Panda invites N.L. to the record shop - By N.L. Belardes

What’s it like to be groped by a punk rocker you’ve never met before? I guess it depends on your views of people who are trying really hard to shock you. Unless, that’s just part of the punk code, that unwritten dogma of what it means to be a punk nowadays…

I walked into Going Underground Records. Storeowner, Ronald, also of Bakersfield punk band, The Neon Nazis, sat behind a kiosk (I’ve been calling him Rnld and he’s fed up with that, even though that’s his screen name). Panda hung out near Ronald while another musician from Loser Life leaned against a record display. A young lady stood next to him as if waiting to hear Panda’s diatribe about to begin.

Right away I shook hands with Ronald, while Panda, surely filled with the idea of being shockingly punk, walked up, arms in an embrace and frisked my nuts like he was some kind of punk rock cop checking for an illegal Emo hernia. I didn’t enjoy it, but he didn’t shock me. He could have walked out in a jock strap on fire singing Loser Life hits into a chocolate-covered dildo and I would have acted the same. Whenever you show off, there’s a gimmick involved, and I was just there to observe the person behind the panda mask.


Panda talks at Going Underground Records

Let’s get to the pontificating of Panda, a local junior college history student with ambitions to be a historian and punk rock progressive… Panda wanted to talk about the article I had just published, “Panda and the Bakersfield progressive punk movement, revealed.” He thinks I don’t get it. I do. But dialogue is good, and if musicians want to describe their scene, I can listen.


Musician from Loser Life


An uninhibited torch bearer shows phallic mask

Panda and the progressive punks claim to carry the torch of punk rock. In carrying such a torch, they pull away from bands who seek mainstream songwriting and career development that might make them compromise genre or creative license. Guys like Panda avoid commercialism and seeking labels, period. He finds a sort of noble punk heroism in carrying a torch that others misrepresent as punk rock pretentiousness—and that goes even within the genre of punk rock as there are obvious differences within Bakersfield punk circles. “We don’t exclude people, though. Everyone is welcome. If they don’t want to be a part, that’s fine,” Panda said, illuminating that torch carrying means that more than one band can… OK I’ll say it… grab the fiery stick.


Panda grasps his torch of punk righteousness

Panda creates music, stays hip to the history of punk, publishes his music even if it means vinyl, and performs lots of shows across America, even in Europe. It’s a lifestyle that takes progressive punks through youth hostels, houses, and small venues across America and Europe. “We tour no matter what. We just want gas money from place to place. Some of these bands say things like they’re going on a three-week tour or they’re going to be on the Warped Tour. We live the lifestyle that gets the touring done, and we put out the music.” And so Panda believes carrying the so-called imaginary torch of progressive punk means he and a small group of Bakersfield punk musicians are more noble to punk because they live a poverty-stricken life of virtue as other anti-mainstream punks have supposedly done; and are virtuous because they aren’t famous, yet keep creating, keep touring, keep putting the hardcore sounds to vinyl because that’s what they can afford.

It’s creating, and churning out and performing, and grinding away from city to city in a global network of punk affiliates that welcomes the multi-layered sounds emanating from a globally progressing scene that has affiliates in Bakersfield. No, it’s not like joining a club. But it is a fraternity of sorts that self-declares punk rock righteousness by swinging a torch that they could theoretically lose (and a big trap door opens under their feet) for listening to or trying to create mainstream music.

But punk did become mainstream… Sub culture within sub culture within subculture?

And for some reason there is a punk code of ethics involved, which means you can’t change your mind and perform a different style of music. Once a punk, always a punk is the unwritten code. And if you, let’s say, suddenly turn emo, or metal, or ska, then you have relinquished the torch of progressive punk rock. You’re out. I’m guessing you lose respect at least in punk rock circles, though you might still have the respect of being a great musician. Though I doubt that from Panda.

If being a punk means thumbing your nose at the material aspects of society, then that’s good. These guys don’t want to create music that ever gets compromised, or ever gets on a label where they would have to be anything that they themselves haven’t created.

Makes you wonder, though, if people were living life like Panda, under a code of punkdom, if suddenly creating a song like “Donut Shop”, would punk poverty still be a virtue? Or would the torch be reinvented once again by the power of mainstream punk? Or does being in the code of progressive punks means the sounds will always be hardcore… what is hardcore? Is it just more primal?

Well isn’t that the reverse of mainstream music? The punk understream does not allow the mainstream punk and thus becoming an antithesis to itself?

It gets confusing.

Even Panda seemed at a loss for words. A few times Ronald questioned Panda. His friend talked some but mostly stated that he and Panda were writing history papers on punk. I asked what cities Panda’s friend was focused on. He mentioned the LA area. I told him to talk to Howard Owens about some LA punk history. I think he ignored that comment.


Panda symbolizes his right to defend against babytalk

And then Panda looked at me, “And we want you to review our stuff. And we don’t even want a good review, because you never say anything bad about the bands. You could criticize them once in a while. The scene needs that. We would never want a good review.”

Oh I see. I get him but he doesn’t get me. “I look at the overall scene and try to draw attention to it. For one, I’m helping to illuminate the Bakersfield music scene. And I do get controversial. Did you read the article about the director and filmmaker I posted today? I doubt if the Christian sector is going to totally agree with me suggesting a director might have been directing porn.

“The scene couldn’t handle bad reviews from me. I got enough criticism and hate mail for using the term ‘bar bands’, or saying a drummer drank alcohol. If I started being negative about the Bakersfield music scene, instead of illuminating, I would just be kicking up dust, and then an eventual dust storm, and then, instead of someone outside of the scene thinking, ‘Bakersfield is where the music is at’, they might not be able to tell what the scene was amid viewing all the chaos of the storm.” Then I pointed to each person in the room. “But there’s plenty of room for reviewers. If you want it done, why don’t you write the bad reviews, or you, or you, or you…”

That’s a lot of talk from youth. If someone wants it done. They should just get off their asses and do it. Or fucking start paying me to be a bitch.

Isn't that what Panda was talking about? They carry the torch because they get off their asses and make the punk music and tour all over the world?

Perhaps a punk can't review because in their code of ethics it's all about punk, so it takes someone outside of the code to write about the music scene, which means I could never be a punk because I write about mainstream music? Right? Wrong. See the trap?

But that’s OK. Progressive punk rocks can declare a torch, and all the old timer hardcore punks in town can claim to have held it. But there are a whole lot of torches in Bakersfield being held in many different genres, and even more lighting the entire world, and they come in all shapes and sizes, and some even lead to labels. And I don’t really care about the torches anyway. I just listen to the music, because I like music.


Prepped for a comedic war of punkdom vs. mainstream


Not really a declaration of war but a statement


Sort of a comedy statement that, "We're just who we are."
Can any of us help who we are?
Baby powder donations can be sent to Loser Life

This entry was posted by N.L. Belardes, on Friday, July 14, 2006. You can leave your response.