Against Me!

Tom Gabel Reveals Details Of Transgender Life In Rolling Stone

10 May 2012 15:59:17 EDT

Against Me! singer details her long journey to her new life as a woman and her plans to 'meet it head-on.'
By James Montgomery

In the new issue of Rolling Stone, Tom Gabel goes public with her life-long struggle with body dysphoria, her transgender status and her desire to live life as a woman.

Gabel, who will be known as Laura Jane Grace, makes the admissions in a feature in the magazine, which hits newsstands on Friday and details the long road she took to get to this point; from her first childhood realizations that she was uncomfortable in her male body — she has early memories of watching Madonna on TV and fantasizing about being her, and says she played with Barbies — to her teenage years in Florida, where she kept her secret hidden and felt ashamed, telling writer Josh Eells that she would often pray to God, asking, "Dear God, when I wake up, I want a female body."

And when that didn't work, she'd try pleading with the devil, saying, "I promise to spend the rest of my life as a serial killer if you turn me into a woman."

Gabel said that she took inspiration from a transgender Against Me! fan named January Hunt — the feature opens with the two meeting in New York City — to finally begin transitioning from male to female, and has begun the process by undergoing electrolysis treatments (she'll also soon begin taking hormones). She says she plans on living life as Laura for a full year before thinking about having sexual-reassignment surgery, and that she's given up drinking alcohol, because she wants to be totally present for the transition process.

"I don't want to feel like, 'This is an uncomfortable situation, I'll have a couple drinks,' " she said. "I want to meet it head-on."

At the time of the Rolling Stone interview, Gabel had yet to reveal her transgender status to her parents, who are divorced, and had only recently told her Against Me! bandmates about her decision to transition ("I felt like I drop-kicked them in the face," she said. "We had the most awkward hug ever, and then they left. And the second I shut the door, I was like, 'What the f--- did I just do?' "). But she says that she has every intention to carry on fronting the band, saying: "However fierce our band was in the past, imagine me, six-foot-two, in heels, f---ing screaming into someone's face."

And though much of the Rolling Stone feature focuses on Gabel's journey, Eells also spoke at length with Gabel's wife, Heather, who admitted to being a bit thrown by her husband's revelations, but ultimately decided that she wanted to stand by her side during the transition ... and beyond.

"I kept waiting to get mad. Like, 'Tomorrow, I'll be really upset,' " Heather told the magazine. "I'm like 'Let's just see what happens, and we'll just roll with it.' My friends have been like, 'What about you?' But I'm fine. I just want him to be who he is, and for us to get on with phase two. You know, just ... change."

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Against Me!

Tom Gabel's Transgender News: What Does It Mean For Her Marriage?

09 May 2012 15:52:41 EDT

Tegan and Sara, Fun., Gaslight Anthem, Senses Fail tweet their support to Against Me! singer.
By Gil Kaufman

Against Me! singer Tom Gabel has received an outpouring of support from her musical peers in light of her announcement on Tuesday that she plans to begin life as a woman. Her brave decision decision to go public with her transgender status earn praise from fellow musicians including Fun., Tegan and Sara, Senses Fail and Gaslight Anthem.

The news came just hours before a vote on Tuesday in North Carolina to pass a constitutional amendment  banning gay marriage, but just before President Obama stated publicly in an ABC interview on Wednesday (May 9) that he personally supports gay marriage. During a cycle that brought highs and lows in the ongoing debate over gay marriage, one of the questions that arose in the MTV Newsroom following Gabel's news was whether it would have an impact on her wife and their marriage.

Though Florida is not one of the six states in the nation that recognize marriages between same-sex partners, Gabel's declaration won't change her marital status either way, according to Lisa Mottet, Director of the Transgender Civil Rights Project at the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force.

"Under established law, marriages are evaluated for their validity at the time of marriage, i.e., the date of the wedding/when the marriage license was signed," she said. "Only divorces, death, and annulments end marriages — gender transition does not end a marriage, nor convert it to a same-sex marriage. If two people were considered different sex at the time of their wedding, they will continue to be considered married until death, divorce, or annulment."

Gabel came out as transgender and discussed plans to begin living as a woman in the next issue of Rolling Stone magazine. She will now go by the name Laura Jane Grace and remain married to wife Heather, while undergoing electrolysis treatments and taking hormones to make the transition from male to female.

"For me, the most terrifying thing about this was how she would accept the news," Gabel told the magazine about her Heather's reaction. "But she's been super-amazing and understanding."

Gabel has dealt with gender dysphoria for years and decided it was a good time to speak up about the private struggle, telling only a few family members and friends about the upcoming transition before talking with the magazine. "I'm going to have embarrassing moments, and that won't be fun," Gabel said of coming out. "But that's part of what talking to you is about -- is hoping people will understand, and hoping they'll be fairly kind."

A number of her peers praised her bravery, including the members of Fun., who tweeted, "Reading about Tom Gabel coming out as transgender = inspiring. Always been a fan but it's even more amazing to know how strong & brave she is."

Openly gay twin sister rockers Tegan & Sara weighed in also calling Gabel "so incredibly brave." Congratulations and support also came from the members of Senses Fail, Broadway Calls, Toxicbreed, I Am the Avalanche, Motel Life and Circa Survive.

One of the most heartfelt notes was posted by Gaslight Anthem singer Brian Fallon, who preemptively struck out at anyone criticizing the decision. "So Tom's gonna be Laura now... and in 2012 I still find people on the internet commenting on another person's life how they insult and condemn a person for his choices," he wrote.

