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Richmond, VA Culture & Politics Since 2005

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To The Core: Weekend Playlist by Ace Stallings

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Every Friday night, RVA Mag drops one scorcher of a playlist curated by influential artists, musicians, and institutions.

This week’s offering is presented by the illustrious Ace Stallings, who made his name in Richmond as the singer for local hardcore mainstays Break Away. He does quite a bit more than that, though, not only contributing vocals to local newcomers Neuromancer but booking a ton of excellent hardcore shows around town and becoming an author with the release last year of his first short story collection, Mourning Songs. His playlist is filled with ragers from all genres, hardcore to hip hop, house to glam metal, and everything in between.

Virginia, it’s time to dance.

Music Sponsored By Graduate Richmond

Lust For Destruction: Weekend Playlist by Vinyl Conflict’s Bobby Egger

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Every Friday night, RVA Mag drops one scorcher of a playlist curated by influential artists, musicians, and institutions. This time around, our playlist comes from a man who should need no introduction for the record-buying faithful of Central Virginia: Bobby Egger, the proprietor of Vinyl Conflict. Located in Oregon Hill, Richmond’s leading punk rock emporium also releases vinyl and cassettes by top local artists, from metallic hardcore scorchers Left Cross to hip hop legend Nickelus F.

This might be a cold and dreary weekend, but Egger’s playlist is guaranteed to heat you up; when you listen to it, you definitely won’t want to sit still.

Start the pit, Virginia.

Music Sponsored By Graduate Richmond

Rage and Rhythm: Richmond’s Hardcore Scene Meets Hip-Hop

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As a hip-hop artist growing up on Richmond’s Southside listening to hip-hop, R&B, reggae, and jazz, I was not a fan of hardcore music. I would get exposed to alternative rock, punk, and hardcore mostly from my white friends and MTV. I couldn’t understand the ear-splitting instrumentation and random screaming for three to four minutes per song.  

Which is ironic, since that’s the same thing my grandmother would say about rap music. I didn’t understand the headbanging and fisty mosh pits — or the black eyes, cuts and bruises, broken bones, the sweat and bloody t-shirts. What I did understand was that there were millions of people who loved this music, and it meant a whole lot to them, just as hip-hop meant for us.

Earlier this year, I mentioned to a friend that I wanted to learn more about hardcore music. So I started listening to a few bands like Show Me The Body, The Acacia Strain, and Division of Mind, and attending shows at Strange Matter. I needed to get a feel for what I was missing out on in Richmond’s legendary hardcore scene.

Months later after finishing my brother Nickelus F’s album Stuck, I was invited with Nick and NameBrand to meet Bobby Egger at Vinyl Conflict, a record store well-known in the hardcore community.

To our surprise, Egger and a few of his friends felt the same way about hip-hop and wanted to explore the idea of working together. When this eventually happened, we found ourselves touring alongside hardcore and noise acts. Headed to Baltimore on the first leg of the tour with Nickelus F and Lil Ugly Mane, we didn’t know what to expect or how things with a mixed crowd would go in a city we’ve never played.

PHOTO: Michael Millions

Sitting in the green room before the show started, energy filled the room. And when the moshing started and the crowd got pumped, I got nervous. How would they react when Nick and I hit the stage? Would they give us the same energy? Does this crowd love hip-hop?

When we took the stage, the crowd went stupid, and it was obvious that they loved the rap sets just as much as the hardcore sets. Hitting me all at once, I realized the crowd wasn’t there for one genre over the other, they were there because they were feeding both sides of their souls; the intersection of rage and rhythm. Seeing this from the stage put me at the edge of this new world, which we were literally jumping into.

Unwinding from the performance, I realized that mixing hardcore and hip-hop was absolutely perfect. I started to see this at shows in Philly, VA Beach, and Raleigh — all sold-out shows. But as I watched opening bands from Richmond, like Division of Mind and other legends like Tarpit, Dry Spell, and Victim, I paid more attention to the lyrics; their content was parked on the same lane as hip-hop’s. They spoke about similar environments, social issues, government, peace, equality, and of course a little death. What’s a hardcore show or hip-hop show without that? 

