To be frank, this was a pretty lean year for new music, especially new music by new artists. I looked, and didn’t find much. I wish I had, honestly, it’s not just me being a cranky old man who’s like “All that new shit sucks!”, and there are newer artists who are doing good things. They just released their albums in ’07. There also wasn’t very much in the way of compelling heavy metal this year, which is kind of a drag. When I have to even half-consider Metallica for a list like this, the metal community’s been slacking.

Anyway, onto the list, which is no particular order, with brief comments if I can get a handle on that whole brevity thing, man.

Guns N’ Roses-Chinese Democracy:

and not just because it finally came out. I’ve really enjoyed this album a bunch. It’s not a perfect record (there are a couple of songs on it that aren’t up to the standards of the others), and if you were looking for “Appetite For Destruction” or even “Use Your Illusion”, you’re gonna be disappointed. I think Axl and his new band really did terrific work here, on the whole, and it’s a terrific hard rock record in a world that’s short of them these days.

The Killers-Day And Age:

I like this one a bunch more than “Sam’s Town”, their last one. It’s more relaxed, and not suffering from “Holy shit, we have to knock everyone on their asses with our second album!” syndrome. If the last one turned you off, it’s safe to come back now.

Pinky Beecroft And The White Russians-Somethin’ Somewhere Better:

I’ve written about this one at length here, and it’s holding up very well. I really hope this record makes it out of Australia (and does well there too), because it’s really a worthwhile listen that’s grown on me with each listen. The songs land anywhere from clever to anthemic, and that’s a tough range to pull off. Good job, Pinky and co., and I look forward to hearing more.

Grace Jones-Hurricane:

everyone’s favorite really scary woman returns from a long absence, and releases the record Massive Attack didn’t get around to releasing this year. Good to have you back, Grace! Now do that crazy snarl for us!

The Cure-4:13 Dream:

here’s where I make all the sp00kypants types in the audience cry. I think this is a terrific record, and if you’re a Cure fan and you don’t, fuck you. No, it’s not “Disintegration Of Pornographic Bloodflowers in Seventeen Seconds”, but neither are about a dozen of their other albums. Musically, this is Robert Smith doing a pretty straightforward pop/rock record, and the band and production are totally on point. Lyrically, Robert’s still singing about being old, on drugs, and having one night stands, which he’s been doing for a ways now, but I don’t think anyone’s expecting him to suddenly start writing about social injustice or Jesus or anything. He writes what he knows. He’s in good voice, which is pretty remarkable considering how unorthodox his vocal style is, and considering that he is old, probably on drugs, and more than likely, having one night stands a lot. Really, I can’t find too much wrong with this album. People have given way less shit to artists who’ve put out bad late-period albums (I’m looking at you, Nick Cave), but because this is The Cure, and Robert has “Disintegration” to live up to, this record’s getting unfairly shit all over, despite being a really solid effort in my view. Give it a shot with an open mind, if you’ve been avoiding it because of all the whining people have done about it.

Portishead-Third:

I’ll confess, I haven’t listened to this one a lot in the second half of this year, but I enjoyed it plenty when it came out. It’s actually closer in style to Beth Gibbons’ solo record “Out Of Season” from a few years back than the first 2 Portishead records, but if you like Portishead, I think you’ll dig it.

The Dandy Warhols-Earth To The Dandy Warhols:

absolutely nothing new here, if you’ve heard older Dandy Warhols records, but they’re not as totally fucking stoned as they were last time they did a record, so this one’s pretty good. Consistently one of America’s best bands, but yeah, they were high last time, and they’re slightly less so here.

Rick Springfield-Venus In Overdrive:

God friggin’ bless Rick Springfield. That’s all I have to say here.

Coldplay-Viva La Vida or Death and All His Friends:

“You know how I know you’re gay?” Yep. Good record.

Amanda Palmer-Who Killed Amanda Palmer?:

Amanda’s really coming into her own as an artist. This is some good stuff, whether you’re a Dresden Dolls fan or not. I’m in the “sorta” column, personally, having enjoyed them a bunch live, but not being someone who listens to them casually all that often. This record, though, really well put together, an easy listen, and one of those albums where you look up from what you’re doing every so often and think “Wow.”

Honorable mention:

Tom Jones’ “24 Hours” is a bit uneven, but when it hits (like on the opening “I’m Alive” and “The Hitter”), it KILLS.

Enjoy, and feel free to leave your own picks/suggestions/opinions in the comments.

Christ, there are a lot of people in this band, and I’ll totally fuck up the names if I even try to name them all: Pinky Beecroft (center, in pimp-tastic red track suit) and the rest of Machine Gun Fellatio, who are going to call me on being the right cunt that I am for not naming each of them individually. If I’m lucky, anyway. Oh, fine, fuck it, let’s have a go at this, and let them at least kill me for getting a name wrong: (from left to right) KK Juggy, Brian Ferrysexual, Three K, Pinky Beecroft, The Love Shark, Chit Chat Von Loopinstab, The Widow Jones. Fucking ‘ell.
(Photo courtesy of MGF’s web site, uncredited)

Pinky: It was okay, I think. The US leg was a whole lot more fun than the UK…. mostly I guess because everything seems possible in the US. And the food is edible.

SC: Any interesting anecdotes from the various cities you hit?

Pinky: There are interesting anecdotes from every city; i’m not sure where to start. In Nottingham UK we came on stage after 6 punk bands, then Andrew W.K., then us. Thousands of nu-punk types, and me in a lemon crushed velvet suit. It was an interesting meeting. In LA the bouncers at the Viper Room made Chit Chat (one of the guys in the band) put his clothes back on, right after he’d just stripped off. Which the rest of us very much appreciated.

SC: Were the gigs in the States showcases for US labels, or just for the
hell of it?

Pinky: A bit of both. We’d love to score a decent deal with a US label, but then again if it doesn’t happen, we’ve had a fantastic time there.

SC: When should we expect a new MGF album?

Pinky: Everybody keeps asking me this. I don’t know. I need to write some songs, and so do the others. As soon as i stop coughing.

SC: Your score for “Gettin’ Square” has just been nominated for several awards, and I think your band’s music often comes across as having a
“cinematic” feel to it. Would you guys ever consider moving strictly to film scores, or is the thrill of confusing the hell out of live audiences just too alluring to give up?

Pinky: I doubt that you could get us to move strictly to anything. We’re not very strict. We’d like to do more film scores, but it’s a matter of time. Time is a great problem.

SC: Do you have any more offers to score movies lined up at the moment?

Pinky: No.

SC: Do you have any offers to score anything else (drugs, hookers, etc.) lined up at the moment?

Pinky: Yes certainly. Our fans seem particularly adept at scoring all sorts of things for us. If we could get our fans to score the movies for us, we’d have it made.

SC: In Australia, you’ve got upcoming dates booked in stadiums opening for Robbie Williams and Duran Duran. In the US, you played, among other places, the upstairs room of a strip joint. Which do you prefer?

Pinky: I don’t think we prefer one or the other. Which is a fucked answer but it’s true. The New York gig at the Pussycat Lounge was I think the best show we’ve ever done. It had a lot of energy. Then again, supporting Robbie Williams at Aussie Stadium in front of 50 thousand people was fun too. It’s funny, in both cases it depends on the crowd. And what drugs you’re on. And what drugs the crowd is on.

SC: When you played with Robbie Williams and Duran Duran, did you encourage them to take their clothes off as your band members so often do, or
encourage them to keep them on?

Pinky: I generally encourage males to keep their clothes on. Particularly Englishmen.

SC: On that note, I have to ask at least one question that you’re totally
tired of hearing by now, I’m sure: why do your band members take their clothes off so much?

Pinky: It gets hot on stage.

SC: You guys switch gears a bunch in your music. Is it ever hard to get
used to shifting between something like “Muthafukka On A Motorcycle” and the very different “Unsent Letter”, particularly live?

Pinky: Yes it is sometimes. But then again, it’s also hard to stay in the one groove. I can’t imagine how some bands cope, playing the same song twenty times every night, night after night. I mean, are they always in the same mood? How do they do that? My own mood shifts every ten minutes some days.

SC: According to a friend of mine who lives in Australia, most Australian acts who achieve success in the US are, in his own words, “shithouse”. First off, do you agree with this assessment from a fellow Australian? Second, do you have any plans to become shithouse in the future to improve your chances of being successful here?

Pinky: To answer the second part first, I think we’re pretty shithouse already. I don’t know how we could become more shithouse than we already are. In fact we’re so shithouse it’s a wonder we’re not number one in the US.

As for the first part of your question, I don’t know of too many Australian acts who achieved success in the US. I can think of INXS, who definitely weren’t shithouse. Michael Hutchence had a great voice. Who else was there? Crowded House were a New Zealand band, nothing to do with us. Who else is there? Air Supply were way before my time.

SC: What do you guys know of your US fan base?

Pinky: Nothing. Do we have a US fan base?

SC: What role do you feel the Internet has played in your popularity,
particularly outside of Australia?

Pinky: Very little. I’m surprised, actually, by how little the Internet seems to influence anything.

SC: What are your views on people who download and trade your music?

Pinky: It depends. If they make money out of it, then it kinda pisses me off. But you know, I understand the urge to get stuff for free. It’s such a difficult area that it’s hard to say who’s right and who’s wrong. I know that when I was a thirteen year old I would make tapes of albums that I couldn’t afford to buy. But then I see fuckers in the pirate CD business who are simply into making money, not making music and I want to kill them. So ummmmm� it’s complicated. Obviously. I would like to be able to make a living out of playing and writing music, but because of the technology, it’s getting harder and harder. You have to be kind of unbelievably bland to get a big audience. Which is sad. I dunno, I think I should start looking for a job as a postman.

SC: How has Australia’s reaction to file-sharing differed from what you know of America’s? In some ways, from what I read, it gets cracked down on even harder there than here (including a report I read recently that ARIA is seeking jail time for some guys who got caught running an mp3 server).

Pinky: Yeah Australia seems more hardcore than anywhere at the moment. The thing is, record companies don’t know how to deal with this stuff. They don’t know how to survive. They get eaten by bigger media conglomerates – soon there will be no little fish, just big fucking whales. And I’m not sure whether those big fucking whales want to hear anything from a band like Machine Gun Fellatio. I think they want Celine Dion number 652�. or Beyonce number 12 zillion. Who’s going to take the risks? I don’t know. The problem I think is less about the internet and pirating music and more about the radio. Because radio is refusing to take any risks, and this is where new or original music gets hurt – because the average person doesn’t get to hear it. But then again, maybe that’s because the average person is so fucking average that he or she doesn’t want to hear it. So� what do you do? Pop another ‘flu tablet, drink the whiskey, scratch your chest. Shag somebody. That’s pretty much all we can do. Keep fucking.

SC: I’m tired of asking questions.

Pinky: Yeah, I’m tired of asking questions too.

SC: What questions would you like to be asked in interviews like these?

Pinky: I would like to be asked the following questions:

1. Pinky, can I please give you 5 million dollars?

2. Pinky, can I please give you an apartment in New York, free of
charge?

3. Pinky, would you please find time to have a threesome with my two
gorgeous female friends?

SC: OK, since that last one went so well, I’ll ask two more questions. Aside from the ones I’ve just asked you (particularly the “Why do your band members get naked so much?” one), what questions do you never want to be asked by a journalist again?

Pinky: I would like never to be asked the following questions:

1. Pinky, can you put my name on the guestlist?

2. Pinky can you tell me off the record of course about your drug
problems? Alcohol problems? Mental health problems?

3. So um Pinky what do you do in the band?

4. What sort of music is it?

SC: Finally, what are your hopes for MGF in the future?

Pinky: I hope that some insanely rich American falls in love with one of our songs, preferably one that I’ve written, and gives us (or, better still, just me) a vast amount of US cash to do pretty much whatever the fuck we/I want to do.

Or, failing that, I would like to get a little more sleep in the next few months, and write a few decent songs, and see my gardenia grow just a little more.

“Drink…from the nectar of the Gods…”
From left to right: DJ Blood Sacrifice, the departed Evil Ray, Prometheus, Saucy Jack, Fra Diavolos.

Normally, I like to fill this space with a little something to introduce you to the subject of each interview, but what can I possibly say about this next band that hasn’t already been said by Christian fundamentalists, the PMRC, or Satan? Heck, the Gods Of Fire are such a bastion of metal greatness that Satan manages them, as you’re about to read! I kid you not! Vocalist Prometheus, guitarists Saucy Jack and DJ Blood Sacrifice, drummer Fra Diavolos, “Fire-ette” Lucretia XXX, the mysterious “New bassist”, and even Satan himself recently took some time out of their busy schedule of preparing for their upcoming New York gigs (see the bottom of this article…they’re playing TONIGHT, November 10th in New York at Arlene’s for one!), torturing souls and listening to “Sad Wings Of Destiny” on repeat play to talk to My Big, Black Cock about their endeavors, the power of METAL, and their day-to-day debauchery.

Scott Crawford: We know what Prometheus’ story is, as by now all mortals should be familiar with The Story Of Fire. What drew the rest of you to the flame?

DJ Blood Sacrifice: I was born of the flame, I live by the flame, and will die by the flame.

“New bassist”: I was born, died and then was born again to play in this band. With that evil Evil Ray out of the way, I can now fulfill my destiny.

Saucy Jack: There was once a day when I was but a boy, sitting on an airplane, listening to Eddie Van Halen shred through a wicked solo. A friend of my mother, Mrs. Jack, asked what I was listening to.

I replied, “I am listening to METAL.”

She said, “Why aren’t you listening to Technotronic or hip hop like everyone else?”

It was at that point that I decided that I must save the world from crappy music using the might of metal.

SC: Do you have any plans to play shows outside of the New York area?

Saucy: There are plans in the works for pure world domination. So that answer would be “yes”.

DJBS: Not until we get our shit together enough to make a record.

SC: When will the full-length Gods Of Fire album be ready?

Saucy: When the fires of Hell and the voices that converse in my head tell me it is time to do so. They are fiesty, the time is near.

DJBS: Not until we get our shit together enough to play shows outside of New York City.

SC: When you’re creating your music, what sources do you draw upon for inspiration?

DJBS: I got very into a video game called “Silent Hill”, so I wrote “Welcome to Hell”. “Eternally Strong” was inspired by Ray Brent Marsh, the guy in Georgia who ran a crematorium but was storing the bodies around his property instead of burning them. I am convinced he was trying to re-animate an army of zombies. I combined that idea with an HP Lovecraft book which is about pretty much the same thing, but inspired some more badass occult imagery. Otherwise I just write about wizards and orcs and beautiful women.

Prometheus: Archetypes. As in a Greek tragedy, the ideas are larger than life and trancend themselves into comprehensible through the music we make. Destruction, Death, Glory, Fire, Love…these are the stuff that METAL is made of.

Saucy: The bands I listen to, the fellow shredders I listen to, and anything that I come across in life that is METAL (i.e. The Long Walk is derived from a Stephen King book, it is the most METAL book I ever read). In other words…we are inspired by things that are metal, to make more metal.

SC: Sadly, the great Evil Ray had to leave the band. Why has he forsaken metal in this way?

DJBS: A woman.

Prometheus: California. He was working for Arnold Schwarzenegger the whole time, that double-crossing SOB.

Saucy: The Demon that is known as “California” and “His wife’s great job” captured his soul and moved him to the forsaken land of Orange County. If it was not for “Live After Death” we would have had Satan set Long Beach Arena aflame instead of the woods.

SC: What can you tell us about Evil Ray’s replacement (perhaps even letting them tell us about themselves in their own words)?

Saucy: He will crush your soul if you play out of time.

“New bassist”: You will feel the bass rumble in your bones and know it is good.

SC: What do you do in your spare time, when you’re not busy spreading the power of Metal? Or, if you have no spare time because of the awesome responsibility on your shoulders, what would you do if you did have spare time?

Saucy: I try to have “relations” with the succubae of the underworld.

Prometheus: I play mah jong with Saucy, drink fine wine w/ Satan and Fra Diavolo and discuss the state of the world and other epicurian delights. My cavorting with DJ Blood is of a different nature, suffice it to say it is an exploration into the realm of the id evoking images of eating animals raw, graveyards, sulpher, bloody scythes and bleu cheese.

DJBS: You can learn all about my interests here. Additionally, I love alcohol, Italian horror films, video games, Chinese food, and a good trim rather than a total shave.

SC: Do you, like the great Ronnie James Dio, frown on frivolous use of the \m/ sign by rank amateurs like Britney Spears?

DJBS: Metal, much like Jesus, will not judge who seeks aid. Metal will accept confession and give absolution. If Britney wants to throw horns, let her. We all know better, and for the amount of masturbations I have had over her, I feel it’s the least I can do.

Prometheus: Use it all you want ye that are ignorant of its power. Just don’t be surprised when the flames of Hell appear in your bedroom at 4:30 in the morning awaking you from an innocent slumber as the homonculi snatch your soul, shape it, caress it and transform you into the metal loving zealot that you are soon to become…HAHAHA!!!

Saucy: ABSOLUTELY. Dio is a forefather of METAL. I will NEVER forget the face of my forefathers!

SC: What would you like to say to the aspiring Gods Of Fire groupies in the audience?

DJBS: I am disease-free and if I go down, I’m not coming up for hours.

Saucy: Come once, come again. The way to my heart is simple, sensitivity.

Prometheus: Feed the Flames!

SC: Prometheus, do you ever get tired of being struck down and resurrected night after night?

Prometheus: I should say so. Fortunately Herakles freed me from my bonds a while back to end my eternal torment. I have developed quite a hatred of birds over the course of my bondage. There’s only so much a Titan can take before he reaches his breaking point and snaps.

SC: For those members of the audience who would like to reach your
Halfordian heights, what steps do you recommend they take to keep their
voices in shape?

Prometheus: I live on shots of gasoline. I eat broken glass and rusty nails each morning for breakfast. These items fuel me with the energy needed to create my SCREEEEEEEEEEAMMMMMMMMS of metal!! Oh yeah, Yoga and a good night’s sleep help too.

SC: Saucy Jack and DJ Blood Sacrifice, have you ever set an audience on fire by burning up a fretboard with your incendiary guitar playing, and throwing your guitars to them so they can lap up the flames like the dogs that they are?

