Gab de la Vega

Hello and thank you for answering the questions.

It's me to thank you for this unexpected interview!

Can you please tell a 'lil bit about yourself, your projects and bands.

My name is Gab, I'm from Brescia, Italy. I don't know what to say so I will cut it short: I have an acoustic punk folk solo project as Gab De La Vega, I play in a hardcore punk band named The Smashrooms, I run a hardcore label and distro named Epidemic Records and I do some other stuff that I generally call “life”. I guess that this interview will tell more about me.

Why did you start „Epidemic Records“ ? And how did it evolve in the last

years ?

Since the beginning I liked the sense of community, mutual help and respect that hardcore and punk rock gave me. I started listening to punk and hardcore bands that were released by punk and hardcore labels, run by punk and hardcore kids themselves. So I wanted to do my part too. It all started as a small distro and a label to release The Smashrooms records at first, but then it grew up, involving more bands, and now it gives me a lot of satisfaction, even if it requires a lot of time and commitment.

Do you have a special kind of band, which you support with „Epidemic

Records“ ?

Not really. It must be a band I like of course. Then it must be a band I get along with. There's a lot of bands that are musically great, but that I wouldn't get along with in any way. On the other hand there are bands of friends and people I respect I might not like. I will keep supporting and helping these ones of course, but probably I will not put money in their release.
If I really like a band and the guys in the band are people I get along with, chances are that I will put my money in their record. Of course it must be a steady project: putting a lot of money in a band that barely plays shows around wouldn't be the best choice.

As you can see, there's a lot of thinking behind a choice.

When did you start to play solo just with an acoustic guitar ? Why did you

start it ?

I always liked strumming my acoustic guitar. I started writing some acoustic songs around 2010 I guess, but I never thought I would played those in front of people.
In 2011 some friends of mine listened to those songs and suggested me to start playing shows. In the end I decided to do so and after a while I started getting requests for shows.

I really enjoy playing acoustic, it's pretty different from a hardcore show. There's no need to explain why. I play acoustic because I like it a lot and it gives me the chance to play different songs in a different way than the hardcore stuff I usually play. Many people, either outside or inside the hardcore community, enjoy acoustic music and this provides me the chance to face a different, or better wider, audience. I'm still a guy who comes from a hardcore punk background so my approach is definitely influenced by this, but still I can mix it with the folk songwriter attitude, telling stories, explaining what pushed me to those reflections, ideas, feeling I put in words and music.

An acoustic show of mine has definitely a slower pace than hardcore punk shows I'm used to, I really enjoy this way to express myself, my thoughts, my experiences and reflections.

Let's talk a bit about attitude. You are vegan and straight edge. How long

are you vegan and straight edge ?

I went vegan in 2007, after about a couple of years as a vegetarian. I used to drink alcohol, but then I started thinking that there was no need to drink that much to have a good time and I didn't like the behavior of those people and friends I knew that used to drink a lot. I also didn't like the feeling of being drunk or under the influence myself. So I started drinking less and less, until I didn't feel the need to touch a drop of alcohol anymore. I realized that I didn't need alcohol, tobacco or drugs to define myself, my personality, my identity. I was a person with a lot of things to express in words and actions and I realized that those substances were useless, or even harmful, in the development of my identity in the social context as well as in the expression of myself as individual.

I went drug free and stayed that way; for a pretty long time I didn't feel the need to claim myself a straight edge, because I had a great respect for that, which I always considered a political stance and idea to be taken seriously.

By that time, a lot of people asked me if I was a straight edge but I really didn't feel like to tag myself that way. After a lot of thinking and considering the straight edge in its whole meaning, I decided to make it clear: in my opinion straight edge is a choice that makes my political ideas complete, solid and coherent.

Why are you vegan?

There's a million of reasons why is a good thing to go vegan. There's no good reason not to do so.
I could talk a lot about veganism, because it's something I really feel, but I will tell you just this: I don't want to contribute to the suffering, exploitation and death of animals. We can live without being responsible for their suffering, exploitation and death. Everyone condemns suffering, exploitation and murder. This is the same for animals. There's no “good suffering”, “good exploitation” and “good murder”. Give veganism a chance and you will see how great it is to live a compassionate and ethical lifestyle that causes no harm to anyone.

Why are you straight edge?

