The official occasional newsletter of Bad Religion

In Issue #9:
* What It Is
* New Merchandise Catalog
* CMJ New York City
* Fast Food and The Music Industry
* Australia? What Happened?
* Release Notes
* 1998 Research Fund
* Web-surdities
* Old Lyrics
* New Leaf
* World War Three
* Erratum
* From the Mailroom
* Contact BR

WHAT IT IS
The band is breathing a collective whew! after our Summer and Fall touring. We played in front of a lot of people and had fun doing it. But it was tiring and we are home for the holidays. We are planning a series of tours next year that will finally feature our newest work from No Substance in addition to the more classic set that we usually play. The Warped Tour was a fun way to spend a summer, but since there were so many bands, none of them could play for more than 30 minutes. We got a lot of requests, both in person and by mail, for a longer set of music. Next year we are going to try and honor those requests by playing a normal concerts-worth of material from all eras of the bands history. We hope to see you there!

THE NEW MERCHANDISE CATALOG
Finally, there is a reliable, simple way to order BR T-shirts, jerseys, shorts, hats, skateboards, etc. Our new merchandise catalog is the way (see the last pages of the newsletter). If ordering by mail is too outdated for you, simply order from our official merchandise webpage
We have a revolutionary software that allows easy, and totally secure payment on the web. The only people who can see your personal information are you and your credit card company. We stay out of it. We simply get a confirmation, and receive payment from your credit-card bank. If you are still wary of new technology, you can order by mail, for details email: : sales@badreligion.com for details. Keep checking for newly released merchandise. Some of the items will not be taken on tour with us, and there are always special items available.

CMJ -NEW YORK
The 1998 CMJ music fest went off as planned this year with none other than Greg Graffin as the keynote speaker on Friday, November 6th. The following is a transcript of the address from the podium at the Hudson Theater at Times Square:

