Punktv's Journals

Thomas Mignone Interview

Thomas Mignone Interview - Filmmaker, Music Video Director and Visionary.

PunkTV.ca: Weâ�™re on the line with Thomas Mignone whoâ�™s a music video director, a live music director and now a motion picture director. How are you Thomas?

Doing great today. How are you Dixon?

PunkTV.ca: Very good. So can you just as a bit of a background bring us back and tell us how you got started in directing music videos, live concert productions and then evolved into motion pictures?

Sure, I had an opportunity to work, a good buddy of mine Scott Gibbons had given me an early CD of some music and it was a group I hadnâ�™t heard before called Slipknot and I really kind of fell in love with it and ended up doing videos for them that got a lot of attention. They were at the time touring with another band Mudvayne which I then did a video for them right after and that ended up getting a lot of attention and an MTV award which kind of opened up the opportunity to work with a lot of different artists like System of a Down and Iâ�™ve done some work with Sepultura and Soul Fly and a lot of rock bands. Each of the video projects that I would do with these artists, my particular style is to try to come up with something of a narrative even though itâ�™s not a linear story line, just something that would conceptually kind of convey the spirit of the song and a lot of the artists really liked that in addition to the performance elements. That wanting to keep writing I guess story lines prompted me to a year or so ago I wrote my very first script and people seem to really like it and I was able to get some support and ended up directing that last year and over the last 12 months directed it and then did all the post on it and now finished the final graphics and sound and it has taken about 12 months from conception to completion and that film is now done as the first feature and weâ�™re just starting to take it to festivals and screening it for folks at the distributor level and plan to have it theatrically released.

PunkTV.ca: We can get to your videos and discussion about the technical and creative aspects of that but first letâ�™s talk about the movie, itâ�™s called â�œOn the Dollâ�?

Each of the characters in the film has over the course of it has been kind of contemplates and reflects on some of the early issues they have in life which causes them to be the characters and actors that they are in the film and a lot of times they share similar exploitive traumas whether on a psychological, physical or emotional level. The lead character in fact was physically assaulted and the title comes from a term thatâ�™s used by child welfare advocates and helpers when they would say to a child show me where on the doll, show me where you were touched, where you were molested. So it has a subtle reference to that.

PunkTV.ca: This is going to get a bit personal but obviously in anything that you write like that thereâ�™s got to be, especially in your first movie, some underlying elements that are semi autobiographical?

In this particular case, no. I wanted to write a story that would sort of encompass a lot of themes that people seem to be very much intrigued by and can relate to but I wanted to do it in a very non-exploitive way and from a perspective that is typically not seen from and the lead character, although non of it was auto-biographical, you tend to cross paths with a lot of people that when you go beneath the surface of who they are whether artists or friends you start seeing maybe some reasons why they act a certain way and why they have a certain perspective on the world. I think a lot of people can relate to those themes and many people have been abused or exploited in different forms and it isnâ�™t until later on in life that they can really look back at it and put it in a proper perspective. The film has a lot of fetishistic and dark sexual connotations. Thereâ�™s no graphic or gratuitous sexual scenes however, itâ�™s all on a very psychological level. So I think it kind of takes a pretty interesting path to tell the story of these characters in a way thatâ�™s not typical.

PunkTV.ca: Steven Covey, the self-empowerment speaker, refers to that position as a paradigm of one sense of reality as it affects their ability to qualitatively and quantitatively process external stimuli. I think youâ�™re saying what youâ�™re trying to do is show the similarities between the characters and the ways that they relate to their outside world based on similar shared paradigms based on previous experiences.

Yea, overall there is a paradigm for how all of these characters have been in one form or another been abused or exploited and as adults now when they cross paths unknowingly and unwillingly they end up befriending each other and helping each other out of situations that they each find themselves tumbling into. The lead character Guy works at an adult newspaper and he is constantly crossing paths with an assortment of kind of strange and interesting characters and one day a girl enters his office and seeks his help on running an ad which isnâ�™t really a very savory thing, sheâ�™s looking for someone to help her get out of a difficult spot and she wants to run an ad to do so an ultimately the lead Guy helps her by doing the job himself and along the way they kind of get over their heads when they cross paths with some not so nice people and they also meet other characters from different story lines that have shared paths and they end up all helping each other without even realizing it. The way the story is kind of intertwined and culminates together I think people are finding pretty interesting.

PunkTV.ca: So itâ�™s non-linear then?

Itâ�™s very non-linear and sort of fractured story telling but with things occurring the background of one scene or story line that are seen else where that correlated and it isnâ�™t until the last third of the film that it really starts to come together and reveal itself.

PunkTV.ca: I can think of a lot of non-linear films that I really like but sometimes they drive me completely bananas I think itâ�™s because Iâ�™m compulsive obsessive by nature. So a movie like Memento is beautiful or Run Lola Run or these kinds of movies and even Pulp Fiction which was so wonderful. Why do you think itâ�™s becoming so acceptable to show movies in this fashion? I thought we were getting to the point where people where finding it difficult to keep their attention span on anything for any lengthy period of time and yet more and more movies come out like this one where youâ�™re basically proving the opposite, that people want to see non-linear movie making. What are your thoughts on that?

Well I like the references that you made to some of the films although On The Doll is not similar in structure to films like Pulp Fiction or Run Lola Run or even Memento. I understand your point in regards to that but I think maybe more references such as Crash or Magnolia which have current story lines is probably a little bit more in a direction that On the Doll is structurally. I think a lot of people do like that approach in one sense because I think a lot of the way we conduct our lives is very much in that capacity.

PunkTV.ca: Youâ�™re checking your Blackberry and youâ�™re doing an interview and youâ�™re turning another phone that comes on off and you got the TV playing in the background, like thereâ�™s always 5 or 10 other stimuli thatâ�™s going on is what youâ�™re saying.

That and Iâ�™ll have multiple You Tube windows open at once and a couple different My Spaces going or itâ�™s not uncommon to have 4 or 5 different IMâ�™s going at the same time. Itâ�™s just the way we conduct our lives, itâ�™s very multi-tasked like that and have parallel actions. So I think as a story telling structure it feels, at least for me, natural to try to convey information in that way and I think just as a style element itâ�™s the way I like to try to tell stories. The videos that I did had the similar approach that a lot of the information was happening simultaneously and different pieces of information are given come together towards the latter part of the clip. Thatâ�™s kind of been my stylistic approach on my writing and directing.

PunkTV.ca: The fact that we are capable of doing so many things at the same time now I believe our brains are almost getting supercharged, weâ�™re getting faster CPUs even though weâ�™re basically making the same amount of money we got to work so much harder for it and we really have to process so much more data donâ�™t we?

Itâ�™s really interesting you say that because that is the exact subject of a script Iâ�™m writing and how we are so fast approaching almost the saturation point in our physiological ability to deal with the increased streams of information that are sort of bombarding us. I find that very interesting and potentially catastrophic for the frailty of human beings and I think thatâ�™s why a lot of people tend to snap under the increased work load or pressure. I completely agree with what youâ�™re saying.

PunkTV.ca: I want to read that screenplay.

Iâ�™m probably about 70 something pages deep on it. If what you said is any interest of you Iâ�™m sure youâ�™d find this screen play intriguing.

PunkTV.ca: Do you read DSM manuals and did you spend a lot of time researching aspects of mental disorder and human psyche and varying conditions of despair to write the script you did for On the Doll?

I did a bunch of solid research. One thing I feel I tired to do as accurately as possible is just convey a very strong genuine sense of reality. I think people leave a screening saying wow this is definitely something that could be happening or is happening right in the here and now. I did speak to a lot of people, reached out to a lot of psychologist and psychiatrists and just got a strong sense of not only just persons experience but also interpret that in a way a mass audience could relate to some experiences or similarities of peopleâ�™s own paths could at least be related to what they see on screen in the behavior of certain characters.

PunkTV.ca: You were trying to create a universalism in understandingâ�¦ Painting with broader strokes in order for the message to be profound and poignant yet widely understood and loved and revered.

I think that itâ�™s true and the effort was made to try to convey these nuances and subtleties in peopleâ�™s personas to a wide audience. I think that people tend to get an initial impression of for instance somebody or some thing, a piece of music or a painting or letâ�™s just say an initial impression of a person they bump into or meet, you may think that person is one way. Maybe you donâ�™t like them, maybe you donâ�™t like they way he looked at you or an action or something but then as soon as you get to start to know somebody a little more you start to think I see why he was that way and heâ�™s not so bad after all and I understand it a little bit more. A lot of the characters in the films when we first cross paths with them they arenâ�™t very likeable and you wonder why they do what they do and why they just behave the way they do and it isnâ�™t until certain elements, especially some of the lead guys there are a couple of key scenes that I think audiences in some of our screening the feedback was they thought some of these people were initially really horrific and unlikable and then towards the end they start realizing that they really are genuinely likeable people and itâ�™s just their situations kind of dictate why they are they way they are.

PunkTV.ca: (So you are saying) Letâ�™s hope we can celebrate A) the differences in people and B) a little bit of compassion and understanding. Just donâ�™t accept that initial gut reaction that you have about somebody because thatâ�™s really what paradigm is all about is trying to understand someoneâ�™s paradigm and the sense of perspective thatâ�™s created from within that.

I think thatâ�™s an idealistically nice approach and thought but I for one I donâ�™t have a whole lot of faith in peopleâ�™s abilities to do that. I wish and I think we all grow up wishing that people could be that way but it seems to me that itâ�™s an unlikely reality that people would kind of embrace differences or embrace the things that make us diverse or different. I just donâ�™t have a lot of faith in human kindâ�™s ability to do that to be quite honest with you.

PunkTV.ca: But thatâ�™s what separates people that are able to create the kind of creative works that you do and letâ�™s face it perhaps some of the people that are listening to that music, thatâ�™s just what separates people is that level of understanding and ability to do that. Youâ�™d hope that people would attain to that at least, eh?

I would hope so.

PunkTV.ca: Tell us about the growth and the bridge between the music videos and the motion picture and how that experience has been for you?

Well a lot of the videos that I do I approach very cinematically and I work with artists that appreciate that and are seeking that. Going into it Iâ�™m asked to write a treatment and my particular style is to key onto a lyric or a theme and then to develop a very cinematic and somewhat narrative and certainly a non-linear yet narrative story line that could reflect or depict that them or that lyric line that I find interesting. I think a lot of artists spend a lot of time and though putting their music together and the whole process of creating it and then recording it and I try to compliment that as much as possible by bringing a certain artistic integrity and that to the visual interpretation of that. A lot of the artists I work with really appreciate that because that conveys a though provocative or compelling capability on the sense of the artist. What theyâ�™re trying to say is not just superficial and not just eye candy. So that approach to the videos Iâ�™ve done is just my own personal style and Iâ�™ve just been an avid lover of films and music forever and when I finally decided to put pen to paper and try to write a story thatâ�™s been bouncing around in my head for some time it seemed to come out in that same kind of way as an extension of the music video treatments that I typically like. My video treatments sometimes are 20 pages long.

PunkTV.ca: You keep answering questions that I was so interested in asking you. The first was about the treatment writing process and the second was what would typically be in a Thomas Mignone video treatment and how long would it be and would it contain sketches and drawings and text?

