ASS-END OFFEND 2005 Summer Euro-Smash Mother Fucker

Before I begin, let it be known to all: The punks in Eastern Europe know how to put on a fucking show! I have never seen this much enthusiasm, sincerity, generosity, comradery, ...should I keep going? I am permanently inspired. Now we’ll start at the beginning...

June 27th - Pocatello, ID - Our first night of tour. The show was in a park and our merch got soaked by the sprinkler system that kicked on during the middle of a band’s set and everyone fled. I’m sure passersby were entertained by all of it. After the show we ended up at a party at some apartment. Some guy got offended that they had written ‘Fuck the U.S.A’ on their wall. So he left and returned with a drunk, crazed army fuckhead jock who recently returned from Iraq. I was leaving the apartment when he came into the hallway. He was about 6 feet from me when he pulled a gun out of the front of his pants and raised it, pointing it at my face as I quickly stepped back into the apartment and locked the door. I could hear him outside saying he was going to ‘fucking kill everyone’. One of the girls knew the guy and she went out into the street with him where they screamed at each other while we left. It has been a long time since I’ve had a gun pointed at me and I wasn’t expecting it. Things can get fucked up so fast! This was a discouraging first day of tour, with 9 weeks to go. The right wing needs to open their fucking eyes and understand that despising the U.S. for its human rights abuses and its neocolonialist agenda does not default someone as a supporter of terrorism, and that freedom is a void ideal in the absence of equality.

June 28th - Reno, NV - Before the show watching drunk homeless dude harassing people and getting some guys to buy him beer because he was 86’d from the gas station, then leaving before they returned so they drank his beer. Later we heard that he pulled a knife on someone and they beat him up. Oh, and the show was fun.

July 1st - Oakland, CA - The Hazmat is a crazy place, to say the least. People were lighting off firecrackers everywhere while bands played and fucking in the hallway by the bathroom, Marcus relentlessly trying to light me on fire with a cigarette lighter. When we played, somebody set off some firecrackers right next to my face. My right ear was completely deaf for the next 4 days. We stayed with friends in west Oakland & someone tried to break in to the van but luckily Brent was sleeping in the van and he scared them off with his big stick.

July 4th - Seattle, WA - Another fun show, but I hate the 4th of July. America: Fuck You; Marcella Ricky: rest in peace.

July 5th-6th - We spent 2 days with our friends Danny & Spoon in Olympia; built a loft in the van and I bashed my thumb in the sliding door of the van. My entire thumb was purple and gross.

July 7th/8th - Drove to Seattle, got on the plane at 1:30 pm, flew over Hudson Bay, Greenland, Iceland, Scotland, and into Amsterdam, then got onto a smaller plane, into Warsaw, PL July 8th at noon. Only 11½ hours went by for us so it was like midnight at noon. This was the first time I had ever left the United States (except for childhood camping trips to Canada -but that doesn’t count for much). I felt as if I had a great weight lifted from me, like I had been cured of a lifelong disease!

Josh bought his tickets separately from us so he was on another flight. So we met him, Wojtek, Maja, and their friend Karolina & her dog Gappa. It was very surreal. We were getting into a van with 3 polish punks and a really smelly polish dog. I was very uncertain of what I should expect. First we drove to the El Blaska Squat and met everyone there, then downtown via the bus that has a fee but it’s not enforced at all so no one pays it. We walked all over the old part of Warsaw in a delirious stupor. After taking a variety of busses, getting lost, we finally made it back to the squat and getting much needed sleep.

July 9th - Ciechanowiec, PL - Daria, one of the squatters who lived at El Blaska, made us yummy crepes and tea. Then we joined her and her boyfriend Phillip on another excursion near downtown, to a market where we got drenched in rain. Then we left Warsaw, drove through small farming communities to Ciechanowiec for our first show in Europe. Along the road in the countryside there are teenage girls in super short skirts. Josh asks and it is confirmed: they are prostitutes. Another interesting thing we noticed right away is that there are very few SUV’s (we might have seen 2 the entire trip). Ciechanowiec had a population of 20,000 people before the war and 5,000 after. The population has still not regrown. We originally were to play in Bialystok but the squat was evicted there so Darek from Oreiro got us on this show. Before the show we ate at an outside bar/ café, and they had a huge pot of free vegetarian food. Everyone went fucking nuts at the show, then went back to the bar and we watched drunk guys dancing on the tables and falling all over each other.

July 10th - Before leaving in the morning we went to the outside agriculture museum on the side of town. There is so much old culture that is preserved. Then we spent the day driving through Lithuania and into Latvia. The countryside is beautiful here. We drove all over in the dark couldn’t find Josh’s friend’s house so we are going to sleep by a gas station.

