Guitarzan Vs. Bazzilla Featuring Drumasaurus Rex (interviewed December 2002 - February 2003) photo courtesy of Guitarzan vs. mp3.com

Give Me That : What made you come up with these outrageous names that you guys have for yourselves?

Guitarzan (G): The name Guitarzan Vs. Bazzilla featuring Drumasaurus Rex came from
guitar, bass, drums. The anti-DJ Rock band, even though we love DJ music. FEATURING,
VERSUS, DINOSAURS!

Drumasaurus Rex (D): Originally the names, as I believe it to be, came about as a title with which to invoke a sort of name EVENT! rather than some one word band name that
resonated with quaint punctuality. We opted for the "one-night-only-event-style" name
which actually allows us more room to play because it relinquishes any particular
expectations. Seemingly, the names have come to represent the musicians relative to the
monster instruments, although I prefer to think of myself as the proverbial stunt man who
drives the enormous fire breathing, metal crushing, car stomping - DRUMASAURUS MONSTER TRUCK TONITE AT THE METRODOME!

Bazzilla (B): Just plain stupidity!

GMT: I don't think Tarzan would last long fighting Godzilla (laughing). I really dig the guitar sound you've got going for Extra Terrestrial Highway, what model guitar did you use to record that with? 

G: I play Fender bitches.

B: Fender with plenty of delay.

G: They are good for fast and noisy stuff but on a couple of tracks there was a hollow
body and a lefty Tele, played upside down, and maybe some other shit. 

D: Imagine a little wooden box laminated with tile on the inside. Every time you open it
there's this miniature fieldhouse inside with a fender pointing out the window playing to the birds. When you put your ear up to it you can hear the guitar playing from far away, across the field and echoing on the tiles.

GMT: Every guitar player out there is always tampering with the Blues, you know even the
Heavy Metal guys in the interviews are showing off Blues chords but for a lot of people it
just don't work, they lack the soul. You on the other hand are a natural, what was it or
should I say who was it that inspired you down that path?

G: I would love to be able to do what those Heavy Metal guitar shredders can do! I don't
have enough time in this world.

D: I don't know for sure, but I think sooner or later every guitar player ought to investigate the Blues. While there may be lots of history in classical guitar, the history of the guitar's
overwhelming popularity roots itself in Rock-N-Roll and the Blues. As for Joe (Guitarzan) his natural ability to listen to these musical ghosts, he would have to tell you their specific names.

G: So I have to play a spaced-out version of what I dig - Chuck Berry, R.L. Burnside,
Link Wray and of course Yngwie Malmsteen, he played a show in Mpls where his tights split and his balls fell out shooting the brain, Rock!

B: Jimi? Stevie? not so strictly Blues or Pop.

GMT: I can hear some Jimi on a few tracks but the rhythm section is more on the Motown
thing or even early James Brown. What do you think of this mainstream Garage revival? I
mean I was always under the impression that Garage Rock equals Low-Fi.

B: I think it's a statement of the main industry and how much it sucks!

D: It's the pansy bands, everyone is suckin'. It all depends on your definition of
Garage Rock, I mean they obviously weren't recorded in a garage and it doesn't sound like
it was recorded in a garage!

G: We should call our shit Basement Rock! or Living Room Rock!

GMT: Well Basement Rock is what the Halo Benders called their music. Do you guys rehearse in somebody's basement or rent out a rehearsal space like My Apple?

D: We are rehearsal space whores, we play anywhere.

B:  We practice telepathically.

G: Osmosically...We play in my basement now, we used to rehearse in our fuckin' living
room with the 1800's heater adding reverberation through our upstairs apartment where I
used to live with Bazzilla in Minneapolis. The downstairs people loved our brand of
Rock-N-Roll especially in the wee hours of 2:30am to 6:00 am!

GMT: When I saw you guys play a couple years back, it seemed like you were heading
toward the Psychedelic Space Rock genre but when I saw you recently it was more of a
mixture of Garage Rock and British Post Punk. Was that the direction you wanted to take
the band or did it just come about unintentionally?

B: Kinda what comes out, nothing that we are striving for.

G: Most of our noise is improv when there is no one watching - making weird noises and
also I love to play songs. Hopefully playing cool songs with a little bit o' character to em'
with some messages of ET life, mind-control, hollow earth, future transportation and
madness.

D: I just want to take this opportunity to say thanks for listening. I kinda think that the
Psychedelic Space Rock you have referred to is what tends to happen naturally for us when we turn away from our written songs. We tend to write for the Rockin but improv into the unkown Zero Point Energy of the Cosmos. We were eager to play out, and in the beginning, it seemed we would try to fill time with improvised ether music simply because we hadn't written as many songs yet. I dunno, I also did more psychedelics then...maybe that has something to do with it.

