What bands have you played in? (Jon) I played in Gob (US) and Kralizec with Jensen. Jensen played in Vae Victis, Redrum (Reno), Gehenna, Cold Sweat, and a few others. He is currently in Artimus Pyle and a new band with members of Cold Sweat.
After so many efforts in bands what has made iron lung sustainable? We are only two people.
Being a two piece how do you keep a full sound? Powerful Amplification.
Do you use standard tuning or pedals? what is your gear set and set up in order? I don't use pedals (except a tuner). I generally tune to D. I use a 100 watt Matamp (Jensen's), a 100 watt Sunn Model T, and an Ampeg 2x15" powered by a 400 watt PA head for the low end.
What have you learned to make your sound better? Pure sound and volume are all you really need.
Why did you leave reno? We just needed to leave that place. It took so long because that is where I grew up. Reno is a very strange town. It can be a lot of fun and it can be an ultimate bummer.
What was the first grind show? My first grind show or Iron Lungs first grind show? I'm not really sure what my first grind show was. Our first official show was at Resurrection Records in Reno, Nevada with Yellow Machine Gun from Japan some time in 2000.
Favorite show ever played, and favorite show ever seen? That is a tough one. We've played so many shows in the last 6 years. One of my favorite shows was in LA. It was a perfect show. Too bad very few people were there to witness it. One of my favorite shows I witnessed was the Jesus Lizard in Sacramento. I don't remember what year it was, but there were very few people at that show. That didn't seem to matter to David Yow. He was on fire that night. I think he just wanted to destroy everyone who did bother to show up.
Do you find yourself using unusual sources for lyrics? I guess if you consider medical reference/text books an unusual source, then yes.
What is the Freq Factory? It is the worlds first portable electronic scratch music instrument.
Who makes it? We are the Opus Frequency Labs, an independent designer of DJ and electronic music instruments and toys. Opus Freq Labs was founded as a collaboration between the Opus X dj crew, and Scientist Mike from NASA research. OFL was created to provide DJ's and electronic musicians an independent outlet for custom equipment. It is their belief that in an art form where the equipment dictates the type of musical expression available it is absolutely important for artists to take an active role in designing and building their instruments.
How does it work? The Freq. Factory is a portable battery powered instrument. By combining an adjustable synth tone, and a digitally sampled scratch sound, with a cross-fader and a vinyl scratch control, users are able to practice and create new music anywhere.
What kind of options are available? Freq Factory v 2.1 comes standard with: *Headphone Out (1/4") *Battery Power (1x9volt) *Pitch Adjust Knob *Scratch Pad *Cross-fader Reverse *Use on both sides (left/right side scratching) *Digital Display *User changeable 5" vinyl record *Small Size(~7"x4"3") *On-board digital "ahh" sample *Pitch Guide Display shows the exact note being scratched (C, Db, D, E, ....) *Key mode let's the user select a major or minor key and scratch only notes from that key. (Future versions will be more customizable.)
Where can people get one? www.opusfreqlabs.com
How long have you been a DJ? Many moons...
What are some of your favorite shows you have played? Renn Fair in Portland, OR Club Nutz in Tokyo, Japan Quarter Note in Sunnyvale, CA
What is your favorite hardcore band? Grindkrime
Any upcoming records? Watch out for the sequel to Rat. vs. Squirrel, Ant vs.Cochroach
What bands have you played in? Lets see.....Backslide, Plutocracy, Sirota, Spazz, ETO, Capitalist Casualties, Bombs of Death, Scholastic Deth, What Happens Next, plus a few other projects here and there. Oh, and the Meat Shits. Ugh.
How long have you been playing drums? Well, I played on other people's stuff since 6th grade, but got my own cheap drumset in 8th grade (around 1986). Never took lessons, and have never really progressed. I am eternally stuck in the same patterns and beats.
