Untitled Document

Speedo Interview - Rocket From The Crypt

Speedo Interview
1998-06-23
Virtual Cardiff
http://www.virtualcardiff.co.uk/music/rocket.cfm
Interview with Speedo
23 June 1998

Rocket From The Crypt is the band's second release on Interscope, or Elemental in Europe. Are you pleased with what the band has produced with Kevin Shirley at the production desk?
Yeah, totally - I don't think it's the definitive record, you never really make that, 'cos if you do, you might as well just pack up - I think it's the best one yet though. I think everybody has their finest moment on it once you break it down to a more personal level, and that as a whole it works really well.

Rocket from the Crypt have never employed a producer prior to Rocket from the Crypt, and you've admitted that you are not technically minded - but the other albums all sounded fine. Why change?
'Cos we just wanted to be alleviated from the stress of worrying about keeping something that we thought should sound a certain way and trying to get it right. We just wanted to get in there and play, because this material warranted that approach, like Scream Dracula Scream warranted the approach we took for that. What had happened on Scream Dracula Scream was that we spent about a month and a half recording the damn thing, you know; we had walls of vintage amplifiers, we had like three drum kits in the room, we had orchestras coming in to do this and that - it was basically cool and really fun - but it was very unlike what we do and what we're like when we play live and, uh, when we came to that time to mix the record it was just such a nightmare, making sense of everything. We had to enlist the help of someone to mix the record cos we were very unhappy with everything we'd done. That was like the first time where we kinda like realised that help applied the right way could be a cool thing; help can create something that's really unattainable. So, that opened the door for us to use Kevin on this record, we did not want to be laboured over any of the technical bullshit at all, you go in have fun and that's what we did!

Do you think having a producer restricted you in any way?
Definitely not because ultimately it's my record - I'll do whatever the hell I want to do.

Why did you decide on Kevin Shirley as Producer?
We'd heard specifically one thing he did with Aerosmith that had like horns on it and it had a really cool like vibe and we were like, hey, if he can make that band sound like that imagine what he can make us sound like. So um, that was the thing, we liked the way the horns were treated, we liked the way it was done and we actually talked to the guy and it was like, you know, the only way I really make records is this live way, in the live setting. That was cool 'cos that's what we wanted to do.

Am I correct in saying that the album was recorded completely live with virtually no overdubs?
Yeah, that's true. There were a couple of overdubs - there was like a vocal thing on one of the songs where the horn players were singing while they were playing, a backing thing on a part where there were already horns. Obviously that sort of thing is an overdub. There's another thing on percussion on "You Gotta Move" that's overdubbed where Apollo 9 kinda did this percussion thing. His hands were full on the sax at the time. That's about it, I think there were three songs with overdubs.

Was the entire album recorded in New York City?
Yeah. It was.

Why did you decide on New York City on the East coast when you live on the West coast?
That was pretty much one of the things that was Kevin's call, like, you know, 'hey this room over here like suits making records' with the kinda live thing going on and you can get really great separation there - just hang out in the same room and do it.

You had about 40 songs for the new album - how many did you record?
Yeah, there were even more than that. We recorded 16. That's it. We recorded three extra songs: Strangehold, Cheetah and Raped by Ape, and all three of those are either out or coming out as B sides.

Were the songs for the album chosen democratically?
Well, it was pretty obvious the songs we were going to use, the ones that were happening and the ones that weren't. A song like Cheetah, which was one that we really wanted to put on the record but we did not want to have fourteen songs on the record - it felt like hey, you know, Cheetah's a great song, but there's some great songs that do that thing on the record whereas we didn't want to sacrifice taking any of the other flavours off.

Less is more?
Yeah, we wanted to have only 12 songs on the record but it was impossible to make that cut so 13 it was. 13's our lucky number.

How many singles do you plan to release from the album?
Well there's one out right now, that came out today called When in Rome (do the jerk); that's just the one rocket shaped vinyl. And we'll be doing one for Lipstick which will be a couple of CDs and a 7" with various tracks, some recorded in San Diego and some recorded in L.A., and there were a couple of tracks recorded in New York City. Then after that we're gonna be putting out a lot of vinyl in the next year, just different releases. We have a live thing that we're gonna be working on - it'll be like only available at the shows we're playing. We have a couple of re-mix things also. Just a few things like that, you know, easy things that you can sell for a couple of dollars at shows 'cos they're so cheap to make, so that there's constantly cool stuff coming out. If you don't want it, you don't have to buy it. It's basically inspired by coming over here, the whole vinyl culture is such a cool thing. There's so many compilations of old soul records, stuff like that, different mixes. I'm not into and know very little about electronic music. Rock and roll music and soul music and live music - it's so great. Over here it still has such a place, you know, there's still a lot of people who really like that.

How long did Rocket From The Crypt take to record?
Two weeks as opposed to two months for Scream Dracula Scream.

Any plans to release a live Rocket album?
No, not really they're all usually pretty terrible, although some of my favourite albums are live albums - AC/DC - If You Want Blood, that's a cool album; also MC5 Kick Out the Jams, Otis Reading Live at The Whiskey - that's amazing - James Brown, Revolution in the Mind.

Any plans for an All Systems Go II?
Well, yeah, but first of all we gotta put out All Systems Go again because it's been unavailable for so long, so hopefully that'll happen but, yeah, we wanna do a volume II - we've been talking about it for 2 years now.

What are your touring commitments at the moment?
We've got a few things on, then we go back to the States, we got a pretty cool tour lined up in the States playing with a lot of really great bands: The Make Up, Delta 72, Trans am. We're really excited about that. We just did the Foo Fighters tour prior to coming over here - that was for a month - that was really cool.

You're playing Glastonbury Festival this weekend, but you've had some bad experiences with festivals, haven't you?
Oh yeah, the whole thing with the Reading Festival was really wild. At the end of that gig we ended up getting fined £3,000 'cos we exceeded the noise level, that was the lamest thing. The generator also ran out of fuel! Totally stupid.

Something I'm sure Virtual Cardiff's readers would like to know - will Rocket From The Crypt be coming back to Wales?
YEAH, yeah, right. I think it'll be in uh September? We have a connection with the Welsh! Awesome! I don't know what the connection is. I think Wales is the most unpretentious part of the U.K. and I think that's why we like it there.

Have you ever thought about releasing some songs by yourself?
Yeah there have been some times when I thought "these are really cool things that I'd like to do", um...I think there's some stuff I was working on, kinda like a more orchestrated production, you know, kinda like more Neil Diamond type stuff, that I would really like to do some day when the time is right. You know, I'm so lucky to be in this band - the people in the band, man, they're amazing.

Why did you get rid of the sideburns?
I got rid of them because change is good!

What are you listening to at the moment?
I think the new Fugasi record is fucking awesome, I think it's really great. The new Trans am record's really good. The Beach Buggy album's really cool. There's a band called the Detroit Cobras that are really cool, I like them a lot. It's mostly R'n'B and rock and roll covers - the woman who sings for them has a great voice.

Are there any particular British bands you're listening to at the moment, apart from Beach Buggy?
As far as Melody Maker and N.M.E. are concerned I don't really see a lot of the stuff I enjoy covered in them. I saw Supergrass at a festival in Australia that we were playing at and I thought they were really cool.

That's it - anything else you wanna tell Virtual Cardiff's readers, John?
Yeah - "Virtual Cardiff Readers" sounds like a really bad name for a techno band! "Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee, we are the greatest RFTC"

Interview by David Hardacre & Rebecca Burns