We at MK were completely unaware of the existence of one of our most popular ViXXXens, Miss Corina Taylor. It was in the early quarter of 2004 that she submitted her photos to us and almost a year later we discovered her porn past. Since then she embarked on a hasty hiatus from the industry, made a handful of appearances on the Howard Stern show, appeared in a Monster Magnet video, made the pages of the gossip tabloid The Star in which she is unromantically linked to actor Jared Leto, become a mother and is making her return to the adult industry with a lil help from none other than MK's founder Alex Zander.

In fact Corina may have very well enjoyed more media exposure since her departure, including HBO, than she ever did when she was shooting fuck flicks.

When it was announced that Corina would be joining AZ at Glamour Con 36 in Chicago, the adult press picked up on it, and there was a new fire starting in Chicago. This time it was Zander's cell phone. Photographers form Porn valley and smut studios were burning up his phone, and it was Cherry Boxxx's Dominic, a publicist that AZ has noted many times has gone more out of his way to accommodate our krew at the big AVN show in Vegas, that had the golden ticket. This very interview was actually conducted for Dominic to accompany the photos he had his photographer take while Corina embarked on her maiden voyage to the Windy City.

While at Glamour Con Corina did numerous photo shoots, met loads of fans, and was spotted in the company of the legendary Seka and the new girl on the block Justine Jolie, the lovely British lass Taylor Wayne, and of course a massive MK Magazine posse at the annual After Dark Party.

Perhaps the most notable event of Corina's visit was the bond that was built between her and MK. We were intoxicated by her southern charm and her almost shy manner. MK is no stranger to developing friendships with adult talent, but this Arkansas beauties etiquette won us over like nobody else. So, it was only fair that we let her tell it like it is in this no holds barred, and uncensored interview, in which among all the press, positive and negative once and for all, you can read her version, here and now, in her first post porn expose' .

So here she is in all of her slendor, a lady who is more desirable and fuckable and more fun than Hefners girl next door. Corina "the hot chick" Taylor. Bad enough for Stern and Jared Leto but too good for you.

In April of 2004 you submitted your photos to become one of MK's ViXXXens. How did you first hear of MK and why did you find it an appropriate outlet for your images?

I am not sure I remember exactly just how I ended on mk-magazine.com, I do know that I was just sitting around and surfing the net and sort of stumbled onto it. After browsing the site for a bit and seeing what a cool site it was and finding a section that is called the Vixxens section on the site that allows girls to send in photos and be a part of MK, I thought to myself I have got be on here. Mk is a fuckin killer site for a rock a fiend like myself and it housed not only rock but porn as well, and coming out of the adult industry, and seeing the opportunity to be on the site, I had to send in some pics. Alex then contacted me and the rest is history! Actually, Alex did not know until recently that I even did any adult films, LOL.

The music that moves you and the music you listen to and indulge in seems to reflect the same as that which we expose. How did a nice southern girl become exposed to such an anti establishment/ counter culture art-form?

Around 12 I fell madly in love with Alice In Chains. I wanted to marry Layne Stayley. Not the junkie, I wanted to marry his eerily beautiful voice and his angst and persona that radiated thru his lyrics. I still think he is one of the greatest rock icons of my time. He was easy on the eyes, though LOL. Now the way I was turned onto my favorite band ever which is Marilyn Manson is a different story. A pretty crazy one actually; when I was 14 or so I was living in an apartment outside of Little Rock. This guy from San Francisco moves into the complex. He was pierced and tattooed and just really different from everyone else in the building. This guy actually goes around with a roll of fuckin duct tape and cassette tapes he sat around and made of Manson's earlier music and was sticking them on doors. I get this cassette tape duct taped to my door along with a note that said something to the effect of listen and you will love it. He was going around like a Jehovah Witness spreading the word only he did not have a bible and a bicycle. He had nipple rings, a roll of tape, and some great fuckin taste in music. I took my cassette and I did just what he said I to do. I still love Manson to this day! I also love 80's music, too like Depeche Mode and Duran 2, and the glam stuff like Skid Row, Billy Idol, and even Winger, they covered Purple Haze and it fuckin rocked.

Who in the music industry that you admire have you met, and whom do you really want to hang out with?

I admire so many people in the music biz, not just the people onstage or writing the music I listen to, but people who are behind the scenes as well. I have the chance to meet some cool people though like Rob/White Zombie. I was 15 years old! I did get to meet Manson when I was around 18. I loved the band so much I ended up fucking the touring guitar player at the time on the back of Manson s tour bus, while my friends waited outside in a car in front of the venue for like 3 or so hours. He was only my 2nd sexual partner, so it was wild. I had not even learned that shaving your pussy was the thing to do. We are slow here in Arkansas. So he got hairy high school girl pussy, well I did shave the sides down a bit, oh yeah and he ate it ,too. LOL. I did start shaving it right after that, though. I have also met 3 Doors Down, Jimmy Chamberlain, Peter Di Stefano from Jane's Addiction, Chad Smith and Adrian Young, the drummer of No Doubt. Damn, I have met a lot of drummers, hehe. Puddle of Mudd, do not get me started on this band of assholes. Umm, who else? I know I am leaving people out for sure. Well Monster Magnet was one too, hehe. I am moving on to the next question for now…

Corina by Karlton

When and how did you get involved in the biz and how long was your tenor within porn?

I entered the Beaverhunt in Hustler magazine. Actually, I entered it two times. The first time they printed my entry photo in Barely Legal, the second time I entered it they not only printed my entry photo in Hustler, but they called me up and told me I was a finalist for the contest. That was my "in" into adult. My mom took the photo that got me the phone call from Hustler. Some people mistook that as my mom ultimately wanting me to do porn. That was not the case at all. It was my idea to enter the contest and she just took the snapshot.

Who was your favorite director/studio to work with?

I really liked working for the guys from Kickass because it just seemed like we always got a good laugh at all my shoots for them, and there was no bullshit. I also enjoyed playing dress up for Suze and Holly Randall. I enjoyed shooting for Clive McClean, for Hustler, he was a funny guy. I also liked the lovey-dovey shoots that I did for Cherry Boxxx and Babydolls as well as for Adam and Eve. My favorite scene though has got to be the one I did with Ben Bratt in Love 'Em Natural for Acid Rain. He is just really sexy and I thought we worked really well together onscreen.

Everyone knows and it's well documented that Alex i a HUGE Suze Randall fan. How would you sum up working with a woman in the industry of exceptional taste and an eye for beauty that she is renowned for?

I thought that Suze did an amazing job for what she had to work with at the time, speaking of myself at that point in time of my life, of course. I knew she was HUGE before I ever went out to L.A. with the contest. I was happy to be able to work her. She is incredibly talented and so easy to work with. I wanted to shoot with Kurt Lockwood on that shoot and she even made that happen. Holly Randall is great too. You know Suze looks like a woman who would never say the word pussy and she said it a lot, LOL. I also learned something new on her set that day. I had never seen or heard of a bidet in my life. You know the French toilet that squirts water up into your pussy and ass. I sat on hers as long as I could before the shoot! I would love for her to shoot me with my new figure. I know they would be some amazingly beautiful shots. Suze is great.

Why did you decide to take a "hiatus" from the industry?

I was just wearing out. I was worn out physically and mentally. I just really needed to come home. I had a shoot booked the very day I got on the plane to come home. It was for Joey Silvera. I hope he forgave me for that LOL. I got up at like 4 in the morning and I packed up my shit. I called LAX and there was a plane leaving for Little Rock at like 6:30-7ish. I took all my things and I was on the plane back home to Arkansas just like that. I did not think twice about my decision to leave.

When did you move to LA, why, how long, and what are the ups and downs of Porn Valley?

I moved to L.A. in Aug. of 2003. I was like a nomad or a gypsy or something. I moved around so much in the 9 or 10 months I was out there, it was ridiculous. Well for me there were a lot more downs than ups. I really got taken advantage of in a lot of situations. I did not make too many friends while out in Cali. I did make friends with a taxi driver from Simi Valley though, he would make sure I was alright no matter what. Especially after I ran out on a former agent over the whole “anal” thing. The very first time he picked me up to take me somewhere he started telling me dirty stories. Hehe, I did not know what to think of him, but he turned out to be a sweet little old man. He was like the perverted grandfather I never had. I also ended up spending some time on my own living in and out of hotels around the valley. There are very few who I stayed in contact with and even fewer who are performers that I have talked to since leaving Cali. Kami Andrews is one of the few girls in porn that has heart and soul. I have kept in contact with her through e-mail.

Motherhood? How has it changed Corina?

Becoming a mother for me is a blessing in itself. I mean under all the shitty circumstances surrounding my pregnancy, I decided to keep her and just be a single mom until I meet the right guy who is gonna love me for who I am and I can have, you know the simple kind of life. Of course, they have to love Savannah too, hehe. I would like to sit here and say that becoming a mom has made me somewhat of a tamer person, but I think it has done just the opposite. Now I am defending two human beings and not just myself anymore in a world of shit. She is such a light to have around. She is growing so fast and has her own little personality already. She is a complete mess and I love every bit of it. So that I don't sound cliché here, I will just say that there are some very pretty baby girls in the world and mine is most definitely one of them.

Elaborate on the labor that you described to me after giving birth to your daughter.

Let me just say it was the absolute most indescribable amount of pain I have ever felt in my entire life and I have been hit in the head with an axe! First, my doctor let me spend almost two full weeks in hell waiting on me to dilate past 2. It was not happening at all, so I ended up having to be induced. It was like a circus at the hospital when I went in to have her. I won't go into that LOL. My epidural ended up not working properly and Savannah started to head out. Not only did I feel the WHOLE fucking thing, the doc stitched me up twice because he suddenly notices that he had stitched me up with the wrong fucking size shit. I felt it all. Of course, at that point you don't care. I am lying there holding my baby and feeling every stick of the needle between my legs the entire time. Now I am like if I can go through that ,I can go through anything. Throw a brick at my head, I can handle it LOL. But it was all worth it in the end. :-)

How does your relationship with your family figure into your work?

Well, outside of my mom and the whole Hustler thing, my step-dad kinda got drug in when I mentioned on Stern that he and my mom had seen some of my work. I also admitted to having walked around the house naked in front of him. Stern, then wanted to talk to my step-dad. That whole ordeal just opened a can of worms that ended up having my step-dad failing a lie detector test given to him by Ed Torrien on national television.

So you've been getting loads of press as of late. Lets start w/ Howard Stern. Tell me about that?

The way I initially got on the Stern show was when I did this show for pay per view and it was some rigged up bullshit. They needed a girl to go on Howard Stern that was part of the show. For some reason they called me up to represent them. I went on the show not wanting to. I literally fought going on the show. I had watched Stern for years. I mean he is one of my favorite people in entertainment, but I have seen him totally decimate girls on his show. I was so scared of that. Howard ended up not doing that to me. He was way more interested in me than the shit I was there to plug. I ended up being on his show like two or three more times and I also did a couple of call-ins as well. Howard was great to me. Of course, he has the talent of tearing people to shreds without them really picking up on it at the time, so for all I know he could have been doing that to me, but I honestly don't think so.

And Star Magazine and Jared Leto. What's your version of that scenario? What's the truth according to Corina?

I mean the whole thing was about how Jared was still dating Cameron Diaz at the time all this took place. He like, was playing with his dick while watching me lap dance his own brother after I got through lap dancing Jared himself. Jared had this MONSTER size cock, too. I was like WOW, he needs someone tall like Cameron to take that thing. When Jared hooked up with Ashley Olsen, it was on, the story had to be printed. I was so excited...Not only did I get to see Jared Leto's BIG dick firsthand Star magazine writes about it years later LOL. I loved watching him in "My So Called Life" on MTV back in the day. So my run in with Jared was definitely one of the up's (literally) that came out of being in the biz.

Has Jared responded? If so, how?

The very next week Jared dumped Ashley because he felt she was too like “cookie-cutter” for his newly found image. He must have loved it. Guess he felt like more of a rock-star because of it.

Do you feel misquoted?

I do not really think of it as me being misquoted, but how people are interpreting what I am saying. I would say that I do feel more persecuted rather than misquoted or mistook. I have seen some shit and fought battles that I have not seen any and I mean any of the other girls in adult put up with and go through. People were jealous of me in high school and shit though, and some of those people years later blast nasty shit about me along the net. I am like HOLY SHIT, you people still haven't grown the fuck up? Then again, I was born and raised in a state full of ignorance and close-minded closet freaks. Why should I expect anything any different?

Okay, when we met and we were having lunch at the hotel, we asked you about anal. I don't think we got to the virtual "bottom" of the subject. Lets clear this up, once and for all. On Stern he asked and you and claimed to have done several anal scenes on film. Yet, in another interview you had claimed that the director nearly forced you to do anal, and you mentioned that you didn't even practice the fine art in your personal life.

Okay, once and for all, lets clear up all of the misinterpretations and misrepresentations. This is a very touchy subject for me. I mean I was there, I was the one who got fucked up the ass, and I was the one who got fucked over in so many different ways that day. Not the asshole posting their stupid fucking opinions on ADT. Vince knows both he and Eric fucked me over. Everhard has been offering up footage of the incident as of a couple of weeks ago. Funny because he is trying to make himself look innocent, so why when Vince chopped up the whole fucking scene would Everhard not chop shit up to make himself look like a hero, too. Give me a fucking break. It is also funny to me that the agent I ran away from over anal was buddies probably buttbuddies with Vince Voyuer and this whole fucking incident happens on Vince's set. “The cocks already in your ass” was repeated several times at the beginning and did that make it to the final cut? Well fuck no!!! I read the other fucking day where some jackass on ADT writes on there and says that I told on Vince and Eric becaise they put some bitch on the box cover instead of me, with it being my first anal (forced or not), that I was whining over that. I am like, “what a dumb fuck!!” That box did not even come out for like two months or so after the fact, and I talked to Sharon Mitchell the very night this took place. I did not know that night that I would still be getting fucked months, and now over a year almost 2 years later!! Fuck! Not only that, when things get quiet that is one of the subjects that just keeps getting reopened. I want it to die already. I got fucked over. It's history HELLO! Sometimes, I can make a statement and people try to find ways to connect it to the whole Vince thing, I am like, man, I am trying to fucking close this chapter in my life. Whatever comes out of my mouth has nothing to do with that shit. I am trying to fucking forget it, if people would just let me. I mean if you got thrown into being fucked up the ass and you had never been fucked up the ass before and you were not ready, would you wanna sit around and discuss it for years. I don't think so! You would be doing your best to accept it, forget about it, and move on!

So after over 1 year off, are you willing to and are you ready to go back to work?

Only under the right circumstances and only for the milder stuff. It also has to be for the right people. There are some good people in the jizz biz if you are lucky enough to find them.

What are your stipulations, and standards?

Well, I need to be careful now. More so now, than ever. I don't need to be in any dangerous situations. I have a daughter that needs me. I honestly wish I could only do girls. If I had known the biz at all when I jumped in, I would have gone that route. A guy is more apt to respect a girl who is adult that only works with other women than one who does gangbangs, LOL. I mean I have not had sexual intercourse since October 2004.That is my choice, of course. I am not this super slutty girl that goes out and sport fucks. Sex is not like a hamburger for me, I don't need it to survive LOL. It's nice with the right person, but it is not at the top of my everyday agenda. On a lighter note, I do love giving head and I like to swallow, hehe.

What did you make of Glamour Con?

I really enjoyed Glamour Con. I mean Alex Zander and the guys from MK made it all possible for me. I was just glad to be able to finally meet Alex. I was supposed to meet him in Vegas this past Jan. and I was unable to to make the AVNs .I was happy to sit down with Alex and have a conversation in the flesh.

And meeting AZ in person, was it as bad as you expected?

Bad… LOL...In a good or bad way, hehe. Alex is not only very personable...he shares a lot of my same interests in music and movies. He was so open and so friendly. I am so glad I was able to make the trip up to Chicago. He’s just this amazing guy that totally rocks and he loves what he does and he’s so likeable... He is the nicest person I have met that is associated with the adult biz. I mean he accepted me and he did not listen or believe the b.s. He met me, and we conversed with each other on a level of openness and acceptance that I have found to be so fucking rare in the industry and outside of the industry.

Corina and girlfriends with MK's Zander and Karlton

Do you see your relationship w/ MK and AZ as friends and associates as helping you get back into the industry?

I ultimately do not wanna be in the industry. I mean I may do one more dip in the biz if and only if things are done the right way and I am safe and taken care of. I wanna do more music videos and modeling and have extra roles in “B” movies, that sort of thing. I would love to be in a horror flick someday. I am a HUGE fan of scary movies and gore. I have been ever since I was a little girl. I am in school full-time working on a science degree and I am enrolled in a surgical tech program. I wanna do that too. I have a lot of things I would like to do. I would also like to do them in a way that better represents who I am as a person, a real person, than anything else I have ever done.

You came to Chicago with a rock-n-roll photographer who seemed to be a pretty good friend. How long have you known Joe and how is he involved in your return to the spotlight?

I have known Joe for quite some time. He was a dj at one of our local rock stations that houses a rock calendar, which I have appeared on. I was around 19 when I met Joe. Joe normally shoots musicians and live acts, but he does shoot local models on the side. I needed someone who knew what I wanted and was compatible for me and willing to help me in the photography/managing dept. He also owns 2 other businesses of his own. I am just his side gig.

Where can people see more of his work?

People who would like to see more of his work experience, if they are interested in rock-n-roll artists can check out jlphoto.net. He also just got through shooting me for a cover in my home state of Arkansas. It was for one of our local magazines.

You shot with Karlton. What did you make of that and did what MK had to tell you beforehand make sense?

Karlton was very nice and very easy to work with. His shoot was long, but he took some really sexy stuff for Alex and MK. He is a talented photographer. He is funny, too. He has sent me some of the photos that he took over the net and he was apologizing. I was like, “what?” These things are fuckin hot. He is such a perfectionist that perfection is not perfect enough for Karlton.

Martin was sent to us from Dominick at Cherry Boxx in LA. How'd you like working with him?

Martin, was a breath of fresh air. Here is this guy from L.A. shooting content of me in Chicago that walks up and did not know who I was. He had not heard or read the b.s. He was just a super nice guy that was a quick photographer and he wanted what I wanted. He was not like, “you have to do this or you have to do that.” He was so nice to me. I appreciate Dominick sending Martin to Chicago and setting me up with him to shoot. I have worked for Cherry Boxx before and they were all so nice. Martin was so laid back, I did not expect anything any different coming from Cherry Boxx.

Rock and porn. Is the combo still significant? If so, more or less?

I think it is much less. I mean it used to be the rockstars loved the pornstars and the pornstars loved the rockstars, and some people used to say that rockstars ultimately wish they were pornstars and vice versa. Nowadays, you see rockstars with more of the model-type women. I am not talking about the nude ones either, Tera Patrick aside.

Okay, Monster Magnet and music videos. How did that happen and do you want to do more?

I answered an ad in Craig's list for dancers for a music video. I did not know until I auditioned that it was for Monster Magnet. Which was cool, because I was a fan of theirs mainly due to their association with Manson. Manson's old bass player was featured in one of their vids. I had a great time. Some girls did not even know who these guys were and I was like “Hello” and “What rock do you live under?” They were just kinda there. I missed the opportunity to be in a video for Manson soon after coming home and that really hurt. That was a HUGE ouch for me! I most definitely wanna do more videos.

Whose music video would you like to be in?

Gosh, there are so many bands I would love to be in. I mean from Nine Inch Nails to System of a Down to Type O (if they ever do another vid) to Fuel, A Perfect Circle, Rob Zombie, now that would rock! Of course, Marilyn Manson. What would really be cool would for me to be an Evanescence vid being as they are from hometown and all, hehe. I could even see myself shakin' my ass in a Lil' Jon Vid. Well, if I had a bit more ass to shake. I love to dance... it would be fun to just rock out in a video .Monster Magnet's vid had some in it.

We’ve met and befriended many girls in the Adult Industry and we do have our personal favorites as those who we can now consider friends. You my lady are certainly the biggest contradiction and exception to the rule. We are stunned at what a true lady and a southern belle in every sense of the term that we've ever come across. How and where do you draw the line and who do you attribute you charm and etiquette to?

This is a very short answer… My mom.

Britney Skyy just signed a 6 pix deal with Cherry Boxx. Does it wet your appetite a bit to jump back in and work with her?

I would love to work with her. I knew who she was before going out to L.A.I had seen her in magazines and I thought she was very hot and sexy. I never saw any of her films work until I was in L.A. I was basing this on her sex appeal in her photos spreads. After seeing some of her work and seeing her in person. My opinion has most definitely not changed. In fact, I think she is somewhat underrated. She is drop dead gorgeous and she is not boring to watch on film. I would eat her pussy. Who wouldn't LOL:)

You live fairly close to Gauge. When are you two going to make friends?

I have only met once and it was on KSEX. I thought she was so cute and just like this little ball of fire. I was excited about meeting her. I kept getting asked if I knew Gauge, I was like “I gotta meet this chick.” It finally happened several months after being in the biz. She now lives like literally 45 minutes away from me.

So when are you an Gauge going to come to my city together and tear the motherfucker up with ol AZ?

Hopefully in Oct. at the Pimp's and Ho's party. My fingers are crossed. I know I am gonna be there.

Corina's very first photo submission to MK

So on your next trip to Chicago, what are your hopes and aspirations?

To just strengthen my friendship with Alex and everyone in his… um hmmm, posse, and to have a blast being surrounded by quality people.

Corina, it's a true pleasure to work with and become a friend of yours. You are a real token to what an MK ViXXXen should represent. What do you imagine doing as far as association with this 10 yr old organization?

I hope to just keep building my gallery on your site and to keep being a part of such a killer website as well as letting everyone know just how great you guys are...Hopefully, I will grace the pages of your magazine someday...so instead of just saying I was in porn and I was in a nudie mag, I can say I was in porn and I love Rock N Fuckin Roll and I am in a magazine that stands for something that is a huge part of my life and coincides with the biz I am in, (was or is). LOL…

By Sara Josephine

The Machinehead/Devil Driver show at House of Blues in Chicago began with many twists and turns and my interview with Dez was looking more and more difficult to come by. My tickets for the show never made it to will call so I had roadies and managers telling me I could only do the interview then I would be “escorted out”. But my night in shining armor, wearing a Motorhead shirt, sporting long black hair and a tribal tattoo on his chin came to my rescue. Dez is what every interviewer hopes for when trying to get truthful information about a band or music in general. Dez turned my whole night around by being open and honest about himself, his band, and the tour. He- and only he- pulled strings allowing me to sit and enjoy the sold out rock show after the interview. Dez proved himself as a real person in a world where ego precedes human compassion, and I’m proud to call him my friend.

