NEW YORK – THE FINAL GOODBYE TO LIVEFASTDIE

LFD were my favorite band in New York and for a while every show was different and good, even when Camero was teaching the other people the songs onstage. You never knew who was going to be playing in the band that night or how many people would show up. One show ended with Vice‘s associate editor spurting blood out of his brain after Sarim accidentally wanged him with a guitar. Another turned into a fight with pieces of mannequins. Towards the end of their existence the shows were losing steam and I recognize that it was truly time for LFD to go away. The final show took place on Saturday at Rockstar Bar. 

Everybody you’d want to see was there and in high spirits. The members of Golden Triangle, who were opening, coated themselves with flour outside. They were a blast of energy as always, and Livefastdie were constantly switching the lineup around onstage. You’d hear a song, wait a minute, another song, few more minutes, some new song. There was this woman with dyed blonde hair punching people and going nuts in the pit. She punched me in the face, and she punched my guy Drew in the dick nine times and in the face for good measure too. Then right as he was getting lifted up to be crowd surfed she punched him in the guts and knocked the wind out of him. 

LFD’s set really came together when it turned into a freeform guitar jam. Sarim was in the ladies’ room, rocking out for the toilets and when he came back he had the trashcan in tow. He chucked it into the crowd.

Camero, the only real member of the band, let me into his house to ask him mildly insulting questions the day before their final show.

Why’s Livefastdie breaking up?
It’s just time to call it a day. Four years is a lot longer than I thought it would go. Weird punk’s taken over. Hippy shit. No room left.

Towards the end you were just playing the same set over and over.
The problem with having a band that’s not really a band is that it’s hard to learn new material. You have to play what everybody knows when they show up at the show. My heart goes out to anyone who didn’t hear something that they wanted to hear.

In five years people are finally gonna catch on and the two most peripheral members of your band are going to go tour as Livefastdie, like what happened with the Misfits.
As long as Marky Ramone’s involved in some way that’s fine. I’m already on to something new. It’s called making money.

How’s that going?
Pretty good. Selling weed and a little bit of coke, and then the standard nine-to-five thing as a front.

Let’s talk about all the guys who’ve been in LFD.
Timecop’s in Chicago right now and couldn’t make it out. This being Livefastdie, I didn’t ask people to come out until three weeks ago. Penis Vonwrinkle will be DJing tonight, somewhere else. Gozac Termbo will be there, he’s up to not much. Lastname will be there. He’s working at Junkshop so he’s got that going on. Let’s see. Shadow Falcon, not gonna make it–playing with Crystal Stilts, not gonna be at the show. Where are they now? Zab got a new job and has to learn the shit that he told them he knew how to do over the weekend so he can’t make it. Wish him luck on that. Sweet Joey’s in LA rockin’ out, not comin’ back. Viking Thrust will be there, of course.

What else is he gonna fucking do?
Yeah, exactly. What else is he gonna do? Well, his new band Indian Casino is what he’s gonna do, but not tomorrow. Sarim will be there.

Did Sarim ever get an LFD name?
Sarim’s just Sarim but I put him down as Sarim of Denmark at one point cause I was making fun of the Danish and he pointed out that his mom was Danish. There’s nothing wrong with the Danish but they’re the Canada of Europe, right? Those are the only people I can remember. Jeff who’s played the last few shows will be there. Luke from the Snipers may be there. He’s probably building a house right now. Joe Tampoff’s gonna be there. Great guy. Shit, Block’s gonna be there. Bones is gonna be there. Nobody’s really doing anything.

Starting Sunday I am officially changing my name to O Camero. Viking Thrust thought it’d be funny, like the Black Lips song, O Katrina. Like “O Camero, why you gotta be so mean?” It’s a spending money reference. “Why you gotta be so mean? You gotta pay for my shit.”

What are the other bands you’re in now? Nice Face, Indian Casino, Jail Hippies, and Liquor Store.
Yeah and occasionally the Junkman Band.

