[ SEE YOU IN HELL ]

Interview for Italian UNITED FORCES NEWSLETTER – questions by Marco (ZAS! Autoproduzione) and Ale (MEMENTO MORI). Interview is from August/September 2005.

1) M: Hi Filip, it's more than a decade that you play punk-hc, first with MRTVA BUDOUCNOST and then with SEE YOU IN HELL. Tell us about the changes the scene and your bands have met along this years.
Well, MRTVA BUDOUCNOST started back in 1994, so obviously it’s a long time ago and lots of things have happened meanwhile... I think that w/M.B. we used to be really 100% enthusiastic and maybe a little naive in many aspects, also maybe a bit disorganized. But it’s just natural I think. While today w/SEE YOU IN HELL we work as a tight unit ready to reach for new things, which makes the whole experience still interesting and entertaining even we are not teenagers anymore {I’ve just turned 30 yesterday}. I think it is really important to work w/people you can agree with on basic goals and when I look back, I am sure that many things we are doing now w/SYIH would not be possible w/M.B., because we were often too chaotic and the motivation wasn’t all the time on highest level. Today it’s different, which is great and even we are all approaching 30’s and have families and children, everything is running much better, because we already know what we want. I think that we can agree on basic thing that hardcore/punk is a great concept/environment for self-realization, that almost everything depends just on you and your own activity {Do it yourself – not waiting for other people to do all the shitty work for you!} and that you should sacrifice a lot to gain much more in the future.
The scene in Czech has changed a lot as well since early 90s, again in many aspects – it used to be more fresh/chaotic/idealistic as well, today it works really good, but sometimes the “spirit” is not here anymore. But it’s also a matter of age and getting burnt out from time to time after all these years. I think it is important to keep looking for things which can inspire you and start to burn the flame in you again – I am lucky as I constantly get a decent kick from new bands, cool people, interesting places we visit w/band etc. But it is for sure pretty depressing to see so many old friends just giving up and starting to live just normal grey and nauseous lifes despite all the slogans, revolutionary rhetoric or rebellious clothes... fuck it.
The has scene also changed musically a lot, I remember that when M.B. started, not many people over here used to be into extreme HC/crust/raw punk, there were just few bands of this genre in Czech {just few of our good friends back then – few bands like PANGS OF REMORSE, HELL ON EARTH, HEARTLINE... we used to play mostly w/punk rock or „tough guy HC“ bands back then in our early years, man, it did sucked!} and over here in Brno I think that almost nobody did cared about us. Again, this is completely different now, since we have a great scene in our hometown w/more than dozens of active bands {4-5 raw punk bands just in our rehearsal room!}, few zines, steady concert places, tons of gigs, cca 5 gig collectives... it is really great and I can’t not believe how much it used to suck in the past over here.

2) M: A glance to your business: what do you do in your life beside the activity in the DIY community?
A: Life's a bitch so we have to face a everyday life that's "sweetly" imposed and that we may feel stranger to us, there's a sharp border between this life and the DIY one in your existence or is it not so clear and defined? How far you try to push it in your experiences?
If you mean where do I work, then I am social lawyer in Gypsie ghetto here in Brno. It’s pretty interesting work and it pays relatively OK, so I am pretty happy there. There are around 12.000 Gypsies living in Brno and most of them belong among the poorest ones, so there are different social programms to help them. Before I used to work in social-ecological organization organizing different campaigns, the most important one was against the building of new shopping malls {hypermarkets} in Czech Rep., which are destroying the local economies/architecture etc. Infact I still do a little of these activities, right now I work on a book about our experiences w/fighting evil shopping malls!
Also I have girlfriend and 1 year old daughter, but this is not tabloid newspaper, so I think there’s no need to talk more about my personal life, hahaha...
To answer the rest of your questions, I believe that you can directly influence lots of things in your life by yourself, if you really try hard. I see no big difference between my job and my DIY activities, at my job I am {for almost 100%} my own boss and I am pretty sure that the work I do has some meaning and that it’s helpful to people in need. Infact I see it as a continuation of my previous political activities {I used to be active in local anarchist and later social-ecological movements since early 90s}. Life can be really fucked up and sometimes there’s not much you can do w/it, but you just have to try harder or you will end up just surviving and not living at all.

