by Christine Natanael/photos by Dara Blumenhein
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What happens when you get a bunch of musicians together in a room with some instruments? Inevitably, they will pick them up and start jamming—usually covers and stuff at first, just goofing around—but give them long enough, and they’ll start writing some songs. Make those some musicians who have already played together in previous incarnations of popular bands and who already have a working rapport, and you’re three quarters of the way to the finish line.
That was pretty much the case with Los Angeles-based Circus Diablo. Seems core members Billy Morrison (vox) and Billy Duffy (lead guitar) knew each other (and drummer Matt Sorum, who only recorded the tracks on the CD due to his current Velvet Revolver duties), from their previous days in a little band you might have heard of called The Cult. But I’m getting a bit ahead of things here. Truthfully, for those interested in band trivia, Billy Morrison’s Cult connection goes back to 1988 when he played guitar in the English goth group Into A Circle alongside Barry Jepson, original bassist for the goth/punk band Southern Death Cult, which, although still having Ian Astbury as a singer, was a very different animal from the later rock incarnation of the band known as Death Cult, which Billy Duffy came to join in 1983 and which was still vastly different yet from The Cult we all know and love. But, I digress…
Back to the present and the Circus Diablo timeline… So, Morrison and Duffy were messing around and having a bit of fun, and ended up writing a track together called “Touch the Sky” (which ain’t on this CD, so don’t get all cranky lookin’ for it.) They both knew Ricky Warwick from “back in the day” when he was the rhythm guitarist for New Model Army and later the vocalist for The Almighty, so inviting him over to join in on their little casual thing seemed natural.
Before they realized it they had written a bunch of songs. After demo-ing them all up, the next step was the decision to make them into a real album, but for that, they would need a real live drummer and a studio. And isn’t it handy that their old friend Matt Sorum could help them out with both?
As for the touring components, well, obviously Sorum’s a little busy with VR, so the guys briefly hooked up with and did some shows with Jeremy Colson from Steve Vai’s band before acquiring their current skinsman, Charles Ruggiero of Slunt. For a bassist, they got a guy who is better known for his lead vocal chops, Bret Scallions, he-who-be-o-formerly-o-Fuel, and who had been living in New York City and playing bass for a band here called The X’s.
Still, as if cranking up a new band isn’t enough for these guys, Billy Morrison still runs Camp Freddy, the wildly popular all-star covers bonanza that he does together with core members Matt Sorum, Dave Navarro, Donovan Leitch, Jr., Chris Chaney, and Scott Weiland, (and if I have to explain to you who these people are, then you need your rock credentials revoked and a lesson in how to use a Google search engine); Billy Duffy tours with The Cult, Ricky Warwick was doing some solo acoustic opening gigs for Def Leppard and will be touring Europe solo acoustic with Keith Caputo in September; and Brett Scallions is the new vocalist for Riders On The Storm with Ray Manzarek and Robbie Krieger of The Doors fame—talk about multi-tasking!
For four short weeks,
the Diablo boys were out headlining the second stage on the Ozzfest, or
as it’s called this year, Freefest, Tour, promoting their new self-titled
disc before having to cut that trek short due to the impending births
of both Ricky and Brett’s babies any day now.
Just a few days before that happened, though, I gave Brett a call and
we settled in for a very intimate and revealing chat about Circus Diablo,
impending fatherhood, Riders On The Storm, his Fuel past, and all kinds
of other stuff. So make sure you’ve got all the rations and stuff
you’re gonna need, because this one is kind of long.
BRETT SCALLIONS: Hello?
CHRISTINE NATANAEL: Brett Scallions?
BS: Yeah?
CN: It’s Christine Natanael from crushermagazine.com.
BS: Hey, how’re you doin’?
CN: I’m good. How are you, buddy?
BS: I’m doing good. I see you’re in New York City.
CN: Damn right. You know I’m in New York.
BS: I love New York. I lived for, seven years or so there. You know that. What am I thinkin’? Hell.
CN: You know that. You watched me get my tattoo in your damn bar...
BS: I know!
