HardLore - Freddy Madball Part 1: 1983 - 1994

Episode Date: March 26, 2026

We’re joined by one of the marquee vocalists and frontmen in all of hardcore music: MADBALL vocalist Freddy Cricien, known to most simply as Freddy Madball. In part 1 of this two-part 5 HOUR conversation, we discuss Freddy and Madball’s history from 1983 to 1994 - Discovering hardcore via his brother Roger Miret of Agnostic Front, starting Madball when he was just 11 years old, the “mad science” behind Ball of Destruction, following up with Droppin Many Suckers years later, and the massive endeavor of signing to Roadrunner Records at the height of the 90s hardcore boom for their debut album Set It Off… Much more to come next week. A true landmark conversation for this show andone we’re thrilled to finally have made happen and to share with all of you. Thanks to Black Heart Barber Co. in Nashville for having us! __________ Cool links: • Get 15% off DUNABLE GUITARS with code HARDLORE • Get 10% off MILLS VINTAGE site-wide with code HARDLORE __________ 00:00:00 - Start 00:00:58 - Freddy Madball 00:03:28 - Agnostic Fred: Discovering Hardcore Via Agnostic Front 00:15:02 - First Time Singing On Stage 00:16:35 - Being Dubbed "Madball" by Vinnie Stigma 00:19:31 - Finding Community in Hardcore Early, "Skinhead" Backlash 00:24:27 - Sneaking Into Shows, Getting Into Hip Hop, Finding His Own Interests in Hardcore 00:34:10 - Bad Religion, Brett Gurewitz & Hold It Down 00:41:14 - Cro-Mags & Agnostic Front Rivalry 00:43:26 - MADBALL 00:52:22 - Pardon This Interruption... 00:55:29 - BALL OF DESTRUCTION... Recording Live, Roger the Mad Scientist, "Hardcore Lives" 01:11:39 - DMS 01:21:53 - Thoughts on Krishna In Hardcore 01:24:20 - DROPPIN' MANY SUCKERS... Matt Henderson, First Madball Tours, Growing Up on Record 01:35:07 - Working With Don Fury 01:44:49 - SET IT OFF... Roadrunner Records, The 90s Hardcore Boom, Writing For the First Time  HardLore: A Knotfest Series, Fueled by Monster EnergyEdited by Steven Grise • Title sequence by Nicholas MarzlufJoin the HARDLORE PATREON to watch every single weekly episode early and ad-free, alongside exclusive monthly episodes.Join the HARDLORE DISCORD for community discussions and to participate in our future Q&A episodes.FOLLOW HARDLORE: INSTAGRAM, TWITTER, SPOTIFY, APPLEFOLLOW COLIN: INSTAGRAMFOLLOW BO: INSTAGRAM, TWITTER For sponsorship opportunities, email us! [e-mail] Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

So you brought up Vinnie being an encouraging figure in your life. He gave you the name Madball. That's correct. Tell me. Vinnie being Vinny, you know. Was it based off the toy or the sock with the... I don't want to say that exactly, but could very well have been strongly influenced by that. That's funnier because that stigma watching TV, seeing this toy and being like, that reminds me of Freddy.

There's another component to it. I do have a little bit of a temper. As an 11-year-old? You know, only if I'm asking. Like if you bring it out if you got me going yeah I could be a madball Hello welcome it's our Lord time how you doing beau I'm doing great Colin where are we today? We are at Blackheart Barber Company in Nashville Tennessee for one of the most monumental days in the history of our sport here We have

Maybe the definitive hardcore frontman realistically this is a true lifer of the genre one of our most anticipated guests of all time. Someone on the immediate list in the beginning. Like the show started it was like, well if we could get Freddy one day, that'd be great. Many call them the chosen one.

Please everyone welcome New York's own Freddie Madball. Thank you. Thank you guys. The chosen one. The chosen one. Wow. That's a first. The new king right here, that's awesome. That's awesome. How you doing? Thank you guys. Appreciate it. Thanks for the kind of work. Doing great, doing great. Nashville, Tennessee.

How long? I've been here a few years now. Cool. Yeah. You dig it? Yeah, I dig it. I really do, actually. A lot of cool people.

I've come across people from like back east, from West Coast that I know. Like, yeah, making a lot of good connections here with good people. And it's like, yeah, I love it. Is it the centrality of it all in terms of being a traveling guy? Yeah, yeah, a few things. You know, cost of living. And we had some, my wife has some family out here.

I got a couple of very close friends that ended up making their way out here. So there were a few things that kind of drew us to this area. Sure. But I love it. So far, so far so good. Was it hard to leave New York? Well, actually, I'm glad you mentioned that

because I actually was in Florida for a bunch of years in between New York and here. Interesting. So you went Florida, New York, Florida. Or New Jersey, Florida, New York, Florida. Yes, yes. My whole life has been between New York and Florida, Jersey. A little jersey sprinkled in there, of course.

So this is the first place that's not on the East Coast. Sure. That's not New York or Florida. Okay. So it's new. It's a new experience for sure. Well, Nashville, you got pretty now. Yeah, yeah, so on.

But, yeah, Florida's always been in the mix since my childhood. And, yeah, I was there for a lot of years. My kids were born there, and so I was raising my family there, and then now we're here. Well, before we get into Freddie Madball, I think we have to start with Agnostic Fred. And, you know, we say the chosen one, because you're a very unique case where normally we ask guests, how did you find music, how did you find hardcore music? When your case, hardcore found you very young. So tell us about finding hardcore.

at seven years old through your brother Roger and agnostic front. Agnostic Fred. That's awesome. You guys do your homework. Come on. Yeah, man. I don't know that very many people have even brought that up ever in an interview. So that's, that was good. Yes, I was Agnostic Fred before I was badball. I mean, yeah, it's funny because like you said, hardcore found me, I didn't come from like metal or punk, which is typically, you know, like the case with people, you know, even like my brother and Vinny, they come from punk. Yeah, I mean, your brother's quote of like never trust a hardcore kid who didn't come from punk.

Didn't come from punk, yeah. And like, yeah, I mean, that's how he found hardcore. Being in the punk scene and then stumbled upon this new thing and boom. So for me, it wasn't any of that. I wasn't a metalhead and I wasn't a punk rocker. I just, the first, like, you know, heavy style music that I discovered was Ignostic Front, victim of pain, actually United Blood before that. And, I mean, yeah, you know, you hear rock stuff or, like, or even, like, heavier stuff, like, you know, Iron Maiden or, you know, Black Sabbath or, like, Like those kind of names, those big names, of course, I had heard of those bands, you know,

and I maybe even knew some songs, but it wasn't what I was into. Yeah, it wasn't your thing. It wasn't my thing. I loved all music. Like, as a kid, I mean, I was big into hip hop as a kid. Like, still am. Huge, you know, like, that was like a big thing for me, you know, from like as long as I can remember. So the first heavy music that I got into that really got immersed into was hardcore, yes, and it was obviously

Gnostic front. So some people flip through records and they find a Metallica record or something might find like I don't know a bad brains record at best Sure that's best case in her You created in a lab find like the purest form the golden egg That was lucky yeah I mean you know like my I have other siblings and like there were like all kinds of records in my house so like they'd be like a random like Led Zeppelin record or like and then there'd be sitting right next to like a salsa record because I'm Latin you know like my mom's Cuban my dad's Colombian so like heavily you know there's always been like a lot of Latin music in my house different styles a lot of salsa but like

that was always big and I always liked it I wasn't like oh I hate my parents music I I enjoyed the music and then there'd be like my sister stuff like random disco and like 80s pop. Sure. And then there'd be like heavier stuff. They're like such an eclectic variety of like music. But it wasn't your cool tattooed older brother.

You know? And then you pulled out the gatefold victim and pain and it was like that was the hard stuff, you know? And then like I mean, does it get any better? No, it does not. So Roger's your half brother? He is.

Did you guys grow up together? We did. We never. really used the term half-brother with so it's Roger my brother Rudy and my sister Myra. Okay. They're all my, Roger's

like 12 years older Rudy's like 10, 11 years old, you know, they're all just like there's like a 10 year gap between us at least. And so they're all they were all born in Cuba. That's right.

And my mom's first marriage when she was like 16. Okay. Crazy. And so they're all Cuban. So the whole family is first generation of America. I am, well, I'm, yeah, whatever you would consider me second or, like, I'm the first one in my entire family born in America. Right.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So whatever that would be first or second. But, yeah, they're all born in Cuba. They're all Cubans. Wow. And so my mom came over with three little kids, and then she met my dad in New Jersey.

Okay. And then her and Roger's dad split up. my dad came into the picture he was younger than their dad my dad's younger than my mom and uh yeah then a whole other chapter yeah started and i was born and here we are but yeah we never spoke like my little half-brother or anything like that because i i was like the baby to them like you know they took care of me they were like oh you know like 12 years is a big gap yeah that's that's like that's a part-time caretaker. Yeah, my mom was going to have,

like my mom miscarried a bunch of times before me and after me. Oh, wow. So they were always expecting this little brother or sister that was like, when is this thing coming? Like, when's this little kid coming? And so every time she would like miscarry or whatever, it would be like, and then finally I came.

So it was like a big deal when I came into the picture. Yeah, you're a celebration. Really? You know, it happened. And then after me, my mom tried again with my dad and she can never make it happen again. She lost twins in one of those, either before or after me lost twins as well. So yeah, it's sad, but it's brutal. It is what it is. Yeah.

I made it through somehow. You did, you did. We're glad you did. It was this time period when you first see that victim and pain of the United Blood EP, is this you're in New Jersey at the time? I'm in Florida at the time. Yeah, I was born in Jersey and we were. relocated to Florida when I was about four or five years old, young. And yeah, my grandfather went to Florida and my dad followed him.

They wanted, they wanted sunshine and like tropical, because that's kind of the climate where they come from. Of course. So, but Roger stays in New York. Roger's not having it. He's like, I'm not going to Florida. He's like, he's older, like, what, 16, 17, you know, like a kid, but, you know, in days he was older.

Yeah. So how does it come that he goes, okay, you're gonna come to New York for a trip, vacation or something just to visit? Yeah. How does Ignostic Front get presented to you as a thing that enters your life? Firstly in New York. Okay. Yeah, because they hadn't toured.

He just wants to bring you around? Yeah, they hadn't toured yet. So it would have been about 82, 83. That was my introduction. So it was like, I forget how I made my, I think I do remember how I made my way to New York. I went to visit an aunt in New Jersey in Patterson. And I have a lot of family still in the New Jersey area. My family's, like, again, between New Jersey and, like, Florida, South Florida, and

some are sprinkled in New York. But so for one reason or another, I ended up in New Jersey visiting my aunt, my aunt and my uncle. I had a bunch of uncles there, cousins. some my age, some a little younger. And Roger picks me up in New Jersey because he's living in the city at this point. And, you know, he's my big brother,

so he wants to hang out with me. Of course. And that's how I get introduced to the scene at the time, which was based mostly, really in, like, Lower East Side, like Alphabet City area. And then my whole world.

I just got exposed to, like, like this whole world, which was like very different. In its infancy. In its infancy. And also in a setting, early 80s Lower East Side, what was that like? Wow, especially for a child. Just like how the pictures.

Yeah, it depict it. It's like crazy. You know, some places look like third world country like war zone and then, you know, I mean there's always, there was always an element of like, a lot of cool art. I mean, you know, East Village, Lower side. Alphabet

City, you know, it was like a hub for artists. So it was like music, art, this, that. So there's always that element sprinkled in there, you know. But yeah, a lot of crazy, a lot of drugs, like, you know, people nodding out, a lot of weird.

But, you know, they, they tried to insulate me as best they could. They took care of me. You know, they, they did make me panhandle a couple times. I mean, that probably worked. I'll forgive them. I'll forgive them for that. I'll give a pass.

But yeah, it was like, you know, my brother and Ray B's and Vinny and like that whole Jimmy and like that whole original first generation New York hardcore guys. Like they all like, you know, yeah, I mean, I was like, hey, look at this little kid. So they took me around and I went to A7. So they're psyched to have you around? They were psyched to have me around. Okay. I mean, otherwise my brother would have just kick me, you know, brought me back to my aunt's house and been like, all right, we had

fun, took him for an ice cream. Here he goes. I think Madball's whole existence is like proof that your brother loves you in a way. Like especially in the early. I question that sometimes, but you're right. If you really, if you break it down, we'll get there. Yeah. So what, he's a mad scientist. Right. And he was experimenting. I think it's a bit of both. I said, I can see that. I could see that. Yeah, I can see that. And there's, we'll, we'll get there in just a second. I don't, do you like, do you remember much from your life from seven to 11 years? years old. I don't remember much. There's outside of like a couple action figures I was excited about and bands I started to like. In your case, you have all these photos and videos popping up of you as a little kid on stage. How vivid is all of that to you still?

I mean, I'm with you like my memory's not great like that. Like, you know, I know people that have like photographic memories and like, you know, it's more vague, but the pictures do Help me like remind me of a scenario or situation. Yes, the pictures are great like when I come across those pictures I could sort of transport myself to that time period and remember Almost even what I was smelling at the time like you know so funny you said that because I was gonna say you'll see an old picture and you will remember how that bar smelled Right. Yeah or the house that we know was like a squat you know and they had like a distinct odor They made not necessarily a bad one just like a squatty odor You know, like, whatever that is. 100%.

And so, like, pictures are great for that, you know? Like, yeah, people are lucky nowadays to have just, like, photographs with their whole entire life from beginning to tend because it's just going to be like, yeah, I'm not going to forget anything. Yeah, because otherwise we just have books,

like a photo album. And those are gone. And that's it. You lose those in the fire every time. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Do you recall your first time singing on stage? Well, there's that picture of it,

which reminds me of how I felt. Sure. And you could see my face in it, and I'm terrified. Yeah. And I remember being nervous, but I remember also having the desire to do it. You know, so it was like, I'm scared, I'm scared, but I'm going to do it. You know, like, I'm not, you know, like. You were surely influenced and encouraged by your brother.

