Page 18 - The NOISE November 2015

The meaT puppeTs Take flagsTaff!
The Meat Puppets have probably been a band longer than you’ve been alive and they undoubtedly influenced some of the most important artists from your most memorable years. We had a chance to chat with founding member and Arizona native Chris Kirkwood
about the early days of what would become alternative music, what’s next, and the almighty Black Flag. What follows is a testament to the intense attitudes of honesty, angst, and humility that birthed the grunge explosion. The Meat Puppets will be performing their cow-punk classics, as well as material from their latest release at The Orpheum Theater on November 28. Tickets will undoubtedly sell out fast!
You performed on Nirvana’s Unplugged In New York, easily one of the most important releases of the ‘90s. What can you tell us about that night?
It was fun to do! The guys weren’t initially planning on releasing, though. It was just going to be one-off. It was interesting because Nirvana was suddenly getting so popular and we were on the road with them. Kurt said they were planning on doing a solo set and maybe they were thinking of covering some of our songs. That was just fine with us. He decided to have us on and make it a little easier on himself, like letting Curt (Brother of Chris and Meat Puppets guitarist) do all the frantic guitar work and let me flub the bass part. Ha! It was a very, very funny thing. You couldn’t know what was going to go down after that, of course. But, that was fun. Nice guys, definitely, and in an odd place. Just a little garage band to suddenly being pretty much the biggest in the world. Very unique to see and you could tell they were handling it as best they could. I just thought they were really cool guys, on top of their stuff, and it was a great time.
In addition to music, you’re also an accomplished artist. Where does art fit into your creative process?
Ha! I’m doing it as we speak. I’m actually working a piece right now. I do it to relax. I’ll take out a pen and paper and watercolors with us on the road. I like to sit around, it’s like a space-out thing for me. Music, art, what the f##k ever, I do it to self-indulge myself. Ha! Definitely drawing is real chill. Just pick up a pen, fill a piece of paper ... It helps that my standards are really low. It gets to a place where I don’t even really try and I’m just cleaning out the goop in my brain.
The early days of SST were some of the most brilliant and creative times in the last 50 years of American music; however, yourselves included, almost immediately felt restricted by the idea of hardcore. What was your time on the label like?
At the time when we were making the music, none of us were sitting there going, “God, we’re making history!” We were just trying to get records made if we could. It just happened that it was on Black Flag’s record label. We’d been around playing shows for a while and the way we got on out there was through a group of Phoenicians who had moved to Los Angeles called The Consumer’s. Jimmy, who went on to be in The Germs as Don Bolles, was our Phoenix connection and, through them, we met the band Monitor who went on to put out our first 7”. We were definitely screaming a lot at that point, our original stuff was pretty fast and hectic, definitely similar in that way to hardcore but we had an art side as well. Because of that, we were able to play different kinds of shows and punk rock, at that time, lent itself to that. They were mixing the lay-out of shows, it hadn’t gotten so class specific. So, it wasn’t anything to us, we were able to jump genres as far as that’s concerned. SST was a cool label. They picked up so many interesting bands, and, being as it was Black Flag’s label, they purposefully went out and picked up bands that weren’t anything like them. That’s where punk rock was at the time. It’d been happening for a while with stuff like the Ramones and it’d made it’s way out into these little pockets of the country. There were scenes popping up that were unique to themselves still under that blanket label of “punk rock.” And Black Flag toured a lot and that’s how they met those bands.
The whole thing seemed to come together very organically.
Yeah. When you’re wrapped up in that kind of s**t, you’re not doing it for posterity. But, at the same time, we were. You’re making records, it’s not like your farting into the wind.
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INTeRVIeW BY mIke WIllIams
As The Meat Puppets were moving away from hardcore scene, the band said they were into “pissing off the crowd.” Any memorable antics that seemed to work better than others?
It wasn’t an intentional thing. We were trying to define ourselves in the way that we wanted to. We never considered ourselves a hardcore band. At all. We didn’t even really consider ourselves punk, we were just the Meat Puppets. In that, we were going to do exactly whatever we wanted to do. You could see it on the 7” and certainly on the 12” where we purposefully did some covers, like the Doc Watson one and the Pioneer’s “Tumblin’ Tumble Weed.” By the time we were ready to actually record, we were already flexing ourselves off in another direction. It’s the right of the artist to basically do whatever the f**k they want. As far as pissing off the audience, there’s a few memorable points. The song “Up On The Sun,” Curt was beginning work on it and we were playing at the Roxy in New York City with Suicidal Tendencies. They definitely drew a very hardcore crowd, a certain look, a certain behavior, all that kind of stuff ... We’ve just never been into that kind of thing. So, while were playing, at one point the crowd is just losing their minds, screaming at us “Get off,” and my brother had just had his twins. They were real young and babies cry a lot. At one point, he started taunting the audience by saying,
“You are my daughter,” over and over again with guitar over it. It evolved into the lyrics that wound up the song.
Beyond the reunion and touring, what else have you been up to lately?
I’ve been doing a podcast lately. We recently spoke with Fred Armisan of Portlandia and Saturday Night Live. A friend of mine thought that, having done this as long as we have, the stories are unending. All these nights blabbing with friends after shows, it just seemed like something fun to do. We’ve gotten to talk to a lot of different folks and it’s been really interesting. I’m digging it.
Did you get to talk to Mr. Armisan about the recent Danzig guest spot on Portlandia?
He did! I’ve got a funny Danzig story, as well. We were playing with them (The Misfits) up at the Filmore, but I think it was called the Elite Club at the time, and we played fifteen songs from the soundtrack of The King and I.
The Yul Brynner movie?
Yes! We opened with that and there was an immediate barrage of beer cans, loogies, and whatnot from the bunkers. That kind of stuff was going on back then, very crowd involved, so we made it through our set and those guys started playing. For some reason, the punkers were throwing things at them, too, and this was when Doyle and Jerry were in band. Those guys are BIG motherf**kers ... Well, Glenn himself is a big, brawny f**k and Doyle took his guitar off and belted this kid in the head with it. Actually broke the body of his guitar on him. It turned into a riot.
Wait, this is a pretty famous story from the Bay Area punk scene and was described in the oral history of the San Fran scene Gimme Something Better ... The Meat Puppets played that?
Oh yeah. That kind of thing would happen pretty regularly though. The cops were always on the prowl at punk rock shows, especially in L.A. I remember some time after Flag played here for the first time, they let us play with them out in Huntington Beach. It was Henry’s (Rollins) first show there, it was a pretty big one, and the police showed up. Someone stole one of the cop’s helmets. And they’d do this thing where they’d come down the left and the right of the show, move to the back, and next thing you know, there’s a whole bunch in there. We were just like, “Oh s**t,” and they told us to give back the helmet or else. It was funny, but, at that time, music was an outlet. Growing up in Phoenix was weird. The only things you had to relate to was Wallace and Ladmo and the desert. And it’s only gotten more alienating.
Amen.
| Mike Williams prefers puppets made of meat. music@thenoise.us interview