JFA — the band that defined Skate Punk and launched thousands of stage dives — has teamed up with preeminent early 80s punk photographer Ed Colver — who documented the primal energy of the early 80s punk scene and untold staggering stage dives — to invite you along for the grind in JFA’s latest music video called, fittingly enough, “Stage Dive.”
The video for the first single off JFA’s incendiary LAST RIDE LP (vinyl due on June 9) flings itself through scores of Colver’s signature high-contrast imagery that captures the aerial chaos and slam dance mayhem of early 80s-era gigs with TSOL, Social Distortion, LA’s Wasted Youth, JFA and many others.
The undisputed heavyweight of 80s punk photography, Colver’s images appeared on first albums by the Circle Jerks, Black Flag, Bad Religion, Social Distortion, Legal Weapon, China White and Wasted
Youth, to name a few.
“Ed Colver was and remains a legend unto himself when it comes to capturing the very essence of hardcore punk in action, and we are beyond stoked he opened up his archives for this project,” said
JFA lead screamer Brian Brannon.
“Stage Dive” tells the story of a punker who finds release in the momentary freedom of flight, while the singer of the band playing at the time instead plunges headfirst into the ground when the
crowd “parts like the Red Sea.”
Brannon has some personal experience with this fate as evidenced by the video’s last photo — the only shot not taken by Ed Colver — showing Brannon unconscious in the pit in a pool of his own
blood (photo credit: Lance Dalgart).
