{"id":3649,"date":"2013-10-10T09:16:28","date_gmt":"2013-10-10T09:16:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/skylight.gr\/administrator_wordpress\/index.php\/2013\/10\/10\/gwarrrr\/"},"modified":"2013-10-10T09:16:28","modified_gmt":"2013-10-10T09:16:28","slug":"gwarrrr","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/skylight.gr\/index.php\/2013\/10\/10\/gwarrrr\/","title":{"rendered":"GWARRRR!!!"},"content":{"rendered":"


Q: We are here in Santa Cruz at The Catalyst Club.\u00a0 It is November 5, 2012.\u00a0 Dave Brockie has been kind enough to grant me another interview . . .<\/strong><\/p>\n

A: . . . Oderus [Urungus] has decided to let me come out of my pen for a little while.\u00a0 We were [previously in] one [for the November 24, 2009 interview].\u00a0 Now we are in another one.\u00a0 A series of cells they keep me in all the time.\u00a0 Working me to death that bastard!<\/p>\n


Q: For this interview I thought we should give the fans a retrospective of the band going through each record starting with the present and working our way back. <\/strong><\/p>\n

A: Okay.\u00a0 You realize my memory will get fuzzier and wuzzier as we go along.<\/p>\n

Q: So we will use most of your energy on the present.\u00a0 As your brain cells get depleted we will go backwards.<\/strong><\/p>\n

A: Sometimes the opposite happens.\u00a0 Listening to the sound of my own voice droning on and on actually gets me more fired up.\u00a0 Nothing can be finer.<\/p>\n

Q: What stands out for you in terms of the band\u2019s history with the release of Bloody Pit of Horror (2011)?<\/strong><\/p>\n

A: Slap dash rush job.\u00a0 Absolutely unbelievable that we created that record as quickly as we did.\u00a0 Cory [Smoot, late former guitarist] already had a whole album basically written for his side project in which he was going to get Randy [Blythe, vocalist] from Lamb of God and me to do vocals on.\u00a0 Cory had this whole f**kin\u2019 side project record.\u00a0 All the music was recorded.\u00a0 He was just waiting for me.\u00a0 He wanted to call it Religion is Fiction.\u00a0 Cory wanted me to write all the lyrics.\u00a0 Cory said, \u201cI want it to be called Religion is Fiction.\u201d\u00a0 I asked him, \u201cDo you have any other ideas?\u201d\u00a0 Cory responded, \u201cNope.\u00a0 I got all the music.\u201d\u00a0 I said, \u201cAll right.\u00a0 I can roll with that.\u201d\u00a0 I think a lot of religion is fiction.\u00a0 It is certainly a provocative statement.\u00a0 I was ready to rip with it.\u00a0 When Cory played it for me, I said, \u201cThis is the best sh*t you\u2019ve written!\u00a0 It\u2019s so long it\u2019s got to be a Gwar record!\u201d\u00a0 Coincidentally, we were approaching the end of the two year 25th anniversary.\u00a0 We wanted to release an album at the beginning and end of the anniversary.\u00a0 We were running out of time.\u00a0 We needed something soon.\u00a0 So Cory said, \u201cHell yeah!\u201d\u00a0\u00a0 We just took Cory\u2019s album, learned his songs, and recorded it in a whirlwind.\u00a0 I remember writing songs while we were in the car on the way to the studio.\u00a0 I did most of those songs without ever playing them live with the band, which is a total a** backwards way of making music.\u00a0 But it worked!\u00a0 It is our heaviest, densest album, definitely one of our darker works.\u00a0 It will always be one of my personal favorites.\u00a0 Unfortunately it will also be the last record Cory will be on because he passed away last year [on November 3, 2012 from a heart attack caused by a pre existing coronary heart disease].\u00a0 Bloody Pit of Horror was a hell of a statement for Cory, and the music may live again because you can hear snippets of the music in the Cory Smoot Experiment solo record.\u00a0 Randy Blythe [Lamb of God vocalist] and I still talk about finishing the project as Cory wanted us to.\u00a0 So Cory\u2019s music could be reborn again.\u00a0 Hell it\u2019s only metal!\u00a0 Just dress it up a little different.\u00a0 The songs do sound different.\u00a0 They have different musicians playing on them along with Cory\u2019s original guitar tracks and new vocal arrangements.\u00a0 It\u2019s weird because by the end of the day Cory\u2019s album could be three different albums.<\/p>\n

Q: Pustulus Maximus has replaced Flattus Maximus [Cory Smoot\u2019s Gwar character].<\/strong><\/p>\n

