An Interview with SUGARSMACK

An Interview with SUGARSMACK

This interview was done May 13, 1993 at Sluggo's in Pensacola, Florida. Deanna left the band awhile later so now it is the crazy foursome.

TT: Introduce yourselves and tell us who is in the band.

Hope: Well I'm Hope.

Deanna: I'm Deanna.

Hope: Sugarsmack also contains Aaron on bass and Chris on guitar and John on drums. I'm a singer....

Deanna: And I'm a percussionist.

Hope: Exactly. (laughter)

TT: Deanna, didn't you used to play with Dirt a long time ago?

D: Yeh, a long time ago on their first record I played with them.

TT: Tell us how you got started, how you got together and who thought up the name, Sugarsmack.

H: Oh, God, I thought up the name and I was just driving in the car and there was only one other band with Sugar in the name and that was The Sugarcubes, who I really love, so I said, "Well, we'll be in good company." Now there are too many Sugar bands and I want to change it to Nutrasmack! (laughter) But at least for the time being it's gonna be Sugarsmack.

TT: How did you all come together?

H: Me and Aaron started writing songs together and we recruited Chris. He started playing a little guitar with us and it was working out really good. He had lots of good ideas and then we had also been talking to Deanna and John, who was Chris' friend. We'd been talking to Deanna 'cause we knew her a really long time from the old band (Fetchin' Bones).

D: They begged me.

H: And we begged her. We crawled around Atlanta begging her for 3 days and 3 nights. At the end of the third night she said yes. And that's not all.

D: As long as I get paid more than everybody else.

H: Yeh, she gets paid extra.

TT: Who writes most of the lyrics?

H: I'm pretty much responsible for all the lyrics you hear. I hate to admit that but..(laughter) I just think up things that I like. If I think of something I think I've never heard before at all and it strikes me as really unusual then I like that too.

D: It's all a reflection of your personality though, right?

H: Yeh, I guess so...the twisted self.

TT: What do you all do when you're not busy with Sugarsmack?

D: I live in Atlanta so I work there. I'm a light technician. I'm working on some club music with a DJ friend of mine.

H: We're really a 90's band. We all live in different cities and we all have to have other jobs just to kind of get by 'cause I think that's something about the 90's is that in the 80's it seemed like everyone had one job. They had more than enough money to buy as many drugs as they wanted or whatever they wanted to spend their extra money on. Now I think everybody has at least 2 jobs and still doesn't have any damn money.

D: Thirteen jobs.

TT: I have 3 jobs and still have no money.

H: I got 15 jobs.

TT: Hope, I heard you were doing some touring with Pigface.

H: Yeh, I did that. That was me. That was me with the purple hair.

D: That wasn't Mary Biker.

H: Yeh, that wasn't Mary Biker. Mary Biker is a guy with a dick. I'm a woman with a clit. (laughter) I have to say that that didn't really go over in some places. I think a lot of assholes think industrial music is for men only, that it's a male dominated sport. I think they cut a guy like Chris Connelly all this slack even though he sings a lot more like David Bowie and less like Ogre. But then if I get out there then they're like, "Oh, what's this chick doing out here singing rock n roll?" Toward the end of the tour it got to be an aggrofest where at first it was the finger, the middle (laughter) then by the end everybody...I mean I just took over. Me and En Esch would be up there just fuckin' nailin' shit to the wall.

D: But then you need to grab your crotch.

H: I don't need to grab it. They can smell it. It's there! (laughter)

TT: I don't see any flies around here.

H: No, it's a good smell. I thought it was really interesting and I think we opened a few eyes with that Pigface tour. I thought it was high time that a high profile industrial band had a woman do more than just sing backup.

TT: I read that review in Flipside where they ragged on you.

H: Yeh, like I said, I thought that was really bogus. It's just the typical example of guys getting a lot of slack cut for them and then women get no slack cut for them whatsoever.
D: For example, Michael Jackson.
H: I was going off on that. Michael Jackson and Prince are the most tired 1983 motherfuckers with their style and their music. I even like their music but I'm using this as an example. Yet, if Madonna was still wearing the same clothes like Michael is sporting the same look, she would have been out of there like Cyndi Lauper was.
D: But they still give her shit.
H: We need to be looked at on the same terms.

TT: If a woman is a boss, she's a bitch, but if a guy is a boss he's just doing his job.
What's this I hear about a book you wrote when you were younger called 10,000 Saliva Glands?

H: Oh, my god! Where did you find all this information?
D: She's digging good.
H: I was an author before I was a singer. I still have the whole gross book series that I did when I was about ten: 10,000 Saliva Glands; Anne's Hair (which was under her armpits); and Ted's Ten Foot Long Tongue. (laughter) It was well received by the older members of my family.

TT: What do you think you both would have done had you not been in the music scene?

D: I don't know...Rollerderby.
H: Become a sniper, seriously.

TT: In what city would you prefer to be a sniper?

H: I'd just travel around sniping. Things are really bad and everybody needs a major creative outlet.

TT: One last question. What is the most favourite and tackiest piece of thrift store clothing you own?

H: My Tinkerbell costume. I haven't had the guts to wear it yet. It's a yellow 50's Tinkerbell outfit.

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