Yeah. Roger can do it. I can do this. For sure. I mean, you know, you always look up to your big brothers and, you know, in like so many ways. And yeah, I was learning the songs. I was starting to like mouth the songs and be like, okay, yeah. I mean, they're simple songs.

And then it was my brother, but I also have to credit Vinny. Because I think he also caught me like kind of singing like one of the songs and being like, oh, the kid knows the songs. You know, and I think. And that's so him. It started to spend his time with him. Yeah. Come on, kids.

He's scouting. I'm still the kids. Br. I'm a half a century old, but I'm the kid. Trust me. So he's, you know, I think he kind of looked at my brother and it was like, I don't know if they spoke about it or if it was just kind of like they spoke with their eyes, like, or, you know, but then it was just like somehow, some way they just kind of were like,

go ahead, do it. So did you get the bug from that first time? I think so. Yeah. I would say. I would say. Yeah. Yeah.

So you brought up Vinny being an encouraging figure. figure in your life. He gave you the name Madball. That's correct. Tell me. Yeah, that was one of my Vinnie being Vinny, you know. He might have been influenced by other things that were going on in the 80s at that time and, you know, like watching a lot of TV in Mont Street at the Montstreet apartment, you know. So is it, was it based off the toy or the sock with the... I don't want to say that exactly but could very well have been strongly influenced by that. That's funnier because that Stigma watching TV, seeing this toy and being like, that reminds me afraid. Well, picture him watching like whatever he's watching, you know, regular TV. That's funny already. That's funny already.

Just chilling out and, you know, talking to the TV. Yeah. And then, you know, you know that's happening. I mean, I've seen it. Sure. So I love you, Stiggy. And then like a commercial comes on and it's like, ball madball right so it was i think more that than the actual like it was just the sound of it uh-huh reminded him of me somehow wow i was kind of a madball like i kind of like uh there's another component to it it's you know uh i do have a little bit of a temper and you know only if i'm agitated like if you bring it out as an 11 year old yeah wow and so I think like sometimes for like tour fun they would like piss me off just to see how it would react. Regular old scrappy dude.

This is the mad scientist part. Okay. And so I think they would like poke at me and like not Vinny. Vinny was cool. But like you know, my brother and a few other people would like I think they just, you know, like they'd get bored. Get you wound up. They're like, let's mess with the kid. Let's see what he does.

Why not mess with the kid? And then cut to me throwing rocks at the van. like really I'd get like enraged okay you know I would have assumed that the the band name came from a billiard ball and a mad ball you know and one would sort of fitting later on in yeah sure but it's it's funny that it's almost like almost it's actually it's very wholesome yeah the way it actually came yeah yeah yeah no it's a little more a little more uh wholesome like exactly like you said but it was a combo of like Vinnie's imagination

and my temperament when I got messed with. Otherwise I was pretty chill kid I think but if you got me going I could be a madball. And one day he was just like Mad ball, madball, you know, and then I had shaved my head so

you know the whole ball look yeah it was like it just became it just became madball. There's a difference between finding something peripherally at seven years old or your brother showing you something that's kind of like, okay, cool. And then it becoming a lifestyle community, how strong was that feeling for you between seven and 11 years old to be like, okay, this is the place I want to be, this is my thing. Super strong.

Okay, immediately. Especially that age range. Because there was a time where I sort of fell out of hardcore that that's later, but, you know, seven to... 12, 13-ish. Yeah, I was like, you know, I just became immersed in it. And then like I just, I was bummed to go to Florida. Like when I would have to go back to Florida, I was bummed.

I was like, I just want to be in New York. Like, I don't, like, had met such cool people. Something about the living outside of the norm really spoke to me. The music clearly resonated with me because otherwise I just wouldn't have even, you know, Like, because people, you have to remember like every single thing your older sibling plays for you, you're not going to necessarily like that. You know what I mean? Like you could also. But the one you like, you are going to remember forever.

You know, you can put something on and go, that's not my thing, man. That's not my bag. I'm over here. Yeah. I was like all about it. And in that range, sorry to interrupt, in that range, are you living with Roger? No, no, I'm living with my family.

But I mean when you're in New York, when you're visiting. Yeah, I mean like even when I'd be visiting, you know, like sometimes like, it'd be like, oh, I'm going to go visit my family in New Jersey and, you know, responsible adults and like my cousins and like, but I was always looking for an excuse to like go to get over Let me go hang with my brother 100% Yeah

When you get home to Florida Is there like a single other hardcore kid No No No So you're You're the complete You're an outcast at home

Dying to get back You got boiling I could remember going to school With the first time I shaved my head And people looking at me weird Um What the hell? Yeah

You know And it was just like You know Because I had like I don't know Whatever haircut you have at that time in like the 80s or the 80s like some kind of whack haircut and like I was like screw this shave my head you know my mom was bummed oh you beautiful hair you know and you do have beautiful

oh thanks man I appreciate that um but you know moms yeah of course you're beautiful hair and I'm like and then uh I forget like I might have had like uh I don't know what some kind of a F shirt on and like I was just dressed. I wasn't like outlandish. It wasn't like I had like five color hair and like really, really trying to like be shocking.

But whatever I was wearing was shocking to those people. I mean was the word skinhead subversive to the average person in 1983, 84? I mean, sadly, that word was like

negative. Yeah. Yeah. You know, like, it wasn't the skinhead. Like, already. Already, like, early 80s, already. Like, it was more subversive, but the people that did know

immediately thought that for some reason. And, like, I'm like, that's not the skinhead that I know. I'm like, I'm in New York with, like, black skins and, like, Latin and, like, every Jewish, like, it's like, that's not the world that I'm, a part of, you know. Was there part of it? So like, like,

an agnostic front using the word skinhead when it's like a dirty word, even in the time. Pretty brave. Is it, is it kind of like a fuck you to... Kind of. Okay. Okay. I mean, they're pretty punk, right? And pretty, like, FU. So, like... I mean, I think they were just flying the flag

of what they were. They were New York skins. Yeah. It was genuine. It was genuine. From them, but you know, I don't even think they realized until they started touring how bad that climate was as far as like it becoming more political and then like the right you know wing and nazi skin like all that element i think they really started to see that more as they traveled and i saw some of it as well sure because i was there you know with them so i was

like yeah this yeah i can you know it's it's it's kind of wild how are you getting into non all-ages shows at the time. That's a great question. Great question. I think they snuck me into it was either A7 or C-Bs. Well, A-7 maybe didn't need to because A-7 the show started at like one in the morning

or something like crazy like that. And it was like more wild style. Sure. Like run by the kids. Sure. We've been in there recently and it's tiny. Dejan took us after we had the day with Vinny. It's so small, but he took us in the back

where they have all the stuff still. Yeah, very cool. Super small scene, you know, back then. If you see a little kid, you'd know there's a little kid in there. That's not sneaking in. For sure. Like, you're still sneaking into a child. Yeah, I don't know, like, I don't remember how, how, I know that C-Bs was bad.

They were strict, me. Really? Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Was it, when did it become C-Bs and not Hilly's on the Bowery? Was it, was that, like, was it already C-Bs? Yeah, that's before my time. Yeah, that's before my time.

Vinny would be a better person to that. He said he went there when he was to. Hill is. Oh, yeah. Vinnie, yeah, Vinny, yeah, that's his, that's his, that's his, that's his, that's his thing. Yeah, he'd tell you about Maxis Kans. He would tell you about all that old, like where punk was transitioning into hardcore. By the time I went there was already CBs. But the Sunday matinees were probably just starting, or hadn't, hadn't hit their stride yet. You know what I mean? Of course. But I had to be, we had to talk to them about me being in there and they didn't necessarily sneak me in but I can only go do a song and leave

and I had to be escorted in and escorted out by either Big Charlie who was like old school security guy there great guy rest in peace Big Charlie or like Ray B's or like one of the guys. Would you just hang out outside then? Yeah so I would just be hanging out like my brother would would have his van out there, doors open, people hang in. I mean, that was kind of a thing anyways, like at CB's. Like, people really like to hang out outside because in there it's all dingy and dark. So you really only went in when the show was happening.

The cool part was the hang outside. I mean, you know, still is. Whether you drank, didn't drink, didn't matter. Like everyone hung out, talked to each other. You had the straight edge faction, you had the drinkers, you had this, didn't matter. You know, everyone respected each other, knew each other. So, yeah, I'd hang out in the van until it was like, you know, I was allowed to go in. And sometimes I'd extend my time inside.

I'd cheat and be like, they're not saying anything. And then eventually someone would be like, yeah, you got to get your brother out of here. He's not supposed to be in here. And has that for like liability reasons on there? Exactly. It's interesting that they cared about that. Really? Considering everything else about it.

And there was a bunch of 16-year-olds in there. So it's like, I mean, yeah, I mean, the guesses are different. 11. 11, 16. Was there a single other 11-year-old present, even in the community at the time? You know? The chosen one.

Not that I can remember. You're Luke Skywalker. I can remember, no. I think I was like one of the younger, there were a lot of young people on the scene, but no one as young as me, no. Nothing I can remember. You mentioned that you were a hip-hop head.

Yes, very much. That's not so much a genre that we know all that much about. Were you into hip-hop at that time? Was hip-hop? I don't even really really. know when hip hop really like took off. I know it being New York. Hip hop and hardcore kind of almost the same age I think like I think hip hop may have come like punk maybe just before

like hardcore the way we know it. But similar in age I mean obviously hip hop's trajectory is like it's pop. Yeah that's essentially music. Yeah. Who are some of the artists that I mean I loved like you know, we had like in my house there were like Curtis Blow records, which is like super old, which was kind of like before my time, but I still was like, I liked it. And we had Sugar Hill Gang Records, Grandmaster Flash. We had like all those old records, but the stuff that I started to like kind of like on my own was like Slick Rick and Dougie Fresh had this, had a record that had like, I guess it'd be like an EP. We had like just a couple of songs on it.

And it was called the show. And so it had like loti-dadi on the other side. It was like the B-side. And that was like, I think I even bought that record with my own money or like my own money. From the panhandling that they made. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Yeah, right. Sure.

So, yeah, stuff like that. And then of course, like run DMC, LL Cool J, like the names that everyone, you know. But in their infancy as far as like, like, you know, relatives now. license to ill when it first drop, Beastie Boys first record. You know, that was like a big one for me. I love that record. Were those guys around when you were first coming around? I didn't know them super well, but my brother, Vinnie, those guys, know those guys, yes.

Was there a bit of like, oh, these guys are taken off now too cool type thing? No, I never got that vibe. And Jimmy was especially, Jimmy, you know, I'm talking about, you know, Jimmy from Murphy's Law. Yeah. Anytime I say Jimmy, I'm, there's only one Jim. There's many jimmies, but there's only, you know. In your world. He was tight with them.

Okay. They brought out Murphy's Law on their first big arena tour. Oh, shit. I didn't know that. In America for the Licensed Ill album, which is basically where they just popped off. They took off right after that. And, I mean, they were already doing arenas on, like, their first tour. So that just goes to show you where they were headed.

And I thought it was super cool that that they were. They brought out Murphy's Law. It's awesome. Because Murphy's Law meant a lot to New York Arcor, but in the big picture, they weren't like some big band. Yeah. So I thought it was really cool. I know one of them, I forget which Beastie Boy also played bass for Chromex a couple times.

Like later on, or mid-end, I know, I forget which. Yeah, I'm trying to think about that. You know, the first time I ever played New York, we went to Flight Club, the shoe store, early 2000s. Grandmaster Flash walked in dropped like 10 grand on shoes in 2003 money you know that's like

he's half a million dollars he age as well too he's like in great parked came in just bought a bunch of shit had it put in his car and left and it was like the coolest thing I've ever seen real New York moment yeah what were so agnostic front pulls you in Murphy's Laws around

what were other hardcore bands you connected to at that time that were kind of popping off yeah what demo because like like yeah your brother's in Agnostic Front and that's going to get you there. But finding this collective of other bands is what's going to keep you there.

Pretty much anyone that played with AF I you know, I just at that time I just loved the culture. You know, like I'm not sponge. You're just so good. Yeah. And I'm not like, you know, I wish I should have been

better about this, but like I'm not like a great historian of the core. of the culture, you know, like I don't have like every seven-inch, I don't have like, I couldn't name you every single band, you know, but, you know, all the New York bands, obviously, classic bands, war zone, this, you know, like all those bands, I mean, goes without saying, sick of it all, you know, I liked it all, you know, and, and obviously my world grew bigger as time went on and I got to travel and meet other bands from other places.

But yeah, anyone that like AF toured with or anyone that played C-Bs when I was there, I just was hungry to like absorb whatever, whatever was going on, you know? And I really, you know, as I got older, then I started to find the stuff that really, really, you know, affected me, which was like, you know, Brightside from Killing Time and like certain sheer terror records and like, you know, even like the first Chromeags, your quarrel, you know, like, you know,

those things are like impactful to like, I think anyone to the hard call pretty much. That's the landmark. Those were important records for me that I kind of started to find, you know, my own taste. And those, you're, you're, you're, 15 when those are coming

out and there's a big difference between the thing you hear at seven years old. When you're a kid you kind of don't know you just kind of see who you see and like you're just like cool cool cool I mean I was on tour with GVH with A.F and I just they were just such cool guys and I just

loved them just based on like he was nice to me I like it was just cool cool English dudes and like you know I didn't know that they were going to be this like legendary, you know, British punk kind of hardcore-ish band too because they're like super influential to hardcore.

You know, like GBAH discharge, like those kind of heavy punk bands, I think, influenced early hardcore. Everything comes from somewhere. Yeah, yeah, yeah. One thing that surprised both of us when we were talking and when we spent the day with Vinny

and something that I heard you say, We played a fest together somewhere in Europe Maybe two years ago now Bad Religion was also playing. We played a fest Brutal assault or something. The one with all the big excavators. Okay.