What is your favorite drum kit you have ever owned? They are all fine....I started with a crappy rented Ludwig, moved onto a Yamaha turbo-tour (which is what I still play on), and have various touring/beatersets, like a basic Tama, and a basic Yamaha to thrash. In the PLUTO days I used to dream of getting a Sonor or some shit, but then I figure that kinda stuff is not meant for what I do. I'm not tech-death metal, a little 4 piece tama suits me fine. Plus, I don't feel so nervous when singers launch off the kick-drum.
How do you like to set up your drums and why? Minimal kits are best. Four piece I think is the best, although 2 rack toms are fine as well. I think one or two crashes at the most. When I first started I would have all these crashes and shit everywhere, it made no difference. Although I'm a fan of the big ride and crashes, when playing fast they tend not to accent the hits as much since they reverberate for longer.
How old were you when you first recorded? Um, first recording....good question. PLUTO recorded twice with Freeway (immortal fate) working a little 4-track. Before that, BACKSLIDE recorded on a little boombox in our practice space. But the real recording came in 90 with Bart at House of Faith with PLUTO's first demo, "Progress?". I can't really remember the experience. I just remember being nervous, and trying to get used to having head phones on and shit.
How did Plutocracy come about? It was through a bunch of people that skated that I met Jesse the singer, and at that time it was Kindred on guitar and Mike on bass. We were just some really raw and fast basic punk. We practiced for a while and played our first show at the Pony Express pizza, it was insane for how many high school kids came out to see us...after they got a glimpse of this band they had only heard about, they realized how bad we were and never showed up again. It was pretty funny.
What was your favorite Plutocracy show? The old Pony shows were fun, our show at One Step Beyond with MINDROT, PHOBIA, IMMORTAL FATE, EXHUMED, COLOSTOMY was pretty rad as well. We also did these shows at a pizza place in Los Gatos with SLEEP and 976, those were awesome. Back then, just playing a show was an accomplishment, no one wanted to book fast hardcore/grind at all. When we finally got a show at Gilman it was after like 4 years of the band being around and few records being released.
What is your favorite grind show? Hmmm, seeing CARCASS on the symphonies of sickness tour was pretty awesome. INSECT WARFARE are bad-ass, I just saw them like 3 times live and they destroy. They lay to waste most of the fake-ass MTV2 tech grind you hear so much these days...
What is the most bands you have played in at once? I think 5, but most of the time one band would get back from tour and one would get active again. Yet there were times when all bands were going all at once....that was pretty crazy.
How did Spazz come about? Dan and I talked about doing a fast hardcore band...so we just started jamming in his garage around ' 92 or so. I talked about it in an interview I did and Chris read that....he thought it sounded cool so he wrote and asked if we should all get together and do something....the rest is (bad) history...
What was the first 625 release? NO LESS/ETO split EP. Love that record to death, NO LESS were fucking so great.......
Is it hard to keep up on a label being so busy? Yeah, although it's easier to do a label than a band. I pretty much dedicate my time to school 7 days a week, 10 hours a day, but I manage to get in time here and there.
How was it going from singing about evolution and despair in E.T.O. to taking part in the tongue-in-cheek subjects in Spazz or What Happens Next? Hmmm, it wasn't particularly difficult, except that I sucked at singing....My voice didnt really fit with ETO, and singing for SCHOLASTIC DETH was embarrassing, although a lot of fun.....I just feel really uncomfortable performing these days....
What are some of your non-rocking interests? School, school, school. I love reading and teaching classes, etc. I used to skate a lot, but I'm out of the loop out here in NYC, dont really know too many people nor where parks/spots are....
Do you have any dream projects? Just doing some new project with non-scenester people who like to play fast music and aren't flakes......I don't know if I will do another band again though.... just dont have any time to do it these days.
What is your favorite record that you have played on? I like the SCHOLASTIC stuff, I like the last SPAZZ LP, and the WHN Stand Fast LP...those are probably my favorites......
