| 1340 Magazine Chad Olson Dustin Diamond is best known for his portrayal of likeable, curly-haired goof Samuel "Screech" Powers from the popular 90's Saturday morning television show "Saved by the Bell." After the show went off the air, he not only began doing stand-up comedy but he also started a band. Diamond (bass), Evan Stone (drums), Scott Ireland (guitar and vocals), and rosebud (vocals and guitar) presently comprise Salty The Pocketknife. A diverse group, their music and style is hard to describe, let alone pigeonhole. I talked with Diamond and Stone recently, the two interacting brilliantly. Stone is a pleasant, easygoing guy with an aversion to record industry politics. And while Diamond isn't the nerd he portrayed on his hit T.V. show, at times his ingenuousness isn't too unlike his Screech character. Listen in as we chat about Beastie Boys rumors, gas-passing elephants, and just what it is that makes Salty The Pocketknife a band to watch in 2004. Chad Olson: Dustin, how did you get into acting? Dustin Diamond: Oh, gosh. Well, I'll give you the condensed version. Basically, when I was eight years old...I grew up in Northern California, the Bay Area, San Jose. And San Francisco was about an hour away, and San Francisco was the "L.A." to the Northern, uh, Bay Area. So that was where all the auditions were held and everything else. I was just going with my mom through a Macy's department store. I was eight years old, just messin' around like a little kid having fun. I wanted to go shopping for toys, and she wanted to go, you know, shoe shopping. And I just got bored, and she wanted to sit and rest. So I started making her laugh, and posing like I was a mannequin. There's a lot of websites out there that say my first job was as a mannequin, and that's totally wrong! I was posing as one just to make my mom laugh as a little kid. CO: [Laughter] Evan Stone: Now he works as a mannequin. CO: [Laughter] DD: Yeah. So, someone came through and said, "Hey, you know, I run this department store. Your kid is very funny and personable. I think he'd be great in an ad." So, I went to San Francisco an hour away to be a model, a child model. One month into my building of my portfolio, one of the photographers I was cracking up the whole day, turns out he has a close friend who works at a talent agency, so he says, "We'll go down there, and now instead of making hundreds of thousands of dollars you could make up to millions; you're unlimited." I went and auditioned for the people, and they signed me up. And that's the short version. CO: Then was doing stand-up comedy just kind of an off-shoot of liking to make people laugh, or how did you start doing that? DD: Well, I'm naturally a performer, and I think that stand-up...You look at every great comedian out there, everyone from Seinfeld, also Ray Romano, Drew Carey, Johnny Carson, Jay Leno, David Letterman...Everybody...Steve Martin...I mean, these guys are all...George Carlin...They're all fantastic comedians who do also stand-up. All the people on "Saturday Night Live," "Second City"...So, it was a natural transition, and since I hadn't done stand-up and I had done acting first...You know, most people start out with stand-up and hope to get a T.V. show. I did it backwards; I had a T.V. show and now I'm doing stand-up. Next year I'll be doing security work with Gary Coleman! CO: [Laughter] What do you enjoy doing most: being a musician, actor, or comedian? DD: Musician is something I wouldn't say I enjoy as much as it's...Of course I enjoy it, but I would say it's an addiction. It's something that's in my soul; I have to do it. If I quit everything else, I would still play music. CO: Which takes up most of your time right now? DD: Well, it's hard to say because stand-up is a unique thing. I have one show tonight. I perform for 45 minutes, and then I have 23 hours and 15 minutes of downtime. Of course, you fill-in with press and relaxing and sleep and stuff like that, but otherwise I'm just writing music. CO: Evan, I promise I've only got two more direct questions for him and we'll get on. ES: No, that's fine. CO: Dustin, how did acting prepare you for being a musician, or has it? DD: Not at all. They're totally separate. Let's put it this way. Most people like to put stigmas, people like clichés and catch phrases: "A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush," and all those things. Okay, well "actor-turned-musician"; you always hear that. But the reality is I've been in the entertainment industry for acting 19 years. And I've been in music going on 22 years, so that's three years extra in music. So I'm a musician first. It's just that I didn't get famous as a musician first. CO: In what capacity were you doing music before you were acting? DD: Oh, well, gosh. I mean, I got into acting when I was eight, so when I was five I wasn't rockin' out. But, I mean, I started learning. I wasn't like 21 when I picked up my first guitar and started writing chords. Let's put it this way: