| Interview Transcript interview by freelance journalist Claus Martin Friese Orange Blossom Special, Beverungen, Germany June 3, 2001 |
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Enters Brian Krumm...
Would you like being really famous? KRUMM: No, I wouldn't mind, if I got paid for it., Haha. Sure, that's an old dream, to play music for a living. I'd say, you'd have a way to express yourself. As a musician, as a lyricist. CHRIS: Yeah, that's it what keeps you going, when you're tired. When you've worked all day at a job that you don't care so much for and you go home, and you go like 'hey, I'm tired, but you look forward to it all day. We wouldn't be doin' it. Well, I don't think you first started out just for getting famous, all that star stuff. KRUMM: Yes, we are. We need lots of bimbos... CHRIS: Yeah...haha I see, loads of groupies... KRUMM: Do you know VH-1's "Behind The Music"? We have to work on somthing like that. Right now, the storyline's too boring. So we'll get famous and ... CHRIS: ... become a drug addict. Haha. What about your lyrics, Brian? Some neat little stories, a little off, with that different twist. Are they authentic? KRUMM:Partly authentic, part made up. HUNT: He just changed the names to protect the innocent. That's like when Brian comes down to us and plays us some songs. Generally we know the story right away. I know where it was, I know who it was. But the names have changed. You're writing the music together. How do you come up with it? KRUMM: The way it works is like, usually I come up with a general idea, then bring it down to the basement and then bash it out. Change it around and see what works and what doesn't work. Basically. How does the band fit in? HUNT: When he brings a song down to the basement, we litterally sit down and listen to it. The songs, when he brings 'em to us, are noit far away from being done. Lyrically, it's all drawn out, It's all there. CHRIS: Structurely too, it's in pretty good form, usually. Krumm's always a bit off, you see. LEACH: So we gotta straighten him up, first, haha... You don't consider yourself as a backing band, though? KRUMM: The thing about our band is that I grew up with these two guys (Chris & Hunt) We went to Kindergarten, grade school. Outside of St. Louis. Leach is our little brother even though he's the oldest band member. But he's the youngest band member just the same, isn't he? LEACH: These guys have been playin' together since Kindergarten. KRUMM: And we kidnapped him. Did you have to use force, like weapons or drag him? KRUMM: yeah, hit him on the head. So the three of you grew up together. Y'all had the same musical influences then, too? I guess it's been some AC/DC on, some Who, too. HUNT: It's been a really strange mix. It was also Stray Cats. And Van Halen's been the first band I'd gone to a concert of. Our influences are all over the place. We were in cover bands when we were little. And we were playin' Kiss in Brian's bedroom. And Ozzy. Detroit Rock City and all that. Crazy Train, all that weird stuff... LEACH: And the Nuge (Ted Nugent), and some stuff that has come over. I'd recognise some Tom Waits in your stuff, with rocking it out, although a little more structured. Harmony changes, and you keep the tension up. Rocking out the odd ones, like Smog and their lot. KRUMM: Yeah, I'm a big Tom Waits fan, my-self. HUNT: If you look at our history, Tom Waits has been a big influence on Brian in the last few years. KRUMM: Like Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds. But I also was into this band Camper Van Beethoven. LEACH: ... take the skinheads bowling, boys. And Cracker, after that. What about those last five years? HUNT: It's been pretty much the history of the Great Crusades. There has been so much really what was fed into what this band is now. Brian and I were playin' in another band together, the Suede Chain, which was an American band, we'd tour the States for about five or six years. Put out a couple of records and that's where we sort of learned our trade. Working hard, getting on the road. Last night we were talking about how we'd get to where we are... KRUMM: ... yeah, until five in the morning. HUNT: We're from the middle of the States, you know. We've gotten to where we are 'cause we deserve it. We haven't gotten lucky as far as, like, a big name producer comes in and says: 'I wanna take 'em and make them stars'. We worked really hard and toured, made records and kept going. You'll pull a lot of self confidence out ot that, I'd guess... The producer doesn't have to tell you what to do. HUNT: We don't really need anybody to tell us we're good. Cause in many ways we know that we're