Patrik Mata | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan

I knew I could sing. I just knew it. And I just had this burning yearning in my heart that I have to do this. I don't care about anything else. Yeah, like a bolt of lightning. I tried to get other guys to play with me. No one would play with me. This kind of goth, death rock, whatever people want to call this genre, which you were part of initiating into the world. People would go, I'm not going on after these guys. I don't want these guys on our bill. They can't play. They're horrible. I mean, they look weird. What's up with these guys? There are those artists who, they are the art, and everybody tries to figure out how to do what they do. That's me. Patrick Mata, thank you for being here. I'm so happy to talk to you today. It's my pleasure. So, there isn't a ton of information out there about your life. Maybe that was purposeful. Some of it. Some of it. And I get yelled at about it. Well, from the point of view of interviewing someone, you know, you kind of start with the cursory kind of like, you know, the life story. And one thing I saw attributed to, and I always like to ask as opposed to assume, was this your connection to kind of Dadaism and... There's a big influence on me. Okay, great. So let me start here and then we'll jump in. I'm very curious for your thoughts on this, because when I saw this and then I thought of your work and your life, like it's it put all these pieces together that maybe I didn't understand before. OK, so I want to ask you how you came to it, because I came to it from my own direction, but I didn't know you'd come. Oh, yeah. OK, so so let's start here because I Tristan Zara. Oh, he was. There you go. He was my David Bowie. OK, before Bowie. OK, let me say a couple of things here. And then, uh, and then I want to, of course, I want to hear from you. So, uh, uh, did you read, uh, it came out fairly recently, the book about, uh, Kiki Man Ray. Did you read that book? No, no, I know who she is though. Yeah. So it's an exploration of Man Ray's relationship with Kiki, more so from the vantage point of Kiki, as opposed to Man Ray, which is very interesting. Did these people speak to her? Well, no, she's long passed away. I know that, but I mean, it didn't. It's kind of a, let's call it a deep dive reassessment of her place in the Dada story. Normally she gets kind of cast as a kind of... She was friends with Man Ray too, right? No, she was Man Ray's lover. That's what I mean, yeah. And really wanted to marry Man Ray. Their relationship was a lot deeper than I thought. And I've collected Man Ray photos, and so I have pretty good knowledge of Man Ray. But I always saw her as a kind of a character in this play of this time in Paris. This idea that she was the model muse for so many artists. But the book is a beautiful reassessment. I wish I could remember the author's name. It's called Kiki Banray. And she used to sign autographs as Kiki Banray. She thought of herself as his wife. And she had a lot more influence over his artistic work than people thought. Anyway, but they talk about Tristan Czar in the book. And in the beginning, Czar was this radical who kind of reset the table with how the artists in Paris, all these expats and stuff living in Paris, should see Dadaism, and they'd have Dada symposiums, and he would lead poetry nights and stuff like this. But they do talk in the book over time, kind of Dadaism fell out as a sort of cause celeb, and Zara also kind of fell out. But even to the end, he was all in on Dada. So I want to say a couple things about Zara, because I saw a lot of reflections in your work, but I wanted to ask you. So these are just some basic definitions. Anti-art nihilism, rejecting traditional beauty and logic, Zara saw art as a tool for destruction and negation of established values, aiming to shock audiences. Spontaneity and chance. He promoted chance operations like cutting words from newspapers for poetry and automatic writing to bypass conscious control and reveal authentic expression. And, of course, the Great Dada Manifesto 1918. He outlined Dada's goals attacking bourgeois morality, logic, and the perceived complacency of art. That's me. So tell me. To me, it frames your story so beautifully, I think. so i'm much more interested in that part of your story than like where'd you go to school you know i mean if you want to talk about that stuff please but i think this part is essential to your it's all relevant everything is reinforced of that of everything yeah but can you illuminate that something yeah um i was uh studying to be a journalist i wanted to be like hunter s thompson and i was more into writing um and uh interviewing people myself and uh i discovered dada by going into the art book area in the library. And I said, oh. And I loved the visuals and everything. And it was pre-pistols. You could see where they took everything from that, from Jamie Reid and all that. And I saw a photograph of Tristan Zara, and I loved his hairstyle. And I go, well, this is kind of Bowie Berlin-ish, the wedge thing. So I went and had my haircut exactly like that. No one looked like that. And then because of Bowie, I started putting makeup on. But the whole thing about the Dadaist was that It was punk rock. It was pre-punk. It was a little nihilistic, but when they existed, there was war. It was kind of reflective of what happened to the punk rock scene. So it's all relevant to me. Zara's manifestos. I have all these books on Dadaism that I collected over time. I stole the one from the library, actually. That's very Dada of you. And the idea of him doing the cut-ups, like pre-Burros, putting them in a hat and then taking them out one by one at random and just reciting them pissed a lot of people off at the poetry readings back in that day. And the poetry readings back in the day were like punk gigs. You know, they became violent because people didn't understand. Like the Rites of Spring, the Stavinsky, where they rioted. Yeah, walked out. Yeah, so it was kind of like all of that. And that really interested me, because you must be touching someone somehow to make them react like that. So that was part of what really attracted me, was the power that he had, and how people didn't like him because of certain ways that he acted. So that really turned me on. I really dug that. Did it affect the way you listened to music? Actually, it did. I'm a big believer in the outsider art and outsider artists. I think they have more to say than most people. Madness is a thing that I enjoy. Antonin Artaud, he was a big thing for me. I have a lot of his collected works. Just the bravery of these people. They didn't give a chance. It's like, this is how I feel. This is what I'm doing. And I'm going to look this way. It's the way I want to look. And the way the Dottas would put on performances, they'd make the costumes out of construction paper, and you've seen the photos, and it's just incredible. No one looked like that. So to me, that was anti-fashion. Yeah. You know? Yeah. So, um... And of course, it extends into the surrealistics... Surrealists. Yeah, I was into Dottas before I got into the surrealists. Yeah, but there's that natural extension. Then you see, like, let's call it the wave after, like Cocteau, Dolly, William Burroughs, Ryan Geisner. uh and genesis and then the the leader i can't remember his name uh artigan um the guy who was ahead of the surrealist party that kicked dolly out yeah yeah yeah i can't remember his name um is it antonio or no no no he was a different guy he was completely mad i think he was in the mad house at that time yeah um so looking back now because you've had time to reflect on that influence what person or what era most evoked for you who you wanted to be as an artist? It was, again, Tristan Zara and David Bowie, basically. It's almost kind of like bookends of the same philosophy. Yes. And at the time, because I grew up with Bowie, digging him, you know, I got everything I could find. And like with the Beatles, the Beatles were a big influence on me as a child. third grade i saw them on ed sullivan when they appeared and my mom she uh managed a record store and so she was like uh as a friend of mine had said of like a pipeline of all that information from britain and of course everyone was looking at britain at that time because they were so innovative all that just like what happened in the 90s later you know um but what really inspired me was the fact that they uh they were so all individualistic and that's what i love about all that being an individual yeah that's important to me yeah it must it must make you laugh because you know i kind of stumbled in the goth around 84 85 and where people get almost like they get kind of stuck in a lane like this is goth this is rock this is alternative i hate all of that yeah me too i'm always like who cares yeah yeah i thought this was supposed to be the fun club. Yeah, that's not what it's about at all. You missed the point. Yeah, yeah. Okay, I'm glad, because I get that from you, but I'm glad to hear it from you. So, when did you come to LA? What year? 75. Okay. What happened was, it's kind of a funny story. Like I said, I was studying journalism, and I discovered Burroughs, Andy Warhol, and the factory era, all of that in art, in the library, the college library. And I frequented books and took them, and I said, well, no one's gonna read this. I want this. So I did take the books, you know? I take them home. I still have some of them. I love it. Because I'm gonna get something out of this, you know? So, I told my mom that I wanted to... I'm just not happy. I gotta run. I gotta roam. I got a heart to roam. And she was the only one who was supportive of me, because, like I said, she managed a record store. She was a singer when she was 19. She opened for Billie Holiday in this little jazz band that she had at the Monterey Jazz Festival. And I didn't know that for years, and I was stoked when she told me. Have you heard recordings of your mom's work? No, no. I did some research. I couldn't find anything. But she did say she made a record, but I don't know if it happened to it. Anyway, I said, I'm out of here. So my dad didn't know, and he was a working-class guy, And he worked really hard to keep us together and everything. But I had to leave, so she gave me like 50 bucks. And I left. I took a bus to L.A. And I didn't know anyone. Didn't know anyone. All I had was what I was wearing. I didn't think about that. I thought I was so naive. Tell me about the day you arrived. Like, what is that day like? Well, I go, okay, here I am. Now what? I don't know anybody. I kind of freaked out a little bit. Yeah, I would freak out. But I was so excited. I was so excited. and uh so i kind of maintained myself i actually walked in there was a market on sunset across from the whiskey called the sun bee and i went in there i had i didn't want to spend my 50 bucks and then don't get me wrong i'm not a thief okay but um i went into the market and i started eating food and putting the trash down my pants and in my jacket and and i just walked out and i said okay i ate i'm good you know and i kind of hung around walked around and i met some girls and like at the record store, there was a licorice pizza on the corner, a costume of whiskey, and everyone used to hang out there. Pat