LINKS:

thecompulsionsnyc.com

myspace.com/thecompulsions

In this contextual framework, think of The Compulsions as true streetwalkers, feet marching on wet pavement as lamplight reflects off puddles on the sidewalk, night owls searching for the ultimate musical destination with a pocket full of dirty riffs and their hearts as the compass. This is a real band with talent to spare and a confident honesty that can’t be faked. It’s allowed them to share the stage with the likes of famed gutter-glitter guitarist Cheetah Chrome of The Dead Boys/The Stilettos plus the Star Spangles and Gilby Clarke (ex-Guns'N’ Roses) among others.

Formed in 2002 by vocalist and guitarist Rob Carlyle, The Compulsions are an
authentic antidote to blasé sounds. Sure, they have nostalgic retro elements, but wrapped up in a modern package and not limited in creative vision. While their two fantastic EP’s 2008’s Demon Love and the 2007 release Laughter From Below rock like a more punk informed Rolling Stones with elements which recall other greats of grit and attitude like The New York Dolls, these guys aren’t just aping past greats. The Compulsions have personality and identity all their own rolled up nice and tight as a cigarette alongside the influences they proudly wear. They’ve already been the featured artist on Napster and iTunes, and recently none other than Classic Rock Magazine called them "The Coolest Band In The World".

These accolades might seem like a big deal and yet Rob and the band make it all seem effortless. I guess it helps when the band also includes drummer Frank “Thunderchucker” Ferrer (of Guns'N'Roses/Love Spit Love/Psychedelic Furs fame), bassist Joe Merrigan and guitarist Brian Gabriel, all of whom are fiery and potent players. These guys have cool wired to their skeletons.

“The idea is to make it seem like we just rolled out of bed, plugged in and played,” said Rob via telephone from New York City. “Sometimes it’s like that and sometimes it takes a minute, sure. The important thing is to have fun, real good fun ‘cuz if you do your fans probably will and then you’re probably doing something right.”

The Compulsions are definitely doing something right, judging from their sweat-soaked live reputation and enthusiastic and growing fan base. In general there is a lyrical nature to the band’s guitar parts that makes them as catchy to sing as the lyrics, just like classic boogie or blues. Hell, it seems like The Compulsions were born at the Crossroads, guitars and whiskey bottles in hand.

“When I first started listening to rock n roll at the age of three or whatever, I never even imagined that I would try and do it,” Carlyle explains. “The first rock’n’roll record I ever heard, I never even thought about a guy playing guitar. I just felt the sound coming through the speaker. You don’t think about how it got there. It wasn’t until later on that the light bulb went off as a kid and I realized this was what people do with their lives. Back then at the time, it seemed impossible and you just have to give it a try. In the beginning stages maybe you’re not as good as you would like to be or are still figuring it out, but the goal is to be as good as your heroes.”

“Whether rock or disco or punk, a lot of music is about a relationship gone south,” Rob muses. “I don’t know why that seems to work so well. Maybe because as human beings it’s the thing we feel most passionately about. A relationship gone wrong seems more interesting to me these days. There are great songs about relationships going great but I don’t know if anyone wants to hear that from me right now. I do have an idea of something I wanna do that’s more positive but you gotta be careful with that. You don’t wanna be too sappy. People pull it off, but we’ve stayed on the dark and dirty side.”

Hey, you gotta walk it and rock it like you feel it, but nonetheless the band isn’t one dimensional in approach or themes. They are quite the barn-burning outfit but it’s all about keeping the devil just at bay.

“We have our song called “Shake Hands With The Devil”, but if you listen, we’re telling you not to. Don’t fall for the bullshit,” Carlyle says. “I remember seeing an interview recently with Bob Dylan and he was saying how on the old folk records if you actually listen to what the guys’ are saying in the songs, they are actually telling you how you’re supposed to live life,” Rob elaborates, thoughts building on one another. “If you listen to a lot of rock’n’roll songs, a lot of it is the guy tellin’ you 'Don’t be a dick! Here’s how to do it the cool way'.”

It’s a fine line to walk in the world of rock where business and pleasure often overlap in tempting ways. That’s rock’n’roll, the constant struggle…and the morally gray ambiguous areas.

“There are a lot of references to good and evil and the underworld in this band,” says Rob “There’s a lot of that kind of imagery in the songs. If you listen to the overall message, there’s a lot of good versus evil. A lot of it’s about the dark side of life and the effective way to talk about that is with a snarl and a growl.”

A forthcoming EP of new material is sure to continue the band’s “no-compromise” street approach and exploration of all sides of morality.

“The three EPs, Laughter From Below, Demon Love and this new one that I’m not divulging the title of yet, it’s gonna be a whole series,” Rob announces. “The unholy trinity! Whether we package and market it as a set, I don’t know, but in my mind these three EPs are linked. There are six songs each on each, you do the math.”

