Drag City Records will release today recordings of lost in time punk rock band by the name of Skam.

Lost in time yet always in season, here’s a blast of that ol’ perennial, the punk rock, representative of the swiftly changing times around Bailey’s Crossroads, just outside Washington, D.C., in the early ’80s. Skam recorded this stuff in ’82–’83, then broke up, leaving these songs to be released…maybe never? Or more preferably, now, to race into the bloodstream of jaded, faded today with all the vigor and rigor of Skam’s eternal youth.

“The scene we were part of, as spectators, was the early 80s DC punk rock scene”

It’s always very exciting when something lost finds its way on the table. Are you excited to have your music finally available worldwide?

Jack Anderson (bass): Of course.

Vince Forcier (vocals and guitar): Of course. Yeah.

John Hugo (drums): Yes, absolutely. And fun to reconnect because of this.

Vince: We’re really happy to be working with Drag City. It’s been a great experience. And it’s nice to see our music finally out in the world.

How did Drag City Records find you?

Jack: I used to play in No Trend and Drag City released a box set of some of our old recordings a few years ago. So I was already on the label.

“Beer and amphetamines”

Would you like to share about your upbringing? Where did you all grow up? Tell us about daily life back in your teenage years.

Vince: We met at the local Catholic grade school.

John: Yeah, yeah, we met in fifth grade. And Saint Anthony’s had a school band. Jack, you played in the percussion section. I remember playing with you.

Vince: But there was no thought of starting our band at that time. I just remember that in fifth grade John sat in front of me and he already had a little bald spot.

John: God only made a few perfect heads. The rest have hair, man.

Vince: It’s probably worth mentioning that we really liked our alcohol.

John: I mean, definitely, I think we all started drinking at a fairly young age and kind of took it to an extreme at the time. I would say the common thread was the band and music and then the common denominator was alcohol. It was always there.

Jack: But not at the very beginning, right?

John: Yeah. It was when we got a driver’s license.

Vince: Beer and amphetamines.

Jack: I recall John and I going over to Obadiah’s house on snow days, when we’d have an hour or two delay, so that we could go to school drunk. For me, it was a balance of trying to stay out of trouble and doing our thing.

Vince: And just enough school work not to get kicked out and the rest of the time was split between playing music and drinking. We found each other because there weren’t that many people playing rock and roll when we started playing together.

Was there a certain scene you were part of, maybe you had some favourite hangout places? Did you attend a lot of gigs back then?

John: Jack, your bedroom was a hangout.

Vince: Yeah, that’s true.

Jack: I would say the favorite hangout places were any bedrooms at our friends’ parents’ houses where we could get away with stuff. We practiced in all our parents’ basements and rotated around when we wore out our welcome.

John: And in my 1973 Dodge Polara. We hung out there a hell of a lot.

Vince: The scene we were part of, as spectators, was the early 80s DC punk rock scene.

Jack: Eventually.

Vince: There was a sub scene, I guess I’ll call it a sub scene, in Bailey’s Crossroads (right outside Washington D.C. in Virginia) where a lot of the punks who knew each other hung out together. There was Scream’s practice house, the 9353 guys. Vance Bockis and I shared the same dentist.

Jack: Scream house was definitely a hangout place. Vince, you practiced at one of their houses for a while, right?

Vince: Yeah, with Second Wind.

Jack: And yeah, we did attend a lot of gigs.

Vince: We went to the 9:30 Club, the Wilson Center, basement parties where bands were playing.

If we would step into your teenage room, what kind of records, fanzines, posters et cetera would we find there?

Vince: For records, anything from Dischord Records in the first couple years of the label. The Clash, Sex Pistols, Ramones, Dead Boys, Iggy and The Stooges, MC5, that whole genre. I really didn’t put up posters ever.

John: I would say that my room is pretty bare. Do you remember the basement room? We practiced with the Sex Pistols posters and The Clash posters.

Vince: And that awesome black and white picture of Bob Marley.

Jack: My bedroom was plastered with posters like wallpaper and I started doing that with KISS.

Vince: You actually had the KISS Army terry cloth armband, didn’t you?

Jack: If you joined the KISS Army you got all this stuff. I got the decal for a T-shirt and I think you got a little membership card. I don’t remember the armband, but I did have a Skateboarder magazine headband.

Vince: Yeah. I remember you were a KISS Army member.

Jack: So I got over KISS and moved on to Led Zeppelin. The walls were wallpapered with Led Zeppelin posters. As we transitioned into punk, those came down and then it was flyers for local punk rock shows. That was the transition for me. From KISS to Led Zeppelin to punk rock. My posters reflected that. And it felt really cool to put up a flyer I made for a Skam show. For local fanzines, Truly Needy and Thrillseeker.

