STACEY DEE

STACEY DEE

When did music enter your life and at what point did you realize it was something that would become a passion? What led to you picking up an instrument, and how did you begin writing your own songs? Who (if anyone) was encouraging you in the beginning?

I was born into music.  My dad is a singer/songwriter that played guitar to my Mom’s belly.  It’s been a passion of mine since I could comprehend what it was.  I played drums before anything at 4 years old.  Then I played piano a bit.  I was ALWAYS a singer.  I knew this was what I was going to do from very young.  Both of my parents encouraged me to play and sing.  My dad had given me a guitar so many times but I was like, “I’m never gonna play that thing”.  I pushed music away in my teens but finally picked up the guitar was I was 20.  Immediately I was writing songs.  I had been writing songs since 4th grade.  But I didn’t know I was a real songwriter until I was 20.

As you began to develop your songwriting skills, who were the main artists you looked to for inspiration and as an example of the kinds of song structures and lyrics that you were interested in exploring on your own? Which punk bands and artists were most influential to your songwriting?

I’m not sure.  As soon as I found out I could write songs I was off to the races.  I don’t know how to play anyone else’s music.  I suck at doing covers.  I just dove into writing.  My influences come from everything I’ve ever heard that I liked.  I can’t pin point one or even a handful of influences.  It comes more from life and drawing from everything.  But NOFX and Green Day were two of my favorites.  I’m sure I draw from both of them. 

Your style of songwriting is concise, melodic, and direct in its delivery. Have you always structured your songs this way? Do you generally prefer your songs to be short and pack a punch? Do you typically write with an acoustic guitar?

I am one of those songwriters that tells true stories.  Honest stuff that has come from my own life.  So, yes in a sense I’ve always written true to life stories, and I guess I’ve always written short and concise songs.  I’m not big on jamming out in a song.  I think the longest song I’ve ever written was 4.5 mins.  That’s too long.  Haha.  I love the pop structure and it’s really all I know how to do.  3 min songs all day!  Almost every song I’ve written starts on acoustic guitar.  Sometimes it’s hard to translate to electric though.  You have to be careful! 

The style of punk that Bad Cop/Bad Cop plays has dynamics and textures to it that stand out - does the rest of the band members add their flavor and personality to the songs? How do those collaborations play out prior to a song being finished? Do you demo songs and do any home recording?

Yes, everyone adds something to our songs.  It’s always different.  Sometimes we have played it before we record it, sometimes we don’t play on it until we record it.  We always demo songs at home.  I record them into my phone and then send them to everyone.

What's the songwriting dynamic like between you and Jennie Cotterill? Do you both typically bring complete songs to share and then work on them as a band? Do you feel that you both influence one another's songwriting, and do you feel that there's a natural compatibility there? Do you ever feel a sense of tension or competition with Jennie since you both are great songwriters? What have you learned from her as an artist?

Jennie and I are a great team.  Whether we write songs together or apart, we are huge supporters of each other’s stuff.  She always inspires me.  I’m sure I do the same for her.  We don’t write anything like each other, but what we bring to each other’s songs is something different that either of us hear on our own.  Before our band got on the same page, there was a bit of tension sometimes when anyone brought a song.  But that’s just the ego wanting to be he only great one.  Haha.  So lame.  After I got sober I told the girls, “fuck, I’m done being weird and jealous and judgmental with you guys.... if you have a song, let’s fucking give it a shot”.  So we are way more supportive of each other now and less competitive.  Not only do Jennie and I write, but Linh writes too.  So I think everyone just wants their songs to be heard.  It’s not out of disdain for anyone else’s songs but out of wanting to be heard.  I’ve learned a ton from both Jennie and Linh.  They write different songs than me and it always pushes me to be better. 

Linh and Myra are together a great rhythm section and also two very interesting personalities that add a lot of energy and excitement to the Bad Cop line-up. Do they ever involve themselves directly in the songwriting? What's their role from a composition perspective?

Definitely!  In our song “Womanarchist” Myra came up with “wants to make the whole world Co-exist”. Which was perfect!  I couldn’t find that’ll word “coexist”.  And we almost settled for saying “Feminist” again.  But I wouldn’t let it go and Myra nailed it.  Linh is a fantastic singer / songwriter.  We all sing on the records.  It’s all 4 of us that make this band work. 

Do you feel that experiencing pain and hardship provides a certain advantage for songwriting? Has/does songwriting provide for you a necessary therapy, and do you write songs constantly or do they come in waves? Does your history compel you to share stories through songwriting?

Pain and hardship are the easier things to write about.  What’s hard is writing a positive song without sounding cheesy.  Yes, writing songs is how I process my life and everything that happens to me.   Writing comes in waves.  You can’t force it.  Sometimes an idea will happen but I won’t finish the song until months later.   100%!!!  Like I said, everything that happens in my life propels me to write about it. 

A question I tend to ask is related to the connection between art, addiction, and depression - do you feel that creativity comes with this baggage naturally? In your experience are talented artists typically people who are more prone to emotional strife and addiction? Has your songwriting sharpened as a result of getting sober?

Yeah, unfortunately a lot of artists are depressed people.  We are sensitive and empathetic to the pain and suffering in the world and in our selves.  It makes for great art.  But do for being happy and positive.  My songs have gotten ten times better since I got well.  It was hard to switch writing from a negative standpoint to a positive one.  Learning curve for sure.   My dad is also a recovering addict and he’s always said to me, “addicts are the most sensitive and creative people”, and I couldn’t agree more.  When an artist is lost, abusing themselves and not creating it makes for a sick spirit. 

In a recent piece you wrote about your experiences with addiction, you mentioned that you still smoke weed. I've always found weed to be a drug that unlocks creative doors, or at least provides an incentive for accessing a "weirder" side of one's creative process. Do you find that cannabis can be a songwriting enhancer?

