CASKET MUSH – KEEP GRIND POLITICAL.

Dead Relatives November ’23 Release Show at Non-Plus Ultra on November 3, 2023. Featuring Casket Mush, Infidel, The Sleeperz, and Spunk. Shot by Cole Beldyn.

Matthew (guitar/vox): People are gonna stay liking whatever’s trendy. But for all the musicians out there — just try and make good music.

Derek (drums): That’s all we wanna do, is make good music. There aren’t many grind acts doing something real and unique and new, ’cause a lot of musical phrases in the genre get recycled. It’s been kind of hard for me to get hyped on some of the bands that are popping up. But there’s gonna be good and bad sides to every genre.

M: Every scene’s gonna be s***ty in its own way. But I feel like there’s no need to hate any scene, there’s only room to appreciate and protect the one you’re in. All the locals that come here to support us and s**t… That’s great. That’s community. We should all be celebrating that.

Honestly, the aggressiveness of the music drew us more into the gore thing. Punk’s all rainbows and daisies in my opinion. <laugh> Even some of our lyrics — I’m only talking about things that go through my head every day—

Vic (vox): —and it’s more hardcore than most of what gets branded as hardcore.

M: What we make is a release of our emotions, dealing with everything that’s going on. Especially with our newest releases, it’s just s**t that we deal with.

Chud (bass): Lots more death metal influence.

V: And the more we’ve written, the more real it’s gotten.

M: If anything, it really is an emotional experience, playing and listening to this. All the anger and explosion you feel every day of your f*****g life wrapped up in a genre. That’s exactly how I felt when I was growing up. And I had a scene to reflect it, you know?

V: There’s something about violence that makes you feel good, you know? <haha>

D: Yeah, violence is the way to go. Especially to the people that deserve it.

M: The only way to solve anything with the government and all that has to be violence. Politics is bullshit, both sides are the same devil. Everybody has to stick together no matter what, there’s more civilians than the 1%.

We’ve heard people try to tell us to keep politics outta grind, and to us, that’s the lamest take we’ve ever heard.

V: This genre was meant to be political. It was born from early, radical punk that needed to evolve to stay out from the mainstream. You can’t take the roots out from where we started.

(Collectively): F**k cops, f**k the IDF, free Palestine, all that.

C: But at every show, the real ones know the real ones. I’ve seen a lot of people act punk for six months and then take off the ski mask to dress all cholito and s**t <haha>.

D: I mean yeah, you can tell who really appreciates the music, and who’s just there for Instagram, or for a space to get fucked up at.

But shout out Juice and Lagrimas, man. Things got pretty serious when we got in that studio with him, just a whole new level.

M: All those dudes have helped us out so fucking much. Honestly, we wouldn’t be here without them.

V: Recording may seem like it’s not that big of a deal, but it really is. It makes a difference, you’ve gotta spend a lot of time on that. You could have songs down live, but if you don’t record them well it just doesn’t track the same.

One thing I’ve noticed as far as how we’ve played; we’ve gotten better at our instruments every release, you know? And each release reflects how much better we’ve gotten.

D: That’s how it should be. That’s how it’s been since we started making music. We haven’t really gotten recorded by anybody except Juice and our friend Isaac for another recording. But I feel like a lot of our best-sounding releases have just been done by just us, which is pretty cool.

V: It’s more rewarding like that.

C: My roommates get annoyed at my sober living house when I practice guitar and shit. <laugh> It’s hard. But if you keep everything DIY, s**t will just work out.

M: You don’t need a studio and expensive equipment to record. It’s so accessible nowadays, making music. Anybody can do it. You just gotta put your f*****g soul and time into it and you’ll be happy at the end, you know?