At Anti-flag's show last week, Jeff Gustafson and Joel Scheingross had the opportunity to catch up with Chris # 2. The interview lasted a while, but Chris had many profound items to speak of, and we hope everyone will have a chance to read this.

Chris2: I am Chris #2 I play bass and sing for Anti-Flag.
Jeff: So far how has the tour been going?
C2: The tour has been amazingly awesome. I dunno does that work? Amazingly awesome, its been incredible. With us we have two A-f record bands, Pipe down and Virus 9. Who are smoking, and the ladies like them too, and
Anti-Flag Pic courtesy of http://www.multimania.com/antiflag
the ahh I'm joking because they are back here. And we have Thrice who are incredible, and Against All Authority who have just been rocking forever. You know. And it's like every show has been basically sold out. Accept for Lawrence, Kansas. But you know if we would have sold out Lawrence, Kansas I think I would have hung myself. Ahh. Its been awesome because of the state of affairs the country has been. And everything so gung ho red white and blue and military, and things like that it's amazing to play a show and have people on the same wavelength, and all have it in our heads.

Jeff: I read on your web site that you had an article, rather a letter to the editor, in the New York times.
C2: Yeah
Jeff: Did they publish it?
C2:No. We were in the NY times. They mentioned us as one of the bands people weren't listening to anymore (after 9/11), and it was so frustrating because we go out on this tour and we are selling out 1000+ venues all over the country and it's like what do you mean people aren't listing anymore? 		"Keep the energy up...that's what makes punk rock beautiful."

Jeff: How has the reaction been? Have people been like "Anti-Flag are you anti-American?"
C2: We have gotten a lot of that, but we clear a lot of that up on stage. You guys will see that tonight. We talk about a lot of the misconceptions.
Joel: I noticed you guys changed your T-shirts. Like the T-shirts you sold last time I saw you like 2 years ago. Like, no more of the guy behind the bars of the flag.
C2: No. The thing is we still sell those shirts. We just have new designs. We've gotta keep up. We still sell the flag burner patch. I don't think we have changed anything. We still feel the same way about the flag, it's just a piece of fabric. I don't think we've changed in that respect at all. I think that the flag has become an evil tool, I mean they use it; they wave the flag and as soon as you see the stars and bars flying its an excuse to go and bomb a Third World nation. And to me that's.. that's fucked.
Joel: You mean like propaganda?
C2: Exactly. And Ummm. We still feel the same way about it, there's still problems going on in the USA. I mean it doesn't nullify the fact that innocent people died September 11th. That's still tragic but you can't ignore everything else that is going on. By turning the flag upside down, defacing the flag as some people would call it, to try to bring attention to some of these problems and use it as a distress signal. We are gonna continue using it that way until things are tuned around. Until the government is back in the hands of the people. Doing that really helps your self get heard.

Jeff: What's the most important of those problems you were talking about, besides the "war on terror."
C2: Well I mean I think that it is a total farce that all of these multi-national corporations own the government. Umm the voters don't own the government. The US citizens DO NOT own the government. It's not a government for the people any more. Its like... look at where the campaign money comes from, look at who pays these peoples bills, who pays these peoples off. So that they can go into Third World nations and rape them of their resources, and build these factories there and use their labor. It's. . .the company of the world. The huge corporations, it's Enron, it's Exxon-Mobile, it's General Electric. Its just like, I think that's the biggest problem. I think that's what we need to strive towards, is getting profit out of the government. And getting people back into it.
Joel: The situation I see, is that we are basically in the Cold War again. Except Communism has been replaced by terrorism; we're sending advisers into the Philippines and that's the first thing we did with war in Vietnam... How do you feel about all of that?
C2: Ahhh, well I mean. . . I think the war on terrorism is an excuse to take peoples liberties away, and give more power to a corporate run government and a way to make people feel safer. They are gonna start tapping your phone, and are gonna start banning forms of statement like burning the flag, or turning the flag upside down. And it's just like, it's gonna snow ball in to people having no freedom, and that's very scary. But if you look at the facts, it all boils down to money. It all boils down too oil. The Middle East is where the oil is, if we can instill a tyrant government there that's gonna help the US drill the oil. And the us is there to (recorder didn't pick up end of statement)

Jeff: The drilling in Alaska, are you guys for that?
C2: We definitely are not. I mean it's.. there has been so many advancements in technology that we don't need to use oil. I think that it all boils down to the golden dollar. And George W Bush owns how many oil refineries, and is backed by all of the major oil companies, whose side do you think he is going to be on?
Jeff: And he was real good friends with Kenneth Lay from Enron.
C2: Exactly- And people are like why is he not talking? I'll tell you exactly why he's not talking, it's because he was involved. I mean human beings were screwed over because of it.