I’m super open about everything in my life.  I don’t know why.  I wish I wasn’t sometimes.  Haha.  Not only was I a drug addict, I was a sad, sick and lost person.  I was negative.  Always.  I didn’t know what being positive meant.  So not only did I get sober but I changed EVERYTHING about my perspective to life.  When I was getting better I was having a very fucking hard time writing songs again.  I always knew that I would smoke weed again.  It works for me and I prefer living a cannabis positive life to one without it. Again, my Dad who has been in the program for like 25 years and I were talking one night and I was telling him how hard it was for me to concentrate and I couldn’t write anymore.  He said, “you might want to try smoking weed again, even just a little bit to get your creative juices flowing”.  And I did and it helped immensely.  I have one of those brains that races and won’t be quiet, cannabis helps me so much in being able to concentrate.  I know it doesn’t work for everyone, but for anyone that doesn’t want to take big pharma pills like myself, cannabis rules!!!!  

Bad Cop/Bad Cop is a very tight and energetic live band - how does this energy translate in the studio setting? Do you prefer to record live with the band or track separately? Do you enjoy recording more or performing more? Do you revisit your own songs and recordings often? How do you feel when you listen back to your own songs?

Thanks, we sure are!  We are always happy, energetic and positive people.  And that translates to the studio every time!!!  I don’t mind either way of tracking.  I just like recording and all of its facets.  I enjoying performing more than recording.  But it’s different for everyone.  I do revisit our songs.  I listen to Warriors a lot. It’s hard for me to listen to Not Sorry as that was the height of my addiction.  It’s hard for me to listen to myself all fucked up and not at my best.  But I do listen to Warriors like it’s not my band!  Haha.

Fat Mike has seemed to be an important mentor in your musical career. What specific role has he played in your development as an artist and songwriter? What lessons have you learned from his songwriting approach? Do you feel that your songwriting has improved as a result of his influence and support? What is your favorite song that he has written?

Mike has done so much for my career and me personally.  From giving me a chance at one of the starring roles on his musical, “Home Street Home”, to signing Bad Cop Bad Cop to Fat Wreck Chords, to producing our records, to paying for me to go to detox to get off of drugs, to inviting us to play with NOFX.  He’s said to me,  “I’ve always liked you Stacey, for whatever reason”.  I know how it is, sometimes a person comes along in my life that I think, “I wanna help this person.  I don’t know why, but I’ve got to”.  Mike is my mentor and my great friend.  I would do anything for him!  

Who are your all-time favorite songwriters in any genre? Do you ever write songs in other genres as a songwriting exercise? If you could release an album in any genre other than punk, what would it be?

I have done singer / songwriter stuff and hip hop.  I do anything that presents itself.  Creating music is so fun!  Singing is so fun!  I would love to make a super polished pop record.  I love songs - all kinds and like I said before am completely inspired by anything I’ve heard that I love!  There’s are millions of great songwriters.  I love my Dad.  He is probably my biggest influence.  

What do you think of heavy metal? Do you feel that there's potential in metal to be as lyrically sharp and passionate as in punk? Have you ever considered writing a metal song? 

I think all music has the ability to have sharp lyrics.  I like Heavy Metal sometimes.  I don’t really listen to the lyrics that much tho.  I have not considered writing a metal song.  

What are your future goals as a songwriter and artist? How do you feel about the songs that you've contributed so far, and what you've accomplished along with your bandmates in Bad Cop/Bad Cop? Do you think you'll continue songwriting throughout your life? What advice do you have for the aspiring songwriter?

I will always write songs.  It’s what I do.  It’s the strongest gift I was born with.  I’m extremely proud of our band.  To have gotten this far is incredible.  Huge thank you to our record label and the people behind us for believing in us and allowing us to get to do great things!  I don’t wanna look to far into the future.  Being present is where it’s at. I’ll just keep creating until I can’t anymore.  I would tell any aspiring songwriters to never give up on themselves.  Everyone’s songs are valid!  Believe in YOU!!!!

  

JAMES CAHILL

photo by Jason Falchook

JAMES CAHILL

What are your earliest memories of loving music? Can you recall any specific songs, experiences, etc. that really hooked you? Do you come from a musical family? 

It goes back pretty far. One of my earliest memories is laying on my bedroom floor and drawing to stacks of records, like Marlo Thomas' feminist kiddie record Free to Be You and Me, the Pete’s Dragon and Grease soundtracks, Rick Dee’s Disco Duck and lots of musical theater from our public library. I spent much of elementary school listening to musicals from the 1930s to 60s by Rogers and Hart, Rogers and Hammerstein, Jerome Kern, and Cole Porter, but I also really loved Michael Jackson (who Chris, aka Pontiac, and I got to see live on the Victory Tour when we were super young), The Carpenters (the favorite of our baby sitter), and whomever was a guest star on The Muppets. Many of my ideas about pop music and bands came from TV. I was absolutely in love with the Batman theme song, which had everything: trebly guitar, horns, women signing nonsense phrases, and a really campy sensibility... The Monkees used to air early in the mornings in NY and I remember getting up before anybody else was awake to watch it alone. I also loved the Hanna-Barbara and Rankin/Bass programs, like The Banana Splits, Josie and the Pussycats and The Jackson 5ive cartoon. So my blueprint for being in a band, writing songs, and solving small-time crimes all derived from these sources. 

At what age did you begin to explore and find new music? How did your early musical tastes develop, and who/what were the biggest influences on those choices?

