INTERVIEW: PETE CHRAMIEC PART I

Photo courtesy of Atomic Action Facebook page

To coincide with my interview with Verbal Assault vocalist Christopher Jones, here is the first part of a conversation I had with the bands’ guitarist, Pete Chramiec. Although the line of questioning may be similar for both interviews, I’m deciding to run them in separate installments as both conversations yielded different answers and insights into the band history. Perhaps later, I will combine both interviews into one, long-form piece to be printed somewhere. Who’ll print it I don’t know — maybe me? I’ll give it some thought.

In the first part of Petes’ interview, we talk about his acceptance into the burgeoning Rhode Island Hardcore scene, the formation of Verbal Assault, their first gigs, and the bouts of diarrhea that came along with them for Pete.

Tony Rettman: How did you become aware of punk rock? 
Pete Chramiec: I had a pretty cool older sister who was bringing home all the perfect records you’d wanna hear as a little kid. The Ramones, The Clash, and XTC were my top three. I went to see The Clash on the Combat Rock tour in 1982 by myself. My mom dropped me off and I wore this really stupid outfit. Christopher Jones and I were friends since nursery school and he started getting into the more underground Hardcore stuff. I remember the first early Hardcore stuff he had was a little too gnarly for me. The Clash is my favorite band and even their early stuff was pretty poppy when in comparison to The Nihilistics or early Black Flag. So, I wasn’t sure if I was totally on board with it. But then we started getting the regional compilation records like Not So Quiet On The Western Front and This Is Boston Not LA and that’s where it all exploded for me. That was the summer after eighth grade. I’ve always been obsessed with maps, so getting the geographically oriented compilation records was perfect for me. I could picture the band in a place and connect it to a map. It did something to my brain where I wanted to know about every single geographical chapter of Hardcore. Then reading Maximum Rock ‘N’ Roll with all the scene reports, it became a very geographical thing that fascinated me and I wanted to see all of it. 

How did you find out there was a local Hardcore scene? 
There was an older band called Big World. They were probably about fifteen years older than us and were more of a Johnny Thunders-type punk rock band. Me and Chris snuck into one of their shows and I think it might have been Big World opening for Johnny Thunders. It was a daytime show at a bar. That was pretty cool. It was the first loud, small club show I’d ever seen. From there, a slightly older crew of surfers and skaters intercepted us when they saw us skateboarding. Doug Ernest, who became Verbal Assaults’ drummer, grinded up to us on Broadway, gave us the once over, and invited us over to where his band Vicious Circle was practicing. If my life ever became a movie, it would start with that first Vicious Circle practice we saw. The guitar player strapped a Les Paul on me, I started playing it and then he told me to step on the distortion pedal and it was just this magical moment of hearing a distorted Les Paul. We bought instruments right after that. 

What were the other early bands from the Rhode Island Hardcore scene? 
Vicious Circle was in Newport and Idle Rich was from Barrington. They were the big brothers that coached us along. From there, it was Verbal Assault, Positive Outlook, and about ten other bands sprouted up that were a little bit younger. For a tiny little region, we had a lot going on. 

I should mention The Proletariat, too. They were the local band that was a tier above everyone else by being a seriously good band. We played with them a bunch and they were always encouraging. The singer Richard Brown did deliveries for an auto parts chain. If he saw skaters anywhere in Newport, he’d pull over and chat with us. 

Being in such close proximity to Boston, were they an influence due to being one of the first Hardcore Punk scenes in America? 
We were blown away that these bands were only a few hours away and we could see them all. The early Boston years were fucking amazing. We saw all the heavy hitter Boston bands up there and then they came to Providence a bunch. I can’t remember if SSD ever played in Rhode Island but all the other bands did. Mark McKay who played drums in Slapshot adopted us and was our main Boston contact. He and Hank Pierce were the two friendly Boston guys. A lot of those bands were older and it was hard to talk to them when you were a pimply little child. 

Did you witness the change over into Metal with those Boston bands? 
It was honestly kind of a bummer when The F.U’s turned into The Straw Dogs because they were my favorite Boston band. Hardcore was still fresh for us and these older guys were getting second guitarists and doing Heavy Metal and it wasn’t exactly great Metal to my ears. Springa wasn’t a great Metal singer. He was an excellent Hardcore singer, but I don’t think he really pulled it off. That’s just my opinion. So maybe Boston going in that direction is why we got more D.C-centric. 

How did Verbal Assault form? 
It came together the summer after eighth grade. It’s embarrassing, but I remember air guitaring at Greg Lyons’ house and we started talking about forming a band and Chris Jones was also talking about starting a band. Greg was more popular so I thought it might be more fun to be in a band with him. Chris was more bookish and serious, but it was pretty obvious he had his shit together. We didn’t get our instruments until the beginning of ninth grade I think. I was playing through my dads’ old stereo amplifier head. It was me, Chis and Nick Barbato. We were all in the same grade. Tom Gorman joined us for a little while before he left for college. Vicious Circle was really fucking good so the bar was set high. Being cocky young kids, it always felt competitive; like everyone was trying to shred harder. Skateboarding crossed into the music thing because it had the same vibe as being at the ramp and trying to do it better than the next person. By ninth grade, Newport was exploding with music and skateboarding. It was really fun. 

Do you remember anything from the first Verbal Assault show opening for the Circle Jerks at The Living Room in November of 1983? 
Yeah, but it’s all in snapshots. I remember how magical everything looked all lit up on stage. I think we played our whole set as one song. I don’t think we stopped in between any of the songs. We were always over practiced and over ready and overeager. For all our first shows at The Living Room, I would get bowel evacuating diarrhea right before we played due to being nervous. It seemed like for all our first shows there, I would tune-up and then run over to power wash the toilet. 

Maybe that was the advantage of being a Hardcore band in Rhode Island?  You got the chance to open for a band like The Circle Jerks where if you were from Boston or New York, that slot would have been taken by the big band from that city. 
That’s a great point. There were enough bands by that point that everyone got their chance to play. It would usually be a band like Suicidal Tendencies headlining and all the bands from Newport opening for them. 

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