A: Yes.\u00a0 Cory had placed such a stamp on playing Flattus [Maximus] that we decided to retire the character.\u00a0 Flattus had been around forever.\u00a0 Gwar had several other musicians performing as Flattus before Cory [Dewey Rowell, Pete Lee, Tim Harriss, Zach Blair, Brian Fechino].\u00a0 But Flattus was undeniably Cory\u2019s baby.\u00a0 We had no desire to put someone else in the Flattus costume.\u00a0 We went to a four-piece following Cory\u2019s death [on November 3, 2011] and finished our tour.\u00a0 We finished what we felt we needed to do for the band and moved on by beginning the process of finding a new guitar player.<\/p>\n

Q: Who plays the Pustulus Maximus character.<\/strong><\/p>\n

A: Brent Purgason, a Richmond, Virginia native.\u00a0 Brent has played in a lot of bands more well known on the East Coast, including Cannabis, not Cannibal, Corpse.\u00a0 They are kind of like Cannibal Corpse, but all their songs are about smoking weed.\u00a0 They are fairly popular.\u00a0 Brent is really a funny guy, and he is f**kin\u2019 metal as f**k!\u00a0 He plays all of Cory\u2019s guitar parts note for note, but in his own way, which is what I was looking for.\u00a0 I told guitarists that came to the audition, \u201cYou have to play Cory\u2019s parts note for note.\u201d\u00a0 That is pretty much what they all tried to do.\u00a0 Many of them failed to do even that.\u00a0 But that was really not what I was looking for.\u00a0 It was a trick!\u00a0 I was looking for someone that could play Cory\u2019s parts note for note but also take it a step further.\u00a0 Honestly that is what Brent did.\u00a0 Brent wrote a few flourishes, runs, and extra parts, which is why he got the job.\u00a0 <\/p>\n

Q: Lust in Space (2009).<\/strong><\/p>\n

A: Lust in Space was a bit of a muddle.\u00a0 I love the way Lust in Space sounds and the packaging, which looks beautiful.\u00a0 I just think the story is a little confusing.\u00a0 We tried to tell the story of Bozo Destructo bearing an alien baby to come to Earth and somehow save the Universe from Cardinal Sin.\u00a0 Bozo is trying to create a vaccine using the baby who will escape from outer space and create the perfect life form.\u00a0 Sawborg [Destructo] does not want that.\u00a0 The Destructos do not want that.\u00a0 So they try to escape to Earth where they want to hide the baby.\u00a0 As the Destructos\u2019 spaceship enters the Earth\u2019s atmosphere it is shot down by a Cardinal Sin warship.\u00a0 Gwar winds up with the baby.\u00a0 I don\u2019t really know what happens after that.\u00a0 Gwar encounters a few weirdos.\u00a0 Sawborg crashes his spaceship, which Gwar fixes up.\u00a0 Gwar goes back to outer space to kill Cardinal Sin, which we ultimately do.\u00a0 But in the end Gwar is pissed off because we find that outer space has no crack!\u00a0 Goddam it!\u00a0 Gwar also misses heavy metal.\u00a0 We admit to ourselves that we kind of grew fond of all those apes we f**ked and all those human beings we created.\u00a0 We love their helpless adulation and how they easily die for us.\u00a0 Gwar also loves their crack cocaine.\u00a0 So we came back to Earth.\u00a0 A lot of time was spent figuring out that plot. <\/p>\n

Q: Sounds like it could have been a double record.<\/strong><\/p>\n

A: Maybe.\u00a0 The fact that we also made a 20 minute introduction video piece that went along with the show and made no sense whatsoever made it more confusing.\u00a0 But I was kind of cool with that though. <\/p>\n

Q: Beyond Hell (2006).<\/strong><\/p>\n

A: Beyond Hell is great!\u00a0 What stands out about that album is we worked with Devin Townsend [producer].\u00a0 Beyond Hell was another concept album that detailed Gwar\u2019s decent into hell, including the guardians of different levels of hell we fought.\u00a0 Beyond Hell was Gwar\u2019s take on hell.\u00a0 It was our Dante\u2019s Inferno [first part of Dante Alighieri\u2019s 14th century epic poem, Divine Comedy focusing on Alighieri\u2019s journey through hell].\u00a0 It is a very heavy record.\u00a0 Devin [Townsend] really got the concept of the record well, and he worked me really f**kin\u2019 hard as a vocalist.\u00a0 Beyond Hell is a standout record. <\/p>\n