You know the one? Okay. And I think I know where you might be going with this And I'm happy you're asking this If it's what I think. You just said we got hardcore royalty in the house. Yeah. And I want everybody to give it up

and make sure you watch bad religion. Yeah. And this was years before we talked to Vinny. Before I knew that that, that bad religion, I wouldn't have guessed would be an influential band to the guys in New York, to the East Coast.

Well, specifically, like my brother, I remember my brother wearing a bad religion shirt in the early 80s. Like, he would play shows with like this old bad religion shirt. On the United Blood, seven-inch girl. Maybe you're right, yes. And, like, I think he, like, you know,

everyone back then would, like, bedazzle their shirt, like, cut it off, like, you know, And which happens now too, right? You know, sometimes you want to just, you know, cut the sleeves off. Don't wrong with that. Hey, you're preaching to the conductor. Yeah, you know what I want to trim the bottom a little bit. 100%.

It happens. It happens. So I remember that symbol, like, you know, like, very vividly. Like, that logo is very much like, but I was watching that interview with Brett. Yeah. And, well, I want to preface what I'm going to say. with this, I have so much respect for Brett because we were on epitaph briefly. It was sort of an unfortunate thing because it was, I think, one of our stronger records,

but we didn't really get to push it the way it deserved to be pushed. And a lot of that had to do with me. I got into some legal stuff. At this point, I'm older and I'm getting into all kinds of stuff. street shenanigans, dumb stuff. And so I got myself in a bad situation. And, you know, I got locked up briefly, did a little skid bid, blah, blah, blah. And it hindered that push.

And then I was excited to, you know, revisit the opportunity. And then we lost the guys that were the lineup at the time. So it was just like a mess. Just to give you a little context about hold it down, about why that was never really pushed so hard. But fast forward to, I don't know, a few years back, Brett, I asked Brett for the album, straight up. And because I was like, you know, it's like, it's sort of like living in like obscurity in a way. at my Kempitaph. And I ask him for the record.

And Tim is a friend of mine from Rancid. And so Tim was like, oh, man, Brett's cool. Just talk to him. And I'll put a good word in. I mean, I know Brett, but not super well. He's not my homie like that. And all it really took was a phone call and a couple of emails. And he let me have that record, which is unbelievable.

He's like a genuine punk. Dude, that is the most punk thing. That was like no red tape, no BS. He was just like, yeah, Freddie, you deserve it. You deserve it like, you know, he understood. I mean, it wasn't like it's something that's making him a bunch of money anyway. But still, that does not happen. But the money thing is irrelevant because there are people who will like hold on to stuff,

Even if it's not making them any money, they just want to have ownership of it. Yeah, because it could. Because it could, yeah. Because you never know. Could go in a movie or something. You never know. The band could pop off later in the game,

and now that record has a lot more value. And not to get too much into the business of things, and I don't want to put anyone's business out there, but I just want to thank Brett because, and I've never had the opportunity to publicly thank them for being like a stand-up dude, for being like a real guy. Like, even on our level,

Like even on the DIY underground level of music, people still play that industry card. People are still very business and very industry. And he was not that way. He was like, say less. Here you go. That's not a thing. Here, take your album.

Take your masterpiece back for free. It's crazy. Crazy. Yeah, crazy. I'm forever, like, eternally grateful to Brett for that. So I want to preface that. Now, moving on to the bad religion thing, I remember on the interview we're like,

oh, it was like my favorite hardcore band of all the time. That is not exactly accurate. Great band. Iconic, legendary. If there's a hall of fame for punk hardcore bands, they belong in it, like, among others. Agreed. But I have to give the greatest hardcore band of all time title to AF.

I'd have to be. And I think that's where the message was a lot of, little mix because I was shouting out AF, but I also shouted out bad religion in the same breath. So I was saying best hardcore band in the world, the Gnostic Front, but there's a lot of hardcore royalty in the house, bad religion in the house. And so it got, there was like something that was like, not to say that, not that there's anything wrong with like, hey, all love and respect to bad religion as well, you know, but, you know, it was still, A.F always gets that. Yeah. And we agree. I agree. We've said. But with, but with, even with that, and then

with talking to Vinnie and realizing that they were that influential of a man. It's just not something that I ever really put to paper that I thought about. It was cool to see that from both his generation and your generation. You know what I mean? That the respect

is there. I mean, those guys know better than I do, but like, Cali, D.C., even, like, negative approach, which is one of my favorites. Super influential. But, like, I feel like with that first generation, they were all influencing each other. Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

So, like, who came first? I don't know. You know, bad Marines or somebody out west? I mean, it's hard to say. It's all like late 70s. It's the same time, and it's so fast. And even if you think about United Blood, that's like 81, 82. Sure. So it's like they're not far behind.

A. F is right there. Right there. You know, and they're unique. So everyone's unique. No one sounds like bad brains. No one sounds like bad religion. No one sounds like A.F. No one sounds like calls for alarm. You know what I mean? Like all these bands. So it's like... A little pivot here.

You mentioned Cromags earlier. Yeah. I'm always wondered, was there ever like a silent kind of rivalry between A.F. and the Cromags of like, who's the king in New York here? Who's the band in New York? I would...

I mean, it's funny because they all sort of came up. Like, I remember when I first went to New York, Harley was very much a part of that original squad. I know John was around as well, but for some reason I don't remember him in the mix as much. Maybe he was going through some stuff at the time, so he was a little out of the mix. But Harley was also once the 12-year-old kid at the shows.

He's the original punk, like 12-year-old kid before me, before my time. And I give him that. But Harley was part of that original squad of guys in the early 80s that I met, when I became indoctrinated and became like, you know, immersed in this. Harley was there for sure And they were homies But I think by the mid-80s

There were some weirdness with the camps I'm not gonna lie I'm not gonna I'm not it's not for me to really tell AF story I hope you interview my brother I would oh dime too That's another one of these Say the word I'll make it happen It's another one of the inner person

The minute we get off of this And it's I think it's important for the culture 100% which is what you guys do And I appreciate that man You guys cover the culture in a great way So yeah, thank you salute to you guys

He'll tell you probably Okay More in depth Those things But there was There was there was some There was some Unspoken maybe like

Because you don't see a lot of old flyers With both bands on it No they don't play together Yeah Yeah it's weird It's very interesting It's a good it's a good observation And you're right

It was sort of like It became different camps Yeah let's just say that Yeah And people had different intentions and, you know. We'll talk to Roger about it. And now it's over 40 years ago. Yeah.

Yeah, for real. Yeah. Yeah, for real. So, but you can't deny like age of quarrel. Mm-mm. Like that right? One of the best. Undeniable.

One of the best. Yeah. So you turned 12 years old. Yeah. Somebody says to you, hey, let's make a band. Rod, your brother and stigma. Your brother in stigma. Yeah.

Say, let's, Michael Jackson-esque, really. You know? But it's, it's, it's, it's, you know. Is it, hey, do you want to record something? Like, how does that, how does Ball of Destruction? I forget how the exact conversation went, but it happened pretty organically just because by this point, it became a tradition of sorts for me to come up

and sing a song with A.F. Anytime I was with them. So, you know, I'm getting older. I'm getting a little more comfortable. I mean, I'm still like a kid. I'm shy, but. I think I graduated from doing like, it's my life,

which was easy enough. Which is an animal's cover. An animals cover. The animals. Those are our guys. I love the animals. Dude, they're awesome. They're one of the best.

They're like bad. Huge fans of the animals. They're like bad boys. They were like, they were like, they were rough. And I mean, the name, does it get better? That's awesome.

It should be the fucking animal. Yeah. Yeah, no, I love that. And I, you know, that was one of those ones where like you go back and get into it after the fact. Yeah, absolutely. Because like Vinnie, that's his era. Like, he grew up with the animals. Like, he loves all that stuff. Hence why he hijacked that little segment of the song. But then, then, oh, yeah. I mean, I went retroactively, went back with a lot of music.

And like, I mean, you know, I love old news. I love all kinds of stuff. But anyway, not to veer from the question. So that was my first song. And then blind justice, The end of blind justice into last warning became my thing. Like when, you know, the end of blind justice starts coming with that, you know, where you get those last lines that build up. And then all of last warning? The mic would be, the mic would be handed to me. And then, and I don't know how that came to be.

But I guess I liked those songs and I was just like, yeah, you know. But also the symbolism of a little kid saying there's no justice, there's just us. There's no justice. It's just us. That was my lines. Yeah. It's amazing. Yeah, that was the seed planted for Madball right there.

And then all of Last Warning. Yeah. And so I would do that anytime I was with them. Which, like, Last Warning is one of the biggest, like, mouthfuls. Oh, my God. On the records. But having that inclination of, like, fitting all that and figuring that out as an 11-year-old, if I were your older brother, I'd also be like, this kid's singing per band.

So how does that become? I mean, I guess they recognize some. that I was able to like do it and stay on time. So yeah, that was simply it. Like I would just do these songs with them wherever I was, you know, be it Florida or New York, C-Bs. I think I even sung those songs on like a live-at-C-Bs recording or one of those live at C-Bs.

It was one of those deals where I got brought in. The first one, yeah. I sang and then they were like, get them out of here because it was like the craziest show ever. Sure. It was like just people, like just like everywhere. Like you couldn't barely see the band. You know, it's like, wow.

So is it, is Madball like a cheat code? Like he's the singer of the band. You can't, you can't kick him out. He's the singer. He's got to be in here. I mean, maybe. Madball is Madball. Yeah, I'm Madball.

Exactly. That's true. But did Madball perform officially before anything was recorded? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Officially, un-officially, there was an AF show where a couple guys didn't make it. Craig.

Craig. And I think Steve Martin. That makes sense. And so, I don't know why that is. But they didn't make it to this show, a new Rochelle. And my brother, being a guy who thinks on his feet, you know. Picks up a bass. That's right.

Well, I'll play bass. you play dead we'll do madball because madball idea concept was already there it was in the lab was in the lab i can't even i don't remember if we had recorded ball destruction yet or not i don't think you had okay probably not but the seed was like we were already talking about and it's all a f songs which is which is amazing which is the funniest part yeah was it was it was more novelty than original sure okay let's just say that sure but yeah yeah Roger picked up the bass, Vinny had the guitar, Will, and I sang the older songs. And show went off, you know, like the people that were there to see AF.

I mean, I'm sure they were bummed, but they made the most of it. And it was cool. Like, from what I remember, it was like, the reception was, like, positive. Who is, like, in a non-derogatory way at all, you're kind of this mascot for the youth of this culture, you know? No, I don't take offense to it. at all. I mean, I feel like I was the mascot until Madball. So like, Gnostic Fred was the mascot. Yeah, there you are. And like, at first I was like Gnostic Fred, like, you know, like, you know, when you're a kid, especially a rebellious one, like myself, you kind of want your

own identity. But I didn't mind it because it was like, yeah, I mean, these are my, these are my, this is my family. And like, yeah, yeah, I'm with them all the time. Yeah, I'm agnostic Fred. Okay, I'm cool with it. I can take it. I'm named after the coolest band in the world. I am a all right I'll accept it I'll accept it but then Madball when Vinnie Chris and me

Madball that felt like my own identity in a way like that felt like okay now I'm not agnostic Fred now I'm just this other and I didn't initially like Madball the nickname I was like Madball

like what you know and it you know I was like a little bit like not feeling it at first and then it just they were relentless with it they just that's all that's

all they called me. Vinnie, my brother, Craig, the whole, whoever was around at that time, that became my nickname. And so they're, boom. Then between that, I guess my personality and then also the fact that I was singing with AF, they were like, dude, like, we got to do a seven-inch

with you singing like old AF songs. And how, just see what happens. You said it was more novelty than serious, but like it's serious enough where that, they're taking time out of their lives to record with you singing. So they took it somewhat seriously. Yeah. Yeah.

I mean, I never viewed it that way, but yeah. I mean, you're right. I mean, they could have just been like, I just talked about it. Sure. Or live only kind of thing. This could have been cool or would be cool, but just like, oh, we don't have time for that. Yeah, it's true.

They did take time out. I mean, it was awesome that they did that and that they, They, you know, viewed me in a way where like, okay, I think this kid can pull it off. That's definitely, you know, a good feeling. And obviously it was fun to do because I knew a lot of old A-F songs. So just being around them. And, you know, even songs, these are songs, some of them were never made it to United Blood. Maybe made it to their set, maybe not, but like they were floating around old, you know.

And so we just kind of like brought them back to life. It's like a proof of concept B-side record or something. It's such an interesting. And that's you on the cover. That's me on the cover, yeah. And so we just went with it. And yeah, it was just like we took a picture. And like it all just happened sort of organically and fast.

And just like the songs were already there. So there was no writing really necessary. And the recording was like a two-track live at Don Fury's. So it was not, nothing super technical or like, no like 50 passes on vocals to get like a take is just like, go. Oh, you ripped it live, straight now. I ripped it live, yeah. You, now, obviously, you're very young on this recording. Yeah.

So you sound young. For sure. You sound young. Yeah. You eventually, and we'll get there, but you eventually have a very distinct voice. You know, you have your style. Your voice. Were you trying to do that voice?

but you were young, so you were just going for it. Okay. I was just yelling. I was just yelling. That's what I knew how to do. I was like, okay, yell and make sure that you don't fumble the words. Perfect. And you didn't?

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Ball of Destruction. Yeah. Eight songs, five minutes, 48 seconds. That long. One of the greatest hardcore seven inches of all time to this day. Thank you. And your literal child on it. Any fond memories of the actual recording process? Were you there when they did the music as well?

Oh yeah, yeah. We all did it in the same room. It was live. It was live. It was like, yeah, it was a lot of fond memories because it happened down the block from Vinnie's house. So, you know, Don Fury Studios was on spring. In the cellar, right?

