For this week’s issue, talked to Matt Werth, who runs the record label RVNG Intl. and hails originally from Little Rock, where he was an active member of the early and mid-`90s punk scene, the era of Das Yutes a Go-Go and File 13 Records (which he eventually ran for several years). The article covers his own musical output in passing, but in the interest of local history and completism, it’s worth mentioning here that, teenagers or not, his band William Martyr 17 was very much a real thing and even sort of great. It’s post-hardcore or it’s punk rock or it’s whatever you want to call it — it’s intense. “To some extent,” Werth said in our interview, “because we toured a bit and did have File 13 and other record labels releasing our music, it somehow got out there past Little Rock. That was kind of my high school experience, those bands.”

This track was released in 1995 as the B side of a split 7″ with Plunger, and the band was apparently already finished at this point. In the liner notes, its members are introduced in the past tense: “William Martyr 17 was …”

Advertisement

UPDATE: Courtesy of Nate Powell, here’s the complete William Martyr 17 discography, which Powell released via Harlan records in 1999. More info here.

Advertisement