"How about the people who go through this and never find peace and end up committing suicide? Would you rather that? Or maybe he could become a raging drug addict and ruin his life and family? Would you rather that? Or maybe we could have rules from a dictator where everyone gets killed for anything they believe against the government, oh wait, that doesn't work ... How about you leave the guy alone. How about you let another human being make a decision about their lives without your snide prejudices and bigotry? This is one of the hardest decisions a person can make ... Whether you agree or don't, it's not your life. It's not your family. It's not your band, it's theirs."

And it wasn't just musicians, as WWE wrestling champ CM Punk also weighed in, writing, "@tommygabel courage and bravery. I got your back."

What do you think of Tom Gabel's announcement? Let us know in comments below.

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Against Me!

Tom Gabel Comes Out As Transgender: In Praise Of Bravery

09 May 2012 13:11:36 EDT

Why the Against Me! singer's decision to live as a woman is also a genuine act of courage, in Bigger Than the Sound.
By James Montgomery

Tom Gabel probably didn't want to be praised for her decision to come out as transgender; she just wanted to be comfortable in her own body. But I'm going to praise her anyway.

Because when Gabel announced to Rolling Stone on Tuesday that she planned to begin living as a woman — after struggling privately with gender dysphoria for years — it was undoubtedly the most personal thing a major recording artist has ever gone public with, an admission that's sure to make her the target of cruel insults and petty insinuations (to say nothing about what it might mean for the future of her band, Against Me!). But rather than focus on the close-mindedness of a select few, it is certainly more worthwhile — not to mention important — to laud Gabel for what is, in its purest form, a genuine act of bravery.

To be fair, Gabel is not the first musician to come out as transgender. In the 1970s, electronic artist Walter Carlos announced that she, too, suffered from gender dysphoria and underwent sexual reassignment surgery to live life as Wendy Carlos. And just last year, Life of Agony singer Keith Caputo made headlines when she became Mina Caputo. But Gabel's case is different. Since her earliest days, she has always been a punk pariah, criticized for "selling out" at every step of her career.

I got the sense this bothered her on some level (how could it not?), because when I interviewed Gabel in 2006 for AM!'s major-label debut, New Wave, she definitely made mention of it, saying: "There is no pleasing everybody. ... I guarantee our new record will get the same reaction that all our records get. Some will be like 'It's awesome,' and others will be like 'I absolutely hate it.' But fast-forward a few years, and the ones who said they hated it are the ones who say they loved it all along."

It will be interesting to see how Against Me!'s fans — and detractors — react when Gabel begins living life as Laura Jane Grace, because they definitely can't accuse her of selling out anymore. If anything, her decision to begin gender reassignment treatments is the most punk-rock thing imaginable: being true to one's self, being unafraid to be different, speaking out regardless of the repercussions. These are the tenets the genre (and, for what it's worth, way of life) were founded on — and, really, what they should still be about today. If you have a problem with Gabel's decision, you're probably not a punk at all.

In coming out as transgender, Gabel will undoubtedly inspire others to do the same. She is proof that the truth is nothing to be ashamed of, that there is nothing as important — or admirable — as living the life you want to, on your own terms, detractors be damned. And the fact that Gabel's wife, Heather, will remain by her side as she begins this new chapter is not only equally inspiring, but, in the wake of the passage of North Carolina's Amendment 1, which made law that only a "marriage between one man and one woman" would be recognized by the state, it seems even more important. Because truly, is there any greater definition of love — or support, or dedication or unwavering union — than what they share? You can quote biblical verses to deny that fact, but really, you'd be missing the point.

For years, fans like me have marveled at Gabel's pained yet poignant lyrics, with their searing desires to break free and find a place in the world (on the standout New Wave track "The Ocean," Gabel growled, "And if I could have chosen/ I would have been born a woman"). It turns out, it went much deeper than that: Gabel was at war with her own body, and now, finally, she's found the courage to make peace with that conflict. It's beyond admirable; it's downright brave.

Like she told me six years ago, "There is no pleasing everybody." Ultimately, you've got to please yourself. And with courage and conviction, Gabel has done that. No matter how you feel about her new life, you can't deny that it's everyone's basic right to live life on their terms. That goes beyond music or politics or religion: It's humanity, pure and simple.

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Against Me!

Against Me! Singer Tom Gabel Comes Out As Transgender

08 May 2012 23:26:35 EDT

Gabel reveals plans to Rolling Stone to take the name Laura Jane Grace after undergoing gender transition.
By Katie Byrne

Against Me! singer Tom Gabel has come out as transgender and discussed plans to begin living as a woman in the next issue of Rolling Stone.

Gabel, who will go by Laura Jane Grace and remain married to wife Heather, will undergo electrolysis treatments and take hormones to make the transition from male to female.

"For me, the most terrifying thing about this was how she would accept the news," Gabel told Rolling Stone of Heather. "But she's been super-amazing and understanding."

Gabel has dealt with gender dysphoria for years and decided it was a good time to speak up about the private struggle, telling only a few family members and friends about the upcoming transition before talking with the magazine. "I'm going to have embarrassing moments, and that won't be fun," Gabel said of coming out. "But that's part of what talking to you is about — is hoping people will understand, and hoping they'll be fairly kind."

