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RUTH RUTH INTERVIEW

Stubble Interview by Ken Zebbyn

RUTH RUTH (Chris Kennedy, Mike Lustig, Dave Snyder)

Ken: First off I'd like to say that you've got this pretty exciting EP out right now on Epitaph records. How did you get together and why did you call yourselves RUTH RUTH?

Chris: RUTH RUTH formed in '93 in New York. We were playing around in New York. We've known each other for a long time. We were called FAT LUCK JOSH for like one night and a whole bunch of other... nothing that we held on to until we came up with RUTH RUTH which came from a Lily Tomlin movie. Mike and I were watching it one night and we heard that name in the movie and we were like "We'll take that name". The Epitaph thing came about, we were... We put out a record on American in the fall of '95 called Laughing Gallery and then we put out a 45 in January of the following year with an independent record label out of New York called Deep Elm. That guy at Deep Elm played our material for Brett at Epitaph and he liked it a lot and the idea came up about doing a one off with Epitaph. Then we got permission from American to do it and we did it. Now, probably in the new year, we're going to go do another record for American. We've been kind of ping-pongin' back and forth but people have been really into what we're doing and we kind of go with the flow, you know?

Mike: (In a mocking manner) Yeah, go with the flow, yeah!

Ken: How'd you guys meet?

Chris: Well, Mike and I met through my wife Marlee.

Mike: I went to school with his then girlfriend. She introduced us.

Chris: We met...we were both like 18 or younger. We were playing together on and off but not until '93 did RUTH RUTH come about.

Ken: What's your favorite song on the EP and what, in retrospect, would you do to improve the rest, if anything?

Chris: Well, after you hear it you'll probably... I know I think that we can make them all better. I mean, we're happy with the way it came out. I'm into Julia right now, the opening track. We always have fun playing that. But, umm, every tune you can make better after you've figured out all the bull-shit...

Ken: I've only heard the new EP, what's next or in fact before recording wise?

Chris: Well we got the full length album that we did for American like a year ago. Then we did the 45 and the EP. We're planning on doing another record in March. A full length.

Ken: What's the last book that you've read?

Mike: Rabid Run, John Updike, Rabid Run.

Chris: I read Catcher in the Rye.

Dave: I read Candy by Carrie Southern Halper.

Chris: I just read that.

Dave: I really like that.

Chris: Isn't that the one they made that movie about with Marlon Brando?

Dave: I don't know? It was written like in the 50's or something. It was a big scandalous book. Funny, really funny.

Dave: I've been pickin' up some old Spider-mans and Deathlocs.

Ken: Alright, the comics man out of the bunch. Stubble, in addition to music reviews, also does comics reviews now. What do you think about the spider clones?

Dave: I haven't been buying new stuff. I just buy old stuff. I haven't been keeping up ever since when the new universe or whatever, I was just like this is too much information. I like it when it was simple. There were things that didn't make sense but that's alright.

Ken: What's on your turntables or in your CD or tape players back home right now?

Mike: The new LEMONHEADS album for me.

Chris: I got to think about that for a minute... John Barry.

Dave: Well, on my turntable, still right on there now, is the SATURDAY NIGHT FEVER SOUNDTRACK. In the CD player I think it's the Nutcracker.

Ken: Some pretty good extremes right there.

Chris: What is in there? I don't know? I think it's empty right now.

Dave: Well that's what my wife's using right now. She's listening to the best of John Denver.

Chris: But you've got that killer tape with Dean Martin. We've got everything, Dean Martin, rock-a-billy, whatever.

Ken: Anything exciting, tragic, funny, or whatever happen to you on the road that you'd care to share with the readers?

Mike: Well, something comes to mind I must say. Do I tell this story?

Dave: Tell it!

Chris: You'll have a scoop that's never been told anywhere before.

Mike: Alright. You want to hear the whole thing?

Ken: Sure. We've got plenty of tape so tell away.

Mike: How large is your readership?

Ken: I don't know but it's got to be a really large number, doesn't it?