The first thing I pretty much do is listen to the song honestly at least a hundred times before I write a single word. I just would listen to it over and over again for 3 or 4 days driving, at home, I just really feel like I need to absorb that music really well in order to comprehend it. A lot of times when we film there are so technical aspects of my film making approach to videos that are just my particular style. I never like doing play back to an artist because I think itâ�™s difficult for an artist to try to keep up to a song that typically when they play it live, they might record the song and now they go out on the road to support that new music with a tour, theyâ�™re playing that song live and itâ�™s typically played faster and slightly different than when it was recorded a yea or so ago or a half a year ago in a studio and so the artist is used to that. On a video shoot technically I will have the artist play the song live, I donâ�™t have nay play back, I donâ�™t like to read on any of the performers faces that they are struggling to keep up with something so thatâ�™s one approach on a technical level. On a creative level I need to understand the structure of the song and the notes to the song and the musical flows and the emotional flows of the lyrics so that visually I create something that compliments the song structure and tells a story that the artist might feel profoundly strong about. So I absorb it by just listening to it over and over again then I will most of the times just struck with a very heavy idea for one or 2 lines of the song that will stick out in my mind. Itâ�™s usually something that I find very interesting the way they say something, the words that they use or the significance of a particular line will most times just jump out at me and stick in my head and thatâ�™s what the concept will imamate from and Iâ�™ll write a very lengthy and sometimes way too long concept and a lot of times Iâ�™ll write how that concept for that particular video relates to other songs on the album, on the CD, because a lot of artists write more than just one songs so I try to find common threads or elements amongst several songs on a CD that seem to be similar or connected so that the artist feels that this is a true depiction of what theyâ�™re trying to say. Some songs are independent on their own but a lot of times songs on an album tend to have the same ideas and trends that are like others. So I try to wrote a treatment that conveys those themes or elements in particular to the one song but how it might even be reflected in other songs. Then Iâ�™ll work very carefully with the artist on and I tend to tear out a whole bunch of pictures from magazines of lighting examples, wardrobe styling, the level of color saturation or muted imagery. Whatever the aesthetic is that is in the writing of the treatment I will usually supply a whole bunch of visual references because a lot of times you may say â�˜oh itâ�™s a very deep red feeling in the videoâ�™ but deep red to one person may be totally different to another so Iâ�™ll have examples of what different picture parameters and perspectives could be interpreted by and then weâ�™ll narrow it down. I take that usually right through when we are filming I typically have no story boards per say but I have all of these visual references tacked up on the board and we get an overall atmospheric vibe or sense of what the feeling is of this song in that particular scene. Then I think a lot of artists typically at that point are on the road and by the time the video is shot they are on the road supporting new music so you donâ�™t have the luxury of sitting in an editing room or a color timing room with them. I tend to spend a lot of time, sometimes 3 or 4 days just color timing and Iâ�™ll have several different passes for what the color parameters could be and the lighting parameters and we go back and forth a bunch of times with editing and post production decisions. I very much like to keep the artist in the loop on that because it is in fact a visual depiction of what theyâ�™re all about and I like to keep honing it down to exactly what they feel is accurate and that process Iâ�™m pretty passionate about and I spend a lot of time devoting myself to and I tend to find that artist really appreciate that and they get exactly what they expected and their expectations a lot of times are exceeded and they are quite happy and we end up doing multiple projects with the same artists.

PunkTV.ca: I want to talk just briefly about Fiona Apple and Marc Romanuk and how he portrayed her in a lolita-esque fashion in that debut video of hers and if youâ�™ve ever completely missed. Like Fiona Apple might say that she loves the aesthetic of the video but she feels that Marc missed on that one. Iâ�™m just wondering if youâ�™ve ever missed?

Well I really donâ�™t know any of the history behind Fionaâ�™s video and what the treatment may or may not have been and what the intentions may or may not have been. I was very intrigued by that video, I thought that was a very beautiful looking video and I found it very interesting to watch but I donâ�™t know any of the history of that. With regards to my own work I think Iâ�™ve been able to put forth what my ideas are and interpretations are and then communicate them over creative dialogue with the artist sufficiently where when we do get on set I normally have a big monitor there and rather than me off to the corner behind some flag or something everybody kind of peeking into the monitor I like to have the monitor in the middle of the floor on a swivel so I can swing it around and show the vocalist ok Iâ�™m framing you from right here to right there and Iâ�™ll open it up and zoom the camera here and weâ�™re going to see you and the guitarist behind you in this shot or weâ�™re going to move it over here and they have a sense of what the shot actually is and how itâ�™s framing up so that then they know how to properly perform and play to the camera in order to make it feel as natural as possible. I think thatâ�™s just an individual film makers approach is how they do it and how they can get it right.

PunkTV.ca: I think that by building that foundation throughout the process and by the time they get to the end they feel more like theyâ�™ve been an active part of the process rather than saying, â�œhey we had nothing to do with thatâ�.

I think especially where a video sits you have the ability to record everything and then now the video resolution is quite high and you can play back to the audience why you think that take wasnâ�™t all that good or that was killer or we could move on because we grabbed this here and it spontaneously came to life here and thatâ�™s a killer shot, letâ�™s move on. They can see it and they have a sense of the culmination of it everything kind of coming together and thereâ�™s a confidence saying we can wrap out now feeling like weâ�™ve got it at least in the can and as long as we got a tight edit on it then it should come out as expected.

PunkTV.ca: Back to one of the comments you said earlier when you said you donâ�™t get the band to lip sync to the song for the reasons that you stated, obviously youâ�™re going to stay away from tighter shots of the lead singer singing that part of the chorus at that point because you may have problems syncing it up then?

I donâ�™t know, I donâ�™t agree with that. The technology is there to compress or expand frames to fill a shot and Iâ�™ve never come across a situation where I like to hang on to shots for extended periods of times and the Mudvayne video was a great example of that. Thatâ�™s done live and they played as hard as they wanted to and were unrestricted in the sense of their performance. Once we got into editing there was some number crunching that had to get done to make sure that as we hang on shots of the monitor the frame is filled with tight close ups of their faces and the words are spoken very fast and everything seems to stay in pretty tight sync. At times you have to press upon the artist to at least listen to their CD version of the song because a lot of times they tend to change some lyrics or sing it a little bit differently 6 months later or 2 months later and you just want to remind them that if you want to be at sync in these parts you have to be at least speaking the right lyrics.

PunkTV.ca: For your style tell us about the influences, directors and artists and literary heroes that make it into your work on a regular basis.

Thatâ�™s a pretty interesting question. Iâ�™m a huge fan of several directors, certainly Paul Thomas Anderson or David Sphincter or Michelle Gondry of course. Very sort of stylistic film makers I like them very much and I think they do just tremendous work. Iâ�™m a big fan of guys like Ralph Steadman or Charles Bukowski, guys that just had a really interesting slant on some things.

PunkTV.ca: Charles Bukowski is the best. I love his writing. Not some much on the poetry but I really do love his books. Iâ�™ve read a whole bunch of the beat stuff and I think him and Kerouac and Ginsberg and Cassidy and Richard Brautigan. Thereâ�™s really a lot of that missing in todayâ�™s literature.

So there are 2 heroes of mine right now who I just think are awesome; one is Phil Hendry.

PunkTV.ca: Whoâ�™s that?

Heâ�™s a completely brilliant and insane talk show personality. He has a show thatâ�™s just unlike any other that Iâ�™ve come across. Phil Hendry will have a dialogue with someone that you just completely loathe and for people who donâ�™t know they donâ�™t realize that Phil is doing all the voices of all the characters and he has people, and itâ�™s usually on your drive when youâ�™re stuck in traffic and the day is beating you up and thereâ�™s they guy whoâ�™s suing Aamco because heâ�™s sitting at the traffic life and he heard the commercial come on the radio and so he thought someone was beeping behind him so he lunges forward into traffic and takes out a school bus of kids. Heâ�™s suing now the radio company and the advertisers because they forced him to do that and itâ�™s just the most outrageous, ridiculous scenario and the skit is the folks who are calling in to react, they donâ�™t know that itâ�™s just all an act and the person thatâ�™s talking to the host is the host himself kind of just playing one against the other and itâ�™s really the most clever kind of scenarios that this guy comes up with and the way people react to it is whatâ�™s really, truly entertaining.

PunkTV.ca: Comic genius and great timing like that new Colbert.

Exactly, thatâ�™s another great example. That kind of sort of tongue in cheek humor and slant on the world that we live in I think is really, really engaging to me. Riley Martin is another great example. Just guys that are a little bit off and out there but rooted enough in the reality of what we see and live everyday that itâ�™s just a really odd take on things but you know that thereâ�™s a lot of truth to it and that I find really fascinating.

PunkTV.ca: Really brings out the nature good and bad of the human condition.

Thereâ�™s a really odd quirkiness about people just why they are the way they are and you can watch the National geographic shows and the Discovery Channels and you start realizing that out of all the creatures that are walking around or doing their things humanity is just the one that has the strangest take on things.

PunkTV.ca: Itâ�™s little known that you did the 1997 Lit video Bitter that featured Vincent Gallo, speaking of strange and wonderful. I think heâ�™s just about the coolest person and one of the best directors on the planet. How did you meet up with him?

Well Buffalo 66 is one of my favorites. Iâ�™ve known Vincent for a while and heâ�™s an audiophile and heâ�™s actually a great musician.

PunkTV.ca: As an aside, he has a website thatâ�™s called Big Blue machine or something like that, that lists all of the gear that heâ�™s into and he collects all kind of 50s and 60s equipment and everything. People might not know about him and how you met.

The way I got him to be in the Lit video was like getting him a 19 inch Ampex equipment rack. Theyâ�™re really hard to come by and I knew someone that had one. I drove over in this old school car and he just loved it and thatâ�™s how we kind of connected on that level. And so I had listened to the Lit song Bitter and it just conjured up this character who just struggles and struggles and struggles and just canâ�™t seem to get anything right epitomized by the story line that plays out in that track. I just kept envisioning Vincent as the only guy who could actually portray it with facial expressions and body language to just convey that sense of utter frustration and bitterness. I approached him with the idea and he really dug it and agreed to do it and weâ�™ve remained friends since. Like you, I think heâ�™s a very talented artist.

PunkTV.ca: Heâ�™s an enigma. By the way thank you for that story, that was very entertaining and Iâ�™m sure quite indicative of the way that he deals with everybody.

Well he is a unique person and when you find that quality in somebody itâ�™s a good thing, it keeps you interested in things. He has a fresh perspective as opposed to anything that gets stale.

PunkTV.ca: What did you think of the Brown Bunny? It got booed and I saw it and I thought it was beautiful.

Ya I have a DVD of it and Iâ�™ve watched it several times and it stands on itâ�™s own for what it is. Every film maker does things for a myriad of reasons and what theyâ�™re trying to say may not always be what someone else is going to experience it for or wanting to hear so sometimes the match is perfect and other times itâ�™s not but that what makes film making and film going the experience that it is. I would much rather watch something thatâ�™s maybe not to my liking or at least controversial so I could have dialogue afterwards about what I just spent 2 hours experiencing and I think any time that you can do that itâ�™s a goof thing. Certainly thatâ�™s much more interesting to me than just kind of being lulled into a mediocre sense of complacency.

