Speaker 1: Hi, This is Bobby Brown and welcome to another fucking podcast.
Speaker 2: Kids with your loud music and your Dan Fogelberg, your Zeema,
hula hoops and pac Man video games.
Speaker 3: Don't you see?
Speaker 4: People today have attention spans that can only be measured
in namo seconds, old legends. They just do great black
legend and an Adam work from with a lot of.
Speaker 3: Hello, Hello Las Vegas, Hello world, Hello my royal minions.
It's good to see you. What's I was going to
be seeing a busy Presley host of the program, and
my co host with that tooth go host for the
intro at least Mike Gossip if they had a roll show,
the water Cooler and all ended stuff, and Mitch the Dog,
Mitch the doll. It's a good buddy. That's a good buddy.
Speaker 1: Yeah, dude, you talked to today.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: I had a nice, fun, hour and a half long
conversation with him, diving into rock and roll and flip
and songwriting and songwriting and everything. It's a good time.
Speaker 1: This is a dude. This is a dude that I
first met when I was with you and we were
uh working at a podcast convention rock and pod and
I met Brynn and I immediately fell in love with
him and in a totally gay way.
Speaker 3: So we're clear, Well you're into older guys. What can
you say?
Speaker 1: No, dude, he's such, he's he's the greatest dude in
the world. He's just he's a ton of fun. And
this this is a hell of a fun interview.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's good times. It's good times. And speaking of
Rock and Pod, that yellow guitar behind me that you
guys can see. I talked about this on the Patreon
here say patreon dot com. Slash real is president. It's
only five dollars a month that guitar I made. I mean,
it's a cheap ass epiphone. I made it to honor
Jeff Lebar when we did the show and at Rock
and Pod we did rare hair and that was right
after the great Burrito injury. And it's set up to
spin and I whole half hardly attempted it with my
fucking torn rotator cuff. Three times. I had to use
the other arm. But that's that's that's my Jeff Lebbar
tribute guitar. And that's actually for sale four hundred bucks
shipping included stage played. I'll signed it. You guys want
to hit me up. It's just one of those things
I have. You know, it's cool, but I don't need it.
You know. Let another Cinderella fan enjoy it.
Speaker 1: So there you go, there you go.
Speaker 3: What do you say we get into this? Mm hmm
you got anything?
Speaker 1: I think it's great? Enjoy the shit out of this.
We certainly did.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you got anything to pimp before we run into
the interview?
Speaker 1: Nah? Just be good to yourselves and each other, all right?
Speaker 3: So here we are going to play a classic Mike
Dawson reading from the Book of Kiss, and right after
that Brent Urens right here on another fucking podcast with
Ezzi Presley and Mike.
Speaker 1: Dawson, a reading from the Book of Paul Verse Animalize
chapter under the Gun. Yeah, there's no speed limit where
I'm coming from. Let's hit the highway doing sixty nine.
Praise beat a Paul, How.
Speaker 3: Are you brand? Are you good? I'm good, excellent, excellent?
Speaker 1: Hell yeah, dude?
Speaker 4: Or on music. Just twenty four to seven, I was
working on something just before tuning in live via satellite
with Presley. Be a satellite nice. See what I did there?
Speaker 3: I did? And of course tomorrow's his birthday.
Speaker 4: Oh well, see what you did that?
Speaker 3: I did not know this, And also the day they
announced the day that I think it was the day
they announced that Kurt died blazing.
Speaker 4: dB Kurt, oh right, because.
Speaker 3: I was looking at because I every year.
Speaker 4: I yeah, I.
Speaker 3: Randomly grabbed that his shirt and sometimes it just always
works out. It's the day that we found out he died.
So weird.
Speaker 4: He was great to do shows with. He was just
like so low key and low stress. Never brought a
drama to this situation.
Speaker 3: Dude. My favorite Kurut story, La Guns was playing at
the Red Carpet and they got set up, they did
their soundcheck and the opening band comes in and goes,
so are they gonna move their drums? Kirk looks at
the drummer goes, they're not here to see you. You
have three options set up in front of them, set
up on the floor, or go home. That's it. That's it.
They're not here to see you. They're here to see
La Guns.
Speaker 1: That's what you call choices.
Speaker 3: Yeah, he didn't raise his voice, he just he was
calling this is that's your options? That's it.
Speaker 1: I love that shit. I love being calm and being
right one time we were doing uh, we had we
had this uh, this kid that was working for the
show one time for the Corolla Show, and like he
wanted to do some kind of game on the air
and I hadn't heard about it, and all these things
are supposed to go through me. Somehow this didn't go
through me, and all of a sudden it's on the
air and I'm just shaking my head, going this is
a bad idea. So anyway, I told the kid it
went horrible, and then I told the kid afterwards, I said,
you don't do it like this. You run it through me.
Here's what you got to do. And then one day
he said, Dawson, can I talk to you? Can I
talk to you about this after the show? I said, absolutely, dude,
let's go outside and talk. We go outside and talk,
and before he can say one word, I said, this
conversation is not going to go the way you think
it is. There are two producers on this show and
they're both named Mike. End of conversation, very calm. It
totally worked out, but I felt really proud of keeping
my shit together. But also there was an element of,
you know, I can be calm and be a total dick,
and I'm gonna get a lot more out of this
if I'm calm.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so I'm jealous.
Speaker 4: I'm so with you on that.
Speaker 3: I'm jealous. Both you guys are firing lung darts. I'm inside.
I can't. Maybe I should move my whole setup out
to the parking lot so I can fire lung darts
with you guys.
Speaker 1: How long you've been smoking, Brent, yep?
Speaker 4: How long I'm gonna give it a night? Well, you
know when you first start, I can't remember, like how
long I kind of smoked. Like, by the way, this
Mike isn't hooked up, but I felt so I see
both you guys with your I mean it's hooked up.
It hooked up to my recording gear. It's not hooked
up to my show.
Speaker 1: It looks great.
Speaker 4: I felt so inadequate. Yea with you, Mike, thank you? Uh,
I forgot what we were talking about.
Speaker 1: When did you art smoking? How many years? Now?
Speaker 4: So I've got a funny story. I started smoking, I
want to say, in eleventh grade. And we had both
an indoor and outdoor smoking area in our high school.
And the indoor area had like jute boxes, shit and
fucking foosball table and a bumper pool table and a
little pizza shack.
Speaker 1: Why wouldn't you smoke? I mean, and then I want
to go play foosball. Yeah, this is the smoker's area. Well, shit, dude,
give me a fucking pack.
Speaker 4: And right by so that there was four glass doors
access to the outdoor one and always every day of
every in between every class, there was a dude standing
somewhere by those doors selling joints for a dollar.
Speaker 1: Nice.
Speaker 4: And if you planned everything right, you took a home
mech class on your fourth hour, which was which was
classically the lunch hour, so you can use your lunch
money to buy a joint but still eat at lunchtime.
Speaker 1: That home act.
Speaker 4: That was my that was my schedule.
Speaker 1: That's beautiful. I uh a similar similar high school experience
juniors and seniors at my private Catholic high school. Mind
you uh, juniors and seniors were allowed to smoke cigarettes
in the parking lot. If you were freshman and sophomore,
you weren't allowed in the parking lot, So therefore you
weren't allowed to smoke. But as soon as you're a
junior and senior, as you step into the parking lot,
you can light a cigarette.
Speaker 4: They lifted the value of the real estate of that
parking lot a lot. They were that fucking park. Hey,
we have a parking lot. Let's let's fuck with them.
Speaker 1: So you mentioned that you're just producing music NonStop. Up,
what are you working on right now, right now today?
Speaker 4: For me, I'll show you because I was about to
record something, but I was working on one of my
mentees songs. I don't still have it up, do I know?
And it's really cool, but uh.
Speaker 1: M hm.
Speaker 4: With mom no ham, what was I doing?
Speaker 5: Shick with a lotitude.
Speaker 4: Pretty chords?
Speaker 1: H I that is very pretty. It's a little reminiscent
of Melissa. Oh yeah, it's a little bit.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I could hear that.
Speaker 1: But I like I like the I love one of
the things that I was kind of never really able
to do with songwriting because my knowledge of chords and
guitar is, you know, I've been playing since I was
fifteen years I still know five chords.
Speaker 4: Don't let don't let the chords get in.
Speaker 1: The way, right, yeah, exactly, don't let.
Speaker 4: The chords get in the way of a good song.
I can tell you these chords I found by mistake
one day I do it. I do play a lot.
This is open E tuning, and I do use it
a lot. And I have a sock in here because
I had to record, and I'm mute here because I
had to record some really stickato like right, it was
going on shang shang. Yeah, I forget what I'm talking
about a lot. Now.
