Classy San Diego Announce Tour Dates

Oklahoma City ska-rock band Classy San Diego has announced a round of upcoming tour dates.

"We’re really excited to hit the road again this summer," said drummer Blake Edlund. "We’re getting to play in a few places and with a few bands that we’ve already been around and getting to do some new things too, so it’s the best of both worlds for us. We’ll have our first full length album out this summer as well, so these next few months are going to be really awesome."

The tour dates can be found below. Venues will be updated as more information is available.

July 28th – OKC - TBA

July 29th – Lawrence, KS - TBA

July 30th – Omaha, NE @ Barley St. Tavern

July 31st – Des Moines, IA @ The Gas Lamp        

Aug. 1st – Russellville, AR

Aug. 2nd – Little Rock, AR

Aug. 3rd – Texas - TBA

The Russellville date is apparently not working out at the moment.

Oklahoma Punk Calendar

April 20^th

Blacklist Royals, Black Canyon, They Stay Dead @ VZDs. Oklahoma City

April 23^rd

Voodoo Glow Skulls, Left Alone, Classy San Diego, Truckside Down @ Blue Note. Oklahoma City

April 26^th

Reno Divorce (greaser punk from Denver), Havana Affair @ VZDs. Oklahoma City

May 7^th

Total Chaos, The Dirty Mugs, The Scandals, Kinda Creepy @ The Conservatory. Oklahoma City

May 10^th

The Dirty Mugs, New Imperialism @ The Yeti. Tulsa

May 17^th

Brutally Frank, The Dirty Mugs @ The Yeti. Tulsa

May 18^th

Dirty Mugs @ The Blue Note. Oklahoma City

May 22^nd

ANTiSEEN, Hellstomper, The Costanzas @ The Conservatory. Oklahoma City

May 25^{th
Terveet Kadet (Finland), Lotus Fucker (DC), Sete Star Sept (Japan), Common Fears (Tulsa) @ Soundpony. Tulsa}

May 25th
Sunny Side Up CD release show, The Last Slice, Classy San Diego @ The Conservatory. Oklahoma City

May 31^st

The Casualties, The Dirty Mugs, Violent Affair, Chokehole Stab, Community Pools @ The Conservatory. Oklahoma City

June 4^th

Gogol Bordello @ The Cain’s Ballroom. Tulsa

June 22^nd

The Dirty Mugs @ The Blue Note. Oklahoma City

June 25^th

MDC, Verbal Abuse, In Defence @ The Conservatory. Oklahoma City

July 5^th-7^th

Fuck You, We Rule OK! punk & oi! festival: The Krays, Krum Bums, Brassknuckle Boys, Who Killed Spikey Jacket, Adolf & the Piss Artists, The Agrestix, Combat Crisis, The Bad Engrish, Ponx Attax, Victory, The Shame, Sniper 66, Violent Affair, Dog Company, and a lot more. @ Vanguard. Tulsa

If you have events coming up, contact Punk is OK on Facebook.

Interview: Violent Affair's "The Pressure is Rising"

When you hear anyone talking about street punk in Oklahoma, the name Violent Affair usually comes up (or at least some variation including a “The” or an “A” at the beginning). The band has gained quite a bit of national notoriety, and even has some international fans. They have toured all over the country, and played with some mainstays of the punk scene.

Unfortunately, Violent Affair runs into the same problem that seems to plague other Oklahoma bands like The Dirty Mugs and The Last Slice; they have not released a full length in about three years. In 2012 they signed to Jailhouse Records, a punk label out of Virginia that has also released bands like Pinkerton Thugs, The Scarred, and Tenebrae. Soon after signing, they released “A Call to Arms” a 7” single that signals good things for the bands future releases.

This June, the OKC punks will release “The Pressure is Rising”, an EP which will lead up to the release of their next full length. I got a chance to chat with Zach, bassist for the band, about the release and their upcoming tour with The Casualties.

PiOK: Your sound has changed a lot from Stand Trial. How has it evolved on "The Pressure is Rising"?

Zach: I think the most interesting thing about following punk rock bands is seeing how they change and evolve over the years. I think we've grown as musicians from playing together all the time. The music definitely pushes different aspects of punk rock that we liked a lot but couldn't express as well before. The good answer is we're angrier than we used to be.

PiOK: What are you angrier about?

Zach: (Laughs) Lots of things. More specifically, other than the blitz cover none of these songs are necessarily upbeat. Each song is kind of about a different issue that really was fucking with us be it a personal song like “No Way Out”, or a kind of rally song like “A Call to Arms”. “Social Disease” is the track we did for “Punk Aid: Indonesia”, “Dead End Nights” is a preview of what kind of stuff is to come for our follow up full length "The Cockroach Theory"

(Check out Dead End Nights, which will appear on "The Pressure is Rising")

PiOK: What made you guys want to cover "Someone's Gonna Die?" What was it like recording it?

Zach: We all love blitz. We got drunk and recorded it. Jesse almost knocked over a really nice microphone.