PunkTV.ca: Yeah, spoon fed pabulum kind of complacency. Which leads me to this questionâ�¦ there is that one scene there, obviously it is a beautiful movie and all the movies that he really does heâ�™s kind of Marlon Brando-esque in the sense he has a vision for the movie whether heâ�™s directing it or acting it or behind the camera or whatever and I think that supersedes everything thatâ�™s pretty much happening at the film at the time. Thatâ�™s obviously the Chloe Sevigny scene where heâ�™s really literally and symbolically giving a hundred percent of himself in this scene, the gratuitous sex scene. Iâ�™m just wondering at one point did he and did you self censor? Do you find that youâ�™re ever saying to yourself, â�œok, this is going to be too gratuitous, I canâ�™t let this goâ� or sometimes I think it was Romanek again that did the video for Nine Inch Nails and thereâ�™s nudity and bondage and so forth, at what point do you say Iâ�™m going to self censor that and Iâ�™m going to stop and not allow myself to do that.

I think itâ�™s a collaborative choice. Certainly with videos you have an artist that youâ�™re responsible to and certainly on music video projects things are funded by a record company or a management company thereâ�™s a certain inherent responsibility to deliver a product that is usable and the definition of the usability is there could be one version that is airing, there is a second version that is available on a DVD etcetera. So I think thatâ�™s a collaborative decision that has to be made amongst the artist, the companies involved with the end product and the film makers. On a feature film, I think itâ�™s much more wide open and on something that is more of an indie style approach where letâ�™s say thereâ�™s an author director that has written something and self financed it and he just wants to be totally true to what his or her vision is without any limitations. Certainly the artistic landscape and the ability to express it are not limited except if you impose it on you self. If a studio is behind it and a studioâ�™s money is behind it then you have to be responsible to that and if thereâ�™s someone on set saying this is not going to fly those are battle between producers and directors and on set representatives. For myself I would say that I typically write just form the heart and Iâ�™ve never really been one whoâ�™s tried to be blatantly either fallacious or gratuitous. I tend to find sullies and innuendo a lot more interesting than anything thatâ�™s blatant and so if you read for instance the script for On the Doll you would see a lot of very overt sexual and promiscuous scenes. However the ways the scenes are filmed and the way the psychological level which those scenes are conveyed in my opinion leaves a lot more to viewers imaginations than anything that I could film and I particularly like that approach. Thereâ�™s a classic scene in Reservoir Dogs where to me it was very upsetting and disturbing where the police officer was tortured and ultimately killed when I go back and watch that scene I donâ�™t see anything but I just watch the frames that isnâ�™t really that disturbing but when the camera frames away and the sound design moves away creates a very upsetting feeling in me I know thatâ�™s because on a psychological level thatâ�™s playing a lot more to my imagination than any thing that I could be seeing. I think weâ�™ve seen so many things now whether itâ�™s in films, the technology is so advance that we have the ability, budget permitting, to be as realistic as we need to be. We can re-create things very realistically I we want to and I think weâ�™ve all seen so much whether itâ�™s sexual or violence or just things around us, the stimuli around is in addition to just in film but whether it be turning on the news or online. We are so much more savvy just by the things that we are bombarded with constantly that to try and create something new and different feels like it would be better to try to do so on a psychological or emotional level rather than just trying to recreate a reality.

PunkTV.ca: The Red Ocean / Blue Ocean. One is their management theory and one is to work within an existing infrastructure and to compete within that infrastructure is to think outside the box and that competes with no one and in your when you do go that route and you are gratuitous youâ�™re basically doing what everyone else has done but if you try to find another way to represent that youâ�™re taking the path less traveled and competing with no one.

You just triggered my mind. The climatic scene in Buffalo 66 for example, I thought it was brilliant how this personâ�™s whole entity and being is consumed by his sense of revenge to exact revenge on the person who missed the field goal and ultimately landed him in a jail cell. When that climatic moment occurs, that could have been filmed in a way that could have had prosthetics and effects but with dynamics it could have looked horrifically real and it almost would have been like ok so what? The way it was handled which was not so gratuitous which was a frozen moment in time and then allowing a camera to kind of examine that in a very suspended moment kind of feeling the non-reality and on-gratuitous approach I felt realy made that a significant moment for me.

PunkTV.ca: I was thinking about the torture scene in Pulp Fiction.

Or in Reservoir Dogs where they dragged the police officer out of the car and then Michael ultimately slices off his ear. You never see any of that, you hear it and itâ�™s brilliant sound design and the way they just pan the camera of to the right you are left with this really ugly feeling but you see nothing. If the camera would to stay on that for the sake of gratuity it would have been a lot less dramatic I think because all you have to do is watch the current version of the worldâ�™s most extreme medical videos and the next thing you know what could be more real than a guy with a giant steel hook coming out of his head thatâ�™s in the operating room, it just doesnâ�™t get any more real than that. So weâ�™ve seen these kinds of things so many times that we tend to become a little bit maybe dulled by the reality therefore gratuity I think kind of just doesnâ�™t stack up so much anymore and to me I find people a lot more sexually appealing, a lot more sensuous when theyâ�™re wearing something than when theyâ�™re not. I think a lot of that can be applied to the day to day that we live all the time.

PunkTV.ca: What would surprise kids most to learn about director Thomas Mignione?

Probably that I love classical music most and that I wish I could be directing a video for a guy like Chopin but heâ�™s dead so I canâ�™t but I wish I could.

PunkTV.ca: Well you could do Michael Buble or Bochelli.

There you could.

PunkTV.ca: Or Norah Jones.

Iâ�™m an avid fan of classical music even though I do a lot of hard rock and heavy stuff, I like classical music a lot.

PunkTV.ca: Which of the following experiences have you had: have you seen the face of God, have you had an alien encounter or have you seen a ghost?

Iâ�™ve actually experienced all 3.

PunkTV.ca: Do you care to expand on any one of them?

No, theyâ�™re real personal.

PunkTV.ca: You wouldnâ�™t believe the variety of responses I get on that question. Iâ�™m going to publish a book along with my photography about it at some point.

Itâ�™s a great question and itâ�™s a really, really solid good one.

PunkTV.ca: Itâ�™s common and you wouldnâ�™t believe I talk to death metal bands and black metal bands and punk rock band and directors and a whole gamut of people and thereâ�™s a commonality in those kinds of experiences. For me, it attempts to try to get together the existential question of belief in things outside of that which we experience internally.

Thatâ�™s probably why you do so well as an interviewer, Dixon. You seem genuinely interested in what people have to say and you research them so that you create an interesting interview, at least thatâ�™s what I have found, thank you for that.

PunkTV.ca: You are most welcome, send us the screenplay when you can and I look forward to seeing your movie.
Thanks to you also!

3 Inches Of Blood Interview

3 Inches of Blood Interview - Jamie Hooper one on one with Punk Tv's Dixon Christie

PunkTV.ca: First of all, please introduce yourself.

Iâ�™m Jamie from 3 inches of Blood.

PunkTV.ca: Itâ�™s Dixon Christie here from PunkTV.ca, weâ�™ve got 3 Inches of Bloodâ�™s Jamie Hooper, it is February the 8^th 2007. First of all tell us about your day.

Itâ�™s been interesting. I had a driving shift from about 5 this morning until about 11. We went and got a hotel and had a shower which was much needed. We basically had to have a bottle of bleach and a scrub brush.

PunkTV.ca: Did you get it all off?

Oh ya, itâ�™s all off now. Weâ�™ve been in the van the past 35 hours roughly because we drove straight from Chicago to here and we only stopped for gas.

PunkTV.ca: What happened in Chicago?

Our van decided that it was going to have everything break at once as we were suppose to leave town to meet a deadline in Denver to play a show for this Cradle tour. So we had to forfeit the Denver show unfortunately and we spent an extra day in Chicago trying to get a new van. Which we fluked out because Nick, our bass player, a friend of his lives in Chicago and their band just broke up and they had a new van with only like 40 000 clicks on it and theyâ�™ve been looking to unload it because being a broken up band they have no use for it and they probably needed the money.

PunkTV.ca: Who was the band?

Off the top of my head I canâ�™t think of it. I remember somebody referencing pop punk so weâ�™ll have to get the pop punk germs out of the van.

PunkTV.ca: Youâ�™re talking to PunkTV.ca, we love punk rock and metal.

We love punk rock too.

PunkTV.ca: You guys are big rock stars now and you can afford to buy a new band on the road.

This is definitely not the case. Weâ�™re about the poorest mother fuckers around, or mofos for the CRTC.

PunkTV.ca: Whatâ�™s your per diem?

Ten bucks a day and that doesnâ�™t go very far when youâ�™re smoking a pack of cigarettesâ�¦

PunkTV.ca: And drinking as much beer as you do.

Ya exactly. Thatâ�™s like a 6 pack and thatâ�™s about it.

PunkTV.ca: I bet youâ�™re happy to get back to B.C. and Alberta where at least you know where to buy good weed cheap.

Especially Alberta where the beerâ�™s cheaper too. Coming out from the U.S. and coming to Canada itâ�™s like 3 times as much for a 6 pack. You can get a 6 pack of PBR in Washington state for like 2.99 and those are tall boys. Itâ�™s the deal of the century.

PunkTV.ca: I think they have some beer here thatâ�™s 10.99 for a dozen.

AGD, I love that stuff.

PunkTV.ca: Do you? Ok so bring the kids up to date. For kids that donâ�™t know you guys are huge touring with all of the biggest bands in the world right now but you started by getting together some old friends to jam and you were jamming out an old band of yours and you said hey this rocks so hard we want to check this out. Tell us about that.

It was more a matter of trying to get a bunch of old band mates together to play some shows and when we all sat down it was way more fun to just play something fresh and metal trying to relearn some shitty power songs or whatever. It was much more fun to crack a 6 pack and pump the metal we all love.

PunkTV.ca: Isnâ�™t it amazing how itâ�™s finally coming around. Even 5 or 10 years ago we could never be having this conversation, you could never have such a blatantly and positively 80s power metal influenced metal band hybrid with, I donâ�™t want to use any terms, but itâ�™s definitely hardcore, death metal kind of influenced music. Youâ�™ve got all the great, they call mellowdeath sometimes but itâ�™s all the sweet melodics but with the chugging and everything. We wouldnâ�™t have been able to have this conversation 10 years ago, weâ�™re in a better time and space arenâ�™t we?

People are more open minded these days it seems. Weâ�™re lucky that way with our shows to because sometimes you go to shows and itâ�™s like people ainâ�™t get along so well but people have made a note when coming to our shows that itâ�™s fucked up weâ�™ll go to a 3 inches show and thereâ�™s black metal dudes, thereâ�™s crust punks, thereâ�™s like straight edge kids, thereâ�™s old ass metal dudes with poodle hair and everyoneâ�™s in the same spot having a good time drinking beers, how does that work? You wonâ�™t see that at very many shows so itâ�™s nice to be able to cross a few boundaries that way.

PunkTV.ca: We talk about that with a lot of kids and I think you really got to thank shows like Taste Of Chaos. Warped Tour, Iâ�™d still like to see a lot more punk rock at Warped tour because thatâ�™s one show that Iâ�™ve been going to for 15 years and I would like to see a lot more punk rock. But I think like a Taste Of Chaos and a Sounds of the Underground and shows like that have really taught us that you can have black metal and doomcore and death metal and Trivium and As I Lay Dying all on the same set and still pack the shit up and Cannibal Corpse too.