Speaker 1: Well, what I was going to say a brain injuries,
that's all right. What I was going to say was
in that little groove you just played, I could tell
that that first part was the intro to the song
and that switched over into the verses. And that's one
thing that that I respect that I always thought was
kind of lacking in my songwriting. To get that, you know,
that kind of hook and intro right out there in
the beginning, and then you know, you return to that
as you go. But that's not that's not the pattern
of the verses or you know, it's just it. I
like it.
Speaker 4: Well, it's it's tricky. It's a tricky thing because when
you're playing just guitar, right, you really don't have any
sebilance is that a real word of a vocal or anything? Right?
The tendency is to overplay the guitar yeah, because now
you're making up for everything. And actually, when you're playing
guitar and writing by yourself, a person's tendency is to
play every instrument down the guitar. So you start going,
I'm playing the drums, I'm playing the bass. I got
the rhythm. Wherever the drums and bass were there, I'd
probably going, you know what I mean or something. So
writing a song is a h when you're doing it
on your own, you know, if you're not doing pre
production with a band, and everybody is responsible for their
own component, the drummer, the drums, obviously, the bass, the
bass player. That takes the load off of the writer
and it actually helps the writer and makes things a
lot easier because now, if you have the right guys,
you don't have to think about that ship right now.
Now you're all just now you're doing this, and that's
that's what we all hope for in a rock band,
and it's wonderful for me. Is I have that in
flip right, not to single out, not to leave out
Mono in any way, shape or form, but Kilo and
Greg and I have been playing together so long, and
specifically really Greg even more so since nineteen seventy nine,
and I'm here to tell you that Greg Guy and
I'm and myself Cherry forever have never had a crossword
since since nineteen seventy nine.
Speaker 1: That's rare, would you agree?
Speaker 4: We lived together, and we were poor together, and we
moved to New York together with a garbage bag full
of Jiffy muffins.
Speaker 1: One of those they're like, I mean, obviously it's food
that poor people eat, but I've never heard of it.
Speaker 4: Clearly, they're like at the time, they were twenty five
cents of box, and I think they would make four
little muffins, four or five little muffins per and I
think we like bought enough of them to like and
cooked them and baked them or whatever and filled a
garbage bag with them.
Speaker 3: How long did they last?
Speaker 4: Long enough? I don't know. I'm gonna guess, you know,
in my it was so long ago, but I'm gonna
sure we got really sick of them and they so
they lasted a long time. Like there's a good chance
that weeks later there were Chiffy Muffins sitting around like
we just could the last three were sitting there for
a long period of time. Nice, Well, what I was
gonna say about this thing, and I said, I forgot
what I said. I had a guitar upstairs, open tuned,
sitting in my I have a breakfast nookie booth thing,
and I had forgot that I had it open tuned,
and so I just grabbed it and I went to
play an E chord right shape right, And I went, well, huh.
Speaker 1: So that's an E on an open E tuning, which
is not an E.
Speaker 4: Correct. Yeah, it's an E something. I'm guessing nine because
it's pretty. If it makes you want to cry a
little bit, it's a nine.
Speaker 1: Ah.
Speaker 4: If it makes you want to drop balloons from the ceiling,
it's a seven. It's the beatles, nan can't dank ah.
The nines are the sad chords. The nine it's a
simple theory. It's the ninth note in the scale, so
it's the second to last note in the scale. So
it's that pretty oh open. It's so if I'm playing
a G the nine would be just the next note
down if you're playing the low, which is basically the bassis.
Speaker 1: There it is. Yeah, that's the money guitar right there.
Speaker 4: That's the basis for every flip song.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I keep on a new song the right, Yeah,
come on.
Speaker 4: A good time I paint you.
Speaker 3: So you're just basically a CDC with different chords.
Speaker 4: Looks exactly right. And I tell my man tees that
that's why I said, let the chords get in the
way of a good song. Name this song. You couldn't
take it so hard, Keith Richards.
Speaker 1: Right, yeah, there you go so hard, stop me.
Speaker 4: Up, same key chords everywhere. He is a sound of moth.
Speaker 1: Interesting. Don't let the chords get in the way of
a good well. Yeah, that it sounded it for a second.
It sounded like a Pete Droge piece called Straylan Street,
probably because it's the same chords.
Speaker 4: Very possibly, and there's really only so many. It's not
about you know, the tendant.
Speaker 1: Thank you.
Speaker 4: The tendency for a player is to to immediately want
to go to the next chord or the next note.
If they're soloing. Now hang on to the that baby man,
milk it and make it say something. Don't go get it.
Don't say nothing, but go get that debt, debt, that
that battle and it says something. So these are this
is all I do with my whole life.
Speaker 1: I love it, dude. I love it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, anyway you should should we start the segment?
Speaker 1: Oh we hadn't.
Speaker 3: I mean, we can leave this in here if you
guys want.
Speaker 1: Oh I thought we were Yeah, I thought we were
into it.
Speaker 3: We'll just keep rolling, man, h keep rolling. Son. You
guys are playing on the twenty seventh of February at
Turf Club.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Correct, you guys know you don't. Flip doesn't play that often.
Speaker 4: It's kind of it's getting more. We've just signed new management. Okay,
but you're you're right, I mean I would, I would
gladly play more, you know that being said? Yeah, that
being said. You know the clubs in like you know,
you know here we are today, right, it's like the
clubs downtown Minneapolis, the.
Speaker 2: Old and Gray Mayor. She ain't what she used to be.
She ain't what she used to be, ain't what she
used to be. So there's difficulties all over the place.
Speaker 1: But then again, I mean, tell me how you feel
about this. It's just is it still just? I mean,
obviously there's a lot more to it, But in the end,
is it really just the joy of playing music on stage?
Is that? Is that still everything it is? Do you
still get the same I'm beast the same feeling, and
there's nothing like that feeling on earth.
Speaker 4: You're one correct, And I've come to the conclusion that
I am unwell because the only time I don't feel
anxiety is on the way to the gig. At the gig,
on the way home, on the way to the meeting
with the record company, on the way to the studio.
In the studio, playing guitar, helping others find their voice,
which is what I do. I don't teach guitar. I
don't teach cover songs. If a person wants to excel
at their guitar playing, for instance, I say, we're going
to do that with your material, and if you have
to play it ten times, well, we're going to use
your music and the things that you write, and I'm
gonna help take those things and turn them, help teach
you how to turn them into songs. And in the
process of doing that, I suggest that you watch me
do it. Like I do when a guy comes and
fixes my hot water eater, I watch them so I
can fix it myself next on him. So so even
on a production level, I say, keep your eye on
me and watch what I'm doing. I wouldn't suggest that
you stop me and ask a lot of questions, because
that could bog us down where we're in a creative
space here and create creativity is is the upper you know,
is is the goal. So let's not let anything get
in the way.
Speaker 1: So just watch right, and that I don't want.
Speaker 4: If we want to have a production session, and that's it,
I'm cool with that too.
Speaker 1: Well. Often, yeah, if you if you stop like that
to answer questions or explain something, it's almost like putting
a stick in the spokes it. It's like we've we've
just derailed the creative train.
Speaker 4: Imagines you're on a potter's wheel, and that's a metaphor
I use a lot because a potter's wheel and a
wet piece of clay can just go anywhere, right, you
can do anything with Chances are when you start you
don't really have a finished product in mind, but you
have just a rough. And also you should have is
a rough because if you overthink it and decide for
an end point before you start, you've just gotten rid
of all other possibilities that could have come up while
you were doing that. Right, So it's like if somebody
you were doing the potter's wheel and you had the
mud and it was wet, and somebody came up and
stopped your potter's wheel, your tendency you would want to
be to like maybe punch that person.
Speaker 3: May Yeah, yeah, that's that's that's interesting.
Speaker 4: That's so yeah.
Speaker 3: Well, the reason I kind of brought up yet that much,
I was like because I was thinking it. So yeah,
it's kind of the gear Daddy's thing.
Speaker 4: You know.
Speaker 3: They only play a couple times a year, you know,
and and it seemed to work for them.
Speaker 4: Well, I'm gonna tell you something fun we got. We're
going into the studio. We got new material coming and
you might be glad to hear that one of those
songs were recording his bubblegum machine. Really finally, yeah, finally,
can you believe that? You know what? I think we
have four or five records out and that's not not
out there?
Speaker 1: How long has this song been a part of the band.
Speaker 4: Since the beginning and it was kind of a it
was kind of a favorite out of the gate.
Speaker 3: Yeah again.
Speaker 6: Now, yeah, it's a bubble gumachhae.
Speaker 4: Let's see if I can do it. This should be
my brief production. We're all living in a fish plumb
playing every instrument.
Speaker 7: You live on the bottom of your shoes, yellow, blue, red,
and the rain.
Speaker 4: I'll turn that thing around. Then you just way down
to see that's where.
Speaker 2: I see you.
Speaker 4: Live in with me inside the bubble gum machine. Gum gum,
bubble gum, live in with me inside the bubble gum machine.
It's a perfect waste of time.
