Monkeys and Hardcore? Dodge It!

In the last 2/3 years, I have devoted more time and attention to what is done in Hardcore at a European level, and France has made it very clear that it has weapons to face everyone! What the hell is going on? Or was it me who was sleeping?

Head!: France already had a heavyweight in the 90s and 2000s with Kickback, still considered huge today. Today, with the amounts of new projects, some will naturally stand out, thanks to a strong personality. I am thinking of Elephants, Wolfpack, Stinky, HardMind or Worst Doubt, which have little reason to envy other European bands.

Matt: Personally, I think there were fewer people listening to Hardcore than now, but that doesn't mean that there weren't some dynamic and productive scenes. And beyond Kickback and Paris, which Head! rightly quotes, we could absolutely add what was being done in the northwest around Overcome Records. There were bands like Fat Society in the southwest, or None Shall Be Saved in Marseille... and these are just a few examples among many.

And before we start with serious things: explain to me what your "obsession" with monkeys is?

Matt: Hahaha! Animals jumping everywhere and long arms hanging and flying, doesn’t it make you think of what a Hardcore show is like?

Antoine: We are all crazy monkeys!

"Dodge This! / Jaw Crack", your new work, joins the Jaw Crack - as the title shows - and it is a beautiful demonstration of good Hardcore. How did this opportunity arise? And, better: what was it like to publish a record during a pandemic of this type?

Head!: It started with conversations during concerts where we met, in 2019, in which Jaw Crack and Dodge This! were involved, or just spectators. The idea eventually caught on and seemed attainable, as both of our bands needed to come up with some new material before going any further. Dodge This! came out of a long period without having recorded anything, and after I joined the band in 2019, new tracks quickly emerged and the split was the perfect opportunity to get back in the saddle. That being said, the fact that it was released during the pandemic is frustrating because it’s impossible for us to defend it on stage, to have a release party... Knowing that Hardcore is above all a style that is lived in concert, we say to ourselves that the half the job remains to be done! 

Is music exchange between geographic regions a custom on the French HC scene? I suppose, with such a large country, it is sometimes difficult to keep up to date with what new bands are talking about, or is the network strong enough that nothing escapes?

Head!: The French scene is still a small world in terms of people involved. Everyone knows each other and connections are often strong between the many organizers across the country, who before the pandemic were on numerous shows in Lyon, Paris, Rennes, Lille or Nantes for example... When a new band emerges, if it is good, then there is a very good chance that its name will go around and quickly reach our ears. And then more generally, whether it is a large country or not, the Internet has long since abolished distances, right?

Matt: When there were still concerts, it was absolutely not uncommon to see in Lyon, people from Clermont-Ferrand, Saint-Etienne, Dijon or even Marseille who came on purpose. And it happened to all of us to travel for hours to go to a concert. We also always met a lot of French people at Ieperfest, in Belgium, which created links. And then with Dodge This! we have built strong bonds and friendships over the years with other cities. I find a good example of this is the fact that all of our recordings were done in Marseille. It shows that we clearly preferred to go and work with someone (Homeless Records / Florent Salfati from Landmvrks / Hate In Front in this case) with whom we were comfortable and we had things in common, rather than with someone who would be from our city but with whom we might have had less affinities. 

What is the origin of this project? How did Dodge This! start, and what influences do you have?

Antoine: It all started in 2014, Pierre and Pedro (the first guitar player of Dodge This!) met each other at a Get Off! concert, they were a huge influence of early Dodge This!, in the 9th district of Lyon. A couple of weeks later I joined them and we started playing and creating songs. After one year, Matt joined us, added his voice and meaning to the songs. Our first show was in October 2015 in Lyon of course! 

Matt: In terms of influences, we do not try to say “we're going to do like this band” or “we're going to do this specific style of Hardcore”… Of course, we all listen to many things in Hardcore, but also in metal, hip-hop, songs... About me, I also have interest for new wave or pop / shoegaze. But I find that in our composition process, we don't think in terms of influences, we just do what we like, we try things... Dodge This! is a kind of a cooking pot for making songs of less than two minutes from a lot of ingredients.

As musicians, what is your background on the French Hardcore scene?

Matt: In French Hardcore I didn't have a background as a musician before Dodge This!, but I know how to play bass ha ha ! To be honest, I had never held a microphone in a band before, had never even sung in public actually. However, there is one thing that I will always remember, there was a group in Lyon called Get Off! (RIP), and it's partly going to their shows that we all got a little closer in the band. And I remember Svan the singer asked me to sing with him on a cover of “Blistered” by Strife. I sang it a few times with them and I remember very clearly that it was by doing that that I really started to love being on stage and it really helped me to let go with Dodge This! 

Antoine: Dodge This! is my first Hardcore band, before that I used to play in rock, Punk bands like Hangover For Breakfast. I took the bass in Get Off! sometimes too. Right now, I also play in Changes with Pierre, Svan (Get Off), and Nico (Hangover For Breafast). 

I've had the opportunity to interview French bands like Youth Avoiders and Syndrome 81, and now you, and the 3 are quite different, if we listen carefully. Is this diversity the richness of the French scene?