Sumer used to hang out there. So I waited, and then I heard about the Rainbow. I heard about it, because I used to collect these magazines, Rock Seam, Cream, Rolling Stone, when they were newspapers. I had boxes of the newspapers, the original ones. So I said, okay, the Rainbow, I'll go there, I'll meet some people. First thing I see, and I kid you not, I see this guy directing Traffic, and he's on the street divider that's between that side and this side of the Sunset Strip. And it's Robert Plant. He's standing there directing traffic. Like, probably fucked up out of his head. Who knows? I don't know him to be much of a stoner, but I know what he did. You know, all the boys did that. And I was like, oh, my God, you know. So I went into the Rainbow, and I met a couple of girls. And I remember one, she invited me to her place. so i i ended up staying there and uh it was her and she had a bunch of other friends so it was like these like rich girls and they're all hanging out at this like mansion it was right around from the hamburger hamlet and i remember the hamburger hamlet was like iggy land because iggy would stand in front of hamburger hamlet and beg because he was not doing well at that time beg for drugs beg for food and that's how he got arrested later because they found him drugged out of his mind standing in front of the hamburger helmet like this on the window, like somebody feed me or something, you know, it's a crazy story. But that's what happened. First time I was there. And I met all these really cool people, really strange people. And everyone was, this was like post glitter glam, 75. And Bowie was, and I was so into Bowie, I was so stupid not to know that he was recording Heteriki. He was doing Station to Station, like at 76, late 75, 76. I would have gone there. Believe me, I would have gone there. So your ambitions at that point, you just want to be a musician, you want to start a band. Yeah, I wanted to be a singer and sing. I knew I had the chops. I just, no one ever taught me anything. Had you figured out that you had a good voice or like where were you at in your musical kind of thing? Well, again, it was, I learned early Dylan stuff. I think everyone learns Dylan because you're learning how to play acoustic and they're easy chords. But I really loved Dylan's surrealist era, 65 to 66. I think the best three records he ever made was during those years. Well, you know, the legend is that he was on tons of amphetamines during that whole. Yeah, amphetamines, heroin, opium, acid. Yeah, I know about that. Very inspiring, very inspiring. Well. Yeah, look what he did. Well, there's the through line that we're already talking about. It's that fine line between, let's say, organized chaos and madness. Yes, madness. And music likes to ride the rail on that. Oh, yeah. Depending on your artist in the year. Mm-hmm. And then I discovered Sid Barrett. And I thought, okay, I thought this guy's amazing. And there weren't a lot out at that time. I think it was Mad Cat Laughs, I think. And I absorbed that record. I still listen to that. But I knew I could sing. I just knew it. And I just had this burning yearning in my heart that I have to do this. I don't care about anything else. And that's when I just, again, I was so naive. I just split. I said, I'm out. I didn't even think to pack a bag. So what were, because again, information on your musical life at different points is kind of scarce. So I would love to have heard something or seen something, but all I know is there's this period between you showing up in 75 before you start your band, the one you're known for. Yeah. Like, tell me about that period. Oh, okay. Before Community FK. There was a band. Okay, this is a crazy story. So there was a newspaper called The Recycler, and every musician looked into classifieds, people looking for musicians, you know? Yeah. And so I found this couple and they wanted a singer. So I went, it was in the valley, so I came out to the valley, and they had this warehouse thing where the door opened like that, and they were in there, and it was a drummer and a keyboardist. And so I kind of tried working with them. They were into some weird stuff that's too commercial for me, I just didn't really like it, but I had no other choice. So I thought, I'll just see what happens. And then one day, they said, well, let's audition another drummer, because this guy wanted to move to bass, and let's get a guitarist. So, one day, these people show up, and they happened to be people I knew from where I came from. I don't know if it was fate, or if they knew that I was there. To this day, I had no idea. But I knew them. I go, what are you doing here? They're like, what are you doing here? You know, kind of thing. Yeah. And so, I knew their talent. So I said, I'm out of here. And the three of us just walked out. Oh, you just split. Yeah, and we went and formed our own band. So the band, the guitar player called it Orange. Had something to do with the British Parliament. I don't know, Orange something. And so he called it Orange. And I thought, well, that's cool. I like that color. And we ended up writing songs together. I wrote all the lyrics and did all the vocals. And we did a demo, but I don't have a copy of it. Were you playing guitar at that point? Just a singer, just a front person. And in one year, we ended up opening for Van Halen. We were second bill of Van Halen everywhere they played. Starwood, Whiskey. We did a lot of that. And then Patti Smith's management, Warto Concern, moved from New York to L.A., and they picked me up. They came and saw the band, and they said, you know. Could you quantify the type of music you were making at this point? It was Raw Power, Stooges, like Proto. And you have no recordings of that? No, I know who does, but I don't know how to get a hold of them. Oh, okay. Yeah, I'd love to hear that stuff, though. but um yeah we were really good and um i i was singing my heart off my balls off and performing and and having a great time and i go this this is what i've always wanted to do you know i'm valhalla this is it you know did you feel from a aesthetic point of view uh it was what you were after is that you still kind of figuring it out yeah i was still figuring it out because here's the thing about as you know being in a band um you kind of you want to kind of have a bonding commonness between you, which is like a dream. It exists sometimes. These guys, I was too intellectual for them. I wrote really good lyrics. They didn't understand, but they dug it, and the melodies were good. I was a good performer, and so we just stuck with it. I just said, I could do better than this. I want to, because I was really, like, we'd be backstage at the Starwood, and I'd have my little blaster with me and i'd have um low on i'd have the low album on yeah punk was just coming out but and i was really into pistols i mean when i i was eating at a restaurant the source and there was a group called back source family restaurant yes that's it cult you know and uh did you ever sorry because i i had interactions with the source family people oh did you i always wanted to meet them and i jammed with the yohoa 13 a few times yeah no way did you ever meet father yode and then i saw him i never got i was too intimidated to talk to him big guy right yeah menacing beard yeah i go wow you know look at that guy yeah at their peak i think they had 150 people living in a house yes i heard yeah wow i would have been one of them you know i think i think don bowls our mutual uh compatriot was around the source family back in those days i don't doubt it yeah he's amazing i love don um but anyway so uh these girls they had a band called Backstage Pass. You ever heard of them? They were an early, like, runaways, post-runaways. None of the members, but that ilk. Sure, I get it, yeah. Yeah, and we were sitting on the patio, and she was reading the very first Anarchy in the UK fanzine with Sue Catwoman on the cover with a striped dress and her style, which was impeccable. Yeah, I know the person. But it was like this big of a newspaper, and I was like, whoa, you know, and can I see that? So, yeah, yeah, yeah. And I looked at it, and I went, oh my God, you know, who these guys and it was the pistols so i went and tried to find everything i could and and lisa robinson was writing about him for uh roxine and all that stuff you could see glimpses of him it was teasing enough for me like seeing a picture of tristan zara that was rock and roll to me you know and i thought oh god these guys amazing so one day when i was picked up by war took concern they were going to manage me um this guy named rory johnson comes in and he's looking for a record deal, American deal for the pistols. And I'm like, oh my God, he's one of them, you know, this British guy. And he had the fanzine and he had a factory sample, not for sale, stamped seven inch of Anarchy in the UK, not released yet. And he goes, here, it's like a press kit. And he just gave it to me. I took that home and never took it off my turntable. Talk about the power of intention. Yeah. And I've had these brushes for my whole life with situations like that. And I thought, oh my God. And so I went home, took my hair, cut it off just like that. Just cut it off. Yeah. And, and I just said, I'm, I'm in, I'm in, I need to do something else now. Wow. And so I, I, um, It's like a bolt of lightning. Yeah, totally. And it really happened. And then it was amazing. I'll never forget it. And then I said, okay, this is, this is my next phase. I'm going to do this. I'm gonna do something else. I'm going to try and start a band, my own band this time. And so I would meet, I had a girlfriend at the time, and I tried to get other guys to play with me. No one would play with me. So she played bass. She played bass, and her name was Cece. And so we had to find a drummer. So we went to the catheta ground every night, looking at punk bands, trying to find somebody. And we saw this drummer, a kid, and he walked off stage in the middle of the set. I think Margo X Go-Go's was playing bass. They had an argument on stage right during the set. I'm like, wow. Because back in those days, it was punk rock, and who cares? Yeah, totally. Being professional, you know? Yeah. So, he threw his drumsticks at Margo, he walks off his kit, walks out of the club. I followed him. I said, oh, I'm gonna talk to this guy. That's my drummer. Yeah, that's him. So, I went outside, and I just talked to him. I go, man, let's jam. Let's do something. He goes, okay, give me two weeks. I'm going to Tahoe, or something like that. So, I waited two weeks, didn't show up, and I'm like, oh, God. So anyway, that's the beginning of Community FK. Wow. Okay, when you started, because I want to sort of try to put some of these pieces together, when you started, did you think like, okay, I know exactly what I want to do, or was it like, I want to start something new, and then I'll figure it out as I go? Did you have a specific vision? Yeah, I did, but it was instinctive too. I just, like I always do, and I had a discussion with my friend in the car on the way here, I do something for the moment and it hard to shake for me where okay I going to do this and gonna sound like that you know It never works for me like that For me I inspired for the moment and then whatever happens at that