Saucy: I am the soft, sensitive guitar player of the band. I want to make sure each member of the audience is alive by the end of the show. That said, the answer is “yes”. These are considered “acceptable losses”.

DJBS: It is like you transcribe my dreams.

SC: What thoughts go through your heads when you’re making the “mean guitar player badass” face?

DJBS: I am a golden God!

Saucy: There are no thoughts. The “mean guitar player badass” face merely represents the mindless ecstasy that comes from knowing that you are part of a well-oiled METAL machine of mass destruction. If you are thinking, you will look unattractive. I will not allow myself to look unattractive. Why do you think I groom my chest hair with such love and care?

SC: Fra Diavolos, despite your superior ability to pummel us with your drumming, you come across as the most low-key of the Gods. Should we take this at face value, or are you just laying low because you’re up to no good?

Fra: My musical roots are to be found in medieval choir music, hence my low key demeanor: however maturity was achieved playing in a (torture) chamber music quartet, hence my well honed pummeling skills. Only playing with GOF I am allowed to reach godly heights with the basest of skills.

SC: Who would win in a fight, you or the drummer from Manowar?

Fra: I am afraid that victory is not in the black eye of the beholder.

SC: LucretiaXXX, how many licks does it take to get to the center of a Fire-ette?

LucretiaXXX: How many licks you got, champ?

SC: Do the mortals reading this have ANY chance of dating a Fire-ette?

LucretiaXXX: I only date short, fat, bald men who can drink their weight in beer. However, I’ll fuck anyone.

SC: Satan, there are a lot of metal bands in the world, and some would even say that involving yourself with a boy band would be far more evil and Satanic of you. What made you pick these guys?

Satan: Gods Of Fire are excellent examples of my Satanic ideals. These true Metal kings and the equally sinsiter Fire-ette Queens live their lives and play their music to serve me. Through my involvement I get to skim 20% off the top.

SC: Pop-up ads: why’d you have to do it, man?

Satan: High click-thru rates. I’ll do anything to make advertisers happy.

SC: Finally, what are the ultimate goals of the Gods Of Fire?

DJBS: We will not stop until all learn to speak with the true voice of Metal!

Prometheus: To save the world with the power of METAL!

If you’d like to experience the power of a Gods Of Fire show live, you will have two opportunities before the end of the year. The first is TONIGHT, November 10th at 9 PM, at Arlene’s Grocery in New York, shortly before Punk Rock/Heavy Metal Karaoke. The next, for those of you who like to plan these things long-term, is New Year’s Eve, also at Arlene’s (this time, with Kiss Nation as well as the Punk Rock/Heavy Metal Karaoke band!).

J.G. Thirlwell of Foetus shows us the goods, circa 1991 at New York’s Limelight.
(Photo Credit: Scott Crawford)

In the second installment of our Flashback Interview series, MBBC staffer justj0hn provides us with an interview with J. G. Thirlwell, of Foetus/Wiseblood/Steroid Maximus/Manorexia fame that he and his compatriot Michele (last name omitted to protect the innocent) conducted in 2001 for the now-in-limbo Faqt Magazine. Thanks to both justj0hn and Faqt for allowing us to bring this one back for public consumption.

As for Ma Thirlwell’s baby boy Jimmy, according to his web site, there will be a new Foetus album available in 2004, and it seems as if he’s been keeping busy in the meantime. I highly recommend the Foetus site, as it’s chock full of information.

In addition, if y’all are interested, I may eventually be persuaded to post yet another interview with Mr. Thirlwell that I did for Propaganda back in the dark ages of 1991 or so as a separate Flashback Interview, but that probably won’t be posted for a while.

And now, J.G. Thirlwell: The My Big, Black Cock Flashback Interview.

2001: For whatever reason, Hoboken was a labyrinth of orange dayglo street cones,
directional cops on foot, non-functional traffic lights and detour signs, causing us to
advance through the town at a slug’s pace. We were 10 minutes beyond being on
time at that point.

Our destination: Maxwell’s, not only to see Foetus perform but to interview the man
responsible for 2 decades worth of nihilistic noize, Jim Thirlwell. I’m a late bloomer
with Foetus. I’ve only been a fan for 10 out of the 20 years he’s been throwing glass,
granite, steele girders, grenades and an unmeasured amount of vitriol into his sonic
blender. There were a few instances, I’m sure, during the interview where he could
have easily thrown me in as well due to my questioning but such was not the case.
He was as personable as he was informative and this is how it went…

Players: J. G. Thirlwell, Justj0hn and Michele

Justj0hn: The 80′s were bombarded with a barrage of Foetus releases whereas the 90′s were sorely anemic. Why was last decade so barren as far as your musical output?

JGT: I don’t think it was that barren, I mean…The early 90′s I got caught up in touring and then after that I started doing remixes and that started to consume me. My remix life really took off. A couple of things that started that off…EMF, Prong…

Justj0hn: yeah, I remember the EMF remix ["I Believe(Colt 45 Remix)]…

JGT: The Prong thing started an avalanche of work for me because it was the first metal
remix that had been done, you know, and then I was the “goto guy” for that…I was
riding along quite nicely on that. I had done the Steroid Maximus stuff which had come
out around then…and then I started writing new material, I had a bunch of new stuff
for “GASH” and then I started talking with labels. It took about a year to negotiate the
deal with Sony and then throw that together and then the Sony thing came out.
My releases tend to bottleneck, they build up and they blurt out all at once. All my
releases come out in clumps. Don’t know if you’ve noticed. But then the Sony thing
happened and that sorta ended…in tears.

Justj0hn: Was that only a one album deal?

JGT: It was a 2 album deal but they uhmmm…It came down to business affairs pretty soon after, like about a week after “GASH” had come out that they weren’t going to promote the 2nd album and you know, there’s some good people at Sony but they pretty much had the rug pulled out from under me, the wheels got set in motion to kinda extricate me from the deal pretty much before it had even been given a chance. That was just not a good way to run things, you know? So…everything sorta came ’round and it was the Portrait of Dorian Grey in reverse, everything came ’round and bit me in the ass and I had to crawl out of that wreckage. It was like everything predicted came true. I’ve been working on new material for a couple of years hence this new outpouring of stuff. I have about 3 albums coming out this year. That’s the way it happens sometimes.

Justj0hn: How would you describe, you personal words, your latest offering?

JGT: I don’t feel I need to describe it. I mean, I think that’s your job.

Justj0hn: It’s a mind pureeing masterpiece. The impending remix album “BLOW” is material from… “FLOW”, due Sept…Is this the first time you’ve allowed other talents to deconstruct and reshape your material?

JGT: It’s the first time I actually requested it. Yeah, the results are amazing. I’m just
finishing it off right now actually. I finished working on the sleeve last night and
uhmmm…it’s really down to the wire, but yeah, it’s coming out in Sept. and it’s
really exciting. It’s an amazing album.

Justj0hn: Yeah, I’m really looking forward to that one.

JGT: It’s interesting the way people took it, the interpreters took it. I mean…everyone
has been most gracious and really taken it to interesting places and at first I was
worried it was all a bit dark but it’s all down to the sequencing and I think it’s
quite stunning.

Justj0hn: You have FM Einheit on it…

JGT: He might not be on there actually. There’s a bevy of other people: PanSonic,
Amon Tobin, DJ Food, Kid 606, Panacea, Sean Beavan , Charlie Clouser, Franz Treichler from the Young Gods, Ursula 1000, uhmm…I might be skipping some people…Me…myself…

Justj0hn: Do you have any intentions of dipping into your extensive back catalogue for
future remix projects…albums?

JGT: Uhmmm…no, not really, I mean…it would be interesting to do but…I don’t own
the rights to that stuff and I feel reticent to make money for labels that don’t
pay me royalties, you know. A lot of people have sent me remixes that they’ve done
unsolicited with varying results.

Justj0hn: Have you ever been approached to do the soundtrack for a major motion picture?

JGT: No, not a major motion picture. I’ve spoken to people about soundtrack work. That’s
something you have to like…that’s a full time job just pursuing that. Filmwork is
very much a committee type thing and I’m more inclined to wanna have someone make a
film around my music, the other way around at this point…I mean, right this
second. It’s not to say in a couple of weeks I’ll change my mind. I did the soundtrack
to one film which is a cross between scoring and music supervising for the film
version of the Atrocity Exhibition by JG Ballard and that’s coming out on DVD. It’s
a commentary on JG Ballard.

I’m really interested in getting songs placed at this point than just actively
pursuing soundtracks to the exclusion of everything else. I had just finished another
instrumental album under the name Manorexia and I will be performing that live next
year at UCLA as part of a contemporary composers series and that’s kinda like a
horror movie soundtrack, you know…it’s quite terrifying.

Justj0hn: Yeah, I was gonna ask you what’s going to distinguish Manorexia musically from
Steroid Maximus…

JGT: Well…there’s quite a few different distinctions. I’m about more than halfway
through the new Steroid Maximus album which I will probably finish when I’m done with
this tour…try to finish, and that’s increasingly become influenced by DJ OTEFSU
which is the name I DJ under and I think it’s really soaked through into that.
Manorexia has had some different criteria on it from the very start. It sorta
started live as an ambient album that didn’t finish live like that. 14 pieces that
kind of crossfade into eachother but I wanted to do something where it wasn’t so
meticulously crafted as Steroid Maximus or Foetus is. It’s something where I was
doing it in a more instinctive painterly way and not second guessing what I was doing
because I think I’m at the point where I’ve done it enough, that the decisions that I
make without agonizing over it too much aren’t really gonna suck because I know
I want and so…that was one of the criteria. The other was having a spatial and
repetitive quality to it instead of cramming it with so much detail and as a result
let the ear and the brain fill in a lot of the blanks and…it really works.

Justj0hn: How did DJ OTEFSU come about?

JGT: I just got asked to DJ at a friends art opening and I dug it. I started it much
more experimental than what I do now but it’s basically a way to flex my record
collection and it creates an atmosphere. I mean, there’s an OTEFSU sound that I go
for and I depart from it. There’s definitely an atmosphere it creates where life kinda
stops in 1975. There’s a lot of spy/crime/cop show elements.

Justj0hn: I missed the The The show I had found out you DJ’d at and I regret it. You’ve
tapped into many genres of music for your art: blues, jazz, lounge, swing, surf, etc…
to create some of the most original noise ever etched on wax…You’ve even utilized an
orchestra on your YORK album that featured Lydia Lunch…

JGT: Well…that wasn’t a real orchestra.

Justj0hn: It wasn’t?

JGT: No, The Foetus Symphony Orchestra.

Michele: [laughs]

Justj0hn: [makes buzzer noise]

Michele: Thanks for playing John.

Justj0hn: Ahh, well…fooled me.

JGT: Well, it was a 9 piece band. I called them an orchestra because it had a bunch of
instruments. It was a bit of a joke to call them the Foetus Symphony Orchestra. It
wasn’t really an orchestra. I’m getting closer to that with Manorexia where I’m
actually going to do it…it will be realized live with a string section, live
percussion, electronics…stuff like that.

Justj0hn: Blunder on my part. Did you ever consider getting a bunch of incredible, over the top, extreme voices together and conducting a…cacophonous cantata? Like…”Foetus: The Opera”?

JGT: Uhmmm…no, I have not considered that. Maybe it’s a good idea. I have recently
sorta finished shouting choir…who I enjoy…

Justj0hn: Shouting choir?

JGT: Ya, I don’t envision wrangling a whole lotta people together under one roof. The
management…I just don’t have the tolerance for that. Hard enough being by myself
let alone with other people.

Justj0hn: Say I have a piece of my own music I wanted to send through the Foetus mill…
uhmmm…mulched and amplified by the hands of Jim Thirlwell. What sorta steps would
I have to take?

JGT: Uhmmm…send it to the PO box and it will probably end up on a big pile.

Justj0hn: I bet!

JGT: Which is not to say I might not listen to it. Some people don’t take unsolicited
music and I understand why ‘cuz down the line…the impact of it…you know…but…I
do listen to some stuff I get sent.

Justj0hn: You probably get quite a bit…

JGT: No, not as much as you might think.

Justj0hn: Oh, I’m gonna touch on the past a little bit. It struck me one day listening to
Calamity Crush that it bears a slight resemblance to Herbie Hancock’s mega instrumental dance hit “Rockit”…did you ever notice this?

JGT: Well, that was kind of a joke on “Rockit” a bit but it was also “Renegades Of Funk” by
Afrika Bambaata…which was a bit more of a homage to that but it was put through my
mangler, I mean…and it was kind of a conscious thing to do a riff like that…
totally conscious…although it was kinda like my early experiments with sampling.
What I’ve been doing up until then was…the way I was creating stuff was manipulating
sounds with pause buttons, effects…just anything that made an interesting noise and
when sampling technology started to become accessible, there was a way to organize
what I’ve been doing with tape loops and stuff anyway and some of the first messing
around with samples was around about then when I was using an AMS delay which you
could lock sounds into and trigger them and that’s how I got all the drum sounds on
that…it’s like an 808 drum machine with all the sounds triggered and then messed
around with and stuff like that. That’s how I got these huge drum sounds so it was
an exercise in that. And it’s interesting because it still kinda sounds, particularly
the b-side, sounds kinda fresh now in an old school way.

Justj0hn: Do you utilize a computer more nowadays…for your work?

JGT: Yeah.

Justj0hn: Is there any software that your using you want to rant and rave about?

JGT: Well, you know…I have one foot in the stone-age and one foot in the space-age.
I still have an Atari 1040 that I really like which I run creative software on and
it’s great. A lot of people still swear by that too but I also have a G4 with Logic
and I’ve been getting a lot of cool stuff. In Native Instruments. a friend of mine
there has been turning me onto stuff which I had just sorta messed around with and
I just got this device, Reaktor I think it’s called, which I haven’t even gotten into
yet but I know it does amazing things and some other stuff, you know…you can spend
your entire life trying to keep up and trying to learn and get deep into it ‘cuz
some of the programs are so fucking deep and I get deeper into them instinctively.
I mean, I can go back to my 1040 because I get so pissed off troubleshooting other
things, you know, but…..I always want to create. I just don’t want to just keep
up with stuff. I think other people keep up with stuff without actually doing
anything….

Justj0hn: Getting kinda lazy with it and just…

JGT: Well, not lazy…I mean, they’re really studious about knowing every advancement of
every different version that comes out. There’s a point where you gotta say OK, I
wanna actually use it for something. I tend to use things.

Justj0hn: Last year I had seen you…[turns to Michele]…was Neubauten last year?

Michele: I don’t remember! [laughs] Uhmm…..yes.

Justj0hn: I saw you in the audience…I didn’t want to be one of the many people talking
to you during their performance. What did you think of their show?

JGT: Was that Irving Plaza?

Justj0hn: Yes.

JGT: I thought they were good. It was good.

Justj0hn: I was amazed…that was my second time seeing them. First time I was sold.

Michele: I had a big crush on Blixa.

JGT: Really?

Michele: I don’t know why…..big crush.

JGT: You know he’s moved to San Francisco?

Justj0hn: Is that where’s he’s living now?

Michele: Oh, has he? He’s getting a tan.

Justj0hn: What was your involvement in the releases of a few early Neubauten albums?

JGT: Uhmmm…..well, I saw them play live in Berlin in like ’82…and I was just amazed.
They were so good. I actually had their early singles. I used to work for Virgin and
I would get…well, I was really into what was going on in Germany at the time…
obscure, well…not necessarily obscure but just independent seven inches that were
coming out…there was a lot of cool stuff on different labels, Zick Zack and uhmm…
I don’t remember the names of the other labels. Ofcourse I had access to all that stuff
and so I kinda knew who they were and then I saw them play live at this festival in
about ’82 and I was blown away. I talked to them about getting…if they would be
interested in getting their stuff released in the UK and they were like, “Ya.”
At that point I had a relationship with Rough Trade who were distributing Foetus stuff
and I went to them with the proposal of putting together a subsidiary label of
Self Immolation with the purpose of putting out Einsturzende Neubauten starting with,
and it was called Hardt records, and I had stationary made and everything like that
and…so, the first release was going to be Strategies Against Architecture Volume
I. So they were assembling that and I was gonna put the money I had made with “ACHE”
into the production of that album and then around that time I was being courted by
Some Bizarre. So they wanted to sign me so I said “Well,…”, I had spoken to
Neubauten about it and decided “Well, if you want to sign me then you gotta sign
Neubauten too…..”, which they did…much to everyone’s regret. So the first
release was gonna be Strategies Against Architecture Volume I and then Stevo
decided to do new material, he didn’t want to do a retrospective, so then we ended
up taking it to Mute. So that’s how that came about.

Justj0hn: Someone had made a vague reference to it and they just really didn’t elaborate,
so…I just to know…..

JGT: We played together over the years and kept in touch and stuff but, they always…
what they were doing then is just like…apart from what they were doing sonically
but like…emotionally and intellectually…it was just amazing.

Justj0hn: Tribute albums have been in vogue for the past few years. Would you be flattered or disgusted if a bunch of uber-gothic/Casio cookie cutter industrial bands covered
your work for just such a thing?

JGT: Uhmmmm…

Justj0hn: I’m not citing any labels.

Michele: Ya…no labels.

Justj0hn: I guess it would depend on the results…

JGT: You make it sound so negative…

Michele: [laughs]

Justj0hn: I know…..I’m sorry.

JGT: I’m flattered when people cover my material so I guess I would be curious to hear
it but if they were like as you described…then indeed I would have no interest in it.

Michele: That’s ‘cuz they’re all so BAD…

Justj0hn: There’s a few exceptions…

Michele: Yeah, sure.

Justj0hn: How did you land the role as “The Satan Guy” on Ann Magnuson’s ’96 album “The Luv Show”?

JGT: I think it’s was ‘cuz how someone referred to me as “The Satan Guy”, like…”Do you
know Jim Thirlwell?”, or whatever…

Justj0hn: And immediately associated you with the devil?