As both genres represent versions of the same thing, the next question then became: Why hasn’t this fusion already happened in Richmond? Historically we’ve seen this before with RUN DMC, Beastie Boys, Jay-Z, Linkin Park, and even Aerosmith. Even now, we can all run a few Rage Against The Machine albums back.

With everything going on in Richmond — monuments, evictions, and gentrification splitting the fabric of our city — this thread of hip-hop and hardcore is one thing actually bringing us closer together. Vinyl Conflict’s annual show in August proved this. The union of hip-hop and hardcore was on full display with acts like Nickelus F, Nosebleed, Slump, Deviant, and Sinister Purpose playing for a fully engaged crowd. “Holy shit,” I thought to myself, never imagining that this would actually work in a city divided like Richmond. There was a time when hip-hop artists fought to find any stage in the city to perform.  

Thankfully, those days are over as we multiply these experiences with more shows, tours, and cross-promotionals. Yet we still have our divides.  

Anyone who grew up in this city knows things are slow to change. Even now as “Richmond” tries to rebrand itself “RVA,” we still have to fight to continue the conversation over things like removing racist monuments from our field of dreams. We still have to fight eviction rates that are at a national high, displacing and dividing families. We still have to fight for police reform, so a black man like Marcus Peters can receive help for his mental illness instead of a few fatal bullets. With all of these challenges and divisions in the city, at least Richmond’s hip-hop and hardcore scenes are intersecting and bringing people and cultures together in new and powerful ways. 

*Cover photo by Landon Shroder

Stool Pigeon: Weekend Playlist by Sheer Terror

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Every Friday night, RVA Mag drops one scorcher of a playlist curated by influential artists, musicians, and institutions.

As you slide through your weekend maneuver, let the playlist of NYHC legends Sheer Terror take you on an unexpected musical voyage which is sure to give you enough soul to battle any of those lingering night-time doubts.

Get amongst it, world.

 

Music Sponsored By Graduate Richmond

Richmond Punk Godfathers L’Amour Drop Massive Archival Release

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L’Amour was one of the first punk bands to come out of Richmond, Virginia. Now, nearly forty years later, a collection of the band’s recordings is being released on local label Beach Impediment Records.

Look to the Artist: 1978 – 1981 is an anthology that includes the band’s 1979 single as well as recordings from the same studio session and exclusive demo tracks. The B-side of the record is a complete live set from 1980, and features never-before-heard songs that didn’t make it onto a studio recording.

Two of the band’s members, Tom Applegate and Dave Stover, still live in Richmond. The two met in high school and bonded over their shared love of Rolling Stones and Kinks records.

“You walk in his room and he’s playing [Rolling Stones 1968 live album] Get Yer Ya-Ya’s Out on the record player,” Applegate said, “And then on his wall, ceiling-to-floor, there were black and white photographs of surfers, and the record collection matched mine exactly. That was a moment.”

The pair attended Virginia Commonwealth University in the mid- to late-70s at the beginning of the punk explosion. The Clash, Patti Smith, and The Heartbreakers had a huge impact on them, as did rock and roll magazines like Creem and New York Rocker.

Applegate and Stover founded L’Amour in 1978 and helped create Richmond’s first punk scene, ushering in a cultural movement that still exists in the city today.

The band released their sole single in 1979. It was the first release on Applegate’s Zero Degree imprint, which went on to issue now legendary records by early Richmond punk bands like White Cross, Beex, and The Prevaricators.

“It was wild being a first generation punk band,” Applegate said. “It wasn’t just us, there were so many people working on the scene in so many different ways, and that’s how it grew. All of a sudden, it became a community.”

In addition to playing locally, the band also toured throughout the region between 1978 and 1980, but they were never signed to a major label. After a few lineup changes, L’Amour broke up and the members moved on to new projects.

Mark Shubert, owner and operator of Beach Impediment Records, came across a sleeveless copy of L’Amour’s single in 2010. Shubert is a longtime fan of Zero Degree Records, and cites White Cross’s 1982 EP Fascist as one of the best U.S. hardcore records of all time.