3) M: Until 1989 Czechoslovakia has been ruled by a communist regime, how was living in those ages? I guess the first punk band born in those years had serious problems with repression and censorship, how did the seminal punk circuit move till the fall of the Soviet-like dictatorship?
A: And how do the modern punks and more in general, the common Czech guy move in this modern day capitalist country that just joined the unsteady crippled U.E.?
Yes, you are right. The life under this so-called „Communist“ regime was so absurd that it’s really difficult to explain it today to somebody who has not this direct experience. Just every aspect of your life was just completely absurd and unbelievable when compared to today’s reality. Let’s just stay on the subject of punk music – every band {not just the punk rock ones!} was forced to have it’s music and lyrics examined by some kind of „cultural commission“{= members of local authorities = members of Communist party + official musicians} if it is not something against „socialist morals“. If they didn’t liked it, you wasn’t able to play officially. Sometimes it was possible to make unofficial DIY gigs, but there was all the time risk that they will be stopped by police and people sent to jail. Especially in early 80’s the repression against all forms of rock music was really strong. It got little better in the end of 80’s and there was even one {just one!} official punk records released – the 7“ of VISACI ZAMEK. Just very few punk bands were able to perform officially usually covered w/local „Socialist Youth Union“ papers, but still it was pretty difficult to play punk live. On the other hand all this reppression made Czechoslovakian punk {+ ofcourse Polish, Russian, East-German etc.} very special and very honest. No doubt that if the regime would continue and not fall down in 1989, then more punk bands would become official making huge compromises like heavy metal bands for example, but it didn’t happened, so it’s safe to say that most of hardcore/punk bands before 1989 were really special and unique. This was made totally clear to me when I was writing the book about history of punk before 1989 in Czechoslovakia {self-published in 2002 under the „Guitars And Screams“ name – 1.500 copies sold, now it’s reprinted}.
By the way there were few common things between 80’s Czechoslovakian punk and Italian punk back then! The first ever vinyl compilation on which few bands have appeared was LP called „Czech, Till Now You Were Alone“ was released in 1984 by Italian label Old Europa Cafe – songs by A64, ZIKKURAT and EXTEMPORE have appeared there among others. It was a great help for independent music over here and todays it’s a pretty rare record. And in 1985 there was an illegal gig of some Czech punk bands and TEST DEPARTMENT {industrial band from UK}, which was visited by the brother of Jumpy Velena {owner of the great Attack Punk label and singer of RAF PUNK} – Giuseppe, who did vocals for one of the bands and in the end got even arrested when police stopped the gig {and TEST DEPARTMENT got arrested as well and deported immediately}!
If you want to know about life under „Communist“ regime in general, then it would be pretty long writing, just very, very briefly – closed borders {most of people were allowed to travel to other Eastern countries only}, 2 years long compulsory military service, censorship, no unemployement {since it was an criminal offence not to work}, heavy pollution, one party holding the power for 40 years, very small selection of goods in shops... I could go on and on. For sure I don’t cry for these fucked up times.
I think that today’s Czech society is not so different from other EU countries and the hardcore/punk scene is also almost similar in most aspects, so there’s not much to tell about it.
4) M: Since a long time you run a DIY zine that seems to be very rich of contents and interesting called "HLUBOKA ORBA". Unfortunately for us it's written in Czech. What's its story and your feelings about it?
