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We're Not Listening
Come On, Come On - Hooligans!, pt. 3
Do It Yourself. DIY.
If you want something done right, that’s the way to go. It’s the way that these three kids went, and it’s how they lived their lives from then on. After brainstorming snappy band names and settling on the funny-yet-exemplary Hooligans! – with the exclamation point, thank you very much – they set out and tested those connections that both Rai and Kenny had built from years of hauling band equipment onstage.
They travelled the Southeast with their instruments bouncing in the back of the old van that Kenny had rented from his cousin, and they played at any venue that would have them. Rai finally got the chance to shout his poetry at a crowd who would mosh along to them. Damon could feel what it was like to play his guitar without being in a drunken haze. Kenny could mince beats and trip over his own drum set and get pissed off at a country that hadn’t accepted him, and it was alright. Perfectly fine, totally normal.
When they worked together, they could put out new material like nobody’s business. The words didn’t always rhyme and the time signatures didn’t always match up even within the song, but what mattered was that they were all happy with the art they were making.
Less than six months after they came to be known as Hooligans!, this band had released their first album. It was self-made, self-produced, and self-sold at whatever show they were at, with help from their buddy Poppy, who would stand by a box filled with these cassette tapes and try to persuade folks to buy ‘em.
That album was called “About Everything,” and in a childish sort of way, it kind of was about everything. Like teenagers, they questioned everything in their lives, from authority (like good little punks) to truth, from inequality to hypocrisy. They didn’t stay on one topic for too long – they’d get around to getting deeper as the years went by.
Rai, Kenny, and Damon were making names for themselves. They weren’t just sticking their middle fingers up at The Man – they were asking why people did it, and then they did it anyway. It was funny to listen to these kids who were barely the legal drinking age shout songs that wrestled with the question of perception and truth and reality and tie it all into such seemingly cliché touchstones of punk.
And to be honest, it sounded like shit. Really, what kind of band makes a debut record that doesn’t sound primitive and unrehearsed? There wasn’t a lot of room for each member to shine, and all of the sound blurred together. Hooligans! had noticed that from the getgo and vowed to tighten up their act – not just in the studio, but on tour as well.
There was a certain kind of chemistry that shined through when they played together, and it seeped over into their personal lives as well; when they weren’t writing music, they were hanging out just as buddies. They steered clear of bars after knowing the pain that Damon was going through, recovering from alcoholism, and sometimes they would just stay in for the night and play video games. That was punk too, right? It was straying from the path, either way.
In 1993, they put out their sophomore album and took what the critics said to heart. Rather than being shadowed in noise and loudness, everything was much more clear-cut, and that’s what made many fans hail “Come On, Come On,” as their masterpiece. Though it seemed like a rehash of their first album in many ways when it came to the lyrics, the tunes were overall just better.
They carried the DIY attitude throughout their whole careers, and 1995 saw the release of a slightly new direction in their music – “On the Question of Where and Why.”
(First of all, what kind of band makes an album with a name that ridiculously long? It was like they took a time machine trip to 2006 and came back eleven years with the knowledge of upcoming trends.)
Rai had written most of his lyrics about questioning ideas with the occasional jab at authority. It wasn’t really until Kenny had really started opening up that he realized that people could be fucked up too. Kenny had faced years of discrimination due to his race and sexual orientation (he came out as bisexual in 1993), and there was a pent-up bitterness that he only briefly let shine on a few select songs in their discography at the time. Rai and Damon loved it. There was a newfound passion in this music that they were creating, and they were all about reinventing the wheel and trying new things.
And just like old times, they garnered a reputation for mixing archetypes with trope-smashing new elements, fighting the power while explaining why they did it. It could be exhausting, being punk rock. Sometimes other bands on the scene would lampoon the living hell out of these guys for unknown reasons and sport elitist attitudes on the same attitude that got them where they were.
But at the end of the day, it never mattered who you were or where you came from. What mattered was the mark you left and how you left it. You’re never appreciated at your own time.