Though Gabel is the first major rock star to undergo a gender transformation, she's hardly the first celebrity. Larry Wachowski, half of the Wachowski-brother directing duo behind the "Matrix" trilogy, has been credited as Lana Wachowki in recent work and seems to now identify as a woman, though neither sibling has spoken publicly on the subject. Chaz Bono, meanwhile, made a very public run on "Dancing With the Stars" as the first transgender contestant. Chaz, born the daughter of Cher and Sonny Bono, underwent female-to-male gender transition between 2008 and 2010.

In the next issue of Rolling Stone, due Friday, Gabel will tell her full story, including what the revelation means for the future of Against Me!

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Against Me!

Blink-182, Rise Against Close Epicenter Festival With Rousing Sets

27 Sep 2010 10:01:37 EDT

30 Seconds to Mars, Against Me!, Suicidal Tendencies also hit stage on day two of eclectic California rock fest.
By Ryan J. Downey

FONTANA, California — Travis Barker was born in Fontana, making it a sure bet that he felt a sense of homecoming as Blink-182 made their only North American appearance of the year at California's Epicenter 2010 Festival in that very town. The trio's hit-packed set closed the two-day event on Sunday following performances from Rise Against, 30 Seconds to Mars, Against Me! and more.

Afternoon temperatures reached 110 degrees in the racetrack parking lot where Epicenter took place, but the crowd's enthusiasm never seemed to wane, thanks in part to a steady stream of water misters and water cannons. Epicenter 2010 kicked off Saturday with Eminem (in his only West Coast appearance this year), KISS and reunited alt-rockers Bush, among others.

Sponsored by Los Angeles radio station KROQ, the eclectic outdoor event celebrated its second year and moved to the Auto Club Speedway in Fontana, part of California's Inland Empire. The Academy Is... kicked off the main-stage festivities on Sunday, looking sharp as they dealt out a deft blend of pop sensibilities and underground angst worked into a taut formula with undeniable effectiveness.

Warped Tour heroes A Day to Remember rode a wave of mosh-pit momentum despite the venue still being less than full in the early afternoon. ADTR have started to crack the mainstream with their mix of hardcore chug and melodic hooks, which has been described as "pop-punk with breakdowns." The Florida-based group is now the biggest band on Victory Records (the label that helped launch Taking Back Sunday and Hawthorne Heights), and judging by the performance they delivered at Epicenter 2010, they seem destined for greater commercial heights.

People looking for punk rock minus any hardcore and with less of the edges worn off were quickly satiated by Against Me!, who hail from the same state as ADTR but play a style more reminiscent of the grimy, up-close-and-personal festivals thrown together in VFW halls without proper permits. Their last two albums may have come out on a major label, but songs like "I Was a Teenage Anarchist" and "White Crosses" reminded any doubters that Against Me! haven't sold out.

Bad Religion ripped into two tracks from their classic 1988 album, Suffer, the second the veteran punks took the stage. Guitarists Greg Hetson and Brian Baker more than made up for the absence of co-founding member Brett Gurewitz (the Epitaph Records owner generally still plays the California shows as a third guitarist) as drummer Brooks Wackerman, who at 33 is the youngest member, laid down a steady pound. Hetson is also in the Circle Jerks and Baker is a something of a punk icon in his own right, thanks to his time with the legendary Minor Threat and Dag Nasty.

The heat was on vocalist Greg Graffin's highly educated mind (he holds a Ph.D. from Cornell and has taught courses at UCLA) as he sipped a less-than-cold water between songs. "It's warm!" he shouted. "What did you expect?" responded bassist Jay Bentley. A new song called "The Devil in Stitches" from The Dissent of Man, which drops Tuesday, received a warm response from the crowd. There were enthusiastic sing-alongs for well-worn KROQ staples like "Sorrow."

Epicenter's ability to stage full production throughout the weekend for everyone from Bush and Eminem to KISS and 30 Seconds to Mars was impressive, considering the difficulty accommodating so many different headline-caliber acts. Recent VMA winners 30 Seconds to Mars followed Bad Religion on the main stage, which they decorated with a large version of their triangular symbol.

A photographer who shot the band described their set as an "estrogen fest," due to the strong and vocal contingent of females who clearly admired frontman Jared Leto's looks at least partly as much as his singing. The band chose its most anthemic tracks for Epicenter, belting out rousing renditions of "This Is War," "Night of the Hunter" and "A Beautiful Lie" with Leto and the two other permanent members of the band — guitarist/keyboardist Tomo Milicevic and Jared's brother, drummer Shannon — firing on all cylinders.

Sporting a white leather jacket (which quickly came off), black sleeveless shirt, red fingerless gloves and bleach-blond hair reminiscent of his Angel Face role in "Fight Club," Jared Leto led the crowd through an incredible sing-along during "The Kill," starting the song off acoustically, by himself, and ending up standing atop the barricade as the rest of the band backed him with electric power.

His good-natured interaction with the crowd was constant: At one point, he demanded one of the venue's large water hoses and proceeded to personally douse the crowd, which welcomed the relief from the heat. The band filled the stage with people from the audience for their last song, as Leto thanked the crowd continually.

Earlier in the day, the second stage was warmed up by Scottish rock trio Biffy Clyro, makeup-smeared upstarts Black Veil Brides and Denmark's New Politics. The Black Pacific, the new Orange County punk band formed earlier this year by ex-Pennywise singer Jim Lindberg, made Epicenter 2010 their first show, playing just before second-stage headliners Suicidal Tendencies.