Speaker 1: Now, that is good.
Speaker 3: Why was that song never put on a record?
Speaker 4: Great question, because there's only so many songs up for
a record, and somebody wants this one and somebody wants
that one, and in those in those positions, I always
leave it up to the producer.
Speaker 3: Okay. So that was the same thing, kind of the
same thing with hair Do because haird wasn't on that
first record. I got it because it was on that
ninety three X compilation.
Speaker 4: Well, but it was recorded for the first record in Seattle, Yeah,
which might be the version that ended up on that compilation.
So and then we were.
Speaker 8: Re we we we re re recorded the whole first
record in l A at A and M after just
a miserable failed attempt in Seattle?
Speaker 3: What what what went wrong in Seattle?
Speaker 4: Was the wrong just was in a good matchup between
the band and the producers.
Speaker 3: Okay, who was it? Who were the producers? Anybody that
we would.
Speaker 4: Know, Sure, Scott McCoy, Uh, he's like you know in Ri,
been in Rim even since then. And Conrad who know who.
So these were like kind of almost not sub pop guys,
but kind of above that. Conran Hudo had just done
She's Lom.
Speaker 1: She's Lom, Presidents of the United States.
Speaker 4: America and uh. And to bring it back to HAIRD
one of the reasons they were chosen was because of
the song Hairdo, which you could loosely go lump gee,
I don't think you kind of it's this quirky, yeah,
weird thing, and there was a thought that so we
had two very certainly two very distinct styles. One was
the quirky, schitzo boy psychobabble hair Do whole world sick thing.
But then we also had the very kind of alternative
power pop thing too with I wish I was a
plan and all of the others all in my head, Dan,
you know, on and on. So so. Producers that we
would interview for doing the first record, some wanted to
do the do the quirky flip. There's a great story
with Bob Marlette Black Sabbath producer who was in love
with Schizo boy. He just thought it was so fucking great. Well,
then I went into A and M to do a
soundtrack for the Crow movie, and Black Sabbath was. I
was in Studio A where we are the world was
was fucking made. And here's here's how cool Sabbath is.
And Sabbath was in Studio C, which isn't much different
than what I call hole in the wall studios here.
It's about this size, right, And Bob Marlette, I'm outside
having a cigarette. Marlette goes, hey, man, how you doing good? Good? Hey?
I go, what are you doing? He goes, I'm here
with Sabbath. Man, you want to come in. We're working
on their new single. And I go, fuck, yeah, awesome.
I go, what's going on there? He goes, Tony's laying
down guitar and I'm like, fucking cool. So I go
in there. Tony I home. He's just sitting on a
little black couch thing he loves seat recording their new
song called Psycho.
Speaker 1: Man.
Speaker 4: Damn really, and Bob Marlette didn't put it all together
fast enough and he starts playing. I go, what's it?
Called and he goes Psycho Man, and I went, dude,
that's funny. Remember how bad you wanted to record skits
oh boy?
Speaker 1: And he kind of went, skits a boy, Psycho Man. Yeah, no,
it sounds like an unlikely superhero duo. Ah good, unlikely
superhero Yeah, Psycho Man and Schizo Boy.
Speaker 4: Unlikely Psycho How did the how did the record company?
Speaker 3: How did Hollywood react when having to re record the
entire record?
Speaker 4: I feel so fortunate.
Speaker 3: Because yeah, mean, because you guys were you were a
new band.
Speaker 4: Well, they had a lot of belief in us, Bob
fight for the president. There was gonna be flip cartoons
which were gonna be kind of like a late night
like the Monkeys on Acid, maybe the Monkeys meet the
Monkeys with swear words kind of cartoon, maybe thing maybe
not a far cry from a Beavis and butt Head
sort of vibe or something. And he gave us the
funds to redo the whole album, and I couldn't be
And the difference between the two sessions is like when
we got I'm proud to say that After a week
of the sessions in Seattle, I called the label and
I said, I don't think this is gonna work, and
they had me stick with it. And I called again
and I said, I don't think this is working. You guys,
I don't you know, there just not responding And so
I wasn't trying to cover my tracks, but I kind
of covered my tracks. And I think in Bob's defense,
I think he was so in love with My Generation
video and the fact that I had kind of just
hobbled that whole thing together myself. I think he had
more faith in me in that department than I deserved,
and maybe thought, well, Brent, if it doesn't go good,
Brent will just take over. He can do it. Look
at that, look at my Generation.
Speaker 1: Well, any reason why you didn't self produce? Because you know,
I mean, you have the skill. Is there the importance
of having another someone there another set of ears? Is
that the only reason just one need an alternate viewpoint?
Speaker 4: Okay, more than just artistic, it's also logistic. There's a
lot of other shit that will bog down the artist.
And again this is something that's covered in my mentoring sessions.
The greatest in the world. Let's just I'm going to
just pull two out of my ass, Okay, Johnny Cash
and Glenn Campbell, Okay, benefited from a producer every time
there could we come up with examples of artists that
have been able to produce themselves to great effect? The
answer is yes, but we can come up with a
caveat for any subject we want to come up with, right, Sure,
So my personal feeling is yes, and an artist will
always benefit from a producer. And here's the really funky thing.
Part of producing is, as you know, for Christ's sake,
is knowing when not to do anything right. Yep, It's
more that that is knowing more than knowing what to do.
Almost that is like the A number one know what
to do when to do nothing thing like playing his guitar.
Speaker 3: It's almost like it's almost like when you're if you're
self producing, you try almost try to make it too perfect,
and that can kind of take away from what you're
trying to do.
Speaker 4: I think there's a lot of psycho Yeah, I think, yeah,
that would be another way of saying I think it's psycho.
Acoustics have a lot to do with it. For instance,
if I give a mix to the guitar player to
each different member of the band, the drummer does a mix,
guitar player does a mix. Singer does a mix, right,
a strange thing will happen. The singer will mix his
voice too quietly because he psychoacoustically hears it louder than
it actually is in the mix, because it's in his
head and it's interesting. But a guitar player will crank
the fuck out of his guitars because he can't hear
it either, but in a different way, right, So it's
that that's you know. That would actually be kind of fun.
They wouldn't have to do a record now, but each
member of the band mix it like mix.
Speaker 1: That would be a very fun ab and also would
make one hell of an extended re release.
Speaker 4: With the Odd Fathers, when we worked with Jack Douglas
and Eddie Kramer, the original concept was to do the
exact same songs with both of them so people could
really hear what the producer is doing, because when you
hear a producer produce a whole album, it's kind of
hard to discern what the producer does unless it's an
obvious thing like Kiss Destroyer, where it's so different from
the three records before it that it's clear, right, or.
Speaker 1: Or like the Doors Writers on the Storm where the
producer goes, oh, we need thunder and lightning here.
Speaker 4: Paul rothschild. If I'm not mistaken, yeah I think so.
But yeah, so you know, I'm sorry if you ask
me these questions and I go off on a tangent.
Speaker 3: Oh that's great.
Speaker 4: But but there's you know, to really to feel like
I'm actually answering complete I feel like it's a requirement.
Speaker 3: You know. We bounce around so much on this because
you know this. I always saying this, this is a
shoot interview. I don't have anything written down in front
of me. This is just fuck it. Let's go here,
let's go here.
Speaker 4: Well is he? You and I have known each other
for five million years?
Speaker 1: Exactly.
Speaker 4: You're right, we've already written it down exactly.
Speaker 3: I remember the first time I interviewed you, and I
don't know if you remember this or not, it was
it was one of the magazine for the magazine. I
came by and uh songs. We were on the porch
and then I just started hammering you with fucking flip questions.
You just stopped, He goes. I knew you were gonna
ask me flip questions and and you and fuck it,
you did it. Man. It was great. And I remember
I asked you if Flip would ever play again, and
you said, well, I mean obviously answers, not no. I mean,
if somebody offers me twenty five thous and dollars, I'm
going to do it. But you went on into the
Odd Fathers. You went in, did all this other stuff,
American Standard, all this kind of stuff. What made you
decide to go back and do Flip?
Speaker 4: Oh, good question. Well, first of all, I had to
clean myself up. I ran into a problem, sure, and
so I did that. So the Odd Fathers was my
first toe tip back in to have it being in
a band. And the reason it wasn't called the Brent
Arnsband or something like that, which did come down the
line later was because I wanted to be in a band.
I didn't want to have to do everything again. Well,
I found out that's not possible in both of my
personality makeup, and if somebody's going to contact the group
about any particular thing, they're gonna call me right and
they do, and they did, but they showed the Oddfathers.
It was cool though. I mean, we fucking got that
deal right away, and you know, got to work with
Jack Douglas and Eddie Kramer, I mean, and put out
part one in part two, and I think the concept
of the whole Odd Father thing was really cool, the
pinstriped suits, the Italian words, the whole bit. I mean,
we almost started making spaghetti sauce at one point.
