Generacion Suicida Are Here To Depress The Punks

"We're here to depress the punks, I guess." That was Tony Abarca, frontman of the LA band Generacion Suicida, talking to a restaurant patio full of punks in Richmond on Wednesday night. During one of his infrequent moments of between-songs patter, Abarca admitted to being "not much of a talker," but "depress the punks, I guess" is a pretty accurate summary of Generacion Suicida's mission. They're definitely a punk band. Their fans are punks. (I'm taking a moment here to acknowledge that I skipped this column last month and that this month's installment is about a punk show, not a hardcore show. It's OK. We'll get through it together.) But Generacion Suicida's version of punk is relatively slow and atmospheric, full of heavy sustain and gothed-out guitar-twinkles. The only problem is that you can't really get too depressed while listening to Generacion Suicida. They're too good for that.

The Richmond show wasn't Generacion Suicida's first patio party. Fifteen years ago, the band came out of the DIY punk scene in a heavily Latino corner of South Central Los Angeles. Basements are rare in that part of the world, so punk bands generally play in backyards instead. Like many of their contemporaries, Generacion Suicida sing in Spanish. Unlike many of their contemporaries, they don't really make fast mosh music. Instead, over a long discography, they've mastered their own kind of evil death-rock churn. The drums are deliberate, hypnotic pulses. The bass hits little Peter Hook-style murmur-melodies. The guitars go in a few directions — dark surf-rock leads, sheets of Cure-style echo, splintered scratches. Tony Abarca's vocals, meanwhile, tend to the militaristic-shout side of the spectrum, as if he's not totally sure what kind of band he's in. It's an awesome combination.

I can imagine seeing Generacion Suicida in a cavernous club full of dry ice and people dressed like bats, but that's not their cultural context. Instead, they're a DIY punk band, so they play DIY punk shows, like the patio gig in Richmond. They made sense there, too. In person, Generacion Suicida's style speeds up and hardens, and the dark parts of their sound take on downright sinister overtones. But this was the fun type of darkness. Nobody moshed to Generacion Suicida on Wednesday; that wasn't the vibe. Instead, maybe 100 punks — mostly different shades of middle-aged, still proudly displaying a whole lot of tattoos and specific haircut choices — just stood around and soaked in the atmosphere of a hot, humid, beautiful night out in the city.

As it turns out, Generacion Suicida are an ideal patio band for middle-aged punks. Their music fills the air and bounces off the buildings around it. They all look cool, with black button-ups and shiny boots and interesting haircuts. They're a cool fucking band. Generacion Suicida weren't really on my radar before Wednesday's show, but I can now recommend that you pay attention to that band. They've got an album called Hombre Nuevo coming next month. Get involved.

I was on that patio with a few friends, drinking cheap beers and ripping cigs and then hitting the adjacent restaurant for burgers after the show. It ruled. One nice little bonus: I never had to look out for anyone jumping on my head or spinkicking in my general direction, which is just a profound relief in a Richmond punk context. I love a scary mosh situation, but sometimes a situation's lack of scary moshing its its own reward. That night, I had a great time, which means Generacion Suicida fully failed in their attempt to depress at least one punk. Try harder next time.

Speaking of a great time: You ever see a skinhead with a tambourine? If you ever happen across one, you're about to have some fun. In this case, the skinhead with the tambourine was Fizzy, ex-lead singer of East Coast oi heroes the Royal Hounds NYC, formerly known as the New York Hounds. Fizzy was in Richmond with Loosey, a New York crew built around a fun proposition: What if a bunch of guys from street-punk bands tried to sound like Thin Lizzy?

I will tell you what: That is a good idea. Loosey probably have all kinds of obscure power pop and pub-rock and early glam influences in mind, but they sound to me like a rough-and-tumble no-budget punk band doing their very best to approximate AC/DC-style Camaro thunderblues rock 'n' roll and winding up sounding instead like Hüsker Dü if all they ever wanted to do was party. It was extremely fucking sick. All five guys in the band maintained varying levels of shirtlessness throughout the set. One guitarist, I'm pretty sure, did not take his cigarillo out of his mouth once. Fizzy kept a mic stand two feel off the ground so he could periodically fall to his knees and howl. Most of the time, the only word I could pick out from the lyrics was "baby!"