Stomp on the thing. Yeah, in the basement, yeah. It was on spring, I guess. And, like, right in that area, like, right in Vinnie's neighborhood, which you guys have been to. And, yeah, I mean, you know, we'd go get sandwiches at Porese's, like, you know, the neighborhood stuff. So we were in the neighborhood, so it was very comfortable. And then, like, went down, recorded. Backups were done by, I think, like, Mark Super Touch.

and um um um which is a band that like you know back you know you guys know super touch you guys know your stuff Craig yeah did backups i think that was it i think it was like two people and then like maybe some of the other guys but like yeah it was just fun it was just like fun quick we we we hit it pretty quick like we like didn't take too long like we nailed it and it was it just a feeling of like that's gonna be cool yeah it was it was awesome i mean i was like oh man i'm like i'm gonna actually be on like a recording yeah this is wild when you're 12 you know i mean it's not real until you get the thing yeah and the the logo idea the or it's orange i think yeah yeah where do that who made it where that come from i can't remember because it's as

iconic as any other yeah it one of the greatest i can't remember where we got that font yeah man i have to ask my brother i didn't know if you're gonna ask my brother we'll ask you we'll um because i didn't know if it was a sports font or like just something? It was clearly hand-drawn. It just worked. You know, like when we were coming up, you know. I mean, the picture was taken by Amy,

who was mother of my, of Roger's first child. They were never married, but they were together a long time. She was in a band called Nausea. Oh, hell yeah. Yeah, of course. So she was a photographer, like on the side. Like, you know, she did that picture. and I think all the pictures on there

or maybe hers, but, man, that is such a good question about the logo because that logo is still important to us. It's the one. That's our logo.

Yeah, for real. But we do know that Steve Huey did the iconic Madball itself. Yeah, yeah. The version that's closest to what it is, for sure.

Sure. For sure. Is that something you were ever told to stop using? Legally because of the toy. No. Okay.

So free reign on the bad ball. That guy, he can be on anything? Not that I can remember. Not that I can remember. I feel like I would remember something like that. If it was like a massive thing where it was like, oh, don't do that. I think it was just different enough where like and maybe. Good for the toy.

Maybe they didn't care enough, you know. So it was like, yeah, some hardcore man. Did you ever ever have one? I wish. I never had one. Yeah, no. So maybe they did. I feel like I did after the fact.

I think I grabbed the couple after the fact. But like, I wasn't into them before. But yeah, the logo, man, I'm gonna have to really. It's a great. That's one of the best. Maybe Howie has something to do with that as well, Howie Abrams, because that record went to, in effect. Sure, I passed on you guys. And I'm sure they had something to do with helping with the layout and stuff.

Howie was very, Howie Abrams. I have to mention him because he was an A&R at InEffect. And he was my brother's go-to guy. And he was the one that Roger presented Ball of Destruction to him. Like, hey, I got this cool thing that we recorded. What do you think? And in effect was this new label under relativity or under something. There were some umbrella label under something bigger.

they were like here's this crazy thing with my little brother and Howie absolutely loved it he could have said this is a piece of shit and uh excuse my language no no no no

cock but um he was like all about it and he went on to sign us to Roadrunner as well okay there we go so I got to mention Howie because historically speaking

he's very very instrumental in Madball team Madman And the reason I mentioned him is that he would probably have a good idea of like how we came up with that font with that logo because he was part of the InEffect squad that put together the ball destruction thing. I think the lettering though is mine. I'm pretty sure it's my scribble. The ball of detroit. Okay. That's cool. And that's it on a lot of records. Set it off as me. Yeah. A lot of times where you see like the, you know, it written out. Drop it down. Drop many suckers as me. So yeah, like, which is a fun fact. That's awesome. That's a great fact. I have no idea. Ball of Destruction.

Did that mean something? Did it sound cool? I think it came out of Vinny's mind or something. I don't know. It's another one of those like Vinny creations maybe. Vinny and Roger. Yeah, I was like, what do we call it? Madball.

Okay, we had the name of the band because it's my nickname. Okay, we got the band. What do we call the record? And I think probably Vinny. It was like, yeah, Ball of Destruction. You know? And it was like, yep. Makes complete sense.

Yeah, yeah. That's me. The nickname came before the band. Yeah, for sure. That just dawned. Yeah, yeah. Wow. He is Madball.

He is Madball. Yeah, that's why when you ask me that question about, can the band exist without the name and say, well, I mean, technically it can, but I am Madball. It would be like Danzig, kicking in Danzing. Like, I mean, yeah. So, Ball Destruction has multiple songs on it that you're still playing 40 years later. Yes, sir. Pretty unbelievable.

It's dope. Who else can say? You and the Rolling Stones. Metallics. And Ignatian. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I guess they're timeless.

Yeah. Well said. Yeah. I mean, you know, they're ridiculous, but timeless. Yeah. I really like the idea of you saying hardcore lives on this record. Yeah. It was like almost prophetic in a way.

Because hardcore in general is so young that the, there's almost no need to declare that it lives, but you putting that message out there that early as just like a mantra almost ensures that it always would. Like you're at 12 years old going, this new thing currently lives, and now you have a thing to say to keep it alive for it.

Yeah, yeah. And then it's now it on the end up. I don't know. Like, I mean, that was definitely like an ad lib on my part. Really? Yeah. Yeah. I don't think anyone,

Told me to say that. I just like yelled it out. Wow. And yeah, I mean, you know, I still use it as a hashtag. Yeah, it's an album type. You know, just to kind of like, I don't know, it's like, you know, our scene's always like fighting to be heard, fighting to be noticed. So, you know, it was one of those kind of statements. And I feel, I still feel like that today.

You know, it's like, you know, you have all this, you know, all this stuff that was influenced by hardcore in the music world. So, and it's still like, some people don't know where it came from. Kind of, you know? So, like, I don't know, that sentiment, that feeling, that like underdog kind of feeling

has always been there from jump. Yeah, it's crazy. You know, like, no one knew my brother's band. Like, I couldn't tell people like, yeah, I was hanging out with him outside. Who? Yeah, what's that? Which is not the case anymore.

What's that? Not even who's that. What is that? what's that name? That's a weird name. You know, like, so yeah, it's always like, hardcore lives, you know, rooting on the, rooting for the culture.

You talked about It's My Life earlier. I think that and Crucified are the songs that are like permanently coursing through both bands and like being reused. Like the part you use Crucified and the breakdown of Crucified is in like three different records. or something. It's everywhere. It's kind of bull throwers. Yeah, it is. We should do it live. We should do

a portion of it live. We're going to get there. We're going to get to one. We'll get there. We'll get there. An iron cross cover. It is. Right? Yep. And yeah, I remember, I remember getting into badball. I'm sure it was set it off the first thing I found, which obviously we're going to get there too. But I remember thinking like, they do this part a lot. You know what I mean? Not understanding. It's like, yeah, that's kind of the point. Yeah. It's fully aware of it. I agree. That's always stuck with me. It's cool. Whose idea was that for, I guess, just like permanently adopting Crucified as the whole Camp's anthem? Well, we kind of stopped it, especially when AF came back into the fold. But for us, we always did little things as an homage to AF.

when we started playing because you have to remember that when Madball actually became an actual band, not just a novelty of like, hey, here's this cool seven-inch with this little kid, cool, cool, cool, cool. It was that. Nothing wrong with that.

It was awesome. Something I'm extremely proud of. But we weren't like actively touring and stuff. That didn't come until like the early 90s and really until after dropping many suckers. which I'm sure we're going to talk about but um we're almost there just about but no no yeah no no

I'm not Russian um but uh what are we saying so so yeah it there was always like a F is a part of the band AF is a part of our lineage whether you like whether we like it or not is it you know AFs that's our lineage

that's where we were born out of that you know family and like we were always proud of that. It wasn't like I was trying to like, oh, I need my own space, my own identity. I don't want to be like, you know, people go that route too where it's like,

I think we eventually did that organically anyway, just because I have a different personality than my brother. I have a different things to say. I have, you know, like I'm my own person. So that happened organically. And even stylistically, we're very different from me. Big time. But back then we wanted to keep AF's name kind of like the hardcore lives things like you know

We've we felt like oh man where's where's it where's hardcore going? It's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's It might fade out already you know already um and so A. F decides to take a break and so we would incorporate A.F things into our set we always covered friend or foe we did parts of crucified like we're talking about always there was was AF in the mix and you know my my my band was the last lineup right last agnostic front lineup so it just naturally made sense to always keep it in the family but we stopped doing friend or foe we stopped doing crucified a lot of AF related stuff when they came out it's my life kind of became yours it's my ours yeah sorry AF yeah and sorry animals too by the way it's ours thanks

thank you very much we are two guys who love to know stuff we we love oh yeah we love the nod you Yeah, yeah. We love the references. Cheers. So, so, you know, knowing that that was, that that's not like, I don't know, let's play an AF song. No, no. It's like, no, we're going to play our, the anthem. Yeah.

Yeah. That was purposeful. No, we wanted to keep, you know, if we were going to be the next generation coming. Yeah. And the flag or the baton was handed to us that we were going to make sure that we represented them in some way. Do you feel as though you're like a second generation punk, hardcore kid? I feel like I'm a third generation. But.

Because there's a group of four and then like your brother and Vinny and then you. Their first for sure pioneers. My brother and them always say that I was grandfathered into the first generation. I like that. The past. There was there. I was present. You were there.

So. That's proof. One could argue that I'm grandfathered into the first generation. Second gen to me is like sick of it all killing tons. I don't know how you guys No no I you know it I evaluate that Yeah That's just me

Which is monumental stuff And then I think we came after that Obviously you know like even though ball of destruction Is existed at the same time that Brightside existed Yeah It was not like a serious like it was it was serious but not You know what I mean? It was like a thing But it was not an active you know

See Sunday matinee band or like Tori band. You know, that came later. So as Ball of Destruction is happening. They were dealing liberty and justice. Yeah, I was there. And I know that very well because I was there while they recorded Liberty and Justice. Wow. I went up to I think of New York with my brother.

And were you when you played the gong, by the way? How did you did? Yeah. Wow. A hard lord. When you heard the kind of sonic departure of causeful alarm, were you into that as of josephal arm? as of just as a fan of the man it was different for sure but i could appreciate some some of the

elements of it for i didn't hate it i didn't hate it i was big big big victim and pain guy more so than united blood um victim and pain still uh when i hear the first chord makes my hair the hairs on my arms stand up still to this day and uh so that was like Like, you know, United Blood's great. But Victim of Pain was like, you know, the record. I mean, that's the New York Hark Corp. That's the New York Corp. And obviously, this is biased because, you know, that's my family.

And I came up with those guys in that camp directly. So it's a very biased statement. We can validate them. And I feel like a lot of people, especially New York people, but even East Coast or even some West Coast people, I mean, like, I feel like a lot of people would, like, back me on that. They won. We held the tournament for this very thing. They won.

They won. Thank God. Cost for alarm is great, though. Yeah. Like, I have no issues with cost for alarm. Like, production's a little weird to me. My brother's voice was a departure from what I was used to. That was where it kind of became.

That kind of freaked. That kind of freaked me out a little bit. I was like, at first, I was like, What happened with the victim and pain voice, you know? But, you know, as you've seen, it just kind of happens. It happens, man, it happens. And, you know, there's some great songs on Cause for Alarm. Yeah.

And it definitely influenced a lot of people. Oh, yeah. That record. Ourselves included. I don't know. Maybe more people than victim and pain in a way. Because it was crossing over. It's a crossover.

It's possible. Something that I think we have to talk about, just to talk about the, the full lineage of MadVal, the lyrics, the album titles, the merch, is DMS. When did that become kind of a central part of the Madball story in your life? DMS? Yeah. Well, it, you know, it predates me.

Right. Being a part of it. Sure. But when I permanently moved to New York as a young guy 16 years old, I linked up with a group of guys that were like in my age range, you know, because prior to that, I was always with older dudes. I was always with stigma and Roger. Even like Will and Matt, they're not like crazy older than me, but they're still older guys. Like, you know, Will is always like a big brother to me.

Like Will had no shame about like bringing me out. and hanging with me and like he was super cool like for being like a guy who was like you know out on the town and like a little older like you know uh i don't know about like bringing this little 12 year old 11 10 whatever you know i've known wilson i'm nine 10 years old whatever he never made me feel like that he was always cool about bringing me around so will mattie you know i had those guys are my friends you know they're closer in age to me than roger um but i didn't have like a group that was like that were my friends, my own friends. You know, not just Rogers' friends

that I met through him or whatever. You know, and then, like, that's when I started meeting, like, Toby, H2O. And, like, he became my friend outside of that circle, even though, yeah, he knew AF, he was with Sick of Adols camp, but, like, we just kind of hit it off on our own. And then, like, he introduced me to Isaac, and then I met Isaac, and then Isaac introduced me to Hoya,

and then Narc, you know, Those became my boys. They became my friends. They were still maybe a little bit older than me, but still like close enough in age where like, and there were a lot of commonalities. Like we all liked hip hop. Fashion wise, we all kind of dressed a little bit like

urban or thuggish, you know, but still we were hardcore kids. And we all had that in common. Like we were in Carhart or whatever was stylish at the time, but we were hardcore kids. Sure. And so there were a lot of things that we had in common, And obviously the main threat of it was hardcore because we did meet essentially through that vehicle.

But like that was that was pretty much it. So I organically like became friends with these group of people and then they just so happened to be a part of this family of sorts, this brotherhood of sorts. And I naturally fit in. I naturally fit in. I always had that kind of thing anyways. Like even prior to that, I had a group of friends in Florida, and we had, like, a crew. It was completely unrelated to hardcore.

It was, like, more, like, street-level stuff. But, like, nothing to do with hardcore. But we had our own crew, and we had letters. And we, you know, so I don't know. I was kind of, like, gravitated towards, like, you know, brotherhood thing. Sure. And then we found that it with, you know, with each other in, like, through the music and then through just the friendship and then, like, hanging out.

Like, you know, then it became a thing where, like, we would all hang out, meet, you know, in the LES or meet on Avenue A, St. Marks, and, like, we would meet there, like, all the time and hang and get to know each other and get into stuff. Good and bad. Yeah, sure. So it was just a, hey, you're in the family thing type thing. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it eventually grew and grew and grew and whatever. You know, that's a whole other thing. But, yeah, I was accepted into the family very early on. Cool.

