Higher Learning - Five Punk Rockers Recall Their College Days (by Jay Hale)

Milo Aukerman (Descendents) -- How often have you heard a phrase like, “Don’t let his thick, Coke-bottle glasses fool you, beneath those specs lies a beer swilling party animal?” Quite a few times I’d wager to guess. But you’ll never hear Descendents frontman Milo Aukerman described in such a fashion; there’s no deception to his appearance. Under those glasses lies a nerd, a man who never ran with the popular crowd but somehow went on to front one of the most influential punk rock bands of all time and earn a Ph.D. in microbiology along the way...

Greg Graffin (Bad Religion) -- If you’re going to start a band and have the audacity to name it Bad Religion, you better have the moxie to back it up. Luckily for Greg Graffin, he not only displays the songwriting skills necessary to state his case, the vocalist also has a proficient educational and philosophical background that can challenge even the most grizzled barroom theologian...

Lane Pederson (Dillinger Four) -- When Dean Wormer told Bluto in the classic comedy “Animal House” that fat, drunk and stupid is no way to go through life, Dillinger Four drummer Lane Pederson must have thought to himself, “Well, two outta three ain’t bad.” The husky gent often answering to the name “Monkey Hustle” sure loves his beer but unlike his thirst for higher learning, he doesn’t keep that under wraps...

Dan Yemin (Paint It Black) -- At age 34, Dan Yemin isn’t the prototypical hardcore frontman. Sure, he’s got the tattoos, the long list of street cred he established with other bands over the years and, damn right, he’s got the pipes. But Yemin brings a pair of other items to the table that few can - a Ph.D. in psychology along with a MRI brain scan photo taken after the stroke he suffered just three years ago. Now that’s hardcore...

Nate Albert (ex-Mighty Mighty Bosstones) -- Early on, I always knew Nate Albert had a lot more going on upstairs than your average rock and roll guitarist. When The Mighty Mighty Bosstones would hold their annual holiday extravaganza, the five-night Hometown Throwdown, it would normally be smack dab in the middle of finals week for most Boston area colleges. If you planned on attending each show, a clever way of cramming for your exams needed to be invented. One night, a friend of mine found a study partner for his world history test at the club. It was none other than Albert. Listening to them go back and forth about Western Europe was humorous at the time and when I heard Nate had aspirations of revisiting his college career, I really wasn’t all that surprised. The time he chose to finish off his degree, well, that’s another story...

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