“As long as we’re alive then Punk’s not dead yet!”
Punk Rock is probably some of the most honest music anyone will ever hear. Stripped away are the pretenses of “professional musicianship” leaving in its wake the raw emotion, power, and intellect—or lack thereof—of the music. It can be anything, it can be nothing, it can be everything. Somehow it has endured over the years in many different waves and forms, but to quote The Exploited, “Punk’s not dead!” It is now 19 years since the Stern Brothers began taking over downtown Las Vegas and it looks like it isn’t going anywhere anytime soon. Thank goodness for that!
Four years later, it’s no longer a reunion — Refused are reborn as something new
Refused
It’s really hard to find a concert that was better, and more well-attended, than the 2012 show at the Warfield that marked the triumphant return of the Swedish hardcore giants known as Refused. Alumni and newcomers from all scenes of loud, angry music were found wandering the crowd en masse, and the band themselves, fresh off of their first gargantuan performance at Coachella, took the tinier stage they were offered and absolutely demolished any doubts held about their ability to still blow the minds of their audience. To this day, every time Refused has returned to the Bay Area, they acknowledge that performance as the one that actually convinced them to stay in the game. Singer Dennis Lyxzén regularly has stated that the gig brought them back down to earth, from the lofty, uncertain heights of trying to conquer the main stage down in Indio, and the energy expressed in every one of Refused’s shows since that time has always seemed to be a display of gratitude for that night. The question, then, was whether or not Refused would treat the early ’10s as their victory lap back in the race, or actually return with a new path to follow as an active band creating new art.
The answer, of course, is the latter — and they show no signs of slowing down.
