Ta historia jest za ciekawa, zeby jej pozwolic umrzec w natloku wirtualnego syfu. To jedna z takich rzeczy, na podstawie ktorych tworza sie legendy. A przynajmniej plotki. W kazdym razie warto przeczytac.
Oto Rasaraja aka Robert Fish o swoich doswiadczeniach z mloda amerykanska scena chrzescijanska, ktora probowala budowalc swoja wlasna spolecznosc oparta o glosna muzyke, krory my nazywamy hardcore'm.
After a funny discussion over at Deathtalk I decided to write out my first and only experience with the so called “Christian Hardcore scene”. I will preface this by saying that I know people that are into Christ that play in hardcore bands, members of Coalesce and Frodus come to mind, but they were a part of the hardcore scene and aren't entering it just to bring people to Christ and at least from my experience they are somewhat heritcal in their own approach. I tend to think in most cases these individuals, like myself in regards to Gaudiya Vaisnavism, are more inspired by the aspirations or aspects of a philosophy than taking a literal approach to texts although I may in some cases be incorrect as that comes from my small exchanges with these individuals. Still in my eyes there is a huge difference between those individuals and those bands that play music that sounds like a “hardcore” band but are more akin to a church funded youth group (this is the only way I can refer to them without getting nauseas) that play heavy music.
These bands are on Christian labels which are supported by Churches and youth ministries and their entire image and being is designed to maximize appeal and gain followers for the band and thus their church/ministry. Much of it is as real as an episode of Alf. Now I may wish Alf was real reality TV but it wasn't and neither is this bullshit really hardcore.
So what is the “Christian hardcore scene”? In the Deathtalk discussion someone mentioned a huge church/corporation close to their home that has secured a fleet of vans and trailers, replete with Christian sloganeering in "extreme" fonts. Inside the facility are practice rooms and more gear than your local Guitar Center. It is almost as simple as “Hey, are you in a local metalcore band that is ready to spread the word of Christ Jesus Our Lord and Savior? Well, then get in the van because the church will PAY FOR YOU to tour. Full ride.” That is what is a good example of what I mean by the “Christian Hardcore scene”. I don’t claim to know who these bands are nor do I really find it important.
One final note before I get to the story: My story involves a Zao show. I have no idea if Zao was one of those church funded youth groups that played heavy music or if they were something entirely different but the setting of this story was at one of their shows.
Anyhow on to the story:
In 1999 my band The Judas Factor headed out on our first and only US Tour. The instructions to Robby, our booking agent, were simple: book us as many shows as possible during this tour even if that means 2 or 3 shows in a day. We had a few days with two shows a day but not many. The day we hit Omaha, Nebraska we only had 1 show booked. We got into town late in the morning and found out the show wasn’t starting until 10 pm. We were bummed about the long wait as nothing on tour is more painful than the down time. We asked the promoter of our show if there were any other shows going on earlier than ours within an hour drive and he mentioned a show about 30 minutes away with the band Zao. As soon he finished his sentence we told him he must drive to that show with us so we could finagle our way onto the show. Within minutes we were on our way. Although we had heard the band name Zao before we had no idea who they were and what we were in for.
We drive out to the middle of nowhere to some church where the show is to take place. We get out, ask the few kids that are there who the promoter is and hunt him down. We explain that we are in a band and on tour from NYC and had the day off and wanted to know if we could play the show. We told him he would play for free and as short or long of a set as he thought fit.
“What’s the name of your band” he asked with a puzzled look.
“The Judas Factor”.
He smiled and said sure. We unloaded our equipment into the downstairs of this huge church, set up our merchandise and went outside. Within minutes we were playing our favorite tour game that I believe we called Quarters. Simply put you stand 5 feet from a wall and try to throw the quarter as close to the wall as possible. The person who get’s it the closest wins all of the quarters. This helped feed us various times when we got enough locals involved. Anyhow we had about an hour to go before doors so it was a way to kill time.
We are playing as kids begin to show up. We quickly notice that most of the kids are young and they were not simply dropped off by their parents but their parents were hanging out. Seemed weird but then again the place was in the middle of no where so if you didn’t drive Mom and Dad were the only option and if they came from far enough away maybe they were just going to hang around outside while their kids enjoyed the show? Anyhow kids and their parents are showing up and what we expected to be a show in front of 20 people is now in the hundreds. Awesome.
At one point this little kid, maybe 12, comes over and asks what we are playing. We explain to him the game and the next thing you know he is playing with us, we are all having a blast and things are good. We all like this kid and bestow him with the name “Chuckie”.
First band starts and we go downstairs. Although the band was rather bad they were also rather young looking so whatever. They didn’t exactly sound like a hardcore band but nothing else about them really caught our attention except for the fact that a lot of the parents were downstairs watching the show which made us all chuckle. We head outside and just hang out at the van.