As someone who wasn't familiar with Loosey before this show, I was really into all of this. So was the guy in the hardhat across the street, who climbed up on a stoop for a better view and then enthusiastically air-drummed until he got called back to work. I figured that most of Loosey's songs were about girls or cars or drinking with your boys or whatever, but then Fizzy introduced one song as "a sci-fi romance." How do you like that? A skinhead with a tambourine, thinking about the moons of Jupiter. Life's rich pageant.

When my friend Mitch and I walked up to that patio on Wednesday night, Richmond D-beat thrashers Siphon were just starting their set, and what I heard was fast and mean. But we both realized that we didn't have any cash and that you couldn't get onto the patio with a credit card, so we walked a couple of blocks until we found an ATM. By the time we got back, maybe 10 minutes later, Siphon were done. Sometimes, things are just like that. Bands play short sets. If you don't come fully prepared, you might miss something.

Animal Instinct - "Under The Boot"

These Richmond kids just played their first show a couple of months ago, and they're already bringing maximum authority to a fundamentalist old-school tough-guy anthem about hating cops. The guitarist shreds like a pro, seemingly not even minding that he sounds like he was recorded in a dumpster. The singer gorilla-grunts with passionate zeal. It just brings a tear to my eye. People come, and people go, but the old ways simply refuse to die. [From Demo, out now on Rebirth.]

Criminal Instinct - "Serve"

Two "Instinct" bands in a row! What are the odds? The whole deal with returning Atlanta heroes Criminal Instinct is that they're the scary guys who play fast. That's a wild oversimplification. Work with me. Criminal Instinct's members are all-stars in the corners of the hardcore scene where people compare mosh injuries like they're the guys on the Orca in Jaws, but their songs still tend to be extremely short and fast. That's the juice — early '80s hardcore punk techniques in the hands of extremely not early-'80s hardcore punk guys. It works great. But "Serve," the song from right smack in the middle of Criminal Instinct's new surprise EP, is the one track that isn't fast. Instead, its demonic midtempo dinosaur stomp pushes into transcendent knucklehead groove territory. Whenever I hit play, I black out and then wake up in a puddle of someone else's blood. [From Is It Raining At Your House? EP, out now on Closed Casket Activities.]

Dynamite - "Lay To Rest"

Dynamite came all the way from the UK to play last year's United Blood fest, and I missed them because they were on early on a Friday afternoon, before I got off of work. They had fucking amazing merch — these heavy striped rugby shirts that said "DYNAMITE UK HARDCORE" or words to that effect. I would've bought one, but I have this weird thing about how it's stolen valor to wear merch for a band that you haven't actually seen live. This song is a simple hard-charging anthem that only really sounds like UK hardcore because of the guy's accent, and it absolutely lives up to that rugby shirt. [From LP Promo, out now on Northern Unrest.]

The Easy Eight - "Fear As A Gift"

I think it's wild that Charlie Manning Walker decided to end Chubby And The Gang, which was a solo project at the end anyway, to start a new band with songs that would totally make sense if they came from Chubby And The Gang. Maybe he just got sick of people calling him Chubby when he is not that at all, or maybe it's a matter of slight subgenre gradation. The Easy Eight forego Walker's last band's pub-rock influences for a straightforward hammering pogo with tons of reverb and a few spooky synth sounds amid all the whoa-oh-ohs. Which means: It's his Misfits band! Sounds fucking great! Sign me up! [From The Easy Way Out, out 8/29 on Static Shock.]

