N.J. Sneer rocks the New Brunswick basement scene with mixed reviews

By Corey Klein

After a performance by New Brunswick locals Rex Mars, the N.J. Sneer, affectionately referred to by fans as “The Sneer,” did a sound check before breaking into their blisteringly loud, abrasive set.

Many attendees headed for the exit of the New Brunswick basement, in the house guitarist John Andrew Cole, a.k.a. “Johnny Slugger”, calls home.

However, several close friends (diehard fans?) shouted along with Nathaniel Parker, “the Cake” while jumping around and knocking into one another in the barely six-foot-high basement, which was never meant to be a concert venue.

The show, organized entirely by Cole, also featured New Jersey hardcore favorites on Scorpion Records, Flat Earth Society; This Ship Will Sink, an up-and-coming New Brunswick math metal band; and Void Control, punk rock from the Jersey Shore.

The N.J. Sneer, a North Jersey-based hardcore punk rock band, has been performing shows in New Jersey’s underground music scene since the summer of 2002.

The four-piece outfit, which includes Cole, Parker, bassist Justin “Jersey” Blasi and drummer Jason “Punk Rot Beet” Biggs, put all their energy into every performance.

Parker, a 21-year-old video store clerk, danced spastically and shouted incoherently, sometimes nearly swallowing the microphone.

Blasi, a 22-year-old broadcasting major at Temple University in Philadelphia, known to occasionally shatter an old bass guitar during a show, aggressively stomped while “sneering” (pun intended) at his audience.

Biggs, a 22-year-old electrical engineering major at the Devry Technical Institute in North Brunswick, NJ, flailed his awkwardly large sticks on his blinking-light-adorned drum set, while shirtless, displaying his scars from self-mutilation.

All the while, Cole, a 21-year old physics major at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, NJ, wore a snarling sneer and all-white clothes, to accentuate the fresh bloodstains from his bleeding fingers as he viciously scraped his knuckles against his strings.

“We got it into our minds that we wanted to go nuts live and I think to some degree, we even work on it. It’s almost performance art, as Cake once said,” said Cole.

By the end of the Sneer’s set, Cole’s makeshift lefty (“upside-down,” as Cole put it) Fender Squire rested on the basement floor; the pick plate drenched in blood.

Cole explained the significance of bleeding at every show as “leaving a part of himself on the stage” and “giving his all” at every show.

Friends and fans have said he bleeds on account of his poor guitar technique. Although, most agree, it adds to the live performance.

“It came from bad technique, but he has no reason to correct it,” said Daniel Epstein, 20.

“If he’s bleeding because of his art, I guess that means he’s serious about it,” said Matthew Keys, 21.

Monica Barr, 18, called Cole’s on-stage bleeding “an immature stunt.”

“It’s very clichéd for members of a punk band to cut themselves,” she said.

Punk rock superstars Iggy Pop and Sid Vicious have performed this stunt before. Cole respects both artists and takes such criticism as compliments.

Stunts aside, the Sneer’s music has been described as raw, intense, and energetic; as well as abrasive, revolting, unoriginal, and “an acquired taste.”

N.J. Sneer Hates You

Anyone who has seen the N.J. Sneer generally says the same thing: they are not seeking anyone’s approval.

Jonathon Soto, 20, said, “They don’t give a crap who likes them.”

“They don’t give a shit about what others think,” said Daniel Scheiman, also 20.

And Daniel Epstein said, “The beauty of their live show is their complete irreverence for whether or not the audience likes them. They are just as successful if the audience can’t stand them.”

The lyrics to the song “Blasi to the N” read, “’Cause I don’t give a shit what the kids think/ I’m just playing to beat people up because/ my band fucking hates you/ N.J. Sneer fucking hates you.”

After a performance, a viewer may find the band members intimidating. Despite their lyrics, Cake, Slugger, Jersey, and Punk Rot Beet are an approachable group of guys off-stage.

Their “we-don’t-care-what-you-think” attitude may be a defensive mechanism against would-be critics. All told, the band members have confessed their desire to be rock stars and to be liked. While laughing in the face of criticism, they may be crying on the inside.

The Origin of the N.J. Sneer

Cole and Parker, childhood friends, grew up in Summit, New Jersey. The two started a band called The Pants in late 2000, at the beginning of their senior year at Summit High School.

The Pants featured Parker on vocals and Cole on guitar. A drum machine the duo nicknamed “Professor Bad Ass” kept the beat.

The group wrote lowbrow songs about bodily functions. They recorded 11 songs, two with Blasi on bass, and played two shows in classmate Steve O’Cone’s basement and one in Cole’s basement.

Blasi, also played in a band called Tap, which would later become Prevent Falls.