July 11th - Valga, Est. - Ate breakfast at the border of Latvia and Estonia on the beach of the Baltic Sea. Visited the park in Mazsalaca - ‘Skanakalna Dabas Parka’ and walked the trails along a lot of old wood carvings. Today’s drive was much shorter than the all-day drive yesterday (actually Wojtek did all the driving and we didn’t do shit!- This is one of the nicest things about this part of our tour!). There was a really awesome band practicing when we first got to the club called No Fun, although they didn’t play the show with us. We met some kids who showed us to a grocery store. The show was awesome, lots of young kids and not a whole lot of drinking, probably no less than a show in the states. This is interesting because of the lack of underage drinking laws, and because beer is cheaper than most soda and even bottled water! These kids had so much energy, it was the best feeling to be around them. They are not shy or self conscious. The U.S. punks could learn so much from them! The freedoms they have are not taken for granted. They were asking for our autographs after we played and I found myself asking for theirs! A lot of kids ask for autographs and photos, it’s not saying they think you are a big rock star, it was just a gesture to be friends, at least this is how it seems to me. We had a lot of good conversations concerning social politics, DIY culture, and the differences in the challenges the punk scenes face in our respective countries. We recorded an interview for a local zine, but by this time everyone was really drunk and there was a lot of trailing off so I’m not so sure the interview will turn out too well. All the bands we played with tonight are from Latvia. We had to rent power converters for our amps and tonight Tom forgot to use his and it blew a fuse in his amp. So we borrowed and who knows when we will find a new fuse. I am still awake and it’s 5:30 am. It’s so hard to get to sleep every night, my brain just won’t shut off. We drove through three countries today and into a fourth one tomorrow. I have never been so far away from home and I have been on the verge of a nervous breakdown, but at the same time I am in love with this place. Everyone here seems so sincere; it has revived what little hope I have for the human race. I am afraid that Americanization will fuck it up. I am afraid of a lot of things right now. Going back to the U.S., and worse: Montana. I am also really worried about my Grandmother, she’s really sick and I worry that something will happen while I’m gone. I want to be able to tell her all about this trip. She has been a music teacher her whole life, and is still an amazing piano player. It has always been her dream to travel the world playing music.

July 12th - Tallin, Est. - We met up with JMKE and we walked all over downtown Tallin. The other band we played with: No More Rock Stars, were really good and they were the first straight-edgers I’ve met over here. They were really nice guys. I found it interesting though that they were completely against politics, be it anarchism or capitalism, they had no opinion. Tom got accosted by a prostitute (She said “hey big boy” and proceeded to rub a golf club against his junk) and Brent got shoved by some big dude, I re-smashed my already smashed thumb in the very same place. Wojtek was stopped by a cop when he went to bring the van around to load up (and Tom was bothered by yet another prostitute). We waited in the street wondering what happened to Wojtek and finally he returned and we were very relieved. Then to Villu and Tirts apartment to sleep. Well, I went to sleep, Josh, however, put some serious hurt on a bottle of vodka.

July 13th - Today we got on the ferry and floated over to Helsinki, parked under a bridge to relax, walked downtown, then to the squat, which used to be a fire station. We made jokes that the fire station was probably closed down because the fire trucks couldn’t get down the terrible road! The first floor there is a practice space, second floor is the big room where bands play, and a kitchen. The third floor has a small room with really filthy barracks, and a big room with a upper loft to the Anarchist Black Cross office. There is a lot of activism here, and it shows in all the flyers from past events and huge syndicalist flags everywhere. The Hero Dishonest people showed up and hung out but we were the only band to play, the band from Israel didn’t make it. We ate vegan stew and everyone drank and I tried to sleep in the barracks but all the dust gave me terrible allergies and I ended up on a couch somewhere. Finland is far enough north that there are only a few hours of semi-darkness at night.

July 14th - Before leaving Helsinki, Marku showed us to look at old churches. My feet hurt from walking so much! After the show we slept in the attic of a squat where Brent found Twin Peaks books that were translated to Finnish. We later learned the attic was a free store and Brent could have kept the books.

July 15th - Today we drove back to Helsinki, took the ferry back to Tallin, then drove to Rakvere, a small town of 22,000. There is an old castle that was built in the 13th century. We met up with JMKE again and the show was a blast. I met some really friendly racists, which was awkward because I told them I am anti racist and they still wanted to be friends. Fuck! I met a kid who had never met an american before, never been in a fight and never known anyone who owned a gun. Oh, how I wish I could say the same! (I’m not a gun control advocate but most people who have guns in Montana are fucking idiots about it). We stayed with a girl and her parents. Wojtek tells me that in Poland when you turn 18 you must either go to college, or do community service for a year, or serve in the military for one year. New recruits are put through terrible initiation pranks and suicide is common.

July 16th - Fono Fest took place in a field outside Cesis. The show started at noon and we got there in the evening. There was probably about 600 people. But by the time we played at 4:30 in the morning (the show went all night) there were about 60 people. Josh went to Riga to see his friend for the next few days.