And there weren't a lot of us at that time. And it was also going through a transitional period because there was a regime or a generation prior to that and a lot of weird stuff happened and guys went here, there, everywhere. Because like I said, the crew itself predates me by a little bit. I mean, still now, I mean, being a part of that since I was 16. you know since 92 or whatever it's a long time yeah but it existed a few years before me and um but it was splintered it was kind of like you know two factions and one became obsolete um and so yeah i i naturally fell into that that that that that uh extended family and the rest is

The rest is a big part of the band. It became kind of part of Madball too. Because I dropped in many suckers. Exactly. It goes on to influence the name of a couple records. We're almost there. We're almost there. It's a family.

It's the family. It's the family. It's just so, like Colin was saying, so kind of integral with the identity of the band. It would feel odd. It would feel odd to just not even... No, I'm glad you brought it up, and I had no issues at all with that.

I mean, it really, you know, I never considered... it a gang or anything like that. It's, it's, you know, I mean, we always, we dealt with a lot throughout the years. You know, we had our share of trouble from past stuff, stuff that, you know, we were a part of, but like, I never wanted to like, you know, just calling it a gang to me sort of diminishes what it meant to me or what it means for, you know, just calling it a gang to me sort of diminishes. what it meant to me or what it means for some of us.

It's like family more than just like, you know, just some random crew. Anyone can come up, look at the alphabet, grab a couple of few letters, and come up with a crew. It's like straight-edge, you know? You can be drug-free, but you can't be straight-edge if you're not part of the culture. Right, right, right, yeah, yeah, exactly. And it's an important, you know, it's definitely became something important to us, especially being a young guy, you know, I'm trying to, you know, find myself, trying to figure things out.

I'm in this big city. Sure, I have big brothers and sisters that are looking out for me here and there. But you need yours. But I'm trying to find my own way. Yeah. You know, and my brother told me very early on when I moved in with him, he's like, I can't afford to support you. I vouched for you to come here and live with me, but we're living in a squat.

I'm not like, he's not McJagger, you know, like we're not, like, no one's rich. He's like, you're going to have to make your way. And he instilled a good work ethic in me because I got a job, like right after he said that, and then, you know, I always had a job for years. What was that first job? I worked at San Loco, a taco place, a Mexican choice.

Very. Anyone that lived in that ever yeah I believe so they ended up opening like three or four of them like they blew up all right But my brother knew the owner and Daryl great guy and I needed a job and so like I like went in there and like I worked the cash register like I like that was my first job ever It was cool yeah it was cool it was wild it was open till four in the morning and it was on like right off of St. Marks on like first or second So like you saw the wildest stuff Yeah you know bum's coming in bleeding.

The while the guy came in bleeding and I just left. I was like, don't get that on me, bro. I went out and looked for like a big stick. Like I just wanted distance. I was like, I'm going to clunk this guy with this stick. And it didn't have. I mean, he ended up, you know,

we ended up getting him out of there. But like you'd see the wildest stuff at like two, three, four in the morning in the city. Yeah. Drunk idiots. I mean, you name it. You know, so it was a learning experience to say the least that job.

But a good lesson. Yeah, good lesson. To, you know, stay. like yeah you gotta work it's not a free ride in any sort yeah and the hardcore stuff certainly wasn't gonna pay the bills right um and that came later anyway you know like i had the job before we were actively doing shows and stuff so yeah no my brother told me early on like you're gonna have to you know like man up saying that it's not a free ride saying that you were living in a squat and uh that what was i'm sorry what was his partner's name from nausea amy

amy yeah uh took that picture it reminded me of one of my favorite pictures of your brother where he's holding them, like a submachine gun. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, I remember that. It's in the squat. Like, that's like the caption is always like in where they lived. And I just like, you said that and I was looking at that photo. Oh, yeah. I mean, you know, you're living in like a kind of wild place.

You know, like, A, B, C, you know, you're in like the alphabet. Alphabet city's no joke. Right. If you know anything about like, you know, that area of New York. You know, especially when you get to Avenue D, the projects down there. Avenue D is a whole other thing. You don't really go to Avenue D unless you know people or like, you know, yeah. It can get crazy down that way.

There's a lot going on. When did that change? It's different now. I think D is still kind of like, you better be careful. But like, I mean, gentrification and like New York in general has started to morph into like a safer place, which is not necessarily a bad thing. But an expensive place. But an expensive thing for sure.

I mean, I saw it a lot. It was already happening, I think, in the 80s, but even when I moved there in the 90s, early, very early 90s, I saw it. I saw it happening. Was that Giuliani? This was pre-Juliani,

so I think when I moved there, was it Koch? But there was a big, like... I don't know. Like, I forget who was the mayor, but it was pre-Juliani, but then Giuliani came in. Like cleaned up.

It cleaned up. Yeah. Yeah. I've always been curious. Just from the other perspective, what were your thoughts on the Krishna stuff happening in hardcore early on and throughout the 90s? It was such a big thing. Yeah, it was a thing.

It's a mystery to us. I mean, you know, like, I respect, like, anyone's, like, spiritual connections or, like, religion or whatever. Like, I'm cool with that. Like, I mean, like, you know, like, I'm always like, hey, do you, man. If you feel like that's your thing, you know. I never had an issue with it. I mean, I thought, you know, yeah, it was definitely a big part of the scene.

Like, you know, you had that faction. You know, it's nothing that. And they had some good things. I was attracted to personally. But I know a lot of guys that were like, you know, into that whole scene and like, yeah, to each his own, you know. So you just kind of saw it from afar like, huh. Yeah. Yeah.

It's like, this is an interesting aspect to this whole hardcore. It really is. But you have so many different things. You know, like you had like the street element, which was us. You know, like we, like I said, we were like these thuggish kind of, you know, kids that loved hip hop but also were hardcore kids. So like you have that element, right? And then you have like Krishna and then you have straight edge and you had like just the old

school, the elders who were just like, we're probably looking at everyone like, what's going on? You guys are all crazy. What's happening with this? Were you ever straight edge? No. Nice. No. Always respected it though. I always, you know, always had friends that were, like I said, I was very close with Toby for a lot of years. You know, me, he's still my friend, but, and he was always straight edge. Always. And there were always a couple of guys like that that hung out with us and like, they just didn't drink, didn't get into that kind of stuff, you know. They would mix it up with us if they needed to, but like they didn't drink, they didn't do drugs.

I totally, totally respect that. Awesome. Yeah. I thought it was cool. I was like, good, man, good for you. It's great. Yeah. I love it.

No, it's, yeah. I encourage that. I want that for my kids. Oh, yeah. You know, like, you know what I mean? That's what my dad's. I enjoy my couple of drinks. I'm not a big, like, I'm not into drugs.

Like, I'm not a drug guy. Like, I just enjoy my sip on a little something here and there. But like, yeah, I encourage it. I encourage it. Matt Henderson enters the band. Okay. and is such a big part of what would become the Madball sound. New York Sound.

The New York... Well said, Freddie. How does he get involved, and when do you guys start putting together the first fully original Madball material? He joined AF. People are going to be like, is this an interview about Ignostic Fronters? Well, there is a half. It's a family.

Yeah, of course. And they're dying here. I'm sure there'll be time enough for Madball anyway. Yeah, we're getting there. Again, there's such a direct connection and lineage that it has to be, you know, talked about. But Matt joined AF right before one voice, which I think is after Victim of Pain a very important agnostic front record. Where was he? Who found him? Roger. He just found him.

Yeah. I think Blind Approach, Maddy's band played. A.F. Maybe in New York, Minneapolis. It could be both. It could be both. And Roger immediately, Roger's a good scout for talent. I got to say, I got to give him that.

He's a nut. He's a mad scientist, but he's a good scout for stuff. Because he recruited Will Sheppler, who was also a very important drummer, at least for me, again, biased because Will is my brother. very important drummer for New York hardcore, I think. I mean, if you ever hear Anthem,

that beginning part, that's Will. So he recruited Will, he recruited Matt and Craig and and Vinny recruited him. But, but, uh, so really? Yeah, Vinnie's got it all. Puppet. D-1. That's it. Vinny wins. But yeah, he saw something in him and then called them. And then called them up and I'll let him if you ever interview him I'll let him tell his his own story better than I could tell it but that's how we you know Matt was in the mix because A.F. was sort of like what are we are we going to continue are we not going to do this anymore and then we decided to do the second mad ball seven inch I was at this point living in New York living on 10th street squat team B and C shout out to 10th Street squat we decided to do ball uh drop a

many suckers. It was just kind of like, well, you're here, you're living here. Remember that Madball thing? My nickname is still Madball. I mean, literally all my homies that I talked about called me Madball. Before the band was established really, you know, like Toby, Ezek, all these guys called me Madball. That was like how I was introduced to people. You know, this is Madball. What's up? How are you doing? So like, yeah. So, um, Well, we might as well try something else. Roger had some music. Maddie Henderson had a couple of riffs that were not AF, you know, not for AF.

And it just started compiling these songs at the 10th Street Squad in that, you know, like just getting together. Roger had a big booklet of lyrics. This is before I even knew how to write lyrics. And just started going through the lyrics. It's like oh this could be a song and then then job many suckers came together so Rogers was Roger and Maddie I got to attribute I got to tribute that Music to them Wow and even lyrically to them you know Yeah, I mean like you know the right maybe some of the aesthetics I could give myself a little credit for

And maybe editing a little bit because there was some like stuff there where it was like My brother was writing goofy lyrics and like purposefully, you know, like a little like like on top, on the nose, like a little like like, oh, like on purpose. And so I was like, maybe change that word there, maybe change that word there. But I didn't really know song structures, lyric writing. I didn't know that too well at that time. It's coming soon. So that was where Maddie came in. Ball destruction, 89.

which came out, I guess you would have been like 13, 14. By that came out. By that time. This is 92. Yep. Big vocal change. Yeah. You grew up literally in between these two records.

Puberty happened. Yeah. It helps. It helps a lot. This is where I think you sound like you, where Madball sounds like Madball. You know what I mean? Because we have.

Starting for sure, yeah. And we have like full-fledged Madball classics, what I would consider classics, Spin on Your Grave, never had it. across your face. These are songs that are like the second they start, you know, exactly. Like, I know this song. You know what I mean? You can hear them this year. Yeah. Wherever Madwell's at all. I'm sure. How was the reception? Hardcore was in a weird place. And that's a great question because, I think a lot of people

think because we sort of were handed the baton and endorsed and sort of co-signed by the OGs. that it was automatically going to pop off for Madball. And that wasn't really the case. You kind of had something to prove. We had to prove ourselves. Yeah. So I wish it were a little easier, but it wasn't that easy. And like the timing of it was weird because like I said,

hardcore right at 92 was like having a dip, a downward, you know, trajectory. And like AF was thinking about what they're going to do. My brother's thinking about a whole other career. And like there's all this other stuff happening. So it wasn't probably, probably wasn't the best time to start a hardcore band. We did have the cosign of the OGs and we did have the players. Yeah. I had a hell of a squad.

You really did. By default, I had a great squad. Will and Maddie and Vinny, you know, Vinny's personality. Everyone, you know, I mean, I had a hell of a squad. And Roger was playing bass at that time. So yeah, it wasn't easy. It was received better in Europe. Already.

Right away? Already. But still not what you would think. Still not what you would think. Well, you were right. Harcourt is in such an interesting place because this is like the victory records era starting. Earth Crisis, Integrity.

Just pre-it. Yeah, right, right. Just pre-demos. The 90s, what the 90s would become. is starting to happen. And like Madball is the like continuation of the 80s. Yeah. And like the spirit of hardcore.

Yeah, you don't have like Crown of Thorns, 25, VOD, like may exist in some form. Not really though. I think they're, this is pre them becoming bands. But then soon after they pop onto the scene. It's like who knows what would have happened had Dropping Manny Suckers specifically not come You know? Yeah, I don't, I really, yeah, who knows is right, man. I mean, we like what we put together.

Yeah. Like, we thought it was cool. Like, even though, like, I was a little bit, like, some of the lyrics were like, it's not what I would have written, but I don't know how to write. Sure. Yeah, right. Hey. Yeah, we're going to ask.

So on the cover, you see here is Freddie and three guys who aren't in the band. Is that true? Yes. That's a fact. That's a fact. Just guys. Holy shit. And I think that's another secret testament to you being Madball, which is interesting.

Who are these guys? And who took this photo? Well, that's Hoya. Right there. Right here? Pre-Madball. He was just my homie. Okay.

That's Isaac. Oh. And that's Narc. Wow. In the back. That's hard lore. What's what we're talking about? I think there's a back.

picture of us as well or it might be inside maybe if you look at it if there's another picture of us walking down the street I'll give you another piece of lore oh no there's not maybe not well there's another where you can tell surprise it's not on that that should have been a gatefold that we got to we got to figure that up yeah we'll talk about that third press um who took the picture you remember Amy Amy took it okay wow yeah she's just three yeah because she's still in our in the mix like she you know I lived with Roger and Amy in the squat so And then eventually I had my own spot in there. I got my, you know, I was able to like,

acquire a place. How does that work in a squat? It's pretty wild style. Do you just take? Well, you, not really. You know, you get to know the community and then you work your way in. And then, you know, it was a lot of family.

There were families in there. It wasn't like, it was cool. But this one in particular that I ended up in, we did kind of sort of take it. But it was because, someone had taken it from a good person. So we usurped it back. Robin Hood is it, you know?

Yeah, we Robin Hood, that one. So the framing, Amy, did on that picture. She's good. It's fucking awesome. It's such a good picture. I think it still works. It still works. So that's the squat?