What new bands are getting you stoked these days? FALLEN WORLD, EDORA, STRAIGHT JACKET, SECRET 7, INSECT WARFARE, HATRED SURGE, KNUCKLESCRAPER, XBRAINIAX, WIDESPREADBLOODSHED, WARZONE WOMYN, BRAINHANDLE, CALL THE COPS, NO DICE, DEADFALL, SUBURBAN DEATH CAMP, SECOND OPINION, ROSENBOMBS, FINAL DRAFT, AXRXMX, there's a shitload more........
What is the most sentimental summertime salad days song for you? Side B of SCUM.
Who is your favorite drummer? Olav from LARM and SEEIN RED.
Who is the craziest band you have hung out with? Hmmm, I have no idea......
2. where are you from? I grew up in Ossining, New York. Ossining is a suburb along the Hudson River about 40 minutes north of the Bronx. My hometown’s claim to fame is Sing Sing prison, which was known as the “Death House” because more than 600 prisoners were executed there while the electric chair was in use from 1891 until 1963. The infamous cannibal Albert Fish was electrocuted in Sing Sing in 1936. That’s also where the popular expression “up the river” comes from. If you got caught in the city and sent upstate to Sing Sing, you were fucked. If you grew up in Ossining, you were also fucked.
3. what is the first thing you remember enjoying to draw? Uhh...monsters and girls. Mostly monsters. I used to draw Godzilla a lot and copy pictures out of my older brother’s ‘Famous Monsters of Filmland’ magazines. When I was about 6 years old I really loved to draw the band KISS! I used to collect the Kiss trading cards in the late 70’s and my older brothers and I used to sit around drawing Kiss and listening to Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin records.
4. what are some of the albums you have worked on? I’ve worked with Engorged, Phobia, Autopsy, Abscess, Frightmare, Axiom, Warmachine, Harum-Scarum, Abigail, Machetazo, Hellshock. I think I probably forgot some.
5. what was the first album you did art for? In 1994 I did a drawing for a band called Pineal Ventana from Atlanta, Georgia. They were an unusual art-punk band that used to play at a strip club called the Claremont Lounge. They sounded kind of like Flux of Pink Indians meets Neurosis meets Siouxie & the Banshees. I did a drawing that they ended up using as a tour shirt.
6. what was your first grind show? Probably Disassociate or Assuck. I was listening to fast music like DRI and Cryptic Slaughter when I was a teenager but I actually got into grind pretty late and I didn’t really go to many shows. I grew up during the crossover era and was lucky enough to catch Suicidal Tendencies on the ‘Join The Army’ tour and Anthrax at L’amours in Brooklyn on the ‘Among The Living’ tour. Mosh!!!
7. what do you have in the works? I just finished the cover art for the latest Phobia record called ‘Cruel’. It should be out soon on Willowtip Records. Next up is poster art for the Razorback Records event happening here in Portland this coming June (2006). They don’t want to use the word “fest” but this will be 2 days of beer drinking, death metal fun!
8. how did you hook up with the guys in Machetazo? About 6 years ago I ordered a Machetazo/Rise Above split 7” from Machetazo’s drummer Dopi and we became pen pals. We always talked about doing a project together and a few years ago Dopi asked if I would draw something for a live studio recording called ‘The Maggot Sessions’. The weird thing about that drawing is that the band didn’t know what I was gonna draw and I hadn’t heard what songs they were recording. I had a funny idea that I would surprise them with a spoof of the Iron Maiden album ‘Number of the Beast’ with Italian horror film director Lucio Fulci as Eddie. Without knowing my idea for the art, Machetazo opened that recording with a grind version of Maiden’s intro to ‘Ides of March’! As it turned out, we were all surprised by the strange Iron Maiden synchronicity. And that 7” rules!
9. why can't I find a copy of Destroying Angels? I guess you’ve never asked me for one. In the true D.I.Y. tradition, Destroying Angels is 100% cut & pasted, copied, collated, stapled, and shipped by me alone. I do everything with that fucker. I seem to put out a new issue about once a year and I only print a few hundred copies of each one. There’s really no distribution. It sells pretty well at Reading Frenzy here in Portland and that’s the only store that carries it so far. You can always order copies directly from me (www.dennisdread.com) or from Ajna Offensive (www.theajnaoffensive.com) or Parasitic Records (www.parasiticrecords.com).