I started getting into contemporary pop and rock in the summer between 6^th and 7^th grade. I got a clock radio with a cassette player for my birthday and three tapes: The Monkees “Then and Now: The Best of the Monkees,” U2’s “War,” and Run DMC’s “Raising Hell.” I had four older siblings, so I inherited and borrowed a lot from them, which is how I got exposed to The Clash, The Kinks, The Who, David Bowie, The B-52s, The Cure, Robyn Hitchcock and the Egyptians, The Primitives, and Jesus and Mary Chain. My sisters all listened to WLIR, which was a new wave station in the NY area, so I tuned my clock radio to that station and got introduced to The Ramones, The Replacements, The Soup Dragons, Teenage Fanclub, and even Sweet Baby (I believe I may have been lucky to be listening to the radio the one time they were played on it in NY in 1989, and spent years searching for that record). I used to skip lunch a couple of times a week at school so I could save up money for tapes and lps. 

My neighbors the Martinez brothers knew all kinds of cool punk bands championed by Thrasher Magazine that were good for skating to—Black Flag, The Dead Kennedy’s, Minor Threat, Suicidal Tendencies, the Butthole Surfers—so that was a formidable influence too. Around 8^th grade my friends Krister, Chris, and I started going to Manhattan to skate and check out records stores just to flip through the bins, and that’s how I discovered the X-Ray Spex, the Buzzcocks, The Dickies, Redd Kross, and other pop forward punk acts. The summer between 8^th and 9^th grade my friend Tim and I pooled our money to buy train tickets into the city to go to an autograph signing by The Ramones at Tower Records in the Village. We didn’t have money to buy any of their swag (or even get two tickets home) but it felt very important to make that pilgrimage and meet our heroes.  

Another huge discovery was coming across WFMU, and their free form format. When I was in highschool Pat Duncan used to broadcast his punk show on Thursday afternoons including live sets by touring acts, and that’s how I first heard The Mr. T Experience, who really blew my mind with their mix of catchy songcraft and irreverent, pop-culture references. 

One final source was my mom who had a knack for finding cool things in the trash, and following that ethos, I could never pass a trash pile on my skateboard without investigating. I came across a lot of great records that way as well as lots of weird stuff: Beatles and Herman’s Hermits albums, Lesley Gore records, a box set of rock musicals (Tommy, Hair, Jesus Christ Superstar), but also speeches by Kennedy, Borscht-belt comedy albums, and what not. I also spent a good amount of time in Salvation Army record bins picking things based upon their covers. 

This all added up to a pretty heterogeneous musical education, which hasn’t really stopped. 

When did do you begin playing music, and what were the circumstances? Was the guitar first? How did you learn to play, and to what extent is your musical background formal? How much of what you've learned has been self-taught?

I was pretty fortunate to always have access to musical instruments. My school district had a great band program, so I started studying trumpet and piano in 4^thgrade, euphonium and tuba in junior high. The guitar came last and without any formal instruction. In 11^th grade I bought a black Charvel heavy metal guitar and a yellow Gorilla practice guitar amp for $90 from a classmate who was upgrading his gear. I went to the local music shop and picked up a guitar chord book as well as the few books of sheet music that were closest to my tastes: The Monkees greatest hits, The Cars greatest hits, Bob Marley’s greatest hits, as well as a Queen’s greatest hits and Hair the Musical chord book, which were both at the upper level of what I could play then. A few friends taught me some tricks and with that I was off and running.    

At what point did you begin taking a creative approach to music, and do you recall writing your first song? Were there specific influences guiding your first attempts? Were there any people in your life encouraging you or offering feedback that helped to build your confidence?

I didn’t really start writing in a regular way until I was 17 or 18 or so. I mostly wrote on an acoustic guitar. My first slew of songs were pretty silly, and all a little too long, but they got me rolling and I started doing open mics, and not getting booed, and that was a lot of encouragement. The first song I wrote on electric guitar, with the idea of starting a band that actually did something, was “Arizona” which appears on our first ep. The people I’ve played with over the years have been great interlocutors, critics, and sounding boards. Chris Mazer and Mike Faloon were really important in terms of pushing the songs, suggesting ideas, and being patient with me as I worked through ideas, and the many labels we’re worked with have been really helpful. To some degree, the bands we played with, like the wonderful Egghead., Dirt Bike Annie, and Boris the Sprinkler, who all helped push me to write better and get more ambitious, though in a quite different ways.  

Were you a part of any significant bands or projects prior to Kung Fu Monkeys? Which style of music were you most interested in playing when you first started writing songs? How did your songwriting goals evolve into the style you're most known for?

Significant to me? Sure. In high school I started a group called the Screaming Nannies, and we played a high school battle of the bands where we were objectively the worst band on the gymnasium floor (the group had various line-ups depending on the level of embarrassment my friends could tolerate, but the essential one included me on guitar and vocals, my non-drumming friend Mike on drums, and another friend, Jessica Pavone, on violin—who also played on KFM’s Strange Mystery sessions some two decades later but is best known as an avant-garde composer and performer). I would best describe The Nannies as Shaggs-esque, but I was trying to write songs with hooks, I just didn’t have the ability yet. I then spent a couple of years playing alone as I mentioned, and that’s when I really started figuring out what kind of songwriter I was and wanted to be. I mostly played acoustic shows at coffee shops around LA, and really, anywhere where people would have me. Most of those songs were pretty much heart-on-my-sleeve cries of a lonely and awkward 18 year old, and not very good ones at that, but they helped me get most of that out of my system and start to develop a voice of my own, which certainly helped when I started working with other musicians again on what became first Dr. Pasketti and his Kung Fu Monkeys and eventually simply the Kung Fu Monkeys (a name I outgrew by the time we had finished our first ep, but ended up stuck with for various reasons).   

When I was really active in music, as a way of practicing, I used to play along to albums I loved by Cub, The Kinks, Undertones, Jonathan Richman and the Modern Lovers (esp. Rock’ and Romance and It’s Time For…), Buddy Holly, Lesley Gore, The Beach Boys, but also all the Phil Spector produced girl groups like the Ronettes, and would try to figure out all the songs on a side (a really good exercise for learning how to write and play, and for getting inspired). This helped me internalize the key structures of those idioms, and also taught me a few good tricks, like the effect of throwing in the occasional weird jazz chord, or simply a made-up chord like at the end of “Luau All Night” (which was primarily written by Chris, but I added a few flourishes here and there). I suppose the more I wrote, the stronger my voice and style became, and the more I had a sense of how to get what I wanted. 