JGT: “Oh yeah…that Satan guy, yeah.”…so, I relayed that story to her and she loved it.
That’s how I wound up being “That Satan Guy”. We were working on some material
together around about then, actually the song “Heuldoch 7B” that’s on “FLOW” I originally
wrote for her and she had some vocals on it and then she ended up not liking her
vocal take so I took the back-track and radically reworked it and turned it into what
it is now.

Justj0hn: I remember when I had originally read about it years ago…the ad was kinda
misleading and it made it sound like it was strictly you and her…

JGT: Ahh…..really?

Justj0hn: Yeah.

JGT: I didn’t know anything about that.

Justj0hn: Have you been paying any attention to this electrowave/synth/club resurgence?
Bands like VNV Nation, And One, Apoptygma Berzerk?

JGT: No, don’t know any of it. Is that part of the “New Wave Revival”?

Justj0hn: Yeah, yeah it is. Do You think there’s a new musical revolution gestating within the
Internet?

JGT: I’m not qualified to answer that. I’ve never even downloaded an MP3 in my life.
I wouldn’t know what’s out there. I do think that basically the democratization of
music…if that’s a form of distribution…I don’t particularly think it’s a good
thing…’cuz it’s inevitable, there’s so much crap out there, there’s no way of…
way of filtering.

Justj0hn: No, there really isn’t.

JGT: And I think that as a result, music, which used to be special, has become devalued
just by the sheer amount of it…in it’s omnipresence…everywhere.
And I can understand why the generation that comes up now doesn’t hold it with such
reverence or importance as the previous generations because there are so many other
distractions out there…it’s become wallpaper…it’s been so…been so…

Justj0hn: Diluted?

Michele: It lost the sacredness it once had.

JGT: It’s really so narrowcast by…by, you know, large corporations who are trying to
second guess what people want to hear. Of course it’s always out there to be dug into
but, you know…it’s what is shoved down your throat that is so mediocre to start
with that maybe it takes away the desire to dig deeper into it. When I was growing
up, music was “It” and, uhmm…I guess there’s still people like that, that feel
that way. I still feel that way! High form of art.

Justj0hn: A friend of mine, being a recovering resident, wants to know if there’s any
meaning behind the Niagara Falls reference in the Hammer Falls?

JGT: Uhmmm…I don’t remember what the reference is…in that, about Niagara Falls.
Was probably a play on words. I don’t really remember.

Justj0hn: Did you ever have to deal with a stalker…or sick the authorities on an over-
obsessive fan?

JGT: I’ve kinda had some stalking experience…but I’ve dealt with it by…in private
means as opposed to going to the authorities. Private forms of law enforcement.

Justj0hn: Wow…this whole next section we’ve previously talked about. Uhmmm…any plans on compiling your artwork, lyrics, maybe some stories and poems you’ve written…publishing them?

JGT: No immediate plans to do that. I’m not quite ready to write my eulogy yet. I’m
still writing my legacy. There’s an art show opening at Exit Art in a couple of
weeks…it’s dedicated to LPs, you know, 33 1/3 covers. I have a little installation
in that but…..the stuff is pretty well catalogued on the web site at this point…
and that’s ever growing. I’d like to turn it into a CD-Rom, I’d love to have a book
but most of the artwork I do gets channeled into the sleeves. It’s not like I do a
lot of artwork that doesn’t end up published so it’s all out there and everyone can
own an original. That’s how it was always intended to be made…

Justj0hn: Did you have anything to do with the Internet APB that was sent out on that
girl for ahhh…she was on stage at the Knitting Factory…performing mock
fellatio?

JGT: Oh NO…was nothing to do…nothing about that.

Justj0hn: That was someone else?

JGT: I don’t know who that girl was. There was another APB that went out…on some
other girl…which was semi-successful. Struck me dumb over this…personal
question(?). But…uhhhh…WHAT an IDIOT! Nah, that’s me…I’m the idiot. She’s lovely…..no comment.

Justj0hn: Somehow…I was under the impression…were you ever married to Lydia Lunch?

JGT: We lived together for 7 years.

Justj0hn: Alright…every time it’s brought up it’s like “Oh, they were married…”

Michele: It’s the question every time someone mentions you[in a gruff voice], “He’s
the guy married to Lydia Lunch?”

JGT: So…uhmm…whatever that means…cohabitated. We’re still in touch. We still
talk all the time, close.

Justj0hn: Wow…I’m actually at the end of this. That’s all I got.

Michele: I wanna know something…When you’re sitting at home and you put something on, what do you listen to? Is there anything out there right now…..

JGT: Out there right now?

Michele: I only listen to old stuff…

JGT: Yeah, I listen to a lot of old stuff. I listen to a lot of soundtracks. That’s my
favorite stuff to listen to at the moment and I’ll go through phases we’re I’ll
listen to old rock or electronic stuff or, you know…a lot of the people I invited
to remix me, that’s…I listen to a lot of their stuff. Amon Tobin is one of my
favorites. But ya, I’ve sorta been digging into old soundtracks which is also…
uhmmm…it’s all research into DJ OTEFSU stuff. If I find something that forms
a little cornerstone of a set, a theme or an arc in my set you know, I go for that.
I recently started listening to Mandrill and Marlowe…and bands like that who do
kinda like afro-latino type stuff which is kinda cool. Lots of congos and stuff.
Ya, I’d say the soundtrack stuff is the most dominant at present, but I have pretty diverse tastes.

Justj0hn: How long are you on tour for? This is day one of it, right?

JGT: This goes ’til the 24th of this month…for 3 1/2 weeks and then I’m going out
to LA for DJ OTEFSU and I’m also performing at the Fetish Ball out there…3 songs
with the house band and then come back here to put BLOW into production and then
doing Philly…and 2 nights at the Mercury Lounge.

Justj0hn: That’s right…the Mercury Lounge. I’ll have to be at one of those two…

JGT: September we goto Europe for about 6 weeks and in November I’m mounting a live
performance of “BLOW” in LA and I’m trying to pull together all the people who’ve
remixed me on “BLOW”…for one night.

Justj0hn: Oh really? That should be incredible…

Michele: Do you get a better reception here…or in Europe?

JGT: Ahhh…I don’t remember. Depends on the place, you know. Europe is really good.
I haven’t toured there in a long time so we’ll see how it goes.

Michele: I’m done [laughs].

Justj0hn: I’m spent…uhhmm…we to expect any old material to show up on stage tonight?

JGT: Ya, there are some old songs that have been radically reworked and some old stuff
that I’ve never played before…and then some stuff from “FLOW” and a few that have
never been released as well…so it covers the gamut…you know.

Justj0hn: My first time ever seeing you was last year at the Knitting Factory…that show
was nothing short of incredible.

JGT: Uhhh…well, it’s a similar set…but different members and a couple of different
things.

Justj0hn: What impressed me the most was the drummer…did he also have some kind of…keypad (was trying to say drum-pad panel). He would drum…and use that as well…
blew me away.

JGT: Yeah…same drummer. Vinny Signorelli. He used to be in the Unsane.

Justj0hn: Are you still working with Hahn Rowe?

JGT: Hahn does a violin solo in one of the songs on FLOW so, I guess, yeah. I haven’t
seen him for about a year.

Justj0hn: Alright…I guess I’m done. Thank you very much for the interview.

Michele: Pleasure meeting you.

Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Richard Hackley.

We’ve had a lot of doom, metal, and Satan on this site over the last month, what with Slayer, Cathedral, and Devin Townsend appearing. In the interest of fairness and equal time, My Big, Black Cock went hunting for a scoop, and I believe we’ve found one. Christian artist Richard Hackley rose to prominence (some might say infamy) somewhat recently as his “SongSermons”, particularly the epic “God’s Backhand”, were featured on the now-defunct worstoftheworst.com site, which profiled what they referred to as “Very Bad Music on the Internet”. It seems that they’ve since fallen prey to God’s backhand themselves. ;)

I found something quite different than flat-out “very bad music” when I found Richard. Music that’s simply “bad” to my ears, I tend to find to be unlistenable, but this was not the case with the music I heard. I couldn’t (and still can’t) get enough of this stuff, and this has been the case with many of the people who I’ve turned on to Richard’s music as well. I found a whimsical, bombastic sound musically, with the unlikely echoes of Kraftwerk and Laibach in the arrangements. Vocally, the obvious comparison is to the recently departed Fred Rogers, which makes for quite an unusual juxtaposition of styles, admittedly. The lyrics, while they are indeed “sermons” of a sort, differ from the intolerably sappy norm of Christian music, and seem to possess (inadvertently or otherwise) a sense of levity to them. You can’t help but notice that Richard Hackley’s enjoying himself when he makes these songs, and his enjoyment is infectious in a rather quirky way.

Perhaps even more unlikely was the reception I received when I came to Mr. Hackley with my interview request, from “mybigblackcock.com”. I wasn’t quite sure what to expect, other than an almost-definite “no”. Not only did he surprise me by agreeing to the interview after mulling it over for a period of time, but he’s been one of the easiest folks I’ve gotten to work with in the time I’ve been doing this (which, if you don’t take my hiatus from interviews into account, goes back over 12 years now).

As a rule, in part because of my ethical, political, and spiritual leanings, and in part because most people who call themselves “Christians” strike me as being anything but, I don’t usually do so well in my dealings with them. Richard has proven himself to be an exception to this rule in many ways, and an exceptional guy PERIOD…bright, insightful, open-minded, Internet-savvy, and a consummate pro in a sea of amateurs. Big thanks go out to him for agreeing to do this interview, and for investing a great deal of his spare time in it.

Without any further ado, the one you’ve all been waiting for…Richard Hackley: The My Big, Black Cock Interview!

SC: Richard, why did you, a Christian songwriter and singer, agree to an interview with a website bearing the name “My Big, Black Cock”?

RH: After your invitation to do this interview, it took eight days for me to make the decision. During this time, you and I had some email dialogue, plus I went to your website twice. It became clear to me this was an example of “you can’t judge a book by its cover”. Your emails were professional and respectful of my situation as a Christian with a tough call to make. Plus, and this spoke volumes, your big black cock turned out to be a silhouette of a rooster.

The content of your website is undeniably for adults. You make this clear on your home page, warning children to go elsewhere. But anyone on a porn hunt will be disappointed at “My Big, Black Cock”.

Over the eight days, I came to trust your intentions as a journalist. I decided your invitation to interview me was something like the owner of a Las Vegas nightclub saying, “Come in and put up your posters about Jesus Christ. We won’t smear them with graffiti.”

SC: Do you feel that there’s any risk of being ostracized by your peers for doing this interview?

RH: This could be a double-edged sword. “My Big, Black Cock” readers, both new and repeats, would expect to find material of a more raw and earthy nature. You may catch some flack for this interview. But our common link is music. Hopefully your readers will understand this.

As for me, I think of Jesus, who chose to dine with the regular folk, some of whom would have visited “My Big, Black Cock” had the Internet been available. The religious leaders criticized Jesus for associating with those whom they considered to be lesser people. I expect there will be mixed reactions from Christians regarding this interview. There may be a few who believe I am violating 1 Thessalonians 5:22, “Abstain from all appearance of evil.”

There will also be a few who will respect this interview, as well as respect “My Big, Black Cock” for hosting such a wide open music forum.

SC: Your sound is a quirky, rather unique juxtaposition of styles. How did
you come to mix all of the elements and create “the Richard Hackley sound”?

RH: I think the heart of this question will be answered elsewhere in the interview. As it is worded here, the question compliments me too much. I’m not smart enough to knowingly extract various elements and mix them together. When getting my college degree in Music Theory/Composition, the most practical thing I learned about composing music was, “If it sounds right to the composer, it is right.” So “the Richard Hackley sound” is a result of trial and error … experimenting with each song until it flips my switch.

SC: Could you describe your songwriting process for us?

RH: One of the common questions is, what comes first? Music or words? Early in my writing, the music came first. Somewhere down the line, lyric ideas started coming sooner than music ideas. So, in something of a leap of faith at the time (i.e. leaving a comfort zone and venturing into the unknown), I flip flopped the process. It worked. So, to fledgling songwriters, start with whichever is easiest for you. Later, you can try the other.

After several years of songwriting, I seem to have settled into a pattern now.

1- I start with a short lyric idea, which I usually intend to be my hook (I’ll use the example: “make impossible a friend”). I generally decide on the exact wording of this lyric idea before I try to match music to it. The full lyrics for the song come later. They are never a problem. If a short lyric idea capsulizes a major concept for you, the lyrics will be there later when you are actually ready to organize your thoughts and write the full lyrics. I do recommend having a notebook exclusively for lyric ideas. Sometimes the outline for a song comes at the same time as the short lyric idea. I don’t trust myself to remember that much information when it comes all at once. I’d rather get it written down ASAP.

2- Next, I try different melodies with this short lyric idea. In the example “make impossible a friend”, there are seven syllables. My melody will probably have seven notes. Maybe more. Certainly not less. If the first melody doesn’t satisfy me, I’ll do a second, then a third, perhaps a fourth. You could keep on with a fifth, sixth, etc. But for me, after the fourth, I usually pick the one I think is best, and work with it. If that produces nothing, I try the melody I think is next best. Rarely have I had to go this far before coming up with a marriage of lyric & melody that satisfied me.

3- Once I am satisfied with the completed hook, I start orchestrating the rest of the music that will accompany the hook … bass, chords, countermelodies, drums, etc. Eventually I have a fully arranged piece of music, usually two measures long, probably no more than 7 to 10 seconds worth.

4- Here, I might write the full lyrics, or arrange the rest of the music, whichever seems clearest in my mind. Whenever it is that I do tackle the rest of the music, I start by studying the small portion of music I’ve already composed, for in it will be numerous tiny ideas (maybe a catchy rhythm, or a fragment of melody) that can be expanded into full sized ideas. I call this “the song growing out of the seed” method of composing. From this process comes the ideas for the rest of the song … intro, verses, choruses, bridges, transitions, coda, etc.

5- If the remaining lyrics have not been written, this is usually where it happens.

6- If the vocal melody has not been written yet, it does now. And this happens a lot. The vocal melody is often the last thing I write. This is probably an area where I am weak … melodies. Other than the high attention given to the hook in step #2, my melodies are not labored over very heavily, or written for originality or beauty. My melodies are mainly a result of … “What fits with the orchestration I’ve already done, and doesn’t sound too much like a melody I’ve already used?” (With this rather mechanical and uncreative criteria for melodies, I’ve sometimes wondered … if I removed all lyrics and orchestrations, and just hummed my melodies a capella, would they all sound alike?)

One other thing I strive for during the composing of the music is what I call the interest factor. I try to maintain something of interest from beginning to end of a song.

If a song has three verses, the music can get pretty boring the third time around. Sometimes even during the second verse. Though the latter verses will have new lyrics, I don’t always consider that enough to maintain the interest factor. Something different usually needs to be happening in the orchestration. Sometimes it means bringing in a new instrument sound. Sometimes it means subtracting an instrument altogether. Sometimes it means writing a new countermelody to join what has been heard in the first two verses. The variations are too numerous to name.

Some sounds are boring and hurt the interest factor. The most blatant example to me is an organ chord that is held for several beats, and there is nothing in that organ sound that has any life to it. It doesn’t increase. It doesn’t decrease. It doesn’t swell. It doesn’t fade. It doesn’t vibrato. Just a solid, unchanging sound. This, to me, is an interest killer. A piano chord at least fades, giving it (and the song) a little more life and interest. So when I’m searching for sounds on my synthesizer, I’m looking for ones that have some life to them. On those rare occasions when I’ve used a “lifeless” sound, it was kept very subdued. The sounds with life/interest are the ones I put out front.

SC: What inspired the writing of what has to be considered your signature
song at this point, “God’s Backhand”?

RH: I would have preferred a different signature song. Perhaps “Make Impossible A Friend” or “The Enemy Called Average” or “God Is The One We Should Trust in First”.

I’ve written around 100 songs, most of which have been just as available to the public as “God’s Backhand”. So there are 99 other songs that are just as representative of me. Probably more so. But “God’s Backhand” rubbed a few people wrong, so it got the most attention.

What inspired the song?

There was (and continues to be) a wave of events and media coverage that are subtly teaching us that God is unreliable. Here in Wichita, there were three such events (spread over a period of a few years). A female employee at a sandwich shop was murdered at closing time. A police officer was killed on duty. An assistant football coach at a large state university died of cancer. In all three cases, the coverage by the local newspaper made a major point about the victim and her/his faith in God.

The police officer even carried around a copy of one of the psalms in his hat band. The psalm focused on God’s protection. Everyone who picked up a copy of the paper the next morning was able to read about this.

I respect that the newspaper was trying to point to the high qualities of these people and the loss that would be felt. But God was sure taking a hit. The message was coming across that we cannot count on God for protection or healing.

So I decided to write some songs to hopefully reverse this gradual erosion of God’s credibility and reliability. “God’s Backhand” was one of those songs. Its intention was to inspire confidence in a God that can be depended upon, even in life and death situations.

The imagery in the song is a figure of speech, not to be taken literally. The song is not about God killing, but about God protecting.

SC: Given the whimsy and occasional bombast that I hear in some of your
songs, is your approach to songwriting done with tongue in cheek, or are
you dead serious about all of this stuff?

RH: I’m serious.

How do I explain the presence of whimsy and bombast? I’m not sure. I’ll tell a bit more about my songwriting process. Maybe the answer will be there.

Regarding the music: In my attempt to maintain the interest factor, I’ll initially overload the composition with too much music, too many parts, too many ideas, too many counter melodies. This is deliberate. It allows me to then experiment with various combinations of all those elements, and use what I think helps the interest factor the most. Brahms wrote something to the effect of “Anyone can compose music full of notes. The secret is to know which ones to let fall to the ground.” This probably describes my process and my intention. But maybe I don’t let enough notes fall to the ground. Or maybe I don’t let the right ones fall. Maybe the whimsy is there as a result of me leaving something in I thought helped the interest factor.

I go back to the basic rule of composing: “If it sounds right to the composer, it is right.” Maybe 5 years from now more of those notes will be falling to the ground. Maybe less.

Subject matter nearly always suggests the music that should go with it. Sometimes the suggestion is basic … like using a major key for happy lyrics. Sometimes the suggestions get more specific. In the fourth movement of Beethoven’s Sixth Symphony (made famous by Disney’s original “Fantasia”), he used timpani drums to portray thunder in a storm.

