Racetraitor

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Racetraitor (1996-1999) was a political straight edge hardcore punk band from Chicago, Illinois who managed to get on the covers of both Maximum Rock N' Roll and HeartattaCk before releasing a note of music. Known for calling audience members "crackers" and for espousing radical beliefs influenced by black nationalism, third worldism and other anti-colonial ideologies (and for some members, eventually, Islam). Their lyrical content revolved around issues of privilege, Western dominance of the Third World and inequalities in globalization. Additionally the band addressed issues pertaining to constructions of sexuality in America, corporate dominance of economic and public life, veganism and the straight edge lifestyle. The name Racetraitor was in reference to using one's social and economic privilege to create a more egalitarian world. The idea was to take the pejorative term "race traitor" used by white American racists and claim it as a positive self-chosen label. The band's message also held that "race" was an artificial and constructed human category. They released an album called Burn the Idol of the White Messiah on Uprising Records and then a split EP called Make Them Talk on Trustkill with their friends in the Indianapolis band Burn It Down.

Early on Racetraitor’s music could be characterized as power violence, featuring an abundance of noise and blast beats. Songs often timed less than a minute, which gave their early shows the quality of containing more spoken word than music. Eventually, their 90's hardcore, extreme metal and metalcore influences came to the foreground and Racetraitor's songs became longer and more defined.

Post-breakup

Drummer Andy Hurley is now a member of Fall Out Boy alongside occasional Racetraitor fill-in bass player Pete Wentz. Hurley also played drums in several other projects, including Killtheslavemaster and Project Rocket, and was briefly reunited with singer Mani Mostofi in a band called The Kill Pill, who released one record on Uprising before disbanding. Hurley was also a guest drummer on the "Jihad" EP released by the briefly reformed Vegan Reich.

Dan Binaei went on to form Arma Angelus with Pete Wentz (Fall Out Boy) and Jay Jancetic (Holy Roman Empire). For a short time it also included Tim McIlrath (Rise Against) on bass, and eventually Andy Hurley on drums. Binaei currently has put together a new experimental rock project entitled Tiger Spirit consisting of previous members of Suicide File, Sweet Cobra, and Nude Celebs.

Bass player Brent Decker continued his activism in the US and abroad before returning to Chicago. Currently Decker works at the Chicago Project for Violence Prevention and plays in Tiger Spirit.

After the Kill Pill, Mostofi went on to complete an MA in Middle Eastern Studies from the University of Texas at Austin. He continued his activism in the anti-war and pro-Palestinian movements and traveled to the Middle East extensively. Currently Mostofi is working on a JD at Fordham Law School in New York with an emphasis in international law.

Other members

Eric Bartholomae, who played bass and second guitar, spent roughly four years doing animal and eco activism in Chicago following the breakup of the band. In the fall of 2008 he moved to Minneapolis, MN. He has since put together a new musical projected called Willoughby.

Wentz, a regular fill-in live member of Racetraitor, formed Arma Angelus with Binaei, who released one full-length album on Happy Couples Never Last. After that band's dissolution went on to form Fall Out Boy.

Racetraior in the Press

Recently the Racetraitor has been feature in the books Burning Fight: The Nineties Hardcore Revolution in Ethics, Politics, Spirit, and Sound by Brian Peterson and New Wave of American Heavy Metal by Garry Sharpe-Young.

External links

• Racetraitor at MySpace