This Saturday, April 1, 2023, at the Doll Hut (107 S. Adams Street, Anaheim, California) skate punk legends JFA return to action after a three-year hiatus. Quazimofo, Celebrity Stalker, Functional Lunatics, Not A Chance, Jabbermouth, Tragic Radicals, Shifted Tide, Razorblade Romance and Brian D From HBH will be rocking two stages with food vendors, and Juice Dan Levy from Juice Magazine will be hosting Juice Talks and interviewing Daggers skater Eddie Reategui, with livestream by Taxi TV and much more. 21+, Doors at 6pm. This show is brought to you by Twisted Soul Entertainment and Dos Dias Promotions. Get your tickets at https://events.eventgroove.com/event/Jfa-73331
To celebrate the new record, Last Ride LP on DC-Jam Records, JFA created a new video titled “Stage Dive” featuring classic 80s punk rock photography by Edward Colver.
BRIAN BRANNON INTERVIEW BY JUICE DAN LEVY
Juice Dan caught up with JFA frontman, Brian Brannon to get his predictions on what’s next.
JUICE DAN: How did you decide to go with Edward Colver photos for the JFA video “Stage Dive”?
JFA BRANNON: Ed has been a friend of mine for a long time. He took a lot of killer photos back in the day, including some of them that really stand the test of time. He’s the man when it comes to ‘80s punk rock photography in Southern California. Ed Colver’s photos were on the first releases from everybody from T.S.O.L. to Black Flag’s first album, and Circle Jerks first album taken in the pool at Marina Del Rey for Group Sex. That Wasted Youth first album, Reagan’s In, had a guy doing this amazing back flip stage dive into the crowd. This guy had a Wasted Youth sticker on the back of his jeans. Pat Longrie, who was the drummer for Uniform Choice, Ed got a photo of him doing a stage dive and he had JFA on his jeans and that was on the cover of the JFA We Know You Suck CD that we put out. I’ve just known Ed forever, and we’re doing this album and I was like, “Wouldn’t it be cool if Ed would shoot it?” So he did. We went to Signal Hill, because one of the songs on the album is about Signal Hill and the races, and he shot some killer shit. Then we’re trying to put together videos for different songs on the album and one of them is called “Stage Dive” and I thought it would be badass if we could get Ed’s photos to use in this video, so I hit him up and he said, “No problem.” I was like, “Fuck!”
“Ed Colver’s photos were on the first releases from everybody from T.S.O.L. to Black Flag’s first album and Circle Jerks first album taken in the pool at Marina Del Rey for Group Sex. That Wasted Youth first album, Reagan’s In, had a guy doing this amazing back flip stage dive into the crowd. This guy had a Wasted Youth sticker on the back of his jeans. Pat Longrie, who was the drummer for Uniform Choice, Ed got a photo of him doing a stage dive and he had JFA on his jeans and that was on the cover of the JFA We Know You Suck CD that we put out.”
– BRIAN BRANNON – JFA
JUICE DAN: It’s so good. Tell us about this show tonight. It’s been a minute since you guys played. Tell me what’s gonna happen tonight at the Doll Hut in Anaheim.
JFA BRANNON: So this is the first show we have played since COVID, so it’s been a long time and we are ready. We did take some time when COVID was over because we have also been working on this new album, so we got that out of the way and now we are ready to go out there and have fun playing.
JUICE DAN: When does the new album come out?
JFA BRANNON: The first single is out now on Spotify and iTunes and stuff like that, but the record should be out in record stores in June. There are only going to be 500 of them on vinyl. Half of them are going to be at Zia Records and the other half will be all over the place, so get on it if you want it, because they will probably go fast.
JUICE DAN: What can we expect from The Last Ride?
JFA BRANNON: Well, it’s what you would expect from JFA, balls out, from the heart, covering a lot of ground, both musically and lyrically. We’ve got three instrumentals on there, a kinda Hendrix-y one and a kinda surfy one, and one kinda in between those, which is called “Desert Pipes, which I got Ping, who shot all the desert pipes photos back in the day when they were just big Ameron 20-footers in the desert, in the ‘70s, so we have a video for that too. Here’s the thing. I’ve been doing this shit long enough that when I do something I want to do it to the Nth degree. I’m gonna go for the frickin’ moon on everything. Why half ass anything? So everything on this album and about this album is gonna be just like our live shows. Just give it your all, and leave it all on stage and drink a ton of water for all the shit you sweated out when you’re done.
JUICE DAN: I love that you’re doing the photo videos with your songs. It’s really sick.