July 17th - We got little sleep, ate an awesome breakfast, met the AntiManiax- our companions for the next 9 days, and drove to the Green Club in Vilnius in an old run down building (which has just been evicted to make way for new development). I met a Lithuanian skinhead but the conversation didn’t get very far because of language barrier. Then we ended up at a straight edge guy -Dennis’s place where there were kids who traveled from other countries. People from Belarus, Poland, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, and the U.S. all in a room together trying to communicate, usually using English. I checked my email to find that my grandmother has been in the hospital for three days now with pneumonia.

July 18th - Went to a store and asked for an international calling card. The cashier gave me a dirty look and shook her head. I bought some food, walked out and sat down for a minute. Two security guards came out, pulled out whipa-sticks and stood there looking intimidating so I left. Okay, not everyone here is nice after all! I guess there are assholes in all areas of the world. It’s unavoidable. Then we drove to Kaunas. I bought a bottle of Kvass (a drink made from the acid of rye bread -tastes sort of like root beer) which looked as if it was made by a local business. It turned out to be made by Coke. I had been tricked! Antis café was unorganized but still really rad, it got more and more packed as the night wore on. Bieska, who set up the show, had us stay with her, her parents and grandparents, and a rat named Bulga (they all live in a house that was pretty nice, although there was no operational toilet in the entire house.

July 19th - We were scheduled to play in Klaipeda, Lithuania at Club Melnarage but nazi skinheads put a bunch of people in the hospital a few days before during a show so the club was closed down. So: Day off. We went swimming in a small lake, stayed at Bieska’s again.

July 20th - Drove to Riga, met up with Josh, ate pizza, went to the Depo and watched a show. The organizers warned us that tomorrow night’s show might not go so well because nazi skinheads always come to shows when a political band or a band from america plays and the Nazis in Riga don’t fuck around.

July 21st - Walked all over the old part of Riga, drove by a parked cop car, I looked inside and there was an officer sleeping in the drivers seat! Went to the Depo wondering if we were going to get lynched by nazi’s. They never showed. We had a blast and the anti maniax slayed through every song. They were a lot of fun to tour with; very friendly people.

July 22nd - On the way to Kuldiga I saw a boy and girl, probably 8 years old, on the side of the road in a small town and they were trying to hitch a ride! Zabadaks is a DIY youth center with an upstairs with barracks for travelers who need a place to sleep. These were much nicer than the Helsinki barracks. I played table tennis with a guy who spoke not one word of English and we had a blast. We walked all over Kuldiga, the most beautiful place I’ve ever seen! A bridge goes over the river that separates the town and there is a waterfall. Also, I don’t think I have ever breathed air as pure as this. There is a cheap liquor store called Krustpunkts (means Cross point, but ironic because many punks buy from there). The Kuldiga flag bears much resemblance to the anarcho-syndicalist flag. Perhaps only I would recognize this.

July 23rd - Kolonija was a weeklong diy youth camp located in the middle of a field somewhere in between Alytus and Pivasivnai. Tonight is the last night of their camp. During the antimaniax’ set some kids from the camp blew and juggled fire. I wondered how long before they set fire to all the dry grass surrounding the whole camp. The show was over by 10pm and the organizer asked us to play another show in a town 50 kilometers away. The place was a fancy restaurant in a sort of resort community. When we first arrived an old flamenco band was playing. We felt very out of place. The guy who set up this show had made flyers and we were on them, even though he had not asked us or the antimaniax about it until 2 hours before it happened.

July 25th - Warsaw, Poland - Got very little sleep and walked all over downtown Gdansk. We’ve been trying to get a show in Berlin for tomorrow but it’s not going to work out so Wojtek had a friend set up a show for us tomorrow in Wroclaw. Today’s show in Warsaw has been the height of the tour, and really, the height of all my experiences going to shows. I wonder if any show will ever compare to this one ever again. The Fabryka squat is the only fully standing building in the center of an area of demolished buildings all around. We met up with the Against Me dudes and Warren showed us to the roof where we looked out over the area of rubble surrounding us. We could also see the downtown area in the distance. We were fed awesome vegan dinner. Toward the end of the night there were about 200 people there. During our set people danced really hard and had much fun. This is my first time seeing a ‘leap frog’ circle pit and a ‘row boat’ pit. Fucking hilarious!

July 26th - First we went to the squat where Wojtek, Maja, Karolina and others live. They made us dinner. We invited Karolina to join us for the rest of the trip and she agreed. Then we went to the venue, another squatted building downtown. We played for about 30 people, a really long set, walked all over downtown, rode the bus back to the squat.

