Cage The Elephant: The Culture Brats Interview

Have you heard? Cage the Elephant released Melophobia, their highly anticipated third studio album today, and if the band has its way, you'll be spending a good chunk of time listening to their handiwork and enjoying the fruits of their labor. The challenge for longtime fans and new converts is getting on board with a band who changes sounds like toddlers change underwear. Trying on something new can be tricky but Cage The Elephant has experimented successfully and broken new ground with each new release, delighting devotees and gaining new listeners with every chance they take.

We spoke with guitarist Lincoln Parish about real life, rock star status, and raising the bar.

Hey Lincoln! How are you today?
Hey! Good, how are you?

Doing great. Where are you guys?
We're in Boston right now. Good we're on the same east coast schedule. I like to get up early.

So I listened to Melophobia and I loved it. But I've got to ask you right off the bat if it's a nod to the Talking Heads' seminal Fear Of Music album? I got this wild hair that it was parallel to the whole way that record was the bridge between their first two albums and the rest of their career and Melophobia is your third album as well as actually meaning "fear of music."
That's funny, because someone else brought that up the other day but actually we didn't even think about it.

So now I sound like a completely unhinged hidden conspiracy theorist. Talk about reading too much into something!
Isn't that what they were thinking? What is the meaning behind this?

Okay, so going with the bridge between albums idea... This is your third. And after Cage The Elephant and Thank You, Happy Birthday, I was actually a little surprised by this album. It sounds familiar but also expands out into territory you haven't much covered yet. Was that a conscious decision when you went into the studio? Did you set out to attain a certain something or was it more improvisational?
Yeah, I would say that this one was probably the one that we went into with the least amount of contrived ideas. Before we went into the studio it was kind of like we need to leave some bookends open and you know, not have everything completely sussed out. Just because we wanted to leave some room for spontaneity, for things to happen. We had the songs. The songs were for the most part there, but the general sound of the album was the least known when we went in. And that's kind of where the title of the album came from. I guess that's what it really means as a band, is not having to make music to cater to any one type of particular sound. Not sure it that actually answers your question.

Adam DeVine: The Culture Brats Interview

If you or your kids (or you and your kids) are fans of Cartoon Network's Adventure Time or Regular Show, there's a damn good chance you'll be fans of Uncle Grandpa, which premieres tonight. Uncle Grandpa was created by Peter Browngardt, who also worked on Futurama, Adventure Time, and Chowder. It tells the story of the titular character, his talking belly bag, a dinosaur named Mr. Gus, a Giant Realistic Flying Tiger, and Pizza Steve, an egotistical slice of pizza who is voiced by Adam DeVine from Workaholics and Pitch Perfect. Adam was nice enough to take time from filming the upcoming season of Workaholics to answer a few questions about Uncle Grandpa, his favorite cartoons, the upcoming season of Workaholics, and more.

How are you doing today?
I'm tired. We're in the midst of shooting Workaholics and my brain is melted. Besides that I'm great. Hopefully this breakfast burrito will get my mind right.

Tell us about Uncle Grandpa, your new show on Cartoon Network.
It's a cartoon I would have loved as a kid and would still love as an adult. It reminds me a lot of Ren & Stimpy in how cool and raw the animation is.

I've watched the "Tiger Trails" and "Belly Brothers" episodes and feel that fans of Adventure Time and Regular Show are going to love Uncle Grandpa. What attracted you to the series?
I thought the shorts that were on YouTube were awesome. So it helped that I didn't think the show was gonna suck. Truly, I wanted to do something that my extended family could watch and not think I'm a drunk/drug addict maniac who shouldn't be allowed at Thanksgiving. I'm sure that's how they think after watching Workaholics.

You play Pizza Steve, a cocky, talking piece of pizza. Is that the strangest role you've ever played?
It's definitely the most delicious role that I've ever played. Pizza is my life blood so it really is a dream role.

What are some of your all-time favorite cartoons?
Ren & Stimpy, Rugrats, TMNT, and DuckTales. I almost broke my neck as a kid trying to dive into a pile of change. I dunno how Scrooge McDuck pulled it off.



I'm a big fan of Workaholics. Have you started writing the new season yet? Anything you can share about what we can expect in the new season?
We are shooting the new season right now! I'm writing this from set. If you like Workaholics, you're gonna love this season, and if you don't like Workaholics, just go to bed, you're no fun.

What else are you working on right now?
I have my own stand-up show coming out on Comedy Central this fall called Adam Devine's House Party. I basically have a giant house party and invite my favorite new stand ups to perform in my backyard. It was bonkerz. Also, I'm gonna do a few episodes on Modern Family this coming season!

Best of luck to you with Uncle Grandpa, Workaholics, and everything else!
Thanks! Let's be best friends or something?

Here's a preview of "Tiger Trails," one of the two episodes that premiere tonight at 8:00 PM on Cartoon Network:

Kathi Wilcox: The Culture Brats Interview

During the late eighties and early nineties, you probably noticed the early rumblings of DIY culture fused with practical feminism that eventually turned into what would come to be known as Riot grrrl. Back then, any number of bands took credit for or claimed association with the movement but after the smoke had cleared, there wasn't much doubt left about who was left standing in the shelled-out remains of the initial explosion: the seminal Bikini Kill.

They were the first across a dangerous musical threshold and lay down on a few punk landmines so that other women could follow suit and walk through a little less frightened. Over the years, band members and friends collaborated, stayed active, played under different monikers, and lived their lives fully and artistically.

Recently, longtime friends and Bikini Kill bandmates Kathi Wilcox and Kathleen Hanna reformed the once experimental The Julie Ruin (a side project that originated with Hanna some years ago), recorded the soon-to-be-released album Run Fast, and got ready to go on a national tour. We spoke with Kathi recently about things past and a future that looks more than rosy.

Hey Kathi, how are you today?
Good how are you?

We are here in Washington DC, and you all were on NPR this morning!
Yeah, I know! They put it up last night. We just got finished watching the VMAs and I was just checking online and Kenny from my band was like, "Oh my god, they put it up early." Because we knew they were going to put it up but they went and did it early. Yeah, super exciting.

