KoB - How is this tour treatin' you so far, you've got a little thing going on right now, right?
David J � Yeah, it's a new group, which I'm calling the Velvet Cosh and it consists of cello and percussion; Joyce Rooks on cello and Kris Krull on percussion, a trio, a little power trio, acoustic power trio.
KoB � Did they perform on the your latest recording?
DJ � No they didn't, we've yet to record together, but we're going to do that in May because we have a big tour on the west coast in May and do some recording then.
KoB � Is the new album finished yet?
DJ � The new album is long time finished, yeah, I'm still looking for a good home for it. I was considering putting it out myself, but it's a big ordeal to become a one man record company. There is so much entailed, you know.
KoB � You had mentioned on your site that you were basically doing all this on your own now. So, are you Hey Day Records?
DJ � Hey Day Records is a very small indie label based on the west coast, with a good heart, but not much, really not much clout, financially, but they just got the right spirit. You know they're gonna put this thing out there, it exists, they made it exist, so I can give it to you and sell it at gigs. It's not officially available yet, but it will be in, hopefully in a couple of weeks. And then the full length CD will follow, hopefully in early fall. On my end, I might just end up putting it out myself, if I can get that together, but it's a lot to take on.
KoB � Touring and selling records and merchandise on the tour is that bringing in money to help put that out?
DJ � No (chuckles from both David and Richard his tour manager ensue). No, I mean it's a lot of money to do that.
KoB � Well, with that happy note, let's put something on from the new EP. I've had a day to listen to this but I'd say that the price of the show and this disc are well worth it, especially since four of the five tracks on this EP will not be on the full album. So, what would you like to hear from this?
David � We could play the title track, which features Dave Navarro on lead guitar, it's got Bruce Kaphan from American Music Club on pedal steel and Mark Kozelek from Red House Painters sings and plays on it and Steve Perkins plays drums. When the full length comes out there will be an extended version of it.
KoB � You also have a Thievery Corporation remix on this EP, for the full length will there also be other remixes or other artists working on tracks in that capacity? or will there be another single or EP?
DJ � Probably no other singles, just on the record itself. But I am, I'm working on other music as well, like I'm working with the Nortec Collective who are based down in Tijuana, cuz I live just outside of San Diego, so they're my neighbors. And I'm doing a song with Panoptica, from the Collective. It's a work in progress which we are actually playing on this tour, we've got the pre-recorded electronic elements, and we play that and I sing live and we play percussion over top and cello. So it's evolving on this tour so as soon as I get back I want to finish that one.
KoB � Have you considered playing live with Nortec? Maybe even touring?
DJ � I think the audience is a bit too split. But a one off show, we might be doing a couple of dates, one-off, two-offs, on the west coast with Panoptica possibly, that's just an idea. But also some of the other artists in the Collective, like Bostich and Fussible are going to be doing remixes of one of the tracks on this EP, "Mickey Rourke Blues," and they're gonna call it "Mickey Goes to TJ." And there is another finished remix of that track by Pink Noise which I've brought along here, so we can hear that. So, that will be a little EP.
KoB � So this is a remix of the song from the EP?
DJ � Yeah.
KoB � And can we play it?
DJ � You can play it.
KoB - Because the version on the EP, the FCC says we can't play it because it has a 'naughty' word in it?
DJ � Yeah, that's right. No, there is no naughtiness (in the remix).
KoB � Ok, well we will definitely play the Pink Noise remix later on, let's go ahead and play 'Guitar Man.' Stay tuned as later we will discuss some of David's past including some of the music he's pulled out as well as more of what's to come.
["The Guitar Man" is played and then David asks that I play Love and Rockets' "Shelf Life" off of Sweet F.A. Of course I oblige.]
KoB � I have to ask, since this tune ("Shelf Life") seems a bit appropriate, could you tell us a little about that track.