DEZ: I’m having a GREAT time. I’m getting ready to dive into a bottle of wine right now! I can’t believe your boy didn’t show up!! I’m gonna fuckin’ strangle him! (He means the illusive Alex Zander, an old friend of Dez) Sold out and he’s not even here!!

- by JAMES BOEHLER

In the late spring, early summer of 1991, I walked into one of my favourite record stores, Atomic Records, in Milwaukee. From the moment I walked in the door, a song later known to me as "Vanadium-I-Ching", struck me in a way that no other music had at that time. It was also a very heavy psycho-delicate time, in the aftermath of Gulf War Part One. What's different now from then? A lot and nothing. Many of bands the bands that I had been into at the time had been together for maybe 10 years, or were broken up or dead. The German and truly orchestrated noise group, EINSTURZENDE NEUBAUTEN, had just released a "greatest hits vol. 2" package entitled, "Strategies Against Architecture 2". It contained material from 1984-90 and disc/side 2 was playing. For the duration of my weekly visit, I had transcended into a different consciousness. I couldn't translate the language of my heritage, but oddly enough it felt very familiar to me. I was hooked, so I approached the music pusher who was going to get me straight on my latest fix. The Cooler-than-thou Record Store Clerk had to tell me at least 10 times how to pronounce their name. "EIN-STUR-ZENDE...NEU-BAU-TEN!" I had never heard anything on that level which had surpassed anything considered "industrial" at the time. If there was a true term for that word, E.N. would apply if not on the basis of the own instruments that they create or incorporate into their performances, then on the translation of their name alone: "Collapsing New Buildings!" On the 30th of April, 2004, I arrived a the Metro for what I would later learn was going to be their last show in Chicago, or the last tour of America for that matter. I still wasn't sure who I would be interviewing, though I requested to interview Blixa Bargeld, since the he was the mainline towards the group's existence. Whatever he says goes. I was bit nervous of the possibility of ever meeting him. He's a very educated and well traveled man that has no time for bullshit of any kind. He also is responsible for 2 of the more influential groups of the last 20 years. The Bad Seeds and, of course, Einsturzende Neubauten. Once lead into the bus, I the first face I saw was that of Professor Bargeld. I properly introduced myself and thank him for the opportunity to speak, or more or less, listen to him. He seemed more interested in talking any way. He reminisced about the last time they played the Metro (July 2000), but doesn't remember much because they toured so consistently. He remembers a lot of obnoxiousness in the audience during his monologues and how he feels about it.

By Sara Josephine

Lamb of God has proven themselves once again on the fierce metal tour with Fear Factory, playing to packed venues in every city. Lamb of God’s release of Ashes of the Wake provides listeners with some of the most brutal metal combining, speed, death, and hardcore into one delectable mix. My interview with Randy Blythe was interrupted several times due to the bands recent popularity and soaring album sales. My in person interview was shifted to 3 different time slots, and then I finally got bumped down to a phone interview. Nevertheless, Randy delivered and answered questions about the recent tour, and Ashes of the Wake.

RB- I Hate God, Napalm Death, and Lynyrd Skynyrd

Interview by Sara Josephine

“Power Ballads are far from dead, my friends” was one of the final statements Brian Fair, lead singer of Shadows Fall, made to the crowd at the Bottom Lounge. Shadows Fall is a refreshing mix of old school squeals and solos combined with new varieties of riffs and vocals. The band’s heaviness can hang with the best of ‘em, especially when it comes to their live shows. The live force of the band is incredible complete with Brian doing the windmill at every opportunity he can! They remind me a lot of pre-black Metallica meets Testament. And their new album, The War Within is no exception delivering raw power of metal fused with rock n’ roll.

BF Oh, just an interview.

By Cindi Loftus photos by SuZn Murawaski

These words describe the man and the music that is Danzig. Glenn Danzig is the man and his newest CD, Circle of Snakes, is the music. You are all familiar with Glenn’s colorful twenty-five plus year history in the music business. We take it from here into the future with this exclusive interview.

The best thing about touring with G.D. and the band is we are ALL friends. We always have a crazy time. The fans screaming their guts out and losing they’re fucking minds is the shit too. STAY DEAD.

Be it the Old Testament, the Live Testament or the New Testament. Tairrie B remains a True Testament of one thing about the entertainment industry in the United States. We're no longer trendsetters, the masses buying the music that is being promoted by the labels here are sheep being spoon-fed bullshit. That's right Middle America is eating shit, when what they should be eating are her words. Bitter as they can be, Miss B speaks the truth. She's an amazing singer, messenger, poet, a fun interview and excuse me for saying, is pretty easy on the eyes. (Photos are a testament to that.)

Alex Zander - I just got done looking at your site.

Tairrie B - Oh, really? We haven't updated the My Ruin one We've got all our old stuff we haven't updated it with the new. We have a new record coming out in September and like a whole new band and all this new shit.

AZ Something different than what I have? I just got the "Speak and Destroy".

TB -Oh, you did? Yeahhh!

A.Z. So, there's something different coming out?

T.B. Yeah, I'm not supposed to talk about it I was told but we have another record coming out in Europe! (laughs) on the 4th of September.

A.Z. Okay, I'll go find some way to get that out of somebody.

T.B. Oh we got to get it to you cause it's like the fucking bomb, it's the real deal.

A.Z. Well, I was thrilled when I got this in the mail on Monday, "Speak and Destroy.", I saw Manhole open for Type O.

T.B. You saw Manhole open for Type O!

A.Z. Yeah, and I got one of your band members to give me a CD single (Victim) and I tried to track you down through the label after that and wanted full length and couldn't find it.

T.B. Ucchh, Let me tell you, Noise Records the fucking pit of my stomach!

A.Z. Really? Are they still around or something?

T.B. The worst fucking label in the world! We were on tour with Type O Negative and the label couldn't get the record into stores to save our lives and we could have sold so many records.

A.Z. Yeah, that tour was high profile.

T.B. It was a joke, we have to order our own records and sell them at shows. We would pull into a town and I'd see an ad in the paper for our record at Tower Records and I'd go in there and say " Hi, I just want to invite you guys to the show tonight and thanks for working the record". They'd be like "We don't even have any of your records." There's this ad in the paper and people are coming in and I'm like "WHAT?!?" Oh, it wasjust so fucked up.

A.Z. Well, that explains it because I couldn't find it anywhere either.

T.B. No one could, we couldn't find our own record. We were so irate, it was such a nightmare.

A.Z. I bet, so what happened with Manhole?

T.B. The story was, Manhole went to record our second record "Relief to Release" and we ended up getting sued for the name. There was a band in Texas called Manhole, that we met actually for a brief drama filled second when I was on stage with Type O Negative, too and they sent some people down to, like, give us shit and of course it turned into a horrible girl fight and we were slapped with a lawsuit and they owned the name. We thought we owned the name and we had a record coming out and no name we thought oh fuck what are we going to do? I was watching Faster Pussycat, Kill Kill one night and I thought Tura Satana that's a pretty rad name, Let's use that! So, we just ended up using that and we got it copyrighted she never copy wrote the name and we did it and we put the record out and then after we recorded it, which was like pulling teeth with our ex-guitar player. We had just had a lot of problems with our guitar player Scott it was just not cool at all, especially touring and we finally got to the point where either I'm leaving or he's leaving, one of us is going. We had our first headlining tour booked in Europe, it was a really huge deal for us, we were gonna headline for our first ever time and he pulled some bullshit and I was just like, "I can't deal with this anymore, you all wonder why we're not making it like we should because no one cares."

I said he's gotta' go or me and we let him go and within two weeks we had this new guy in, Brian, from this band called Spitkiss that were up in San Jose. He came down, met us, knew the shit we brought him in and he went on the road, toured with us everything was great. We did a couple of tours, we did the states, it was really fun it wasn't like some big tour, but it was really fun. Then we did Europe twice and we played all the festivals and everything. Toward the end of it things were just really weird in our band, I mean not cool, some things happened and I just one day had enough and I quit. I said I'm over it and I felt really bad for Brian because he had changed his whole life and moved down here and came in. But you know, it's like having three husbands. It's hard, and it's really hard when certain people don't respect you at all.

A.Z. So you just reformed with My Ruin as an all-new band?

T.B. No, I didn't reform what I did was I quit the band and I just kinda' was like, well, I'm not sure what I want to do at this point. I know I don't want to be in another band right now, you know, I don't want to get into that. People were calling me saying why don't you sing for our band? I was like "Awww, it's not what I want to do.". The funny thing is, right after that I got invited to the Kerrang! Awards, as a presenter, and we actually won an award for best independent band. I'm like, standing there going "Great, I just quit the band." No one knew it yet, and I didn't want the press to know, we didn't want anyone to know, we kept it really quiet. I came home and after that a big scene went down at the awards because my label Noise Records were there, but they wouldn't even fly me out to accept this award and they knew about it. It was unbelievable shit, a big huge scene from the stage to Noise Records to Green Day starting the standing ovation because I dissed my record company and I guess they thought that was very punk. It was kind of funny and somebody happened to be there from a label out in Europe called Snapper and called my manager and said, "Let's do a deal, let's give her a record, let's let her do whatever she wants." I couldn't believe it, because I was speaking to different people like at Roadrunner who were saying "well why don't you demo us this?" and I thought you know, I just don't feel like going and finding a band. I'm just not in that head frame right now, I just got out of a band, it's like breaking up with someone. So, I basically met with a lot of people, the guys in Downset, I used three of the songs we had written towards the end of Tura Satana with Brian that were hit songs and I had met these guys in England, this crew called Bushak (the do remixes)? We had a lot of fun and did some weird kind of different, I don't know, industrial kind of weird spoken word stuff. I met this girl Melanie who was a guitar player through a friend and I thought her stuff was really cool so I ended up doing a little collage record that I thought was really killer. I thought, this represents who I am right now, I'm feeling a lot of things, it's all my influences packed into one. My band would never see doing something like "Close Your Eyes". They would never even want to even touch something like that, I just thought this is my experimental project right now and it's hard you know and I talk about it in the past tense because of the fact that I just did a new record and so it's kind of hard to do all of the U.S. interviews because it's a year later.

A.Z. Right, I just noticed that, this thing was recorded in March of 1999.

T.B. Yeah, and we changed it, we took two songs off and put two songs on, "Fever of Mass Christ?" we re-mixed "Tainted Love" and we did a live version of "Preacher" so we put a couple extra things on there. It is really difficult for me because it is a year later and my head is in the new record and I've got a new band that wrote an entire record with me as a band. Now I am actually in a band.

A.Z. So, is it going to have a different name?

T.B. No, it's My Ruin, it's actually now a band. I don't know if you got press photos, but...did you get photos?

A.Z. I got two, one of you and one with three.

T.B. The one with three, the guy next to me is my guitar player, he wrote the new record and the girl, Megan, is our bass player and she toured with me on My Ruin last year off that record and we kept her and we use Chris from Downset - he actually drummed on the new record because Marcela, my old drummer, had come on the road with me for My Ruin last year in Europe and played. It's very difficult to explain to people, I'm having a lot of trouble with it just getting around my headspace of where I'm at, you know?

A.Z. Will it be as emotional as this one, as personal?

T.B. The other record is completely amazing, it sounds like a Southern..it sounds heavy very Pantera-ish. It's all really heavy. Definitely got to get you a copy of it, check it out.

A.Z. I was happy to get this in the mail, I had no idea what you were doing I guess I tried to get the Manhole record from Noise and I couldn't get anything from their publicity and I couldn't find it the stores. Then I read about the name change to Tura Satana, which was cool, then I just didn't know where you went, I didn't know you were touring and had another record out.

T.B. Yeah, it's been pretty crazy, we've done all the festivals in Europe, the band is pretty big, My Ruin is pretty fucking big in Europe and Tura Satana got really big over there too. That was the problem, we stayed we could support ourselves touring over there, we had big, huge crowds and it was like a completely different world for us, you know they got the record in the stores over there and no one ever did shit for us in The States. This record even, I mean I went back with this and our first show as My Ruin and we played the Reading and Leeds festival and it was just amazing and completely different. I'm hoping it's going to get a good reception in The States, but it's really hard for me because there's some electronic stuff on there and I don't do any of that at all right now. We brought out a keyboard player and we had a lot of crazy things go on when we toured that record in Europe but we didn't have a deal in The States until just recently. I was like, I wasn't even sure I wanted this record to come out here just because I'm onto the new one and I was like, it's a year later, how am I gonna do interviews without talking about the new record? I mean, you know, that's where my head's at. So, it's kinda' weird, I've gotta' have my band that just did this one come and tour in The States with me now and do songs off this one. It's such a confusing little thing, but it probably be all good, so…

A.Z. So that comes out you said in September and that's in Europe?

T.B. Yeah, It's called "Prayer Under Pressure of Violent Anguish". If you look at the Snapper site, you can hear some of it and download some of it, it's www.snappermusic.com and go to the My Ruin part and you can see some of the stuff and download some of it on there.

A.Z. Do you feel like talking about any of the lyrics on there?

T.B. Absolutely.

A.Z. I've only had it for two days, but I've been playing it and playing it to friends and I actually sat down today and read some of it. "June 10th" what's that about, who is that about?

T.B. "June 10th", why did you pick that song?

A.Z. That's the kind of stuff I like, I like Type O Negative kind of stuff where stuff is really personal. That's the first one I wanted to ask you about.

T.B. What do you think it's about?

A.Z. It kinda' sound like somebody led you on and fucked you over.

T.B. (Clears throat) Yeah, he sings for a very prominent rock band, (laughs) it's the same thing that "Blasphemous Girl" and "Absolution" are about.

A.Z. Same situation, and same person?

T.B. Yeah, it's definitely done, I think that "Speak and Destroy" has a lot of different... everybody that kind of knows me knows that I'm not quite the hidden agenda girl, I kinda' just say it. In "Blasphemous Girl" I say dry lung vocal martyr" and anyone who knows the metal scene will know exactly who that is.

June 10th is sort of the tribute to the person in a good way, "Blasphemous Girl" is kinda' my…. I use a lot of religious imagery in my writing you know I like to, sort of, people will take it the way they want, but I like to kind of talk about God as someone I know, maybe and even the Devil at times. I sort of use myself in many aspects as The Mary Magdalene/Virgin Whore thing, I like to use certain connotations in certain ways and "Blasphemous Girl" is more of my attack against this person, I'm being blasphemous against this person who taught me about this or that and saying God wants a piece of my ass, meaning I know what you want from me and I'm coming out against you and against this in this relationship. Then June 10th is sort of the okay now I 'm going to look at it and I'm going to be loving toward it and I'm gonna be a little more.... the end part that I'm saying is actually letters that were written to me, excerpts from letters that were written to me, people think that it's something I'm saying to someone. All the artwork on the record sort of goes around the song "June 10th".

A.Z. Yeah, I saw the one line from it twice in there, so.

T.B. The hotel on the back, the girl on the cover ˜Miss June 10th and There's a note in the record from the person from that day and it's kind of the most strongest emotional song on there but yet in a different way. I guess "Absolution" is dealing with the purgatory aspect of it the love/hate with it and I don't know, it's kind of weird, my lyrics are always very personal.

A.Z. The two songs I was going to ask you about you answered in the same question so that's great. I didn't realize they were tied together, but to me it seems like the whole album just ties together. What about "Cosmetic?".

T.B. "Cosmetic" is kind of a way I was feeling one night looking at a fashion magazine. I don't know, I mean people make so many comments about the whole issue, back where I started from, ˜why aren't you doing anything like you were doing when you were in Manhole? Speaking out for women's rights or talking about how the media portrays women or abortion or all the issues I had touched on in Manhole, and I think if you don't grow, you become stale. Now I still support everything I've ever written about and ever talked about, you know what I mean, that's how I feel and I always will. "Cosmetic" I think was me growing up a little bit and looking in the mirror and talking about how I felt blessed are we among women, and it's kinda' like hey you know what, I'm not some model, I'm not some beauty queen, I am who I am and every girl should feel that way when she looks in the mirror, you know and be happy for what you have and be proud of who you are, no matter if you're 10 pounds overweight or 100 pounds overweight. Be beautiful to yourself first and everyone will think you're beautiful. It's just everything is so cosmetic and fake, there are bands that think that you need to put a fucking mask on to get up there and be whatever, I'm, like I don't really need to have anything on to do it. "Sycophant" is definitely about those bands, I'm not dissing Korn in any way, I'm dissing the bands that have come up trying to be Korn, trying to be all those things like children of the Korn-fed styles. Throw on a pair of Adidas and all that crap and jump on the bandwagon. I just find it repulsive and I find it kind of sad. I've grown up with most of these bands out of L.A. and one minute I see them playing one way and the next minute they're in a magazine wearing tons of makeup and fucking body makeup, talking about they're crazy and posing like they're lunatics, and I'm like gimme' a fucking break.

A.Z. (Laughs)

T.B. That's some weak shit and kids shouldn't buy into that, they should see through that, they need to see that those people don't give a damn they're just writing bullshit lyrics that aren't....you know I wanna' say something. I don't care if I sell a million records or make a million dollars, but I do care about when a girl comes up to me at a show and says ˜Wow, when I heard a song you sang it made me feel like this because I can relate to this or whatever, that makes me feel good. That's how I feel when I hear Nick Cave or P.J. Harvey, they're not fucking superstars, but they're superstars to me because they've inspired me.

A.Z. Great! Why did you pick "Tainted Love" of all songs to cover?

T.B. The truth is, I wanted to cover a Nick Cave song, which we do on the new album by ironic chance, but I wanted to and I just couldn't figure out what I wanted to do at the time, I wasn't with the right people I needed to be with to cover it . I was in England and I wasn't feeling right, we were driving to the studio somebody had this 80's tape and "Tainted Love" came on and I go God, I love this song! I love that line "sorry I don't pray that way" and I was thinking, that is so me. It just hit me, and I thought this fucking song sums up saying to someone exactly how I feel " It's time you leave, it's time I leave, it's fucking...your love has been tainted, you've tainted me." I know what it's about but you interpret lyrics to your own interpretation.

A.Z. Exactly.

T.B. That's what I think is so cool and a lot of people have given me shit for covering that song , believe me.

A.Z. I've played that on the radio already. It was the first song last week on our syndicated radio show MK ULTRASOUND. That will be playing actually on Loud Radio out there around 9:00 next
Sunday, they syndicate it out West. I talked a little bit about your history With Manhole and Turf Satan, it was a kicking song to play something New, for us anyway.

TB Cool thank you for playing it!

A.Z. Oh, my pleasure.

T.B. It's a weird thing, because I was like everyone's going ˜okay she's jumping on the bandwagon-"Cars ","Blue Monday"' the vibe, whatever, I'm not doing a duet with the singer from Soft Cell, and I don't think I'm trying to completely recreate "Tainted Love" the way it was, you know?"

A.Z. I don't think you did at all, I liked your take on it.

T.B. I wanted it to be a little different, a lot of people are like well you fucking ruined the song. That's the whole purpose of doing a cover, you cover it the way you would cover it, people don't realize that. I'm not trying to dog them but like when I hear "Cars" by Fear Factory , I'm like Gary Numan's on there.

A.Z. It sounds just like it.

T.B. What's the point, I don't really get it, you know what I mean, it's like okay great, I want to hear you do a cover of how you would do it.

A.Z. At least you didn't do "Spin Me Round" like everyone else is.

T.B. Oh, Jesus are you kidding?

A.Z. I can't believe how many versions of that came out this year.

T.B. Oh, yuck. On the new record we have a hidden track, we covered Black Flag- "My War" and "Do You Love Me" by Nick Cave. That song is so beautiful.

A.Z. I can't wait to hear that. I love Nick Cave.

T.B. So do I.

A.Z. That's good stuff. I didn't know anything about the Easy E stuff and one day I was sitting with- do you know Thomas Thorn from The Electric Hellfire Club?

T.B. Yeah.

A.Z. We were talking about Manhole, and he had mentioned that you were- he's like that's one of Easy E's girls...

T.B. Whaaaat?

A.Z. referring that you did something on that label, not the other way.

T.B. I was like, wait a minute.

A.Z. This is when they were opening for Godflesh and I actually didn't get to read any press on it until now until this thing that you wrote, your own bio/ press kit, which is good it's more personal.

T.B. There's a thing on the website all about it with pictures of him it's under Stigmata and there's all that rap stuff under there.

A.Z. I'll look for it. I didn't ever hear any of the rap stuff that you did.

T.B. Well, the album was called "Power of a Woman" and it was released on his label and Easy is on it Everlast is on it, Dr. Dre is on it, the D.O.C there are a lot of people that are on it. Then I ended up writing a second record and I worked with Salt N Pepa I did a lot of great shit, and at the end of it and I had a band come in called Sugartooth who were on Geffen and I did a song called "Running with the Devil" we covered the Van Halen thing and did a crazy rock version of it and I sort of decided, you know what, I need to be with a band. This world, a lot of shit went down with me in that world that was pretty heavy duty and I just didn't feel right anymore there and so I stole all my tapes from my label and locked them up and I wouldn't let them release the second record. They wouldn't let me out of the contract, and about a month before Easy died he called me for a meeting and gave me the money he owed me. He told me he was very sorry for keeping me under contract, he said a lot of things to me and I didn't know in his mind what was going on. I didn't realize he had AIDS and he was gonna die, I didn't realize anything, I thought it was just really strange how I hadn't had anything to do with anybody at the label for a really long time. I formed Manhole, but couldn't really do anything, it was in the early stages. He handed me my contract and he said, "You're free to go, here's the money I owe you and I hope you have a great life." He told me he thought I was kickass, I always stood up to everybody, I never took any shit and I wasn't some ho on the label and he respected for that. A month later, I'm driving down the street and I hear a letter being read on the radio station rapper Easy E has issued saying he has AIDS and a week later he was dead. I was like oh my God, It just all blew me away. That guy definitely gave me my start, he signed me and he taught me how to stand up for myself, I mean, Jesus Christ, the N.W.A. camp that's not the easiest group of people. Being a little white girl on that label you better stand up for your shit or your gonna get fucked over big time, a lot of crazy shit happened on that label.

A.Z. What year was that?