Vince: Touch and Go.

Jack: Flipside, Maximum Rock and Roll, Forced Exposure. All the standards

John: I just remember sitting in your bedroom reading them all.

Was Skam your very first band or were you involved with any other bands?

Jack: Skam was the first band for all of us.

Can you elaborate on the formation of the Skam?

Vince: Yeah, we all went to school together so we knew each other. I brought up the idea of starting a band with Jack while we were going to a Jackson Browne show. I recruited Obadiah. Then we needed a drummer. We knew that John played drums in the grade school band. He took the call and that was it.

What influenced Skam’s sound?

Vince: I’m thinking of what influenced Obadiah’s sound as a writer. I think British pop and then British punk were a big influence on the sound. So, The Clash, The Sex Pistols, Ramones, Dead Boys and then as we started going to hardcore shows that influence started finding its way in.Scream, Black Market Baby, Faith, Minor Threat. I think BMB was a particular influence from the Connected compilation put out on Limp Records. First local album I bought, I think. Still have it.

Jack: The Beatles. Obadiah loved The Beatles when we first started. He had their songbook and knew most, if not all of it.

Vince: Yeah, absolutely. His biggest early influences were The Beatles and other 60’s British pop sounds.

What kind of places did you play? What are some of the bands you shared stages with?

John: Do you remember when we played at a pizza parlor? There was nobody there. I remember seeing the waitresses and the cook staff come out of the kitchen and listen to us. It was when we were doing all The Rolling Stones stuff.

Jack: Yeah, it was terrible. We got so, so much better as a band when we played punk rock.

John: And we played that picnic for Obadiah’s mom’s job. A kid who had a Rush T-shirt just looked at us the whole time.

Jack: Glaring and scowling.

Vince: And at a Keyettes convention that got shut down by a threat to call the cops.

John: We drove out to some place in Vienna one night. It was like a renovated movie theater. But yeah, it was mostly basements.

Vince: Parties in parents’ basements. The one at Chris Bray’s house was memorable, with Screamand others. There was Jules Loft in Baltimore.

Jack: Jules Loft was a real gig. We went on the road.

Vince: And Oscar’s Eye which was a famous drag club above a transvestite bar.

Jack: And that was with No Trend and Bang Gang from Austin, Texas.

Vince: and The Sluts from New Orleans at Jules Loft. Also Insurrection in Chris’s basement.

Jack: Which Guy and Brendan were in, and who later played in Fugazi.

Vince: Mike Fellows was in that band I think. Who later was in Rites of Spring.

Jack: Also United Mutation and Media Disease. I can’t remember for certain, but we might have played with Dave Grohl’s first band Freak Baby. One of the few photos we have shows me using their bass cabinet. But the band we definitely played the most with was Scream, who Dave was also in although not at that time.

Where did you record the songs that are being released?

Jack: Side one was recorded in a studio in 1982.

Vince: Yeah, Eastern Recording Studio in Glen Burnie, Maryland.

Jack: The first four songs on side two were recorded in my parents’ basement. The last four songs were recorded live at our high school. It was our senior year talent show.

John: It was like Eurovision.

Vince: Yeah, it was our high school’s version of Eurovision.

Would love it if you could provide insight on the albums’ tracks?

Vince: If you listen to the lyrics of the song ‘No Name’ there’s a real political bent. There’s this politics going on around you where people are making decisions but you’re kind of unknown in that process, it’s kind of the unrecognized, every man that’s kind of losing out in that process. We were 17 years old and during Ronald Reagan’s version of America. We weren’t buying it and really a lot of the kids in the punk rock scene weren’t buying it. That was reflected in the lyrics.

John: Also the song ‘Capital Punishment’.

Jack: It’s terrible. It’s tongue and cheek, right Vince?

Vince: It’s more sarcastic. That seems to be the solution that’s being offered by the right-wing in America. I’m certainly not endorsing an approach like that. it’s more like the hypocrisy of that brand of politics or religion on television. For me that was also another big influence where you’re exposed to the real proliferation of Evangelical Christianity on television. And not really buying that either. Kind of seeing the hypocrisy and the bullshit of right-wing politics. This was when right-wing politics were getting kind of wed to Evangelical Christianity. I know for myself, I was reacting to that. I still have strong reactions to that.

Jack: I always thought that song was a bit influenced, at least in attitude, by the band Fear. Being sarcastic.

Vince: I’d agree with that. I mean, now somebody would listen to that and freak out trying to take it literally. But at that time, it was not uncommon for bands to be really sarcastic.

John: That song was so bloody fast.

Vince: Yeah, we like to give our drummer a workout.