10. what is the worst experience you have had with doing art for people? In general, it can be frustrating working with people that have minimal visual understanding or appreciation because they’ll try to give me some stupid concept that makes for horrible imagery. Also, my drawings have been reproduced very poorly over the years, mostly by D.I.Y. punk bands. I’ve seen hours worth of shading turn to shit when a band bumps up the contrast to give it that crappy “punk look”! A good example of that is the Axiom ‘Impaled by Chaos’ art. The worst is watching a band snort tons of coke and then tell you they can’t afford your rates. I also once had a label attempt to “colorize” my drawing in Photoshop. That was bad. But usually I have great experiences working with people. I tend to work with friends or people who just respect my ability and instincts enough to trust what I draw. The best experience was doing the art for an Autopsy DVD recently that should be out soon on Peaceville. The band let me draw whatever I wanted, everybody loved the art, and the label paid me immediately. That’s just about perfect.
11. what is your favorite cover (of yours) so far? I really like the Engorged ‘Where Monsters Dwell’ cover. It’s very simple and stark but it captures the mood I was going for very well. It also has funny details that actually reproduced well, like the advertisement on the back of the comic book. I also really like the drawings I did for the Hellshock/Consume split 7”, but it reproduced like shit.
12. top ten favorite records right now? I only get 10?? Ok. Here goes, off the top of my head: 1. Moondog ‘The Viking of 6th Avenue’ 2. Engorged ‘Where Monsters Dwell’ 3. Golers ‘2nd Generation’ 4. Cro Mags ‘Age of Quarrel’ 5. Ennio Morricone ‘Per Qualche Dollaro In Piu’ 6. Funerot ‘Invasion from the Death Dimension’ 7. Deathspell Omega ‘Kenose’ 8. Anal Vomit ‘Demoniac Flagellations’ 9. Alice Cooper ‘Love it to Death’ 10. Toxic Holocaust ‘Hell On Earth’
13. are you still doing alot of volunteerwork? You’re probably referring to the work I do with homeless kids downtown. I actually get paid to do that. I’ve worked in Portland’s youth shelters for several years and I’ve worked as an intake counselor at an alternative to juvenile detention. Now I’m running a non-profit (duh) street outreach program and I train volunteers to go out on the streets and attempt to assist homeless people. I also go out under bridges and into camps and find young people who might need shelter or GED assistance or drug treatment or mental health evaluations. It’s exhausting and thankless and occasionally rewarding work.
14. how does it feel to be an aging crusty fucker with kids? I’m already an “aging crusty fucker”? Damn. Now that I'm over the shock of that realization, it actually feels pretty good. I became a father at a fairly young age (by today’s standards) and it never occurred to me that I should stop being who I am just because I’m raising children. They’ve grown up right alongside me and we’re very close. I honestly can’t imagine life without my daughter and stepson. The advantages of having children young is that I’ve had a lot of energy to play with them and work and still take care of my own shit. Sleep becomes less important. The obvious disadvantage is that I’m broke all the time and don’t own a house. It’s also sometimes alienating to have to socialize with other parents that are much older than me, but I’m extremely loyal and a very dedicated father. If being a good dad means I don’t wear my Ghoul shirt to the school picnic, well, I can live with that.
15. What is your daughter’s favorite record? Kallisti is almost 9 years old and she loves anything positive and girly. She really likes this harp player named Joanna Newsom. She also really likes Joan Jet and Hilary Duff. I listen to alot of Scandinavian folk music around the house and she loves dancing around to that stuff. But if it makes you feel better, Lebenden Toten dedicated the song ‘Blood Drinkers’ to her at their last show in Portland a few months ago.
