Latvia - Riga

Latvia 2

“To begin with hc and punk bands are rare in Latvia. No major bands that everybody would know of.

There is one, but you could hardly call it punk...Inokentijs Mārpls. They're not a technical band. The fame they have is based on their humorous lyrics. Some translated from latvian to english are - I will wash my foot tomorrow, I will drink beer now!



Only a few people are really into hc music. And those who play it blend it with metalcore. Bands such as…

SideMind


Židrūns


The metal scene in Latvia is much bigger. Such bands as Skyforger, SIA Radikal, Sanctimony, Relicseed, Huskvarn are popular among all alternative people.

Also there are no straight edge bands (I'm a straight edge myself and it just pisses me off). It's due to the fact that the youth in Latvia are getting shit-face drunk and are not interested in moral values. They're too busy following all the trends. Now they're hipsters. Two years ago they were emos. A couple of years before that they were into hip-hop.

I think the hardcore and punk scene didn't catch on since it began in the early 80's. In that period of time Latvia was a part of USSR where you couldn't listen to the music you wanted and people just couldn't get the latest information about music trends.

It's different with metal. Early metal (Black Sabbath, Deep Purple, Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd) were popular in the world at the time. And people who got permission to travel (leave USSR) knew that those were the bands whose records you needed to take home. So it caught on. Just think about it. You can take home only one record from your trip. Which one will you choose? A band who you might have heard of, or a band you haven't...?”

Latvia 2

Latvia 1

I think the local scene is doing better now - now we can organize some shows with foreign hc bands and there are some new local bands:

Bikes Against the Machine (oldschool hardcore/bike punk)

Kastete


Defectives

Latvia

The latvian hardcore scene is not living its best days at the moment, mostly because of the economical situation in our country. For example in 2006-2007 we invited such bands as Gorilla Biscuits, Ignite, Madball, Death before Dishonor, No Turning Back, but nowadays all we can afford are some european or russian bands. This year we have had only 2 gigs of non-latvian bands - Ray (Russia) and The Vendetta (Italy). We simply can't afford to invite someone else.

Also the best days of latvian hardcore bands are in the past. All my favourite acts are disbanded now.

In.Stora

When My Authorities Fall

Vimaz Trīs Vārdi

Cita Attieksme

The only band which plays since 90's and still is alive is Kriegopfer from little Latvian town Saldus.

What I like about our scene is the strong sense of community. We don't care about nationality (it's a problem in Latvia, you know), are you hc-kid, skinhead (normal skinhead, not nazi of course) or punk and so on.
Our scene since the 90's, when it began, has not always had the typical attitude of most worldwide hc bands - it has been more crusty or anarcho-punk. Lyrics are anti-establishment, anti-capitalist, anarchist etc. Music also is more crust-punk influenced or metallic.

Lyrics are mostly in latvian. But for example band Vismaz Trīs Vārdi has translations of their lyrics in russian and english on their web page.

Also one of first latvian hardcore bands, Hope Dies Last has an album with english lyrics. Mostly lyrics deal with more worldwide problems, but, I think, for ex-USSR countries, the issue is how politics doesn't stop stealing and lying.