Suicidal Tendencies are a Southern California institution. Their 1983 self-titled album helped spawn "crossover" with its blend of punk, hardcore, metal and skate-rock and the unstoppable single "Institutionalized." "Cyco" Mike Muir remains the only original member of a group whose alumni have joined everyone from Megadeth to Metallica; Bad Religion drummer Wackerman played with them from 1997 to 2001. The present incarnation of ST, which includes Mike Clark (guitarist since 1987), closed the second stage with energized takes on live staples like "War Inside My Head."

Rise Against bridged the gap between Bad Religion's social commentary and Suicidal Tendencies' aggression, setting the nighttime ablaze with their Midwestern take on melodic hardcore. Singer/guitarist Tim McIlrath and crew played a set seemingly designed to please the people who've followed them since their Fat Wreck Chords days and those who discovered them on the radio alike. Billed just before Blink-182 on the main stage, the huge crowd reaction proved them worthy of the spot.

"Prayer of the Refugee," "The Good Left Undone" and the acoustic "Swing Life Away" were all highlights, while "Ready to Fall," predictably, generated the biggest response.

While it was said to be Rise Against's last show of the year, Epicenter was Blink-182's only North American show in 2010. The So Cal trio, who reunited for a summer's worth of touring last year after a long hiatus, took to the stage to loud cheers from the estimated 25,000 people in attendance.

Tom DeLonge was wearing a shirt emblazoned with the logo of his apparel line, Macbeth, while Barker was of course shirtless. With the front of his hair pointing high to the nighttime sky, Mark Hoppus regularly raised his hands in triumph during a 90-minute set that was a bit light on their usual comedic chatter but heavy on hits.

Blink will work on a new album soon, with their Epicenter performance serving as ample reminder of their formidable catchy-tune-making prowess. Among the songs in their arsenal on Sunday night: "What's My Age Again?," "All the Small Things," "First Date," "The Party Song," "I Miss You," "Always," "Stockholm Syndrome" and the appropriately titled "Stay Together for the Kids."

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The Best Albums Of 2010 (So Far)

30 Jun 2010 06:52:15 EDT

Vampire Weekend, Janelle Monáe and more have provided the soundtrack for the first six months of the year, in Bigger Than the Sound.
By James Montgomery

The first half of 2010 is in the books, and if you're a fan of oil spills, Tea Parties and vuvuzelas, well, congratulations on having the best six months of your entire life.

For the rest of us, January through June has been a bit of a bummer. If you're like me, you've found refuge from the bad news in good music, and thankfully, there's been a whole lot of that so far this year too.

If you've been asleep at the switch (or hiding out in your bunker), I don't blame you. But there's really no excuse for missing out on soul-charging, life-changing music — even if some of it really is pretty sad. So, as a public service to the trembling masses, here are my picks for the Best Albums of 2010 (so far).

10a. The Wave Pictures, If You Leave It Alone/Instant Coffee Baby
Ultra-literate, supremely swoony Brit pop, courtesy of Morrissey-in-the-making David Tattersall, this double album collects two of their most recent (and best) LPs for the first time here in the States. Of course, given that they came out in 2006 and 2008, respectively, it feels sort of like cheating to include all of this on a Best of 2010 list, so, instead ...

10b. Kate Nash, My Best Friend Is You
The sound of being young and brilliant and tormented and so wonderfully, frighteningly in love that you don't know whether to scream or cry, My Best Friend Is You represents Kate Nash at her most scattershot, squeaky and downright smart. Ditching the studio polish that dragged down her debut (2007's Made of Bricks), she teamed up with Bernard Butler to make an album that's rough, sprawling and unafraid to get plain weird, which is probably how we ended up with songs like "Paris" "Kiss That Grrrl" or "Don't You Want to Share the Guilt," which ram together '60s girl groups, '90s riot grrrl and '70s boho spoken-word punk. Confident one minute, conflicted the next, Nash is a complex gal, indeed, and while it's hard being young and gifted, for the first time, she seems ready to accept the responsibilities and carry the mantle.

9. Tobacco, Maniac Meat
As the frontman of Pittsburgh weirdos Black Moth Super Rainbow, Tom Fec buries his vocals in a marshmallowy mash of vocoders and buzz. As Tobacco, well, he pretty much does the same thing, only he's somehow upped the weirdness. Maniac Meat is a twitchy, witchy listen, darker and more perverse than anything he's previously done. Kind of like a mohair sweater on bare skin, the tracks here itch and irritate (in the best way possible), and you're probably gonna end up with a rash. But you listen anyway. Throw in a couple of Beck cameos (on "Fresh Hex" and the excellently named "Grape Aerosmith") that find the former Odelay madman sounding fresher than he has in years, and Meat only continues to fester. Don't pick at the scabs.

8. Yeasayer, Odd Blood
What happens when one of Brooklyn's brightest bands decides "Screw this, let's make a pop record"? Odd Blood, of course. Perhaps the most fittingly titled album in recent memory, it's a wavy, dreamy listen, full of supple, electronic fields that undulate and dip, creating precipitous peaks and delving canyons, with frontman Chris Keating's otherworldly vocals floating above it all like plump clumps of cumulonimbus — all of which is a rather bookish way of saying that Britney, Katy and Gaga wish they could sound this good. Pop music for the 22nd century and beyond.

