Refused's Coachella Reunion: They Explain Why



Believe it, punks: Refused's Coachella reunion is happening. The Swedish hardcore punk band were only together seven years (from 1991 to 1998), but released three full-length albums before calling it quits. Their album–cult favorite The Shape of Punk to Come–is considered one of the best punk albums ever. But even two years ago lead singer Dennis Lyxzén was telling Excite in an interview:

“To be in that band is one of those things that half the time I'm
sympathetic and understanding towards why people would do it. The other
half, it's just such a useless maneuver. It's a defeatist attitude but
if your objective is to play music with your friends and have a good
time, there's no harm in reuniting your band for a couple of shows. For
us, there have always been so many other aspects of what we did, that it
always felt like a complete no-no. You can't do that shit. Minor Threat
never got back together. That's kind of our take on it. With some
things, the legend is better than the actual thing.”

And now? Here's the reasoning behind the reunion on their homepage.

We never did “The shape of punk to come” justice back
when it came out, too tangled up in petty internal bickering to really
focus on the job. And suddenly there's this possibility to do it like it
was intended. We wanna do it over, do it right. For the people who've
kept the music alive through the years, but also for our own sakes.

Check out the whole statement after the jump.
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Here's what's written on Refused's homepage:

We had a band once, in Umeå. We would pile in a van,
like every other punkband, and thunder off in pursuit of friends and
glory in some basement in front of 20 people, 50 people, in towns 4-5
hours away. Sometimes there would be more than a hundred people and we
would later in the week refer to that as a “big show“. We were
ambitious, but we didn't think of it as a career. We never made any
fiscal sense whatsoever during 7 years of touring. Like most punkbands,
it never occured to us to even try. We had a scene, we had some politics
and we had just a hint of artistic ambition. True to our swedish roots
we got very serious very fast. And then suddenly we got good. It's a
delicate path to tread for precocious twentysomethings anywhere on the
planet, but this particular bunch didn't make it. And that was fine.
Most enterprises in life are unrelated to incredibly violent rock music.

      It's been a motley 14 years since our band came apart. We've all
kept busy in our respective endeavors but we've all remained friends and
kept in touch. There have been offers, and lots of jokes about these
offers. We've sort of looked down from our high horses and made fun of
people who've just wanted to share the psychopathic intensity that we
would deliver on a nightly basis in our post-pubescent prime. A reunion
has just seemed irrelevant to us. Too much other shit to do.

      But then Kristofer got his degree from the Swedish opera academy,
Jons medical studies began drawing to a close and Dennis and David
started a new hardcore band together. Finally, after a decade and a half
hiatus, Kristofer picked up the guitar again. Which made David want to
play the drums again. Which in turn led to all four of us suddenly
making new music in assorted constellations. As all this was brewing,
Coachella got in touch. There were a couple of phone-calls, lots of
skepticism, some hesitant enthusiasm before one of us basically said: “
This is ridiculous. There are friends of ours who would murder close
relatives just to go see bands there. Let's just do it, one last time.
” And with that, socialist fag-loving pc scumbags were on the road again.

      We never did “The shape of punk to come” justice back
when it came out, too tangled up in petty internal bickering to really
focus on the job. And suddenly there's this possibility to do it like it
was intended. We wanna do it over, do it right. For the people who've
kept the music alive through the years, but also for our own sakes.

      We feel that you deserve it and we hope the feeling is mutual.

      See you in the pit.

//Refused 

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