Thrasher Magazine

The Lost Bombers lineup is steeped in some heavy skate blood: Cody Boat, POD, Matt Spiney, ”Big Ed” Cugudda and Zach Connolly. All hailing from Portland, these blokes bring an uncut style of skate rock to the table with a hint of some old English punk delivery. Veteran survivor of the road turned drummer, Zach C was at the helm of the 151 van in the beginning and was responsible for putting the “rock” into its “roll” brand attitude along with Pigpen and Neil. Eventually Zach’s liver spotted and his back went out but the attitude never wavered and you can hear it in the Lost Bombers. Here he obliges the Larb with some words on the band. Now grab your dog, a bottle and board, find a deserted parking lot and crank ‘em up! —Sam Hitz

Did you fall in love with skateboarding and rock ‘n’ roll at the same time as a kid?
Before skating there was BMX. The soundtrack back then was Judas Priest, Motörhead and Van Halen. That was the early ‘80s. Shortly after came skateboarding and the soundtrack changed almost immediately. I got a hand-me-down Gator in late ‘85 and around a month later someone gave me my first punk/thrash mix tape. It had S.O.D. on one side and Flipside Vinyl Fanzine Vol. 2 on the other. That started the love affair with punk rock. Me and the three other kids in my town that skated started buying up any punk vinyl we could find at the shitty local record shop. We’d each buy an LP and trade with each other and make tapes. I still have tapes my friends made for me back then and that was over 30 years ago. Skateboarding and punk rock were synonymous back then.
 
Lost Bombers has a nice ‘70s Oi!/punk sound with skate lyrics. What are the band’s biggest influences?
A lot of times when we’re coming up with new songs someone will say, “Man, this sounds like that one song!” We don’t want to reinvent the wheel. We just want to play the music we like, so if something we come up with sounds like an old punk or Oi! song, we’re, like, “Fuckin’ rad!” We want to play music that old dudes like us will be stoked on, but every now and again we get kids that are into it. If we can hype up one skater kid out there on some old punk and Oi! then it’s all worth it. We need more punk in skating. If you want to check out some shit we’re into, listen to The Templars, Chron Gen, Combat 84, The 4-Skins, Criminal Damage, Cock Sparrer, The Last Resort, The Macc Lads, Slaughter and the Dogs.


“Frontside disaster in front of some asshole” paints a familiar picture. Who comes up with the lyrics?
Matt generally writes the lyrics but we all collaborate a bit. Sometime’s I’ll come up with the idea for a song and a few verses, and Matt will fill in the blanks. Once we get a solid idea for a song, the lyrics come together pretty quickly. It’s not rocket science. Like on “Locals Only,” “You come from out of town to skate our spots/no respect you think you‘re calling the shots.” That almost writes itself.

If you were forced to burn just one: skateboard collection or record collection, which would it be?
I’d have to say the skates. Some of the vinyl is pretty rare. Like The Chiefs “Blues” 45 I got from Mikey Rat like 20 years ago. That one came from his older sister (RIP), so there’s a shitload of sentimental value in there too. There’s also a lot more of it. I’ve got a few decks that would suck to lose, but I think the vinyl would hurt more.

What’s the best and worst thing about being a skate punk band in Portland?
I guess the best thing is that there’s a pretty good crew out here that goes to shows and generally supports the skate/music scene. The worst thing, to me, is that there’s not too many other skate punk bands to play with. There’s a big skate scene here and there’s a big punk scene too, but somehow they don’t overlap too much. We’d like to see more punks coming to the “skate” shows.