7. Against Me! White Crosses
Just as polished and unabashed as their divisive 2007 major-label bow New Wave, still as snarling as 2005's Searching for a Former Clarity, White Crosses somehow also ushers in a brand-new chapter for Gainesville, Florida, punkers Against Me! Frontman Tom Gabel has settled down, gotten married and welcomed a child into the world, which is perhaps why, here, he seems a tad bit, well, reserved. But it could also be that, after more than a decade spent raging against the machine, he's finally realized that the problems haven't changed, the enemies have multiplied, and the rich just keep on winning. So instead, he turns his ire inward, railing against pinheaded crust punks he used to run with (on unlikely radio staple "I Was a Teenage Anarchist") and the suffocating Florida suburbs of his youth. Turns out, the past sucks just as much as the present. And in the process, the snarl somehow only gets fiercer.

6. Sleigh Bells, Treats
Sounds like: cheerleader camp, power tools f---ing, the "level-up" music on any NES game (circa 1988), a really sh---y Sanyo boom box, double Dutch, hyperspace, hellfire, hurricanes, a more polite Motörhead, Three 6 Mafia's "Stay Fly," Funkadelic's "Can You Get to That" ('cause they sample it), Brassy (thanks, Weingarten), Crystal Castles on Quaaludes, Link Wray on Amphetamines, the impending robot apocalypse, "Top Gun," summer, guard dogs, drugs and joy. In theory, Sleigh Bells are just a guy, a girl, a guitar, some (seriously) overworked machinery and a whole lot of distortion. But in actuality, they're so much more.

5. LCD Soundsystem, This Is Happening
In 2007, James Murphy wrote the coda for New York's once-bright electroclash scene with "All My Friends," a bittersweet beauty of a song that also doubled as a rather perfect rumination on the unstoppable advance of middle age (something he's been dreading for a while now, actually). Thankfully, he hasn't shuffled off into pleated-khaki obsolescence just yet, and, if anything, on This Is Happening, he seems to be coming to terms with his lack of cool, lamenting, "Everybody's getting younger" (on album-opener "Dance Yrself Clean"), rolling his eyes at the drunk girls on the dance floor, extolling the virtues of finding "good places to eat" in his neighborhood, and picking fights with Village Voice gossip columnists — just because. Acerbic, sarcastic, downright hilarious (and, sometimes, even downright sad), Murphy's like Randy Newman, only for bloggers and kids who still take drugs and dance all night, and minus the paunch and the Hawaiian shirts. For now, at least.

4. Janelle Monáe, The ArchAndroid
So far, it's the year's most un-categorizeable album, a conceptual cluster-frick that leaps between genres with the same glee Monáe seemingly gets from pulling her hair up in that outrageous pompadour. Sweaty funk, honey-dripping soul, pastoral folk, paranoid psych — it's all here, and it's all great. Over the course of 18 tracks, the pint-size Monáe weaves a dystopian narrative that's part "Blade Runner," part "Metropolis," managing to out-Badu Erykah and out ATL-ien Outkast ("Cold War," which just might be the year's best song, rages and wails like the baby sister of Outkast's "Bombs Over Baghdad"). Ambitious, impressive stuff, even if you can't adequately describe it to anyone who may be interested.

3. Titus Andronicus, The Monitor
Sure, it's flawed — a tad too long, a bit unfocused, a little muddied, production-wise — but one expects those sorts of things, especially when a band this young attempts an album this ambitious. The Monitor is, after all, a concept album, though said concept is sort of hard to define: In part, it's about the Civil War (it takes its name from the first ironclad ship built by the U.S. Navy), but it's also about wild-eyed frontman Patrick Stickles' quest to figure out life in the 21st century, a journey that takes him from the safe confines of New Jersey to the unfriendly confines of Boston and back again. He never quite finds what he's been searching for and, in the end, learns that things are just as fractious as they were 150 years ago — perhaps even more so. Tent-poled by three truly epic tunes ("A More Perfect Union," "Four Score and Seven" and "The Battle of Hampton Road") that keep the whole thing from sagging in on itself, The Monitor is the kind of album so big, so bold and so unabashed that you learn to love it, warts and all. Sometimes it pays to dream big.

2. Vampire Weekend, Contra
Four years ago, Vampire Weekend were thrust into the spotlight with their self-titled debut and suffered all the slings and arrows that come with that kind of overnight success. Sure, with their pique polos, boat shoes and penchant for, uh, borrowing from the Soweto sound of South Africa, they brought a lot of it upon themselves — but you couldn't blame them for being a bit taken aback by it all. After all, one can only be picked apart by critics (and anonymous blog commenters) for so long before they snap. And, well, Contra is the result. It's by no means an angry album; rather, it's a determined one, a well-conceived, flawlessly executed "f--- you" to their detractors. From the WASPy gal on the cover to the culturally loaded content of tunes like "Horchata" and "Holiday," this is VW at their most resolute. "This is who we are," they seem to be saying. "Deal with it." Of course, they back it all up with a boatload of really great tunes — "Cousins," "Giving Up the Gun," the album-closing ti

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Against Me!'s White Crosses Looks Back To The Future

01 Jun 2010 16:07:15 EDT

'Writing this record, I spent a lot of time reflecting,' frontman Tom Gabel tells MTV News.
By James Montgomery

With 2007's New Wave, Against Me! detonated the very notion of what it meant to be a "punk" act. Released on a very major label (Reprise Records) and produced by a very famous name (Butch Vig), the album featured big hooks, even bigger studio sheen and a boy/girl duet thrown in for good measure.

