This Bike Is A Pipe Bomb – “This Is What I Want”

First off, I love the name of the band. They invoke Woodie Guthrie’s famous “This Machine Kills Fascists” warning writ on his acoustic guitar. And they play Country-punk, which is an interesting proposition. You think it’s not going to work, and you will make jokes about Country-Rap, but for this band it totally works and is totally awesome. It becomes neither exactly country nor punk, as it falls into none of the traps of either genre. I would prefer to call it “Superstomp” or “Honky-core” or perhaps “Power-Folk.” Yeah “Power-Folk,” I think the band would like that one.

But I like this because I feel like it is music for punks made by punks. Remembering back to college, when the punk kids played at open mic they played acoustic protest songs. They were into socialism and food not bombs, but weren’t into the Sex Pistols or the classic clichéd punk. They liked Ani Difranco and Dylan. Those kids would like this a lot. It’s protest music, and it is purely positive.

I found this song after getting turned on to Against Me! by Meg 5 from WGSU. (More on Against Me! perhaps in the future. Thanks Meg 5!) The website declares “If it ain’t cheap, it ain’t punk” and all the CDs are $5 each! At that price, even I can afford their complete discography!

The lyrics start with “This is what I want: I want all the punks to take to the streets, playing their guitars. This is what I want. It’s what I want!” And from there on it’s just great. Listen for yourself.

This Bike Is A Pipe Bomb – “This Is What I Want" link

I have two other bits to sell you on this song. One: Check out a live version of this song from a show the band played at some place called The Bike Barn on June 22, 2005. It is available at www.archive.org. At that show, one of the band’s members got sick and the other band member left with them, which left only the drummer, Ted. Apparently members of other bands on the Plan-It-X record label helped out. The lo-fi recording has someone endearingly yelling “AW COME ON” after a false start and numerous other people singing along. Anyway, it totally sounds fun and great.

Two: members of this band also have another band called The Blank Fight with not Ted on drums but Aaron Cometbus, of the fantastic punk ensemble Pinhead Gunpowder and the indispensable Cometbus fanzine. It would be impossible to get more punk than that.