So you guys have the new full length release planned for September 3rd, Run Fast, and the first ever national tour with The Julie Ruin with a stop here in DC at our beloved Black Cat on September 7th. There are a lot of people really looking forward to this, longtime Bikini Kill fans . I've heard the single and the album and while the old songs you did in Bikini Kill still really hold up after all this time, the new material is fresh and packs a great punch. It's great. Did you think the impact of the older stuff would remain so fresh in the minds of the people who were around for Bikini Kill and that the new material would keep attracting so many new young fans?
I have to tell you that I'm totally surprised. We have only played two full-length shows so far and it has been a lot of young people, but more surprisingly it's just when I do interviews or when I go out and people come up and they say, you know, not that they're necessarily Julie Ruin fans but that they're Bikini Kill fans and they're fourteen and they're kind of like "We just found out about it." Kathleen keeps saying this in interviews but I'm experiencing the same thing. It's like they age through it and there's always a new generation of people that find out about it. And I don't know if it's Rock Camp For Girls or maybe it just fills a void that girls kind of need or something, but I am surprised. Also, I'm happy. I'm happy that girls are finding it and feeling it and relating to it that strongly. And while I'm happy, I'm also kind of bummed because maybe that means things haven't changed very much in this other way, that girls are still experiencing all the same stuff that we were when we were girls, so that might be one reason that they are relating to it.

Animotion's Bill Wadhams: The Culture Brats Interview

It's not every day you get to speak with the guy who taught you how to play synthesizer. But that's kind of what I did when I spoke with Animotion's Bill Wadhams, whose "Obsession" was one of the first songs I taught myself how to play on the synth. Bill spoke with me about the Lost '80s Live tour, Mandalay Bay, where he was when he first saw the "Obsession" video, and more.

Animotion will be performing as part of the Lost '80s Live show in Long Beach on August 24th. What can fans expect at the show?
Well, the Lost '80s Live shows, they string together a bunch of bands. We all play abbreviated sets, about twenty minutes per band. But we pack as much as we can into that twenty minutes. Each of the bands will be playing their biggest hits.

The tour played at Mandalay Bay's Beach Stage this past weekend. What was that like?
It was fantastic. The show sold out. There were 3,500 people there. The crowd really comes to see bands from the '80s and they're just on fire. They're a really fun crowd. It was a great night.

What's the location like? Isn't that where they watch you in water?
Yeah. It's crazy because at the Beach Stage, you can actually stand in the water if you want. The deepest part right in front of the stage is maybe three feet deep. The actual floor of the stage is ten feet above the water, so you don't want to be too close or you can't see. But if you go online, you'll see pictures of the stage and you'll see lots of people standing in the water with their shorts or bikinis. It's a fun venue.


Why do you think festivals like Lost '80s Live are so popular?
Honestly, a lot of people know the songs better than the bands, I think. For some of us, people are more likely to come out to a show that has a few '80s artists. If Animotion was playing by itself, it's less likely to sell out a venue or bring the people out.

Strength in numbers.
Exactly.

"Obsession" is one of those touchstone songs from the mid '80s. When you guys were
recording it, did you have any idea how big it would become?
No. As a matter of fact, I kind of thought that it would not be a hit. It was kind of wacky how Animotion came together. I had a solo band. I met Astrid and a few other people that had formed a group and they were lacking a male singer/guitarist/songwriter because there had been a shakeup in their band. I joined up with them and to me it was kind of a wacky project, but it had some things I didn't have in my solo career. I didn't have a lawyer, a manager, a producer. Astrid and a couple of the other people were in another band and they had some of that going on. When I hooked up with them and we recorded the album, I thought, "Well this is all good but I don't really know if it's ever going to see the light of day." After we recorded the album and actually put it out, it sort of did nothing for almost a year, from the time we recorded it until the time it was added to a P1 station in Los Angeles. Once it hit that station, it took off. But I did not see that coming.



MTV was so huge at the time. What went through your heads the first time you saw your video on there?
The album was out and it was not doing very much. It was getting local play in LA. The first time I saw the video was on a... a radio station had a video program called Video One in Los Angeles. I was painting a house and I heard the song on the TV in the house. There was some lady living there, a little old lady, and I said, "Excuse me, can I come in and take a look at your TV because I think I might be on it." She said, "Sure. If you're on TV, what are you doing painting my house?"

I don't remember when I saw it on MTV, but I can tell you once it hit MTV, we were being played in power rotation, which meant once an hour. Once it hit MTV in power rotation, I was recognized every time I walked out the door. It was phenomenal.

You guys are unfairly labelled as one-hit wonders. At this point, do you just laugh it off or point them to your two other Top 40 hits?
Well you know, our keyboard player said it best: "You don't see any TV shows about two-hit wonders." They keep pulling us in, whether it's NBC, MTV, VH1 or whatever. "We're doing this thing called Hit Me Baby..." When I first heard the moniker, I was like, "Oh, great. That kind of sucks." But now that it doesn't really matter to me. It's all good.


You also record and perform with Brian Huston. I listened to a few of your originals and covers and you guys sound great together with really great harmonies. What brought the two of you together?
Brian is a film director and I've done some work as an Art Director on film here in Portland. We met on a video set. He put together a jam session with a bunch of people working in film and video in Portland. We had a good old time and after we did it a few times, I noticed that Brian was the one in the group that could really hold a harmony. He was really steady with his melodies and harmonies so we decided to start playing out together. We've been doing that for about four years and we have a bunch of shows coming up in Portland between now and the end of the year.

Final question: Make your dream Lost '80s Live show. Pick five contemporaries to perform on the bill with you and tell me what song you'd all perform together as the final jam.
Ooh, nice. Well the Lost '80s is kind of like... we're not the Princes and Phil Collinses. At least I know we're not the A-list of the '80s, but some of our songs are A-list. But if I had a choice of any '80s groups on the bill, I'd start out with Peter Gabriel. David Bowie. The Eurythmics or Annie Lennox. And Simply Red.

One more.
I'd say A Flock Of Seagulls because they've been great to work with for the last ten years. We've done a lot of shows with them and they're a great live band and they're good guys.

Awesome. What song would you all perform together as the final jam?
"Sledgehammer."

Animotion will be performing at Pine Ave. in Downtown Long Beach on Saturday, August 24 as part of Lost '80s Live. Joining them on the bill will be A Flock Of Seagulls, When in Rome (UK), Gary Myrick, Boingo Dance Party, The Flirts, Naked Eyes, and more. Tickets are still available.

A Flock Of Seagulls' Mike Score: The Culture Brats Interview

As time passes, the mind plays tricks on the memory. It's an inevitable result of living long and seeing much as you pass through. For those of you lucky enough to have been around for MTV's maiden rocket launch as the first wave of bold and eager new artists beamed into your living rooms, you are sure to remember the daring coiffure and irresistible melodies of A Flock of Seagulls. When I think back to the space-age melodies and the no-holds-barred fashion choices, I chuckle to myself before recalling the music. We all loved the music.

We spoke to Mike Score, A Flock Of Seagulls' lead singer and primary songwriter, who will be rolling out the classics along with other famed '80s artists during a big concert in Long Beach on August 24th.

