Album Feature: Anti-Everything - DragSTER
Three Song Breakdowns From ‘Anti-Everything‘
Fi reveals the meanings behind songs from Anti-Everything.
Tokyo Joe This song has a gaming analogy because all relationships have an element of combat and struggle within them. It’s about shitty past controlling relationships and the empowerment you get when you realize that they held no power over you at all. It’s about letting go and moving on.
Drone Pilots This is a 49-second diatribe against the pure cowardice and malice of a country sending an unmanned weapon controlled by someone in a comfy armchair to kill people for reasons of power and wealth under the guise of security. It’s disgusting.
Vultures Circle It is a very paranoid song, a feeling of being watched, exploited, and manipulated by the powerful, by the vultures above.
Six albums in, dressed to kill and armed with incinerating riffs and raw intensity, DragSTER are one of the UK’s hardest-working punk bands on the scene. Straight out of the streets of Coventry, they restore an outlaw edge and chanting anthems to rock. Formed in 2014, they were produced by The Damned’s Rat Scabies within a year and have been managed by Jah Wobble from PIL. Now they’re signed to Louder Than War Records and championed by label leader and The Membranes frontman John Robb.
Disenchanted by the ever-warring tirade of manufactured popular music, the gang got together to fight back by holding a mirror up to politics, society, and the music industry, writing their own angry, honest songs. They delved headfirst into an unremitting rotation of writing and touring and have had a whole heap of fun along the way, building up a huge following of loyal fans. The five-piece, made up of Ryan Murphy on drums, Tom AK on bass, Fi Dragster on vocals, Diesel on guitar, and Ben Kelly on lead guitar, have grown together in companionship and musical aptitude over the years.
Fi shared with Vive Le Rock some of their achievements along the journey. We started with her striking image. It’s both retro pin-up and modern goth and is inspired by a ton of passions, from her love of Bettie Page to ‘50s style and punk. But a big influence is old horror movies, which she told us more about: “I tend to go for classic era horror. I love the 1930s Universal Pictures films with Bela Lugosi, Boris Karloff, and Lon Chaney Jr. I even have The Bride of Frankenstein tattooed on my thigh. It’s because they were shot in a certain way. They were black and white and relied on the psychological rather than gore. There is an other-worldly, creepy quality within those films. I also love the Hammer horror movies with Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing from the ‘50s and ‘60s as they had a style all of their own and they are goth as hell.”
DragSTER released a creepy horror video in a haunted house for their song “Damned” in May and told VLR about filming: “The video was super fun to make. We work with a guy called Martin Edwards at Wind Up Monkey Productions who is basically insane. He comes up with wild ideas like putting the band in a Hansel and Gretel nightmare house in the middle of Bavaria and setting fire to small toys. The filming was done at our rehearsal spot in Coventry; it took just two hours, and the rest was all from Martin’s twisted brain in the edit.”
The group’s latest album, Anti-Everything, was awarded an 8/10 review in Vive Le Rock and was well received by fans. Fi revealed what went on during recording: “Recording took over two years. It was produced and recorded by the amazing John Priestley, bassist with The Damned, and was recorded at Abatis Studios. John is like the sixth member of DragSTER; he had a huge input into the songs and is a production genius. Lyrically, we knew we wanted a dystopian theme. It is how we feel in these modern times, and we wanted to vent our frustration at those in power and scream from our perspective of increasing powerlessness.”
The album artwork for Anti-Everything was created by Marie Sindel, who designed it based on the Orwellian direction DragSTER’s songs were heading in. “She’s a fantastic Irish artist, and we wanted an isolated design to go with the songs. She came up with lots of cool ideas, but when the band saw the final design, we flipped. It was so totally on the nail with our thinking.”
Fi explained why signing to Louder Than War Records was the right choice for the band on their latest album: “Regarding the release of the record, DragSTER wanted to be on a label we trusted, and that put out music we love. It is very important to us that the label we are on is as passionate as we are. It shows in the way Louder Than War has launched the album and generated a buzz from our fans and press that they are very hands-on.”
Fi is a long-time vegan of twenty-six years. She explained why: “I’ve been vegan since I was a kid, really. I made the connection between what was on my plate and the abuse and slaughter of animals. Veganism is very important to me and Ben, our guitarist, and is much more than just a diet. We only use products that are cruelty-free and have not been tested on animals. We won’t wear leather; we don’t support charities that fund vivisection. Two of my dogs have been rescued from laboratories.” She recommended a few vegan dishes to try: “I have loads of great vegan recipes. I love Mexican food. I do a killer lentil chili taco recipe that I mix with homemade guacamole and shop-bought salsa and vegan sour cream.”
Though DragSTER is on the UK punk scene, their heavy metal and gothic influences don’t go unnoticed. Fi has always said that for her, punk is about standing up for something and having a good time. She explained: “Whatever you do, have fun doing it. We stand for attitude, where no one is discriminated against because of who they are, for a society that is not ruled by a handful of psychopathic billionaires. We stand for a kinder, more tolerant attitude. Shouldn’t that be everyone?” We couldn’t have said it better ourselves. Make sure you catch DragSTER on the UK punk circuit.
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