Q: Beyond Hell was preceded by Live from Mt. Fuji (2005). <\/strong><\/p>\n

A: Live from Mt. Fuji is a fake record!\u00a0 It was actually recorded in Pittsburgh, [Pennsylvania].\u00a0 People were so confused.\u00a0 We actually listed the date it was recorded as a date in the future!\u00a0 But people still asked, \u201cHow did you guys do that?!\u201d (inebriated mock tone)\u00a0 Oh my god!\u00a0 People f**kin\u2019 sometimes actually ask me if Gwar is from Antarctica dude!\u00a0 They ask, \u201cWhat\u2019s it like down there man?!\u00a0 Is there a scene?\u201d (inebriated mock tone)\u00a0 I respond by saying, \u201cYeah, just some penguins, Norwegian researchers.\u00a0 It\u2019s pretty cool.\u201d\u00a0 Their response, \u201cReally?!\u201d (inebriated mock tone)\u00a0 It was recorded in Pittsburgh, [Pennsylvania] with samples of the crowd noise, including the Japanese shrieking, from Cheap Trick\u2019s Cheap Trick at Budokan [1978 live record].\u00a0\u00a0 We figured we were never going to play in f**kin\u2019 Japan so we might as well make a fake record about it!<\/p>\n

Q: I\u2019m surprised Gwar is not more popular in Japan. <\/strong><\/p>\n

A: It just costs so much f**kin\u2019 money to get the s**t [stage gear and costumes] to Japan.\u00a0 Gwar does not sell millions of records.\u00a0 We are still very much underground kings . . . or more like slobs . . . or princes.\u00a0 I don\u2019t know.\u00a0 We don\u2019t want all that money. (laughter)\u00a0 All that money is for rich people.\u00a0 We like playing the underdog.\u00a0 We wouldn\u2019t mind playing with some money just to see what it is like.\u00a0 But we can\u2019t comprise what is most precious to us, that we actually have our self respect as artists, which is an unbelievable thing to have. <\/p>\n

Q: Somewhat like Slayer, a band that continues to have a loyal fan base. <\/strong><\/p>\n

A: Yeah, exactly.\u00a0 You\u2019ve also got Motorhead.\u00a0 I am so lucky because once you get to that level you do not have to defend it. <\/p>\n

Q: Also look at what happened to Kiss.\u00a0 They maintained a loyal fan base even during the period when they released sub par records such as Asylum (1985) and Crazy Nights (1987).\u00a0 The fans did not care and continued to buy those records.<\/strong><\/p>\n

A: Oh yeah.\u00a0 I know!\u00a0 After the third reunion tour I got a little pissed.\u00a0 Also, they seemed to be so shameless about how they put different people in the costumes [referring to current Kiss guitarist Tommy Thayer adopting original Kiss guitarist Ace Frehley\u2019s spaceman character and current Kiss drummer Eric Singer adopting original Kiss drummer Peter Criss\u2019 catman character].\u00a0 The characters in Gwar are really important.\u00a0 Gwar has to have people play them the right way.\u00a0 [In contrast] Kiss would throw anyone in [to play the Kiss characters].\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/p>\n

Q: War Party (2004).<\/strong><\/p>\n

A: War Party was the album where Cory Smoot [late former guitarist] and Todd Evans [former bassist] stepped up and distinguished themselves as songwriting geniuses.\u00a0 War Party also marks Gwar\u2019s departure from Metal Blade records and the first record on DRT Records.\u00a0 Starting with Violence Has Arrived (2001) Gwar sought to redefine itself as a more pure metal band, something we underlined with War Party in a big way.\u00a0 Initially, DRT [Records] had a lot of money and connections.\u00a0 DRT managed to get clearance [from the City of New York] for Gwar to shoot a video in the middle of Times Square, which is pretty f**kin\u2019 awesome!\u00a0 Gwar shot the War Party video in Times Square.\u00a0 About halfway through Beyond Hell (2006) DRT [Records] just fell apart and folded.\u00a0\u00a0 The label\u2019s fancy Manhattan offices became a single room in Harlem and then out of the guy\u2019s [owner of DRT Records] New Jersey house.\u00a0 The [office] steps shrank from 30 to one.\u00a0 We ended up in New York City court with the guy [owner of DRT Records], which was actually good because we got back all the rights to Violence Has Arrived and War Party that we now own free and clear. <\/p>\n