July 27th - Vsetin, Czech Republic - We got searched at the border because there is a rave happening this weekend and people are bringing drugs with them. Ironically the only suitcase they searched of ours was mine, the only straight edger in the group. In Vsetin, we went to the river and dipped our feet in and skipped rocks. The show was a lot of fun. Lots of people in a small space. Karolina spilled a full beer all over me and then laughed and said it was all my fault. Sure, pick on the straight-edger. After the show I got into an argument with the show organizer. I have a tattoo that I designed that has a circle-a and hammer& sickle. He accused me of being a ‘communist’. His only definition of communism is the soviet one, which is possibly the worst example ever. I tried to explain that I am not a Leninist and I believe in individual freedom but I also believe in equal opportunity which is highly ignored in capitalist systems. He would not hear my side of the story. I understand that many people in Eastern Europe suffered because of the soviet army and they equate the hammer and sickle with the swastika. But the meaning of the Hammer & Sickle is simple: Workers of Industry and of Agriculture Unite! To say this symbol only represents soviet style communism would be to ignore both it's initial meaning, and the fact that the symbol was used by many Libertarian-Communist groups and parties. I am not saying that I adhere to or even agree with the ideals of every group, but the Russian Revolution had such great potential and was unfortunately ruined by authoritarian ideals. It should go without saying that the only true and realistic form of Communism is an Anti-Authoritarian one. It is time to take back the Hammer & Sickle as a symbol for what it really is: a symbol of the necessary unity of the impoverished people of all nations to destroy the exploitive tendencies of capitalism, nothing more!

The origin of the Circle-A symbol is not very clear, but it is said to have been first seen during the Spanish Civil War in 1936. Later, French Anarchists used the old slogan "Anarchy is Order" (Proudhon) to give new meaning to the circle. Speaking of the Spanish Civil War, there have been so many books written on this subject and the circumstances were very complex, and in no way am I trying to simplify them, merely giving one brief detail: One of the unfortunate reasons for it eventually being unsuccessful was due to the breaking apart of unity between the Anarchist militias and the Communist militias, ironically this was in part due to the Soviets' involvement near the end of the uprising. It is clearly evident that the only way the human race has any hope of bringing about a new society based on Social Equality, Economic Equality and Personal Freedom is through the unity of all anti-authoritarians, whether they consider themselves to be under the banner of Anarchism, Communism, or no banner at all.............Umm...........So after the show we stayed with a Russian guy who spoke not a word of English, but we had conversations anyway.

July 28th - Today we went to 2 of the 3 Auschwitz camps. I won’t say much about this except that anyone who denies the holocaust needs to visit Auschwitz and see the mountain of human hair, the stoves made specifically for burning bodies, the photographs of a great number of the inmates, which line the walls of the buildings. We felt that we somehow owed it to ourselves to see this place. Krakow was the last show in Europe. Then went walking around the town, left Krakow at midnight, got to Warsaw in the early morning, said our goodbyes and got on the plane.

July 30th through August 27th - After getting off the plane, going through good old paranoid american airport inspection, the tour was only half over. 4 weeks of long drives, expensive gas, arguments, frustration, barely making it show to show; then coming home broke as hell. Any DIY band who’s done a U.S. tour knows how this is. I still had a lot of good times during this part of the trip, met some really friendly people, saw friends made from past trips, but this spiel is long enough already, so I’m quitting here. Since coming home, and playing our final show, and not being in a band for the first time in 5 years, I am yearning to get back into it. It seems I have more panic attacks if I’m not screaming at someone on a daily or even weekly basis. It is somehow therapeutic.
-Matt Svendsen

This section by Dan Lawlor:

Life seems to really begin after the adventures are over. It’s been an amazing summer! Things I never would have imagined I would be doing say 5 years ago I’ve had the incredible opportunity to do these past summer months.

Now that it’s winter in Montana (and this one seems to be fitting the endearing stereotype we seem to have conveniently forgotten about Montana winters over the last 4 or 5 years: cold, heaps of snow, colder and never-ending). I find myself once again in the lethargic mode of becoming ever dependent on the in-doors, heat, and staying warm. This means a lot of things. All the shit put on shelves and forgotten about, takes on a renewed quality of interest and or inspiration. Time to sit down with loads of coffee, tea, or alcohol and get some shit done finally! Summer always fills me with the overwhelming desire to let loose, live adventurously, and the experience-it-now-and-reflect-upon-it-later-in-writing feeling. I tried to keep a daily journal of touring for two months this summer. But I found I lost interest in dryly slopping out the days motions and decided to leave the writing for future times when I could sit down and form a more introspective “big picture” angle on it all. That and who wants to sit and write when you could be out interacting with new exciting people and fully appreciating where you are by having fun with new friends and new places.