“God’s Backhand” similarly suggested its own music, both in basic and specific ways. A minor key was logical for the verses, to reflect the serious dangers in life from enemies. Switching to a major key was logical for the chorus, to reflect the good news … that God was stronger than any enemy. Accented drum strikes were logical to portray enemies being knocked aside.

Regarding the lyrics, where most of the bombast (“pretentious inflated speech or writing”) must be, I have only one explanation: I consider the Bible to contain God’s Word. It is my chosen source for truth and I have elevated it, in my mind, over any other written document or expressed opinion on this planet. If my lyrics do not reflect this elevation, then I’ve watered my lyrics down, for which I owe the God of the Bible an apology. The stories and promises in the Bible are pretentious and inflated, if there is not a God who inspired them and will back them up.

SC: You’ve said that nothing really worked for you musically before you
began making Christian music. What were your original songs like when
you were still exclusively making secular music?

RH: I was trying to be commercial, and failing miserably. What was on the radio just wasn’t me. My love songs were more like lame songs.

Those early songs must have been pretty boring. I sent out probably 100 to 150 tapes (1 to 10 songs per tape) to song publishers and never seriously interested any of them.

My best work back then was not on songs I’d written, but arrangements I did of songs by a friend. He and I also sent out tapes … his songs, my arrangements. We were never offered any publishing contracts, but we actually did receive compliments from a few publishers, and invitations to send future material.

SC: You cite “anything from Beethoven to The Beatles” as your musical
influence, which is a pretty wide spectrum. Could you expand a bit more
on who your biggest musical influences are, particularly those who make
electronic music, if any?

RH: Good point. That was a pretty wide spectrum, insinuating I was soaking everything in. I should have worded that “Beethoven AND the Beatles”, as these were the two most significant influences on me.

Somewhere around my 16th birthday (1965) I bought my first orchestral music album. This was also when the Beatles were hot, but my interest in orchestral music had been growing to where I was willing to part with some money on what I perceived at that time to be something of a gamble. That first album was Leonard Bernstein and the New York Philharmonic performing Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony. I wish I could say I knew what I was doing at the time, but it was really a fluke that I picked one of the most powerful, uplifting and well loved pieces of music, performed by one of the world’s best orchestras. (The opening four notes of that symphony are probably history’s most famous musical idea.)

I was hooked on orchestral music from that point on. But my love for the Beatle’s did not suffer. They were the only pop/rock group around that I consistently enjoyed nearly everything they did … to the point I would purchase one of their newly released albums blind (like I did with that Beethoven album), hardly knowing anything about the album’s contents. I found the Beatles to be innovative and versatile. Where most bands continued to sound the same over the years, the Beatles kept doing drastically new things.

And it seemed they could copy any style as well, if that was their choice. One example that stands out for me is their song “Back in The USSR”, where they briefly go into a 1960’s west coast style (as in Beach Boys, Jan & Dean, etc.)

One of the motivational notes I have taped up in my work area says, “The key to creativity is to yank convention inside out.” For Beethoven and the Beatles, that maxim explains the presence of their experimentalism and pioneering. For me, the maxim justifies the absence of trying to be commercial.

After the Beatles broke up, I stopped listening to the radio. I don’t think this was “going into mourning”, but it may have been. Today, I still rarely listen to the radio. But the point is, whatever happened in the music world after the Beatles had no identifiable influence on me. I was so out of touch that the development and widespread use of MIDI happened without me having a clue it even existed. When I learned of MIDI (early 1980′s) it was something like Rip Van Winkle being astounded at the changes that went on while he was sleeping.

SC: What music (both Christian and secular) have you been listening to recently?

RH: The only music I listen to consistently is my classical CD collection. Anything else is only briefly, and for some specific purpose.

SC: Your music doesn’t sound quite like most Christian/praise and worship
music I’ve heard. I did notice that for a while you were a member of the Sunflower State Gospel Music Association which means you’re not totally an island here, but have the Christian music community in general (radio stations,
other musicians and the like) been open and receptive to what you do, or
do you operate mostly on your own in terms of building a fan base?

RH: At the start of my Christian song writing, it used to bother me that none of my songs ever fit into the praise & worship genre … either musically or lyrically. This concern went away one day when I read Colossians 3:17, “… teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs …”

I didn’t know exactly what those three categories of music encompassed, but ‘spiritual songs’ sounded broad enough to include what I was doing. And the word ‘teaching’ from the verse seemed to fit what I was attempting in my lyrics. Later yet, the function of my songs seemed to get confirmed when the idea came to call them SongSermons (now my registered trademark name).

Members of the SSGMA accepted me with no problem. Their membership already represented an extensive mixture of styles before I joined. The founder of the SSGMA is a DJ, as well as the music director, at a local AM Christian radio station. He plays a wide variety of material when he’s on the air. He is also into helping local Christian artists and did give one of my songs (“That’s Believing in Your Product”) some air play.

But I’m not actively trying to build a fan base. My performances are mostly in health care facilities, like nursing homes, assisted living facilities, etc.

SC: What do your co-workers at Dillon’s think of your music?

RH: The few who have heard it have been appreciative and supportive. Dillon’s, like most companies, has a policy against employees discussing controversial subjects on the property … religion and politics being the prime examples. So I’ve had to choose my opportunities carefully.

SC: Describe for us the experience of seeing Richard Hackley live.

RH: You’ll see someone dressed cleanly, but casually. No suit and tie, but probably not blue jeans either. My Birkenstock sandals go everywhere with me.

The music and voice are easy listening. You will come away calm, relaxed, and maybe inspired. You won’t leave on an emotional high, just peaceful and confident. You will not be captivated by dance moves or high energy performing. It will all be very laid back. But as boring as that sounds, I seem to have a program and a stage presence that are enjoyable and captivating in their own ways. At least, I’ve been told this enough that I now believe it.

Elsewhere in this interview I mention being likened to Mr. Rogers. Though this was meant as criticism on that particular occasion, there have been 3 or 4 other people, spread over time, who have made the same comparison in a complimentary way.

SC: I see that you’ve been playing shows at correctional facilities
recently. How has that been going for you, particularly at the juvenile
facilities, where I’d imagine the inmates might be a little less willing
to accept God into their lives?

RH: Interesting you would specifically mention juveniles. One time I performed for a group of boys, 8-15 years old. After the program, they left the room in what seemed to be the same frame of mind as when they entered. This was a very unusual experience for me. But the chaplain said it was normal, and to just believe that some seeds had been planted.

The adult correctional facilities were a different story. There is always some visible lifting of burdens. Many of the messages of my songs help inmates see that being in a prison physically doesn’t mean you have to be in one mentally.

I’ve also played three gigs in a rehab facility for teens. Some of those teens were very bored by my program, seeming to resent either being stuck in that facility, or that they had to listen to me. Others, though, seemed to hang on every word.

SC: Do you have any upcoming, open-to-the-public appearances that you’d like
to tell us about?

RH: Thank you for the opportunity. I wish I did. The facilities I play are generally small and not really meant to be open to the public at large.

SC: Do you feel, or have you directly heard that you’ve reached any skeptics
and brought them around to Christianity with your music?

RH: I consistently have people approach me after a performance and thank me for the program and the messages. But I believe these are usually people who are already Christian. My ministry is more pastoral than evangelistic. I nurture the flock, rather than increase it.

SC: Your music has gotten, and gets a pretty interesting reaction from the
people who find it online. Do you have any anecdotes you’d like to share
about this?

RH: Most of the interesting stories center around the bad press I received from “God’s Backhand”.

One time a got an email from (no kidding) god@msn.com. He wasn’t too happy about “God’s Backhand”. He wrote, “If I had to ‘backhand’ anyone at this point, you would be up around the top of my list.”

I also received a courteous email from someone who heard “God’s Backhand” played on a talk radio show. He said I was characterized as a “nutcase”. I’m not completely sure of all the details involved, but it appears these radio personalities believed my song was written to support Israeli Prime Minister Sharon for his killing of Palestinians.

If you remove “God’s Backhand” off by itself, there is nothing in it to establish a context of current day Israel and PM Sharon. I think the radio folks may have already had a Middle East context in their mind when they heard “Backhand”. And perhaps I inadvertently caused this to happen. At the web page where I have “God’s Backhand”, I have another song called “God Is Not Neutral”, which refers to terrorists. If the radio folks listened to “Neutral” first, it would not take many steps in logic to apply a Middle East context to “Backhand”.

I replied to the individual (who emailed me about the radio program) and commended him for contacting me personally regarding the song’s meaning … something the radio folks did not do. In this case, the listener was wiser than those with the microphone.

SC: Did it bother you that some of the web sites that mentioned you poked
fun at your music in a mean-spirited way?

RH: I liked how you worded that. “Did”. Past tense.

At first it bothered me. But you have to toughen up or cave in. Someone (Madonna?) sings a song about there being no greater power than the power of good-bye. I’d put the power to ignore right up in that same category.

My tiny “leap to fame” was due to “God’s Backhand” being listed at a website called “Worst of the Worst: Very Bad Music on the Internet”. The critic who reviewed the song did not criticize the imagery or religious message of the song, but my singing of it. He described me as “an opiated Mr. Rogers”. Talk about a mind picture. Can you imagine the already tranquil Mr. Rogers on opium?

I think the critic was saying that a song with an aggressive message like “God’s Backhand” needed an aggressive voice to sing it. A valid point. But when I try to sing aggressively or intensely, it backfires. I don’t hit pitches as well, and my voice gets abrasive, unpleasant to listen to. (I have proof of this … old recordings of me from 10 years ago. Even I don’t enjoy listening to them.) I lose the calming effect. So I’m better off staying with an easy listening delivery.

The two obvious options were, 1- remove the song from public access, or 2- find someone else to sing it. Neither appealed.

A year later, still mulling over the critic’s remarks, I redid the song. I lowered the key a full step, which put it in a range where I could sing it with a bit more authority, without sacrificing the easy listening vocal style. I also removed some of the audio fx that seemed to trivialize the song, rather than add to it. (These fx also rated insults from the critic. Again, I eventually agreed with him that they were poor additions to the original version.)

One other website accused me of stealing music from Sega. I suppose it’s inevitable that if you keep writing, you eventually write something that sounds like something else. Most of us know the song “Battle Hymn of The Republic.” If you have opportunity, find a CD of Brahm’s Piano Concerto #2. Around the 10:00 mark of the first movement (on my CD it starts at 10:19) you’ll hear something remarkably similar.

SC: How effective have sites like mp3.com, IUMA, etc. been for you in the
difficult task of getting your music heard?

RH: If we’re talking about generating income or number of plays, it’s been quite disappointing. Sure, your music is now available world wide. But something has to bring people to your site. The number who stumble on to it is very, very small. My sites were overlooked by the millions, until “God’s Backhand” made it on the “Worst of The Worse” list.

But there have been some good non-financial rewards, mainly in the form of emails from people who have in some way been strengthened by something they heard in my lyrics.

SC: Has anyone ever approached you at work, on the street, etc. after
recognizing you from your picture on the Web?

RH: What are you saying? That I’ve put on weight? Lost some more hair? That I now need glasses to read? That it’s an old picture?

Seriously, the answer is no.

SC: How much time do you spend on the Internet?

RH: Maybe 30 minutes a week going to sites. But I may spend 1 to 3 hours a week at email.

SC: What are some of your favorite destinations online?

RH: One day it may be sites that offer free MIDI files of Christmas carols. A different day it may be the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office website. Depends on what I’m after.

SC: What are your feelings on mp3 file-sharing?

RH: It’s fine if the copyright owner has approved it. If not approved, our laws define it as theft.

Yes, I copyright all of my songs. But mp3 file-sharing is not an issue that causes me much concern since I offer my songs freely anyway. If I was actually trying to make a living at music, I’m sure I’d be more passionate about this.

My advice to others: I know the music industry seems like a financial monster that oozes greed. But it has the law on its side. Don’t endanger yourself by trying to steal from the monster’s food dish.

SC: As an ASCAP member, do you feel that the RIAA has your best interests at
heart with their campaign of lawsuits against individual music listeners?

RH: As an ASCAP member, I probably should be supportive of the RIAA. Again, since I freely give out my material, I’m spared the frustrations of having it duplicated and passed around against my wishes. I’m all for my songs getting distributed as widely as possible.

My ministry, like “My Big, Black Cock” I think, operates on a donation basis. We both believe in our causes and are willing to finance them out of our pocket if necessary.

As for my fellow ASCAP companions who make their living off royalties, etc., I cannot fault them for trying to protect themselves, or for supporting the RIAA if that is the case. I suppose I weaken their struggle by not joining into it. But if I did join in, it would probably cause me more problems (distractions) than profits.

SC: You began performing exclusively Christian music in 1994. Did this
coincide with you becoming a full-fledged Christian or being “born
again”, or were you always a Christian that just decided that this was
the music you wanted to do around that time?

RH: Not the holiest of motivations on my part here. I decided to do Christian music because my secular music was going nowhere. It’s sort of a sour grapes reason, and certainly a case of inverted priorities. But God has not held that against me. Which is probably a good example of His patience and forgiveness.

Plus, I simply found more important messages (to put into lyrics) from my study of the Bible. That’s why the switch happened in 1994. Mainly just to feel like I was accomplishing something worthwhile.

But when did I become a full-fledged Christian? As a child I attended a Christian church, but I never made a deliberate decision about Christ until March of 1971, when I sat through a Biblical research class, and decided the Bible would be my source for truth.

SC: If you haven’t always been a Christian, can you tell us a bit about your
life beforehand? Did you have any problems that brought you to God, or
did you live a relatively normal life?

RH: I had problems that brought me to God. Ego was perhaps the worst. A few other problems, also. Some of which would probably make good copy for “My Big, Black Cock”, but I’d rather just leave in their grave.

Dabbled some in drugs, too, mostly marijuana. There’s a story here. Around the age of twenty, I first tried marijuana because the lead guitarist in the band I was in said, “It puts you in touch with truth.” He didn’t really know how hungry I was for that. I took his statement at face value and adopted an almost clinical approach. I would sit down with paper and pencil in front of me, get high, and write down thoughts. I knew I was in no condition to recognize truth while stoned, but I figured the next morning, after my head cleared, I could study what I’d written and start putting the mysteries of life together.

The Bible talks about man being fascinated with the imaginations of his own mind. That’s a pretty good definition of ego. I may have taken that to a new level … or new low. The rambling and nonsense that I penned those nights was disappointing, frustrating and depressing. Sometimes it would seem I’d figure out some little bit of truth, but that would then generate a new question.

It was like an answer was really just bait to lure you into more uncertainty.

The most meaningful thought I had during those sessions (and the only thought I remember 30 years later) regarded the Beatle’s song, “Why Don’t We Do It in The Road?” I decided they were not talking about intercourse, but about taking a whiz.

Why would anybody want God if they can reach truth like that on their own?

But the upside is that in my search for truth using marijuana, I found something that absolutely did not work. It took me a major step closer to God and the Bible.

SC: As somewhat of a layman on these matters, I wasn’t able to nail this
next one down from hearing your lyrics. Do you consider yourself a part
of a particular sub-denomination (Baptist, Pentecostal, etc.), or do you
just think of yourself as a Christian?

RH: Just a Christian … a Bible believer. I rarely read things written about the Bible. I’d rather read the Bible itself. (One exception is The Prayer of Jabez by Bruce Wilkinson. I’m on my fourth reading of that little gem.)

SC: Do you attend church regularly, or do you practice your faith on your
own time?

RH: On my own time. Since March of 1971, I’ve been consistently, and pretty much daily, a student of the Bible. My present routine is to get up two hours before work each day (I go in at 5 a.m., so I’m up by 3 a.m.) to be sure I have some time to study the Bible. I have QuickVerse 7.0 (from Parsons Technology) installed on my computer and store all my notes there.

In the course of a year, I’ll go to a church 3 or 4 times. Seldom the same church. No, I don’t make a pest of myself and thus overstay my welcome. I sit quietly and listen. And I always leave each church with something that has helped my spiritual growth. But no church service will ever come close to matching the growth you get from your own systematic, private reading of the Bible.

SC: I’ve seen no mention of it on your various sites, but Fred Rogers didn’t
always beat people over the head with the fact that he was the Reverend
Fred Rogers, either. Are you now, or have you given thought at any point
of your life to becoming a minister?

RH: Again, not very holy motives on my part in this area. I am not a minister, and any thoughts I’ve had of becoming one are usually just inspired by my desire to stop working at a grocery store. Not the kind of motivation God is really looking for. Nor is it motivation strong enough to bear all the various responsibilities of a full time ministry.

SC: “Christianity” means a lot of things to a lot of different people. Your
songs seem to convey more of a hard-line, fundamentalist stance, but in
our correspondence, you’ve rather surprisingly come across so far as a
pretty open-minded guy in a lot of ways. Would you consider yourself
more of a “live and let live” Christian, or more of a “fire and
brimstone, cast down the sinners” type like the narrator in your songs?

RH: You say open-minded. I hope what you have picked up on is an absence of being judgmental. It is something I purposely try to prevent in myself, or correct if I detect it. An example is the first email you sent me. When I saw www.mybigblackcock.com, my mind instantly made judgments … erroneous ones. The nice thing about emails, though, is that you don’t have to respond quickly. It gives you time to recover from judgment errors and research a bit more.

I’m more of a “live and let live” Christian. I’ve heard several times that if you’re pointing a finger at someone, you’re pointing three back at yourself. I’ve actually examined myself a couple of times when I’ve been critical of someone else, and found the maxim to be true.

Romans 2:4 says it’s the goodness of God that reaches people and inspires them to change.

The narrator in my songs? He should be like me for the most part. The narrator in “God’s Backhand” and “God Is Not Neutral” is certainly hard-line, but those songs are exceptions rather than the rule.

Some of the hard-line atmosphere may be there because of the self-discipline needed to walk with the God of the Bible. I don’t want to suggest, by error of omission, that a walk with God requires no real work on a person’s part.

Most of my songs portray the goodness of God and the positives of living with God, rather than the negatives of not. This is a motif I deliberately monitor in my lyric writing.

