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Iron Cross (band)

 

 
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Iron Cross (band)
 
 
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Iron Cross is a hardcore
Hardcore punk

Hardcore punk is a subgenre of punk rock that originated in North America and the UK in the late 1970s. The new sound was generally thicker, heavier and faster than earlier punk rock....
/Oi!
Oi!

Oi! is a working class street-level Music genre of punk rock that originated in the United Kingdom in the late 1970s.The music and associated subculture had the goal of promoting unity between Punk subculture, skinheads and other non-aligned working class youths ....
 band from Baltimore, Maryland
Baltimore, Maryland

Baltimore is an independent city and the largest city in the U.S. state of Maryland in the United States. Baltimore is located in central Maryland along the tidal portion of the Patapsco River, an arm of the Chesapeake Bay....
 and Washington D.C..

They play a rough form of streetpunk, and is the first band in the United States
United States

The United States of America is a Federal government constitutional republic comprising U.S. state and a federal district. The country is situated mostly in central North America, where its Contiguous United States and Washington, D.C., the Capital districts and territories, lie between the Pacific Ocean and Atlantic Oceans, Borders of the U...
 to adopt the skinhead
Skinhead

A skinhead is a member of a subculture that originated among working class youths in the United Kingdom in the 1960s, and then spread to other parts of the world....
 look and the Oi! musical style. Some early members were original to the DC Skinheads (the first Skinhead scene in North America) and had close ties to the Washington, DC hardcore punk
Hardcore punk

Hardcore punk is a subgenre of punk rock that originated in North America and the UK in the late 1970s. The new sound was generally thicker, heavier and faster than earlier punk rock....
 subculture
Subculture

In sociology, anthropology and cultural studies, a subculture is a group of people with a culture which differentiates them from the larger culture to which they belong....
, due to its relationship with other hardcore bands, with Ian Mackaye
Ian MacKaye

Ian Thomas Garner MacKaye , is an United States singer and guitarist. Active since 1979, MacKaye is best known for being the frontman of the influential hardcore punk band Minor Threat, and the alternative rock bands Embrace , Fugazi , and The Evens....
, and with Dischord Records
Dischord Records

Dischord Records is a Washington, D.C.-based independent record label specializing in the independent Punk rock music of the D.C.-area music scene....
.






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Iron Cross is a hardcore
Hardcore punk

Hardcore punk is a subgenre of punk rock that originated in North America and the UK in the late 1970s. The new sound was generally thicker, heavier and faster than earlier punk rock....
/Oi!
Oi!

Oi! is a working class street-level Music genre of punk rock that originated in the United Kingdom in the late 1970s.The music and associated subculture had the goal of promoting unity between Punk subculture, skinheads and other non-aligned working class youths ....
 band from Baltimore, Maryland
Baltimore, Maryland

Baltimore is an independent city and the largest city in the U.S. state of Maryland in the United States. Baltimore is located in central Maryland along the tidal portion of the Patapsco River, an arm of the Chesapeake Bay....
 and Washington D.C..

They play a rough form of streetpunk, and is the first band in the United States
United States

The United States of America is a Federal government constitutional republic comprising U.S. state and a federal district. The country is situated mostly in central North America, where its Contiguous United States and Washington, D.C., the Capital districts and territories, lie between the Pacific Ocean and Atlantic Oceans, Borders of the U...
 to adopt the skinhead
Skinhead

A skinhead is a member of a subculture that originated among working class youths in the United Kingdom in the 1960s, and then spread to other parts of the world....
 look and the Oi! musical style. Some early members were original to the DC Skinheads (the first Skinhead scene in North America) and had close ties to the Washington, DC hardcore punk
Hardcore punk

Hardcore punk is a subgenre of punk rock that originated in North America and the UK in the late 1970s. The new sound was generally thicker, heavier and faster than earlier punk rock....
 subculture
Subculture

In sociology, anthropology and cultural studies, a subculture is a group of people with a culture which differentiates them from the larger culture to which they belong....
, due to its relationship with other hardcore bands, with Ian Mackaye
Ian MacKaye

Ian Thomas Garner MacKaye , is an United States singer and guitarist. Active since 1979, MacKaye is best known for being the frontman of the influential hardcore punk band Minor Threat, and the alternative rock bands Embrace , Fugazi , and The Evens....
, and with Dischord Records
Dischord Records