It doesn’t really feel like LFD is totally done since you still play in bands with Sarim and Viking Thrust.
Yeah, you could look at it that way but we won’t be playing the songs. Except for occasionally we’ll play the songs.

You hardly play LFD songs at LFD shows as it is!
We do. We play the songs. Everybody wants to hear a certain song but we’re not big so we don’t have hits. There’s no way to indicate what we should be playing. We just play the ones we know.

What was your worst show in the four years of LFD?
I would have to say when we played Gonerfest ’cause I’d been up partying all night and went to bed at four in the afternoon only to wake up at 5:30 in the afternoon and then had to go to the show. I was pretty hungover and we went on second and it was lackluster. We were never asked back but they did pay, so that was pretty cool.

What was the best one?
Probably Opra Haus in Germany. We played some squat and there were like 500 people there and there was some pop punk band that wore Hawaiian shirts went on before us. Then we went on and this guy from some other band was so excited to see us play that he jumped out from backstage with a fire extinguisher and kicked some dude in the head while he sprayed us with the extinguisher and it was pretty messy. That guy was supposed to do a record with Screaming Apple Records and he beat up the guy who ran the label. We took a 20-minute break and then finished the set. We played Paris a few days later and it was so hot that the heat made the extinguisher solution congeal. It mixed with sweat and killed an amp. The King Khan shows last summer were fun too.

Do you feel that you achieved what you set out to accomplish with this band? Did you set out to accomplish anything?
I never thought I’d put out a record so I accomplished more than I set out to do in the first three months. The rest of it was gravy.

Livefastdie was my favorite band. Favorite modern band. No, favorite modern New York band.
Thanks for narrowing it down.

I’ll back up to “favorite modern band” How many people told you that you were their favorite band?
At least five. I was happy to do it while it was going on. Towards the end my heart wasn’t in it. It’s hard to write songs about puking and getting fucked up and being hungover ’cause you run out of material. I’m sure once the band officially wakes up in like ten months I’ll have new songs and release a new record.

I’d like to go back to the interview technique I pioneered the first time I met and interviewed you, which is me looking at my iPod and asking you what every single one of your songs means.
Alright.

Tell me about “Pizza and Vomit.”
Self explanatory. It’s about pizza and vomit. It’s pretty easy to eat pizza when you’re drunk. You’ve probably eaten a slice or two. And then you throw up. It’s more about the spins.

That opening Twilight Zone-style intro to the song makes it feel that way. What’s “Armageddon” about?
That was written as an acoustic ballad to be performed with Andy Animal from the Stalkers. He used to have a Misfits tribute band and I felt like it was the closest I ever got to writing a Misfits-sounding song. I don’t know if Andy’s ever heard the song, although we’ve played together several times. We play it a lot ’cause it’s easy as fuck. It’s about what it’s about. “Had a rough night, last night, Armageddon, last night, last night…” You see what I mean? Running out of material. It’s officially titled “Armageddon Last Night (Armageddon)” There’s that line “Stored some food / couldn’t feed them all / wish it was closer to Burrough Hall,” and that’s ’cause there’s a Kennedy Fried Chicken on Jay Street. And if we’d lived there instead of Park Slope at the time we coulda had fried chicken.

What’s “She Don’t Kare” about?
That’s a cover by the Spits. It’s about a chick who sucks.

“Love Dogs In Space.”
I wrote that at Greg from the Carbonas’s apartment and I wrote that song right then and then there ’cause we were joking about writing a song right then and there. There’s a line in there about aliens coming down and stealing my Jay Reatard records. Who knew at the time that his records would be even more collectible? At the time I was just making a joke that maybe 300 people would get. Now maybe 300,000 people get it.

Is he that popular?
Maybe.

Tell me about “Bang It’s a War.”
It’s about how the scene’s not big enough. It’s all harkening back to a time before all these bands had blown up. It’s a time when there wasn’t room for two people promoting shows in New York ’cause God forbid they should be on the same night. Where are the 30 interested people gonna go? Bang, it’s a war.

“Alcoholic AIDS.”
That’s about waking up so shatteredly hung over that you feel like you got AIDS from drinking.