When the next band goes on we go downstairs and they are preaching away about God’s plan, our place in it and how we are to insulate ourselves from non-believers. We all look at each other utterly bewildered but just shrug it of as a band that really digs Jesus and a crowd that is just nice.
The third band goes on and again we go in to check it out. Sounded like Korn. Fuck this. We stop over at the merch table and Dave, who was doing our merch, is giggling because we are somehow selling a lot of merch at a show we weren’t scheduled to be on and to kids and parents who had no idea who we were. As we laugh about how strange it is the band stops and the singer starts talking. He goes into some long speech about how bad sex is unless you are married and in a true Christian relationship and everyone cheers. We look at one another puzzled. He then goes on to say that homosexuality is a sin and an abomination and that homosexuals will go to hell for eternity. The few of us start yelling shit at this band. People turn around and look at us strange but the band is oblivious to our yelling and just goes into another song. We start walking out and see this kid wearing a shirt explaining that God gives animals to us so they should be hunted, killed and eaten. At this point we are completely bewildered.
We get outside and see the promoter for our show and he is hanging out with 15 or so kids that he had called and alerted to us playing the Zao show. After some quick introductions we explain, in disbelief, what we just witnessed and they all stare at us in equal disbelief.
“You do know who Zao is don’t you?” they ask.
“Um, not really” we reply.
They then go on to explain that the band and everyone there are Christians and that every band that plays was a Christian band. The parents aren’t there to drop off their kids but to participate in the show and that this is normal in the “Christian Hardcore scene”. Over the next few minutes they fill us in on this phenomenon and our minds are blown. They explain that a Christian Youth Ministry was putting on this particular show and apparently there was a whole network of these Youth Ministries across the US that put on shows and support tours for these bands. Not sure if Zao confined themselves to this scene or not but today this was the case.
At this point I wander back in to the show and just stand their watching the crowd who are just so happy and inspired by what they are witnessing and my mind is blown. I was experiencing a church revival, which is cool for them, but not the hardcore show I was expecting to attend. I head outside and sit against the wall wondering what to think. I mean these people have a right to their revival but I have a right to crash it, don’t I? I decide that I do have that right. I will say what I feel regarding the bullshit they were spewing and if it pisses them off well welcome to my world. Now I am ready to play.
When the band finishes we hurry downstairs to set up because we all want to just rip into it at this point. On my way down the promoter of this show stops me and he looks distraught.
“Zao can’t make it”.
Turns out they got stuck in some storm and would never make the show, which meant we were headlining. I tell him no problem and help get everything set up.
Between people hearing about Zao just cancelling and, I assume, some people realizing that this band was the same people that were yelling shit at the last band when we got ready to play the crowd was a bit smaller. Maybe half the crowd.
I think I open the set by saying something witty like “God is a myth and homosexuality is natural” and we rip into our first song. The few kids that came to see us get into it, we go nuts and everyone else stares with a few people trying to yell at us but we are way to loud and they mean nothing.
Next song I talk about how eating meat shows a basic lack of compassion and any god or religion that condones that is a sham. Now half the crowd is yelling at us and I thank them for all of the Wars and atrocities that have occurred in the name of their “god”. In the meantime the 100 or so people outside are now running, not walking, running down the stairs towards the stage screaming at us. We rip into the song and within 20 seconds the PA is off, our amps unplugged and the place is chaos.
Justin is running around, guitar in hand, yelling something about loving Jesus, loving homosexuals and trying to hug people. Little Dave is swinging his bass wildly and yelling to everyone that if they wanted to fight he would take them all on. The kids that came with us are yelling and having pushing matches with others. I am just yelling at whomever is getting in my face… pure mayhem. It sort of calms down and I ask the promoter why he won’t let us say what we want to say? He says we are vulgar and are being disrespectful to their church. I tell him that I just sat through a band that was disrespectful to humanity and everyone that doesn’t fall within their fairy tale world so now it is my turn to say what I think. Everyone starts yelling again and it is clear the show is over.
People are at our merchandise table yelling at our merch guy that they want their money back. We refuse, pack up and head outside. The mayhem continues outside with people yelling at us and threatening us as we unload and someone breaks the windows of a band that was hanging out with us.
As we throw our stuff in the van “Chuckie” walks up in tears. He explains that because of us he is now going to hell and would have to repent for the rest of his life. He is sobbing and nothing we can say will make him stop. It is sort of heart breaking but what can we do? We finish packing up, tell the kid that he will be okay and get the fuck out of there.
That evening’s show was much smaller than the show earlier in the day but the kids were stoked on the theatrics of the first show and we had a blast.
The end.