I'd like to start out by talking about a few big things coming up, one of which is the big concert in Long Beach on Saturday August 24th, hosted by the legendary Richard Blade and featuring A Flock of Seagulls and many others. It's interesting that for so long, all these hugely popular bands from that very pivotal moment in music history stay so vivid in the collective consciousness of the people who love them. Everyone waxes so poetic about everything from the '80s and you ask them to come up with some '90s groups that made the same impact and you only get a handful. It must be rewarding to still have the love. Do you still get that great audience feedback when you are up there playing live?
Oh, a lot of the time yes. Because I think it was an era like the '60s where you tend to remember every band and what they did. I think that what happened in the '90s is that bands became more generic and they sounded more like each other. So in the '60s and the '80s, every band seemed to have its own personality and you knew almost the instant that a note came on the radio which band it was. For me, that's what makes the difference: the individuality of the bands rather than the conformity to each other. I think audiences like that. They like to go, "Well now Berlin are on" or "Now A Flock Of Seagulls are on" or Wang Chung and they know that it's a different sound. You go see a bunch of '90s bands and it's the same sound for three hours.

I've seen a few planned festivals featuring '90s bands that were previously huge either tank or cancel because of poor ticket sales. Made me think hard about staying power.
Yeah, I don't think they write songs. I think the '80s was the last real era of songwriting rock bands, you know? And then it just became formalized and I don't know why. I guess it's just the way that the people who created those bands grew up. They grew up with more of a formula in their heads than trying to be individual.

You've been touring a lot. Now I know that this big concert in Long Beach is you with A Flock Of Seagulls, but you've also come out with your debut solo single "All I Wanna Do" this year. When you are playing with the band do you ever work any solo tunes into the set list? Or is it just hits for the fans?
The Seagulls thing is the Seagulls thing. And I've kind of been working towards keeping that as kind of era specific. When I do my solo stuff live, I might include a couple of Seagulls things but the Seagulls thing, I don't think I'm going to stretch it out with solo stuff. And in fact I did my first solo single but I've got a second one ready to come out and an album right after that. But you heard about the robbery right?

Ugh, yes I did. That was actually the next thing I was going to ask you about. I heard all the rough copies and demos for the solo album were in that van, right?
Yeah, they were. I was going to finish it up right as it was taken. Stuff we've mastered and stuff we've finished mixing, but the album will still go ahead. It just means that I can't do any remixes or add or take away from anything because the main drives with all the tracks on them were stolen.


I'll assume that waylaid and delayed you quite a bit.
Artwork and everything was on them and the funny thing is that one was the main drive and then the other one was the backup and you know I was all like, "I'm fine, I'm good, everything is backed up if I lose a drive," but then they both get stolen at the same time. So even my backup was stolen. It's not a case of "Oh well, at least we can carry on."

You seem to have dealt with it rather well. Even Richard Blade, who is legendarily mild-mannered, came on his show on Sirius SX and each time before he'd play one of your songs he's recount the horrible story of the gear and the van being stolen. He was angry enough for ten men. So they found the van but none of the stuff in it, huh?
Yeah, well they found a couple of bits of gear but nothing that we needed. Just a few old pieces of gear like cabinets and guitar amps but nothing that gives us any hope that we'll get anything else.

Kind of makes you wish the culprits would find themselves surrounded by angry A Flock Of Seagulls fans and hit with the karma stick.
Could still happen.

Never say never.
Well, this has happened and I can't really do anything about it, I've just got to go on. And I mean, of course it makes me angry but angry doesn't get me through the next show or I can't walk on stage and go "I can't play because these bastards stole all my equipment." We're going to go on and do the best we can with what we've got. And it will take us a little while to put our sounds back together but that's what we've got to do. It's just a case of you've got to do what you've got to do.

That was some tap dance you had to do though. You went on stage right afterward with borrowed equipment, didn't you?
Yeah, we just borrowed some gear and played and everyone said it sounded great. We were like, "Well cool." That probably means that we can get by. We play on stage for ourselves, so we wanted to sound as good on stage as possible. But I think fans will be a bit more forgiving, you know what I mean? If little pieces are missing or the lead guitar doesn't quite get it right, the audience is still into the song. But for us it's like every little thing that's missing is a big thing. Like I said, we are just going to carry on and put it back together bit by bit. I think shortly we'll be, "Well, okay that happened but now we'll just be more careful in the future."

Lesson learned but I suppose you can't prevent well prepared thieves from following you after the show to your hotel.
Yeah and we've had long discussions about now and the thing is we've been traveling around with our gear in that van for years and nothing has ever happened to it so we got complacent. It just shows you that no matter what you do, really you have to keep an eye on everything you own.

You are very embedded in the cultural consciousness both musically and visually. MTV's rise and and domination had something to do with that. Now that the music video's time has sort of come and gone and in its place is this strangely manufactured cookie cutter system that rolls out very specific looking and sounding artists. Having been on the cutting edge of a new age of music and having seen that roll through, how do you feel about the dramatic and very corporate change in the music industry? Imagine A Flock of Seagulls tying to break in this climate?
I think the whole corporate thing has ruined the whole music scene. Maybe lawyers and accountants, they've taken over. You know rock and roll was always a chancy thing and you took your chance and most times if you were good, you made it and if you weren't, you fell by the wayside. Now unless you come up through Disney or something like that, then you are not going to get a chance. I know that there are lots of independent bands that put out their own things and they're successful but I don't think it's the same as being, say, a rock star from the sixties through the eighties. In the nineties, corporations took over the whole thing and they ruined the individuality and like I said before, the whole idea that you could come from nothing and play your guitar great and become a big rock star. That just doesn't seem to exist anymore, at least not on in the forefront of rock. Maybe you can do it in the background and then break through later, but I'd hate to be in a band starting out now, put it that way.

Granted not everybody who tried from the '60s through the '80s made it, but it was a lot more freewheeling and dangerous. And seemingly fun. I like it when I remember someone, they leave their mark. When I mention A Flock of Seagulls to someone they get an immediate visual and can sing at least a few songs. I know of no one who can't recall the hair and the videos. But now you'd never get promoted or managed correctly or allowed to do your thing. You make money or you get dropped from your label. I've seen big artists leave or get dropped from their label.
I don't think there are any real labels anymore really.

Giant corporations bought most of them.
It used to be like Island Records would grab an artist and say, "Oh I like these guys, let's put their record out" and it was a chance and the band took their chance. Now it's not a chance, the corporation just says, "We'll spend five million dollars and this guy is going to be huge" and then next year some little girl will come along and we'll do the same with her. Almost like you don't need talent.


And anything considered a mistake can just be glossed over. Auto-tune is the biggest thorn in my side. I hate it.
And I think American Idol and all that makes it interesting and what's the other one from the other side of the pond?