The stark black and red minimalistic covers of the previous releases evoke true blues/desperado rock’n’roll, perfectly suiting the contents of the records. Some bands are considered rock’n’roll but don’t have much of a blues link or aesthetic. Some don’t need it, like more underground, edgy, experimental bands or even prog bands like Rush who go in any direction they want, (go listen to the Rush song “Prime Mover”), but the glossier rock bands that don’t have much of a blues link and are often popular in these days of MP3 quality singles like the All-American Rejects types just don’t have that aforementioned “bite” as much real torchbearers like The Compulsions. They just fall flat in comparison. The Compulsions have elements that are classic but stake their own claim to it.

“I admire a lot of industrial and modern stuff like Marilyn Manson or Nine Inch Nails. I definitely admire that,” Rob says. “The first record, which was called Laughter From Below, a lot of people seemed to like that style, so I knew in the back of my head that I was trying to lay the groundwork for our very basic rock’n’roll sound with some different genre shifts going on on that record. But, I knew if you were a real hard ass you would say it was just the same song over and over again. On the second EP there was definitely a desire to show that we were still gonna do that kind of stuff but also throw you curveballs like ’Cocaine’, for example.”

“ The reason why ‘Cocaine’ got that kind of treatment was because, I don’t know what it sounds like to you, but I wanted it to sound like a negative experience,” Rob admits. “Eric Clapton always said it was an anti-drug song, but I wanted ours to really sound like an anti-drug song, like it was coming from the deepest, darkest depths of hell. Whether we achieved that or not, it’s up to you, but the backwards guitars and synth bass and machines, those otherworldly sounds seemed creepier to me than traditional stuff. We recorded it as a four piece, and it didn’t sound as dark, dirty and dangerous as I wanted it. Then we messed with it and that’s what you hear.”

“Right, and at the same time I’m hoping someone who follows the band is thinking, ‘I don’t know what these guys are gonna do next,’ because we surprised them,” Rob acknowledges. “You kind of always wanna keep the audience guessing.”

It’s a very singles driven market nowadays again, in the wake of downloading and online music services and iPods. It’s refreshing in the case of The Compulsions that the band’s short EPs feel like full records because the songs have lot to them, and every tune is memorable and a potential single.

“That’s awesome to hear and definitely something we were going for,” says Rob. “If you listen to six songs and after those six you feel like you heard a whole record, that’s great. You’ll want more. I’d rather be like that than 14 songs that lose the fans' interest. It’s too much.”

On “Down On The Tracks” from the first EP, Carlyle almost sounds like a more dour Tom Petty with a deeper register, and unloads the great line “You’re a well trained dog doing parlor tricks for them.” It could apply to a social scene or various situations, but Rob explains that some of the songs inspiration was from a perhaps somewhat unlikely source.

“Really, you got that impression about us?” asks Rob, laughing and feigning surprise. “Basically, the way it always worked was I would see guys that were great playing with other bands and I’d approach them about doing something with me. I always try and go for the best players I can and cool guys and there’s been a lot of great players in the band. For whatever reason, availability and others, it happens to be the guys I’ve got in the band now. They’re awesome, awesome guys. Joe, Brian and Frank are just great.”

Frank Ferrer in particular is one of the most talented players in music today, a guy who really seems to have a great attitude to go with his booming percussive skills. Frank’s drumming on the new Guns’N’Roses Chinese Democracy album, on the title track and the epic and satisfying yet bitter “There Was A Time”, are some of the absolute highlights of that record. Frank’s presence, among other things, has made the “NuGuns” as they are sometimes referred to, start to seem more like a band than the vanity project of Axl Rose some people have perhaps unfairly dismissed it as without knowing everyone’s side of the story. As Axl himself recently asserted while admirably blogging online at Mygnr.com directly to fans about his point of view “I get that some like a different version or lineup the same way some like a specific team line up or a particular year of a specific car but because you and I are getting played I’m supposed to throw the baby out with the bathwater?”

Whether you think the Guns’N’Roses front man is guilty of hubris or not, it is pretty damn cool the famously reclusive and interview shy Axl blogged his side of his famous feud with Slash directly to fans dying to hear about his take on things. And while some sections of Chinese Democracy suffer from ProTools clutter, a lot of it is awesome and promises great things to come and a new chapter of a classic act.

With all this going on for the very busy Ferrer these days, having played on one of the most discussed and anticipated albums ever, has it been hard for our friend Rob Carlyle here of The Compulsions to co-ordinate things with Frank recently?

“Yes!,” Rob exclaims emphatically and then laughs. “He seems to have some time right now so I’m gonna take advantage of it as much as I can. Frank’s on the next EP, on pretty much the whole thing, and we just did a show with him last week. I don’t know what the future holds for us or him in two or three months, but we love playing with him. He’s a great guy and a tremendous player and it’s great he’s documented on some songs.”

People say all the time and have for years that rock’n’roll is either stone dead or here to stay. The Compulsions seem to draw good crowds and have nostalgic aspects but their classic rock elements are for the right reasons. With Kanye West having topped Chinese Democracy in the charts, people are saying rock is less popular than rap these days, but it will always have an audience. I have to also add that if MTV played music at all anymore and if there was more media emphasis on real rock again like there is on shit-pop and a lot of deplorable rap (not discounting the very talented Kanye), would things be different? People eat up what they are over-saturated with the most! That’s a no brainer!

