Henry Fonda

Henry Fonda is a powerviolence band from Berlin Germany. I think this was the last interview we did for issue 2 (2009).
They got back with us fast  and with great answers.  

B: First what is the PxVx/Grindcore scene like in Germany?
HF: Well to be honest there is no real powerviolence scene over here. I mean we have a handfull of bands that play or that played powerviolence but those bands are mostly the only ones of the their style on a show line up. There is a cool scene for trash stuff and a lot of bands popping up from time to time everywhere in Germany.
Go check out Ape Attack, A Bit of Braindead, The Omnipresent Desease, Nihil Baxter, Over the Top, Memorial, Infested. some of them got small powerviolence influences but mostly play fast trash hardcore. For grindcore there is a lot of stuff going on here but to be honest i cant realy give any good infos about that cause we mostly play the hardcore shows and grind bands seem to play the metal shows. Anyway if you want to know more about fast german bands check out these: Quattro Stagioni, Cold War, A Bit of Braindead, Ape Attack, Omnipresent Desease, Hungry Lungs, Spastix, Bob Roony, Over the Top, Infected, Memorial to name a few that came into my mind right now. For grind check Sanitys Dawn, Cancer Clan, Cyness, Yacoepse.
B: What bands influenced you guys when you were starting?
HF: I guess everyone of us got his own influences but we were all listening to a lot of more traditional PV stuff to the beginning like infest, Spazz or Neanderthal and realy got into newer stuff like Hummingbird of Death, Punch, Weekend Nachos later. for my part im realy influenced by older Magrudergrind and Quattro Stagioni, our drummer is more into d-beat and trash, rich our guitarplayer is heavily into Infest and thomas loves the new Coke Bust and holds up the flag for traditional grind stuff like Napalm Death or Phobia. But we are not limited to that. Everyone is active in other bands that play completly diffrent stuff like for example tech metal, atmospheric sludge or some straight forward hardcore stuff so we draw our influences from a lot of other crap and even a lot of non hardcore stuff. also most of the band got a faible for old german punk.
B: The song titles seem a bit humorous, would you say they have a social/political message, does the band have any sort of message that drives it?
HF: Well our lyrics are realy important to us even if it looks like joking because songs tend to be so short there is always a message behind it. There are a few songs about the so called mainstream hardcore fashion thing, songs that deal with topics as homophobia or racism, songs about how we hate work, songs about the current police state thing that goes on over here or a song about squatting. We even have songs about powerviolence itself or pizza. So we are not limited to be a 100 percent serious band but most of our lyrics are serious and not funny at all. Its important for us to speak about certain topics at shows like violenct dancing and sexism in our scene for example and we like to have a dialouge with people cause we think that punk is about sharing ideas and not only consuming shit and going back to all day life after a show. We have lyric sheets with english explanations that we hand out at shows so people know what we sing about. We have them uploaded on our myspace so get them if you like.
B: You seem pretty lacks when it comes to copyrights, how do you feel about copyright laws. Do you think the internet has changed the way bands look at copyrights?
HF: To be honest I dont care if people download our songs or play covers or use them for compilations or stuff like that. I mean this is not the mainstream. No evil music buisness shit. We dont make a living out of this and thats why we dont need to care about that. for example downloading music. Major labels and pseudo major labels they say that it is false to do so but for smaller bands this realy helpful. I mean fanzines are not that popular anymore (wich sucks) and I dont find them often at shows specialy here in Berlin and there has to be something that keeps you informed about music and politics. So there is the internet with a massive amount of blogs, sites, myspace profiles and so on. everyone can take part in it and you get information realy fast. Its a usefull tool. A friend told you about band xy you go and check them out download their demo and if you like them you go see a show or buy something from them to support them if you like. I dont think that this is false. The other thing we do and thats what you mean I guess is the whole trading thing. I mean  I was realy into trading releases a while ago and the thing that always pissed me off was the postage rates. So why not making it available on the internet and people can make their own copies or print their own shirts? I mean this is good for the distro itself cause money comes in to support new projects and releases and this is good for the band cause it is free promotion and free distribution for them. If the band gets some tapes for themselfs then for me this works fine. I hope this was understandable if not drop me a line and i will awnser it.
B: LoFi vesres studio recording? Proes and cons to each? Do you run your own label?
HF:  Well studios cost money and thats were it mostly stops. We are poor we try to finance our band with the money we make selling merch. So there is not enough money to go to a studio so we do it ourselfs. Rich and me are trained a bit in recording and we have some shitty equip that makes it possible to make recordings for Fonda and other bands. The result is not always great but its listenable for us so its ok. Lo-fi recording can be done for free so its always a good solution for smaller runs of releases (the more diy way) but they mostly not good for representing a band. Good quality recording is mostly expensive and dont has to be representive for a band too but i guess its more fun for your ears. Next time we record we try to record  everything live in a studio so because we dont use overdubs we should be able to get through our shit in time and without loosing too much money. 
About the label thing. everyone except francois our drummer is running a label. Thomas is running his thing called Noones Innocent Records, Rich and me are running various small run labels such as Yehonala tapes, Obi Wahn, Toxic Kids.
B:  It looks like you guys are planning a European tour, any thoughts about coming to the USA?
HF: Yeah we are planning a us tour right now. We think about coming over for september 2010 and play a east cost tour. so it is in the starts and we just need to start booking shows and fix the timeplan ... So if anyone that is reading this can help out with a show on the eastcost or got any good tips for us or email lists or stuff like that get in touch with us we could need some help. tom@yehonalatapes.de
B: Do you guys have jobs, were you able to work them out with the tour if so? What is the average age of the band members?
HF: Well Francois is 20 right now, Thomas is 27 (not sure) and Rich and me are 23. All of us got jobs and its quite diffucult to get free from work sometimes but it always works out. We realy want to play as many shows as we can if there is a show in the week we play it and go to work tired the next day. Thats it. Most of our free days we have at work we use for playing tours. Work sucks haha
B: Why Henry Fonda for the name or was it just random?
HF: It was more random I guess. Rich and me came up with some names and we liked that one. But I realy like that film with Charles Bronson and Fonda... Dont know what its called in English.
B: What are your future plans for the band?
HF: Well European tour, US tour, releasing a shitload of wax, writing a shitload of songs so we can do so, South East Asia tour and more shows outside of that shithole Berlin. 
B: Any last words or anything you would like to let people know?
HF: Good luck with your zine. Thanks a lot for the intrest and the questions i hope the awnsers are understandable. up the punx.