Why Are You Into Hardcore?

By Ryan Germ

  For as long as I’ve been in this scene and have watched interviews I’ve always seen the question “how did you get into hardcore” thrown around. But I have never seen a question I think is just as important get asked: “why did you get into punk/hardcore?” I believe that the emotional “why” is just as important as the “how” yet it gets talked about way less.

I know that I found it as an outlet for all the aggression I’ve had and as a way to express myself. As a little kid I used to have really bad outbursts of rage but finding hardcore gave me a way to channel it into a positive community. Ever since I heard the song “Gator Smash” by Kids Like Us in my dad’s room when I was about 7 or 8 I’ve been hooked on this genre and culture. Even before I could find the music the way I can today, I embraced everything about this genre. Hardcore is my life, and it always will be. Today I’ve had the pleasure of talking to 23 of my friends, scene figureheads, and people I look up to across 10 different states in order to ask them this question.

Andy Saba (The Virgos; ex NAILS, Harms Way, and Bad Seed)

I didn't get into HC until I was 15 and had already been going to Punk & Metal shows for a couple years. My old heads all told me HC was lame so I stayed away. Until my friend showed me Hatebreed. I tried to resist I was like dude we can't listen to this it's lame! Then I heard it. I literally could not fucking believe it. Immediately went out and bought Perseverance and Terror - Lowest of the Low on CD. Didn't tell a soul and listened in secret. Next year I met Ned Russin and he gave me Age of Quarrel, then his brother Alex gave me Master Killer and Set It Off. Ruined me. Started going to HC shows in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania where it was OK to kick someone in the face when the spirit moves you, and in the 2000s it was probably the best scene in the country. Thanks WBHC 🖤

Chris X (TIHC/Philly HC Shows)

Growing up as a kid in the '80s, I got into metal early on.  I was also exposed to the imagery of punk through movies, TV, media etc. It always spoke to me. Something about the rebelliousness. I was never "one of the cool kids" so that grabbed me right away. Musically, I was always seeking out the most extreme and/or subversive bands I could find. The hair metal bands on the radio and Dial MTV weren't cutting it. Had a friend I met through skateboarding put me onto some stuff. Between him and the faint college radio signal I could sometimes get on my walkman, I found 7 Seconds, the Dead Milkmen, Agnostic Front and others. Thank you lists in the liner notes of tapes by bands I liked led me further down the rabbit hole. Started going to shows (bad brains on the Quickness tour with Leeway opening was my first, honestly should've hung it up after that, how could anything ever top that?) I've been in this thing of ours ever since, and its given me most if not all of the things in my life. Decades long friendships, relationships (for better or worse, mostly worse 😂) , it has sharpened my ideals. Straight edge, veganism, radical left social views, community etc. Touring has afforded me the gift of travelling all over the place. Most of what I have and what Ive done have come to me through punk and hardcore

Metal Pete Angelo (comedian)

I think for me it was Hatebreed, being from Connecticut hearing heavy riffs, these anthem like singing along, made you feel

Like you were part of the song. It was aggressive and powerful but also full of positivity.

Lyv (Terminal Collective)

Basically my whole life I’ve grown up in a family that is huge about all subgenres of rock, more particularly punk rock from my parents. I pretty much naturally evolved with their taste and was grateful to have the exposure to it from such a young age, because it made it all the more exciting when I could come out and start supporting DIY or not.

Cartwheelsinplace (Instagram page)

I was going to local metal shows when I was 14 and eventually ended up at a show at castle heights in queens nyc

Phil (Drosera)

My friend’s older brother would drive us around in high school and at some point riding with them I heard Atreyu’s Suicide Notes and Butterfly Kisses, then started getting into Slayer and just kept searching from there. I found The Black Dahlia Murder and saw they were coming to town so I went to that show. I’d seen bands before but that was my first real hardcore/metal show; Black Dahlia, Remembering Never, Terror, and Unearth. Mean Pete talking between songs about real issues that I cared about had a lasting impact on me. He showed me that you can get up there and be angry and take a stand and fight for what you think is right in a way I hadn’t seen before. After that night, going to shows and listening to heavy music was pretty much all I wanted to do.

Philly Hardcore History (Archival Instagram Page)

I think the whole idea that it was almost a secret. I didn't really fit in anywhere else. I was a good athlete and played sports but still got bullied by teammates because I was chubby. Hardcore was a place where I didn’t have to prove myself to anyone. I liked that punk and hardcore had a message too. A goal of a better world. The other music I was listening to didn't have that.