FAST FOOD AND THE MUSIC INDUSTRY By Greg Graffin
Since I am known as a person who usually sings about serious issues, I figured I had better keep things very serious here today. I'd like to begin by relating a story to you about...Arbey's Roast Beef.
I like fast food, I think it is a good product and a great invention. Last week I was standing in line looking over the simple menu and I decided I would get the #1 value meal. Then I realized my craving for lots of fries and I said "Can I have a large fries with that instead"? The cashier said: "Why don't you just supersize? After I said okay, she reached for the supersize cola and I saw that this thing was the size of a small trash can. Who can drink that much cola? Who can carry it? You would have to strap it in, to a child-restraint harness, if you ordered it at the drive-thru window. I said, "That's okay, I just want a regular cola but keep the supersize fries".
This is the point that all hell broke loose. The cashier said: "UUUUMMMM, we can't do that sir. It was as if I asked her to derive Kepler's law of orbital rotation or something! Apparently, the keypad on the cash register didn't include an option that allowed a supersized fries without a supersized cola. Three other employees came forth from their posts to help out their confused co-worker. None of them could figure out how to accurately charge me for my simple request. I said "Don't worry about it, just give me the regular sized drink and I'll pay the full price of a supersized number one value meal. All of the co- workers, let out an appreciative sigh of relief. And the people behind me in line were relieved too: "Who is this guy holding up the line, taking all the employees for his own special needs? "That's when it dawned on me: Things in our society have become too efficient.
There is an over-efficiency problem to the extent that institutions offer you only a limited set of choices and what results is a subtle determinism of your behavior. I believe that this isn't what people want. They want to be more free. They want to exercise their freedom of choice. Do you remember the old marketing slogan of Burger King? "Hold the pickles, hold the lettuce, special orders don't upset us. Today, special orders might not upset them, they just short-circuit their brain synapses. The "Have it your way" mentality of the past is no longer valid. Today, virtually all of the fast food chains are saying "Have it our way". You are not free to choose. And this is a serious issue.
The music industry itself is not immune to this kind of simplistic, over-efficient, marketing mentality unfortunately. And I think this is something that needs to be addressed. It requires a lot more discussion than we can have here today, but I will break it down for you quickly and add some of my own analysis and maybe inspire some change.
Step One: Is there a problem?
I think so. Why do so many bands and artists sound the same? Artists have always emulated other artists, that's not exactly the problem. Today, it seems, the similarities are getting profound. Lead singers are sounding identical to other singers on other labels. Combine that with the producers, using the same techniques for different bands, and we are left with: singers sounding the same, production sounding the same, two different labels, the same product, value meal mentality. Consider this: Epic has Pearl Jam, BMG has Creed, Sony music has Silverchair, Epitaph has NOFX, but MCA has Blink 182, Interscope has NIN but they figured they could amplify that so they offered us Marilyn Manson, WEA has Pantera, SONY has Korn, Geffen had Berlin in the 80's so 10 years later they figured they could offer it to us again in the form of Garbage, WEA has Alanis Morrisette, ULG has Meredith Brooks, Arista has Sarah McLaughlin, WEA has Paula Cole. The list could go on and on....
Why is this the case?
I think it's because art is hard to make, so artists copy other artists. But art is even harder to sell to the public, so the sellers copy the marketing strategies of other sellers. The artist and seller then form a bond of self-congratulation that destroys their desire to try something novel. The result is a lower diversity of musical styles and a more programmed, less realistic image of the artist. The other result is higher, more predictable sales, and thus a greater proportion of signed bands selling boat loads of cds. Why do we buy it? The music lover doesn't have much of a choice. We either buy the music that is presented to us or give up listening to it. Most of us would choose the former.
Part Two: How does this problem come to be?
I will attempt to illustrate the process of how I think this problem is perpetuated through the industry. I would like to borrow an analogy from biology to show how evolutionary systems can progressively enhance efficiency through time, but only at a high cost...the cost of diversity.
The music industry evolves just as a species evolve. In nature there is natural selection: Species must adapt, or they become extinct. In the music business, bands have to either sell records (a form of adaptation itself) or they get dropped (a form of extinction). Evolution depends not only on natural selection, but also on probability. The variety of animals that can be created in the next stage of evolution are not a random sample. They are determined to some degree by the variety of animals that exist today.
This can be stated simply in the following way "whatever comes next in any evolutionary system is dependent on what is available at present". Biologists call this phenomenon a markovian process, a process of non-random probability that constrains the outcome of the evolutionary sequence of events. Think of how monkeys came to be. They didn't just appear suddenly like some aliens landing from outer space. They were derived from animals in a previous stage of evolution that looked similar, but weren't quite monkeys.
The music industry also has evolved through a markovian process. For instance, it is not a random chance that we have Alanis Morrissette. She didn't evolve out of the null-and-void. She came from a former template. She borrowed styles and sounds from a very limited set of other artists. The important thing to be learned is that it is possible to predict with some degree of accuracy what the next stage of evolution will look like, based on what things look like today. And if the music industry doesn't cultivate a diverse array of artists today, they will extinguish the possibility of future musical revolutions.
Every time a species becomes extinct, its genes are removed from the gene-pool of the future and they don't re-appear. Likewise, every time a band is dropped, or an artist's catalog is discontinued, there is a negative effect on the next stage of music-industry evolution. Dropping bands severely limits the range of choices from which the next generation will take its inspiration. The crop of artists-to-be of the future is determined by the artists that exist today. Inspiration is analogous to hereditary.
So the question in the music industry is the same as the biggest question in modern biology: "How do we maintain diversity"?
If we continue to clear natural habitats, and pave them over with cities or agricultural land, we will cause a lot of species to go extinct because they cannot adapt to our rapid destruction. The net result: Fewer types of organisms in the next stage of evolution. Likewise, if the record labels only promote carbon copies of each other's artists rosters, and ignore bands and artists that are qualitatively unique, there will be a very restrictive set of artistic styles available in the next decade. And a limited array of products is bad for any institution's long-term prospectus.
Now comes the difficult part: Suggesting reparations.
I think our values are askew. We have come to measure quality in the wrong way, usually in terms of dollars and cents and not in intellectual or emotional stimulation. This is probably both a symptom of our society, as well as an arrogant irreverence by those who wield the power. There is a common attitude among music industry people. I've heard numerous executives say: "Who are we to judge the music we release? The kids love it! We are just giving the people what they want to hear".
In short this means that the reason they are putting out crappy music is because it is what the people really want. I don't agree with this. I think it is logical to ask: Is it what they really want to hear, or does the industry determine what the people hear through "un-natural" selection? I think there has to be a set of quality standards other than how much money an artist generates. Less-popular bands deserve to be sustained. Their value should be measured by projecting their influence forward, into the future, and not merely by calculating last year's profit and loss statement.
In order to maintain diversity, we need label executives who are willing to stick their necks out and say "This is good music, and this is poor quality. This has integrity, and this is a blatant rip off". Artists need to be told when they sound like someone else. It helps them recognize what is and isn't unique about themselves. It helps them develop. I think there has to be a more sophisticated approach to developing artists and bands. I know that bands need to be educated. They don't need the pressure of their labels simply throwing money at them while they cross their fingers and hope for a hit. This isn't real development.
Bad Religion took a long time to develop into gold-record- status artists. Every step of the way we learned and applied our knowledge. Atlantic helped us reach a larger audience all along the way. And although we are a unique situation, I still think we prove that real development can occur in the industry without sacrificing artistic integrity.
In conclusion then, I think there has to be an acknowledgment by the people who sell the music that they play a significant role in determining the public's musical taste. By overlooking unique artists in the search for superstars, and by forsaking long- term development in lieu of instant one-hit wonders, industry executives actively winnow the choices of the musical styles and images that are presented to the public. Thus, the industry, through a markovian evolutionary process, facilitates its own demise, and contributes to the progressive senility of our society. It is as much a truism in music, as in politics: If you offer the people nothing but mediocrity, you will create a mediocre people.

