Course of Empire Strikes Back


I interviewed Chad Lovell, drummer with Dallas-based rock band Course of
Empire, on Tuesday, February 24, 1998 at about 4:30 in the afternoon.  The
band has a new release on TVT named Telepathic Last Words.  I have 
followed this band's career since the early '90s and recently listened to
the band's album a lot.  That's what prompted me to want to do a current
piece in support of the band.  The interview is the story so let's get
with it.

[CL-Chad Lovell, TX Beat-Keith Ayres]

TX Beat- Are you ready to rock on our interview?
CL- Sure man.
TX Beat- I'm rollin' tape now...
CL- You're gonna have to deal with my laryngitis, sorry.  I had food
    poisoning a couple of days ago and I'm pretty sick to my stomach
    and so I kinda got a really bad...laryngitis problem.
TX Beat- So I'll make it as quick as possible then.
TX Beat- Where are you at right now.
CL- No, we're in Dallas.  We just got back.
TX Beat- Are you at the studio?
CL- Uh-huh...
TX Beat- The last time I interviewed you guys was for the release on 
         Zoo in '92, I know a lot has happened since then, can you 
         briefly bring us up to date?
CL- Well, we had released Initiation in, like '94, which was the 
    second record we did, and we toured for probably about six months
    or so on that tour opening up for the likes of Prong, Engines of
    Aggression, etcetera, etcetera and hold on for a second. [Chad is
    distracted by another call coming in.] I'm sorry, I got thrown 
    off.
TX Beat- You were touring with Prong, Engines of Aggression...
CL- Yeah, people of that era can understand everything was pretty cool
    and then we went back in the studio at the end of that to, uh, 
    start working on a new album.  So we started working on some new
    songs and we basically set about building our own recording studio,
    which is where you're calling right now.
TX Beat- Is it a private studio or can people book time there?
CL- I've actually produced a couple other bands outta here in my own
    spare time, like Doosu and Strap and just various people, just
    friends mainly.  But no, it's not open to the public.
TX Beat- Have you got any good road stories from touring with bands 
         like Prong that you'd like to share with our readers?
CL- Oh, there's always good road stories, uh, uhm y'now it's just
    mostly drunken idiocy (laughs).  There was one time where we were
    playin' North Carolina and I'd become pretty good friends with the
    drummer from Prong and he'd invited me to go on the bus with them.
    And so we took off and y'know, rode overnight in the cool tour bus 
    and then, like woke up the next morning there in the French Quarter
    and walked off the bus right straight into a bar and drank a
    Hurricane and just went from there on 'til about four o'clock in 
    the morning...ended up getting kicked out of their hotel because,
    uh, he and the bass player got into a fight because we interrupted
    them while he was with his girl and we were like yanking the covers
    off of them and he got up...
TX Beat- Did anybody have a camera?
CL- No (laughs).  We were too drunk to even think about that kind of
    stuff and then ended up bustin' up some of the furniture.  And then
    we were standin' out on the balcony and the security had already
    come up and told us to tone it down once and they were walkin'
    around outside.  We both decided we had to take a leak, so we just
    kind of pissed off the side of the baclony on these security guys
    (laughing).
TX Beat- Alright...
CL- We were right out (laughs).
TX Beat- I know Michael joined the band in '93 didn't he?
CL- Yeah, well right around '94 actually.
Tx Beat- Are Vaughn and Mike the original guys?
CL- Yeah, it was Vaughn Stevenson, Mike Graff, and Paul Semrad, and
    myself, and another guy named Anthony Headly.
Tx Beat- So the only guy that's changed is Michael Jerome.
CL- Yeah, Michael Jerome is...well after Anthony there was a guy named
    Kyle Thomas (who played with the Reverend Horton Heat and The
    Daylights) he played in Flowerhead for a while.  And he played with
    us for a short time and then we got Michael Jerome.
TX Beat- How does using two drummers work?
CL- Well, it works out fine with me 'n' Jerome (laughs)...
TX Beat- Does one guy take a more melodic approach and the other guy
         take a more rhythmic approach?  Is there any forethought in
         role-playing?
CL- Is one of us the bitch and the other is not (laughing)?
TX Beat- right, is one of you the bitch and the other is the slut?
CL- (Laughs) I think...I don't know if we've really ever talked about
    it y'know what I mean?  I think we just kinda do our own thing. 
    We kinda listen to each other's ideas and we either think that 
