@Pennywise
2015.09.20
Echo Park
採編 / Lucia
影像 / 範小川、寧瑞琛
＊今年<上海回聲公園音樂節>更名為<混凝草音樂節>，因為Echo Park被Echo APP發律師函禁用。混凝草——<Concrete & Grass> 。
第一個問題：今天在上海有沒有唱《Fuck Authority》。唱沒唱不重要，信息我們已經接收到。這個來自美國的老朋克在為川普即將當上美利堅總統而糟心，他說賈斯汀比伯給自己取了個搞笑的名字，人們都巴不得吃掉自己的大Mac，所關注的只有金卡戴珊和她的老公。
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My parents didn’t want me to be part of punk rock. In 1980s, which is a long time ago, punk rock is not popular. Bands like, the Dead Kennedys, or Adolescents,or Sex Pistols.
My parents look at those records and smash the records andthrow them into the trash, you know? They doubted and hated. And they said it’s ruining your life, and now I’m in Shanghai, drinking beer.
My parents went to Mexico maybe once.I』ve been to Australia, Europe, 20, or 30times, so, like punk rock for me, it opens up my mind.
沒有聊到多少關於音樂的部分，同美國大叔的聊天很順滑。再回憶和國內搖滾樂手訪談，從沒指望我們可以聊政治擦邊球的話題，有過一次還需要關掉鏡頭和錄音筆，公司不能聊，同行不能聊，甚至同一個樂隊的樂手也不能聊，也曾因為倆樂手說主唱神經質而被要求刪稿。
聊的越多，我們愈發感受到對自由和本能的渴求，但它像一張黏糊而破敗的蛛網存在於整個國家，你完全可以做任何你想做的事情，只是凡能觸及到的活體、言論、作品都被同一個母體所噴出的物質染色，成千上萬的音樂人所做的音樂，被成千萬上億的觀眾聽到，他們到底在做什麼？只有一個路可以暢通無阻，那就是大娛樂家。以往接觸過的音樂人，唱搖滾有很多，可以稱為Rock Star，一個都沒有，多數敗在了一點，畏畏縮縮，All Or Nothing，一口氣不來，向何處安身立命。
也有例外，紅領巾樂隊，因為提到同前身戲班的衝突，事後被告知不想放大可否刪掉。為了一次成功的訪談持續幾天所做的功課和勞動往往就在這一瞬間推翻。
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「發吧，只有讓更多人知道才會有影響力，有影響力才能有用，我們支持你們。」在要求刪除的第二天我們收到了這條信息。」
剛畢業時上新東方英語，口語老師是京城某金屬樂隊的貝斯手，某節課他拿一首歌來講單詞和發音，那首歌叫做《All Or Nothing》，一年後唱這首歌的樂隊來到了中國上海，我們問他的第一個問題是：今天在上海有沒有唱《Fuck Authority》。
聽什麼樣的音樂容易見到什麼樣的人。
主唱: Jim Lindberg
吉他: Fletcher Dragge
鼓手: McMackin
貝斯: Bradbury
Freak: Did you guys sing the song 《Fuck Authority》？
Fletcher: We didn’t.
Freak: You didn’t or, 「for the record, you didn’t」, but 「 off the record, you did」?
Fletcher: No,we didn’t do it.
Freak: Is that because you were told not to?
Fletcher: We had to submit our lyrics like a set list of songs and gave it to the cultural and arts bureau. They take a look at the videos and stuff. We didn’t put it on it, because we thought maybe they wouldn’t like it, so we decided…
Freak: True, I heard that the song. I read the lyrics. I love it,「fuck authority, silent majority, we should rise against the system」. So normally when you are told not to sing a song, how do your normally react?
Fletcher: Well, no one in other country told us not to sing it.
Freak: Not for this occasion, but in the past in general.
Fletcher: It depends. I think if you are in a band that hasa message like pennywise. If they say you can’t do this song, or that song, but you can do the other song; it’s still important to play other song.