DJ � Yeah, it's a good link to the other song there because when I was recording that track that was when I met Bruce Kaphan from American Music Club, as they were still going then and we were recording up in San Francisco, which is where they were based. And he played the pedal on that one as well as the other, he's really a great musician. But, the story behind the song is in the early 90s I got signed to MCA, I did a solo record, "Urban Urbane," and basically it didn't sell like hundreds of thousands like they thought it would. They were trying to go a little bit alternative, that's how they explained it to me, they wanted to sort of mine that. But they also wanted the big figures, you know, because they're a corporate monster. And so, when it came to doing the follow-up, I submitted some demos, it was just me playing acoustic guitar, I just got this phone call saying they weren't going to do it, not with those sales scans, you know. And literally, I put down the phone, slammed down the phone, went into the other room, picked up the guitar and wrote that song, just straight away. So it was a very immediate and visceral response to the situation.
KoB � And on your website, didn't you say you have had some similar responses to this new one?
DJ � Um, for different reasons. People seem to like it but I'm told that it's too sophisticated and that it won't sell. It's almost like being told it's too good. You know, and it's very frustrating, a bit because of the volatile nature of the music business they don't want to take a chance on it and even independents�Well, I've had several independents that want to put it out but they want to own the tapes, they want to play it safe as well and I paid for those tapes myself and I don't want to give them away for nothing, and they are not going to give me any kind of advance, you know, no advances up front�Good percentage, but I think it warrants more than that, so that's why I've been holding back, but I'm kind of caught between the devil and a hard place really. I don't know what it's eventual outlet will be, I'm sure it will find an outlet and it's very frustrating, because the record has actually been finished, gettin' on for two years. I've got a new record all written and ready to go, you know ready to be recorded. Obviously I need the funds to get that one out and I have no record label, you know it's a bit of an up-hill battle.
KoB � What is your take on the internet as a form of promotion?
DJ � I think it's very good for an up and coming artist, you know for an artist just startin' out, it's really great. But I think it is�I'm ambivalent because I think it deprives more established artists of some degree of income. And also, the sound quality isn't that good, it's not, I can hear it you know, compared to a CD and certainly if you compare it to vinyl it's nowhere near as good. But, I think there is a whole generation coming up, that have been brought up with the internet, but their ears, they hear differently because they have not been brought up with vinyl. So, I think that kind of subtlety, the subtlety of the wave form is lost on them.
KoB � Would you mind telling the story, or at least a piece of the story of how you got into DJing and who helped you out when you first started?
DJ � Well, I've always liked being the DJ at home, just playing records for my friends. The first time I had a go on a twin deck set up was, again when we were recording in San Francisco. A very close friend of my brother's was up there sort of just trying to start out and having a few gigs around town and he had a twin deck set up so, I asked him to show me how it all worked. He later moved to LA and became very successful under the name of Christopher Lawrence. So he's really the guy that sort of showed me the ropes.
KoB � What has your brother (Kevin Haskins, formerly of Bauhaus and Tones on Tail) been up to?
DJ � He's working on film soundtracks. He's just done a pilot movie for TV and also computer game soundtracks. It's all studio stuff. He's working with Doug DeAngelis, who was the producer of 'Lift' a Love and Rockets record. That's something I would like to get into as well, film soundtracks, write songs for films.
KoB � I always thought that 'Songs from Another Season' had a bit of a soundtrack quality to it. Made for a great full record listening kind of thing. Though I have to ask, I don't suppose you will be performing 'I'll be your chauffeur' this evening?
DJ � That's, yeah, that's very likely. A distinct possibility.
KoB � Quick change of topic, and a rather general question at that, but could you tell me about the Bubblemen? What was that all about?
DJ � Well, I've got my own theory on that. It started of as a little doodle, sketch that Daniel did. And, we decided to make the doodle manifest in Love and Rockets and the idea was kind of the antithesis to Bauhaus. These clown figures who had perennial smiles and were very good natured and they apparently came from outer space. But they were kind of holy fools and that was the perception and they had come to earth to enlighten us, lesser beings, and educate us as to the error of our ways, our war mongering ways.
