Anti-Flag

Part 1 of Angel’s interview with drummer, Pat Thetic

—

About 6 week’s ago, we had the opportunity to spent about half an hour chatting with Pat Thetic, drummer for the American punk band from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania anti-Flag, who are known in part for their outspoken views on American government.  As we got drizzled on by impending torrential rains, we discussed everything from the span of their decades long career to their newest album.

CONFRONT: The first question we ask bands we have never interviewed before is always a request for them to give us a quick run-through of their history as a band and as musicians.  Of course given the length of Anti-Flags history that’s not really possible but if you can break it down to a few key points that would be great.

PAT: My name is Pat.  I play drums in a band called Anti-Flag.  Justin [Sane] and I grew up playing soccer together.  He is the guitar player.  Because we were losers and didn’t do drugs nobody wanted to hang out with us so we played music together.  And then we traveled around the country, ran out of money and to make a long story short, came back to Pittsburgh and decided to start the band again; which we’d been working on for a while.  Finally in ’93 or ’94 we decided we really were going to make a go of it.  So we started playing.  We had another bass player for about a year and half.  He was on the first two records.  He quit.  We got Chris Head, who plays guitar now, to play bass and he was a horrible bass player but we liked him so much as a dude that we said ‘well you really play guitar, so why do you play guitar and we’ll make it a four piece’.  Then we had another bass player from Canada for a while, a Toronto girl, lovely person.  And then Chris 2 joined in ’99 I think and we’ve been the same band since then I think.  And since then we’ve been playing around the world, playing rock shows, having a good time.

CONFRONT:  I read that you’d been around for 20 years or so but you were saying that you really good started in ’93 or so…

PAT: Yeah.  Well Justin and I played a show somewhere around 1988.  I don’t remember exactly because I don’t have a good memory for that type of thing but I’ve been told it was 1988.

CONFRONT: Yeah I think that’s what it on Wikipedia or your Myspace or something like that.

PAT: (laughing) Well there you go.  If it’s on Wikipedia it must be true.

CONFRONT: Exactly.

PAT: So ’88 but then we both went and played… actually Justin’s a really great drummer so he played drum in another band and I played drums in another band cause I can only play drums.  But then we went traveling and the money ran out and we decided to start a band.  Not because we decided it would make money but because we decided ‘what the hell else are you going to do other than music’.

CONFRONT: How do you find that the industry has changed since you’ve started be it 20 or 15 years ago?

PAT: Well it’s interesting because I was never aware of an industry until recently.  And right now it just sort of makes me laugh because we went to a major a couple of years ago.  It’s unfortunate because some of the people we interacted with were very nice but a lot of them don’t have jobs anymore because the industry, as they say, has shit the bed.  And we were a band long before anybody cared about Punk Rock – the new wave of Punk Rock because obviously people cared about Punk rock before us – so right now, music is in the shitter.  It doesn’t matter.  We are still out doing the same thing.  There are still kids that come out to rock shows.  So it’s not as important to us.  We are looking to buy a Ferrari or to live in mansions.  We play  rock shows because love what we do.  And if we make enough to feed our families and get to the next show that’s all we need.  So we don’t really need the industry.  In our world it makes much more sense when there isn’t an industry.

CONFRONT: Why the short stint with a big label then?

PAT: Because we asked them for ridiculous things and they gave them to us.

CONFRONT: (laughing) Wow!  Ok that’s nice.

PAT: (laughing) Yeah I know.  We were like ‘What the fuck?’.  I mean it was sort of embarrassing because we were like ‘ok we want this stuff’ and they were like ‘ok we’ll give it to you’.  We said ‘You can’t do that!’ and they were like ‘well we said we’d do it’.  So yeah.  But I mean that’s the short flippant answer.  In reality we’ve been a band for a long time and we thought ‘we’ve seen how the independent world works so let’s see how things work in the major label world’.  And it was interesting and an education for us to see how ridiculous that world is.  And how radio works and all those things.  It was just so fucked up.  When I was a kid in a band I thought it was really cool to hear a song on the radio that you liked.  Now you sort of realize how dirty it is and how some bands get on the radio.  And now we realize it’s not that cool to be on the radio.  It was an experience and it was good experience, I wouldn’t trade it.  But I’m glad to be back working with people that make more sense to us.

CONFRONT:  There was a little controversy amongst some of your fans about that decision right?

PAT:  Yeah of course.  I mean I’m one of those kids.  Because I’m definitely a major label hater.  I hate all bands that change and do things like that.  I grew up in a world in Pittsburgh were if you came one time in a van and came the next time in a bigger van I was pissed and I was not having that.  So I’m very aware of all the problems that come with moving to a major label.  And to be honest I was sort of surprised that there wasn’t more of a stink than there was; because I was having emotional turmoil about it.  Within the band there was a lot of emotional discussions about whether or not it made sense to do.  So I figured if it was a controversial decision within the four of us it would be a controversial decision for kids who are fans of the band.

CONFRONT: Was there an exchange with the fans in some way, not necessarily to appease those that were unhappy, but to explain to people why the change to the majors was being made?