Freak: So you can always make compromise, right?
Fletcher: Right, a little bit of compromise is ok. All ofour songs have an important message. Not just that song.
Freak: So you totally get that people need you to make compromise.
Fletcher: Yes, you know, you come here ( unable to play it), but maybe 2 years later, you』ll be able toplay that song.
Freak: Maybe you can like mix your message in your songs,right?
Fletcher: Yeah. I mean all the songs have similar messages,just not as blatant.
Freak: I know that, I get that, just like sublime, right?
Fletcher: Yeah, it’s more important to come here do something, than do nothing.
Freak: We』ve noticed that the percentage of rock music in Grammy Awards is getting decreased, you know. And more and more rock bands have increased other elements in rock music to make it become a mixture, so what is your view in that? Is that a trend? How do you view that trend?
Fletcher: I think that commercial music is a problem ingeneral. The corporations, the record companies that have invested money in Kanye West or this type of stuff. Yeah, he is a great song writer. But I don’t like him as a person esp. about what he said.
I think it’s really ridiculous how he talks about how great he is, when there’s so many other good bands, like Beck, that is really good and produced their own songs. But I think what happens is that the media they take the Kardashians and Kanye West, and they feed this to the public. They wanna make this so popular, because they want to make money of it.
Freak: It’s quite commercialized.
Fletcher: Right, it’s commercialized, and it’s set up. Grammys, it’s a set up. It says let’s have Kanye and TaylorSwift. She is pretty cool. She writes her own songs. I like her. She’s pretty humble. But like there’s a lot of bands that is not even writing their own songs. And you look like FoolFighters.
Freak: Just like fast food you know.
Fletcher: It’s like shove it for the dump people. Just shove it in your mouth.And get the most money you can, and brain wash it. I watched the music awards acouple of weeks ago.It’s so horrible that the performances. Like Justin Bibber. The guy has already made a bad name for himself, and he goes and starts crying; it’s like you’re faking. I’m back. I wanna be an actor.
Freak: It’s like, you’re an actor not a singer.
Fletcher: That’s what Hollywood is. That’s what the music is. It’s all money. Money, money. If you look at the band like FooFighters, or like Beck, pure artists, that are writing songs, that are going out there doing things good and still keep looking. You know.
I mean. Beck won the Grammy. So that’s cool but like where is the attention of Beck there? The attention for Beck is from the Fans.That’s cool, that, there’s still little bit. But I think all the stuff in between is just ridiculous, and it’s just like everything else in the world is bad commercialism is bad.
Freak: Also, we noticed that there’s these lyrics in one of your songs, < all or nothing>, is that 「there’s a poisonous diseasecalled, complacency is taking control of our lives』. As a punk music band, you』ve been there fornearly 30 years, from 1988, right. Do you still keep the attitude of self-doubt? To always challenge oneself, refuse to be complacent.
Fletcher: Yeah. I mean if you want to be complacent and an American or anybody in the world. Like right now we have a racial president going on in America, and Donald Trump is running for president. There’s a perfect example of commercialization, is that a guy who has a TV show, is a total Jack Ass. He’s like totally crazy. He’s out there yelling.But people are actually buying it. Because he’s not going off a script like most presidents, selling what he says.
People like the honesty,even though they think what he is saying is totally crazy. And there’s this guys named Bernie Sanders, who’s a socialist,right? I’m really behind Bernie Sanders, because America will not be a socialist country.
People are worried,oh, he is a socialist, he wants to fix the education. He wants to fix all the problems in America. So, all these people, like I post something on Facebook,last night, of some top romin in 7/11 and I got like 300 likes, and like 90 comments.
But so I get like 400 hundreds likes and 80 comments for something about what I say. But when Italk, instead of sitting on the couch of America, I’m talking about this guy Bernie Sanders on Facebook all the time. It’s like 「 wake up,people, and watch this video, listen to what he has to say, I get like 10 likes, and 2 comments.
