Grab your s’mores, your bug spray, a shot of Malort and pack your bags as Riot Squad Media is returning to Northeast Pennsylvania to take over the West End Fairgrounds in Gilbert, PA with Camp Punksylvania! The 3-day festival with multiple stages and amazing national and local acts like 7 Seconds, The Bronx, Less Than Jake, will take place from 5 July until 7 July tickets are available here. Zach (guitar/vox), Andrew (bass/vox) and Craig (drums/vox) of Suburban Downgrade have joined TGEFM to discuss this year’s festival for the latest installment of our Camp-centric interview series: Happy Campers. Check it out below and I’ll see you at the campfire!
Thank you so much for agreeing to this interview! What can you tell our readers about Suburban Downgrade? Your sound, your history, your mission?
Zach: I believe what it comes down to, we are a group of dudes who enjoy aggressive, raw punk rock that includes a good amount of sincerity, positivity, and as well as us all as a community making it through the day by day bullshit. Thus being an outlet, a coping mechanism to keep our heads in a better place. Before SD, I can say that we were all some shit shows. We believe that this helps us grow as people, and we hope that we can help others with that as well. Our sound is how we’re feeling at the time we write the songs, rather it be fast and aggressive, happy and dancy, or even the occasional melancholy. All those aspects affect our sound.
We got into this when Craig and I (Zach) were discussing the possibilities of starting a small punk rock band after an evening of giving craig a ride home after meeting for the first time. Not long after, we asked Andrew, who I (Zach) have known for a few years and clicked well with personalities, politics, and a sense of humor. Quickly getting on a few DIY shows with old and new friends got the ball rolling, and it has been a beautiful shitshow from there!
What does the festival circuit mean to bands like Suburban Downgrade?
Andrew: The ‘festival circuit’ as it is now, is crucial to getting us heard. We play a lot of shows a lot of places to make our music accessible and stay relevant. Being a part of this incredible punk rock festival circuit is incredibly important to all of us. I cant stress this enough , it is truly dumbfounding to appear on a flyer with bands I’ve been listening to since I was 16. We are so grateful to be a part of that.
Zach: Festivals are always a Divine experience for sure. It’s a lot of work, days worth, for just a 30 minute set may seem like a lot, but it is always worth it, and we always gain from it. Festivals like Camp Punx and The Upstage Fest in Clearfield has opened our eyes to a lot of amazing bands that we would not have become familiar with if it wasn’t for these fests. Another great fest we got to be apart of multiple times was Smite Fest. Awesome times, awesome people!
Your performance to open up Saturday’s Main Stage last year was a true standout for me last year at Camp. What made you want to come back and do it again? How has it felt being able to watch this thing grow from the inside?
Zach: You’re too damn kind! Honestly, we love returning mainly to see the amazing faces we got to know from the times before. We have made some amazing friends, all thanks to what Riot Squad Media creates for this community each year!
Andrew: watching Punksylvania grow from the first time we played and attended it to now has been a wild ride . The event is constantly improved upon by riot squad media every year, and they’re all super in touch with what people want to see at their event.
What album or band or significant singles made you go “Yeah, this is what I want to do” Not just an influence but who or what was the catalyst? On the flipside to that one… Who are some non-Camp bands on your radar that TGEFM readers may not know about, but you think they should?
Craig: For me personally, it was The Ramones, Rancid, Minor Threat, Bad Brains, Black Flag, The Misfits,Descendants, Pure Hell, Verbal Abuse and Sum 41. Among others too. Too many to name honestly, but those are some of the main ones. When it comes to specific albums I wouldn’t be doing this without Rancid’s Let’s Go and Sum 41‘s All Killer No Filler. Massive influence on me and my drumming and those albums will always hold a special place in my heart no matter what. Two of my all time favorite albums. As for bands that your readers may not be aware of that are definitely worth checking out, they’re all incredible, Are Video Massacre, Pucker Up, Winter Wolf, Owned By Assholes, Kevo Can’t dance, Hans Gruber And The Die Hards, Chesty Malone And The Slice Em Ups
Andrew: The daylight society , the whatleys, owned by assholes , the daylight society, abstentious, FTS from New Jersey, SO MANY MORE
Zach: We have so many talented friends who we have been lucky enough to play with, as mentioned by Craig and Andrew. A couple other groups y’all really need to check out that we LOVE: Xs For Eyes, The Snipped, Purplestickey, Grampian… So many that I know we’re forgetting. Y’all may already know The Wasted, amazing dudes, REAL fucking punk rock! Y’all know The Karens, all the love to them, some of the hardest workers in the DIY underground in my opinion. Y’all gotta check out No Comply outta York!