moment, there it is. And you're all in on the moment. Yeah, yeah, and then you document it, and then you move on, and then the next thing doesn't sound at all like that. I see, I see. And the other thing, too, was that I didn't have access to studio or anything like that. Back in those days, there was no digital, you know? So you had to remember everything. So to write my songs, I couldn't listen to anybody else's music. I had to focus, if I had a melody or an idea, I'd focus on that all day until I could get to a guitar or get to something and lay the idea down and then get a cassette player, you know. Yeah, because it's still from the point where you first start with Community FK until your first record, it's still a few years. I'm not crazy about that, right? Yeah, we recorded in 82, the first album. So there's about three-plus years of gestation of the music that you're playing live before you make a record. Am I crazy about that? Yeah, yeah. So what did the band sound like? If you could just kind of give it a... Well, if you listened to the first album, that was our set list. That was our very first set list. But I'm saying, what did it sound like in the beginning, though? Oh, it was... I'm just confused because... It was noise. Don Bowles did our first gig. Don Bowles did our sound. And he was dressed in drag. and he had these hot pants, Daisy Dukes on and fishnets and a wig and everything. Knowing Don, it just makes me laugh. Yeah, that's Don though, you know? And he loved it. See, he would be the person who would get it right away. And he really, he played the PA like an instrument. And I heard their live, he recorded his live. And I know he has it. I know he's got that tape. And I heard it and I thought, wow, we're not that bad. And I was also getting into public image, Keith Levine's guitar style. Yeah. So that's the angular... Yeah, yeah, and more on the high strings. Yeah, yeah. And he had that metal guitar, it was made of metal, and it had that resonance. And so I tried to write a song like Public Image, that single. I tried to write a song like that, and I couldn't. So it came out as a song called To Blame. Okay. And so it kind of has that guitar style on it, but that was me just interpreting it. Yeah. I could never copy some person. I could never sound like someone I really liked. Yeah. I had to have my own voice. So I just said, well, this is how I hear it. Yeah. What's striking to me about listening, I was listening this morning to your first album, and it strikes me, it's like, you know, the Beatles has a way of casting a shadow over everything, a weird kind of way. For better and for worse. I love the Beatles. I'm sure you do too. But there's no Beatles on that record, if you get the joke, right? I mean, it sounds like you've wandered into this new zip code that's totally your zip code. And I think that's what's shocking. You know what I mean? Yeah. For me, it's a parlor game I like to play where I like to sort of like, how far does this rabbit hole go down? Like with you, with Dada, it's like, if you start with Bowie, you can go all the way back to Zara. And I'm sure there's... And Burroughs. But I'm sure you can find, even before Zara, there's this other guy or another woman. You know, there's always this other person. You're like, where's this come from? Yeah, that's how I learned. to a lot of things. Yeah. So I think it's interesting, your first record, it's like, it feels like, I mean, I hear the influence, but somehow, fast, passed through your blender, filter, wherever you were in your life, it doesn't sound like you're copying anybody, and that's where the originality comes in. We all, of course, learn from other people. That would be ridiculous that we just sort of made up our own music. You know, there's beats. Well, you're not Harry Parts, you know. Sure. That's what I'm, so what I'm saying is shocking, I think, in rock and roll where there are those moments where you're like, wow, something totally new and you obviously aren't even sure if it's new right i'm just expressing myself right yeah so in that in that in that in the build-up years uh getting to that first record i know i'm kind of jumping around but in that so you're playing like you said that was our set list okay so give me a give me a typical reaction and a typical place you would have played before you put out your first record you know there's no record review there's not you can't hand somebody this is our album, you know what I mean? You're just on stage somewhere, you're opening, you're playing a gig. It's Wednesday night at wherever, Ghazari's. Yeah, I never played there, thank God. No, it's a joke. I know, I know, I get it. But I'm just saying, I never played there, just to make that clear. No, that's not why it's a joke, you see. What I'm saying is, give me the atmosphere because I think sometimes it's always easy to look in the rear view mirror and say, well, that kind of worked out. But when you're in it, it doesn't feel like it's working out. People are walking out, people are throwing things at you, including other bands. Oh, yeah. So tell me about that. Okay. To me, I likened it to, again, you know, Rites of Spring, Stravinsky, The Dadaist, you know, where the hostile reactions, nihilistic interpretation and reviews, things like that about what you're doing. People would, okay, what really, really hit the fan was when someone was brave enough to interview us for the LA Times calendar section. They gave us a full page and let us, just like here they are, read about them. They're great. This guy thought we were great. Before that, people would go, I'm not going on after these guys. I don't want these guys on our bill. They can't play. They're horrible. I mean, they look weird. What's up with these guys? And I had named the band Community. That's the original name. And we couldn't even put that on the marquee in those days. so took the uc out and you know there it is so people start pronouncing it fk and so that that happened then um uh bookers uh would say i'm not going to pay you you get 15 percent of zero and they put a line through the zero but i don't like you i don't i don't get it i don't get it and uh 15 percent of zero yeah yeah and they just didn't get it they would so they refused to pay us and uh and i thought hmm it's kind of dadaistic is interesting and i kind of you saw it as a version of success yeah i liked i kind of liked it you know it was like when the bully acknowledges you you know and they start getting ready to throw a punch then they stop and they go hmm i don't know something about this guy he might hurt me or or i don't know what he's going to do yeah you know so we just we just fought back i mean uh one time we are opening for killing joke our very first break gig was I got, I was, during those days, uh, I was trying to get a job as a paste-up artist. Uh, now everybody does, you know, Photoshop. So that's when you would like, you'd cut out, paste, glue, and you'd do it for a newspaper or something. So I was beating the path and it was August, it was hot. And I came home very disillusioned. I was like, oh, how am I going to get a job doing this? Uh, I even went to Larry Flint's place in Century City to try to get a job for him and i didn't get the job so so i come home and then there's a phone call and it's the booker for the roxy and she goes her name was michonne god bless her and she goes um uh i got this band killing joke playing uh the whiskey two nights uh do you do you want the gig i went i was a huge fan first album i had it i go oh my god first joy division album too that came out i mean it was such a great it was like 1972 and all those great albums came out yeah uh well this was 1980 you know 81 and this all these great records are coming out the passage you heard the passage sure yeah i had that pin drop album is unbelievable anyway so i said we'll take opening night you know of course so we got opening night we had to play two sets they clear the room in the middle and then you had to play a second set and close the night um i see well yeah so when we got that gig, everyone thought that we didn't deserve it. And everyone thought that we paid our way to get the gig. But what I didn't know, underlying all of that, we had an audience. I had no idea. Because we used to get nothing but hostile reactions. And sometimes you'd have to fight somebody just to get your stuff in the car. You know, they're trying to, here's my chance, you know, there he is, you know. And, you know, and so... Sorry to laugh. I've had a few of those myself. I bet you have. I'm sure. It's a sign of... It's a good thing, I think. Anyway, so that being said, we got a lot of bad letters to the editor in that calendar section. Wow. Because I remember this one guy, he wrote, they don't deserve this. They're not musicians. I have to show it to you sometime. We're better than they are. No one could figure it out. And then we had, again, this underlying audience. One guy got it. His name was Howard Parr. And now he does a lot of soundtracks for films and things like that. But he had a club called The On Club, and he was a mod, a British mod. He was here from England. So he gave The Untouchables some of their first gigs, a ska band, things like that. But he dug what we were doing. He thought we were kind of Joy Division-ish, because we were bass-heavy and drum-heavy. And that's what I wanted. And so I thought my guitar was just like spiced. It wasn't really important. So he gave us every Wednesday for one month to do whatever we wanted to do. In those days, there were no DJs. So we just brought our record collection to the club, played our favorite tracks. Two people show up first night, just two people. And we didn't know how to take that. I thought, oh man, I don't know. So we played two songs in the band, played two songs, one song for each person. and then we just played records the rest of the night. A week later, 10 people show up. I go, huh. And then we see people showing, because I wore makeup. I had a long Rosicrucian priest coat that I bought at Fiorucci. There's a lot of things going on between it. I got a job at Fiorucci, and I was working there, because I could look at who I wanted, and I was wearing white face and all this stuff, and had a Rosicrucian priest jacket that I adored, cloth buttons that went all the way down. And so I looked like that. And kids started showing up wearing black trench coats and eyeliner. And I thought, oh, these are the boys. This is awesome. Things started gelling. And then we started getting a big audience. Then bands wanted to open for us all of a sudden. And then we were headlining. Wow. And so things started to gel. Yeah. And the hostility started to disappear. Interesting. Yeah. Looking back now on your first record, remind me of the title, because I have it written here. The Vision and the Voice. Thank you. I got that from a Crowley book. Oh. It's a beautiful record. Thank you. And I'm sure most of the focus is probably more on the second one, because that's where it all really kind of comes together in a way that is probably more easier to discern for the modern ear as far as what followed. Does it make sense what I'm saying? Yeah, I understand. Yeah, of course. That's a development, though. Yes. And that's normally where I would go. In fact, recently I found a vintage press of that, the