good. We're not great yet, but we will be. Especially with a lot of people getting fed up with computer fed radio. Everybody's looking out for new stuff... How did you get in touch with your label. You used to be on Trocadero, right? HUNT: Originally we'd been on Trocadero. KRUMM: Now we're on Glitterhouse. A couple of years ago we were doin' our first Euro tour and played at the OBS. There we met Rembert and all the others. We were sure right from there: We need to be on this label. LEACH: We knew that back then. And Rembert went too like, 'If you're ever looking for a label...' It didn't work out right away, though. When Trocadero ended up, not closing up shop entirely, but went smaller, it worked out. They'd just been very helpful then. To make it happen. HUNT: With Rüdiger from Trocadero it was totally by chance. Brian Krumm and I are the only ones originally in the Great Crusdades. The record came out in the Staters on Parasol (American label). One of the bands on Parasol was gonna be touring in Europe, so they sent the CDs and Michael from our old label said, 'hey, why don't put your CD in there, too?'. Rüdiger from Trocadero heard us and said 'hey, this is good. Would you let us put it out?' and they released it. And Rüdiger passed on some CDs to Ludger from KGB booking agency... LEACH: That was, what really made it happen. HUNT: And Ludger was going like 'Do they wanna tour?' and we were like 'Yeah, of course'.But it didn't work out the first time. Then Ludger came back around and asked if we'd still like to come over. That was a Yeah again. And so we came over and kind of worked really hard, had a great tour. We're really thankful to all the people made it possible. So we landed here. And it felt like home. Rembert & Reinhard et al... they're just great. CHRIS: Part of the joy being here is that being with Rembert and all of Glitterhouse cast. Being around them. I was going like 'I can't wait to see those guys'. With their thing they're just like us with our music, the same kind of approach. HUNT: They just care about music. This is not about making money. It's about dedication. Other with our old American label. They wanted to put our album out out of respect. But they didn't really backed us. So we said, we're not gonna take their money, rather put our own money in it, so we didn't want to feel any guilt, like we'd owe something to them. Quite honestly, our relation to that label is still very good. Because of that. Leach in fact has a really big relation to that label, too. He, as well as a kind of solo artist, has put out some records in his own right. He's a very good pop songwriter. So if you'd hear any sort of pop rumbelings within this band, it's this ... fucker. LEACH: ... haha, yeah. How come y'all are wearing suits? KRUMM: Because it's fun. It's different. LEACH: Well, the whole dress thing wasn't working. So we got rid of the dresses and got suits... It's kind of hard to imagine you sporting petticoats... LEACH: Next tour, it's gonna be around Civil War era... CHRIS: Krumm looks like a rebel soldier. We'll fight on stage, we'll do the Continental Soldier... KRUMM: I think it's started out just because so many bands just wear jeans and T-shirts. LEACH: It worked really well for us over here, too. First time we came here, we were just getting off the plane and got out of the van and came in here, Reinhard was going like 'Vere ar ze suits? Vere ar ze suits". I went like 'We don't sleep in them'. We just wear 'em when we play. HUNT: It's a Chicago like a-thing, too. They see the suits and they all go: Chicago bangbang, the whole mobster thing. For me it's like you sorta look like all those old Blues and Jazz musicians. They have a pride in their art and they show up like 'I'm a professional. I'm here to play music'. It all goes together ... with Brian's lyrics and the music off various sources and all a little against the grain... KRUMM: That makes sense to me. What about your gear? Krumm, I totally disrespect you for treating your Strat the way you did last night. Tonight, you've been slightly more gentle to it, but it' still got some deep impact... ALL: Hahaha. KRUMM: As long as it works - that's all I care about. The guitar? I don't care about. Doesn't it detune? KRUMM: I Usually do it at the end of the set. So in case it really breaks, you just go ahead and take the next one? LEACH: No, that's it. No other guitars. KRUMM: On the plane, we were just allowed one guitar, one suitcase. Down in the studio, you probably use a lot different instruments, do you? The sound of your latest album is more sophistacated than your live set, which is rather raw. LEACH: Yeah. Definitly. HUNT: I think