Lucas “Twitch” Disangro (wrestler)

Wrestling. CM Punk got me into rancid. And then I did a deep dive listened to black flag, the Sex Pistols, Op Ivy, Minor Threat, Bad religion, 

Against me, Dead Kennedy’s. The rest is history

Alex (Mosh Academy/South FL XXX)

Well, I got into Hardcore because I was a punk you know, listening to the basic Nirvana stuff and grunge and I always supported like these  small local scenes but I want to go to enough like punk shows but just that becomes like oversaturated and kinda boring and I always like to mosh you know what I’m saying like but I was like “there has something more than just local punk shows and following TikTok trends” you know so I went to this one punk show I didn’t know the time that it was a hardcore show at like a bank, top of a bank or something like that and I just saw these people just spinkicking and fucking crowd killing each other and it really built like a energy inside me I’m like yeah I wanna do that like that’s fucking sick and you know the music was weird to me at first, but I got used to it and it was really good and I saw the community was and I was like wait this is way more interactive then the small grunge shows I was going to. You know, I started going to more shows, making friends, really enjoying the music, and I thought I was part of something and I was. So in conclusion I got into hardcore shows for my friends, the music, to support the scene and get others into it. 

Rian (Detroit HC - Sassaprilla)

I got into hardcore because it spoke to me above anything else. Growing up, I felt severely alone and secluded, and it offered me a sense of community I couldn't get from peers. When I felt disconnected, I always knew I could turn to the music, and when I was older and able to go to shows, that thought of screaming into a mic with my friends and beating the shit out of eachother made life a lot more worth living. Also the fact my magazine has healed me a lot as a person. I know that sounds super silly but having that social connection as well as being recognized for something im passionate about is incredibly amazing and something I wouldn't trade the world for.

Matt (Barricade - South FL XXX)

I really liked the community aspect along with the music. I feel like the community part is more important and something that I care about greatly. Music is dope but being able to be apart of something that’s bigger then yourself is #dopeness

Oscar Capps (Vox - Vulture Raid)

I got into hardcore because gorilla biscuits popped up on my pandora when I was in 5th grade. I got into modern hardcore when my best friend drug me along to drain and Pain of truth at the church in 2022. The heavy music never clicked until I saw it live and it blew my mind.

Nik (San Jose XVX)

When I was 6 years old, an album came out that started everything for me. That album was American Idiot by Green Day. I know, I know. It’s not a hardcore record. But walk with me here. Because of that record, I learned about the 924 Gilman Street scene. Which led me to finding bands like Rancid and Jawbreaker. Green Day’s covers also led me to bands like Husker Du. Still not necessarily hardcore, but very much punk. But over the years, more and more of these gateway bands led me to more and more hardcore bands. Nirvana led me to bands like Bad Brains and Minor Threat, Metallica led me to bands like Misfits and Discharge, Machine Head led me to bands like Cro-Mags and Poison Idea, Sepultura led me to bands like Dead Kennedys, so on and so forth. But I didn’t realize these were hardcore bands, I thought they were just punk bands. Bands I definitely liked. But I didn’t know I was into hardcore yet. I then got into more and more metal bands of that time like Machine Head, Lamb Of God, and Killswitch Engage. Another such band, that I thought was just like those 3, was Hatebreed. Little did I know they were a massively influential hardcore band. I thought they were simply a metal band. I then found Trash Talk and Code Orange Kids, and these were bands that were described to me as being hardcore bands. I loved them. Shortly thereafter, I was also told that not only were these bands hardcore bands, but all those bands I mentioned earlier were too. It blew my mind that bands that, on the surface, seemed wildly sonically different were both “hardcore” bands. That was when I learned that hardcore, and punk in general, was just as much about a certain ethos as much as it was about the music. And as someone who always felt like an outsider, that ethos spoke to me. The one context where I felt the most acceptance being authentically myself was within the hardcore/punk community. Not only that, but this was the one genre of music where your heroes don’t think themselves to be above you. Hardcore is the one place where I can make friends more easily than anywhere else, and with those friends, I can play on the same stage my favorite bands played in the YouTube videos I grew up watching religiously after school. Hardcore is the one place where I can show Keith Barney the Throwdown tattoo I got, thank him for all the influence he and his music have had on me, nerd out about Machine Head with him before he plays a set, and then have him point at me during the song from which I got the lyrics tattooed on me. Hardcore is a beautiful thing, and I am forever grateful that that Green Day record I would seek refuge in before and after school when I was 6 years old led me to all of this.