X FActor?
Yeah, it's stuff like that where people will become stars. It used to be if you were good, you got on TV and became bigger. Now they start their careers on television and they can't maintain on TV then their career is immediately on a downward slide. I really look at it and I kind of go, "Thank god I'm not starting out now."

Recently I watched some live footage and I compared it to older recording and I've got to say your voice still packs a punch. When I showed it to someone else they kept referring to A Flock Of Seagulls as synth/pop and I argued saying I remember you more as a guitar-driven band with layered melodies. Weird what you remember. Maybe I've been categorizing you wrong all these years.
Well, when my brother was drumming he was just a nonstop machine, so that drove everything along a lot of echoes and guitars and stuff like that. But you know what I think? That when people like something they add a little bit of something to the music themselves. You start going and little melodies appear in your head maybe just to add to what the band is playing. And of course when we recorded we multi-tracked everything so it probably sounds a little different. I think we're quite raw live and it seems to work for us for some reason. We might be better off with another synth, but it works as a four piece and that's how we've kept it.

Further dates on the tour past the August 24th concert in Long Beach?
We've got more shows, like this weekend we're playing the Mandalay Bay, then Long Beach, then we go out to Flagstaff Arizona, down into Mexico, and then across to NY and back into Minneapolis. The thing is, because it's not a tour where we play every day it can be a week or two between the shows and we could choose a couple more. If it's doing okay, it keeps getting extended by another couple of dates here and there. When it does well, promoters pick up another show here and there.

That's a lot of time and travel. When you work on your solo stuff between all this, that leaves little time where you aren't on the road. Will you just go out and tour when the solo record comes out as well?
Yes, if it gets to that point when the album comes out, I'm going to have agents try to put a tour together. It will be a short tour and then judging the reaction of that and what's going on with the Seagulls, I'll try to slot that into there. If we are doing, say, a Seagulls date in NY then I'll try to do a solo date in the same area in the same time frame. The whole thing will travel out not just as two separate bands but as a whole unit. And as far as the travel, it's better than sitting home and cooking flapjacks or whatever.

True. But you better pack your suitcase for a long trip.
I've lived out of a suitcase for the last twenty-five years really. Apart from I once took a year off and I had a great year doing stuff, but as soon as I got back to doing music I was like, "Ah, this is home." For me, being on the tour bus is like exploration. I like meeting fans, I like playing. It can get tiring with the travel but when you have a good show and you're tired, it lifts you out of that. You go, "Wow, that was awesome." And you know what the other thing is? When you get that call to do a show, it's kind of like they come out of nowhere. Usually the agent will call up and say, "Hey got you another two shows, blah blah blah, can you fit them in?" and you go, "Of course I can fit them in" because this is what I want to do. It's always a good feeling, it's never like, "Oh goddamn it, not more shows!"
As I get older, I'll have plenty of time to sit around and wonder why isn't anybody calling me.



Since you are a musician, if you were in charge of a music festival and you booked the acts and chose their final song to play before the last curtain-who would you choose and and what would be the tune?
So I'm choosing one song that everybody would have to play?

Yes.
I think I'd have everybody sing "Hey Jude," and extend the end by twenty minutes so the whole crowd could get into it. I'd have Jimi Hendrix play a lead guitar solo in the middle of it. Actually I went to go see Paul McCartney a couple of months ago and I don't know how old he is now but he was absolutely brilliant.

Seventy one, I think.
He was brilliant, he had so much energy and his voice was great. I was just wowed. He looked like he was having a great time. The songs he played were brilliant and of course I'm a big Beatles fan anyway. But that to me was like, "This is a true rock star doing the real thing." So yeah, the closer would be "Hey Jude," the crowd can get involved in it and I'd have Roy Orbison, who I thought was brilliant in there.

A Flock Of Seagulls will be performing at Pine Ave. in Downtown Long Beach on Saturday, August 24 as part of Lost '80s Live. Joining them on the bill will be When in Rome (UK), Gary Myrick, Boingo Dance Party, Animotion, The Flirts, Naked Eyes, and more. Tickets are still available.

Tom Keifer: The Culture Brats Interview

Owner of one of the most recognizable voices in rock 'n' roll, Cinderella frontman Tom Keifer released his first solo album, The Way Life Goes, in April. He's also travelling across the U.S. on his first solo tour to support the album. We caught up with Tom and spoke about the album, touring, his voice, streaming music, and chili dogs.

You just played Canton at the Hall Of Fame Festival. How did that go?
It was awesome. It was a lot of fun. We got to tour the Hall Of Fame in the afternoon, which I had never done before. I had my son Jaidan with me and Savannah who's on tour, so that was cool. That's how the day started. And then... great show! Great crowd and a really great time.

The Way Life Goes, your first solo album, was released back in April. It was ten years in the making. At any point were you concerned it wasn't going to see the light of day?
Probably the whole time we were making it! It was really a leap of faith. It was really about making the music. We produced it independently of a label, so right then and there we had no idea if anyone was going to pick it up. We took a long time to make it. There was also the concern that the whole time we were making it I was having a lot of voice struggles. I wasn't sure that what I was putting then on tape was even something that I'd be able to reproduce live ever, so there were a lot of aspects that made it a walk in the dark or a walk of faith.

So far, it turned out okay. My voice has gotten stronger over the years. I've been on tour and been able to sing the material fairly well and we also were fortunate enough to have the record picked up by a great label, Merovee Records, who is doing a great job of getting it out there.

Were these songs that you originally wrote for Cinderella but they didn't fit for one reason or another or were these always for your sole use only?
I started writing for the solo record in the mid '90s when Cinderella parted ways with Mercury Records and we were drifting apart, purely because we didn't have an outlet for our music or support of a label at that point. So I started thinking about a solo record then and I just started writing. When I write songs, I don't think about what it's for. There's a lot of stuff that I write that's not appropriate for me or Cinderella and probably better for another artist but usually they just lay around because I'm not actively pitching songs. I just write to write and the idea of actually recording and producing a solo record just kept getting put on the back burner for years until 2003 which is when I decided to start production and recording. There was a lot of songs piled up by then and certainly some of them could've been on a Cinderella album.

You're also on your first solo tour. How's that been going?
It's been great. We've been out off and on since February. I think we've done about forty dates so far this year. It's been cool to play some new material and I'm also playing some of the old Cinderella stuff. It's been a lot of fun.

What's your favorite song to perform live from The Way Life Goes?
Hmm... Probably "Solid Ground."