Why not? I think straight edge is the natural evolution of punk. Drinking, smoking, taking drugs is nothing revolutionary. Unfortunately most of the people in the alternative communities (especially in punk) still live by the stereotype of the damned rebel that makes things that society sees as wrong and condemns. But just take a look around. You're not a rebel if you do drugs. Everybody does. You just conform to the norm. In a world where everyone wants to feel detached from reality, trying to escape from it, the “punkest” thing you can do is to stick to reality and live it. Turning a blind eye on problems doesn't solve them and doesn't make any change in the world.
It's a long talk but basically I see straight edge as something that completes my political view. I want to live my life in freedom, be active, be aware and conscious. I don't want to support an industry, a part of the system, the mechanism, that wants people to be numb and docile. If you need to poison yourself to cope with the sense of oppression and alienation that modern life can give, sure there's something wrong. Boredom, frustrations, solitude, (self) acceptance problems and issues of any kind won't be solved by any cigarette, drink or drug.
But please notice: I have a lot of non straight edge friends and I'm not the one who preaches on other people's habits. It's a choice I made for myself and I'm open to talk about it in respectful confrontations, but I really don't want to be the straight edge guy who attacks non straight edge people and bores them to death. I think I can say I'm just a normal guy who lives his life, with its ups and downs, in the purest way possible and who is aware of it.

Anyway, there's a very interesting book that I want to suggest to those who want to learn more about Straight Edge. It's “Sober Living For The Revolution – Hardcore punk, straight edge and radical politics”, edited by Gabriel Kuhn. It's a good starter that gives different perspectives on straight edge and its links to politics.

Do you think straight edge is a political choice and not just a personal ?

I guess it's not just one or the other. It's both. It's a political choice because every aware choice we make in life has political repercussions. On the other hand it has repercussions on your own life too. So I guess we can say it's personal too. You can live it has you want, but in my opinion straight edge needs to be considered both as a personal and political choice. I think that every personal choice has political aspects as well as political choices are basically personal choices taken with awareness and commitment. It's not just a matter of “partying sober” and it's not just a matter of “sober revolution”. I guess it's nothing but “life”, lived in the purest way we can, extrapolating ourselves from the poison-based social pattern we grew up in, which we absorbed as the only way to be in the social context. It's not true: we were sober kids that became smokers and drinkers. Why we could enjoy life without substances and at a certain point we needed those to be included in society? We don't need those to be real, deep and articulated individuals. On the contrary, those substances are used to cope with the mechanisms of a society that wants us flat, needful and frightened. Any person, any individual can do great things, can be someone without drinking, doing drugs nor smoking. If you need a cigarette, drugs or alcohol to live your days it's pretty clear that there's something wrong. Why did we start needing those things in our teenage? Do we really need those things to become men and women? We need to return to be those young boys and girls we used to be before poisonous imposed needs came into our lives.

I saw you in a squat in Vienna. Many people were smoking in this little

room, where you played. What do you think about this, as a straight edge

person ?

It's pretty common in squats and social centers. Squats are places where freedom and respect are basic. But in this case it is taken in a contradictory way. “We are free to smoke inside of the room” means “we are forced to breath smoke and have sore eyes” for non smokers. If we were all born as smokers and smoking was a natural activity of human beings, then everyone would smoke and non smokers should go outside to breath fresh air. But this is not the case. Non smokers are forced to breath loads of passive smoke. Freedom to breath and respect for non smoking people is not considered. This is not the way squat politics should work. You can smoke and do everything you want, but in the respect of those who didn't decide the same for themselves.

I think that squats and social centers should invite smokers to smoke outside, to let people breath fresh air inside, which is good for smokers too actually. Please notice: I didn't say that squats should ban smoking. Banning doesn't bring a self-responsibilization of people. It just say “you can't do that”. It doesn't help people to raise awareness of the problem, it just says “this is forbidden”. It's always better to make people understand why some thing shouldn't happen instead of telling them not to do so. This is one of the most important things I consider in my political view: my freedom ends where another person's starts.

What do you think about squats in common ?

I like squats. I played many shows with The Smashrooms in many squats around Europe and I guess we always will. I also played many acoustic shows in squats and I will keep doing so. I also enjoy other activities, both political and social. They are places that try to create a different kind of socialization.
Sure there are some dynamics that still don't work properly in squats and these need to be fixed in order to offer a better alternative to the sterile, consumerist socialization offered by expensive clubs.

Sometimes we can find the same dynamics of the criticized “outside world”, transferred into the squat space. I think that offering the same shit we don't like in society in a squat doesn't make a real alternative. Unfortunately some squats are meant this way and this makes me pretty sad. So good that most of the squats are run by people whit a real critical view on these issues, which work hard to make squats and social centers good alternatives. These need to be supported.

What means D.I.Y. For you ?

Getting involved, making something in a better way, with more heart, more passion and more satisfaction.

