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On Tyranny: Deaf Club Guitarist Denounces Trumpists for Taking ‘Pride’ in Racism, Sexism

Posted in Features, Interviews, On Tyranny, On Tyranny with tags , , , , on 10/16/2025 by Kurt Orzeck

In the latest installment of On Tyranny, Brian Amalfitano (Deaf Club, ACxDC) criticizes the right wing in America for abusing free speech to further their racist, sexist, anti-immigrant and fascist aims—including, shockingly, in quarters of the punk-rock underground. Amalfitano also provides insight into Deaf Club‘s newly released album, We Demand a Permanent State of Happiness (Southern Lord), what nihilism means in the guitarist’s point of view and how it might take longer than a generation to undo the catastrophic damage that the Trump regime continues to inflict upon America.

Following our Wednesday night conversation, Amalfitano touched base again with The Bad Penny to share sentiments expressed by a hero of his and of this website, Kurt Cobain: “If any of you, in any way, hate homosexuals, people of a different color or women, please do this one favor for us — leave us the fuck alone.”

Additionally, Newsweek reported Thursday that the Trump administration indeed may double it’s “bailout” of Argentina to $40 billion, while the cost of extending the Obamacare subsidies that is apparently at the heart of the U.S. government shutdown would amount to about $35 billion for the next fiscal year. (Meanwhile, the same Congressional budget resolution has already granted $29 billion in new funding for ICE, swelling its budget to a size greater than the national military of all but 15 to 20 countries.)

Check out The Bad Penny‘s 43-part On Tyranny series, which The Bad Penny launched in the spring, here. Recent installments include interviews with Cosmic Reaper, MyVeronica, Planet on a Chain, Necrofier, Cheap Perfume, Bobby Conn and many more.

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On Tyranny: Cosmic Reaper’s Frontman Says ‘This Is a Class War … We Can Take the Power Back’

Posted in Features, On Tyranny, On Tyranny with tags , , , , on 10/15/2025 by Kurt Orzeck

The honorable Thad Collis, guitarist and vocalist for surging doom-metal squad Cosmic Reaper from Charlotte, North Carolina, blasts the oligarchy and warns that the metal underground will not be spared in Authoritarian America if we all don’t act immediately to stop the Trump regime. The band’s new album, Bleed the Wicked, Drown the Damned (Heavy Psych Sounds), is already a contender for best metal album of the year. Buy it here. Check out The Bad Penny‘s 42-part On Tyranny series, launched roughly around March, here.

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On Tyranny: Planet on a Chain Vocalist Says ‘A Lot of People Are Willing to Fight Hate in This Nation’

Posted in Features, Interviews, On Tyranny, On Tyranny, Videos with tags , , , , , on 10/01/2025 by Kurt Orzeck

In the latest installment of The Bad Penny‘s series On Tyranny, we enjoy a comfortable conversation with Planet on a Chain vocalist Dave Ackerman about terrifying topics like Authoritarian America, censorship, and why it’s imperative for the punk-rock community to fight fascism immediately.

We also discuss Planet on a Chain’s bracing new album, Ritual Routine, which drops Friday on Revelation Records. Order a copy here and check out the Oakland punks’ Bandcamp page here.

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On Tyranny: Feminist Punk Band Cheap Perfume Declares ‘White Supremacy Is Not Punk Rock’

Posted in Features, On Tyranny, On Tyranny, Videos with tags , , , , , , , , , on 09/30/2025 by Kurt Orzeck

Cheap Perfume don’t know how to talk cheap. Ahead of their new album dropping Friday, feminist punk quartet Cheap Perfume discuss Authoritarian America with rock journalist Kurt Orzeck as part of his ongoing series On Tyranny. Vocalist Stephanie Byrne and guitarist/co-vocalist Jane No open up about threats they’ve received, how the LGBTQ+ community is under attack and needs to band together now more than ever, and how they “implore artists to just say ‘fuck that’ to self-censorship.”

Preorder Cheap Perfume’s Don’t Care. Didn’t Ask, which comes out Friday on Snappy Little Numbers, here.

Check out the archive of The Bad Penny‘s ever-growing and increasingly popular On Tyranny series here.

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On Tyranny: Metal Band Malevich ‘Had a String of Shows Canceled for Some of Our [Pro-Palestinian] Activism’

Posted in Features, Interviews, On Tyranny, On Tyranny, Videos with tags , , , , , , on 09/29/2025 by Kurt Orzeck

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Last night, The Bad Penny had the distinct pleasure of catching up with one-half of Atlanta’s blackened post-death metal band Malevich: drummer/vocalist Sasha Schilbrack-Cole and guitarist Josh McIntyre. We talked a bit about Under a Gilded Sun, their new album, which hit the streets and the Interwebs late last month. But the bulk of our conversation revolved around how Authoritarian America is impacting musicians, as we had planned for the interview to be part of The Bad Penny‘s ongoing series On Tyranny.