You mentioned the problem with your voice. How are things nowadays?
It's pretty stable now. It's been an up-and-down battle since the early '90s when I was first diagnosed with the partially paralyzed vocal cord. I was told I would never sing again. There was no magical cure for that. Basically, it's been a struggle, bouncing from one coach and speech pathologist to another, trying to pick up whatever knowledge I could gather to try and teach my vocal cord to work right again. Over the years, it's gotten stronger and more stable but there were years of hell when I couldn't sing at all. I would try to and I'd injure myself. I've had six surgeries to repair those kind of injuries, what I refer to as the collateral damage from singing with the weakness.

I feel fortunate that it's pretty stable now and some nights it's stronger than it was before I had the problems. It's still a daily maintenance thing, a lot of therapy and exercises to keep it in shape.

What is your daily routine like for your voice? How many hours do you have to put in?
Usually about ninety minutes, rain or shine, year round. Sometimes I take days off to give it a little rest. Even on a show day, my warm-ups can be ninety minutes to even two hours sometimes before a show. One of the symptoms of the condition is extended warm-up. It just takes forever for your cords to get into that place where they can actually perform. It's part of the condition.

On Facebook the other day, you wrote about how companies with unfair royalty payments are hurting the development of new artists. Would you like to elaborate on that?
I think it just comes down to the thing about the lost revenues in the industry. There's a lot of emphasis placed on that lost revenue contributing to artists not being paid fairly for their creations, which is true. That's just one aspect of it because the lost revenue in the industry due to illegal downloading and some of these streaming networks, a lot of that revenue that's been lost would flow back through record companies and publishing companies to develop artists. I was lucky enough to come up in a time when a label would spend a lot of time and money to record a record. They would not only record the first one, but the second and a third, add develop an artist and bring the artist along. I think that that's an aspect of how the industry's been hit that a lot of people don't think about because the emphasis is put on unfair rates paid to artists, which doesn't resonate with a lot of fans. I think the broader picture of up-and-coming artists not getting the same opportunities afforded to them because of the lost revenues is a much broader issue and problem and I think the window is closing and getting smaller and smaller for those kind of opportunities for new artists. It's sad.



What advice would you give to a band starting out today?
It all starts with the music and that music should be you. It should be uniquely you and come from your soul. Don't chase trends, stick to what's true to you and what's in your heart. If you do that and you're fortunate enough, maybe the trend will become you. That's first and foremost, no matter what generation you're in. Secondly, every generation has its challenges to overcome. The more you can arm yourself with information and knowledge and try to figure out how to get around the challenge you face today, it's important. We had our set of challenges, there's nothing new, there's always challenges. So you stick to your dream and figure out how to make it happen.

This goes beyond music, too. The current challenges due to technology [are] really punching the creative industry hard due to lost revenues. It goes into literature, movies. It goes into software development because a lot of that is pirated. It's way beyond just music. It has a real domino effect, too. Look at all the bookstores closing, all the movie stores closing, all the record stores that are gone. Obviously, it's a far-reaching problem beyond people being paid fairly for their creations. Which I'm not saying isn't an issue, I think that is an issue. It comes down to the technical term which is intellectual property, which applies to software, literature, movies, music. And I'm sure there's a bunch that I'm not even thinking about.

Are there any plans for a Cinderella tour or album in the future?
Certainly touring. We're on a hiatus this year because we toured three years in a row and burned the candle at both ends. As far as a record goes, it would need to be the right situation and obviously that situation is affected greatly by the current state of the industry. It's why I chose to produce my record independently of a label. I didn't want my music to be subject to the attitude about the artist development or recording funds or budgets of today. Once you sign with a label, they give you x amount to make a record. When you come to the end of that x amount, they tell you you're done. If artistically you don't feel your music's done, you're faced with a compromise. I felt I didn't want to do that to my music.


This was thirty years ago, but how did the Pat's Chili Dogs commercial come about?
I don't know exactly how it came about. We were a local band. Cinderella was all original from the beginning. We had all played in cover bands prior to that but once Cinderella was formed, it was all original music. There was only a couple of clubs locally that would allow that to happen. If I remember correctly, the owner of that hot dog establishment saw us at one of these shows and approached us to do a jingle for him. I was faced with the challenge of... He told me all the information, the locations, and everything that had to be in the jingle. I never wrote a jingle before. Wrote it, went in and recorded it, and then he shot the commercial for it.

MTV was really big then. We weren't signed and didn't have a video. He was smart and I think his business probably went through the roof. He wanted to take a young rock band, create the jingle, create the commercial, and then he went and bought all this advertising time for the commercial on MTV locally. We felt like we were on MTV. It was a good trade-off. I think he sold a lot of hot dogs and we got a little recognition.

So do you get free chili dogs for life?
I think if we pulled through there, he'd hook us up.

A lot of artists write books, giving all the details from back in the day. Any chance we'll get one from you?
A book? I've been approached. I just don't feel the story's over yet. I don't know if I'll ever write one. I'm a pretty private person. But the offers and approaches I've had so far didn't feel like anything I wanted to do. But that's not to say there won't be a day.

One day they decide to make a movie about Cinderella. Who plays Tom Keifer?
That's a loaded question, my friend. I'm not much of an actor, but maybe I should just go with playing the role myself. At least that way I would know it was accurate.

More Tom Keifer: Official | Facebook | Twitter

Robert Williams: The Culture Brats Interview

If you're searching for a definitive image to represent the roaring life of Robert Williams, you will grow weary with indecision and will be hard pressed to come up with something that won't be tossed out for not fully capturing it all. Luckily for you, the newly released film Robert Williams Mr. Bitchin' comes about as close as you can get to the sustained burst of the prolific and important artist as well as a compelling inside look at the astoundingly groundbreaking work and contributions of the trailblazer to whom so many owe so much.

If you've never seen his work, my suggestion would be to immediately remedy this by feasting your eyes on this compelling documentary that is fierce, funny, and strangely sentimental. With all of life's tedium and banality, everybody needs more Robert Williams in their day.

I just watched Mr. Bitchin' and I loved it.
Really?

Yes. I was a little floored actually. They've unleashed this thing on the populace and it provides a pure escape into the fringes of your galaxy. It was like whiplash and a bit of an artistic history trip, with so much packed into one film I felt I'd been gone for two years but I suspect it didn't even scratch the surface of all the places you could've gone. How far were you willing to let the filmmaker delve into your pool and did you want anything off limits for the viewer?
That's very kind of you, I appreciate you saying that. For me and my wife Suzanne, this was really torturous.

Really?
Yeah, it took three film crews over twenty years and they boil that down for well over two hundred hours of footage. So it was an ongoing thing that just kept going on and on and on. I am so happy with the result, but I couldn't do it again. I absolutely couldn't do it again. Here's the problem: to be an artist or a writer or an actor, you have to perpetrate yourself as a celebrity and you have to push this on people. That isn't my makeup. I'm not trying to feign humility here, but continuously trying to push myself as somebody special is more than I want to do beyond the artwork. You understand what I'm saying?

