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No Use For A Name.
 About five years ago, before emo and hardcore jumped to the fore, punk music was dominated by three words: Fat Wreck Chords. Fat Mike (of NOFX fame) ran the label responsible for bands like Lagwagon, Strung Out, Rise Against and the legendary No Use For A Name. Some say that in today's world - especially after the label lost Rise Against to Geffen - Fat's lost its relevancy. NUFAN vocalist Tony Sly says otherwise. "You know what? It will lose its relevance if they don't put out enough records, but now Fat Wreck Chords is starting to put out a lot more," he says emphatically.
During the last American election, however, Sly admits that priorities changed for the label. Fat Mike was a big part of the Punk Voter website - a site for punk fans encouraging them to take notice of politics - and set up the Rock Against Bush tour and compilation CD featuring everyone from NOFX to Foo Fighters, encouraging kids to get out there and vote.
"I think they were kind of sidetracked for a few years with the whole Punk Voter, Rock Against Bush thing - so much so that it stopped becoming a label," Sly reckons. "It became like this political office, it was crazy. I called there, and you wondered if they were gonna answer the phone 'Punk Voter' or 'Fat Wreck Chords.' And that's not a good time to put out a record."
While supportive of the movement, No Use For A Name weren't overly involved. Now, however, Sly says the label's back on track. "I don't think [Fat's] lost their relevance, because now they're putting out bands that I think are really good, like Against Me! and The Lawrence Arms. I know what you mean though, that it peaked several years ago. I could definitely tell that too, and it was more along the lines of if you were a band on Fat someone's gonna buy your record just 'cause of that logo on the back. Well it's not like that anymore, because lately they've put out different things, they've been going in different directions, which they should do. No one should identify you by the label that you're on, 'cause that's how you end up with a bunch of those crap bands that sound the same. Essentially that's what's happening at Victory Records right now - it's like going around again."
No Use For A Name played the Warped Tour 2005 in the States and Sly was amazed at "that Victory Records Scene" which dominated the line-up. "That's just the sort of direction that [music] took. You could kind of see it coming," he sighs. "I hate to say this, but I just don't think there's a lot of talent there: I think there are some good musicians in a lot of these bands, but hardly anybody can write really good songs. That's kind of scary, when people are buying like 300,000 copies of a band that can't write songs. I don't mean to sound bitter, I just couldn't believe that when we were on the Warped Tour this summer I couldn't pick out the bands from each other. It's like all these kids are out of the Gap commercial."
Sly formed the band with drummer Rory Koff way back in 1987, so it's not surprising that he's got a bit to say about the evolution of the punk scene. However, as the band approached its 20th anniversary, they took a risk with this year's 'Keep Them Confused' - a diverse album that not only contained the melody-heavy punk the band was famous for, but ballads and mid-tempo rock numbers. "Risky, maybe, for you to put your head on the chopping block for people to say whether to cut the band's head off or not," Sly admits, "but it would be more risky for us to put out the same album, just for our own well being. Originality is really huge in my opinion: if you're just [re]doing it, its not really art anymore, it's like you're just shitting it out and people are eating it."
While they've definitely matured, old-school Australian fans can still expect classic NUFAN when the band tours in October. " We've been playing 25 or 30 songs a night when we used to play like 17 or 18. We're trying to put them all in there so that everybody's satisfied."
Matt Vesely
 | No Use For A Name play at the Adelaide UniBar on Wed 2 Nov. |
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