But, you know, Abby and I aren’t there anymore. We moved out to
L.A.
Billy Morrison
BS: There we go, let me go somewhere more quiet here.
CN: There we go.
BS: Actually, when you started talking there, I didn’t recognize the fact that it was you. I was thinking that it was some other Christine or whatever, you know?
CN: I had to use my professional voice. (laughs) See, now I get to meet you in work mode and you get to meet me in work mode.
BS: Right, right, exactly.
CN: Instead of hanging at the bar…
BS: Yeah, hanging at the bar pounding beers and doing shots of tequila and getting all banged up and getting hangovers the next day.
CN: But that’s a good thing, too.
BS: Oh, those were fun times. I cherish each and every one of them.
CN: So, you moved out of the city because you’re gonna be a daddy…
BS: I’m gonna be a dad next month, man.
CN: Yay! That early?
BS: I’m having a little guy, a little boy. He’s almost ready to come out and take the world.
CN: You get to join the rock and roll parent club.
BS: Let’s do it.
CN: You get to be one of us now.
BS: I know. It’s so weird. You know, it’s like, your whole life you dream of being a rock star and stuff, and you never think about being a rock and roll dad, you know? And then suddenly, boom, one day the wife goes, “Guess what? I’m pregnant.” And you’re like, “Shit, I’ve got to be responsible now!”
CN: Responsible for corrupting another person’s psyche…that’s amazing, isn’t it?
BS: (laughs devilishly) Right?
CN: You get to mold somebody just the way you want them.
BS: Yeah, exactly. Hopefully I’ll be able to show him some good things where he can learn and apply to life and hopefully he’ll learn to be himself, that’s for sure.
CN: Yeah, it’s really fun being a parent. My son just turned 14, so…
BS: Holy crap, you’re not old enough to have a 14 year old!
CN: And I’ve got a 23 year old daughter...
BS: You’re really not old enough for a 23 year old daughter.
CN: (Laughs) Well, thank you. You’re my new favorite rock star, Brett.
BS: I was trying to get brownie points there.
CN: I can see that! Yep, I’ve been around the block a day…at least as long as the two Billy’s…
BS: You know what? Being around the block is a beautiful thing though, you know? My tour manager out here on the road with us right now has got a 19 year old daughter, and we were somewhere in…I don’t even know what state we were in, but we were at a venue, and there was a little baby store right there next to the club. And I went in to just kind of look around for my little guy, and then also my best friend back home, he just had a little girl, so I ended up buying a little girl dress for him and his little girl. And I was talking to my tour manager, and his 19 year old daughter was there, and she went into that baby store. And he was like, “Yeah, man, she’s all like, baby freaking out right now. She’s really got it bad for baby stuff.” And she was looking at all the baby stuff. And I was like, “Dude, you need to run in there and drag her out of there and tell her not to go in there for at least another ten years.”
CN: Yeah, right.
BS: If she starts having kids now, she’s not going to be able to go out and live life to the fullest and learn about life and enjoy it for herself, you know? Don’t bring someone else into a life when you haven’t lived your own yet, you know?
CN: Yeah. Yeah. I think that was the thing with, like, my parents, because I think my mom had me when she was like, 20, because that’s what they did in the ‘60s.
BS: Sure. Absolutely.
CN: And I think she really resented having kids really young.
BS: You know, I don’t think that anyone should ever really resent or regret having achild, I think they should just look at it and say, “I wish I would have had you a little later in life.”
CN: Yeah. Like, she resented not being able to live her life out at the time she was young—like, wistfully, you know what I mean?
BS: Yeah. We should all be able to go out and sow our oats and live life for ourselves and be self-centered and go out and travel and learn about things and see how it all works. And then be able to bring someone into the world and say, “Okay, these are the things that I’ve learned and these are the dumb things that I’ve done, (laughs) and these are the smart things that I’ve done.
CN: Unfortunately, there are some people my age who just never grew out of that, either, and they’re 45 and still living in their mom’s basement. So, you can take that too far—that not growing up thing.
Billy Duffy
BS: Right, right.