That was a big, empty, like, lot next to the squad. Okay. So the building that I live in is attached to that picture right there. And there were these big, gates and someone owned that lot and would randomly park their cars there or do whatever with that lot but we somehow got in there, crept in there or something and then took that picture and Amy yeah she caught a good angle she she did she did do that and the street angle which I don't know why it's not there um third press the reason I bring that up is because you mentioned Steve Huey before

Steve Huey is in the street shot awesome so and Narc my buddy of Narc was one of my very close friends is Steve Huey's brother his younger brother. He's more my age. Steve's a little older. But Steve was in the street shot. So if you ever see the original, it's me and those same guys and there's an additional guy

that's Steve Huey. Awesome. Wow. I love it. So Ball of Destruction, one of the greatest hardcore seven inches of all time. Drop many suckers, one of the greatest hardcore seven inches of all time. You too kind? No, no, no. It's real.

Don Fury, did he do? He did this one as well. Okay. Tell me about working with Don. He's a funny guy, man. He's an interesting dude, man. Yeah, he was, you know, he did a lot of, say what you want about him, but he did a lot of classic New York hardcore stuff, man.

His name is very important to the culture. Yeah, it was kind of similar to the first one. We kind of just went in there and banged it out. Like, we had these songs, ran through them. I think we went to, like, Grey Area or whatever studio we went to and, like, rehearsed the stuff. and I figured out the cadence of like how I was going to do it. I will say that I think I was like a little bit self-conscious about the fact that the first one I was a little kid and sounded like a little kid.

So I think I purposely tried to sound older. Sure. Compensating a little. Oh, I'm dropping many suckers. I did a little, you know, like I kind of like, you know, I mean, it's my voice. It's my tone. There's no effects on it. It's very basic recording.

But I did sort of try to like bring out this heaviness to try to, because I still had that complex of like, oh, I'm a kid. So I need to sound like a man. And there is that feeling when you're a kid of like, I can't wait to be grown and do whatever I want and do this, take this around the world. And then you look back and you're like, man, I really wish I just appreciated being a kid.

Exactly. Exactly, exactly. When you get to this stage, then you're like, yeah, it was cool being a kid. But yeah, I did a little bit of that on that record. But same kind of deal. Recording was like quick. And yeah, it was fun. You know, this time different players for backups and different guys showing up the studio. Now we're in the early 90s. But Don Fury, the studio itself didn't change much. Okay. It didn't change. The sound did.

Yeah, I agree. I agree. The sound got a little better. Sounds great. It also has, there's some B sides and unreleased stuff that was on, like, the Triple B re-release with, what, Ready to Fight is on it. I think friend or foe is on it. Those are all, yeah. There's a few other. To do our version of it.

Oh, yeah. Yeah, what was the session more than six songs or something that are on the? Probably. Probably. We probably recorded a few more and then just. used narrowed down to the ones that ended up on there um but it wasn't like this big like hey mad boy like it wasn't like this big announcement went out in new york like here's this new big like it like i can remember our first show was like early on it was like bad like we played

this show in n yu and it was like maybe 50 people there really and it was like wow this is going to be rough. Wow. Like we did not inherit A.F.'s fan pace. Interesting. Like, you know, initially. Sure. I think eventually we started to get some of those guys, like, when they took, some of

the older school took notice. You know, that started happening, you know, when, like, wetlands came in and Coney Island and C.B. still was in the mix. And the shows started to come back up. Then people started to take notice of us. But those first, first shows right after we dropped that were rough. Did you tour around the country on this? No.

We went to South America. Okay. Randomly got invited to go to Buenos Aires. How does that happen in 1990? I don't even remember. Like, someone called us like, hey, you know, they love you out here. I'm like, what? Like, who, what?

And I thought it was cool because I'm, you know, that's my ethnicity. you know, like I'm Latin, like, so I'm like, oh, wow, like in South America, really? And so somehow someone got us in touch with someone and like they were like, they were into dropping many suckers out there. How is that we going to get there? I don't know. Somebody came to New York and like found it and like brought it out there. And so we did a version out there where like I did an interview with someone in Argentina and I'm speaking in Spanish and they put it on like this South American version. of dropping many suckers.

Oh, cool. And just, I guess, to kind of connect with the people because no one spoke English. But then there was a connection because, like, oh, they speak Spanish? Boom. Go to Buenos Aires and it's like a whole other world compared to New York.

Completely packed club. Really? People losing their muds. By then, when it was in the band. Yeah. Roger was trying to figure out his life and You can ask him what he was doing But we needed a bass player and it wasn't like he left us

Hanging dry it was just kind of like I'm gonna do my thing we should probably get a young guy You should probably get some and naturally I look into my pool of friends You look at the album cover yeah I'm like well he plays bass he was in a band called demise and you know and The advice is still active at the time. Yeah, they're back. They're back now, which is crazy. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Wow.

But they were active but not, you know. And then, Hoya jumped all over the opportunity. And boom. And so his first trip and my first trip overseas was Argentina. You know what? I will say there was one tour before that. Madball opened up for Agnostic Front in Europe. I don't know.

So this is how you just. discovered that drop many suckers before hoia okay roger on base okay and dropping many suckers made the rounds a little bit out there but not we had it with us we were like selling it okay on the road yeah and like hustling it you know and people did not know madball out there some did from ball of destruction but it wasn't like an overwhelming reaction when we played it was nothing like that. But did you then watch AF in Europe and go, where we need to, like coming here consistently is something, is a goal? Like, that's, this, this seems to work. I could definitely see that there was something

happening there and it was something important. And AF obviously got a different reaction. But that was only like their second time going there. So we went with them, we went with them on They're like second trip to Europe. Maybe third, maybe third. Was that a van tour in Europe? Do you remember? It was a tour in a 60s, old 60s tour bus. Oh, like almost famous, like the old ass-assass.

Like wild style tour bus. Like someone, like I think MAD like secured this like tour bus that we would sometimes have to push to get it started. Yeah. It was wild. Wild days. So downhill was good. Yeah, that was always a good. That was always good.

Let me ask you. Madball is headlining Buenos Aires. Yeah. You have 14 minutes of music at this point. Yeah, we have ball destruction and drop the miniskers, yeah. You got a full agnostic front set. How long is a headlining set for Madball? Like, what do you, at this time?

I mean, we would add like, we would add AF stuff for sure. Just add friend of folk, crucified, you know, all the classics like that. And then all ball destruction. Because to go to such things like that. I'm trying to remember if we had any set-and-off songs when we went out there, like that we were starting to write. Maybe, maybe not.

I mean, we might have had like a song or two that we were starting to put together. But, yeah, it was really just older material that we had to. that we had to make the most of it. It's awesome. Yeah. Yeah, and we did.

We made the most of it. We made the most of it. I mean, but yeah, that was the first time we got a reaction where we were like, whoa, people like us. You know, because even in Italy, I remember we played like Rome on that tour. I remember the whole tour was like a bum out for us. Oh, my God, this is brutal, dude. Like, I'm out there trying to get in people's faces. I'm going out into the crowd.

I'm doing everything possible to get a reaction and it's rough and there would be there would be times where I can get him going But for some reason when we got to Italy or like like I'm pretty sure it was Rome It was like an explosion for bad ball and I was like oh what's this about like this is different That's just some Italian guy Yeah like the Italians like this right off the way you know like the Italians they were feeling us and uh Yeah and then next time that I felt that same thing was like when we went to Buenos Aires. Unbelievable.

And that was just, they're still one of the best, that place is still one of the best places to play in the world for us. Okay. Those people have tremendous amounts of passion. Yeah. They do hardcore. They got to go?

They do hardcore. They do hardcore, right. Okay, good to know. Now it's time. It's time. Okay. The big one. We have to set it off now.

Ninety-four. You have to. The day. debut Madball LP following up one of the, sorry, following up two of the greatest hardcore EPs of all time with one of the greatest hardcore LPs of all time. Tell me about putting this together. This is the album one. You know it, Howie Abrams.

We're playing shows around town at this point with dropping many suckers and howie maybe went to a show or heard that I was like back at it with Matt Ball, you know, after he had put out Paul's destruction. And, yeah, he sort of was like, are you going to, are you doing this again? And I'm like, yeah, I mean, we're like kind of serious. Like, I don't know. I mean, as serious as one could be at that point. Yeah, because you don't know.

We don't know. We don't know. Like, you know, like the AF guys that are in my band are not even sure if they want to keep doing music at this point because they had done some a lot of touring with a f you know and some of it was great and fun and whatever but like it's not the most lucrative thing and whatever and guys are getting older anyway so the guys are like yeah i'm kind of serious everyone's kind of playing it by ear like we're we're going to be as serious about this as it allows us to be how he comes into the picture and um offers us a deal with roadrunner the real

Yeah, maybe a million. I don't know. Like at that point, like what that contract said, like I still don't know what that contract says. But like, no, yeah, three, yeah, yeah, we were down for three. And that's a big deal. That's a big deal. That's a big deal. That's a big deal. Especially being a band that's not really like, we're not popping up. You know, like nowadays you got bands that are like, even without an album are like hyped and are popping. So like, I can see a label approaching them and going like, yo, you're the hot thing. Yeah. But we weren't really the hot thing, but the scene itself was sort of weird. So it wasn't necessarily our fall either, but it was like, it was just a weird time.

But we were going for it and playing and trying to build it back up and other new bands were coming out, starting to pop up. And so he saw something in us again. He saw something in us again and was like, hey, I'm starting to, I'm A&R at Roadrunner now. And at the time we just knew Roadrunner was like Sepuletura, typonegative, like all this stuff that's like compared to our world. Big. But then Biohazard and Life of Agnew were simultaneous with this. So it's like this hardcore boom is happening.

Yeah. Biohazard were having a moment. Like Biohazard was the one band that for sure like in the early 90s, like especially 94, we're having. in a moment. But they were transcending your regular hardcore scene. Even if they come from the scene and my brother was close with like Evan and like

so like we knew the biohazard camp. Were you in the punishment video? We went to all those videos. I wasn't that guy that was trying to get my face in the mix a lot because there's some guys out there that were like really like feeling themselves. They really wanted to be seen and that's fun. That wasn't my bag

but I was there. If I'm not in the shot it's because I'm behind the scene like, I'll let those guys, I'll let all the, you know, let them have their moment. But I'm in like a scene where like, I think it's like me and Kevin from Bulldoze, rest of peace. And like, somebody jumps on the Brooklyn Bridge. And like, I go like that because like they jump on my head. That's like the coolest part of the movie. Well, yeah, I'm one of the guys going, ah, don't kill me.

You know, like, but, you know, but no, but we were dancing. Like, we were dancing on the bridge. Yeah. You know, and by dancing, I mean, you know what I mean. Oh, yeah. Which we should talk about. Yeah, yeah, let's get there. So it's like me, Kev, probably sob, minus, you know, whoever.

Yeah, he's in. Yeah, all of us. Like all, you know, that whole squad. That's awesome. And that was, I think, the only shot I came out in maybe. But there is a picture with the dogs and the band. Yeah. There's a picture.

And I think you can see you. I pretty much see everybody. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, we were there. They invited us. It's awesome. Because, you know, they were doing this whole style that was very, like, you know, connected to the streets. You know, this whole Brooklyn thing, you know.

And they're from Brooklyn. They weren't being disingenuous. Disingenuous. They were, like, legit from Brooklyn. But I think they also knew that we were, like, actively running around in the streets. We were like, the hoodlums running. around. And we were from the scene. And they know people, we all knew each other. So naturally,

they invite us to be a part of that whole movement. You know, I don't want to say to give it credibility because they had their own credibility, but it gave it a little more. What's interesting is like they're not DMS. No. The music video is DMS. Kind of. There were a couple of crews in there.

Because at the time, some of the guys weren't necessarily us. They were like BYB. They had their own like Brooklyn thing And you know And then some of them were old sunset Sunset crew You know Sunset crew

Sunset Skins Some of them became I think they called it BYB right It was called Boneyard Boys or something Yeah I think it was BYB It was like sob And it was a couple of those guys Eventually

Over time A lot of that morphed into us Sure sure We absorbed a lot of that Just because just by a natural order of Of course But so are you seeing

Would you have gone You probably would have I want to ask anyway Would you have gone with the Roadrunner thing If you didn't see Biohazard as like Hey they Yeah I would have totally gone with it Yeah because we had no other We didn't have any options

Yeah true there were not a lot of people knocking At our door to like put stuff out It just so happened that the one that did knock on our door Was a big one The biggest one Yeah really Really I mean wreckage put up

out that drop a mini suckers and they were just kind of like what did they put out i don't know like look it up like google it i don't like did like three things i don't know like what they put out so they weren't like a victory or something yeah sure yeah sure or whatever other labels at that time but roadrunner but roadrunner was a big deal it was on the strength of on the strength of how he and he saw us play and he thought he was impressed by the show or something and he was like happy to see that i had giving in another go after Ball of Destruction. And yeah, at that point, like, he invited us to the office, I think, on Broadway at the time. And we sat with him, and he talked about, like, are you guys going to, like, tour and, you know, all these questions?

And we're like, well, I mean, yeah, we're willing to, you know, like, I mean, I'm a kid, so I don't care. Yeah. I think I'm still in high school at the time or something. So I'm like, yeah, I don't care. I don't care about school. 360 deals were common at the time. Was that something you guys had? We didn't do a 360 deal.

Okay, good for you. Which, which to the people not in the know. We didn't do a 360 deal. What we did was a merch deal with them. 360 deal. Oh yeah, go ahead. I'm sorry. Oh, 360 deals basically you're salaried by the label.

And if your sales exceed that salary, you don't get that the label does. It's a bad deal. It's a bad. In my personal opinion, I don't, you know, and there's people that have taking that deal even now. Oh yeah. Bands that have taken that deal and bands that are successful that have had success that have taken that deal and the good thing about success I guess is that, you know, and when I

mean success, I mean, you know, numbers and all that stuff. The good thing about that is that you can leverage that and renegotiate a deal. So there's always that. But we didn't do 360. We did a like four or five album thing and. Part of it was you sort of weren't forced to sign the Blue Grape, but you were encouraged to sign a merch deal as well. And you did one?

We did with Blue Grape. Blue Grape was attached to Roadrunner at the time. And they were doing everybody's merch. I have a lot of old Madball shirts. Yeah, we have some Blue Grape ones floating around out there. Really? Yeah, yeah, yeah. We were with Blue Grape, yeah.

