Lone Rider - Skinheads Web Zine

We started around March 2005, the first virtual line up was a little bit different than the current one, we just knew each other from hanging around together or meeting us at pubs and gigs. The only skinhead oi! Band at that time were Riot Squad, with members of older oi! Bands from Valencia, like Last Warning, Alta Tensión, Social Combat... so we thought it would be great to make an oi! Band with new people and new ideas. At the beggining we had a different singer, he just recorded some rehearsals that can be found on the net as demos but left the band soon. Vega (our bassist) joined later and I had to start singing and playing guitar at the same time. So this was the first serious line up: Pablo (drums), Vega (bass) and me, Nèstor (guitar and vocals). We also had a side project called Gol Nord, which was a hool band for Levante UD team. Some months ago a good friend of us, Santi, joined the band as second guitarist; he also plays with Join the Rejects, which is another oi! Band from our region; check them out! I did play also with Shaved Dogs during some time and now I’m playing with Mercancias.

Pablo is 29 years old and nowadays owns a typicall spanish bar so don’t miss it if you come to Valencia! You may find us there eating and boozing haha. Vega is 27 and he works at a family business, I’m 27 too and working in a part time job serving meals to school kids. I did study Economics at university so I hope to find a better job but things look quite bad today in Spain. Santi is 27 and he’s now unemployed and has started studying again.

About our releases we’ve got the first MLP “Glory Nights EP” on DIM records, then we’ve released My Land b/w Natural Born Drinkers 7" in Crowbar records and our own label: Glory Boys Records; finally our debut CD “Skinhead Resistance” on DIM records again. The LP is going to be out very soon and will be 500 hand numbered copies on DIM records too. We also put one song in a US compilation.

Our main themes of inspiration for the moment have been the skinhead way of life, our everyday life, things that piss us off, some criticism about the system and the ruling elite (fuck them both), pride in our land and alcoholism. So I think the topics are the typical ones for a skinhead band. But I don’t think we fall into the same boring lyrics that many bands use to write, we try to make them in a way that people really can identify with them and sort of rise their spirits.

Musically the main influences would be the biggest oi! Scenes in our opinion, which were the ones from England and France in the 80’s. Anyway we listen to a lot of different kinds of music styles from where you can pick the best inspiration too; I really find very useful for a band to listen to a lot of music so you can put a different style to your songs so they don’t look the same and also you can be more critic with your own stuff, so you think twice before puting a song out. I love to listen to bands from everywhere in the world, I don’t mind if they sing in strange languages for me cause I love music and can appreciate what they are doing.

When our first recording was ready we put the songs on myspace and asked some small labels that were releasing their stuff on vinyl if they were interested and most of them didn’t bother to answer. We didn’t thought that a big label like DIM would be interested in new bands like us but he did contact us and said he would like to put our stuff. So we are very grateful for his support. Maybe in the future we would like to release our stuff as we now have the money, resources and contacts to continue by our own. So it’s very possible that Glory Boys Records puts our new stuff and maybe even we support new bands too.

About the CD we are not completely satisfied but just because recording and musical facts. The album was recorded in summer 2008 and has taken 2 years to be out due to problems with the artwork. We think that the sound has not the power and feeling that we were looking for and also we feel like if we could have recorded in 2010 it will be much better and reflect our current level as musicians. But we are very relieved that finally it’s on the streets.

I think we’ve played around 50 gigs, many of them outside of Spain as it’s difficult for us to get many gigs here as the scene is not as big as in Europe and people are much more worried about gossips than music. We’ve played with bands as the likes of Cockney Rejects, Condemned 84, Last Resort, The Veros, Loyalty, Superyob Frankie Flame, Retaliator, East End Badoes, The Warriors, Code 1, Ultimo Asalto, The Templars, Tommy the Terrors, Offensive Weapon, First Strike, Haggis, Skinfull, Shaved Dogs, Acero Condal, Skulldog, Mercancias, Join the Rejects, Hate Edge, Tattoed Motherfuckers, Kill Baby Kill, On File, The Pride, Endstufe, Headcase, Indecent Exposure, Short Cropped, Pressure 28, The Cliches, Volxsturm, Ultima Thule, Volund Smed, Kategorie C, Forbidden Rage, Kalevalan Viikingit, Agent Bulldog, Booze Glory, On the Job, Scum, Rythm’n’Boots, Discharger, High Society, Prima Linea, Gerbenok, Martens Army, Hammer the Nails, Bombecks , Wasted Nation, Molokids, and some others that I can’t recall right now.