Thatâ�™s totally true. We played the Sounds of the Underground Vancouver date this year and it was great because youâ�™d go straight from Cannibal Corpse to Terror to us to Gwar. Like us between Terror and Gwar is such a weird combination and then Cannibal Corpse, The Black Dahlia and then As I lay Dying and itâ�™s like itâ�™s a pretty good mix match of bands going on. And the place is full for every band, itâ�™s not like thereâ�™s this clichÃ© of kids for this bands and them for this band, everyone is watching every band so itâ�™s pretty cool.

PunkTV.ca: Then you get bands like As I Lay Dying and Norma Jean. Thereâ�™s a couple of Christian bands so you throw in something thatâ�™s completely off the wall. Youâ�™ve got death metal Satan worshippers on the one side.

Behemoth even made cracks about the Christan core on the tour and it was hilarious. The singer in between songs made some wise crack about Christian bands on the tour and Medicaide and shit. We weâ�™re like thatâ�™s awesome. The guys had like synchronized hair whipping, it was brutal.

PunkTV.ca: You know one of the bands, now that you mention it, does it most prolifically is Fat Mike from NOFX. He did it for I think like 50 shows and he forced that poor band UnderOath, they quit the tour. He bugged them so bad that they quit the tour and they went off the tour.

Thatâ�™s pretty insane. Have you ever heard of a band from Winnipeg called Swallowing Shit? Itâ�™s not hardcore, itâ�™s like fucking spastic brutal grind power metal stuff, itâ�™s real good. Swallowing Shit which is political grindcore basically you can call it and they had a song called Christian Metal is Equal to Nazi Reggae and it is one of the best song titles I have ever heard in my life.

PunkTV.ca: Speaking of titles, Three Inches of Blood, I thought it came from a movie but it actually came from one of Bobâ�™s dreams.

Actually thereâ�™s a few explanations for where that came from, itâ�™s not always the same explanations. But out reasoning for the title in the current manifestation is when the heavy metal army rolls through town, thatâ�™s how deep the poserâ�™s blood will run in the streets. Itâ�™s kind of like the crusades except this is the unholy crusade rather than the righteous Christian crusade, itâ�™s the opposite.

PunkTV.ca: Why are themes like crusades and glory and honor and Vikings and fire and blood, why are these crusades so important to bands like you guys?

Iâ�™m not sure that they are so important. The idea, not exactly the theology behind such things. Itâ�™s all from the Manowar sort of aspect, thereâ�™s this imaginary army of people that is trying to stop Manowar from being so metal. You never see these people but Manowar is like weâ�™re metal we wonâ�™t let these people bring us down and of course itâ�™s all imaginary. Youâ�™ve seen Heavy Metal the Headbangerâ�™s journey, the part where Dee Schneider was in front of that committee and defending metal and saying that they donâ�™t cause kids to shoot themselves in the face and Judas Priest doesnâ�™t make people kill themselves, itâ�™s the same sort of thing. The metal heads have to unite in metal and the metal heads are the underdogs so you have to have those songs of metal glory and triumph over adversity and sticking up for your metal rights.

PunkTV.ca: Even the emo bands, do they need to unite?

Fuck them. They donâ�™t need to unite, they need to die by our hands

PunkTV.ca: I didnâ�™t agree with that. Tell us about the Vancouver metal scene. Aside from you guys, Strapping Young Lad and my good friends in Time is the Enemy, are there any other good bands from Vancouver and I heard the scene there sucks.

It goes up and down but there are a lot of fucking awesome bands from Vancouver, A Javelin Reign is good, Mass Grave who we just played with those guys are fucking awesome. Limb from Limb is another brilliant band, Blood of course. Thereâ�™s some good noise projects like the Rita and stuff like that. There are a lot of more underground stuff in Vancouver that if you donâ�™t live there you just donâ�™t know about, like basement shows and punk houses those are the best things that are always going on. Good music is always being played in someoneâ�™s basement with a keg not in a venue with a thousand people watching.

PunkTV.ca: My good buddy Joey Shithead lives there and he is one of the few fucking labels that buy ads and pay for them right away. All hails to the Joey Shithead, heâ�™s got a new band too.

He keeps spreading the word in the proper underground too. He advertises his music where it matters in zines and stuff, thatâ�™s important.

PunkTV.ca: You said that your influence is Motorhead, Metallica and beer. Letâ�™s talk about the bands you love best today and the beer you drink most.

The beer we drink most is Pacific Pilsner sold only I think in B.C and brewed in Prince George.

PunkTV.ca: Pilsner is a good beer. In Alberta Pilsner is a good quality beer. Nice clean taste, no bitter aftertaste, no bitter beer mouth, none of that.

Weâ�™re big fans of the beer.

PunkTV.ca: You donâ�™t look like it, well you look very thin. Bob is the big beer drinker in your band?

Weâ�™re all big beer drinkers. Iâ�™m probably the biggest beer drinker actually.

PunkTV.ca: Whatâ�™s a normal night of beer consumption for you?

Weâ�™re talking 12 give or take. The other night I was pushing to 20.

PunkTV.ca: How have you enjoyed being on the road with Cradle of Filth? I know that Dani Filth is not drinking on this tour and I know that most of the band is not drinking or drugging or doing much on the tour. How has that been?

Itâ�™s good, itâ�™s fun. We still manage to sneak in our daily quota, thatâ�™s not affecting our intake at all. I donâ�™t know how theyâ�™ve operated in the past but they seem to be on the ball and enjoying themselves. I know if I was on a sober tour I probably wouldnâ�™t be having quite as much fun as I normally do but each to their own I suppose.

PunkTV.ca: Advance and Vanquish, you guys are still touring the hell out of that. At some point isnâ�™t it enough. Where is this album, Fire Up the Blades? Like your logo, itâ�™s all coming together. You know the first time I say your logo I was like what the fuck is that? Oh I know what that is yeah.

Itâ�™s funny because you get people coming to the shows who obviously arenâ�™t pot heads and theyâ�™ll have some guy come up to the merch table like Iâ�™ll have the one with the target on it or a kid will be like I want one with the spiral and youâ�™ll be like alright buddy.

PunkTV.ca: You canâ�™t really find hash anymore.

Depends on where you look I suppose. Itâ�™s funny because you go to like the UK or something and thatâ�™s the only thing you can get is crappy hash.

PunkTV.ca: People in Vancouver hot knife marijuana?

Yup.

PunkTV.ca: Pop bottle?

Only to conserve your money of course, you got to stretch it out especially when youâ�™re in a metal band.

PunkTV.ca: Living on 10 dollars a day.

When youâ�™re on tour. When youâ�™re not on tour itâ�™s zero dollars because It doesnâ�™t go so far.

PunkTV.ca: When you have a particularly good merch day do you guys get to go wow we can get 20 bucks each today?

No we donâ�™t do that. We had to buy a new van the other day.

PunkTV.ca: So if PunkTV bought you beer or bought you a dinner, weâ�™d be your friends for life. Ok well weâ�™re going to buy you a beer or food. We want to be your friends for life.

Beer is the priority.

PunkTV.ca: Ok then letâ�™s get you some beer. I know you guys got to go on tour with the Darkness and Justin from the Darkness actually did some back up on stage with you. Tell us about that, I guess he got his voice shredded.

Iâ�™m not sure that was the direct result of singing Deadly Sinners or not but there was one show that he came on stage and I got down on my knees like I was holding Excalibur or some shit like that and he took the mic and he sang Deadly Sinners with Ken. It was pretty cool because there were big crowds and we werenâ�™t used to playing in front of crowds. So itâ�™s kind of cool to have a guy from, theyâ�™re style isnâ�™t necessarily my bag of tricks sort of thing but it was cool to have somebody from an influential band in front of a large crowd of people sing one of our songs.

PunkTV.ca: When you think about it the Darkness and that album breaking through as it did in a lot of ways it did pave the way for the new movement of the old metal. I mean really thatâ�™s what weâ�™re talking about.

Somewhat, in sort of a Def Leppardy or Thin Lizzy sense but not in a Destruction, Creator, Sodom sense which we feel is far more important. Although we do have our Thin Lizzy influences. Donâ�™t get me wrong, we listen to a lot of new wave-ish heavy metal, 70s rock and we have equal parts influence and equal parts Carpathian Forest influence. Weâ�™ll listen to everything from Neil Diamond to Carpathian Forest to Leonard Cohen. Our influences come from all over.

PunkTV.ca: You ever read Leonard Cohenâ�™s book Beautiful Losers. Did you love it? Do you have any male friends like that?

Not so much.

PunkTV.ca: Any of the weird love triads that he celebrated in the book?

No.

PunkTV.ca: You know because of the descriptiveness of it and you know his nature, that had to be autobiographical. Whoâ�™s youâ�™re favorite writer?

Right now its Kurt Vronin. I just finished his book Irons of Titan actually this morning at about 3 oâ�™clock in the van and it was darn good, heâ�™s got a bunch of books. Iâ�™m a big Paul Throw fan, Graeme Greene.

PunkTV.ca: Your list should include people like Bukowski. He was a consummate drinker.

Iâ�™m not a big fan of Bukowski. Actually a few weeks ago I watched a Bukowski 3 DVD set wasted sitting on his couch rambling about bull shit under the guise of being interviewed but itâ�™s just him ranting for like 4 hours and at one point his lady friend, I donâ�™t know what their relationship is, sheâ�™s sitting on the couch with him and he like fully is punching her and kicking her and calling her a cunt infront of the TV camera. Itâ�™s like holy fuck itâ�™s the shittiest DVD alive. But theyâ�™re usually the most creative outlet because maybe being an old wasted asshole helps that.

PunkTV.ca: For a real diversion in that Elmore Leonard.

I havenâ�™t read any of him.

PunkTV.ca: Get Shorty and Stick, like all kind of cinema noir, dark, pulp fiction-y type stuff and itâ�™s good stuff. Tell us about your upcoming tours and what youâ�™ve got coming up and tell the kids about the album.

The album we just finished recording around Christmas time, like December 22^nd we basically finished recording it. Of course we just finalized the artwork and the cover art and everything just yesterday and the track listing, what songs are going to be on it and what order we just decided that yesterday. Itâ�™s coming out May 8^th, it was suppose to be out in March but it got delayed because dealing with record labels thereâ�™s way too many cooks in the kitchen. So May 8^th is when it comes out. Weâ�™re on this Cradle of Filth tour until March 4^th so from here we go down the West coast, across the south, the East coast to New York. Then from there weâ�™re going to the UK for 3 weeks and weâ�™re doing 3 weeks of shows in England, Scotland and Ireland which is nice because weâ�™ll actually get to go to the Thin Lizzy statue down by his house so thatâ�™s going to be a pilgrimage for me to make for sure. Weâ�™re there for 3 weeks and weâ�™re just waiting on a couple tours that weâ�™re hoping to get after that. Weâ�™ll probably be doing the US either on our own or opening for somebody.

PunkTV.ca: The real question is when can the kids get a hold of the new album Fire Up the Blades?

May 8^th.

PunkTV.ca: One more thing, Iâ�™ve seen a startling number of kids with the number 3 tattooed on their body.

