The powers that be have, ironically, made life easier for Anti-Flag as Truepunk discovers from bassist Chris #2.

Pittsburgh punk protagonists Anti-Flag owe much to the American Warped tour, the popular annual music festival with which the veteran quartet has virtually grown up.

Interview by Steve Tauschke with bassist Chris #2 of Anti-Flag.

“We played two shows on the Warped tour in 1999 on small side stages and the next year we were a second stage band,” says Chris #2 (born Chris Barker) on the phone from Pennsylvania, “so I felt we were really starting to have an impact and gain some ground as a band. It’s an eye-opening experience when you see a tour where five to ten thousand people were coming out. And it wasn’t just one person walking away from the Anti-Flag show energized and empowered but a lot of people were connecting with our music and our ideas in the same way that we do. We are back again this year so we have a lot of history with this tour and a lot of landmarks in our ‘career’ have been defined through it.”

The ever-expanding Warped caravan has in recent years provided Anti-Flag with an ideal platform from which to voice their dissenting views, albeit via an old school punk soundtrack. The group’s latest album For Blood and Empire certainly tackles with aplomb what they regard as the underhanded forces of global ‘evil’; the CIA, 10 Downing Street and most topically, their interpretation of American colonial militarism.

“Any time through history where you have a war or a conflict of human interest whether it be through violence or political policy, then that’s going to influence art whether it’s painting or music or poetry - and I think that’s going on right now,” says Chris. “We’re seeing more and more artists come out not only standing against this war in Iraq but around the world. I think that’s the silver lining. It’s a total cliché but sometimes shit needs to get really bad before it gets any better and I think that’s where we’re at, another paradigm shift in our world’s history.”

Inspired by the explosive punk template of the Dead Kennedys and The Exploited, Chris, vocalist-guitarist Justin Sane, drummer Pat Thetic, and vocalist-guitarist Chris Head believe this nation’s foreign policy needs a rethink, citing local comedian David Cross’ satirical observation that ‘a war on terror is like a war on jealousy – you’re never going to end it!’.

“It’s unfortunate but in America we live in a country full of misinformed people and the reason they’re misinformed is because they watch network news everyday,” says Chris. “And that makes them afraid and once they’re afraid they can’t help but continue to watch and have that cycle of fear over and over. We as a band are trying to break out of that and say ‘you don’t need to be afraid all the time, you can be constructive and find out what’s happening in this world for real’.”

In their early days, Anti-Flag found themselves lumped in with the so-called unpatriotic minority. Now the tables seemed to have turned.

“It’s definitely far easier to be in Anti-Flag today than it was back then,” says Chris with a touch of irony. “With September 11 they – and I mean the people in power in the world – have made their bed, and in fact made it easier for us to be in a band. The error of their ways has been brought to life and frankly the chickens are coming home to roost.”

So does the fight ever wear you down?

“It doesn’t wear the four of us down because we love what we do, we love this band and the music we create and our artistic outlet. Beyond that, the celebration of all the people coming together at any show we play is more than we could ever ask for. I feel the band today is bigger than it’s ever been maybe because of the political landscape - or maybe because people just like the way it sounds.”