PAT: No!  Because we figured that the kids that were smart enough to see what was going on would get it.  The great thing and the worse thing about punk rock is that everybody thinks they know better.  I think I know better and everyone else thinks they know better.  So it didn’t really make sense for me to say ‘hey Joe Schmo, what do you think about this?’ because they’d say ‘I’ll tell you exactly what I think’.  But I’ve had a lot of discussions with a lot of young people at shows, old people for the matter, about what they thought of it.  And a lot of them had come to some sort of similar conclusions that we’ve had when we talk about it.  There’s like ‘Oh yeah that sort of made sense’ and others are still saying ‘that sucks I wish you wouldn’t have done it’.  But I’m ok with that.  I mean there are a lot of things I do in life that suck.

CONFRONT: Sure but at same time, this is your business right?  I mean you have to keep in mind that you have to put food on the table and so on.  So you can’t be completely blaze about the whole thing…

PAT: Sure!  And I mean that was part of the decision of course but there was much more that was part of the discussion than just that.

CONFRONT: I heard that a new album was coming out?  Or is it that one just came out?

PAT: We do.  It’s called ‘The People or the Gun’ and it just came out a couple weeks ago and it will fucking rock your ass off.  Your ass will be on the ground.

CONFRONT: I have to go and check that out.  I’m sorry to say I haven’t done that yet.

PAT: (laughing) I can tell because you hadn’t asked about it yet.  It’s a bit of a go back to four dudes in a cinder-block room playing music and that’s sort of what we were going for on this record.  Cause the other records we were sort of going into it differently; going into texture and going bigger and bolder and thicker sound.  And this one we were like ‘ok fuck it’ and were just four dudes banging it out.

CONFRONT: How has the reception been for it on the [Warped] tour so far?

PAT: The kids seem to dig it.  Especially the French kid here.  I love the French kids.  They are like ‘Last record not so good.  This record, better’.  And that’s the neat thing about us too.  Cause the perspective of having a number of records is that I don’t have to take offense to any of that.  They are like ‘I like that record, this one was crap, this one was ok, this one was crap’.  And I’m like ‘That’s cool’.  I like ‘em all.  They all have good moments and bad moments.   Some of them I really botched on a couple of songs you know.  I listen to drums and think ‘wow that song I really blow’.  But for the most part, it’s good that kids can come up to you and tell you they like this record and not that record.

CONFRONT: Do you think that’s specific of the punk world?

PAT: Yeah I think so.

CONFRONT: Where as in the pop world if you are fan of someone you almost have an obligation to ‘like’ all their stuff regardless of whether or not it’s worth listening to?

PAT: Yeah, exactly.  Exactly!  Again, that’s the beauty of punk rock.  And that’s why I like this community. It’s because people believe they know better and that their opinion is worth something.  And it is very valuable that they can come up and tell you what they really think.  And it’s not going to change my mind but if think that the last record sucks or that I played a shitty show you can tell me that’s fine.

CONFRONT: Is there something that you learned when you started those 20 or 15 years ago that you applied to the way you ‘run’ your career today?  Or are there new things that you have to apply now that weren’t necessary or available then?

PAT:  Well there are definitely new things.  I’ve had fifteen conversations at the merch table with young women today because they want to have girl shirts.  And I have this belief that all shirts should be equal.  There should be no girl shirts or boy shirts.

CONFRONT: (laughing).  That’s such crap.  You say that cause the shirt you have a fitted to your male body.

PAT: (laughing).  I know.  Well see, again, you think that opinion’s crap.  For me, it’s the opinion that I hold.

CONFRONT: I can understand why you feel that way from a band and business perspective.  But from a girl’s perspective, especially one who has no neck and too much cleavage, those t-shirts don’t work on girls.

PAT: Well it’s not from an economic perspective.  It’s that i believe in the socialism of T-shirts.  I believe everyone should wear the same t-shirt.

CONFRONT: You can have the ‘same’ t-shirts without comprising on fit.  It’s about fit not fashion.  The cut of regular t-shirts doesn’t look good on the majority of girls.  They aren’t cut to fit our bodies.

PAT: Well that’s exactly what they tell me.  They are like ‘Well if you were a girl, you would see this differently’ and I’m still like ‘No!’.  That’s something that I’ve held on to that doesn’t make any sense but I still hold on to it because I believe in it.  Cause when we were young, girls just wore regular t-shirts too.  If you had a t-shirt that you liked and it wasn’t tight enough, you cut it up and made it into a female centered shirt.  So there are things that definitely change as you go through music.  But there are also things that we maintain.  We still believe that music and art should be about something that makes you feel uncomfortable.  It if doesn’t make you question life or question your existence or question something, then there is no value in producing it.  So those types of things we’re still doing even though sometimes I lose battles about whether or not there should be female t-shirts and stuff like that.

Not to give you guys too much to read in one shot, we decided to break the interview up over two weeks.  So check back next Thursday (September 17th, 2009) to read part 2 of our conversation with Pat.

In the meantime, if you would like to learn more about Anti-Flag, visit the sites below:

http://www.anti-flag.com/

http://www.myspace.com/antiflag

And to view our full picture gallery click here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/confrontmagazine/sets/