One guy came to the Seattle show on New Years Eve and he had the circle 3 the size of a coffee cup saucer right in his armpit which is apparently the most painful place ever. Thereâ�™s another guy in England his nameâ�™s Ian and he has Three Inches of Blood just the words tattooed from his wrist to his elbow on the inside of his forearm and then heâ�™s got the big circle 3 on his chest. And thereâ�™s some hip hope guy in Boise Idaho who came and heâ�™s like I donâ�™t listen to metal but I listen to you guys and he had like a half sleeve or Orcs and Demons. Itâ�™s a phenomenon and itâ�™s a little weird. Iâ�™ve got a couple tattoos that are artwork from albums I love but I donâ�™t have any band names tattooed on my body, thatâ�™s crazy. So every time somebody shows me Iâ�™m like thatâ�™s awesome and flattering but youâ�™re crazy. Itâ�™s definitely cool to see for sure.

PunkTV.ca: I got to tell you about a really bad tattoo that one kid I know got and by kid I mean heâ�™s 35 and he works in a tattoo shop and just to fuck with the head of his boss, his boss name is Charlie, he got a big black and white jail house style tat of him across his whole leg with his face and across the top it says Charles in Charge. Ok youâ�™re 50 and youâ�™re looking back and saying that wasnâ�™t such a great idea, a tattoo of Charles in Charge across his leg and itâ�™s his boss. I said do you love this guy, is he your best friend? No, not particularly.

I got 2 of the most hilarious tattoos that Iâ�™ve seen shopping in Providence Rhode Island and the guys come to our show when weâ�™re in town and they give us free tattoos and we have a post-show party at their shop and beer and get 5 am drunk tattoos. One guy there, we were at the shop getting tanked and there was a stencil on the desk that the guy was getting done the next day. You know the Minor Threat art of the beer bottle wearing the jacket, the bottle of violence art and itâ�™s the beer bottle wearing the leather jacket holding 2 beers and itâ�™s the same idea but itâ�™s a hot dog wearing a leather jacket with a bottle of ketchup and a bottle of mustard in its hands and above the banner instead of saying Guilty of Being White, that song title from Minor Threat, it says Guilty of Being Delicious and the thing is like this big. One of the guys Mike who tattoos us there heâ�™s got a full back piece like neck to ass side to side and itâ�™s a monkey riding a unicycle playing the accordion smoking 80 cigarettes at the same time wearing a Viking helmet with horns and above it and below it is a banner saying only God can judge me and his goal was to get the worldâ�™s stupidest tattoo. Itâ�™s like 2 and a half feet tall and wide, itâ�™s pretty spectacular

PunkTV.ca: Which of the following experience have you had; have you seen the face of God, have you had an alien encounter or have you seen a ghost?

None of the above although when we were recoding the record Dan Turner, who was the engineer, he was in mushroom studios in Vancouver about 1:30 in the miring and he claims to have seen a ghost in the control room while he was doing some editing. The guys who work there claim that they also, between certain nights between 1 and 2 if youâ�™re alone in the place you get this eerie someoneâ�™s there feeling. The guy kept saying he kept seeing flashes of black like somebody running behind him out of the corner of his eye. I think itâ�™s bull shit but of course Iâ�™m the worldâ�™s biggest skeptic. I like empirical evidence to back things up not some guy whoâ�™s tanked at one in the morning seeing a ghost.

PunkTV.ca: Empiricism, are you at all into Carl Hume?

Not so much. I havenâ�™t delved into him too much.

PunkTV.ca: What would surprise kids most to learn about you or Three Inches of Blood?

That weâ�™re all big Neil Diamond fans.

PunkTV.ca: Neil Diamond rocks.

I saw him about 6 months ago when he did the last tour and it was fabulous. He had this crazy toned stage and he had the horn section and the back up section and it was divided into like a pie and as each section was required it was raised up from underneath and then theyâ�™d do their bit and sink back down and I would close up.

PunkTV.ca: One of my clients actually came through my house the other day and I had like 21 Neil Diamond albums, he saw all my Neil Diamond records. Heâ�™s from Korea and heâ�™s like you have vinyl records, do you want to sell them? I go ya 5000 US so I sold my entire collection including all my Neil Diamond albums. So if anybody has any Neil Diamond albums they can send me Iâ�™m completely out of Neil Diamond vinyl but I got 5000 dollars US.

Testament Interview

Testament Interview with Eric Peterson in Support of the Spitfire Collection and their 2007 World Tour

Testament Interview with Eric Peterson in Support of the Spitfire Collection and their 2007 World Tour

By Dixon Christie

PunkTV.ca: Itâ�™s been 20 years and itâ�™s basically been you and Chuck from the very beginning. Tell us about a lifetime of making music with your best friend.

Itâ�™s been great. Itâ�™s been a long marriage, thatâ�™s what I call it. Weâ�™ve been together so long as business friends through good times and bad, itâ�™s all good. Now its coming full circle, we got the original guys back with us and we got our new drummer Nick Barker whoâ�™s going out with us and doing the new record with us. Itâ�™s a lot of fun.

PunkTV.ca: You guys have probably been through some downs in the last little while, Chuck just made it through his bout with throat cancer.

Ya he beat that, itâ�™s been a couple years now and it seems good and everything seems to be good. Itâ�™s all good.

PunkTV.ca: And the record is coming along well, you guys are halfway done this record?

Well thereâ�™s a lot of material but what weâ�™re doing right now is tracking the ideas right now and see what we like and what sticks and adding new songs along the way.

PunkTV.ca: Youâ�™re currently on tour supporting the Spitfire collection which features the classics like Practice What You Preach. How is he audience?

Well weâ�™re not really just going on the road to support that. That is another corporate move from the record company. Thatâ�™s something we would not have done but since they have the license to our material they can let it out any way they want.

PunkTV.ca: How does it make you feel when they do another greatest hits?

When they emailed it to me I told them theyâ�™re crazy and thatâ�™s the stupidest thing Iâ�™ve ever heard. Weâ�™ve already put out a best of and the label that weâ�™re on now they took all the best songs from the Gathering and Demonic and the whole and they licensed it to some company, some smaller company licensed it out to then and then we didnâ�™t even know what was in store.

PunkTV.ca: You sound frustrated.

I donâ�™t really like that label.

PunkTV.ca: And thereâ�™s not really much you can do about that but obviously from a writerâ�™s perspective you guys are kind enough to do some press in order to talk about the upcoming album.

Ya thatâ�™s what Iâ�™m talking about. We donâ�™t tour that much anymore so when we do get a chance to go out. Weâ�™re going to Australia so itâ�™s going to be a lot of fun. The festivals are coming up in Europe and we always have a great time with that. But this time around weâ�™re working on new material so thatâ�™s a plus for us and our fans that weâ�™re actually going to be putting something new out soon.

PunkTV.ca: You guys are going to Hungary, Poland, Serbia, Germany and Australia. A world tour practically eh?

Ya but itâ�™s kind of spread out though over the 4 months so thatâ�™s pretty cool.

PunkTV.ca: Is it nice after all this while to be able to go out and play all these festivals as opposed to playing the smaller rooms?

I like both. Both are great. Festivals of course you reach a lot more people but thereâ�™s nothing like a good sold out, packed club show. We just did that last week and we played our hometown San Francisco. We had a great show, it was our first show with Nick and it was great.

PunkTV.ca: You guys grew up with Suicidal eh?

Theyâ�™re from LA, weâ�™re from San Francisco so theyâ�™re from the South and weâ�™re from the North. Weâ�™ve done a lot of shows with them in the past when we were first starting out. We did the Clash of the Titans but we havenâ�™t really been in contact since then.

PunkTV.ca: Thatâ�™s what I was going to ask you is what happened to Mike Muir and the boys?

I donâ�™t even know. I know back in the day those guys were crazy. We had some good times but they had a pretty crazy vibe going on.

PunkTV.ca: Well the bravest tiger dies first or the brightest flame burns the fastest.

Whatever it was they lived by their code and they werenâ�™t fake. The Suicidal Tendencies were as real as you can get as far as being tough guys. They didnâ�™t take any shit from anybody.

PunkTV.ca: Itâ�™s nice to sell records but when youâ�™re talking about re-releasing old, old stuff and the deals that you have with the label are probably in favor of the label so you guys are probably making the lionâ�™s share of the money on the merch and thatâ�™s a big part of what affords you to go on the road these days eh?

Itâ�™s not the lionâ�™s share but it definitely helps out. Itâ�™s one of the things that keeps the machine rolling like oil in your car. Itâ�™s part of the process of making things happen.

PunkTV.ca: Speaking of oil in your car (cheesy segue hereâ�¦) you guys are no stranger to the Middle East. I know recently you played in the Dubai Desert Rock.

Ya that was in Dubai which is the immigrants down there by close to Iraq or no closer to Saudi Arabia and Iran. A lot of the kids that came there were totally cool metal heads, long hair, Slayer shirts, they were cool. I hung out with a bunch out there and it gave me a totally different perspective on Middle Easterners. I think the way we portray them over here is pretty stereotyped. I went out in the city and theyâ�™re great people, a lot of style, great ethnics, great food, good hard working people. They got a bad rap and I know itâ�™s crazy over there but good people.

PunkTV.ca: I was going to ask you about the USA badge that American bands wear when they travel and Iâ�™ve asked this question to other bands like Napalm Death and other politically aware bands. Tell us about when you travel, especially to a place like the Middle East and how you feel about this administrationâ�™s so called war against terror.

Well first of all, weâ�™re a rock band and I donâ�™t think they look at us as a political movement. They probably think of us more as the rebels against the norm of the Americans. Weâ�™re not a political band, we play rock and roll and rock and roll is more universal. But we do have that USA badge and Iâ�™ve never really encountered anything bad from it so far. It does cross our minds when we travel. Weâ�™ve been offered to play Israel a couple of times but weâ�™ve turned it down because of the horror stories. But we had a great time. Chuck and I look American Indian, he more a little but than me but people usually trip on that more. Especially Chuck because heâ�™s a front guy and looks like a big Indian, theyâ�™re just kind of like cool.

PunkTV.ca: Do you guys feel like Native Americans are getting a fare shake with losing lands and being ostracized of communities.

Now that itâ�™s all said and done maybe but itâ�™s one of those things where itâ�™s kind of too late. Thereâ�™s too much damage done.

PunkTV.ca: Well a lot of people complain about giving special concessions to indigenous people and their rights to land and their oil rights.

Our forefathers lived things a lot differently than we do and weâ�™re trying to cover up the messes I think. I think everybody is a bit more level headed these days and politically have their heads on straight. Itâ�™s just the same all this shit that went down but I guess weâ�™re doing the right thing by doing things like that.

PunkTV.ca: So being an innovator of 80â�™s guitar orientated thrash metal tell us about how you feel about all the great guitar based metal bands coming up these days and the new movement thatâ�™s coming out and all of the bands are playing together - everybody seems to be getting along real well.

Thereâ�™s a lot of great metal bands out there now. Quality has gotten a lot better, technology has gotten a lot better to make it sound better. So I mean itâ�™s a great time for metal actually.

PunkTV.ca: What else can you tell us about these shows, do you have any planned for the United States or Canada over the next 6 months?

Ya weâ�™re talking about doing Toronto and Montreal and Ottawa maybe and Quebec City. Weâ�™re looking into doing all that stuff like an East Coast thing in like July. That should be pretty cool.

PunkTV.ca: Ok so weâ�™ve got 2 more questions that we ask everybody. The first one is which of the following experiences have you had: have you seen the face of God, have you had an alien encounter or have you seen a ghost?