I think my songwriting goals never really stopped evolving, as the better I got at it (if anybody believes I improved) the more demanding I became on myself. One clear trajectory in my songwriting was a move away from an exclusively first-person perspective (the stars in his/her eyes narrator of most of our tracks) to a focus on scenes and character studies and more oblique, surrealist-inspired imagery. When I write a song, I’m usually already imagining the production. Had we ever gotten lucky enough to have had a serious budget behind us, we would have gone nuts in the studio: lots of strings, horns, and what not, but given we typically had time for only a day or a day and a half for most of our eps, and something like five days for the majority of our album, we had to work fast and compromise a bit on what we could get done. But any time I have entered a studio to record, I’ve brought alone a notebook with a pretty clear flight plan of the ways we would use every track available to us. That’s not to say that my collaborators haven’t been important to this process: quite the opposite. Working with all the bandmates and engineers (particularly Chris “Pontiac” Mazer, Mike Faloon, but also the later line-ups of KFM) made significant contributions, and also allowed me to think about how to write for and with the collective. 

In your work there's an apparent authenticity in your craft that makes the songs much less "pop punk" and much more timeless, though clearly rooted in a classic rock n' roll era that predates our generation. What motivated this mission to create such a distinctly classic sound?

Thanks for describing it that way, that’s super generous. I don’t know that I was on a mission so much as simply writing the sorts of songs I wanted or needed to write and trying to capture the sounds I was after in a way that was a little less obviously time-stamped. I like a lot of catchy punk music, but in terms of what and how I write and the limitations of my performance style on guitar and as a singer, we just weren’t ever going to go for the Marshall-stack, Ramones-clones sound that many of our contemporaries were pursuing.     

Your craft is very impressive in its simplicity and directness, but your melodies and structures are also sophisticated in the context of pop punk. Was there a conscious effort to balance complex melodies and arrangements with a more stripped down, straight-forward approach?

Context is everything, right? A lot of the realization of our songs was a matter of the limitations of skill and the need to economize. The Kung Fu Monkeys were all amateurs: people doing music for the love of it, but without real professional ambitions, and, at least on my part, that much technical skill. I took a lot of inspiration from early Elvis, Buddy Holly, and Jonathan Richman records, which were often stripped down to the basics. I do suppose that on two eps—"Rock n’ Roll Dance Party with the Kung Fu Monkeys, Shindig Vol. 2” and “Electric Tangerine Smile, Shindig Vol. 3”—I was interested in seeing how far we could strip things down to essentials, and perhaps went a little overboard. We may have gone a bit too far for some tastes with that on “Electric Tangerine Smile,” but it’s worth noting that record was made in my apartment for the cost of a cassette tape and a pizza pie, which fed the musicians and then served as the drum that Mikey Erg played on the record. (That incidentally is a testament to Mike’s skills that he made a cardboard box sound so good but also the magic of hanging a single SM57 from the ceiling and recording the room, which is how we tracked the instruments for that record: all live in single takes, with the vocals being recorded afterwards in the same fashion.)    

You're known to have championed not only the "Bug" guitar tone, but also a very distinct doubled vocal style. The production is clear and yet there's a roughness to it that feels very organic. Can you describe your process for finding the KFM "sound", and explain why those particular aesthetics resonated so much with you? 

You’ve nicely described the arc of the group’s sound. I always had a pretty strong sense of what I wanted to do in the studio, but as I mentioned we rarely had the time, budget, or vocabulary to get all the way there. A lot of the sound was a result of trial and error but also learning how to effectively communicate to others what was going on in my head, but also asking lots of questions of other musicians and studio people, and studying any photos of bands I loved at work to see what they were playing and recording with, where the mics were set-up, etc. (I wish I had come across Gabriel Roth’s manifesto “Shitty is Pretty” when I first starting recording as it would have sped up things immensely.) It might be interesting to ask former members what it was like to work with me, as I think I was a bit of a control freak. 

In terms of doubled-vocals, this was something so many of the pop singers of the 60s did (and The Ramones too), and it sounds so much richer to me. Our first few eps were made with less than ideal amplifiers (it wasn’t always easy to afford studios with more than Marshall stacks at first), but as I got a clearer understanding of the sound I wanted, and was able to convince other people it truly was what I wanted (a few engineers were incredulous that I didn’t want distortion on my guitars), things got a bit easier. I played through two fantastic early 60s amps—an Ampeg Reverberocket and a Silvertone 1472 (which were both unpopular and inexpensive when I got them: one cost about $250 and the other I got in a gear trade with Chris), and my beloved and now departed Kalamazoo KG-2A guitar, which was a pretty “plinky” sounding guitar (I found it in the window of Rivington Guitars, if memory serves me correctly, with a sign that said, for some reason, “Perfect for girls”), and a Danelectro 12-string, which I also sadly don’t have anymore, but for a relatively cheap guitar, sounded great. Part of these decisions were purely practical: I didn’t want to lug around heavy equipment and didn’t care for things to be all that overwhelmingly loud (these were 12 and 10 watt amps), but I also couldn’t afford a Vox AC-15 and a Rickenbacker at the time and the gear I used was more or less the same materials so many great teenage garage groups of the 60s used. I should say that Chris was a great source of information about gear and recording lore. He worked for a while as a professional sound engineer (a really good one) and he picked up a lot of great insight. Mike Faloon had a huge musical vocabulary, and as editor of the zine Go Metric, was really plugged in with what was happening in underground music and would share all kinds of great records with me that gave me lots of ideas. He was a pretty important influence on really pushing my tastes. 