T.B. It was 89 and the record came out in 90. It was funny because it had two videos on MTV I hosted Yo MTV Raps with Dre and Ed Lover .I did all that, I'm wearing like a track suit, It was really funny I was blonde, platinum blond, I looked like what Korn looks like when they do this thing now.

A.Z (Laughs)

T.B. That's totally my past and it's hard to even relate to that now. I'm putting together a book right now, I've been working on for about a year and it's a book from 1990-2000 a girl's sort of journal through music. It's journal entries, collages, art, letters from people, stories, I'm having a writer, from Metal Hammer, actually do a thing with me through the whole book and it's going to be called "God Wants a Piece of My Ass". A photo journal of a blasphemous girl and it's got very religious overtones through it and sacrilegious overtones it's very crazy but it's very truthful and it tells a lot of stories in it too.

A.Z. Do you ever get any shit over some of the imagery and some of the lyrics that you use on the religion front?

T.B. I get more shit over, like, pictures I've taken if I've posed in a magazine and I'm wearing something I get more shit like "why is Tairrie B…." I'm like oh please, it's not like I'm in Playboy gimme' a fucking break.The clothes don't make the woman; the woman makes the clothes.

A.Z. Right.

T.B. I think people are a little bit confused about my religious "thing". I think they don't know if I'm a Jesus freak or a Devil worshiper from one minute to the next, and if you walk in my house you wouldn't know either because there's tons of both and I 'm just very drawn to the spiritual side and the dark side sort of somewhere in between. I find both fascinating. I find the Bible fascinating and I find the Satanic Bible fascinating. There's something you can get in each, to say that you can't get something from every religion is crazy, there are so many religions out there. If people have a problem with it, that's their problem, I think Jesus is way more scary than the Devil, all this Satan shit is funny.

A.Z .( Laughs)

T.B. Tura Satana is not... oh is that what that's about you're Satan worshipers now? That wasn't what we were about, look, I can use that imagery and not be a Cradle of Filth chick, okay? I think Marilyn Manson did the whole Devil thing there are so many bands out there that are all neato. If I do a shirt that says Jesus is a rock star, I'm gonna get more shit from that than something about Satan because it's scarier to people. An Evangelist is scarier to people. That terrifies people way more for some reason.

A.Z. More threatening, yeah. You talked a little bit about bands like Korn and that, do you think there's too much of that rap/metal thing flooding...

T.B. Honey, when I was doing rap/metal years ago, I was being told "this will never work". I mean, Cypress Hill guys even told me "this thing will never Work" I look at them now doing that song they have going oh, really? Its funny I just see all these bands popping up out of nowhere jumping on that same thing and I don't want to be a part of it; I don't feel a kinship with it at all. I felt a kinship with certain bands in my town like Snot and Human Waste Project and certain people were around when we were around and Downset .I really love Downset and I think they do the rap/rock thing the best and they've gotten the least amount of publicity, respect, or acknowledgement and I think they definitely do it the best. When I look at someone in a red baseball cap flipped backwards talking about "I'm gonna break, gimme' something to break" Give me a break, I think it's complete crap.

A.Z. There's too much of it, it was good at first, but when that's all you hear and it's all you get to see on MTV.....

T.B. Every band, there is just so much more music out there! I mean gimme' a fucking break, the new "Bomb Pop" record is amazing and why isn't that on MTV? Why isn't there a video for them on MTV? There are so many bands out there that are so incredible and there is just no vehicle for them, they have to remain underground. I can't turn on MTV and watch Papa Roach and Static X, I can't do it; I just can't stomach it. I'm not dissing the people, I'm just saying I can't watch it.

A.Z. Oh yeah, they're nice guys, I think that Static X is funny actually.

T.B. I think it's very hysterical because I grew up with all these people- well I grew up a little bit before them in the scene and then they all kinda' came along and it was like okay, ya' know everyone sounds exactly the same to me, it's like one big long record, I don't understand does no one else see this, that they're buying into the one long record concept? The people that are different they just don't seem to fit into that anywhere.

A.Z. Did you ever get a chance to do any video stuff?

T.B. Mmm hmm...Manhole had a video, Tura Satana had a video, and My Ruin had a video that came out last year.

A.Z. Are these available at all?

T.B. I'm not sure, Manhole had a video for "Kiss or Kill", Tura Satana had one for "Luna" and Tura has a video coming out it's really weird, it's spoken word kinda' tripped out little thing.

A.Z. When we played "Tainted Love" on the radio it was the the only radio friendly song on Speak. We'd love a video we could play on our cable show. But, we'll dig a few more out of here as long as there's not too many fuck words on it.

T.B. I say the "f" word here and there, Ya'know.

A.Z. My engineer was sitting there trying to lay on the dump button, we have no delay. (Laughs)

T.B. Oh, man, sorry about that.

A.Z. That's okay. (Laughs) Personally I dig that vibe.

T.B. A girl's gotta' be a girl. (Laughs)

A.Z. Is there anything else you can talk about the new album then?

T.B. I'm really happy that I did get a chance to do this and it was a nice refreshing break out of doing what I was doing before and kind of come clean in a lot of ways do a lot of different sides of myself, everyone has different sides and just like my new record is really, really heavy, I don't know what the next one will be, ya' know what I mean? You can never tell, I think that represents a big part of me, I guess I wish the one thing that would have happened is that I would have stayed in one place with one producer so it would all sounded more cohesive, but in the other sense it's more like a collage and it's a collage of a lot of feelings and emotions. I hope that people can dig it and have an open mind and not be like what the fuck is this and when they hear "Tainted Love" she's like electronica queen now, what's going on? Get to "Blasphemous Girl".

A.Z. The album that's coming out in September, if we can't get it here do people go to your website or the label's site and order it?

T.B. No, we're going to be able to get it out, it's definitely coming out in September and I definitely have faith they're going to have it out here and Spitfire will definitely get it in stores, I am not afraid of that. The Noise thing was the whole problem with that.

What do you listen to?

A.Z. I like all over the place, I mentioned Type O to you, and I like Switchblade Symphony a lot, Nick Cave, I love, Leonard Cohen .....

T.B. Right on!

A.Z. I like anything personal and emotional. I love Danzig stuff, I like his old stuff not his new stuff.

T.B. Yeah, his old stuff was really great.

A.Z. The Doors are my favorite band of all time so I'm like everywhere, I don't like the rap/metal thing anymore it was fun at first but there's just too much of it for me. It's played out.

T.B. Played out definitely.

A.Z. I like emotional, honest music that's why I like your album a lot because you're talking about how you feel or how you felt at the time and I think that's awesome.

T.B. I think a lot of people find offense at that sometimes because they're like ˜she's too personal and she spills it all out; but isn't that what music is supposed to be, instead of candy-coated and pop I don't just sit down and go okay I have to write a catchy hook, oh my God! I have to write something that can be played on the radio. I write something from my heart and I think that's a little more important.

A.Z. I like how you speak your mind and that's why I like Lydia Lunch.

T.B. She's awesome.

A.Z. I love Lydia Lunch and I see her and I'm in awe and I'm one of like five guys in the whole place and a bunch of women want to kick our asses but I really like where she's coming from.

T.B. I don't know if you're familiar with Jessica from Jack Off Jill?

A.Z. Yeah, oh, yeah.

T.B. She did a duet with us on the new record that is coming out in Europe, she is fucking just awesome. I really believe, Jessica is, like my as corny
as this could sound, my sort of attached, detached sister. Her new album is very similar to our new album and we write from like the same place there's just like we the same sort of mindset and I really dig her, man and I really respect her. I think she's a huge star and that nobody's figured this out yet. Well, they broke up. She's doing another project now, it's sad because her record just came out and her record is brilliant.

At this point the tape cuts off and we just continue talking. But rest assured brave reader there will be more conversation to follow as we follow up on "A PRAYER UNDER PRESSURE OF VIOLENT ANGUISH" and our love affair w/ the Divine Miss B.

Tairrie B, or Miss B. as she is often referred to has previously worked as a solo artist (a white protégé of rap producer/svengali Eazy-E) and her first album, 'Power Of A Woman' is now highly collectable. In 1990 her solo debut stalled and she elected to concentrate on music with a similar thematic ethos but a more aggressive bent: Manhole, a hard rock group from Los Angeles, California. (Who changed their name to Tura Satana for legal reasons) With Scott Ueda (guitar), Rico Villasenor (bass) and Marcelo Palomino (drums), Manhole worked in territory widely analogized as 'post-hardcore metal.” Tairrie B continued to rap as well as sing over the backdrop, which also contained trace elements of hip-hop rhythms. But it is doubtful whether those unacquainted with the singer's past confused Manhole with anything other than a ferocious hard rock group. The group split-up in late 1998, allowing Tairrie B to concentrate on a solo career recording as My Ruin. With My Ruin, Miss B remains one of the more influential members of the female metal scene. Tairrie B will be bringing out a book soon, where she will document her life amd her experiences together with new photos, titled "God Wants a Piece of My Ass".

Upon the long awaited US release of A PRAYER UNDER PRESSURE OF VIOLENT ANGUISH were permitted to witness the second chapter of My Ruin.

In her own words - A PRAYER UNDER PRESSURE OF VIOLENT ANGUISH is 14 songs strong with two short spoken words segments, which appear at both the beginning and end of the album. SELECTED PRAYERS include BEAUTY FIEND, STICK IT TO ME, LETTER TO THE EDITOR and POST NOISE REVELATION which confronts the critics and media head on and straight up. Speaking of which, we have recorded our own tribute song called ROCKSTAR (dedicated to the late LYNN STRAIT of the band SNOT). There are tracks that deal with my own love / hate dichotomy of religion and relationships such as HEARTSICK, SANCTUARY, HEMORRHAGE, LET IT RAIN and MASOCHRIST (which will be released on the single only). It also boasts a long overdue duet featuring JESSICKA from JACK OFF JILL appropriately titled MISS ANN THROPE as well as covers of DO YOU LOVE ME? by NICK CAVE and the classic BLACK FLAG song MY WAR (which features Mick on duet vocals). We decide on these particular songs to cover because they were very inspirational to us while writing the album. -Tairrie B from the website www.myruin.com

Also available from My Ruin is the live recording "To Britain with Love and Bruises.” Which includes 11 songs from both albums of material.

Be it the Old Testament, the Live Testament or the New Testament. Tairrie B remains a true testament of one thing about the entertainment industry in the United States. She says, “We're no longer trendsetters; the masses buying the music that is being promoted by the labels here are sheep being spoon-fed bullshit. That's right Middle America is eating shit.” What they should be eating are her words. Bitter as they can be, Miss B speaks the truth. She's an amazing singer, messenger, poet, a fun interview and excuse me for saying, is pretty easy on the eyes.

The band is MICK MURPHY guitar, MEGHAN MATTOX on bass, YAEL drums, and Tairrie B out front with pipes that rival any band on the circuit. They all joined in for the following interview that offers quotes that pull no punches. It is straight from the heart, simply put, the truth. Something a lot of people in the industry can't seem to handle in the age of using pop music as a way to sell sneakers, Playstations and zit cream.

Alex Zander: So what took so long to get here to Chicago for My Ruin to play?

Tairrie B: A band needed to invite us out. We needed to be invited on a real tour so we were unable to play. So we were unable to do it. It's hard when you have no label.

AZ: So no support from Spitfire now?

TB: “Shitfire!” is not our label. They never were. They licensed a record without our permission from a U.K. label called Snapper, both records, behind our backs. When we tried to make it cool with them we said, "well we're on your label let's do something." We got offered Tattoo the Earth, we got offered a lot of stuff. They were like "nope, we're not gonna support you. We're just going to put your record out there and whatever copies we feel like putting out and see what happens." They didn't give a shit about us. So that's why we wrote a song called "Spitfire" about it which will be on our next record.

AZ: As far as a new record, other than the live My Ruin record, when is that gonna happen?

TB: When we find a label. We have the record written. We have about 18 songs written. We're planning on doing a couple of real cool covers and Morgan may appear on the record, from Kittie. We got the whole concept down, we know what we're calling it. We know what we're doing, we're ready to go! It's called The Horror of Beauty. It's just a lot of things we've been going through the past couple of years.

Mick Murphy: It's going to be a killer rock album, too. Rock, not "nu-metal." It's super-heavy rock.

TB: True metal, that's what it's going to be. See, we have a guitar player in our band that doesn't sound like the same five guitar players in the same other five bands that copied the same five guitar players (laughs). He can do solos.

MM: Actually, this is music before 1990, you know what I mean? So I think that makes us a little different.

AZ: When we did an interview with you a year and a half ago that was on Speak and Destroy, which was new domestically but it had been around in Europe before on Snapper?

TB: Yeah, and actually this band did not do that. A lot of people don't understand, they're like "well you change your name every other year, what's going on?" So I'll just give a quick recap. I used to be a rapper back in the day on Eazy-E's label, Ruthless, like 12 years ago. I put together a band called Manhole, which was a rap/rock, kind of like Body Count, Downset, Rage. But a female front. We did a record called "All is Not Well." We did a second record after we toured the world off that and did great, but we got sued for our name by a band out of Texas called Manhole, a punk rock band. They wouldn't let us buy it from them so we had to change our name as our new record was coming out. So we released Relief the Release under the name Tura Satana. So a lot of people got confused like what the hell? What is this? Then we ended up touring the world off of that and I ended up wanting to do something completely different. I was a little bit tired of the rap/rock thing. I wanted to branch out and do something a little bit different. The guys in my band were really not up to it, but we were on the same wavelength, though, on a lot of things. So I left the band and I did this solo record called Speak and Destroy. I named the project My Ruin because I didn't want to call it Tairrie B. I worked with a lot of different artists and producers and put together a touring band. That's where I met Meghan. She came out with me and toured with me first in Europe and England. I came back and decided it might be fun to put a new band together again. Everybody's like, “every other year she has a new band name," it's crazy! It kind of became a joke, but now it's pretty serious. We met Mick, Mick stepped in and he used to front his own band. Mick actually plays drums, sings, plays guitar. He pretty much does it all. He's the frontman for his band called Movement. He played me all the stuff he had written and I was just blown away. It was amazing so it was like maybe we should do some work together.

MM: Yeah, I was looking for something to do. My band had broken up and I had songs. I played her my songs and she was interested. It sparked up a romance and band all at the same time.

AZ: Did you play on Speak and Destroy?

MM: I played on the remix of "Tainted Love" on the American release.

AZ: Which was why he was on the promo shots.

TB: See, Spitfire was just a joke. Spitfire really jacked our band up. They waited a year to release one, then we were going to have a video for "Tainted Love" and then they pulled that. We were going to do Tattoo the Earth and then they pulled that. Spitfire Records just really tried to sabotage our career, big time. They wouldn't let us do any press in the States. They were afraid we were going to tell what was really going on, which we were.

MM: When we questioned them at all they got totally offended.

TB: We're a real band. We're not some fake garage band that's like "take our record and fuck us." They didn't give a shit and we were working really hard. "Speak" was a good record and "Prayer" was a fucking great record, and I can say that it's a great record.

MM: And our next record is going to be even better.

TB: Yeah, we really worked hard. We've been writing this record for a couple of years. There's a lot of subjects that I think our band relates to kids on a completely different level because it's more of an emotion. We're like an emo-metal band. Kids come to our shows and we have kids in the front row crying. It's like a completely different thing, girls throwing themselves onstage. It's very dramatic, they really relate to the lyrics and they really feel the music. It's something really cool, I think it's really different. It makes me really proud to be in a band that can set a standard for something new instead of following a trend. I don't think there's anyone that My Ruin can be compared to and I love that fact. It's what makes original bands.

AZ: So do you blame the lack of press in the United States on Spitfire?

TB: Oh fuck yeah. With our press kit in Europe you'd think we were Marilyn Manson. You'd think this band is huge.

AZ: If you look on your Web Site, (www.myruin.com) all the press that's there is amazing.

TB: Yeah, Spitfire was just "own up, cut them off. Cut them off from everything. Can't do this, can't do that." Finally we got out of all the contracts and legalities.

MM: They were afraid the truth might come out about how lame they are.

TB: Really, just lame, shady dealing. Really, I thought "oh it's a baby label." We were like ok, they think we want a break. Let's get this band out there, get them on Ozzfest, Tattoo the Earth, get out there and get their name out. Have something to break besides the old shit their still pumping. The guy's a dinosaur. He's just an idiot. I hate badmouthing someone like that, but this guy's a real fucker.

AZ: What's on the live album, who's on it, what's it called, who put it out and when was it done?

MM: We did it on our tour of the U.K. the first thing we did when we got to England was went to this barhouse in the middle of nowhere.

AZ: That tour was on the new record, right? Because I don't have that.

MM: It was a mixture between the two records. It gave this lineup a chance to do our versions of the songs off Speak and Destroy. We kind of changed them a little bit, made them more of what we do. And to do live versions of the songs off "Prayer" with Yael, because Yael didn't play on the "Prayer" record. She got into the band after we made that record.

TB: I really love that record. I think it's very raw and like they said, they did the record before Yael came into the band. They did the record at 4 in the morning and we had just gotten off a ten-hour flight. I got up at 9am and did all the vocals in and hour and a half-two hours.

MM: It's like a live studio album.
TB: It' crazy. It was awesome and I think it's great because it's really raw and it's everything from the music to the vocals to the artwork on it is pictures from the tour. It's really us. It really represents what My Ruin is. I think kids love that. They felt like we called it To Britain with Love and Bruises, because it was our little gift to Britain. For all the kids being so kind to us it really meant a lot to us to do it.

AZ: So the best way for somebody to find your music is?...

TB: Amazon.com, Hot Topic, they're now carrying it. They just took us in to the family. It's a shame, I feel really sad that we come out here every night and we play for all these kids and we go to our merch booth and our merch girl says "200 kids came up tonight asking for your album." We're like "what?!" We sell out. I mean we're doing more merch than any other tour. We're selling out, we're doing great. That's how we're surviving. But we have no record out here and we can't get them out here. So we're like we just need a label. We need a label to get behind this band and say I get it, I'm not afraid of it. Let's get you guys on the road, let's get you guys out there, let's make this fucking record and let's do it! That's all we need. We're not looking for a million dollars. We're looking for some real people who aren't liars.

MM: Who don't want to change us into some formulated band.

TB: Yeah! Who don't want to turn us into something we're not. I'm not that little, melodic singer girl. I'm not going to be Linkin Park. That's not gonna happen. But what I am is what I am and I can relate to a lot of people. This band can relate to a lot of people. People tell us that every night, we loved you, you're not that typical thing out there. It's different. Someone's gotta take a chance. Someone will believe in us and that person will step up when the time is right, and we know that. Until then we're gonna bust our ass and do what we gotta do. We'll play for everybody as long as people will bring us out, like Kittie.

AZ: Are you still writing your book?

TB: Been working on it for years, for a few years now. It's insane.

YAEL: It's a novel.

TB: It's not really a novel anymore, it's like a...

MEGHAN MATTOX: Encyclopedia.

TB: (laughs) It's like 1,000 pages now. I took it to a book publisher and he's like "oh my god, there's like 8 books here." It's insane. So I may have to break it down.

AZ: Tell us about it. What's it about and what are you putting into it?

TB: Well, basically it's about one girl's life in music. It's going through my rap days, Manhole, Tura Satana, to My Ruin. It's road stories, it's tour journals, it's diary entries, poetry, song lyrics, private pictures, letters from kids, letters to magazines I've written that were published and not published, letters from people, all sorts of crazy shit. Someone who didn't even like us or like the band could pick up the book, say oh my god and read it for days. It's insane, it's really crazy and when it gets published it'll be the same as the record, it finds it's home with the right person.

AZ: The Web Site's extremely detailed as well, there's a whole lot in there. Does it address some of the same themes? Is some of the artwork the same? It's of the best sites I've ever seen.

TB: Some of it. It mean it would be getting ahead of me for the book and then I started thinking about it and I said hmm, you know that's kind of what it really all is, like the artist screaming. In one way or another that's all I've been doing for the past how many years, I've been screaming. Add this to this, with this, for this in all these different ways. From the early days when I was involved in the "Rock for Choice" pro-choice movement, helping battered women and working in all those causes, all the way to screaming for women, standing on stage and saying get up here! You can come up; you don't have to be the girlfriend. You can be the girl onstage. I think a lot of girls relate to that. That's why I go in the audience and put my mic down and say sing with me. The show is with me. I love that. I love it that a lot of times we do shows, we don't have the giant reaction but we have people just looking at us in this intense way.

MEGHAN: More of a connection.

AZ: That was obvious from watching tonight. Do you get that everywhere?

MEGHAN: I think you get it more when it's a smaller venue and you're right there with everybody.

TB: Personally I've played festivals for 120,000 people and be like 25 feet away from stage with photographers below and I just sit up there thinking, I'm freaking out. I can't relate to that. So I have to jump down and go through them to get to the kids. Everyone's like "you can't jump down there, you're not allowed." I'm like I can't do a show up here. I have to be touching someone.

YAEL: You may as well be in your rehearsal room. You're not connected with anything because you're so far from everybody. Some of the shows on this tour have been like you walk off, take off your shirt and drench the water right the hell out of it because it gets amazing. It's energy, that's all. They give it, you give it and you can feel it just building and building and building. It's really dynamic. Like mellow stuff where she's just talking to a crowd and enticing everybody and they're like "what the fuck is she saying?" Then it's like well this is what I'm saying! So you can feel that. You can see them moving in a certain way, at least I can, because I'm in the middle. So I can just see the whole thing happening whether it's up here or down there and just work with everybody.
TB: We did a little documentary, we filmed it. We have a lot of home videos and we're going to put them all available on our site pretty soon. But we document everything we do and we have a lot of crazy, crazy stuff on tape. But it's awesome. Every night kids say to us you should have been higher on the bill, and we're like, our time will come, we'll get there.

MM: The coolest part is the kids that have never heard of the band before, they come up to us and say. "oh my god, where have you been?! You guys are amazing!" It just feels really good. Of course the kids who sing every lyric and have the records, that's awesome. But to turn some new heads, that's what it's all about, as many people as possible.

TB: To turn the disbeliever into a believer. You see the guys and girls who stand there when we walk out like "you can't impress me." They have that look like "I'm not here for you." I'll walk right up to those people and grab their faces, you know, right in their faces look at them, hold their hand…

MM: And they're converted.

TB: It's crazy! They'll come up to you after the show and say I heard shit about you, you know, everybody has a story afterwards.

