Armalite

In 2003, Atom Goren retired his guitar-and-synthesizer one-man punk band, Atom and His Package, after eight years of recording and touring, partly in deference to the fact that he and his wife were soon to become parents. However, while Goren adopted a new career as a schoolteacher, his interest in music stubbornly refused to go away, and in 2005 he teamed up with a handful of other veterans of the Philadelphia punk scene to form Armalite. Playing speedy, angular punk with witty but politically conscious lyrics and no fear of high volume, Armalite feature Goren on guitar and vocals, Mike McKee (formerly of Kill the Man Who Questions and Amateur Party) on guitar and vocals, Dan Yemin (ex-Lifetime and Kid Dynamite) on bass, and Jeff Ziga (who's worked with Affirmative Action Jackson and True If Destroyed) on drums. The band cut its self-titled debut album in mid-2005, and it was released in early 2006 by indie punk label No Idea Records. Given the time commitments of the various bandmembers, Armalite haven't had the opportunity to tour much, but they've played a number of memorable gigs in and around Philadelphia, and appear at the occasional festival.