In terms of the aesthetic resonance, it was in 60s pop that I first came across a mixture of profound yearning and idealism, born of disappointment and a will to escape, that suffused not only the lyrics but the entire production. It offered a kind of salve for me during a tough period in my life. At the same time, I loved the spazzy, hyperactive energy of punk, and tried to merge those two (like many others before me obviously).  

As Timbo from Mutant Pop emphasized in his description of your vocals, there's really no other pop punk singer quite like you. In the context of mid/late 90's pop punk and punk rock, did you feel that you were taking a bold step? Is there a sense in which the extremely upbeat vibes and sincerely sweet vocals were more "ballsy" than the typical snotty sneer most punk bands were going for? How did you see yourself and KFM in relation to the more popular musical aesthetics of the Lookout!, Fat, and Epitaph eras?

That community—or at least a small but crucial part of it—embraced us, so in a way I feel a strong fondness for many of the people from that moment in underground music. We of course encountered plenty of bands, audience members, and critics who weren’t having it, and were even openly hostile toward us. I won’t name names, but we had label mates we played with on tour who clearly saw us as an affront to their understanding punk rock, which maybe was true, but we weren’t necessarily following any ethos besides be kind to everybody and accessible to fans and fellow bands. When we played shows, the punker the crowd, the poppier and more gently we’d play. If we were on a full punk bill at a bar, I’d often give the group juice boxes to bring out on stage, or pretend I was listening to Lesley Gore songs on transistor radio, or whatever else would be slightly askew. Somebody in the magazine Punk Planet, I believe, once started a review of “Girls, Cars, Sun, Fun!” by calling us one of the most subversive bands in the underground, for precisely this reason, which was validating given that Punk Planet hated our first few records.  

In terms of my vocal style, I do think years listening to musicals and Irish music gave me a healthy appreciation for the value of a high tenor. When we were very active and I was keeping my voice in shape, I had a pretty wide vocal range (I did all the falsetto parts as well as bass vocals on our records). The thing with a tenor voice is it’s pretty hard to sound tough, so that may have played a part in shaping the sweetness of the sound. 

In terms of how we saw ourselves in relation to that scene, we often were on the margins. We were a bit too exuberant for the indie pop scenesters of that moment but a bit too twee and poppy for many of the punkers. Perhaps we never found our niche, but we did meet lots of great people.  

The Kung Fu Monkeys catalog is very consistent in terms of the songwriting quality, the production aesthetics, and the overall image enhanced by the cover art and photos of the band that might have easily tricked the listener into believing that your songs were written and recorded in the 1960s. Do you feel that you fulfilled your true vision of the band? Are you satisfied with how it all wrapped up? Were there any other goals for KFM that remain unrealized?

That’s really kind of you to say. Too kind perhaps, but thanks. There was a time where I couldn’t bear to listen to some of the recordings but I’ve gotten over that, and now am mostly proud of it, warts and all. There are a few lyrics I wish I had written differently—for instance, in “I Miss The Ramones” I wish I had stuck with my original lyrics of “if they were here I’d kiss them”—and compromises I wish I hadn’t made in the studio (especially with the guitar sounds on “School’s Out, Surf’s Up, Let’s Fall in Love”), but now it all seems very much a part of the moment and history of intimate struggle that goes into bringing any creative object into the world. There are a few things I still wish we had gotten to in the studio that are now sadly lost to history. During the sessions for “It’s Coast to Coast” we tracked all the parts save vocals for a song I wrote called “Do You Do You Do You Do You Do You Do You Do You Do You Dig the Shaggs?” which for issues of time we never got to do the vocals for (we were using a studio on off hours and got kicked out). I have since lost the chord charts and lyrics, so we’ll sadly never complete that, though it was a hilarious (to my mind) song and featured a great violin part and a Shaggs-esque breakdown. Likewise, on our “Mysterious Mystery” sessions I really wanted to play a typewriter solo on “Persephone Please” (I still hear it in my head when I hear that song) and had a much more ambitious drum sound for “Alice, After the Fall” that we didn’t get to experiment with, again for time reasons. In terms of unrealized goals, I always wanted to bring the group more into contact with the African American roots of the music we played and had some fantasies of attempting a soul record with vibraphones and the like: I love the Motown and Stax records sounds. But I think we finished our most active period on a real high note: I’m very proud of all the aspects of “The Incredibly Strange Case of the Mysterious Mystery” and “Son of…” which were made when we were the house-band for the original Chris Gethard show at the Upright Citizen’s Brigade. We were so well-practiced and at the height of our powers. But who knows, maybe there’s another chapter still to be written: all of us are more or less still in touch and good friends, even if we’re spread throughout North America. It’s always a treat to get to hang out with the gang when were in the same city. 

Getting back to the lyrical tone - there seemed to be an intentional attempt to create a very sunny, bubblegum atmosphere throughout each album. The lyrics addressed love and life in ways that always came across to me as playful and fun yet sincere. In composing lyrics, was there a serious focus on maintaining this vibe, or was the process more care-free as the songs suggest?

I was really inspired by Tin Pan Alley and Brill Building writers, and they put a lot of care into crafting things that could be simultaneously serious, silly, but always sincere and even honestly sentimental, but never self-serious. In other words, genuine, never condescending, but also sort of silly and in on the joke. I had a dream that eventually we’d get picked up to do a cartoon, so the songs had to be kid friendly. I often wrote from the perspective of a character—a slightly more optimistic and perhaps innocent version of myself, but not quite me—and this sometimes was a little limited (I certainly could have railed about injustices or expressed a bit more Id). I think we did have a lot of expectations to meet in terms of what the labels wanted as well as our fans. I often dreamed of starting an evil twin band that would be sunnily morose, but that never came together, save for a few home sessions under the moniker The Peppermint Engine.   