“I randomly discovered the single,” he said. “I’ve had it for years now, and I just thought it was really cool.”

Beach Impediment is well-known in the world of DIY punk and hardcore, and has been involved in several archival projects since the label started in 2011. It’s inaugural release was a reissue of an EP by Front Line, an early 80s hardcore punk band from Virginia Beach.

Shubert said he met Applegate by chance at a monster truck rally several years ago, and broached the idea of an archival collection. It turned out that Applegate and Stover had held on to the original tape reels from L’Amour’s recording sessions, as well as a sizable stash of live recordings, photographs, and flyers from the era.

“I was really excited with how it all came together because, you know, not only am I a fanatic for punk music, but as a person who works in the public history field, it was such a thrill going through their archives,” said Shubert.

Look to the Artist: 1978 – 1981 provides a rare glimpse of the early years of Richmond punk rock, as first-wave bands laid the foundation for the DIY punk and metal scenes that were to come. It’s as much an anthology of the band as it is an artifact of the era.

After L’Amour, Applegate went on to join Beex with his future wife, Christine Gibson, and Stover started The Prevaricators. Though Gibson has since passed away, Beex is active in the punk scene in Richmond today, and sporadically releases new music.

Applegate still speaks nostalgically about his formative years playing in L’Amour, and the early days of DIY punk.

“It was a gift to have the opportunity to play rock and roll,” he said. “And that’s about as much religion as I have. It’s my mantra.”

Physical copies of Look to the Artist: 1978 – 1981 will be available this Friday via Beach Impediment’s webstore. 

Music Sponsored By Graduate Richmond

Vinyl Conflict’s New Label Blends Punk DIY and Richmond Hip Hop

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Vinyl Conflict record shop has unveiled plans for a locals-only hip hop label. Bobby Egger, owner and operator of Vinyl Conflict, debuted Fantastic Damage Records in early October following several successful hip-hop releases on the shop label.

The first two releases on Fantastic Damage will be cassette reissues of “Vices” (2013) and “Triflin” (2015) by local hip-hop artist Nickelus F, and will be available in time for Nickelus F’s upcoming tour with Tommy Wright III.

Vinyl Conflict specializes in punk, metal, and hardcore records, but the label’s roster has recently expanded to include several local hip-hop artists. Egger said that the success of those releases encouraged him to start the new label.

“People have been really excited about it,” he said. “It’s been really pushing me to look into future releases.”  

Earlier this year, Vinyl Conflict Records released a vinyl edition of Nickelus F’s 2018 album “Stuck,” and a cassette version of “Flick your tongue against your teeth” by Bedwetter, alias of Richmond artist Lil Ugly Mane.

“Obviously the first couple releases I had the privilege of putting out had really strong reactions,” Egger said.

Fantastic Damage will function much like Vinyl Conflict records. It’s a DIY label, meaning that the record label and artist work together to promote the record and set up tour dates. The DIY model has been the modus operandi for punk and hardcore labels since the 80s, but it’s a relatively new idea in the world of hip-hop.

“I’m kinda showing them how the DIY label works and I’m actually finding out that a lot of these dudes have released records for themselves but they didn’t have the network to distribute it,” Egger said. “I think the DIY deal is very good deal for artists, especially if you’re not on that next level yet.”

The combination of hardcore and hip-hop has had sporadic success at both the national and underground level, but that hasn’t necessarily been the case in Richmond. Yet both scenes have up-and-coming, well-known artists in their ranks.

“The two scenes aren’t very aware of each other,” said Egger, “but I think that there’s a certain level of interest on both sides that hasn’t been tapped into.”

Several mixed bill concerts featuring local Richmond hardcore bands playing alongside hip-hop artists like Lil Ugly Mane, Nickelus F, and Mutant Academy have created some crossover buzz in the city.

Egger, a long-time fan of hip hop, said that the energy and enthusiasm of those shows were pivotal in his decision to start the new label.

“I just want to work with artists who I find interesting that don’t have a deal yet,” he said. “I think bringing stuff to the physical format is only going to make Richmond seem bigger on the music map.” 

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