You can imagine how stoked I was to see an email in my inbox titled "I was in Judge." I was even more stoked once I actually read it and saw that it was from Judge guitarist Lars Weiss and that he enjoyed YeahYouKnowIt's review of the Judge 7" the other day. Oh, and that he doesn't hate crunkcore.
If you are old, you understand that Lars is a hardcore vet who has done time in legendary bands like Side By Side, Alone In A Crowd, Uppercut and of course Judge. If you're one of the younger kids who reads this site and don't understand exactly how well-respected and awesome these bands are, read this interview with Lars from Double Crossed and learn. Let me be perfectly clear: I make a lot of jokes, but I fucking love hardcore and I always will. Lars seems to be on the same page, and I am definitely stoked to hear from someone who was in some bands that mean a lot to me. Thanks bro, if you're ever in town hit me up and we will get fucking crunk!
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Lars is the guitarist with Tony Hawk hair in this video for Judge's "Where It Went." If you don't think this is a lolfactory, you are in the No Fun Club.
Here is his email:
Hey,I was in Judge for minute (I played guitar on the summer 1990 tour & "The Storm" ep) and I just had to let you know that Scene Girl's review had me dying. So funny on many, many different levels, most of which have been touched upon in the comments on your blog and the livewire records board. Totally surreal reading an extra-long text message making fun of Mike for wearing raver pants. I really want to see what she thinks of "Screaming for Change"....Anyway, I still see Sammy on the regular. Can't wait to tell him about the post.Btw, I've checked out the blog before and I dig it. I too am an old dude who keeps up with new stuff. For awhile, my taste leaned towards (for lack of a better term) "hipster rap" -- Fools Gold/ Mad Decent, etc., but now I feel that shit is kinda weak. I still keep up with dancehall and beardo house stuff like Rub'n'Tug, Map of Africa, DJ Harvey but those dudes are older than me! Always looking for something new to get excited about. I have to say I found out about crunkcore from StuffYouWillHate and while I don't exactly "like" it, it does fascinate me.Anyway, keep up the good work...Lars
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One of the funniest hardcore songs of all time, "When Tigers Fight" by the highly underrated and highly fucking awesome Alone In A Crowd
I hope Sammy is also stoked. I am a big fan of his work, especially the bowling shirts he rocked in the layout for the CIV record! Lars continues in a second email in which we discussed the finer points of hardcore lolfactories and crunkcore:
You're right about "When Tigers Fight" [being a lolfactory]-- Drago, Carl (Killing Time dudes) and I were dying in the studio when we recorded it! Drago even came up with the idea and overdubbed the little "ding" that you hear when Jules says "There ain't gonna be no bell..."....As far as Crunkcore, I mean how can you not be interested in anything (Lil Wayne included) that involves a lot of tattoos and autotune.. Plus, I'm for ever searching for great Rap/ Rock hybrids (I've always though Leeway should have been huge & Fred Durst should still be tatooing in FL somewhere) and maybe one of those kids could do it. I mean some white kid's gonna have much more of a feel for hip hop than Pharrell (or Lil' Wayne)does for punk rock...
Thanks Lars, I'm glad to hear that you and I both know how to have fun despite being fossils! Oh, and a giant high five for coining the phrase BEARDO HOUSE. A++++
9 comments:
one WIN delivered on a silver platter?
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Ah, dude, when I saw "Judge responds", I was totally hoping that they would "get it", and at least one guy did. Awesome!
Yeahyouknowit, you should review Bold next. Those dudes were awesome.
Okay, back to listening to Blackout Crew!
I'm an old man. I barely care about most music. Having said that I'm still on anyone's nuts if they played in Judge. I can't help it. Whenver I see Sammy and his balding afro...I still get the shakes.
od stuff but this isn't really "Judge" I wonder what some of the more srsly serious ex-members think.
Seems like the Bridge 9 dudes are slightly less hostile to the whole thing than the APers. Which is the exact opposite of what you'd think.
Lars being into 'Blog House' and Beardo Disco is interesting because back when I was living in DC (early 2008) I would always see mad dudes with beards and old SxE/Hardcore tats at these parties & always wondered how they got from that to this.
od stuff but this isn't really "Judge" I wonder what some of the more srsly serious ex-members think.
Send it to Porcell, I'm sure he would think it's funny. I read his zines back in like 94 and he is a smart, self-aware guy. Sounds like Sammy is the same.
And LOL @ "This doesn't count, Lars wasn't REALLY in Judge!!"
The Alone in a Crowd and SBS 7"s are two of the greatest hardcore records ever released. I'm glad to see this dude is still cool and psyched on music and has a sense of humor about things.
This is fantastic.
Baltimore has a big "hipster scene" with that beach house and wam city horse shit. Beard house makes a lot of sense to me.
I think the old SxEHC dudes get into it for the coke and women...I should probably say girls, not women, but you know what I'm getting at. As female friendly HC and metal have become it is still friendlier when the band shops at the same stores as the female fans. And while that stuff is popular. the modern HC that is closer to the old school stuff we remember is still rather femaleless.
When is the next review coming? some Earth Crisis? Warzone? VOD demos?
@stephen: My thoughts EXACTLY.
@condor: Haha, chicks and coke are pretty alluring to us old dudes for sure. As far as future reviews, I've actually thought about all those bands haha- havent decided yet tho.
hah, pretty funny. i remember reading an interview with lars in the mid 90s sometime where he was talking about being into jungle/drum & bass and mentioned Metalheadz/Goldie, etc. cool to see he's made the transition to the disco beard.
btw, lars didn't coin the phrase "beardo house", it's been around for a while now.. check out djhistory.com's messageboards, people on there are always mentioning beards in association with "balearic", disco, house, etc.
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