@babygotbacktalk
What does “punk” mean in contemporary culture? Emerson College grad and Baby Got Back Talk vocalist and bass player G’Ra Asim on once helped explain it to a friend this way:
…I always think the best punk looks and sounds find ways to synthesize the glamorous with the cantankerous. Every generation of punkers reimagines this basic question: how can I subvert, dodge, dismantle or thumb my nose at norms and expectations with such jauntiness and panache that even those who are committed to conventionality begin to ponder what they ever saw in it?
Upon moving to NYC, he connected with fellow travelers lead guitarist/vocalist Jake Lazaroff, violinist Rhiana Hernandez and drummer Derek Schildkraut, and together they’ve concocted an infectious, upbeat pop-punk brew on their 4-song EP, Take This The Wrong Way.
As people who went to predominantly white colleges, we relate to songs like “Historically White College”. For example, it has these on-point lyrics:
Monday morning:
read the classlist
They’re gonna need some
extra practice
saying your name
so the frat kids
in your midst whisper “terrorist”So you try to make up your mind
If you’re gonna erupt this time
If you want to discuss this sense of injustice
You’ve come to the wrong place
“Backbone” is the strong, hook-y opener. “Fever” and “Here’s The Plan” take on love, with the latter finding the song’s narrator embracing his nerdy, starry-eyed, smitten state.
Says Asim: “We’re what punk looks like in 2017: driven by a DIY ethic, conversant with social issues — especially as they pertain to gender and race, enabled by interweb, bankrolled by day jobs, resonant with the most venerable iterations of punk but firmly committed to injecting some new flavor into the mold.”
Great energy and great promise from this young band. More to come? We hope so.
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