Radio Silence / A Selected Visual History of American Hardcore Music

I want to remind everyone that we’re going to be setting off the Radio Silence /Selected Photography show in Boston, MA tomorrow. The Boston Globe interviewed me about the show, you can peep it here. They even put up a photo gallery, you can check that out here.  What really had me tripping was that during the interview I had an epiphany about Boston, MA. As soon as I tuned into punk, hardcore, underground metal and as much indie music as I could devour, I learned that Boston had a pretty incredible history, there was folklore everywhere. Despite the incredible sounds I as hearing, there was something tragic about  the notes of Get It Away, Wolfpack, Alcohol or other Boston hardcore classics, the songs sounded as bitter as the city can be at times due to arctic temperatures, stifling wind-chill and a bizarre mix of extreme right and extreme left thinkings both hating dudes in the middle like myself…oh yeah and the Red Sox always lost…it sucked.

The saddest notes came from Mission of Burma, a band that wrote some of the greatest indie-pop songs ever as well as some jolting angular post-punk tunes that we’re still figuring out. Every time I heard one of their tunes on the radio I could see Bob Stanley throwing a wild pitch (not going full Buckner on this one), I’d see the Bears “berrying” the Patriots and the tragedy of Len Bias. They should have ruled the world and SSD should have been the brand name that Minor Threat was to straight edge, they were from MY area of the globe you see and it had to be that way.

During the interview it hit me that Mission of Burma had reunited and I got to see them about six times, the Red Sox won two world series, the Patriots won three super bowls, the Celtics won sweet seventeen and due to hardcore growing to a level no one anticipated order was restored to the universe because DYS, SS Decontrol, The FUs, Last Rights and other Boston legends that were gods to me cemented their names in hardcore’s history and have been given the attention they deserve globally.

So yeah what I’m saying is let’s fucking celebrate.