MM: Yeah, there have been people who will say "I heard really bad things about you guys, but you guys are really cool." So hopefully that's what this tour is going to do and that's open some eyes.

TB: We're not fucking rock stars. People think because you're on the cover of a magazine or other shit that you live in mansions, you're rock stars, and we're like come on now! We're in a van, we're ghetto fabulous!

MM: In a van down by the river.

TB: Exactly! We're out here Black Flaggin' it. For real. When we do "My War," I really feel like I relate to this. I understand this shit. The people that I respect in the business, the people that I think are amazing are not the people on MTV. They are not the people that are all over MTV. I don't want to be this big -for me, I'm speaking for me only- I don't want to be Gwen Stefani and I don't want to be Madonna. But I want to be what I am, whatever that's going to be. I want to live my life, be happy, do my music, tour and have kids get it and sell records. I actually have records available. We're playing for how many kids tonight? How many of these kids are actually going to be able to find our fucking record? That's what scares me.

AZ: You had that same problem with Noise Records.

TB: Yeah, exactly!

AZ: I remember seeing you for the first time opening for Type O and one of your band members gave me a sampler and for months I couldn't get Noise to send me any. They sent me 8x10's but no records.

TB: Nope. We would get out there and play for 2,000 kids a night. There'd be an ad in Tower Records and I'd go in the store that day and say "I wanna invite the staff to the show," because we didn't know anybody and they'd say "well we have one record." I'm like "what?!" We had to start getting our records on the road and selling them. But we sold them all out. At least Noise gave us records to sell on the road.

MEGHAN: You got 8x10's because it goes with the territory of being a woman in this business. They're selling a hot face to you and they're not looking at the substance behind it.

TB: This is not a hot face, this band is not a hot face. That's why we do songs like "Beauty Fiend" and "Get Pretty." We have lyrics so please forgive me for not being pretty or sexy. That's not what I'm here for. I'm not here to be your little doll up on stage with my fake tits and fakeness. I'm up here just to give it to you, if you don't like it get the fuck out. You know what? Someone else is here that will. If you want some bimbo up on stage yeah I can get one in this band. But that's not coming to this band. That's not what we're about. If that's what we've gotta be to be on MTV then fuck it. I don't need it, we don't need it.

AZ: Now Eazy-E's label...How did you get into rap and then involved with that label.

TB: I was a street dancer, I was really into graffiti art and breakdancing way back in the day. I know KoRn made it really cool to wear Adidas and track suits. Well back when I was wearing it, it wasn't cool for a white girl to be wearing that shit. I was just really into it and I met Eazy-E's manager at a N.W.A. concert with a friend of mine and he's (manager) like, "oh you're a rapper?" I was like "oh yeah." He asked if I had anything and I said "well Quincy Jones's son had did a song with me, Jimi Hendrix's "Foxy Lady,"" on a little demo. So I went down to N.W.A.'s studio all by myself, with nobody. I walked in and played them all my shit and they're all sitting there, Ice Cube and everybody. So he handed it back to me and was like, "oh cool." So I said thanks and went to walk out and he said "do you want a record deal?" As quick as that. It just kinda steamrolled, but then it got really crazy. It got a little much. I was in love with rap music, I loved graffiti, I loved DJ'ing, breakdancing, everything about the culture. And all my friends were into punk. But something was really alluring to me about this culture. It was really straight and really scary. I think it prepared me. I think being down with N.W.A. in those days prepared me to be in this world. They were like the Slayer of rap. I think that a little white girl walking around going "fuck you" to these people was like "what? Wait a minute!" It got to the point where you were told to carry a gun with you to your own record company for protection, there's something wrong there, you gotta go. I'm into music because I love music. The day I don't love what I'm doing is the day I'm going to leave it. I left that world. I wasn't jumping on the bandwagon, I just wanted to do something harder. I knew my voice was something different.

AZ: You told me before something that's just amazing and honest, is that you got paid before he passed away. He took care of you.

TB: Yeah, he paid me all the money he owed me. Eazy kept me under contract for a long time. He wouldn't let me go when I was in Manhole, the early days. Everybody knows he died of AIDS. You live a lifestyle and whatever that lifestyle is you talk about it, you brag about it, just like 2Pac. You live a lifestyle and you sometimes die that lifestyle. Kurt Cobain died a lifestyle and so did Layne Staley. Certain people die the lifestyle they live. It's sad.

MM: He let you out of your contract.

TB: He let me go before he died. He said "I want you to go." Two days later I heard on the radio someone reading a letter. It was like I looked at him, I sat right next to him, I had no idea! He did not look sick at all. He died less than a week after that. I was sent a letter saying "do you want to sue Ruthless?" Along with a list of people I knew for money. But he took care of me. He gave me money. I was free to go, he let me out. Thank god, or I might still be under contract to this day as some gangster mafia shit. I'm pretty happy about that. So I have nothing bad to say.

AZ: Then you were sued over the name Manhole...

TB: But we really didn't get sued, though. Noise Records got sued and they changed their name to F.A.D. and we were just told change your name. They wanted like $300,000. We're like we'll give you $40,000 for the name and they wouldn't take it. Then after we changed our name, two months later that band broke up. It was like oh my god! It was ridiculous. Put us through drama for nothing. Noise changed their name because they didn't want to get sued and they had to re-issue all the All is Not Well records and call them Tura Satana.

AZ: So Tura Satana didn't have a copyright on her name?

TB: No, and the funny thing was, she started getting letters addressed to us. I ended up getting in touch with her through the Internet. I said, this is who I am, this is why we named our band this, because one night before we had to name our record we went through 30 million names, I was watching Faster Pussycat and watching her I just thought, wow! She's just everything that I want to embody on this record, and who I want to embody as a persona. I thought, that's a great fucking name. It sounds kind of Spanish and scary, kind of evil. I brought it to the band and they were like "that's killer!" There was no copyright on it. Later, I started talking to her, and another part in my book is with her as well. I'm interviewing her because of why we took the name and who she is and why she inspired. I think that's really cool.

AZ: We've talked to her before.

TB: Yeah, she's hot. She was very flattered that we did that, so I thought that was really cool.
AZ: Do your videos get played in Europe at all?

TB: Yeah, the old videos for Tura Satana did, there's a My Ruin video for "Terror." We haven't done the video.

MM: This band isn't represented in a video yet. We have tons of tour videos at home.

AZ: That stuff is great, just seeing (the show) tonight.

TB: I gotta send you some home videos.

MM: It's very punk rock-style videos, but there's a lot of heart and it's very honest.

YAEL: And we have the two VCR editing.

MEGHAN: I think we're staying ghetto though. Regardless of whatever happens. It's the flavor of the band. I wouldn't mind having a driver…
MM: Yeah, it would be cool to have somebody drive the van.

YAEL: Yeah, we'd be a little less tired.

AZ: Who's driving?

MM: Me and Yael do most of the driving.

TB: A lot of people want to see us fail out here. A lot of people are very "oh fuck My Ruin. They'll never make it. They're trouble, they're a nightmare." But everybody's been happy with us. Everybody's been kind. It's cool.

AZ: What about at home? I know you did a Whiskey show. It was talked about a lot on the Internet.

TB: We did a couple. Our shows in LA are crazy. We're doing one when we get back. We're actually up for an award right now. LA Weekly, which is like the village voice, they're doing a big award show. They do their yearly awards and we're up for best rock band. Chili Peppers have won it before us, and System of a Down. We're up for it. We just got asked to perform with Tenacious D and Concrete Blonde. Somebody we really respect is gonna be on the show. A few people, very underground and very cool. I mean it's very cool for us to do things like that. I'd rather play with Concrete Blonde than fucking Coal Chamber any day. That shit doesn't mean shit.
AZ: So you don't have a problem getting a chance to come back out by yourselves and playing a couple of smaller clubs, then?

TB: We're gonna make it happen. After we do all this, we're gonna make it happen. People are telling us, "you know if you guys don't get signed off this then something's wrong." If we don't get signed, we're just gonna come back out and do it again.

MEGHAN: We could do this again, that's not a problem. There were bands on this tour that have asked us to go out with them.

TB: American Head Charge rocks.

MM: They're really good (rest of band agrees). I'm not going to lump them in with the bands with a shtick. I think Slipknot's cool but too many bands have ripped them off. But Head Charge is really good. They've got great songs and a great singer, too.

TB: They're actually talented and nice guys. I wanna say one thing about American Head Charge, they are the stinkiest band. They know that, I say this to them. I spray them all with vanilla. They put dead pig heads backstage with us and we were spraying them with vanilla.

AZ: You're a happier crew than I expected to meet because the music is so emotional. Is the new album that you already recorded as emotional?

MM: When we play a show it's a whole different story. After we play we're a lot happier.

AZ: I love that emotion, it provokes a feeling. Music should be like that.

TB: I think it should be. You gotta have tension in order to also have release. There's gotta be some pain to have something. I gotta be honest, with me, I'm in a relationship and a lot of my records have been relationships. What's your religion Tairrie? You talk about the religious aesthetic of everything, and I'm like, my religion is relationships. That's what I address on every record. Most of the time it's painful stories. Right now I'm in a happy relationship so you gotta dig deeper into other subjects besides just this. We have to go through a lot of the other things. We have a song called "Weightless," that's gonna be out on our next record that to me, is going to be the next Beauty Fiend. It's a really important song to me personally, because it deals with when we showcased for a record label in New York City a few months back. The funniest was - and I'm not gonna say who it was - big label, big person, called me up and was really into us and we sent him a package. He called me up and said, "I'm blown away. The music is incredible, the lyrics are incredible, the The band is incredible, your photo, Tairrie, you're beautiful, you can be on magazine covers, but do you have a weight problem? I need to be honest with you, are you a little heavy there? Because rock stars have to be thin, I'm afraid." And those are the lines that just violated me. I was like what a fucking thing to say to me. Who is gonna say that to like Pantera?! Know what I mean? Go tell Phil that! That was such a disgusting, derogatory, misogynistic comment towards me, gimmie a break. He said this shit and we showcased for him anyway. It was worthless, it was not worth our time. Idiot.

MM: It's getting really bad in the music industry.

TB: Are you going to appeal to the Britney Spears girls? NO! We're not!

AZ: Universal dropped the ball on Garbage. They didn't do 100,000 in the States.

TB: That's sad. That's really sad.

MEGHAN: That's ridiculous.

YAEL: That's a joke.

MM: Who?

Rest of band in unison: Garbage!!

TB: Shirley Manson, I'll tell you what I think about her. I think Shirley Manson is kind of like me in the way that - it might sound weird - she's a singer and all that, but she writes really dark, creepy lyrics about subjects that are very intensive. People don't really hear that because it's so poppy. But if you really listen to those lyrics she's got some shit going on! I love that.

AZ: The first record is dark and the new one is dark.

TB: She's awesome. She is not afraid to talk shit. I love her. So, she's bad. But I think the new album deals with a lot of topics that are really important. It needs to be brought out to the forefront. Girls need someone to tell them it's ok to look like this, to do that. You don't have to look like this to be that. You don't have to do this. Get pretty in here, don't get pretty out here.

MM: But as a guy in the band, it's not just about chicks. This band appeals to guys, too. It's not a riot grrl band. It's not a riot grrl band that excludes guys. And this isn't just the chicks with some side guy. This is the four of us in a band together.

TB: I hate it that we're a great chick band. We're not a chick band, because without Mick Murphy there is no My Ruin, straight up. People might go "oh, Tairrie B is leader of this band." I put the band together, yes. I'm the frontwoman. But if this man was gone, there'd be no fucking music. We're all partners in this band, but this is my soulmate partner as far as music. He brought what I really needed to do to the forefront . I've never had a musical partner like that.

MM: Thank you very much.

TB: You're welcome, baby.

In 1990 DORO released her second solo album titled "Doro". It was recorded at Fortress Recorders in Hollywood and produced by legendary fire breathing KISS bassist GENE SIMMONS. For this record DORO opted to record with many different studio musicians rather than work within the restraints of a bandsituation. DORO is very excited to work with her idol Simmons. She later says: "It was one of the best experiences I've ever had because I've been a huge KISS fan forever and to work with Gene Simmons was an honor. I learned so much from him." DORO films two video clips: "Unholy Love" filmed on Earth day just outside Yosemite Park and "Rare Diamond.

Having been out of the U.S. music spotlight for over a decade, German rock
icon Doro Pesch has returned to show America what's been missing in the
current state of hard rock! After captivating & enchanting the audience at
this year's March Metal Meltdown in New Jersey, Doro is preparing to
unleash a new album, titled Calling The Wild, on KOCH Records (set for
release on September 12th) that will re-position her name to true rock
regality.

Although she has kept musically active in Europe over the years, her new
album "Calling the Wild" is her first U.S. release since 1990. As a solo
artist, she has in excess of eight releases to her credit and has achieved
worldwide success.

Not a woman to pull any punches, Doro enlisted the assistance of some very
noteworthy musicians to compose this magnum opus! She recently teamed up
with Motorhead frontman Lemmy Kilmister in Los Angeles to re-record the
Motorhead track "Love Me Forever" in pure, emotive Doro fashion. The song
originally appeared on Motorhead's album 1916. This collaboration also
spawned a new track, another duet called "Alone Again." Both songs will
appear on Calling The Wild.

If your palate is not yet wet with anticipation, the release also features
contributions from Slash (Snakepit, ex-Guns 'N Roses) and Al Pitrelli
(Megadeth, ex-Savatage, ex-Asia, etc.) Eric Singer and Bob Kulick of the
KISS family also pitched in. If that wasn't enough to make a mammoth of an
album, the proverbial icing on the cake, however, is an amazing Doro-ized
cover version of the Billy Idol classic "White Wedding." But for this
writer it is the ballads that came "Calling.." It is her trademark, love
hungry ballads coupled with high octane rockers that keep the fans starving
for Doro.

It was in the cold Chicago December weather that my partner in crime, Bob
and I went to the House of Blues to interview Doro, who at the time was
fighting a cold. What was intended to be a 15 minute interview lasted
almost an hour. And we were subsequently invited back after her
performance. Doro didn't look like she had aged a day since I first became
aware of her in 1990 and she was as beautiful at heart as she was to
behold. To this day she remains one of the kindest and most gracious
performers I've yet to meet.

Between sips of hot tea this is the conversation that took place that cold
wintery night.

Alex Zander: Before I get into the dirt, I love the song "Constant Danger."

Doro Pesch: Oh, great, great.

AZ: I have other questions I want to ask you, but where did you find the
inspiration for that?

DP: This guy I (have been) writing with for a long time, his name is Gary
Scruggs. I met him in Nashville in 1991 and I loved "True at Heart" Have
you ever heard that, "True at Heart?"

AZ: No, I haven't.

DP: It was probably my favorite album, my most favorite album. It didn't
get released here in the states. I met Gary and ever since we are writing
songs together. I always go there before I start a record and I get all the
ballads out of my system. I can write the best ballads with him. I came
down there to him and usually I give him some ideas or chord changes and he
can do it ever so slightly, but much better with wording and stuff with me.
We're a good team, he's the man. He's been heartbroken a thousand times.

AZ: I can tell, that song is beautifully sad though, in a beautiful way.

DP: There's another song from him and me on the European version, it's
called "Black Rose", when you hear that…heartbreaking. Certain records
weren't released here in the states, on each record there are a couple of
songs of him and me where you can be sure you get goosebumps.

AZ: Why isn't the song on the liner notes there's no lyrics for that song?

DP: The record company forgot. I got the album and then they said, "Doro,
we fucked up," and I said in which way, and "Constant Danger" isn't in the
lyrics. It was a fuck up, but it wasn't meant to be.

AZ: That's a great song, I really like that. So, it's been a long time
since you've been in the United States, what's been happening?

DP: Actually, I was always living here and I was always doing records here.

AZ: So you recorded those albums here?

DP: All the time.In New York. Usually I did...plus an album which didn't
come out .which was the "True At Heart" album. Then we did one album in New
Jersey and in New York, "Angels Never Die." Then we did a live album which
was really great. The guys in the band, they played on it. They are with me
for seven years. The bass player is with me for ten years. I think the live
album…it's the shit. But anyhow, it didn't get out here. Then we did one
called "Machine To Machine." We did it in New Jersey. "Love Me In Black"
was the last one. We did it half in New York and half in Germany with the
band Die Krupps.

AZ: I love Die Krupps.

DP: Yeah, Die Krupps worked on five songs off the new album with me. I went
to New York for this new album and to Los Angeles and to Hamburg and to
Nashville.
I mean it was all over the world. With today's technology I could work all
over.

AZ: I found it interesting that you worked with some members of Die Krupps.

DP: Yea, we are now partners in the studio.

AZ: I wish that they would do more. Everything's imported and on
compilations. How did you get the new contract, the state-side contract?

DP: I'd love to tell you that story because we always had a strong fan base
even when we didn't get a release here. The climate for heavy metal wasn't
so good in the early 90's and when I delivered my records we always had the
worldwide deal but that didn't mean shit. Like after eight months or after
ten months they could say well we don't want to put it out and then it was
usually to late to shop it or people say well it's not MTV enough or we
couldn't get a release here. So on the last tour there was this guy Tony
who was doing our webpage and he's a die-hard fan. He's like twenty-five or
something and he's doing the Internet page, it's called Dororocks.com.

AZ: Been there.

DP: Yeah…and he's (been) doing it for a long time. I think he was the first
one with the Internet stuff and he was with us on tour, on the last tour in
Europe, the "Love Me In Black" tour. He visited like for three concerts and
he was so excited. He said it's such a shame American fans can't hear it
anymore. He said, "Can I do something?" and I said "Well, whatever you
wanna do." Then he said "Can I get permission to contact labels and stuff?"
I said, "Yeah, I don't even want to tell my manager." Then he did and in
between two weeks we had four record deals. Then, the first guy who called,
from Koch. He was so nice and I thought, "I feel a really good vibe there."
Then I said, "I'm coming over to the office," and I went over and played
him "I Wanna Live" and "White Wedding." He said, "Let's do it." That was
because of the fan club.
We always had the lawyers shopping the tapes and it was a lot of money for
the lawyer which never got us anywhere. So I loved to tell you that story
because (it shows) the power of the fans.

AZ: I've been waiting for this day for a long time.

DP: Me too, me too. Especially when I was living here and I was recording
here, it was heartbreaking when the records didn't come out year after
year.

AZ: Everybody's getting fucked here now, though. You work with a lot of
well-known names on the new album and you're probably sick of answering
this question, but how was it working with Lemmy?

DP: It was the best! I wouldn't have mentioned if you wouldn't have brought
it up, I met him in '82 in England and I couldn't even speak English that
well, or not at all! But we always had a good vibe going. Then I met him a
couple of times at some festivals and the last couple of years we kind of
lost touch. Then after a session I wanted to listen to some good Motorhead
stuff and I put on that record, "No Sleep At All" You know that one.I got
it from a fan, somebody sent it to me and I never knew why. I thought, "Oh,
that's interesting, maybe they know that I'm a big Motorhead fan." But I
never listened to it because the record player wasn't hooked up. So,
anyway, this time I plugged it in and I went to listen to it and there was
this cute little picture which is now on our CD as well of Lemmy and me. I
think it's '86.

AZ: Oh, the old picture, I like that.

DP: They say '88, but I think it's '86 Monsters of Rock festival,
backstage. When I saw that picture I thought, "maybe I should give him a
call." It was really hard to get the telephone number. I had the telephone
number in my book. It was the same one, but the area code changed and I
didn't know that. So I called it up and nobody was there or the number
wasn't good anymore. Then, somebody said, "Why don't you write a letter to
the management?" That's what I did. I put a photo inside and I said "Hey
Lemmy, it's me, Doro, remember this one, about the photo and how about we
do something together?"
I gave him my telephone number and said call any time. A couple of days
went by and I never even thought he would call back because I didn't know
where he was, if he was on tour or where he was living. A couple of days
later the phone rang and it was Lemmy. I was so shocked. At first I thought
it was one guy from my band making a joke. Then he said, "I think it's a
great idea. We haven't seen each other for so long. Where do you want to do
it? In England or in Europe or in America?" I said, "Anywhere, it doesn't
matter." He said he had a very good experience with this guy Bob Kulick who
produced songs for his last record. He said "There's a great studio, you
might like it and if you like it I'm sure I'll love it." Then I flew over
the next day and he came to my hotel room and we talked and talked and it
was so great. It was the first time that we could really have good
conversation. It was fucking great. We were kicking around some ideas and
he said that he has this one song called "Alone Again" and he wrote it two
years ago and if I wanted to hear it. I said I'd love to. He played it and
after ten seconds I said, "That's the song. I want to do it. Definitely
want to do that." I was totally excited about it. He said, "Maybe it will
be a single at one point, what should we do for the B-side? Should we write
another song?" I said Yea and I brought up the idea that we could redo
"Love Me Forever" again because it was always my favorite or one of my
favorite songs of his. He said yeah, that would be great. We did it in two
weeks and it was just a dream. He was the sweetest person. He has so much
heart and soul and is an amazing musician, I must say. Really amazing. I've
been doing it now for a long time and I saw many musicians, but Lemmy was
always on. He was always on. You'd put the record button on and when he
played he was always on and I've never seen that in anybody. That was
really super special, and he played that solo for "Alone Again."

AZ: That's beautiful.

DP: In one take. It was the highlight of the record, or one of the
highlights of the record. You just can't hold a drinking (contest) with
him.

AZ: Well that's what we're gonna talk about because for so many years that
I've known Lemmy, that guy just drinks so much. But you were also with
another extreme personality, Slash, is he the same way?

DP: Yeah, similar way. Actually it was more of a surprise to me, I wasn't
there when he recorded. I came back to New York one day later and it was my
band and my engineers who were working with me in New Jersey, they ran into
Slash in New York after a concert, backstage. The band was hanging out with
Slash and he said he was mixing his album in New York. They said they would
put down the basic tracks for this one song, "Now Or Never." Then the
engineer asked Slash, "Hey how about you play a solo? I think Doro would
freak," and he said yeah, that would be a great idea. He said, "I first
want to listen to the song if I can vibe to it," and they made him a little
demo. He listened to it and then he came in the next day with a big bottle
of Stoli and ten packs of cigarettes.

AZ: I had to ride in his van when an AC/DC show was here.So, you have
Slash, Bob Kulick, and another KISS connection, Eric Singer. Why'd you pick
Eric Singer?