Thanx for the compliments, but only just last 2 issues {24 and 25} were done in this slick/professional way – basically they are put out together like a book w/2 coloured cover and latest issue has something like 160 pages of full page {A4} format, so yes, it is pretty big zine, also probably the most expensive one here in Czech {it costs cca 3 USD}. But still I manage to sell 800 – 1.000 copies of it. It is also longest running zine in Czech as I started w/it back in 1993. I have always concentrated on more or less „extreme music“ {fast HC/crust/raw punk etc.} mixed w/radical politics {squatting, youth centres, ecological issues, animal rights, direct actions etc.} and it seems that it works. There’s not any clear political ideology behind the politics in my zine, but I would say it is probably closest to „life-style anarchism“ and politics of everydays life. On the musical part of the zine – I try hard not to follow any fucked up trends and not give any coverage to bussiness-oriented labels/activities... I even don’t review CD’s as I want to support vinyl and tapes for 100% as my fave and in my opinion truest punk format. Now I know that it may sound like a contradiction as my band released CD, but we always prefer to release vinyl first and also this is my zine and I do whatever I want w/it, OK? Also I positively know that quite a good number of people got influenced by my zine and bought record players and many people buy new vinyls w/the zine’s review section in the hand... so I really hope that I am doing my bit in saving the vinyl format against ugly CD’s. During the years Hluboka Orba did interviews w/bands like RESIST, DISORDER, HIATUS, DISCLOSE, CRIPPLE BASTARDS, MASHER, PRIMITIV BUNKO, CAPITALIST CASUALTIES, SPAZZ, DEMON SYSTEM 13, EBOLA, CONFUSIONE, AGATHOCLES, REAGAN SS... published scene reports from all different corners of the world... reviewed thousands of vinyls and tapes... Also few years ago I did this huge „Italian punk scene“ special w/info about few dozens old Classical Italian bands, interview w/CORROSIONE, photos etc. – this issue had big success and lots of people here found out about the great Italian punk history thanx to it. The newest issue has interviews w/kind of smaller and more obscure bands like LAMANT {Belarus}, GEORGE HARRISON {Russia}, DESASTRE {Brazil} or HRYDJUVERK {Iceland} as I am becoming totally sick and bored with the endless worshipping of established Amerikkkan, Swedish or Japanese bands... I believe there should be room also for lesser known bands from not so over-hyped countries and I am quickly losing most of interest towards this crust fashion oriented latest trend, even I used to be really big fan of crust not so long time ago. Fuck the trends... I do my zine in Czech language, because I can express myself in this language best and make the reading really interesting. Also I don’t see so big interest in English written zines in the abroad {ofcourse except USA and UK}, it seems to me that people loose interest towards zines and most of todays zines are not so interesting anyway w/either emo-personal stuff inside or these big silly magazines interviewing the some super-popular shitty bands again and again and having most of the content consumed by adds. By the way if there’s anybody reading this and having classic Italian zines like T.V.O.R. or Attack Punk, then please contact me, I would really appreciate xerox copies!
5) M: With your bands you made several tours around europe in squats, autonomous circles, youth centres, etc.anyway in places closely bound to DIY ethics. Where did you feel the more at ease and what about the Italian gigs?
Yes, I did lots of tours, basically almost everywhere in Europe with exception of Scandinavia {although M.B. has played one gig in Denmark} and few other countries. With SEE YOU IN HELL we are touring UK again for 2nd time this September and there’s plan to tour Japan next year as well. We feel 100% well w/DIY way of organizing gigs and playing outside the commercial circles. I like hardcore/punk because in it’s truest form it’s nonconformist and DIY way of doing things, it’s not something you can „live“ just with clicking the button of your TV, not something you can read in newspapers about... We are not rockstars and we don’t demand anything unreasonable for our gigs, we just want to be treated with respect and we want the people who organize something for us to be honest and to do everything really well, because we do it the same way here - when we have foreign bands playing here, we treat them as our guests and we expect the other people to do it like this as well. Still after all these years of touring {M.B. went for it‘s first foreign tour back in 1996} I still believe in international cooperation – „network of friends“ based not on money, but on friendship, honesty and trust in hardcore/punk scene. From 90% we always used to have only good experiences and we can’t complain at all. Of course there were few cases when we were pissed off, when the people organizing the gigs acted like complete assholes and made the things really difficult to us, but it can happen from time to time and it won’t stop us. We are no rockstars so we are completely satisfied with being the part of this DIY scene. And I am 100% sure that that you can meet much more assholes in musical bussiness anyway, so „non-DIY“ way of organizing is for sure not better.
