Californian punk legends Strung Out dropped the 10th album of their remarkable 35-year career, Dead Rebellion last month. Simultaneously one of the heaviest and most melodic records, Dead Rebellion is a record informed by and reacting to the world and all the experience and wisdom that vocalist Jason Cruz has attained.
Produced, mixed, and recorded by Shawn McGee at Artistry Recording Studio in Las Vegas, Dead Rebellion might represent a new chapter for Strung Out, but it is guided by the same principles that have always driven the band. While they’ve never thought of themselves as a political band, this record—like all Strung Out records—has captured the zeitgeist and the self-destructive political climate, especially in the USA perfectly.
Ahead of Dead Rebellion’s release, we caught up with Cruz for a discussion about Dead Rebellion, the band's longevity, their special relationship with Australia and the crossover metal records that inspire their unique brand of punk.
Jason, Strung Out are about to drop your 10th album, the absolutely killer Dead Rebellion. What enables you to continue to release music of such high quality and passion this far into your career?
“I think it’s just the fact that we write kickass punk rock songs. Whatever your opinion may be on our band, we write kickass punk rock songs. After all these years, there is still such great chemistry there and we’ve got it streamlined when it comes to writing now, but that creativity is still there and I’ll keep doing it for as long as that feeling is there.”
Crowds downunder have always held a great love for Strung Out. Is there something about your music that you feel particularly connects with Australian audiences in a way it might not other places?
“I don’t know, but honestly, I’m grateful that Australia has always been so good to us. I think maybe it’s the melodic element, the connection between the heavy and the melodic. Sometimes I wonder if people understand us, or if they just hear what they want to hear, but you can’t spend too much time thinking about that. My job is the making of it, everything after that is up to you, I no longer have control over it.”
That’s true for all musicians I guess, once a song or record is out in the world, the meaning is no longer yours alone, it's also up to the listener to decide what it means and where it fits in. As an artist do you find that an interesting experience?
It’s like that with painting, or any art form. It’s the process. You’re only entitled to the process and the work itself, not to the fruits of your labour. The process is the most important thing and then once it's done, and somebody's paid money for it, they can do whatever they want with it. They could piss on it, they can talk shit about it, they can exalt it, whatever they want, it’s not up to you, it’s up to them to decide.
That’s a pretty healthy perspective. We’re predominantly a metal publication and one thing that has always appealed to me as a listener about your band is that metal element and how it has made itself more known in the music itself as the band has progressed. Was that a deliberate thing to explore heavier elements and influences as your career evolved?
“Have you heard the record yet? (Dead Rebellion)?It is the heaviest record we’ve ever written! When I started my side project band, I stopped worrying about Strung Out being this thing that it wasn't. I found an outlet to do my weird shit. So for me personally, I kind of embrace the metal, I let those guys run free. You know what I mean?”
“I'm probably the least metal guy in the band. There are certain metal records that I love, but those guys grew up on metal, and I kind of grew up on punk and jazz and weird shit. So it was always that conflict, that conflict that created our sound. And I think we just have been letting the horses run free in the last few records.”
Now you’re admittedly not the most metal guy in Strung Out, but you do have metal records you love, so now I’m curious, what are some of the metal records that have influenced you, be it in your artistic path or your personal one?
“Suicidal Tendencies are my biggest metal influence. People always argue whether they are metal or punk. I love bands like that, that have a pun attitude but metal guitars. So for Suicidal Tendencies, How Will I Laugh Tomorrow When I Can't Even Smile Today, that is one of my favourite punk or metal records of all time. Still to this day.”
“Master of Puppets by Metallica. Any of the Slayer records, I love Rick Rubin, so anything Slayer did with Rick Rubin like Seasons In The Abyss, old-school stuff like that. Crossover by DRI that’s an awesome record. I love how they bridge punk and hardcore, I love a good groove. I love Iron Maiden with the first vocalist, Paul Di'anno, when they were a bit more like a punk band, they had an attitude about them, they weren’t as formulaic as they became. I love that version of Iron Maiden, I never liked Bruce Dickinson too much, he was too operatic. I like the rawness of the first lineup and that first record was pretty killer. So Iron Maiden by Iron Maiden.”
That’s a pretty awesome list! It’s also pretty illustrative of the heavier side of Strung Out. I can definitely hear that bridge between the likes of Suicidal Tendencies, DRI and Slayer in your music. It offers a pretty decent look at that side of the musical palette of Strung Out.
“I’ve always thought that Strung Out was the sound of the masculine and the feminine fighting each other. Those guys would show up with a riff, and I’d think okay, what can I write to this that's the complete opposite of that? You know? I could scream over it. Or I can write something really pretty over it and write some lyrics about a fucking flower growing out of the crack in the sidewalk. Whatever I do, I try to create that duality. And I think that that duality is the sound that we have.”
That’s a really good way of describing Strung Out for sure. It’s pretty awesome how you have that freedom to try and create that duality on this unrelentingly heavy record Dead Rebellion. As a lyricist, you’ve always had a lot to say and that trend continues on this record, where you’re just spitting about a number of important topics. How do you approach that from a writing perspective? Do the other guys give you the songs and you work around what they’ve done or does it all come together at once?
“Strung Out is like a bunch of Heshers fighting each other for space on the record. Like they're so talented, and have so many riffs that I just sit back and say what I like and what I don't like. I kind of steer the ship, then Rob is the General of the band. I kind of just do the opposite of whatever they come up with. That’s worked for me this whole time, so I’m going to continue doing that. I try to write pretty melodies. I love pretty melodies, I love crooners, I’m not a very good singer, so I love good singers. I love guys that are not operatic, but they have a nice delivery of pretty melodies. So I try to put a pretty melody over a really ugly heavy riff, that’s what I do.”
I’ve been fortunate enough to see your live shows quite a lot throughout my life, and I’ve noticed that your shows downunder are always a high-energy affair. Are you planning on visiting Australia on this record cycle?
“I think probably next year, we were just there last October. So I guess give it a year or two to simmer and then we'll come down. There's a lot of competition right now. Everybody's going to Australia right now. After the pandemic, the floodgates were just wide open. I think it's good to give it some time and let people miss us a little bit.”
The last time you were out was for a 30th anniversary tour, is it hard to believe that you’ve now been doing this for that long?
“Yeah, I can't believe it. I can't believe it, there was a time after every tour, I told myself, I gotta stop and get a real job. And then it just kept going. It's like a bad joke that just kept going. So here we are.”
If there's one thing that you would like people to know about Dead Rebellion to encourage them to listen to it. What would it be?
“I wish I could convey the amount of love that went into it. And amount of care. You know, I mean, still, to this day, it's like, the amount of work and attention to detail, it’s profound to me. And I'm proud, I'm proud of it. I'm proud of the focus that went into it. Two years of working every day. I'm very proud of it. There's a lot of love that went into that record.”
That is an awesome way to be. To be proud of the work you're doing now. A lot of artists struggle with the concept of their influence or importance declining as they get further and further away from their early releases, just because of the nature of people's reception of music. So it's good to hear that the band is still incredibly motivated and committed to creating the records that people will love.
“That's not for me to decide, all I can do is keep on doing, doing the best I can to earn my place you know, I feel like you have to earn your place here. Once you're in a band and you're in people's minds, and you're out there, I feel like every record, you need to reinvent yourself a little bit and earn your place in the world as a musician, you know, and I hope I did that with this record.”
Dead Rebellion is out now on Fat Wreck Chords
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