1. Would you mind giving a bit of background/history of the band? what you've released so far, and what's next? Steve: Well cause it's almost 10 years or over, no one really know ;-) i'll keep it short and advice for people to check out the myspace - bio , which is long,long and long again also boring ;-) line-up at the beginning ; Davy-bass Filip-drums Stef-guitar Steffen-vocals Steve-vocals (just joined before first gig) line-up now ; Arno-guitar Azill-drums Boris-bass Lolo-vocals Stef-guitar Steve-vocals releases; UPS the record 1 song on a comp. 7" totally missmastered by releasers 7": split 7" with Okotta from Belgium lp's: split with Olho De Gato from Holland split with Mass Genocide Process from Tsjechia split with Cop On Fire from Spain/US Arno: hi ya's,i guess steve allready went through all that so i'll keep it short..im arno and i've been destroying my ears,liver and brain for way too long with those guys,something like 6years now..i play,or at least try to play dis-tortion(never mind the guitar,all we want is noizzz)...i love wasting my time playing music and everyone in the band have been involved in other "musical"(HUM!!!)projects,so i dont know if it fucking matters but i have been in skew whiff(in trust we crust metal punk,never hade a chance to record with the bastards although) and detritus(melodik metal crust with dual female singers,the band splited up a while ago but check out the soon to be released lp on RUINATION rec)...And i recently started playing second guitar with 'give up all hope' (crazy d-beaters from london),wich is really exciting...So im gonna now spend quite a lot of time here in london. 2. Do you mind being labeled a crust band? Sometimes bands get uptight about a label like 'crust'. Can you ever see crust hitting the main stream and becoming a genre like emo or the like? Steve: I don't mind being called a crustband, but lately i guess we're to punk for the crusties and to crust for the punx , hell what's in a name anyway :-) hmM don't really know about that, but i guess if crust goes more metal then metal itself it could get totally mainstream , think Sepultura standards, but it all depends on a state of mind from the band, and anyway i guess there's still some politics in crust so you won't get that mainstream shite quite fast , i hope ;-) Arno:BUT WE WERE A EMO BAND...!!!we only started playing D-beat went it became the fashion and tought it would be a good(and only!) opportunity for the band to get known...So we kicked out our drummer and hired azill just cause he was in hiatus(we actually never heard them but people said they were some kind of crust gods that people whorship in japan and stuff so we thought we needed him)...once we are home we take off our fake dreads,fake tatoos and listen some real music (not that horrible noise you like!). 3. This question is more aimed at you Steve. Being a parent whose a crusty punk, have you ever gotten hassle from teachers etc over it? The day my first child was born the nurse in the hospital said, I hope you'll dress her 'normal'! Steve: Ha, nice question!! Well i'm not the biological father from our kid but been taking care of him as he was my own for over 7 years now, so i wasn't at the hospital ;-) But yip , we live in a small village with (when i started living here) mostly farmers , so it was a big culture shock for them, and yip i had the , hope you're kid doesn't turn out as you, his school mates laughing with my nosering , well there's a lot of cows here so you can go figure and also my name rhymes on the dutch word for bull, really creative little shitheads ;-),at a schoolparty had a comment from a totaly drunken old fart, aren't you ashamed and blablablah, had to ask 3 times before i understood what he said ;-) Teachers are cool with it, since there school anthem is like everyone's different so respect that, a lot different then my time at catholic school ;-) 4 How did that last tour with Nuclear Death Terror go, any amusing stories? Steve: Hoo, yeah , it was nice seeing them play every night , still a bit sad i couldn't enjoy it more since i had/have some problems with my back. And yip a big thank you to Cristinna for sorting the dates out. A funny story, well i'll tell it from Lolo's point of view, when we played Gotheborg i mysteriously dissapeared from stage , so i fzell from it and it took a while bnefore i could crawl up again , he said i hear you but i couldn't see you, fun,fun,fun ;-)Ha posing with an old sailorlike type in Christiannia (Kobenhavn) where it's normally forbidden to take pics. And hell for the rest of that tour we did alone it was (beer)heaven ;-) Arno:the tour with NDT was ace,those people just fucking rocks and it was a great pleasure to drink ourself into oblivion with them as well as watching them play every nights of the scandi part of the tour..plus they booked everything for us there so thanx a lot for that,specially christina!cheers!!! ...and jacob for having to deal with us drunken irresponsible fools!!vaguelly remember drowing mustaches on people sleeping as usual,but not much more,thanx to all the hash and beers people gave us.but on the czech part of the tour we were 3 bands to leave praha (our friends from instinct of survival and guided craddle)but we were the only one to make it to vienna!!!ethanol realised he forgot his passport only few kms before the border,thanx to a sleepless drunken night so G.C couldnt make it,and pacek enjoyed too much cheap vodka and ended up pissing his pans and fucking up his pissport so I.O.S couldnt make it neither,haha!so who are the loosers,he?:)..thanx to anyone who organised gigs,cooked and gave us beers!!was fucking great! 5.What's the scene like over there at present, is it easy to put on gig's etc? Steve: Well there's a big repression again against squats, so i just received a mail that Squattus Dei was evaded by the riot police this morning, but there not sure if some people are still holding up , but for sure they'll squat something new, they're quite active in Leuven.As for Ghent well i heared 2 squats must be evicted soon , but it' hard to look for a new squat now it's getting colder so i hope the city gives them till after winter to move. But there's some youngsters doing there best to organise gigs in other regions of belgium so that's brilliant. Arno:the scene is smaller then a couple of years ago but its fairly easy to put up shows in liege,we've got great venues like this pub called the "carlo levi" were they let us book shows for free or this punk runned club "le factory",or its still possible to book"bigger"shows in "la zone" from time to time...its a bit a shame there isnt so many squatts to organise shows at like a couple of years ago althought.. *that would be fucking cool,only played 2 shows there in the past with skew whiff,and it was really nice!but nothing planned at the moment!but who knows... 6. Lastly any plans of coming to these Green shores of Ireland? Steve: Invite us and if everyone can we'ld love to come and get wasted with you guys, but the thing is , it's not always easy with Arno being in the UK, Azills other band,travelling , parenting,.... Ok , Sean thanx for the interview and your patience for us to get this all together ;-) Arno:thanx a lot for wasting you time with us,was cool,keep on the good job and of course stay punk,the diy thing,not that mainstream bullshit!up the punx!!!any hatemail can be send at misery_and_despair at excite.com cheers!!! arno Contact Arno