Jeff: Do you think George Bush is using his popularity too skirt the Enron issue?
C2: I mean obviously he's using the fact that he is buddy-buddy with the media chumps. When they talk about Bush they don't talk about the fact that he denies to talk about Enron, they talk about how high his approval rating is. How can you have blind unconditional faith in an almost elected official? You know that was a scam in itself.
Jeff: I here a song coming on.
C2. Yeah its tragic, there will be lots more songs.

Jeff: Anti-flag came out with a new album last week right?
C2: Yeah "Mobilize."
Jeff: Yeah. I saw you answered a lot of questions about 9/11 in the linear notes. Is there anything else you talk about?
C2: Yeah, actually the first song on the record is "911 for Peace," it's a song we recorded September 13th. We wrote it, Justin wrote it, on September 11th, when everything was happening before our eyes. Obviously recording seemed really trivial in most peoples eyes but that's our voice, music has always been our voice, and we had some things to say, and we wanted to say them. We were in the studio recording the 8 songs for "Mobilize" and that was one of the songs that made it on. And people ask us if it was written pre September 11, and the name changed, but it was written on the 12th. We practiced it on some friends gear, and went to the studio, you know. "Mobilize" basically means that people of the world, youth of the world, human beings of the world, need to put aside all of the Euro-American beliefs, and start being real people. I think we need to think about people all over the world, not just America. Not just better the world we live in, but better the world everyone lives in.

Joel: So where can a typical American go to find information to not be led on by propaganda?
C2: Well, there's a couple of places you can go. Democracynow.org, indymedia.org.
Jeff: Inthesetimes.com.
C2: Inthesetimes.com. I mean you can go to Anti-Flag.com, we have links to other sites. We have people that update those sites all the time. You don't have to believe what we say, you don't have to believe what anyone says, you just have to find all sides of the information and make an educated decision. I think believing what CNN tells you, and what Tom Brokaw is spewing every night is not the way to go. There's a lot of information out there, you just need to find it. I mean there's so many steps we can take as human beings. Whether or not it's not shopping at Wal-Mart, or not eating McDonalds, or not wearing leather, or being vegetarian, or being vegan, all those thing are small steps and I think we need to dwell on all the good that people do instead of putting ourselves ahead of someone. Because you know "I'm a vegan and your only a vegetarian, I'm better then you" (sarcastic tone). Every one is trying and at least your putting more effort then somebody who isn't.

Jeff: That kind of leads me to my next question, a lot of people have the attitude like "I have a mohawk so I am punker then you," does that piss you off?
C2: Yeah it does. On the first record "Die For Your Government" there's a lot of songs about posers and things people say. As we grew older, we sort of realized that, yeah that stuff sucks, that people will get into punk for the fashion, and use the lifestyle that we lead as a way to be cool or what ever, but there's more important problems going on to talk about.

Jeff: You guys are straight edge? Or some of you are straight edge?
C2: Yes we're all straight edge. I hate to say straight edge, because a lot of negativity goes towards that, but we don't drink, we don't smoke.
Jeff: Yeah I just say " I don't drink because I do enough stupid things when I'm sober."
Joel: But at that same time you don't have grudges against people who choose to drink, right?
C2: Yeah. A lot of people, since we have non smoking shows, a lot of people are like, 'ohh what is this?' But the reality of it is Justin is very allergic to cigarette smoke, none of us in the band like cigarette smoke, and if we have the opportunity for it not to be around us we'd like it not to be around us.

Jeff: What do you guys do when you aren't in Anti-Flag?
C2: We run AF records. You know, we are on tour for six to eight months of the year. Then we're at home running the record label. The rest of the time we try to have a social, human life outside of the band itself. It becomes very difficult, but yeah, it's our lifestyle.

Jeff: When you are home in Pittsburgh do people know you are in Anti-Flag when they see you on the streets?
C2: Well, people in Pittsburgh don't really like Anti-Flag. It's funny, no one really likes us, everyone hates us there.
Jeff: Did you sell out the show there?
C2: We didn't play there yet, I'm interested to see if we do.
Jeff: Were you initially in Anti-flag, or were you an addition?
C2: No I'm not an original member of Anti-Flag. It was a three piece, it was Andy, Justin, and Pat. Andy left the band, and came in for bass. Then they switched Chris to guitar and, then I came in, and we were both named Chris, and it was too confusing to have two, so he became #1 and I became # 2.

Jeff: What songs do you like to play live?
C2: I like playing "Got the Numbers" live, I like playing "911 for Peace" live, and "Under Ground Network" those are a few songs we like to play live.
Jeff: Any covers?
C2: We play "White Riot" by the Clash, we played "Minor Threat" by Minor Threat before, we played "Because I Got High" (every body laughs), that's a joke that me and Pat do. Yeah we play them all.