the next record we are gonna be a little more true to that. We spent a lot of time in the studio. CHRIS: It's a whole different story. HUNT: There are some edges we sort of polished down - instead of letting them stay there. LEACH: And accentuate them a bit more the next time. KRUMM: I use D'Arrio strings, a 0.10 set. CHRIS: Who cares? I got a Pearl kit and I use the same bass drum I had since I've been ... (pause) ... nine years old. LEACH: He beats the shit out of it. And beer's all over it. Don't you get the cramps the way you're drumming standing up, Chris? CHRIS: You just have to keep moving... HUNT: We often tell this story, we've been asked that lots of times. The reason why he stands up is, well... I moved to Chicago after the band I used to be in broke up after touring forever. Krumm moved up to Chicago, too. So it was time to sort of get the band back together. I flew out to L.A. Chris and his wife Sara were living in L.A. It was his wife Sara, she wanted to come back, but Chris was writing for film. I just flew out there to see what his vibe was, and he was kind of ready to leave. So it was like 'Hey, do you want to move to Chicago?' Yeah. So he moved to Chicago. CHRIS: Haha. To take my place. To have a good time, hahaha... We partied, until it was five in the morning. HUNT: And smoked cigars on the front lawn. CHRIS: ... that was crazy. Drinking like a bunch of... Wow, we had a good time. HUNT: When we got him, we didn't have a drum set. We had a kick drum, we had a snare. But there was no stool for him to sit on. CHRIS: The pedal was broke. I had to flip it up KRUMM: No kick drum pedal. LEACH: And there were no TomToms, either, just the floor Tom. CHRIS: There wasn't hardly anything...My drum set wasn't hauled over yet. HUNT: So he said 'Well, I can do that' and started doin' it. So it became the thing... KRUMM: ... not having a stool. Sounds more than just a running gag. Obviously, you're feeling comfortable... CHRIS: What I like about it and when I started doin' it like that, I was goin' 'Well, when we get to the record, I'll be sitting down'.It'll be no big deal. I like new challanges it brought to playin' the drums. It makes you think like ' "Well, I can't do certain things, I can't use my left foot. I can't lift it to the HiHat". It forces you into things you wouldn't have thought about when working on Brian's music. I like that aspect. I found that I was doing things, and making choices I may not have thought about had I been just sitting down.And too, live! I just love it. I Like the freedom I just like to being able to explode. LEACH: The power. I just like to see him ... I always look back to him, and he looks so awesome. And same for everybody else, too, to see what he's fucking doing up there. CHRIS: I always played hard. But when we got to the studio - they had a stool. So I put it all up, set the drums up and started playing. But it was more 'Hey, I just can't fucking do that. It sucks.' ALL: HaHaha. CHRIS: I felt like ... a low person. I didn't like that at all and we kicked that out, pushed all the drums back up the whole day. We recorded the basic tracks that weekend. I did cheat on 'Name I don't recall', though, I have to say. You can't play that over and over for about ... you know, many takes standing up I was down on that. Yeah, it's kind of a gag and it's fun. Drummers are the backbone to the band, but the bigger their kit, the lesser you see the drummer himself... LEACH: Yeah. This kind of puts him on the same level as the rest of us. Getting into a groove, getting into power. You look up and notice that Chris is doing the same things as you are on stage. CHRIS: Yeah, I can relate to the others on stage.. Well, your live sets are very unique, do you alter the set list very much? HUNT: Even though we play the same set for the most part, we don't want it to be the same set every night. We get into a groove and try to keep it throughout. We want it to be different, otherwise it would become boring for us. LEACH: There's so much energy here at Glitterhouse. We try to do our show as hard as we can for everybody, every night. Just being here is a little different. It gets better. Getting Rembert on stage just does it... Good to have people like him around. Makes the world a better place... CHRIS: Those memories will last a lifetime... HUNT: Well, Glitterhouse is not making a lot of money off of us. We're not a band that sells a lot of records, right now. The fact that they go like 'Shut up. You guys are good people, you write good music'. I have immense respect for people who say: 'You know what? OK, you're not selling a lot of records, but what you do is good, it's