CN: But, definitely experience life. You’re so right, so right to have told him that, especially with girls, because they tend to not…they tend to get all into headspace with a guy and not think past that.
BS: Yeah, yeah. Exactly.
CN: So, man, you’re out there doing your thing. How many bands are you in now, Brett? (laughs)
BS: I don’t even know how many bands I’m in now. (laughs) No. Right now I’m out with Circus Diablo. We’re playing Ozzfest, and it’s absolutely fucking nuts, you know? This is like, we’re definitely the black sheep on this tour. We’re definitely a heavy band and stuff, but we’re nowhere near compared to the heavy bands that are on the bill like Hatebreed and Lamb of God. Those guys are insane they rock so hard. They’re great at what they do, ya know? But us, we’re more melody based.
CN: Yeah, you’re more straight-ahead rock. It’s not like that extreme stuff that Ozzfest is known for on the second stage.
BS: Yeah,
exactly. But you know, we’ve been having a really good response.
When we get done playing we go over to the FYE tent and do autograph signings
and stuff, and people go, “Man, you guys are a breath of fresh air.
It’s really nice to see a band like you guys up here.” You
know? They’re all like, “I love metal and I love coming out
to see these bands, and it’s nice to be able to sit back and really
listen to a good rock band like you guys.”
CN: Yeah. It gives a break to the ears, and it’s refreshing to the eyes. You guys, especially with the two Billys and Ricky, with the pedigree, and you’re more the new era, from the late ‘90s and 2000’s with Fuel, so you’ve got two eras of fans coming from the straight-ahead rock…
BS: Right…
CN: So, you’ve got the older people that can bring the kids, and it’s like a family thing, I guess…
BS: Yeah. I think music is universal, but sure, especially the stuff that we’re doing, it’s all about just good music and songs, songs that people can connect with and shake their asses to, you know? We like to hit the young and old generations, alike. I don’t think that—I’ve been seeing a lot of, quite a few families out here at Ozzfest and stuff, like a dad with his son and a mother with her daughter and things like that. They go and hang out and enjoy it together, you know?
CN: Usually, when I’ve covered Ozzfest before, they usually don’t show up until after the second stage stuff is done. Like, they might drop the kids off earlier, and then come later for Ozzy or whatever.
BS: Sure.
CN: But now they’re coming earlier probably because of you guys, too, because they were Cult fans or Almighty fans…so maybe you’re bringing them out a bit earlier, which is great, too.
BS: I would like to think so. I certainly hope so. I’m sure there are still those groups or those families who still do what you were saying, which is drop the kids off and then come later and enjoy Ozzy and stuff like that because they can connect with that a lot easier from the Black Sabbath days and just Ozzy’s solo career in general. It’s something that everyone can connect with, so…
CN: So, the story of how you connected with Circus Diablo… I know it’s convoluted because…well, in my head I know the story because obviously you guys’ve all known each other for a while.
BS: Yeah, sure, but sometimes you need it from the horse’s mouth, and it’s easier to convey it on paper when you’ve got me saying it versus you trying to say it. I understand that. But, (affects British accent) It all started when…(laughs)
CN: Once upon a time…(laughs)
BS: I think, well actually, I’ve known Billy Morrison for quite a few years, back when he was playing bass with The Cult and when I was out with Fuel, of course. And we just hit it off and became really good friends and kept in touch and stuff and kept saying to each other, “We’re gonna do something together one day, just wait and see” kind of thing. And um, I think you were actually there this one night, were you there when The X’s played Snitch?