Another funny thing is we were on rush management, rush, the rush management, like the hip-hop Rush Lush label. Really? Yeah. Yeah. Also to do with Roadrunner and those relationships. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Scott Cohn, rest in peace of Scott.

But yeah. How long was Madball a blue grape band? Because that, like I've truly. A little bit. First, early on, early on. That is fascinating. No idea. Yeah.

And I feel like it was part of the deal. And we didn't care or know any better. So we were just like, yeah, sure. Somebody cares about us. somebody wants to put out an album let's go does the merch deal is that just like

you're still hands on and designing and producing yeah we definitely had say like aesthetically speaking for sure we would be like I don't like that I don't like that

I've always been very much like that always mattered to me good you can tell it's some of the greatest it's still the the like Like, the madball longs. The blueprint for hardcore merchandise is that you go and you look up old Madball stuff and you go, okay, okay, good, I got an idea now. I shouldn't say me.

It mattered to all of us. Like as a band, as a collective, as a group. But being Madball and being the guy who's obviously still, it's all there. The name, my name, whatever, yeah. Sure. My name, whatever. So, yeah, it's important. It was always important for it to come across.

I mean, there were shirts that I hated. that people love now. Yeah, they're worth a thousand dollars. Yeah. You know about that? And I was like, I never liked that design. I was like, that design sucked. Like, I hated it so bad. And I let it ride.

One, we called one, like, the chicken bone shirt, where it just looked like these splintered bones and it made like the next. I know that one. And it's like, and people love that shirt. Yeah. It's worth a lot of money. Go to millsbentridge.com.

Yeah. So it just goes to show you, maybe I know what I'm doing. Maybe I don't. Maybe I don't know what I'm talking about. But back to the thing, yeah, we were a blue grape band as part of that initial signing. For the whole time? No, no, no, no, no. I feel like at some point we got off blue grape or it was like partially blue grape and then we kind of did our own thing in Europe with someone else.

Maybe. I think all my like set it off. Madball stuff is screen stars. I have screen stars and toll toll tax. Did you care about that at the time? Were you like, I want the screen stars blind? No. That's a thing now, though.

Oh, yeah, for sure. Big time. I know that for sure. Big time. Yeah. I know that even just seeing like a blue grape tag or whatever. Money. That's dollar signs.

That's a big deal, yeah. Now, we didn't. We didn't know. We didn't. I mean, we were stylish in our own way, like in our own rugged way. So we were like, we knew what we liked, but we didn't care about, like, who made the shirt kind of thing. Like, so much.

Like, that wasn't that big of a deal. So who is writing Set It Off musically? Okay, so part of Set It Off comes from Drop Many Suckers. Sure. So we naturally were like, well, we need to do some of those songs again. Absolutely. Because we didn't think a lot of people, you know, like, not a lot of people heard Drop Many Suckers. me let's be honest you know so spit on your grave never had it cross your face so we like automatically

like hijacked part of that and then that gives us somebody to the record yeah and the production quality quality is like why would you not want yeah let's do this on this preservation you know and then the writing was matt henderson of course hoya comes into the mix he starts bringing in riffs Naturally, Willie's doing his Willie thing, of course. And onset it off is like, shoot, he's unleashed. Yeah. Yeah, I think set it off and demonstrate my style where maybe two of Willie's best drumming records, period.

Sorry, Willie. Not to take away anything about an A.F records, but I think Akeem really stepped outside of his own box. It's a totally different feel. a different rhythm. Different feel. And they're genre defining. It's not just that they're like band defining or person defining.

I mean, and he was on classic AF records. So like he's not some slouch. He's Will Schepler we're talking about. He's doing it again. He came in on Liberty and Justice for AF and then was through the rest of the. So yeah, he really did his thing. I would say the majority of the riffs are Maddie and Hoyer for sure. Are you fully taking over lyrics?

I fully take over lyrics. Wow. Barring a few songs. That's where I started to learn how to write lyrics. And I did that. I wanted to do that. I was like, okay, I'm not, you know, I got to speak for myself at this point.

Like I can't let other people write for me. Like we're dropping many suckers or ball of destruction, which weren't my lyrics at all. And for people following along at home, this is 94. So you're 1819. Yeah, 94. Yeah, exactly.

Yeah. I mean, that's daunting for anybody at age. But, you know, that's a... It's still... The roadrunner record. The first LP. I still cringe at some of the lyrics I wrote. But it was also honest and raw and real.

And that's all we could ever, you know... It's all I could ever... You know, that mean, that's one thing that you're never going to not get from Madball. I mean, it's honest, it's real, comes from a real place, real experiences. Yeah. And that's what I was writing, you know. And then there were a couple songs that I didn't write. Set It Off was written by Hoya.

Wow. Yeah. Holy shit. So I got to credit him for that. I may have thrown my own little accents and cadence and maybe a word or two here and there, but like that was his song. I think that was a song he had been holding on to for a long time because he was very excited to show us that song

and then it became set it off. Track one type of track. Yeah, yeah. Hell of a song. I remember he posted a video, like a reel. Yeah. Explaining how he used to write riffs and he would loop hip-hop drum beats.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, like on YouTube or something. Or like wherever. Wow. Yeah, he definitely had his own program of how he did things. Maddie was definitely the lead guy. The most accomplished, experienced, you know, older, well, him and Willie of the same age, but like, you know, the older guy in our camp at this point. I mean, Vinny's in the camp, of course.

But Vinny's just like the overseer. Like, he's just like, not let you kids do your thing. I mean, you know, when it's time to hit the stage, I'm going to do my... He's happy to be there. You're happy to happen. He's happy to be there. happy to have him. We got that endorsement from the godfather. Yeah. And Vinny loves Madball. He really does. He's legit. To the stay. I mean, I know, like, you know, I'm since I'm a kid. He's like a older

brother to me. We're like family and all that. There's that. But does it mean he has to like Madball as much as he does? He genuinely, always believed in Madball, but genuinely loves it. So he's cheering us on and the whole thing. But Maddie's lead and Maddie knows song structure. He knows, you know, he's sort of like the producer, you know, built-in producer.

Yeah. And he's even taking whatever Hoy is bringing to the table and he's loving it but he's also putting it into the format that makes sense. Processing it a little bit. He's producing. Literally producing. Yeah, producing. And I'm hearing it all. And he was even helping me with lyrical like setting a part choruses versus verses.

It's funny because I know this stuff so well now, but like back then I was just so green and like I was like, you know, I was like, but I started to figure it out pretty quick and Matt did like the stuff I was writing. He did like a lot of the, you know, the spirit of what I was writing and stuff. So he just kind of helped me like clean it up. Yeah. And formulate things. And so Maddie was really the producer, the built-in producer.

and a lot of, obviously a songwriter and Hoy as well. I wrote most of the lyrics, maybe a couple of songs I didn't. But yeah, and that was how it started to come together. I think we went to like, at that point we were going to maybe the music building in like Midtown, Manhattan. The music building. The music building, yeah. I feel like the lore is Madonna was there and lived there or something. and like you know squatted there

but like wrote some stuff there I don't know like a bunch of bands were in and out of there it was like it was like a thing but we knew a band that had a spot there so we like bought into their spot bought some time and I could be wrong it might be gray area

there were a few places that we were rehearse at there was like this crazy downstairs basement spot I think it was gray area and there were various rehearsal spots but the music building really stands out to me and just put them together man just started like you know like someone would bring a riff you know either Maddie Hoy or whatever and then just build on that riff and they were like you know the songs just

started to come together and you know that's how all those newer songs came to be and lyrics sort of came on top okay nothing came lyric first it was more okay that's the way I hear this yeah yeah nowadays I do I have I like you know more involved in writing so like I'll I'll get like a chorus can influence a riff. Totally, yeah, a phrase, yeah. You know, but back then it was all like, I was very reliant on, you know, what I heard to inspire me.

Sure. Is it you who says we don't fake it, we just take it? Okay. So that was probably my idea from, my idea to use that sample. Oh, so I always, the rumor was that it was you.

No. that was will Sheppler wow yeah will had the deepest voice of all of us speaking voice

did you know that no will Sheppler had the deepest speaking voice um I loved that movie American me at the time yeah

banga it was a classic and I mean I saw it in real time at the movie theater I was like wow this is this is dope you know and then so I obviously

borrowed from that um with all respect Yeah, of course. You know, and there were lines that resonated with me and my friends and like how we were living as well. So it wasn't like, you know what I mean? We were faking the funk. It was, you know, stuff that was relatable to our lifestyle.

So I had the idea to use a sample, but it wasn't translating on the thing. And then it was also the clearance stuff and whatever else possibly. So we had Willie do it in the studio. That's the way to do it. Yeah, he really did. Okay, that works. Boom. Wow.

With the street noise and everything, the squirrel noise. I forgot who's idea was to do. Yeah, we all kind of collaborating on like whose idea was to like do like the, but the New York feel to have like the street sounds and like all that. Yeah, that was. We're going to get to a couple of them. Oh, yeah, real quick. One more thing about your voice specifically on this record. Uh-oh.

No, no, no. I don't love it. It was a rumor when I was young. Like in high school and I and I probably when I discovered this record that you whisper yelled it Yeah, I knew this wasn't gonna be true, but it's one of those things I want to put in bad I have never whisper yelled anything I don't even know what that is. Yeah, it would be like that's like an oxymoron It would be like to whisper yell I read between the live oh god, no

Yeah, no hey great to hear but I don't love my vocals on that album I'll say that I'm sorry to say that publicly. Yeah, I do. As long as you guys like, I'm good. And whoever else out there likes it. I think it was the effect that they put on it. Whatever compression.

Compression. Whatever Jamie Locke put on it at the time. Let's talk Jamie Locke. First of three records with Jamie. Tell me about working with him and dialing in. Nice guy. Very nice guy. Very like, how do I say this without sounding offensive?

I mean this in the best way but very like squareish looking guy like not the guy you would think was doing a madball record and crafting the madball sound yeah yeah like regular dude glasses like very regular dude but clearly

genius like behind the boards and like was like knew his stuff I mean he had worked I think at Normandy that's how we met Jamie was AF I think worked with him

in some capacity at Normandy Did he do one voice? He was involved in one voice I think I think he was involved in one voice He was technically not the guy that was supposed to do one voice

But something happened And then like Jamie came in the mix With other people Don Fury was producing on that too But I was there I was in and out of there When they were doing one voice I remember popping in

I don't know if I did backups or not, but I remember when they were recording that. But Jamie came from that Normandy camp, and then we somehow, I don't know if Maddie stayed in touch with him or whatever, but like we got in touch with Jamie and he got on board with our stuff. And then so we were working with him at whatever studio he was working out of. so like one of them was like Michael Johnson's studio in in like mass area

funny enough we've never recorded an album in New York interesting really yeah how crazy is that could amend that it's never too late yeah might be time album 10 we've already done we have one about the drop so

maybe the next one maybe the next one Album 11. I don't know why. I don't know why that is. Well, I just imagine getting around the city with instruments is hard enough. Dude, there's like a home video of Warzone going to a show and Ray's going around picking everybody up.

Yeah. And it's like VHS camera, like in advance. Oh, that's fun. It looks like the biggest nightmare. It's insane. Oh, it's a nightmare. Yeah, the city can be a nightmare. Speaking of, New York City is my favorite hardcore breakdown of all time.

Yeah. That song is, I think, my favorite Mad Ball song. I may agree. And I think it is like the rawest vulnerable. And I mean that in like a complimentary way. Yeah, thank you. And just one of, like a blueprint of how I think a song should go. Truly, it's one of my favorite songs.

Appreciate that. Did you write those lyrics? Yes, I did. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's great. Yeah, for sure. You've encapsulated the hardship of early 90s New York, New York City in the hardest song on the album. Tell us about that song, we love it so much.

Yeah, it was just the vibe of the song. I can't remember who wrote the riffs. It was probably a collaboration of Maddie and Hoy. Riff-wise, but the vibe of it, you guys know because you're both. write songs and you're both in bands and your musicians and so sometimes a song has a vibe that brings you somewhere and

that's ultimately like especially when you're writing to music how you hear you know like how it starts I just envisioned the first lines you know I see it every day you know and I like like, then I went from there.

It was like, it was the vibe of the music that set the tone for... The music informed the story. Was the weapon at the beginning of the song sampled? Yeah, probably. That's cool. You stopped playing this for a long time. Did we? Throughout my entire youth.

Did we? I would go... I went to... It's back on. It's back. Good. Thank God. Thank God.

I was always there and it would be like, this is the time. they're playing it this time. I'm so happy, you guys. I'd be stretching. I'll be ready. Okay. But I'm glad it's back. It's back.

I think it's got to stay back. Yeah. You know. I forgot why we stopped doing it. It might have been one of those things where like we were personally feeling like it wasn't connecting. And you have that. Yeah. You know, there's songs that I personally would want to play.

And it just never clicks live. So it's like, all right, I guess we got to, you know, toss that one to this. I don't think that's the case with that one anymore. No, no, and we brought it back, and then since we brought it back, I feel like it connects with people a little better now. The vocal cadence to the verse, is it-dick-dick-dick-dick-dick-dick-dick-dick-da-da-d-d-----a-d--d--. Are you, did you come up with how that fit? I did.

It's like perfect. Yeah. Yeah. I truly think it's like a perfect song. Yeah. I mean, and you know, my cadence was always subconscious. Consciously or consciously influenced by hip hop. Yeah.

You can definitely feel it in that song. So you're in the pocket, you're having syllables turn around on the riffs, you know. Reality. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, I never quite went to rap rock route, thankfully, but. Yeah, I think thankfully is right. I definitely have to attribute some influence to like, just because that's all I listened to in the 90s. I was like, I was such a poser with hardcore.

I listened to hip hop the whole time. No, but no, I did listen to my share of hardcore as well, of course, of course. But, yeah, it definitely helped. I mean, it gave you a unique perspective. Help me understand. Yeah, it gave me, yeah, it did. It gave me a unique writing style, I guess you could say, I guess, yeah. Lockdown.

