Bad Religion Punk--Book

[budda12ax7]

I just read the newish Bad Religion book

https://badreligion.com/dowhatyouwant

Curious if anyone else was into this band...honestly I only listened sporadically after 2001 or so. The book is really good...describes the local early punk scene in LA very accurately. Here is a Bad Religion Clip...vintage style.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ppn0WIEk9M

[zhivago]

I've been a massive fan of BR since the very early 90s and I have seen them live many times.

The book was a great read, I got it when it first came out a while back. Greg Graffin released his own memoir a few months ago, but I haven't had time to read it yet.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Punk-Paradox-M ... 0306924587

[JSett]

I've been a massive fan of BR since the very early 90s and I have seen them live many times.

The book was a great read, I got it when it first came out a while back. Greg Graffin released his own memoir a few months ago, but I haven't had time to read it yet.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Punk-Paradox-M ... 0306924587

Ditto. Big fan since about 1996 when I first was shown them. Seen them many times all over the world in my travels. Brian Baker is a true punk hero. Wasn't aware of this book but it's going on the list.

This acoustic version of Sorrow is divine and shows the beauty of the songwriting in a stripped form.

Sorrow

[s_mcsleazy]

seems like an interesting read. bad religion are a band i love but only listen to like twice a year. when i get on that mood, i'll listen to everything they've ever done (except substance and new america) they're definitely a good example of a band where working hard pays off and i think that's worth keeping in mind.

i also wanna just say how much of my own songwriting comes from bad religion. i was listening to my favorite bad religion song and realised it's probably part of the reason why on faster songs, i try to add a halftime breakdown/outro.

also semi-related to bad religion. when i was a teenager, i really didn't like american idiot - green day because i felt like process of belief/the empire stikes first - bad religion held that crown by doing the whole "punk rock opera" thing before and better. but being into punk during the bush years was a weird experience imho. so many folk were screaming from the heavens "green day are the only band making a statement right now" you'd point at bad religion, propagandhi, pennywise or NOFX and they'd all be like "doesn't count" for some reason.

[zhivago]

I've been a massive fan of BR since the very early 90s and I have seen them live many times.

The book was a great read, I got it when it first came out a while back. Greg Graffin released his own memoir a few months ago, but I haven't had time to read it yet.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Punk-Paradox-M ... 0306924587

Ditto. Big fan since about 1996 when I first was shown them. Seen them many times all over the world in my travels. Brian Baker is a true punk hero. Wasn't aware of this book but it's going on the list.

This acoustic version of Sorrow is divine and shows the beauty of the songwriting in a stripped form.

Sorrow

I just love their live shows, and Brian was a great addition to the lineup. The one bummer about the book is that Hetson is not a part of it, it looks like their falling out was pretty bad...although there was a podcast he did with Fat Mike from NOFX where he mentioned the reasoning of at least some of it...which also explained some of his performances in a couple of live bootlegs I have seen on YouTube...anyways, it is still a good read and 100% recommended.

BR have made some timeless punk rock, hopefully they will continue to tour, and I will continue to attend the shows.

[interceptör]

At some point I just got fed up with all the band/artist books, but these two definitely seem worth picking up.

I really got into BR when Recipe for Hate was released and quickly bought the earlier albums, but after that I felt they lost their edge and, well, eh, kinda sold out. I think there was a change in the line-up or summin'? Didn't see them live until around 2015 and they were really, really good.

Anyway, thanks for the tips!

[zhivago]

...and of course two state the obvious, BR have had a tremendous influence in so many punk bands when it comes to song writing, shifting from major to minor keys etc...the older I get the more eI appreciate how the chord progressions go and how they play off the vocals...even going as back as Suffer and No Control.

[zhivago]

At some point I just got fed up with all the band/artist books, but these two definitely seem worth picking up.

I really got into BR when Recipe for Hate was released and quickly bought the earlier albums, but after that I felt they lost their edge and, well, eh, kinda sold out. I think there was a change in the line-up or summin'? Didn't see them live until around 2015 and they were really, really good.

Anyway, thanks for the tips!

I think you will enjoy reading the book as it sort of explains the records they made round that era.

[JSett]

...and of course two state the obvious, BR have had a tremendous influence in so many punk bands when it comes to song writing, shifting from major to minor keys etc...the older I get the more eI appreciate how the chord progressions go and how they play off the vocals...even going as back as Suffer and No Control.

100%. If you dig enough it's essentially folk and Americana at its roots. The major/minor thing is huge in my songwriting too and BR, along with others, pushed me that direction. No Use For A Name (RIP Tony Sly) did it in spades too.

There was a lot of intelligence in the 'dumb' punk/skatepunk world of the 80s/90s if you looked hard enough.