Speaker 1: You know what is cool too, is when you're free
to not call the band by your own name. Your
name's already done, You're out there, that's that's what that is.
Now you get to think of another cool name and
there's a little bit of anonymity in there too, where
you get to kind of be like, no, it's a band,
It's not me and the band. Whereas you know, when
when I started the band that is he and I
play in now the Smoking Kills. I really wanted to
call it the Smoking Kills, not Mike Dawson and the
Smoking Kills, because I just wanted to be a part
of a band. But then what it came down to
is how are people going to connect this with my
previous work on iTunes. I'd like everything to sit together.
So the executive decision at the end before the record
came out was we got to change it to Mike
Dawson and the Smoking Kills so that it's easily findable.
But but there is there is a lot of freedom
and new creativity. It's like getting a new dog and
trying to think of a name, like here we go,
we get to do this again. What's going to be
the greatest band name?
Speaker 4: And it's like it's like walking in New York City.
It's like there's a million people, yet you're still invisible.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yes, exactly, and and and it's fun to be
invisible a little bit.
Speaker 4: You're in there and not you know, it's kind of liquid,
you know, it's kind of like yeah, yeah, no, that's
no question about I. You know, I think I'd be remissed.
Speaker 1: He's gonna be remiss We're remissing you on the screen
and from your microphone as well. Here he is. I
love you, buddy. Uh oh yeah.
Speaker 4: Finyl Baby, Vinyl Baby, Smoking Kills on Vinyl rock Steady Records.
Go get it.
Speaker 1: That's right, that's right.
Speaker 3: That leg will be in here.
Speaker 4: Go to band camp, rock Steady Records and fucking get it. Man.
Speaker 1: Hell yeah, there's an easter egg at the end of
side one.
Speaker 4: I mean the fact that we're sitting here like wow,
and this whole thing. I mean, okay, let's pretend we're
a band, right, well, well, let's smoke and kills. I mean,
it's perfect for us exactly. I was gonna say, what
would we call ourselves? And then I looked at this
in the thing and I went to this, So, yeah, my.
Speaker 3: Gossip, Brent, what was it that made you decide to
do flip again?
Speaker 4: I'm sorry I diverted.
Speaker 3: No, No, it's all good.
Speaker 4: It's all good, okay. So then the odd Fathers happened
and then it all got put in my lap anyway,
and you know I have a part to play in
that too, right, So then I decided to go with
Bryn Arns in The Blast, which, I is a cool name,
the Blast. It's a good name for a band. I
don't think there is one either, Actually it is, and
uh it's fun.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 4: And I was gonna do Obsession. I was going to
do everything my whole obsession, funhouse, rattling bone, adfather's whips.
And I asked Greg iidem if he wanted to do it,
and he said yes, right, Duff played drums for us
for a period really yeah wow, And uh then we
got offered the reunion gig it first avenue and we
sold it out and I felt like an idiot.
Speaker 3: Well it's one of those things like you go away
long enough eventually.
Speaker 4: Well it wasn't guess you know, it was pretty fucking cool.
But that's when I just came to the realization that
I'm a dummy too, not just go into it, but
I think I did neet that acclamation period after what
I had just come out of before we pull that off.
If I would of went into full you know, it's
like not warming up before you run or something.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so was that not a runner though, I'll tell
you that.
Speaker 1: Then again, I imagine do you play golf at all ever?
Brent Okay golf? But if you did, I would say
that you're the kind of person who would not take
practice swings, just like me. And that's the opposite of this.
It's like, wait a minute, I better stretch before I
run here. And it also I think taking that break
makes getting back into it so much more worthy. You
need to miss something to really experience the joy of
it again, especially if it's you know, and.
Speaker 4: Who I am, no quote, you're again, You're just so perceptive,
so that that's what did it. And I'm really glad
it did? I mean I have been walking away again
for one second.
Speaker 1: It's all right, brother, I have.
Speaker 4: Been a professional musician since I was in the fifth grade.
Speaker 1: Is awesome.
Speaker 4: Here's the drama from that band. Okay, the band was
originally called Ash of Evil, then it was called Evil Ash,
and then it was called Ash. Now in my memory,
that was like three years, but it was more likely
probably two months that those name changes. Yeah, I am
pleased to tell you that this band I started in
the fifth grade, played our first concert the next year,
stayed together till we graduated high school. Now, think about
that in terms of year, I'll use the term year
age because we're here in fucking eighth grade. One year
is the equivalent of what now ten?
Speaker 1: Yes?
Speaker 4: Yes, so we got to do the math backwards and
let go. Yeah, those those seven eight years are of
the equivalent of twenty five thirty years right when you're
at that age.
Speaker 1: Well, because there is science behind that to back it up.
It's we have we have so much sensory perception that
were being overloaded, and it's like the days seem so long.
Remember when you were a kid, the night before Christmas
was interminable. It was it was endless. Now when you're
getting older, because we we we have our our perceptions
have been limited through age. Now time seems to fly
a lot faster.
Speaker 4: When you're one day old and then you're two days old,
that second day is half your life.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 4: Oh shit, that's that's the real theory.
Speaker 1: That's right.
Speaker 4: You're only ten years old. Six was half your life, right?
So but some of them. Here's some fun facts regarding
so I'm sad to say I'm sad to say that
the reason I got this was the drummer carried down
Brock passed away from a Yeah, but some but and
him and I started the band together. We were playing
hockey at a rink and he goes, hey, man, I
heard you have electric guitar, because I got a drum set.
And we literally on my steel runner sled that night.
Brought my wardsamp and my t Scoe guitar down to
his basement and stayed there till I fucking graduated high school.
Speaker 1: Wow, Jesus, can I ask you what your parents did
for a living.
Speaker 4: Yeah, my mother was a homemaker extraordinaiy like Martha Stewart
would drop her jaw. We never had store bought bread.
For instance, which ship which. Because I thought we were poor,
I would go over to kids's houses and they'd have
wonder bread and I'd be like, like, you're rich.
Speaker 1: And totally dude. I asked my mom one time when
I was a kid, I said, Mom, how come we
never get Chef boyard? And she said, because you got
Chef boy are you lucky? Your mom can cook?
Speaker 4: Dude? Bingo bingo? There were there were rows and Rosa
cookies on the counter. I swear every day I came
home from school made her own bread. She she won
every baking thing in the Minnesota State Fair that you
can possibly win, and then some to the point where
they had to ask her to stop putting shit in.
Speaker 1: Oh that's funny.
Speaker 4: And when we were little and my mother this was
her art. Is kind of where I'm going with this,
because I consider a true artist. Uh, when we didn't
have anything to do, when we're bored, you know, when
you're little. I got a funny story about my grandma
when I said that to her once, but which was
a real life lesson. My mom would have books of
like famous painters, That's what she would say. She'd go
go listen to some music, go look at those books
of those painters. I remember that very specifically.
Speaker 1: What's the story of your grandmother?
Speaker 4: Well, the story with my grandmother as once I was little,
we lived across the street from a park, which is
where the hockey place was where I met carry. I said,
I was bored. Now. My grandma grew up on a farm.
Not having anything to do is beyond luxurious to her.
Speaker 1: Oh shit, yeah.
Speaker 4: And she looked at me with the stink eye of
a spoiled little nineteen seventies sixties kid with a TV
and a radio in his room and across the street,
complain that he ain't got nothing to do. Right, she
would have added, she would have been out slit in
the throat of a hog.
Speaker 3: Sure, yeah, yeah, Brandon, What do you remember about the sixties?
Did you get to go to see the Beatles at
at oh Matt Stadium? Were you too young?
Speaker 4: Greg went? Cherry went really? Yeah? He also saw the
Dave Clark five at the Armory is his dad took them?
Speaker 1: So?
Speaker 4: And to get back to my parents, my dad was
the inventor of Are you familiar with scratch and sniff?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 4: Yes, yeah, my dad invented that.
Speaker 1: Did you know that I'm sure you know, especially since
your dad was the inventor of scratch and sniff.
Speaker 4: Some cat to that story, but yet that's that's the headline.
Speaker 1: Well, the gimmick one of that one record label used
one time as they put a scratch and sniff on
the cover of one band's album and it smelled like
the band's name. Do you know the band?
Speaker 4: Oh? I love this The Rasberries.
Speaker 1: Yes, Oh, glad, I knew that. I think I don't.
I can't think of any other answer that might fit,
but it's got to be out there. I mean the cars,
the cars. They could do a new car smell, scratch
and sniff and have released it on a car well, a.
Speaker 4: New cars album, a new car smell. That's brilliant. If
they see this and don't do that, oh, that's fucking great.
Where what I'm sorry is he?
Speaker 3: I was just asking you know what you remembered about
the sixties and music wise. That's why I asked you
if you did get to see the Beatles at that
stay down.
