Christian Sumalpong is the living embodiment of the DIY spirit. Through his work as a musician in the bands S.P.E.A.R. and Juiced, his label, Pure Chance Records, and booking company, Every Show Ever, he's helping push the local hardcore scene in Guam.
I try and cover as many regional scenes as I can on No Echo, so when Christian reached out to me recently, I knew it was an opportune time to shine the spotlight on Guam and what's he's been doing there to help grow it.
S.P.E.A.R. just kicked off the year by releasing an EP called Invasive Species, so we also talk about that, and vocalist Machalek is part of the conversation below. Dig in and learn about the Guam hardcore community along with me.
First off, how would you describe Guam to people who have never been there? Admittedly, I know next to nothing about the Island and its people.
Guam is an island located in the Micronesia region of the Pacific Ocean. It is a U.S. territory with a population of about 173,000 people ranging from mostly Chamorro and Filipino people, as well a mix of Japanese/Korean/Chinese people and other Micronesian ethnicities such as Palauan, Carolinian, and Marshallese people. There are also many Americans living on the island, either to live and work here independently or as part of the U.S. military occupation.
The island itself is what you could describe as a tropical paradise, with the warm (and I mean very warm) weather and the ocean being visible from at least one direction of where you are at all times. The people are hospitable, and the food is amazing.
A lot of people come here for the first time and end up staying. It’s sort of an ideal place to retire, with its chill and slow island lifestyle. The art scene is also very much thriving at this time, with many people creating new things, throwing great events, and cultivating a good community that’s open and inviting.
You are entrenched in hardcore, running a label, booking shows, and playing in a band. How did you come to discover hardcore and how much of a hardcore community do you have there in Guam? Do you see it growing?
In my personal experience, I was first put on to hardcore music from a sampler CD that I got with a merch order during my 8th grade year in 2009. It had Reign Supreme, Bishop, Down to Nothing, Blackened, and a bunch of other hardcore bands on there alongside a random early The Wonder Years song (who I’m sure was why I received the sampler in the first place).
I started to dive deeper into hardcore music once I got on Tumblr around 2011 and discovered Turnstile, Harms Way, Trapped Under Ice, Backtrack, Incendiary and more. From then I was just about fully in.
In regards to a hardcore community on Guam, there is definitely an interest in heavy music on the island. When I was younger, the music scene was pretty much either metalcore/deathcore bands or reggae bands. In recent times, there have been just a few bands demonstrating actual hardcore punk music, going on to play a handful of shows before disbanding.
With the emergence of our band and this EP, I can definitely feel the scene’s appreciation and desire for more things like it. People that I’ve never seen before are coming to shows and saying they’ve been keeping up with S.P.E.A.R. from the beginning. With the feedback we’ve gotten just from existing as a band, I can definitely see it growing and I highly encourage the next generation of musicians to join us in the scene.
What's the story behind Pure Chance Records? Tell me a bit about the releases and what you have planned for the rest of 2025.
Pure Chance came to life just in the past year of 2024. I love seeing what bands do outside of just performing music, whether it be writing, recording, or even just kicking back on their free time. I’ve always had the thought of starting a label in my head, and labels like Run For Cover, Sunday Drive, and Scheme are what showed me that there are really cool and visually engaging things that you can do with a label aside from just releasing music.
When my other band, Juiced, was getting ready to drop our first EP last year, I felt it was a good opportunity to finally get the label running. The Juiced EP was the first Pure Chance release and we did CDs straight out the gate. The feedback to everything was great, and I would love to release the EP on tape and vinyl in the future.
The next release was this S.P.E.A.R. record and the reaction was even better this time. It’s really rewarding to see everyone resonate with the band’s hard work. It’s showing us that there is opportunity out there even for people from Guam, who almost never get to see their creations leave our immediate circle.
Pure Chance is working on releasing more music from other local artists this year, and ultimately just wants to make more cool shit. I would also love to work with some international artists, the possibilities are endless.
How did S.P.E.A.R. come together and what are some of the musical influences that went into the stew? I know the lyrics are paramount in what the band is doing, so please talk about that.
S.P.E.A.R. came together in 2021 with vocalist Machalek, guitarist Thomas, bassist Dave, and drummer Kyle all jamming and me initially just taking promo photos of the band. Thomas had been back on island from San Jose, California where he currently lives and plays with his band, Star 99.