AUSTRALIA? WHAT HAPPENED?
As many of you know, we had to cancel our tour to Australia in January, 1999. This was regrettable to say the least. Life intrudes on profession from time to time, and one of the BR members had a profound personal crisis that precluded him from being able to leave his family. We are going to make it up to the Australian fans somehow at a later date.

RELEASE NOTES:
Did you know that Greg Hetson owns and operates a recording label called PORTERHOUSE RECORDS? Well, he does. Here is a brief introduction to it:
Porterhouse records was founded in 1997 by Greg Hetson and resident Westbeach Recorders producer, Steve Kravac of MXPX and Less Than Jake fame. The labels first two releases were co-produced by Steve and Greg H. Their combined efforts helped to bridge the gap between the hard-core honkey tonk sounds of Speedbuggy (featuring ex NOFX guitarist Steve Kidwiler) and the Sabbathesque sounds and Alice-Cooper-stage- antics of Rosemary's Billygoat.
In January, 1999, Porterhouse will re-release the punk rock classic "Wild in the Streets" by the Circle Jerks. The new remastered package will be an enhanced CD- ROM featuring a screen saver and collection of rare band photos. Look for the Circle Jerks debut "Group Sex" re-release in the near future.
The releases are available for $12.00. Send a check or money order to: Porterhouse Records,PO Box 3597 Hollywood, CA 90078

Further release news:
Bad Religion will be featured on an album released by Fat WreckChords in April, 1999. It is an album called "Short Music for Short People". The BR track is called "Out of Hand" and it is 35 seconds long. In fact all songs on the album are around 30 seconds. At any rate, the song "Out of Hand" is bound to be one of the standout tracks.