For all the polish, frontman Tom Gabel's snarl remained just as gruff as ever, and the targets AM! set their sights on — the impotence of the music industry, the ineffectiveness of the government, the embarrassment of peace-ified protest songs in an increasingly violent time — very much encompassed the wrongs of "The Man," , circa the last days of the Bush administration. Which is to say that, no matter what AM!'s (many) detractors liked to say about it, Wave was still very much a punk album — and quite the forward-thinking one, at that.

But when it came time to record the follow-up, Gabel didn't find himself looking toward the future once again. Quite the opposite, in fact.

"Writing this record, I spent a lot of time reflecting," he told MTV News. "I spent a lot of time thinking about people I used to know, places I used to hang out, things I used to do — I grew up in the anarcho-punk scene, and I had many experiences in that — so that almost couldn't help but show up on this record."

And the result of all that reflecting is White Crosses (due June 8), an album that matches the bombast of New Wave but, rather than pushing the envelope forward, is resigned to be a rather curdled love letter to Gabel's punk-rock past. Songs like the title track, "I Was a Teenage Anarchist" and "Because of the Shame" detail his time spent kicking around suburban Florida as a knotty crust punk, and none of them are exactly what you'd call "fond remembrances." It's as if, by looking back, Gabel is even more disgusted by the punk scene. And when coupled with the fact that AM! wrap his barbs in a musical mélange of — as he put it — "a little Bowie, T.Rex, Cock Sparrer, some Clash, some Replacements and some Primal Scream," you get the feeling that the sole purpose of Crosses might be to further distance the band from the punx.

But the way Gabel sees it, the album — and, really, Against Me! circa 2010 — is just the product of a very natural evolution; one that comes from playing 200 shows a year, parting ways with your past (last year, the band split with Warren Oakes and replaced him with former Hot Water Music drummer George Rebelo) and being unafraid of moving forward ... even if that means looking backward to get there.

"It forces you to not only re-examine the musical relationship you have with each other, and the way you play with each other, but it forces you to re-examine your friendships," Gabel said. "It's really easy when you tour for so long with the same group of people to fall into roles. You know, like, you're the guy who's always late to bus call, he's the guy who has a really hard time ordering in a restaurant, he's the guy who takes really long showers ... and to have a new person thrown into the mix, it shakes things up, and it gives you a new life. ... I feel like, every year you continue playing as a band, every record that you make, you inevitably — hopefully — become better as musicians, and, really, that's the goal of all of this."

What are you expecting from Against Me!'s new album? Let us know in the comments.

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Against Me! Drummer Ditches Fame For Burritos

10 Jun 2009 06:51:00 EDT

'It felt really natural and it was a great run,' Warren Oakes tells Bigger Than the Sound.
By James Montgomery

Dudes leave bands all the time, for reasons that are exotic and distinctly "Behind the Music"-ian (drugs, money, women, jealousy, religion, solo careers, etc.), which is to say that the average person cannot relate to any of them. Warren Oakes is different. He left Florida agit-punks Against Me! for a reason that is understandable and completely proletarian: He wanted to sell burritos.

Therefore, Warren Oakes is a hero — the "Working Class" kind John Lennon keened about all those years ago. This has less to do with the burritos as it does with the principles of the whole thing. Here, let me explain.

Oakes played drums in Against Me! for something like eight years, toured prodigiously hard (200 shows a year, mostly in a van), recorded four fantastic, hard-charging albums (2002's Reinventing Axl Rose, 2003's As the Eternal Cowboy, 2005's Searching for a Former Clarity and 2007's major-label bow, New Wave) and always looked like he was having an absolute blast. He was the bearded, blissed-out yin to frontman Tom Gabel's gruff, gravelly yang ... the kind of guy every band needs, especially when the going got tough and the crowds got hostile. And both happened quite frequently during his time in Against Me! (for reasons I documented in a column back in 2007).

If Oakes looked eternally pumped, this is basically because he was living the rock-and-roll dream. Make no bones about it, AM! will probably never be a successful rock outfit. They're probably never going to sell out arenas or move millions of units. But that wasn't the point: Oakes scratched out a living playing drums in a band, he toured the world with his best friends, and he did it all as hard as he could for as long as he possibly could. (That's why kids join bands in the first place, isn't it?)

Of course, this couldn't last forever. Economics and savings accounts and adulthood and the like are most certainly not very rock-and-roll, yet they are rather huge aspects of reality (who knew?). So in April, half out of necessity and half out of sheer exhaustion, Oakes decided to bring the rock chapter of his life to a close. He left Against Me! to sell burritos in Gainesville, Florida.

Or at least, that's what he told me on Tuesday.

See, I am an Against Me! fan. So when I first heard that Oakes was out of the band (and subsequently read Gabel's rather matter-of-fact blog post about the situation), I figured he had been fired, which bummed me out. So I called down to Boca Fiesta, the burrito joint Oakes had just opened, hoping to speak with him. I left a message with a manager named Jeff, but never expected Oakes to call back. But he did.

We talked about the AM! situation, and Oakes wanted it to be known that he wasn't fired, but rather, his leaving the band "was really a mutual decision ... it was really amicable." He said he still considers the guys in the band to be "more than friends — they're family," and added that Boca is already carrying Against Me! guitarist James Bowman's homemade hot sauce on the menu.