CN: Not Snitch. I was at The Continental show. [note: Brett, Duff McKagan, and Scott Weiland are no longer name investors in the NYC club called Snitch. –CN]
BS: Oh, okay. Well, The X’s played one night at Snitch, and Billy just happened to be in NY that night and I told him, “Come on, hang out.” And so he did. He called me up the next day and said, “You’re a fucking great bass player. You’re a fucking great singer. Come and play with us, man. Me and Billy Duffy and Ricky Warwick have a band that we’re working on and we have a batch of tunes. Let me send you something.” And I was like, “No problem.” So he sent me the record, all the stuff that he and Ricky and Billy Duffy had been working on. And I thought, you know, this is really good shit. It’s a lot of fun and it’s powerhouse rock and roll with guts and melody and content. So I called him back and said, “You know what? Yeah, I’ll come in and I’ll hangout and jam with you a little bit. And he’s like, “I don’t want you to come and audition. I’m telling you to come on in.” And I’m like, “All right, cool.” So I was still living in New York then and I would go to L.A. from time to time and hang out with those guys for like, a week at a time and then do rehearsals and stuff and just kind of trade some riffs back and forth with each other and stuff like that. It kind of started snowballing. Next thing you know, we’ve got a record deal on KOCH Records and here we are at Ozzfest!
CN: Yeah. So, you and Ricky are lead singers behind a guitar/bass player…that’s an interesting set up, there, Brett…
BS: Yeah, right? Every night, Morrison has got his work cut out for him. He’s got two lead singers standing next to him. But he’s really stepped up to the plate, and he’s kicking some real serious ass out there. I’m proud to stand next to him and have him command the stage and I’ll just stand next to him and play some bass. That’s cool for me because right now I get my cake and I get to eat it too, you know? Because I get to come out here and I get to play bass with Circus Diablo and then I go out and sing with Ray Manzarek and Robbie Krieger from The Doors with Riders On The Storm, you know? So, I get to expand and push myself to be not only a better singer, but a better musician, too, ya know? I’m not just a one trick pony and that’s it, I get to come out here and play bass and be a musician, and I get to play out and get to do all the fun things that I love to do which is simply to be an artist and a musician.
CN: Yeah. So that’s working out really good with Ray, then, huh? You guys played here and I didn’t get to go. I’m like mindless Nellie over here. I’m always behind the computer typing. I sometimes lose track of dates.
BS: Yeah, we were in NY not too long ago and played the Nokia Theatre. That was a great night, but I got sick as a dog, though.
CN: It’s so cold in there.
BS: Naw, I got sick like, two days before the New York date.
CN: Oh, you mean, like, SICK, sick…
BS: Yeah, so I had a sore throat and a dry cough, and it was just awful, you know? I did a gig and I was in Boston, and I had a doctor come to my hotel room and shoot me up with cortisone and stuff to try to reduce the swelling and help me to get better and stuff. I had a great night in Boston that night, but then in New York the next night…
CN: It comes back double-fold after the cortisone wears off…
BS: Oh, yeah. It sucks, man. I hate having to go out and give a bad show, you know, being sick. But you’ve still got to walk out there. You know, the show must go on. What are you going to do?
CN: Well, I was really happy when you got that [Riders On The Storm]. It’s kind of interesting that now you’re working with Ray and my friend Darryl [Read] is working with Ray on his spoken word stuff, [a cd released in Feb. '07 titled Bleeding Paradise] and I still haven’t met Ray.
BS: Really? They’re great people. Ray and Robbie both are great guys. It’s a lot of fun to share a stage with them, you know? There’s a lot of history between those two guys. They are two of four people that built a catalog for all time.
CN: Did you listen to a lot of their music growing up?
BS: Oh yes, of course. I don’t think there’s anybody out there who hasn’t listened to Doors music at some point in their life. That music is—they’ll put it in a time capsule and there’ll be a world apocalypse and everyone will be dead and then someone else will come back in thousands of years and try to figure out what society was like here and they’ll listen to a Doors record, you know? It’s one of those things.
CN: When did you first get involved in music? Like, how old were you?
BS: I’ve always been infatuated with music. I remember when I was 4 or 5 years old, you know, I’d get up on the hearth and throw Elvis records on and sing and dance to Elvis, you know? That was my stage, and I’ve always had a passion for entertaining and being into music, you know? So, my entire life, I’ve always just, it’s been what I wanted to do. I never looked back, and I never thought, “Okay, I need to—I never went, this is what I want to do, but I better prepare myself for failure, so I better try to do this over here, too.” I never did that. I just said, “Okay. I want to be a rock star. I want to be a musician, and that’s it, and fuck everything else.” I didn’t look at anything else. If this whole thing just went to shit, I couldn’t go, “Oh well, I guess I’ll just go back to school and finish getting my degree in the medical field or something.” Fuck that, you know? I don’t want to do that. I want to do this. So, this is all I’m gonna be. I’ll always be in music.