We have different experiences from different countries and I definitely don’t want to generalize so much, because it is always a bit dangerous and also I don’t live in these countries, I just spent few days there, so I can’t judge too much... also within these countries the different cities have different scenes and it can vary a lot. Still I think that our {speaking about SEE YOU IN HELL} best abroad gigs were in France together with GRIDE, we were blown away by the great response in Dijon, Montbrison and Bordeaux – it was strange, because everybody complains about France all the time... Also England and Scotland were great, again UK was for long years just completely cut off from the touring circuit and almost no bands tried to go there as the scene was pretty much dead there... but in last 2-3 years it has changed for much better and now we have no problem to play like 10 gigs there during our September tour... last year we had great gigs in Bristol, Edinburgh or Aberdeen, so we are really happy to visit it again... Germany is always 100% well organized, you get good money, good food and they treat you really well, there are dozens of places {youth centers and squats} to play and mostly are people really interested to help you. Only problem is that the people at gigs in Germany often look kind of bored... Slovakia is killer if you are able to get more gigs there, especially in the middle and eastest part of the country, they don’t get too many gigs there usually, so they are really grateful when bands tour there, again we had few killer gigs there with GRIDE in May 05... I was a bit let down by Spain, where we played in 2003, but Basque country gig was pretty wild even there were only like 30 people. There were not many people to see us in Spain, but we played all gigs there during working days and also the organization was a little chaotic... I have heard also pretty good things about Southern Europe countries like Greece, Macedonia or Serbia from other bands, but I have never played there {there is plan for SEE YOU IN HELL to make short Balkan tour in 2006}... On the other hand there are countries where the hardcore/punk scene seems to me to be completely dead – like Austria {we have it really close to Wien from Brno and we used to go there to see gigs in last 10 years, but even the killer bands like DROPDEAD never attracted more than few dozen people}, Netherlands {there are few good bands, but they are usually much more popular in the abroad, the gigs there attract again just few people usually}, Hungary... we are not very interested to play in these countries again, I think it’s a waste of time, but that’s just our experience. We want to go to places where the hardcore/punk is really kicking and burning and after seeing 100% crazy gigs in countries like USA or Japan I am really not interested in wasting time and money travelling to places where people look so bored by hardcore/punk.
About Italy – again, I don’t want to act like some expert, I don‘t live there, so these are just my observations/experiences as an outsider. In 97 MRTVA BUDOUCNOST played in Milano and Udine, in 98 in Vitorio Venetto, Pinarela di Cervia, Vigevano and Milano again and in 2003 SEE YOU IN HELL played in Torino, Cremona, Vigevano and Cesena. We always wanted to play in Italy as the band members are/were very enthusiastic for 80’s Italian punk scene and we thought that we will find it’s remains in Italy even today. Well some of the gigs were really great {like this one in Pinarella in squatted hotel near the beach with like 10 bands playing – it was fucking excellent!}, but mostly I felt that the people are not very much interested in hardcore/punk, seems like after the end of the 80’s explosion it was never so good again... shame! I just don’t understand it at all – with so many squats it should be easy to have some kind of active scene {Just think about Japan where if you want to have gig you have to rent club for 2 000 USD for one night!}, but it seemed to me that many squatters are mostly interested in rave, hip hop, reggae or some commercial punk... also sometimes there were so many drugged out losers on the gigs just not knowing where they are. There were few hundreds people on SEE YOU IN HELL + GRIDE gigs in Torino and Cremona and we got paid extremely well {thanx to Giulio and Andrea!}, but I think that most of those people just came to hang out. My favest place I visited in Italy was probably Confino squat in Cesena, really nice place and friendly people, also La Sede/Vigevano was always nice.