Mike: Alright, uhhh, we went and did...we'd ended two months on the road. We'd gone home and then we had to fly out to do two shows, one in Chicago, one in Detroit. Actually, we're going to do a radio show in Chicago, then go to Detroit to play a show, then drive back to Chicago to do another show, then fly home so I can get ready to move to Massachusetts for the summer. So, we go out there, do the radio show, go to Detroit, do the concert, sleep over about twenty miles outside of Detroit, wake up and ask the hotel clerk where to get breakfast. She says there's a truck stop about ten miles down. You got to try it. It's great. We go to the truck stop and it's like a classic, wood paneling, Elvis pictures, like the best Michigan awful truck stop you've ever been to. Our old drummer Dave and I order Pork steak. We're like, we gotta order the grossest thing so there's this thing Pork steak, eggs, hash browns, you know, and all this stuff. We scarf it down and then we drive to Chicago. By the time we get to Chicago to do the sound check... we're playing at the double door and it's supposed to be this big concert with people from Epitaph coming who want to see us.

Chris: At the time the Epitaph thing hadn't come through yet and they were coming to check the band out also.

Mike: Right, it was like this thing. A guy from American was coming to oversee everything, like our A & R guy. It was like this big thing, we're in Chicago plus there's this DJ Mancow who's been pushing us so it's sponsored by the station. We do the sound check and I'm feelin' a little queasy Our A & R guy's there and he wants to take us out to dinner so we go to dinner next door to the club at a fancy restaurant. Everybody's at the bar drinking so I order a drink, drink like half of it and I can't finish it 'cause my stomach is freakin' out.

Chris: I'm watching Mike at the table kind of turn green.

Mike: Yeah, and then we sit down to eat dinner and I can't order any food. I eat like a bite of something and I'm like OHHH and my stomach is f**kin' freekin' out. We finish dinner and I think I'm getting gas or something. We go back to the club and everyone's like "OK, lets go down to the dressing room". We've got like an hour and fifteen minutes before we're supposed to be on stage. Everyone goes into the dressing room. I'm walking down stairs in the club through the hallway and all of a sudden I feel like I've got to fart. I'm like in the dressing room and I'm like alright, I'm going to save everybody because this feels like a bad fart and it's going to reek so I'm gonna just step outside of the dressing room, fart, wait for it to air out, and then go back into the dressing room. I step out in the hallway and I go to fart and I feel wet. I'm like, It couldn't be but I don't know what's really happened. I put my hand down the back of my pants and I pull it out and there's diarrhea all over my hand, covered. I'm like, oh my God. I've got like an hour to play now. I wipe my hand on the wall, run upstairs, and go up into the bathroom. I have diarrhea all over my legs and all over my pants, a f**kin' total mess.

Chris: Goin' to the public bathroom in a club with no lock on the door and no door on the stall.

Mike: The first thing I do is just go to the bathroom so I take this huge shit.

Chris: You wanted road tragic, you've got road tragic.

Mike: I take this huge shit in there. Well, first I throw out my underwear. There's like a little wastepaper basket in there. I throw out my underwear, take a huge shit and then I'm like alright I've got to deal with this. There's shit on my jeans so I wipe it off as best I can, put them on to go outside, get a huge stack of wet paper towels and go back into the bathroom to give myself like a sponge bath with them.

Chris: Now, don't you feel deathly ill like you have the flu or something?

Mike: All I'm concerned about is my colon. That's like my only concern is, you know, my intestinal problems and the fact that I've got to be on stage very soon. So, wetting the towels and everything... this guy comes in and starts going into the stall and there's only one stall and I literally went "Don't go in there!" like that and he's like "What?" and I say "You just can't use the stall!" and he's like "Are you gettin' sick in there?" and I was like "No?" and he goes "It smells like someone's gettin' sick." and I was like "Nooo. Just don't go in the stall." It turns out he's a f**kin' security guard and he goes "Are you in the band?" "Yeah." "What band?" "Ruth Ruth." "Oh, you play guitar? What do you play?" "Guitar." "Where are you from?" "New York." and I'm like ohhh. This guy's talking my ear off. So anyway, I get rid of him, I go back in, shit again, and then I'm sponging myself off. I get most of it off but can't really and I'm throwing stuff in the toilet seat to where it totally clogs the toilet. The toilet is ruined. You know when you go into a bathroom at a concert and you see there's like tons of shit, and it's clogged, and there's paper all over the place and you're like what the hell happened? I was the guy that night. (laughter)

Ken: Everyone takes turns.