Part of my desire at the time to stay on the sunny side of the street was because there was a good amount of sadness in my late adolescent years: a number of close friends died in a short period of time (from suicide, drugs, strange accidents) and my mom was diagnosed with stage 4 cancer. In the midst of all of this, my mom took me to see Don Was’s Brian Wilson documentary, I just wasn’t meant for these times. This didn’t connect with me at the time, but I think the gift that my mom gave me on that afternoon, besides time together with her, was a model for how to find solace and even shelter from emotional pain in the tiny utopia of a pop song, which is sort of what I tried to do with the band. 

Did you find that KFM provided for you a fulfilling emotional outlet? I've wondered if you might also have a songwriting mode for darker, more negative emotions that wouldn't have fit the tone that people associate with your work. Are you generally as happy as your songs suggest, or is this outlet something that helped to elevate your mood by creating very fun and care-free tunes?

The band was a good way of sublimating sadness or anger, so I do think part of it was trying to elevate my mood. I did limit myself a bit in the voice I privileged in my work with KFM. I definitely kept much of the idout of my songwriting with the group. This was perhaps a misstep given how important id and recklessness are to so much great rock music that I love, from the inchoate teenage lust of garage rock, the sizzle of great soul, the unrestrained howls of The Stooges, and the genius of Ronnie Spector’s delivery. It only lurks at the very margins of KFM material, and mostly in a rather joking form, like “Somebody Put Something in My Ovaltine,” which plays on Dee Dee Ramone’s “Somebody Put Something in My Drink” but also so many great psychedelic songs, or a few winks in “My Baby Said Yeah!”  

What did you make of the response and feedback you've received over the years for your songs? Did you feel that enough people "got it"? To me your songwriting has universal appeal and yet there's a very underground element to it that seems to all but guarantee that only those who seek it out will find it. Do you agree?

This is a tricky question: the fact that we’re talking today really blows me away, as it’s been quite some time since KFM has done anything. Honestly, I do wish more people had found the band, and I suppose that’s our fault for not pushing ourselves more or being more careerist (in fact we overdid our commitment to obscurity by primarily releasing our work on tiny 7” record labels), but it was also a matter of falling in between genres, not playing cool, and simply having some bad timing (our CD School’s Out was released just as Timbo started to shut down Mutant Pop and file sharing was becoming a thing, so that killed it, and we never got to tour that album as Faloon and I left NY and the band went on the first prolonged hiatus). All the same, a few bands have covered our songs, including a really great version of “When the Waves are Low” by Saint-Brooklynsburg, a musician based in Russia. 

Reflecting on your work, what has been your proudest moment as a songwriter? Are you still musically active, and if so what projects/endeavors are you currently involved in? What are your future musical goals, and what "bucket list" items would you ideally want to check off as a musician and songwriter? Finally, what advice or perspective might you offer to aspiring songwriters?

I think we ended on a high note with our last eps, in terms of the quality of the songwriting and performances. Watching the last Chris Gethard Showand hearing the studio audience humming along to “Persephone Please” during the closing credits was quite a high point, even if almost nobody knows that’s one of my songs. The songs I wrote for my spouse—“Double Bubble,” “Let’s Go,” “I’m Combing My Hair”—are close to my heart. I have a soft spot for the songs I wrote about music—“I Miss the Ramones,” “I, Herman,” “Junior Varsity is Wrecking My Brain”—and the sheer silliness of “American Beach Party USA” and “Chapel Hill, Surf City” still bring a smile to my face. Looking back at 60 plus songs we recorded, I’m on the whole pretty pleased with the silly little songs I managed to bring into the world, and certainly had fun going around the country playing music and making records.   

As for future goals, honestly, I took a long pause from music. I sold most of my gear and my record collection to help a family member in need, and I have a pretty demanding day job that keeps me busy and demands most of my creative energies. However, recently I picked up a guitar amp, a fuzz pedal, and took in my one remaining guitar (a gift from Chris) for repairs, with the sense that maybe I’d try to do some writing again, which actually means relearning to play and sing. I still have a few unfinished songs rattling around. I’ve also thought about doing a French Revolution inspired punk record called “In Defence of the Terror” (the name of a book by a great French historian Sophie Wahnich) which would mostly be songs about the guillotine and barricades, which are timely topics.    

I don’t think I have any earth-shattering advice for aspiring songwriters, but I do believe, as with any form of writing or creation, it’s a matter of discipline and good habits. Don’t let a day go by that you don’t commit a note or lyric to the page! I used to do a lot of writing on public transportation and even wrote the chords and lyrics for most of “The Kung Fu Monkeys are America’s Favorite Band” on the 6 train after work one day, so always have a notebook and pen handy. Study the masters, whomever they may be for your personal cannon. It’s always a good idea to listen to lots of music beyond whatever genre or style you might work in. Ultimately, though, write for yourself.

HEWHOCANNOTBENAMED

HEWHOCANNOTBENAMED

You've had a long career and tenure in music - how did it all begin?

It all began watching my father play the piano when I was very young. He would play classical music like “Flight of the Bumblebee” and tunes from shows like “Mary Poppins” I remember him doing a little act, hamming it up for me and my brothers.

Was music an important outlet for you early on in life?

I guess, although I didn’t think of it that way. It was something I liked to do. I took piano lessons and it took a little while to get any good at it.

When did you realize it would become a focus?  

Eventually I could play a few basic pieces by J.S. Bach. That’s when I started liking it and thinking of it as something that I could do that other kids couldn’t.

How and when did you begin writing songs?

I learned to play guitar when I was about 16. The first songs I wrote were religious.

How did you learn to play guitar, and who were some of the artists who inspired you to start writing?

My family was very Catholic so I had to go to church every Sunday. They had a guitar Mass and I saw that a few kids my age were involved in this and were playing the guitar. They got to hang out in back of the church and I figured that it would be more fun to do that then stay up front with my parents. My favorite bands were The Beatles and Elton John. It was about 1976. I learned how to play songs by bands like that and I’m sure that helped to shape my creative style even to this day.

