My feelings about Lip Cream have changed a lot over the years. The first Japanese punk band that ever made an appearance was called the Plastics. They made the B-52s sound like Blue Cheer. After a couple years, though, Japan found hardcore, and everything changed with bands like the Stalin and the Comes.

I first heard about Lip Cream from Pushead— the guy who wrote for Thrasher and designed T-shirts for the Misfits and Metallica, all the while having his finger on the pulse of the international punk community. Somebody had to sit down and write all those longhand letters! Pushead first turned us on to G.I.S.M., who I honestly didn’t care for at first—I thought they looked like three members of Motley Crüe with one badass singer and sounded much too metal for my dainty-cloth punk ears. Guitarist Randy Uchida was clearly influenced by Judas Priest but with the speed of punk, so after a couple continuous listens, it hit me like a sledgehammer. This was some of the most brutal music I had ever experienced.