by the time I was eight, I knew all of the chords, all the augmented...All this, everything, you know. I could play anything my dad could play because I always learned what he played. I could play Beatles songs, and tunes that I heard on the T.V., I'd try to figure out. I figured them out as best as I could at eight years old, but by the time I was known as the "Saved by the Bell" thing, by the time that thing got big like in '92/'93 around there, then I was pretty proficient. And I never stopped. CO: Okay. Isn't Mike D. of the Beastie Boys your brother? DD: No, I'm an only child. CO: For real? DD: Uh hm. Yeah. There's a longtime rumor... CO: Somebody told me that today, and I'm like, "What?!" And they said they were 99% sure, so I figured I had to ask. DD: Well, they're 100% wrong! CO: That's right! DD: Let's put it this way: they had a magazine - I don't know if they still have it - called Grand Royal that The Beastie Boys put out. So, I did an article with them awhile back because obviously Mike D. gets the same thing I get but in reverse: "Hey, is Screech your brother?" That's what people probably ask him. Well, the funny thing is we both have similar features, we both play bass, and our last names are Diamond. I can see where the rumor would get started. But alas, we are not anything more than chums. CO: Really? Did you grow up in a musical household though? DD: Oh, yeah. My dad used to play guitar when I was a kid. I learned on a Martin, so I got spoiled. CO: Cool. Alright, well, we'll get into the band now. Tell me about Sonance Records, and have you guys had or did you have any major label interest? DD: Evan? ES: Uh, good question. DD: [Laughter] ES: [Laughter] Um, we weren't aiming for major labels, per se, because we knew that the kind of music we were creating wasn't going to be their bag. They weren't going to be able to... DD: It wasn't going to be their big money-maker. ES: Yeah, they weren't going to be able to push it the way that we needed to push it. They weren't going to be able to get behind an eclectic act like ours like they would behind a teeny-bopper band. So, going the independent route seemed like the best for us. We needed to be the top-dog on the label so that we could get the kind of push that we needed. Unfortunately, that hasn't worked out for us. CO: What other bands are on the label right now? ES: None that I would... DD: Who knows? ES: None that you would probably ever hear of. CO: So are you guys a little disappointed at this point in the...? ES: Yeah, beyond disappointed. CO: That's too bad. DD: Well, the thing is that the world is full of people who make promises but break them. When you get a situation where people...You know, you want to be grateful at first because this particular label has given us a chance; they've taken a chance on us: an eclectic, crazy, Frank Zappa meets Mr. Bungle style music, all odd-time. ES: Yeah, but that's a chance knowing they're going to get notoriety because of, you know... DD: Let me finish. Part of it is where they're giving us a chance, yet on the second part they don't want to put any money into it because they figure, "Oh, well people will know Dustin." CO: Slap your name on it. DD: "It'll just fall into our laps." And when that doesn't happen...Let's put it this way: the fact that I played Screech on "Saved by the Bell" means as much to the music and the fans as this. Here's the extent of the entire, from start to finish, their realization that I'm in the band: "Whoa. Screech has a band? Oh, let's go see it. Oh, jeez that is Screech! No way! Hey, hey, he can play! Dude, right on!" Okay, done. Now, once that's out of the way...I mean, you can hear guys that get excited and shout out "Screech!" during the show. But for the most part, after the first or second song is done, those people who just came down to see the guy from T.V. play bass, they either get the music and stick around and love it and "Screech" is never mentioned the rest of the night, or...And then it's just like, "Whoa, hey man! Great music!" They've really got it, or they don't get it at all, and they're puzzled. Then at the end of the show go, "Whoa! That was weird, man!" ES: They were coming expecting to see "Saved by the Bell" or "Zack Attack Band" or something like that." CO: Okay. [Laughter] DD: Yeah. Then there's obviously the people who just come down, say, "Oh, that's not my thing," get bored of it, and then leave, people who don't really care about the music at all. ES: And we're not going after everyone. We're not a pop band. We know what kind of a crowd we're after It's very eclectic music; we're doing it because we love this kind of music. We're not trying to be the next Britney Spears, Backstage Boys, whatever the hell you call them. Yeah, the Backdoor Boys. I try not to keep up with what's hip and modern because that's usually what's not hip and modern in my eyes. But getting back to the label...As far as an independent label, whoever it was going to be that joined up with us