The Witzard

Don't Sleep 2023 band photo (CREDIT: unknown) Whoever said "lightning only strikes once" clearly has not met Dave Smalley. From being right in the middle at the birth of US Hardcore Punk with D.Y.S. to creating the blueprint of Melodic Hardcore with Dag Nasty, from helping to invent Pop-punk as we know it with ALL to finding himself in the middle of the West Coast Punk explosion of the 90's with Down By Law: Smalley was always on the forefront every time Hardcore Punk stretched its envelope. While others may use a legacy like that as an excuse to take it a little slower, Dave Smalley has no intention to rest on his laurels and keeps writing new music and releasing records. When he founded Don't Sleep with fellow East Coast Punk Rockers Garrett Rothman, Tony Bavaria, Jim Bedorf, and Tom McGrath in 2017, the world was more than excited about seeing him front a fast yet melodic Hardcore band again. Being motivated by the immense positive feedback, Don't Slee...

Bloomington, Indiana's genre-eschewing own A Vulture Wake (A.V.W.) recently unleashed their second EP of the year! Animal is a progressive powerhouse of hooks and riffs—five songs continuing the band's ongoing movement to "Do No Harm; Take No Sh*t," while taking aim at the powers that be, inner demons, and a bleak future on this dying planet. A.V.W. now offers solutions to the issues raised in their previous releases—commit violence, give in, leave the planet, sleep? The choice is ours. Animal follows the critically-acclaimed and fan-embraced Kingdom EP—also, produced, engineered, and mixed by Mike Kennerty (The All-American Rejects, Direct Hit!, These Enzymes.) Just this past Friday, both the Animal EP and its predecessor, Kingdom, were collectively packaged together as the 11-track One.Kingdom.Animal album. Available on colored vinyl through Thousand Islands Records and limited to 500 LP's, it comes with a lyric sheet insert and black inner-sleeve and featur...

Scott Reynolds with Anti-Flag at The Friffid, Australia, 2016 (SOURCE: AAA Backstage) New York-based artist Scott Reynolds has become something of a legend amongst underground Punk/Hardcore die-hards. Reynolds is widely known and beloved for his grizzled tone, acrobatic-like vocal abilities, and short time spent with Descendents' off-shoot ALL from 1989-93. Scott "Ratchet" Reynolds has intermittently performed and/or recorded with the likes of The Bonesaw Romance, Fastgato, Goodbye Harry, The Pavers, Scott Reynolds & The Steaming Beast, Three Car Pile-up, TonyALL, and, most recently, cover band Wuttin Tarnation with members of Just Like Them & Fuzzy Dustmite. For his latest solo effort, Chihuahua In Buffalo , worked with his former ALL bandmate Bill Stevenson, who produced and engineered the album, along with Andrew Berlin & Jason Livermore, at his own The Blasting Room. It's the first time Reynolds & Stevenson have worked together on an album since ...

"SUNNY & SHARY Beach Umbrella Rental" (Artist Unknown) Chris Shary is a Descendents/ALL -affiliated artist, drama teacher, father, husband, dork, and self-described "Grade "A" [Certified] smarta$$." Shary has been scribblin' pictures of mostly Punk bands ever since 1988 and had a short-lived music career himself; making records with his own bands, Evel Knievel Rice, Pilot Car , and Sizewell , as well as performing back-up vocals on 7Seconds' Leave A Light On and Down By Law 's Blue. While most well-known for his work with Descendents/ALL , Chris Shary has created album artwork, T-shirts, concert flyers, etc. for blink-182 , The Dead Milkmen, The Dickies , FIELD DAY (ex-Dag Nasty,) The Germs , Good Riddance, The Queers , Redd Kross, Rise Against , and Teenage Bottlerockets. Chris Shary designed the artwork for Descendents' Cool to Be You, Hypercaffium Spazzinate, SpazzHazard 12-inch EP, and and "Feel This" 7-inch flexi...

I. Atom Age Industries: MISFITS ENAMEL PINS WAVE 2 (@atomageindustries) Atom Age Industries is a Bellflower, California-based clothing company and store-front. They re-produce and sell goods from artists such as AC/DC, Blondie, The Cramps, D.O.A. Dead Kennedys, FEAR / Lee Ving, Hüsker Dü, The Misfits, The Police, and Suicidal Tendencies. Atom Age primarily sells T-shirts, records, and enamel pins and carries a host of limited edition capsule collections for the above-listed artists, as well as countless others. Etched beer mugs/glasses, letterman jackets, enamel pins, patches, can & bottle cozy's, skateboard decks, button packs, CD's, silk-screened posters, and other assorted items. These newly-released Misfits Wave 2 Enamel Pins are now available... just in time for the next (fingers crossed!) Original Misfits show! Wave 2 features 6 glossy "BULLET," "FIEND EYES," "HALLOWEEN," "EVIL NEVER DIES," "DIE, DIE, MY DARLING" ...