Then I later on discovered the Hopi Kachinas, these Kachina dolls that are based around different spirit forms, and the earliest one is a clown, a clown Kachina. And he's a holy fool, he's a classic holy fool and he's, he is basically an elongated Bubbleman, in this like, he has the same black and white bands and the antennae and the big smiley face and the big eyes but he's just stretched, you know, long. But, his role was to imbue society with enlightenment through clowning, and I think we were touching on some sort of archetype, I do. I don't know how, but that's my theory.
KoB � Excellent, I think that's what sold me on them, after watching them on a Love and Rockets video, I liked the idea of them being an antithesis to Bauhaus, yet being a part of them at the same time, like on the Mask album.
DJ � Yeah, although it's, on one level it's an antithesis, but Bauhaus you know, that was a pretty complex world.
KoB � True. Well, I suppose we should play some more music, since we don't have any Bauhaus cued up right now, let's go into this yet to be released Pink Noise mix. Could you tell me a little about how you ended up writing this song, not this remix, but the original version.
DJ � The original song is called Mickey Rourke Blues. And, I just simply picked up a magazine and there was an interview with Mickey Rourke and it's pretty much verbatim, just all the stuff he was saying about how he was disenchanted with Hollywood and he'd rather hang out back in Miami with his mates, and he'd rather be a boxer. What it came down to, he'd rather box, because that was more an honest profession, you know. And it's just all about that. But this is the remix version because you can't play the other version because there is one swear word on it, which was taken from the interview. But that's the genesis of the song.
But how I came to work with Pink Noise, Richard Morel who also helped me on the original version on the EP, was through Deep Dish doing a remix of a Love and Rockets track, Resurrection Hex, and they did this Love and Dub, very long, very great remix�Found out that they were going to do, it just goes on and on, it's all very convoluted, but we were working on 'Lift,' we were thinking about who we would like to get to do some remixes, cuz it was very electronic and we though that would work. So, Doug DeAngelis, the producer, he said, 'well, I think Deep Dish would do a great version of this.'
So, the next day he went round to see them and he went into the studio and they had a pile of like the complete works of Love and Rockets on their desk, in the studio. And he thought, like did somebody phone up and say that we were coming? And they didn't know anything about it and it just turned out that they were fans of Love and Rockets. And that's all that was on the desk, and then he said we got this idea, we're doing this new record, would you like to do a remixes for it? 'Oh yeah, great' And then Richard�Morel, who is Pink Noise, is the singer in Deep Dish. So I met Richard through Deep Dish and just, again it was just pure chance that we were recorded that song because I was staying with him in Washington, and it got snowed in, I was just staying a couple of nights and we just had nothing to do, and he said 'Do you wanna record?' Cuz, he's got a home studio, and I said 'Yeah, I've got this new song, maybe you could do that.' And that was 'Mickey Rourke Blues.' And then he said, 'I really want to do a remix of this.' And it was very fortuitous as well because he's a big Mickey Rourke fan and he had a these sound files of Mickey Rourke dialogue there then. But, I also wanted to generate all the rhythm from fight sounds so we got a copy of 'Raging Bull.'
KoB � Yeah, you can hear them especially as the track begins.
DJ � Yeah, well it's all the way through, the drums, all the drums are just like punches and sort of grunts and when De Niro hits the canvas, you know, that's like the bass drum, sampled and looped.
KoB � I remember hearing an interview with Martin Scorsese on NPR, I believe it was Fresh Aire, and he discussed the sound effects that they used in dubbing the fight scenes in 'Raging Bull,' including lion's roars, train noises and car crashes�
DJ � Right, and they were slowed down.
KoB � Yeah, just to exaggerate the madness of the fights.
DJ � Right, it's very well done, the sound design on that movie.
KoB � Between your djing and working with other people in the electronic music realm, do you plan on intertwining any more electronica within your albums, besides remixes? It seems a lot of what you write is basically just you and a guitar.
DJ - It always comes from the song. If the song suggests that then yes. It's an organic process, I don't think, 'I'm gonna do this' and these will be the component elements, it just happens, you know, so possibly.
KoB � Well, let's go ahead and play this track then, won't have you much longer as sound check is soon and we want to get a bit more in with you before you leave. Here is the Pink Noise remix of Mickey Rourke Blues, or was there another song, the Mickey Goes To�
DJ � Oh, Mickey Goes to TJ, is going to be with the Nortec Collective, see it's all very complicated, there's so much going on.