The international DIY punk scene is what we’re talking about here. People sharing ideas, music, frustration, and well...life. Now, I won’t be so shallow as to say the music is all that it’s about, because that is just a small facet to a large fucked up synthetic diamond, formed of human excrement; but still a gem, nonetheless. Music just happened to be the medium we chose to represent ourselves across the seas in foreign lands this summer touring as the band ass-end offend. We did not hold any answers to life’s many nuances. Instead we raised our voices and unleashed some aggression along with everyone else who showed up to the shows we played. What we found were rooms full of excited dancing kids most everywhere we went in the Baltic countries. Now take into consideration that a lot of this area has only been free of Soviet occupation for less than twenty years. Sometimes in the u.s.a. we forget (in the midst of bitching about how fucked up things are here) just how lucky we have been comparatively to other places around the globe. Basically we have always been able to freely organize, discuss, and protest what we want legally in a nonviolent way. I’m not saying that everything is happy-peachy-keen here in the good ‘ol u.s. of ‘merica cause that certainly is not the case. All I’m saying is that it could be hell of a lot worse. We met an extraordinary guy named Villu and played with his legendary Estonian punk band J.M.K.E. Sometime in the late eighties Villu was locked up in a mental asylum pretty much for writing political lyrics about the fall of Soviet Russia and oppression in the area at the time. Of course, now, things are much better than they were, but it’s just amazing to hear stories from people who experienced it first hand and not that long a go.

More than once we were posed with the question “why Eastern Europe and not the more popular bigger cities in the west”? Well a lot of that has to do with Josh Vanek, who originally sparked the plausible idea of ass-end offend going to Europe in the first place. Having served in the peace corps in Latvia and also taking another Missoula band (The Volumen) on a closely mirrored tour a few years ago, Josh had a good framework for us to go on. We threw out our collective tentacles and started contacting anyone we could think of with any ties to D.I.Y. music in Eastern Europe. After a few failed attempts at collaborating with organizers and lots of scribbled out routes on maps of the Baltics, we finally had a plan in place not three weeks before we flew out, barely. The first people we met in Poland were Wojtek and his girlfriend Maja, who would be our drivers for the next eighteen days across Eastern Europe and into Finland via ferry. They quickly became our good friends and helped us feel more comfortable and at ease as it was the first time 4 of us had been over seas. The language barrier was more like a language “pothole”, meaning it was less of a problem than I had expected at first. Most younger people had been taught a good amount of English in school. So as long as we kept the slang to a minimum, communicating was surprisingly smooth. Most nights we found ourselves in various squats and former squats that were now paid for by groups of people who either lived there or helped organize events and shows in the spaces. It was incredibly inspiring to see this happening with such efficiency and passion. Only on a few occasions (mostly in between shows while driving) did we have to find our own meals and beer. At almost every venue we played there was someone there who had gone to the trouble of cooking delicious vegan meals for the bands and organizers to fill up on before or after the show. The attention payed to this sort of treatment is something that is becoming all too uncommon at shows in the u.s. I cannot stress how nice it is to get a free meal when you’re out traveling and trying to be as frugal as possible with what little money you have. All in all, the 3 weeks we spent traveling through Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Finland, and the Czech Republic were 3 of the most exciting and memorable weeks of my life. If a helicopter fell out of the sky and chopped me into a thousand pieces tomorrow, I can honestly say I would die a satisfied person, but there are countless more adventures awaiting. I plan on making a move out to Portland, OR as soon as I scrounge up enough money to make it happen. Along with a few other close friends, I hope to continue to be able to play music and be a part of this always interesting community of incredible individuals who make things happen with what few resources are available. Until that happens I’ll be right here in Missoula, MT attempting to save money on my shitty ass kitchen wages and trying to stay warm though the next few months of winter. Nöströvié!! (‘cheers’ in Polish)

Nice patches, dude. An interloper’s guide to squatting Eastern Europe. -by Džoš Vanek

Howdy. My name is Josh, and between 1997 and 2000 I spent about two and half years living in Latvia, a Baltic Sea-bordered land of enchantment. I was a high school teacher with the U.S. Peace Corps. Since leaving in 1999 I’ve been back four times to visit friends, see music and to bring back my friends. The following thing struck me as a hopefully a good complement to what I’m positive will be a thorough and interesting European tour diary that Dan and Matt have done. The following is my highlights reel with some complementary (free) analysis and, well, you know, context about all this, if you’re interested.

Some Background: I met Ass-End Offend at some point in the year 2000 in Missoula. Aside from having a daggone unwieldy name, they’re a ferociously awesome punk group. Hang tight, there’ll be some more explanation about that later. Between 2000 and 2004 they self-released three great singles. After witnessing them get tighter, better and take more and more musical chances, I asked them if they would record an LP for Wäntage. They said they would, drove down to San Francisco and came back with 12 songs. At some point in late 2004, working with Ass-End Offend on the “Character Assassins” LP, and seeing how hard they worked to tour the entire U.S. behind it, we started to discuss how to get them to Europe. Ass-End Offend are Tom, Brent, Dan and Matt. They play hardcore DIY punk, and are for the most part from Montana. Most of them now live in Missoula, with the exception of Brent who lives up in Kalispell, near Glacier National Park. Their music is heavy, fast, desperate and alternately violent, hopeful, gloomy and inspiring. Probably for me, most important hook is that the songs are interesting, short and tonally, always really satisfying. Tom invested in good bass equipment at some point, and added a thick, deep dimension to what had started only as a pretty solid hardcore group. Brent is a punk vet whose playing is really unique and musically ambitious, Matt was a later addition who came from some good angry screechy punk groups (Venal IV and the Antidifrancos) his second guitar added substantial heft and power to AEO’s attack. Dan Lawlor well, Dan is a Lawlor, and Lawlors can drum.