One song I wrote, called “Why An Elbow?”, is perhaps an example. My first set of lyrics regarded the elbow as an illustration of two different approaches to life: reaching out (helping others), and bringing in (self-centeredness). But I didn’t like this good vs. bad theme. I wanted something that pointed to a positive for either direction of movement involving the elbow. So the ‘bringing in’ movement took on a theme of ‘taking care of yourself so you may better help others’. I made this change because there is already too much around us that triggers self-condemnation. I didn’t want “Why An Elbow?” to be another brick in that kind of building. Instead, I wanted it to suggest more constructive things. First, and most obvious, that God was quite brilliant in His design of our physical bodies. Second, on a more subtle level, that we are not as screwed-up as we are often led to believe.

SC: With organized religion of all faiths at the root of so many of the
world’s problems, is there ever a time where you find yourself thinking
that religion does more harm than good?

RH: Yes. Religion is frequently shooting itself in the foot.

Christianity is just as guilty as any other religion. But there’s a distinction I make that keeps me peaceful.

True Christianity is what God worked for us through Christ. When man starts inserting his own thoughts into it, you then have religion. These insertions have continued to increase over the years so that today, “Christianity” has splintered into lots of religions.

Despite that, the true Christianity that God originally intended is still available. How does one find it?

The Bible makes an important observation in Acts 11:26, “And the disciples were called Christians first in Antioch.”

If that is where the term ‘Christian’ was first coined, then the logical place to find God’s original version of Christianity would be from whatever inspired that term to be coined. The Book of Acts and the New Testament epistles are the closest source we have to this information.

SC: How would you justify all of the wars, murders, persecution, and
intolerance that nearly every one of the world’s major religions,
including Christianity, seems to foster in some way or another?

RH: That’s a tough one. I think many of the problems you listed start with someone being unsure, insecure, but needing to feel they are righteous. The apparent strategy is … if you can physically silence your opposition, that proves you are right.

It’s similar to that person who, in a disagreement with someone else, always has instant comebacks. Mr. Snappy doesn’t care if what he says is right or wrong. As long as words come out of his mouth last, he wins.

SC: Are you for or against the war in Iraq in particular, and the “war on
terrorism” in general?

RH: In the movie “For Love of The Game”, Kevin Costner stands on the pitcher’s mound ready to throw his first pitch of the game. As he stares down toward home plate, he knows he needs to focus his mind. He says to himself, “Clear the mechanism.” The din of the crowd fades into total silence. Now he is ready to pitch.

This is often what a Christian must do in the world.

As a Christian, the war in Iraq was a distraction. If I wasn’t at work, I was tuned to Fox News. I was getting nothing else done. No progress was made on new songs. My rehearsal discipline started to diminish. I wasn’t scheduling any new bookings. And any already scheduled bookings were interruptions to my “staying informed”.

As an American, though, following the eye-opening events of 9/11, I believe “America’s Backhand” needs to be felt from time to time by our enemies. One of the great secrets to maintaining peace is to maintain intimidation of your enemy. The terrorist leaders are talking tough and should be taken seriously. America cannot be a doormat for anyone to walk on.

SC: What do you think of the job that George W. Bush has done as President
so far?

RH: Instilling fear seems to be the immediate goal of terrorists. Why? The best answer I’ve seen is from Thomas Friedman. In his book Longitudes & Attitudes, he writes, “Unable to actually imprison us, these terrorists want us to imprison ourselves.”

The biggest challenge President Bush faces is to keep Americans from becoming afraid. Success or failure of this country to resolve other issues, like the economy, are probably riding on the American population being confident.

President Bush has been very courageous to act on what he believes will, in the long run, keep us from imprisoning ourselves. We take freedom for granted. But it can be removed from our country without even changing the Constitution. All it requires is for us to become afraid. No matter what rights and freedoms you have as an American citizen, they don’t help much if you live in fear.

I wish results of the searches for terrorists and W.M.D.’s could roll in faster and more convincingly. If I were president, I would be wavering in my certainty by now. But President Bush seems to have the strength to stay on the course he deems best. This is important in a leader. Someone who vacillates is not leading, but rather being led.

Someone in the military once said, “Indecision kills more men than wrong decisions.” Those who vacillate are probably just as dangerous to have at the helm.

President Bush has also made it clear that from now on that we cannot let down our guard. This reminds me of a “Star Trek” episode from the early series with Captain Kirk, Mr. Spock, etc. I love that series, but there was one particular episode that always left me feeling uneasy. It was called “Lazarus”, and involved a parallel universe.

A man called Lazarus had discovered a small passage between the two universes. But Lazarus had an evil counterpart in the other universe who had also discovered this passage. Both Lazarus’s knew that if both of them were in the same universe at the same time, it would set off a chain reaction explosion that would end all existence. Naturally, this is what the evil Lazarus intended to do. So each time he went through the passage one way, the good Lazarus would pass through the other way, thus keeping existence intact.

Kirk and Spock would meet with the good Lazarus when he was in their universe. They hatched a plan that during one of the exchanges, when both Lazarus’s were in the passageway, the Enterprise would seal both exits shut, locking the two Lazarus’s in that tiny area, where they would spend eternity in combat with each other. The plan worked, and the episode ends pretty much on that note.

As I said, this always left me uncomfortable because I was not much of confrontational person to begin with, and the thought of never being able to relax and let my guard down just plain depressed me.

Now America seems to be in this Lazarus scenario.

If, when President Bush leaves office, he leaves a confident America for the next president, then Bush will have been a great success, accomplishing more for our future than any laws or programs ever could.

SC: What are your views on legalized abortions, and population control
(birth control, etc.) in general?

RH: Let me provide a verse for the answer. Note how early this verse is in the Bible. One of the keys to Biblical research is to go to the first record involving whatever you are studying. There you find basic, ground work truths that will help you solve more complex issues.

Genesis 2:7 “And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.”

Note all of the elements that must be in place before God calls someone a “living soul”. No argument (claiming to be documented by the Bible), for or against abortion or birth control, can be valid without staying true to this verse.

SC: What are your views on the death penalty?

RH: For it. I also think public executions (maybe even televised?) should be considered. That would wake people up to being more accountable for their actions.

SC: What are your views on gay marriages, and homosexuality in general?

RH: To someone who believes the Bible is generally good stuff to live by, homosexuality would be acceptable. But to someone who believes the Bible is God’s Word, homosexuality must be seen as something God did not intend. I’m in the latter group.

But don’t ask me to condemn gays. I will report what I read on the pages of the Bible. It’s up to each person what respect they give it.

Does being a homosexual make someone hell-bound unless they change? No. Not if they are born again. Based on the New Testament, the only thing that makes a person hell-bound is to never, at any point in their life, accept the savior. Romans 10:9 gives the simplest, nutshell instruction on how to acquire eternal life: “That if thou shalt confess [accept] the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, though shalt be saved [made whole, i.e. born again].” If a gay person obeys this verse, he/she will get the same result as anyone else.

Being homosexual does not put an uncrossable wall between a person and God.

I have aspects of my life that, by now, should be out of my life, if I were a perfect Christian. But there are things that I haven’t yet been able to shake. The head-on struggle to give these things up, and the repeated failures to accomplish it, were starting to make me think I was a failure, rather than the success the Bible says I am. I finally had to stop the struggle and simply be faithful to what I could do. The growth from this approach may at some point enable me to discard other qualities I don’t want. But at least now I’m moving forward with God again.

SC: Are you familiar with fellow Kansas resident Rev. Fred Phelps (owner of
godhatesfags.com)? If so, what are your feelings on him and his “teachings”?

RH : I’m somewhat familiar with his outspokenness on this issue. The website name is too harsh for me to think I want to hear more of what he has to say.

SC: Do you feel that the separation between church and state in the U.S. is
valid (taking into account the fact that this country was founded by
people who were looking to escape religious persecution by an oppressive
government), or is it time to strike that from the lawbooks?

RH: To me that’s a no-brainer. Keep church and state separate. Otherwise, I can see nothing happening but a dismal repeat of history.

SC: The fact that you’re associating with a somewhat unsavory element like
this web site to get the word out begs an interesting question: would
you give up your own salvation to save someone else?

RH: If that scenario was possible, my answer would be, “Probably not”. I haven’t grown in love enough.

But the question is theoretical as the situation will not arise. The new birth is incorruptible seed (1 Peter 1:23) in every cell of the body. I couldn’t give it up anymore than I could give up the seed I got from my earthly parents.

SC: Do you think that doing this interview will reach someone and bring them
around to Christianity?

RH: I imagine if something good along those lines happened, it might more likely be that a person, raised as a Christian but not currently practicing, might feel moved to get recommitted.

SC: Ultimately, what are you trying to convey to people through your music?

RH: That the Bible is God’s Word, and that God is for them, rather than against them.

There can only be one Supreme Being. I’m hoping I can convince some that the Bible is where to learn of Him.

SC: How would you like yourself and your music to be remembered?

RH: As for me … people can (and will) forget about me. The message is more important than the messenger. As for my songs … that at least some of them were choice segments of the message.

SC: Is there anything else that you’d like to share with us that hasn’t been
covered during the course of this interview?

RH: I have another free product available. Not music, but something I wrote in 2000 called “Basics of The Bible”. It’s pretty much what it sounds like. A crash course in understanding the Bible. It can be read in one or two evenings, but I hope you would take longer.

If you’ve liked my answers to this interview, or the messages in my songs, you’ll probably like “Basics of The Bible”. I’m sure Scott would call it “bombastic”, if that gives you anymore indication. I can send it to anyone with email. You may contact me through either one of the two web pages listed below. In your email, please request “Basics of The Bible”, if that is what you want.

http://artists2.iuma.com/IUMA/Bands/Richard_C._Hackley/

(this site has the highest quantity of my songs)

http://www.soundclick.com/bands/5/songsermons.htm

(this is the only site where you may hear the controversial “God’s Backhand”)

Gene Hoglan of Strapping Young Lad (Photo Credit: Matt Fisne)

I caught up to drumming god Gene Hoglan (Strapping Young Lad, Death, Dark Angel) on a street corner in New York City (no, he wasn’t looking for hookers) before SYL’s show there with Samael and Cathedral, and he graciously answered a question that’d been on my mind since I first saw him perform.

Scott Crawford: Gene, how do you make it look so easy? You do this crazy shit behind a drum kit, and it looks effortless for you.

Gene Hoglan: Well, it’s not brain surgery, man…it’s just metal drumming.

SC: Have a great show tonight!

GH: Thanks, brother!

“OH! MY! FU! CKING! GOD!” Devin Townsend live at Toronto’s Opera House, 10/03/03.
(Photo Credit: Matt Gahagan)

For the uninitiated, Devin Townsend is one of the most prolific and exciting artists in music today. Since beginning his career at 19 as a singer with Steve Vai’s band on the 1993 “Sex And Religion” album/tour, Devin has exploded forth with a prodigious musical output under a variety of different monikers, most notably Strapping Young Lad. His music, described by many as “progressive metal”, is an unparalleled mix of heaviness and melody…intensity and brutality juxtaposed with an almost pop sensibility at times. Townsend’s music will kick your ass all over the place, but you’ll find yourself humming it later in the infirmary whether you want to or not. There’s simply too much musical ground to cover in a brief introduction, but the web site of Devin’s label, Hevy Devy Records should do it some justice.

My Big, Black Cock sent two devoted brothers of metal, Mark Y. and Jamie Olmsted, to interview Devin before the Toronto date of his marathon “All In The Family” tour, which included Strapping Young Lad as headliners, as well as his latest “Devin Townsend Band” project and the metal gods Zimmers Hole (featuring Jed Simon and Byron Stroud of SYL). The following is a transcription of what happened. Metal discretion is advised. :D

Jamie Olmsted: So, the US tour with Samael and Cathedral went well?

Devin Townsend: Yeah it was good…it was good…we did Superjoint Ritual right before that too, so like, it’s been like, bangbangbang…

Mark Y.: Oh yeah? How are those guys on tour?

DT: Great, yeah, they’re great…really really cool.

MY: I’ve got their two albums and…

DT: *looking at Mark’s laptop*

MY: Sorry, forgot to print off the fucking questions…

DT: No, it’s cool, just checking out the computer. Is it actually more road worthy, or does it just look it?

MY: Oh, it’s worthy, it’s worthy…just me work laptop…

*Devin stops to talk to road manager about other interviews lined up*

MY: Ok, so any crazy shit happening on this tour, band wise?

DT: You know, it’s been such a long year of touring, I don’t even process the crazy shit anymore. It’s like, “Oh God, there’s crazy shit going on in the front lounge, I’m gonna go to sleep”. *laughter* I mean, I don’t fuck groupies, I don’t do hard drugs, I don’t drink that much. Touring for me’s just a job…a real awesome, fucking cool job, but it’s still something I really have to devote serious energy to or else I just can’t do it properly, ya know?

JO: You’ve gotta do it right.

DT: Yeah you do, you really do. It may be your 50th show in a row, but it might be some person who’s like a big fan, it’s the first time they’ve *ever* seen you, right? So you gotta be “on”.

MY: Yeah, it was like for me, on your last show here, the Club Rockit one, I had been waiting for that show forever since I’d never seen you guys before then and the buildup was killing me.

JO: Yeah, that was my first SYL show, too.

DT: Cool, it was a hard one, too.

JO: You guys were on! It was great.

DT: Yeah…but..we weren’t, that’s the thing…that’s the thing about the consistency of the show, even when you’re “not on” you gotta be “on”.

JO: When the sequencer died at the end there…

MY: …and Munash (keyboardist) just lost it…

DT: *laughs* Yeah, but all those things, it’s just part of the entertainment. I mean, we’re here to entertain, ultimately…so the show has lots of elements of “we’re entertaining ourselves, too, right”? So if the the show isn’t going right, or we’ve had a bad day…you know, then it’s a good idea to have fun and see what happens.

MY: Are there any bands around right now who are kicking your ass?

DT: New Dimmu Borgir is fucking Kick ASS! Meshuggah, of course…Opeth…you’re talking metal, right?

MY: Oh hell no, anything…

DT: Immortal…anything? Fuck, I love everything, man. Ween…you know, ABBA, AC/DC, Andrew W.k., Carcass…whatever, ya know what I mean? Morbid Angel…fuckin’… like Old Lady Driver, Stravinski…anything, really, it just doesn’t matter. My music’s not really about the music, it’s more about the statement, so as a result of that I try to take in as much as I can to make it as varied as possible. If for no other reason than to keep myself interested, right?

JO: Well, that’s who you make the music for, after all…

DT: Kind of a combination of both, really. You make it for yourself, first, with the knowledge that there’s gonna be other people that are gonna be taking it in, so it’s kind of a good symbiosis.

MY: So did you get a kick out of the Punky Bruster album knocking Metallica’s “Load” out of the number one spot in Japan?

DT: Heh, it was only a couple of charts…I mean, I’m pretty separated from what we do, you know? From the whole “career” it’s kind of like, things happen…we’ve had moderate successes in some places and everything, but it’s still…it just doesn’t mean anything…it’s like…it’s like…the more that shit I know about, the more fights I get into with my friends, right? It’s more just like, “Yeah, that’s cool.”, ya know what I mean? That’s great…

MY: Have you heard their (Metallica’s) new record?

DT: Yeah, I got it. Went out and bought it.

MY: What’d you think of it?

DT: Uh, it’s cool. I don’t like it, but it’s cool, ya know? I mean, I can get why they did it that way…it’s pretty pure from that angle, but it’s just not really relevant to me anymore. It’s like, you put on, you know…Anemic or fuckin’ Dimmu, or any of these new bands, that are doing “metal”, and it’s just like, “Ah, whatever guys, like you missed the boat fucking years ago”. Although I hear their live show is just stunning…

MY: Yeah, I hear they’re still really kickin’ it in that respect…But speaking of Metallica, you can’t do so these days without bringing up the RIAA. What do you think of music downloading?

DT: Download the fuck out of it. Download everything I’ve ever done, and give it to your friends. If you like it, buy a t-shirt.

MY: Yeah, like that’s how I got him (Jamie) into your material, sent him one song and that was it…

DT: Awesome. The whole point is to get people to *hear* your shit…

JO: Yep, track one off of “City” and it was downhill from there…

DT: Chances are you might’ve bought something from hearing that…

JO: Yep, bought every CD you have off of Hevy Devy after that…

DT: Yeah! Exactly! Thank you! That’s the point, and I think denying that is just like shooting yourself in the foot.

JO: It’s better than the radio to get things out there…

DT: I agree. I mean, it’s just like, fuckin’ the whole purpose of making music is for people to hear it and the Internet’s a great forum for that, right? So, get it out. Film my shows, whatever…*laughter*

MY: I read an interview with Gene he did during your last Toronto show, and he was asked to give a one sentence synopsis of your live show. I believe he said, “We’ll rip your fucking head off.”…you agree with that, I mean, when you’re “on”?

DT: *laughs* Oh yeah, of course, even when we’re not “on” we’ll rip your head off.

MY: Yeah, that show kicked my ass for your entire set…

DT: cool…cool…we’ll do it again tonight, too. It’s like, it’s like…Strapping is really a vicious fucking musical chaos thing, but it’s cool…

JO: Oh yeah.

MY: For me Strapping just reaches out, grabs you, and you’re like, “Ok, fuck, time to go kill something…”

DT: Yeah, yeah it is…

JO: On that note, do you think there’s anyone who rocks harder than Strapping?

DT: Of course…in their way, right? No one rocks harder than us in our way, you know what I mean?

MY: Right…right…for the writing process for S.Y.L., how do you get in that mindset? Do you sit down and go, “Ok, I’m gonna write a Strapping record. It has to be heavier and angrier than anything out there right now”?

DT: Not necessarily. It’s just…like, I think most of making music is the organisation of it. You know, if you’re in an evironment where your jam spot’s cool, everybody’s sounds are cool, your guitars are tuned up, everybody’s cool, you’ve got a joint, smoke…everybody’s got a beer, it’s late at night, the lighting’s good, no one’s got any stresses at home…the right group of people can make fucking brilliant shit. Spearheaded by any one of those members, right?