Chris: Meanwhile, Mike vanished. We can't find Mike. We don't know what happened. We knew he'd be walkin' around but we can't find him. We were wondering what the hell happened, you know? We were worried.

Mike: I put my pants back on, no underwear, and I go out to the van to get another pair of pants. Thankfully I brought one more pair of pants 'cause we only have these two shows and I was like...

Chris: Everybody unpacked. Nobody packed.

Mike: I literally, when I was leaving home, thought to myself "Maybe I'll spill something on my pants. Maybe I should bring another pair". So I go out there. I get them. I know that the one bathroom in the club is destroyed so I go next door to the restaurant to use their bathroom. I walk in there and I've got shit stain on my pants that's seeped through so there's this huge brown thing that probably stinks like hell.

Ken: What color were the pants?

Mike: They were light green.

Ken: A new trend.

Mike: So I'm in a really nice restaurant and I've got a pair of pants under my arm and I'm walking through trying to be you know, everything's cool, don't worry about it. It's packed and I'm squeezing by people probably rubbing shit all over their dress and stuff. I get to that bathroom, got to shit again, just ruin their bathroom, take off my pants and there's a waste paper basket in there. I throw out my favorite jeans in this waste basket. I put on the new pair of pants and underwear and there's still like that film of diarrhea 'cause I haven't really showered so it's really gross and I can't get the smell off my hands and everything. Horrible! So then I've got like half an hour to play and I go and I get the van that's parked outside the club and I just go to get medicine. I'm tryin' to find a drugstore that's opened at 11:30 in Chicago, half an hour before I'm supposed to be on stage. I'm drivin' around and I find one. I go in there and I get a huge jug of water 'cause I know I'm going to be dehydrated from the diarrhea and the sweating on stage and the Imodiam AD. I go up to the cash gister and as I'm putting down diarrhea medicine and water I have to shit so bad I have to say to the woman "Do you have a bathroom I could use?" She looks down at the medicine and the water. She looks at me and she was like, "Yeah."

Chris: Did you wreck that bathroom?

Mike: Yeah. Oh, my God...

Ken: Going around ruining bathrooms.

Mike: So I go in there, take like a triple dosage of Imodium, go back to the club, and then I tell these guys what's happened, at which they start laughing hysterically, and say "If I run off the stage tonight you know what! Like I may not be able to finish." So I get out there, we do the show, and then I had to wait to get a 6:30 flight home from O'Hara to New York. You know that plane film you get like when you're riding on a plane and you get all sweaty and it gets kind of gross? Like I had that, plus shit, plus I blocked myself up so bad that now I'm getting sick. So, I got like a flu for three days and at the end of the flu the Imodium wore out and I shit my brains out again and then finally I was better... and that's the end of the story.

Ken: That's a great story. I'll tell ya.

Chris: I dare anyone to top that for being on the road.

Ken: Absolutely.

Mike: And that was like the last show.

Ken: It's a painful road story.

Chris: Put that in your hat Mic Jagger.

Ken: When you guys get together and write material, does it usually start one way or...

Dave: ...It starts one way...

Ken: ...or does each guy bring something...

Chris: I do all the writing and I usually demo at home and then I bring a tape and we all play it.

Ken: OK, and everyone learns their part more or less on each song?

Chris: Yeah.

Ken: Umm...

Mike: You're overwhelmed by the diarrhea story.

Ken: I am. I really am. Right now I'm starting to feel like I need some Imodium AD myself. Wow, that really goes right to the lower bowels. It makes me think of...

Chris: ...Chicago?

Ken: ...Actually, it reminds me of the last time I...when I did the Horde festival and I ended up...we got there so late we missed everybody good and I had to watch Lenny Kravits. About the same kind of a feeling. It goes right down to my bowels but he was good...in that way. (laughter) With so many different punk bands on Epitaph, how do you feel you fit in? What Punk scene are you into?

Mike: For the punk, as far as that goes, I don't think... we're not really in any... like in New York at least there are definitely like clicks of hard core punk bands and stuff. We have nothing to do with that at all. That's a cool thing and I go to their shows and I've seen like that community thing in those shows and that's awesome but us as a band have no place in a... we've never really gotten into a click of bands. There are bands we're friends with now from the last year and a half of touring like EVE PLUM or whoever who we could say like yeah we could maybe play somewhat similar music and we're friends and whatever but like the punk scene a) I don't think we're punk and b) I don't think we're in a punk...definitely not in a punk scene.