Still, it’s almost like elections with the fallacy of red & blue states. I believe it’s more of a constructed reality than a general truth. There are always people all over who are gonna love real rock’n’roll no matter what’s popular at the time. Rock survives.

“It seems like it’s true,” says Rob, backing me up. “Rock’n’roll, when it’s really rock’n’roll, the cross pollination of black man’s blues for lack of a better term and white man’s folk music, it does cross over racial divides and ethnic boundaries and ages, rich or poor. Nine out of ten people seem to like it.”

The Compulsions “Groove On” has certainly been stuck in my head for days. I love the song’s deep, mean groove and shining horn section that evokes Otis Redding’s take on “Satisfaction” or the Stones themselves ala the great “Rocks Off” from Exile On Main Street. I love when horns surprise you in a composition like Depeche Mode’s “Something To Do” from Some Great Reward, to cite a different genre as another example.

“I wanted to do something funky and even referencing ‘Superstition’ by Stevie Wonder,” Rob tells me. “There’s a great clavinet deep down in our mix, an idea that came, again, from Stevie Wonder. ‘Trampled Under Foot’ by Zeppelin is another one. It’s another way to do something different like a stripped-down bar band and seemed conceptually right to have it on there.”

Conceptually perhaps raising some eyebrows is the band’s ode to all things fat and flubby, the hysterically crude and yet awesome “large ladies need love, too” Demon Love song “Big Fat Sexy Mama”. GBH had “Big Women” in the past, and of course there’s Queen’s “Fat Bottom Girls”, but what made Rob want to pen a number like this? Is the answer really as obvious as the bigger the cushion the better the pushin’?

“It seems like something almost every band should have, an ‘In praise of the large ladies’ song,” Rob laughs. “John Lee Hooker had ‘Big Legs, Tight Skirt’. Sir Mix-A-Lot had ‘Baby’s Got Back.’ I don’t know. Rock’n’roll is about more. [laughing] It actually took a long time to write those lyrics. I worked on that song for about three years before I finally got it all right. I wanted it to be perfect. Even though it’s filthy and dirty, if you listen to what I’m sayin’ it’s actually very loving. This character I’m playing in the song is totally admiring that kind of gal. I wanted to make sure it wasn’t insulting. Very few people seem to have had an issue with it so I think I probably pulled it off.”

I’ve gotta say I love the idea of Rob’s mind dwelling on the topic and lyrics for three years and I am forced to tease him about it.

“Three years, I know,” he sighs. “Should it be ‘cleavage like a canyon’? It took awhile! It also took a while to build up the nerve. Do I wanna do this? Part was building up the nerve and part was getting every word right. It’s become one of the audience’s favorite songs we do live. Once we pull that out the room is ours. It loosens everybody up.”

Can we expect the same sense of focused fun from the forthcoming third 2009 EP?

“We recorded with the same guys so there’s continuity. We had a pre-production meeting last night with the producers, Hugh Pool and Ken Rich. We have a great time with those guys. There’s a lot of other stuff in the can that no one’s heard yet. I must have about thirty songs done with these guys of different genres and ideas and different feels in addition to the next EP, stuff like that. The working relationship is pretty smooth at this point and there’s a lot of trust there. Hopefully we’re gonna deliver the kind of stuff we think you’ll like and throw some curveballs.”

“I’m not gonna lie,” Rob continues. “I would like to have the band on a major label getting the band out to more people. Labels are starting to come around these days, so that’s good. I’d like to put out a full length record. Would we collapse all these into one record or finish a new one? I don’t know. A lot of people still haven’t heard of us yet. There is enough material in the can and a lot of ideas on paper or in our heads or on tapes that we could do a full length record from after this.”

I ask Rob what he has learned most about himself from being in The Compulsions.

“I didn’t realize I would be this driven,” he says. “I’m having the time of my life, but there is a lot of hard work that goes on behind the scenes. I’ve been relentless for the past six years. It’s only been recently that the momentum has been starting to gather and we’ve been starting to draw crowds. People are starting to get it more and it is becoming more fun. I didn’t realize I was a workaholic psychopath! [laughing] That’s what it takes, but I’ve got to stress that you’ve gotta have fun. Otherwise, you’re doing it wrong. It’s really becoming my life and it’s so awesome. That’s the best part of it. People ask me to sign stuff and that’s the biggest compliment. This is what I’m doing right now, and I’ll do it until people don’t seem to want to hear it and maybe still do it then anyway, who knows?”

Even causal readers or long-time fans of The Compulsions might want to know how Rob was (ahem) compelled to come up with such a classic sounding and yet untaken band name. It sounds very British, almost.

“Not as much thought went into it as you might think,” Rob admits. “Now looking back on it, it was a pretty good idea! It has a forbidden quality and rock’n’roll is about doing what you want when you want to do it. You have a compulsion, I guess, and there’s that instant gratification, and there’s something very rock’n’roll about that, I guess. There’s a lot of ways to interpret it and I love that. I love stuff you can interpret four or five different ways. If you look back at a lot of classic bands they’ve had that. I have heard that about our stuff where people will say they thought it meant one thing or another and you are all right! However you want to interpret it is fine by me.”