“Not A Dog.”
Don’t shit where you eat. That applies to a lot of things. Don’t screw girls in the bar you like to hang out at unless you’re gonna date ’em. Gotta figure out what side your bread is buttered on.

What about “Forged in Flames”?
It’s an homage to everything that’s great about this country. I wrote on the third of July and posted it to the Myspace on the fourth of July, 2005, as a present to America. I stand behind that.

“I Can See The News On Termbo.”
That’s about how I could see that if I did a record that’s country-tinged that people might not like it.

I like it.
Thank you. That was the first one. I came up with the idea that was like G N’ R Lies. We were gonna do a second record but didn’t have enough material so we did a record that’s half live and half country or stripped down.

Is “LA’s Alright” a response to “New York’s Alright by Fear”?
No.

How is that possible? It’s a perfect response.
It is but It’s just about my loathing for LA. LA’s just fulla douche bags.

Tell me about “Complicated Scumbag Situation.”
It’s about doing some stuff that you should be ashamed of but you’re not. If you told someone else they’d be shocked. It’s complicated; it’s not so cut and dry. “Wellllll she was 17, but I didn’t know.”

I’ve been there. I don’t think I’m a bad person but sometime’s I do bad things.
That’s exactly it. You’re a scumbag by definition but there’s more to it. Most people get in these situations with aid of drugs and alcohol.

This next song is my second favorite, behind “Can I Get Some More.” It’s “By the Time These Flowers Die.”
We were in Europe playing a bunch of shows with Jack Oblivion and we were talking about country with JP and I came up with the first verse right there. The first verse is “By the time these flowers die, I’ll be balls deep in some slut / Looking for a prostitute or jerking off to smut / Told one too many girls she was the apple of my eye” Something, I can’t remember.

What’s “King Hick” about?
That was about a guy in New Hampshire who had a name for everybody but didn’t have a name for himself, oddly enough. One guy was King Hick. I was Clown Hick. On and on. King Hick’s about “I’m gonna make a record that’s pseudo country, so what?”

What’s “If You Got Nothing Nice To Say (Let’s Hear It)” about?
That’s about touring in the US and you run out of shit to say. You got to drive from Memphis to Athens, Ohio, and it’s 14 hours and you woke up hung over after getting kicked out of someone’s house for saying some dumb shit and you had to sleep on a floor on a scumbag prostitute motel. You don’t hate people, you’re just bored as shit and gotta talk some shit.

What’s “Chickenhawk” about?
“Chickenhawk” is about a documentary of the same name. It’s the first song I ever wrote for Some Action but they didn’t like it. They said it sounded too much like rap when I brought it in. I was going for an early rock feel. “Chickenhawk Chickenhawk where are you? / Down on the playground after school. / Looking for a chicken that’ll make you drool but Chickenhawk Chickenhawk you’re no fool / Because oh, you’re a bird of prey / But Chickenhawk, today’s just not your day.”

Is he gonna get arrested?
That movie follows members of NAMBLA and talks about how NAMBLA’s supposed to be a support group instead of just pedophiles actively lusting, but there’s this one guy, Leland Stevens, that they talk to. He’s got white hair and wears half zipped sweaters and has this country home that he brings boys to. They all live next door to playgrounds. I highly recommend you watch it. I watched it fucked up and not fucked up, good both times.

What’s “Standing on a Chevette” about?
People in their early 20s probably don’t know what the fuck a Chevette is, but the Chevette was a car made by Chevy that was everywhere. The Ford Escort was another one. Ford had the Escort. Chevy had the Chevette. The phone company would drive Chevettes. At one point in my home town of Littleton, New Hampshire, the phone company sold all their Chevettes to this one salvage yard and switched to Escorts, so when every kid turned 16 their parents were buying them a Chevette because it was like 300 dollars for this milk-white Chevette. The song’s about standing on a Chevette, screaming. It’s seven in the morning, the sun’s just about to come up, everybody’s holding out on ya, and you just jump up on that fucking Chevette and start screaming. Screaming about how everyone’s a douche bag and they’re fucking you over and you’re getting the short end of the stick. It’s about being at that place, 6:30 AM, completely out of money, completely out of everything, and just pissed.

