MISHKA Interviews CVLT Nation

MISHKA recently featured an interview with Sean on their “Bloglin,” so I wanted to re-share it with you on CVLT Nation! With all the interviewing we do of other people, it’s kind of nice when someone else asks us a question. What follows is the “5 Questions” from Mishka…

Text via: Mishka Bloglin

Here he is again, Sean Reveron, harbinger of the awesomely vile clothing line CVLT Nation, returns to the Bloglin, not in the form of a brutal Blackened Everything mixtape, this time in the flesh. Sean is an entrepreneur, underground music enthusiast, and purveyor of all that is heavy. Fortunately, he was able to answer five big ones on the intent of his new brand, the creative process that brought him to this point, and the state of metal in general. Escorting the public into a new epoch of foulness, this guy is on the cutting edge of fringe culture. Listen up.

Is Cvlt Nation something you do all on your own? You put out a lot of material outside of the design stuff such as mixtapes, album reviews, and all-around media articles, I can’t imagine you do that all by yourself?

Sean Reveron: No way…I couldn’t do it all on my own! My wife, Meghan, and I spearhead the project and do the majority of the blogging, like 60% of it. But we also have contributors from all over the world who are a part of the metal and punk scenes in their own areas, like in Ireland, Germany, Indonesia, England, New York, Texas, Cali – so we get a wide variety of coverage.

We don’t micromanage our bloggers at all, so they bring a lot of different perspectives and opinions to the blog. It’s really amazing that we have been able to connect with so many awesome and talented people from around the world, whether in music or art. The metal communities worldwide have been so supportive of what we are doing, and we see the site as a way to support creative people in the communities as well.
Read the rest of this rad interview after the jump…

Sean Reveron: Working with Rockers NYC made up some awesome years of my life, but it was time to move on, and it was just natural for me to gravitate towards punk and metal imagery and music because of my background as a part of those scenes in the 80s. CVLT Nation is a culmination of ideas I have had for years, all wrapped into one brand, and the first season we paid tribute to KVK with one of our shirts, Legion. KVK will always have a special place in my heart, but it was more of an art project than a real clothing brand.

Yeah, I’ve heard you’re a veteran of sorts in the early L.A. punk/hardcore scene. Did you grow up listening to the SST guys like Black Flag and The Minutemen or skate punk type stuff like Suicidal Tendencies or The Adolescents? Had any interesting experiences with the bands themselves or at the shows? I mean you must’ve seen some shit.

Sean Reveron: I was into all those bands as a youth…it wasn’t either or for me. Being that I’m a Venice local, when we all got into punk in the 80′s it was natural that I became a Suicidal Boy. They were our local band, so we had to rep our hood. More than that, everyone in Suicidal Tendencies were our homies. Some of my favorite moments happened hanging out at Suicidal Park (Mar Vista Park) before shows, plus all of the leagues we had, like the Suicidal Golf Club, Suicidal Softball League & Suicidal Bowling League. One of my favorite memories was New Year’s Eve, 1983 – Suicidal played a house party in Santa Monica & played all Sabbath covers. It was a huge kegger, and the cops came & tried to smash our heads in, but we escaped, jumping over fences, running wild in the streets!

I saw Black Flag play mad times in all sort of places. I remember seeing them at their reunion show at the Santa Monica Civic, that was rad…everyone who was ever in the band performed that night, it was pretty epic, & The Misfits opened up. The next day, The Misfits went into the studio in Los Angeles & recorded their last album, Earth A.D.. Another gnarly Black Flag gig was seeing them perform outside the federal building in Westwood. What made this gig extra special is that for once the L.A.P.D. could not fuck with us because we were on federal property, so we could do whatever the fuck we wanted to do. I was super lucky to have grown up in the LA punk scene, but one thing I want to stress is that we were the outsiders, the weirdos, the freaks – & we were one huge punk rock family.

I’m a hardcore punk and metal nerd myself and love the fact that you post reviews of underground releases that a lot of so called “headbangers” would have no clue about otherwise. Is extreme music just as much a part of the brand as the t-shirt designs and diy items you sell? What do you think about those who don’t listen to the music but embrace spikes, leather, and satanic imagery as a fashion statement?

Sean Reveron: I have always been into underground music; I think it stems from supporting my local bands and artists as a kid. Plus, one of my favorite things to do is to look for and listen to new or obscure music on the internet, and I am so happy I’ve been able to incorporate that into my blogging. CVLT Nation is all about heavy music, art, clothing & cultures, so heavy is pretty much integral to the brand.

For the CVLT Nation clothing brand, we work with artists who have ties to the music community through their artwork on albums and band merch, so the clothing itself is inextricably tied to the music. It’s really important to us to make clothing that speaks to people who are into the blog and the music and art we cover. As far as the “fashion” of looking dark, I try not to judge people for it, but I think maybe they should give the music a try so people don’t mistake them for posers.

Fair enough. If you could name one artist/band, or even a few, that are currently performing and putting out new material as an inspiration for the work you do now and how your musical tastes have evolved over time, who would it be and why?

Sean Reveron: The rad thing about CVLT Nation is that through our blogging, we are finding so many inspiring bands and artists. The underground is literally teeming with creative people, so it’s hard to point to just one or two. With music, we have some projects we are working on with bands that we find inspiring, like our Sonic Cathedrals mixtape series, where a band curates a mix of the music they find inspiring. We put one out last week with Altar of Plagues, and we have some in the works with bands like The Secret, Young And In The Way and Coffinworm.

As far as art goes, when we find artists that inspire us, we find a way to work with them on graphics for the CVLT Nation clothing brand. There are so many talented artists out there in the world, and we are trying to provide another platform for showing their work through the clothing and the blog. The great thing is that we have gotten so much good feedback from artists who want to be a part of what we’re doing.

How have my musical tastes evolved? I’ve always listened to dark music, I am just allowing more of it into my life than I used to. I still like a huge variety of music, but I am exploring heavy music and finding out how many different layers and textures there are.