JFA BRANNON: Thanks. I’ve got some other things working. We’ve got a song called “Badlands” and it’s basically because I met a dude at Vans and he was talking about how skating is not what it used to be to him and he was talking about going back to the Badlands, so that’s a song right there. For that one, we will probably do some video and go back with Salba and explore some pools and mix in some old school stuff. I’ve got another song that’s about Ben Schroeder on there. It’s called “Vert Soldier” and it’s all about him being crazy and the locomotive that is Ben Schroeder on the coping. “He’s riding. It’s frightening. His 50-50s make lightning…” It talks about, “In the Combi, he drops in on your Mommy.”
“I’ve got another song that’s about Ben Schroeder on there. It’s called “Vert Soldier” and it’s all about him being crazy and the locomotive that is Ben Schroeder on the coping. “He’s riding. It’s frightening. His 50-50s make lightning…” It talks about, “In the Combi, he drops in on your Mommy.”
– BRIAN BRANNON – JFA
JUICE DAN: Yes! That’s amazing. He totally would.
JFA BRANNON: Yeah. If your mom is a kook, he don’t care. He’s coming through. It’s your job to look out for him. Your mom should know better than that. [laughs]
JUICE DAN: I had a personal experience with Schroeder landing on me at the Combi trying to do an egg. I felt like Mt. Everest landed on top of me. [laughs] It was epic.
JFA BRANNON: [laughs] Yes! So we got the song for that. I’m hoping we can get some good video footage of him. I just want to do shit right. Oh, and we have a new JFA t-shirt design. It’s called the Grind Master design. It’s the JFA logo made out of 215s and 131s.
JUICE DAN: Sick, dude. Thanks, Brannon. I really appreciate this, man.
JFA BRANNON: Yeah. I’ll save a couple for you guys. See you tonight. Thank you. Later.
ABOUT JFA:
Hardcore punk band, JFA formed in 1981, defining skate punk and Skate Rock scenes. Over the years, the lineup has included many bass players and drummers, but the dynamic duo of Brannon and Pendleton has remained constant. Now JFA is releasing a new studio album in June 2023 titled The Last Ride. Pre-orders launching soon at www.DCJamRecords.com.
DC Jam Records shared, “If you ever wondered what the hell happened to real from the heart, blazing fast, solid running, tight as nails, old school to the bone, genuine 1980s born and bred, backyard pool inspired skateboard punk, let not your heart be troubled: It lives!
JFA is back with their first studio album in way too long and you don’t even have to be a hardcore skateboarder or old school punk aficionado to pick up the heavy sound they’re putting down. But it damn sure wouldn’t hurt.
The songs on THE LAST RIDE (out June 2023) range from the lying liars and their deluded followers actively attempting to dismantle everything that ever made America great, to barreling surf music, dewatered swimming pools, good punkers gone but not forgotten, and the searing truth that asphalt has taken a piece out of everyone who’s ever ridden a skateboard down a hill.
Fret not, the album’s title does not indicate the imminent demise of the OG Skate Rock band that launched a thousand stage dives.”
As founding guitarist Don Redondo puts it, “Last ride refers to ‘one more’ at the end of a skate or a surf session. You either bring it (get a killer ride) or sometimes go for it to the point of slamming hard. Nobody does a safety run after saying ‘one more’ — while many skaters won’t even say ‘one more’ out loud (the mojo is that strong).”
Or, as Brian Brannon, original JFA singer, practitioner of blatant vocalism, two-time gracer of the cover of Thrasher Magazine, and the dude filmed rolling down a slide multiple times into a bone dry cement desert pond in the 1989 Santa Cruz Skateboards Speed Freaks video says: “Everyone should just live.”
Driving, thumping, toneful bass on THE LAST RIDE is once again provided by Corey Stretz (The Blades, The Crowd, China White, The Outsiders), throwing down a melodic rhythmic pummeling of the deep end.
Meanstreak-while, hard pipe-hitting, multitimbral, Animal from the Muppets, punk rock style drums is provided by Jamie Reidling, who was once a teen drumming delinquent hailing from the parking lot of the infamous Cookoo’s Nest. His musical rap sheet rattles off the likes of The Cadillac Tramps, Shattered Faith, Big Drill Car, U.S. Bombs, Die Hunns, TSOL, and Devils Brigade [with Tim Armstrong and Matt Freeman of Rancid].
We’re talking tight, raging, musical, skate punkitude all around. Johnny Come Lately’s, try to keep up.
Get THE LAST RIDE while it lasts.
Pre-orders launching soon.
Check this out! A limited run of 100 JFA Pool Paisley skateboards, sequentially numbered and signed by the band, featuring artwork by rad artist Jer Warren, are available to order now through BiFocal Media (link below). Designed and built by PS Stix and traditionally screen-printed, the decks will look great on any wall — but unlike most band decks out there, these babies are built to shred down to the very finest detail because JFA is and always will be a band of skaters. First come, first served. Cheers! — with Bifocal Media.
