In what I’ll dub ‘Weekend Punk’ based on the belligerent hardcore ditty from Zankou, here are some beer-soaked thoughts on some of the punk bands I took over the course of the weekend.
My first stop was the ‘Gender Is Not A Genre’ showcase at Temple where I got my first taste of the new ‘double trouble’ lineup of Xiao Wang, with An Lin joining the fold again. The result: an even more volatile concoction of scrappy punk and blissed out kawaii core tunes. Dizzying fun.
After they finished up, I stuck around to catch Guangzhou ska-punk outfit Pinboard whose debut release from a couple months back has slowly become one of my favorites of the year thus far – a charged, bombastic, flailing stage dive into 80s/90s era punk rock that never lets up.
The next day I swung by the beginning of D.O.G’s annual punk festival entitled Punk Rock Tribes. It was only three o’ clock in the afternoon but the place was already filling up with punk fans of all nature. Finger Family kicked off the festivities with a fist-pumping, upbeat pop-punk set. Despite starting when they were in high school, they have managed to hold onto their musical integrity and gain a huge following – a blast.
Following them was Zankou, another band I’ve been eager to catch up with – anarchic in nature, they played it fast and loose, injecting their songs with an abrasive, taking the piss out of everything from genre to song structure. Ridiculously fun and jaw-droppingly brutal. More pics below.
Hey!! Where can I listen to Xiao Wang songs?? Also, do they have any social media accounts to keep up with them? Thanks!!