DOA
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By Silja J.A. Talvi

Talk Minus Action Equals Zero, An Interview With D.O.A. Frontman Joey Keithley

He was the heretical harbinger of hardcore; Canada’s reigning prince of punk. A 22-year-veteran of a music scene that has seen better and worse days, D.O.A. singer and guitarist Joey “Shithead” Keithley first formed his Vancouver-area punk trio in 1978. Finding an immediate, international audience for their brash sound and for Keithley’s gruff, comedic and politicized vocals, D.O.A. quickly released a series of 45’s, EP’s and LP’s, including Hardcore ‘81, an album that helped put a name to a largely West Coast-driven sound that included Black Flag, the Circle Jerks and Social Distortion, among others. The kinds of audiences that once packed large, unruly punk venues have long since diminished, but Keithley hasn’t stopped believing in the music. Backed by a rotating pool of drummers and bassists, D.O.A. has released a string of butt-kicking albums, including a clever collaboration with former Dead Kennedys frontman Jello Biafra, Last Scream of the Missing Neighbors (1989), Loggerheads (1993), The Black Spot (1995), and 1998’s music/CD-ROM Festival of Atheists, issued by Keithley’s own indie label, Sudden Death Records. Like Biafra, a one-time San Francisco mayoral hopeful, the energetic Keithley has also run (as yet unsuccessfully) for political office. In 1996, he ran as a candidate in Western Canadian provincial and civic elections. Late last year, he campaigned for the position of mayor of Burnaby, the suburb of Vancouver, B.C. where Keithley resides with his wife and three children. In 1999, Keithley also released his first-ever spoken word album, J.O.E. Beat Trash (Sudden Death). His autobiography, Talk-Action=Zero, is expected to be published later this year.

ST: D.O.A. was widely credited with developing a sound within punk that came to be known as hardcore when you released Hardcore ‘81. The two terms—punk and hardcore—are used somewhat interchangeably today. Can you explain the significance or the origin of the term, back in the early 1980’s?
JK: We picked up on the term—we saw it in a magazine in California in 1980. We just thought, “That really defines the new movement of punk rock.” Originally, people had a really derivative style of the sound of New York, specifically The Ramones and/or derivative of the English style: The Sex Pistols, The Damned, and so on. To me, this whole hardcore thing started on the West Coast and included the Avengers, D.O.A., Black Flag, the Circle Jerks, the Dead Kennedys and dozens more. We didn’t coin the term but we put a tour behind it and made it well known and spread it around. A lot of places we went, people had never seen punk rock before, so the term ‘hardcore’ did become synonymous with it. At the time, we just thought as long as you had this hard, no-compromising attitude, that was hardcore punk. Hardcore was very political, very socially active, very non-compromising.
ST: What kind of special significance do you think that punk rock has a musical force—and as a political force—as we enter the Year 2000?
JK: I think it still represents that whole DIY (Do It Yourself) ethic. That’s the biggest thing that has come out of the punk scene with a lot of significance, apart from the musical and stylistic (fashion) contributions to society, although the stylistic stuff I don’t care about at all. It has a way of motivating people and making them think for themselves. It should [although] it doesn’t always. Punk is also combative. A lot of bands on this [Social Chaos] tour were involved in that approach ... it’s the same sort of thing people got out of jazz in the 30’s and 40’s or the early rock music of the 50’s or the counter-culture of the late 60’s. It’s that spirit of rebellion. For a lot of people, it’s still alive.
ST: From your standpoint, in what ways was the early punk scene in the late 70’s and early 80’s such a unique and exciting phenomenon?
JK: Musically, it was an awakening for me. Politically it was too, although I was already a young person who was reasonably politically aware. I picked up on that angle of using music as political and social expression rather than just [using it as] straight-out entertainment ... There was also a lot of upheaval [at that time]. It was personally dangerous for a person to be a punk. I never got beaten up by people for that, although I got in a bunch of fights. I know lots of people who had a hard time walking anywhere without being called a ‘faggot’ or having stuff chucked at them or having guys jump out of trucks wanting to fight—just because someone had green or purple hair or torn-up clothes. The police also reacted very strongly against it. Here [in the Vancouver area], I was personally involved in eight or nine police riots, where basically there was a punk rock show going on and the police would come in and start a riot. They didn’t understand it and they thought it was completely out of control. It was beyond their understanding that people could act or look or think this way, especially with punks that word attaching the word ‘anarchy’—without them necessarily understanding it. It looked [to the police] like there was this anarchist ‘ring’ going on. That’s what the police in Vancouver thought and they banned all punk shows for a period of about 6 months in ‘79. To me, the punk scene was much more challenging then than it is now, although a lot of the people continue to do some challenging stuff.
ST: When you say “challenging,” do you mean musically speaking?
JK: Musically, politically and socially. It’s inevitable when something is not new anymore. It doesn’t have the same impact.
ST: Was there ever a point in your musical career when you considered throwing in the towel or moving on to other things?
JK: We did in 1991 and 1992. For close to two years we split up and didn’t do anything. Did I ever want to? Sure. Trying to get more people to listen [to our music] is a difficult thing. I kind of take the approach of a guy I’ve been lucky enough to have conversations with, [radical folk singer and activist] Pete Seeger. Pete must be 70 by now ... If I could have half as much motivation and will as he has, that would be a great thing.
ST: What does keep you so involved and connected to punk rock? Do you still find that there’s a particular spirit or energy in the music and the scene that doesn’t exist elsewhere?
JK: I don’t see [that same kind of spirit] in pop or dance music, and I don’t particularly like metal ... I think punk rock really fun music to play. People are really out of control and really disrespectful. It’s not very conformist, whereas you look at mainstream rock or country or pop, those are pretty conformist [genres].
ST: If there’s anything you could have changed about the direction that the punk scene took—especially in the late 1980’s and early 90’s in North America, what would that have been?
JK: Nothing, really. But I say that because I don’t think it’s possible to change a cultural tide. That’s just the way it goes ... I kept saying what I thought and doing what I thought— no matter how out of the mainstream it was. This whole thing with the ‘bigness’ of the punk rock scene nowadays—well, it’s receded a bit recently.
ST: It’s receded quite a bit, actually.
JK: Right ... I think it’s interesting that it got more accepted. I’m kind of grateful to those 90’s punk bands] because a bunch of kids did get turned on to punk rock, and a bunch of them have gone back to listen to the older punk bands... If a person’s punk knowledge started with Rancid, they’ve got a lot to learn. And some of them do go back and take a look.
ST: You have three children. How do they relate, if at all, to the punk scene? Do you bring them to shows, or do they have any appreciation for the music?
JK: (Laughs) Yeah, they kind of do. My daughter is always saying “Don’t use punk words!” You know, if I swear or something. It’s funny, because [they’re from] a totally different generation ... I think they think it’s pretty interesting. My daughter especially loves the [D.O.A.] tapes. It’s the way it is, up to a certain age at least, where children are really into what [their parents do]. They really like my acoustic shows. They’ve been to a bunch of those as well as a few D.O.A. shows. They thought it was sort of crazy the way people jumped around on stage—either the band or the audience.
ST: They thought it was crazy in a bad way, or they thought it was crazy in an interesting kind of way?
JK: [Laughs.] They thought it was “psycho.” They used that term [to refer to someone on stage]: “He’s psycho.”