You are a political musician. Do you use your shows to give speech and

talk to the people ?

I wouldn't call myself a political musician. Probably I shouldn't call myself a musician either, because of my technical lacks, but this is another story. Why political? I'm simply a guy who plays songs and speaks out his mind. There's no boundary between personal issues and political issues. One song I can talk about the way I feel about something, the other song I can speak out my opinion about military interventions to protect western countries interests in far away lands. But it's still me, the same person, the same mind, the same show. Why should I say “this song is political”, “this song is personal”? I know we ofter tag bands or artists this way, but I started thinking we shouldn't. We're not just political people and we're not just people caring about personal issues. We are deep, multifaceted individuals that can have interests in many different things: traveling, riding a bike, having fun with friends, living a love story or even politics. Yes, I care about politics and yes I put a lot of effort in making political issues clear to many people, both with my songs and my activities, but everyone who knows me can tell you that I also love making jokes, doing impersonations, having fun, traveling, watching TV series... I'm just a normal guy who cares about a lot of things. A statement like “Gab De La Vega is a political musician” makes me look like a very boring dude who preaches on people and that never has fun and honestly I don't feel that way at all. I'm not like that. As I said I care a lot about politics but I think that everyone should simply develop a healthy interest in politics just like they have interest in playing basketball, reading books, studying subjects they like, doing the job they love or skateboarding. Politics is a part of life. What I would like to see is a world where politics is lived as a normal part of people's life and not seen as a boring science for weirdos and ultra-militant people. This way more people would grow up aware and active and maybe the world could be a bit better. Taking politics back from the greedy and dirty institutional hands and giving it back to the people, where it belongs. That would be awesome.
For this reason, yes, I often speak in the between of the songs when I want to explain the issue the song is about and bring some quick reflection easy to catch on those topics. But I always try not to make boring and endless speeches that make the show harder to enjoy. I give tips, suggestions and quick explanations, then I let the people get them and start looking for answers, in hopes they start thinking about those things.

Do you have any special tour experiences, you will remember for a long time ?

I like funny tour stories. The Smashrooms have a lot of those to tell. Highways always offer the best, for example. One of our favorite: European Tour 2010. Our drummer Cello was staring outside of the window on a highway in Germany and suddenly turned to us shouting: “Guys you won't believe this! You won't believe what I saw! There was a couple having sex in the field just next to the highway! I'm sure! She was wearing a red T-shirt, he was all naked!”. We will never know the truth, but he's more than sure that it was no illusion: there was a couple having sex in a field next to the highway, so close to the traffic... We always have fun telling this story to friends. But we have a lot of stories to tell. Honestly I will always remember every single second I spent on tour. Tour life is amazing!

Who designed your shirts ?

I designed them. Another thing I love of the DIY ethic: you have skills? Use them!

Can you explain the situation in Italy ? Is there still a (concious)

hardcore scene ?

I would say yes. There's still people involved in hardcore punk and a lot of good bands to support. I guess hardcore is in a bad phase generally speaking and Italy is no exception, but I don't want to be pessimistic, so I will say that there's people still caring of a meaningful and committed hardcore scene. It could be better though. But I really don't want to complain (too much). Check out italian hardcore bands on tour!

What can we expect in the future from you and your projects ? I saw, that

you are working on a new „Epidemic Records“ Homepage.

Well... a lot! Epidemic Records new website is almost ready and it will host a brand new e-store to order records, t-shirts and other stuff directly from there. A good friend of mine is helping me.

I want to record a LP as Gab De La Vega, to be released in 2013. If anyone out there runs a DIY label and wants to help, please get in touch. I also want to tour Europe again.
The Smashrooms are working on new songs for a new LP too. It will be different from the previous stuff. I really can't tell how it will sound in the end but since these first days spent writing and practicing new stuff I can tell you that this is going to be our best production so far. Maybe it will sound really different to the most, but it's what we want to do right now: we wouldn't write a record that sounds just like The Wind Of Tomorrow or Questions. I'm really excited for this. Can't wait!
The Smashrooms will hopefully tour Europe again in 2013 too. We also started a new project named HFPS – Hardcore For Political Support, a benefit project to raise money for political activists and prisoners involved in struggles we support. I hope to do good things with HFPS. More info will be given from our page and from the new Epidemic Records website soon.

Any last words and shout outs ?

Yes: go vegan! It's great, easy and makes a huge difference for the animals, for the hungry populations, for the planet and for ourselves too. Let the revolution begin in your kitchen!

I also want to thank you for this interview. See you hopefully next time I will play Vienna!