At some point, we started talking about it, and lo and behold they were all excited by the idea of going to Europe, knew it wasn’t going to happen easily, and were committed to working hard at it. For close to a year, we met monthly to plan, set out tasks for ourselves, update on our progress and rethink our strategy. After doing some early budgeting, we knew that in order to make it work, we’d need a couple of things in place 1) additional dollars to rent a van and equipment once we got there, and 2) plane tickets. The rest, we figured we could get taken care of.

After deciding that plane tickets would be our individual responsibilities, the real hump to get over was finding the dollars to make the van and equipment rental reality. We decided to ask our friends if they’d help us raise money, and folks resoundingly came out of the woodwork and put together the Punk Rock Prom (II). 6 total Missoula bands played, each played a couple of another’s songs. Punk Rock Prom, after all was said and done, was a blast and raised just over $2000 for the tour.

Originally we wanted to spend our time split between western and eastern Europe, with the idea that we’d make better money in the west, and spend less in the east. For numerous reasons, none of them particularly interesting, touring the west didn’t work out. We’d hoped to tour with some other bands and then we’d hoped to get help from a hardcore booking company, and both didn’t materialize. We regrouped, and decided that we’d focus on Poland, the Baltic countries and Finland. After getting back, I honestly am glad to have gone where we did.

Euro-Highlights Reel
Just after the fourth of July, we boarded planes for Warsaw, Poland and spent the next three weeks tooling around eastern Europe’s Midwestern-style farmland in a hot Mercedes van named “Biedrona” (ladybug in Polish). The whole damn thing was a lot of fun, and it opened my eyes to DIY culture, squatting and modern society’s best example of conscientious objection to capitalism. I think overall what I enjoyed most about it, was going with a purpose, rather than just as a vacation. I’m all for vacations, don’t get me wrong, but having the objective of getting to shows, and making things work as best as possible, having fun, with a bunch of people from my home was incredibly satisfying now that I look back at it.

Moreover, setting up shows over the internet, and really only communicating with people over email, and finally getting to meet them was a strange and pretty exciting experience too. Having the reason for being there with a band gave me a reason to easily meet people, which really enriched the whole thing in a way that traveling as a tourist hasn’t really ever done for me. Honestly other than one or two cheesier promoter types, everyone we met was really interesting, proud of their towns and scenes and incredibly hospitable. My favorite towns and venues, and the reasons are as follows:

Elblaska Squat (Warsaw, Poland)
“Elba” as I think it’s called was the administrative offices for a trucking company, I believe. It’s a two story building on a three or four acre piece of fenced land with some dilapidated warehouses and loading docks. The place is well along in the dis-use, disrepair end of things, but functions well and houses between 10 and 15 folks. This was the first place we went after getting off the plane, and it was my first ever, real-deal squat. The folks who lived there were really welcoming, after the initial, “what’s the deal with these clowns” sort of once-overing. A couple dudes were out in the yard welding bike frames together, other people were reading, a few friends came by to drop off some furniture, and there was a big weedy field where we played Frisbee until passing out from exhaustion. In the morning, a nice girl named Daria cooked us pancakes, and we went to try to do some shopping at Warsaw’s legendary market. It started to rain buckets and we aborted the mission.

Kino/disco (Ciehanowiec, Poland)
One of the first exchanges we had upon meeting Wojtek (“voyteck”), our driver on the tour, was learning from him that the first show that I’d booked, in Bialystok, en route to Latvia, had been cancelled. In a pretty excellent introductory move, Wojtek put out a call to folks involved in the punk scene to see if there were any shows the band could get on. Within a few hours we learned that there was a show in Ciehanowiec (“chee-ha-nov-its”) and that the promoter was happy to add Ass-End to his bill. The town was due east from Warsaw, about two hours drive. Ciehanaowiec is a town of maybe 4,000 people, with a nice pair of lakes at its center and a big ethnographic museum. The promoter’s name wad Darek, and he had done a good job getting the word out. Rural eastern Poland on a Saturday night! I was a little apprehensive, but the turnout was great, we were treated to some vegan pasta and sauce, cauliflower salad and Lech beer. Darek is an incredibly nice guy, and he threw a good show. Most of the openers were decent rock and roll, or punk. Ass-End slayed and sent the crowd at the former disco into a spastic frenzy. Darek’s band, Oreiro, who have a record out on Trujaca Fala from Sopot, were excellent, melodic, heavy, dramatic hardcore. Definite hometown favorites who had the kids literally bouncing off the walls. The show had to be over by 11PM or so we ended up at a beer garden, where we were approached by local, middle aged women and told we must dance. I did. Tom did. And that was that. We spent the night at Darek’s aunt’s home by the local school dormitory. In the morning, while Wojtek installed a new stereo and a fan, we went and checked out the mill pond, old farm equipment and houses at the ethnographic museum. To have somewhat happened onto the show, we came away ahead in about fifteen ways.