In general I would say {not only from my experience} that the problem with Italy lies in the fact {besides not so many people interested in punk anymore - I mean DIY hardcore/punk, not some spaghetti pop punk crap} that the scene is not very reliable – there are not much steady places to play, because gigs are only in squats and they get evicted or their inhabitants do change and their musical preferences may change as well, that foreign bands can’t be so sure if they will get enough money and if they will be treated well {THEMA 11 from Czech played in Alessandria a while ago and got like 12 EU for gig – totally fucked up!}. Also it seems to me that many people in Italy are kind of isolated from the rest of world, not communicating so much with bands in abroad {language problem?} or not giving a fuck at all about them. I have lots of good friends in Italy from bands or distros, but in general I still feel that Italy is a bit isolated from the rest of Europe {it’s similar case with Spain}. If you look at tour plans of many foreign bands, you will notice that many of them have just completely stopped visiting Italy at all, because of all this, which is big shame I think.
OK, I just hope that I don’t sound like complaining cry-baby, I would really like to tour Italy again, maybe to go more south this time {Even I can imagine it could be even more chaotic and disorganized like in the north – but maybe I am wrong!}, but it seems that in foreseeable future it won’t be possible at all.

6) M: It seems to me that your bands never put out releases on CD (except maybe some comps.) but exclusively on tape or vinyl, here in Italy almost none give a fuck about tapes anymore and vinyl is losing ground getting more and more a format for die hard fans. The situation in Czech is different? How comes the choice to make no CDs at all?
No, SEE YOU IN HELL has appeared on some comp. CD’s since the beginning and few months ago we released our full CD on Too Circle Records {LP + split 7” songs + 2 bonus songs}, which will be also re-released on CD or tape in other parts of the world {Mexico, Belarus, Russia, Croatia, Brazil...}. MRTVA BUDOUCNOST has never released CD, but there are 2 CD-r bootlegs of our tapes released in USA and we have also 1 song on CD comp. of CRIPPLE BASTARDS covers {but this one was originally supposed to be released on LP}. I still like vinyl much more than CD’s and I almost don’t buy any CD’s at all – my record collection has few thousands of vinyls, few thousands of tapes and maybe 100 CD’s, which I mostly got for free. I just don’t like this format both design and sound suck. But I also respect that there are countries in the world where the vinyl is just almost extinct and we want to spread our music there, we have to do it on other formats {tapes, CD’s}. Even here in Czech where is one of the last vinyl pressing plants located is vinyl more and more expensive. I just think that records are still appreciated much more in the scene, while CD’s are often seen as very cheap format w/almost no value.

7) M: You're a great fan of hardcore-punk from the first 80's and SYIH alternate influences of bands of those years (for instance Japcore touches in the vein of DEATHSIDE/GAUZE) with more modern parts. Which bands of that era catch/caught more your attention?
If we talk just about 80s, then of course I love lots of Italian bands {see below}, then of course Japanese bands {KURO, GAUZE, GISM, DEATHSIDE, SWANKYS, CONFUSE, CROW, THE CLAY, OUTO, LIPCREAM etc.}, East-European bands {SIEKIERA, DEZERTER, ARMIA, TZN-XENNA, REJESTRACJA etc. from Poland, H.N.F., RADEGAST, F.P.B., S.M.S., SANOV, ZONA A, LORD ALEX etc. from Czechoslovakia, SCHLEIM-KEIM and LATTENTAT from East Germany, U.B.R., TOZIBABE, III KATEGORIJA, SOLUNSKI FRONT etc. from Yugoslavia, GRAZHDANSKAJA OBORONA from Russia}, Scandinavian bands {MOB 47, ANTI-CIMEX, TOTALITAR etc. from Sweden, BETONG HISTERIA, SVART FRAMTID, BANNLYST, FADER WAR etc. from Norway, WAR OF DESTRUCTION from Denmark, TERVEET KADET, KAAOS, BASTARDS, RIISTETYT, APPENDIX, VARAUS etc. from Finland}... fuck, this could be an endless list! Of course lots of 80‘s US hardcore, South American hardcore... I think that in almost every country all over the world there were some killer bands back in the 80’s, like there are killer bands today, you just have to search for them... even in country like France which doesn’t have so great hardcore/punk history you could find some great 80’s stuff like HEIMAT-LOS, RAPT or FINAL BLAST... from Australia for example MASSAPPEAL or CIVIL DISSENT... from Switzerland FEAR OF GOD... you just have to search a bit... so it is very difficult for me to say which 80‘s stuff I find best as there are dozens or even hundreds of great bands to listen to.