CN: Did you study music in school or just learn it on your own?
BS: No, I studied growing up. My first instrument was the saxophone, actually. I learned it in 6th grade band where they put an instrument in your hand and say, “Okay, try this.” I just happened to grab a saxophone, you know? Then it spawned from there. I picked up a guitar for the first time when I was, 14, I think, either 13 or 14. My brother came home from college, and he happened to have an acoustic guitar with him. He taught me a G-chord, and I sat there and played a G-chord for like, five hours straight until my hand slipped and I landed on a C-chord. And I just kind of took it from there and kept teaching myself over and over again. And then, I would always—if I saw someone else playing a guitar, I would look at them and watch them and try to learn what they were doing, you know, and pushed myself to learn how to do these things. That’s the way my whole life has been, especially in the world of music, you know? Watch, learn, and listen, and try to learn it and do it yourself.
CN: Right. What was your first band, or attempt at a band, and were you guitarist, or what did you do in it, and when did you first attempt singing?
BS: (laughs kind of softly to self) Ah, my first band was uh…or I guess my first attempt at a band was when I was in high school. I was a senior in high school, I think it was. Me and three other guys, we got together and we formed a band called Cherry Red. And I was playing the rhythm guitar in it, and me and two of the other guys would trade off singing songs. We would do Lynyrd Skynyrd and Van Halen and, I don’t even know what other kind of music we would do. It was just a lot of Southern rock and stuff, because I grew up in Tennessee, so, there was a lot of Southern rock.
CN: I grew up in the Carolinas, so I feel ya.
BS: Yeah, so ZZ Top, we played ZZ Top and stuff like that.
CN: And so, from there, you knew music was going to be your life, so, that was just a little taste.
BS: Yeah. So I was totally doing that, and then I went off to college, and I went through my college phase, and I was studying music. I went to a little two year private college, Lambuth University, for a couple years. It wasn’t really a two year college. It was a four year college, but I only went there for two years. [Lambuth University is a small but prestigious Christian liberal arts college in Jackson Tennessee affiliated with the United Methodist Church. They are offering students a new degree path beginning with the Fall of 2007 -- a Bachelor's Degree In Entertainment/ Music Industry Studies. http://www.lambuth.edu–CN]
After the second year, I was
like, this really isn’t for me, you know? But I studied music while
I was there. I studied music theory and appreciation and stuff like that.
You know, they were trying to teach me how to write music down on a piece
of paper and I was like, “You know, I don’t want to see what
it sounds like. I want to hear what it sounds like.” I was very
bad at seeing music theory. I’m much better at hearing things and
pointing them out and playing them and writing them versus trying to write
them down and stuff like that, so… I got out of school at that point
and started playing the seedy bars doing acoustic gigs with a few other
guys in Tennessee there. And eventually I hooked up with Jeff Abercrombie,
who was the bass player with Fuel. He
and I were just good friends for like a year, and then one day he called
me up and asked me if I would like to send some songs in to submit as
an audition kind of thing. And I joined up with him and some of his bandmates,
which happened to be Carl Bell and a guy named Jody Abbott on drums. And
they were just doing cover songs and stuff like that at that point. So
I was like, “You know what? I need to get out of Tennessee.”
They were kind of traveling around the northeast and the coastline and
stuff playing gigs, so I could make some money at it and not have to get
a normal job. So, I gave them, like a few songs and then they called me
up after they got it and asked me to fly up to Albany, New York to meet
up with them. So I did, and we just ended up playing a bunch of cover
songs and stuff for a few years, and while we were doing that, we were
working on our own stuff. And that later became Fuel, you know, and we
played together for a good, 13 years, I guess it was. Twelve or thirteen
years, and then in 2005 I quit them.