What’s “Do I Look Like a Bank to You” about?
Do I look like a fucking bank? You need five bucks? Fuck you! I hate crust punks. I’m not gonna give money to anyone who has a sign. You gotta dog? What, are you irresponsible now? I see how fucking filthy you are, you didn’t get this way overnight. You been filthy. You got this dog and you’re giving it a shit life.

Yeah. Dogs can’t choose to get fed pizza and beer. Why did you die your cat blue? Cats can’t decide to be punk.
Nine out of ten cats are not punk.

Tell me about “Got Nitedo.”
That’s about my friend Alex in seventh grade. He lived a couple towns away and I didn’t see him over the weekend if my parents wouldn’t drive me to his house to play Nintendo or his parents wouldn’t drive him to my house to play Nintendo. So we leave school on Friday, I didn’t see him until Monday, and he comes in with a sling on his arm. I was like “What happened?” He said, “I was playing Kid Icarus like all weekend.” All weekend, like didn’t sleep. And he got tendonitis. 

“Webshits and Blah Blah Blah”–what’s that one about?
That was a response to a thread on a message board. There was a band from France touring with a band from Tennessee and at one point the French band said that they “didn’t care about your webshits and blah blah blah.” I wrote it in five minutes so I could post it on the thread. It became an instant success. It’s only been played live once in Chicago. I have it on my computer. It sounded awful. I just write songs to amuse myself and if someone else likes them that’s great and if not what the fuck do I care? Didn’t cost me any money.

Tell me about “Guitar Star.”
Never gonna be famous, I think that’ll stick.

What about “Sick As Shit of Shit”?
You ever get down and bored and feel like your sick as shit of all this shit?

What about “Thought You Could Steal My Beer”?
You got to the party, thought you could steal my beer. We don’t like your pussy face, don’t show it around here. Thought you could steal my beer?

Tell me about “Dawn of the VHS.”
All these bands are talking about this, that, and the other. Technology. We decided to take it back to VHS.

“Tough Fuckin’ Shit” is a GG cover.
We fooled a lot of people into thinking we sounded like GG but we’re way worse. I was playing in Some Action before LFD and when we started I just wanted to sound like the Devildogs or the Ripoffs and it went in a different direction and record companies got involved. I started Livefastdie in a direct response to not wanting to do that. We were a very image-conscious band and I was trying to get away from that with Livefastdie.

Everybody’s got a gut.
I thought everyone was gonna be much fatter when I originally came up with the idea for the band. I was pretty skinny at t time and I have actually gained weight for the part of Camero Werewolf. Look for me to be much skinnier very soon cause now that this shit’s over, gonna shed the weight. As of Sunday I am officially known as O Camero.

I feel like you, Sarim, and Viking Thrust are in the only bands I really care about. LFD is smart in the ways a band should be smart, dumb in the ways a band should be dumb, and good and bad in the right ways too. You don’t care about the things that don’t matter. You do know how to play your instruments. The songs are poppy and fun and the recording is complicated and noisy.
It’s funny that you mention the noise aspect because I expected to cash in with the noise crowd and be super rich. I figured it’s just punk enough for this group of kids and hardcore enough for this group and it was noisy for that group and pop enough for that group.

That attitude only works if you’re Mindless Self Indulgence and you’re doing electronic pop. In New York you gotta wear your brains on your sleeve.
To be really successful you have to be “earnest.”

You’re earnest. You got a sense of humor. Can’t be serious all the time.
We’re more Jim Varney Ernest.

What’s the legacy of Livefastdie?
I’ve got a box full of records in my closet, I keep ten of everything. I’m just waiting till they’re worth something and selling them on eBay. That’s why I started the band, to drive T-shirt sales. I thought it would be a good name on a T-shirt.

And then Camero went to the bathroom and didn’t come back.

NICK GAZIN