PiOK: This EP is leading up to your next album. Was it recorded at the same time?

Zach: It was. These are all tracks we did in the mean time for various EPs and compilations

PiOK: So can we expect the sound, not just recording quality but also songwriting, to be a good indicator to what the new album sounds like?

Zach: Definitely. This is a good definite mix of what Violent Affair is doing now. It's more than it used to be.

PiOK: I’d like to switch gears a bit. You're getting ready to head out on tour with The Casualties. How did that come to be?

Zach: We've played with The Casualties a few times now and throughout our growing-up as a band they've been super helpful. They supported us and helped to get our name out and were just all around awesome dudes. They hit us up last month asking if we wanted to do a stint with them around the U.S. and we were like...how are we gonna turn that down? (laughs)

PiOK: No doubt. Now that you have this big tour and upcoming releases, where are you hoping to take the band? How far do you have to go before you consider yourselves successful?

Zach: As far as success goes, I think we're happy with where we're at right now. We all started out as young kids who wanted to be in a punk rock band. Now we get to do that and people are showing up and having a good time. We just want to spread the message to as many people as possible. We'll keep doing this until someone shuts us up, I guess.

PiOK: Thanks for taking time to chat. I just have one more very serious question. What is your current stud count?

Zach: Current stud count is approximately 250 including 2 belts and a vest. It's a casual afternoon.

PiOK: “The Pressure is Rising” is scheduled to release in June on Jailhouse Records. “The Cockroach Theory” is scheduled to come out later this year. Check out a video of them playing Blitz at The Conservatory in Oklahoma City.

The Last Slice on Tour

The Last Slice are no new face around the Oklahoma scene. Since their first show in 2008 (a 15-or-so minute set at the King of Clubs in Claremore, OK), The Last Slice have figured out how to do things the right way. Several bassists, numerous tours, and a full length album later they are starting to hit their stride on the road. I got a chance to talk to Jason Ward, the band's trombonist and manager of sorts, before they head out on their Get Weird Southern US Tour.

PiOK: You guys are getting more and more experience on the road. This is your second tour of 2013. How have your tours progressed from the beginning to now?

Jason: Our first tours (and I'm talking like, 2009) we so poorly thought out and constructed, I look back at them now and I wonder how we even made it home without dying of starvation. Seriously, though, now touring is a full fledged business. I do most of our management and booking and have become fairly good at getting us in the right places with the right people. I wouldn't say we're profitable quite yet, but we have hit the break even point and for months out on the road at a time, that's something to brag about.

PiOK: What is your favorite part of touring with The Last Slice?

Jason: I could say something really cheesy about how I like meeting new people in different places, but since we've been really hitting the road hard over the last year, my favorite part of touring has become those few fans that come from god knows where (we had someone drive 6 hours to see us in New Jersey), just to see you, and then they scream every word of every song right back in your face. That's becoming a thing that happen more often than not now that we're constantly returning to these places, and it just gets more exciting every time we go out.

PiOK: What is your least favorite part of being on the road?

Jason: Money. I wish money didn't exist. That's an extreme obstacle for living on the road for a month at a time, because no one wants to starve.

PiOK: The band has done multiple tours to both the East and West. Which direction do you personally prefer to travel?

Jason: East. The west coast is fun in a lot of places, but those places tend to be way too spread out. The east has a lot of bigger cities just jammed right on top of each other. Your drive times are less and you can cover more ground faster. Plus, we've really built a name for ourselves in some spots out there and that seems to be where most of our fan-base resides now.

PiOK: What is one thing, other than your instrument, that you have to have on tour with you?

Jason: My phone/laptop. Both of those things keep our business running 24/7. I'm usually booking or doing something while we're driving down the road just to make sure we don't miss a beat.

PiOK: Best of luck to you all on tour. I would be doing the readers a disservice if I didn't take this opportunity to ask about your next album. Your debut full length, Fresh Cuts, took a long time for you to release and featured a lot of songs from your first few years as a band. Are we going to have to wait that long for a second album? Have you started planning it, and if so can you give any details?

Jason: I'm not going to say a whole lot, but no. You will not have to wait so long for our next album and I would almost guarantee you it'll be in your hands by this time next year if not way sooner. The album is pretty much written, it's just a matter of having a little time off from the road to actually get in to the studio and get it done.

PiOK: You have played a few new songs live since your album release party; how are the new songs coming along

Jason: Currently we've been playing Artificial Crab, a song about how bad artificial crab meat is, and another one called Chick's a Trip about crazy girls. Both of these songs are fully complete and have become sort of crowd favorites. On this last west coast tour, we added another new song called Strike That Match, which I feel is going to become a permanent addition to our live catalog.

PiOK: Is there a noticeable difference in style between the Fresh Cuts tracks and songs you have written since?

Jason: Oh yes. This is Last Slice 2.0. This next album is going to blow you away.

A list of tour dates can be found on the image below or on their Facebook.