Mason (Forced NJHC)

Mostly my friends who played in bands, I knew them from school and went to one of there shows and got hooked on hardcore

Brandon Richie (Vox - Pusch)

Would love to help my brother. “For the paycheck”, I just wanted to get paid and switch up on my day ones!

Caitlin (Guitar - Impact Driver)

I love the way hardcore makes me feel. When I got into punk when I was 13, the attitude of punk was for me, largely defined by and through Henry Rollins. His major contribution to the punk attitude documentary (which is still free on YouTube) really spoke to the violence, anger, and rebellion that drew me to punk in the first place. All though I love all sub genres of punk (besides D beat), hardcore is the one that really encapsulates the violence and power that interests me the most. Furthermore, I feel more socially accepted in hardcore than I do other sub genres where the type of shoe you wear tends to matter more to lamer people who tend to not be there for the music and community itself. I always loved the film a clock work orange and wanted to be in their gang. I love to play in bands that encapsulate that vibe of danger and violence, no matter the sub genre. Hardcore fuels me everyday, much like the relationship to the person I love and am devoted to forever.

Nick May (Morning Eagle; ex Settle For Less)

Because of your dad

Cory Espinosa (ex Settle For Less, Art Director/Graphic Designer)

I first found my way into hardcore through its album art and flyers. The tone of the artwork wasn’t just aesthetic; it hinted at an entire world of feeling and intensity that I wanted to be a part of. I’m fascinated by how design choices can express the ethos of a band before a single note is played. It’s what keeps me engaged not just as a listener, but as someone interested in the creative exchange happening at the intersection of both forms of art.

Will Yost (ex Settle For Less)

I’m Will Yost and I got into hardcore when I was 15. I’ve always had a gravitation towards fast and heavy music stemming back to my childhood. It started out with mainstream punk music like Green Day. I loved the tempo of faster music. It matched my brain and what I felt as a young kid growing up. As far as heavier mainstream, it was Stone Temple Pilots and Alice In Chains. I loved the heaviness of their guitar tones. Flash forward to my early teens, I had (and still do) a cousin named Cody Novak who really introduced me to hardcore music. I was blown away. It was all of my favorite genres mashed into 1. Plus the lyrical content was more of who I was becoming as an angsty teenager. He showed me Blood for Blood, Black My Heart, and Cruel Hand. I started going to a lot of shows in the Philadelphia area. House shows, Venues, shows at skateparks, I was infatuated by the scene and all of the amazing people I met through hardcore.

Keller (NJ XXX)

I got into hardcore because of the community. I used to be a truck driver and I failed a drug test, I was kicked out of my house and had to move back to Jersey to stay with my grandmother. I was lost, I had nowhere to turn, no one to speak with since my friends were over five hundred miles away. My first local show, Bayway and Shattered Realm at the Williams Center last year in November, I was pulled onto stage by Jayway and I first hand experienced just how much love and respect this community and hardcore gave you if you returned it. That’s why I got into hardcore, that’s why I love hardcore, that’s why I live my life through hardcore.

Tim (VTHC)

Honestly, I had been going to metalcore/metal shows my whole life and a friend showed me “in the eyes of the lord” a few years ago and ive been hooked since. Been going to shows for a few years now in my local scene in Vermont and like to think that im a big part of it. I love the music, the dancing, the brotherhood, and everything else that ends up being an added bonus

Dan (NJHC)

to be honest it was mostly friends, i already listened to metal and punk a lot and decided to start going to shows, my first one was a who remembers show with cutdown

Jess (PAHC)

i grew up around punk and metal music, so i always had a love for fast aggressive music, i started getting into more hardcore around two years ago, and around a year and a half ago i went to my first hc show, a few months later i made more friends within the scene and today i consider many of those people my family. the main things i love about hardcore is the aggression, the violence in the pit and the angry music both provide me a very positive outlet for pent up emotions, and the community. the hardcore community has been the most supportive and accepting group of people i have ever met, and i have never belonged in a space more, the people keep me around, without the community i would not be in the scene. that’s pretty much it haha!

Conclusion

Well damn there goes my weekend. But seriously, hardcore means so much to so many people. From the outside looking in you may think “damn that’s idiotic, this is nothing more than screaming over riffs and the crowd flailing their arms” and from a one dimensional point of view you’d be correct. But to myself, or my friends like Nik and Keller, or long standing members of the scene like Chris and Saba, it’s so much more. It’s why we keep coming back. It’s community. It’s brotherhood. It’s fucking hardcore.