Bad Religion

They say rock’n’roll is a young man’s game. Imagine what they say about punk.

Bad Religion never worried much about what “they” say, and neither should you. Go by the energy, go by the intent, go by the WORK – of which this classic, groundbreaking hardcore band could never be accused of avoiding.

Aside from essentially defining the California half-pipe punk blueprint, Bad Religion has defied the usual trend-shifts or values-ditched ubiquities of the usual punk band storyline and morphed along with challenging album after challenging album amid astoundingly consistent touring, retaining their core audience while roping in subsequent generations of anxiously energetic kids.

The band has long settled into the current lineup who have arguably enacted to most muscular Bad Religion to ever kick empties across a stage: Greg Graffin (vocals) and Jay Bentley (bass) join Brian Baker (guitarist since ’94), guitarist Mike Dimkich (8 years in), and drummer Jamie Miller, who’s already been with the band for six years.

Bad Religion is in an almost singular position in the history of punk. Having formed right on the heels of the original explosion, they led the west coast arm of hardcore’s birth, adding their chunky riffs, zooming harmonies, and viciously verbose lyrical punch to the basic bash of hardcore. Then the band continued to expand their pop-punk template through the ‘80s and into the indebted “neo-punk” sound of the early ‘90s and weathered the questionable dichotomies of the “alternative rock” era by doing what they’ve always done – releasing explosive album after album to consistent acclaim from fans and critics.

And if you’re positive there is no way they could keep doing the same thing all these years, you’d be right. They haven’t. They’ve continued to throw songwriting and production wrenches into the works so’s not to bore themselves or their never-diminishing following.

The re-rejuvenation started around 2007’s New Maps of Hell, with its titular nod to their classic debut album (How Could Hell Be Any Worse), matching that youthful fire with a deeper burn born of growing up through all the actual pain you worried might happen when you were a teen.

The Dissent of Man (2010) had the increasingly active professional author Greg Graffin unleash all the verbal venom he could most freely spew with his beloved punk band, while musically, the band delved into some varying tempos. Then, with True North (2013), Graffin got even madder, and the band followed suit. Then they immediately followed up with an album of rabid runs through holiday classics, Christmas Songs (2013), because why the fuck not. When Bad Religion is often described as “intellectual,” that doesn’t mean just their lyrics, it means their musical choices, like whipping up a completely unexpected and heartfelt Xmas record.

Six years passed, and one might’ve worried the band had been beaten down like every other good thing during the Trump years. But no! on 2019’s Age of Unreason, they gathered together 15 tracks of some of the best material of their career, adding a wee more production gleam suited to amping up the songs to get through all the dispirited noise of that time and mixing their perfect balance of dystopian dread and future hope into Age of Unreason.

Not that they had gone anywhere for those six years, except on tour, a lot. The current seven-year-running lineup can flesh out any of the band’s eras, but they seem perfectly suited for the band’s latter-day catalog that’s so vehemently fueled by the third-gear aggression of a punk band who is still out there playing with, gathering energy from, and inspiring the newest punk bands -- keeping these elder statesmen of punk sharp, incensed, and ready to go forward.

The band’s rep, as socially aware thought-provokers, can obscure the fact they’ve remained one of the most viscerally powerful live bands on the planet, remembering it’s the beats and riffs that get your ass off the couch in the first place.

Of course, being stuck to the couch was sometimes inescapable during our last terrible year of COVID fear. So once again, leaning into their smarts, Bad Religion concocted a recent online run of eight, chronologically curated, streaming live show docuseries, recorded at the Roxy in Hollywood as COVID reared its ugly ass. Two seasons of career-highlighting, fan-thanking ballyhoo, featuring reminders of the band’s development in the face of often simplistic skate punk pigeonholing.

When he’s not stomping on some festival stage in front of thousands somewhere, singer Greg Graffin is a professor and author who has released numerous books on history and personal survival. He even garnered the prestigious Rushdie Award for Cultural Humanism from the Harvard Humanist Chaplaincy in 2008.

And now, in 2021, Bad Religion has finally received its own long-awaited autobiography, Do What You Want: The Story of Bad Religion (out soon on paperback), credited to, of course, the whole band. While propped up on the band’s egalitarian legend, its focus is the long and moshing road of a band who probably would’ve laughed if you’d told their 20-something selves they’d be celebrating their 40th anniversary. Laughed, then strapped on their guitars and jumped out on stage again.

If you get to see Bad Religion – as they plan upcoming tours and festival shows by the end of the year – you’ll see that snotty 20-something is still kicking its way out.