Chris: When we went with Epitaph the big thing about...the whole thing Brett wanted to do at Epitaph with RUTH RUTH was he knew that we weren't a punk band and he wanted to... He loved what we were doin' in the pop thing and he said he's always wanted to sign a pop band. He even had a band that he'd been workin' on for awhile that played kind of what we were playing and they were looking to branch out into that...We were kind of like a guinea pig in a way. I know a lot of people think that we put a record out on Epitaph we probably put out a punk record but we didn't. We put out a pure pop record.

Ken: It's the first thing that comes to mind when you think of Epitaph. I haven't seen any video of RUTH RUTH yet but, I assume you must have something in the works. How do you go about writing music specifically for video as opposed to having just a record in mind?

Chris: It never felt that way writing the tunes. It's too hard to get to that point. I gotta write a tune for me and if I like what I'm doing...I would never be able to write that way. We've never really gotten to that point. We made one video for Uninvited that got minimal play on MTV but that came after a whole line of luck and hard work and everything like that. Back with...I don't know. Maybe if you're huge you have to begin to think visually with your writing and that would maybe not be a negative thing. That could be a very creative thing...but, I'm not about that right now.

Ken: Any favorite cities to play on tour?

Mike: New York for me maybe, even though it's our home town, 'cause we've played so many shows there that have been like small empty clubs. To play a good show, have a lot of people there, maybe opening for someone good or be headlining our own or whatever...but it's good. It's really exciting to play at home and have it happen 'cause it took us so long playing to no-one in New York.

Chris: I like Chicago. I like playing in Chicago.

Ken: Have you toured Europe?

Chris: We did one trip. We did a ten day tour of England.

Ken: Were they familiar with your material?

Chris: No. We got there...

Mike: There were people.

Chris: We got there right when our record came out. We did a TV show or two where we went and played Uninvited. We had a great time.

Mike: Last year we really wanted to concentrate on the states instead of spreading us out real thin and we spent whatever, nine months out of the year touring the states.

Ken: Have you set any long term goals for RUTH RUTH?

Chris: It's not about that for me right now. It's about having a career and making money to pay our rent. To do what we love to do and have a career at it. Right now we all could be making more money if we were working a day job but we love it too much to give it up. We're giving it a shot right now. That would be the long term goal. To have what we love to do for a career.

Ken: What's it like to be on a bigger label like Epitaph?

Chris: Well, we were with American, so...

Ken: Is it any different?

Dave: Epitaph is calling people back.

Chris: That would be one way to look at it.

Mike: Epitaph's an amazing company. They do a severe amount of, I hate using the word, grassroots.

Ken: They really do though. They're a label that's in touch with a small fan-zine like us whereas a lot of big labels and even smaller labels would rather send stuff to Spin where it gets thrown into a garbage bucket.

Ken: Using a movie title, how would you sum up your music career so far?

Chris: Dog Day Afternoon. I hate everybody.

Dave: The Cook, The Thief, His Wife, Her Lover

Chris: That would be it.

Ken: I notice you're a foursome now. Was it a conscious decision to expand from a trio early on or did it just work out that way?

Chris: Every record that we've made, we've made with a two guitar player thing in mind. I hear it in my head that way and now I'm getting to hear it live that way. I think it elevated the material to a higher level for me. I like hearing what I hear in my head, you know?

Ken: Your pop style centers around the vocals. Is it difficult to keep from over using a trademark hook or riff when your writing new songs?

Chris: The more you write the better you get at arranging. That would probably fall into like an arrangement thing. If you get lucky you come up with a good arrangement where you avoid any bad repetitive type of things.

Ken: If there was one thing you could change about New York, what would it be?

Chris: Nothing.

Dave: Free cabs. (laughter)

Chris: I like that.

Ken: Any words of wisdom to share with our readers?

Chris: We played a show with Mike Whatt one time and after he finished the show, before he left, he told the crowd, "Form your own band." I like that one. I'll rip it off from Mike Whatt.