8) M: I noticed many times how in Czech scene are really loved Italian bands from the 80's and it's clear that you're a great fan of them, too. How do you look at the nowadays Italian hc-punk? Do you think it would be able to get appreciated out of borders and overseas as happened 20 and more years ago?
You are right. For example our good friends HOMO CONSUMENS play cover songs by IMPACT, WRETCHED, DECLINO or INDIGESTI and they are 100% old Italian punk fanatics even to the point that they are able to repeat the between-songs-speeches from 80’s bands live recordings in perfect Italian language... really! Bands like WRETCHED, IMPACT, NEGAZIONE, RAW POWER, EUS ARSE etc. are really appreciated over here among the people into raw punk/crust. I have few dozens of old tapes from my Italian friends and I love very much even the more obscure stuff like BED BOYS, 5 BRACCIO, SORELLA MALDESTRA, NERORGASMO, KOLETTIVO, UART PUNK, CHAIN REACTION, STINKY RATS, PUTRID FEVER... 80’s Italian punk is just a pearl in world‘s hardcore/punk history and it belongs among the best stuff ever in punk! I think that also CRIPPLE BASTARDS have lots of to do w/promotion of these old bands not only in Czech w/their great „Frammenti Di Vita“ cover songs EP. I like the raw energy of these old bands, you can hear it from old bands in Spain or South America as well I think. Also I like the thing that these bands were very political and DIY and only very few of them got later more commercionalized {like NEGAZIONE or KINA}. This stuff sounds still very honest to me.
And again, I am not living in Italy, so I can‘t give you totally clear opinion about today’s Italian punk bands, but on the other hand I am always looking forward to hear some current bands, which are playing in the vein of these 80’s classics, so I know many bands. My fave „new“ {most of them have already splitted up, I mean 90’s and 00’s bands} from Italy playing in this old style are/were CORROSIONE {2 fucking great split LP’s!}, CONFUSIONE {killer EP’s, but not so energical live, I expected some wilder stage performance, but still good gigs!}, KONTATTO {all their 3 split EP’s are really good, like WRETCHED/EUS ARSE resurrected!}, CREPA {really noisy stuff on their split LP w/CORROSIONE, like PRAVDA or AGONIA!}, CRIPPLE BASTARDS {their mid 90’s stuff}, NIKOTINA {reminds me PEGGIO PUNX a bit}, PISCIA KORSAKOV {obscure band from Udine from mid 90s, demo tape out}, KRIESTI RVOTA {again Udine, just tape out}, HAVOC {I have just hear recently their CD and I immediately thought „Fuck, this has to be the lost NERORGASMO record!“}, MEMENTO MORI {still sounds a lot like CONFUSIONE – I love this NEGAZIONE/INDIGESTI sonic attack!}... It’s shame that most of these bands don’t play anymore and I think there’s not so many current Italian bands playing this classical 80’s style. I know that some bands try to play more in the crust or grind direction today, but especially from Italy some of this stuff is totally awful {but I like N.A.B. or DISARM} and don’t even try to ask me about this intelectual post emo stuff like WITH LOVE or similar bands... I can’t stand it {But it’s just matter of taste, OK?}.
No, I don’t think that today’s Italian bands are known or appreciated in the abroad, but it has lots of to do with the stuff I‘ve talked before – I think that they don’t care so much about releasing/distributing their records, touring in the abroad, communicating w/people from other countries... I think that only band more known in the abroad {apart from some oi! bands who are really popular over here} is CRIPPLE BASTARDS, but I can’t think now about any other band’s name... sorry. By the way make sure to check out TOMOROW and TANTRUM from Japan if you want to hear some today’s bands imitating old Italian sounds – they do it extremely well!

9) M: Recently you've been to Japan and could see/meet/know its hc-punk-grind scene. Like you I'm a great fan of rising sun punk-hc that from the early 80's owned great bands (GAUZE, NIGHTMARE, G.I.S.M., CONFUSE, S.O.B. & many more) and even now give the light to excellent bands and labels. Which impressions you got and what are the differences with European scene? Which band, person, place did hit or shock you, positively or negatively?
