Riot cop.

LITERALLY, A RIOT. I've seen 'em from afar. Though I haven't seen Alex in quite some time, I still have fond memories of being his backbone for a spell, drummer that is. One of the more creative and truly active sociopolitical punkers I've ever met. Alex used to have this crushing machine (he may still have it for all I know), and in this machine was placed televisions, plaster skulls, and various other manner of explosive objects. At certain points throughout the gig he would pull the lever and--SMASH--something would blow up or fly to pieces. Now this may or may not leave you thinking about politics or economic struggle, but that's until you ask Alex. Hey, that should be a new column, Ask Alex. Well, aside from blasting things to bits and high-speed surf licks, Alex was right up front in Seattle, WA, giving the fuck-all to the man. I know this because we watched some footage from the fiasco the next night before we played a gig, the perfect fuel to the fire, and I got to see him in fine form. I suppose a little revolution goes a long way. Say, wasn't that Thomas Jefferson that said that? Go figure, go Riot Cop. Oh and Alex, I live in Portland again so I'll see ya 'round

Give an intro.

The band is called Riot Cop, and my name is Alex. I play guitar and sing and write some of the tunes. My drummer is Evette Reyes. We're out of Portland, Oregon, and my bass player is Justin Spite. We're a political, surf-punk band.

What really inspires some of the things that you write about and talk about?

Lately, the Iraq war. I've been thinking about class struggle and the proletariat struggle of workers around the world. The people of Iraq are the poor workers of Iraq and are being trounced by the US government that is there to basically plunder their wealth. I feel that the US troops are being used as a blade, if you will, to cut out the soul of the working class of Iraq.

I feel that there's a worldwide struggle, that it is an insurgency of the whole world, those that fight against the WTO in the past and those that fight against oppression by government are being labeled and will be labeled as an insurgent force. So it is a worldwide insurgency against government oppression. We [Riot Cop] try to talk about these things in our music. One of the songs starts with the line, "I don't support the troops. I don't support the cops. I don't support the war. Smash McDonald's not the masques."

Do you think through playing your music or making music that it's the most effective way to reach people that maybe aren't thinking about these things? Or do you just try to move like-minded people that are already maybe on the same page? Are you just trying to organize that more or where do you see this going? It's kind of a broad question there.

Well music is one way of communicating things, for sure. I also feel that imagery is another effective way of communicating ideas; simple imagery like political poster work and wheat pasting. I've broken down imagery into silhouettes of riot police. People think America is such a great place but there are still riot police bashing people's heads in, acting the jock nation that we are. You see it in our president, in our vice president. That they have their world domination, basically, totally figured out. Having Paul Wolfowitz, the head of the World Bank, is amazing, basically. And that the world domination is basically completed right now, that they won't stop. Republicans love the jock mentality. They love that America is torturing people, but we won't stop either. We won't stop getting in their way. There are so many rich people that hate poor people because they say that they are using too many resources, but it is actually the rich people of the world that use more land and far more resources than any poor person could. I mean, poor people are basically living out of the dumpsters and living out of the land fills and polluting less than any single rich person with their huge million-dollar homes and their vast quantities of oil that they use to burn their lives and burn our lives. Basically, there are too many rich people on the face of the earth.

What inspires your lyrics?

Well, the songs are framed around days of protests. Like if there is a political action going on, like a day of action, I will look at the events that happened in those days. Usually there are very extreme things that happen like police shooting everyone with tear gas and just beating people and actually looking more and more militant every time. Every time I go to a protest throughout the years they have more gear. I am starting to see tanks. These low slung kind of armored personnel carrier tank things that I never really saw before. Everything is being more ratcheted up. The protesters themselves, I think, are ratcheting things up too in protecting themselves. So after a day of action, if the events were especially significant, I'll write the chants into the songs or comments people have said throughout the day. Bush was in town a couple of months ago. There were people chanting, "Bye bye GI, in Iraq you'll surely die." When I sing those words in songs people get very concerned, thinking that I am saying those things, personally, to the troops and perhaps I am because I don't really support anything that they are doing. But, they're also chants and slogans that people are saying throughout the days of those actions. Also, I like to make posters that are not just a personal attack against troops, per say, but if I can do anything to discourage anyone from joining the military or doing anything for corrupt government, or government at all, I will do those things.

What gives you hope?

There are such good, powerful things going on, constantly. Like Homeless Front type stuff. Like squatting land and getting blocks of people together to take over unused pieces of land for building homes and things. There's a thing called Dignity Village up in Portland where we started a Homeless Front and started squatting land and kept going and it kept getting bigger and now Dignity Village is a solid thing. There are sister villages being built everywhere. There are blank pieces of land everywhere--it's good that in the skateboarding community, starting with Burnside, in this era of finding a piece of unused land and putting up a swath of cement and that just growing upon itself and people coming together because everyone has energy to do good things. People have energy to do bad things but there are good people doing good things and making a name for themselves, and basically not putting up with being put down. Doing cement work is giving people a good name and giving people skills. It's an underground workers' party. EGWP and working for yourself. No bosses. No employees. I guess it's the DIY ethos, if you will.