Ricky Warwick
Bret Scallions
CN: It was really that long? I mean, because Fuel was really popular, it seemed like, for such a short time, but you really knew ‘em that long, huh?
BS: Well, the first record came out in ’98, I think, and we started playing together in ’93.
CN: So, yeah, you knew them a lot longer than you were really popular.
BS: Yeah, sure. Well, there was definitely a growing period there, a long growing period, and there was a long period of time where we were doing covers to make a living while we were working on our own songs.
CN: That incubation period, when young bands are doing covers and gigging around, I mean, it can be really tough.
BS: Yeah.
CN: A lot of people don’t realize how much determination you have to have to consistently push forward and pursue music. Like today, a lot of these bands are just thrown together.
BS: Yeah, sure, there are some bands that are like, “Man, we’ve been together for THREE YEARS—“ Three years? Big fucking deal! Like, shit, man, three years is nothin’.
CN: Right. I think that was the point, too, though with Circus Diablo, that Billy [Morrison] and Billy [Duffy] were making is that, you know, they and Ricky just got together and jammed and it wasn’t planned. They were just fuckin’ around.
BS: Right, sure. This whole thing happened over a mistake, you know? This was like cumming in your girlfriend on accident. It just kind of happened and the next thing you know, there’s a baby, you know? And here we are! (laughs) It makes it even more exciting, you know, because we’re all seasoned veterans, at this point. We’ve all been in it for quite a while. We’ve seen how the machine works, to a certain degree, of course, we’re always learning, but you know, we at least have a tight grasp on what the reality of it is. So we can sit down and try to write good songs, you know, and everybody is really good at coming up with good ideas, so you know there’s gonna be something there that’s worthy of a listen. Luckily with this situation, with Diablo, we have a firmer grasp on the reality of what this business is than some of the fresher, younger bands that are coming out and who are just along for the ride until they can figure it out.
CN: Yeah.
BS: That’s the way we were with Fuel when we first got started. Back in ’97 and ’98 when we were first getting started, I didn’t know what the fuck was going on. I was just excited to be on a record label and have a major release, you know? But, uh, now it’s a lot more exciting for me to be able to hang here with guys who have done it for a long time, and everybody’s really professional about their thing, and we all just want to make great music and have fun and love doing what we love to do, you know, which is be a part of a great band and make music and get out and celebrate some music, and play some music in front of fans, and have fun. You only have one shot at life. Why would you be miserable doing something that you’re not necessarily happy doing, you know?
CN: Yeah, exactly.
BS: That’s kinda how it got for me with Fuel. It got to where I was depressed, you know? I didn’t enjoy myself. I didn’t enjoy the band, the group that I was working with anymore. And it all just felt like, you know, fucking making cookies. Like, “Okay, this is the system. This is how we do it, so let’s keep doing it this way,” kind of thing. There was no fun in it anymore. I had no creative outlet, you know? Carl liked to do the bulk of the writing for that band, and he didn’t like to write with band mates, you know, so…
CN: That’s always a weird situation, when one person’s just the creative sadist of the band.
BS: Yeah, sure. It’s not fun. Who wants to be—who just wants to be an entertainer? I don’t want to be just an entertainer. I want to be able—I want to write music with my band. I want to write music with, not just my band, but with other musicians. I want to be able to have a creative outlet, you know? I want to be able—I think that if one person is writing the music and dictating what happens with the music of that band, then it’s not really necessarily a band anymore.
CN: No, you might as well be the monkey standing next to the organgrinder at that point, for peanuts.
BS: Yeah, absolutely! It really felt like a stale, fake thing to me, you know? And they’ve now replaced me, and, you know, good. I hope it will be a better machine for them. I hope it will work for them, and I wish them all the best, you know? I’m not gonna wish poor success on anyone.
CN: I just got an email that they’re playing Sturgis with Ted Nugent and Godsmack, so they seem to be doing okay, I think. So, Brett, what do you think is the boldest song on the new Circus Diablo record, in terms of like, emotional and lyrical content, and why?