Speaker 4: My first concert was Alice Cooper Welcome to My Nightmare
Tour with the James Gang opening with Tommy Falling on guitar. Yeah,
it was fucking awesome. My older brother Rhett took me
and he vowed to never take me to another concert
after that because I was doing I had a chair
in the aisle and I was like doing full blown.
Pete Townsend jumps into the aisle the concert off of
my chair and I embarrassed him.
Speaker 1: That's funny. What was the first record you ever bought
with your own money?
Speaker 4: Well, as far as music in the sixties go, I
can tell you. I think my favorite band is Three
Dog Night. Really yeah.
Speaker 1: The bass player on the Smoke and Kills record is
Tim Hutton. Oh, Danny Hutton's son. Correct, And we recorded
a lot of that in Danny Hutton's studio where they
they they dug a hole and recreated stacks in Laurel Canyon.
Speaker 4: My little brothers Kuy is working on a documentary right
now about Three Dog Night.
Speaker 1: No really, Well, if you want a connection, I've got
it for you. I can easily put you in touch
with Tim. I would be more than happy to do that.
Speaker 4: He is what you know what the second song is
we're cutting in the studio.
Speaker 1: Tell me.
Speaker 4: I'm gonna do it open tuning, So no, I'm not
so fuck it up. Our version. Jeremiah was fro tell
you it sings it the man.
Speaker 1: In Wine.
Speaker 4: And the reason the documentary is getting made is because
they're trying to induct three Dog Knight into the Hall
of Fame. Is I don't know that as fact, but
that's that's.
Speaker 1: The they They should be there. They should be there
solely for the reason that uh Negron's dick blew up?
Just for that reason.
Speaker 4: Wasn't there a whole uh like section of his book
that was literally called my dick Blew Up?
Speaker 1: Yes? Yeah, yes, he is disgusted right now, Izz he
is rethinking asking Dawson to be on this podcast.
Speaker 3: I'm I'm reimagining my my great burrito injury and the
fall on them where I almost fell off the cliff
when I was driving back and almost died, and thinking
how bad that hurt driving from there alone in that
car for seven hours to get back to Vegas and
how bad that hurts when I sneezed and I thought
I was going to die. But this guy's dick blew up?
Speaker 4: What? What? What? What's the burrito incident?
Speaker 3: I was running for a brito and I because I
wanted to beat somebody in line and my knee gave
out and I crashed in front of the fucking Britle
Place and I tore my rotator cuff.
Speaker 1: Yeah, light a candle, curse the glare.
Speaker 3: And the worst part was the people I was trying
to beat in line. They had ordered ahead. They're just
picking it up.
Speaker 1: Wow, those decks.
Speaker 4: That's not easy, dude, You live a hard life.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I wonder what your grandma would have said about that.
Speaker 3: You mentioned how you you mentioned how you had to
get yourself cleaned. How much of that was the end
of You still.
Speaker 4: Get the burrito? Did you get there?
Speaker 3: Of course?
Speaker 1: Of course no. He saw it through. Mission accomplished. But
there was some casualties. Yeah, he took he took some shrouds.
Speaker 4: The case better than it change. The flavor was the experience,
the experience, It was still everything.
Speaker 3: By the time I got home, the adrenaline had wore
off and the pain was starting to set in. And
then I realized I couldn't lift my arm higher than this.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Oh, I've never should have gotten a chili dog
in addition to the burrito, right to up the endorphins
after I was done.
Speaker 4: I love a good fucking salty dog. Oh yeah, I
love it well.
Speaker 1: The last time we saw your face, or the last
time I saw your face at least Brinn. I don't
know if Izzy has seen you since, but you came
out to Ireland's thirty two in Van Eyes with us
on a Tuesday night Jam night, right, yeah, and classically
you showed up in pajamas, which made me smile, and
you were going to be in La for a few
days and you said to me, Hey, let's get together
and write a song. And I'm like, that's a great
f fucking idea. And then life got in the way
of living. And then I called you like six days
later and you're like, dude, I'm out of town now,
I'm gone. And I'm like, so, I was crushed by that.
And uh, I don't think I ever like formally apologized
to you for not getting on the ball, because I did.
I did understand how fucking cool that would have been.
And I've been beating myself up over it since we're
going to write a song. We are going to write
a song about a dad who says he's going out
for cigarettes. Yeah, and he never comes home.
Speaker 4: That's right, that's right. I remember going dude. I like that.
I mean I remember going, I like that, I'm in.
Speaker 1: But do you have you? Have you been or I
know you haven't, but I don't think you have been?
But any more plans to come out to l A
and is this is? I don't know how far? How
far is Flip going to go? What are we doing here?
Let's what's the expansion? And you know there. I know
there are a million factors to what happens, but what's
the idea?
Speaker 4: No idea? Just to do take it as it comes. Again,
I've done as professionally since the fifth grade. I understand
completely and clearly that it's a liquid existence.
Speaker 1: That's an album title.
Speaker 4: Liquid existence. That's a bad seventies prog rock band.
Speaker 1: Oh is it really?
Speaker 4: No?
Speaker 1: I no, No, it should be.
Speaker 4: Yes, of course it's so much so you thought maybe
it was.
Speaker 1: No. No, I'm so gullible that I don't even get
a tag on my own joke.
Speaker 4: Okay, hey, I got a joke for you, Dawson. I
just told you how many groupies does it take to
screw in a light bulb?
Speaker 1: I want to say, that's not their job, but what you're.
Speaker 4: Right, the correct response is why would you have him
do that?
Speaker 1: Exactly?
Speaker 4: So you're right. You're the first person I've ever told
that joke to that that got it right.
Speaker 1: I like that joke.
Speaker 4: We were talking about, SOH songwriting. We can still do this.
Do you have a recording reg you sure you do?
Speaker 1: I do so do? I Okay, let's uh, this is
what I do. Let's plan it out and uh and
see what we can do.
Speaker 4: I like that time in our lives.
Speaker 1: Of course we do.
Speaker 4: Yeah, can I the three of us, let's let's write
a theme song for this show.
Speaker 1: Oh that's a great idea, dude. I had an idea
about a song about a song from the h Only
only snobbish audio engineers will really appreciate this. But the
song is written from the point of view of the
front of how and it's everybody. Everybody is asking for
more of me? Can I get a little more of me?
Speaker 3: Yeah? It's called the Ballad of Night Bob.
Speaker 4: Oh, dude, that's good.
Speaker 1: But can I ask you a question that we saw.
Speaker 4: About a woman who was in love with her vibrator
from the point of view of the vibrator. Oh, it's
kind of a pinocchio ish kind of almost vibe going on,
called the automatic man. Ah, that's what did he do
the things you know that I can do? What did
he say when he uped and walked away? So I'll
just wait here in the face of all things going down.
But now you know it, you're no good all alone.
Speaker 3: I like that shit, Dawson. What were we gonna ask?
Speaker 1: Well, you know, Brent, we we did have that spectacular
weekend out in Tennessee, uh where it was the Rock
and Pod h Conference. I wouldn't call it a festival,
but it was a conference and you know, all the
rock podcasts were there and that was a lot of fun.
And that's where you and I first met man. And
then you know, I grew up in California, so I
wasn't the Zip Flip was not in my zeitgeist growing up.
And so I've been able to go back and be like, oh, yeah, no,
here's a new cool band. Here's a new band from
forty years ago. Let's fucking go and that. And I
love I really love the makeup. I it feels to
me more of a gimmick. It feels like a personality change.
That's a different person up there. That's not bryn Ar,
that's that's the singer of Flip.
Speaker 4: There isn't a flip gig that doesn't go by that.
I don't contemplate it. I'll tell you that much.
Speaker 1: Tell me about that.
Speaker 4: Well, one of these days it'll happen. You want to
know what stops me. So there was a period, you know,
when we had the hit, where I was putting that
shit on and off three times a day. Go to
a radio station, do an end store, play this, a
play of that, play a corporate cag play over there,
then go play at the big show at night. And
it's really messy mm hmm. And no, I never was
given like Britain, we set up this place for you.
I had to everywhere we go, go find the bathroom
or whatever it would be to put that stuff on.
And I mean, you can even probably see here my
place is fairly tidy. I might I might have a
small amount of clean freak in me, and so I
was unable to leave all that white powder. And the
makeup is oil based, so it's like working with taint.
So you're putting it on. Then you go to turn
on the faucet. Now there's makeup all over the fawcet handle.
And then so by the time I'm done, there's white face, powder,
and fucking there's just shit everywhere. It was really messy
and that's what keeps me from doing it now. If
somebody would have taken the bull by the horns and
set me up with the place everything I needed to
put it on and off every day, be a totally
different story.
Speaker 3: How much of that makeup really was you? Though? Do
you feel like you are that split personality that the
makeup portrays?
Speaker 4: Nope?
Speaker 1: Is there is there an element?