Little did we know that we’d be speaking to two individuals whose intellectual capacity is as profound as their crushingly righteous music. Enjoy perhaps the best installment yet in The Bad Penny‘s On Tyranny series by watching the entire video above or on YouTube, or reading an abridged version of the conversation after the jump.

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On Tyranny: Ex-U.S. Navy Captain-Turned-Psych-Rock Musician Jeremy Moore Warns of Fascism

Posted in Features, On Tyranny, On Tyranny with tags , , , , , , , , on 09/24/2025 by Kurt Orzeck

Jeremy Moore, originator of Washington, D.C., avant-garde/psychedelic-rock collective Zabus, takes part in The Bad Penny‘s “On Tyranny” series to talk with music journalist Kurt Orzeck about the relationship between authoritarianism and societal inaction, and how his time serving as a U.S. Navy captain gives him a unique perspective on the rise of fascism in the U.S.

Go here for The Bad Penny‘s On Tyranny hub.

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On Tyranny: Metallica Teaches Trump Foe Gavin Newsom a Lesson – Fight Fire With Fire

Posted in Features, On Tyranny, On Tyranny, Videos with tags , , , , , on 09/24/2025 by Kurt Orzeck
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On Tyranny: Bobby Conn Doesn’t Mince Words About ‘Con Man’ Donald Trump

Posted in Features, Interviews, On Tyranny with tags , , , , on 09/05/2025 by Kurt Orzeck

“The goal of fascism is control and power. That’s the whole thing. That’s it. There’s no ideology beyond that. … Maybe we’ll make it through this. But I don’t know for sure.”
-Bobby Conn

Chicago’s own Bobby Conn is a king among troubadours, a musician’s musician, and yet also a musician who fights for the people, á la Billy Bragg. His last name is perfectly ironic, as Conn is best known for speaking truth to power and dutifully serving as a protest musician since he started playing music in 1989 with the avant-garde group Conducent. Five years later, that band broke up and Conn embarked upon his journey as a solo artist, which resulted in eight studio albums.

His ninth, Bobby’s Place, just arrived in late August. It’s pretty far out there, dubbed a “split-personality” record in which the first half tells a fantastical story about him living on an astral plane, while the second half imagines him as the star of an alternative-reality workplace sitcom named “Bobby’s Place.” The project captures and sustains the eccentric personality that Conn has embraced throughout his career, which has showcased him as a performance artist, glam-rock devotee and unabashedly outspoken critic of American politics and culture.

When The Bad Penny interviewed Conn via video before the release of Bobby’s Place, he noted that it is his least political record to date. That said, he told Splendid Magazine in 2008 that “All the records that I’ve done are a critique of what’s going on in contemporary America.” And with that in mind, Bobby’s Place can’t be considered detached from reality, even if some of the storylines he tells take place in an alternate reality.

That debate aside, we invited the highly politically opinionated legend to participate in our ongoing series On Tyranny, and he graciously and enthusiastically obliged.

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On Tyranny: ‘You’re Telling My Kids They Can’t Read This Book?’ Author Andrew Laties Rails Against Book Bans

Posted in Features, On Tyranny, What You Readin' For? with tags , , , , , , , on 08/31/2025 by Kurt Orzeck

“The majority of Americans are angry about this idiocy. There will come a tipping point.
The majority will fight back and win.”
-Andrew Laties

Andrew Laties isn’t your typical free-speech advocate. The decorated author co-founded the annual Easton Book Festival in Pennsylvania, The Children’s Bookstore in Chicago, the Chicago Children’s Museum Store and the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art Bookstore in Massachusetts. In some respects, he is Donald Trump’s greatest nemesis: He is omnipresent thanks to the aforementioned institutions he established across the country, he won’t be bullied (as he was in the past), he doesn’t mince words or self-censor but rather speaks from the heart with unfiltered ferocity, he is an outspoken champion of free-speech who refuses to be silenced, and he is prepared to battle the Trump administration’s book bans to the bitter end.

In other words, Laties is one of us. Even if you don’t place censorship and book bans high on your list of priorities, whether you deem the issues to be political or not, he’s fighting for your rights too. His previously detailed his crusade in the book Rebel Bookseller: Why Indie Businesses Represent Everything You Want to Fight For – From Free Speech to Buying Local to Building Communities. Last month, he unveiled his latest work, the very timely You’re Telling My Kids They Can’t Read This Book? Our Hundred-Year Children’s-Literature Revolution and How We’ll Keep Fighting to Support Our Families’ Right to Read.

When Laties reached out to The Bad Penny, it was a no-brainer to invite him to participate in our ongoing series On Tyranny, inspired by the Timothy Snyder handbook of the same name. Here is the exchange in which we thoroughly enjoyed partaking today with Laties, a hero in the sickening, unbelievable and yet very real battle to save democracy for us all, and not just the livelihoods of artists and dissenters, but their right to exist in American society.

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