“You must be Evan!” Cross Dog’s Tracy A. exclaims as I welcome her and bandmate Mark Rand into Sadleir House.

We’re meeting on this gorgeous Monday morning (sans drummer Mikey Reid, sadly) to discuss the band’s imminent LP, All Hard Feelings, releasing June 7^th on Stomp Records.

As I show the two members who’ve joined me around the house, Tracy relays how she used to volunteer with Rock Camp for Girls* in Sadleir’s Hobbs Library, back in the before-times of pre-pandemic yonder.

The house has changed a lot since then. Peeling paint and cracked facias have been retouched, rooms shuffled, new amenities—such as the community and student centre’s much-used free coffee station—installed.

The room to which I’m taking Tracy and Mark, the second floor’s cozy Library of Truth, didn’t even exist when Tracy was doing RC4G a scant four or five years ago. Around that same time is when Cross Dog last put out an LP—2019’s Hollow, a heavy, topically charged and introspective album.

Just as the band were slated to embark on a tour in support of said album, the COVID-19 pandemic derailed their plans. To that end, the release of All Hard Feelings also signals a return to touring for Cross Dog. Their album release party, the night of June 7th at Peterborough’s Bar 379, has already sold out.

While this may well speak to their status as hometown heroes, with five years since their last release it’s fair to assume that Arthur readers of today might not be acquainted with the band. I therefore ask Tracy and Mark how Cross Dog would describe themselves to anyone for whom this might be their first exposure, which prompts a laugh from Mark.

“In all our social media we used to have this hilariously long description,” he explains. “I’ll try to remember it verbatim—it was like: ‘loud, noisy, socially conscious bass-driven, metallic, hardcore, punk rock n’ roll’.”

“Feminist punk rock,” Tracy interjects.

“Feminist punk rock,” Mark echoes. “It was excessive for sure, but the short answer is probably just ‘a feminist punk band’.”

While this answer provides a rough taxonomy of the band’s genre and ideals, Tracy says it still fails to wholly encompass what Cross Dog is.

“I think one of the best compliments that you have been given was that we don't sound like anybody,” she tells Mark. “There’s no ‘we sound exactly like this’. It’s such a mix of influences that it’s kind of its own thing.” 

Her bandmate attributes this in part to Cross Dog’s composition—they are a punk band without a lead guitar. The heavy riffs the trio lay down are an exercise in sonic trickery—a careful manipulation of Mark’s bass by a rig of myriad pedals.

“I feel like the style of music we play isn’t avant-garde or anything,” he shrugs, “but the fact that we have only a bass guitar and drums and vocals makes it a little different.”

Even compared to other acts signed to Stomp, their record label, Cross Dog stands out sonically.

“It was very shocking when they signed us,” Tracy nods. “We’re just so much heavier than everybody.”

“The label began as a ska label,” Mark adds. “Even their logo is a little skanking dude with a two-tone suit on. It’s very ska. We almost thought it was a mistake—like, are you sure you have the right band you want to sign?”

“We’ve quickly learned though that the ska thing was just how they started,” he explains. “They’re brilliant, wonderful people who are open-minded about music—and just most things.”

It’s not only their sound that makes the band unique, however. One of the most important facets of Cross Dog’s identity is their commitment to their political beliefs, of which they make little pretense of hiding.

“We’re also so politically overt,” Tracy notes. “It’s funny because that has come into play in a practical sense where we’re going to make things a little harder for [our label] just because we aren’t willing to play certain places or play with certain bands.”

I ask the pair to tell me a little more about the “vibe” of their forthcoming album, All Hard Feelings, and how those sonic and political tendencies manifest in it.

“I think it's the concept of All Hard Feelings and of the title itself,” Tracy muses. “The themes on the record are all hard feelings — things that are difficult to confront or to deal with, whether it's depression, neurodivergence, reproductive justice, trans rights.”

“There’s a bit of juxtaposition, though,” Mark adds. “If you compare it to the last album, the music is slightly more upbeat. It’s not as dark. The backdrop has an air of positivity.”

This is all in service of a more focused, united approach to their political message, the band says.

“What I actually wanted was to have that feeling of optimism where it's not like ‘everything sucks, fuck this,’” Tracy explains. “Like, that's implicit in there, but it's more about uniting the people. I wanted people to feel optimistic and feel like we’re together. There’s so many of us who feel this way.”

This optimism is something she feels is reflected in the present political moment.

“Just look at all the protests going on campuses,” she points out. “People—especially Gen Z—are really wanting to live their beliefs and see the world reflect these values, that are also values I would hold as my own.”

I take this as a good opportunity to ask the pair what they mean when Cross Dog describes themselves as a “socially conscious” band.

“I think as the primary lyricist, this has been an avenue for advocacy and activism for me,” Tracy tells me. “I’ve always wanted to use my words and the way I write to articulate my values and to try to help people in my space think about things in different ways. For me that’s always been a cornerstone of what we do here.” 

This marriage of music and politics is more intuitive than anything else, she stresses.