Speaker 4: Yes, yes, it's a post occurrence, not a not a
premeditated When I was an ash of evil, Oh the
Angels saying there was there's a band in my town
called Backbreaker. The lead guitar player's name was Johnny Johnson.
He had a Marshall and an SG in like nineteen
sixty nine. That was a big fucking deal. He wore
half black, half white face. So when we did the
My Generation video at the sound Gallery, which was a
block away from Teeners, which is a theater, makeup store
and clothing and stuff, all the stuff for the theater,
I decided, this is just a throwaway we were doing,
and I was doing it so a friend, Calm Johanovich
can film his life. I'm like, I'm gonna fucking do
I'm gonna pretend I'm Johnny Johnson and I'm gonna do
the half black half Johnny Johnson because I used to
watch them through their basement window like Stare watches the
fuck he had an echo plex. They're playing Muscle of
Love by Alice Coopridge, and I'm just like, I was
just enamored. So that's where the black white face comes.
There was no like are big, Yeah, nothing smart there?
Speaker 3: Now when did when did Bill Acoin come into it?
And how much did Bill have? How much was that
you guys are and how much of it was Bill
that kind of brought the characters to life?
Speaker 4: None of it was Bill?
Speaker 3: Okay.
Speaker 4: That being said, a producer knows when not to do nothing.
Same goes with the manager. Okay, there's plenty of other
things he did that are phenomenal. That was not one
of them. That started out with me really wanting to
do something that harkened back more to Obsession here. For
my my first band that was big in the Twin
Cities was called Obsession. There was a doctor in the
band that predates prints. There was a doctor in the band.
The drummer dress, stuff like the Little Rascals. The lead
singer was like a heavy metal guy with studs and leather,
and I was Johnny Thunders. I wanted and I liked that.
I've always liked character based bands, the sensational Ale Tarve Band, Kiss,
the Beagles, the Monkeys, and so that was really what
I wanted to do. I remember when I was living
in New York and Kelo was flying me back and
forth to do demos to Minneapolis with them. One day,
I'm watching the Jenny Jones Show and there's a drug
dealer on the Jenny Jones Show with the synthesizer voice
you know, no sure.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah yeah too to protect them, Yeah, make it
seem like a bigger deal than he actually both or
both And anyway, the guy's name was Kelo.
Speaker 4: And I just went that name is badass. And I
picked up the phone and I go, dude, how would
you feel about being Keiloh? And he goes, He goes,
I mean like keel o'bale. I go, perfect, Ye, that
was it, So that's kind and then we showed. Then
when we did our first photo shoot, Greg grabbed a
banana and put it in his pants, like phallic is
phallic Leo Ward, and so for a very short time
his name was Nana Boy because.
Speaker 1: I was just banana Yeah, okay.
Speaker 4: Bana Boy. And then he just showed up to rehearsal
and he goes, you know what, I go what he goes,
I came up with Cherry Forever. I like it better
than Nana Boy. I go, I do too dumb. And
then when Kai got in the band, he would show
up one day. He was bald, but he would have
little bits of hair coming out and then he would
shave it and I'm like, god, ky, you look like
a chia petchia, And and he would up to rehearsal
and Greg would look at him chia and it just
like then it turned into Chia. So that just kind
of happened. Then when we signed with Walt Disney, there
was talk of me actually being Flip, that that would
be my name that came up in a meeting. And again,
to Bob Pfeiffer's credit, we'll get back to Bill a Cooin.
Bob Pfeifer's credit, he was like, you have all these
cartoony names in the band. He goes, you need to
remain in the human element in the band. Plus hear
the front man. And he's the guy who said, he goes,
I like the makeup in the My Generation video. I
mean he pushed that thing. It was the number two
independent music video in the US that year and number
one in Canada and Mexico. So he did he did
a great job. And I love Bob still to this day.
But he's the one who said, He's like, we went
and played the dragon Fly, we went and played the Ritz,
we went and played the Viper Room, We played all
those places early on in LA and he was like, no, no, no, no.
He goes, You're so expressive on stage, that makeup just
is one dimensional. He goes, he just get this or this,
but when you're playing on he goes, no, no, no.
So he was the guy who like made sure that
I stayed that. Now back to what was Bill a Coin.
Bill a Coin first saw us in the late eighties.
He was hired for Funhouse to help develop a stage
performance with the band. There was a problem with the
stage performance of Funhouse that I was basically Pete Towns
and meets Johnny Thunders, and the singer was more of
a is a very cool, calm and collective badass. In
more of a Phil maug Ufo or maybe Bond Scott
kind of way. But they wanted to and we were
getting interest from Lab was Rolling Stone and just called
us the best unsigned band in America. And so Bill a.
Coin was brought in to help figure out a way
to create a bouncing act on stage. Herb Guard, by
those two are my favorite managers of all time. Herb
Guard I could go on for days anyway. Bill Brow
is brought in to help develop the stage show and
even in it out across the board because I guess
I was a stage hog by all and purpose. And
we get down with the first session and we're walking
up towards the front. Is that you were at the
sound gallery right? Yeah? The front There was like a
front room in the sound gallery, curb wall. It was
really cool in there, and we went in there and
as we're walking, I feel a tug out the back
of my shirt and it's Bill and I turn around
and go, hey, man, what do you think? He goes.
He goes, I think you should be the front man
for the band. And I'm like, you mean fire the singer.
He just kind of shrugged. He didn't say yes or no.
Later on I had never even sang backup vocals before Flip.
I was hired to write songs for somebody else that
turned into Flip.
Speaker 1: Did you ever did you believe that you could sing?
Or no? Yeah?
Speaker 4: Okay, yeah, I still don't really believe me too.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 4: I don't think anybody ever really does, though, for maybe
Slein Dion or something. You know, they think she can
sing too much.
Speaker 1: I mean, Whitney did so much cocaine.
Speaker 4: Yet that it's ultimately a turn on. So when Flip
happened and I became the lead singer, it dawned on
me one day that said this three four years ago,
that I should be the front man. I'm gonna call
him up. And that's how Bill got back in the picture. Now.
One of the beautiful things that Bill did. We started
at a tour with Evan Essence right when they're whatever
that song was was.
Speaker 1: Wake Me Up Inside.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and at the end of all of our shows.
This is the makeup era. This is later on, you know,
the Columbia Records, Artemis Records era. Yeah, we did a
show with Evan Essence, and we would inevitably close each
show with a pillow fight. Feather pillows. Okay, we're free
cut and would make a huge right. I mean it was.
Speaker 1: Especially with the right lights.
Speaker 4: Awesome.
Speaker 1: Dude, Yeah yeah, dude, that's it's so much better than smoke,
bro It's.
Speaker 4: Better, way better. Yeah. And we had leaf blowers and
shop facts. Our crew is that you remember. Get that
ship cleaned up like it was nobody's busines this right,
it was still all out in the crowd and stuff
and on the ground, and the bars really hated it
because any kind of sink with liquid in it would
get full of feathers and he couldn't get him out.
We actually played a game at one place once we
did the feather pillow fight. Got a call from him
complaining that there was feathers and all the sinks. The
next day I sent him three buckets of chicken. I said,
here's the rest of them.
Speaker 3: Well, you guys, you used to have to sneak them in, right, yeah.
Speaker 4: Yeah. So then we got in trouble doing it. Nobody did.
So we made all these amp cabinets dummy cabinets where
the backs came right off, and we hid feather pillows
in them. And then towards the end of the show,
the crew behind the back line would just pull those
off and hand them to us. We're like, fuck it, right,
we're doing it. We're playing a festival and tell us
not to don't do the pillow. We hire a helicopter
and fucking drop feathers on everybody. You know, so but that,
but that's so.
Speaker 1: That's what I call money well spent.
Speaker 4: After that Evan Essence gig, we're walking back to the
tour bus and their tour manager punches my tour manager,
Sean Walgren in the back of the head gold cocked
him out of nowhere because of the feather pillows quote unquote.
The truth is is fuck crowd wanted an encore. We
went over huge and it bummed them out.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 4: I'm back in the tour bus with Bill a Coin
and he's talking to the agent. Of course, we had
to sign with Evan Essence's agent to get on the tour. Yeah,
and they just got a call. He just got a
call from Evan Essence and he's throwing a fit and
he's gonna drop flip and everything, and Bill grabs a phone.
He goes, you know, you told me you wanted a
rock band. He goes, you don't get any more rock
than what just happened, go fuck yourself. And that was that.
That's when I went Bam. I like this guy. He
didn't physically say go fuck yourself, but he said but
he did say, hey, man, you said you wanted a.
Speaker 1: Rock band, right right. It reminds me. You've reminded me
of something that my my dear friend, multi instrumentalist, great singer,
Jonathan McEwan always told me. He always called and and
I don't think this is the case for you, but
I think you can see how it is the case
for a lot. He always called managers damaging and producers
reducers exactly. And it seems to me like you've you've
navigated that gauntlet very well, and you've been very successful
in in the people now. And it's it's not just
that you picked them, but they picked you, and you
gotta you gotta feel some kind of I think you
should feel a little bit of musical pride inside that
I will.