Our worst gig was one in Belgium, we were so drunk that we could barely play, then we learned that we couldn’t be drinking since the morning to play a good show at night. One of our best gigs was when we played in Chicago, the was a very good atmosphere and the crowd was enthusiastic so it all worked perfect. We have good memories about our gigs in Mexico, as the audience went crazy and we didn’t expect that. Then we have had many fun with gigs in our own city, where there are always very good friends in the audience and everybody have a good time; the one with The Cliches here was great. Our last gigs in Sweden were great too, many people enjoyed them. Anyway we also keep good memories about the whole weekends spent away from home, not only about the gigs, we like to do our best also with the people who put the gigs for us. We must keep our reputation on the “Drunken Elite” motto, you know.... haha.

Ultimo Asalto: They’ve been one of the greatest bands from Spain lately but I think they don’t play anymore, some of them are not involved in the scene anymore, others have another projects, like the drummer who is in Secret Army, a punkrock band from Barcelona. We were lucky to play with them in the US and I can tell that they kicked ass over there. They are nice people and some of us know them since years. Maybe they’ve been the most known spanish oi! Band outside Spain from the last 10 years on.

The first skinheads in Spain could be seen in the early 80’s, the first ones were from Barcelona and neighbour industrial towns, also there were in big cities like Madrid, Valencia, and also in the Basque Country, Seville, etc... As there were no oi! Bands at the begginig ,until Decibelios showed up, they were following punk bands. The main punk scene was in Basque Country with bands like Eskorbuto, RIP, Cicatriz, MCD, all of them very good ones. Along with Decibelios, in Barcelona there were bands like Skatalà (oi!/ska band; their first work “fent d’aqui” is great) and Pisando Fuerte. Then another 80’s bands could be III Guerra Mundial, Producto Nacional, Generación Violenta, Conemrad, but they only put demos or live recordings which didn’t show their quality. So there was a first wave of skinheads in the 80’s and the second one was in the early 90’s. Many RAC bands come from this second wave, like Division 250, Klan, Estirpe Imperial, etc. There were also non political bands like Zakarrak, Ruin Bois, Last Warning, Alta Tensión, Suburban Rebels, Front Pilsen, etc and left wing/antifascist bands like Oi! The Arrase, Pilseners, Opció k-95, Remences, etc. In Valencia one of the first known bands in the 80’s was Interterror, then some of them went to form NES (I really recommend their demo or “maqueta” in spanish) and La Resistencia; there was a bar where punks and skins met called “La Lecheria” we’ve met some of those older punks and skins and they’ve got crazy histories to tell haha. Then in the 90’s, as I said before, Alta Tensión, Last Warning, Abriendo Cabezas on the non racist side, and División 250, Klan, Legion Negra on the RAC side were also from Valencia. Later on bands like Social Combat an Riot Squad. So you see there have been quite bands in our city. After we started Shaved Dogs was also formed and later on Mercancias and Join the Rejects (don’t miss any of them).

That picture was taken at the Dynamo Dresden stadium, we went there to see the football match when we were playing there; if possible we like to go to football matches when we are in other cities playing. We’ve also been to the A.C. Pisa and Olympique de Marseille football stadiums. We used to follow Levante UD, the other team from our city besides Valencia CF (they are big rivals) which used to play in lower divisions but now is playing at the first division. We were all members of a firm called Força Llevant but it disbanded and they don’t exist anymore.

Most of my time I spend on listening to music, rehearsing and reading about topics like conspiracies, ocultism, hidden history, mythology, symbology, exopolitics, ancient/esoteric traditions and things like that, I’m really interested in that stuff. Then on weekends we give our livers a hard time and try to party as much as we can. We also like to travel to other countries to see some fests and meet many friends.