Articles of Faith was a Chicago-based hardcore punk band (1981–1985) notable for songwriting in a class above most of their contemporaries (and successors). The band's later work, the In This Life LP in particular, either founds or foreshadows the emo sound. Originally a Springsteen / Clash cover band called Direct Drive, the group made an about-face and changed both its music and name after frontman Vic Bondi made a pilgrimage to Washington, D.C. in 1981 and underwent a conversion he describes as an “epiphany.” The typical AoF song featured hummable melodies and conspicuous hooks, showing funk, reggae and jazz influences, accompanied by lyrics bemoaning the difficulty of finding freedom and fulfillment in a cookie-cutter mass-consumption driven society typically, but not always, delivered at a searing pace. While the band's influence was blunted by being based in Chicago, it maintained close musical and thematic ties to the Washington DC / Dischord Records scene. Drummer Bill Richman (a.k.a. “Virus X”), a member of the Revolutionary Communist Party briefly left the band in 1984 due to the waning of the band's political emphasis and Richman’s increasingly fervent Stalinism. He returned later to record In This Life. Bondi had already left Chicago by the time AoF disbanded in 1985. In This Life was issued two years later. The original lineup reunited for a European tour in 1991. The final show of this tour was recorded and issued as part of the Your Choice Live series.

Frontman Vic Bondi was originally a protest singer with decidedly leftist views. He went on to form Alloy, and Jones Very after AoF's demise. At the time of AoF's original breakup Bondi was working as a history instructor at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Bondi's subsequent day jobs included working on Microsoft's Encarta as managing editor of the Encarta Interactive English Learning edition (Bondi's attempt to fend off accusations of hypocrisy on this ironic career choice can be found here). Bondi resurfaced with another politically charged band, Report Suspicious Activity in 2006, and was featured prominently in the documentaries American Hardcore and You Weren't There.