Punk Rock Therapy

Power And Wealth Need Slaves -- or P.A.W.N.S. as they’re commonly known -- are a four-piece political punk group that originate from Santa Cruz. Their music has been compared to bands such as Crass, The Avengers, Half Empty and Conflict and their grouping of alternating fe/male vocals are one of their strongest aspects. P.A.W.N.S. began as a side project started by friends for guitarist Ray deHated and drummer Little Drummer Boy, who were both already in a band called Political Silence, but quickly became more than that. The band has recorded three CDs for the Oakland record label, Bad Monkey, and appeared on several compilations. P.A.W.N.S. went through a line-up change since their move to Chico—two of the band’s original members left and they gained a new bass player. In mid-July they are leaving for a month-long tour of the Northwest and Canada.

I had the chance to sit down with St. Ann (vocals), Ray deHated (guitar, vocals), Bisquick (bass) and Little Drummer Boy (drums) and have some drinks... okay, we had a lot of drinks, and it was a lot of fun. Between the beers and teas and assorted other mixed drinks, we managed to discuss their views toward being a politically charged band in a time when fluffy pop drivel is more common than not.

St. Ann: At the end of our last tour, Ray deHated and I got dropped off in Chico, and ended up staying.

Bisquick: Tell about how the old bass player disappeared.

Little Drummer Boy: We were playing a show up in Canada and there was this girl in the crowd that kind of looked like his girlfriend, but not really, and they spoke that night for about five minutes and then talked for a few hours on the phone over the course of the rest of the tour. Then, when we got home he broke up with his girlfriend and she [the girl from Canada] flew down and they were married [laughs]. So, we came to Chico and needed a bass player and Bisquick fit right in.

Ray deHated: He picked up the songs in the blink of any eye and then we hit the road.

Ray deHated: I think it’s a development, more than a change in line-up. It’s where we were going. You can hear it in the second album and then in the third it just seems like a natural progression.

Little Drummer Boy: I started playing drums really young, at probably about five. By the time I got out of eighth grade, I started playing with Political Silence. That’s why I’m called Little Drummer Boy; I was 14 when I started playing in a band.

Ray deHated: No, my music started with Political Silence, which formed in 1989. I started out by singing because I had no musical ability. I just crashed in with everyone else and had a passion for lyrical content and the punk movement. We started busting out music—and it was really poor music to begin with—but the lyrics really energized it. I didn’t start playing guitar until Political Silence’s original guitar player left, so I had to start.

Bisquick: I guess I got my first bass around 1986-87. Operation Ivy lived about a block down the street from me, and I would hang out at their house and jam. I was pathetic, but I really liked the bass and so I keep doing it. I’ve just bounced from band to band since I arrived in Chico.

Ray deHated: Political Silence had been playing for about eight years and we were becoming sort of a legend in our hometown of Santa Cruz. We got a knock on our door one day and it was a friend saying that The Bad Monkey wanted to get a hold of a song for a Santa Cruz compilation, Santa Cruz Still Sucks was the title of it. So, I had never met Mike from the Bad Monkey, but I called him up and told him that we were doing this other project called P.A.W.N.S. and asked if we could send in a song to get on the compilation. He told us that to not even bother that there were way too many bands and we couldn’t get on it, but we sent it anyway. The next thing you know we had the first cut out of 20-something bands, we were getting a lot of fan mail from Canada. It was awesome. After that he began producing records for P.A.W.N.S. It was a total fluke thing.

Little Drummer Boy: The point is, that if someone tells you not to send it in... send it in!

Ray deHated: Mostly we make contact through e-mail because it’s free. We don’t have any Internet access [right now] because it costs money and we try to do things as cheaply and as DIY as possible. It works out pretty well. There are an endless supply of people to meet who are empathetic to the views we have, and that’s the fantastic part about booking. It helps to destroy some apathy.

Little Drummer Boy: The last tour of the Mid West—in Amarillo, for instance—one night we were the only band that played and a lot of people still showed up. We played some songs twice and mixed them around to try and lengthen the set [laughs].

Bisquick: It’s actually really surprising what places have a big scene and what don’t. A lot of the towns that you just expect to be backwards, like Salt Lake City, have a huge punk scene. I was really floored. It was way bigger than I’d ever imagine. The night we played there, it was a five band line-up the place was packed, the local bands were so good, these Salt Lake City bands were better than most of the shit you see in The Bay.

Ray deHated: The tours turn out pretty awesome. We have a driver, and on the last tour we did 6300 miles in a month, and we didn’t have to drive at all.

St. Ann: Except for two hours once.

Ray deHated: We just party in the back of the RV. We have a moving permit for the vehicle that allows us to drink in the back while the driver is free to haul us around. It’s a mobile party.

Little Drummer Boy: The driver even takes us party hopping sometimes [laughs].

Little Drummer Boy: We like to play a lot of punk squats. In Oklahoma, we played a movie theater and they took out the first ten rows to create some room for kids to be in, and at that show people were actually singing the lyrics to our songs while we were playing.

Little Drummer Boy: I personally like "Fox Holed." It’s about being in the bottom of a fox hole with a lot of dead bodies around you, shooting up with morphine because you’ve been shot a couple times.

Ray deHated: The thing about the song "Fox Holed" is that all his friends that are dead in the fox hole are telling him that he is lucky to be alive, but he responds with "but they don’t feel pain." It’s interesting to see how pain is a quality that can reassure you that you are alive. Another song is "Badge Of Stupidity" that was written about an event we went through.

Little Drummer Boy: We were playing a show at UC Santa Cruz and our roadie didn’t have his hair all spiked up or whatever—he didn’t look like a punk. So, a couple other punks picked a fight with him and gathered around him and he had to fight his away from about ten gutter punks that were picking a fight because he didn’t look like a punk. That is opposite of my whole theory of life, the concept of, to be a punk you have to look like a punk. It doesn’t matter if you have a dyed mohawk if you’re a jock... you’re still a jock, but with a mohawk!

Ray deHated: "The Badge of Stupidity" has to do with people who are wearing that Crass patch, but they want to kick your ass because you don’t look like them.

Bisquick: It’s this pseudo-non-conformity, where you have to look like a non-conformist or else they’ll get on you because you have to be one of the different people, just like them, or you don’t fit in [laughs].

St. Ann: Not at all [shaking her head slowly, but aggressively].

Bisquick: Well, we wanted to write about beaches and such, but we just couldn’t cut it [laughter].

St. Ann: At a lot of a live shows, people can’t even understand most of what’s being sung, it’s just the energy and the musical quality.

Little Drummer Boy: And then they buy the CD so they can read the lyrics.

Ray deHated: I would have been burnt out on the punk scene a long time ago if it hadn’t been for the fuel of the political aspect. It’s essential that you don’t dumb yourself down to be accepted by the mainstream.

Oh good, I knew you’d say that. You’re hoping to inspire people to…

St. Ann: …seek out the people who feel that same as them.

Ray deHated: We want to inspire people to think about things. For me, it has to do with destroying apathy and the sort of mainstream lyrics we were talking about are so demoralizing. There are so many people world wide who don’t get any sort of AP news coverage and those are the sort of people you want to seek out and help and let them know that they’re not crazy, we just live in a crazy world and it can be disgusting sometimes. It’s sort of like a great big therapy group [laughs].

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