BS: I’m not the right person to answer that question.
CN: Well, you didn’t write them, but you can observe.
BS: Well, these are Billy’s [Morrison] lyrics and he wrote these songs and these lyrics and he sings these lyrics, so he’s gonna have—he’s got a closer gauge on the true meanings of the songs, and which ones are maybe deeper and more spiritual than others, you know? I think that some of the songs that really stand out for me as good songs, or better songs than some of the others maybe, would be more like—first off, our first single, I think is a great song. It’s a song called “Loaded”.
CN: Yeah, your single. Yeah, it’s good. It's big.
BS: Yeah. It’s a really good song. It’s high energy. It’s an easy-to-swallow kind of song, you know? There’s other songs, like “Red Sun Rising”. Oh, how would I describe it? It’s almost kind of like an Adam Ant kind of thing, you know? Or U2, even…it’s got a little bit of a U2 quality to it for some reason—maybe that’s just me. There’s a big rock ballad on it called “Shine,” that is just a beautiful song. And I think that it could potentially be a good song for the band.
CN: Yeah. That is a nice one.
BS: And then there’s another song that didn’t make it on. It’s only on select copies of the record, a song called “Mary’s Shadow.” That one’s only on certain copies of the record. It’s on the FYE copies and on some international copies, but it’s a song called “Mary’s Shadow” and I’m really diggin’ that. I’m thinking that could be a really good song for the band, too.
CN: I like the one that he does that’s spoken word…
BS: “A Commercial Break”?
CN: Yup.
BS: Yeah? That one’s either a love or hate relationship. A lot of people are like, “‘A Commercial Break,’ that one is really interesting and really cool.” And then other people are like, “What the fuck is up with that thing?”
CN: I like stuff like that, so…
BS: I like obscure stuff, too. I’ve always been the guy that liked the stuff off the records that wasn’t necessarily the singles, you know?
CN: Yeah? What are some of your favorites? Things that you are into or were into that influenced you growing up?
BS: Musically?
CN: Yeah. Album cuts, songs…stuff like that…obscure stuff…
BS: When I was a kid, for the longest period of my life, the Van Halen Fair Warning record was like a Bible to me.
CN: That’s a good one.
BS: I used to listen to that record, probably ten times in a day. “Mean Street”, “Unchained”, and “Push Comes To Shove” the whole thing just had me, you know? It just sucked me in. That, to me, is, by far, the best Van Halen record, EVER.
CN: Definite, definite, good album.
BS: Yeah. You’ve always got the classics, too. You’ve always got the AC/DC Back In Black. You’ve got Led Zeppelin IV, Houses of the Holy, that’s the master book for me, from Led Zeppelin, as far as I’m concerned. As soon as they come up with “Song Remains The Same”, you know, "Okay, this is a fucking brilliant record."
CN: Depth, layer, just the way they did things back then in the studio, it wasn’t pushed, it wasn’t contrived. They had no one looking over their shoulder going, "Hey man, you’ve got 10 days. We’re on a schedule. Let’s go. We’re over-budget.” It was real organic, and a lot of that is missing in the music industry now.
BS: Recording-wise, it wasn’t perfect, which made it perfect, you know, if that makes sense to you. There were so many terrible imperfections on there that were so beautiful. There were sour notes. I was joking around with Robbie [Krieger] and Ray [Manzarek] and we were talking about, oh, what song was it, um, “Waiting For The Sun”, and when Ray’s piano solo comes in, on the recording, he hits a sour note in there. And I was joking with him about it. And he was laughing about it. He said, “We did so many fuck ups on those records because we went in and did them in a week.” But that’s the beauty of those records.
CN: It’s more emotion than it is perfection.
BS: Absolutely there’s more emotion because that just happens to be the way that they played it that day. They never play it the same. They’ve got a certain format of how they want the song to go, but when they’re recording it, they’re just jamming. They’re just playing and feeding off of each other. And then when they’re done recording, they go, “Let’s listen to that and see how we sounded.” You know? Then they go, “Okay, that sounds good to me. That’s it. Let’s go onto the next song.”
