Guttermouth has been around since the late 80′s, managing to outlast their contemporaries in the punk scene without the least bit of guilt. Their name has become synonymous with deliberately explicit, yet sarcastic and humorous, lyrics that are prevalent throughout their music.

They are most recently best known for their controversial exit from the Warped Tour six years ago. Since that time, Guttermouth has continued to tour, continued to make music and continued to be unapologetic with anything that they have to say.

They are going to be coming to Atlanta at the beginning of August and I had the opportunity to ask Mark Adkins, the lead singer, some questions about the band; what they’re doing and just generally pick his brain apart.

JF: Guttermouth has been notorious for being vocal about their beliefs. Do you believe that the music industry works to promote people who are less vocal about their beliefs and work to promote the bands that are happy with being told what to do?

MA: Indeed the band has and always will hold the First Amendment in high regard. I will say, “Take advantage of your rights, while you can.” With that guy who presently sits in the White House, who knows what he has up his sleeve. I believe he wants to make most Americans, as well as illegal immigrants. dependent on the government as well as countless other evils. I could go on forever about immigration, but…

As far as the industry promoting people or bands who are vocal and the robots on the other side…This is very hard to determine based on some of the current artists (I use this term loosely) who appear to base their entire performance on image driven sexuality. Straight, gay or just plain whorish (Is that a word?) I’m sure many parents censor their children from this, but they sell millions.

On the other hand I think back to yesteryear and have no idea what the industry was thinking releasing songs like 1977’s “Christine Sixteen” by Kiss, which make Paul Stanley sound like a modern day child molester. Or 80’s semi stars Sparks’ song “All You Ever Think About Is Sex”, or the song “Little Girls” by Oingo Boingo. Again, some would say that Danny Elfman sounds a bit perverted. I wish I had more time for research prior to answering. I would like to know more about the political climates and censorship movements of each era. I think 60’s, 70’s, 80’s and they all had hit makers with controversial topic’s, dress, dance and drugs. I failed to mention the 90’s and 2000’s, mainly because they were very uneventful.

I guess it would have been easier to say, “I don’t know”; so let’s go with that. Disregard everything I mentioned above.

[Author's note : Yes, 'whorish' is a word. Also, the only reason that I left that first part in, is because it gives our readers a much clearer view of Guttermouth and the fact that Mark Adkins is not afraid to speak his mind about the issues.]

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