second album. The closed one sat on. Yeah. But listening to the first album this morning, I was really struck by like, there was actually, it's hard to explain. There's always that moment of innocence where the thing you're trying just kind of comes together and you're not quite sure of the result. We didn't care. But I was really struck by the freshness or how starkly sort of modern the first album remains. Does it make... I'm struggling for words, but because it's hard to define something that's groundbreaking. Maybe that's a compliment I'm trying to pay here. Well, I appreciate that. It's so different. And that's what I mean, the joke about no Beatles. It's like songs just kind of start and stop and there's a lack of... for something that normally gets the pretense, the label of pretension, you know, this kind of goth, death rock, whatever people want to call this genre, which you were part of, you know, initiating into the world, it lacks the pretense in a way. You know what I'm saying? I think people later kind of add pretense to something. Oh, yeah, because they're trying to understand it. Yes, but it has almost no pretense, and I think that's what's even more shocking. no one's ever said that to me i hope that comes across compliment i need it does and i'm flattered thank you but tell me your version of it because you're the author and you're also living it at the same time so maybe walk me through that for you because i'll try we can only have those watershed moments in our life once oh yeah i know that and and being an elder now um I get sometimes a little acclimat, you know, when I think about it. But... What makes you emotional? How beautiful it was and what a time it was. You know, you'll never be repeated. You can't repeat things like that. Yeah, that's kind of what I was trying to say in so many words. And if you weren't there, you missed it kind of thing. I'm sad I missed it. Oh, I wish you were there. Yeah, yeah. But it was living for the moment. And I was cool with that. I thought, I don't know what this is, but I love this. I love my life right now. And yeah, sure, it's a struggle, but that's not a problem. I'll get through it. I'll make the next day, as long as I can go to that rehearsal room and just see what happens. And we had access to a Prophet 5, and they had just put those out. Sequential circuits put that out, and a lot of it, like Bernie Worrell was using it for Funkadelic and Parliament. And we didn't use it like that. We saw it as, well, let's throw the manual away, and let's just see what happens. And that's what happened. We'd just let it, we'd program it and preset it and then just let it go, and then we'd play over it. And we'd just let it... Like a drone instrument. Yeah, yeah, like a drone. And some people, like, we're trying to define our sound. Terry Atkinson's for the LA Times, who was the music editor and critic. He saw the Killing Joke show, and we were playing songs from the first album. And he said, uh, they're gloom and doom. They're drone music. I don't know what it says, but it's awesome. I really dig it and I get it, you know? Yeah. So that was a great thing for us. And we put that right away in our press kit. We thought, this is it. And someone else described this as brittle psychedelia, intense noise, suppressed sexuality, all kinds of really cool terms. I thought, oh, okay. yeah so people are starting to pay attention but i i thought what we were doing was was um unique but then again i didn't know what it was i just knew that i loved it and um i loved doing it you know i thought well it's there's so much to explore yeah and there's only three of us so we didn't want a keyboard player you know we thought we just let it do its thing yeah yeah so that's that's what that is i don't know if that answers your question but uh no no i'm because it's just um there's so much going on uh in my mind when i think about that because there was so much going on yeah yeah i think it's that it's like um i at least in my own life i find myself ruminating on things that didn't seem important at the time and it lends a certain sort of sentimental thing of like you see yourself through the rearview mirror in a form of innocence you knew what you were doing, but you didn't really understand the depth of what you were doing. Not at all. It's like you almost got to be older and maybe take some drugs and go, wow, I was actually onto something. But we took drugs, but... No, I don't mean it like that. I know what you mean. I know what you mean, but still. I guess what I'm saying is it's like sometimes... It's like one of those old movies where, you know, a stranger stumbles into a new town. And, you know, he's just looking for some gas or something, and this thing happens, you know what I mean? Yeah, yeah. And I think those musical moments in our lives are... they're significant because it's like, I don't know if you have this sensation, but sometimes I think like, gosh, I wish I'd written more songs, taken more pictures, wrote more stuff down. Yeah, I reflect like that sometimes, yeah. But it's all happening so fast and you're in it and one day you're just, you're eating at Denny's and then you're playing a gig and it's just all going on. You're in your youth and it's just kind of rolling through. Yeah, whatever happens next, you know? Sure, sure. I can't wait to see that, you know? Yeah, so once the record came out and you saw it, that something was shifting and you were certainly on a musical journey, one that you authored you're like you you feel possessive of the journey that you're having um what was your what was your plan just keep going or do you just do you suddenly think oh this is working and now i want to do blank yeah no i i didn't think like that i didn't we didn't even tour we just played san francisco san diego la that was it that was our our network did no labels come sniffing around not not at the time no not until um independent project records came and they said, we want to put an album out with you guys. We thought it was crazy. Yeah, yeah. But what we did it, and he paid for the studio time. And it's funny, we recorded it at Mystic Sound, which is where Led Zeppelin recorded parts of Led Zeppelin too. And we didn't, at that time, it wasn't cool. I see. Like, Led Zeppelin, you know? And now I'm a huge, I love Led Zeppelin, you know? Yeah, yeah, yeah. But especially when, like you say, you go down the rabbit hole with Jimmy Page and there's more than meets the man. Sure. And that really inspires me. And even now, now I know more. But still, we couldn't tour, but I thought, it doesn't matter, because all that matters is the here and now. And that's something that's maybe a problem for me. Like, some guy tells me, I always plan a year ahead. You should try to do that. Like, here's what you want to do this year. I go, I can't do that. I don't know what I'm going to do in a year. Well, in talking to our mutual friend, Josh. Yeah, lovely guy. Yeah, he's close in our world, and Josh Richmond, for those interested. Yeah. You know, I was trying to, in order to talk to you today, I was trying to get to know you as a person a little bit, even though we hadn't met. Because I certainly want to respectfully kind of approach your work, because that's what we're here to talk about. Thanks. And he was saying something, I don't remember what he was saying, and I said, well, that makes kind of what you're saying about how you're just kind of in the moment. And I said, oh, that makes total sense to me why, and again, I don't know you, right? So I'm like, I'm telling somebody who knows you, my impression of you, right? And I said, it makes sense to me because he's an OG. And what I mean by that is there are those artists who they are the art and everybody tries to figure out how to do what they do in a form of imitation, but the artists themselves can't imitate themselves because they are the art. Does that make sense? Yeah, it does. Yeah, and I totally agree. I agree. I've always been in awe of people like you, and I'm also in awe of you, but the reason is because I'm not that type of personality. Come on. No, I'm serious. I'm more of a studier, like an architect. You know what I mean? I study a lot of things, and I got to put things carefully together to get what I'm after. Okay. And everybody around me is like, Jesus, how long is this going to take? and why is this so complicated? And it's like there's a blueprint in my mind is always better than what I'm able to achieve, but I'm always chasing this kind of blueprint into my mind. But I've always been in awe. And I knew people in Chicago back in the day, like yourself, who just seem to kind of embody the work. Like they're a work of art and then their music seems to be the soundtrack for the work of art that they are. Yeah, they're expressing it. Yeah, so I see you in that, I don't know if that sort of... I don't even know the word for it. It's just like some people just, they are the thing. Does that resonate with you? Yeah, it does. Because even everything you're talking about, like whether it's Bowie or Zeppelin, I can hear moments where I think, okay, I can hear the influence, but somehow it still comes out sounding like you. Yeah, because I don't imitate anybody. Like I said, when I was younger, I tried to emulate Bowie and all that kind of stuff. that just wasn't me and then eventually me comes out yeah like the vocals um uh i was really into the girl groups of the 60s and i'm not my mom who's tell me because i'm obsessed with girl groups from the 60s well i love the shangra laws uh the shangra laws they're like punks you know right yeah and her voice imagine she was singing those songs when she was 16 16 yeah yeah that's what an incredible voice yeah she just passed away not too long i heard yeah god bless her that bummed me out what a voice i played her records that day on her honor and uh but the double tracking also blew my mind like when i heard lennon double tracking in the beatles records i thought oh man that's so amazing it sounds like a third instrument you know yeah and so they did that everyone double tracked at one point during those days the brillo recording people and all that but um i don't know uh i i i know that there's not another person like me and it's not an ego trip. It's just, I don't know. I can't really explain. Because again, I'm living this in this body and there's things going on in here. If I had more chances to express what's up in here, I would probably have 50 records out at this point. Like Psychic TV, I really love the fact that they put a record out every day for a while. They put an album out every day. did you know that i didn't put out 23 records yeah um a good friend of mine was was close to genesis yeah i interviewed him once oh how was that that was amazing he dosed me i got dosed sorry to laugh no no it was it was a trip no pun intended yeah uh but uh he was he was that's when he was exiled over here and uh because something happened to him in england and he had a school buff so he trying to do the further right mary paxton kind of thing and he was with paula and to the children And so Flipside asked me to interview him I said yeah no problem Then he played the Stardust Ballroom I went in there He wanted to hold my hand So we held hands, and we walked around, and we talked. It's like we're talking