CN: Yeah. A lot of improvisation has been taken out of music over the years, and that’s sad.
BS: Yeah, it is. But, the last Fuel record I did took over six months to make and cost over a million dollars.
CN: That’s insane.
BS: It should never be that way, though. But, I’m as much to blame for that. We all were to blame for that record costing what it did and the amount of time it took. You know, we took Michael Beinhorn to do that record, who’s notorious for that. He’s notorious for making long records, for taking a long time to make ‘em, and then going over budget. And we picked Michael, but at the same time, we went in and took our fucking--it was us, too that was doing six months to make that record. It was unnecessary, but we still did it.
CN: Sometimes you get to that point. I used to have this thing. I can’t remember exactly how I laid it out, but I used to tease my friends that by the time they got to their third album that that they were on the fourth stage of “Rock Stardom”. I used to have the “Ten Stages of Rock Stardom”. Like, in the beginning, you’re real humble and you’re grateful for your fans and their attention and the second stage, you’re still humble and you’re awed by everything, and the third and fourth stage you start to get a little more cocky, you know, the fifth stage you start to get degenerate and turn into an asshole. I had it totally laid out. And every time I’d see them, I’d go, “Man, you’re approaching stage seven, you need to pull back.” And they’d go, “Shut Up.”
BS: From what I’ve seen, a lot of the artists that I know that have been around for the past 20 years and have made seven, eight, nine, ten records and stuff, they end up being the most humble and excitingly nice people.
CN: Because by the time they get to stage eight and they fuck up or they lose it all, they get to stages nine and ten when they go back to being humble and grateful. By the time you get to nine and ten, you’re cool again in the “Stages of Rock Stardom”.
BS: And they get to the point to where they go, “You know what? I know who the fuck I am. And I know that I’m badass, but let’s have fun and enjoy each other’s company.”
CN: Yeah. “I don’t need to prove it. I don’t need to, you know, I’m comfortable with myself.”
BS: Yeah, absolutely. It takes a long time for people, especially in this business, to get comfortable with themselves, just like, as you just said. But you know, because you’re so, in this business, there’s so much pressure to be better than the other guy.
CN: Also, that weirdness of quick success and quick money will do things to you.
BS: Yeah. That, quick money—the average band has a life span of five years, and they’re lucky to get that, you know? So, you’ve really got to make hay while the sun shines and you better know who the hell you are. Oh, excuse me. I think I have to do another interview here.
CN: Do ya?
BS: Yeah. See, we end up talkin’ and the next thing you know, it’s 45 minutes later, and we’re still talkin’ about shit.
CN: Oh, no. I got good questions in there. Everything we got is good.
BS: Oh, good.
CN: I get stuff just by having a conversation.
BS: Yeah, well, those are usually the best interviews, because you just end up talking or hanging out, and it’s not always about, “Well, we started about five years ago and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah…”
CN: (laughs)
BS: I’d rather just hang out and talk and be me, you know, and let you know who I am. Because I think, first and foremost, that’s what the fan wants to know, anyhow, who you truly are as a person. You know, versus, just hearing the story of what the basic story of the band is.
CN: Well, I think they want to know about you as a person, you’re right. So, my last question is what is your greatest fear?
BS: My greatest fear? Oh, boy. That’s a tough one. I think even the strongest person still has many fears. You still have the fear of, am I gonna survive this fucking thing that we’re all doing, which is life, and living, you know? Am I gonna be successful? Am I going to be able to take care of my family, you know? I don’t want to end up on the street, you know? I think we all just want to be able to do something that, you know, when we’re 80 years old, or even after we die, people still want to go to and refer to, or listen to, or look at. You always want people to reflect on your achievements. I guess a fear would be to just kind of waste away into nothing and have people forget about you.
CN: That’s a good one. Well, thanks, Brett.
BS: Thank you.
CN: And good luck with the baby. You have to let me know as soon as he’s born.
BS: I will. I most certainly will.
CN: Bye.
BS: Bye.
Charles Ruggiero