What projects or bands were you in before The Dwarves?

I formed my first band in college with two fellow music students in 1978. We all played acoustic guitars and sang country rock covers, mostly stuff by The Eagles and Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young.

How did The Dwarves come into the picture for you?

I was a college student in Waukegan IL., a city north of Chicago, when I got a knock on my dorm room door. It was a long haired 16 year-old kid who had heard that I owned a vintage Farfisa organ. He told me that he had a psychedelic band and that their organist had just quit the band and they were looking for a replacement. We smoked a few bong hits and arranged an audition. I got the gig, probably more because I had a cool keyboard than anything else. The band was then called “Suburban Nightmare”. Eventually the band changed it’s name to The Dwarves and the kid changed his to “Blag”.

What was the scene like in San Francisco at the time you began playing in The Dwarves?

We arrived in San Francisco in 1986. Everyone was talking about how cool the punk scene had been a few years before that. We didn’t really think of ourselves as a punk band so we just tried to find gigs wherever we could. “Mabuhay Gardens” was still around but it wasn’t much like we heard it used to be. We became regulars at small venue in the Mission District called “The Chatterbox”. We were also one of the first bands to play at the newly opened “Gillman Street Project” in Berkeley.  Bands in SF the late 80s tended to sound more like “Guns N Roses” than “The Dead Kennedys”.

Throughout your time in The Dwarves and into your solo project that continues today, your songs have long been associated with grim humor, sexuality, uncomfortable realities, and otherwise controversial themes. However, you're also known to write very catchy melodies and many of your songs have a poppy feel offset by the darker lyrics. Has this always been your natural modus operandi?

It took a while for me to gain the confidence to contribute any of my own stuff to the bands repertoire. One of the first songs was called “Fuckhead”. My band mates liked it so I guessed that fueled the dark humor of my lyrics. Back then most of my creativity went into writing music while Blag and Saltpeter added the lyrics. Much of the “Blood Guts and Pussy” era featured songs cowritten by me and Blag. I also had an obsession with GG Allin’s songs around that time. The catchy melodies I blame on my love of the Beatles and other rock music of the 60s and 70s that I listened to as a kid.

Your songwriting seems to incorporate a certain musical competency that suggests some formal training - do you know a lot of music theory?

I know some theory. It seems like that kind of knowledge isn’t always valued in rock n roll. The ability to play 1, 4, 5 chords goes a long way and doesn’t require much theory. Playing by ear is sometimes all that is needed.

When we've worked together, you seem to understand some of the more elusive nuances of harmony and song structure. How did you accumulate this knowledge? 

That kind of knowledge was mostly gained through experience and learning how to play piano.

On your solo albums, you tend to vary your style of songwriting significantly while retaining your distinct personality. Are you comfortable writing in different genres?

Yeah I guess. I am mostly a rock and country songwriter. I don’t think I could pull off jazz or classical very well.

How do you typically begin writing a song?

Usually with a guitar. I come up with some chords and hum a melody to it. If I know I want to work on it and make it into a song I usually add some lyrics, either some catch phrases for a chorus or a first line of a verse. If it sticks I keep developing it then little by little. Sometimes it takes a while and sometimes the song seems to almost write itself.

Do you have a method for recording or cataloging ideas so as not to forget?

I always have a notebook going. I have often made demos of songs on my home computer as well.

You seem to be fairly knowledgeable about recording and also seem to have a lot of fun with that process - has this always been the case?

I have been involved with recording projects going back to 1982 when the first “Suburban Nightmare” album was recorded in a studio in Champagne IL.

What specifically do you enjoy about the recording process, and is there some advice you might give to DIY enthusiasts who want to make their own recordings sound good on a budget?

I enjoy tracking a lot more than mixing but I most enjoy creating the songs before they even get to the studio.  As for advice, get a good engineer that you trust.

We've discussed the dangers of being an honest artist in today's world - particularly for we masked individuals who happen to sing about fucked up topics! What are some of the challenges you've faced in your professional and personal life as a result of having an alter ego? Do you proceed with caution even today?

Yes, it seems like people often forget that performers are entertainers primarily. It is a show and anyone who gets up on a stage is presenting a character who is not exactly the same as the person who is off stage. Performers can forget that as well. Wearing a mask has helped me remind myself of this.

What's your level of involvement with The Dwarves currently?

I have recorded with them on most of the albums. I play any shows that I can. I love playing with those guys.

Do you have a significant role in songwriting these days?

Currently most members of the band write. I usually get one of my songs on each album these days.

How would you describe your songwriting relationship with Blag Dahlia?

He has always been easy for me to collaborate with. Usually I feed him a riff or even a fully developed set of chords and a melody sometimes lyrics.  If he likes it he will often add lyrics and make a few changes. I trust that he will come up with something good. I think there has to be high level of trust with a songwriting partner.

Do you two have similar instincts? What have you learned from his songwriting approach?

Yes I think we do have similar instincts about what Dwarves songs should be like. I think I have learned more from Blag than anyone else about writing and performing, probably because he likes my songs for the most part but isn’t afraid to give constructive criticism. He has taught me that you don’t always have to stick to conventional formulas like intro/verse/pre-chorus/chorus/outro etc. Sometimes I still fall into that anyway though.

As a musician, which accomplishments are you proudest of so far?

My answer to this question may be surprising to those who don’t know me but I think I am more proud of accomplishments as a teacher of music than as a writer or performer. My parents were both teachers. They passed away a few years ago and I had the opportunity to speak with many of their students at the funeral. So many of them expressed to me how much meaning both my mother and father brought to them through teaching. That kind of impact is very important and truly something to be proud of.

Is it somewhat strange to be such a well-known figure in punk, yet to be virtually unrecognizable to fans when you're unmasked? Is that fun for you, or somewhat unsatisfying?