“I think it’s really important to speak to your values, to stand up for marginalized communities. These are things I just believe in my core,” says Tracy. “If Cross Dog is going to be something that I put myself into, that’s got to be a part of it too.” 

“I feel like often the loudest voice in the room is often the worst voice to listen to,” Mark muses. “You know, ‘assholes are always loud.’ So if we can be incredibly loud with our message then maybe we’ll cut through some of the bullshit.”

The band doesn’t limit their message and their politics to their music and lyrics, however. Both band members tell me that it’s important that they live their principles.

Cross Dog recently cancelled tour dates across Ontario and Quebec after it came to their attention that the band they were to be touring with, Flatfoot 56, had released an anti-abortion song titled “Fight to Live.”

For Tracy, however, sticking to their guns in instances such as these is “kind of a no-brainer.”

“We have a lot of privilege to be able to speak about the things we do with minimal risk to ourselves,” she notes. “Who am I to choose safety because I have that option when so many of my friends don’t?”

Tracy stresses that while she “[doesn’t] want people to get it twisted thinking we’re not open, conversational people that have the best intentions,” Cross Dog’s beliefs and their music are inextricable from one another.

“We've been a band now for eleven years,” Mark interjects. “When we started the band, we established right away that we were going to use this platform for more than just music—we're going to share our values through our lyrics, through our messaging.”

Reproductive rights remain a focus for Cross Dog, thematically, on All Hard Feelings. Their next single in particular, titled “Jane Roe,” tackles the matter head-on.

“It’s a reproductive justice song that we’ve been playing for a minute,” Tracy explains. “It was I think the first song we wrote for this record, and it’s just becoming more and more relevant as time goes on.” 

In the time since the release of the band’s previous record, the United States Supreme Court verdict on Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization overruled the longstanding Constitutional right to abortion enshrined in Roe v. Wade. Even here in Canada, contraception access remains a political sticking point, and whispers abound about Pierre Poilievre and the Conservative Party’s potential stance on abortion access.

"There was a moment where we wrote [“Jane Roe”] and I was like, ‘by the time this album comes out, is this even going to be relevant?’,” Tracy recalls. “It’s always relevant —that’s the thing.”

She puts it this way: “When you have rights, there’s always people still working to take them away. While you think you have rights, you become complacent. You’re not advocating, you’re not planning ‘how do I keep these rights?’ But there’s all these other people, the whole time—all these orgs that are like ‘No, we need to get those rights taken away,’ and they’re always working.”

“That’s where the ‘it’s not pro-life if we don’t have rights’ comes from—that single,” Tracy explains. The mantra prominently features on the band’s website and summarizes some of their political preoccupations on this project.

Mark points to “Jane Roe” as an example of the contrast between the lyrical content and instrumentation of All Hard Feelings.

“Probably more so than any other song on the record, this is the one with the most juxtaposition between the lyrics and the feeling of the song,” he tells me. “I think that people could dance to this song. That's an interesting sort of disparity, but I also feel like  it helps carry the message.”

This, Tracy notes, is a contrast from 2019’s Hollow.

“The last record was a very dark, exploratory, self-indulgent release. When we did Hollow it really helped us to refine who we are as a band and explore some even darker themes.”

While All Hard Feelings is more musically upbeat than its predecessor, it doesn’t shy away from engaging with serious subject matter all the same.

“On Hollow, the finishing song was called ‘Rapist,’” Tracy recalls. “On this record we have a song called ‘Collateral Damage,’ about the Justice system and how it’s set up against [sexual assault] survivors.”

The song took substantial inspiration from Chanel Miller, the survivor of the Brock Turner assault. “I read her book like five years ago, and I was just thinking about how little has changed in that regard in all this time, and how the Justice system is really just set up to revictimize people,” Tracy tells me. “Anybody who’s a survivor is seen as collateral damage.”

She’s quick to add “Our darker ideas are still on this record, but it definitely feels more fun to listen to. Hollow sounded dark—and was dark. This one sounds a little more joyful.”

“The music is still a critique on what’s going on, socially,” Mark adds. “But it’s a little more ‘fist in the air’ than despair.”

Even the higher profile the promotion for All Hard Feelings is bringing them (their most recent music video sits at over 68k views at time of publication), Mark says the core ethos hasn’t changed. “Now that we're sort of starting to see a little bit of visibility we aren’t willing to compromise on how we started the band eleven years ago.”

“I’d rather have literally nobody listen to us than compromise on it,” Tracy interjects.

As I point out, however, it’s certainly not as if nobody is listening to Cross Dog. Tickets to the aforementioned album release party sold out in less than 48 hours.

“It felt really good cause we never know where we stand in Peterborough,” Tracy admits. “We are maybe a little bit more niche for this community and while we're stoked anytime somebody comes out to support us, we just don't want to overdo it because we don't know how many of those people there really are.”

“I see the garbageface sticker on your laptop,” Mark observes. The local doom rapper is a close friend of the band, and is also one of the opening acts for their launch party show. Mark explains that garbageface frequently asks them to play shows in Peterborough, though the band are often reluctant to book hometown gigs.

