Traditional question: history of the band, line up… ? I (Chris) got the idea to start the band in 2002 with our drummer Big J. After that Little Mike joined up on guitar and for about a year we had a revolving door policy with 2nd guitarists and bass players. In 2003 Kyle joined on Bass and Jason joined on guitar and that brings us to our current line up. We recorded our 2003 'Keep 'em Firing' shortly afterwards. Is there a band that make you want to start Lone Soldier? What are your influences? I don't think there was one band in particular that made us want to start the band. However I remember hearing all the bands coming out of the East Coast and Midwest at the time, particularly Hated and Proud, CounterattacK, Battalion 86 and The Bureau. They all had sounds that were distinct and different from what was being carted around as Oi! at that time and were decidedly un-PC. Sort of if they can do it why can't we sort of thing. As far influences go, we are influenced primarily by late eighties U.S. Oi! like Moonstomp, New Glory and YDL as well as Hardcore like Negative Approach, Sheer Terror and early Sick of it All and Cold as Life and early Agnostic Front. Bonecrusher, Blood for Blood and Condemned 84 are big influences as well. If someone has never heard Lone Soldier, how would you describe your music? We've had a lot of comparisons to YDL musically, which we take as a compliment because they're one of our favourite bands and did a great job of bridging the gap between hardcore and Oi! and creating a distinctly American style of skinhead rock'n'roll. We just play solid, aggressive music. We're not trying to reinvent the wheel or add three-minute guitar solos to every song. Simple, aggressive shit that does its best to avoid clichés and the basic Oi! chords I guess. I've understood you're from California, how's the scene there? Lots of shows...? The scene in terms of quantity - lots of people, always shows happening etc. In terms of quality it's pretty shitty, lots of fucked up people. We get all the big bands coming through Dropkick Murphy's, Agnostic Front etc. But we very rarely get any decent smaller bands coming through. As far as Oi!/streetpunk we have a few good local bands - Bonecrusher, The Switchups, Riotgun, No Solution, and tons of shitty ones. Hardcore is a different story, always lots of good shows, tons of good local bands - Internal Affairs, Donnybrook, Right Fist, Piece by Piece, Every Man 4 Himself and of course Terror. Are you in touch with some other US bands? Do you recommend us one in particular? No plans to release a split with a band? We're in touch with quite a few bands out of state here in the U.S. As far as recommendations for skinhead bands go, I would recommend American Noise, CounterattacK, Condition, Stresscracks, Nation of Suspects, Fed Up and Skin Disorder. We're supposed to do a split 7" with Nation of Suspects that should be released sometime in the spring of '05. What about your discography? Any releases? Discography as of now is pretty limited: - 'Keep 'Em Firing' six-song demo - self released 2003 - s/t four song demo - self released 2004 What do you think of the actual OI/Skinhead scene in the USA? Depends on where you live, America is so big and so spread apart that the skinhead scenes varies from place to place, town to town, state to state. Things seem to be slowing down now. Though it also seems that a lot of skins especially in other parts of the country seem to be getting back to their roots and getting more into hardcore. All in all though I'd say things are sort of slow. Any contacts with people outside the US (Europe, Japan...)? We are in contact with Peter from Pure Impact and Uhl from Dim records and we have a few other friends in Europe. Not so much in Japan, though if we have any in fans out there they should get in contact with us and let us know. We'd love to do a split with a Japanese band like Strong Style or Jinrai, most of the skinhead bands from Japan seem to have an original sound coupled with a very patriotic attitude. To talk about gigs, do you often play? Are they mainly local gigs or have you ever played outside your state? We hadn't played in awhile till last weekend; we played a local hardcore show with Internal Affairs, Cold Shoulder, Everyman 4 Himself and Mother Speed. We plan on playing a lot more in the next few months. All of our shows have been local shows, bar shows, VFW halls, shitty venues etc. Never played out of state but we've talked about it, we have some friends on the East Coast who have brought it up but as of yet, nothing more than talk. Keep on talking about gigs; do you easily find places to play? It varies sometimes we'll have a venue that will let us book shows for a few months with no problem, then it will close up or change management. Sometimes there's trouble and we get 86'd from playing there. A lot of the all age venues in southern California are like that, they overreact to small things and then stop having Oi! or Hardcore shows. It's a lot of bullshit. Future plans about playing outside the USA? Not as of yet. Anybody interested in flying us out to play is more than welcome to get in contact with us. We'd have to work it in around jobs and school and shit but we'd be more than interested. Can you tell us who will win the future elections (Bush or Kerry)? Couldn't say, the polls seem to be saying its more and more neck and neck everyday. What's your feeling on the war in Iraq & the fact that US soldiers die there (nearly) everyday? We support a policy of pre-emption against any country, regime or group that represents a security threat to the United States. Now if you want to talk about the U.S./Coalition peacekeeping/nation building in Iraq, we have mixed feelings. In some ways the criticism that a lot people are offering up resembles what was being said about U.S. assistance and involvement helping Europe and Japan recover from WW2. Keep in mind that for the first couple of years after the war there were still tiny pockets of Nazi resistance and guerrilla fighters in Germany. Now Germany and Japan are obviously success stories, how much of that kind of success we can expect in Iraq I couldn't tell you. Though it would be nice to think that the people of Iraq would choose a stable Western-style democracy, I have my doubts. There seem to be a lot of religious and cultural differences between Iraq and the West and sometimes I get the distinct impression that the Middle East is a wasteland of fucking savages that would be better off dead. As for soldiers dying, this may sound cold but they are professional soldiers. They made a conscious decision to join the U.S. armed forces, and this was part of the deal. The fact that soldiers die doesn't make me angry at our government, it makes me angry at the sons of bitches that are shooting at them! I just want to end this by saying again that we support and honor all of the U.S. and Coalition soldiers serving overseas, especially those who have made the ultimate sacrifice. Personal friends of ours can be counted among them, and we hope for their safe return. Give us a top ten of favorite bands. By band member - Chris (at the moment) 1. Sheer Terror 2. Bonecrusher 3. Blood for Blood 4. Under One Flag 5. Condemned 84 6. Bull the Buffalos 7. Strong Style 8. Donnybrook 9. No Solution 10. Pledge of Resistance Jason (guitar)...this is my eclectic top 10: 1. Bull the Buffalos 2. Strong Style 3. The Hives 4. Internal Affairs 5. Carry On 6. Franz Ferdinand 7. The Strike 8. Think I Care 9. Hated and Proud 10.The Unruly Do you play any covers? If so, which one? Right now we cover Negative Approach's 'Ready to Fight' , the 4 Skins 'Wonderful World' and YDL's 'New Glory'. We used to cover Combat 84's 'Rapist' and Blitz's 'Razors in the Night' but everyone covers that shit so we thought we'd start to do something different. Maybe we should really start pushing the envelope, fuck it, look out for Oi!'d up covers of Journey and Dramarama. Future plans for Lone Soldier: Lots and lots of local shows. Making more enemies than friends. Our 2004 demo is scheduled to be re-released as a 7" on Dim early in '05 with new artwork, liner notes etc. We have a split 7" with Nation of Suspects that we already mentioned, tracks on Anthemic Oi!core Volume Two on Blackout Records (England), one track on a Negative Approach tribute on Prophecy Records and may donate a track or two for a BDTR/Empire Falls tribute on Not for the Weak Records. We'd like to release a full length, a couple more splits and play anywhere people will let us. So feel free to drop us a line motherfuckers! Final word. Check the band out, let us know what you think. If you're unlucky enough to live close to us, drop by and check out a show. Official website : http://www.lonesoldier.net