DP: It came actually through Bob, and he said who should be the musicians?
I said, well there's Lemmy on bass and my guitar player, Joe Taylor, he's
living in L.A.. So it was between Bob and Joe. He said drum wise? Because
we wanted to record the next day and my guy was living in Philadelphia. Bob
said, "How about we choose somebody here?" So it was either Randy Castillo
or Eric Singer. Then we decided each of the guys should play one song. Eric
was there first in the studio and he played two songs in one day. It was so
fast and so good, you know, he was really good. I'm a big KISS fan.

AZ: That's where this is leading, working with Gene Simmons, my favorite.

DP: Yeah, same here. I love bass players in general. I think I found out
I'm really a bass player lover. It's like he came to see me in LA just to
say hi and to watch the show like a week ago. That meant a lot to me.

AZ: That's cool

DP: That was so cool.

AZ: He's a busy man.

DP: Exactly, exactly, I called him up like 4 o'clock and then he came to
the show and I thought, "that was the highlight for all of us on this whole
tour." The whole tour was going really well, but that was fantastic.

AZ: I saw on the (self titled) Doro album that he wrote four songs. I know
that Tommy Thayer was Producer, and that Gene is listed as Exectutive
Producer but how much did Gene do as far as production or was that just his
name?

DP: Everything, he did everything from recording, songwriting and he mixed
this one song which didn't come out so good at first. Then it came out so
good. I loved that so much and then I wasn't so happy with the first mix
and Gene said, "Don't stress out over it, just go to your hotel and the
next morning you'll see." The next morning my message light was on and I
called down and they said there's a tape here at the front desk. Then I got
the tape and Gene said well check it out if you like it. He was mixing all
night until 9 o'clock in the morning.

AZ: I love that album. That's why I was myself, a long time KISS fan knew
of you because of that album by Gene Simmons. I love it and I play it till
this day. I still have it on cassette.

DP: Oh really?

AZ: But I often wondered though, if his name was on there just because you
put it on there or if he had that much to do with it?

DP: Totally, totally. He really dedicated all of his time to it. He was
totally involved into it and I could feel the input was always (there), his
energy is endless. Nobody has that. He has a way of working with musicians.

AZ: He gets so little credit though.

DP: That's right.

AZ: They only look at the makeup and shit. They don't see that the guy's
extremely talented and a great businessman.

DP: Totally, totally.

AZ: He has a beautiful voice and he's a great writer.

DP: I think so too. I had the big honor of listening to the demos when Gene
sang it alone, I still have the demos in my home. He sings really
beautifully and you're right, not a lot of people know that. I was witness
to some greatness that was really mind-blowing.

AZ: What do you prefer, your hard rock anthems or your ballads?

DP: I love both the same way. I couldn't say I like the hardcore stuff more
than the ballads. I think every song is unique and hard to compare. It's
hard to compare "Constant Danger" to "Burn It Up." I love playing "Burn It
Up". I love them both. For this new record I thought every song should be
totally unique and should not sound like another song. I know ballads have
a bad rap sometimes. But when I write ballads I fucking mean it and it's
not like to have the ballad for radio or shit like that.

AZ: We started off the interview this way, but what inspires you to write
the love songs the way that you do? Some of the painful things, the
wanting, the yearning, where does that come from? What's your inspiration,
relationships?

DP: Everything, memories or when you've met people or experiences,
everything. Songs for me are always holy, there's always like an idea.
Every song is made different too. When I'm on tour I'm in a different
mindframe than when I'm doing an album. When I write songs then I'm really,
really open about it. Sometimes I get ideas in my dreams. When I go to
sleep certain things come, usually that's the shit, that's magic. They just
come out .

AZ: Are you the type of person who sleeps with a notebook next to her bed?
Do you wake up from your dreams and write them down or do you do it from
memory in the morning?

DP: The notebook, that would be a good idea but I'm such a messy person
that I don't find stuff. It's always very valuable, but usually I have a
little walkman where I can record the melody because the melody I can't
remember anymore when I wake up. The lyrics maybe, but the melody its
sometimes hard. But the ideas they really come deep down from the soul or
from the spirit or from the gut or from the heart. You can feel it when
something comes from really deep down. But, the other way, sometimes a rock
song started off with a great riff and then we put some notes over it. I
prefer when the notes come first and then the idea.

AZ: I feel the same way. Why did you decide to do "White Wedding?"

DP: It was an accident that we did in a jam session in the studio with
Jurgen Engler from Die Krupps. I was singing it and I thought, "Wow, that
sounds pretty good." Then we recorded it and it almost made my top twenty
list. I always write as many songs as I can. Some songs they are not as
good and I choose the ones I like the most. "White Wedding" was up there
and we did just a video for it. We did it in England and in Boston.

AZ: Good, and finally probably a cheesy question that you're sick of, but
the music scene in the United States basically just sucks for the last ten
years...

DP: It's gotten better!

AZ: It's hard to work in the music business and concentrate on the kind of
music that I do. But there's a bit of a resurgence, how do you personally
feel about the future of hard rock in the States.

DP: I think the last two years I've really felt that it's picking up again
beautifully. Even for me, this tour, almost everywhere sold out or very
crowded and I think it's a good sign that rock is coming back in a big
way, I really think so. That I even got a new record out, that was like,
god, even the industry and everybody is watching rock again, which for many
years they gave a shit, you know? Now it's hard to sign bands again and I
think it's getting better, I really do. Our heads were hanging low for
many, many years. But, I think it's really getting much better.

Doro's touring band this time out is: Johnny Dee (drums), Joe Taylor
(guitar), Doro (vocals), Nick Douglas (bass)

The Atkins Diet: Easy Listening For Difficult Fuckheads

Since appearing on the scene in 1980, English-born Martin Atkins has become one of the leading lights in the world of industrial metal. His label, Invisible Records, has been home to some of the most important acts of the genre. Born on August 3, 1959, in Coventry, England, Atkins took up drumming at an early age and soon displayed a notable proficiency. Martin joined John Lydon’s Public Image Ltd. He then concentrated on his industrial fuel/inspired collective, Pigface. Throughout the 1980’s and early ‘90s, Atkins played with a large number of bands, including Ministry, Nine Inch Nails and Killing Joke. Since then, Atkins has put most of his efforts into maintaining Pigface and Invisible Records, occasionally joining other bands on a temporary basis. His most significant recent project, the Damage Manual, involved contributions from Jah Wobble, Killing Joke’s Geordie and Chris Connelly. An EP and an eponymous album were released to critical acclaim. Atkins was on a (drum) roll.

As founder of Chicago’s own Invisible Records, producer extraordinaire and the driving force behind Pigface, he had appeared in MK ULTRA’s pilgrim issue. Since then, he made 2 other covers and appeared on our nationally syndicated radio show MK ULTRASOUND. The bands on Martins’ imprint Invisible Records have been the topic of many interviews with some of our favorites, who just happen to be thee most innovative and creative bands over the past decade. The bands include Ohgr, Evil Mothers, ChemLab, Killing Joke, Psychic TV, Lick, Ashtrayhead and of course Pigface. Also there are some of the most enjoyable compilations, including Nine Inch Elvis, Opium Jukebox, 2 Ministry tributes, a great Alice Cooper comp and some great double-discs of trippy delights called Drug Test.

2001 opened the door for a revolving lineup of bands plugged into Atkins’ latest brainstorm, an indie-music fire starter he’s dubbed Underground, Inc. Inspired by the energy he finds flowing through the underground music scene, devoted to realizing his vision for indie music’s future, he’s completely committed to the bands he has embraced. He is not only in it for the cash, he loves doing what he does, and his track record is a true testement to that.

I joined Martin to chew the fat at his new office, studio and home, where I was greeted by his wife, kids and the family dog, Porridge. This is his third space in Chicago since 1998, and how they find the energy to move so much gear and product would baffle most. But I know Martin well enough now that he IS energy and is not lacking motivation. With the motivation this man exudes, he could literally move a mountain, or at least blow it up. For the first time the focus of our conversation was not Pigface or Invisible. I wanted to know why he was getting buried in another mountain of work, a mountain called Underground Inc.

Alex Zander: Why Underground Inc. when you have Invisible?

Martin Atkins: I formed Invisible before I joined Killing Joke. I had a label before that. It’s something I always dug. But it seemed to me there was such an identity to Invisible. I know the guys in Thrill Kill didn’t want to sign to Invisible. They were on Wax Trax! And fuck knows what other labels they’ve been on. Why not just keep Invisible to be the label for Pigface and everybody that’s on Invisible, but open things up. We’ve got 15 years of experience with dealing with a large distribution machine, selling to the mom and pops, working this county. Fuck, it’s huge, it’s great, wonderful, it’s so much fucking work. By creating Underground Inc., it’s a great place for small/medium-sized labels to be. If I’m not happy with the leverage I have at the distribution level, with the attention I get from a national distributor, then it’s fucked for everybody else. If I have 5 titles, even if they’re selling 10,000 units a piece, it’s fucked. I’ve got 260 titles on Underground Inc.

AZ: What’s the benefit or a small label like Cracknation, Jason and Jamie, doing their thing through Underground Inc.?

MA: Well, an easy thing to look at is Alternative Press, left to their own devices, they’d probably take out a quarter-page ad. Well, it’s just cheaper for them to take have 3 cuts in a 12-cut, full page ad that we do, 12 titles. You see those ads that we do. So that’s the gist of the really boring part of it. But, we’re all doing those ads together. We use that ad to then say to a group of 17 independent stores, “hey, we’ve taken out this ad, have you ordered the stuff?” We’ll bounce it to our distributors and say, “hey look!” Do more with an ad than simply take out an ad. So, when I call my distributor, I’m the guy who has called them about Thrill Kill Kult, I’m the guy who’s called them about Pigface, Einsturzende Neubauten, or Meg Lee Chin. Whatever. And I’m the guy calling about Cracknation. It just has to do with leverage. It’s gross. It’s gross in both ways of gross. We’ve done 60 titles this year, so we have their attention. so if I say to them, “I really need you to put My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult album on the front cover of your book that goes to every store in the country, they’ll listen. Once that stuff happened I knew that this was a good place for all those people to be. It’s still tough because I don’t think a lot of the labels we’re dealing with understand how tough America is, or how bands call and say, “hey, we’ll do our own posters and that’s gonna help!” I’m like, “well, what is the reason that the store is going to put up your poster? In fact, you need to tell me why you think this envelope is going to get opened? Nevermind the poster getting up on the wall.” People look at me like I’m crazy, but it’s worth that.

AZ: Anybody who’s worked in a record store knows that a lot of that stuff just goes out in the trash bin.

MA: Yeah, I mean, I’ve paid $10,000 to marketing companies to call record stores across the country and go, “Hey, what do you think of that promo we sent you of the new Meg Lee Chin?... oh you haven’t seen it...alright, we’ll send you another one.” So you send another, and you know it’s sitting there; they just can’t be bothered to look. So you send them another and you pay someone to make the phonecall to say, “Ok, do you have an envelope with a donkey on it?” This one company had a donkey sticker... “You do have that envelope, that’s the Meg Lee Chin album. Can you open the envelope? Alright, could you put the CD on? Could you listen to it? Thanks a lot.” That was a few years ago. It’s really tough.

AZ: What gave you the idea to do this?

MA: I think that I wanted to use our experience, what is it, fucking 16 years? And our machinery to help labels that didn’t necessarily want to sign to Invisible. I also wanted to, not necessarily, produce and engineer every single record that came out through the machinery. It has to do with me changing my focus. I don’t play drums very much anymore, I don’t engineer very much anymore, I’m producing the new Pigface album and I’m running my company. I’m trying to do a better and better job of doing that. It’s very complicated because I’m still an artist and I still have feelings for bands whose music I like. But I’m doing a better job of running my company.

AZ: And that comes from just the experience?

MA: It comes from the experience and it also comes from, I think, I know people who run really tight ships, who don’t have as much empathy for an artist for a band that’s on the road, whatever I can do to help. I think at certain times in my life I’ve been very, very helpful to bands that maybe I was harder working on their band than they were. Lab Report for instance, we did over 2 and half-thousand promos. We took them out and had them do a half-hour opening slot for Pigface. They didn’t do anything on their own. I did four albums with them and I should have just told them to fuck off. You’ve had this opportunity and you’ve done nothing with it. we were getting phonecalls from all over the country, people prepared to pay $300 for a Lab Report show, $400, for just two guys and a couple of instruments in the back of a pickup truck - they’re going to be making money every night of the week. I think now I’m doing an alright job of saying I work as hard on anything as the band themselves are working. I’ll match your efforts, but I’m not going to work twice as hard on your music as you are.

AZ: I think bands like Thrill Kill, Chris Connelly will always play. Meg seems like she’s never taken a break. Then you’ve got bands that won’t do anything. What’s it take for, say some guy from Davenport, Iowa says I’ve got this little label, and I want to get under Underground Inc. What do you want to see from them?

MA: Well, first you’ve got to call me. Who are the bands that don’t do anything?

AZ: Let’s say someone like MACE, a band like that. They want their name to do all their work for them. They did this five years ago and now they want to come back and do something. What would it take for a band like that?

MA: An act of God. Someone winning the lottery. For MACE? There are bands who’ve called and wanted to do stuff. You know what? Pay all the bills and I’ll be there for you. There are bands now I wouldn’t fucking go near. The fact is that a mediocre band that works their balls off is always going to do better than a fantastic band that’s lazy. That’s just a fact. I think that the major label machinery, the press, has fostered the belief, the fantasy, that it’s not about hard work, it’s not about diligent follow through, it’s not about doing 250 shows a year, it’s not about starving in a band and not showering for 4 days, it’s about something else that cannot be defined. The reason everybody’s done that is 1, the press on the major labels want people to believe it’s magic. Imagine the headline in MK Ultra: “Here’s another band that’s worked really hard, day-in and day-out!” It’s not very sexy. The bands want to believe it because if you’re faced with the alternative - sit around, talking about it, fantasizing about how I could be, if this, if that, if only this, if, if, if... That’s a lot easier than actually doing it, rolling up your sleeves, going and playing to 9 people on a Tuesday night in Boise. Because you’ve got to play in Boise to get to Seattle. Or playing the wrong venue on the wrong night, with the wrong opening band with horrible diarrhea on a fucking Sunday afternoon, all-ages show in San Antonio, TX. You do that because you have to. You’re running the business of your band; you need to know what’s going on across the country. These days I’ll work with a hard-working band and I can help them present their music. I don’t know how to help a band that doesn’t get it. If you don’t understand what’s involved or you won’t listen, then I don’t know what to do.

AZ: To the audience it looks great. It looks like, let’s say a Pigface show, you’ve got 15 people on stage, 13 drummers in the last case, to the audience looks great. These guys are having the best time. They don’t see what it takes to put something together like that. They don’t see what happens afterwards when everybody tears down their own shit.

MA: Well, we do have a good time. There’s no amount of money that would make me got through all of that: printing all these posters and doing all the insanity if we didn’t have a good time. And if we weren’t having a good time I don’t think people would go because that energy comes off the stage.

AZ: I think that some people have the impression it’s a three-hour job. Some bands think that they’re going to go in, say a band that wants to get signed, they’re gonna come in, do an hour and a half show, do some press and that’s it. What do you say to somebody like that?

MA: Fuck off. Fuck OFF. Give up. Two years ago I had a flight delayed from San Francisco to LA. I called 75 radio stations from a pay phone while I was waiting for my flight. It’s doing an extra interview after the show because the guy wasn’t around before, even though your knees are swollen, you haven’t had a shower and you can hardly talk because you’ve been screaming at the promoter because the PA wasn’t big enough. It’s 500 little tiny things and I think people want to believe it’s one big thing. Bands want to believe there’s a guy in LA or New York in a big office with a penthouse view. And behind a velvet curtain there’s this big green button, and that guy may or may not decide to press the big green button that means superstardom. It’s just so not about that. The reality is everybody’s future is in their own hands. You can make a massive difference to your own career. It’s not sexy. You can call the venue and make sure they have posters; you can call the local stores. Sometimes a band will come in and say, “Well, we’ve just finished our four-week long tour and here’s a list of 10 stores that didn’t have our CD.” Well why didn’t you call me while you were at the store? This is fantastic information, this is market research that you did on your own behalf. Actually this store won’t do this because of that, but these five stores should have had your CD’s, let me make a call. I think some bands want to believe it’s not about the largest amount of work that I’ve ever encountered in my life. It’s just not sexy. You want to think it’s about a fucking four-foot long rail of coke, a limousine and the major label exploit bands who believe that. Once you buy into that, you’re fucked. You’re waiting for the major label to tell you when your next album’s gonna come out. You want to work hard like the people we work with now like Krztoff from Bile, holy fucking shit. Look out. How powerful to have a group of people like that, the guys from Sleezebox, running their own business, understanding what’s going on, getting it out there. They have taken the power and they’re running with it. Now, we’re organizing ourselves, all the labels that are doing this stuff. They’re working hard on their own, but they see if we do this together, that hard work will equal ten times the benefit together. Everybody watching out for everybody else. Meg Lee Chin and Chris Connelly handing out postcards for the Thrill Kill Kult tour, Thrill Kill Kult handing out postcards for the Pigface tour, everybody handing out postcards for the new Chris Connelly album. It’s great. It’s all of those communist propaganda posters come to life: unity is strength, all of that stuff.

AZ: Do you want it to be, five years from now I don’t want to have drama, I don’t want to do Pigface and I just want to sit back and run this thing? Or, I want to do both and just not worry as much?

MA: Well you see what’s going on here. I love working on music. Last week I was chopping the heads off ceramic nuns with a wet saw and photographing my nuns with Newcastle Brown Ale collage, bottle tops and flowers, I mean I want to do all of that all the time, use my abilities and the machinery we have here to help a band like Voodou I am so proud of what we’ve done with them and for them. I don’t say what we’ve done with them like we’ve put them in plaid outfits. I mean in conjunction with their efforts, together with them. A year ago they were on the first Notes compilation, they opened for Pigface, we saw them, they were here in the studio in January, now they’re on the road with Thrill Kill and Michelle is singing on the new Pigface album. I want to be able to help bands like that more and I want to help more bands like that. I want to have quicker, easier, better accounting machinery. many times when a band’s on the road, we’re on the telephones making sure the packages have gone out to the venues, the radio knows about it, the stores have got the posters, etc. sometimes what we need to have is somebody sitting here churning out progress reports for the bands. That’s a personal goal for me because a lot of bands we deal with, I’m probably between 10 and 80,000 dollars worse off for dealing with them. But, they have an idea of that. They might think I put maybe 30 or 40 grand into them. Robert (Hyman) is doing a brilliant job of getting things sorted out. Whether a band is supposed to get a statement once a year or twice a year, four times a fucking year, hey, look at where this is at now. So that the bands can understand where we’re at, where their business is at, how far they’re going in a certain direction. That’s a goal of mine and I think we’re close to achieving that. Just carrying on what we’re doing. The way things are in America right now, I need to not forget the goal of simply just being around because a lot of labels aren’t. Wax Trax! isn’t, Reconstruction, Fifth Column, Slipdisc, none of those labels are around. Two years ago people would say, “How are things going?” Well, we’re still here. This year the curve is exponentially upwards, which is a result of all the time and effort everyone’s put in.

AZ: I’m impressed that you stress that you care about the bands and the music because a lot of labels only care about the bank account.

MA: I need to care about the overall financial picture, because with the way things are growing, Bile, Nocturne, Thrill Kill, Cherrie Blue, Voodou, out on the road right now. Every one of those bands need a little bit of help. Four or five other bands are in the studio. We have 8 new releases this month and we just signed a deal with Einsturzende Neubauten in December. I mean all these little things. The next thing you know we’re fucked. We just got $100,000 that flies out the door. We need to stay on top of that. We need to stay on top of where each individual band is for their own progress. But I think that we have the tools to help the band, whether it’s relationships with agents, relationships with venues, you know I just talked to a promoter in Portland and Seattle, we’ve been working with them for 15 years. There’s a club in Minneapolis I go back to 1981 with. But it’s not a goal of mine to be sitting behind a desk. I want to play my drums whenever I feel like it, do artwork whenever I feel like it, produce music whenever I feel like it and oversee everything that’s going on.

AZ: That brings to Pigface. The new album is January, you’ve got 33-34 people on it. What’s this album about? The last was the Best of Pigface, which was a great collection for the fan. It’s nice to have something like that. But is this a departure from anything you’ve done in the past?

MA: It’s similar in that you can hear Curse, Jared, you can hear Charles Levi, you can hear Frankie Thrill Kill, you can hear everybody. That’s the great thing about Pigface. It’s not like, “Well who’s that?” Everybody is themselves within Pigface. I think the difference is, the closest album to this for me would be Notes From Thee Underground, there’s only like 16 people on there. Look at Jello Biafra, what did he say? “Mental illness is the road to freedom.” Well great. But Penn Gillette, for instance, took all of the fucklists from my fucklist and the Preaching tour. Some guy in Denver wrote to fuck cute, skateboarding chicks who turn out to be lesbians. Everybody writes fuck the police, fuck this, fuck that. But Gilette read all of those out and interrupted a voice-over for a Disney movie to do that. They sent me photographs of him with tape wrapped around his head to keep the headphones on. There’s much more interaction with all of the people. Fallon was here for three days working on stuff. Michelle from Voodou was here. Frankie was down here. A few people have mailed in their contributions. But, to me, it’s the record I’m already proudest of.

AZ: What’s the title of it?

MA: Easy Listening for Difficult Fuckheads. For me, to be working with Edsel, Fallon, etc, that feels good to me because they weren’t fucking born when I was in Public Image Limited or when I did American Bandstand. But at the same time, to be working with Keith Levine, who I haven’t spoken to in 20 years, he was the guitarist for PiL, co-founder of The Clash, to have Chris Connelly working on Pigface again and En Esch, it’s all of the spirit of when Pigface first began. But I think the major difference is there’s ten times the input a’la producing the record. Whereas I think that possibly Notes, definitely Gub, definitely Fook and probably Notes From Thee Underground, things just existed. Here’s this song that’s 7 minutes long, fuck off. Whereas, this album, here’s this song that’s 7 minutes long, god, I like the chorus, but if Chris Connelly was singing in the chorus it would be fucking great. So I asked Chris to come in and sing – OK. Then I take I verse out, why don’t I fuck with that, put the middle bit at the beginning, and producing and arranging the songs so isn’t it cool that there’s 14 people on the song. Isn’t this a cool song. It’s not a cool song because so many people are involved. To me a lot of the songs succeed in and of themselves. It’s the most diverse, but it’s also the most focused and I’m really pleased with that. There’s a track, to me, that reminds me of the stuff I did with Nine Inch Nails on “Wish,” there’s bits of Ministry in there, there’s bits of Ruby and psychedelia and trip-hop. Of course the sitar and those nasty guitars, layered vocals and bullshit, obscenity and it’s fucking cool.