now, but we're holding hands and walking around. And then someone goes, here, here's some water. And I'm like, okay, like this. I take the water, and then about two hours later, there's this feeling in the back of my neck, and I'm going, oh, God, I think I know what's going on. And I started coming on to acid psychedelics. Yeah. But I watched the show and we talked about Burroughs and we talked about Geisen and I could see all that in what he does, but he was doing the house stuff. He misinterpreted acid house as acid house, you know, which it wasn't, it was something else. But how he interpreted it, I thought, well, that's like me. I interpret something, and I don't know if it's misinterpreting it, but either way, you come out with something original. Yeah. Trying to interpret something. Yeah. You don't imitate it. You let it inspire you, and then you throw it up, you know, and then it comes out as such. To give you a different take on that, so I saw Psychic TV Genesis Band probably somewhere around 87. Yeah, it was around those times and they were really peaking. So I saw him at the Cabaret Metro in Chicago, and, you know, They come shuffling out like they just woke up from a nap. Right? Yeah. Like no waving, no showbiz. Just come out like about 11 people on stage. Wow. And I thought, what am I watching? I was bored by it. And at the same time, I was interested in it, right? It was probably a bad night. No, I think, and it was interesting because the addendum to the story was, I was telling you about I had a friend who was friends with Genesis. So, um, at some point I told her that I'd seen Genesis play live and she started saying, oh, I think Genesis would, would really like, like you. And this is, I think when he was towards the end of his life, he was getting sick. So it wasn't like a thing you pick up the phone and call him. Okay. So we started passing messages through the mutual friend. So Genesis would send a message to me. Yeah. And, um, and then since then, since he's passed, I've spent some time trying to understand his life and his work. But I always go back to that gig, right? Because here's this moment of innocence. I'm just 20 years old, whatever. I'm standing in a club and here's just another band, you know, and I've seen them all. And I sure you saw them all, you know, like they all came through town and you go to the gig and there'd be a hundred people. Yes. Right. It was a good gig too, that way. The small audience. Yes. There was this beautiful moment with alternative music where it wasn't what it became, and I'm not saying it was bad, it paid the bills, but there was this beautiful moment where there really weren't that many punks. There weren't that many goths. You know, there were like six goths in Chicago and I happened to be the 14th of them. You know what I mean? It was one of those. And the originals didn't like me because I was three years younger than them and I showed up in 84 instead of 81. Yeah. Yeah. Right. So I always go back to this gig and I'm saying all this because I think it relates to you as well. There's that moment when you're in the audience and you're watching, and you're actually watching something quite brilliant. As a musician, I'm focused on the guitar is out of tune. Why has he got three stand-up drummers? He can't really sing. Yeah. But the revolution of it is, it's the Velvet Underground, it's Iggy Pop, it's Bowie. No, no. So this is the soundtrack of something that's happening. But the real revolution is the fact that we're not playing this showbiz game. We're not, we're living a different type of rule. The revolution is anybody could be up here. That's the great revolution of alternative music. That's what I loved about punk, early punk. Right. So it's been beautiful to talk to you about the innocence of it because, you know, I stumbled upon it in around 84, you know, with what was going on out here. And I can talk about that in a second. But from your vantage point, you've started something. And, of course, now there's labels and names for it. Back then, it probably didn't have much of a name other than Doom and Gloom. Doom and Gloom are the wrong. But looking around the atmosphere, you know, you got whether it's Christian Death over here, Alien, Sex Fiend, or whatever. There's these artists, specimen. I supported them. Yeah. Yeah, played with them. But what I'm after is when you see this start to congeal into something that looks a little bit more organized or a little bit more like there's an audience. You know what I mean? It's not a cult of one. It's a cult of a few. But it's like something is happening. It's not even popular. Yeah, I saw that happen. Right. But you're there. You're like, well, something's happening. Some people are getting signed. Yeah. Bessiman had Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, which was an MTV song. Something is happening. What's your impression when it starts to happen? It becomes slightly diluted, misinterpreted, like anything else. Look what happened to punk. And Josh was telling me the other day, how would you even believe 50 years later it would be huge? This whole alternative thing would be as huge as it is. It's a commodity now and all that. In my day, it wasn't. We were the anti-heart, and that's what I was trying to do. I said, no, you, you, you're cool. Come on. And that's what we did. And then those people that we said, come on, they came. And the other ones, they off and they went and did whatever they were going to do. And they got signed, whatever. But the thing about it is, I didn't chase that. I didn't chase, I'm going to wreck a deal. I never thought like that. It happened usually accidentally. i didn't ask independent project now here i am come and sign me they just said we want to do a record with you but were there people in your in your orbit that were saying i think you can do more with this or oh yeah let me give a keyboard player you know tell me tell me yeah people like you got a synthesizer up there why isn't anyone playing it you know i said it's playing itself it's playing itself yes they're like you know i don't get it it's like exactly you don't get it you know we're going to keep doing this this way my way that's the way it goes i mean you're this is la right this 80s there must have been somebody like if you guys got i mean it was was there some record guy in your ear was there some oh i've met them heiress i mean well dig this chrysalis records okay okay uh during the close one sat satire era um it was before we actually recorded that record um some guy from chrysalis was courting us at the shows and all this stuff and he's like oh come on So we went up to his office and this guy was a total douche. And I just like, I thought, I'm not going to sign to this guy. I don't care what's going on here. And I didn't hear anything that I wanted to hear. He was just like, oh, we're going to, you know. So there was some percolating interest. Yeah, yeah. There was some of that. Some people were trying to be brave. Did you see it as? Put a foot in, you know. Sure. Did you see it as a lack or in hindsight, do you see it as a lack of ambition or your just brain was not organized that way? I'm just going to do art and whatever's going to come up, it's going to come up. Well, it was like if someone like you comes up and says, you know, I really want, let's do something, you know. I go, well, I would with you. But when someone like that comes up to me, I'm going, no, I'm not going to do anything with you. I see you, you know. Yeah, we had a funny thing once where we were playing a gig. Some guy had flown in from L.A. to possibly sign us. This would have been 89, 90, something like that. And so I told the band, like, you know, don't say anything stupid. Of course, yeah, yeah. Like, you don't do the interviews, I do. Well, it was one of those things, like, just don't say anything stupid. Yeah. And this guy was notorious because he, uh, he, I think he, in order to sign Green Day, he dyed his hair green, and he was one of those guys. It was like something out of Spinal Tap. There you go. Anyway, so the guy comes backstage, and it's like, you know, it's like this big. We're all kind of sitting, uh, getting ready to play, and the guy goes to us, uh, we're just talking, and somebody said something about doing drugs or something, and he goes, do you guys do drugs? you know it was one of those moments where it's like i didn't want anyone to say anything yeah yeah because um because you know it might blow our chance at a record deal and jimmy chamberlain drummer the pumpkins ghost does a one-legged duck swim in a circle no way are you serious and then the guy got freaked out and went away because we quote-unquote did drugs uh-huh and we're like everybody everybody has drugs where have you been bro this is the eight this is the 80s bro yeah yeah yeah what are you talking about well then again we would attract all kinds of outsiders to our early shows, we'd play a place called Al's Bar, which was downtown. And there was an art scene there because of the people going to Otis Institute and things like that. And design schools are down there. And so we would play warehouse parties sometimes. But Al's Bar was great because it was so small. It's a small real estate, but packed with people. I mean, there was more room for people because it was a bar, you know, but it was like a beatnik bar. And it was perfect setting for us back in the early days. And so one time this guy shows up and he's gapped to the gills and he's like, I have something for you. I got something for you. And we're like, who is this guy? I don't know. Let him in. We brought him backstage. He brings this newspaper. It's like a bushel. And he lays it on the floor. He goes, I made this for you. It's all this cocaine. And it was just... I don't know how he made it. I said, I don't know about that. I don't know if I'm going to take what you made, dude. You know? Maybe a bathtub or something. But we We attract all kinds of strange, really interesting people. I found out he was a painter, and he'd been up for two weeks. I thought, I'd like to know this guy, you know? But, yeah, we had similar things like that happen, and then some guys, record guys, offering us drugs, you know? Okay. I said, nah, I don't know. It's just so busy. Yeah, yeah, I get that. It's not me. So, Close One Eye is the apocryphal moment where it all congeals. You know, it's still early days of what's now called goth or death rock or whatever. It was goth. That's when goth happened. 