The Strike (more here and here) never disappointed, even if they did love posing with broken-down scooters .
The three non-album tracks here ("Red Storm Rising" a Zinn-esque history of The Great Depression, "This Fragile Life" a rocked-up Neurotic cover and "Ball and Chain" half spoken-word-half-SLF fist-shaker) proved that punk could be catchy and still have a conscience back in 1995. Who says you need a Republlican president to inspire great American punk rock?
Victoria link is in the comments
Speaking of comments: Do we really need bad political leaders to make for good punk rock?
My career as a promoter was limited to three shows: an experimental art quintet who shall remained unnamed, a Latin America benefit show catered by Food Not Bombs and Minneapolis’ (via Winnipeg) mod-punk band The Strike featuring Chad Anderson on guitar/vocals Chris Anderson on drums, bassist Kris Adams and second guitarist Micah Garlich-Miller.
Garlich-Miller, the other "member" of my – uh-hum – "band", Jane Fonda and the Hondas, had asked me personally to book the show. So, Winnipeg being a small town, I asked one friend to book The Orange (an old Orangeman’s hall that had fallen into the hands of a theater collective), one to lend me his P.A. and another bunch to be the opening bands. Then we rounded up the volunteers (sound, posters and, of course, concessions) and soon enough, just like Mickey Rooney and Judy Fuckin’ Garland, we “put-on-a-show”. It killed! The bands rocked, everyone got paid and a stack of canned goods made it back to Winnipeg Harvest.
Those opening bands, The Bonaduces (discography here) and The Umpires (who politely declined to have their demo here), were still finding their legs but The Strike cruised. They donned the suits, ran through a dozen thundering originals, played two Jam covers and hawked a demo tape with a red star on it. Yup, in 1995 a Mod Revival Revival.
The Strike, along with the Odd Numbers and The Gain (with bands, one is an accident, two a coincidence but three is a movement!) were conscious throwbacks to the sounds of ’79. Mod revival (a.k.a. parka-punk) has an unfair reputation for derivitiveness but A Conscience Left to Struggle with a Pockets Full of Rust is no rip-off. In fact, this raging album owes as much or more to Woody Guthrie and The Clash as it does to Paul Weller. “"Kicking Ass" for the working class” is the rabble-rousing motto here, as Chad Anderson raspily excoriates a "Shallow", buckled culture. Propulsive Stiff Little Fingers-esque guitar riffs and inter-weaving backing vocals consistently ratchet up the tension on this already maddeningly tense brace of songs. Then come the reggae flashes on songs like “Downpressor Man” before the (vinyl version) of the album ends with a cover of an old Northern Soul raver, “You Can Forget It”. Enjoy this criminally MIA album you lucky bastards!
A Conscience Left to Struggle with Pockets Full of Rust link is in the comments
To hear the folk-core (sorry, my bad term) band, The Treason Brothers, that Chad Anderson formed after the Strike go here. (Thanks Holmes!)
Speaking of comments: Does this album "Kick Ass" or not?
The Strike's excellent second album is still available from Victory Records
These two nineties Minneapolis punk bands matched punk and politics with furious tunes and, unlike many of their contemporaries, had a working knowledge of musical history. Each band here contributes an original and a cover of an older Brit-folk-punk song, Tom Robinson's "Ain't Gonna Take It" in the Strike's case and the Pogues "Sally Maclennane" for Dillinger Four. The Strike broke-up after singing to Victory Records in 1999 but D4 went from Hopeless Records to Fat Wreck-Chords gaining popularity despite putting out only two albums in the aughts.
I saw a show with D4 and the Strike in Minneapolis in '99 and each kicked ass in their own particular way. However, despite the truth that either of the first two Dillinger Four singles best the first Strike single, D4's first album felt like a let-down, whereas each of the Strike's full-lengths were devastating. But I may be in the minority on this one...
MRML Readers: Leave us a comment and tell us who would win in a battle to the death between the Strike and Dillinger Four.
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Re: Re-Ups
MRML does not plan to restore all of the content lost in The Great Mediafire Gutting of 2012. Polite requests may be made in the appropriate section, regular commenters will get priority.