Jeff: How do you respond to people who say you sold out because you guys did Warped Tour, and stuff like that?
C2: Well, I mean, it's like what I said about dwelling in the negative. Like you know there are a million bands that have done way worse things than Anti-flag, and not only that singled out. They are singing about mistreating women and things like that. It's just stupid, you know. Like if you really want to take the time to bash Anti-Flag then go ahead, I'm not going to listen. We feel that us having this humanitarian sort of agenda that we do, the more people to here it the better. Even if they think we are full of shit it's a different side of the story then they are starting to hear. That they are touching on.
Joel: So you guys just want to educate people?
C2: Most likely yeah. It's like this great big band touring, and stuff like that, and meeting interesting people, we want to meet as many people as possible you know. As far as being on a major label are stuff like that, like I don't know if we could ever do that. But it's fun to do what we do. It doesn't make any sense to me to play to the same five people every night because they already got it. There are people who don't know about the things that are involved, and those are the people that I'd like to reach out too.
Jeff: Have you done anything for charity in the past?
C2: We've done compilations for Battered Women Shelter in Pittsburgh, and we did a tour where ticket sales went to various organizations in each city. And we try too bring organizations out on the road with us, Amnesty International, the Anti Racist Action, to educate people on what's going on out there.
Joel: Last time Hot Water Music toured they did this whole F--- ticketmaster where they didn't sell any tickets, pre-sale tickets, through ticketmaster, have you guys ever thought about doing something like that? Do you view ticketmaster as one of those monstrous big corporations?
C2: Yes and no. I'd rather people didn't by advanced tickets, that they'd just come to the show, but like it's gotten to the point that some of the places. . . we cant play in everyone's basement, and not have advanced tickets. It's like we wish we could, but its gotten to the level where there are too many people, and we gotta go in some bigger rooms, and things like that. We've thought about it, but I wouldn't know how to do it. I wouldn't even know where to begin, it's like we book a tour and we want to go to this city and we go there. We try not to work with big places places like big venues..(recording gets fuzzy) that's a battle that anti-flag fights. (I thinks that's kind of what he said. )

Jeff: Who influences you politically?
C2: There are people who influence us like (recording got fuzzy again and I could only make out one name) and Jello Biafra. And people who are really educated human beings. Amazing, but it's almost like common sense. Today we read the LA times and they reported that welfare is benefiting more people then it's hurting in the state of California (I think he said California at least), and you know its not true. You know what I mean, and that sort of infuriates us and makes us want to write music, and talk about certain things that are important to Anti-Flag.
Jeff: Have you ever thought about running for political office?
C2: Yeah, but we probably couldn't because of our radicalness. But we've talked about it, it would be funny.

Jeff: Obviously you guys are very educated, have any members of Anti-Flag gone to college?
C2: 3/4ths of Anti-Flag is going to college. I haven't gone to college yet, but as far as things we read we like to find as many different things, we also read the USA Today to see what's going on in the "real" news
Jeff: You say that sarcastically?
C2: A lot of the newspapers are not reporting about what's really going on. But it's interesting to see what's spewing from the bought off mouths of certain reporters.

Joel: So in this post 9/11 world, you are out there promoting all different types of causes every night. When all the kids, when all the 525 kids leave the show tonight, is there any one particular burning message you want them to take home with them, that you feel is like the greatest cause that Anti-Flag has been talking about?
C2: Yeah, keep the energy up. It's like inside the walls you just see so much energy so many people excited. And that's what makes punk rock beautiful. They need to take it outside, meet new people, make new friends, shake new hands, and once you have your circle of friends that you hang with and you start putting yourselves forward and it snow balls. You know not everybody is a political robot, we're not political robots, we have fun as well. It's very important to walk out and care about other people as well. And that's what I hope people do when the leave the show, is meet new people, no ones gonna be a dick head, everyone's gonna have a good time, and everyone is gonna care about each other, that's what Punk Rock to me has always been about.

Jeff: Are You Guys trying to start a new paradigm?
(every thing becomes silent for like 5 seconds)
C2: Whoa! I'm trapped in the matrix. Geez, I wouldn't even know where to begin. No we just want everybody to be friends.
Some guy in the background: Is that so wrong?
(Everybody laughs)
C2: I think that people shouldn't dwell in the petty bullshit, it doesn't matter if you don't have a mohawk any more, or it doesn't matter if your mohawk is bigger then my mohawk, it's stupid, there is more important things going on, we need to cherish the times we have, we need to start living as human beings, treating other people respectively, and as human beings.

You can write to Anti-flag at http://www.anti-flag.com/ or:
PO Box 71266
Pittsburgh, PA 15213

http://www.fatwreck.com/
thanks to the Anti-Flag Resistance Fan Page for the A-F pictures!

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