knew going in that they were going to be getting some notoriety from Dustin's name. The problem is, what we feared is happening; I think they're leaning a little bit too much on it, and trying to get as much free stuff as possible. DD: Resting on the laurels is no good. ES: Yeah, so we're not in a very good spot as far as... DD: It's tough to find people who will put faith and back the stuff that we see in the music. Yet there's other people that just want to make a quick buck. Of course, we all want to make money. But Evan and I where we fund this project...There's no money in music unless you are one of the Backstreet Boys or Britney Spears or Justin Timberlake. So, we're doing this because we love music and because we like to share it. I think I can speak for Evan on this as well. Correct me if I'm wrong, Evan, but I just want to make enough money to continue doing music indefinitely. That's what I'd be happy with. ES: Yeah, that's the idea. That's the goal. Support yourself doing what you like to do. But, there's gigs that you do for money, and there's gigs that you do for love. This band is definitely one that you do for love because we know that our audience is going to be small. DD: But loyal. CO: I did some poking around on the Internet, and for the life of me I could not find any Bug Guts samples. How are they different from Salty the Pocketknife? DD: Well, Scott and rose, obviously, with Bug Guts they did most of the stuff, and most of the writing, just the two of them. Of course, on their second album they brought Evan in and Evan put together just fantastic drum parts. But it's sort of country...Not country like how you'd think or what you'd see on a country station. I'm trying to think how to word it. It's more like hillbilly folk punk. Like hillbillies on acid. Like acid hillbilly punk country. ES: What we did with Salty the Pocketknife - when Dustin and we formed Salty - is that we all started writing as a team. The formula with us for as far as the writing style is rosebud writes the lyrics, Scott comes up with his...We all come up with our own individual parts. We all tape record our personal sections, and we all come in with what we like and new ideas. We all review the same material from the previous week. I think with this band we wanted to take the quirkiness of what we all kind of like but make it a little bit easier on people's ears because after all, you really want your art to be understood by the majority of the people. I guess what I'm trying to say is that you can do art because it serves something that you need to serve for yourself, but at the same time I think that you genuinely want to please others with what you do. I don't think it's necessarily selling-out to write in a way or to create something in a way that's understandable to a lot of people. I think that's sometimes more selfless than selfish because you're trying to make it a communal thing. We all do things for selfish reasons, but I'm creating this...Even Mother Teresa. She was a saint, but she did what she did because it served something that she needed to serve for herself. So, we do this for ourselves but at the same time you can be conscious of how you portray what you're creating so that other people understand it and can see eye to eye on it, as opposed to some artists that just, like avant-garde guys that just want to be wacky for the sake of being wacky, or writing odd-time things. DD: Sort of cocky, like, "This is crazy and wacky, and you'll never get it!" ES: Yeah, that's beyond me, and that's not what we're after. We're trying to incorporate the stuff you'd like to hear. DD: If anything we'd like to hip people to this music and kind of like ease them into more complex ideas that we have. Really that's all that music is; it's just ideas based on sound. ES: There's bands that blow us away that are out there that are doing this kind of material that are great musicians older than us with more experience, but you'll never hear about 'em. Why won't you hear about 'em? Because radio won't play 'em. Why won't radio play 'em? Because people don't get it. So we figured if there is some way...That was part of the plan anyway. We were going to send this stuff in, and Dustin's name was going to be able to get the CD from the bottom of the pile to the top so that people would be curious about what he was doing. And say, "Wow, this is kind of interesting! Maybe we'll even play it." And we are; we're getting played on over a hundred college stations right now, and for this kind of music that's pretty cool. We're even charting. So that's even cooler. So, in some small way if we can help other bands that are doing similar stuff that we're doing get out there, then great and we've accomplished something great. For the most part, what you're hearing on the radio - especially on commercial radio - is just stuff that's force fed and paid for to be on there, and people don't realize that they have a lot of options or choices out there that they'll