Oor Magazine, Netherlands
February 24, 1996
Yesterday you had a day off. Have you had any time to hang out playing
tourist?
Ben: No, we just flew in. We're in America for the fourth time now.
We already saw everything the first time. Sometimes we walk around a little,
but we don't really care. I think I like L.A. most, but I wouldnt know
why.
You’re wearing a Lowlands T-shirt. Did you like it there?
Ben: I'm always mixing up Lowlands and Roskilde. We've seen good concerts
at those festivals... Offspring, Page and Plant. At Lowlands we saw Shellac.
That was fantastic. Steve Albini is great.
Via Led Zeppelin you became interested in rock 'n' roll.
Ben: Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin were the first groups we were listening
to. That was the only thing we had. Our parents owned those records and
we ourselves had no money to buy records. Later we did and then we bought
Helmet, Tool, Rollins, Shellac and the Velvet Underground. Those are our
favorite groups now.
You mention Rollins and Offspring as your favorites, but I can hardly
find any punk in your music.
Ben: I don't think Rollins is punk. Black Flag is, but it is no influence
for us. It's a way too modern trend now. Many people decided to play punk
at the moment it became a trend and that's not how we want to be. We like
bands who played punk when it wasn't cool yet, though. All that trendy
thing is crap.
Do you agree when I call you a grunge band?
Ben: No. People who call us grunge mostly know our singles,
Tomorrow
and Pure Massacre. If they'd know our whole album, they wouldn't
call us
a grunge band. The same fucking people are always comparing us to Pearl
Jam and Nirvana. The album doesn't have a Seattle-grunge sound at
all.
Daniel: You also hear jazz, funk, and rap on the rest of the album.
Even fusion and classical music. In a couple of months, after the European
tour, we'll start
with the recordings for a new album. We already have a lot of new songs.
Isn't it hard for you to find the energy for all those concerts?
You’re in school too so you must have a very busy agenda, especially for
a 16-year-old.
Chris: We dont have an agenda.
Ben: The new school year just started two weeks ago so we are missing
a lot now. We have two more years two go. Then we'll only proceed with
the band. We don't wanna study further. Studying sucks.
Have your parents come with you again?
Ben: Yeah, only the fathers. If they have to work we tour with the mothers.
With the fathers it's fun, but it sucks with the mothers. The mothers are
boring. They are there, but we hardly see them, so it's pretty OK. They
arrange things sometimes.
Do you like doing interviews, by the way?
Ben: No, we hate doing interviews. Most of the time we don't know what
to say. It's depressing and I'm getting awfully tired of it.
[Daniel suddenly discovers that he's sitting next to the light panel. He
turns off the lights and puts
everyone in the dark, which Chris, Ben and Daniel think is very funny.]
Ben: Do you mind if we go to sleep?
Why, are you bothered by jetlag?
Ben: No, but it's so dark that I'm getting sleepy. I went to
bed at 4 o'clock this morning.
Daniel: I couldn't sleep until 6 o'clock. I've been jerking off in my
bed for
hours.
Ben: I watched the video Speed. That was pretty cool,
especially the scene where his head falls off.
Chris: Movies are only cool for when you are bored.
Daniel: Jezus, you are talking stupid. You look like a frog.
Are there any things you do like to watch on television?
Chris: We only have one good music programme in Australia, the rest
is crap. They only show mainstream pop and way too much hiphop.
Have you heard Helmet with the House of Pain?
Ben: Who is the House of Pain? I don't like it. Sorry, what was the
question?
What do you think of Helmet and the House of Pain with Just Another
Victim?
Ben: Oh, that song. Yeah, it's great. I only like it when Page Hamilton
of Helmet sings. When the rappers come in halfway it's no fun at all.
You obviously prefer the heavier guitar stuff.
Ben: Yeah we really like thick fat guitar walls. A grotesque and heavy
sound -- I go hard on that.
On your last album you sang, "Growing up is like a civil war." Could
you explain that to me?
[This question leads to an heavy wrestling party between Ben and Daniel
who show each other every corner of the hotel bed.]
