Fujirockers: The official fansite of the Fuji Rock Festival

When Refused’s lead singer Dennis Lyxzén told the Fuji Rock audience, “I’m sorry it took us 20 years to get here,” he was both referring to the band’s total absence from the music world in the last decade and also their sudden, much heralded return to a position that they might never have even imagined possible. Sunday night at Fuji Rock, the hardcore punk band from the tiny northern Sweden city of Umea, played to a White Stage audience of several thousands, with the entire front of the stage exploded into one giant mosh pit. They’ve done the same earlier this year at Coachella and several other major festivals. In the 90s, they were playing small punk clubs when they finally decided to call it quits.

Earlier in the night, Lyxzén offered a bit of an explanation, saying, “We wrote all these songs when we were a bunch of anarchists in the 90s, but they mean as much today as they did then, maybe even more. The world is even more fucked up in 2012 than it was then, and we need a revolution now more than ever.”

As for the set they played, it was as tight as a studio performance and as explosive as a club show. In other words, it was fucking awesome.

One couldn’t help wondering why Refused had to go away in the first place? Did the world need 10 years to digest their music before it could give them the big stages they deserved? Were they really so far ahead of their time? Or did they need to mature from 20-somethings to almost-40s before they could discover a balance between their earnest, anarchist-socialist idealism and the corporate world of international rock music? It’s most likely a combination of the above, but thank god they’re back. And they look as good as ever. Maybe even better. Watching Lyxzén’s leaps (in one case off a 1-meter tall monitor he’d turned on its side) and sinewy dance moves (there are doses of Mick Jagger and David Bowie in there), it’s hard to believe he just celebrated his 40th birthday earlier this year. The rest of the band looks just as good. Style-wise, they sport a classic look, all wearing collared shirts, skinny jeans and leather shoes.

If you know Refused from their album The Shape of Punk to Come, you’d have known to expect the post-modern touches: spoken word manifestos used to introduce songs, electronic samples, techno beats, sections of spacey experimental noise and the like. That was all there, but in reduced quantities. They weren’t about to dilute down what was essentially a gigantic punk gig and let it lose its explosive force. Since it was hard to make notes in the mosh pit, I didn’t manage to jot down the entire set list, but some of the songs are listed below.

At the end, Lyxzén left us saying, “Always remember to stay fucking curious! Always remember to stay fucking wild! Always remember to stay fucking hungry! And don’t worry, boredom won’t get me tonight!” Then there were about 30 seconds of blast beats, a final mosh pit explosion, and finally the band came out front and took a bow.

Some songs they played, in no particular order:

Coup d’Etat
Refused Party Program
The New Noise
Refused are Fucking Dead
Liberation Frequency
Rather Be Dead
Summer Holidays vs. Punk Routine
Tannhauser/Derive

PHOTO: 深野輝美
More photos: http://fujirockexpress.net/12/15326.html