If you want something done right, that’s the way to go. It’s the way that these three kids went, and it’s how they lived their lives from then on. After brainstorming snappy band names and settling on the funny-yet-exemplary Hooligans! – with the exclamation point, thank you very much – they set out and tested those connections that both Rai and Kenny had built from years of hauling band equipment onstage.
They travelled the Southeast with their instruments bouncing in the back of the old van that Kenny had rented from his cousin, and they played at any venue that would have them. Rai finally got the chance to shout his poetry at a crowd who would mosh along to them. Damon could feel what it was like to play his guitar without being in a drunken haze. Kenny could mince beats and trip over his own drum set and get pissed off at a country that hadn’t accepted him, and it was alright. Perfectly fine, totally normal.
When they worked together, they could put out new material like nobody’s business. The words didn’t always rhyme and the time signatures didn’t always match up even within the song, but what mattered was that they were all happy with the art they were making.
Less than six months after they came to be known as Hooligans!, this band had released their first album. It was self-made, self-produced, and self-sold at whatever show they were at, with help from their buddy Poppy, who would stand by a box filled with these cassette tapes and try to persuade folks to buy ‘em.
That album was called “About Everything,” and in a childish sort of way, it kind of was about everything. Like teenagers, they questioned everything in their lives, from authority (like good little punks) to truth, from inequality to hypocrisy. They didn’t stay on one topic for too long – they’d get around to getting deeper as the years went by.
Rai, Kenny, and Damon were making names for themselves. They weren’t just sticking their middle fingers up at The Man – they were asking why people did it, and then they did it anyway. It was funny to listen to these kids who were barely the legal drinking age shout songs that wrestled with the question of perception and truth and reality and tie it all into such seemingly cliché touchstones of punk.
And to be honest, it sounded like shit. Really, what kind of band makes a debut record that doesn’t sound primitive and unrehearsed? There wasn’t a lot of room for each member to shine, and all of the sound blurred together. Hooligans! had noticed that from the getgo and vowed to tighten up their act – not just in the studio, but on tour as well.
There was a certain kind of chemistry that shined through when they played together, and it seeped over into their personal lives as well; when they weren’t writing music, they were hanging out just as buddies. They steered clear of bars after knowing the pain that Damon was going through, recovering from alcoholism, and sometimes they would just stay in for the night and play video games. That was punk too, right? It was straying from the path, either way.
In 1993, they put out their sophomore album and took what the critics said to heart. Rather than being shadowed in noise and loudness, everything was much more clear-cut, and that’s what made many fans hail “Come On, Come On,” as their masterpiece. Though it seemed like a rehash of their first album in many ways when it came to the lyrics, the tunes were overall just better.
They carried the DIY attitude throughout their whole careers, and 1995 saw the release of a slightly new direction in their music – “On the Question of Where and Why.”
(First of all, what kind of band makes an album with a name that ridiculously long? It was like they took a time machine trip to 2006 and came back eleven years with the knowledge of upcoming trends.)
Rai had written most of his lyrics about questioning ideas with the occasional jab at authority. It wasn’t really until Kenny had really started opening up that he realized that people could be fucked up too. Kenny had faced years of discrimination due to his race and sexual orientation (he came out as bisexual in 1993), and there was a pent-up bitterness that he only briefly let shine on a few select songs in their discography at the time. Rai and Damon loved it. There was a newfound passion in this music that they were creating, and they were all about reinventing the wheel and trying new things.
And just like old times, they garnered a reputation for mixing archetypes with trope-smashing new elements, fighting the power while explaining why they did it. It could be exhausting, being punk rock. Sometimes other bands on the scene would lampoon the living hell out of these guys for unknown reasons and sport elitist attitudes on the same attitude that got them where they were.
But at the end of the day, it never mattered who you were or where you came from. What mattered was the mark you left and how you left it. You’re never appreciated at your own time.