Speaker 4: Take it a step further. Being a broke young musician
sleeping on people's couches and stuff, right, let's not confuse
that with real homelessness. I was a cute white rock
and roller did not have a hard time finding a
couch or a sleep by in the early eighties, but
that was broke. Food was harder to come by. I
had been known to rate a midnight fridge or two.
I had to create a concept for me to be
comfortable enough to sleep at night. So I made up
a phrase called creative currency. In my mind, I said,
the richest person in the world, with all the food
in the nicest house in the world, can't buy what
I just did tonight. You could throw all the money
in the world at it, and it doesn't make it.
So the creative currency that I just deposited, for lack
of a better term, is more valuable than money. And
this was kind of a denial almost. It was a
tool that I used to keep me going even though
I was didn't have a car, I was broke, had
three T shirts.
Speaker 1: Well, that's what people who you know, haven't sold their
souls to rock and roll like we have. That's something
that they don't understand. They don't understand that creative currency.
Speaker 4: No, they don't a lot of a lot of like
film producers do, though, like they'll throw money at it
to make a movie. Just to hang out in the
dressing room with Johnny Depp and pretend they're an act.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Well yeah, even.
Speaker 3: This podcast that I've been doing for fucking thirteen years.
I'm not making money on this, right, But the same thing,
you know, I have to use the International Bank of
Musicians from time to time. The pawn shot.
Speaker 1: Well that's funny, is he? Because that's good. When I
first started a couple decades, you know, fifteen years ago whatever,
and I haven't done it in a while, but I
used to do a podcast it's called Front of House
where it was half live performance, half interview, and I
watched and I mixed the sound and have a really
good time with these great artists. And I always told
people the reason why I started this podcast is so
I could get Shooter Jennings to play in my living room.
And that was it, and you did no, it didn't happen,
But I got his I became dear friends with his
bass player, Ted Russell Camp.
Speaker 4: Another greatness, another brush.
Speaker 1: With who produced the the Smoking Kills record. So it all,
it all worked out, and maybe, you know, maybe one
day that door's not closed.
Speaker 4: What record did he produce? The Smoking Steady record?
Speaker 1: That's right, rock Steady Records, not on rock Steady. Well,
it's available.
Speaker 3: This is another reason for us to do another record
so we can get that rock steady fucking logo on
our album.
Speaker 1: Well we were I mean not to make it about us,
but is He introduced I was in Vegas with is He.
I was doing comedy shows a few weeks ago and
we went to a place where Eddie Trunk was. There
was a band playing and it was like it was
it was a Monsters of Rock reunion. And is He
introduced me to a gentleman and said, this is the
singer of the band I'm in And the guy looks
at me and he goes, dude, that is a great record.
And he worked with Ozzy forty years ago he died
and what he said, Yeah, no, it started forty years ago,
four forty years and so anyway I was asking him.
I said, I said, look, I want to get more
life out of this record. And one thing we were
thinking about doing is let's make a music video for
every song. And what what his advice was, go record
two more songs and re release the album as an
extended version.
Speaker 4: I'm I second that emotion.
Speaker 1: So there you go. I think I think we'll do that.
Let's we we can we can. We can put that
on the back burner. So I got one quick question
for you too, Brent. I want to know when you
got into the fight with the bleach and are you
okay in a.
Speaker 4: Fight with the oh my shirt.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm making a stupid joke, dude.
Speaker 4: No, No, it's a funny one, because this was a
sweatshirt that I used to paint my basement with one
day and I got all over it and I was
gonna throw it away. So I went into my laundry
room where I have a hanging thing, and I draped
it over it and I looked to my left and
there was a spray bottle. I looked to my right,
there was a bottle of bleach, and I went, fuck it,
and I sprayed it. I go, I'll come back and
take a look tomorrow. And I looked at it and
I went, I think.
Speaker 1: I like it. Yeah, yeah, dude, Yes.
Speaker 4: So that's it. And I gotta tell you, it's soft
and cozy. All these little light areas are a little
extra soft and cozy. And it's winter here in Minnesota.
Speaker 3: It is winter, it is, and it's going to be winter.
On February twenty seventh, when Flip plays the Turf Club.
It's going to be winter on February twenty second, when
the twenty first, twenty first, twenty Saturday, the twenty first,
Well whatever, I'm playing at the Red Carpet.
Speaker 1: There you go.
Speaker 4: Are you going to be here when we're at the
turf No, if you can change your flight, you do.
I want to get up and dose too, freak with us?
Are you bringing? Are you? Are you bringing you the
fucking coyote? So ka that guitar I make right? Yeah,
I got the first one ever made. I think they
only made twenty of them, and I think I've pretty
much owned it. Everyone at one point or another, is
he's got one that's got a different branding on it.
Speaker 3: It's uh huh Katana, No.
Speaker 4: It says, uh, well, it's the town in Seattle, Word
where Brad Simsel, the best rock singer in the world lives.
Uh why my brain farting on it. They also make
those things people put on the roofs of their cars
to carry stuff with. Yakama.
Speaker 1: Okay, there you go, Yeah.
Speaker 4: But you can't really read it, says Yakama. That's the
best playing that's that is the best coyote. Next to mine.
Oh I had a guy, a great guy's not well
still hear me?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 7: Yeah, I am Chicago well and I became acquainted.
Speaker 4: And one day this shows up. Oh you built this
for me. Now I don't do anything with it because
it's unpainted. I'm afraid to hurt it.
Speaker 1: It looks like Kentucky.
Speaker 4: It needs to be painted. Yeah, yeah, when.
Speaker 3: I'm assuming nicer would it's it's.
Speaker 4: Heavy for me. Mind, so feather light I like to like.
I think that's what I like about years too. It
was light. So I'm thinking maybe get a chambered. But
I'm not good with nice guitars or nice cars. I
don't want to be afraid to scratch them. I want
to invite the possibility that they could get scratched.
Speaker 1: I agree with that. That's why you're driving truck. Yeah, well,
that's why I'll drive a truck.
Speaker 4: A nineteen ninety seven Lincoln town Car.
Speaker 1: Oh beautiful, dude, I got a ninety seven for Runner.
Speaker 3: When can we expect the new Flip stuff to come out?
Speaker 4: Well, like I said, it's coming out on a track.
Didn't I tell you that? No? But oh god, I'm sorry.
The two songs are coming out on an eight track,
but the music isn't really on the eight track. It's
a download thing. In the artwork on the back, you'll
get a download. But we're going into the studio on
the fifteenth of January, pre production on the fourteenth and thirteenth,
nice sweet of really don't need so we'll just probably
drink sodas and those guys will drink beer, will hang
out and run the songs a couple of times and
have enjoy each other. Yeah, so we're actually hoping, I
mean great, We're going in with John Fields, you know,
multi platinum gazillion album Soul Killer. He also produced our
last album, Too Dumb to Quit. So who knows that
it would be cool if they were done by the
by the turf gig.
Speaker 3: Well, I mean, in this day and age, it almost
could be, almost.
Speaker 4: Could be the only you know, I just don't want to.
I wouldn't want to place that pressure on John. No,
I haven't done that.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And how much longer do you think you can
do it.
Speaker 4: Music?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 4: How much time you got?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 4: The question is, Brin, if you weren't doing music, how
long do you think it would take you to put
a gun in your mouth? That's the real question.
Speaker 1: That's uh, that's certainly a different angle, but yes, that's
the real question. No, I hear you, dude.
Speaker 3: I mean, look, if they have to put you out
on stage in a wheelchair, you're still going to be
out there doing it.
Speaker 4: I can't, of course, answer that with complete accuracy. But
like I said right at the beginning of this thing,
the only time I don't have anxiety is when I
am doing what we are doing now, and that is
talking creative music making and the whole world that surrounds it.
The managers, the other bands, the venues, the guitars, the
fucking instruments. There's so many.
Speaker 1: So when you when you first said that earlier, it
brought up something personal to me. I'm I often throw
up in the alley behind the club before the show. Interesting,
have you ever? Don't You don't experience that anxiety. You
don't experience that fear. See, I embrace that fear because
it makes me feel alive. And it's like, yes, be scared,
but go up there and fucking do it because you
know it's gonna be fucking great.
Speaker 4: The only gig I was ever scared at, Okay, before
I literally had the dream where I walked on stage
in my underwear. Okay, the cliche, which I still say
would make a great music video of nothing, of collection
of bad dreams before you go on stage. Just it's
all that. One thing I'd like to add about this show,
if you go to my Facebook page, are actually photographs
of it. And the first Kiss album was the only
album Kiss album out and I'm wearing Paul Stanley makeup
at that gig. And the only one Wow, Kiss album
that had come out yet was the very first one.