What have been some of the most memorable moments or experiences with the band so far? What’s been the most unexpected? The weirdest?
Zach: I Forget… Nah, but it is hard to narrow down. Meeting some artists we’ve been listening to since our youth… Fucking awesome. Craig and I recently were tickled silly over getting to meet Dr. CHUD while playing with The Karens, who he is now drumming for at the NEPA Horror Fest. The Misfits being a household name for us since we were kids, thats pretty mindblowing to us. Thats the easiest I can answer, its the most recent. …I had to clean Craig’s piss off of a hotel floor before… Won’t forget that.
Andrew: Most memorable– continuing to get to be on flyers with bands from my youth . Weirdest– opening for green jelly Unexpected– actually developing some musical skill because of the volume and caliber of shows were playing .
Craig: Like Zach said, meeting Dr.Chud was an unforgettable and surreal experience for me personally since he has been one of my favorite drummers since I was a kid and a huge inspiration and influence to me. Opening for Green Jelly was really cool and playing Upstage Fest last year with Sick Of It All and Life Of Agony was a surreal experience too.
Regarding live sets, what are you most excited to bring to the Camp Punk audience? What do you want the campers to say about your set when they write home from camp this year?
Zach: High energy, and a lot of heart.
Craig: I hope they don’t go away and say “THAT WAS SHIT!”
We’ve all got a few, what is your biggest regret? A gig you turned down, advice you didn’t take, what one thing do you wish you handled differently as a musician?
Zach: Not a god damn thing.
The punk and ska scenes have almost always been at the forefront of inclusion and diversity within the music scenes. The flipside of course is that the gatekeeping in the scene is also very prevalent? Why do you think the genre brings in such a welcoming community and is so happy to let everyone in and also seems to shut the doors so quickly behind themselves?
Zach: Always gatekeep… Remember those flea marketers? That was a GATE!
Andrew: Ska and punk has always been about inclusion and acceptance for me , and I see less gatekeeping and toxicity now than I did when I was fresh getting into punk rock. There will never be any sort of music scene thats free of drama and shitty people , but I think its been improving steadily since I’ve been into it and I wanna keep making it better . It’s for everybody.
This could be my own confirmation bias thanks to following a lot of the Camp Punksylvania acts for the last year or two, but the whole Northeast PA scene seems to really be thriving right now. What’s going on over there that is nurturing so many killer acts?
Craig: Uuuuuuuuhhhhhhhhhhhh Middleworth’s BBQ chips!
Zach: I think with asking ourselves for years “Why isn’t there anything to do? Where’s the music” well, this community wanted to change that. I can say now, to the people who claim “Punk rock is dead” are being lazy… get out there, there is constantly shit going down. You just gotta sometimes travel a little for it.
If Punksylvania were a real camp, what activities are each of you leading?
Zach: …It IS a real camp, Ed. I have a camp councilor badge to prove it!
…Mushroom baseball!
If there are any post-show jam sessions, what song would you like to perform around the campfire this year?
Zach: No idea, that kinda thing comes on a whim. When we did do that, we had no idea we were about to, and it was a blast!
Camp Punksylvania is a smorgasbord of fantastic acts. Which bands are you most excited to see?
Zach: For me, 7 Seconds, Koffin Kats, those are my two “holy shit” acts on the bill.
Craig: Of course I’m excited for a lot of the bigger bands, but I wanted to put a spotlight on some of the smaller bands that im excited for that everyone should check out. Beef, Soji, The Karens, Meanderthal, Old Daggers, One Revived, Dr.frankenstein’s Monsters, No Complyance, Sweet Anne Marie, Ship Of Fools, Matt Pless, The Galaxy Has Eyes, Some Kind Of Nightmare, The Whiskey Bats, The Chemical Imbalance, Racist Kramer and Black Guy Fawkes. SO many great bands on this thing, I’m gonna check them all out. Camp Punksylvania is truly a special thing for everybody involved and we are beyond grateful to be a part of it
Was there anything I missed that you’d like to share or dive deeper into with our readers?
You didn’t miss a thing . Can’t wait to see everyone at camp and the shoes and events that come after!
Bad Dad (occasionally called Ed) has been on the periphery of the punk and punk-adjacent scene for over twenty years. While many contributors to this site have musical experience and talent, Ed’s musical claim to fame comes from his time in arguably the most punk rock Blockbuster Video district in NJ where he worked alongside members of Blanks 77, Best Hit TV and Brian Fallon. He is more than just an awful father to his 2 daughters, he is also a dreadful husband, a subpar writer, a terrible dresser and has a severe deficiency in all things talent… but hey, at least he’s self-aware, amirite?
Check out the pathetic attempts at photography on his insta at https://www.instagram.com/bad_dad_photography/