Rockiklubi (Valga, Estonia) Valga, Estonia is a little border town of about 15,000 people. “E-stonia” as its called because of it’s tech saavy population, is by far the furthest along of the former soviet republics. That’s largely because it’s right in Finland’s back yard, small, ethnically pretty homogenous and concepts like good government and transparency were piped in for years via Finnish television, so that when they had the chance, Estonia new what they wanted to do, swallowed the toughest pills earliest, and have seen economic growth steadily every since. Arrr, so anyway, Valga is a town down in the south end of Estonia where a guy named Ivo had set us up at his “Rockiklubi.” The venue was the second floor of a public sauna in one of the shitty ubiquitous apartment buildings that are all over the former Soviet Union. The space was a great DIY venue, and Ivo was a really nice guy who did sound, and let all the bands stay at the venue so they could return home the next day, after missing the last buses. Most of the bands had come from nearby Latvia, and after the show each 17 year old member proceeded to drink close to 6 gallons of beer and smoke 45 cigarettes over the next 7 hours. I’ve experienced this type of deal before and its appeal lasts about 37 minute for me. So, I found a nice quiet landing above the club part of the venue, and crashed for several hours. Meanwhile the local teens got plowed and swore a bunch and polluted themselves, which is what you do when you get away from your family (with whom you live in a three room apartment until you’re 25). Hey-ho! Rockiklubi has a really unique feel. Go there and watch a band if you get a chance.

Zabadaks (Kuldiga, Latvia) After having spent the better part of four of five days in Riga, and at the beach, I was ready for Kuldiga’s small-town charms. Zabadaks is a large retrofitted barn that some ambitious locals have turned into the country’s best punk rock venue and community center. When I lived in Latvia, I lived just up the road from Kuldiga, and have some great memories of seeing cramped, wild shows in crazy basement spaces, and walking the town’s old winding streets with friends, so Kuldiga is always a bit of a homecoming somehow. The venue itself was given to NEKAC –an nonprofit dedicated to supporting noncommercial music and culture- by the city, and it was improved using hours of donated time and a decent sized EU grant. Now it functions as a truly positive, low-cost center for kids (mostly) from all over the region. Since I was there last with Volumen, they added lots of sleeping space to accommodate the kids who miss the last bus to stay for a show or movie. Zabadaks is thoroughly good vibes, and is an example of what more of us should try to do in the U.S. Their website, www.nekac.lv, has all kinds of pictures and explanation.

Laura Ziemele and Edžs run the place, and do so flawlessly. Laura is also responsible for some great silkscreened designs, such as “less hardcore, more music” and “dari pats” (Latvian for do-it-yourself). The show was well attended, however I missed most of it to catch up with friends who’d driven down to say hello.

Alytus Region (Alytus, Lithuania)
To say this deal was way the fuck in the sticks, is to put it mildly. We got to the town nearest the camp, and were provided with the requisite drunken, swearing-in-Polish (“kurwa”) local guide to get us the final 6 miles. Darius, an Alytus guy and hardcore.lt contact, had set up a summer camp called “Kolonija” for young people from his town. The theme was DIY, and they’d spent the week learning to cook, discussing politics, learning to blow fireballs and hanging out in the beautiful rolling hills of southern Lithuania.

The show was literally played on grass, much to the chagrin of the Antimaniax who were on this portion of the tour. It struck me as perfectly invigorating, we were fed, given beer, and paid fairly. There were about 20 kids, mostly 15 -17, or a bit younger, I’d guess. They seemed pretty into Ass-End and went perfectly apeshit for the more accessible songs of the Antimaniax. At some point Darius made it clear we could have a second show, if we wanted at a night club in Druskinkai. We accepted and drove for a couple hours further to this resort town, to a beautiful, high end club called Kolonada. Sure we were mistaken, and a little worried about what would happen if we weren’t, we found the manager, and asked what the deal was. Sure enough, this was the spot. Punk music on after the flamenco band! Everyone from the bands were pretty sketched out, just anticipating that a) reactions would be only negative or b) this was just some freak show type attraction for the yuppie clientele. Ass-End took the stage and cleared the place of all but five or six folks, one of whom was a well-known academic who took the mic and did some screaming. Antimaniax seized the opportunity to lecture Lithuania’s nouveau riche about their excessive lifestyles, albeit with far to much pompousness to be at all effective (for me). To see privileged western Europeans lecturing the emerging middle class of the former Soviet east about their excessive consumption is something I will always cherish for its sheer absurdity. The club’s manager fed us all extremely well, paid us fairly, and arranged us a free spot to spend the night. Weird, but positive, somehow.

