Over the past few years, the term “punk rock” has been hijacked by ad firms and glorified boy bands to sell everything from Chips Ahoy cookies to everlasting salvation (Christian punk rawk!).
That makes the latest effort from New Jersey’s Detournement that much more satisfying. Yes they make a fantastic, teeth rattling, sing along hard core/pop punk hybrid, but they also designed their latest album around a valentine to the Communist Party (the vinyl record is designed as a red heart). Now that takes guts!
Though they have no plans to play Philadelphia (really no shows planned anywhere for now), they are based just one state over so there's always hope.
Singer Zak Kalpan spoke recently about the new record, the relationship between politics and punk and the Communist Party. Sean Hannity and Glen Beck beware!
Obviously Detournement has never shyed away from taking a strong political stance. I've noticed more and more in interviewing younger punk bands that they are afraid of being called political punk band. Why do you think that is?
I wouldn't say that we really take a strong political stance on anything, but we do write songs that are often very specifically pointed at political topics or political issues, sometimes current but often referring to past events. So, in a way, I'm hesitant to consider Detournement to be a political punk band because being a political punk band should probably mean that the members in the band are doing something politically active. I don't think that singing about politics makes me a politically active individual. I find that young bands are usually too quick to define themselves as political punk bands and usually aren't. I did that for years myself. So I dunno, maybe the kids are finally getting smart to something, though I doubt it.
Should punk rock be political?
I don't think so. I'm in no position, at least not yet, do determine what punk should or should not be. Do what you want and let the class-war sort you out.
Any lineup changes since the last record?
I'm working on bringing in a hype-man but haven't found the right person yet. We've had some drummers come and go since we started but that's usually how it goes.
What was the inspiration behind Awaken With Millions...?
I had an idea about what I wanted the next release to look like, design-wise, which was to do something with the Sun Records logo and mash it up with a Maoist theme. So that's where the idea started. This record, Awaken with Millions from One Heart was sorta musically designed to be more of a pop-punk record, more uplifting and less scathing than the Screaming Response EP was. The title-track was written to go with the layout and was inspired by the story of the Chinese Civil War. The day I was working on the final details of the layout, it happened to be the 60 Year Anniversary of the People's Republic of China, so I added that element into the layout which tied it all in very nicely. The vinyl is red heart-shaped which is pretty cool.
Can you talk about the first song "Chicago '86"?
I started writing this song years ago, like maybe 10 years ago. I wrote some version of it after I read "The Jungle". My family is from Chicago and I imagined what it must of been like for my grandparents and great-grandparents living there at that time. So the song started off as some sort of Chicago story but over the years I lost the bits of papers or couldn't read my scribbled notes and so it was re-written a few times and eventually it turned into a song about the Haymarket Massacre but still contained some elements for the early versions too.
Is Detournement considered a side project, a supergroup or a full-fledged band?
Supergroup? Why, because the drummer from Lifetime quit our band? (Laughs) We're all super-dudes, but no, I don't consider it a supergroup nor should anyone else. We're just a band and we do band things from time to time and in-between I don't think we think about the band at all. Dan, our bass player, likes to think of it as the best high-school band ever and he's kinda right. If we were like 16 then this would be the best sh*t in the world. To get to play awesome, fast, short, angry, political punk rock every couple weekends and play some shows and put out seven-inch records and shit, it would be so cool. If we were 16 people would be impressed too. They'd say "Man, for a bunch of young kids, they are really good and pretty intelligent too." Unfortunately, being in our 30s and doing this, it's really kinda just sad. (Laughs) I'm kidding. We've all known each other independently of each other for so long, through so many bands and different scenes and different times and places, it's really cool to be doing this thing together and having the "members of" usually doesn't hurt although sometimes it can, I guess, depending on the band and the band member. I've had a habit of shooting my mouth off over the years and I'm not the only one.
Any plans for future releases?
We're doing a split on No Idea with this band from Minneapolis called Off With Their Heads. They sound like Blink-182. They are kinda douchey but the drummer is a nice guy. That release is already in the process of being processed. We're also in the process of finishing up the recordings on a couple of new songs which will probably be released on a split release of some sort or just a single sided seven inch or something.
How did you get Pete Steinkopf (of the Bouncing Souls) involved to produce?
Nepotism. Good old-fashioned nepotism. I've been working for and with The Bouncing Souls and Chunksaah Records for over a decade. The Pete was into what we were doing and put the offer out there so we took him up on it. It was cool cause we had just done a week or two with The Bouncing Souls so everyone was comfortable with him and it was nice for us to just hang out together at K8s and do those songs.
How long did it take to write and record this record?
Writing time is negligible. If it takes more than half an hour to write a song then we know we are over-thinking it. Dan and I do most of the writing and demoing ourselves and we know the sooner we finish writing, the sooner we can play video games and watch reruns of "Curb your Enthusiasm". Tracking is usually pretty quick too. The record is only three songs and I don't think it breaks the 5 minute mark. I think we spent a day or two on it which was probably way too long as well but we had to stop a lot to eat. I like food. Food is good.
Any plans to tour at all this year?
We are not a touring band. We might do a week or two at some point but I don't know what our plans are this year. It really depends on if someone asks us out again or if enough people are interested in seeing us and want to try to co-ordinate something. I really don't see anything happening tour-wise this year but you never know. We flew to San Francisco a couple months ago to play a show with Cocksparrer so I guess anything is possible.
Anything else you want to add?
The Communist Party USA has championed the struggles for democracy, labor rights, women’s equality, racial justice and peace for ninety years. Check it out at www.cpusa.org.
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