AZ: Now how do you pull off something like 13 drummers on a stage without rehearsing? From the balcony it looked and sounded great.

MA: It was pretty wild. Once again, that probably had more to do with the help and support of our crew than it had to do with any kind of magic. It was magic, it was a magic moment, but I think that you reach a point with an exhausted crew on a tour like that and you better hope that if you have an opportunity in Iowa four weeks before the 13 drummer show to buy your crew pizza at midnight because the venue hasn’t done their job and everybody’s exhausted, or you can make somebody a sandwich, anytime you can show your crew that fucking care about them, you better do it. Because the last night of a tour nobody wants to be thinking about 13 fucking drumkits. The tour manager doesn’t need 13 people, “Where’s the dressing room? When’s that song? When do we come on again? Do you have any more drumsticks? Who’s got the snare drum?” The lighting person, everybody thinking, “I’m gonna be home tomorrow, I’m gonna have a shower, shag the girlfriend. No one’s thinking about, fuck (laughs) 13 drumkits. The soundman doesn’t need to deal with it, the lighting person doesn’t need to deal with it. We called a band in Columbus, Ohio and said, we really like you guys, you can come and hang out, jump onstage with us? OK! I’m like ok, how many drumkits do I have kicking about? You think of something and you hope that there are enough people who care around you who can help you realize that.

AZ: I’ve seen you drum with a lot of people, but LeAnn (Dickless from The Beer Nuts), she really kept up.

MA: She’s a great drummer, but she’s just really nice. She’s pretty stunningly talented at pop songs, singing pop songs in the back of the bus, and then before the next line of the pop song, asking a question where that line of the pop song is the answer to. It’s a stunning party-game ability.

AZ: You know, she gets through 3-4 times a year, Beer Nuts shows, but a 90-minute grueling set of Pigface could tear anybody up.

MA: Yeah, I remember when Danny from Tool came out with us. When was that 1998? Yeah, he came out for the last 10 days of the tour. Me and Joe Trump were playing and we had the third, black Pearl drumkit, hey he’s fucking playing in Tool. I looked along the line and I liked that camera angle of three drummers in a line. It looks good from the front. But, it’s good from the side, and I see Danny like “ooohhh, fuck,” there’s bits of tape just coming off of his hands where he’s taped his fingers up. It is tough. There’s times we’ve played 4 hours. There’s an energy level that fuels all of that. But once you get caught up in that energy level, you’re not exhausted. You’re just caught up in it. But LeAnn was great. I’ll tell you who was really good as well, Krztoff was great. I really like him. Matt Walker is fucking solid. He’d never rehearsed with us, he’s just really solid.

At this point we wrapped up, talked shop for about another hour and then I let Martin free to watch the soccer game with his Brit visitors who were still nursing a hangover from a night out on the town. It was our 5th interview w/ Mr. Atkins in 7 years, a man who knows nothing of the word exhaustion, who works tirelessly for the bands you love and continues to still make the most creative music this side of the corporate machine. And Underground Inc. is showcasing and developing the newest and true cutting-edge sonic art. For one reason, and that’s the same reason we’re still around. Do the math.

www.invisiblerecords.com

There is simply not another cable TV music video show that can match JBTV. For nearly 20 years Jerry Bryant has hosted and produced a true cutting-edge format hour of music video and interviews. Everyone from Bjork to Skinny Puppy has graced the screen of his award-winning TV show. (Billboard Magazine Best Modern Rock Program and Regional Emmy for Outstanding Achievement Entertainment Program)

For residents of the Chicago area, Jerry Bryant is no stranger. But to those who access Billboard Magazine every week, his chart displayed next to MTV’s, will literally have their mind blown. There cannot be a more original format in this day and age of airplay overkill. When MTV isn’t showing the video by your favorite band, you can bet that JBTV is. If not, it is as simple as calling in or shooting an email to request. The man will play it. The proof was in one of our recent visits to the impressive JBTV studios, we were on for an hour, and he played each of our suggestions. You ain’t gonna see the stuff we love on MTV.

Alex Zander and Moe Wyoming had the pleasure of hanging out with Jerry one afternoon to get the scoop on who the man is behind the magic of their favorite music network.

Alex Zander: Explain your background, why did you start JBTV?

Jerry Bryant: Well, I moved here in 1980 after a divorce. I was in Milwaukee for many years from 1968 - 80. I had a radio station until 1975, 93-Q FM, which was one of the first progressive rock stations on radio in Milwaukee. It was full power, 50,000 watts on FM. So we’re similar to what 93 XRT (a Chicago radio station which started 30 years ago as a progressive station) was, because they would be ethnic half the time. That’s the days when I started in radio, same kind of thing, only in Milwaukee. Then I did production and stuff up there, a lot of TV commercials and things for a lot of ad agencies. Then in 1980 I said, “Oh, well let’s go to Chicago,” because I got divorced (laughs). I came down here and I started just doing audio productions like CRC, Chicago Recording. Then I realized I needed my own studio. Then I came here. When we first came to this studio here, it was just audio because that’s all we did. We used to do all the Pink Floyd promos, I’ve been here (this studio) for 20 years. I think it was 1983 since we got into this facility. But, from 1980-83 I was working at CRC and Dick Marks studios on Michigan Avenue; audio production. We did tour spots for all the tours. You name a tour, we did a commercial for it. Back in the old days, we did the original Pink Floyd tour, all that kind of stuff.

AZ: Before Clear Channel (laughs).

JB: Well yeah, Clear Channel’s only what, 8-10 years old? (laughs) So anyhow I was doing radio production. We came in, because at this point, radio stations would go, “we can’t afford a $100,000 retainer,” So we’ll do your commercials then! You don’t need to pay us a retainer. So they saved money and that’s how we got into doing production. So I’d do a commercial, like we did the old WMET (now defunct rock station) spots, “moving like a giant star cruiser through 50,000 watts of power,” all that kind of stuff. Film, I spent $60-$80,000 on commercials and that’s what we started doing for radio stations. How I started JBTV, I’d get a reel and they’d say “oh, we want Madonna on our commercial.” But on that same reel there’d be Peter Murphy, or all these other bands. They’d send us a one-inch, big reel of all these bands. So I’d be using the Madonna for the commercial and I’d go, “boy, look at this Peter Murphy video! Look at this video!” You know, KMFDM, all these artists and music, Skinny Puppy. They’d send out one big reel, much like you guys are familiar with the club business, like a club reel. You’d get all these different textures of music. Some was cool, some you didn’t play. I’d go, “wow, I wanna do this.” That’s how I started JBTV, which was around 1984.

AZ: What’s the difference between a station you were on then and one you’re on now?

JB: Well, I’m on public access, too. What makes television great is that anyone can go on TV. If you want to go on TV, you can go on TV with your own show on public access. You have to be a resident of the city and you can go there and do it, or if you have your own equipment, you just have to submit a tape. Just make sure it’s technically good, that’s all they care about. But you can’t do anything, you can’t promote things directly, you can’t sell things, it’s a non-commercial area.

AZ: So when you’re promoting, or you have spots for records for certain bands you have on the show, is that because the band’s on the show, or coming on the show? How is that considered not promotional?

JB: Well, let me explain television first. Public Access is the one you can’t do anything. There’s a channel called “Leased Access,” which is Channel 25. Now that channel is available to local people, they don’t charge to go on or anything, but you can run commercials on it. So that’s the difference between the two access channels. One’s made that, if you want to promote MK Ultra, here’s our product, here we’re gonna interview and you can do a TV show, put it on there and run commercials for it. But on public access you can’t. It’s a difference in the channel allocation.

By law, they have it so you have to have these access channels. Anybody can go on, nonprofit, you can do profitable stuff, but it has limited viewership so you can’t charge a ton of money or anything. Then, the other alternative is to be on broadcast, which is what we’re on.

AZ: So when you started, you mentioned you’d get reels with bands like Peter Murphy and early KMFDM...

JB: They’d have 20 bands on them! I’d see all these different bands and I’d go, “Well, I want to play that!” That’s how I started JBTV. I started doing a TV show just playing that kind of music. MTV wasn’t at all in Chicago in the early days because cable systems were non-existent in most of Chicago, except for the suburbs. The only way you got to look at music videos in Chicago was through a show like a JBTV.

AZ: So as far as the music though, it’s always seemed to be cutting-edge music. Not the mainstream, your play list doesn’t look anything like MTV’s. But you were onto bands before anyone else.

JB: Yeah, there’s a pile of videos that just came in today, so I go through all those videos, I’ll archive them and dub them all to my archive tapes. Then I’ll go, “Oh, this is a good video.” That’s how I’ll start playing it.

AZ: When did you get picked up by Billboard?

JB: That was maybe 6 or 7 years ago.

AZ: How did that come about?

JB: No, we were on WOR for a long time out of New York. So we were on national. I loved it when we were on WOR. That was amazing, we were in Trinidad. Channel 9 used to be a super-station, WOR used to be a super-station, Turner Broadcasting is a super-station and KTLA used to be a super-station. There you used to be able to watch WOR on your cable system out of New York. It used to be fun watching New York news. Or let’s see what’s going on in LA news? They cut us off from all that now. The only station we get as a super-station is Turner Broadcasting. So when we were on that is was great. Peter Hamilton came here and he was like, “I was watching you in Trinidad! You played my video, I’m forever grateful.”

AZ: And you do a lot of interviews here in the studio...

JB: I do them all right here. I don’t like going out and doing interviews on location. You don’t get a good interview there because the band goes to a venue, what are they thinking of? They’re worried about their show. Am I gonna do this right? They’re into the music. They don’t care about anything else but what they have to do that night. I like to have them come here so they’re totally away from the venue. Doing interviews at the venue sucks. It’s so difficult, especially for TV. It never looks good. Once you bring in all your stuff and set it up they go, “Oh you can’t be here. You gotta go over there!” (laughs)

AZ: Who was the first band to get big that you had in here?

JB: Oh there’ve been so many I don’t even know. I don’t have a clue.

AZ: Ever have anybody get a little bit out of control?

JB: The Kottonmouth Kings. (laughs) They all seem to be great. I give them space to do things. When John Lydon came in, he was at WXRT for an interview. He was supposed to be here at say, 4 o’clock, and he was at XRT at say, noon or 1 o’clock, at 1:15, Armando’s going, “John Lydons’ here! He wants to do the interview now.” I’m like, “He’s not supposed to be here till 4!” Well it’s now or nothing! I had nobody here to run camera, so I offered to show him the studio and he goes, “I don’t want to see your fucking studio. One question and I’m outta here!” (resounding laughter) So I set up the camera and I couldn’t get him to stop talking and I never even asked him anything. I was running and the camera and said, “Now what do you think about...” and he says, “It’s rude to point, don’t point!” But he talked about corporate radio. Everything he talked about 10-12 years ago is so relevant today, as to what’s happening with music, corporations have taken it over, how hard it is for small bands to get noticed. But that’s why it’s great you have a magazine that’s gonna put KMFDM, Ministry and Prong in there. I mean, we shot Prong in concert ages ago.

AZ: So talk about the corporate thing. You just had a little incident that we ran a story on, where you were actually refused tickets to a New Found Glory show, a band you helped promote.

JB: It was between doing a show in Chicago or Denver. So we said, “Well, we wanna do it here.” They said, “OK, but we’re going to go with this other company to do all the production instead of you guys.” I felt that was one of the few shows where we would fit in something corporate. New Found Glory, we promoted them over the years. We were the first to play their videos; they were on the show before they even had a video. So we’ve had them on the show doing stuff. The corporates they went to an out-of-town TV show. What ends up happening is you get these great radio stations, say Q101, just using it as an example, promotes an artist, but the new radio station gets the credit for it and gets to sponsor the show. It’s the same kind of thing. It’s a decision that was made. I don’t think the band had anything to do with it; it was totally the record label. We helped build these bands, especially in Chicago; I mean Chicago has the best audiences, hands down. If you go to the Metro, The Vic, any of the venues in this city, the audience is really into the music. Unlike, we’ve shot in other markets. We’ve shot in Minneapolis, Joe Satriani and the G3 Tour. The crowd sat for the show and those guys were jamming! Joe went into the back and was like, “Are they going to sit the whole show?!” (laughs) They didn’t get up or do anything. In Chicago the same show wouldn’t matter if they had seats. They’d be on the seats!

AZ: So your take on corporate radio, now?

JB: Everything’s got its good and bad points. A good thing is it consolidates a lot of products so for a record company you only have to go to 1 or 2 people now, instead of having to go to 100. I think every city is so unique. Everything used to be good about Chicago and about LA. Everything’s got its own music scene. Seattle used to be the thing. Now there’s no more of that because with radio being so generic it’s going to be harder for all the smaller bands in these areas to get noticed. The Seattle scene was only noticed by Seattle radio stations who had the guts to play these bands. Then all of a sudden, other people went, “Oh, that’s a good band, we should play that.” Now it’s harder for that. That’s the bad side of it.

AZ: I’m sick when I watch MTV or MTV2 it’s just a bunch of bands who are all the same and no variety. It’s like blocks of a certain kind of music I don’t necessarily listen to or appreciate. But if it’s 3 in the morning and I’ll be flipping through channels and there’s a good band on, there was a day in the early music television Much Music, they would mix them up. You’d have a good variety, a rock band, hair band, Seattle band, then you’d have a rap band.

JB: That’s called programming. Now everything’s programmed differently. It’s all programmed, “Oh, what sells?” It used to be a guy in radio, as I used to be a disc jockey, if it’s a sunny day out and it’s warm there’s a whole sort of music that fits that. If it’s dull and depressing like a lot of news events happening, maybe you want to change the music a bit. A disc jockey used to have that capability. Tom Petty has that great song, “The Last DJ.” And it’s true, it is so today about what’s happening with music. That song says it all. There used to be a time when you could call a radio station, now most of them are automated. The World Trade Center could be getting bombed and you’d have the radio station, “Hey! How ya doin’ New York City! Broadcasting from the World Trade Center!” You know?

AZ: I want to ask you about some Chicago bands that are doing quite well right now. I’m not sure if you’ve had them in before, but Disturbed?

JB: Oh yes, right from the beginning. I like their music, they were this tough, aggressive sound and I had a thing for the lyrics.

AZ: Their second album debuted at #1. Did you see the potential in them?

JB: Well I thought their music was great. I thought their album was strong, aggressive; it wasn’t like anything else that was out there at the time.

AZ: Now you’re playing their “Prayer” video. MTV will not touch that. What I like about Disturbed, those guys will not bend and edit that video.

JB: I don’t think they should. I had Moby in here and Moby tried to get back on MTV and they said, “No, you’re just not hip anymore.” But he had that song, “Revolver,” MTV made him change the lyrics. He changed them and MTV still wouldn’t play the video. So he came here and he was complaining about it. I mean, I started with Moby, I was there at the beginning.

AZ: How much time a week do you put into your one-hour show?

JB: Oh, I like to spend every moment I’m not working on commercials on the show. All weekend it takes me to put the show together, usually. When bands come in, we had OK GO, they spent two hours here. So I have all this great footage, and I only use maybe 10 minutes of the two hours. And I use public access. Because that’s stuff I can play where if they say “fuck” or “shit” I can let all that stuff stay in on the air. I hate censorship. But I’m broadcast and I don’t want to do anything that’s going to cause us to be a problem. I don’t want to be a Mancow or shock jock for TV.

AZ: So that was on Channel 19.

JB: On Cable 19, which more people watch because it is so unique and so different. It’s grass-roots programs. It shows you that people are tired of seeing the same thing all the time; the same music, the same cookie-cutter kind of approach. I think that’s what corporate radio is really screwing up on. They can own all the stations they want, just leave the control to the cities that they’re running in. Don’t expect one person, like “Oh, you’re going to be the modern rock guy and the easy listening program director, you can handle that.” That’s what it’s become. For me it’s hard to look at the little bit of music that I like, because I don’t like to venture too much from what in like. I don’t like to be like MTV and play a pop song or do this; I want to play within my format, or what I think is within my format. So I’m a much tighter playlist. So when stuff goes on MTV and it’s crossing over it’s like well, it’s a little out of it. We’ve had some artists that have done that, they’ve been on the show but now we won’t play them as much.

AZ: I like how you have a band like the Murderdolls, but you also have a variety of power-pop and what they call garage music now, it’s all on there.

JB: Again, I like to do it right at the beginning. Once it gets exposed and it’s all over you won’t see it again. I like to give every artist a chance because people’s careers are on the line! By the time they get to making an album, they put a lot of time and effort into it. I appreciate that to begin with.

AZ: One last question, when Skinny Puppy’s reunion album comes out are they gonna come down here?

JB: Anytime they wanna come down, they’re welcome. See anybody can be on the show, I hate to say it that way, but it’s true. If they call, we don’t solicit people too much. Once an artist gets to a point, Tori Amos is a good example, she was in here two times, but she said stuff that she will never talk about now. She talked about drugs and her early days, all the stuff that back then was ok. But now she’s more respected and worth money, you can’t say things like that!

Declaring themselves "The Worlds Sexiest Band,” I LOVE RICH have been rocking their hometown Chicago and the Midwest with their over-the-top rock show since 1995. As 2000 was coming to a close ILR decided it was time to follow up their critically acclaimed 1997 release "Live, Wet, Drippin' With Sexx.” So they decided to record what would be called the "Greatest Rock N Roll Album Of All Time!” Led by singer/bassist Rich, a 247-pound package of red-haired, spandex clad, sex appeal, ILR marched into Attica Studios to record their masterpiece. The result, 12 tracks of pure rock n roll laid down by a trio that was completed with Drew Blood on drums and Eider Ferrari on guitar. The album and coinciding club tour, (they wanted to get closer to the fans) sent women and girls into a sexual frenzy. And it did the same to a lot of men too. ILR are now on a mission to bring their big rock n’ roll show to the world that wants it and even to some places that don't.

What makes you the sexiest band in the world? I would really hope the day will come when I can get past this whole "RICH as a sex symbol" or a "RICH the sex GOD" talk and people would just talk about me as the brilliant artist/musician that I am. But I am cursed with my overwhelming sex appeal.

It's strange that your debut record was recorded live, what's with that? Our debut full length record was recorded after a bootleg demo of ours was released over in Cambodia (which is where our first disc was recorded). That bootleg went on to be the biggest selling cassette in the history of the third world (which isn't all that many, since very few people over there have electricity let alone stereos) , and we recorded the disc at the height of "ILR Mania" over there. We are considered just like the Beatles over there, only we don't suck.

Is ILR a novelty act or do you really like 80's rock that much? We're NOT a novelty act! There is obviously a lot of humor in what we're doing, but you can put on our album and dig it without being ironic or funny. Just because there's humor involved in what we're doing doesn't mean we're a comedy act. And I want to be too cool and tell you that I don't really listen to 80's rock/metal that much, but as I sit here I'm listening to Black and Blue's "In Heat" album and I know every word to "Get Wise to the Rise" I can't exactly deny it, can I? But to be honest I actually see us more along the lines of the early 70's New York rock bands like the the Dictators and KISS than I see us like sounding like Bon Jovi or Night Ranger, but maybe that's just my opinion.

How much of an influence is KISS? Who? KISS? Never heard of them. Just kidding. I've heard of them. Weren't they Vinnie Vincent's first band? The Invasion ruled...

Sum up your punk rock past. It's not like I used to be in Fear or anything (although that would be a great lie to tell). But when I Love Rich started we were musically a lot closer to the Ramones pop punk thing than we are now, though the Ramones are still a huge influence on us. When we saw that the Lookout Records / pop-punk trend was starting to wane, we decided to go for the over the top metal-punk thing in a last ditch attempt to sell out and get signed to a major label contract, which may or may not pan out like I had hoped.

Why do you write so many songs about yourself? I want our music to celebrate the life and times of arguably the most important person in the world, me! A wise man once told me to" leave modesty for those who deserve to be modest", so I do. Humility is a very over rated quality.

Who/what is Hot Chocolate? (The bands biggest hit is Hot Chocolate) Hot Chocolate is a drink which main ingredients consist of a mix of milk and coco. It is best served hot and most people enjoy either whipped cream or some marshmallows with it. All kidding aside, please let the record show that I do indeed dig black girls.

What is your favorite past time? Well, my friends and I like to get together and play chess while we discuss Shakespeare and the history of the Catholic Church in Guatemala. And if you get Drew and Danny involved in a game of "Hungry-Hungry Hippos" they'll be occupied for hours.

What are your thoughts on "Nu metal" I don't really dig a lot of it. I hate the bands with blonde white kids trying to act like they're from the ghetto. I want to note that Limp Bizkit are the 2nd worst band ever (System of a Down are easily the worst - there's just no fucking excuse).

Who loves Rich? Everyone with good taste. Probably even a few people with bad taste too...

Subsonic Frontman Ron Marks is a third generation musician. His grandfather, an Italian immigrant, was a band conductor from the 1920s- to the mid 1980’s. Ron’s uncle attended Julliard and founded Marks Music. His parents were both music teachers in rural Pennsylvania. His father’s influence passed the gift onto a young Ron. He began playing drums at 5, and like the rest of us, his initial introduction into rock n roll was KISS at age 14. His tastes naturally evolved into heavy music and his favorite band became Celtic Frost. Sometime thereafter the band announced they desired a second guitarist, so Ron sent the Swiss band a demo on cassette.

Ron Marks joined the Celtic Frost line-up in May of 1987, after the release of “Into the Pandemonium.” He became CF’s lead guitarist, thus fulfilling a long-planned goal of CF’s - to have two guitar players in the band in order to create a fuller sound in live performances. Ron’s presence within the band was heavily overshadowed due to the hardships CF was facing at that time. Although Ron was only in the band for a few months, his contributions turned out to be quite immense. He was a key element which influenced and helped change the band’s sound. Ron left CF in December of 1987. He was to actually have been a part of the follow-up to “Pandemonium” in 1988 (what eventually became “Cold Lake”) but ultimately declined to rejoin the band. In 1989 he returned to Frost unofficially to help record “Vanity/Nemesis” in Berlin. Ron’s tenure with Celtic Frost at that point would only be the recording of the “Vanity/Nemesis” album.