And that’s kinda how I feel about any of my projects, it’s like, “get in the right mood”, and then, music happens. It’s always there to get, like…I mean, the only time music doesn’t happen is when you’re fuckin’…not in the right headspace…and it’s like, I’m in a different headspace with every group of people I’m with, I’m a chameleon, I think, so I think at that level, it’s like “OK, these people have this energy and so we’ll write music based around how I feel when I’m in their presence.”, you know what I mean?

JO: For sure…

DT: It just works…I mean, I’ve got 50 different projects…

MY: How do you maintain that kind of consistency though? ’cause all of these bands, like Ocean Machine, Physicist, Terria, Infinity, DTB and of course Strapping…they all manage to kick so much ass. How the fuck do you *do* that?

DT: Well, I think…thank you. Well…why shouldn’t it? I mean, why would I wanna put something out that doesn’t kick ass? It’s like…’cause when I listen back to it, I’m kind of like, the records that I have done that don’t kick ass, I’m kind of like, “Why didn’t I just fucking do a little more?”, I know what I should’ve done, why didn’t I wanna do that at that time? Because I was tired. Ok, well, just be a better worker. Like, a lot of metal of any sort of consistency in music is being a hard worker. I mean, you can only party so much before your body’s just like, “I can’t take any more…man, I gotta sleep”. You know what I mean?

“I’ve been up 12 days on this fucking drug” or whatever, “I can’t fucking function anymore”, let alone write something other people are gonna wanna relate to. So for me, I’m like, “Party…but keep it simple, don’t fuck yourself up”…

JO: …in moderation…

DT: In moderation, you know what I mean…and then, and then process it, and work hard. Take all that fucking partying you did and all those experiences and all those stupid bullshit things that happen on tour, and like, “How does that make you feel emotionally?”, and then, work hard to make a statement about that, and that kinda is a synopsis of the year. Once that year’s done, you can kinda listen to the record and go, “Oh, ok”, and move on.

MY: Got anything in the works now, or…?

DT: Oh yeah, dude. Fuck yeah, I got a record call Tetramental, and it’s like a musical…

MY: Oh, ok…

DT: …but it’s not cheesy…it’s cool.

JO: Rock!

DT: It’s like…yeah, I got a book…and I got like, this TV show…more DTB stuff…more SYL stuff…I’ve got tons of productions I’m doing next year…

JO: DTB really kicked my ass, man…

DT: Thanks man.

JO: …like, right out of the gate.

DT: Cool.

JO: It’s such a…well, pretty much every record’s kicked my ass, but, it really…it grabs you, sonically.

DT: Yeah. It’s kinda funny, it’s like, each record is written around a specific headspace and it seems each record seems to attract its own crowd, to a certain extent. You know what I mean? Some people are like, “I like it. I like what it was hinting at prior…but this one”, like Terria, or DTB or fuckin’ Ocean Machine or whatever, it’s like, “That’s the one that really sorta speaks to me”, and I’m kinda, “Oh, that’s cool”, right? Because it’s like that kinda indicates you know that the job’s being done correctly…because it’s like the emotions that we’re singing about and all these things that we’re singing about are not…unusual.

JO: You’ve managed to write an album for just about every headspace I have.

DT: Well yeah, cool, but I think, as we get older, new headspaces will arise. As I get older, I’ll just keep writin’ about ‘em, right? So it’s like some people will listen to some and say, “That’s the best thing he’s done”, other people say, “*That’s* the best thing he’s done”, or whatever, right? Some people hate certain things, but I’m just kinda like, that’s cool, I mean, as long as you like *some* of it, then at least we’re doing our job…you know, partially, right?.

JO: Oh yeah…

DT: I mean, there’re some people listen to DTB and like a song like “Storm”, or “Life” off the Ocean Machine record, and then they listen to “Oh My Fucking God”, or “Rape Song”, and they’re just like, “No no no no…I can’t… I can’t-deal- with that…I don’t -want to- listen to that…but I really like *this*”, right?

So I’m kinda like, “Cool…cool”, but I’m split, right? I kinda like, I like all of it, you know what I mean? And it’s like, as a result of that, I mean, I’m a real chaotic mind, because it’s like I never really at ease but at the same time, it’s like, a cool place to be, because there’s always…shit to do, you know what I mean?

JO: Exactly how I see it.

MY: You’ve been so often and so long recently, just wondering where your favourite places to play are?

DT: I like America. I like Canada. I like Korea a lot. I like Japan. I like Australia. I like Germany. I like France…I like England…

MY: So basically, you just…like -all- of it…

DT: Yeah, I don’t like Carmel, Saskatchewan.

*laughter*

DT: No, no, I do. We were treated very well there…by the 6 people who showed up…

JO: Oooh, ouch.

MY: Yeah, I read about that somewhere on the ‘net I think…

DT: No, I like Carmel. I don’t wanna be dissin’ Carmel, they had some of the best food we’d ever eaten.

JO: Nice!

DT: Yeah, but it was just like…some gigs stand out…-that- stood out in my mind. Some gigs stand out in your mind and you just go, “Wow, what a fucking headfuck”, right? Other ones are just like, “Ah y’know, part of the job…’nother day at the mill”, ya know?

MY: So you guys got a practical joker in your midst on tour?

DT: Jed.

MY: What kind of shit does he pull?

DT: *laughs* Ah, fuck…punch you in the face while you’re asleep.

*laughter*

MY: That sounds unpleasant…

JO: I’ll have to try that one…

DT: Yeah, you don’t fuck with Jed, man. Jed’s the Pirate of the group, man, he’ll fuckin’ swashbuckle you.

*Jamie and I burst into laughter*

DT: He’ll swab your poopdeck.

JO: Oooooooh…bad.

MY: So what do you do to blow off steam and relax when you’re not on stage?

DT: Smoke pot. Writes -lots- of music. Write lots in my diary. I listen to -lots- of music. I’m a computer freak, man, I just fucking can’t get away from my computer. So when I’m not on stage, I’m either on the phone or on my computer.

MY: Sounds like me…only without the touring part…

DT: *laughs*

MY: Any signifigance behind all the water imagery in your music?

JO: Like rain…oceans, all that…

DT: I think…I think it’s more psycho…not psychosomatic, I guess…”psychological”, it’s more just like I grew up in Vancouver where it rains a lot, so it’s like…I just -like- it, but I think, maybe on a deeper level it’s that sorta knowledge that human beings are like 96% water, too, so it’s…it’s a tie we’ve kind of got to it. Plus life kinda flows…and there’s lots of metaphor an’ shit…

JO: Like the “cleansing” of rain…

DT: Sure, I mean, any of that shit…I mean, but it’s like…I mean, my music means something really specific, but you know, I’ll never tell, ya know, what it is.

Ya know, because it’s delusional and retarded, but I mean it’s like in terms of what it’s supposed to mean? It’s not supposed to mean ANYthing, man. Like, it’s supposed to mean something to -me-, but I’ll be fucked if I tell anybody what it means….

JO: …something different to everybody…

DT: Absolutely. To the lyrics…and the artwork, and everything is written around purposely being vague about very broad emotions, so it can kind of apply to certain scenarios…well, the scenarios apply very specifically to things in my life as an artist, right, but I mean, you’re not gonna find out what that is, so…*laughs*

It’s just not important. I mean, it’s like the music is about people relating to it. I mean, I remmeber listening to a Rush song when I was a kid going, “Wow, that means -this- to me” and finding out it mean -that- instead, and it’s like, “Oh…uh…”

JO: I guess it’s good to leave the mystery in there…

DT: Yeah, totally. Totally…

MY: Like let people think it means whatever to them…whatever it may be…

DT: Of course, and it does, essentially, because it’s not supposed to mean -anything-. Like, I mean, there’s no fucking big anything, there’s no hidden meaning, there’s nothin’, it’s just…there is to me, but that’s only ‘because I’m fuckin’ the person who created it, right? But in terms of other people, like, whatever man, let it just compliment your life, and when you don’t like it, throw it away. You know what I mean? It’s entertainment, man, fuck it.

If you -wanna- get deep with it, it’s all there, but if you don’t then fuckin’ jam out, right? Come to the show, it’s entertaining.

MY: Ever written anything for a specific project and then finish it and go, “Nah, doesn’t belong here” and have it end up on another project?

DT: Oh, sure.

MY: Does that happen a lot or can you usually keep on track?

DT: I dunno, I kind of get stuck on themes, and when I’m writing for that theme, I kind of write it to the exlusion of everything else. I keep all the other stuff on my laptop, right, but it’s like…I’ll be like ok, like this Tetramental thing, you know, I think about mirrors, for example…or Infinity, or fuckin’…whatever, right, that sense of that, that whole theme that’s kinda…behind it, I’m just gonna go “there”, for a year, and see what comes out of it. I may have a couple of riffs that come along, but I’m just usually like, “Ah, nah nah nah”, and I forget about ‘em, and it’s like, this (points to the tape recorder) is what I use, to write. Like, that exact same sort of thing…except not stereo. That and a notebook, ya know? It’s like, the good ideas you remember, and the bad ones just fuckin’…float away…and I mean, sure, it might’ve been a -great- song, but I mean, fuck it….there’s more where that came from.

JO: Indeed!

MY: So you got an ETA for this Tetramental?

DT: Probably by the end of next year.

MY: How about the book?

DT: It’s gonna be part of Tetramental. The digipak’s gonna have another bonus disc with three separate projects and 5 songs each on it that I’ve done over the years…over this year in the back of the bus.

It’s like, I’ve got another techno project, and like, this crazy retard project, and it’s like, everybody having a party and making a song out of everybody’s little soliloquy sort of thing. It’s stupid, but it’s cool bonus shit.

JO: Excellent, yeah.

DT: The book, it’s gonna be like a hardcover CD with a 50 page book, in the CD. It’s gonna be a real comprehensive project.

MY: Do have an all-time favourite book of your own?

DT: I don’t read that much…I like Heavy Metal [magazine]…it’s got philosophy in it, you know…and sex, and violence…and rock’n'roll and the whole the whole works, and it’s got pictures, so I’m cool with that…

*laughter*

All-time favourite book? Nah, don’t read enough to have one…

MY: Alright, cool…so you have an EP of cover songs on the queue…

DT: Yeah, we’re gonna wait for that, for a little while…we’ve kinda blown ourselves out with touring this year, and it’s like…I’ve got to do a couple of productions and…write some more music…and…get some other shit out of my system, then we’ll get back to that.

MY: Do you have the songs chosen that you’ll be covering?

DT: We’re tossing around things, but there’s nothing really definite…we’re gonna wait ’til we reach that bridge…

MY: Some interesting threads going on about that on the SYL forum page…I think some one mentioned wanting you guys to cover some Bee Gees or some shit…

DT: *laughs* It’ll be good, man. It’s gonna be real dominating.

MY: Awesome, looking forward to it…

JO: Do you have a favourite song to play live? Anything that rises above the rest?

DT: From Strapping? Strapping would be…hmmm…”In The Rainy Season”, probably…

JO: That’s a great track…

DT: Yeah, it’s really fun to play.

JO: I would imagine so!

DT: It’s easy, and it’s effective, too.

JO: I’m guessing a lot of people like Detox, live…

DT: Yeah, it’s hard, though. Yeah, at the end of the set after 8 weeks of touring…fuckin’, my throat is just like, “Come on!”…

MY: That’s something I meant to ask…how the fuck do you keep your voice intact?!

DT: Well, it’s fucked up now, but I mean, it’s still kinda there…I could pull it off. It’s like, “fuck it”, whatever man…I’ll do it…until I can’t do it, ya know…

MY: At least until your throat fucking implodes…

DT: Totally man, try to make a big dent while I can do it, and hope that I got the strength to do it for a long time…

MY: Well, at least you shouldn’t have to worry about this place being a fucking oven tonight, well, not like Club Rockit was the last time…

DT: No…no, that was insanity.

JO: When the heat kills your sequencer, it’s time to pack it in…

*laughter*

DT: Man, that was Fucked Up.

MY: What do you think about the crowds in TO?

DT: I don’t really notice crowds, to be honest…I mean, everywhere you go, there’s people, right?

JO: Any place you do notice a signifigant difference in crowd reaction, though?

DT: Not really. I mean, it’s kinda like…because the subject matter is pretty broad, it’s like, everywhere we go, people relate to it. So it’s like, on the level that I want to relate to people that I meet, it’s like everybody’s trying to speak in the same language. So, that being said, everyone appreciates it in their own way…some crowds don’t really respond…other crowds go apeshit…but everybody kind of digs it in their own way, and that’s cool.

MY: ‘Cause in my experience the last few years, Toronto crowds are notorious for being (in my opinion), lame asses when it comes to metal shows…

DT: So’s Vancouver, man, I grew up with it.

MY: Heh, guess every scene seems like that from the inside…

DT: Yep.

MY: Alright man, that’s most of the shit we had written down…

DT: Right on, brothers…

JO: A friend of ours we just got listening to Strapping has been going around to his friends saying, “This is methamphetamines for your ears”.

DT: *laughs* I can see that…

JO: …and he’s now totally embraced all things SYL…but anyways, I think that’s one of the better analogies I’ve heard for Strapping Young Lad.

DT: Man, I’ve never done meth, so I can’t tell, but I can imagine man, I saw that movie, “Spun”…

JO: Hah, yeah!

DT: That’s awesome, man! [ in reference to the SYL wallpaper Mark has on his laptop ]

MY: Yeah man, some people online have come up with some awesome artwork for your stuff. It’s cool.

DT: Alright, I’ve gotta do this next interview, so…

MY: No problem man, thanks a shitload for the time, and it was awesome sitting down and talking with you, man.

JO: This has been awesome, thanks!

MY: Expect to see us killing ourselves in the pit for the show tonight, and have an great show, Devin!

DT: Thanks, I appreciate it, brothers.

Cathedral, from left to right: Brian Dixon (drums), Lee Dorrian (vocals), Garry “Gaz” Jennings (guitars), and departed bassist Leo Smee (Photo Credit: Joe Dilworth)

Kings of doom metal. Reincarnated 70′s rock gods. One of the hardest-working, longest-suffering bands in metal. Take your pick, Cathedral fit the bill. I sat down with founder/vocalist Lee Dorrian and guitarist Garry “Gaz” Jennings as they were wrapping up their U.S. tour with Samael and Strapping Young Lad, and we made our way through their views on the recent metal scene, how they’ve coped with being survivors of the “next best thing” curse (among others they seem to have endured), and what it truly means to be ‘eavy.

SC: On “The 7th Coming” as doomy as it is, you really come across like a band who are emerging from the other end of the tunnel. Would you say you feel that way?

Lee: Hmmm…hard to say, really, because…I don’t think it’s that much more advanced or different than anything we’ve done before, previous to the “Endtyme” album, really…that one was a lot more dark, a lot more primitive sounding, a lot more…doom, shall we say? We’d done five albums up to that point, and the band had been together for over ten years. There had been loads of highs and lows up until that point, and periods of time where we were kind of strapped. There were a couple of years where we were doing absolutely nothing. There were various lineup changes up until about ’95. Loads of things had happened.

After recording 5 albums in the same kind of way where production played a really big role…to go back a bit further, when we did “The Ethereal Mirror”, our second album, that was for Columbia Records in the States, and production on that was really big…there was a lot of money spent on it. I think we unwillingly set a standard of production with that album that we had to try and maintain with like a quarter of the budget. By the time we’d done our fifth album, “Caravan Beyond Redemption”, we just wanted to break ourselves of that kind of trap, that production kind of trap.

So with “Endtyme”, we wanted to go back to what the band meant to us in the first place, the whole feeling of intensity, and the whole reason and passion for doing this kind of music, without having to depend so much on production. That’s why we went for such a bombastic sound on that album. A lot of the internal dark, dirgy feelings of hatred came through us on that album. When we approached “The VIIth Coming”, we’d kind of rid ourselves of a lot of that angst, and we just approached it in a much more musical way, I suppose. It wasn’t really linear doom…we had a varied amount of different types of songs that seemed to flow better. They contrasted each other a little better.

SC: You sound relaxed on it.

Lee: I think so. I mean, a lot of the records we’ve done…since “Caravan Beyond Redemption”, all the albums have been pretty much prepared before we went into the studio. Before that, there was a lot of last-minute stuff. There were a lot of times when we were actually writing stuff in the studio five minutes before songs were recorded. A lot of it was very spontaneous and last minute. Since “Caravan”, we’ve been a lot more prepared, and I guess since we’ve been around for so long…the band’s been together for thirteen years, we don’t get so stressed out about writing stuff anymore. It seems to come to us more naturally these days.

In some ways, it’s easier to come up with material, but it’s harder to decide what material to use. I guess over the years, we’ve had so many different kinds of influences. You know what you’re going to get from Cathedral, but at the same time, we have experimented with different styles and different elements, where it’s been kind of extreme doom, or more 70′s-influenced hard rock or out-and-out heavy metal, or whatever you want to say, even proggy folk stuff. There’s been elements of all that in our music, so to have one specific direction running all the way through an album is kind of hard for us to…it’s harder than actually coming up with the material, shall we say?

SC: Even with all of the experimenting, you guys are still so goddamned heavy, especially live. When you’re playing, are you ever worried that the Earth’s going to collapse inward underneath you as you play?

Lee: We could always be heavier. That’s all we can say. On this tour in America, it’s weird, because we normally play a lot louder than we’re actually allowed to play over here. It seems like there’s a lot more restrictions over here than there are in Europe. For us, it’s kind of like we’re not firing on all four cylinders really, because we’re normally a lot more brutal live than we have been over here, as far as volume goes, anyway.

SC: I’m going to have to go to Europe, then.

*laughter*

Lee: So it can always get heavier, y’know?

Gaz: I think Cathedral has always strived to be as heavy as we possibly can be. We always strive to be heavy.

Lee: But without being stupidly heavy.