It's an interesting slice of the whole pie in that you have to become a certain something that you are not in order to get what you are doing in front of people.

That's exactly right. Continually trying to be a nice guy and being humble and you know I'm just as much of a jackass as anybody else and I have an ego and I just really don't want the bad side of me to come out. I'm just all the time trying to watch myself, and I see myself in the film and I get so tired of myself. After seeing rush after rush, year after year, and thinking well, they got this far, I've got to keep this thing going. I hope what you saw, you appreciate because it was fresh. I don't have that luxury. I can't see that thing fresh.

Yeah, and I also had no idea that this was an ongoing neverending culling of your life for a twenty-year span. That's like making the world's longest movie. I thought this was put together from found historical footage, your personal stuff, and the work the filmmakers did.
No, it took three different film crews over more than twenty years and one film crew would pass it on to the other.

That is a long time to have someone watching you.
Not so much about me and Suzanne, but I think what's really interesting and important about this film is you get to see the underground and alternative art world that no one gets to see, and you get to see it over a long period of time. It's a window into underground comics and the psychedelic posters and the hot rod and gallery world. There's really no other way for a person to get a glimpse of that.

It really was a bit of a history lesson... I'm looking at Artie Shaw alongside of Von Dutch, etc. and I'm still astounded at the number of incredible people that they packed into this film about you. Also, you provide an interesting link between two unconnected worlds: commercial success and absolute artistic freedom. You seemingly never had to worry about playing it safe. Looking closely at the film, you are driven to work your ass off and leave some mark on the world but you say that off-the-wall paintings are the hardest way to success. Could you have chosen an easier way?

Well, the thrust of my life is to take enjoyable visionary work and shove it into the real art world. Now, the art world is not the friendly place you think it is. For my whole life, I have made a direct assault and entry into the real art world. It even started out in art school as an enormous amount of criticism during the abstract expressionist period when I tried to do realism. Realism was absolutely forbidden, and it still is to a certain extent. To come in with enjoyable cartoon artwork that has disregard for political correctness and to completely do away with the boogeyman of sophistication and just say "Look, this is what is really interesting, let your eyes do the looking." Your intellectual powers seem to fail you. I've been through some very important galleries and had very very important connections in the art world and I've tried to play the politics of the whole thing. I've come to the table with this off-the-wall stuff that's really been a struggle. That's what my life is really about, that's my essence. People interpret that movie as a relationship between a man and a woman, in fact when that film was showing at the Museum Of Modern Art in New York, one guy said I should have never gotten into art, I should've been a marriage counselor. I don't know, the film is for your judgement now, I think I've worn myself out on it.

So many worlds, people, and even endless facts and side stories collide in your paintings and other work that you actually have to invest time to really look. It's like getting hit with a technicolor bat. Do you ever have someone purchase something and you feel like they'll never fully appreciate the amount of furious spectacle and detail you put into it all?
Yeah, of course. But you know, I have to sell them because that keeps me alive and pays the mortgage and lets me have a future to do more of them. You know, there are always certain people who have investigative skills. And you come to find out that people in the arts aren't the ones who have them. So there's always a disappointment, a guy will say, "Well I bought the painting because it had a number six in it."

That guy might have missed something.
I mean, well, I sold a painting, it paid for its time, it will keep me going. I just have to live beyond the disappointment.

In the film there's talk of rule breaking, causing offense, and the burden of being not pleasant but accurate, and I found myself rewinding and continuously laughing at the section where you plainly spell out that horses actually don't like people and the only thing keeping your house cat from devouring you is its diminutive size. Do you think people's projecting their own crazy fantasies of what they want the world to be versus what really lies beneath is part of the appeal of your work? That maybe it opens your eyes to something you knew, but didn't necessarily want to acknowledge?
Well, for every three supporters I pick up, I pick up six or seven people who can't stand me.

You are not without your critics, that's for sure.
Yeah. The New York Times is always waiting for me, you know? I'm a prime target for them. Back when William Wilson was the head critic for the LA Times, he would always ride me. He said my art was like bad country and western music. They are always laying in wait. When the very few people come up and appreciate my work and I can make a living at it, it's justified. It's really justified.



Critics love to make sweeping generalizations about the future of art but it's always some rogue upstart who comes out of nowhere to shake things up from the unlikeliest of places. I never thought the playing field would become level enough for all kinds of different artists to compete and become known for telling a new story with a completely unique thumbprint. Now, thanks in large part to the trail you have blazed, they have somewhere to go, they can show work, they are taken seriously and enjoyed by people who may not have seen them otherwise. I know that's like an albatross around your neck saying everything before you was one way and everything after was different. But it's true.
I'm the guy who laid down over the barbed wire so they could walk over in comfort.

Exactly. Sorry to make you the Moses here, but you sort of parted the Red Art Sea.
There wasn't a lot happening for these type of artists before you.
You are exactly right. I want to be modest, but in that respect I can't be. Because I just had no support for years. I had no peer group for a long, long time.

That's got to be a lonely place, is it not?
It is. It really is. When I had so many friends that were in the arts, and they were all abstract expressionists and later conceptualists and minimalists, and they all referred to me as "The Illustrator". I haven't made it yet! I'm in one of the biggest galleries in New York, Tony Shafrazi, and I've got in the Whitney and all, but man it has just been an uphill climb like swimming up a waterfall or something.

Yeah, but it's also been constant forward motion.
I've had some very important support and let me explain some of my support. In that film there was a shy guy that only showed up a couple of times in the movie, his name is Walter Hopps, and I'm sure you didn't remember him.

No, I took notes. Got his name right here. Walter Hopps will be here in 20 minutes, right?
Walter Hopps, okay. Walter Hopps made Ed Ruscha and Ed Kienholz and all the artists on the west coast in the fifties and sixties. He made them. He was the director of the Pasadena Museum, started all the west coast art. He tried to get Von Dutch to be an artist in the mid fifties. He had a Zap Comix show at the Corcoran Museum in Washington DC in 1970. Before he died, he was in charge of the Menil Collection in Houston and head curator at the Guggenheim in New York. Shortly before he died, he was not only nominated but elected in Europe as the world's number one museum director and curator. Walter Hopps was one of my biggest supporters. Before he died, he was working on a show at the Guggenheim, but his passing from illness caused that show to die out. But that would have been an enormous turning point in art if that show would've come about.

A number of very important people push me and help me. On the other hand, I've had museum directors in town that said they would have nothing to do with me. It's kind of a blind struggle.