honest, sincere, you put on a great show. It will happen eventually'... LEACH: ... yeah, and it will all come around. HUNT: And that's how we've always been. Work to continue, work hard and make good music. CHRIS: I got that energy right from the beginning from them, when we got here. We went out drinking and just talked. Everybody had a great time. It's been that way ever since. LEACH: That opened our eyes as far as ... like, you know, the reception we get in the States is good in our home town, in Chicago, we do pretty well, but over here it's a whole different ball game. As you're talking about people getting sick of mainstream music and all that: This was our first real step into seeing all those different people. From ten-year-olds up to ... fifty. Whoever.There was this big different group of people that was really passionate about music, that we never would have had the opportunity to meet. It was really a big boost for the band to come here. As we said before, it evaluatedthe whole thing we're doing and it helped us immensely. Now, we're like ... gosh, like to live here in Germany. Your re-evaluation comes across quite clear. You seem happy about the current situation? HUNT: It's been a great grounding situation for us. There are so many people that would blow it up your ass and go 'You're the greatest'. But we deserve where we are. We would freak out if we'd gotten real famous. Now, I mean, I think we can handle it. But when we were younger and in other bands...and we wanted to be famous. I'm glad it didn't happen. There are so many traps. In LEACH's band, he had before us, the had a major label record deal. It failed for the most part. It's good to just continue and do what you're doing. and not never get off the path you wanna be on. LEACH: Yeah, and I got caught up in some of that kind of stuff. This is sure a huge relief. CHRIS: It's about making the best songs possible and play it with as much energy as I got in my body. LEACH: ... and raaawwwk. CHRIS: You give everything you've got, you give everything when you record HUNT: ... and sleep for a couple of hours and then do it again. You have to love it - and we do. HUNT: The pain goes away once you're on stage. Like last night. After the show we loaded the gear into the van - we don't have a crew here. KRUMM: That's the part we wouldn't mind to change... LEACH: There are a few things... HUNT: But we wouldn't be braggin' about it, either. That's fine. What are your plans for the future? Where are you touring? KRUMM: This time we're touring only Germany. And Austria. We're doing the "Chelsea", a club in Vienna. This is kind of our second home. HUNT: It's our third show there. It's interesting, because on our fist tour, we were bright-eyed and starry-eyed. We could not believe that 200 people showed up to see us in Vienna. It feels good people keep listening to our music and go 'we want to see that band'. Cause in the States it's all so cluttered. There is so much music out there. But when we hit Vienna on our first tour there, and all those people were there and that sort of evaluated that, like 'hey, you know, we are writing good music, people do enjoy it'.We owe it to them, to put up a good show and play it out live for them. Vienna is always really really good for us. LEACH: The guy who ownes the club there, was it Reiner? KRUMM: He's the promotor, not the owner... LEACH: Well, he went like: 'The next time you come, you gonna play your fist show in Vienna and you play your last show in Vienna. And if I got the guts up to ask my girlfriend to marry me ... you're gonna play at my wedding'. I went like, OK, fine. Hahaha. CHRIS: That was after ... I don't know how many beers... LEACH: ... yeah, after a lot of beer... Did he already took the bride to the altar? LEACH: We're gonna play there again, but I don't think he had the guts. CHRIS: We're very thankful to them. They were very good to us. HUNT: We're expecting Vienna to be very very fine... LEACH: Maybe, we'll meet her this time. She wasn't here the last time. But she's that mystical girl friend... HUNT: Yep, and we went like 'Does she have any friends?' HaHaha. Where are you heading afterwards? HUNT: We're returning to the States at the end of June. And do what? HUNT: Record an album. We brought five or six new songs along, to play live. Ever been to Texas? KRUMM: If you wanna play in Texas, you gotta have a fiddle in the band. Well, like in Austin, they got some pretty fine music scene. That lead guitar is hot, but you gotta have a fiddle. That lead guitar is hot, but not for a Louisiana man (brawls like a bajou man), the same one. more press |
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