Beauty Fades, out May 27 on Iodine Recordings, is a 13-track album comprised of Smoke or Fire’s first EP, Worker’s Union, alongside seven other rare or previously unreleased tracks. This collection wonderfully showcases the band’s infectious brand of spirited, passionate punk. We sat down with vocalist and guitarist Joe McMahon to dive in further.
First, what prompted the idea for this release at this time?
Casey and I reconnected a few years ago when he posted an old flyer from one of our shows, and he mentioned rereleasing the record since things didn’t really go as planned the first time. At first, I wasn’t into the idea of releasing an album of songs that were 20 years old. I honestly hadn’t listened to the songs in years and didn’t know how they would hold up.
Casey came out to one of my solo shows when I was playing in L.A., and we talked about it further. I listened to the songs, and I felt like they still help up really well, actually. Some of the best songs we wrote. When Casey told me he was getting Iodine back up and running and we would remix and remaster the songs and do some really amazing artwork, that’s when I got excited about it. And also, what a cool opportunity to release something new during COVID times when impossible to do anything.
I actually interviewed you back before Above the City came out and asked about reissuing the Workers Union EP. You said of it:
“’99 or 2000 a kid put it out for us and a month or two later Iodine wanted to pick it up. We added one more song and they re-pressed it and (they) went bankrupt about two months later, so not a lot ever happened with that. It’s still distributed by Revelation because Iodine had distribution through [them] but nothing ever happened with that record because we didn’t have a label.”
So, I guess it’s fitting it’s coming out again and more people can hear it, and that you’re releasing it with Iodine, who are back …”
Yeah, I mean we tried to release the record twice and after it failed the second time I think we sort of just gave up on it and decided to start writing the next record, which became Above the City and got us signed to FAT. But a lot of these songs remained in our set for years, so I’m happy people can finally hear them recorded. And I’m really happy to be releasing it with Iodine. Somehow it all worked out. Just took a while.
And just looking back and putting this material out now, I was just wondering if your views of the band’s earlier material have changed over the years. The songs and the passion definitely stand the test of time …
It’s weird because I listen to these songs ,and I feel like I could have written them yesterday. I was writing most of this music around 9/11, and that sort of had a big influence on me and the band. We had strong feelings against the war. A song like “50 Cent Hearts,” I look at the world today and unfortunately nothing has changed. The war I was singing against lasted 20 years and ended just before the rerelease of this record. I think about that 22-year-old kid writing these songs and I know I’m not the same person, but I feel the same about all those things I was writing about. I just feel sad that I don’t feel like I have the energy to fight them now like I did then.
You put out the last Smoke or Fire full-length in 2010. Can you see writing and releasing new material under the Smoke of Fire moniker at some point?
I have new smoke songs. I never stopped writing. But there are no plans right now to release anything. I stopped making plans after year one of corona. I’m just waiting to see which end we come out of on this thing and go from there. I do love the new songs I’ve written, and I’m sure I will release them in one form or another at some point.
And after that album came out, did you ever formally dissolve the band? Or was it more of a being on hiatus?
We released the album, and then we toured a bit in the U.S. and then overseas. We never broke up, but I moved to Germany in 2014, and after that we only got together a few times.
About present times, who constitutes the band nowadays? Do you see any touring in the future?
I have no idea what the band would look like if we decided to play again. Everyone has their own lives, and some have families and kids, and I just don’t who’s up for what. A few years ago, I did a handful of festivals in Europe and Canada and a few shows with the Descendents. It was with some musicians I was already playing with for my solo stuff. There was talks about us doing some really small shows in Boston and play the old material before Covid started, but nothing since.
If there’s anything else you would like to add, please feel free to do so here.
I really just have to thank Casey for all of the work he put into rereleasing this record, and also the original engineer Ethan Dussault for blowing the dust off these songs after 20 years and making it sound incredible. For anyone interested in side projects, you can check out my solo album, Another Life, and also Jeremy and James have a great band called X’ed Out.
Listen to “Beauty Fades” here:
For more from Smoke Or Fire, find them on
Photo courtesy of Bryan Wynacht