1998 RESEARCH FUND
We are proud to announce the recipient of the 1998 Bad Religion Research Fund:
Lena Sharon Nicolai of the University of Michigan, department of Biology. Her study, entitled: "Dispersal of mycorrhizal fungal spores by rodents and consequent effects on tree seedling establishment and forest regeneration" was chosen from over 300 other proposals.
Her study goes against the grain in important ways. It shows that terrestrial animals can be critically important in regenerating the forest ecosystem. The tacit assumption in ecology is that the flying insects, or bats, or wind pollinates the tree species themselves, and so they are the most important elements in regeneration. Lena's study is testing this paradigm by looking at the role of rodents and how they affect the condition of the soil, namely, the mycorrhizal symbiosis (an intricate web of fungi and plants that allow the right conditions in the soil for forest regeneration). That terrestrial vertebrates could be so important in creating forest health would be a shift in the way we look at ecosystems and could help change our ecological values.
We would like to congratulate Lena, and thank all the others who sent in proposals this year.
The Bad Religion research fund supports challenges to authoritative views in the social and natural sciences, through field-work investigations.
For more information see the Bad Religion Research Fund Guidelines on www.badreligion.com or write to: treva@badreligion.com or write to: Bad Religion Research Fund PO Box 4416 Ithaca, NY 14852
WEB-SURDITIES by Greg Graffin
Maybe this will become a permanent column in Bad Times...
The world-wide web is growing so exponentially fast that problems are arising and no one seems to notice them. This column will be a reality-check for those who have lost their sense of what it means to be human, and therefore have a twisted view of reality, because they spend far too much time on the world-wide web. Hopefully, my opinions will provoke some fruitful discussion.
Recently, I read an article in the paper that related the growing trend of "Digital Demonstrators" (Wall Street Journal, Dec. 3, 1998). It said that "virtual marches" could be an effective way to bring about social change. It stated that "activists can demonstrate with a mouse click...
This really pissed me off! First of all, it is a gross misrepresentation of what motivates social and political change. Ultimately, social change comes from an emotionally based behavior pattern. The reason people change in unison is because we are united by a similar emotional response. We are not moved to change the laws if we don't have an emotional experience that connects us to the political issue.
For instance, those who have experienced a loved-one suffering in pain on their death-bed are deeply motivated to change the laws regarding doctor-assisted suicide because of the intense similarity of their emotional response to their dying loved-one. Or further, those who have experienced discrimination, or racism, or poverty, have an emotional connection to one another, and consequently, are deeply motivated to change the social conditions. "E-mail protests" barely even cross the threshold of lending support to an issue. The internet is so anonymous, and such a poor gauge of the emotional status of its users, that it is hard to verify if the words and pictures you are seeing were even generated by a human being at all.
Let us not blunder and assume that behaviors such as protest marches, sit-ins, benefit concerts, lectures, and other social gatherings can be reduced to electronic media that effectively filter out all human emotional connections. How do we measure the seriousness of a cause? We see it and experience it with our senses.
When a million people show up in Washington D.C. and demand to be heard, it is a powerful, moving expression of what it means to be human, social and conscious. Email effectively filters us from both sociality and consciousness, and that is why it fails as a means of protest. There is nothing dangerous about it either. What can the unruly "e-mob" do if their "e-cause" is not enacted? Send out more "e-hate- mail" (Stop it you're scaring me!). But a huge throng, collected in one place is dangerous and moving. It says we have made huge errors in our policies. So huge in fact that these people were angry enough to leave the comfort and privacy of their homes to allow their faces to be seen, and voices to be heard. And if they are ignored, there will be trouble.
In short, email can be used to alert people of pending problems, but it does not constitute the demonstration. "E-protests" will fail to bring the social change because they aren't based on human contact. Contact, the merging of the senses, the coupling of human experience, is necessary for any kind of meaningful protest or demonstration. If protests become only electronic, they will be nothing more than an allegory of human nature, as whimsical and fickle as the charged electrons that dance across the computer screen, careening toward a strong nucleus, that only temporarily holds them.
OLD LYRICS
Here are two more BR classics from the old days. These are sample writings of our teenage years:

NEW LEAF:
from the E.P. "Back to the known",
also appears on "80-85"
When everybody dies around you
From someone elses gun
It makes you really stop and think
About the years to come
Something good has gotta happen
To the human race
We all had better stop hoping
And set our heads on straight
You gotta Turn over a new leaf
Because that old one is turning on you
You gotta turn over a new leaf
Its the futures only hope or we are through
Today is over, it's already shot
So we can't think about ourselves
If we find worth in our nature
Then saving that can only help
Start filling up your pockets
With things you really only need
Save life and earth and water
There can't be any other deed

WORLD WAR THREE:
from the E.P. "Bad Religion"
U.S. government blew its plan
Too much money down the can
Stop, look, and listen to what the president says
The first lady is a fucking les (this was the era of Rosalyn Carter, by the way)
They all think they know it all
America, Russia, China are all about to fall
Lethargy will over-rule
U.S. government's wading pool
World War Three
"Forget it"! came from the president's door
"I'll make us have another world war
it don't matter what the people think
We have to save our precious brink
Here I go, I'll push the first bomb
Yeah, it's headed straight for Guam
All the rest will release soon Right into your living room
World War Three