The guys had been in talks to start a hardcore project and were writing/practicing in anticipation for the first show on Guam since the pandemic (dubbed The First Show Ever). From then on, the band played a couple more shows and after hanging out with the guys so much I was eventually asked to become a member to both cover guitar duties while Thomas was in California and also give input in writing.
The sound of the band is influenced by late 2000s hardcore like Backtrack, Ceremony, Carry On, Glue, Gas Rag, with a mix of elements of late '80s/early '90s stuff through a modern lens. The lyric and vocal style of the band is influenced by Tragedy, Sheer Terror, Minor Threat, Sepultura, Oi Polloi, and Angelic Upstarts.
Invasive Species just came out, so what can people expect from the EP? That title is perfect.
Invasive Species is a punch to the face. The music goes 100 miles per hour and the lyrics sear into your brain. As Guam is victim to many actual invasive species in regards to plants and animals, the title of the EP refers to numerous intrusive factors that have left a negative impact on the people of Guam.
These songs are also part of a body of work that has been about 4 years in the making now. It’s invigorating to finally have it out, and we can’t wait for everyone to hear what’s to follow.
Machalek, tell me a bit about the lyrics on Invasive Species.
When I write lyrics, it can start with a general idea or just a single line, and it will grow off of that. Then there is always input from everyone else in the band. My process usually involves looping the song over and over until it fits just right. I keep accessibility in mind while I try to couple aspects of commiseration, education, and raw emotion.
I keep in mind what punk and hardcore has always been to me, and that is working-class communication. We are laying out our ideas, experiences, and feelings. Some artifice is required, but I try to ensure that it does not get lost in too many abstractions. Likewise, there are academic concepts that have been constructed from our experiences personally and collectively, cultural references, and history that I incorporate into songs as well, but those things should be communicated on the level of our experiences and not academic discourse.
For example, "Silver Teeth" is about developing decolonial class consciousness amongst ourselves. There is a common experience with silver metal-capped teeth in Guam. It is often attributed to poor diets, poor hygiene, and lack of insurance for dental care. These are conditions of the colonial poverty we experience as displaced indigenous peoples and working class immigrants. It probably reads like it's about resiliency, but I don't really care for resiliency as it's exhausting to always have to be enduring and strong. I wrote it with two other things in mind.
The first thing is that we should stop being ashamed of where we're from, geographically, culturally, and socially. We should stop practicing this internalized colonial perspective that we need to amount to something approaching wealth, whiteness, and holiness. The second thing is the idea that our culture has been lost to our poverty, that our socioeconomic poverty is an indication of our cultural poverty. So many of us lose our ties to traditional lifeways and even the land itself when we have to struggle to survive under capitalism.
The Chamoru language was outlawed by the US government and then pushed out of the public sphere by the American education system, and we find ourselves hearing about how it was our responsibility as the language begins to be lost. We have been kept from our ways of life, including our language, so we could be better absorbed into the American workforce, the American ideological framework, and American cultural values as our own have been abstracted, lost, and supplanted.
Knowing that our values can and have persisted on the ranches, in our homes, on our work breaks, in the streets, and wherever our transgressions against being a good American have taken place is the first step to reclaiming what we are told we can't have, what has been obfuscated by American wage slavery and impoverishment.
Christian, you book shows locally through your Every Show Ever moniker. Do you get bands from outside of Guam hitting you up? How tough is it for bands to get over there to play shows? Is there any red tape outside of the financial burden it would be for a band to fly over just to play a single show?
Many bands that either me or my friends have met/been in contact with have said they would love to play a show here in Guam. We brought ANORAK and White Surf here for a DIY festival last January, and it was amazing. There isn’t much red tape (at least for U.S. bands) to come here and play a show aside from the money.
The finances are even a bigger hurdle here than other places as even one way flights cost almost double/triple as much as they would anywhere else. As a DIY venture, it’s definitely quite hard for us but not impossible. We’re in a unique spot as we’re closer to Asia, so I have a lot of artists in the region that would love to and hopefully one day bring out here.
What other bands from Guam should No Echo readers check out?
Some other bands from Guam that are definitely worth checking out are In Bedrooms, Juiced, 83books, NVRDRMT, thetonysofar, Fat Tofu, Local Deluxe, Dogs in Dededo, Gssp Grrls, and Bay Daze.
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S.P.E.A.R. on social media: Instagram
Juiced on social media: Instagram
Pure Chance Records on social media: Instagram
Every Show Ever on social media: Instagram
Tagged: juiced, s.p.e.a.r., scene report
