Few and far between are the bands that take you by total surprise, hitting you upside your head and knocking you to the ground with pure musical enjoyment.
Youth Avoiders from France are one such band.
Blending Hardcore and Punk into a very seamless sound that holds the passionate fury of early hardcore while having enough jangly guitars and attitude to make No Hope For the Kids & Autistic Youth feel a bit envious; Youth Avoiders come straight at you, hit you, and keep on rolling throughout the all too short 7 song, 14 minute offering.
Sometimes less is more, and after a near 3-month infatuation with this band, its still holding a firm place in my playlist (as is their split with the equally great Zombies Are Pissed!); so we'll cut right down to it-
Youth Avoiders take everything that distinguished a band like No Hope For the Kids from others just rehashing HC Punk worship (those melodic leads, furious guitars with that ever so clean sound instead of over driven distortion) and funnel it down through a near garage punk sound while including those nearly dueling vocals that some times shout, sometimes sing, to give them similarities to some of my personal favorite Autistic Youth songs (such as "You Can't Take It All Back" & "Find Me Here")- all the while doing it in a way that does not sound borrowed or emulated.
While there isn't a bad track here, the songs "Joy" & "Acid Feedback" get the most attention at the moment. The "breakdown" or temp change near the end of Acid Feedback is simply fucking incredible. Simple, but with a real punch. Enjoy!
The demo is currently available on vinyl as well as their newish split 7inch with Zombies Are Pissed!
For more info and some other equally good French/European bands, check out their website:
Youth Avoiders Website
DOWNLOAD: Youth Avoiders - "Demo 2010"
I also did a short interview with singer Chris, who I had contacted after first being blown away by the band; who was more than friendly and helpful with running copies of their stuff.... Thanks again, Chris!
1. How did Youth Avoiders come together?
Youth Avoiders started in October 2009 with Bastien, who played in a band called Youssouf Today and moved to Paris to train to be a male nurse, Christoph who's German and moved to Paris to study politics, he used to play in a band called Drop The Bomb, and finally Marlon and I used to play in a band called Toad Flanders until we quit in 2008 when I moved to Liverpool, UK for a year. When I came back home in 2009, I met Bastien and Christoph at 2 different gigs in a week time or so. As we were all looking for a band, we decided to book a rehearsal studio and we started from the guitar riffs Christoph had composed at home.
2. What does the band name mean?
Well, our band name hasn't got a really defined meaning. The fact that we had a few songs in a short time after our first practice, and that we had to play our first show one month later rushed us in the search of a band name. In the beginning we didn't really know where to go with our music and lyrics, we just did it influenced by old school bands, so we had to pick a name which sounds both punk and "old school". We like the idea that this name could have different meanings. To us, it means like we are the youth, punk rock is the youth, and we are surrounded by youth avoiders who don't care about underground culture, who don't want to understand nor face it.
3. What have you done as a band so far (recording/shows) and what do you hope to do in the future?
So far we've recorded a 7-track demo at Max's home studio (he also plays with us at some shows on 2nd guitar and he plays in 2 bands called Haute Couture and Black Spirals) which has been released on cassette, and a year later, after it was sold out from the band and from most of the labels, we decided to give it a second life on 7" vinyl. Recently, we also recorded 3 songs that have been released on a split 7" with our friends Zombies Are Pissed! From Caen, Normandy.
We played about 30 gigs, mostly in the Paris area, but also in the UK and in other areas in France. We are playing a festival in Germany in June; we're excited about that and eager to play there.
4. At this time, what are things like in the Paris/French Punk and Hardcore scenes?
I think the punk/hardcore scene is alright in France, we've got good bands and quite a lot of foreign bands touring in Europe. The scene is probably not as big as it is in Germany for example, we've got less venues which allow punk/hardcore bands to play, and less people going to the shows, but we are doing our best to "keep the scene alive", and we're having fun.
5. Is it easy or hard to go to other countries such as Italy, Espana, England, Belgium, and other surrounding countries? I ask, because it is something a little different for us here in the US where the country is so big and travel from state to state is fairly simple most of the time.
It depends on how good and "popular" your band is (even if some really good bands remain unknown), but I think yeah, it's quite easy to tour in Europe as there are no more identity controls at frontiers for European countries who signed Schengen Agreement. You can easily drive from one country to another. You need contacts, people motivated to put up a gig for you and then give your best when playing live. In my opinion that's the best about DIY touring and playing in a band: meet new friends, visit places you've never been to and have fun.
6. Any smaller or new bands from France/Europe people should listen to? Any good zines?
It's hard to answer exhaustively to this question. We've got a list of bands mostly from France on our website that everybody should check (http://youthavoiders.free.fr/linkseng.htm), and, in the case you've been through all these links and you still want more, send me an e-mail (bbqchicken AT hotmail DOT fr). The euro bands that we're listening to at the moment are Eagulls (UK), a lot of bands from the Nordic Area like U.X. Vileheads, Herätys, Terrible Feelings, etc. From Germany there is Dean Dirg, Press Gang, Idle Hands and finally from France there is: Police Truck and Zombies Are Pissed! From France.
Some really good upcoming bands from France at the moment:
- Sport from Lyon, they play a mix of American Football and Latterman-like emo punk
- There is also Cycle To from Paris who are also in this kind of music style
- Haute Couture, with Seve from Autistic Youth (Portland, USA) on drums, Max (who also plays with Black Spirals and us on 2nd guitar), Hervé (who used to play with Miles Away), and Julien (No Guts No Glory). They play early Poison Idea-like hardcore punk.
If you are an English-speaking fanzine amateur, I would suggest you read Just Say Yo! made by Nabil, he just released a new one, it's well made and very interesting, check it out:http://justsayyo.wordpress.com/
We've got loads of other fanzines in France but almost all in French, simply because we're not very good at writing in English :)
7. Any last words, comments?
Thank you very much for your interest, it's always good to know people sharing the same passion and showing interest in what you do, even if they're living on a different continent. It really means something to us. Thanks again and keep up the good job you're doing with this blog !