Dischord Records is a Washington, D.C.-based independent record label specializing in the independent Punk rock music of the D.C.-area music scene....
. Singer Sab Grey
Sab Grey

Sab Grey is the founder of Iron Cross , one of the United States' first skinhead Hardcore punk/Oi! bands.As a teenager, he began to attend hardcore punk concerts in Washington DC, where he met Ian Mackaye, Henry Rollins, and others in the burgeoning Washington, DC hardcore subculture....
 was one of the many roommates in the Dischord House in Arlington, VA. The band's name — and with most of its members being Skinheads — led to accusations of fascism
Fascism

Fascism is a Political radicalism, Authoritarianism Nationalism ideology that aims to create a single-party state with a government led by a dictator who seeks national unity and development by requiring individuals to subordinate self-interest to the collective interest of the nation or Race ....
, which Grey and others in the band and the original DC Skins have always denied. Grey stated in the 1st Iron Cross press kit in 1982, "...oh, and we're not Nazis!"

Career

Iron Cross formed in Washington, DC when Dante Ferrando met Sab Grey. Ferrando was previously in the band Broken Cross with Mark Haggerty while in school. When Grey and Ferrando decided to start a new band, Grey suggested the name Iron Cross. The first lineup consisted of Grey on lead vocals, Haggerty on guitar, Ferrando on drums and John Falls on bass guitar. This lineup lasted a very short time with Falls leaving after Iron Cross' early show at the American University. After Falls' departure the band went through two more bassists before settling on Wendell Blow, the former bassist for the DC hardcore punk
Hardcore punk

Hardcore punk is a subgenre of punk rock that originated in North America and the UK in the late 1970s. The new sound was generally thicker, heavier and faster than earlier punk rock....
 band State of Alert
State of Alert

State of Alert was an American hardcore punk group formed in Washington, D.C. in 1980, and disbanded in 1981....
, or as it is known SOA. The only non-skinhead in the band was Ferrando, who has usually maintained a spiky hairstyle.

T'he band's fourth lineup lasted until just after the recording of their first EP Skinhead Glory, and just prior to its release. That EP features the signature song "Crucified," which was later covered by Agnostic Front
Agnostic Front

Agnostic Front is an American hardcore punk band that formed in New York City in 1980. The band began playing hardcore punk similar to bands like Black Flag and Negative Approach, and were thrust to the forefront of the burgeoning New York hardcore scene in the mid-1980s with their widely regarded 1984 in music classic Victim in Pain bef...
, The Business
The Business (band)

The Business are an England Oi!/punk rock band formed in 1979 in Lewisham, South London. Their album Suburban Rebels became influential in the Oi! movement....
, Subculture Squad, and 25 ta Life
25 ta Life

25 ta Life is an United States hardcore punk band from New York City, originally formed in Queens, N.Y. in Mid 1991. The band was started by Frank Smarra and Harry Minas in Astoria, Queens, N.Y., they were soon joined by Fred Mesk and together wrote most of the material that would be on their early releases....
. The song, "You're a Rebel" from the band's second EP Hated and Proud was covered by the Boston band Dropkick Murphys
Dropkick Murphys

Dropkick Murphys are an United States Celtic punk band formed in Quincy, Massachusetts, United States. First playing together in the basement of a friend's barbershop, they blended traditional Music of Ireland, folk rock, and hardcore punk....
. Songs associated with Hated and Proud were first played at the now famous 9:30 Club, formerly at the corner of 9th and F Streets in DC, as part of a revamping of the band's former live set which members felt was stagnant. This set included both old and new material with a few covers from English Oi! bands.

After Blow left the band he was replaced by John Dunn three days prior to Iron Cross' two set show with the Angelic Upstarts. Dunn had been an original member of the DC Skins and was close friends with the band's members. He still remains so. Dunn left the band just before the release of the Hated and Proud EP. He was replaced by Paul Cleary, who was a founding member of the DC bands Trenchmouth
Trenchmouth

Trenchmouth was a Chicago-based band that fused hardcore with post-punk, no wave, reggae, jazz, industrial, and funk to create a manic and danceable hybrid completely their own....
 and Black Market Baby. Iron Cross was introduced to the world beyond the eastern United States
Eastern United States

The Eastern Half of The United States, the American East, or simply the East is traditionally defined as the states east of the Mississippi River....
  with their three songs on the Dischord compilation Flex Your Head
Flex Your Head

Flex Your Head is a punk rock compilation album. It was originally released in January 1982, and was re-released on CD in August 1995. A Remaster CD version was released in 2002....
.