Now a couple things carry Donbrock actually wrote on the
back of this. It's pretty faded and pretty impossible to read,
but there's a set list which includes Smoke on the Water,
which was a brand new song at that time, and
three original songs of mine in the fifth grade Wow.
And here's here's here's a very flip esque sort of
way of thinking. They gave us from two thirty to
three o'clock to play, and they let the whole school
come watch us in the gymnasium. They let the whole
school out to see us. School ends at three o'clock.
That means a bell ring, right, what song do we
close with? School's out? By Alice Cooper because the actual
bell in the school will ring. Little dude, I'm in
fifth grade, and these are the ideas. This is already
where I'm what, I'm this kind of crap that's coming
into my head. The one thing I didn't take into
consideration was how excited we would be. And we had
played every song too fast, so we had to vamp
on the end of schools out for quite a while.
Speaker 3: But that happens. That happens. See, that's where the anxiety is.
That's why you play fast. It's like because you're nervous.
Speaker 1: And yeah, you know.
Speaker 4: I was in the sixth grade. You know the show
was when I was in this Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 4: We also my dad, who worked at three M where
he invented scratch and sniff, had access to dry ice,
which was a big deal in nineteen seventy three.
Speaker 1: Oh shit.
Speaker 4: And I'm sitting in my kitchen and my mom had
a humidifier, one of those nineteen seventies fake wood grain humidifiers,
like a gold almost grill cloth in front of it
with two knobs on the front, one on and off
and one how hard How fast do you want the
fan to be going? Right? And I'm like, God, that
thing looks just like a little amp. Oh my god,
it's got a white tank in the back. Oh my god,
it's a humidifier. It blows the air out. We're gonna
have fake amps on stage that look like they start
on fire. We gotta find another humidifier and we're gonna
use those as our dry ice machines. And we're gonna
go back and give fake feedback or whatever, and smoke
is gonna come out of What the audience are gonna
think is amps.
Speaker 1: Dude, that's rock and roll.
Speaker 4: I mean it's demented. It's demented. What kind of sixth
prader has these thoughts. It's not good.
Speaker 1: It's not bad.
Speaker 4: No, I'm clearly very proud of it. But yeah, yeah,
that we did that. Those there's a photo of that
on my Facebook too. My mother took a photo when
the fog machines were going. It's bad. I'm playing a
teasco tulip and I had a cape and I.
Speaker 3: Was wearing a cap and Paul Stanley makeup.
Speaker 4: Paul Stanley makeup, and my mom back homed and teased
my hair for me. And before we went on stage,
I looked out of the curtains, and my friend Billy
Walters was there and he goes, hey, man, how'd you
get to your hair to do that? And I told
him just I said, I washed it and ketch up.
So everybody thought, like at school the next day, like
did you really wash? Billy Walters said, you washed your
hair and ketchup?
Speaker 1: Did you?
Speaker 4: My little brother, my little brother, who was like six
years KI, he's like six years younger than me, says
that a bunch of people were following me home from
school that day, and I still to this day would
just say, no, those were just other people walking home
from school. Happened to me. But he saw it like
you know pied Piper.
Speaker 3: Yeah, how much did you rely on Ki? As far
as the artistic direction.
Speaker 4: Well, the direction was more, i'll say, a group effort.
There's more concepts ideas that I came up with, not
unlike humidifier, smoke machine, but in making it happen and
making it colorful and knowing his skill directed my ideas
in that way. So for instance, you know, we had
trading cards and the thing was to put flyers up
everywhere you could put still put flyers up back then,
and I'm like, what if we did trading cards instead
and put them on countertops at record stores instead of
flyers on polls. I tell you what, what if we
do four individual ones, so they got to collect at four,
and let's put just Brins in this store, and just
she is in this store, so people got to go
around and get them. I tell you what, what if
on the back, after you get all four, you turn
it over and it's one big picture.
Speaker 1: Brilliant dude. It really sounds to me like you're banging
on that scratching sniff raspberry's door. You know what I mean, Mom,
I don't.
Speaker 4: Have anything to do. Go look at the fucking painting books, right, Hey,
eat this stuff. I got an idea. You know my dad, uh,
he's he's still that way. He's got an illegal water
well in his basement that he uses to fucking heat
all his floors and shit, he lives by a lake,
so he's like, I don't have to digberry far. He
builds illegal well in his basement. I'm probably gonna get
him arrested now. And it's fucking running all his water
ship in his house. Good for free? Good?
Speaker 1: I know good? I mean crystal geyser fucking bought a
piece of land at the bottom of a fucking spring
in California. Why do they get the fucking water? Fuck you?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 1: So good, good, good on your dad.
Speaker 3: Well you guys, I mean, if you're in Minneapolis St. Paul,
in Minnesota, in the in the in the upper Midwestern area,
get out to see Flip on the twenty seventh of February.
Such great fucking stories and get a lot of those.
I'm sure there's some of those stories in this book.
Speaker 4: Oh, I got a fun story for you. First of all,
I'm really sorry that I just seen. We've been on
here for an hour thirty minutes and I've been talking
really a lot, so that's awesome. I apologize for how
long and boring this is. I recently got it.
Speaker 1: Wait, wait a second, brit The other end of that
coin is you could be saying nothing. Believe me, as
a thirty year radio vet, both me and Izzy will
tell you more is better. You talking is great, So
won't apologize.
Speaker 4: Oh, I appreciate that greatly. I very recently got a
call to ask if I was available to tour with
a band called Motley Crewe by Big Machine Records, who
they've recently signed with and uh. One of the gentleman
from Big Machine Records is quoted on the back of
that book, guy named Julian Raymond. He's the one who
called me about it. On the back of the book.
You know how big time people put little blurbs down
there as good. It's like something like britn is so
good his career will last him a lunchtime, some like that. Brilliant.
Well I had to do, you know clearly when that
When John, who have become friends with, called me to
do the book, of course, my response was, you clearly
have the wrong number, or you need to get your
hearing checked or ball anyway, So I did about two
I just I want to say two hundred and fifty
hours of zoom interviews, I don't know. And the very
first one when we met, I said to him, I said,
I'm not the worst singer in the world, but one
of these days Vince Neil and Brett Michaels are going
to die, then I'll be the worst singer.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 4: Well that well, if you open the book, So put
this puzzle together. If you open the book, that's the
first line in the book, is that first quote. First
thing I ever said to him. Julian Raymond, who's quoted
on the book, has the book in his office. Motley
Crue is considering a new guitar player. Julian calls me,
and I could see him. You know, he's not even
like even reading or even looking at the book, but
I know it's in his office. I could see him.
I'm going, I got the guy for you. Man. As
matter of fact, they wrote a book about him. It's
right up there, grabbing it and them opening it and
seeing I'm not the worst singer in the world. Well,
what these dates didn't steal? And Brett Michaels are gonna die?
I think that was the end of that. Another brush
with greatness.
Speaker 3: Oh dude, that's fucking great, Bran. They want to find you.
They want to find the rock Steady website, your music
mentoring website. Where can they go?
Speaker 4: My Facebook? It's simple, right, just google me. It's everywhere.
And the rock Steady stuff is on the band camp,
which you know, it's not a great name for a
thing like band camp. But the really truth is is
out of all of them, there by far the best.
But I wish they were called something cooler. And let's
go to band camp.
Speaker 3: Let's go to band camp and I got it my
fucking outro music gear, Brent Arn's whip, fucking odd Fathers,
my goshz Presley, every time you're on, we just scratched.
The surface is just more and more and more, and
I love it and I love it. I love it.
I can't wait to have you back.
Speaker 1: And we could go forever.
Speaker 3: We could go forever. Dawson, what are you got coming
up in Dawson World?
Speaker 1: I'm gonna be in San Diego doing a comedy show
on I believe it's January seventeenth at National Lampoon's Yellow Door.
And until then you can hear me weekday afternoons from
three to seven on ninety five point seven FM The
Ride in Charlotte, North Carolina.
Speaker 3: And on the Adam Corolla Show.
Speaker 1: Every Troup and on the water cool.
Speaker 3: And The water Cooler. Thanks for the shout outs, by
the way, I love it, and of course you can
find me. Really is a president Twist, Twitter, instacrat, Facebook
show page, abut from podcast and Izzypresley dot com for
all the links, including cameo and the Patreon which is
only five dollars a month. And you get this show
at free before everybody else. That's it, man, we'll.
Speaker 4: See you're playing in the Sant Cloud. I'm playing in St.
Speaker 3: Cloud. First show and uh a big kiss jam at
the end. Press the Press Bar Reunited, Brent Orange, Mike Dawson,
I'm busy, President. Don't forget what I lack in talent
to make up for the talk.
Speaker 2: Cock.
Speaker 3: Thank you, thank you very much.
Speaker 1: We're a little late.
Speaker 4: Say good night, Christie, good night, good night.