GMT: Somebody was telling me that you have a Trip-Hop band? What the hell is Trip-Hop? (laughing) I tell you there's so many genres nowadays, I feel like an old fart.

D: We each play with other people sometimes.

B: What was the question? (smiling) Fuck, I don't know what it is - take some acid and
play Hip-Hop! (laughing)

G: Like Eno + Cypress Hill - add party favors!

GMT: I was told that you guys do another band that plays a couple times a week at the
Times Bar or Nyes Polonaise?

D: You must be talking about Test Type.

B: Test Type - Torture! (smiling)

G: Test Type Trio, about 6 months after we started as a band of monsters, Bazzilla &
Drumasaurus Rex started to play with a saxophonist and organist and Guitarzan played also.

GMT: Whereabouts are your guys stomping ground or local water hole? 

B: Terminal Bar - Monday through Saturday and Whitey's on Sundays.

GMT: Extra Terrestrial Highway was recorded by Mike Wisti from Rank Strangers, far
stretch on both sides, how'd all that come about?

D: I share neurosis, common neurosis with Mike.

B: He was cheap (smiling) and he's a nice guy, smart.

G: Beer Bug from Chicken Katsu Records wanted a song for a compilation and introduced
me to Mike and we dug the vibe and made a whole bunch of sound and songs that became Extraterrestrial Highway around the same time I had just gotten back from Area 51.

GMT: Did one of you guys live in Japan? I mean how did you become involved with Chicken Katsu Records cause you guys have played several of the big parties that they've held.

B: Negative. How did they get involved? We played with Munchkins In The Can a lot.

D: We played Bon Appetit with them and Beerbug asked us for a song to put on a
compilation.

G: Chicken Katsu is real cool to us, they support us and distribute some of our records.
Beer Bug asked us to do a song for his upcoming compilation,  with some other bands that
dig that guitar sound. Chicken Katsu is into noisy cool guitar sounding bands and such.

GMT: So where'd you find this drummer at? Man can he play.

G: Drumasaurus came to us in a dream.

B: In the City Pages looking for - Spaced-out Punk Blues Jazz animal!

D: I was drawn to an ad in the City Pages that was looking for a - Spaced-out Punk Blues
Jazz animal or something. I had been answering other ads for drummers and was beginning to get frustrated with finding musical mates. I would lug my drums out of the dorms to some remote basement catbox and jam with boring mama's boys, that is until I answered
the ad placed by Rich and Joe (Bazzilla & Guitarzan). They called me back at about 9 or 10
at night asking if I wanted to jam and give it a shot. The phone had woke me up, and I was reluctant after my many strike-outs. I am really glad I went over there and took the time because I had such a good time playing with them, and they made me sound better than I thought I did...which is what makes playing with good musicians fun. Together you make something more beautiful than you could alone.

GMT: You mentioned Punk in your ad to the City Pages, did you get any responses that had a different idea what Punk was about? You guys are really spread out and you know your instruments too well (laughing) if anything the Minutemen or some of those SST Records experiments.

D: We should our (cut off).

B:  Huh?  What was the question? I don't think we had any Oi Oi Oi dudes, the Jazz and
spaced-out contradicted the real Punk "and fuck you, punk drunk!"

G: They would usually just turn into a big delicious orgy.

GMT: Name some local bands that have tamed those dinosaurs?

B: We got raped.

D: We got raped by this one band, and they couldn't play for shit!

G: Soda Pop Jerk, Amish-armada, Space-camp, Racketball, The Jets.

GMT: What's going on at the present moment for the band? Any new releases coming out?

B and D: <UNISON>  Smoke a joint!

D: I'm trying to (laughing)

G: Every Wednesday starting in May 2003 at the Terminal Bar in Minneapolis. We got other gigs besides that too, we are 75 % done with our next record called (working title) Lick My Love Pump.

GMT: Any plans to go tour for the album?

G:  Rockin the east coast with New York City and maybe Boston since Bazzilla knows so
many girlies out there.

B: We are fuckin' full of shit.

B: Iraq! 

D: We are going to play Iraq!

B: I would like to go to Russia.

D: Play Atlantis when it someday rises.

G: (In a frantic tone) Wouldn't it be funny if we were like Egyptian gods and we had on our album cover pictures of us in gold and arms raised (Guitarzan leaves the table yelling - Atlantis Rising!)

B: No comment

D: No comment

GMT: (laughing) Sorry but I have to ask, what's up with those little drums?

D: What up with those drums, huh, well, they make me sound bigger than I am.

B: Those green drums!

D: Little green drums for little green men.

B: That's right, we got it for ET Highway.

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