never find out about if they can't search for them. Like mp3, for example, used to be a place where you could try to find new music, but once Universal took over that was just another avenue for them to advertise their newly signed bands. DD: Breathe, Evan! Breathe! [Laughter] CO: [Laughter] DD: Evan right now is sharpening a blade. ES: Yeah. [Laughter] DD: Yeah, it is frustrating though. Evan and I basically bitch and complain to each other constantly when we're taking breaks between writing songs. He said it best: there's great musicians out there. If you say the name "Vinnie Colaiuta" to most people, I would be willing to bet everything that I hold dear that your average teenager out there - your basic teenager out there, your tools - 99.9999999999999999% of them would say, "Who?" Yet if you hear him he's probably one of the greatest drummers that ever lived, in my opinion. Even though there's so many fantastic ones: Buddy Rich and Jeff Porcaro and all these other guys. But people go, "Who?" And yet Sting Ten Summoner's Tales, anyone of those songs in there - "Fields of Gold," any of those great songs - you'll hear Vinnie on there, but you never know it. People don't know who these guys are unless they're into music or they're musicians. ES: It's funny. I was just watching a documentary last night called "Standing in the Shadows of Motown." You've gotta see it if you guys haven't seen it. It's an amazing documentary on the musicians, the 12 or 15 or so musicians, that were the sound of Motown in Detroit - you know, "the Detroit sound" - and we never hear them. These are the guys that have done like "My Girl" and just all these hits from that era, and you'll never know about them. They did a documentary on them, and they go into depth of who these guys are. But it's just so interesting that they're just gone; they're lost in the shadows. DD: That's the thing. Evan and I bitch and complain to each other that all we want to do with music is...People out there think this music is shallow; they just don't get the point. It's like, "Oh, it's another actor-turned-musician. Oh, all actors want to be musicians. Oh, it's Screech trying to be a rock star." It just shows how asinine and stupid they are that it has nothing to do with...If you want to be a rock star, you write pop rock tunes that are going to be the top notch. All Evan and I complain about is that it's a shame that there's not more people like us that are trying to hip your everyday person into expanding their musical knowledge by hearing such fantastic stuff. ES: It's more like a crusade that we're on. CO: [Laughter] ES: Totally. We are. We're on a musical crusade. This is kind of an experiment; Salty The Pocketknife is really an experiment because it forces radio programmers to listen to it because of Dustin's notoriety. They're curious, and it forces the listener to make a decision based on the music. Like Dustin said, the "Screech Factor" is going to go away pretty fast, and you're going to be left with what? The music. And you're going to have to base your judgment on that, not on Dustin's name. DD: We're not the first and we certainly won't be the last musicians to attempt this. Frank Zappa...amazing! The Mothers of Invention...amazing! I mean come on, it's The Mothers! The thing is that my parents knew about it, and most kids anywhere my age knew about it, and their parents knew about it. But the kids today aren't hipped to it. In school we teach past knowledge and past great things, like things in history...Great, some horrible, but great in size and scope and their impact on the world. But what impacts the world more than music? I mean, sure historical events and things like that, but what I mean music is right up there on par with anything that should be taught in school and what should be passed down from generation to generation. I think that it's getting lost in the shuffle. So when Evan says we're on a crusade, I full-on agree with that. It's funny because even though people don't get it, it's not like something like, "Ha! Ha! We know something that you don't! Ha! Ha! We're smarter than you!" It has nothing to do with that. We want to hip...I think we're confident in knowing how to deliver. You know how sometimes there's people who can be amazing at something but don't know how to teach it to others? CO: Uh hm. DD: I think that through music you naturally have the ability if you approach it right to play great stuff and make it easy - it's like a learning curve, the ramp-up - to bridge the gap between avant-garde and pure self-expression through any sound and sonic waves you can find, and comfortable Top 40 pop chart things. I think the fact that Salty is all odd-time...There is no song in 4/4, and yet there's one station out there where we're ranked number two. That's awesome. That means that we've achieved what we've intended, and people are diggin' it. People say, "Oh, I don't like odd-time stuff, and they don't play odd-time stuff on the radio." But