Jack: Looking back on it now, some of it is a little embarrassing. But for high school students it wasn’t bad. I mean our politics were pretty well aligned.

Vince: And I think it’s worth mentioning we were in a school that had a very conservative environment – not only Reagan’s America but also a Catholic school where those kinds of right-wing culture war issues were all around us, right? So to me, it was a real act of rebellion to reject all that. This was a period in America where nobody called it Christian Nationalism at the time, but it was really the period when the groundwork was being laid for that. In some ways the kids in the punk rock scene were calling that out. 40 years ago.

Jack: Very prophetic.

When did you stop playing together and what occupied your life later on?

Jack: We broke up the summer after graduating high school. You guys went to college and I ran off to join the circus otherwise known as No Trend. After No Trend I eventually played in another band called HUG.

Vince: I went to school and then left school and played a number of other bands. I got married, had a family. Continued playing in bands as a hobby. None of them were as much fun as Skam.

John: Raised a family.

Tell us about the instruments, gear, effects et cetera you had in the band.

Jack: I didn’t have any special equipment that I recall, other than that 15” bass cabinet you built for me, Vince.

Vince: Yeah.

Jack: That was sweet. I do remember the hippie amp.

Vince: The music doctor’s outer space amp.

Jack: AKA The Hippie Amp.

Vince: We played Gibson guitars into Music Man and Fender Amps. I did not use any effects and just went right into the amp and turned it up as loud as it would go. It was a bit of an arms race in the volume with everybody showing up with louder and louder amps. It was a good time except now my ears are paying for it.

John: Pearl drums, Remo drum heads, those Zildjian cymbals.

Jack: You had that one your Dad gave you. It was a ride that had a cowbell sound.

John: It was a beautiful cymbal.

Jack: You can hear it on ‘Open Your Eyes’. Just the right amount of cowbell.

Vince: We paid a lot of attention to our tone. We tried to get the right instruments to get the sound we want.

John: Yeah, I think we spent a lot of time trying to sound really good versus trying to get out there and play live. There was this balance of practice and play.

“DIY. Everybody should start a band”

Looking back, what was the highlight of your time in the band? Which songs are you most proud of? Where and when was your most memorable gig?

Jack: For me the most memorable gig was a basement party we played in December of 1982.

Vince: Absolutely.

John: Yeah, hands down.

Vince: That was almost like a coming out party for the DC punk rock scene.

Jack: Yeah, exactly. Ian (MacKaye) was there. Jeff Nelson too, I think. I remember at the time thinking holy shit this is like an audition for Dischord. We really played our hearts out. Obadiah did his best Joe Strummer. He out-strummed Joe Strummer.

Vince: I’ve always liked our Search and Destroy cover. I’ve always really been proud of how that turned out. I’m really proud of listening to all our material packaged in an album, in a curated order because up until now it’s been an eight-song studio tape and kind of some random things. So this is really kind of seeing it all in one place as a creative product. In itself, right? Having an album where all the songs are in a particular order for a particular reason. That makes me super proud.

John: The songs that I listen to are actually the same songs that I still tap the melody and rhythm to this day. I mean, they’re just so imprinted. And then of course, the ‘Search and Destroy’ cover. I am super proud of that. I just think the musicianship and that song is excellent. All vocals, guitar work. It’s a great tune.

Jack: The song I’m most proud of is ‘Middle Class’. I wrote the bass line. I wanted to write a song like The Clash’s ‘(White Man) In Hammersmith Palais’. And Obadiah’s lyrics were great for it. One highlight was when we all went to see the Ramones together for the first time.

John: Absolutely.

Vince: Absolutely. It’s interesting as a band we were avid fans, we would go together to gigs and really absorb the influence and really pick apart what we were hearing and try some things in our next practice, because of what we were hearing. So we were in some, in many ways, we were fans first, right?

John: Remember the Dead Kennedys at Landsberg Cultural Center and the fire marshal shut the electricity off and they played everything acapella?

Vince: I remember we stayed back from Beach Week one extra day to get to that gig. I remember driving to the beach in your Dodge Polara and you kept putting that weird stuff in the radiator to keep it from leaking all the fluid everywhere. There were 16 cases of beer in the trunk, so the whole back end of that car was dragging.

Thank you for taking your time. Last word is yours.

John: I’m happy that we got together to do this. And it’s nice to see people from our generation listen to the music again and whether they liked it or not, they’re listening to it. And then the other thing would be the young kids now. Whether they’re in Europe, here in the States listening to it. And basically you just have to have the guts to say, yes, figure out a way to get the equipment and play, whether you sound good or not.

Jack: Alright. DIY baby.

Vince: DIY. Everybody should start a band.

Jack: Yeah, that was the mantra back then. Still could be.

Klemen Breznikar

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