Harm’s Way is a Straight Edge Hardcore band from Chicago with a sound in constant evolution; their songs are always mosh heavy, with tons of hard riffs and they incorporate elements of Death Metal, Groove Metal and, in later releases, hints of Industrial Metal. We met with vocalist James Pligge at Heavy Montreal right before they took the stage, to discuss the albums that have been the most influential in his life and some of his most memorable shows! Make sure to catch Harm’s Way on tour this October with Ghostemane!
What are your top 5 favorite albums of all time, marking the evolution of your musical tastes? What do they mean to you?
Number one is METALLICA Master of Puppets. Growing up in that era, I was very young but my dad, he loved Metallica and we used to listen to it quite a bit. It was a very different contrast to when someone brings you a Master of Puppets or an early Metallica over Load or Reload because that’s kind of when I was getting into music. I remember listening to Battery and thinking “this song is incredible!” It was a gateway to listening to a lot of heavier music so that’s one of the records that comes to mind.
Was it actually the first Metallica record that you heard?
No, Load, Reload and the Black album were actually the first three. Then I started to get into the old albums but Master was the first older album that I got into. For Christmas, my aunt got me Master of Puppets and the Black Album and either Ride the Lightning or …And Justice, I don’t know.
Number two, I’ll say YOUTH OF TODAY. The first record I bought from them was Break Down the Walls. I was about in eighth grade and there’s a record store in my town that was very strange. It was this guy’s house, a guy you would never think was into Metal and Punk and Hardcore. It was a little record store he had all the new Punk stuff that was coming out at the time, which was like Fat Wreck Chords stuff. You had a huge huge selection of Metal. Me and one of my best friends that got me into Punk and Hardcore and Hip Hop, we would always go there and I picked up Break Down The Walls. From there, it was a chain reaction. We used to read the liner notes and in it they would thank MINOR THREAT and GORILLA BISCUIT and we kept going from there.
Number three would be Age of Quarrel, CRO-MAGS, mainly because that’s probably my favorite true Hardcore record of all time and it opened the doors to more New York Hardcore for me, which actually had a bigger influence on my own bands. To this day, it is still one of my favorite Hardcore records.
For years, I didn’t listen to really heavy music, I was more into Punk and Youth Crew, a lot of the Revelation records bands but when I got to 17 or 18, I started getting into more heavy music so the fourth record I would say is Master Killer by MERAUDER. To this day, it’s still my favorite heavy record when it comes to Hardcore and that record has influenced my bands. Everything we write, we try not to rip it off completely but it’s like, “let’s see what Merauder would do.”
I would say the fifth record that’s most influential to my life is SEPULTURA Chaos A.D.. I’ve always loved Metal but in my opinion, that record is of a different breed, especially the time period it came out. I liked Sepultura but again, when I got into them, it was Roots and SOULFLY, more Nu-Metal stuff. But Chaos A.D., in my opinion, is one of the heaviest records of all time. As far as the newer Harm’s Way stuff, I mean, that has continued to influence us always because it’s heavy but also has some very unique elements to it. They weren’t really around it in Metal during that time. It’s like the perfect mixture heavy, unique and then just straight up breakdowns.
What have you been listening to to mostly?
Lately, because we’ve been touring so much, I actually listen to some softer music. I like a wide variety of music but I would say that the three bands I listen to the most lately are SOFT KILL, I love their newest record, CHOIR BOY quite a bit, big fan of them and EMMA RUTH RUNDLE, the newest one from 2018. I really enjoy that. As far as Metal goes: GENOCIDE PACT’s newest record. I think it’s probably one of the best Metal records that’s come out in maybe the last five, six years.
Let’s see what else. I mean, I listen to a lot of old stuff all the time. I love MORRISSEY, the SMITHS, pretty much anything in that era, DEPECHE MODE, the CURE. I listen to a lot of that stuff right now just because being on tour so often with heavy music, there are times when I want something a little lighter.
Can you name a few of the most memorable shows that you’ve seen in your life?
Going back to METALLICA, I’d never seen them until 2017. They played Soldier Field, which is the stadium where the Chicago Bears play. It’s gigantic and I guess I wasn’t expecting that there would be 60,000 people at a concert of Metallica. What’s funny is that every walk of life that you can think of is at a Metallica concert, you know? Some guy’s dad, an older lady, a Punk lady, metalheads, guys wearing Misfits shirts… a very eclectic audience. My friend got us on the field to see Metallica and I didn’t really know what to expect because I had heard that Hetfield’s voice was kind of so-so, I heard that the band in general was sloppy, but they were perfect. They played a really wide variety of music, like 20 songs. I remember after three hours thinking “that’s it?” That’s very rare, where you want to listen to music for that long.
There’s a show, I think in 2005, there used to be a festival in Chicago and long story short, there was a fight and the festival got shut down. And there was three of my favorite bands at the time: MENTAL, The WRONG SIDE and RIGHTEOUS JAMS who were unable to play. They had to shut down the venue and someone had the bright idea to bring the show to someone’s basement. So literally the whole show, probably 300-400 people, go to this person’s basement. I was like “it’s 10pm, this is going to get shut down immediately” but somehow, they all play and everyone goes wild and sings along and it’s one of the craziest shows. I mean, it’s in this person’s basement and it doesn’t get shut down. I would say that’s probably one of the most memorable shows just because it seemed impossible and somehow we came together and made it happen in some kid’s basement. I don’t even know who it was!
Another one would be in 2016, I think? I always wanted to see Iron Maiden and my dad had this on his bucket list. One of my friends hooked me up with some really nice Iron Maiden tickets and I was blown away. You know, they’re getting up there in age but the way they perform, it makes you think “how could they perform for two and a half hours and still go off?” They’re moving around, they’re into it and, you know, I play for 30 minutes and I’m tired. Because I was able to bring my dad, that’s very memorable.
I was able to see MERAUDER before Sob passed away, when they came back. Those were incredible, incredible shows. Twice in Chicago. I can’t remember who played the show…I think BLACKLISTED and then DEAD TO FALL. Those were really, really cool to see.
The show I wish I would have been at was when the CRO-MAGS reunited. Basically, they were doing a tour with the full lineup, with Harley still in the band and the first show after Harley just left the tour was the Chicago show. It was NO WARNING and Cro-Mags…in 2002? I was so bummed because that’s never gonna happen again, probably. But that was really early No Warning, which was really cool.
Now, as far as festivals go, the most memorable festival for me was Posi Numbers 2003. Every band was there. That was at a high point, when TERROR’s Lowest of the Low had just came out and Ill blood (No Warning) just came out. Then MENTAL was at its peak. I remember the DUMPTRUCK demo had just came out and they played. It was just like every band that people would love to see now on a festival or something, playing all at once. That was one of the wildest festivals I’d ever been a part of. But yeah, I’d say that’s about it. I mean, I could go on forever.
Is there any up and coming bands that you’d like to recommend?
I don’t wanna say up and coming because they’re already up but I think VEIN is one of those bands is really cool. They have a really unique sound, but obviously incorporates a lot of aspects of Hardcore and Metal. Honestly, when we did our tour with them in 2018, I was really impressed with the live show. They’ve obviously progressed to a very popular band in the Hardcore scene and starting to be the Metal scene.
Another band I really enjoy is SANCTION. In August 2018, we did Europe with them and we came tight with them. We did that tour with KNOCKED LOOSE as well, which is another band I think is really, really cool.
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