His presence in CF was massively underrated. His influences, technical versatility and philosophy were a major factor during 1987, and therefore for the rest of the band’s existence.

Earlier this year, Subsonic announced it’s signing with Outlaw Entertainment International. After negotiations with president Tommy Floyd, the project was signed to an exclusive management and record deal with the Vancouver, B.C. company. The band’s current CD, Super-Vel, was released in Canada on July 7th, 2002. Outlaw is perusing various options (in the U.S. and Europe) in hopes of augmenting Subtonic’s exposure to the world market. Super-Vel is receiving favorable reviews and promises no lack of identity. The first single released is a cover of Billy Preston’s, “Will It Go ‘Round In Circles.”

Celtic Frost frontman Tom Fischer calls Subsonic, “unusual and almost heavier version of Zappa.” When commenting on the much anticipated CF reunion, Tom volunteers, “When people approach me about one day doing a reformation of the original CF, it means to me: Reed, Martin, Ron and myself. That, to me, is “the original CF.”

I first became aware of Ron when he filled in as guitarist for a band that went through more lineup changes than Spinal Tap drummers and KISS guitarists. The band that could have been a contender, the band once called MACE, a Pittsburgh-grounded industrial band that fell victim to bad management and larger-than-life egos. In MACE, Ron looked and sounded out of place. The bands image was one of glamorizing S&M and the guitarist played live over a DAT dominated live show. But it was his guitar playing that made an impression on me years after the show when I saw MACE open for GWAR and Chem Lab. Fast forward five years later and I read he finally embarked on a solo outing. I immediately got in touch with him, and brushed up on his resume by reading the Celtic Frost book, (Are You Morbid?) Into The Pandemonium, a book where Ron Marks is more-or-less praised as “god’s gift to the guitar,” though not exactly in those words.

Alex Zander: You’re highly regarded as a great session player. Who are bands that you’ve worked with and some of what you’ve done?

Ron Marks: Obviously I’m known for my work with Celtic Frost which was back a few years from 1987-90. I was recording and touring with them. Another band I’ve worked with was a band called MACE, (now-defunct Industrial Band) which was in Pittsburgh. Same thing, I did some touring and recording with them as well.

AZ: Now that’s two different kinds of music.

RM: Yeah, you bet. Well, Frost was my favorite band when they were out. That’s how that came about. With MACE, it was just a referral from somebody I knew and that’s how we ended up hooking up. But I’m very diverse. I’ve always done a lot of different styles of music. I’m always in search of a new challenge and a new adventure. I’m game for anything.

AZ: In the book, “Are You Morbid?” the author and voice of the band, Tom Fischer, had some really nice things to say about you. With as many members as he’s gone through, it should be an honor.

RM: Oh, it was a big honor. It remains a big honor. I’m very proud of Celtic Frost. We went through some rough stuff and we went through some great stuff. It still remains my favorite band. Tom was very gracious in the book and had very complimentary things to say about my playing and our friendship, and that remains. I certainly hope I’m entitled to play on this reunion CD. So we’ll see how that goes.

AZ: Okay, we’ll talk more about that at the end. It’s kind of hard to believe, though, that with your background in music and your family’s background in music, that of all bands you’d pick a heavy band like Frost to like the most. What was it that made them your favorite band?

RM: Prior to that, what I thought was heavy, really wasn’t heavy. I always liked heavy music, but that for me meant Judas Priest, KISS, Aerosmith, bands like that. It was just this new wave of metal that I’d never heard before. Out of all the bands that were on that new thing, Slayer and Megadeth, Metallica and all that, I liked all those bands. But a friend turned me onto Frost and to me it was just a cut above, lyrically and instrumentally. It blew me away. I just listened to it nonstop for probably a good year before I even submitted my demo.

AZ: With your current project Subsonic, you have two releases out. The first one was Mindbomb, which we dubbed one of the top 10 records of 2001.

RM: Yeah, actually there was one before that as well, but these were just pretty much demos that I was shopping. There’s really only one release and that’s Super Vel.

AZ: And that was released on Outlaw Entertainment in Canada. Let’s talk about that one. We just did a review on it. Again I quoted Tom, that what lifts you above any other contender is your extraordinary guitar playing is the feel of someone who has a god-given talent for his instrument. You sure show off those skills on Super Vel. In this day and age nobody seems to concentrate on soloing anymore. What made you want to go exercise those skills and show them off again?

RM: Thank you. It’s something I think I do well, and something I think still belongs in music. When you use good taste with it. Not all of the songs on Super Vel have solos. The ones that do, yeah, there’s certainly indulgence, but if you’re gonna go —go. If you’re going to do it, then do it big time. It’s something I love to do, it’s something I’ve worked on for years and get a lot of gratification out of. I have a little feeling with things I’m hearing that it might be coming back a little bit. So just because it happened to be less than fashionable at this particular time, didn’t mean it was something I was willing to leave out of my music forever.

AZ: Tell me what you think the highlights on the album are as far as you’re concerned.

RM: Oh boy, this is tough. I hate when this happens. (laughs) Okay, my favorite, it’s so hard to look from the outside because I’m involved in it, I think “A Day Late” is a great song. It might not be heavy, but I think it’s a good song. That song was written about a friend of mine, that I knew well through high school and even afterwards. That was one that fell out of my head in about 10 minutes. That was an easy one. The cover thing, the Billy Preston cover, I think that’s a cool song. I think “Jane” is a great song. I think it has a really great story behind it.

AZ: That is a suicide themed tune, is there a story there?

RM: Well, that was a heavy one. I had an old girlfriend phone me some time ago who was quite suicidal. I basically almost literally talked her in off the ledge

AZ: I take it she’s still around then?

RM: Yeah, it didn’t happen, and I’m not saying it didn’t happen because of me. But, fortunately she woke up a little bit and everything’s cool.

AZ: If it did happen do you think you’d still have been able to write about it?

RM: Oh God, I don’t know. That would have to have happened and I would have had to react at the time. It would have been a lot more difficult, yeah.

AZ: The album kicks off with “Lick The Lie” pretty guitar heavy, with a lot of really good lead guitar work. The song after that, “Just Hit Pomona” kicks into high gear, like Rob Zombie type of stuff.

RM: That’s funny you mention that. That’s one of Tom Fischer’s favorite tracks. When we met in New York a couple of years ago he mentioned that if we ever had the chance he’d like to do that one. So quite a few people that love the heavy stuff really mention that song.

AZ: Then you go all over the place. You do your acoustic guitar piece, “Together Alone.” Why do you think it’s important to combine so many different types of music on one record? In this day and age people seem to focus on centering one entire album around one sound.

RM: Well, I like a lot of different styles of music. Believe it or not, it was difficult for me to narrow it down as far as I did. I have to credit my management, Tommy Floyd and Outlaw Entertainment were quite helpful in saying, “Hey Ron, you can do all this stuff but that doesn’t mean you necessarily should.” They kind of drew the reigns in a little bit, which I think was a wise choice because the album makes a lot more sense this way. But to me that’s not going that far outside. I’m a Zappa fan, so there’s no rules as far as styles. But I had to cool it down a little bit to make some kind of record that had a direction.

AZ: I really, really liked Mindbomb because it danced around just about every music genre, even country.

RM: Yeah. (laughs) The country thing, it’s not like I do legit country. I do satirical country because those people give you a lot of reasons to make fun of them. A lot of times you use styles of music to get your point across and to deliver a message. A certain sound delivers that message, more so than I’m going, hey I’m a country guy and a heavy guy and an acoustic guy. I’m not trying to be all these different people stylistically just to show off or all this stuff. It’s like here’s the story and here’s what the story’s about. I can tell a better story if I use this style to tell it. So that’s basically the motivation behind doing some thing.

AZ: You mentioned Tommy Floyd and Outlaw Entertainment, other than owning the label, he’s also your manager at this time?

RM: Yeah, he’s the President of Outlaw.

AZ: Now are you tied into this contract for a few albums with this label?

RM: No, the way it’s going Super Vel is licensed to them and they’ve distributing it. It’s released in Canada right now and there’s distribution set up for Europe and Japan and I believe Australia. Then we’re taking it from there. We have no multi-album deal. They’re shopping the CD to bigger labels and we’re hoping to expand on that deal. Right now it’s just a wait-and-see position.

AZ: Now what are you looking to do? What is your aim?

RM: Well I’m looking to be successful, obviously. That’s a hard thing in this business. There’s a million bands going for very few spots. Not only that, doing this as long as I have, I realize that just getting signed to a label is one thing, but getting signed to a label that’s going to make you a priority is quite a different thing. We’re very adamant about that. There’s no point in getting signed and tying up your options if they’re not going to make you a priority and just shelf you or make you number ten on the list. We need to find someone that believes in Subsonic and is going to make it important.

AZ: So I take it you learned a lot from the guys in Frost.

RM: Oh yeah.

AZ: That book is, if anything, and even if you’re not into the band, a bible for kids getting into the music business.

RM: Yeah, it’s brutal, but it’s the truth. Once again, a lot of credit goes to Tom. He told exactly what happened. We were all hungry as possible and those guys did a mountain of work for years before I ever showed up. So man, they know it even more so than myself. But yeah, it is a bible and any kid that wants to get into it should buy it and read it for that reason alone.

AZ: So you do have your options out there. You can go with a different deal if you want to.

RM: Yeah, we’re looking for the best possible thing. I’m very, extremely hungry to get this going and get this off the ground. I’ve started writing for the next CD now. Whoever believes in us and wants to make a go of it, I am definitely ready to go.

AZ: Say, somebody reads this article in management somewhere and says, “Whoa, this guy from Frost, he’s available. We never knew what happened to him?” What should they know about you and in what you’re looking for in a deal?

RM: Let’s get paid this time. (laughs) Like I said, I want to do it internationally. I want to do it to high level. I want someone that likes this band. I don’t just want to be a part of their accounting statement. They gotta believe in it, they gotta push it and they have to make it a priority. Like I said, we need to do this on a global level because even with all these things in place, the music business is extremely brutal and unpredictable. So we need all guns blazing, whoever would want to pick up the band.

AZ: Does living in Pennsylvania keep you isolated from what’s going on in, say in New York, Chicago or LA? Or are you willing and able to relocate if you need to?

RM: Absolutely, I’m willing to go anywhere. Music is number one for me. It always has been. Should the situation present itself, yeah you bet, I’m gone. I’m living in PA, yeah it’s a little isolated, but it also allows me the freedom to write and spend a lot of time doing what I want to do. There’s a lot of friends and people I know that have moved elsewhere because that’s where it’s at. They’re so busy playing their electric bill they don’t have time to work on their music. So it’s a two-sided thing.

AZ: Speaking of friends, a good friend of yours in now in Prong.

RM: That’s right, Dan Laudo, he’s my very best friend in the world. He’s doing great with them.

AZ: He sure is. I’ve seen them a couple of times. He seems happy. Did he live out there until he joined Prong?

RM: Yeah, Dan’s been out in LA for quite awhile. When I was with MACE, we were getting ready to tour and Prong was also going out with us and they needed a drummer. They said do you know any drummers in LA? I said, yeah I sure do, my best friend Dan and on and on. He went and auditioned and got the gig.

AZ: The funny thing is Dan mentioned to me that you guys grew up with Trent Reznor. Or did he know Trent, or did all of you know him?

RM: Yeah sure, Trent grew up about ten minutes from where Dan and I grew up. We all in a little basement band together in high school.

AZ: Did you have the feeling about him back then, that he would go on to do Nails like he did?

RM: Yeah, sure. Trent was always there. He always had a vision. You knew he was thinking big, as we all were. But it was no surprise to me that Trent went on to do what he did. I have a lot of respect for Trent. He writes great music.

AZ: Now what about putting a band together? How’s that coming for Subsonic?

RM: Well it can happen. But right now there’s not much of a reason for it to happen because there’s no tours scheduled and you’ve got to give They’re gonna say, to do what? And for how much? Unfortunately, these are some of the things a bandleader has to deal with. Everybody thinks it’s rock n’ roll all night and stuff. It is, but there’s also the practical aspect of it. You have to be able to offer a guy something. Right now, until there’s a major signing and a major influx of money to make some things happen it’s pretty hard to get that going.

AZ: Can you give me any insight to the next chapter, the next record?

RM: A little bit, but not much. (laughs) I’ve only written two songs so far. It’s gonna be the same thing but bigger, I guess. There’s going to be a lot more percussion going on, there’s gonna be a lot more real drums on this one combined with program drums that I’m going to be playing myself. I’ve played drums for quite a few years and I recently acquired a new drum kit. So I’m going to be doing a little bit of that. There’s one tune cut already and a few on the board. There’s going to be a few surprises as well. I think that’s always going to be the case with Subsonic.

AZ: What’s the fascination with engines or cars?

RM: Oh man, I’ve been a motor head since I was a little, little kid. That started when I was about five or six years old and my father’s teaching friend, they both taught school together. His name’s Gary Franco, he pulled up in a ‘66 Corvette Convertible and I looked out the window and that was the end of that. I go to drag races, and rallies. And I’ve had multiple muscle cars. Right now I’ve got a black ‘67 Cadillac. I just love cars. I love old cars, man.

AZ: That’s just one thing you can afford to have living in Pennsylvania.

RM: Yeah, exactly. That’s one of the luxuries I have here.

AZ: With something like that in the city you’re not going to get very far.

RM: No, I don’t think so! (laughs)

AZ: You’re either gonna overheat or run out of gas. Okay now, let me ask about all the rumors about the Frost reunion. On/off, you hear one thing and all the momentum builds up and then you get a newsflash it’s not gonna happen, don’t believe it. But they say that it is and if they tour you will be involved.

RM: Well here’s what I do know. What I do know is that there will be a CD. There will be a new Celtic Frost album. I know Tom and Martin are working on that right now. I don’t know exactly about what deal they put together or with whom, but I understand that they’re moving forward either way in trying to put something together. As far as myself being involved, Tom and I have talked about it and I think something’s going to happen, but I can’t really say for sure because until that phone call happens I can’t say.

AZ: But that’s something that you’re open to?

RM: Oh man! In a second. I still love Celtic Frost and I love all the guys in it. For me, even though I got to do Vanity Nemesis with the band, which I’m very grateful and very proud of, I’d like to do a record with Tom, Martin and Reed St. Mark who I’ve toured with after Into the Pandemonium. To me, that’s the classic Celtic Frost lineup and it would be a dream come true for me to be able to record with them.

AZ: I bet they’re very selective when it comes to a label now.

RM: Yeah, we got beat up pretty badly for years. Tom’s been down the road, and there’s no reason to repeat that again. So, it’s not just the matter of not getting screwed or getting paid. It’s not just about money; it’s about cooperation with the band. That was another major downfall with Noise Records. They didn’t believe in Into the Pandemonium and communication broke down. They quit giving us tour support and they quit believing in the band. As I said with Subsonic, it holds true with every band, including Frost, whoever’s involved in has to believe in it and has to love it.

AZ: At one point in the book, Tom mentioned that as good as everything worked out, you weren’t about to get involved in contracts and he knew, sadly, that you would have to depart the project at one point. To still stay in touch with them and be willing to work with them, and them wanting to work with you, has got to be flattering.

RM: Extremely so.

AZ: OK, so if people need to look up information on you on the Internet, to learn more about you, how to buy your product or how to book you, or how to approach you about possible management or getting you signed, how should they do that?

RM: Well, right now they can check out www.celticfrost.com and on the main page there’s an icon for the Subsonic site. Also they can check out www.outlawentertainment.com where they can buy the CD, Super-Vel, on that site and get a little background. Also, we would be open to some booking agencies to do some touring right now. So anybody looking, we’re here.

Feature by Alex Zander

Welcome to our new and ongoing feature. “Where Is She Now?” Every issue we will bring back one of the legendary bad girls who were cinemas most sensational sex symbols. The movies may have been panned by so-called critics, but they were adored by us. Enjoy the first of an endless run of B-Movie Babes that will begin here with Yvette Lera who starred as Razor Baby in Full Moon’s, “Blood Dolls”.

Yvette Lera is a native Chicagoan who was in love with music. She is real rock n roll girl but not at all rock grrl. Her image is one more easily identifiable as glamour as opposed to grunge. She studied acting and music in Chicago, and in the 90’s moved to LA like so many other young women hell-bent on breaking into the business. Unlike so many others her story is not a tragic one. Yvette is, in essence a workaholic, and rock n roll is her job. She’s on the job 24-7, and is not one prone to taking a day off. A shameless self-promoter, her resume is impressive and speaks for itself. Moving to LA her face made her a living as she appeared in print ads TV ads and then moved into movies. She has a few low-budget beauties to her credit, which of course include gratuitous nudity. Somehow she managed to graduate to the biggest summer blockbuster of 1998 Armageddon.

But her real love is rock n roll. And she decided after a brief stint playing the sunset Strip in Hollywood to return to her roots in Chicago. The timing couldn’t be better since the music scene is becoming healthier for original rock music than it ever has. And unlike the Lolitas that have the music world’s attention over the past 4 years, Yvette, writes, sings and plays her own stuff. At the time of this writing she now has the attention and interest of rock n roll legend Kim Fowley. Fowley, who may very well own the greatest rock n roll resume of them all was the man who created the sensation known as The Runaways in the 70’s.

It’s still early in Yvettes return to her hometown, so we wanted to catch her while we could so we sat down at Rannalis under the Tower Records store on Chicago’s north side and shared some beer and chewed the fat.

Alex Zander: Yvette please rattle off some of the movies that you’ve done and what you did in them. And begin with the notorious Blood Dolls

Yvette Lera: First I was in Blood Dolls. I played Razor Baby, so I was the guitar player and the little bad girl in the cage that the villain makes perform songs through electric shock. I was picked from 150 girls chosen by Charles Band and Miles Copeland. They had interviewed us. Miles Copeland, founded IRS Records and he had us working with Penelope Spheres who did the documentaries on the DVD for Blood Dolls, she did “Suburbia,” “Wayne’s World,” “Decline and Fall of Western Civilization”… I worked with Jane Weidlin from the Go-Go’s, we collaborated on some music. So that was a long interviewing process.

AZ: Was that the last film that you did?

YL: Yeah, that was the last major film that I did.

AZ: What was the film Judas Kiss?

YL: Judas Kiss, I was with Carla Gugino, she’s in Spy Kids now, she plays the mom. In Judas Kiss I played an extraterrestrial-vixen sort of thing, Captain Desire. It was the very beginning, basically. It was a small little clip of like a semi-porno with a chick that the security guard was watching when he was getting killed.

AZ: Is that where they got the nudes that are on the Internet?

YL: Yeah, basically, it was just “I’m Captain Desire and I’m here to shoot you,” the alien chick. And we just take our tops off and get it on. (laughs)

AZ: What was House of Wax?

YL: Exotic House of Wax is a Full Moon production, but it’s under a different name. It’s sort of like their softcore things that they do. My character was Cleopatra and I play the wax figure, and it was Cleopatra and Anthony…

AZ: Comes to life?

YL: Yeah, so she comes to life when you put the amulet around her neck and all of a sudden she’s sexy.

AZ: So that’s why for that movie Charles Band directs under a ladies name, right?

YL: Yeah, it’s sort of like how Anne Rice writes and then she does Anne Rampling. Charles also uses the name Sybil Richards.

AZ: That shows up on Showtime, USA and late-night Cinemax?

YL: Yeah, basically. You know, living in Hollywood, starting out I did a few things where you start out, you do a little bit of nudity here and there and it’s just like “alright, whatever.” But, it gets you one contact. Everything that you do in this business, depending on how you work it, gets you from one level to the next. It’s like stepping stones. So because of the fact that I did Exotic House of Wax, they remembered me and they really liked me as the character. Plus I got box art cover for that. They called me in and they were like, hey are you doing skin flicks anymore? I said no, I’m not doing that anymore, I’m moving up. Then they said “We want you to come in and audition for this Blood Dolls film”. You need to come in and actually sing and play guitar, meet Miles Copeland, all that stuff. So I went down to the record label, met Miles and auditioned.

AZ: Your credits include the big budget Armageddon. That’s impressive. I remember you were a stripper in that.

Is that the bar where the astronauts went before they flew?

YL: Yeah, that’s when I met Steve Buscemi, actually. It was awesome because I got cast for that last minute, and it was the scene with Steve Buscemi where it was his last night on earth before he was going up on this big mission. This scene was filmed downtown at the LA theater. They were spending a wad a cash on strippers or whatever. My little part for that, I had my hair really short and slicked back and I was in patent leather, dancing around a pole. I was one of the dancers on the side and he was surrounded by strippers, throwing cash. It was sort of like a real-life meets film-art thing because I was part of that whole scene at one point. But it was cool, and then I got to sit off on the sidelines and Michael Bay was the director, of course he’s done Pearl Harbor and all these big things with Jerry Bruckheimer.

AZ: What other movies?

YL: Basically House of Wax, Blood Dolls, Armageddon, and Huxley’s Brave New World, I had a part in that. That was fun because I got to work next to Peter Gallagher and Leonard Nimoy. So I got a chance to meet those guys and be on the set, be an extra on that.

AZ: Did Peter Gallagher’s eyebrows scare you?

YL: Yeah sort of.

AZ: Are they as big in person?

YL: Bigger and bushier, at least every shot I was behind them…

AZ: Behind the eyebrows?

YL: But I remember the day we were filming that, there was El Nino at the time. So it was raining really hard, it was a scary day. But it was awesome because I got a chance to meet and work with those guys.

AZ: You did music videos, too?

YL: Oh yeah, I was a featured extra in Lenny Kravitz’s “Fly Away” video. I was the chick in the background on the left wearing a red tank top, having a cigarette, kinda dancing/partying. But that was pretty featured, it was played on MTV, it got a lot of airplay. So I was in that. I did a video with the Wallflowers. So I got to talk with and meet Jacob Dylan. I also got a chance to be in a feature, this up-and-coming band, Everything. Then the Harvey Danger video. You know, the cheesy pop stuff, basically. But also being out there I got to sing backgrounds for Danzig. I’ve worked with Chris Vrenna, Geordie Walker, Jazz Coleman, Steve Jones, from the Sex Pistols, Joey Castillo and Paul Raven on the Zilch Hide project from Japan. I got props on that. I got credits for being background vocalist and I named the song.

AZ: I know you were doing Fangoria’s Weekend of Horrors, right?

YL: Yeah, they did a feature on the Blood Dolls. I have a big poster of that.

