INTERVIEW: Shooting Daggers are bringing Queer kids to the front with swagger and sincerity
With the fury of a hurricane, Skate Punks Shooting Daggers are using their blistering, breakneck Hardcore to remind you that "Queercore isn't a genre. It's a movement"
Queerness in Hardcore has been around almost as long as Hardcore has existed, with many crediting its first appearance in the scene to the J.D.s zine that first appeared in 1985, and ever since it has been hard to dissect Queerness from Punk from any conversations around the meaningful impact of the genre.
In recent years, we’ve been lucky enough to see bands made up entirely of Queer people distributing a budge to misogyny and microaggressions in the live music world - but there is no doubt that there is still a way to go. We aren’t out of the woods just yet, with presumptuous promoters, sound engineers and venue managers still offering shirking looks to Queer people as though they don’t know what they’re doing with their gear. It’s a thinning crowd, thank goodness, but it’s still out there.
Perhaps the thing that has brought the most people to Hardcore is the feeling that the listener is finally being spoken for, either personally or politically, and this couldn’t be clearer than with many women or Queer people cutting the pretences, doing away with the bullshit, and taking aim at the systems that weigh down on them and their peers.
Queercore was born from incredible frustration, not just with the wider world, but also from the Punk scene that it called home - and the fight going on is exemplified no better than with the riotous Queercore trio Shooting Daggers, a skatey, surfy, biting slice of Punk from London that doesn’t seem content with itself until it has made a significant impact on the perception of Queerness in modern Hardcore. Luckily, they’re already well on their way.
The new generation that shake things up
When Altopsy sits down with Shooting Daggers, it’s right before their return to London at New Cross Inn, on the final day of Reality Unfolds festival. It’s been a big weekend of big noise up until now, but luckily, the band’s latest record Love & Rage implies that there is still some empowerment and joy to be seen through the flailing arms. The record is a blistering example of a band using its excitement and adoration of its peers to fuel songs full of - well - love and rage, in equal measure.
The sincerity of their writing elevates Shooting Daggers onto the same upbeat playing field as Angel Du$t, Scowl, and Spaced - but with moments of staccato synths in Tunnel Vision and contemporary sing-alongs in the record’s title track, there is more to the band than just a soapbox and a circle pit.
“We didn’t want to limit ourselves to just do Hardcore,” says drummer Raquel Alves. “Like, if we were writing a song and it was like ‘this is really mellow,’ it doesn’t matter if it doesn’t sound too Punk or Hardcore, we’re gonna do it anyway. That’s why the album is a way different thing, because we didn’t want to just fit one label.” Labels aren’t really Shooting Daggers’ thing - but if they’re going to wear a badge of honour, they’re going to do it for the benefit of Queer people all across the scene.
“I think that’s important to keep a movement, it’s like Riot Grrrl in the 90s. It wasn’t a genre, it was a movement, and I feel that’s the same for us with Queercore, that’s why we like to use it as a label,” adds bassist Bea Simion. “If we have to use a label, we use that, because it’s not about the music, it’s about the message and who you are, and identity and representation.”
Though the band started with a blunter edge, with their 2019 Demo and subsequent singles serving as a breakneck statement of intent, there’s far more to Shooting Daggers than an immediate look would offer, especially as a band made entirely of Queer people with the hope to fly the flag for Queercore at every opportunity - and after playing shows with Amyl and the Sniffers, Higher Power and La Dispute, they’re clearly already making their mark. And these new audiences give the band ample opportunity to make their voices heard.
“If you only stay in the DIY scene and play for the same crowd all the time, the same people that are willing to listen to what you have to say, then people are not gonna change their mindset because they already agree with you,” lead vocalist and guitarist Sal Pellegrin says. “We need to confront people that would not agree or would not want to listen to what we have to say, so then they can maybe understand and reconsider their thoughts.”
To the front
“The good thing about Queercore is exactly the fact that it’s not a genre, it’s a movement,” says Bea. “That’s why we like to use it, because it doesn’t define what music we do. We come from the Hardcore scenes, we’re Punks. It’s a genre, but it’s so broad. These Queercore bands do the most different genres, so I think that’s why we choose it for us.”
Movement is clearly key for Shooting Daggers, and not necessarily movement upwards either as they prove themselves on lineups with modern Punk icons - everything that the band does is designed, no matter its style, to test the status quo and mobilise those under its thumb. Queerness is key to the identity of Shooting Daggers, and as the movement speeds up its action at an incredible pace, they intend to take it all the way to the top.
“The more we’ve grown as a band, the more we started having self-confidence in ourselves and knowing we know what we’re doing,” Bea says of the climb and the struggle against a male-dominated industry. “Many times, promoters will approach our driver and talk to our driver, because they are men, instead of talking to us. A lot of people assume that we don’t know what we’re doing. That didn’t change, it’s still like that - but what’s changed is our approach to it.
“We know that we know what we’re doing. We put our foot down a bit more on things. It’s important to recognise that you’re worth something and you shouldn’t let this man with a huge ego talk you down. It’s hard sometimes, they can really bring you down, they can ruin your day - but we are learning to not take it too personally now.”
Together we break the cycle
For Shooting Daggers, though Love and Rage has proven that the band has all of the fizzing excitement of a firework and songwriting capability to write anthems that could pack arenas in no time, the fight goes on. Though Hardcore and Punk have come on leaps and bounds since J.D.s, condescension and sneering hasn’t exactly vanished in the lives of Queer people fighting for their spot behind the mic and on the dancefloor, and as proven by a triumphant set at Reality Unfolds closed by an impassioned speech calling for change in the industry and a reminder of the late David Lynch’s will for people to “fix your hearts or die,” it’s clear that the band is well equipped to tackle it.
Even if Shooting Daggers took only what they stood for to the stage, it would be enough, but for the infinitely danceable and joyous riffs packed into their discography to do even more of the talking (along with their incoming music, which Sal beams is “gonna be even more us”), what the band stands for couldn’t be clearer. There will always be a stage for Shooting Daggers, and it seems that every time they step on it, the women and Queer people waiting for them will always step to the front. It’s a power that few bands have, and luckily for the Hardcore scene we have, and the Hardcore scene that we aspire to, Shooting Daggers wield it like it’s what they were born to do.
Listen to Love & Rage here: Spotify | Apple Music | Bandcamp
Into the Dungeon
Every week at Altopsy, I’d like to take you inside what I’m listening to as I dig around for the best alternative releases about. Take them for a spin and share your thoughts on social media or in the comments! For this week’s pick…
Vanguard - Rage of Deliverance (2020)
If I need to put any of my friends onto some good, invigorating, heavy shit, I’ll always point them in the direction of Rage of Deliverance by Vanguard. A mysterious project born out of lockdown, Vanguard dropped the hottest Vegan Straight Edge Beatdown EP you’ve ever heard and dipped, leaving behind a short legacy of six tracks that challenge, confront, and decimate.
There’s something in Rage of Deliverance that makes it so potent - perhaps it’s in the fact that the band hasn’t done anything since - but it simply doesn’t wear off. The riffs scrape away as the record’s lyrics pull no punches and put you directly in the chair, forcing you to face your role in the horrors that afflict animals worldwide. From an impactful opening speech by Philip Wollen, all the way through shimmying walls of guitar noise and its cacophonous conclusion, this EP is utterly gripping at its weakest, and life-affirming (or life-changing) at its strongest.
Listen to Rage of Deliverance here: Spotify | Apple Music | Bandcamp