I asked him about his decision to leave the band — whether he thinks it was courageous or heroic or even a little bit sad. He laughed and said he didn't, that he just couldn't continue to put his life on hold and dedicate all his time and energy to Against Me!

"I was feeling a little burnt-out on traveling all the time. It's a full commitment being in Against Me! I mean, it's 365 days a year, touring and working on new songs, and I always wanted to give 110 percent. Being in the band was a full-time job," he said. "But it came to the point where I did have to face facts and realize I was starting to express interest in having some other things going on, and trying to split my time and energy just wasn't going to cut it. So that was it. It was really sad — I was really bummed at first — but then the peace came. It felt really natural and it was a great run."

And then Oakes had to go, as the dinner rush at Boca was beginning. He told me that Against Me! fans can always find him behind the counter at the joint ("I've done everything so far — washed dishes, tended bar, made guacamole!" he laughed) and said that if I'm ever in Gainesville, I should stop in for a bite. We ended our conversation — Oakes hoped I wouldn't make everything sound too negative — and I started writing this column.

Originally, I had intended to canonize Oakes, to make his plight seem tragic and his decision heroic. But really, this situation happens every day, to people not just in bands but on assembly lines or insurance offices. Dreams are put on hold, or chucked aside forever, because reality comes calling. That Oakes did it does not make him a hero, it makes him like the rest of us. And perhaps that's his lasting legacy ... the everyman former drummer who ditched the dream and walked headlong into the rest of his life with grace and joy. Like I said, the burritos aren't the main point — it's the principle of it all.

Questions? Concerns? Hit me up at BTTS@MTVStaff.com.

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Warped Tour — With Paramore, Angels & Airwaves, Gym Class Heroes, More -- Announces Full Schedule

26 Mar 2008 13:09:00 EDT

Paramore will tour for only one week, but Cobra Starship, the Academy Is ..., Against Me! and others are up for all 46 dates.
By Gil Kaufman

The Warped Tour — featuring Paramore, Gym Class Heroes, Angels & Airwaves, Against Me!, the Academy Is ..., Cobra Starship and dozens of others — has announced the full schedule for the summer's trek, which kicks off on June 20 in Pomona, California.

While Paramore will tag along from July 1-6, a number of other bands have signed on for the whole trek, including the Horrorpops, Reel Big Fish, From First to Last, Relient K, Aggrolites, Protest the Hero, Anberlin, Everytime I Die, Greeley Estates, Norma Jean, Say Anything, Story of the Year, Charlotte Sometimes, the Bronx, Pennywise, Rise Against, the Devil Wears Prada and We the Kings.

The tour is slated to finish on August 17 at the Home Depot Center in Carson, California. Among the other acts dropping in for runs of dates are: A Day to Remember, All That Remains, As I Lay Dying, August Burns Red, Bedouin Soundclash, Bouncing Souls, Danger Radio, GBH, Jack's Mannequin, Ludo, Madina Lake, Sick City, the All-American Rejects, the Dillinger Escape Plan, the Pink Spiders and the Vandals. The full roster of bands can be found at WarpedTour.com.

Vans Warped Tour 2008 dates:

» 6/20 - Pomona, CA @ Pomona Fairgrounds
» 6/21 - San Francisco, CA @ Pier 30/32
» 6/22 - Ventura, CA @ Seaside Park
» 6/25 - Phoenix, AZ @ Cricket Pavilion
» 6/26 - Las Cruces, NM @ NMSU Practice Field
» 6/28 - Salt Lake City, UT, venue TBA
» 6/29 - Denver, CO @ Invesco Field at Mile High
» 7/1 - Maryland Heights, MO @ Verizon Wireless Amphitheater
» 7/2 - Bonner Springs, KS @ Verizon Wireless Amphitheater
» 7/3 - Dallas, TX @ Superpages.com Center
» 7/5 - Selma, TX @ Verizon Wireless Amphitheater
» 7/6 - Houston, TX @ Sam Houston Race Park
» 7/9 - Atlanta, GA @ Lakewood Amphitheater
» 7/10 - Orlando, FL @ Central Florida Fairgrounds
» 7/11 - Tampa, FL @ Vinoy Park
» 7/12 - Miami, FL @ Bicentennial Park
» 7/13 - Jacksonville, FL @ St. Johns County Fairgrounds
» 7/14 - Charlotte, NC @ Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre
» 7/15 - Virginia Beach, VA, venue TBA
» 7/16 - Columbia, MD @ Merriweather Post Pavilion
» 7/17 - Cleveland, OH @ Time Warner Cable Amphitheater
» 7/18 - Detroit, MI @ Comerica Park
» 7/19 - Toronto, ON, venue TBA
» 7/20 - Montreal, QC, venue TBA
» 7/23 - Mansfield, MA @ Tweeter Center
» 7/24 - Darien Center, NY @ Darien Lake Performing Arts Center
» 7/25 - Camden, NJ @ Susquehanna Bank Center
» 7/26 - Uniondale, NY, venue TBA
» 7/28 - Englishtown, NJ @ Raceway Park
» 7/29 - Burgettstown, PA @ Post Gazette Pavilion
» 7/30 - Cincinnati, OH @ Riverbend Music Center
» 7/31 - Noblesville, IN @ Verizon Wireless Music Center
» 8/1 - Milwaukee, WI @ Marcus Amphitheatre
» 8/2 - Tinley Park, IL @ First Midwest Bank Amphitheatre
» 8/3 - Minneapolis, MN, venue TBA
» 8/5 - Saskatoon, SK, venue TBA
» 8/6 - Calgary, AB, venue TBA
» 8/8 - Boise, ID, venue TBA
» 8/9 - Seattle, WA, venue TBA
» 8/10 - Portland, OR, venue TBA
» 8/13 - Fresno, CA @ Save Mart Center
» 8/14 - San Diego, CA, venue TBA
» 8/15 - Mountain View, CA @ Shoreline Amphitheatre
» 8/16 - Wheatland, CA @ Sleep Train Amphitheatre Lot
» 8/17 - Carson, CA @ Home Depot Center

Planning on going to the Vans Warped Tour or any other big music fests this year? Be sure to join the You R Here community, where you can upload your concert photos, videos and reviews. Go there now to check out coverage of last year's Warped Tour.