I will admit that I do enjoy the un-recognition. It makes it that much better when I am recognized.

How do you approach being an artist who by design refuses to reveal himself publicly?

I do have to be careful about taking photos with fans. It didn’t used to matter much but in this internet age I realize that any photo will be immediately made public.

Some of your lyrics are particularly dark and savage, yet in person you're a very humble, down to Earth kind of guy. Do you see music as an outlet for expressing negativity that might otherwise manifest in the forms of addiction, depression, violence, etc.?

I am an optimist by nature I think. But yes there is a lot of fucked up shit in the world and I am not without blame for taking part in some of it. Creativity can be a personal expression but it can also be a reflection of what is going on around us.

How do you incorporate music into your current lifestyle? 

Music is a big part of my life. I always have a several projects going. For example I am currently getting my band ready for a European tour this fall. This is the first time I have toured over there with my own band. I also recently started working with Spike Slawson playing keyboard in his band The Re-Volts. That is challenging because he writes music that is generally more complicated than my own stuff or most Dwarves material. I am also constantly creating MIDI based film score type of ambient music just for the hell of it. I did manage to get some material into a couple very under the radar documentaries recently and would love to pursue this further. I also have been working with my sister on a children’s musical based on a book my mother wrote and tried to publish about 20 years ago. I also attend quite a few concerts as a fan. I was just over in Blackpool, UK at the Rebellion Festival and loved seeing more bands than I can mention here.

What are your observations and views on the direction that music - rock music in particular - is headed?

I think the most significant driver of history right now is technology. I have seen big changes in my lifetime as a result of it. When I was a child our family had a black and white television and a rotary phone. We had a big acoustic piano in our house and that was not uncommon. When I started playing rock music, we recorded on tape. We went into a studio for a few days and played the songs over and over until we got it right. A few years later Pro Tools appeared and it changed the way recording was done. It also made it cheaper to record and so what once involved a high level of expertise became something anyone could do. One of the unexpected results of technological advances is a “dumbing down” of the people who rely on it. Think about what “Spellcheck” has done to the need to know how to spell. Rock music is electrified folk music. As such it is in a position to reflect this technological world perhaps more than any other genre since it grew out of technology and relies on it.

Do you feel that punk rock songwriting is something that people will continue to view as relevant for generations to come? Also, how do you see yourself and The Dwarves in the context of being "legendary" punk musicians. Clearly you're at that level, but in a different way than other popular bands with a less offensive and more marketable image.

Like any genre punk will fade over time. It has already lost its edge for sure. The biggest thing that punk did was create a genre that anyone can do. Skilled musicians aren’t needed for it. Singers don’t even have to sing, guitar players can get by with a few “power chords”. This allowed people from lower economic classes to get involved in creating and performing rock music like never before. It also tilted the whole genre toward amateurism where it remains for the most part today. Because the bigger entertainment culture driven by profit motive has taken it in as a “style” to be sold, it has lost its rebellious edge. Rebellion and criticism do still exist because kids are kids, but the cry for social justice is less a critique of oppressive institutions these days and more of a call for a rigid moralism cloaked as diversity and inclusion. When punk becomes a “style” it loses its potential for meaningful rebellion. That is why it is most compelling when it is unmarketable. Offensive content is one way this can be accomplished.

Dwarves fans seem to be a rather diverse crowd - do you find that your own music attracts a similarly diverse following? How has your solo career felt in comparison to your tenure in The Dwarves?

I don’t think Dwarves fans are a diverse group. I see mostly young white men in the crowd. My own music seems to attract about the same group. only less of them.

Do you feel more inspired now that you're doing your own thing, and are there significant benefits to being able to do it all yourself if you need to? What are the drawbacks, and what are the challenges of maintaining a project where you're putting out quality recordings and releases on vinyl in a time when fewer and fewer people are buying music at all?

I am able to expand the subject matter of my songs in the solo project. It seems like Dwarves material gets caught into themes about getting high or fucking. While there is some of that in my own songs I think I am able to write about a wider variety of subjects. My releases are almost all money losers. Like I said, it is an amateur genre and I am ok with that. I just like to write and perform music. Fortunately because of my involvement in The Dwarves there are some people who will listen.

What are your future goals as a songwriter? Do you have a "bucket list" of accomplishments or milestones you'd like to reach as an artist? Do you feel that you've already accomplished enough to feel "secure" and just be able to enjoy what you're doing?

I write when I fell inspired to do so. Sometimes personal situations seem to cause that and sometimes other things. For example, I wrote most of “Sunday School Massacre” when I was working a job counseling and teaching emotionally disturbed kids. “Humaniterrorist” came out right after my parents were killed in a car crash. I don’t really have a list of things I want to do as a songwriter. I would like to get some of music into film scores though.

What motivates you today, and what can we expect from you in the near future?

Well Dustin, you inspired me with your song “Bad Things” recorded by Grim Deeds. When I heard it I got the idea to write more songs using the word Bad. That then led to songs with the word Good. I had a rush of creativity and wrote my soon to be released album, “The Good, The Bad, and The Brutal”.

For aspiring songwriters out there, what advice can you offer? What is the key to longevity as a songwriter? How do you remain inspired, motivated, and challenged as a songwriter?

Well, there are many approaches to songwriting. I guess you should find whatever genre you are most comfortable with. If it is rock music, some ability to play guitar is probably the easiest way to go. For rap, you might want to get a home recording rig. They are cheap and easy to learn these days. It doesn’t hurt to learn some basic music theory. I recommend learning to play a little piano for that. As for lyrics, I keep a notebook going and jot down ideas for lyrical and musical phrases, rhymes, and rhythms. Most of these go nowhere but that’s ok.  Don’t be afraid to edit, some of these fragments can be shaped and fit into music. Inspiration can come at any time from anywhere. Sometimes other music, sometimes stuff people say. Whatever, that’s up to you and that is what makes it so fun.