Yeah. Were you, was this a story about a personal experience or are you singing about Roger or somebody else? Lockdown. I'm trying to think of the lyrics. I'm trying to scan through the lyrics in my head right now. It wasn't me because... I've done no wrong. I'm an innocent man.

You don't give a fuck. Yeah, it wasn't about me personally. It was about a couple of guys. It was influenced, let's say. Sorry, I'm going to mess with this mic. I hope I'm not messing that up. It was influenced by people in our camp, you know, friends that had gotten into. to some trouble and like you know all that so yeah I probably pulled from that you know um at that

point at that stage in the game um I just wanted to write about real stuff whether it was like our own experience like what we were day-to-day stuff like living in the city at that time like running around doing what we were doing I or if I could you know pull from someone close to us their experience and I would do that. Write what you know is like the best advice. Yeah, I think. Especially when you don't know what the hell you're doing.

Sure. I'm sorry. As I said before, we are guys who love to know things and we love nods and we love just whatever references to other things that you kind of have to be in the know about, whatever.

C2IC RIP. Yeah. Is one of the coolest I've talked about this on the show. Yeah, it's crazy. It's one of the coolest, just like a nod to another band and to another crew and to this group of people from a different part of the country. Where does Colt's Life and CTIC, when did you meet them? How does that work into the Madball, like, lore?

I want to say I met them on a tour with AF where I had to fill in from my brother. There was an Ignostic Front tour where I had to. I had to, it was like, I guess you could say, my training ground for Madball. It was in 92, maybe prior to that, somewhere like that. Around close, you know, it's all like the time's all crazy. But those years, you know. These years are really busy. 92, 93, like those, that time frame.

But it was obituary, agnostic front, malevolent creation and cannibal corpse. Jeez. And, agnostic front and obituary were co-headlining, But I think obituary was mostly headlining, because it was a mostly death metal tour. That's actually where I was introduced to obituary. And I'm not a metal guy, like I said before, I don't come from metal or punk.

I appreciate all music. And I, you know, retroactively get to learn about stuff. And I think obituary is one of the best metal, death metal, whatever you want to call it, of all time. Yeah, easily. Third top four, for sure. Of all time. For me, you know, and that's me coming from like a not metal, you know, I'm not a metal guy,

but I really liked obituary after that tour. I had to sing, my brother had to go, just a quick version of it, my brother had to go have a surgery, something happened, hernia, whatever it was, and he put me on the spot to sing. I didn't want to. I thought it was a big tour for them, and I didn't think that they would want to see a scrawny, kid

in place of my heavily tattooed brother who's a figure in that world. So I did it anyway because it's what we do. Family helps each other out and ended up having fun. The band

had fun. We made the most of it and the first show or second show was Detroit. So talk about being put on the spot. You roll up to Detroit and there's all these hardcore dudes there, tatted up. You know, Detroit had a look.

You know, outside of New York, I would say visibly, like aesthetically, like hardness-wise, outside of New York, Detroit was a standout scene. Because, like, New York was always known for, like, heavily tattoos, chest tattoos

and all that stuff. And, like, had a look. Like, they just had the look that matched the sound. Outside of that, I feel like Detroit was one of those places. Yeah. Face tattoos, you know.

So anyway, those guys all come out to see my brother in AF and they get me. And you know, and I was like, oh, how's this gonna go? And you know, I hit it off. They were like very supportive and like I hit it off with a few of them. And Ronnie, the original singer for Coldest Life was one of them. We hit it off really well. Jeff, you know, all those guys. And then when Madball came into the picture and we started touring, it just like was a natural.

Oh, and I think Cold His Life were invited to play an AF show at CB. So it would have been AF. I think it was AF, Marauder, Cold His Life, Demise, and Madball. Pretty good. Yeah, yeah. It was pretty cool. It was Marauder with Minus. Yeah.

Wow. It was Marauder with Minus. Hoya played with Demise. So that would have been like 93, 92 demo? Yeah. And that's really where we hit it off. Okay. They came to the city.

So we met them in Detroit, but they came to the city. We hit it off. Well, there was some tomfoolery that happened. That's a couple of places here and there. But we really, we bonded. And we had a barbecue on Vinny's roof. top in little Italy um there's pictures of that floating around somewhere and there's also a picture where like they're all wearing madball shirts oh i've seen i think that's from that pretty sure that's from

that so obviously we bonded we connected and i really uh really uh ron and i became almost like i guess what would be like pen pals almost like um you know and he was he was a a hard dude man he was a he was he was he was a real one and uh we just had a connection and he would write me to the 10th street squat and i wrote him a couple times before yeah yeah of course things um and so uh when he passed it was like a like a it was like man this that sucks like somebody killed that dude like he was like he was like he was like he was like he was like he was like he's that sucks like somebody killed that dude like he He was a good dude, you know? And I mean, you know, you got to understand, like, you live in a place like Detroit.

You're in this certain element. Anything could happen at any time, you know. I know that well, you know, nearly lost my life on many occasions. So I understand. But it was like, it was like, damn, that hurt, man. I was just starting to get to know this guy. What a good dude. Like, it sucked.

And is this one of your first instances, like, personally, with death? I think so. I think so. I think so. yeah it was i hadn't lost many friends at that point and and and and and or even lost many family members and you know so yeah it was a bum out and so i did that as a tribute to ronnie especially but c t yc because you know those were the homies i love we were like you know so paying tribute down by law music video oh my god what a video stigma and the bandana

yeah classic it's a sight to behold Classic. That's good stuff. You should have seen us in Europe, and you want to talk about bandanas and flannels. Stigma? Oh, all. Oh, wow. Who directed this music video?

True Stone. True Stone. Wow. Okay. Was this the first music video? First. Yeah. First.

Is this like, so Roadrunner's giving you the budget for a video. No. No. No. No. No. No. No.

thing so but let me know how he's doing the best he can do for us i mean and roadrunner was you know we can talk about it at some point but they were a huge help for us in europe yeah yeah because they're a european label essentially but um we didn't have a major budget we had people that were going to bat for us but drew stone at the time was popping off with the biohazard stuff Bauerhazard was definitely doing its thing They were like separate from like They were like their own thing

You know how like You have those bands that just do They're just them They broke through Like Bauerhazard hate breed Like you have these bands That just they transcend hardcore And they just

And we all have our own lane Per se but they just go somewhere else And it's just like You know So Bauerhers was doing a lot of videos And Drew is a hardcore guy from the New York scene, old school.

And he loved Madball. He would come and see us at like wetland, whatever. And so he said to us that he had some leftover film or something from these random, all these various videos that he was doing for like Bauerazard or whatever other big band he was doing. And that he would utilize some of that for us and like kind of do it on the arm. like for nothing. And I think he did get money for the second one, which was pride.

The first one, I think he just did it out of love. And it was super gorilla, you know, in Vinny's neighborhood, alleyway, you saw it. Was the song, like, lyrically, is this about a real person or is this a metaphorical guy?

No, it's about, I'd say it's metaphorical, but also based on some real people. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. A bit of both. You know, influence, influence inspired by actual events. Actual events. Okay. Why was this song chosen to be the video? That's a good question. That's a good question, man. I honestly can't remember how we came to that. I don't know why. Maybe because we thought it was a little bit more mellow and palatable. somehow to people because of the bounce of it. Yeah. Could be, you know, hip hop-y and like, maybe, you know, this is a way to like ease people

in to this craziness that we do. Which what people, I don't know what we were thinking, like, we weren't thinking like, hey, we're gonna be on MTV, whatever, but like, was this? Which we did end up being on MTV, actually. Funny enough. But yeah, I don't know what, I don't know, I can't remember exactly the thought process that went into us picking down by loss of the first single. Was the label maybe part of the decision?

Maybe. Yeah. Likely. Likely. And we respected, you know, because we were green. So we kind of were like, but it was also someone that we knew, Howie. So we're like, we trust. You trust them. We trusted them.

Yeah. Okay. Can you describe to me the feeling of just hearing, like getting the master back for set it off? And hearing this start to finish. How do you guys felt about it? we thought it was definitely different that one was out there. Did you feel as though it was the pro- I didn't love my voice, I didn't love my vocals, but

I thought the production was solid. Yeah. Especially for that time. You know, you're listening to it, you know, 90s with those ears. I mean, it's still the snare drum on that thing. It's still pretty solid, right? I haven't listened to it in a long while. It's unbelievable.

Is it still hold up? I listened to hours of badball yesterday. Let me tell you something. Oh, cool. We've been in prep mode. We been getting ready. No, we were happy with the overall. Yeah.

I mean, everything, from like the aesthetics of it, like the, you know, even like the cover to like everything. So we were, we were stoked. We were psyched about it. Who's that baby? No one that we know. Yeah, that's a old, like, it's like every once in a while, the full photo.

Yeah, the real photo comes out. Oh, really? My feed, yeah. It's like, it's like a crop. He gave his daughter or son a gun for his christening or something. It's honestly kind of, we found it. It's this unbelievable metaphor for your life. Yeah.

Yeah, oh yeah, funny, right? A. F just set you on this path when you're seven. And they gave me a gun. And they gave you a gun. They gave me a microphone, yeah. There's another sample at the end, I believe, made it by top of the world. Yeah. Right?

That was from. I always want to say it's Dr. Strangelove, but it's not strange. Cagney and Lacey. That's right. James Cagney. Made him the top of the world. Is it a scar? White, white heater.

One of those kind of old school gangster flicks. That might have come, I forget. That might have been Hoyer that thought of using that sample. Very nice. Public domain. He's done it again. Public domain at that point. Aha.

That might have been his idea for that sample. But yeah, we just, we had these ideas to use these samples from things that we were like, you know, that thought made sense with like the vibe and the lyrical content. Sure. So when Hoya Presents Set It Off the song, does that trigger any kind of kind of? Does that trigger any kind of emotion in you of like, yeah, this is the one, let's go. You've done it. Yeah, we all thought it was dope. Okay.

Yeah, we all thought it was dope. I mean, I don't remember how much refining Maddie may have done to it. He could answer that better. But I don't think it was much. It was like, you know, not to, like, it was like a fully realized song actually when it It came like even lyrics. So yeah, I mean, I give him all, you know, hats off to him for that because that's hard to do.

Big time. And he, and really, never really did that again after because, you know. You didn't need to, really. Yeah, no, but you know what I mean? Like, he, like, not like to discredit, you know, I'm not saying this in any kind of like negative way. But like, you know, he was good at coming with riffs, but didn't always come with full.

song. Sure. Fully realized songs. And I mean, maybe no one did at that time because maybe Maddie. Yeah. You know,

because he was the most accomplished. But like, it was always like a mix of this riff, that riff, this, that, and then Willie comes in, and then I throw my thing on top, my kind of deal.

So it's hard to come with a fully realized song lyrics in all. And I think that was like maybe the first and only time that that happened for Hoya. But it was a hell of a song. Oh, yeah. It was a hell of a song.

You still play it. Yeah. It's a hell of a hell of it. Yeah. A hell of a song, yeah. How close are you and Roger during Set It Off? Is he part of the process at all? Is he there?

Is he present for any of it? He's, I mean, we're close. He's still, I'm pretty sure he's still living in New York. Because he went away for a bit to go do some, like, he went to like Harley-Davidson school in like Northern Florida for a little bit, but like, I was just brief. Yeah, he's around. Yeah, he's around. He's around New York.

He's kicking it around. He wasn't involved in like the writing process or anything like that. No, not so much. But cheering us on, as always. He hears about the Roadrunner contract. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. No, he's in the know for sure. He's in the know.

He backs it. Okay. He's like all four. He's like wanting me to like run with it. Because in his mind, I think at this point, he's done with music. Interesting. I can't speak for him. Sure.

He'll elaborate. But that's my assessment. He's kind of like, okay, well, I've done this band since 80, whatever, two, one. Hard course changed a lot. Hard course changing, and it's always that. And it's still that. And maybe I need to, like, secure some kind of, like, backup thing. And so that's what he went and did.

But it brought him back in. Sure. And we assisted in that a little bit. Yeah. We're almost there. We're almost there. I wouldn't be sitting here talking to you without my older brother, you know, like without him showing me. Yeah.

How has your relationship changed through the years? And like, are you guys actively kind of pushing each other creatively? Definitely always rooting each other on. Definitely. I don't know that we're pushing each other creatively, like actively doing that. but maybe just by the fact that we're both active and doing our things, we are. Yeah. You know what I mean?

Sure. Yeah. There's never competition. Like who's going to compete with AF? No one. So that's out of the... But, you know, there's always like, you know, everyone wants to do, you know, their thing at the highest level, right?

Whatever their thing is. So yeah, they want that out of, you know, for themselves and I want that for them. They want that for us. Yeah. Is his approval more important than anybody's to you, maybe? It's important for sure. It's important for sure. I mean, ultimately, it's like the people that consume it and, like, want to be a part of the experience.

That's very important. Oh, yeah. That's number one. That's number one. You know what I mean? But obviously, there's people like Roger, but other people, even friends that people that have been in this band. A perfect example

was recently like Mitz. Mitz was a big part of our band for a lot of years and maybe doesn't get enough credit. Great guitar player. Also a good songwriter. And he recently heard our new album and was floored by it and loved it not to like insert that

but I have to insert it because it touches on your point. And that approval meant more to me than if like a label guy would have said It's great. Because he lived in this band for 15, 14 or 15 years. We've written together. We've done albums together.

And he's been removed from the band. Not removed like I removed him. I'm saying he's been removed from the band setting. He retired. Whatever. But that approval meant a lot to me. So there's certain key people that really them liking it is like, almost more important than like if your label guy likes it or like if whatever.

Yeah, of course. And thus concludes part one of this incredible five-hour conversation with the great Freddie Madball. Stick around next week when we talk about the New York HarkCore documentary, the Ignostic Front Reunion, demonstrate my style, hold it down, look my way, and literally everything in between and after. See you next week.