Fiddlehead - "The Dogs"

Fiddlehead have always been hardcore more by ethos, history, and association than actual musical style, and Pat Flynn's elemental roar is the main thing that's kept them out of Archers Of Loaf territory. Their new EP, even more internally focused than usual and recorded in Asheville with the main producer from the Wednesday Lenderman Universe, is the moment when Fiddlehead more or less become a full-on indie rock band. Good! They're fucking awesome at it, and the actual indie rock bands aren't writing chest-beating choruses like this anyway! Near the end of "The Dogs," Fiddlehead break down into acoustic campfire folk before building back into a scream-along cyclone. I hear that, and I feel something. [From Baby I'll Change EP, out now on Run For Cover.]

Fuming Mouth - "Cheat Death"

A few years ago, Mark Whelan, frontman of the Boston hardcore/death metal berserkers Fuming Mouth, beat leukemia. That means that his lyrics on the hardest part of "Cheat Death" are demonstrably true: "Near death, but I have escaped! I have survived! I refuse! To! Die!" The song definitely hits a little harder for those of us who know the backstory, but the song doesn't need that. The seesawing judder-riffs and demonic exhortations do that all on their own. When this thing achieves liftoff, I feel like nothing can touch me. I could dribble a basketball on a fully grown Nile crocodile's eyelids. [From The Ringing Bell, out now on Triple B.]

Indication - "Willpower"

One of the reasons I didn't write a column last month is that Balmora dissoloved in concerning, humiliating, would-be-funny-if-it-wasn't-dark fashion just a couple of days before I was planning to go see them. I could've gone and seen Holder and Azshara and the other bands on the bill, but it just kind of took the wind out of my sail. Nevertheless, the epic '00s metalcore revival is a lot bigger than one band. At this point, kids all over the world are screaming passionate diary-scribble poetry and gang-chanting self-help slogans over At The Gates riffs, and Tokyo's Indication do it better than most. Do they even have angel statues in Japanese graveyards? [From Indication/Watch You Fall/Seasons End split Forever Yours, out now on DAZE.]

Initiate - "Numb The Pain"

This month's column includes multiple songs with acoustic guitar. I don't know what the hell is going on there. Maybe I'm just getting old. I mean, I'm definitely getting old, but maybe that's manifesting as me wishing that hardcore would have acoustic guitars in it? That's fucking weird. Maybe I just like it when bands in this world of rituals and purity tests do some weird left-field shit. "Numb The Pain" is an undeniably hard song, with a riff that makes me feel like two triceratopses are playing tug of war with both halves of my body. But then right when you expect the reckless breakdown, things get pretty. The great ones keep you guessing. [From With Love // With Rage EP, out 8/7 on Blue Grape Music.]

Living Weapon - "The Leaving Process"

These days, Jonathan Lhaubouet makes his living playing moody, spacey shoegaze riffs with Fleshwater, and those guys are doing great for themselves, but the vibe is all different. I took my daughter to see Fleshwater a few months ago, and kids were filming selfie videos while crowdsurfing. You would not be advised to go see Lhaubouet's other band Living Weapon and try that shit. I'm not sure the timelines quite line up — Fleshwater and Living Weapon might've both started off as Vein side projects — but I hear Living Weapon as those guys' outlet for all the ugliest, most antisocial angry-teenager sounds that they can't make with their current main band. If you make music this violent, maybe it's a sign that you've just seen too many crowdsurfing selfies happen in real time. [From Death In The Family, out 8/14 on Closed Casket Activities.]

L.O.T.I.O.N. Multinational Corporation - "Absolute Insanity"

New York art-punk electro-freaks L.O.T.I.O.N. Multinational Corporation probably don't belong in a column about hardcore, but it's my column about hardcore, so I say let 'em in. They take their guttural bleep-lurches in lots of different directions, but you can usually mosh to whatever they're doing. This song, for instance, finds the exact midpoint between ultra-stupid Rob Zombie stadium-industrial crunch-stomp and the kind of filthy-disgusting D-beat that only makes sense at illegal midnight shows in abandoned underground tunnels. If Denis Leary's underground sewer-rat resistance from Demolition Man has any hardcore bands in it, then they probably sound like this. [From Machine Hallucinations, out now on Toxic State/Static Shock.]