    somethin's cool or not.  I mean...
TX Beat- You play different parts though don't you?
CL- We play different parts and we vary it up every night too. Actually
    when we're playin' live it ends up bein' pretty varied so, we know
    the basic structure of the song but we'll tend to like f*ck around
    with each other while we're playin' on stage and sometimes we do it
    just because we're bored, you know what I'm sayin', we've played the
    same thing over and over again so you try to throw something
    different in.  Or sometimes we're doin' it to jack with the other
    person because we both know, y'know.  So Jerome and I will be 
    constantly be sittin' there playing and sometimes I'll do something
    and he'll look over at me like, he's answering me on the back side.
    It's a good communication. 
TX Beat- What's happening in the metroplex as far as music is 
   concerned?  It seems like a lot of bands are getting signed...is it
   a good scene or is it disjointed, or what?
CL- I think Dallas has always had a cool scene just simply because
    every band is so toally different from each other there's really 
    not much competition between the bands. I think when you get into 
    a town like Seattle where everybody has kinda got the similar 
    sound...
TX Beat- What Texas bands currently turn you on?
CL- Oh man, uh...shit I don't know man (laughs). I don't really listen
    to a lot of other bands anymore to be quite honest with ya.  It's 
    not that I don't like music anymore...
TX Beat- You're enjoying the silence?
CL- Yeah, yeah, totally.  I tend to listen to my own personal side of
    the (undiscernable).  I listen to a lot of classical music, I'll 
    listen to Electronica, I'll listen to anything but rock 'n' roll, 
    uh, just because I get more or better inspiration from other
    musical sources sometimes.  And think of things I wouldn't think
    about...if I listen to too much rock I'm afraid that I'll end up 
    just Xeroxing other...
TX Beat- That's what I call pollution...
CL- Yeah yeah, totally (laughs).  Who thought that Days of the New 
    would...I mean god damn it's Alice in Chains man, gimme a break.
TX Beat- Oh, I know.  Well, "Automatic Writing #17" (laughs).
CL- Yeah, well yeah, you're catchin' on (laughing).
TX Beat- Did people get the "cosmic joke" on Initiation do you think?
CL- Oh, I think some people do, I think some people don't, but that's
    just true about anything isn't it?  I mean you can sit there and I
    mean there could be somebody like...this'll piss a lot of people 
    off...see I thought Andrew Dice Clay was funny, but most people 
    don't.  Most people think that he's the most offensive, 
    chauvanistic, piece of crap kind of guy that ever walked the face
    of the planet.  But what I say is if he really believed in that
    stuff, man, he wouldn't be a comedian, he wouldn't be funny, he'd
    be serious.  You didn't see Hitler out there makin' jokes
    (laughing).
TX Beat- Have you ever heard of what satire is?
CL- I mean you have to be able to not like something to make fun of it,
    more or less.  I mean if he really believed that way you would see 
    no humor in it whatsoever.
TX Beat- People don't tend to appreciate cynical humor though.
CL- I don't know why, it's a pretty cynical nation.
TX Beat- Who is the conspiracy buff in the band?
CL- That's pretty much me 'n' Graff really got far off into the
    conspiracy realm.  You ever read a book called "Behold the Pale
    Horse" by Robert Cooper is his name, William Cooper.  Man, that's
    a screwed up book to read.  That book was given to me by Kendall,
    the guitar player that was in Fishbone.  The guy that kinda like 
    went off the deep end and joined with a cult and left.  
    Did you ever hear that whole story?
TXBeat- No.
CL- Kendall was one of the founding members of Fishbone and a couple of
    years ago he split and joined this cult.  That's where he still
    lives and several band members and his girlfriend (who was our A&R  
    agent over at Zoo) tried to get him back from the cult and he ended
    up suing them and they ended up getting charges pressed against 
    them.  And they ended up losing, like, 80 thousand dollars.  He's 
    still in that cult.  I mean, he burned everything that had to do 
    with Fishbone and the white devil pretty much.  But anyway, he had 
    given me that book to check out and he had warned me ahead of time
    that, "this book will drive you crazy". And man, it pretty much 
    did.  I have to say it's a dangerous book.
TXBeat- What was it like working with Jon Fryer as producer on 
        Telepathic Last Words?
CL- He was a pain in the ass.
TXBeat- What was the problem?
CL- Oh, he's English (laughs).

