I knew Dario Marić (from Bosnia and Herzegovina) since few years ago while he was still with his old (now disbanded) noisecore band named Šuga. When I met him again this year, he’s now played and involved in many projects; Ersterator, Diskonekcija, many others and the one I interviewed here is CHIKARA. This Raw Hardcore Punk/Crust band also involves a vocalist / lyricist named Johnny Roadkill (from Sweden), another active guy from Puta Malaria, Skitnaste Records/Netlabel and many others bands & projects. Check out this new but great band called CHIKARA which found in 2017. Get more information about them through the following conversation. – Interview by Trashnoiser
Hello Dario Marić. How are you? What was happened to your previous projects & bands, I mean Šuga?
Hello, I’m great and you? Well I have a lot of projects behind me, but Šuga doesn’t exist anymore, we all had our disagreements, mostly because of drugs and alcohol, so we just ended it, and I left it at that.
I’m here to interview your new band Chikara. When and how was this band get formed? Let us know what other bands you involved in beside of Chikara?
After I did a split with Puta Malaria, (my project involved was Ersterator), in November 2017, Skitnaste and I decided to combine our sounds, and that’s how Chikara was born. About my other bands that are active; there’s the newest one, Sarlah, hardcore punk, then there’s Millions of Dead Parazites (MxDxP), gorenoise, with Mariano Trump from Fekal Propulsion, Diskonekcija, crust punk, which ended up as a solo project, and then there’s my other solo project, Ersterator, noisy punk band about my favourite beer. Other than that there’s a few other bands that aren’t active anymore.
Who’s Johnny Roadkill, the person who put his vocals for Chikara?
He’s one of the best noisecore maniacs in the scene! I would say he’s best known for his one of a kind sound, where he’s committed to old school style of noise. Puta Malaria is one of his best projects, but he has many more, such as Anal Ricochet, Status: Kawakami, Fucking Fart, and many more which you can check out on his bandcamp (skitnaste.bandcamp.com). Another thing I would like to mention about him that he’s a great activist for animal and human rights and he’s such a big support to everyone in the scene.
Special question for Johnny Roadkill: What other bands / projects you played in beside of Puta Malaria?
Yes bro I’m Johnny and Roadkill is my artist name, Skitnaste is my label. Nice to talk to you too bro. My active projects are Anal Ricochet, Status: Kawakami, Fucking Fart, Nicki Minoise, Tarmförskjutning, Järnlunga and more. My inactive projects are Error Grinder, Klibbiga Fingrar, Major Krøsamaja, Häleri, Världelös, RUNK, Villfarelse, Tutorial Faceplant and more. Bands I’m in are 53704, WarTvictims, Mastürbate and Rattling Outlaws and I have done alot of collabs also.
How do you define and describe the musicstyle of Chikara? What sort of bands that influence your music direction?
Chikara is a raw crust punk band, the music style that influenced it the most is old school Balkan crust, mostly bands from the 80’s and 90’s and we try to stick to that old school-noisy style, while Skintase completes the band with his vocals and lyrics, and all that makes Chikara what it is. Bands that influenced the sound of Chikara the most are bands such as Faak Am See, Fight Back, AK47, Pas Maters and so on.
How’s the process of songwritings look like? Do you have a plan for each track, rehearse few times before recording or simply plug-play-and-record?
I simply plug-play-and-record the songs, and after that Roadkill writes the lyrics and adds the vocals. It doesn’t take us a lot of time to make the songs because we really have a lot of ideas. We usually make few tracks in one day.
So far (as for January 2018) how many releases have been released by Chikara? Give us a list of 10 most essential/important releases?
So far we have one EP and one album, and over 15 splits with other bands, and a lot of splits are currently in the making. I can’t really list 10 most essential releases, because every one of those had an impact on Chikara. Also, I really don’t wanna put any band we worked with above any other, we’re thankful for all of the support from every single one of them!
What are the lyrics all about?
We have a wide range of subjects in our lyrics. They’re about animal and human rights, against the system, against drug addiction, against wars and terrorism, about crust punk in general, and people in the scene. You can check some of our lyrics out on youtube, on our EP and album. I think its also worth to mention that at first they were in English, but now we switched to Swedish.
Do you guys play live / join any gigs?
Well as of now, it’s impossible for us to do that, first of all because I live in Bosnia and Roadkill lives in Sweden, but maybe in the future we will organize a gig, after we find another band member, because currently I’m the one playing the guitar and the drums, so we would definitely need another member for playing live.
What are the next plans and among the big target you set for Chikara?
Our biggest target is to be the band with the most splits, and become legendary because of it hahaha! But yeah, we have a lot of planned splits with punk, crust, grind, noise bands. Among those there are bigger bands such as Agathocles and some other, but we’ll keep those a surprise.
Last words please? Thank you.
First I would like to thank you so much for this interview, it’s special for us, as this is our first one. I would also like to thank Roadkill for his endless support, and a big thank you to all people who listen to the stuff we make, who support and are engaged in the noise scene, we really appreciate it. And to end this interview: WE ARE CHIKARA AND WE’RE HERE TO STAY!
*Replied on January 31, 2018