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Panic At The Disco Know Punctuation Better Than They Think.

15 Jan 2008 08:03:00 EST

Band can no longer call the Academy Is ..., Enuff Z'Nuff, (hed) p.e. its titular peers; grammar expert intrigued by band's use of periods for Pretty. Odd. LP.
By James Montgomery

Throughout history, rock and roll has been on a mission to systematically destroy punctuation.

This is primarily because punctuation is about rules, conformity and order — three things that rock, in its truest, purest essence, is vehemently opposed to. Semicolons, slashes, commas and periods most certainly do not rock, so in order to smash the system, they are co-opted by rock bands and used for nefarious, decidedly "rock" purposes, which is why we have band names like Motörhead, Mötley Crüe and Hüsker Dü (wanton umlaut abuse), songs like Led Zeppelin's "D'yer Mak'er" (an apostrophic calamity) and albums like At the Drive-In's In/Casino/Out (I have no idea).

In fact, rock has been at war with punctuation for so long now that seemingly every offense has been made — W.A.S.P., Enuff Z'Nuff, the Academy Is ..., Blue Öyster Cult, Blink-182, (hed) p.e. — though in recent years (perhaps owing a debt of gratitude to, uh, trailblazers like Neu! and Wham!), no mark as been as overused as the humble exclamation point.

Pioneered by post-apocalyptic rock outfit Godspeed You Black Emperor! (who would later change their name to Godspeed You! Black Emperor, for reasons apparent only to them) in 1994, exclamation-point abuse came to the forefront in 2000, thanks to bicoastal, post-millennial funk act !!! and bands like On! Air! Library! and Against Me! (who felt so strongly about exclamation points that they would include nine of them in the title of their 2006 live album Americans Abroad!!! Against Me!!! Live in London!!!.)

And even more recently, we've seen an exponential growth of exclamation-point abuse, thanks mainly to much-blogged acts like the Go! Team, Los Campesinos!, Die! Die! Die!, ¡Forward Russia!, Thunderbirds Are Now!, Oh No!! Oh My!! — bonus points for double exclamation points — and You Say Party! We Say Die!, which seemed to indicate that we were heading toward a terrifying future in which all new bands were required to choose names that sound like interjections.

But then, last week, something rather extraordinary happened. Bravely — and rather inexplicably — Panic at the Disco decided to drop the "!" from their name, stemming the tide of exclamation overuse and royally ticking off their loyal (and seemingly nuts) fanbase in the process. The bandmembers tried to play it off by saying the point was "never part of the name to us," and that they axed it because it was "annoying to write." But the damage had already been done ... as several of their fans pointed out on sites like PATDOnline.com, the loss of the exclamation point seemed to indicate that Panic were doing everything in their power to put their past behind them (though we're not sure why they'd want to do that.)

And it's not like Panic had foregone all punctuation-related shenanigans this time around ... after all, they decided to title their album Pretty. Odd., as in two seemingly disparate yet equal statements. Conjoined and yet separated by periods. Seriously.

So, really, what's the deal? By dropping the exclamation point and adding a pair of periods, are Panic bucking the system or paying homage to the long and winding history of rock and roll punctuation abuse? Were they ditching their past and heading full-bore into the future? Well, according to an expert, yes ... on all counts.

"Well, you have the right to call yourself whatever you want, and I guess that right extends to adding or removing exclamation points," Geraldine Woods, the author of Webster's New World Punctuation: Simplified and Applied, told MTV News. "It was always a rather interesting choice, because an exclamation point usually doesn't belong in the middle of a sentence, but I think creative people tend to play around with punctuation a great deal — e.e. cummings comes to mind — because there's a form of rebellion in it. I mean, you learn all the rules, and then you get to break them.

"It seems like [Panic have] put some thought into the changes ... they're not just changes for changes' sake," she added. "Pretty. Odd. works because it conjures up images of something that is both pretty and odd, which is interesting," she added. "And it's grammatically interesting, because without the period, the word 'pretty' would be modifying the word 'odd.' So it takes on a completely different context."

See, even though fans are mourning over the loss of the exclamation point, they can take solace in the fact that Panic are now w-a-a-y more grammatically interesting. Of course, there's no denying that their new namesake is decidedly less, well, urgent ... but hey, maybe for album number three, they'll bring the exclamation point back. After all, if rock history has showed us anything, it's that exclamation points rock.

"Exclamation points are used to convey emotion, to increase the immediacy of what you're saying. They instill a sense of emergency and urgency," Woods said. "To change that, especially for a rock band, seems kind of odd to me. There's certainly a reduced sense of 'panic' in Panic at the Disco now."

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