KoB � Very. Stay tuned�
(song plays)
KoB � (Announces Show Promotion and Info) We were discussing some of the artists that you've worked with as far as remixing and composing music. Are there any�
DJ � That last one was from Pink Noise, and as we said about the complicated issue here. It's even further complicated by the fact that there's another version, a remix of 'Mickey Rourke' on Richard's solo record, Morel's 'Queen of the Highway,' that's just come out. I think it's track five, and that was the original "Mickey Rourke Blues" remix, that he liked so much he said 'Can I put this on my record and I'll do you another one?' And the 'other one' is the one we just heard. And I also played bass on the new Morel record.
KoB � Well, are there any people that you haven't worked with that you would like to collaborate with?
DJ � Well, I am working with a poet called Jeremy Reed, a really great English poet, and I'm putting his poems to music, soundscapes. And, I would really like to work with Bjork on one track, because I understand that she is a really big fan of his work, apparently sleeps with his books by her bedside. So, I'm going to endeavor to get in touch with her and see if that can happen.
KoB � While touring, what kind of music do you bring with you to listen to?
DJ � Very eclectic. The favorites on the bus, at the moment (tour manager Richard, laughs in the back ground).
KoB � Richard, why are you laughing?
Richard � We go into truck stops and buy tapes, compilation tapes.
DJ � Usually country tapes. George Jones is a big one at the moment. The new Neil Halstead solo record, we do a Mojave 3 song in this set. And Spiritualized, that new Spiritualized record I really love, I think it's their best record and the others haven't exactly been flops, you know, artistically great stuff. And the Nortec Collective record, we've been playing that and enjoying that. Johnny Cash, "Murder," yeah that's been a hit. I like Sparklehorse.
KoB � Ok, so what about reading material?
(This time Richard laughs so hard he almost drops his lap of managerial goodies.)
DJ � Yeah (David chuckles a bit himself), well�
KoB � Boy, that one got a bigger reaction.
DJ � Yeah, because we stopped by a restaurant-cum-library in Maine called Food and Books. And the deal is that you get, if you buy a dinner you get a book, you choose a book. And they're all, they're like, the books that have been gathering dust in the libraries for years, that nobody wants you know, and so we all chose a book. The big hit book selection has been 'Rock Star' by Jackie Collins. And Joyce, the cellist, is reading excerpts and entertaining us royally as we go along the road. So we have like a couple chapters every day on the road so that's been the big, bedtime story book.
KoB � What had you been reading prior to your Food and Books adventure?
DJ � The last book I finished was by Rennie Sparks called "Evil." She's part of the Handsome Family. And that's another favorite record, 'Twilight,' by the Handsome Family. But this is a book of her short stories, really great stuff, very, sort of dark and comic.
KoB � Well, I suppose we should let you guys head up to the club. Is there anything you would like to say about this next track you've picked for us to play?
DJ � Yeah, this is a very early Bauhaus song, about tenacity. We sometimes do a version of this for an encore, it's called "Hair of the Dog."
KoB � Actually, that reminds me of something else I wanted to ask you about. You're doing a cover this evening, you had said it would start the show off�
DJ � Well, we do usually start the show off with a cover, yeah.
KoB � Did you want to say anything about it or should we just leave it as a surprise?
DJ � It's a song by a lesser known song-writer called Norma Jean Krautmeyer.
KoB � (I had to chuckle at this as he had just discussed the song and his connection to the artist) O.K.
DJ � Obviously not so lesser known.
KoB � And we'll just leave it at that.
DJ � Yeah, you'll have to come down to find out about that one.
KoB � Ok, well thanks for coming up and we shall see you tonight�(followed by more show info announcing)
I would like to thank both David J and Richard for their time and for making it to Tallahassee. The show was wonderful, even the opening song, a cover of "The Dope Show," by Marilyn Manson. Keep an eye out for David touring in your area and definitely look out for his new CD due out soon, if we're all lucky.