Head!: There is great diversity of bands in France, it's true. Around the Hardcore scene, you may find everything: a beatdown scene, one focused on melodic Hardcore, another one totally connected to the Punk Oi! There is one for everyone's taste, but I dare to believe that it is not exclusive to France.

Matt: I agree with Head, there is good diversity! There is also a more Crust Hardcore scene which has often been very active, there was a lot of Post-Hardcore too some time ago, I really enjoyed bands like Aside From A Day or Anorak for example. But, these different scenes mix too rarely for my taste.

How is the local scene, the Lyon scene? Is "The Local Scene" still alive or has it already been swallowed by globalization? 

Matt: Like all the scenes there were some very active moments and some quieter moments. For a long time, some concerts organizers (not all unfortunately) played the game of always doing “small” concerts which has the effect of greatly energizing the local scene, and when there are big headliners, they always introduce a band or two from the local scene. I find that the mixture of the two is essential, in a city, to bring this small world to life. We will see what it will be like after the crisis emerges, which groups will actually be on stage. Because social networks and the internet, which are tools that prove to be very useful during this period and which allow groups to still share things without real concerts, also have a perverse effect: it’s very easy to do announcements without actually doing anything concrete behind it. And above all also, it will depend a lot on which venues will have survived to be able to play. There were already few and I'm afraid that all this won’t help the situation, because the cultural sector is suffering enormously in France at the moment, as everywhere I guess... After, who knows, there will be less foreign bands that will come and play for a while, that seems obvious to me, so it will maybe give a boost to the local scene.

Leaving HC a little and taking a step towards another musical reality that I love in Gallic lands: your Hip-Hop scene. NTM, IAM, Fonky Family, for example. Is there something about this scene in your sound - as there is in cases on the NYHC scene - or are you totally indifferent?

Head!: Thanks for them. Those examples are old names from the 90s and will mostly speak to the generation that is over 30 today (today's kids mostly listen to the rappers of 2020). However, you saw it right, old school hip-hop (FR and US) with this very specific groovy vibe is part of our musical background. We are also having discussions on this subject, the desire to bring out more this facet in our sound, whether in terms of vocal placement, instrumental interlude, and atmosphere. Only the future will tell! If you are interested in bringing together Hardcore and old school French hip-hop, then I can only advise you to listen to the BornEnemy project released this year, it is done well!

Matt: Entirely in agreement with Head! By the way in Dodge This! we are (almost) all in our thirties. Hip-hop is something that, while not necessarily obvious, really influences us. At least, this is the case for my lyrics. Moreover, I totally worked on my English diction on Ice-T's “Mind Over Matter” for example. There's also a song we used to play on stage called “You and your Zoo”, but never recorded, that had a lot of hip-hop vocals and groove in it.

And why not, sing in French? And I say this because if there is one thing I love about the French bands that I follow, it is the fact that they sing in French... you consider that English is the language of musical expression and that singing could, in some way, close your doors to a market outside France? 

Matt: It’s not really a choice relating to our desire (which exists by the way) to go and play abroad. It’s a rather very personal choice for me to sing in English. I have nothing against singing in French per se, I listen to a lot of hip-hop or songs with lyrics in French. Even in Hardcore, for example, we can think of the excellent posthumous record of Life As War, "Humility or Death", where the majority of the songs are in French. Simply, in my opinion, English is a less "convoluted" language than French, said without any pejorative connotation. Hardcore expresses feelings that are sometimes complicated, but unadorned, often in less than two minutes, and I find English the most appropriate language for that. 

Which bands do you recommend, from Lyon or anywhere else in France? Always available to learn more about the French scene! Jaw Crack I already know eheheh (P.s.: tell them to accept the interview, they did not respond to my message)

Head! : To the bands I mentioned at the start of the interview, you can add Rough Ground which released an excellent demo this summer, Insecurity, PrisonLife, xBreakoutx, Iron Deficiency, Mindslow, or the rabid Parisians of Cavalerie. There are some I'm forgetting! 

Matt: It's hard to name everything, there is Real Deal from Tours as well, so groovy! I like Lifescarred from Amiens a lot too… In Lyon I enjoy bands like Litige or Shitstorm for example. There are bands that have released sound recently but have never played (or very little), I am thinking of Iron Deficiency in particular...

Antoine: Thank you guys, you didn’t mention Changes haha! We talk about Get off! In this interview, you should listen to them; even their record does not sound as good as their live performances!

And Portugal? Do you have any notion of what is done in Portugal? 

Matt: We had the opportunity to see For The Glory several times in Lyon, and even elsewhere on stages like the one at Ieperfest. We even shared a van on a little weekend with them where they were playing one night in Lyon and the next day we were playing together in a festival in Nevers. Grankapo once played in Lyon it seems to me too. Otherwise, I really like Reality Slap and there is New Winds that I have listened to a little too… But, apart from that it is true that I know little, I know Bas Rotten and Devil in Me by name and that’s it 

What can we expect for the future? More music, I hope! Thank you so much for the opportunity and let me know as soon as you have new work! Merci!

Head! : We are not going to be original: our goal is to play on stage again, meet old and new friends, get on road at the slightest opportunity, that is why we make Hardcore. Otherwise, we are already starting to compose new songs with a view to releasing our first album, but it’s too early to announce anything in these times of pandemic.

Dodge This! Official Bandcamp