Most people would simply throw up their hands and give up after so many obstacles. You seem to have an overabundance of character and drive, which seems hugely essential for success in anything but it strikes me as quintessentially an American trait. The work ethic and the never say die undercurrent that runs through the film gives it its punch. You get up at 4:00 AM and start burning it at both ends.
Look, I'm seventy years old. Let some young people take this thing, I don't know. I need someone to ride the back up now. I'm looking for some young turks to come in here and let me get in their slip stream. I've about had it.

It probably wasn't surprising to learn that people pick up your work from all angles and places and that sometimes people attach it to something they've created to promote what they've done. For instance, the Guns N' Roses Appetite For Destruction album cover. When musicians choose that for their album art, do you stop and take stock, worrying that certain kinds of avenues of exposure put a boot on your throat? Are there mutual expectations from both sides, or does something like that not even cross your radar?
Well, that Guns N' Roses thing was an odd situation. In the eighties, I was doing a large number of paintings that appealed to the punk rock world and they were called Zombie Mystery paintings. I had a lot of garage bands that I was licensing the images of paintings to and I heard about a call from San Francisco about some band called Guns N' Roses. They were fucking unheard of. Absolutely unheard of and I said "Well, that's not a good image for you. Come over and go through my slides and pick something else." So this guy Axl comes over and he goes through the slides and he goes, "Well, I just want the Appetite For Destruction painting" and I told him, "You're going to get in a lot of trouble but if you have the balls to do that man, more power to you. I'll tell you the sequence of events you're going to face. First, it's going to be the parents groups and then the churches and then you'll discover you can't get the thing through the Canadian borders. It's like a whole line of things is going to be your problem."

You actually predicted almost exactly what happened.
Yeah, you know, these people were nobody so I let them have this at garage band, punk rock price, see? I just gave it to them. This thing went on fourteen million albums. Just the t-shirt design they lifted off of there that I never saw money [from]. So they made a lot of money off this and it kind of left a bad taste in my mouth. And then when they started getting in trouble with the feminist groups, I was on radio a bunch of times, I was on MTV a couple of times defending this thing. Newspapers calling me all the time, I was the only one articulate enough to defend an image that I told them not to use.

I remember the MTV one. There was a whole rigamarole about what the image did and didn't represent and you laid it out pretty convincingly.
Well, I guess it all worked out. God, I don't know. I certainly wouldn't do it again. They came to me again for a cover and I just turned them down. I couldn't do that again.

At the end of this film I was actually not expecting for someone to throw out the question, "Are you happy?" And you turn to the camera and say very simply, "I am happy" and it ended on this lovely note. You come off as having a wonderful practicality, married with a warm off-kilter madness, but a controlled guy in full control of his faculties and very likable. You mentioned that you really watched yourself during the long filming. Do you ever want to have yourself an angry creative moment where you don't act so civilized?
Believe me, I'm not as stable as you think. I've worked hard all my life but I've had my fair share of problems. I've got this wonderful wife Suzanne and we both realized that you have to stabilize your life in order to get through it. You have to be very careful with every thing you do, and problems will drag you down. I guess in my neighborhood I pass myself off as a square. Just an old man running children off my yard.

Get off my lawn!
Yeah, so. I'm very very happy. I look back on my life and wonder how did I get to be seventy years old? How do I have a house? A wonderful wife and seven cars? Everything is just great, you know? I just wish that I could've changed the art world, ya know? Made it a little more open.

You know what? I think you underestimate yourself. You actually did. Watching this film left me with a great feeling about what could potentially open up and happen in the art world. It really did.
You've been so kind to me. You just really made my day great. I really appreciate it. I hope we run into each other one of these days.

Robert Williams Mr. Bitchin' is available now on DVD and VoD.

Toad the Wet Sprocket: The Culture Brats Interview

After sixteen years (sixteen long years, I might add), Toad the Wet Sprocket, a seminal band for many of us in the '80s and '90s, is coming out with another album! Currently on tour, Toad is releasing its new album New Constellation on September 3rd, 2013. This band was known for their thoughtfully deep lyrics. So it's no surprise that when I caught up with lead singer Glen Phillips we had quite a philosophical discussion about the new album, the work process, the current economy, and coming together again as a band after so long.

Hello! How are you doing today?
I'm doing well. Yeah. It's all good, I suppose.

I know you are in the middle of your tour. How's that going?
Oh, so far it's been great. We just played a few shows and you know getting... switching out crew and you know whatever else, just kind of getting up to speed I guess. But, all considered, it's been quite wonderful. Happy audiences. I mean the main thing is that it's been good to have new songs. Even just a few new ones that makes a huge difference to have something that's not fifteen, sixteen, twenty years old.

So you're playing a lot from your new album then?
Oh, we're playing a few from the new album. I mean, you know, obviously only a handful of people have the new record. And there's only so far you want to stretch an audience as far as new material. But you know, we're playing a few and we're having a lot of fun doing it.

I know you guys have toured on and off over the years but what made Toad decide to start touring again full time?
Well, I've always toured full time.

I know you have!
Yeah. We would try playing a few shows here and there and... I don't know, it's kind of a chicken and the egg thing. At some point it just felt a lot better. It felt like we could make a record and there's no point in making a record unless you're going to work it. I mean, this doesn't mean I'm not doing other projects anymore. This doesn't mean other people won't be doing other projects. But you know for now we're going to be doing one thing and do it well, and put the right effort into it to make it worthwhile. So this is what we're doing this season and we're all kind of investing our time and effort. But more than anything we just did it because we felt like we could all show up and enjoy it and do the right job on it. In the past there was still kind of too much history or strangeness looming over our heads. In the last few years it just seems like we all grew up enough or got over attitudes or whatever it was to make it so we were all happy to be there. So while it's like that we should be playing shows.

John Waite: The Culture Brats Interview

Occasionally, there are days when I hit a hot streak while flipping through the thousands of similar-sounding songs on the radio and I have a flashback. Those kind of flashbacks remind me of all the rabble-rousers who struck a chord for those of us sick and tired of the same bland nonsense. That's when you get that zing of a wake-up call that music runs deeper than what we are fed on a daily basis.

Not too long ago I stumbled upon a rock block consisting of the band and solo work of John Waite and realized that beyond his credentials, which would be impressive to both listeners and music experts alike, there was something else. Beautiful but raw songs, born of what I can only assume are God-given talents but also embraced by legions of longtime hardcore fans.

Because I was having a hard time articulating exactly why John Waite is so great, I decided we'd have a chat and talk about music, art, and the key to longevity... even when you have a terrible cold.

Hey John how are you doing today?
Well, I've got a small cold. I'm up to my eyeballs in antibiotics so I'm a little loopy, but other than that, I'm good. Thanks for asking.

Oh gosh, I'm sorry to hear that you're sick.
Ah, I'm not that bad.I'm on a z-pack.

Those are great.
Yeah, they're really good, but it's a bit like being from outer space for me at the moment.