I visited Japan back in February/March 2004 for almost for free because I’ve worked back then in local social-ecological organization and we won a project from Japanese organization supporting ex-East-European countries... Japan is so bloody expensive that most of people simply can’t afford to visit it – Tokyo and Osaka are leading the chart of most expensive cities in the world. I was there just for 2 weeks, but I saw like 5 or 6 great gigs – basically all the interesting sub-styles of hardcore/punk – just the very first day when I arrived I went to see NO VALUE, IGNITIONS and CONCLUSION gig {fuck, I‘ve missed ASSFORT and LIFE as the gigs in Japan often start so early – like around 18:00!}, then I went to see „ABC Partisan Gig“ w/BATTLE OF DISARM, POWER OF IDEA, BEYOND DESCRIPTION, VOCO PROTESTA {not very known band outside Japan, total CONFUSE-style noise w/super-political lyrics in Spanish language!} + few more, two „thrashcore“ gigs w/RAZORS EDGE, TOMOROW, EL NUDO, CHARM {w/Max 625 drumming for them!}, CRUCIAL SECTION, BREAKFAST etc., I went also to GAUZE gig {also FUCK ON THE BEACH, DUDMAN and NO THINK played there}, which was of course totally killer... they were as great as I expected them to be! All these gigs were in Tokyo, I‘ve also visited Osaka and went to SAAG, VIBRATORS etc. gig there, but I was really tired after hanging out at infamous „Konton Bar“, where local crusties meet {it’s run by POIKKEUS and ex-GLOOM people}... so I went home early. Of course I bought lots of records as there are many great record shops in Tokyo {Allman, NAT, Rough Trade, DIY, Base, Boy, Disk Union...} and Osaka {King Kong, Time Bomb...}, where you can buy tons of vinyls from all over the world and some of the prices are actually pretty good {of course not for the Japanese 80’s classics... shame!}.
If you ask about differences between Japanese and European hardcore/punk, then we could discuss this for many hours... I would definitely say that they take everything much more „professionally“ - they work much harder in much more difficult environment. You have to pay a lots of money for everything – there are absolutely no squats or youth centres, so if you have a band and want to rehearse, you have to rent the studio. If you want to play gig, then like 4-5 bands have to put money together to rent the place. If you want to visit gig, then you pay like 20-30 EU for ticket. If you want to play outside the city, then you pay tons of money for transport {train between Tokyo and Osaka costs like 150 EU and if you travel by car then it’s also super-expensive as you have to pay for the highway}. Everybody has to work there, Japanese people have only few days off for holidays {you can see that when Japanese bands tour in Europe or USA, they can only tour for few days, not for long months!}. All these fucked up things force the bands to work much harder than bands in Europe or USA – and usually Japanese bands have better sound, better looking records, live they are 100% full of energy... gigs do start absolutely on time {and end up before midnight so people can catch last train}, people visiting gigs seem to be much more interested in the bands who are playing than over here, almost all the gigs I saw were really wild {with the exception of ABC Partisan Gig, which was very calm and silent, just people politely clapping between the songs} w/lots of dancing and stage-diving, the sound on all these gigs was super-loud {all the clubs have their own p.a. and all these spaces were really small, sometimes the gigs were organized in recording studios}, bands mostly played just short 20 minutes long sets without any breaks... I mean, this was really hardcore/punk pushed out of any limits, played like this would be the last day ever... and I fucking loved it! I saw no violence, excessive drug or alcohol abuse on these gigs, just people going really wild... Also it seemed to me that Japanese punx are really interested in bands from all over the world, I was surprised to see how for example South-American punk is appreciated there. It seemed to me not so much „US-oriented“ like over here...
