While local outfit Last Years take a hiatus, guitarist Steve Baeza continues to play straight-ahead horror punk anthems with members of Hoodrat, Mr. Nobody, and Accoutrements in a raw dog, boss hog, balls to the blade trio called Bat Lords.

Baeza, who sings for the group, writes all of his songs (most clock in at under 2 minutes) about serial killers, but says that psychotic murder-mongers are just the “jumping off point” for his lyrics, which are mostly about “sadness, despair, death, [and] losing everything in a blink of an eye.”

Despite the grisly subject matter, Bat Lords purge their dismal demons with infectious outbursts that harken back to Ramones and Misfits, unabashedly wearing their mutilated hearts on their sleeves.

Bow down to Bat Lords on Sunday, June 9 at the Tower Bar with Shocktroopers and Sickly Hollow.

Last Years will be regrouping at The Void for a Fourth of July salute to the troops.

How are Bat Lords different from Last Years?

Steve: Less silly more brutal. Last Years were like partying ‘til the end of the world. The idea [that] we're in the last years of our existence, so we might as well party and have fun and get fucked up. But the dudes in Last Years took it too far, where all we did was party and the music was second hand. Bat Lords is like that same idea of everything ending, but not expecting it to. Shit just ends.

How did you go from silly to gloomy?

S: Last Years were gloomy as shit dude! But we kinda just partied it off. Bat Lords is the gloominess without the party. Last Years was like, "everything sucks, let’s party!" Bat Lords are like, "everything sucks, let‘s keep it that way." But same general idea, I guess.

Does that mean everyone quit drinking?

S: I'm actually pretty drunk right now. We all drink just as much as ever I suppose.

What’s going on with your label, Shred the Gnar?

S: I ran out of money to keep it going, but most of the shows I book, I promote as Shred The Gnar. Hoodrat, Sculpins, Last Years, and Bat Lords are the Shred the Gnar bands, but we forget to promote ourselves as a unit… ‘til we get the money to do it proper, ha.

Did you have a few vinyl releases or how far did it get?

S: No vinyl releases. We just put everything on our Bandcamp for free. It’s dumb to charge for digital music.

What inspires your songs these days?

S: What inspires my songs, gaah. I write all my songs about serial killers but that’s just kind of a jumping off point. It’s all just basically sadness, despair, death, losing everything in a blink of an eye. No one expects to die or be killed suddenly. It’s kind of thinking, how did the dudes who were murdered by John Wayne Gacy feel? Cuz that was brutal. Shitloads of teenage boys buried in a basement? That shit’s brutal. And think about the families’ despair. That’s intense. All the Bat Lords songs are kinda based around the idea of death and sadness in a sudden way that it’s not fair. The tunes are poppy as shit, and energetic, but I fully realize this life is fleeting. That’s pretty good fodder for a song. But if you listen to our tunes, you probably wouldn’t ever dig that deep.

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