they'll play Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon's "Money," and that's in seven. But it was easy to latch onto. There wasn't too much going on, and that impresses me. People out there are diggin' the music that we're doing, and that's the goal. ES: And it's not like we're doing anything groundbreakingly new. It's not like we discovered a new thing or a new sound. But I think it's safe to say that our sound is pretty unique. I'm not sure if you have a copy of the record. CO: I do. Yeah. I would agree. ES: I think it would be safe to say that if you heard another song of ours, you might be able to tag it as Salty The Pocketknife. Ultimately that's a good goal to have is originality. Who wants the same Pearl Jam band over and over again for 10 years, you know? Whether it be Train or some of the other bands out there, I can't tell the difference! There was a period in the late 90's for the past five or six years after Pearl Jam came out that I couldn't tell if it was Pearl Jam or not. "No, this isn't Pearl Jam; this is this band. No, that's not Pearl Jam; this is Train." They all sound alike! DD: That's because Sponge and Bush and Creed and Pearl Jam and even Stone Temple Pilots - and I liked them when they came out - everyone was just like [in a low, grungy, Layne Staley type voice], "Yeah! Yeah!" You heard that in every song! It's like the Creed guy throwing his hands up into fists and making that thing; he does it like a hundred times in every video. It's like if everybody on Earth started doing that, I'm the type of person that I'm not blind to it. I recognize it, and I go, "This sucks!" And it pisses me off. I'm sitting here getting pissed off! Why do these guys want me to make fists! It's my passion for music. There's a place for everything. It's like techno music; there's a place for it. There's people out there who all day long, when they turn on the radio, all they want to hear is [mimicking a bass drum thump], "Dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun." And two hours later a new song! [Mimicking same bass drum thump] "Dun, dun, dun, dun-dun-dun, dun, dun." ES: But slower. DD: Yeah, I'm not one of those people. I need more. I like music that when you listen to it, the first time you hear it, it's just confusing. You don't know what's happening, and things are hitting you from left and right, and you don't know what's happening to you. But after you listen to it, the predictability is gone. You're really caught up in the moment, rather than knowing from the first verse how the rest of the three and a half minutes are going to go. And yet if a part does repeat, even if it's odd, crazy time, and there's that familiarity that people need... ES: Also we're pretty diverse in our taste in music. Justin has a wide scope. I'm a jazz musician. I've played in blues bands and reggae bands and country bands and big bands. DD: Some of them quite well! [Laughter] ES: I love listening to Neil Young's Harvest just as much as I like listening to Frank Zappa's Joe's Garage. The music that we're creating is really coming from all of our influences, and we're just taking what we hear. Like I said, we're not trying to set out to be different. This is just the music that's coming out of us, and we're fully aware that it's not typical music. DD: That's not to say that everything that we listen to is incorporated into all our music. There's a mood where I'll just listen to Portishead Dummy and love it, or Lamb, and it just hits me right. And there's times where I can listen to Sarah McLachlan's Fumbling Towards Ecstasy, and it just hits me right. And yet there's other times where I can listen to Frank Zappa's Shut Up 'N Play Yer Guitar followed by Apostrophe followed by Thing-Fish or Tinsel Town Rebellion, and I'm at home! You can go from playing Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon to the Beatles to Gordon Lightfoot to Tricky. If it's great music, we're diggin' it. It suits your moods. I mean, you've listened to the whole CD right? CO: Oh, yeah. A couple few times. DD: Okay. I don't know what you've pulled from it, and that's the great thing because everyone pulls something different. But for me there are songs on there that...You know how some albums the first song and the last song and all the songs sound basically the same? CO: Uh hm. DD: At the end of listening through the whole CD once, if you could hum something it could be track two, six, nine, four...You don't know. But for us, I think for me there's a mood that's set with each song. Like "Rim Goblin" is slip-sliding and slinky, and where you're just feeling rubbery and loose. And there's ""Deus Ex Machina" where Evan is just driving that thing so hard, that's when you're pumped up and you're aggressive. That's a great workout song for me, and I run on a treadmill and listen to that. CO: How did you come up with the band name? ES: Dustin, go ahead. DD: Um, well, there's not much exciting to it. We were just sitting around in my old house, we