Aftermath and new lineup

After further lineup changes that left Grey as the only original member of Iron Cross, the band broke up in 1985. Ferrando went on to form the band Gray Matter
Gray Matter

"Gray Matter" is a short story by Stephen King, published in 1978 in the compilation Night Shift . It was first published in Cavalier in October 1973 in literature....
 with Haggerty. Ferrando also played in the band Ignition. Haggerty went on to play with bands 3 and Severin. Blow, Dunn, and Cleary went different ways, with Blow and Dunn ending up in Los Angeles
Los Ángeles

Los ?ngeles is the Capital of the Biob?o Province, in the municipality of the same name, in Regions of Chile VIII , in the center-south of Chile....
 in the late 1980s. Dunn went on to play in multiple LA line-ups that were part of the new "Alternative" rock in the late '80s and into the '90s.

Grey moved to England
England

native_name =|conventional_long_name = England|common_name = England|image_flag = Flag of England.svg|image_coat = England COA.svg|symbol_type = Royal Coat of Arms...
, where he married and had children. Since then, Iron Cross has re-released their EPs and previously-unreleased material in the form of the full-length CD Live For Now. Grey moved back to Baltimore, and as of 2006, was playing with The Royal Americans (a rockabilly
Rockabilly

Rockabilly is one of the earliest styles of rock and roll music, and emerged in the early 1950s.The term rockabilly is a Portmanteau word of rock and hillbilly, the latter a reference to the country music that contributed strongly to the style's development....
-style band), was performing solo acoustic shows, and occasionally performed with a new lineup of Iron Cross, which completed a national tour in 2003. Ferrando now owns the DC club, The Black Cat. Haggerty now lives in the Bay Area and continues to perform. Dunn left LA for Seattle and is no longer performing. Blow lives in Austin Texas, with Cleary still being located in the DC area.

The 2009 lineup is: Sab Grey - Vocals, Scotty Powers - Drums, Dimitri Medevev - Bass, Mark Linskey - Guitar, Shadwick Wilde - Guitar.

"Crucified"

In the mid 1980s, New York hardcore
New York hardcore

New York Hardcore refers to hardcore punk and metalcore music created in New York City and to the subculture associated with that music. New York hardcore grew out of the hardcore scene established in Washington, D.C., by bands such as Bad Brains and Minor Threat....
 band Agnostic Front
Agnostic Front

Agnostic Front is an American hardcore punk band that formed in New York City in 1980. The band began playing hardcore punk similar to bands like Black Flag and Negative Approach, and were thrust to the forefront of the burgeoning New York hardcore scene in the mid-1980s with their widely regarded 1984 in music classic Victim in Pain bef...
 began covering "Crucified", a song from Iron Cross' recording "Skinhead Glory". Agnostic Front included studio versions of the song on their Liberty And Justice For... and Something's Gotta Give albums. The "Crucified" has become a staple cover song for many hardcore
Hardcore punk

Hardcore punk is a subgenre of punk rock that originated in North America and the UK in the late 1970s. The new sound was generally thicker, heavier and faster than earlier punk rock....
 and Oi!
Oi!

Oi! is a working class street-level Music genre of punk rock that originated in the United Kingdom in the late 1970s.The music and associated subculture had the goal of promoting unity between Punk subculture, skinheads and other non-aligned working class youths ....
 bands. The lyrics refer to being ridiculed for being different, being blamed for society's ills, and being accused of violence and intolerance because of the actions of others. The metaphor of being crucified resonated with Leftist/Communist and apolitical skinheads who were sick of being labelled as neo-Nazis because of right-wing extremist skinheads. White-Power/Facists skinheads also identified with the song due to persecution they received for what they stood for. Crucified has become an anthem for both factions of skinheads worldwide. Live audiences have taken to adding a chant of "skinhead army!" to the chorus, a line not included in the original recording by Iron Cross.

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