So what the heck is punk, anyway?

Is it studded belts and tight pants? Well, no. Is it… So what the heck is punk, anyway?

Is it studded belts and tight pants? Well, no. Is it spiked hair and lip rings? Not quite. Is it Fall Out Boy? Oh, hell no. Though punk can be countless different things to countless different people, to Pat Thetic, drummer of longtime Pittsburgh punk rock band Anti-Flag, this four-letter word isn’t even a distinct type of music.

“Punk is all about the message. It’s an attitude of ‘I don’t like what’s going on, and it’s time to change,'” he said in a recent interview. “I mean, if I had to pick the music or the message, I’d say the message is more important. Punk can be any type of music as long as the ideas and attitude is there.”

As much as you might love your T-shirt collection from Hot Topic, there is certainly something in cleverly named Thetic’s idea. And really, if anyone knows what punk is, it would be Pat Thetic. His band has been the front-runner of politically driven punk rock since the early 1990s, and with its latest release, For Blood And Empire, coming out on major label RCA Records, Anti-Flag might be the first band of its kind to bring their message to the masses.

And if you’re looking for some fist-pumping punk rock with a side of politics, then Saturday and Sunday are your lucky days: The band will play two homecoming shows at Mr. Smalls, shaking Millvale to its very foundation, along with Alexisonfire, Big D and the Kids Table and Set Your Goals.

But before the members of Anti-Flag were releasing records nationally with song titles like “The WTO Kills Farmers” and “Depleted Uranium is a War Crime,” they were just a bunch of punks growing up minutes from where we all go to school. Thetic, now a happy resident of Squirrel Hill when not on tour, and future singer/guitarist Justin Sane were childhood friends who bonded over their discontent with the state of things here in western Pennsylvania.

“Justin and I hated high school. We’d go to shows and started to get into the punk scene. The more we heard, the more we learned politically,” Thetic said.

After a failed attempt at West Coast living, by 1993 Pat Thetic and Justin Sane, along with Andy Flag, were ready for something more serious, as the social and political dissatisfaction of all three were constantly growing. Anti-Flag was born.

“We used to play all over campus. We had friends who went to Pitt, so they would reserve