Daniel: That song really sucks. We'll never ever play that again. I wrote
those lyrics when I was 13. Now I am ashamed of it. Listen to how ridiculous
it sounds. [He sings a piece of Cicada in a very exaggerated and
pathetic way.] My God,
how bad. We should never have put it on the album.
Now that you can afford to jump around on a hotel bed in Philadelphia in
the Bellevue Hotel, your personal life is not really to be compared with
a civil war.
Daniel: No. I don't know. I've never experienced it as a civil war.
It's about the emotions which are part of growing up, but we just think
it's a shittty song. The lyrics are terrible. The record company thought
we had to put one more song on the album. We just put it on the album then,
but I wish we had never have done it.
Ben: Daniel, I could cut your head off for that song.
It's just about how you felt back then. Why should you be ashamed
of it now?
Ben: That song just really sucks.
Daniel: Well, I'm not really ashamed of it.
Ben: Well, I am. I am really deeply ashamed. I'll never play that song
again. We haven't done it in like, a year and a half. We really hate it
intensely.
Are there more songs on the record which you hate that much?
Daniel: Well, we don't really hate Shade, but we don't really love
it either. It's too soft. It's not wrong or something to have a rest break
on the album, but this song is so weak that it doesn't sound like us. We
like the more heavier stuff.
So the next album will be a really hard album without any rest breaks.
Ben: Exactly. The next album will be hard and dark. The sound has to
be even more fuller and fatter. We can do that now because we have a much
bigger budget. The rhythm section has to come to the fore much more so
that it'll really pump. It has to sound like you're listening to a five-piece
band. There might be something a little more quiet, but certainly no cheerful
songs. Not that we're so ponderous ourselves, but dark and steamy music
just sounds a lot better. Maybe we'll put a more cheerful song on the middle
of the album to cheer the listener up, but the rest of the songs are meant
to go cry with.
During the concerts people can hopefully still party, or do
you want them to go home depressed?
Daniel: The people can really jump around and bump into each other.
Don't be
afraid. Look, this is how it'll go.
[The light goes on again for a short slam-dance demonstration where
the bed is used as a trampoline.]
Daniel, your head is purple, do you need some rest?
Daniel: No way, man, are you nuts?
Do you like pogoing yourself?
Ben: Yes, we do. Last week we did a good pogo at Radio Birdman. That’s
an Australian underground punk band from the '70s. They’re now doing
a reunion tour. We saw them a couple of days ago in Newcastle and it was
really great.
The Sex Pistols are coming together again now.
Ben: I think that reunion of the Sex Pistols is going to be a failure.
Their front man is dead and he was really a legend. I wouldn't know who's
supposed to sing now.
Sid Vicious, the bassist, died, but their singer Johnny Rotten is
still alive.
Ben: Oh yeah, Johnny Rotten is the singer. But anyway, I still feel
it won't work. It's like Led Zeppelin is going to play again, but
without Robert Plant.
Does Newcastle have an active club scene?
Ben: There are only small clubs. For about five hundred people. It’s
not as active as Sydney. Mostly local groups play there.
Daniel: We ourselves haven't played in Newcastle for a long time and
I don't know if it's ever going to happen. It's not that we don't like
Newcastle, but there are a lot of people we don't like. Those types who
become punk because they think it's cool. They are posers.
How do you find out if someone's a poser?
Daniel: You can see it. After punk became popular they started to wear
punk clothes. Then suddenly they started to like that kind of music.
[The manager comes in to say it's time for the soundcheck. Ben farts
heavily, to the displeasure of Daniel, who tries to get the stinking thing
out of the room. After much hilarity they're going to sit down one
more time. Daniel wants to do the last question in the dark, so he turns
out all the lights again.]
What do the teachers at school think of your music?
Daniel: They hate it. They're always whining that we're too busy with
our music and that our attendance at school suffers because of it.
They think that what they have to say is more important than your
music.
Daniel: Yeah, but that's a load of crap because going to school sucks
and is not important. Only the first years are important, because then
you learn figures, writing and reading. That's enough. For the rest it's
not important. It's not good for anything to know the physical formula
for copper. By the way, did you just fart?
[Thanks to Charlotte for the
transcript.]