ERRATUM:
In the last issue of Bad Times, on page two, it was stated that many of the problems relating to our human condition were due to the "logarithmic growth" of our population. This is in fact a technical error. The correct word is "exponential"; growth, because exponential growth curves have the property of very rapid doubling rates after an initial slower-growth period. We are sorry about this mistake in usage and thank Dave Morgan of Boston University for pointing it out.

FROM THE MAILROOM
The amount of mail we have been getting is staggering. This has increased dramatically in the last three years probably because of the increased usage of computers and email. Whereas in 1991 we received only about 50 letters a week, today we are getting over 100 letters a week, and about 350 email messages. Because of this, it is hard for us to answer all of it, but we do read it all and we really appreciate it. Sometimes, if we can't answer, but it seems particularly entertaining or relevant we will publish them here and respond in the newsletter.

"I am one of your millions of fans and first of all you should know that I am a Hungarian as is Edward Teller. Do you really believe he is the biggest killer in American history? Perhaps you don't know that he was a refugee from nazi Europe, and he is a Nobel scientist." P.Toth via e-mail

Edward Teller is named in the song "The Biggest Killer in American History" because he is a part of the web of people and institutions that are collectively known as the military-industrial complex. It is this complex that is criticized in the song, not the individual scientist himself. We respect his monumental scientific achievements, and acknowledge that the times were strenuous for scientists during the second world war. But his desire to build larger and more deadly bombs after the war cannot be ignored. In life one must be rewarded for his/her achievements, but also held responsible and criticized for malicious intent. And we don't believe that you achieve peace through war.

"Where was the first show of Bad Religion?" Pedro S. A. Brito, via e-mail

Our first show was at an abandoned warehouse in Santa Ana California. It was an underground punk-rock show that was only advertized by flyers and it was free. It was some other punks birthday party. There was no stage, we brought our own PA, and there were about 150 people there. We drove about 1.5 hours to get there (we were from Canoga Park, CA in the San Fernando Valley of Los Angeles, Santa Ana is in the infamous Orange County). We only had six songs in our repertoire and yet people slam danced immediately which was rewarding and helped to make us less nervous. We only played about 15 minutes, but luckily another band came up and used our equipment and had a couple more songs than we did. They were called Social Distortion.

"How can you be such a hypocrite? You say faith can't support you no more and you look for a beginning and an end. Faith is one of the things that supports me every day. Have you gave the Bible a chance? If you haven't you should. We are saved by faith and not by our works. Your trying to save yourself through works, it doesn't work. If you read some of the near death experience books the people will tell you that there is a Heaven and Hell and that there is a God in Heaven and a Satan on Earth who is going to hell and at this point your going to Hell." Russel, via e-mail

Well, where to begin? The song Russel refers to is "Faith Alone" from the album "Against the Grain", which states "faith alone won't sustain us anymore. This doesn't mean that some sort of faith isn't important, it means that there are more worldly concerns that we must pay attention to if we don't want to become an extinct species. The Bible doesn't mention things like extinction, or overpopulation, or global warming, or habitat destruction, or pollution, or racism etc. that are looming destructive elements of our species. These phenomena were discovered by observant people long after the writing of the Bible. We cannot just pray and expect that the world will become less- polluted, less-populated, or more peaceful. It is up to us to change our destructive behaviors. That takes work as well as optimism. Our faith should be expressed in working toward a better planet for our children and not the selfish, juvenile hope for a better afterlife for ourselves. I don't think anyone is going to Hell because it only exists in the minds of people who wish ill-will on others.

BAD RELIGION Addresses:
Bad Religion Management
11601 Wilshire Blvd
Suite 2040
LA, CA 90025

Greg Graffin:
PO Box 4416 Ithaca
NY 14852

E-mail:
ggraffin@badreligion.com
jayb@badreligion.com
brianb@badreligion.com
gregh@badreligion.com
bobbys@badreligion.com