Well I have never seen anything like that but probably felt the presence of ghosts by asking for it and itâ�™s pretty powerful stuff. It makes you wonder and itâ�™s definitely something bigger than us.

PunkTV.ca: Well there has to be. What is the testament in Testament? Sometimes when Testament is written that AMEN is capitalized. Is there any type of acknowledgement of a greater power within that band? Are we created, do we come from aliens?

Ya I think thatâ�™s what itâ�™s all about. The great revenge is upon us and we will be delivered soon.

PunkTV.ca: What would surprise kids most to learn about the might Testament?

The one thing that newer people can find from us is we just keep getting heavier and heavier. Weâ�™re going to be exploring out roots and all the best things about us. The new record is going to be killer and Iâ�™m really excited.

The Living End Interview

The Living End interview in support of their 2007 tour

PunkTV.ca: Alright, itâ�™s Chris Cheney from the Living End on the line, itâ�™s February the 14^th and weâ�™re talking at about 2:48 in the afternoon. How you doing Chris?

Very well. Happy Valentines Day to you.

PunkTV.ca: Thanks a lot brother. I was just about to wish you the same.

Weâ�™re a long way from home so unfortunately I didnâ�™t get any roses or anything today, I missed out.

PunkTV.ca: Aw you poor son of a bitch.

Iâ�™ll survive.

PunkTV.ca: Youâ�™re going on stage in front of like 10 000 people tonight?

Yea thatâ�™ll do.

PunkTV.ca: Iâ�™m sure thatâ�™s a good enough rose for you. Do you know what magazine comes up when you google the Living End interview? Do you know what magazine comes up number 3 in the entire world?

No.

PunkTV.ca: We do, PunkTV.ca. We talked to you last summer at Warped tour in Calgary.

Ya I remember that show. Number 3 huh?

PunkTV.ca: Number 3 in the world.

There you go, thatâ�™s pretty dam good I reckon.

PunkTV.ca: I can tell it was a momentous occasion for you since you remembered so well.

Itâ�™s one of them highlights. I got to tell ya, we met the Rolling Stones, Punk TV, itâ�™s all up there.

PunkTV.ca: Did you really get to meet the Rolling Stones?

Ya we played a show with them in Sidney early last year. It was very surreal, it was one of those things you couldnâ�™t believe was actually happening.

PunkTV.ca: Did they let you go in and kiss Mickâ�™s ass or touch their clothes or walk in the same space that they walked in?

That was the only rule: no touching Mickâ�™s back side.

PunkTV.ca: And you know you would have eh?

Definitely.

PunkTV.ca: So how was that? You know youâ�™ve made it whenâ�¦

Ya well it was pretty special. It was only one show but weâ�™ve had a lot of thrills like that. We got to play a show with AC/DC, I got to meet Joe Strummer. There are certain things that when youâ�™re in a band itâ�™s essential for you to do some of these wild and wacky things that you never thought youâ�™d be able to do.

PunkTV.ca: How are AC/DC kicking it after all these year?

They were great. They really were just incredible. They wiped the fucking floor with us every night. But it was a learning curve, it was like ok thatâ�™s the standard and if youâ�™re going to be a rock and roll band it doesnâ�™t get any better than that.

PunkTV.ca: And same thing with the Rolling Stones. They bring their A game eh?

Ya.

PunkTV.ca: Thereâ�™s no fuck ups on stage and every light and every single detail is calculated to the nth degree.

Pretty much.

PunkTV.ca: And actually people have used the word Green Day and the Living End in the same sentence and I donâ�™t consider it to be a swear or anything but a really positive homage but thatâ�™s one band that Iâ�™ve watched along with you guys really pull their socks up continually. I think Iâ�™ve seen Green Day 5 times, the first time was in a small club and the last time was headlining for 17 000 kids and youâ�™re watching this experience happen in from of you and youâ�™re celebrating the experience but the band inside is really making that conscious decision to say hey we got to bring our A game to every single show and Iâ�™m just wondering how that growth and experience has really evolved for you guys? Letâ�™s talk about the evolution of the Living End?

Well you know I donâ�™t think itâ�™s something that just happens. I really think you have to work at it and you have to do what you said; you have to push yourself. Weâ�™ve had to really push ourselves to come out with strong songs and continually improve on the live show and evolve as a band and that means being aware of where youâ�™re at and where you want to go and ever being sort of too big headed or anything. Being aware of whatâ�™s around you and you can always try to improve and working on your weaknesses. Weâ�™re one of these bands thatâ�™s always wanted to try and do it all. We started out as a pretty traditional rockabilly band but then we wanted to write punk songs and then we wanted to bring the punk rock thing in with it and we had to kind of event our own style with the double bass that was going to translate to people and it was kind of an image and a vision that we had in our own heads that we had to try to achieve. Weâ�™ve always kind of tried to push the band into different areas and push and foremost we wanted to be a really great live band and I think from that you get that sort of reaction on stage and cover different styles, itâ�™s half the battle.

PunkTV.ca: I think thatâ�™s exactly the magic that youâ�™re talking about is accessibility. If youâ�™ve ever heard classic rockabilly or Jean Vincent or John Lennon doing 60s rockabilly or the Stray Cats and all the way up into the Clash and the Sex Pistols, now weâ�™re talking about Green Day. I think the Living End has made something that was clearly influenced in the early stages but youâ�™ve created a hybrid that is absolutely your own now isnâ�™t it?

I hope so. The best compliment we get is if people hear us on the radio and they recognize that itâ�™s us and they think we sound unique because for me growing up in high school I loved early Elvis and right up to the punk stuff and Elvis Costello and everything in between. For me it was kind of difficult and confusing I suppose to figure out what kind of band we wanted to be but then we just said letâ�™s try to do it all and you can fall flat on your face sometimes in life when you do that. You need to be smart about it and pick and choose which direction youâ�™re going to go and do it 110%. But with us we tried to bring in elements of everything that we liked together and that seems to have worked. We do have something that is genuinely unique and Iâ�™m kind of proud that it hasnâ�™t just been an idea in our heads that was unachievable.

PunkTV.ca: Thereâ�™s definitely some growth and a real experience thatâ�™s gone into it. Letâ�™s talk about when you guys go out on these package tours like Warped and youâ�™re out playing with bands that are not so clearly defined by rock and roll as youâ�™ve been but could be defined by say the Deftones or you find bands that arenâ�™t so clearly classically defined from 30 or 40 years of rock and roll and blues and soul and rhythm and blues as you have but rather bands that have been really defined in the last 5 years letâ�™s say. They kind of came from no where and theyâ�™re defined on bands that arenâ�™t really so well developed. How is it touring in Warped tour and what did it feel like playing with all these bands that have a completely new sound?

I actually didnâ�™t know how weâ�™d fit in. I sort of though perhaps it wouldnâ�™t go down as well as previous years because there didnâ�™t seem to be as much diversity on the tour and I didnâ�™t know if that would confuse the audience with us coming out with a double bass having this retro kind of feel. I donâ�™t like to look at it that way but I guess if youâ�™ve never seen the band before thereâ�™s that kind of image and stuff going on. But I was really surprised, it went down extremely well alongside the other bands and I think the young kids and stuff that saw the band for the first time found something genuinely refreshing about it. One thing that I noticed on this tour, I was a little bit narrow minded going into it but the newer kind of bands that youâ�™re mentioning just because theyâ�™re kind of not doing the traditional rock and roll itâ�™s not as obvious that itâ�™s an influence but they cut their own kind of rock and roll. To me itâ�™s always been more of a feeling and a mood and a vibe than it has been about which riffs you play and I admire that. Rock and roll is different than what it was back in the 50s and 60s but itâ�™s till rock and roll. These kids today, theyâ�™re rock and roll.

PunkTV.ca: We donâ�™t like to use labels but we do interview all of these bands all the time and I love them and Iâ�™m a big fan of a lot of these bands but itâ�™s always interesting for me to not how you guys from Australia are going to come tour North America, perhaps youâ�™re not going to feel like youâ�™re going to fit in and then to wonder how you did fit in. But there are bands like the Horrorpops and The Nekromantix and thereâ�™s a couple of a really super cool bands in Toronto actually, the Creepshow and the Matadors, have you guys crossed their paths?

No, I havenâ�™t really.

PunkTV.ca: Youâ�™ll get sick when you hear them. The guy from the Matadors, when I met this kid he told me it was going to be the best show that I ever experienced and it was going to channel the devil and Elvis at the same time. The bass player actually crawls his huge stand up bass through the audience. He can fall down on his back and flip right back up with it. Being fans of rockabilly as you are I know it would be cool for you guys to check those guys out. Theyâ�™re good Canadian bands that celebrate this music just like you guys do.

Definitely, that sounds great.

PunkTV.ca: Quick views on Fat Mike and the little war that was going on between Fat Mike and Underoath during last yearâ�™s tour. Any comments?

Not really. I only heard a few comments here and there when Fat Mike was on stage but from what I could tell it was a little bit of a running gag between both bands but perhaps it wasnâ�™t, I donâ�™t know. I wouldnâ�™t like to comment.

PunkTV.ca: Tell us about the showcase youâ�™re doing in Toronto.

Itâ�™s called Gâ�™day Toronto. Itâ�™s kind of a cheesy name but it has all the best intentions. We especially like coming here because weâ�™ve always had a really good fan base here. The invite was put out there to come and play and promote Australia and stuff and I had no idea the history of the relationship with Canada and Australia. Itâ�™s been quite strong and I didnâ�™t realize, something like 200 000 Australians come to Canada every year and 100 000 Canadians go to Australia and itâ�™s wild. So we kind of jumped at the opportunity and I think itâ�™s a chance for the Canadians to come in from the cold or something which isnâ�™t a better title because itâ�™s bloody freezing out there.

PunkTV.ca: I was going to ask you, what do you think of the weather in Toronto today?

Iâ�™m struggling. I got lost before trying to get back to the hotel and I had to keep moving because I thought I was going to freeze on the spot.

PunkTV.ca: Would you believe that weâ�™re out playing hockey last night in 30 below weather? Ya you donâ�™t get that kind of weather anywhere in Australia eh?

Not really, no. We have snow hills here but you have to drive to find them, we donâ�™t really have snow in the city.

PunkTV.ca: Since weâ�™re talking about it, how is Australia most like Canada and how are we completely different.

Thereâ�™s a lot more similarities I must admit. A lot more similarities from Canada and Australia than there is America and Australia. Te restaurants and the food and stuff is really great, coffee and stuff like that itâ�™s hard to find that in the states. I think just thereâ�™s more of a light nature here and Australia is known for that people are pretty easy going.

PunkTV.ca: Weâ�™re both commonwealth countries and I think if you ask a Canadian what they felt about England or Australia compared to America theyâ�™d probably tell you that they prefer to go to Australia or the UK over traveling to America probably any day.

It seems that way.

PunkTV.ca: So tell us about the songs that were deleted on your MySpace. I was just checking out what you guys have been doing lately and I know that some of the songs had been deleted by MySpace.

Oh ok.

PunkTV.ca: Do you know which ones?

No.

PunkTV.ca: Itâ�™s said no more TLE, more songs deleted by MySpace.

Iâ�™ll have to check that out.

PunkTV.ca: So letâ�™s talk about some of the bands ideals like control of chaos and not being prisoners of society.