Cole and Parker graduated from Summit High in 2001. Cole attended the University of Maryland in College Park, Md., while Parker attended Kean University in Union, N.J.

While at college, Cole found out his former classmates’ band, Prevent Falls began to receive media hype. He read the band’s lyrics for the song “K Consumption” from their website and was appalled.

“The lyrics read, ‘you can’t ignore the pain. It comes from drug use and a fucked-up family life,” Cole recalled.

“And I knew this kid in high school. And I went to shows in his house. It was a beautiful house, I might add,” he continued.

“It made me mad, and I was like, ‘you know what? I bet 90 percent of the music out there on the face of the earth is straight-up bullshit. I don’t believe that [Prevent Falls vocalist/guitarist Jeffrey Carter] had problems,’” he added.

“So I was like ‘what if there was a band with no image?’ What if there was a band that was like ‘Yo, we just kick ass, rock and roll, and we’re not gonna sell you fucking lies.’”

Cole then suggested starting a punk band to Parker.

“I’ve always wanted to be in a snotty, sneering, punk band,” was Parker’s response.

This inspired them to name the band “The Sneer.” The “N.J.” in N.J. Sneer was Cole’s tribute to his home state.

Cole recalled, “I was far away from home and New Jersey took on this idealized image in my mind while I was still in Maryland. Maryland felt like a jail and New Jersey was this shining…”

“That was what you said about New Jersey when you came back,” Biggs, a 22-year-old student at the Devry Technical Institute in North Brunswick, retorted.

“You were like, ‘this place is a jail. I wanna go back to Maryland,’” said Biggs.

“I’m really proud of being from New Jersey. I’ve got New Jersey pride,” Cole added.

Cole then wrote three soon-to-be N.J. Sneer songs and showed them to Blasi.

Blasi told Cole his songs sounded like old hardcore. Cole had never heard old hardcore, so he returned to Maryland and downloaded a few songs by 80s New York Hardcore legends the Gorilla Biscuits and he quickly became a fan.

Hardcore played by kids who never heard hardcore (but had it explained to them)

Cole, Parker, and Blasi rehearsed a few times with a drum machine.

“We were playing ‘Apathy’ and Cake started screaming his head off and me and Blasi looked over across the room at each other,” said Cole.

“If it weren’t for that moment, I don’t think anything would have happened,” he said. Parker knew Biggs from If Not Then So, a pop punk band Biggs drummed for. If Not Then So broke up and Biggs grew tired of playing pop punk.

“Eventually, someone said, ‘I think Biggs is not in a band right now.’ And I said, ‘Jason Biggs? The god of the skins?’”

Parker asked Biggs to join the N.J. Sneer at a chance meeting at an opera where Parker’s father was performing.

Biggs agreed, and Cole needed a new guitar amplifier after the first full rehearsal, due to Biggs’ hard-hitting style, which made the guitar inaudible by comparison.

“Originally, it was supposed to be a summer-long project and we would all break up. And then we didn’t,” said Cole.

The band members described themselves as “Hardcore played by kids who never heard hardcore, but had it explained to them.”

“I think it’s more punky than most hardcore nowadays, and I don’t like most hardcore nowadays,” said Cole.

The N.J. Sneer sited their main influence as The Gorilla Biscuits and even confessed to plagiarizing a riff or two.

The Sneer recorded their first EP on a four-track in Cole’s basement. The 8-song album entitled Jersey’s Fight Songs was independently released on CD-R by the band’s own label, Mo' Biggah Soundz.

At first listen, Jersey’s Fight Songs is reminiscent of 80s punk acts Operation Ivy, The Descendents, or Minor Threat. The low-fidelity recording creates the sound of a 20-year-old classic. The N.J. Sneer play a style that has been around since they were born.

Biggs’ drumming is hard and on point. Producer Matt Keys describes it as “a hard-hitting metronome.”

The music is weighted towards the bass guitar and bass drum, creating a muddy, thumping sound. Bone-crushing, perhaps?

The lead guitar fills out the high end with harmonics and the vocals are rough and raw, with distortion likely from a cheap microphone and not from digital overdrive effects.

The lyrics, written by either Cole or Parker, consist of angry rants directed at attention-seeking fashion punks, self-obsessed jive talkers, and bored, whiney teenagers.

Screaming at Anyone Who’ll Listen, the band’s second release, which has yet to be released officially, contains eight new songs, including “Girlfriend,” “Choke and Collapse,” and “Better Things to Be,” all of which they perform live.

My Girlfriend is a…

In early 2003, Cole planned on transferring to Rutgers University to be closer to his girlfriend, who he intended to marry.

While in the process of transferring, Cole had a phone conversation with his former girlfriend that would inspire the Sneer’s most recognizable song.

“‘Girlfriend’ is definitely one of our song highlights,” said Parker.