83, 84. Okay, right. And, you know, there's other things going on. You got The Cure over here, you got Susan the Banshees over here, and, of course, some of the other bands that we talked about. It's a beautiful record for people who haven't heard the record, so... I appreciate that. I recommend listening to it. But, and at the moment we're having the interview, some of that stuff's not even online. So hopefully that's going to get rectified soon because it should be. Yeah, we're going to reissue it. Okay, fantastic. So hopefully by the time this airs, it's out. I hope so. You can find it if you dig around enough. So close one sat eye, right? I got the title right? Yes. Okay, perfect. So it's Community FK. And then here comes MTV. like so everything you've said it's like you make this video but you're i'm proud you're not thinking you're gonna end up on mtv yeah not at all and there you are on mtv and by the way being an alternative artist which we now call alternative there wasn't even a word back then but being an outsider artist to be on mtv in 1985 was like shocking yeah must have been shocking to you well yeah because i had no idea that was going to happen i had no idea i wasn't against it mind you you know i'm not getting paid but it doesn't matter what better way to to i thought i thought it was a beautiful video yeah you know it holds up quite nicely and it's cool i'm glad you feel that yeah i'm just saying though um when we filmed it josh was there of course he was there and he's been through the whole thread pardon me he's been through the whole thread but um when we did that uh the i had nothing to do with the storyboard but i thought oh this is interesting maybe this person is trying to say something that I've been trying to say. And so the message was that something was like a funeral, that something had died inside of me. And the way I see the world and the way... This is for the song, Something Inside Me Has Died. Something Inside Me Has Died, yeah. And I just, you know, it's just, there's sadness. And so I named the album Close One, Sad Eye, because you have to have one eye open at all times. So that's what that means. And then it's a sad world that's even sadder now. But I thought she got it. I She wrote the storyboard and I thought, well, this is really interesting. It's like a fallen angel or a Nephilim or something like that coming down to tell everybody, you know, you're losing hope, man. You're losing it, you know, kind of thing. I thought, okay. It was gothy. It's got kind of vibes. It's beautiful. It's amazing. That's when God started to come across, again, 80, 81, 82, Death Rock. That's what we were called and I never called myself that. But, so then things get a little more shinier, a little more prettier looking. And I'm learning to do song structure just by nature. It's just starting, I didn't say I'm going to do this chord and do that chord. It's just how it came out. And then working with other individuals was something I had never really thought of doing. So I started working with two other people in the band. The drummer was still my drummer from the first album. He'd been through Baptism Fire with me and he stayed with me. and I was so proud of that. And so the first lineup, the girl leaves, the bass player, she leaves, and then I thought, well, I'm going to break up the band. I can't do this anymore then. Then the bass player comes up and goes, no, no, no, you've got to be like the damned. They have a family tree that's like this long. Lemmy's played with them. I mean, you know, just keep going, man. So I gave him a chance, and we just started doing the next level, and that's where the material came from, was working like that. I had changed. I was seeing things a little further, differently. But I didn't plan any of that. Yeah. When the MTV video happens, is there now real interest from record labels, or is it still kind of... No. That's really interesting. Yeah. I don't know. I'm still outside. Wow. I'd like to reach more people. Believe me. Because... Especially at this point in the world, there's more people, and because of it becoming a commodity, people are curious and more interested, and I think they see the beauty of what it was. Like you say, they can't live it, they missed it, but they want to feel that. And because of the way I looked and all that stuff, that helped inspire some fashion-anti-fashion. Now, Kardashian's dressed like this. Who saw that? But it's development. When Lady Gaga, who's obviously one of the biggest pop artists of the world, is doing goth. I had no idea. yeah oh wow yeah huh well then she's been working uh lately not exclusively but she works with these this uh uh fashion i guess they're like a fashion duo called fecal matter oh i've seen them on yeah but they've been doing lady gaga's stage wear oh okay so imagine you get the biggest pop star in the world working with truly outsider fashion people in fecal matter you have this marriage now of like the true outsider culture meeting the true insider culture and everybody has opinions on both you know obviously insider art world is always going to dominate just by numbers yeah then there's always going to be an opposition party just because people like us go well i'm not going to do that i'm going to do my own deal but i think it's a sort of a beautiful marriage but you know here we are you know what 40 years after the release of this moment where you know, you hit this kind of peak apotheosis of there's the video, there's you, there's the song, there's this burgeoning kind of form of music, which we now would generally call goth. And your version of it, not to overly personalize it, but your version of it, the LA version, I think is a lot more influential than people realize, which is one of the reasons I wanted to talk to you, because I think it's easier for me now as a fan of music to look back and I could see the through thread all the way back to you. And then when I get back to you, there's nobody before you. Exactly. Yeah, I know that. And that's not an ego trip again. It's a fact. That's a fact. So that's what I would, I want people not only to hear your music, but also understand your contribution here, because the wellspring of that is pretty vast at this point. Thank you. Because I think it's easier, and maybe it's because of America's anglophile issues we tend to sort of lean into people with british accents and not always understand what we've created in our own that's an interesting thing like like in my in my musical life we were certainly influenced by uk shoegaze oh okay but we did it a very american version of it which in many ways turned out to be just as influential in a different way because we grew up listening to uh i don't know american rock yeah where people in the in the uk uh and do you ever listen to my bloody valentine you know yeah yeah i just was it didn't touch me much i'm not yeah you guys but wasn't but it was but is this just as quick as they are yeah but as a quick aside kevin shields the guitar player yeah he's amazing right well like what he did with bobby gillespie on primal scream right i love the remixes fantastic so so my point of telling you this is just like we're sitting around listening to records. When I got to know Kevin, I couldn't understand why I was more attracted to My Bloody Valentine than, say, some of the other great UK movies. Like Flo Dive. Sure. Well, Kevin had grown up in America. I didn't know that. Born in England, spent 16 years or so of his life living in, like, New Jersey, and then it moved back. So he, like we, had been influenced by, you know, Rick Derringer, you know, riffy rock. Yeah, but for me, if I interject... Yeah, please, yeah. My influences were all UK rock. I was totally Anglophile. I was a major Anglophile because of the Beatles... Yeah. ...and the British invasion. I collected all that stuff. Like I said, my mom managed the record store, and when the releases came out, she would bring the promos home. Like, I heard the first Who album that way. I skipped school to skip school, and I was a child, and the Who were on the Today Show. They were broadcasting from England, because it was a big deal then. Yeah, yeah. So they played in the park, they did The Kids Are Alright, and I went, oh my god, this is... Yeah, amazing. Yeah. True pop art, too. Yeah, it's total art, because Townsend was an artist. Yeah. Without him, they would have been nothing. Yeah. They would have been another, like, Trogs or something. Yeah. But that was my inspiration, was UK rock. But again, similar story. It's like, yes, there's an influence, but somehow the American take on it takes it into a different direction. Development. Yeah. Interpretation. I'm just riffing here, but do you think there's a sort of, is it something about the American ethos that sort of takes it into a different direction? I think so. Can you define maybe how that influenced you? Well, again, you're reminding me of things that I hadn't thought of for a while. other influences, Harry Parts, created his own scale, his own instruments. I mean, I thought that's incredible, you know? I didn't want to do that. I wouldn't know where to start, you know? But noise as background is something that interests me. So that's why we just let the synthesizer do its thing. And we would really, at random, just do things and we couldn't repeat it, you know? So the next show we do, now to repeat it, you sample it and then you play it. Right, right, right. There it is. It sounds just like the record, you know, kind of thing. But I don't know. I don't know what to say about that. Go ahead. No, I just, because, um... I do say, I understand. American ethos. Yeah, yeah. But again, I think it's all interpretation, how you see it. As an individual. Again, it's individualism. You interpret that. How could anyone else... Let me give you... How could there be another Billy Corgan? There couldn't be. Sure, but let me give you one take, because I've had a lot of discussions through the years with my British counterparts, they would sometimes come see us play or we'd talk to them after a gig or something and they'd say, you guys are so aggressive or you guys are so much bolder because I'd make cultural differences. I've heard that. Yeah. They'd almost be shocked at the guitar aggression. I've heard that. There was always some magical line for them. You wouldn't cross a certain line. i've heard that yeah why are you guys so aggro you know i've heard that like i remember when i when i um the first time i met daniel ash from bauhaus 11 rockets yeah yeah beautiful guy yeah and uh and i was trying to understand his guitar sound and he was looking at me like like no one's ever asked me that question and it's like i'm i'm like you know i grew up in the midwest it's like how do you how do you make that sound you know i mean i wanted to know what amp he was using what guitar and he was like i always just use this amp you know this vox amp that i've had wow and i and i go even like bauhaus and love and rockets he goes yeah it's the same transistor amp that i used all along and i go do you take that amp on tour he goes yeah like why wouldn't i go i go like that amp you take that amp on tour like you don't leave it at home he's like no why it's just a stupid amp but in my mind the american ethos would be like oh my god you know it's this precious thing. Yeah. Well, let me tell you, I have a story for you. Please share. Yeah. In 84, I was invited to go to England. We were touring with Sex Gang Children, which were a great band. And so I got to see Sex Gang Children every night when we played with them, they were amazing then. And the road manager goes, you gotta come to England, man. We don't want the band, we want you. Okay. So I thought about it and there was some turmoil in the band between members going on and I was getting unhappy and I was frustrated And they didn know things that I knew that was going on And it really hurt me So I thought, you know what, these guys, I'm going to go to England for a little while. So I went to Northampton, where Bauhaus is from. And this guy discovered Bauhaus. I did not know that. He took their very first video at the White