16. how was it living over a record label (Tribal War Records.) for a couple years? That was a great and crazy time. Back then the Mississippi House was a fun place and my family lived communally for three years. My kids were very young and I wanted them to experience a sort of extended family environment. I’m not too fond of the nuclear-family ideal and I think that type of “family unit” doesn’t necessarily foster creativity and joy. Children thrive on meaningful interactions with a broad range of people and my kids loved living there. I attribute much of their advanced social maturity and critical thinking to that early experience of living with so many people. They also got to see Tragedy and Atrocious Madness play early shows in our living room! My drawing studio was set up in a ’57 bread truck I had parked in the back yard. I ran an extension cord from the house and had a desk, a lamp, and a stereo. In the winter I would put a space heater under the desk and draw until my hands and feet went numb. I was drawing a lot and broadcasting a weekly metal show on a pirate radio station in the neighborhood that was probably heard by about 3 people...haha. Neil Robinson was a good friend and my kids would sometimes hang out in the Tribal War distro and help package new releases. He was with me when I taught both of my kids to ride bikes. Of course everything has a life cycle and eventually the dynamics in that house became irritating and fell apart. I mostly had huge differences with some of the self-righteous “political” opinions that were circulating. So I moved my family into a house of our own and have never looked back.
17. thanks dennis. My pleasure, Mike.
*Check out Dennis at his new site dennisdread.com (The title for the article is a link)
Thomas "Pig Champion" Roberts, guitarist for Poison Idea, died at his home in Portland, Oregon, Monday night. Variously described as "spectacularly fat", and "the single largest man in hardcore history", Roberts crowned himself "Pig Champion" after hitting an impressive 450 lbs. on the scales. Unfortunately two weeks ago I had just asked Pig Champion to write a story for Grind Nerd and he never replied. I have always thought Poison Idea was rad and I am glad I got to see that fat bastard play his broken and taped together Iceman guitar one last time.
What bands have you played in? Useless Youth, Disruption, Sheep Squeeze, Clout, Spazz, Shed Dwellaz, Canaan, Shadow People, Underbucket, Funeral Shock... Probably some other stuff i forgot.
Why did Spazz chose to use such a deep guitar sound and have the bass cut through so much? I liked the low end chunk and had crappy equipment when we started. eventually i got a new guitar and better gear and the sound brightened up a bit. now i'm the complete opposite, razor sharp, thin as paper.
Is there anything you have learned over the years to improve your stage or recording sound? If you see a band with a killer sound, ask em about their gear. Play through as much shit as you can whenever you have a chance. Change your strings regularly. Don't be afraid to buy some untrendy gear if you think it sounds good. Don't forget to eat.
Why have you chosen to record with Bart so many times? Bart rules. i first recorded with him when i was 15. I didn't know anyone else at that point and i grew up hanging out at the studio all the time. I've learned tons from bart and continue to learn from him.
What is the weirdest thing Bart Thurber has ever said to you? "You're going to play through that??!"
What was your first grind show? Probably napalm death "harmony corruption" tour at one step beyond
What was it like the first time you saw Plutocracy? Pretty awesome. first time i saw Sleep was that night too. i took mini-thins with my friend matt who brought me there. Matt later became known to the world as extreme elvis.
What was the worst experience you have ever had on tour? Having a band member flip out because he couldn't handle being away from girlfriend / mommy..
Favorite Show you have played? Spazz at Greenville, South Carolina skatepark Funeral shock in Albuquerque, New Mexico house party with Noisear.
Most Grindcore skateboard graphic ever? Rob Roskopp III
Favorite grind on a skateboard? 50/50
Favorite Part in a skate video? Mark Gonzales - Blind Video Days
Worst bail? Dislocated shoulder after hitting an elevator trap door in sf on my way to work.
Do you remember a favorite guitar or own one now and why is it your favorite? Gibson SG, my current baby and the nicest guitar i've ever owned.
What is the worst guitar you have ever owned and why? First guitar my mom rented for me. I can't even remember what it was. It was white and had a matching white Gorilla amp.
favorite Ghostbusters scene? Any scene with rick moranis
Worst grind band ever? There's probably a bunch
Worst show ever? I fell asleep at an emo show an ex brought me to in the early 90's.
Favorite record you have played on? Spazz - La Revancha