Among some of the negative thing was for sure the language barrier – almost nobody understands English there, just very few people speak this language. Japanese language is very different from English and they have really hard time to learn it. I hanged out with good number of people there and they were really polite and friendly, but sometimes the communication was just citing your favourite’s Japanese bands names to each other, haha... So I can’t comment too much about politics or opinions of Japanese punx... I just think that hardcore/punk seems to be very different there from the rest of the world, they usually don’t follow the traditional leftist/animal rights/anti-fascists etc. politics like punx over here do, also I think there are like almost no vegetarians at all. It seemed to me they concentrate more on music and outlook {Some punx do dress really extremely in Japan – check out the great „Inferno Punx“ book!} and they do it really well. Also I would say that different hardcore/punk genres don’t mix so much, I hardly ever saw the same people on more gigs, every scene has it’s own following – crust, thrashcore, traditional Japanese HC... Also in Tokyo you can see so many great gigs in the same weekend, it has like 13 or 15 million inhabitants in the end, so sometimes it is difficult to choose which gig you want to attend...
I’ve enjoyed my Japanese visit for 100%, it was totally eye-opening experience and I definitely recommend it to anybody interested in Japanese hardcore/punk. As I said, there’s a plan for SEE YOU IN HELL Japanese tour in May 2006 and we can’t fucking wait!

10) Last question – tell us something about the United Crusties collective and anythign you want to add for the end.
United Crusties is gig collective active in our hometown, we started it back in spring 2003 because there were many good bands touring Europe or Czech Rep. and often missing Brno, so we wanted to bring some crust/raw punk/extreme HC noise here... So far we did 20-25 gigs, we did gigs for many foreign bands like BORN DEAD ICONS, SEVERED HEAD OF STATE, 9 SHOCKS TERROR, MIGRA VIOLENTA, CONFUSIONE, TRAGEDY, VIIMENINEN KOLONNA, KURWA APARATA, SICK TERROR, FROM ASHES RISE, MUNICIPAL WASTE, D.F.A., LIFE SENTENCE, BURIAL, DEATHTOKEN, RUIDOSA INMUNDICIA, SOCIAL CHAOS, WARDEAD, AFTERBIRTH, TAEVE, BORN/DEAD, FUCKED UP... + for dozens of Czech and Slovakian bands. As you can see most of the foreign bands we did are from USA/Canada, which is kind of stupid as we would like to do more European bands, but the problem is that there are not many European bands we like musically who tour... also the sad fact is that the American bands are usually much better prepared for touring (as they have often some years of previous touring in America behind them) and what is more important they are much better known. Some of the European bands which we like decide to tour with no releases at all or maybe with demo tape or Cdr out, but it doesnt work anymore like this - there are so many gigs even here in Czech (for long years already we are no more "undeveloped" country with no HC scene, infact I would say we have much more gigs here than in the Italy) and people dont come anymore to every concert. Just recently we had really drastical decrease in numbers of people attending our gigs - like 50 people only for gigs of BORN/DEAD and FUCKED UP, which is really small number considering that both bands are known and also pretty good... But there are so many other gigs in Czech in general and especially in Brno and it is very hard to get enough people here. Every year in December we also organize Killed By Brno mini festival with only Czech bands playing, always like 8 bands playing together, usually these events are pretty good and we do also other stuff like video projections or exhibition of gig posters from Brno gigs since 1987 till now etc. There is great gig place here in Brno called Yach Club where we organize most of these gigs, sometimes we do them in SYIH rehearsal room which is pretty small (only for like 30-40 people), but it is always great fun in really friendly atmosphere. With SEE YOU IN HELL we tour every year in the abroad and we also play lots of gigs in Czech and we feel that we should help also the other bands who have helped us, so it is one of the reasons why we organize these gigs.
About SEE YOU IN HELL plans - tomorow we leave for 2 weeks European tour (mostly UK tour though), during autumn we will play few gigs around Czech (2 of them w/MEMENTO MORI!) and we slowly work on our 2nd LP. Our first LP is repressed now, Ultima Ratio label will do 500 more copies, also the record will be released on CD in Spain, Mexico, Brazil... on tape in Croatia, Russia, Indonesia etc. Next year we hope to tour Balkan in March and Japan in April/May. Thats all important I think... Thanx a lot for this excellent interview, greetings to all my Italian friends... LO SPIRITO CONTINUA!