start a Straight Edge band at a time when most old school straight edge bands had disbanded. Having difficulty finding a bassist and drummer, Ray and Porcell found help from two high school friends, Graham Philips and Darren Pesce, who had played with Porcell in a band called THE YOUNG REPUBLICANS in the past.

With current lineups, Raghunath (Vocals), Paramananda (Guitar), Ken Olden (Bass) and Vinny Panza (Drums),Youth Of Today will be touring SE Asia for the first time ever.

Don't miss this!

With supporting acts:

STOMPIN' GROUND (last show)

ABOLITION AD

REVERSED

And guest DJ - Garuda

Date: 14/10/2011
Venue: *scape Lab
Time: 5.50pm to 10pm

Ticket rates: SGD30 for early birds (limited to 60)
SGD35 (Standard til 31.09.11)
SGD40 (01.10.11 til 13.10.11)
SGD45 (AT THE DOOR)

Email : reconstruxbooking@gmail.com

[tour] DISKOIRÄÄ (ES) SE Asia Tour (Sept 2011)

After a short lull in the SE Asia DIY-punk touring circuit come Basque Country punx DISKOIRÄÄ, who play a brand of straightforward yet fast and dirty hardcore-punk. They will be on the road for an entire month, with dates in Bangkok, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, and the Philippines.

Look out for them! In the meantime, if you are ever so inclined, you can download tracks from them here (split w/ METRALLETA) and here (Play And Record EP). Just remember to buy their records if you like 'em (not that we had to remind you, of course)!

[shoutout] Blackhole Radio #5 August 2011

Blackhole Radio skips July to come back in August with a vengeance! Featuring an assortment of DIY hardcore punk rock from Australasia and beyond, it's worth a check out to discover bands one may have yet to hear before.