Elephant Pub. And he showed it to me. It's all VHS days. And so he showed it to me at all these films of Bauhaus in the early days that he shot himself in black and white. I'm like, oh my God, you know. And so one night I'm living with him, his family at this house in Northampton. And it's raining and all this stuff. It's beautiful English weather. I love the rain. And there's a knock at the door and it's Kevin Haskins and Danny. And so they come in and go, we want to meet your friend. Yeah. So I go, oh, cool. And so they come in and we shake hands. We do all those things. And then he goes, I saw you. I heard you have this guitar. Can I see your guitar? And I thought, oh, God, he doesn't want to meet me. He doesn't want to see my guitar. So I bring out my Fender. I had a Fender 6512 original stock with the headstock that goes bent like this. Beautiful guitar. See, I was going to ask you that question because I want to know what you play. Yeah, that's what I played for years. and I had it since I was 19. And so I show it to him, and he's like, can I play it? Yeah, yeah. So he picks it up, he plays it. He goes, oh, this is beautiful, great action, I love this guitar. He pulls out a lot of money and goes, I'd love to buy this, but you please sell me your guitar. I said, no, I'm not going to sell you my guitar. I don't care who you are, you know? I told him this, you know? And he respected me for that. You know? I go, okay, you know? And I said, what are you doing? He goes, well, we're starting a new band It's called Love and Rockets. That's the name we have right now. Yeah. And I said, well, okay. So he tried to buy my guitar off me, that guy. That's funny. And I said, no way, you know. See? So eventually, though, it was stolen. Really? Yeah. Some junkie girl found out where my guitar was, and then I come looking for it, and it was gone. Oh. To this day, I don't know where that guitar is. I know if you heard this story, I had a guitar stolen that was gone for 27 years, and it came resurfaced. I heard about that. What did you do? What did you think? It was like a dream. I couldn't, and the guy got it for me, and he didn't want anything. Well, how did he find it? He gave me a story, and I don't know, let's just say I choose to believe his story, but I don't know if his story's true. Yeah. I'm forever in the guy's debt, because he's a beautiful man, and he gave me my guitar back. There you go. It was like finding a sword or something, you know? It was like my original. Mm-hmm. This was made for me by a samurai. It was like, there's my, there's my, like, if you said pick one guitar to bury you with, that would be the guitar. That would have been my guitar. That's the one in my mind. That's like my guitar. Got it. I love all the other ones, but that's my guitar, right? I do, yeah. So when you say that, it hurts my heart, and I hope that day will come when you get your- I hope so. I hope you're right, my friend. I hope so, man. God bless. I'll look out there for it. Please send me some vibes. What was the color? What was the color? It was Sunburst. Okay. Beautiful. It's the same one that Johnny Winter used at Woodstock. It's the same one Townsend used on Tommy. I've seen the photos of these guys playing the exact guitar. 65. 65, yeah. I'm going to put that in my brain. And it was all, I didn't do anything to it. I didn't know to do anything to it. I just played it the way it was, and it had an amazing tone. Yeah, well, I love that sound. That's why I was the nerd in me wanted to ask. Just a quick, a few other things, and then I want to sort of talk about the present. First time I heard Christian Death, I was friends with this kid. It was an early, early kind of death rock kid. Dressed amazingly, always wore suits. At 14 years old, this kid just happened to be listening all this stuff out of LA. And I remember being in his bedroom hearing Christian Death, and it was like that thing of like... First album. Yeah. Classic. And you're just like, what is this, you know? Roz, man. I miss that guy. Talk a little bit about Roz, because Roz is one of those guys who gets a little lost in history. I mean, people know, if you know music, you know Roz, but I'm saying, tell people don't know about early Christian Death and Roz, please talk about him. Well, here's the funny thing. We never played the same shows together. We were too proud. crowd and one day one weekend josh was there we were all in san francisco we played amazing show we i remember driving up to this we were looking for the club that we were playing at and we drove up and there's this line going all the way around the block and we're like what's going on there and then we park and we go dude you're playing there i'm like what the place was packed i'm like wow we had to walk through the crowd to get to the stage and the next day after the show we're looking somewhere to eat on the opposite side of the street like a black caterpillar are ross and his friends and his entourage we're going the opposite direction and we look at each other hey i had no idea he was in town he had no idea i was in town if we had known we would have played the same show you know that would have been amazing yeah but ross uh ross and i he was really shy and we weren't really friends at first um again it's two artists anti-artists doing our own thing our own sound all that stuff you know and he didn't plan anything i didn't plan anything it just was happening but we respected each other from afar and i heard that through the grapevine like you probably had in your time where people go yeah billy's really great only patrick's really great ros is awesome you know and it's cool to be liked by your peers yeah so we later became friends in the 90s it took that long for us to become friends and uh so we started hanging out and um he was so sensitive and so shy and very funny, very funny guy, very smart, a great artist. He did, because of the Dottis, I'd already gone into collage, and, you know, Sophie Tober and Hannah Hawke, you know, they were some of my inspirations. And his too, I had no idea. And he had some beautiful pieces, and he wanted to give me one. I couldn't take it, so, you know, He said, well, when you want it, you can have it. But the way that he did his thing was incredible, because he would write the music in his head, and he would say it to people. This is what I had discovered. Oh, okay. Someone would probably tell me that wasn't the way it was, because I'm sure there are a lot of instances where it wasn't that way. Yeah. But there were some ways where he would do that, like Captain Beefheart used to do that. Okay. Trout Mask was told to all the musicians, they didn't contribute anything. It was all him, his ideas, Captain Heupard's ideas for Trout Mask Replica. That's how that record was made. I thought, wow. So this is another inspiration. but finally later on uh something started to happen with him i could see he wasn't very happy and things were going on his career was was weird um so one christmas day or i think it was on christmas uh he got kicked out of his house he was with eva o at the time you know eva o of super heroines and uh they were married for a while and so they needed a place to crash i said we stayed my flat you know so he goes well i can't pay you any rent or anything i said well no, you don't have to. He goes, I'll give you a tattoo. I said, well, I was waiting to give me a tattoo. Okay. You know, so he gave me a jailhouse tattoo with Indian ink and a needle. Pam just did a tattoo on me. I obviously still have it, but people always want to know about it. They want to talk about it. And so that gives me a chance to tell Roz's story a little bit. And I loved him. I thought he was a great man, a great person. I'm so happy to hear that because I saw Roz play once. It was when he was out of Christian death. Yeah. He'd come to show. Did you like that work solo stuff uh you know i to be honest i haven't spent as much time listening to it as i as i should um i can be a little slow sometimes but you're busy it's not that it's just it's almost like a form of stubbornness really makes any sense yeah why that's that's a fantastic question um i think sometimes it's a sense of like i've gotten enough from you and i'm i don't want to be i don't want to get more influenced by it i went back okay it's kind of like it's not so much like that i got what i needed it's like it's almost like i don't want to get too close to that sun i understand i'm the same way i'm saying remember i told you before back in the pre-digital days i couldn't listen to any records if i had a song idea yeah i had to like it's if you think about it's actually a reverse form of respect right it's like it's like i don't want to fall under your thrall understood because i get what makes you who you are and and maybe the rest of the world doesn't understand but i understand um because i i love to talk with musicians about who we really know is like the real deal you know like the the real gangsters oh yeah oh yeah i've met a few right and uh and we all sit backstage at some point we go well that one's a fraud and that one's a pretender but that mother and ross was one of those yeah he's one of those yeah about it so just to tell you the story because it'll make you laugh i hope uh so it's it's some club and it's like you know i go in i got my ticket whatever and it's like there's like 80 people there so my heart breaks already because i i'm aware that ross is a significant artist but like it's 80 people in some club in chicago yeah you deserve better absolutely so um there's ross's horn he's saying hey man i'm here god bless yeah um anyway so he's he's he's you know he's he i mean to those who don't know ross williams please look up ross williams music and life but it's weird when you see somebody in a club with 80 people and you're like why isn't this guy playing in an arena, his charisma and his magnetism was like bigger than the room. Like you go like, that guy's a star. Why is he playing in the club? I totally get it, man. Okay, right. So I'm watching the show. It's decent. His backing band's kind of okay. And he goes, I can't do a good imitation. He goes, I want to play a song by David Bowie from when he was good. This is Dodo. Oh, I love that song. They did Dodo. Oh, 1984 and all that Dodo. But I'll never forget the introduction. I want to play a song by David Bowie when he was good. Well, I understand, though, because I've always thought that Diamond Dogs was like a first death rock record. It was very apocalyptic. That's a very interesting point. I've always thought that. I thought, well, why doesn't anyone say that about this record? Now, so you're going to send me back to that record. It's dark. It's apocalyptic. Yeah. It's Barozian. You know, it's a perfect record. And he did most of the things himself. Yeah. Because he had just split from the spiders. And even playing the guitar. Yeah, he's doing the guitar. He hired Alan Parker to do the funky stuff for 1984. Yeah. Because it was the time. It was the spice. Have you ever met Mike Garson, Bowie's pianist? No. I wrote him once when I was working with Martin Atkins, and I wanted him to play on one of my tracks. And he goes, well, $800, I'll do it. They wouldn't give him the money. So this is, who knows when this airs, but Mike's 80th birthday from when we're taping