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Politics. Hatred. Endless war. We doomscroll as our rights are stripped away. Bombings. Kidnappings. Mass shootings. The nightly news is a litany of brutality. Assassination. Subjugation. Deportation. We argue with each other while the rich get richer and cruelty is normalized. These are just a few of the reasons why the title of The Casualties’ new album is Detonate.
“It stems from being overloaded,” drummer Marc “Meggers” Eggers says. “You feel like your head is about to explode, which I think is what everybody is feeling these days. You’re pounced on day by day with terrible news and social media, and you just feel like you’re going to snap.”
“Not too long ago, we were stuck in COVID,” guitarist Jake Kolatis adds. “Now we're trying to get back to normal life, and the world has gone crazy. There are continuous wars and internal political battles here. Everybody's tearing each other apart. Detonate is saying we’re tired of all this division. With this record, we have a chance to say something and promote some type of unity.”
Detonate is the second chapter in a new epoch for The Casualties. As their second album with David Rodriguez at the mic, it solidifies the vocalist’s partnership with Meggers and Kolatis. “It’s like a new era for the band,” Meggers says. “It solidifies that Dave is here to stay.”
As the follow-up to 2018’s Written in Blood and their first record for Hellcat Records—the Epitaph subsidiary curated by Tim Armstrong of Rancid—Detonate sees this new version of The Casualties locking into place. “We were in the studio for Written in Blood about eight months after I joined,” Rodriguez says. “With this new record, we really grew together. For me, it’s the proud moment where we clicked the three Legos together.”
“We’re really proud of this new record,” Meggers adds. “On the first record with a new singer, you can get a little bit of leeway, but on the second record they’re really going to judge you.”
With the unblinking eyes of the punk world on them, The Casualties pulled the blinds and did what they do best. “There was a degree of pressure, but not from outside sources,” Rodriguez says. “We just wanted to do the best record that we could that honors The Casualties name and history without playing the same song over and over. But it wasn’t that we even had to go out of our way. It felt natural to write this new music.”
The title of Detonate’s first single, “People Over Power,” speaks for itself. “We’re getting kind of smushed by the world, by government, by the bad news,” Rodriguez says. “We want systemic change, total transformation, degradation to the state. ‘People over Power’: It’s as simple as it sounds. You keep pushing, and something really bad is going to happen that none of us want. We’ll burn it to the ground eventually.”
“It’s a protest song through and through,” Meggers says. “We want the vibe to be: You listen, get angry, get your gang together, and get out on the streets.”
Speaking of the streets: “Brick by Brick” features a cameo from Agnostic Front guitarist and all-around NYC legend Vinnie Stigma doing some spoken word. “His voice is the embodiment of New York City, the Lower East Side, where the Casualties are originally from,” Kolatis points out. “So, it made all the sense in the world to have him do that. But just having him on there was fun because we're great friends with Agnostic Front.”
“The song has a very New York hardcore kind of sound to it, so I knew Vinnie would be perfect,” Meggers says. “Agnostic Front just happened to be in LA two days after we came up with the idea, so Jake and our engineer went down to the show and gave Vinnie the lines to record. It just fell into place.”
Native American punk band 1876 contribute guest vocals and percussion on “Ashes of War.” “As long as I’ve been listening, I’ve felt like The Casualties always spoke up for people in society that didn't have as loud of a voice,” Rodriguez says. “The Casualties have always had some Spanish in songs, but it just seemed like such an important time to have loud Native voices. You don't hear it that often. We were out on the road with 1876, and the more we spoke together, the more we really found out.”
1876 flew down from their home base in Portland, Oregon, to perform on the track. “Their sacred drum had to be out in the sun—it was a whole ritual,” Rodriguez explains. “It was a very serious moment.”
Meanwhile, “Pigs on Fire” is a trilingual track sung partly in Spanish, partly in English, and partly in Portuguese. “My dad was very involved in the Chicano movement, and my wife is Brazilian,” Rodriguez says. “When I would go down to Brazil, I would see another side of what's going on. Just like the United States, it was colonized and had a large slave trade. And a lot of people don’t realize that it’s the only South American country that doesn’t speak Spanish. It was another piece of the puzzle to speak loud for voices that aren't as loud as the mainstream voices.”
In fact, Rodriguez visited Brazil right before The Casualties recorded the album. “When I was down there, I kept seeing this graffiti: ‘Set the fascists on fire,’” he says. “I thought that was such a cool line. I took my notebook everywhere I would go and I just put the pieces together. I would listen to some news that was going on here and news that was going on in Brazil, and it came together with some really cool imagery.”
“Because it’s in Spanish, English and Portuguese, it’s in the languages that Chicanos and Latinos speak,” he adds. “It’s about us coming together against the powers that be. But for the people that don't understand, we're just telling them it's a barbecue song.”
Ultimately, Detonate amplifies the punk ethos that The Casualties have embodied since 1990: A raised fist in the face of oppression. “I want people to feel empowered when they hear this record,” Rodriguez says. “I want them to feel like they have a voice. I want them to feel like they’re with like-minded people when they come to a Casualties show. They can be themselves and not watch the show but be part of the show—scream with us, jump off the stage. We want them to feel like they’re part of something.”