I get put on hold while Chad takes another call.

CL- Sorry about that. Where did we leave...oh, Jon Fryer...
TXBeat- Did you guys produce part of Telepathic...with him or was any
        of that stuff used?
CL- Well, it was produced in conjunction with him and he was in our 
    studio.  Then after he was gone...and then we mixed the album down 
    at San Antonio at Meridian Studios.  I don't know if you know Travi
    Remmert?  That was the record we had done for Zoo and then we ended
    up signing with TVT they wanted to know if we wanted to change some
    things or add stuff.  We were like, yeah we want to add some new 
    songs.  So the additional songs I produced.
TX Beat- Which songs were the additional ones?
CL- Well, I did that little collage at the front that "Radio Teheran"
    with all the little horns and stuff, "Automatic Writing #17,"
    "Coming of the Century," and "Blue Moon."
TX Beat- "Automatic Writing #17," that's my favorite song on there.
CL- Well, thank-you.
TX Beat- How is the band getting along with TVT versus Zoo?
CL- Oh, TVT is a world of difference, it's far better than anything. 
    There was a lot of nice people over at Zoo.  Leah [Horowitz], 
    Tiffany, a guy named Craig, I mean, they were some friends of ours,
    but there were a lot of people that were higher ups that we thought
    were shmucks and just never ever understood our trip.  They would 
    just do some of the stupidest things.  They were just huge dorks.
TX Beat- Is there a story behind "Automatic Writing #17," and if so, 
         what is it?
CL- Oh, I think that one's really self-explanatory man.  "If you light 
    yourself on fire, the world will pay to watch you burn"  Here we 
    were sittin' about writin' a real pop format tune for us in terms
    of its structure and stuff and yeah, its a totally hypocritical
    statement.  It's cynical satire at its best.
TX Beat- How long was it between records?
CL- Too long man, the other record was released in January '94, this
    one was released in January '98.  I mean, that's four years we lost
    in the whole turn around process because we went out and then we
    got back in '95 and we started writin' some songs.  Then they 
    wanted to hear some demos, see if we were ready to go record again.
    Then we convinced 'em to buy the studio and get all the equipment,
    then we had to put that all together.  Then we started recording
    with Jon Fryer and finished that up at the end of '95.  We finished
    mixing the album in '96.
TX Beat- What does the immediate future hold for C.O.E?
CL- They're trying to hook us up on several different tours.  We're 
    just waitin' to see who will let us go. I mean, it's kinda hard for
    us to open for bands 'cause we have so much damn equipment.  
    They'd prefer to take out the three-piece indie rock band from
    North Carolina that can go up there and play through one amp with 
    harmonicas and stuff.  That's preferable to oh, you've got this 
    band that's got two full drum kits that take up 12 feet of space 
    on the stage and all these guitar amps and stuff...
TX Beat- Does Michael Jerome work at Crystal Clear?
CL- Yeah, he works at Crystal Clear in the tape duplication department
    in his off time.
TX Beat- Yeah I know Jim over there.
CL- Jim Cocke?  Yeah I've known Jim for years.  He and I used to be
    supervisors together at Ticketmaster.  Man, we had it sweet man.
    That was back in the days when Ticketmaster wasn't getting attacked
    by Pearl Jam.
TX Beat- That's all the questions I have for now, do you have any 
         closing comments or is there anything you'd like to add?
CL- Alright man, I think that's pretty much cool.  I appreciate you 
    doing the interview with me man.
TX Beat- Hey, no problem and I hope you get to feeling better soon.


Special thanks to Carlene Donovan at TVT for setting up and co-ordinating
this interview.