Q: Violence Has Arrived (2001). <\/strong><\/p>\n

A: Violence Has Arrived is a great record!\u00a0 That is the album where Gwar decided it had gone on long enough.\u00a0 We were sick of writing funny punk songs that were totally reflective of my obsessed crude sense of humor.\u00a0 I had gotten shoved into the songwriter role because we did not have guys [in Gwar] that could write good metal licks.\u00a0 As result, Gwar was becoming a funny, punk, comedy band where most of the songs were parodies of other differing types of music and s**t, which was kind of weird and a little cool.\u00a0 But it was not, in my mind, really Gwar.\u00a0 A lot of Gwar fans love the albums before Violence Has Arrived.\u00a0 With Violence Has Arrived Gwar decided to get away from that.\u00a0 We have done that to death.\u00a0 We can still play some of those songs live.\u00a0 But with Violence Has Arrived we decided to replace the old, kind of goofy Gwar with a new slimmed down, meaner more evil Gwar.\u00a0 We got this really awesome artist [Adrian Smith], not that our other artists weren\u2019t awesome, to paint a really sick album cover for us, which looks f**kin\u2019 great.\u00a0 The line up had solidified enough that Gwar had really good musicians in all stations.\u00a0 We went after it!\u00a0 The album turned out really great.\u00a0 It is one of my favorite Gwar albums to this day.\u00a0 Very heavy, very dark, sick, slightly political lyrical themes that are hopeless and bleak.\u00a0 Violence Has Arrived is basically Oderus [Urungus\u2019] death poetry.\u00a0 Violence Has Arrived is definitely one of my favorite records.\u00a0 It is like Dungeons & Dragons [fantasy, role-playing game originally designed by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson] on bad acid.\u00a0 <\/p>\n

Q: How about the live record, You\u2019re All Worthless and Weak (2000). <\/strong><\/p>\n

A: Gwar did not have much to do with it.\u00a0 It was pretty much cobbled together by a renegade merchandise department of the time.\u00a0 It was put together as a mail order project that Gwar did not know much about.\u00a0 Gwar did not have any control over that.\u00a0 I would not consider that an official Gwar project, more a bootleg.\u00a0 But it\u2019s still cool.\u00a0 I don\u2019t even know what\u2019s on it.\u00a0 I don\u2019t even think I\u2019ve ever really listened to it.\u00a0 Is it a live album?\u00a0 What the hell is it?\u00a0 It\u2019s a total bootleg.\u00a0 I\u2019ve never even listened to it.\u00a0 <\/p>\n

Q: We Kill Everything (1999). <\/strong><\/p>\n

A: By the time of We Kill Everything Gwar had gone through a lot of line up changes.\u00a0 We lost Pete [Lee, former guitarist].\u00a0 We hadn\u2019t yet found Zach [Blair, former guitarist].\u00a0 Cory [Smoot, late former guitarist] was still a couple of years in the future.\u00a0 Basically, Mike Derks [current guitarist], Brad [Roberts, current drummer], and I were doing a side project band called DBX, Dave Brockie Experience, which is a funny, punk band with three-chord songs with ridiculous lyrics.\u00a0 I played bass and sang.\u00a0 No costumes or anything.\u00a0 It was just a funny little punk band.\u00a0 No big deal.\u00a0 It was really hard to change gears to writing epic metal songs.\u00a0 So we didn\u2019t.\u00a0 Gwar albums began to sound like DBX albums, which is kind of what We Kill Everything is about, real simple, funny songs, but not something you would necessarily listen to more than once.\u00a0 It was almost like novelty rock.\u00a0 We Kill Everything is probably my least favorite Gwar record, but it still makes me laugh.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/p>\n

Q: Carnival of Chaos (1997).<\/strong><\/p>\n

A: Carnival of Chaos is a sprawling epic!\u00a0 That album clocks in at about 88 minutes long.\u00a0 We just went the f**k off on that album.\u00a0 We had a really strong line up, but we didn\u2019t feel any agenda to be any type of band other than what we felt Gwar should sound like at the time.\u00a0 We were so all over the place, and we were doing a lot of drugs during that record.\u00a0 We had a band member who had a drug problem who got us all f**ked up on speed.\u00a0 We f**kin\u2019 did that album over a three month period, and none of us slept for weeks.\u00a0 We thought it was the coolest thing in the world as we went out of our minds.\u00a0 Gwar is from the East Coast.\u00a0 We don\u2019t have speed on the East Coast.\u00a0 It\u2019s a West Coast, Midwest, and Texas thing.\u00a0 You hear about it all the time.\u00a0 You see it on the biker shows.\u00a0 I guess people do it on the East Coast.\u00a0 It\u2019s just not as prevalent on the East Coast.\u00a0 Speed just blew our minds.\u00a0\u00a0 It blew my mind!\u00a0 I said [to myself, \u201cYou mean I can stay up for three days straight and just work in the studio and play music!\u00a0 This is great!\u201d\u00a0 After the third day it was like (flatulence sound).\u00a0 Carnival of Chaos is brilliant in that it is a total tweaker\u2019s album because we went after every single little thing and took it apart, looked at it with a microscope, and put it back together.\u00a0 We did the most bizarre odd things.\u00a0 We had songs that would stop, but they wouldn\u2019t be cut on the compact disc so you would go to the next song and there would be 11 minutes of silence and then another song would start.\u00a0 F**ked up s**t like that.\u00a0 We thought, \u201cOne of these days that mother f**ker [listener] is going to leave that thing [stereo] on and he\u2019s going to realize there is a song there and it\u2019s going to freak him out!\u201d (laughter)\u00a0 The songwriting is all over the place.\u00a0 Carnival of Chaos is not my favorite album, but it is certainly reflects our songwriting chops.\u00a0 That album is a lot more like Frank Zappa and The Beatles than Black Sabbath or Sex Pistols.\u00a0 <\/p>\n

