In April 2013, author Dave Hofer (who’s also a buyer for Reckless Records and played in the Chicago Thrash Ensemble) launched a Bandcamp page called DuPage County Hardcore that’s dedicated to archiving bygone punk bands from his old stomping grounds. Since then he’s dug up and uploaded for posterity a growing trove of old cassette demos, seven-inches, and CDs from barely remembered grind bands, long-forgotten punk crews, and even some groups you’ve probably heard of—among them Spitalfield, the pop-punk band fronted by Downwrite cofounder Mark Rose. Everything at DuPage County Hardcore is unavailable elsewhere (as best as Hofer can tell) and free to download. The collection demonstrates the fascinatingly broad range of the sounds that burbled up from a specific section of Chicago’s suburban punk scene in the mid-90s. I was quite taken by goofy, swashbuckling accordion-and-drums duo Herc., who hardly fit with the pop punk and aggressive hardcore that dominate the page.
Then I was just kinda looking at this tape case that I had all these old interviews in, and I was like, “Man, we don’t have our car anymore—when we did, it still had a tape deck, and I would jam these old tapes in there.” Now we have a tape deck at home. I don’t really listen to these, but I feel like I could do something with them. Then I just had to brainstorm, like, “I should do the same thing I’m doing with these old interviews, except break up the tracks and just put ’em up on Bandcamp so people could download ’em.” The idea at first was just, “Well, I’m friends with basically all of the people that might be interested, on Facebook, so I could just post it up there.” If somebody is missing their old band’s demo or something, they could go and download it. It just kinda went from there.There Is No Shining Heart by There Is No Shining Heart You mentioned you had this stuff lying around. When did you start collecting these CDs, records, and cassettes from the punk scene? What was your entry into the scene?
What’s held up?
Some of the people that came out of that are kind of noteworthy, like I was saying—the Rise Against guys, they’re from the northwest suburbs. That band Spitalfield—they were an active touring band. I guess I just feel lucky to have been a part of it. An outsider may look at it and be, like, “Be a part of what?” But when you’re living it, and getting to play, and play with and see cool bands . . . gosh, I don’t really know how to answer that. I mean, obviously it’s a very sentimental thing.Bury Me At Makeout Creek by The Killing Tree It’s sentimental, but you’re not looking at this through rose-colored glasses.
What made the DuPage scene or even the northwest suburban scene distinct?
And then of course meeting Brian Peterson, who booked the Fireside, and being like, “Hey, we’ve got this band.” That was the other thing with the Undesirables—they were the first band from our scene that played the Fireside, and I remember what a huge fucking deal that was. This is a funny little anecdote: The first show that they ever played at the Fireside was opening for or maybe even playing after Hot Water Music, way before they blew up. I remember we went to that show and saw Hot Water Music and were like, “Hoo boy.” Then they came back, and my old band and Baxter opened for them, and again, nobody was there, and then they broke up and got huge after that.Troy’s Bucket by Baxter You’d just start meeting people from the city and their bands, and I played in this band Authority Abuse, and the guys in that band were just more connected to dudes from the south side. It’s like, “Now I find myself playing a show in Pilsen with Sin Orden.” Or we played with Los Crudos, and, “Wow, they have their whole thing going on here too.” It’s just more to love. The cornucopia spilleth over.
