If you’re into punk rock, or even metal, and you don’t know the left wing Canadian band Propagandhi, then you either live under a rock or you’re new school. These guys are one of those bands that are not only loved by many, but where introduced into the wonderful world of skate punk via Mike at Fat Wreck Chords. They released the bands first album “How To Clean Everything” which included a single “How To Clean A Couple O’ Things”. Now the band has released their 6th studio album from the other label that shaped 90s Punk, Epitaph. Recently I got the chance to jump on the phone to Chris Hannah, the vocalist/guitarist from Propagandhi and asked him a few things, mainly about: their career so far, the way their sound has progressed and what book Chris is into right now.
Propagandhi recently spent about a month around January recording their new album “Failed States” whilst doing some shows here and there and trying to get a set together for upcoming tours. Right now the band is getting ready to tour Canada and the US, starting with the East, then Mid and finishing in the West. After their tour it’ll be time to plan to go overseas and tour Europe. I asked if they were coming to Australia. “Well, I’d love to and we’ve been there twice in the past four or five years. I would have to talk to the guy that brought us over there last time, see if he thinks the new record is a justification for coming over again so quickly, because we were just there last year.” Chris replies. So I told him that the new record is blowing up here and I’m pretty sure the strong Australian following you guys have is loyal enough to another show a couple of years later. Actually pretty sure they would be stoked! On that note, I asked about any Australian bands he is familiar with. “No bands come to mind right now, I mean, back in the day we toured with Stolen Youth and we’re familiar with them a friends.”
Anyone that is a long time fan would know their first album “How To Clean Everything” with smart ass lyrics from songs such as “Ska Sucks” and “Middle Finger Response” that hold political punk morals and send out cheeky grins to the masses. When “Today’s Empires, Tomorrows Ashes” came out, the shock factor went up a few notches with serious messages and thrash off chords from songs like “Fuck The Border”, “Back To The Motor League” and “Natural Disasters”. NOFX even mention “Today’s Empires, Tomorrows Ashes” in “The Marxist Brothers” for friendly jokes and an attempt to boost the albums sales of the soviet red record, which I believe worked. So I asked Chris to enlighten us on their transition from skate punk to a mixture of thrash punk with metal influences. “Well I’ve always considered the band to be metallic, because we were metal heads as kids. What we tried to do in the early days, was combine the sounds of bands like Bad Religion with some of the metallic influences we grew up with. I know it doesn’t sound like it now, but I thought our first record was quite metal, but I doubt anybody would say that now. The vocals have changed because that was my first attempt at singing ever. We were just teenagers sneering over music. So I think we just got a bit better with our instruments over the years, and with that we started playing a bit heavier, faster and wild.” Now Propagandhi have progressed in their music with more depth and better song arrangement, however, the music isn’t the only thing that had changed, it’s also the lyrics with their latest albums “Supporting Caste” and “Failed States” having very heavy messages attached. “We were so young when we wrote our first album and when we recorded in down in L.A, we thought only a couple of hundred people would ever hear it, so we never took it serious to start with. When we realised people were getting into it, then we thought that we should probably start taking things a bit more serious. The next record was “Less Talk, More Rock” and even though we were still young and goofy, the attempts of humour on there was much more serious in terms of content. I think just as you get older and understand the gravity of the things we’re talking about, some of if just becomes less able to laugh at it. Also the stakes are much higher now, I have a three year old son and I worry for his future, where as when I was a teenager and we started writing those songs, I just didn’t give a fuck. Even though indirectly I understood the political components of the things we were talking about, I didn’t really give a fuck as I was too young to understand and hadn’t had much experience.”
Staying on the release of “Failed States” I asked Chris to reflect on the new album and let us know if there was something he looks back on, and would like to change. “Well, the thing that sticks out the most, is the intonation on my guitar. My guitar needed to be re-threaded but I just thought it’ll be good enough. I guess you would have to know my guitar to know the difference. I guess we need to let the record be what it is.”
A lot of bands love to stand on a stage and pitch their morals to the world, sometimes even coming across as hypocrites. So I asked Chris if the band members actually engage in any activism, or use their popularity to not only spread their message, but to help people get to a certain point. “Yes, we try to connect with a lot of activist groups and we also do a lot of fund-raising as a band for them. We also do volunteer work and our drummer does heaps for the Canada Haiti Action Network which tries to stop Canada, US and France from interfering with the democratic progress in Haiti. Our bass player does work in the city with refugees. Plus we try to do fund-raising for Sea Shepherd and lots of indigenous projects.”
After some random conversation, Chris mentions a new book he was reading that he would like mention in the article. It’s called “Green Is The New Red” by “Will Potter, which “is a book specifically about the erosion of civil rights in North America. It mainly about how the North American government is treating environmental and animal rights activists as terrorists. I just read this recently and it blew my mind and I hope this resonates throughout the world.”
Band Interviews by Nick Cavarretta 