Q: It was Gwar\u2019s version of Sgt. Pepper\u2019s Loneley Hearts Club Band [The Beatles\u2019 1967 conceptual record].<\/strong><\/p>\n

A: I think so, a really good analogy.<\/p>\n

Q: Ragnarok (1995). <\/strong><\/p>\n

A: Ooh!\u00a0 Ragnarok is one of my personal favorites because it was the first time where we made a fake newspaper with the packaging and really explored the s**t out of the Ragnarok theme [a series of future events in Norse mythology, including a great battle foretold to ultimately result in the death of a number of major figures, the occurrence of various natural disasters, and the subsequent submersion of the world in water].\u00a0 We wrote fake news articles.\u00a0 It was an apocalypse record about a big comet that was going to hit the Earth.\u00a0 Ragnarok was tied in with the beginning of the new millennium.\u00a0 The idea with Ragnarok was that the end of the millennium was going to come in a little while.\u00a0 Gwar was going to get the jump on the end of the millennium by claiming everyone had gotten it wrong because the world was actually going to end in 1995 [not 2000].\u00a0 We just went off on that record and had a lot of fun.\u00a0 But musically Ragnarok did not sound as good as we wanted it to.\u00a0 We brought a big remote truck into the Slave Pit [Gwar\u2019s Richmond, Virginia-based studio].\u00a0 It was a huge truck that looked like a normal 18 wheel truck.\u00a0 But the interior of the cargo cab served as the control suite for the recording studio.\u00a0\u00a0 We ran cables into the Slave Pit and we created recording spaces [in the cargo cab] using portable baffling [wall\/screen to deflect sound] and used the actual acoustics of the [cargo cab\u2019s] room.\u00a0 We were told it was going to be awesome.\u00a0 For some reason the sound just didn\u2019t cut it for me.\u00a0 Even though the songwriting and packaging are great.\u00a0 It was also the time period CDs were taking over LPs.\u00a0 The cover art was designed to be on a LP, and then they told us, \u201cIt was only going to go out on a format this big.\u201d (hand gesture reflecting small CD size)\u00a0 I was like, \u201cAaahhh!\u201d\u00a0 I spent forever on this super-obsessive photoshopped illustration of Gwar playing the last Ragnarok concert and it got blown down to that big (hand gesture reflecting small size).\u00a0 Oh my god it was so sad.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/p>\n


Q: Was Ragnarok ever released on vinyl?<\/strong><\/p>\n

A: Never came out on vinyl.\u00a0 But Ragnarok is a fun record.\u00a0 There are a lot of good songs on it. Whargoul is on there, which is one of my personal favorite songs. <\/p>\n

Q: America Must be Destroyed (1992) (I apologize as I overlooked This Toilet Earth (1994).<\/strong><\/p>\n

A: America Must be Destroyed is probably my all time favorite Gwar album.\u00a0 The first thing anyone is ever going to see about an album is its cover art.\u00a0 America Must be Destroyed was primarily coming out as vinyl.\u00a0 When we first started working on America Must be Destroyed we were pretty sure we weren\u2019t going to release it in CD [format] because CDs were still a weird\u00a0 new thing that weren\u2019t exploding, and we weren\u2019t really sure it was going to happen.\u00a0 We had this guy do a crazy collage for us, and we absolutely hated it.\u00a0 So poor Hunter [Jackson, band co founder] had to try to put together all the cover art overnight.\u00a0 Meanwhile we had written a really great, strong album that sounded great and had heavy songs.\u00a0 But the title America Must be Destroyed really pissed off a lot of people in Gwar\u2019s organization.\u00a0 The art department and band got alienated from one another over the title.\u00a0 The art department did not want to call the album America Must be Destroyed because they thought it is a dumb title.\u00a0 The band had to defend the title and explain the title.\u00a0 We are not trying to say the country needs to be destroyed, only certain institutions.\u00a0 America Must be Destroyed is not meant as an anti American statement as in killing Americans, but more that the evil aspects of America must be destroyed.\u00a0 America must walk the talk that it gives.\u00a0 America is always putting itself out there as having the greatest government, the land of the free, and home of the brave.\u00a0 Well then America needs to f**kin\u2019 act like that wherever it goes.\u00a0 You just can\u2019t lie about it.\u00a0 <\/p>\n

Q: I think I saw that description in the footnote on the album liner notes?\u00a0 It was about this long (hand gesture reflecting large amount of text)<\/strong><\/p>\n