were practicing, and we wanted to come up with a name that sounded cool Of course, you don't want a crappy name, but on the other hand it's just sort of weird to sit around and try to force something, you know? That's how we approach our music; we just try to let it come naturally. So we were taking a break during one of our nine hour writing sessions, and rosebud started singing. We were all just kind of jamming on our little things, and we played like this little psychotic, circus, country tune, and it was very bouncy. Rosebud started singing, "Salty The Pocketknife is coming round to take your life/Salty The Pocketknife..." and she's singing all these weird things. Evan just stopped and started busting up, and said, "Are you saying, 'Salty The Pocketknife?'" And she said, "Yes, yes I am." And we said, "That's it! That's the name of the band. CO: Debbie Sellnow at Mazur P.R. sent me a list of guidelines, you know "do's and don'ts." On there Scott Ireland and rosebud were not listed as current band members. Is that just a typo? DD: No, well this is the confusing part that gets everybody, even more so than the music. To sum it all up real quick, Evan and I are the core of Salty; it's our brainchild. Evan and I were the first to form this thing. Of course, we brought in Scott and rose for the first album, but Scott and rose are like us; they like to play with many different people. So what we did was we figured we could approach this band not like your typical formula since we're not your typical formula anyway. Basically we're the core of the band. Anytime you hear the music, you're going to be able to recognize the signature sound by Evan and me holding down the rhythm. But we're authors telling different stories basically because we put the canvas out there, and then we let the guitar player and singer - each time we're going on tour or each time we put out a new album - paint on that canvas. ES: Or it could be a keyboard player and a horn player or whatever. CO: Okay, so they were on the first album and won't be on the next album or may not be? ES: It depends. We don't know. DD: Yeah, it depends on how everything works out. If all of a sudden we start writing a whole bunch more tunes with them, we're going to have to put those into a recording session and put those out. CO: Okay. I know that Ron Goudie produced Stryper's first album, and another thing I know that he did was an underground extreme Christian metal band called Vengeance Rising. But I was wondering what else has he worked on, and how did you guys choose him to produce your record? ES: May I? DD: Yes! ES: Um, Ron Goudie. I think it would actually be better to skip that question because I am not in the mood to Ron Goudie bash, and that's probably what I would do right now. CO: Oh, okay. DD: I'll just answer real quick then. You are familiar with Gwar, right? CO: Yeah. DD: Okay, so Ron Goudie produced a lot of Gwar records. Ron Goudie was friends for like 25 years with our band manager Jack Koshick. So he asked Ron - and Ron was pretty experienced in the industry - and he said, "Would you like to get involved with it?" And he did. But then again not everything in the industry works out plainly, so... CO: [Laughter] Okay. ES: Let's say Salty The Pocketknife produced it, and Ron Goudie oversaw it. CO: [Laughter] Gotcha! I think I know where you're coming from. Is "Sever" a pro-choice/pro-abortion song? ES: That's something you'd have to ask Scott and rosebud. CO: Okay. The lyrics are really interesting. I mean, overall, the whole album is. Was "Snack Break" written after 9/11? ES: No. DD: No. CO: It wasn't?! It was written before? ES: Way before. CO: Really?! Okay. What I took out of it, it seemed like maybe she was singing about the actions of the current U.S. Administration. Did I totally misread that? ES: Again... DD: That's the greatest thing; everyone takes something different away from it! [Laughter] ES: Again, that's rosebud's department. I can give you her phone number if you want to ask her. DD: We do it for the music. ES: We don't want to misrepresent her. DD: That's what I was saying, is with authors telling different stories, you're not always going to hear the same message. Remember, what she needs to get out with her voice is not what we are getting out through the tune. ES: And also "Snack Break" is a song...You're talking about "Snack Break," right? CO: Yeah. ES: "Snack Break" is a Bug Guts song that we took for this record. CO: Okay, that's one of them. ES: So it's not one that we wrote as a band. CO: In the bio/song breakdown that Mazur P.R. sent with the album, Dustin, you said that "Butterfly Feat" was "...a happy trip down a road that" you would never take. Why is that? DD: [Laughter] Because I'm psycho. Um, it sounded good! [Laughter] ES: [Laughter] CO: [Laughter] DD: How else do you describe these wacky tunes? I mean, I guess I could go into a long description of what... CO: I guess more what I took from it was lyrically, that you meant