If you give any bizarre answers I'll take them out when I edit, sound fair?
There you go.

Since you've got so much going on, I'd like to start out talking about Live: All Access. Live music is near and dear to many people's hearts, myself included. Is this supposed to be like a breath of fresh air for listeners, a sort of push back against all the digitized perfection of what's out there right now, since all the raw power of music and even the interesting mistakes are glossed over in most productions? What's the reason for the live album now?
Exactly what you said just there. Just write it down and that would be the answer. It's kind of like it really is a knee jerk reaction to all the synthesized, digitized, showbiz-ized kind of thing that's happened to rock and roll over the last ten years. I mean after leaving Bad English, I started a whole different writing style really. Became mostly a songwriter for a couple of years. And then gradually moved back into singing and becoming more engaged in rock. Which was great because I had a backlog of songs that were also country or blues or whatever, but I had a pretty big catalog. This time around, it was really about capturing the spirit of a live band. We had a new guitar player Keri Kelli; he had played with Slash and Alice Cooper. Our other guitar player moved to Chicago and decided he wasn't going to play gigs anymore and we were just stuck without a guitar player and then Keri showed up. I can't even remember quite how we got in touch with him, but he showed up and within three weeks we were doing shows. And about two months into it--we never rehearsed--that was a big thing. We plugged in, this friend of ours just did the session, and we just kind of sat around and played some stuff and he was on. But about two months into playing the gigs everything changed. He really seemed to get it, you know?

Like lightning in a bottle.
There you go. It's exactly it. And I realized something was going on that was intangible, really as far as technical things go. It was pure energy and music and I wanted to capture that as fast as I could. We started with two shows in south Philly, in a church that's been converted into a recording facility called Philly Sound. We bought three kegs of beer for two nights and announced it on the radio as a free concert and we did two shows. Some of the shows were great, some were a little out of tune and couldn't be used, but we got a big selection of songs. There and then, two months later I decided to try it again and by this time the band was on ten. We went up to New Hampshire, in the middle of winter.

Ugh. Cold.
Yeah, Manchester. Ice cold. And I don't know how it happened but it was just one of those things where all the planets align and everything just goes right. Although, the sound check was terrible, and I thought, "Oh no" and then we plugged in. But the audience went nuts and from the downbeat we had this incredible show. I sang my ass off, sang well, I was holding back in the end and Keri and the rhythm section were locked and it was one of those shows. A majority of the album comes from that show. It's trying to go back to that thing that you heard in Rolling Stones live stuff or the similar seventies bands that could do it really well like Humble Pie. It's like going back to that before synthesizers kind of made it so middle of the road. There are no overdubs on this whatsoever. It's completely live so that's why I'm proud of it.

It's really great. And part of the fun for me is that I've seen so much live music in my life I like to think I can really appreciate a great spontaneous performance. So many people have so many wonderful memories tied to the epic concerts of their life. The audience really does play such a large role in the whole experience.
Yes. Absolutely. You get the bounce from the audience when you are on stage. It's like being in some vast moment of communion. It's like everybody is in this space together. That's what my job is. I've said this before: the only difference between me and the audience is that I've got the mic. That there is something that happens that pulls us all together. That's rock and roll that's just worth every second. It's what it's all about.

So many people come away with life-changing experiences at a concert. Some terrible and some life-affirming. You've done your fair share of concerts for the masses and I was wondering what some of your best and worst memories of being on stage?
Oh man. Well, one of the worst would have to be being pulled off stage at the Palladium.

With the Babys, right?
Yeah, pulled off stage by an overzealous fan by the lead in my cord and my bassist. Some girl ran up and I just went straight into the audience, and that was our opening night in New York. So that was a lot of fun.

Welcome to New York.
Ha, I know right. Also, on the way back from Japan we were added to a gigantic bill in Hawaii in some gigantic stadium and they were having power outages and things like that. It was very badly put together and we all had terrible jet lag. We went on stage in broad daylight and everything blew up but the bass sound and I remember singing "Head First," just me and Ricky Phillips, him playing the bass and there are about thirty thousand people watching. But, conversely, there are moments when you do an acoustic show in a theater somewhere and there's such an immediate connection to the audience where there is such a profound oneness and your feet are on the ground and your head is in the clouds, you are somewhere else and it's almost like sleepwalking but it's a vivid experience. Like I said, these songs that I wrote and even in Bad English there are songs on an album called When You Were Mine that are almost country, but then kind of aren't. They are story songs. And you can put those songs into those shows and then do an unplugged version of "Head First" and it just brings the house down. That's where I want to live. I want to live in a world where I can do those kind of songs and then turn around and rock until the roof comes off.

Spose: The Culture Brats Interview

Spose has been called "The next great white rapper" by Vibe magazine. I was nervous speaking to him because I had never really spoken to a rapper before. But the guy I got on the phone with, real name Ryan Peters, was very kind and very candid about his career.

How are you doing? Thank you for taking the time to talk.
I'm doing good. I appreciate my PR girl sending me an email 10 minutes ago reminding me to talk to you. I was about to walk into this Mexican restaurant.

How long have you been working on this mixtape coming out on June 10?
I actually started working on this mixtape about two years ago. I was recording my previous album, The Audacity!, and for that album, I played all the instruments. I had these 64 track sessions, and sometimes I got fed up with making these elaborate songs. I just wanted to rap. So I would pull up a beat from one of my buddies and rhyme over that and that was the beginning of the The Peter Sparker Mixtape. It was me rapping for fun again instead of trying to make this epic Rock Opera that was my last album.

How did you choose that title?
My last name is Peters. I considered myself a pothead super hero, so since 2003 I've had that name. I've always done albums and I thought if I ever did a mixtape, I would called it Peter Sparker Mixtape because that was my more rappy alias.

Marvel hasn't sent you a cease and desist letter yet?
Not yet. I think the "S" on Sparker keeps them away. But I'm not that famous. I'm sure if it becomes popular they'll come looking for their money. I find people don't come to look for you until you're making a shitload of money.

You emphasized that Peter Sparker won't have many pop songs. What was your reasoning behind that?
Coming out of my Universal stint where they had a metaphorical gun to my head to make pop records, I was so turned off by that process. So with this record, I wanted to spit in the face of that and make rap songs.

For those that don't know, what's the difference between making a pop song versus the rap songs that will be on this mixtape?
When you're writing a pop record, you're writing the chorus first. When you're writing a rap song, you're writing the verses first.

What lyrical themes will you explore?
My last album was a bummer theme-wise because it was about things like domestic abuse, bullying, and suicide. So I wanted to take a step back and do lighter material. My favorite song on this new mixtape is about my car, a 2003 Nissan Altima.