A: Hah! (laughter)\u00a0 Really, there was a footnote?!\u00a0 That is hilarious! (laughter)\u00a0 We were recording America Must be Destroyed at full speed chugging right along.\u00a0 All of a sudden I had to go back to Richmond, [Virginia] and explain the record to Gwar\u2019s art department.\u00a0 But man we worked so hard, especially on the title track, America Must be Destroyed.\u00a0 The sound collage we created by using everything from Dr. Strangelove [**], the Oliver North [**] hearings, Dr. [Martin Luther] King, Jr. [**], [Adolf] Hitler [**], all these figures.\u00a0 We formed all [these figures\u2019] words together into this long narrative that ends the song [America Must be Destroyed].\u00a0 The final thing you hear is the space shuttle blowing up, [and] you hear this weird voice saying, \u201cContingency procedures are in effect.\u201d (robotic mock tone)\u00a0 I still get chills when I hear that song.\u00a0 We played it at The Palladium in L.A., [California] and went back to the hotel that night, turned on the radio and that song was on the radio.\u00a0 That is when it hit me and I said, \u201cWow!\u00a0 We are f**kin\u2019 doing something!\u201d\u00a0 That was like album three or four and I said to myself, Gwar is definitely not some underground joke act.\u00a0 We are touching people\u2019s lives in a big way.\u00a0 <\/p>\n

Q: The Road Behind (1992, E.P.)<\/strong><\/p>\n

A: The Road Behind actually came out after America Must be Destroyed.\u00a0 That was the first C.D. Gwar ever put out.\u00a0 It was an experiment to see if C.D.s would work or not.\u00a0 It has The Road Behind and a couple of live tracks that are really, really funny, including a track recorded in Canada from a show where the crowd is trying to fight us the whole show.\u00a0 You can hear fists pummeling people\u2019s faces while I am saying, \u201cI know a lot of your friends are getting beaten up right now and you\u2019re not cool with it.\u201d (laughter)\u00a0 It was horrible dude. (laughter)\u00a0 It\u2019s f**kin\u2019 great!\u00a0 I love that record!\u00a0 Oh my god!\u00a0 They\u2019re all French Canadians and couldn\u2019t understand a word I was f**kin\u2019 saying . . . or so they say!\u00a0 They\u2019re full of s**t.\u00a0 They understand every word.\u00a0 They just pretend.\u00a0 Of course they understand!\u00a0 They\u2019re so snotty.\u00a0 I love people\u2019s cultures but don\u2019t be so proud of your culture to the point where it\u2019s obnoxious to other f**kin\u2019 people.\u00a0 I mean I don\u2019t go running around saying, \u201cI\u2019m from the East Coast, Richmond, Virginia mother f**ker!\u00a0 It\u2019s great there!\u00a0 N.A.S.C.A.R.!\u201d (inebriated mock tone)\u00a0 I mean God.\u00a0 How horrible.\u00a0 I don\u2019t have a lot to be proud about except there is a lot of great people in Richmond, [Virginia], which is why we stay there . . . and it\u2019s cheap as f**k.\u00a0 There is no way we could do what we do unless we live in Richmond, [Virginia].\u00a0 We couldn\u2019t do it in San Francisco, [California].\u00a0 I would love to be in a place where I am surrounded with interesting, amazing people all the time.\u00a0 But I wouldn\u2019t be able to afford the studio space.\u00a0 I just couldn\u2019t.\u00a0 Maybe one day.\u00a0 We\u2019ll see.\u00a0 I always said Gwar is a band that would last forever.\u00a0 So we\u2019ll see.\u00a0 <\/p>\n

Q: You need to get in touch with Lars Ulrich [Metallica\u2019s drummer] to hook you up with Metallica\u2019s studio in San Rafael, [California]. <\/strong><\/p>\n

A: We\u2019ve pretty much f**ked up every cool contact we\u2019ve had in the record industry by Oderus\u2019 foul mouth, which is completely motivated by jealousy.\u00a0 I rag on every rock star.\u00a0 I just don\u2019t even care any more.\u00a0 We played in the House of Blues in Hollywood, [California] last night where Steel Panther [glam heavy metal band from Los Angeles, California that parody the excesses of 1980\u2019s heavy metal music] is huge.\u00a0 I said, \u201cSteel Panther looks like a bunch of c**k sucking f**gots to me! (Oderus Urungus character tone)\u00a0 Oderus can get away with it.\u00a0 But that was not a cool thing to say in Hollywood.\u00a0 The whole audience was at first shouting, \u201cYeah!\u00a0 Yeah!\u201d\u00a0 Then after Oderus\u2019 comment the audience thought, \u201cHuh?!\u00a0 Did he just say that?!\u201d\u00a0 The soundman then hit the sample sound of crickets chirping.\u00a0 \u201cYeah!\u00a0 What do they [Steel Panther] do?!\u00a0 I mean they look like a bunch of chicks!\u201d (Oderus Urungus character tone)\u00a0 I was joking around.\u00a0 I actually really like Steel Panther.\u00a0 They\u2019re hilarious.\u00a0 Then I tweeted today, \u201cI can\u2019t believe people were so offended that I f**kin\u2019 said Steel Panther look like a bunch of c**k sucking f**gots. Jeez people!\u00a0 Lighten up!\u201d (Oderus Urungus character tone)<\/p>\n