That’s because people are lazy. They don’t wanna look atpolitics. They don’t wanna bother,and that’s problem of America and lots of other countries as well They have a voice and they just wanna eattheir big Mac, watch the Kardashians.
And you gotta speak up for yourself andyour fellow humans, and try to make the world a better place, no matter what country you live in.If you want to sit around and be complacent, you are part of the problem. That’s a solution. .
Freak: We also watched this documentary, called The <F world>, F is short for Father. It’s about Jim’s relationship with his daughter. Like he bathed his daughter, watch American Idol together.Now the kids have all grown up. Do they grow up as what you guys expected themto be? Or you let them be themselves. Do you want them? Or secretly want them to be someone who is in the industry of music.
Fletcher: I think, knowing Jim and his daughters, he let them grow up the way they wanted to grow up. Of course if I had a kid, I wouldbe like, Hey, this is the music I listen to, this is what we do. so we listen to punk rock in the car. But sometimes she wants to hear the other type of music, it’s ok. You have to let everyone be themselves. You have to let them be individual.
Freak: Individualism is what you values?
Fletcher: Yes! At the end of the day, you gotta let them grow how they want to grow. You can point them over here, point them overthere. If they wanna be like this, you...
Freak: It’s them that make the choice, right?
Fletcher: Yes, that’s the most important thing about parenting I think. Even thought Idon’t have a kid, The parents that force their kids to do certain things and those kids are unhappy. 「you gotta be a lawyer, a doctor, go go go.
Freak: You have no right to force a kid. They are another human being.
Fletcher: Yeah, so if that person is like, 「 hey, I wanna be a musician. I wanna be an artist. Or I wanna be a surfer. Or whatever I wanna be in life. It’s their right! You don’t own your kid.Whatever they wanna do, you gotta support them. Even if you don’t like it. You gotta see it. Ok that’s what she wants, what he wants, and support them and let them bethe best they can be.
Freak: Tell them what you think is best for them, but let them make the decision.
Fletcher: Exactly, my parents didn’t want me to be part of punk rock. In 1980s, which is a long time ago, punk rock is not popular. Bands like, The Dead Kennedys, or Adolescents,or Sex Pistols.
My parents look at those records and smash the records andthrow them into the trash, you know? They doubted and hated. And they said it’s ruining your life, and now I’m in Shanghai, drinking beer.
Freak: And you can tour the globe.
Fletcher: My parents went to Mexico maybe once. I』ve been to Australia, Europe, 20, or 30 times, so, like punk rock for me, it opens up my mind. Hey, be yourself, don’t worry about other people talking about you, and decide for you what the rules are. Just do your own thing. And I did it, and here we are.
Freak: That’s the spirit of music.
Fletcher: Yeah!
Freak: Be yourself.
Fletcher: So it changes my life.
Freak: We know that Green Day has made it to 「The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame」, so would you share some views about that.
Fletcher: You know I’m not a big fan of Green Day. They used to open for Pennywise in the early years. I like the music, I like the guy. I think they had the choice to stay more punk rock, and they choose to go more commercial, make a lot of money, and become really famous. You know, their music is great. They’re great song writers, talented musician.
I just think on the way up, they didn’t have to do some ofthe things they did. Like bands like Bad Religion. They maintained like astatus of punk rock and loyalty to the scenes. Of course everyone is friends with Green Day. I don’t dislike them.
Freak: I know you don’t dislike them. It’s just that youdon’t like them that much.
Fletcher: I just don’t like how they market themselves.
Freak: So, do you think it’s not good to market? Your brand and your band?
Fletcher: I think it’s ok to market. But there’s a limit. Like a lot of people say, 「 hey, we want you to do this.」 We say, 「Fuck, are you crazy? We are not doing that.」 I remember one time, to put us in the back of a magazine. You can cut us out and put us on your finger.
Freak: That’s lousy, so lame.
Fletcher: I think Green Day did it.
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