Cole’s girlfriend expressed her interest in dating other people to Cole.

“She was like, ‘I need to find myself. I want an open relationship. I was like, ‘Well, fine. Date other people, but you can’t sleep around on me.’ And she was like ‘Well, I need the option.’”

The song “Girlfriend,” originally titled ‘My Girlfriend is a Fucking Whore’ is a fast, aggressive two-minute anthem. The song is no different than most N.J. Sneer songs, with the exception of the chorus, which belts, “My Girlfriend is a Fucking Whore” boldly and without remorse four times.

N.J. Sneer’s first performed “Girlfriend” at the Yorba Lounge on the Livingston Campus of Rutgers University.

“She was still my girlfriend when we played it, and she didn’t even show up to the show,” remarked a bitter Cole.

“Girlfriend” remains a fan favorite. Fans have referred to the song as “brilliant” and “genius.”

Cole denied any tongue-in-cheek humor in the song. He clearly meant every word.

The song received negative criticism, creating a controversy causing the cancellation of a show in Cole’s basement.

The show’s roster was to include the Sneer, Give Me Danger, There Are Witches, and Discord Records’ Beauty Pill and was scheduled for Apr. 21.

There Are Witches’ guitarist Elliot Klein booked the show in Cole’s basement with Cole’s permission.

Problems arose when Klein insisted on charging a five-dollar admission fee, which Cole and Biggs were opposed to.

Cole told Klein, “Shows in my house are free. Period.”

In response, Klein asked Cole if N.J. Sneer could refrain from playing “Girlfriend,” on the grounds of its sexist, offensive lyrics.

“I would like to keep the show a progressive environment where everyone can feel comfortable, i.e. free of sexism,” wrote Klein in an e-mail to Cole.

Cole was shocked that Klein would ask permission to censor his band in his own home.

“And here’s what I thought was interesting,” said Parker, “he had a problem with ‘My Girlfriend is a Fucking Whore’, but not ‘Bleeding Vagina,’ ‘Kool AIDS,’ or ‘As I was Killing a Hooker.’”

“First of all, how does anyone know our songs well enough to decide which ones should not be played?” asked Biggs rhetorically.

Cole responded to Klein in another e-mail, “Words don’t hurt anyone. Actions do. We’re allowed to have feelings and to express them in a way that doesn’t cause clear and present danger.”

“Shows in my house are free and no one is going to tell us what we can and cannot play. End of story,” wrote Cole.

“I don’t think it has anything to do with sexism or beating women or anything. I think it’s just about an individual person who happened to be a fucking whore,” said Matthew Keys, who produced N.J. Sneer’s Screaming at Anyone Who’ll Listen.

The Dark and Dismal Future

N.J. Sneer played in three basements, a bar, a church, and a college campus building since their inception in the summer of 2002. They have performed with several signed acts including The Postman Syndrome and Paulson.

“I believe we’re gonna go nowhere fast. We’ll play another show or two,” said Cole.

“The future looks dark and dismal for the Sneer,” he added.

All band members refer to their group with ironic disdain or sarcastic reverence. When asked to perform this interview, Parker said, “It’s almost like we’re a real band.”

Cole looked over at Parker, displaying mock hurt and said “Hey! We are a real band!”

All members joke of quitting.

In a glimpse of optimism, Parker said, “We’ve been joking about touring for a while, but I really want to do it. Especially after watching the Bouncing Souls [a New Brunswick-born punk band with an international following] DVD. They toured for years and I was watching and I was like, ‘that looks like so much fun. I want to do that.’”

The band members then disclosed their summer schedules and realized it would not work out unless someone made a sacrifice.

“The truth is, we’re all really lazy,” Cole added.

“To our credit, we’re not trying very hard to play out. It’s not that we can’t get shows. It’s that we’re not trying to get shows,” he continued.

All members are pleased with the songs on the most recent EP, Screaming at Anyone Who Will Listen. However, they were displeased with the recordings of a few songs. They plan on re-recording when they have a chance.

This song is not about to make you cry…

The Sneer is not concerned with originality. They are riding rock and roll’s clichés in an underground music scene that values numbing, progressive art music. The N.J. Sneer plays roots hardcore. And they bleed.

Unconcerned with being fashionable, in music style or dress, the Sneer will continue to clear basements. However, the brave souls who can stomach their music as fast, loud, and punk rock as the Sneer’s will continue to adore them, as new fans will surely arrive, if the band decides to put in the effort.

As Dan Epstein said, “Love it or hate it, it stirs emotion.”

Or, as 20-year-old Ariane Goldberg said, “It’s revolting without evoking emotion.”

Either way, members of the N.J. Sneer are only in the band for the fun of it. In that respect, they really don’t give a shit what the kids think.