Yannis, you might know them, but they are relatively small and forgotten about... the album "One For The Money" by the Dutch band Undeclinable Ambuscade is a masterpiece of intelligent, sad melodicore skatepunk that I would highly recommend to anyone. My all-time favorite from that era. And has probably the greatest skatepunk love song ever written on it called "7 Years"

[zhivago]

...and of course two state the obvious, BR have had a tremendous influence in so many punk bands when it comes to song writing, shifting from major to minor keys etc...the older I get the more eI appreciate how the chord progressions go and how they play off the vocals...even going as back as Suffer and No Control.

100%. If you dig enough it's essentially folk and Americana at its roots. The major/minor thing is huge in my songwriting too and BR, along with others, pushed me that direction. No Use For A Name (RIP Tony Sly) did it in spades too.

There was a lot of intelligence in the 'dumb' punk/skatepunk world of the 80s/90s if you looked hard enough.

Yannis, you might know them, but they are relatively small and forgotten about... the album "One For The Money" by the Dutch band Undeclinable Ambuscade is a masterpiece of intelligent, sad melodicore skatepunk that I would highly recommend to anyone. My all-time favorite from that era. And has probably the greatest skatepunk love song ever written on it called "7 Years"

Hey many thanks for the tip, I will check it out...somehow that one escaped me!

[s_mcsleazy]

all this talk of skate punk makes me wonder what an OSG skate-punk band would be like.

[JSett]

Hey many thanks for the tip, I will check it out...somehow that one escaped me!

They escaped most people to be fair.

[crazyzeke]

they're definitely a good example of a band where working hard pays off and i think that's worth keeping in mind.

Agreed, and this applies to rock musicians in general. I've worked with too many players who don't put the time in to get good - or worse in my opinion, they did get good at the playing yet are flaky and unreliable and slow to respond to getting s**t organised, wasting their talent and other people's time - and it's a nightmare that's made me hate being a musician a lot in the last 25+ years. Bad Religion are a good example of staying focused, both on the craft and just relentlessly bashing away at touring and recording, that kind of stuff is super inspiring.

I'm not the world's biggest BR fan - I dip in and out, and my favourite song is still the first one I heard which is You from playing THPS2 new in 2000 on PS1 as a kid, but my god the songwriting is way more sophisticated than most punk, and the lyrics tend to be a step up too. I like it when bands push a genre musically and lyrically; again, inspiring. Why be the status quo of your genre when you can be genre-busting, right? Takes effort though.

[s_mcsleazy]

they're definitely a good example of a band where working hard pays off and i think that's worth keeping in mind.

Agreed, and this applies to rock musicians in general. I've worked with too many players who don't put the time in to get good - or worse in my opinion, they did get good at the playing yet are flaky and unreliable and slow to respond to getting s**t organised, wasting their talent and other people's time - and it's a nightmare that's made me hate being a musician a lot in the last 25+ years. Bad Religion are a good example of staying focused, both on the craft and just relentlessly bashing away at touring and recording, that kind of stuff is super inspiring.

I'm not the world's biggest BR fan - I dip in and out, and my favourite song is still the first one I heard which is You from playing THPS2 new in 2000 on PS1 as a kid, but my god the songwriting is way more sophisticated than most punk, and the lyrics tend to be a step up too. I like it when bands push a genre musically and lyrically; again, inspiring. Why be the status quo of your genre when you can be genre-busting, right? Takes effort though.

i think brett having a good business mind was a good thing too. i think with a lot of punk labels, there's this idea of like "oh we'll put out our records and some friend's records and that will be enough" where as i think epitaph was really good at signing solid bands and getting the review copies into publications. i think a lot of musicians tend to have this attitude of "if it's good quality, people will find it" but that's often the hardest part, getting people to find it and give a shit about it.

i think if epitaph did anything really well in those early days, it was making themselves seem like a 1 stop shop for all your punk needs by releasing something every month or two, even if just an EP or the punk-o-rama comps. also, can we talk about those comps? they were such a good tool for seeing what was out there.

[stevejamsecono]

I'm definitely interested in reading the book at some point just because all the characters are interesting and you probably get a lot of the story of 90s punk in there as well, which is something I admittedly don't know as much about as earlier punk.

Musically it's not for me. I love Brian Baker but Bad Religion is definitely my least favorite band he's been in. I find the songs really samey and stylistically I wish they'd been brave enough to push a little further away from that same drum beat/format. The overt prog-isms of Into the Unknown might have been cool to revisit once they were better established. I'm also not really a lyrics guy and I feel like that's a big part of the Bad Religion appeal.

I dunno, maybe I listened to the wrong thing? I've heard Suffer and my old roommate was a huge fan and had stuff on now and again, but nothing really stuck with me.