AZ: So you had to sit there all day, sign autographs and take pictures with geeks? How often do you do that?

YL: Not very often.

AZ: Full Moon does a lot of merchandising, they made the Pimp Doll, Was that was the only toy from Blood Dolls.

YL: They were supposed to do some dolls of us but…

AZ: They do move a lot of videos and DVD’s.

YL: Well, Penelope Spheres did a full-length documentary on us but she pulled out of the project before it was finished.

AZ: So explain to the readers the advantage of buying the DVD as opposed to the video. Or as opposed to watching it on Showtime.

YL: Buying the DVD is better because you get a lot more for your money. You get cast and crew bios, you get a short clip, a brief piece of the documentary segment that Penelope did with us. In the video it only just shows the Full Moon previews and the movie. But the DVD has a lot more features of each person. You get a little bit more on it. What’s really sad though, about that movie, is Nicholas Worth, he’s the rich guy in the film, he passed away. That’s pretty sad. Yeah, he was a really great guy. Jack Maturin the clown-face guy, he was awesome. He loved us. Of course the midget, Phil Fondacaro who was in Willow.

AZ: He’s in everything, the Little Monsters movie, Bordello of Blood, Addams Family Reunion and so on. Now what’s with Full Moon and dolls and miniature people?

YL: I don’t know. I think Charles Band and whoever is a part of it, that’s just such a big thing, their infatuation with toys and taking it to the next level, creating it to life. Meeting the toymakers who actually built the dolls onset was awesome and showing how they animate the dolls and make them lifelike was really exciting and fun. Besides that, when I did a House of Wax feature they were making a mold out of me and that was quite the experience.

AZ: They made an actual mold of you?

YL: Yeah, what they did was they took me into the stage room. I’ll never forget this day. I went in there and they had me strip down. I was in my heel-platform shoes. I stripped down and was in my underwear only, topless, holding my tits and I had a garbage bag wrapped around my waist they had me sit in a chair and then they wrapped my hair up in this long tall thing, straight up in the air. What they were doing was they were getting ready to pour the prosthetic stuff on me. So what they did, they didn’t even put straws up my nose, I don’t know how I did it, I got myself into a zen breathing moment, and they poured this white, plastic molding stuff all over the top of my body. So basically they poured it off my head, my chest and everything. Then there were these people molding it to me, shaping it. Then after it hardened they cut through a couple parts and pulled it off of me. So I had a whole bust.

AZ: How long did that take?

YL: Obviously it had to be that fast because I was under there not breathing. So probably like 10-15 minutes it took to do it, but it seemed like forever.

AZ Originally from Chicago, when did you leave and move to LA?

YL: I moved to LA about five or six years ago.

AZ: So that would have been ’97, ’98?

YL: Right when I rolled into town I got the gig.

AZ: What kind of experience did you have here, if any? Did you have any acting experience or was it all music?

YL: Well the thing is, I’m a graduate from DePaul University Goodman School of Drama. I got a bachelor in fine arts, in film, theater, television and music. I have a minor in communications. Basically I did film school, then I was a bartender. Being in band and whatever performance art pieces which I was able to be a part of, I was. I was involved in everything that I could be. Being that, I had no fear. I went out to LA with $200 in my pocket and found an apartment and had faith that I’d find a little bartending job. I got an agent and right after that I just started auditioning for people. It’s definitely what they say. It’s who you know.

AZ: So who did you have to know or meet first?

YL: Well a friend of mine was working in the business and basically gave me the insights of what auditions, so it’s more so than just having a variety magazine or whatever. If you know somebody that’s an insider they can give you a tip on what to do. Then you go down and audition and of course, your look, vibe, personality and talent have to win you the part. But it helps to have somebody on the inside to be like, hey, this is what’s going on. Then you go down and you do it.

AZ: What was the first film thing you did?

YL: I think the first filming I did was the commercial work and the videos, stuff like that. Then I started auditioning for film parts and did photography shoots with friends of mine out there.

AZ: With the exception of Armageddon being a huge blockbuster, the most popular movie that you’re known for is probably Blood Dolls, right?

YL: Yeah, for a main feature, yes.

AZ: So when people meet you do they want your autograph as Razor Baby?

YL: That’s right…(laughs)

AZ: You’ve done fetish work with Robin Perine and Steve Diet Godde. Where can people see your modeling work.

YL: I’ve done shoots with Robin Perine Photography, (www.robinperine.com) which is Seeing Red Photography Studio. It’s great, she’s got a studio and it’s fun rock n’roll photography. She’s an amazing photographer She’s done some of the greats such as Manson’s Portrait of an American Family cover album. She’s worked with Chris Stein and Buckcherry, and other bands out there. She’s just a really great rock n’roll photographer. She’s got a great eye. So we’ve done a couple shoots that have been in tattoo magazines and SKIN 2 and my friend Steve Diet Goedde has had a couple of books published, The Beauty of Fetish Part 1 and 2, and he’s shot such girls as Julie Strain and Dita Von Teese.

AZ: He’s pretty popular amongst people who read MK ULTRA. Now you did music out there, right? You worked with a lot of people I know. So tell MK Ultra readers who you did it with, who your friends are in the business.

YL: Bill Kennedy, who I knew and met out there from engineering, he had brought me in and he needed somebody to do vocals. That was the one with Chris Vrenna, Steve Jones and all those people. He had me come in and at the time it was A&M Studios, which is now the Jim Henson Studios, they bought it out. But we went down to the studio with Paul Raven, it was some of the most exciting times, being in the studio, meeting managers from L7, Rage Against the Machine, it was amazing.

AZ: Did you sing for Lick before you went to LA, or while you were there?

YL: I met them on my way out there the first time then came back here for 8 months and was in the band. Then I moved out back to LA.

AZ: Now are they a Chicago band?

YL: They are a Chicago-based band. I met them here in Chicago. They were part of Invisible Records.

AZ: Then you started your own project, Cuntagious, right?

YL: Well when I was doing the Blood Dolls thing, since it was all chick-based filming and fun and kind of horrified. I decided to do a band and that’s when I worked with Meghan Mattox who was my lead, bad-ass guitarist (currently with My Ruin) and drummer Tammy Germani, she does a lot of promoting for punk bands in LA. At the time we were just all three friends, hanging out, getting drunk at the bars, then one night I was like, Hey! Let’s start a band! Let’s call it Cuntagious. We just went off with that. When Penelope Spheres was doing my interviews, she had me sing and play guitar for the Cuntagious stuff, which was great. Then after Blood Dolls and Cuntagious I also sung backgrounds with Taime Downe from Faster Pussycat and Newlydeads. Then the Danzig, and started my own project which was Black Lodge because I’m such a David Lynch freak, just so the world knows, I really admire him as a director. I really like the art that he does, especially Twin Peaks and that kind of stuff. It’s really inspired me. The way Black Lodge came about was that I locked myself in my apartment for two days and all I did was watch Twin Peaks back-to-back. I didn’t stop, and it inspired me to write the song. So right there on my four –track in the house, I picked up my guitar, started writing and said I’m gonna make this song and get it to David Lynch. Well, initially I did. We drove up to David Lynch’s house and we put our CD’s on his front doorstep. Talk about psycho move. David, if you hear us, we love you. Nothing personal, but you’re great. So I wrote Black Lodge because I wanted to get it to him because I thought it was very much reminiscent of a soundtrack for one of his movies. So after doing the whole LA thing, the agencies, the contacts, I just decided to take a break and come back to Chicago to get back to my roots, hookup with some musicians out here and see what I can do. I miss the city vibe. LA is like a sprawling wasteland unless you’ve got money and you’ve got your recording studio and your stuff that you’re doing out there to isolate you in what you’re doing. There’s really no life to be had. I think that being in Chicago gives me more of an opportunity to associate with bigger and better things.

AZ: I think the music scene is happening here, really. Next year is going to be a really good year. Soil is doing really well world-wide, Disturbed debuted at #1 with their second album on Billboard, which is huge. Some of the Invisible vibe with Underground Inc. is happening big time. Ministry will be back out on the road early next year. Now you’re here. Where do you think you fit into all of this?

YL: Being that this is my root and having been a part of a few of these things, also working hard on it and working with some really great players, I couldn’t even ask for anything better than to come back and be working with the quality of musicians that I have here because people are in it for the love of the music. Yeah, everybody wants to have some progression and the rock stardom and whatnot. But I think overall it’s way better quality of a music vibe going on out here, as opposed to just totally getting dressed up and being pretty. I would like to see myself opening for some shows. I mean, even with Cuntagious, as simple as it was with the chick band, we opened for the Impotent Sea Snakes. We did a couple of really great shows, opening for some punk bands. My style of rock is very reminiscent of heavy rock and industrial, but it’s got melodic texture, its simplicity.

AZ: So what’s your mission for 2003?

YL: My mission for 2003 is to rock out with my cock out and really do something. As a female vocalist/guitarist/songwriter, there are not enough of us out there that are really taking control of the scene. It’s really difficult being a female in this art form. You have to compete and actually prove a little bit harder sometimes than normal that you’re able to do it.

AZ: People looking at your tits, rather than listening to the music...

YL: Right, and someone once said to me, guys can be rockers because guys want to be them –chicks want to do them. Whereas if you’re a chick, you sell sex like Britney and Christina, stuff like that, is because they sell them as porn stars that rock. If you’re a piece of meat that somebody can try and get their hands on, it makes the sex appeal that you sell.

AZ: Or keep your hands to yourselves and look at the pictures.

YL: Right, so then you’ve got that, rather than somebody looking at you and taking your art seriously. Maybe that might just be my opinion, but I’ve felt that it’s harder to be taken seriously there. But I really just want to rock out, have a band, be out there and take it by storm, along with friends of mine, like Jessicka of Jack Off Jill fame with her new band, Scarling. I just really want to see these people take off and do the real thing. Texas Terri who is the greatest, and my friend Karen Crisis from Skull Sick Nation, I’m really proud of my girls who have stuck it out and stayed out there doing it. We’re battling our day-to-day life just trying to get the rock out there and get it seen and heard. To me, that’s what it’s all about.

AZ: So there’s more choices than just Gwen Stefani, Jewel and Sheryl Crow for women rockers.

YL: Fuck yeah! Because in this carnival of a music scene we've obtained a new wall of sound though lots of perseverance and a constant flow of energy within a realm of artistic sorts, such as ourselves. The worlds that we live in become smaller and identified through our pursuits of the same goals, although somewhat different, still of the same mold. This is what's happening right now, I believe with the music that I am creating, along with what we are creating, it is there at your grasp and ripe for the taking. Are you ready? I am. The music scene needs an enema and I'm the nurse. Get ready for the shit to fly! We need to take back the reality in the life of the music scene and be heard by all those that will listen, that haven't been damaged by the spoonfed bullshit that they have been injected with! Incidently, my new band is still working on a name, it’s myself on vocals and guitar, along with former members of Black Country Rock, Usherhouse, Emulsion and Nookleptia.

www.yvettelera.com

When Dan Donegan (guitarist), Mike Wengren (drummer), and Fuzz (bassist) were sick and tired of auditions with people who just didn't have the vibe that they were looking for, they finally discovered David Draiman (vocalist). He also brought along a name for their band. And that name was Disturbed... We first met them in a small Chicago club called Delilah's and drank with them at Liars Club, Shortly after opening for MINISTRY they became one of the biggest bands on the circuit. It took us two years to get this interview. After they entered number 1 on the Billboard charts with their latest album, "Believe" an interview reality was becoming un-believable. So "down" and out, we "sicked" Nikki Neil from LA to track down the current taste of the metal world, and it was nearly, I-M-P-O-S-S-I-B-L-E. Finally after putting off the deadline and not getting Dave, she got a founder of the band. It too was bumped. But two months was shorter than two years. So now, finally, we give to you, their fan, our interview with Disturbed.

Nikki Neil: How have the fans reacted to the new material?

Dan Donegan: Great. As each week goes by they get more and more familiar with the new songs. We have noticed a big difference from when we first started touring for this new album.

NN: Where were you when you got the news that Believe debut at #1 on the Billboard chart?

D: We actually flew back home for a day. We were getting together with our management and with our families and friends. We kind of had a heads up that there was a pretty good shot of debuting at #1.

NN: Did you worry about how fans might react to Believe being that the songs are more melodic than those off the last album?

D: Musically there is still a lot of aggression and syncopation with the double bass drumming and the guitar riffs. David’s vocals have continued to improve, as has the whole band. We wanted this album to show an evolution of the band. I don’t really worry about what other people’s expectations are. We have to do what comes naturally to us and hopefully enough people will connect with it and will be more interested in the message of the songs.

NN: What was going on within the band when you guys started to write the material for Believe?

D: We had just finished twenty-two months of touring in support of The Sickness and I had a bunch of riffs that I had recorded and saved. We didn’t really write a whole lot on the road because it was just too difficult. I needed to come home and be back in the environment that I was comfortable with and doing it the way it’s always been done, which is just sitting in my bedroom with my guitar and just working out ideas. So we came home last December and I sat home for a month. I worked on some ideas, and we got together right after January 1st. Mike and Fuzz came to my house and I showed them the ideas that I had. As we recorded the music I burned a copy to a CD for David and he worked on some melodies and then I collaborated with him to finalize the structure. The album just came together quickly. The writing process went a lot quicker than it had before.

NN: Did the band expect to spend that much time on the road in support of The Sickness?

D: We had no idea what to expect. We didn’t see any reason to stop touring because of the success of [The Sickness] and because things were continuing to heat up for us. We had a lot of great opportunities. We played Ozzfest 2000 and then came back for 2001. Then we went on a lot of great tours with bands like Stone Temple Pilots and Godsmack and we were able to have two successful headlining tours. Things were still going well. The singles were going strong, and the album sales were going strong. But, it finally came to the point to where even though it wasn’t dying down for us it was time for new material. We’d go to a city and someone would say, “Hey this is my sixth or seventh time seeing you guys,” and we we’re like “Okay, well….” Not that they were complaining about it, but we don’t want to bore them either. We figured it was time for something new.

NN: We’re you surprised to find that as you continued to tour the band’s popularity kept increasing?

D: Yeah. This whole thing is just overwhelming to us. What I like the most and I appreciate the most is the fact that it wasn’t an overnight thing for us. It was a steady growth. We had not played any shows outside of Chicago until after The Sickness was released. We had so many good touring opportunities. We were playing in front of thousands of people thanks to Ozzfest and the other tours that we had done. So we saw it grow. Each time we came back to a city we would see a bigger turn. I just think that by knowing we had that connection live we realized that we have a pretty solid fanbase. I much rather obtain a fanbase through hard work and being on the road touring. Because of that a majority of these people are fans for hopefully the length of the band’s career. I’ve seen it happen where a band may have one big radio hit and some of their fans are only fans of that one song and not so much of the band. So knowing that we had to really work to get our fans and to get to the point where radio has embraced us is something that we really appreciate because we know we had to work for it.

NN: I noticed that a number of different religions are represented in the symbol that is one the cover of Believe. What is the significance of the symbol?

D: We’re not a religious band. It is more of a spiritual symbol. We wanted to take the four religious symbols and intertwine them and mesh them together to symbolize unity. It’s more about a belief in one. This album is very positive and that is the message that we were trying to send this time.

NN: Obviously the symbol on the cover correlates with the album’s title.

D: Yeah. It’s about a belief in yourself – a belief in humanity. We wanted something that would shed a little bit of light into such a dark world. A lot of the messages on this album are done in a positive way to try to instill a little bit of hope. I believe that there is a God. I don’t practice a specific religion. I was born and raised Catholic, but I don’t really follow it or go to church. I don’t believe in organized religion. It’s more of a business than a religion.

NN: At what point in your life did you start playing guitar?

D: I probably got my first guitar when I was about ten. I didn’t actually take it seriously until I met a few friends in high school who were getting serious about music. And, then I started playing with other guys and we kind of learned from each other. When we finally played our first show, I remember being scared to death and nervous and when the show was over I remember just wanting more. It just became an addiction at that point. I couldn’t imagine not doing it anymore.

NN: Do you ever get stage fright?

D: Not ever since that first show. During that first show I probably didn’t even move two feet. But, as the show went on I got caught up in the excitement and the adrenaline and the crowd’s response when it was over. It was just a rush. The last time I had any kind of…I wouldn’t say stage fright but I was just really star struck when Ozzy Osbourne came out to watch our set. That is probably the last time I felt a little bit of nervousness because to us he is the godfather of heavy metal and in the two years that we played Ozzfest I’ve never seen him come out and watch any band. After the first show we were moved from headlining the second stage over to the main stage because of the chaos and the turn out that came to the second stage. Sharon Osbourne and the rest of the Ozzfest camp had asked us, mainly for safety reasons, to move to the main stage. So that very next show, which was in Alpine Valley, Wisconsin, Ozzy and a few other bands came out to watch the set because everybody was curious as to why we got moved to the main stage after one show.

NN: Are there any guitar players out there right now that have impressed you with their style?

D: Tom Morello from Rage Against The Machine, actually Audioslave now. I ran into him the other day in Los Angeles. I think he is an amazing guitar player. I also think that Adam Jones from Tool is incredible. He’s probably one of my favorite guitar players out there today.

NN: Does it give you a rush when you have the opportunity to play with the musicians that you grew up listening to?

D: Definitely. It’s still hard to swallow it all knowing that these bands have become friends of ours. Like the guys from Pantera. We just played a show on Halloween night in Dallas, their hometown, and Vinnie Paul and Dimebag [Darrell] came onstage and played with us. We played one of their songs as a tribute to them because we’ve always been big Pantera fans. I don’t get stage fright from walking out on stage in front of 25,000 – 50,000 people, but when we share the stage with some of the musicians that we respect and who have respect for us it is pretty overwhelming.

NN: What was MTV’s reason for banning the video for “Prayer”?

D: They weren’t too specific about exactly what it was that they were offended by because if we decided to go back and change those things and then they still probably wouldn’t have played. It would be like, “Well, you said this was the problem.” We can only assume that they were sensitive to the earthquake scene with the building crumbling, and when it came down to it we chose not to re-edit it. We felt that there was a very positive message in the lyrics and in the visual aspects and if we were to change it then we would be admitting that we felt the message was wrong. I think it is kind of hypocritical that they had a problem with the message that we were sending, but whenever you turn on the television, every day, some channel is showing scenes from 9/11 including MTV. When we submitted the video to MTV it was near the one-year anniversary and, at the time, MTV and pretty much every channel was showing those exact images. They are the ones putting those images in people’s heads. The message that we had was about going through life with its trials and tribulations and struggles and trying to give people hope by showing that you can find the strength within yourself to make it through the difficult times. We wanted something big and we chose to go with an earthquake scene. And, after the building crumbles we come out on top of the ruble and finish the song as a band coming together as one and showing that we made it though a difficult time and by doing so we were trying to give people a little more hope.

NN: Obviously you all had to make a lot of sacrifices in order to get to the point where the band is today. Would you say that those sacrifices paid off in the end?

D: Definitely. We still continue to make sacrifices. It is difficult to have a normal life when we are on the road. It’s hard to have relationships. We’ve all been through that. We’ve all been through pretty big break-ups and it is something that we all continue to struggle with at times. It’s not easy to have a girlfriend when you’re 1,000/2,000 miles away from home all the time. It is difficult to do. Some people can do it. We’re very involved in the business of this band, and we have a hard time trusting other people or giving them the ball to run with.

NN: What is your biggest non-musical influence?

D: Probably my family. My brother and everybody that has believed in me and pushed me to prove that I can do this. There were struggles early on because there was a time when my parents said, “Okay Dan you’re going to have to grow up and get a real job. This is a nice hobby you have.” In a way that was an inspiration to me to have to prove my father wrong and show him that I can do this. Every time I was told that I needed a plan B and something to fall back on that inspired me to work harder at this to prove that I never even thought of a plan B.

NN: Being that Disturbed is part of the Ozzfest family, how did Dave Williams’ (Drowning Pool) death affect you?

D: I was very shocked. We were very close to him and all the guys from Drowning Pool. We spent most of 2001 with those guys because we were both on Ozzfest that year. We immediately became really good friends with them at the start of Ozzfest. A few days before Dave’s death the band was in Chicago for Ozzfest and we were at home working on our set and rehearsing for the tour. We had gone out to see the show and right before I left that night I hugged him and said, “I’ll see you soon.” If anything, I’m glad that my last memory of him was leaving like that.

NN: If something happened to David, aside from him leaving the band on his own accord, do you think Disturbed would continue?

D: I really don’t know if that is possible. I couldn’t even imagine that happening. There is certain chemistry within this band that works. Each guy brings something to the table here. If something happened to any one of us I don’t know if it could continue as Disturbed. I couldn’t even imagine that happening.

NN: If you had to describe various aspects of who you are what would they be?

D: I’m very down-to-earth. I’m the same guy. I have to be that way. I was raised that way. My mother has a very good heart, and I couldn’t let her down if any of this ever changed me. I think she is more excited about the fact that somebody comes up to her at one of our shows and tells her how down-to-earth her son is. That makes her more proud than just being a fan of the music. I’m just a normal guy. I love music. I love to hang out and be on the road with my best friends and perform. I’m very confident in what I do without being arrogant in any way. I just believe that anything I want to accomplish happens from hard work and dedication. I don’t know if I’m giving you exactly five words, but I’d say, dedication, motivation, confidence, and down-to-earth. Those words pretty much sum up who I feel I am.

NN: A major music magazine recently did a poll where they asked their readers if they thought musicians should have an expiration date. What do you think?

D: No. I think music is a way to express oneself. There is no better way to express your feelings and your emotions than through music and lyrics. I think that it is a good way to vent and release.

NN: I hear ya. If you had the opportunity to do this all over again what would you do differently, if anything?

D: Nothing. I think it is all a learning process. I think that we’ve all paid our dues and we’ve done it in other local bands and there is a reason why we all came together. It was all part of the game plan. I’ve known Mike and Fuzz for many years and we’ve played in different local bands on the South side of Chicago. And through those times I’ve seen them shine in their bands knowing that they shared the same hunger that I did and they had the same drive and the same motivation that I had and that is what brought us together. We quit our projects in order to start a band together, and we searched for that final piece of the puzzle, which we got immediately when we found David. This will probably be another long run for us. As long as people want it and if things continue to succeed for us we’ll probably spend another 22 months on the road. Whatever it takes. If things are going good we will stay on the road. We want to continue to make music and put it out there. Our passion is the stage and in order to do that we’ll just keep on putting out music so we can keep on performing.