Gaz: Yeah, I mean, there’s heavy good, and heavy bad. A lot of these newer bands seem to just be heavy for heavy’s sake. I mean, there’s a knack to it. There’s gotta be some good riffs and good melody as well. When I was a kid, the heaviest band around was Sabbath. You always defined heaviness by what Sabbath were about. I’d say “Oh, I want to be in a band as heavy as Sabbath”, and it still bears true to myself, anyway, and I think the rest of the guys in the band. All I can say about us live is that we are pretty much a raw, heavy rock ‘n’ roll band, whatever you want to call it. We just go out and play our instruments, and it’s real, what you hear. It’s not computerized, it’s not processed, there’s none of that. There’s feedback, there’s mistakes, there’s tuning up between songs…

Lee: More of a punk attitude, really…

Gaz: None of this bloody fartin’ around with this, and getting up there with a big sort of introduction or anything, no “here we come”, we just get up there and ROCK. That’s what it’s about for us.

Lee: It’s like you say, you consider us to be very heavy, which is cool, but kids who are like 16, 17 probably wouldn’t consider us to be heavy at all, because we don’t use that technology. We don’t just play on an open E chord and scream and growl our heads off. To them, that’s heavy. To us, heaviness comes from more than that. There’s gotta be some kind of feeling and soul to it. That comes from riffs, I think, and that’s what I find lacking from a lot of heavy modern music these days is riffs.

Gaz: I mean, and no disrespect to some of the bands that have played with us, but a lot of the newer bands we’ve played with, as soon as they start the soundcheck or play the first song, you know exactly what they’re going to be like for the rest of the set. It’s all “dukka-dukka-dukka-dukka…” I don’t know. They think that’s heavy, just playing one note and doing it as hard as they can, but to me…

Lee: It’s just not adventurous…

Gaz: There’s nothing happening. Not exciting at all. Anyone can do it, really. We could do it on our next album. We could EASILY do it. We’d like to think that there’s a bit more thought going into our music than that sort of thing. We try to, anyway, definitely. Like Lee was saying, the riffs and all that…we strive to write good songs. That’s one thing we always try and do. I’m not saying every band doesn’t…every band does, but we always put a bit of thought into what we’re doing…where the song’s actually going, what the riffs are about and stuff like that, how catchy they are, how heavy they are.

Lee: It’s easy to be a band like Earth or something like that, kind of a straight-out linear kind of doom band. To me that’s heavy as hell, but we’re different than that, I think. We’re more about structures in our songs. Not essentially all the time, but mainly.

SC: Gaz, what do you use to make your guitar sound the way it does? It sounds like it’s simultaneously, rapidly detuning on all six strings, sorta like the first note of “Iron Man” cubed.

Gaz: *laughs* Well, it’s a big secret…nah, I’m only kidding. There is a knack to playing that kind of way. It’s not rocket science or anything, what I do, but when other people get on my guitar and play…you’ll hear it if we do a linecheck tonight, if the guitar tech gets on my guitar, it sounds like he can’t play a note. He can play a little bit, but when he gets on mine, it sounds out of tune and everything. When I play…because we have downtuned a lot…I know how to attack the strings and how to bend them. You get used to a certain thing. It’s like when you buy a pair of football boots, they’ve gotta fit you properly to make sure you play well. It’s the same with a guitar, in terms of how I play and how I attack the strings and bend the notes. I’ve been doing it for years.

In terms of the sound, I’ve just got an old pedal which I’ve had since about ’85, and I’ve got an equalizer. The Marshall that I’ve got is a Marshall 800, which I got in about ’94 or something like that, but I did have to shop around a bit. I was looking for an amp to give me a really good sound, and once I got that, I haven’t changed it since. Why change something if you’ve got a killer sound? Why keep messing around with different amps, and doing this and that when you’ve got a sound that, like you say, you instantly recognize as “a Cathedral sound”? There’s things we do in the studio to enhance things, but I’m happy with the guitar sound I’ve got. You’re not the first person who’s said that we’ve got a killer sound, and truthfully, it is a killer sound. We’re pretty much as heavy as hell. Like Lee said, though…we haven’t been really firing on all four cylinders because we’ve been restricted volume-wise, which is a bit of a shame really, because usually it’s a lot louder and we’re a lot more brutal.

SC: Yep. Definitely have to go to Europe.

Gaz: *laughs* Yeah. Like I said, though, I’m used to my equipment and how I play and how I attack it. Other people would get on my guitar and probably struggle. As soon as I get on it, I know how I’ve got to attack it and how I’ve got to bend it.

SC: When you write songs, how do you come up with the lyrics?

Lee: I’m constantly thinking about ideas. I’m not the kind of person that sits down and writes this stuff out, but in my mind, I’m thinking about stuff all the time. When the time comes, I normally have subject matter, but first, I come up with a title. I like to come up with a bunch of titles first, and then build a story around them. I only really do that when I need to, you know what I mean? It’s only when I hear the right riff that suits the right title and the right atmosphere and meaning of the song that I actually fit the words to the song. I may have a few verse ideas and a few basic riff ideas for songs and that’s when I start really working hard on them. The rest of the time I just spend with thoughts drifting through my head, building up things in my head.

SC: Have you started writing for the new record yet?

Lee: Not at all, really. We’ve got some ideas.

Gaz: I’ve got a few on tapes, but we haven’t gotten ’round to rehearsing as a band or anything like that.

Lee: We need to soon.

Gaz: We’ll just see how it goes. I mean, the riffs that I write, one minute, they could sound like Celtic Frost and the next, there might be one that sounds like Iron Maiden.

Lee: Mostly not.

*laughs*

Gaz: That’s what I’m saying. The Iron Maiden one will probably never get used. Sometimes I just write a riff and think “Ah, that sounds pretty cool” because I’m into it at that moment, then I listen back and think “That’s not right for what we’re doing.” There’s tons of stuff I’ve got on tape from years ago that is not Cathedral at all. I wrote it, but I just put things down on tape. But then you hear certain things that I write…I might like it at the time, but I’ll put it down and I won’t think it’s that good, and someone else, say Lee will hear it and say “That’s killer!”, where I just think it’s OK. Then I’ll write something that I’ll think is killer, and the other two in the band will be like “Eh…” You’ve gotta get a fine balance between what all of us like. A prime example is a song on the last album, “Empty Mirror”. When I wrote that riff, it was basically me trying to outdo Sabbath. If you actually hear the one I initially put down, the bends were just chaotic. I was so full of that song, like “We’ve gotta do this! We’ve gotta do it!” And the other two were just like “We’ve done that before. It’s just too Sabbath, anyway.” I kept pushing it, but then I thought “It’s pointless, you’re not going to get anywhere.” So about two or three months later, them two come back and go “Remember that song you have, that riff that sounds like so-and-so from Sabbath? We should do that.” And I was like “Cool, yeah.” I got it in the end. There’s certain songs that I write that I think would do really well, but not necessarily. One song in particular that we did years ago, “Suicide Asteroid”, I thought that was a really good song, but it didn’t come out anything like what I thought it would. It’s still a really good song, but it’s not one of the best we’ve ever done. It depends on how it’s recorded and everything.

Lee: I guess we’ll start working on new stuff at the end of October. Hopefully, we’ll be in the studio by June of next year. A year from now, the next album should be just about to come out.

SC: Cool. You guys have apparently had a pretty insane run of bullshit to deal with over the years. I was reading through your bio, and there are all kinds of horror stories. Have things been running a little more smoothly for you of late?

Lee: Well they were, until our last record company decided not to pay us our advance, and that’s when things fucked up for us. It’s probably why our bass player, Leo is not in the band anymore. It just seems like whenever something bad comes to an end and something good starts, something bad happens again and it’s like “Fuck.” The good thing is that we just signed a deal with Nuclear Blast and I think they’re going to be pretty good for us because they’re a very established label, and they seem to promote their artists really well. For us this far down the line to get a deal with a label like that is pretty cool, and we’re very optimistic about it.

Gaz: I mean, a band that’s been together for thirteen years, they’ll probably do four or five records, and if they jump from one label to the next, they’re usually sort of good labels, and then years down the line, you’ll see them on an independent you’ve never heard of. They’ll put one album out and then they’ll do another on another independent. So like thirteen years down the line, us signing to Nuclear Blast is not a bad thing. At least we’re sort of still believed in.

Lee: I think it’s a sign that we’ve got staying power. We’ve never been part of any trendy scene at any time. We’ve never been that high up in our career that it’s meant we’re going to fall right down. We’ve stayed on a consistent level all these years, mainly because we believe in what we do. I mean, we’ve been through so much shit. Just to let you know, that’s probably not even half of it, what you’ve read. So for us to still be here, it’s just testament that we believe in what we do more than anything else. I mean, God, we struggle like hell. Gaz has got two kids, works his ass off to pay for them to wear clothes and be fed…I’m livin’ on fuckall. We give up all of our life pretty much to do this band. The rewards we get out of it are putting records out, touring, being here doing interviews, and whatever.

Gaz: There’s no financial gain from it at all. Very rarely, now and again…

Lee: We did manage to survive off of it by the skin of our teeth up until about four, five years ago, but now it’s like we need day jobs and stuff to make it happen. And then of course if you get a day job, and you have to go away on tour for a month or two, then you’ve lost your job.

Gaz: But we’re still here, honestly, because we’re doing it for the music. Nothing else. We’re not one of these bogus bands that comes along and shouts from the rooftops that they’re this and that, and then three years down the line, they’ve cut their hair, and they’re in another band which is a different style. They were in a death metal band or whatever, or a heavy metal band, and then next thing, they’re in a sort of funk metal band. They’re all different, playing different things. We grew up listening to…whatever, and we still listen to it now. We’re still influenced by it now. We still believe in that kind of style, in what we do.

Lee: We’re just trying to further that kind of music, where we come from. I mean, great. There are all these bands that are doing something “new”, but just because it’s new doesn’t mean that it’s any better than what’s come before. I could fart, and put that out on a record. It’s new, no one’s done it before, great!

SC: Well, Derek and Clive have…

*laughs*

Gaz: Yeah, but it’s a fart from him! It’s not a fart from Dudley Moore!

Lee: Or Peter Cook, either one. We just believe in guitar, bass, and drums, really. Rock ‘n’ Roll. That’s what it’s all about. As long as there’s newer people coming into this world and newer people being born and newer generations playing music, it’s always going to sound new, because there’s always going to be new eras and new periods of time where people are playing that kind of music. It’s always going to be fresh and updated. I think people worry too much about it being a traditional formula, when in fact it’s only been fifty or sixty years that amplified music in that respect has actually existed. It’s not like it’s been thousands of years. I think there’s still a long way to go with rock ‘n’ roll, really.

SC: How did the tour with Samael and Strapping Young Lad go?

Lee: Oh, it’s been good fun! The pressure hasn’t really been on us, because we’ve been opening the show most of the nights, so for us, it’s been fairly easy, and relaxed.

Gaz: It’s just a case of us getting out there and playing.

Lee: And getting ourselves known over here as much as we can, really.

Gaz: It’s been seven years.

SC: I knew there was a reason I hadn’t gotten to see you guys yet.

Gaz: Well, ’96 was the last time we played, so it’s almost like a new start for us over here. There’s no pressure on us. We just go on, do forty minutes, try and pick some of the best songs from the albums…it’s hard, obviously, trying to pick songs from every album, but we do what we can, but we go out there and give it our best shot. Nine times out of ten, it works out for us. There’s the odd gig where it doesn’t happen, but that’s part of life.

SC: Do you get along with the other bands pretty well?

Lee: Very much so. We get on with everyone very well. This is actually one of the most relaxed tours we’ve ever done, I suppose.

SC: Are you fans of Samael and Strapping Young Lad, as bands go?

Lee: Yeah. I mean, Strapping Young Lad…Gene is just like…

SC: Gene’s not human.

*laughs*

Lee: He’s something else.

SC: He just makes it look so effortless.

Lee: He’s something else. Altogether an experience to watch him play. And the band are of course great. And also, Samael. We’ve known Samael for quite some time. We first played with them in ’94 in France. I also used to write to Vorph back in 1989, I think, so we’ve known those guys for quite a long time, and we’re really good friends with them.

Gaz: It was their suggestion that we do this tour. They asked us in Europe if we’d like to go to America with them.

Lee: Yeah, we talked with them in Europe earlier this year, and they just asked us if we’d like to do this as well.

Gaz: That’s a favor from them, that they asked us to do this thing. It was nice of them. I mean, obviously, they must like us as people as well to ask us to do a tour with them. You don’t really ask someone you don’t like that sort of thing, so we must’ve done something right. We get on with them really well. They’re nice guys. Never had a cross word with them or anything.

SC: What other recent bands have you guys been listening to?

Gaz: Last recent thing I listened to was Angel Witch’s first album. *laughs* (Editor’s Note: “Angel Witch” came out in 1980.)

Lee: There’s probably quite a few, but the ones that stand out in a major way, it’s hard to say, really. Witchcraft from Sweden…

Gaz: Yeah.

Lee: You should check them out, if you like doom stuff, they’re awesome.

Gaz: I liked a band, I’m not sure how many people liked them, but Terra Firma from Sweden. I liked them, but they split. They weren’t doing anything drastically different or new, but I kind of liked what they were doing.

Lee: There’s a band from New York, actually called Unearthly Trance, and they’re pretty cool.

SC: I saw that you guys had High On Fire linked on your site. I saw them a couple of weeks ago…pretty cool, had kind of a Motorhead/Venom vibe…

Lee: They’re out with Andrew W.K., aren’t they?

SC: Yeah. What do you think of him?

Lee: I don’t know too much about him. All I know is a couple of hit singles he had in England, those are pretty cool.

Gaz: All I know is he’s everywhere on the cover of every magazine. He’s on the ads…he’s a lot of that stuff, isn’t he? The Kit Kat ad.

SC: Haven’t seen that yet. I interviewed him a few weeks ago. He’s a really great guy.

Gaz: I think he likes us, doesn’t he?

Lee: I read that somewhere.

SC: He’s definitely a fan of your kind of thing, and the things that came before it. Two of his favorite bands are Obituary (he’s got their drummer with him) and Napalm Death (Lee was the original singer for Napalm Death-Editor).

Lee: I read in Burn magazine in Japan that he’d mentioned us a few times. As far as the music goes, I don’t really know too much about it. I just remember that “let’s get a party going” song.

SC: As survivors of the great “next big thing” hype, what advice would you give to musicians who are in a similar position to yours circa “The Ethereal Mirror”?

Gaz: If they offer you lots of money, take it, because we didn’t!

*laughs*

Lee: Take it, carry on playing, and fuck ‘em!

Gaz: Take as much as you can off ‘em.

Lee: They need you. You don’t need them, at the end of the day. If you believe in what you do, then you’ll carry on forever. If you take everything that they say for granted, then you’ll end up disbelieving what you and your reasons for doing it, so always believe in what you do.

Gaz: Ignore all the hype that they tell you, but take the money! We should’ve done that. No, that’s…

Lee: That’s really cynical…

Gaz: That’s almost like going against what we said about being true to the music, but if we were in that situation again…we were young lads then. The money they were throwing at us, we were like “What if this falls flat on its face? Are we going to end up paying all of this back, and then split up, in debt for the rest of our lives?” So any money that they put toward us, we were like “Don’t bother. Take it back.” Then again, a massive company like that, they just write it off.

Lee: We still got stung with that bill…

Gaz: Well, yeah, that…but most of the time, they just don’t care. We were just totally naive. We didn’t know what to make of it. I know what you’re saying. Everybody was going on about “The Ethereal Mirror”…

Lee: Death metal had just peaked, and then the “Black Album” came out and that was really big. We were doing something a bit different, it had more of a 70′s rock element to it, but it was still brutally heavy. And then they had the Black Crowes around, and they tried to make us look like the Black Crowes in photos. Basically, they pulled us out of the underground scene, made us too commercial for the underground, and then we were too heavy for the mainstream, so we got kind of stuck somewhere in the middle. Then it was like “What do you do with us?”

But that’s not the deal…if you believe in what you do, that’s the main thing.

Nick Cave, circa 1992 (Photo Credit: Anton Corbijn)

In the first of My Big, Black Cock’s Flashback Interviews, we turn back the clock to 1992, when Cari Luna and I interviewed musician/author Nick Cave. Nick had just released his album “Henry’s Dream” at the time, and his first novel, And The Ass Saw The Angel was still fresh in the minds of his fanbase. Cari, in turn, chose to tackle the literary aspects of his work, and as a result, she came away with an extraordinary interview that offered a great deal insight into Mr. Cave’s work (and psyche) that was missing from many of the articles I’d read up to that point. (By my own admission, I was there mostly for moral support, so my contribution to this piece is minimal.) Regrettably, the magazine who had asked us to do this piece seemed to miss this part at the time, and a different piece on Nick Cave was run in its place. Since then, this interview has been sitting in my file cabinet, unread for over a decade…until now.

Within the context of this web site’s new direction, I feel that the time is finally right for this interview to see the light of day. Hopefully, despite its ripe old age, it’s still a piece that can be enjoyed by everyone, and something that offers that insight I mentioned earlier into the mind of one of the world’s most gifted, evocative songwriters. Thanks go out to both Cari herself, and to the publisher who paid for this at the time, but ended up not using it. Both have given us their blessing to publish this. Without any further ado…

Over the course of his long career, beginning in the late Seventies with The Boys Next Door, Nick Cave has, perhaps unwittingly, achieved the status of the mythical tragic hero; a slim, tousled shadow bellowing and moaning through the sufferings of his characters, so that there is no way to know where the music stops and where the man begins. “Henry’s Dream”, Cave’s seventh album with his band The Bad Seeds, shows Cave’s considerable story-weaving abilities at their strongest. The stories and their characters possess a vitality, an immediacy that clearly set Nick Cave apart from his peers.

And so, the Eighth of June, 1992 found me sitting across a table from the man himself, wondering what I could possibly ask him. He was notoriously difficult with the press and, I must admit, he seemed quite aloof, looking out from behind his dark sunglasses. I wanted to get past the surface, to uncover something of the man himself. As a long-time fan, still harboring a bit of a crush dating back to my early teens, I wanted to get him to talk to me as a person with a real interest in him and his work, rather than just another member of the press. (Only Nick knows for sure if I’ve achieved any of this.) I took a deep breath, glanced at my friend Scott Crawford (who’d accompanied me to the interview), and began.

Nick: Okay–so what do you want to know?

Cari: On your new album, “Henry’s Dream”, there’s a very strong sense of storytelling and character. These elements have been a central part of all of your previous works but it seems to have really come together on this one, so I was wondering if the experience of writing a novel had influenced your approach to writing lyrics?