lyrically. DD: No, see, that's the thing. I don't judge things by the lyrics; I judge them by the music. I judge things all by the feel and the emotion of the music. I don't necessarily agree with everything that rosebud feels, but that's not my place to. That's what she needs to get out, so that's her area. And my area, of course, is bass and sharing that with Evan as the rhythm. I think I just meant that it's like you can kind of like rock back and forth like you're walking along at a rocking pace, but then because it keeps catching up on itself and biting its own tail. And yet you're not losing time; now instead of hitting on the right, now you're hitting on the left, if that makes sense. Like when you're walking, it just feels like...Like when you sit back in a chair, and you lean back a little too far, and you get to that point where you're like, "Oh, my God. I'm going to fall!" ES: Yeah, basically it's the kind of song that if you're dancing make sure you're near handrails. DD: [Laughter] That's good, dude! CO: [Laughter] Do you guys play live much, or do you have touring plans, or what's next for the band? DD: We played live before we recorded the album. So much work goes into this that it's so exhausting. When it's finally done, you need a break. And you're constantly writing so you've got all these new ideas. Because it takes so long to write the music that once it gets written, you've played it so many times and yet now it's going to go into the recording process where you're going to play it so many more times that... ES: There were logistic problems as well. Dustin lives in Milwaukee, I'm in Southern California, Scott and rosebud are in Northern California. It took a year to actually mix this record, and it took another six months to master the record, and it took awhile to shop the record so we could find a label. DD: That's only because Evan's slow. ES: [Laughter] Now we're looking at supporting this in the next couple of months once the weather kind of warms up a little bit. CO: I've got two more questions. Tell me about the album cover. What's it supposed to signify exactly? DD: The album cover? Once again, there's no preached meaning where it's like, "This is what this means." It's what it looks like. It's some sort of rough goblin or human or humanoid looking creature; it's hard to know what he is. It's just the artist's discretion. ES: It's an artist's rendering. I think the concept that Dustin and I were talking about was to have a guy that was forging something, forging new music. DD: So he's holding the CD, and then of course on the back is the shattered CD after his hammer has come down on it. And the CD itself has the image of seeing the cracks on the CD. It's just kind of cohesive; it all goes together. ES: We're doing a flash animation video for "Shiny Lies" right now, and it's going to tell a very different story. DD: [Laughter] CO: Okay, last question. How would you describe Salty The Pocketknife to someone who hasn't heard you? I've been having trouble doing it. DD: Wait, I'll take it, and then Evan takes it. Mine is simply thus: it sounds like an elephant farting across a harp. CO: [Laughter] ES: Mine is a little bit longer than that. DD: [Laughter] CO: That might be a good thing! [Laughter] DD: [Laughter] ES: The first thing that comes to mind is you want them to know that it's a little left of center, so I usually say, "Frank Zappa meets Mr. Bungle meets Led Zeppelin meets Bjork meets The Police." I try to list a bunch of different bands so that they can get an idea of what our influences are. But ultimately what I do is I say, "Look, I try not to label. I call it music. It's either going to resonate with you or it won't, and I'm not offended if it doesn't." I have plenty of people that I ask, "Did you like the record?" that I gave it to. And I can tell that they're being polite saying, "Oh, yeah, yeah. It's kind of cool." And I'm like, "Look, I don't care if you hate it. I know everyone's not going to like it." In fact, here's the philosophy that I think everybody should live by: expect half of the people not to like you, and expect the other half to like you; but focus on the ones that do like what you're doing and not the ones that don't like what you're doing. CO: Closing comments? ES: Um, buy my record! [Laughter] DD: I'll just say that Evan and I have a lot more to say. It's unlimited, but what we say is not in the traditional sense, which implies speech. Our emotions and the things that we say and need to speak out on come out in the emotion and the rhythm of the music. So if you listen carefully, you can hear stuff that you wouldn't hear if you just had it on in the background. CO: Well, cool. That's all I've got. I'll let you guys go. DD: Evan right now is going, "Dude, that was deep." [Laughter] CO: [Laughter] ES: I'm about to cry. CO: [Laughter] ES: Yeah, I wish I hadn't just said, "Buy my record!" [Laughter] DD: [Laughter] CO: [Laughter] |
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