Q: I think Oderus is related to Kevin DuBrow. [late, original Quiet Riot vocalist] <\/strong><\/p>\n

A: Yeah!\u00a0 I\u2019m related to everyone.\u00a0 I created the human race by f**king apes.\u00a0 <\/p>\n

Q: Scumdogs of the Universe (1990)<\/strong><\/p>\n

A: Scumdogs of the Universe is Gwar\u2019s quintessential breakthrough album.\u00a0 It is the album where Gwar goes from being a weird little art rock band to an actual, bona fide heavy metal band.\u00a0 Scumdogs of the Universe opened it all up for us.\u00a0 It is funny because we did that record with an English label that gave us a lot of money to do it.\u00a0 We wondered how the label was able to get so much money for a one-off deal, one record, get the money, deliver the record, do a tour, you\u2019re done and then you can talk about the next record.\u00a0 What the record label had done is lied to all the distributors by saying they had secured a two-record deal.\u00a0 So the record label got all these advances from distributors, gave us our money, and then they moved to New Zealand! (laughter)\u00a0 I am serious.\u00a0 So we put out the record.\u00a0 All the distributors are selling, selling, and selling.\u00a0 We were wondering why our calls to the record label f**kin\u2019 office in London were not getting returned.\u00a0 The record label had flown us over several times and we\u2019re totally awesome cool great guys.\u00a0 I should have known when one of the record label executives was f**king my manager that something is not going good here.\u00a0 Our manager was great.\u00a0 She actually grew up in San Francisco.\u00a0 But generally you do not want the record label and your manager in bed with each other.\u00a0 So that was a warning sign.\u00a0 Next thing I knew I was getting calls from all over the world, such as Japan.\u00a0 Back in the old days you would get a fax.\u00a0 I remember the fax, which said, \u201cHey Gwar, we here in Japan think we make big sales and we will bring them!\u201d (Japanese based broken English tone)\u00a0 It was this horrible f**ked up English.\u00a0 \u201cSo when we get second album we give big hurray!\u201d (Japanese based broken English tone)\u00a0 I then had to tell them the record label lied to you.\u00a0 You are not getting another record and all that money you spent basically got stolen for you.\u00a0 I\u2019ve always thought that is why Gwar never got to Japan.\u00a0 I thought at that point the Yakuza [Japanese members of transnational organized crime syndicates] was saying, \u201cGwar no good.\u00a0 They will never come here.\u201d (Japanese based broken English tone)\u00a0 In otherwise something very inscrutably Asian went down.\u00a0 That sucked!\u00a0 So after Scumdogs of the Universe we found ourselves without a record label.\u00a0 But that is when we signed with Metal Blade Records who picked up Scumdogs of the Universe and Hell-O and went forward with America Must be Destroyed.\u00a0 We were with Metal Blade Records for many years and now we are back with Metal Blade. <\/p>\n

Q: Hell-O (1988)<\/strong><\/p>\n

A: Hell-O was the first one, in 1988.\u00a0 In 1988 Gwar had been around for about three years.\u00a0 We had pretty much just played in Richmond, [Virginia] as a joke rock act.\u00a0 We would play three or four songs before my band, Death Piggy.\u00a0 We would basically would come out and stand on stage and let the guitars create feedback and go \u201cUghh!\u201d (inebriated mock tone)\u00a0 I wasn\u2019t even singing back then.\u00a0 I was just playing guitar, and I am a terrible guitar player.\u00a0 All I had was a skateboard helmet with glued spikes sticking out from the top.\u00a0 I had fake fur tied around me and football shoulder pads with some stupid spikes.\u00a0 The lead singer was named Johnny Slutman.\u00a0 We would also say horrible jokes.\u00a0 I would say, \u201cHey Johnny I heard you just got in from Cleveland, [Ohio].\u201d\u00a0 Johnny would say, \u201cYeah!\u201d\u00a0 Then I would again say, \u201cHey Johnny I heard you just got in from Cleveland, [Ohio].\u201d\u00a0 Johnny would again say, \u201cYeah!\u201d\u00a0\u00a0 Then we would repeat it and it would take forever.\u00a0 The guitars are just generating feedback and making noise.\u00a0 I would say, \u201cJohnny where did you just get in from?\u201d\u00a0 Johnny would say, \u201cYeah!\u201d\u00a0 That was what Gwar was.\u00a0 It was just horrible dude.\u00a0 Gradually we started getting some songs together.\u00a0 We would do these three horrible songs, leave, and then come on stage as Death Piggy ready to play.\u00a0 But everyone was gone because they loved Gwar and did not care about Death Piggy.\u00a0 Fans would tell us, \u201cThat Gwar thing you\u2019re doing is hilarious!\u201d\u00a0 Death Piggy was just a hardcore band.\u00a0 We had our little run for about three years.\u00a0 We did pretty well.\u00a0 We put out some singles.\u00a0 But people wanted to see Gwar.\u00a0 So we got over Death Piggy and started concentrating on Gwar.\u00a0 Once we realized we weren\u2019t doing Death Piggy and just focused on Gwar and realized we may actually pack clubs and maybe make a little money.\u00a0 But we had to write enough songs for a whole set.\u00a0 <\/p>\n