is coming up soon. Oh, wow. And I think it's somewhere in January and I'm going to go play. No way. Maybe if you want to come in, I'll introduce you to Mike. I would love to. Mike's amazing. Sure. I met Mike when he was touring with Bowie in the 90s and we've been friends. And Mike played with the Pumpkins for a while. Really? Mike is unbelievable. Wow. I know he was a Scientologist for a while. He was. He got out. But, you know, he was playing. Do you know Annette Peacock? Of course. I have her first album. Okay. So Mike played on that record. That's right. And that's how Bowie found Mike and said, I want that. Yes, she was very experimental. And Bowie also lifted a lot from Annette Peacock. I believe it. If anybody wants to go down that rabbit hole. Now I believe it. Right? Yeah. Right. Well, I never thought of that. So he was like, oh, I'll take Mike. I'll have the flavor. So then suddenly Mike's playing in the Spiders from Mars. Yeah. Yeah. I remember all of that. Yeah. I used to read the magazines and stuff and collect all the records. But Mike's 80 years, about to turn 80. Oh, God bless him. And his musicality is completely intact. Wow. And he's still a little bit. And he's a total improvisational penis. I don't know if you know that about him. Yeah, I do. He literally can't play the same thing twice. I mean, he can sight read something, but if you just say, play that song again, he's lived in that brain so long, he literally can't play the same thing twice. I understand. I totally get that. And him and David, he's the musician that played the most with David. Yeah. And their connection was very, very deep. And that musical connection, and what it might bring, that chaos. That's true. He'd throw at a singer of David's level, here's a little Gershwin, here's a little Liberace, here's a little bit of Beethoven. Yeah. And David could surf that wave with Mike. It's a beautiful story. So I would love to introduce you to Mike. Oh, I'd love to meet him. Um, okay. Let's, let's bring this beautiful story to a close, not because there isn't more, because my point here would be, if I have any self-interest, would be to introduce you to people who don't know your work so that your future continues to be vibrant because I know you're still making music. Oh, yeah. So, um, two questions. where's your brain at now for uh performance how you fit into this new crazy world that we're in you know let's call it the digital sphere you know how do you how do you interrelate with that well uh sure i have my own studio at home um i have a box kind of thing um i can't really afford a big studio and all that stuff but i'm okay with that i like the minimalism of it the minimalism but um i um i like it and i don't like it um i'm more of an analog type person if i had more opportunity to go into a studio and do two inch tape i would do that tomorrow i mean uh one of the things i'd love to do is just go in the studio because i have all these ideas and i've got uh stuff in the cans and just throw it out there as a basic and then at that moment just do whatever happens. I don't have that opportunity, but everyone else does. And that's why I think music sucks now. A lot of it sucks to me. I'm not, you know, whatever. Keith, you don't like that. I'm serious. I really feel that way. Once a punk, always a punk. Well, I don't know. I'm not trying to be a punk. That's just the way I feel. I'm just laughing with you. Well, listen to what's going on. I think we all have, I can't speak for everybody, but there seems to be- Well, no, I don't mean that. No, but I'm saying there seems to be a general consensus that something has happen to music in the digital age that's not always good for music. Maybe that's a nice way to put it. Yeah. Yeah. Well, yeah. Okay. Nicely. Um, there's some people still trying to do what we do, what I do, what you do. God bless them. And I'm, I'm, I'm for them, but what gets to the top and to your face is, it sucks. Um, like you still have Iggy and he did his thing. Okay. I get it. Now he's doing, you know, he's repeating it for people that missed it. I get that. God bless him but um there's got to be another one somewhere someone like that in the midwest maybe somewhere doing his thing to 80 people maybe less who's got something to say there's always going to be that person yeah yeah well i champion those people um uh i haven't seen him yet and i haven't seen anyone who does what we're doing yeah like that but my thing is to continue doing this because it's all i know how to do yeah i'm not a shoe salesman you know i'm a hairstylist i mean this is what i do so i'm going to just keep doing the way any way i can any way i can any noise it fits i'm just going to keep doing it yeah you know and the other question i had uh no matter what time it is what era it is yeah well i think that's if they're digital the one thing i've noticed and see if you've noticed it too um and i'm trying to give it a visual image but it i feel like we're in this new era where music is almost kind of feeding back into itself maybe because in the old days you'd have to go to the record store and get the record or your cousin would have the record but now because of anybody can access anything it's almost like you see kids being influenced by stuff from so many different eras like it's not linear like it used to be i understand yeah so i think if there's any advantage it's like um like uh currently right now my audience or the band's audience is is half of it's under 35 so they're finding us somehow how do you know that because you get the statistics from the streaming services i've never thought about statistics yeah you can literally get the statistics now i don't want to look at them because i don't want to think about that but somebody writes me an email and says can you believe this and it's like and i tell them i don't want to hear any bad news so they only reach out if they got something good to say and i thought Well, now that's an interesting thing, because for many years I saw where the audience was just aging, as you would expect. And all of a sudden, boom, there's just all these young people. What about in the 90s for you, though? I mean, do you know the stats about that, what your audience was in the 90s? Well, I could... When you were making your early records. Empirically, I mean, just from looking at it, it was, you know, let's say at the band's peak in the mid-90s, you're probably looking at 14 to 25 would have been 80% of the audience. And you got some people who were like older or your generation-ish would come around because they just, they like, you know, there are people as they age, they still wanna hear new music. Yeah, well I do too, don't get me wrong. No, no, I don't mean it like that. I'm saying it's just, it was a natural extension, but it was very heavily youth focused at the time, driven by MTV and what became alternative radio. One interesting statistic in 1991, when our first album came out, there were only seven alternative stations in America. And by the peak of the 90s, I think it was over 160, 180 alternative stations. Wow. Just in that short amount of time, they literally had to build a new infrastructure to take advantage of rock. Yeah. Sorry, alternative rock or whatever going mainstream. Mm-hmm. So, last thing I want to ask you, and I so appreciate you talking to me. Beans mutual. Thank you. If you could define your production style, because I feel, you know, because I've listened to, you know, recent records as well. And it strikes me that you have a particular approach to production. Could you quantify that for me? It's not very good. It could be better. Actually, I would argue. I would say technically, yeah, I could, as a nerd, I can certainly see where, you know, this could have been a better recorded. But somehow I think your foundational base, the data base, it also lends opportunities that someone that's more organized in that realm would never do because I would sort of overthink it. So do you do stuff fast? Is there a production aesthetic? I know that's a weird way to put it, but I also think that's part of your story. Well, here's the thing. I was asked recently to co-write a song with a band called Beauty and Chaos, and they're like a studio band. And the last record they made, they had different vocalists contribute co-compositions for this one album. and so when they sent me this instrumental i with my minimal out of the box recording studio um i laid down all the vocals i wrote the lyrics i did the melodies um and uh i did one pass and they said okay okay almost there did a second pass and it was perfect and um i did that just on my own and didn't think about production value or anything like that and it came out great so So again, it's that thing where sometimes it's a happenstance. Oh, it came out great. Oh, this one didn't come out so good. I wonder why, you know? Maybe I didn't pay enough attention to it. Or maybe I wasn't thinking about, I wanted to do this thing that Bowie did on an album on my voice or something like that. I think like that. I think, well, that's a great technique. Now, I'm not going to steal it, but I'd still like to figure out how to do it. Like phasing. I wish I could do phasing. I love that sound. It's psychedelia. Well, you could do programs in the box now. I don't know if you know about that. If you're against the box. but yeah i would know i would know yeah they have literally have every program now okay they have they have they have uh this is how crazy it's gotten you can you can if you do plugins on and say pro tools you can get not only the the the reverb chambers that the beatles used you can move the mics around in the room so they have capital records so you can get the beach boys you can get the beach boy but you can get all the reverbs all the effects that they used you can get them all. And they're digital copies, obviously, but they're digital copies of all the effects that they use. So you can get Lennon's vocal doubling thing, the ADT. There's a program, and it sounds just like it. I mean, is it exactly 100%? No, but it's probably 94%. So you have access to all this new technology. What blew my mind was using some of the Abbey Road and some of the Capitol Records reverbs, because I was like, well, there's the God Only Knows reverb i've been looking for that reverb my whole life and there it is punch a button and there it is yeah i know what you're talking about so you're like magic okay that's the magical stuff so for me that's what i like about the digital realm but but i also love that there's a part of you that doesn't get stuck in process yeah i don't but i like that because i that see i'm saying i wish i was more like that well you're like you said you're an architect you think a lot a nerd i call it well That's fine. Some of my friends are nerds. But I'm more naked. I'm more minimal. I don't know why that is. It's just the way I am. And I just like it simple. I just like it simple. Four tracks. You can just give me four tracks and I'll do all kinds of things to that. I love it. So, I don't know. I'm fine with the new world and fine with the digital and all that stuff. I just miss the analog experience. It's more feeling and it's a more magical element. It's not so sterile. It's kind of sterile to me. I get it. I get it. So. Thank you. Thank you, sir. Appreciate you.