I mean, why do people fight over sports? Because of the framework, the schematic of sports, those particular people seize upon these opportunities to be violent. And the number one problem using the same framework would be religion.
Ian MacKayeOne aspect of our site that I really appreciate is how I put up as much information as I've been able to keep track of: dates, the venue, the city, the country, the number of people there, the door price, opening bands, that sort of thing. One of the very first comments we had was from a guy who said, "By the way, the opening band in Albany in 1993 was not the Very Nice Neighbors, it was the Very Pleasant Neighbors." That brought a great joy to me.
Ian MacKayeI'm not talking about what came later [after the American underground punk scene], indie music, or whatever you want to call it, but the music that came before that - that's an important story. So many interviews with musicians get the time or context wrong. You have these older bands, usually men, who tell stories about "Oh, we got into this huge fight, this guy punched that guy," that's the wrong sort of story. My view of the time is truly pioneering.
Ian MacKayeI work at a record label where I have archives. These things [memorabilia] occurred and are important to somebody, and they're important to me. I find the record industry largely repellent. This music, the Teen Idles, all of that stuff, is important to me. I don't have lawyers, an agent or a manager. However I find the music industry largely repellent. I just make records because that's what I love to do. So I think that era, those pieces of media, I keep in my collection.
Ian MacKayeI consider the piano my 'main' instrument and have been playing for as long as I can remember. It seems to me that I might have come up with something resembling a song as early as 4 or 5 years old.
Ian MacKayeAll we wanted to do was to make live records all available. For us, the idea is to make it all available and let people decide which ones they like better. It's not for us to decide. We don't care about that. What we're interested in is the idea that we made these recordings, and they're not doing anybody a damn bit of good sitting in a closet.
Ian MacKaye