Itâ�™s a good title for a song. Unfortunately, letâ�™s face it, thereâ�™s some rules in this world and we all have to abide by some of them. Are we the prisoners of society, I donâ�™t know. Weâ�™re all a part of society, most of it anyways. You can choose how to conduct yourself and live your life, you donâ�™t necessarily have to be a prisoner but we all get parking fines and we all have to pay rent so there are a few necessities.

PunkTV.ca: But it really makes a good anthem doesnâ�™t it?

It does. The thing with that song is itâ�™s kind of my take on writing a song like My Generation or Summertime Blues, just that classic rock and roll imagery of screw you weâ�™re going to do what we want when we want. And every teenager feels that way and Iâ�™ve definitely had my moments of course but it was never really meant as a punk rock statement as such. It was kind of just like I was trying to write a rock and roll song.

PunkTV.ca: How long ago did you write it?

I guess it was written in 97 or something so ya 10 years.

PunkTV.ca: I know that you and Scott have been buddies since you were like 12 years old. How many of the old songs that you have written so far back and some of the old jams and stuff that you guys had worked on, how many of them have been released?

A lot of the first album obviously. Thereâ�™s some stuff on the first album that goes right back to when we were in high school and jamming in his garage. Thatâ�™s about it really. After that we started writing songs pretty fresh and pretty current material for each album. Thereâ�™s always so many songs left over. We always write like 60 songs for each album and we only end up with like 14 on the record so thereâ�™s a lot of stuff lying around that we hope to release one day.

PunkTV.ca: B Sides. I know that in 2004 you guys released that DVD compilation that kids can pick up. Itâ�™s called From Here on In and that was all your best stuff from 97 to 2004, is that right?

Ya well it was all our singles. We did a CD that was the singles from way back from our first EP up to that point. Then we decided that we would do a DVD that chronicled our career so it was like home video footage from when we were like 15 or something right up until a couple of years back, small clubs to AC/DC support and everything in between.

PunkTV.ca: Now kids can see you, youâ�™ve been viewed like half a million times on YouTube but I came across this Mad Twins cartoon. These guys just cooked this up for you?

Ya theyâ�™re fantastic. I saw one the other day and it was hysterical. It was really quite scary, the likeness was quite accurate. We havenâ�™t met those guys but Iâ�™ve heard a lot about them and seen a couple of their clips. Itâ�™s really crazy, Iâ�™d never imagined when we started the band that people would draw cartoons for us and stuff, itâ�™s really wild.

PunkTV.ca: At some point youâ�™re sitting back and saying who the fuck am I?

Itâ�™s a bit like a different person sometimes, the guy on tele and stuff I donâ�™t feel is the same person but I guess it is.

PunkTV.ca: I tried to watch youâ�™re new video for Wake Up and it was blocked by our country because the content producer would only allow it in the United States. Do you know anything about that?

No I donâ�™t, thatâ�™s not good.

PunkTV.ca: So hopefully kids will be able to get access to that. Where else can kids view your videos outside of YouTube?

We actually have a live DVD that we did in Melbourne a while ago and you could probably get that on import or something like that. I donâ�™t know if there are any plans to release that here yet. Aside from that, I really donâ�™t know. Itâ�™s a dam shame.

PunkTV.ca: The latest album kids can go pick up is called State of Emergency. You guys have been touring that for a full year now, are there plans to start working on a new album for 2008?

Thereâ�™s always a steady work flow. Thereâ�™s a few songs kicking around at the moment but weâ�™ve just been so busy with this album and itâ�™s done so well at home and itâ�™s doing OK in the states and obviously here weâ�™re trying to boost it up. It hasnâ�™t really left us with much time to do anything else as of yet but itâ�™s not far away.

PunkTV.ca: The artwork was classic rock and roll.

We wanted something very stark. I guess with the look of the double bass and the kind of guitars and stuff we play we wanted to show that was still an important part of the band for anyone who thought that weâ�™ve perhaps gone very pop or something. I though letâ�™s just have this very stark image of the guitar, bass, drums, the original rock and roll trio look. It turned out really good, we did a photo shoot and that photo looked really good so we just made it black and white. We kept it really stark and it went really well with the title, very in your face.

PunkTV.ca: It just goes to show once again that simple and classic sometimes are better. If you look at the Clash London Calling was a direct homage to the Elvis Presley album where he had Elvis down one side and Presley down the bottom. So when you see those kinds of classic representations in album artwork it almost looks iconic. It speaks to the subliminal mind and says hey this is a classical way of representing this band and I think that can make it a lot easier for it to stand out amongst a whole bunch of other albums.

Definitely. I just adore looking at old album covers and really iconic powerful images and stuff like that. To me itâ�™s a massive part of it. Coming up with a riff and a song is cool but a band that actually has an image and has a whole package and stuff to me is at least half of the appeal of getting into a band is the way they look and the way they present themselves and stuff. Which is why as much as I loved to 50s and the rockabilly stuff to me the Sex Pistols and the Clash was so appealing and the Jam and that whole thing they just borrowed bits and pieces here and there and thatâ�™s whatâ�™s exciting to me.

PunkTV.ca: Thatâ�™s why meeting Joe Strummer was such a highlight to you?

Definitely, heâ�™s a true rocker and thereâ�™s no doubt about it. He was a once in a lifetime kind of guy.

PunkTV.ca: One of my favorite bands is Anti-Flag and the lead singer, Justin Sane, has a solo side project thatâ�™s just beautifully influenced by classic punk rock like the Clash. Have you ever listened to them?

No I havenâ�™t actually. We met those guys and stuff on the Warped tour but I havenâ�™t heard his other band no.

PunkTV.ca: Speaking of Anti-Flag, tell us about this State of Emergency concept from a political perspective and what pisses you off most about the Bush administration or even the Tony Blair administration?

I havenâ�™t immersed myself in it too much but I need to because itâ�™s been thrown in our faces every 5 minutes and I do find it very confusing. I really think the whole thing is just out of hand. When we named the album everything was being declared a state of emergency, it was the brand new catch phrase. It was like it was the new black almost. Itâ�™s kind of us finding something we though would sound good with the music we created cause thereâ�™s a certain urgency and stuff to a lot of our songs and the way the recording was made it was a really sort of hectic time for us so it worked in that sense. Politically as well it was definitely a very now statement. I think you guys and America and Australia and the whole world really is continually baffled by whatâ�™s being achieved and people making all the decisions on behalf of the rest of us and itâ�™s a very scar time I guess. We donâ�™t for a second think that we have any answers in our songs itâ�™s just a lot of the time when we talk about political issues weâ�™re not like Anti-Flag, weâ�™re not out to make a definite pint. Itâ�™s me trying to decipher whatâ�™s right and whatâ�™s wrong in the situation itself. Itâ�™s more of a commentary on whatâ�™s going on.

PunkTV.ca: Kids might be surprised to learn that you guys were featured on Sony Playstationâ�™s Guitar Hero II.

That was a blast. I havenâ�™t played it. Everyone keeps asking if Iâ�™ve played it. I havenâ�™t had a go yet so I must try and do that.

PunkTV.ca: That would make for a funny video actually. What if you sucked at it?

Well thatâ�™s ok, it doesnâ�™t matter cause I wrote the damn thing so itâ�™s cool.

PunkTV.ca: Well itâ�™s not exactly like youâ�™re playing. My buddy actually plays that song and heâ�™s a promoter form back home here and itâ�™s just so funny because itâ�™s not like your playing a guitar at all. Youâ�™re not even playing notes, you got to touch the lights and stuff like that. Itâ�™s completely different. What would surprise kids most to learn about Chris Cheny or the Living End?

Probably how much of a fan of country music I am.

PunkTV.ca: Dwight Yokum?

Not that kind of country.

PunkTV.ca: Hank Williams?

Ya more traditional kind of stuff and particularly country sort of guitar playing. Also what a pop fan I am, I just bought the John Legends CD because I saw them on the Grammys the other night and I though man this guy is a killer singer and I love anyone who can put together classic, well written pop songs. Itâ�™s a world away from what we do when weâ�™re on stage, thereâ�™s a certain aggression and attack and stuff when you see us play live but deep down Iâ�™m a pop fan, no doubt about it.

PunkTV.ca: What about James Blunt?

No, I draw the line there. I donâ�™t really dig that much.

PunkTV.ca: Thank you for that honesty. Which of the following experiences have you had: have you seen the face of God, have you had an alien encounter or have you seen a ghost.

Meeting Strummer I guess was pretty close to seeing the face of God for me so Iâ�™ll pick that one.

Cradle Of Filth Interview

Cradle of Filth Live Interview with Dani Filth in Support of Their Album, Thoronography.

By Andy Warhead and Dixon Christie

Andy: Alright Dani so congrats on the new album. The fans all seem to be going nuts for Thornography. Whatâ�™s your reaction with it and how have the responses been with the fans.

Well I think you just summed it up really. We had good fun recording it, a great time recording it in fact. There were a couple of difficulties here and there but we worked with some great people. We had the opportunities to do al lot of things while we were there and made a lot of contacts doing it. Obviously have Ville and Harry and Bradley involved in it, weâ�™re all good friends. Yeah, itâ�™s great. We actually recorded more tracks, if a special edition does happen and weâ�™re due to go back in a couple of months to finish off the 3 other tracks that didnâ�™t make the album which are really super fast. They didnâ�™t make the album because they just didnâ�™t fit in with the feel. We really wanted to put all of them on there but it just wasnâ�™t the opportunity because weâ�™ve done our 78 minute long albums. So we got 3 songs and 2 cover versions and some other weird stuff like ambient stuff.

Dixon: What are the cover versions?
State by Shakespeareâ�™s Sister and Halloween II by Samhain.

Andy: On the whole what separates Thornography from the rest of Cradle of Filth discography and what exactly is the common creative backdrop or a theme or a common thread?

A common thread really is just a continuation from Nymphetamine. Nymphetamine was really to do with the flesh, this is more of a spiritual thing. I think itâ�™s manâ�™s infatuation with self destruction.

Andy: Thornography has some new elements Cradle of Filth has never really explored. This is kind of a follow up to the last question: what are the things you wanted to give the fans with Thornography you hadnâ�™t given them?

We wanted to do something that was a bit old school, a bit retro, highlighting our origins which would be the thrash scene of the 80s. I guess more emphasis on guitars and choruses. Suretptiously I guess we wanted to, not piss people off, butdo something that was different. We try not to do 2 albums the same. We got ideas for the next record which will be the finale of the Triptych, the mode of the Tryptic that is. So it will be a marriage of the flesh and the spiritual. We just took 4 months out of our schedule and everybody else was out doing summer festivals and just wrote the record with no outside influences whatsoever. Weâ�™re actually planning a trip to a little enclave of Transylvania for the next record, weâ�™re going to go there once we got everything up and running. Weâ�™re booking a house up there too to just go and spend about 2 or 3 weeks up there. The last one we actually booked a places in Whales which was great. It was a huge old house at the edge of a river and just holed up there and wrote which was really good.

Dixon: What is the writing process for you? Do you go there with much of the musical ideas in advance?

We come up with loads of ideas before hand and have a few rehearsals. Thereâ�™s no point paying a load of money to go andâ�¦because our drummer is now Czechoslovakian so he has to be flown over and some of us live in different parts of the country and everything is utilized to the full extent at the time, everybodyâ�™s got to be prepared. So we just have thousands upon thousands of ideas, well hopefully we do.

