Category: VIDEOS

It’s been 40 long years since the release of the Flesh Eaters‘ self-titled debut EP and 14 years since their last album. But on January 18, Chris D. and his supergroup backing band—guitarist Dave Alvin and drummer Bill Bateman (both Blasters), bassist John Doe and percussionist D.J. Bonebrake (both X) and saxophonist Steve Berlin (Los Lobos)—will release new album I Used To Be Pretty via Yep Roc. Not only did all the participants co-produce the LP, all of them will be touring together in support of the album. (If you’re up on your L.A. punk history—and of a certain age—you’ll no doubt notice this version of the Flesh Eaters is the same exact one that recorded the band’s 1981 masterpiece, A Minute To Pray, A Second To Die.)

But back to the future—and the past as well. The Flesh Eaters just made a video for I Used To Be Pretty track “My Life To Live.” If longtime fans think that song title sounds extremely familiar, they obviously have some brain cells still working after all these years. We’ll turn it over to Chris D. to explain.

“I originally wrote ‘My Life To Live’ back in 1982, that version appearing on the third Flesh Eaters album, Forever Came Today,” he says. “It’s a love song, but it’s coming from a fierce place, full of contradictions. I wrote the lyrics about someone I was deeply in love with then and for several years thereafter. She would come to every Flesh Eaters show and even now is still a fan and a friend. At the time, she had another boyfriend, but there was a window of time where she seemed poised to get together with me. I got conflicting signals and behavior from her about the situation. Most of her girlfriends saw me as the dark, intellectual weirdo and the other guy as a more agreeable, normal choice. So it was a frustrating situation for about six months or so, before she gravitated back to him exclusively. When you’re in your late 20s/early 30s, I think some of us have a more straightforward, direct approach to going after who we want as a mate, ignoring certain perspectives on personality and relationship ‘wisdom’ acquired from experience that we might solidify later. The video is aimed at a younger generation, but it still gets that feeling across of holding on uncompromisingly to an ideal or a dream, no matter what the cost. Sometimes—like at the end of the video when an older embodiment of the character has to let go of his beloved truck—we don’t always have a choice, and dreams are destroyed by forces beyond our control. This whole idea also fits in the with the I Used To Be Pretty album title, aging physically, but still emotionally in a ‘younger,’ more idealistic place.”

Well, there you have it, kids of all ages. No matter how old or young you are, it’s your life to live. So act accordingly.

We’re proud to premiere the video for “My Life To Live” today on magnetmagazine.com. Check it out now, pre-order I Used To Be Pretty, and catch this twice-in-a-lifetime lineup of the Flesh Eaters on tour starting in January.

While most 14-year-old, music-obsessed girls sit in their bedrooms making playlists, Sevi Ettinger was instead writing songs to fill these playlists. And not just tunes about boys and, well, boys. No, Ettinger—an American living in Shanghai—was penning tracks like “Salty Water,” which addresses the Syrian refugee crisis that was upsetting her so much that she felt the need do something about it. So she picked up her smartphone and recorded “Salty Water” via an app and utilizing a backing track she found online that was written by Texas musician Nate McCray. Within an hour, the song was done.

After her father posted the track online, it was discovered by Phillip Jarrell, who co-wrote ’70s smash “Torn Between Two Lovers” (ask your grandparents, kids) and helped the now-15-year-old Ettinger make a video for “Salty Water.” Jarrell introduced Ettinger’s music to Grammy-winning producer Jeff Bova (Celine Dion, Cyndi Lauper, Katy Perry), who signed on to make a record with her. The result is the four-song Salty Water EP, out August 24 via Sevillana.

We’re proud to premiere the remarkable video for “Salty Water” by this up-and-coming talent today on magnetmagazine.com. Says the wise-beyond-her-years Ettinger, a successful fundraiser for UN refugee agency USA For UNHCR, of “Salty Water,” “I create music to give others a chance to be heard. When I was sitting in my room watching the Syrian refugees fleeing their homes, leaving everything behind, I knew they needed to be heard. My hope in writing the song is to share their voice, express their pain and show their tears. My dream is for all people to be free—to be who they want to be.”

Mission accomplished, Sevi.