“I don’t think we have the most confidence in whether people like us,” Tracy admits. “We actually are kind of shy.”

“We should probably start playing here more, because the shows have always been fun,” Mark grins. “So why not?”

“We haven’t played Sadleir House yet,” Tracy observes.

“That’s true. We totally should.”

“When we play locally we always try to make it a fundraiser,” Tracy explains. “We’re going to donate the proceeds from our album release party. Last time we did Kawartha Sexual Assault Centre (KSAC), we’ve also collected period materials, you know, anything that’s ‘pink taxed’ (I hate that word). That piece is really important to us.”

I tell Tracy and Mark that I think I speak on behalf of both my colleagues when I say we’d adore them to play a show in The John for one of Arthur’s biannual fundraiser concerts. Both Mark and Tracy, for their part, seem enthused at the concept.

“We’ll do it!” Mark grins.

“Yes—on the record!” Tracy agrees.

This is an album cycle of firsts for Cross Dog. Not only is this their first time working with a label—and hopefully soon-to-be their first time Sadleir House—All Hard Feelings also sees the band’s first time working with a producer. Cancer Bats co-founder Scott Middleton produced the album with Cross Dog, and was instrumental in what Mark describes as “trimming the fat.”

“When we did Hollow, we didn’t have a producer, and so every idea we had was like ‘put it in the song, put it in the song!’,” he explains. “We ended up with like, four or five minute long songs. Some bands can pull that off, that’s fine, but when you’re listening to really brutal, heavy stuff it can be a little bit exhausting.”

By contrast, All Hard Feelings comes in at a lean ten tracks, each of which are much more to-the-point. “We ended up cutting a lot of the material down shorter, and I think Scott was really wise in guiding us to do that.”

“[Scott] was all about creating more memorable moments,” Tracy adds. “The part that people walk away from the song still singing, or that sticks in their head.”

“We probably weren’t the easiest band to work with,” Mark laughs. “Like I said, we’ve been a band for eleven years and we’re sort of used to doing things our own way. When you get someone else in there telling you what you’re doing is wrong it’s easy to get your back up.”

Ultimately, though, he thinks “the collaboration worked out really well.” Certainly the punchiness Middleton’s production brings to “Hard Feelings”—not to mention the tens of thousands of views the single has already accrued on YouTube—would seem to corroborate that.

A lot of these developments—working with a producer, and shooting good-looking, high-performing videos, are of course a product of the financial support working with Stomp Records has afforded the band.

“This is our first time really having a proper [album cycle] where it’s been supported by a label and where there’s like, official things that happen,” Tracy grins. “We’re doing way more press, we’re doing videos. It’s just been fun,”

The videos in particular are something for which the band is very excited.

“We’ve always done our own videos,” Tracy says. “Normally we would do one, maybe we do another at some point, but [Stomp] were like ‘we want three videos for this’. We were like, ‘OK, we’re each going to take one and make it our brainchild,’ and Mikey ran with the first one.”

“In a loose way you could say the first video was Mikey, the second video is Tracy, and the third video is me,” Mark tells me.

The video, which features a series of slapstick scenarios and many iconic Peterborough landmarks, was directed by Cross Dog drummer Mikey and shot by Director of Photography Peter Miller.

“We wouldn’t have been able to achieve that level of quality without Peter,” Mark admits. “Mikey directed the video, but Peter? Peter brought it to life.”

Two more videos are currently in production, with the band in the process of piecing together the video for “Jane Roe”, which Tracy describes as a “tongue-in-cheek, dystopian reality.”

“The concepts for Mark’s and Mikey's are obviously a little bit more humor based,” she admits. “‘Jane Roe’ is not appropriate for humor. Even so it's kind of fun to storyboard and do all these different things. It's been really fun honestly.”

Despite all the fun they’ve had throughout the album’s production, Cross Dog are most excited to return to their roots as a live band.

“When Hollow came out,” Mark recalls, “we had plans to self-book a tour, do it completely DIY and really push it as far as we could, because we had a label (Uncle D records, the in-house label of Ottawa’s Vertigo Records) backing it, but it was an incredibly small mom & pop shop.”

“They basically paid for our vinyl so we could make money off the merch table,” Tracy interjects.

“Then the pandemic happened,” Mark continues. “We just couldn’t tour—no one could. Probably the most exciting thing about this album cycle is that we actually get to treat it properly, the way we wanted to before.”

“My favorite part of all of it,” Tracy says, “is after we play a show, the conversations I get to have at the merch table with people who I just end up having these amazing, heart bursting moments with people. It restores your faith in people all the time.”

“It’s that old school punk rock point of view,” Mark intones. “When I was a little kid I went to punk shows because I was kind of a weirdo, and I didn’t have a huge circle of friends. Now I have all these people in my life because of punk rock. And it’s still happening.”

All Hard Feelings releases June 7^th, 2024 through Stomp Records. The album is available to pre-order for $10 CAD digitally and $25 CAD on vinyl on Bandcamp. You can find Cross Dog at crossdogisaband.com and @crossdog666 on most social media.