Once we got enough decent songs we said, \u201cWhat the hell.\u00a0 Let\u2019s try to get a record deal.\u201d\u00a0 Just one record.\u00a0 That is all we were thinking about, to do one f**kin\u2019 record.\u00a0 I did not send out demo. tapes.\u00a0 I sent out V.H.S. tapes of Gwar doing all sorts of f**ked up things.\u00a0 We would put our costumes on and bust into our local news channel where they would put us on television.\u00a0 We built a fake news set and would mock kill a newscaster.\u00a0 We did all this crazy s**t.\u00a0 The one day it snowed in Richmond we all said, \u201cWe got to put our costumes on!\u201d\u00a0 We would run around in the snow.\u00a0 That V.H.S. got out there.\u00a0 <\/p>\n

Rebby Sharpe, a musician friend from Richmond, Virginia told this weirdo in New York City named Mark Kramer who was running a little record label named Shimmy Disc, an art rock label, which is why Gwar had that art rock association, about this crazy band from Richmond, [Virginia].\u00a0 One night I was laying in my humble apartment in Richmond, Virginia on South Pine Street, which used to be called Spine Street.\u00a0 None of us had f**kin\u2019 jobs.\u00a0 One night I made soup out of mayonnaise.\u00a0 I just took four big globs of mayonnaise and put in some water and I was like, \u201cYeah dinner!\u201d\u00a0 It was horrible.\u00a0 Mayonnaise soup is not a good idea.\u00a0 Everyone has got to go through the hungry years because it builds character.\u00a0 Our idea of a feast was Oodles of Noodles [dried precooked noodles] with a pot pie on top of it.\u00a0 It was the best!\u00a0 You would break up the Oodles of Noodles.\u00a0 It was nothing but sodium.\u00a0 It was wonderful.\u00a0 But it was so f**kin\u2019 cheap.\u00a0 You could get Oodles of Noodles for 25 cents and a pot pie for 69 cents.\u00a0 That is like under a dollar and you are eating like a king.\u00a0 <\/p>\n

I was asleep one night and had this crazy dream I was in New York City, and I had never been to New York in my life.\u00a0 I had sent Mark Kramer a V.H.S. tape.\u00a0 I guess my subconscious was thinking, \u201cI wonder what is going to happen when this dude in New York looks at this V.H.S.?\u201d\u00a0 The next morning I was woken up by the phone ringing.\u00a0 It was Mark Kramer who said, \u201cDude [you] gotta\u2019 come up to New York and record your record.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0 I was like, \u201cHell f**kin\u2019 yeah!\u201d\u00a0 We ran up to New York and basically spent the craziest week of our lives there.\u00a0 We slept under the board in the live room and banged that f**kin\u2019 record out in a week.\u00a0 We recorded with the damn door open in lower Manhattan and you could hear vehicles driving by and sirens in the background between f**kin\u2019 songs.\u00a0 It is so f**kin\u2019 ridiculous.\u00a0 Since Mark Kramer was an art rock guy the songs should have had a more punk rock, thrash metal sound.\u00a0 I\u2019ve always wanted to do a version of Hell-O called Hell-O Again with a more thrash metal, punk rock Gwar production.\u00a0 But the songwriting is really good.\u00a0 That is where it all began!<\/p>\n

Q: All right.\u00a0 We are the beginning and this is the end.<\/strong><\/p>\n

A: That was awesome!<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Arash Moussavian, Entertainment Law Attorney
arashmoussavian@cal.berkeley.edu
www.moussavianlaw.com
www.linkedin.com\/in\/arashmoussavian
All photos taken by Arash Moussavian.\u00a0 This article and all photos are protected by copyright.\u00a0 Please contact me prior to use, or I will make shish kabab of your loins.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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