Nick: I just think I’m very good at writing narrative lyrics–I think it’s what I do best, and it’s what I enjoy doing the most, in a way. I mean, I’ve always written narrative lyrics–all the way back to the beginning, so the book was more of a logical extension of that. Now I just continue to write stories. It’s basically a situation of me inventing characters, and then letting those characters write the song for me, in a way. Once you have invented souls, characters that you can actually visualize and that are metaphorically correct, the stories tell themselves. So, in a way, I find easy, as well, to write narrative songs. I find that I have plenty of stories.

Cari: How much do you feel that your characters are extensions of yourself?

Nick: Well, they are. Yeah…I would say they all are.

Cari: A friend of mine talked to you after a show in Boston, and you told him that your 5th album, “The Good Son”, was a response to the complexity of your novel, And The Ass Saw The Angel, trying to get back to a simpler format. Could you elaborate on this?

Nick: Yeah, that’s true. I’d become a bit disgusted with words and all. And The Ass Saw The Angel is so full of verbiage–it has so much to do with words, you know, and I was a bit tired of words, and so “The Good Son” is much more straightforward, a simple record. I would say that would be the general pattern; I mean, there’s a lot of words on “Henry’s Dream”, but it’s quite straightforward as well. I think I just understand what I’m saying better now than five or six years ago, and so I don’t have to hide what I’m trying to say within complex language. As you get older, you understand what you want to say more.

Cari: Do you have plans for a new novel?

Nick: Yeah, I haven’t gotten the opportunity yet to write it–I mean, I kind of took off last year, in a way. I mean, I wrote a record and did a film and had a baby and stuff–I should have started writing it then but I just didn’t get around to it. So then when I finish with this record–with the tour which we’re going to start–then I’ll put music away for a while and maybe start this new book.

Cari: Are we going to see any of the themes or characters of “Henry’s Dream” in the book?

Nick: Well, the book will be a journey of some sort. Basically the story is of an aggressive, inarticulate boy following his beloved sister and her abductor; it’s basically along the seaside–so there are certain themes in “Henry’s Dream” that relate to that, I guess, but none of the characters.

Cari: What were the specific ideas that you wanted to get across with this record?

Nick: I don’t know, really. When I write a record I just take time off. I look at it as a project of some sort, as opposed to just sitting down and writing songs any which day, you know. I don’t do that. I haven’t written any songs since “Henry’s Dream”, I probably won’t write any more songs for several months–or until I decide to make another record, basically, in which case I will take off the same amount of time and start to write the songs. So what happens is that all the songs form at the same time, and so the records end up having a sense that each song is interrelated, that there’s some purpose to the order of the songs, and that there is some greater story going on. But in fact, it’s basically a situation where you write everything together and there’s echoes of each song in every other song.

Scott: When you get together with the Bad Seeds to put out a record, how does the songwriting process evolve after you’ve written the lyrics? Do you finish them and then take them to the rest of the band, or do you usually write the lyrics along with the music?

Nick: Well…with “The Good Son” I didn’t really feel that the band, as a band had much room for expression. The songs were very much written before we went into the studio. I knew every single part that had to be put down and it was basically just a matter of going in and extracting these songs. With “Henry’s Dream” I wanted it to be far more of a group effort, and sound like a band playing together, and give them more freedom; a lot of the songs on “Henry’s Dream” were very unformed when I showed them to the group, and I handed them far more responsibility than saying “Well–you do this.” I mean, “Papa Won’t Leave You, Henry” is basically just one chord on the piano. I just sat down and said “Right, this is the first song: (simulating banging on the piano) dun, dun, dun, dun”, and sang all this shit over the top of it and said “Alright–that’s the song. Now you do something with it”, which raised an eyebrow or two at the time, but it gave Blixa (Bargeld, Bad Seeds guitarist-Ed.) the chance to play guitar how he wants to play guitar, rather than trying to fit his style of guitar playing into an alien style of music.

Scott: Out of all of your works in print and music, do you have a personal favorite?

Nick: Well, the book, I guess. That’s my favorite thing so far.

Cari: How has your move to Brazil affected your work? Has it been a positive move for you?

Nick: Brazil is very frustrating in some ways. A lot of creative stuff happens there, but nothing that I’m really involved in, so I’m pretty much on my own over there. I mean, I’ve got a girlfriend and a child, but I’m still creatively isolated, and for me that becomes very frustrating. On one hand it’s refreshing because you’re alone in an environment where there’s so much stimulus–inspiration–and you have it all to yourself in a way; at least Robert Smith from The Cure doesn’t live there, or whatever. I mean, you feel like you’ve got this all at your own fingertips, but at the same time it ends up becoming frustrating because I don’t have anyone to bounce ideas off of. I have to do it entirely on my own…and I’ve never been all that confident about what I do anyway–I’m always worried about it all the time–and it doesn’t help me really, basically not even having people to speak to. They don’t have that much sensitivity towards the English language because they don’t really speak it there. So it has its frustrations, but it’s a very inspiring place too.

Cari: One thing that I’ve always liked about your work is that you really do explore the psyche of the character, and you bring the audience into that character. Is that a specific goal of yours?

Nick: Yeah. Absolutely. What really interests me about my characters is what they’re not prepared to tell you about themselves, and the veneer that they created around themselves to protect themselves. What interests me is the lies underneath. I think that’s what interests me in all the books that I’ve really enjoyed–all my favorite books are written in this way–in the first-person, where they’re trying to tell you their side of the story, and trying to convince you that they’re moral, likable people, but ultimately, you realize that they’re not, that there is something very, very wrong with these characters. It’s the secrets and the lies and the things that they don’t tell you that interest me. So, perhaps you take a song like “Jack the Ripper, for example, which seems on the outside to be a very simple song about a guy complaining about his girlfriend–the fact that she’s a bitch and won’t have sex with him, and she’s dictatorial and all this sort of stuff, but hopefully, in the end, if you look at the song closely enough–perhaps the way it’s sung, the way the character sings the song–you realize that there is something wrong with this particular character, and that is perhaps why the woman treats him this way. Perhaps when he does try and make love with her, he approaches her in an aggressive, insane fashion. So that’s what interests me–it’s what’s not told. The lies and the deceit…

And what I was searching for as well, the man beneath myth–the one I think I’ve met, but can’t be sure. A few weeks later, on the stage of The Ritz in New York, the man I met erupted into a thousand-headed, magnificent shining monster holding an entire audience in the grip of what seemed that night to be the most powerful force in the world, a force that can re-invent itself as many times as there are songs to sing and stories to be told.

“Don’t hold back, Kerry. Tell us how you REALLY feel.” (Photo courtesy of American Recordings)

SLAYER.

No, I don’t think you get it.

SLAYER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

“To my species, this is like climbing Everest.”-Triumph The Insult Comic Dog

Never in a million years did I think I’d ever end up interviewing any of the guys from Slayer, but there I was, on the phone with Kerry King from his hotel in Las Vegas, shooting the shit. He was an awesome, down to Earth guy, and I had a lot of fun talking to him.

Jonathan and Mark from No Cover set this one up for me (Thanks, guys! Hope you dug what I submitted…), as I did a story on Slayer for their October issue, which should be available very soon all over southern California among other places, and of course at their web site. In addition to a mini-review of their “War At The Warfield” DVD, there’s a ton of news straight from Kerry about their upcoming spot on the Jagermeister Music Tour, the new album, and their upcoming “Soundtrack To The Apocalypse” box set in the No Cover piece. I strongly recommend checking it out along with the rest of the new issue.

However, I had a whole lot of Slayer left over when my work for No Cover was done. So now, without further ado, the stuff that was “TOO HOT FOR NC!” (That’s a joke, actually. Well, except for maybe the bit about “St. Anger”, heh.) Here’s “Kerry King of Slayer: The My Big, Black Cock Interview”!

SC: You’ve set the bar pretty high for yourselves, and you’ve obviously given your fans reason to expect a lot. Do you guys feel any of the pressure that comes along with being a standard bearer like you are?

King: I don’t know. I think it’s really simple…it starts with us, and we’re fans first. I remember, before Slayer was anybody, I’d go check out Judas Priest back in the early days, and if they put out a record that I didn’t think was up to snuff, I didn’t just hate that record, I was just pissed off with them until they gave me a reason to like ‘em again. For one, I don’t wanna be like that, and for two, I don’t think we ever have become that, so it just helps the relationship between the band and the fans. I think they appreciate what we’ve done over the years.

SC: You mentioned Priest…who are some of the bands (particularly ones that aren’t always mentioned like Sabbath, Venom, etc.) that kicked your ass on the road to becoming the band you are today?

King: Well, it’s obviously them. It’s obviously Iron Maiden. It’s obviously Deep Purple…shit, who else was back then? Rainbow. I mean, Ritchie Blackmore was a fucking nut when he played guitar. The other thing that helped Slayer become Slayer was West Coast punk..Jeff was really into it.

SC: Have there been any recent bands that’ve totally kicked your ass when you heard them, in the way that you imagine your stuff kicks your fans’ asses?

King: There’s two bands that I’ve really paid attention to lately that are new bands I really like. One’s Chimaira. I think they are DEFINITELY carrying the torch of what we did, after all this passed time, and the other band I like’s Killswitch Engage.

SC: What do you think of the other bands on the tour, Hatebreed and Arch Enemy?

King: We’ve toured with Hatebreed before. I mean, if they’re doing their own show, they’ve got some SICK people in their crowd…they’ve always been notorious for having crazy fans. I think Hatebreed fans that are just into Hatebreed are even a bit crazier. The only thing I know about Arch Enemy is that they just put out their new record, with the girl singing on it. I’ve seen their video, and I know they’ve got a buzz, so I’m kind of glad they’re on the bill, because I wanted somebody in the 3rd spot that wasn’t just a filler band. I definitely wanted a strong third band. I’ve yet to see them live, but I’m hoping they’re it.

SC: What do you listen to when you’re not in the mood to listen to metal/punk/hardcore/other heavy music?

King: It’s not very often. *laughter* Man, I don’t know. That’s a tough one. Van Halen…the first couple of records of that, but that’s still hard rock, I guess. I’m just a guitarhead, you know?

SC: Have you heard Tori Amos’ cover of “Raining Blood”?

King: Yeah. We had to hear it to approve it.

SC: what did you think of it?

King: Well, you know…it’s what she does. I don’t really have any opinion of that kind of music. It’s not something I’m into. Did I like it? No. But that really doesn’t matter. It’s some different artist’s perception of what your music is, and that’s how she delivered it. So…not into it, but she was.

SC: Your music’s gotta be pretty brutal to play, from a physical standpoint. How do you keep your energy up for tours, after all these years?

King: Well, we haven’t done a gig in, shit…well, no, we did a couple in Europe over the summer…we haven’t toured reasonably for like 8 months, man and I’m a fat pig! I gotta get on the exercise bike and get ready for the Jager tour! *laughter* As far as energy goes, it doesn’t matter. The intro hits, the lights go out, and you’re Superman.

SC: Where does the Warfield show (from the “War At The Warfield” DVD) rank for you, among the shows you’ve done?

King: It’s probably in the upper ten percent. It’s kind of a tough question. No crazy things went on there that I’m not proud of, so…

SC: What was the best ever?

King: There’s one that’s always going to have a spot in my memory banks, and that’s the first time we played Donington in England. I think that was ’92. First time we’d ever played Donington, and I think it was Paul Bostaph’s…probably second or third or fourth show with us, and it just rocked. We fired on all cylinders that day, and it was awesome.

SC: Do you prefer bigger, arena-to-stadium-sized gigs, or smaller club-to-theatre sized ones?

King: It’s always fun to do clubs, but I wouldn’t want to do it for an entire tour, just because some of them are just so idiotic, the way they’re set up. There’s just no room for anything. That’s kind of what makes it cool, for fan feedback…they’re right in your face. I think my favorite would be between theatres and small arenas. You get the best of both worlds. You’ve got the crazies who are reasonably close to you in front, and you’ve got the ambience of a big show.

SC: In the press kit (I didn’t actually catch it on the DVD) it says that you guys dedicated “God Send Death” to Osama bin Laden. How have current events since 9/11 affected you in day-to-day life?

King: In the beginning, you know, it was…I certainly was never the most patriotic bastard in the world, but that was a big wake-up call. As far as life since then, I don’t dwell on it too much, because shit happens all over the world. Just because we got a couple towers bombed by fuckin’ airplanes…people all over the world have to deal with shit like that.

SC: Onto your fans…we’ve heard about and seen the people who cut your logo into their bodies, and the story about the guy in Minnesota who jumped from the balcony was pretty cool, but have you come across any fans who’ve done things that are too sick to mention in most interviews?

King: Not really. I mean, it’s Slayer you’re talking about, so there’s really no taboo or anything. One of the weirdest things that’s happened to me was in Spain. We were signing after the show, just chilling with fans that wanted autographs, and this dude insisted I use his pen. I’m like “No, man. I’ve got my own pen, whatever.” It turned out that the guy was handing me a scalpel. He wanted me to carve “Slayer” into his arm. I’m like “Dude, I ain’t gonna scar you up, man. I’ll sign anything you got.”

SC: What’s the Slayer groupie scene like?

King: What are those? *laughter*

SC: Oh. OK. *laughs* I dunno, the last couple of tours, it seems like you’ve had more and more girls in the audience, and you guys mentioned that on the DVD…

King: Eh…maybe. What I’ve noticed is that the fan base is definitely rejuvenating itself to like young kids. That’s one thing I’ve noticed a lot. We play on stage, and the front row’s full of like 16, 15, or younger kids, and I’m like “Damn! What are you doing here?” *laughs*

SC: How’s the new album coming along?

King: Dave and I are working on stuff. We’ve been working on like six songs, just him and I. I think Jeff’s got three of his own, so it’s inching up there.

SC: Have you settled on a title yet?

King: We don’t even have titles for songs yet. Basically, we’re putting music down right now, but we’re not far from shifting gears. I want to get another song or two done, and then I’m going to be switching over to lyrics, you know…they start flowing out.

SC: You said you’re not quite up to lyrics yet. Has Jeff mentioned anything about his lyrics?

King: Actually, Jeff just surfaced recently, I hadn’t talked to him for about a month. We were just doing our own thing. I’m working on stuff, he’s working on stuff. He hurt his finger or something, so he’s been out of commission for a while.

SC: Since we’re talking about new material, and an archive of older material…what’s your position on people who download music from the ‘net, and the RIAA’s approach to dealing with them?

King: I don’t know much about it. I think my manager or somebody made a comment about what’s going on recently, and I was like “Really?”, but I wasn’t even paying attention, because I was working on the box set or something that day, so I don’t know much about it.

SC: You guys have varied your sound a bit over the years without losing any of the power behind what you do, like a lot of your contemporaries have. What’s your secret been?

King: I think it’s taking who we are from day one, and not having to change to meet whatever’s popular in any given few years’ span.

SC: Speaking of “contemporaries”, what’d you think of the new Metallica record?

King: I could only stomach it twice. Twice was just so I made sure that I didn’t miss anything.

SC: You made it one more time than I did.

King: *laughs* I mean, there’s some good ideas on there. I’m GLAD they made an attempt..

SC: Yeah, they tried.

King: To me, you can’t jump out of genre for ten years or whatever and just pick it back up. They didn’t live it. They were somewhere else. We, as well as some of the other bands just continued to live it. That’s why there won’t be any dropoff. Where, to me, it’s a BIG TIME dropoff with them.

SC: I literally made it once, beginning to end, and I was like “That’s it”.

King: You were waiting for that one that was gonna grab you, and it never did.

SC: Nope. There was one that was close (“Sweet Amber”, if you’re curious. -Editor), but not quite.

King: I like a part here and there, but they’re too long…

SC: And that snare…

King: …and the snare’s RIDICULOUS, and the lyrics are redundant, they just…make you wanna go puke.

SC: A lot of what people love about your music is the feeling of direct, sincere anger that you convey with it. Do you see yourselves as angry people, or just everyday guys who get the aggression of everyday life out through your music?

King: We’re pretty fuckin’ easygoing guys, but I can get pissed off quick, too. I think it’s probably venting, more than anything.

SC: What goes through your head when you’re writing or playing out one of your solos?

King: Oh. *laughs* Keeping time…*more laughs* Keeping up.

SC: *laughs* Cool. How did you come up with some of the things you do to a guitar in those solos, when you first started?

King: In the early days, I was a BIG TIME whammy whore, tremolo bar whore, because it’s so easy. You just grab that thing and play ten leads and they’ll all be similar, but at the same time they’ll all be distinctively different. I wanted to relax on that, because it gets repetitive, and it becomes like a fix, you know, like “Hey, I gotta play a lead. Gimme that bar”, so I went out of my way to try to make up…say I’ve got eleven leads, make up seven or eight, and then leave three just to go for it.

SC: In the beginning, you guys took up satanic imagery and the associated trappings because it was something powerful that you could use to offend and scare people. The visual aspects of it have toned themself down a bit over the years, but a contempt for and rebellion against the “God” concept (paramount to what a lot of people consider modern Satanic thought) was obviously very strong on your last record. Is it still as important to you as a band to offend and scare the kind of people you were trying to scare with things like that when you started out?

King: I don’t think it’s so much that, as it is an awakening, for me and for people listening to our music. We kind of put things in perspective, as I like to say. I’ll say something like “Are you going to church because you believe in God, or are you going because society tells you that it’s the right thing to do?”

SC: What do you think of the others that’ve gone the shock route, like Marilyn Manson or Eminem?

King: Well, I mean, that’s Manson. He’s good at what he does. I don’t think he has or will ever do a record that’s as angry as “Antichrist Superstar” was. There’s some really cool stuff on there.

SC: Finally, do you ever wake up in the morning, think “Whoa. I’m in Slayer.” to yourself, and pump your fist in the air or anything?

King: Not really. I don’t know any other way to be.

SC: I guess it’s always different when it’s you.

King: Yeah. It’s been a part of my life for more than half my life now. People ask me, “What would you do if you weren’t in Slayer?”, and I’m like “I have no idea.” *laughter*