The Bad Religion bassist still remembers when the late ’80s stage dive went wrong

Alessandro Corona
| Special to Cincinnati Enquirer

Emerging from the Los Angeles punk scene of the 1980s, Bad Religion has since established themselves as one of the most influential bands contributing to the modern pop punk sound. I recently spoke with bassist Jay Bentley about the group’s origins, its legacy, and a highly anticipated co-headlining tour with fellow SoCal rockers Social Distortion, which makes a stop at the Andrew J. Brady Music on Sunday, May 12 Center.

Q: If you remember a story from touring Cincinnati, I’d like to share it.

A: We were on the “Suffer” tour or the “No Control” tour – ’88 or ’89. I’m pretty sure it was with Bogart. I just got hammered. And I jumped into the crowd. I remember this vividly. After clearing the first two people, I realized there was no one behind me. I just landed on the ground. I will always remember that.

Q: You met singer Greg Graffin and guitarist (and Epitaph founder) Brett Gurewitz in high school in Woodland Hills, Los Angeles. How does growing up there influence the style of music you create?

A: Greg and I moved to Woodland Hills at the same time. Greg sang choir. I always saw myself as a guitarist. Then Quiet Riot (with guitarist Randy Rhoads) played at my high school, and I said, “I’ll never be that good.” A friend of mine took me to see The Clash in 1979, and I thought, “I can do that too.”

Brett was in a band called The Quarks, which was more new wave than punk. Brett wanted to get rid of that and told Greg so. We all wanted to find a band that suited our level. We were 15 years old. The technical ability to play punk rock was very attractive.

We just knew what we didn’t want to be. You get labeled based on the bands you hang out with. We were kids in the punk rock scene. These were the shows we went to, and they were the shows we opened for.

We all realized that punk was less about music and more about your intellect. It was never about being stupid and destructive. It was always about thinking that there was something better around the corner if we could just get to it.

Q: You played with Wasted Youth and Circle Jerks. It seems like SoCal had a real collaboration scene in the early ’80s.

A: If you went to a certain show in 1980, there would be twenty people there – all the people who were in the other bands. It was dirty, but it was our gross. The Clash would come to town and 5,000 people would show up and we’d say, “Where are these people coming from?” The scene itself was quite small and we all knew each other very well.

Q: Was there a specific moment when you decided you wanted to pursue music as a career?

A: When I was younger and naive, I sold all my stuff. In ’83 I went to work in a machine shop, and I was fine with that, until I didn’t. And I came back in late ’86 and started playing, and I enjoyed it. It was a reason to go out to friends and drink and cause trouble.

In 1993 we talked about moving to a major label. Suddenly we wanted to make a commitment to tour as musicians. I was driving a forklift at Epitaph at the time and said, “I’m going to quit my job and be in this band full time.” It’s still terrifying thirty years later.

Q: Epitaph is an important part of the punk rock revival of the ’90s. When did you all realize that West Coast punk was going to be as influential as it was before??

A: Never. West Coast punk rock isn’t really a thing. Nirvana came out and the word “grunge” was thrown around. But grunge wasn’t a thing – Nirvana was a thing. Southern California punk rock and that lifestyle came to America through the Vans Warped Tour.

When we’re in Lincoln, Nebraska, with a halfpipe and motocross riders, and we’re playing drunk on a stage at three in the afternoon – that’s just an average Tuesday in Woodland Hills. We just play music and ride skateboards in swimming pools. It was just this all-encompassing thing, from what you wore to what you listened to.

Q: “Age of Unreason” is your most recent full-length album, and you’ve since released a few singles and done some pretty big tours. How has the songwriting process evolved since you started?

A: Greg and Brett write 99.99% of everything. They have become much better at their profession. As for the topic, all you have to do is wake up. For a band like us, you read the newspaper, or watch the news or whatever, and there’s something to write a song about.

For ‘Suffer’ we wrote a lot of songs about what it was like to be a young man in America in 1988. At the end of that year we were lucky enough to travel to Europe and visit the other parts of the world. , which was super eye-opening. When we came back, in 1991 we started writing songs about what it was like to be human on planet Earth.

You realize it doesn’t matter if you live in San Diego or Saudi Arabia. When you are a father, you worry about your children and think about what tomorrow will bring. As a human being on this planet, you worry about everything. It didn’t change the direction of the band, but it did help broaden our perspective on what we were trying to talk about.

People really want to hand us this flag of political activism. We are not political, we are social. We are concerned with human affairs. That’s what we’ve always been about. Whether it comes easily is up to Brett and Greg.

Question: You’ve been working on Social Distortion since your first show. Tell me about your relationship.

A: Bad Religion and Social Distortion are the last two bands standing in the third wave of 1979-1980 punk rock in Los Angeles. We’ve been pretty consistent when it comes to touring and being productive. We’ve been talking about making this happen for 18 years.

It’s reminiscent of what happened in Los Angeles in 1980. Of the 25 or so bands that played at all times, each band had such a unique sound. If you were a punk rock band, you didn’t want to sound the same. It works so well together to show you: this is this band – this is our band.

Social distortion and bad religion

When: 7 p.m., Sunday May 12.
Where: Andrew J. Brady Music Center, 25 Race St., Downtown.
Tickets: $49.50 – $79.50.

Social distortion and bad religion

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