Fabryka Squat (Warsaw, Poland)
Fabryka (factory) has got to be damn near the top of the list of the most ambitious projects that punks have ever been involved with. The place is a four story building sitting on a 10 acre plot of land right in the middle of Warsaw, Poland. Pulling up to it, my jaw dropped about three or four times, each further than the last. We pulled up and went up to check out the fucking castle of DIY squats. The first floor was pretty well bombed out, and the second was where the action happened, with a huge bar and distro area, a large hall with a stage and a big rec-room with couches. The third and fourth floors were all filled with apartment/studio type living arrangements. We climbed up on the roof with the drummer from Against Me! The place was fully set up to hold off attacking forces! Stacks of rotten eggs and empty bottles were all set up and ready for use, behind plywood battlements. The show was awesome, with a little head-bobbing for Ass-End Offend, and an apeshit crowd for Antimaniax and Against Me! This was my first experience with Against Me!, and the couple of them I met were pretty nice, though pretty spaced out after some massive drives across thousands of miles of shitty eastern Euro roads. The couple of songs I’d heard previously hadn’t grabbed me at all, but seeing them at Fabryka made me a believer. They play with the same kind of telepathy that bands like the Minutemen did.

A couple of other notes: the sound man was in Dezerter, one of the most famous punk bands to come from Poland! We saw our friend Darek from Oreiro at the show, and he informed us about the preparations for his marriage to his sweetheart in a couple weeks. Since we were there, I think the city government of Warsaw has taken over the property -which not surprisingly had a high commercial value- and sold it off to a business.

Commentary/Analysis: The more I think about the crusty/squatter/hardcore scene in eastern Europe, the more I’m really fascinated and excited by it. The philosophy of most folks, mostly from my conversations on this trip, and what I’ve read, is to live as much as possible outside of the capitalist system, which they equate directly with exploitation. I can see that philosophically there’s some credence to that, however I’m still pretty convinced that capitalism is a natural way to swap things, services, etc. with other people, and to date, there’s been no better way explained to me. The fact that every DIY show has a market place where cash is exchanged for records, patches, shirts and zines strikes me as a simple, but pure message about the inherent utility of currency, and that a market place has a real, honest freedom about it. If you feel like something’s not worth what they’re charging, don’t buy it, or see if they’ll sell it for less!

What excites me most about the squatter/DIY/hardcore scene is the monumental will these folks muster and ingenuity they draw upon to put together everything necessary to live a life outside of mainstream society. The folks involved with the DIY hardcore scene in eastern Europe get involved, and really, without 100% participation, there isn’t a scene. Fabryka squat was an awesome place, volunteer run, and across the board a real community undertaking. That community work part of things has always struck me as really the most valuable commodity within punk rock. You don’t like the cost of beer at the store, figure out how to make your own, or buy the old ones that are still alright, but past the use-before date. Don’t like paying rent? Find an old building and occupy it. Don’t like working as much as normal folks, or don’t like the type of work they do? Find work that suits you better and do as much of it as will meet your basic needs. It’s pretty ballsy stuff for the most part, and I salute people who figure out how to make it work and live it. There aren’t many of us who can figure out how to align our lives that much with our values, and while there are people among them who get preachy, there are jokers in every scene, and they shouldn’t speak for it. It does strike me, that for as active people are, folks tend to be active in a pretty stock set of ways: anti animal oppression and pro-veganism, anarchist or, anti-organized government, anti-war, pro-bike, pro-dreadlock and pro-metal hardcore. While I either agree with or respect most of those things, I’ve always been somewhat let down by the lack of dissention within the political philosophy and little musical experimentation within this scene. I dig power-chord metal rock as much as the next guy, but there’s much more to be done, and if DIY’s going to be more than a fad that people grow out of, then it needs people to start talking about realities like better government, and not just some bullshit “no heroes, no masters” sloganeering. Ahem!

I also really enjoy that folks from the DIY/hardcore/squatter scene practice the utmost in thrift, figuring out little scams for every damn thing from riding the trams without tickets to dumpstering vegetables for meals to living essentially rent free and tapping in to water and sewer. It’s a little naïve to assume that water and sewer don’t at some point present themselves as costs to other, normal people down the road (say through higher water and sewer costs), but, nothing’s perfect. Eastern European folks spend there summers canning the extra food their gardens and forests produce, so there’s already a pretty strong tradition of doing it yourself there, where nutrition and meals are concerned.

The few kernels I took away from this trip are as follows: 1) Never wait for somebody else to do it for you. People with far fewer resources than we have at our disposal in this country are doing double the grass-roots work than we are here. 2) Want to save money? Get comfortable not spending money, and making other entertainment for yourself. 3) Most vegan food and European hardcore is good (especially Infekcija from Wroclaw), though the fact that Europe hasn’t produced bands like Lightning Bolt or Deerhoof is pretty telling about the state of musical creativity. One major exception is Super Girl and Romantic Boys from Warsaw. Maija, our co-captain turned us on to them, and they are excellent. Thanks for reading, friend. Email me (joshvanek@yahoo.com) if you want any contact information, want to debate some part of this, or want to hear more.