Utter Trash--Victory Flag

Raise the Banner

An interview with Greg Van Krol of Victory Flag

By Mike Salamone

Victory Flag started playing the Cleveland scene in 1997. Originally the band was going to be called Guttersnipe, but since that was already taken they took the title of one of their early songs for a name instead. Since then the band has been through various line-up changes, but founding member Greg Van Krol’s guitar playing remains a constant. Greg’s current partners in rock are longtime vocalist Chad Guyer and recent additions Jay Bielinski on bass and Pat Downes on drums. As far as their influences Greg says, “Slayer and the Accused and Cryptic Slaughter. The crossover stuff is really what we do; we blend everything like D.R.I. and stuff like that. We’ve got influences from all sides; punk, metal, and hardcore. So punk people say that we’re metal and hardcore people say we’re punk and metal people say we’re hardcore.” Whatever you want to call them, Victory Flag has managed to win over fans from all corners of the underground heavy music scene.

For Greg, crossing over to different scenes is nothing new. He did just that with his previous band Face Value, and he has fond memories of the kind of scene unity that was taken for granted in the eighties. That’s something which, to Greg, seems lacking today. “Everybody used to cheer for each other and support each other,” says Greg. “When somebody did good it was like that was one step further for everybody. Now it’s like there’s no happiness for other bands that do good. It’s all cliquish. Back in the day we used to go to shows 4 or 5 days a week, not just to see national bands but to see local bands, everybody. And all the shows would be packed and you knew everybody at the shows. It just doesn’t seem like that any more. It’s disappointing.”

While it’s easy to sit back and criticize, Victory Flag are trying to do their part to make things better. Greg says one of the main reasons for starting Victory Flag was to bring some of that old school vibe back to the scene: “We wanted to try to recreate some of that, and play with bands that wanted to play with us and wanted to have fun, too. Not just play with bands so we can jump on the bandwagon or whatever, just play with whoever wants to play with us.” Victory Flag has been able to find a few area bands that feel the same way including Run Devil Run and Ringworm, and they’ve also been able to open for national acts like Overkill, D.R.I., and Madball. This summer they were one of four Cleveland area bands picked out of 100 submissions to play on The Vans Warped Tour. Greg’s happy about the high profile gigs but says it isn’t the reason he plays music. “It’s just to have fun,” says Greg. “What all of us enjoy doing is playing music. We’ve all been in lots of other bands before and this is just the latest thing that we’re doing.”

Now in their sixth year of existence, Victory Flag has a fairly substantial back catalog of material to draw from as well as new material written with the current line-up. Although the band still plays songs from the early days like “Fallen” and “Pound for Pound” Greg says, “With the new guys we’re trying to move forward. There are still songs that people want to hear us play, so we play them. But we’re really concentrating on writing new stuff. We’ve got two new members in the band and so they bring their influences and have their additions with whatever they come up with.” Since Pat and Jay came into the fold, Victory Flag is writing together as a group more. Greg says, “We just flow a little better. The new stuff we’ve been writing is pretty much all of us getting together and piecing together parts.”

To date, Victory Flag has released one full album on Sin Klub Records (“The Soundtrack to Your Miserable Life”, 2002) and been featured on various compilations including tributes to D.R.I. and The Accused. With the new line-up coming together so well, though, Greg is really hoping to get something new recorded. Greg says, “The new record will be called ‘Red Right 88’. When the Browns were about to go to the Superbowl in the eighties that was the play they called and it ended up being an interception and they lost the game.” The Browns may have choked, but Victory Flag look set to take it all the way.