In many ways, becoming a punk rocker was a forgone conclusion for me, but I got plenty of help along the way. From the late-’80s to the early-90’s I experienced a number of small milestones that, perhaps unbeknownst to me at the time, pushed me towards the punk rocker I would become – but it wasn’t until around 1993 that I fully embraced the inevitable. By then, skateboarding had taken over my life, and with it came a deepening knowledge of punk. I had discovered Black Flag and Minor Threat and the like, but there was something major missing that I couldn’t put my finger on. That summer, I saw an ad in Thrasher Magazine that made my head spin.
The ad stated, “Rancid – Lint & Matt’s first LP since Operation Ivy’s Energy.”
This was huge. Operation Ivy was then and remains today a major influence on me. I cannot stress enough how much that band means to me – as I know it did and does for so many others. I had missed their heyday (1987-’89) by only a few years, but when you’re fifteen, those years seem like a lifetime. Now, suddenly, I felt for the first time that I could be part of something. I could join the fun while it was happening instead of reading about it or listening to it after the fact.
Fast forward a year to the summer of 1994. Skateboarding still ruled my life and by extension so did punk. The only thing that had changed since the previous summer was that I’d decided that in addition to listening to punk, I wanted to be a punk – meaning, I wanted to look like one and learn all I could about what it meant to be one. In the year since I’d first heard Rancid, I’d discovered all sorts of great new bands, but living in a small town meant I had very limited resources about how to transition my love for the music into access to the “life.” I only had movies like Sid and Nancy and other wild ‘80s “punk panic” gems to go on, but I knew from the start that those could hardly be trusted as authentic representations about what I knew in my heart punk was supposed to be. I’d seen Green Day live by then and they were just starting to get huge, but that wasn’t quite what I was after either. There was still something missing.
I figured out what it was one Sunday night in July ‘94 while watching 120 Minutes on MTV. Halfway through the show, a Rancid video came on. It was called “Nihilism,” and I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. Their new album had recently come out and I had yet to get my hands on it, but it was what I was seeing rather than hearing that got my mind racing. Rancid looked like punks – and right then and there, sitting in my parent’s living room, I was a punk too. I finally had a concrete visual representation of what punk looked like, and if there was anyone still left holding onto the “It’s just a phase” mantra, that shit went out the window for good that very night. A few months later, the “Salvation” video premiered and my life opened up even further.
In the dark days before search engines took over our lives, enterprising small-town punks had one sure-fire way to discover new music and bands: we meticulously read the “Thank You” sections of album liner notes. These were a treasure-trove of band names to reference while scouring the shelves of our meager music store options. Rancid albums took things a step further by including poorly photocopied flyers for old shows scattered throughout their sleeves, providing proof that not only were there hundreds of bands out there, but that they were all part of thriving scenes. Early Rancid videos provided a similar visual reference point (thanks to the purposeful eye of their director – singer and guitar player Tim Armstrong) with t-shirts, patches, posters, stickers, and flyers peppered throughout.
Rancid would of course go on to big fame, giant tours, Saturday Night Live appearances, and much slicker-looking videos after …And Out Come the Wolves was released in August of 1995, but it was their first two albums and accompanying music videos that have always stuck with me. Most would say …And Out Come the Wolves is their finest hour, but as a kid who was with them from the beginning and has a very personal connection with the themes of ‘93’s self-titled record and ‘94’s Let’s Go (especially the songs about experiencing homelessness), I have to whole-heartedly disagree. At heart, I will always be a scruffy punk rock kid excited to discover new things, and these grainy, under-produced VHS music videos are just about the best example available of what that still feels like for me.
James is a writer, skateboarder, record collector, wrestling nerd, and tabletop gamer living with his family in Asheville, North Carolina. He is a member of the Southeastern Film Critics Association, the North Carolina Film Critics Association, and contributes to The Daily Orca, Razorcake Magazine, Mountain Xpress, and Asheville Movies.