Dixon: So when you guys go together do you come up with a guitar line first, do you write a lyric first?

We always save the lyrics till last. Itâ�™s easier that way, apart from a couple of times where Iâ�™ve written a chorus. But itâ�™s just easier for the band.

Dixon: So you might have a couple of guitar riffs and when you guys get together for these 3 weeks youâ�™re going to jam it out and through that process is how you guys write.

Itâ�™s a bit longer than just 3 weeks. Weâ�™d be rehearsing for a longer time.

Dixon: Did you find you were listening to anything when you came up with this thrash album?

I wouldnâ�™t say it was thrash, there are elements of our origins and stuff we were listening to when we were growing up.

Andy: Next is a question Iâ�™m sure youâ�™re hearing a lot of and is making your listeners curious; amongst all the things Thornography explores one that stand out most is your vocal approach. Youâ�™ve got your signature howls and growls that just tear the place up but you also got more melodic sounding pipes. What were some ideas behind taking on such a fresh and really wicked new thing?

Weâ�™ve been doing albums now for 11 years, we wanted to do something that was fresh for us. Just to experiment and realize fuck it we got to a stage where we can basically do what we want. For example, I just went out and bought extreme black metal this band called Craft from Norway and at the same time I bought the Spongebob for my daughter and that sort of epitomizes what we can get up to with the band. I donâ�™t mean the comic side but weâ�™ve done orchestration, we experiment with some stuff. At the end of the day itâ�™s not what makes the song but what builds the song up, not the pieces but the final outcome is the important thing.

Dixon: Do you fear at some point any kind of backlash from the die-hards?

We donâ�™t care. Most of the die hard fans that accuse us of being mall rat music and stuff like that, we were just sperm in a scrotum when our first album came out so they have no right to accuse us of anything like that.

Dixon: To write to anybody but yourselves would prevent you from really developing as a band and as artists wouldnâ�™t it?

Yeah it would. We try not to let anything impede us and I donâ�™t think that weâ�™re going to run out of creative juices in a while.

Dixon: Do you ever self-censor? You donâ�™t let anything impede yourself but is there anything that would be derogatory or a subject that you wouldnâ�™t cover as a band?

Yeah, well of course there are loads of things. Itâ�™s Cradle of Filth after all and itâ�™s not a rap combo or anything like that.

Andy: Iâ�™m kind of glad for that one, not that Iâ�™m closed minded. One of the coolest things on Thornography is the cover of Temptation with Dirty Harry of course, can you discuss how the idea came about and yours and the bandâ�™s history with the song? What I liked most was how it had such a wicked Cradle of Filth style but it was still totally catchy and like you said darkwave is the original.

None of us actually liked the original. I donâ�™t know why, we weâ�™re drunk one day and it came out. Charles, the other guitarist went away and thought itâ�™d be a good idea to mess around with the main riff and it just went over all these hurdles. It wasnâ�™t even going to be on the record at all and then Rob went back to LA were Harry lives now and met up with her and she was in the studio and went well would you try this out? And she did and we loved it. The song got further and further along and it ended up on the record and a video. But we are doing another video in that month after we get back for The Foetus of a New Day and I think Bam Margera is going to be doing that.

Dixon: Heâ�™e becoming quite the film director and video director, eh?

Ya, heâ�™s just a friend of ours and Iâ�™ve been over here at a party of his for a week or so, it was crazy.

Dixon: You were at his party for a week?

Ya it was at the same time he was doing the Viva La Bam TV program but it was pretty cool. We went to 2 days, which I canâ�™t even remember half of them, in New York and went to all these big parties and ended up doing certain chemicals with Black Eyed Peas in his hotel room. It was pretty mad.

Dixon: That would surprise most people Iâ�™m sure. He did a great video for HIM, he did a big video in Europe for HIM.

Ya I believe so. Weâ�™re friends with Ville as well.

Dixon: Really good director.

Andy: Ok, Thornography has gone through a bit of a line up change. With the addition of Martin on drums, Rosey doing the live keyboards.

The thing with Adrian was Adrian was taking on too much work. He and his wife are very ambitious with stuff. He had loads of projects and stuff and he just couldnâ�™t commit to the band anymore. It was a pretty hard decision but I think we found a really good replacement in Martin. Youâ�™ll see tonight how good he is.

Andy: Pretty damn good, I like him a lot. Does he bring any new thing to the table? Is there ever any new element of creativity not just with the studio but with the stage as well?

We havenâ�™t written with Martin yet but weâ�™re really looking forward to it because heâ�™s fucking quick. Weâ�™ve been playing some of our tracks, we played Forest and we shaved about 30 seconds off of it.

Dixon: Normally bands will play songs faster live but rarely that fast.

Andy: Thereâ�™s this one thing to really old a credit to Cradle of Filth; being at the forefront of contemporary metal. What are some of the bands that youâ�™re really into these days?

I mentioned Craft because they are very old school black metal and they do it with real style, I really like them. I thought the new Terrorizer album was really good. I like the new 69 Eyes album, itâ�™s great.

Dixon: What do you like for soundtracks? Do you like Danny Elfman?

Of course.

Dixon: His kind of unpredictable big orchestration. Does that find its way into your writing and especially into the studio stuff?

We recorded with a hundred piece orchestra and that was great. We went to Budapest to do that.

Dixon: How much pre production do you do for a song like that? Do you have a hundred parts all worked out and stuff?

We worked with a guy called Dan Presley who is a musical scorer so we do all that in advance and then we would have a meeting with Lazlo who was the conductor. But theyâ�™re a film orchestra so they donâ�™t need any preparation, they just read.

Dixon: And itâ�™s perfect every time?

It took a few times. You can see a bit of it on our last DVD we shot a lot of footage on it.

Andy: Cradle of Filth is obviously very creative with the visual approach, you got your music videos which are great. What are some of the experiences that youâ�™ve had either creatively or working with guys like Alex Shanden form the infamous Cradle of Filth video? Tell us a bit about Alex, heâ�™s obviously very close to the band and he did Cradle of Fear.

I actually havenâ�™t talked to Alex for quite some time, years at least. He was. We became really good friends after the video and we started talking about doing a film because we both knew people who were in the industry. We pulled loads of favors and there was a sequel plans but we couldnâ�™t at the time get the necessary money because we needed a million ponds. We did the first one so cheaply, we pulled in people who worked on Saving Private Ryan and people that had been working on Bent Horizon and stuff like that. So we were lucky and everyone worked on differed payments i.e. they got paid when the movie makes money.

Dixon: How long was the movie, was it full length?

Yeah it was, it was actually about 2 hours.

Andy: On the subject of all your really rad music videos and different costumes you guys do, do you provide a lot of your own input to the bands creativity.

Yeah, of course. Most of it is our input. When we work with artists we work pretty much hand in hand. We discuss what we want to do with them and take it from there.

Andy: One of the things that Cradle of Filth can honorable hold to their history is how extensive your tours have been, You guys go from the smallest to the largest, you guys range from a private club like this all the way to 50 000 plus people at Ozzfest or Dynamo which you guys are really quite frequent with.

Last year we did 80 000 one day and we were about 3 bands away from Guns and Roses and Tool and stuff so that was pretty cool. But my favorite clubs are like this playing for about 1500 people. Not too small, not too big, just perfect.

Andy: With every country you visit do you guys ever see a difference with the interaction of the crowds, like from North America to Europe?

We talked about that actually me and Dave the other day. I was saying I think America, because everything is so far flung and we hadnâ�™t played here in 2 years and people do forget bands in that time, itâ�™s ridiculous. You can sell 200 000 your last album and you expect at least half that to buy the new one straight away but it isnâ�™t that way at all, itâ�™s really odd. Because youâ�™re so infrequent there people think that you donâ�™t matter because they think twice if youâ�™re form Europe and they sort of take a different angle on it. Where as I think Europe being smaller is more of a well worn circuit around there, people are more spoiled because these bands come through there all the time, I think because our scene is sort of European based then they will get more.

Dixon: David Lee Roth of Van Halen one time said, â�œhere today, gone later todayâ�. I think that kind of summarizes the short attention span of the North American market.

Possibly, yeah. I like touring American and Canada more so than Europe I guess because although I love the history and going out and looking at art museums and fossils and stuff like that in Europe it seems easier. The roads are a bit more paved with gold in America and I donâ�™t know what that means, whether there are more Starbucks or the fans are more attentive. It seems that by this time on the European tour Iâ�™d start losing energy and being home sick but I havenâ�™t even got to that stage, even before that stage yet on this tour.

Dixon: Maybe youâ�™re excited about pioneering new territory more and the challenge behind that.

Ya but weâ�™ve done America a few times. It just seems this new album is really kicking off and we hadnâ�™t been here for 2 years and got a new line up. Weâ�™re being professional, Iâ�™m not even drinking on this tour. I know itâ�™s amazing going form alcoholics to absolutely no booze whatsoever. I think everyone is maintaining a high level of discipline.

Dixon: Do you set the standard for drinking or not drinking on the bus?

Probably. There was a bar in the hotel last night and everyone was up in there but I just want to enjoy every show for what it is and I want it to come from me rather than the demon that comes out when Iâ�™m a bit drunk.

Andy: Between that and Dixonâ�™s mention of David Lee Roth I wanted to ask while maintaining your shocking appeal and you refusal to take to the mainstream you and Cradle of Filth have still managed to make such a big name for yourselves that youâ�™re even turning the heads of the big players, so as a 2 part question: what do you think has given Cradle of Filth the ability to take off on all the fat cats and in my opinion kick their asses. You get bands popping up on the internet all the time, you see MTV and often times you see between the latest Hilary Duff and Amphetamine video there. What do you think makes you able to take on the big guys but still maintain your own style?

Dixon: Ya, youâ�™ve been celebrated as an underground death metal band but are seen everywhere. How is it that youâ�™re able to make an impact at the highest level of rock and roll?

Weâ�™ve been accused of selling out by all kinds of people. We were on Sony at one point and people though we would turn into a dance act. You just have to stick to your guns, thatâ�™s it. And not try to be original because if you try to be original than youâ�™re not going to be original and youâ�™re going to start analyzing it. Just stay true to your word and keep going. I like fighting the bastards as well, Iâ�™m a bit of an anarchist at heart and if somebody says that you got to do this then you can guarantee that weâ�™ll do it the other way. I guess thatâ�™s a part of Thornography as well, it must have annoyed people when they heard that we had Ville and some bimbo girl. Thatâ�™s what they were saying that we had some bimbo pop singer on there and heâ�™s singing and oh god theyâ�™ve sold out again. But thatâ�™s not the case at all because I think itâ�™s one of the heaviest album.

Andy: These are questions that we ask everyone, have you ever had a brush with God, seen a ghost or seen an alien?

Iâ�™ve had instances of all of those. I think I have met God. I used to be really into magical trances and stuff like that. Now I just donâ�™t have time for that thing, I have book cases full of that subject but donâ�™t read them. The alien thing, we were followed home by lights in the sky that followed us for about 20 miles one Christmas. I donâ�™t know if youâ�™ve ever seen a night club from a distance and they have light and a pattern in the sky but you leave those behind and this was following us through woodland and everything. As for the ghosts, Iâ�™ve seen loads of ghosts.

Dixon: What would surprise kids most to learn about Dani Filth or Cradle of Filth?

Weâ�™re actually quite nice people.

Dixon: Iâ�™d have to agree with that.