Dave: vocals, guitar
Scott: bass, backup vocals
Dan: drums

The Parasites are yet another pop punk band from Berkeley, CA. They've been around for as long as I can remember and they've released countless 7 inches and full lengths. Their most recent full length is called Rat Ass Pie and it was released by Go Kart Records. They play more of the 80s influenced type of pop punk centering around girls and love. They do show their love for The Ramones as well by covering It's Alive for Clearview Records. This interview was done with mostly Dave but Scott and Dan were around to add to the interview. It was done at Ground Zero in Spartanburg, South Carolina.

SS: SO WHO'S THE SECOND GUITARIST FOR THIS TOUR?

DAVE: The second guitarist for this tour is Dennis. Not to be confused with Denny which was two tours ago which was a big disaster.
DENNIS: No. I'm not Denny. Do not confuse me with Denny!

SS: HOW'S THE TOURING GOING THIS TIME?

DAVE: It seems that we're actually doing pretty well. We're selling a lot of stuff and getting a decent amount of money for the shows although they are not as big as we expected. It's surprising how much we're getting for them, but it's better than the other way around, I'll say that!

SS: ANY MESSED UP SHOWS LIKE THE DENTON (TX) SHOW ON YOUR LAST TOUR?

DAVE: You know what happened in Denton this time? We got to the show two hours late. It was all screwed up, the directions were wrong, so I called up the guy who did the show and he said, "Oh okay, I just got home from work, I'll be right down to the club," which was odd because why wasn't he there already since we were two hours late. We get down there and what had happened was he booked the show for 29th instead of the 9th. So he showed up, gave us some records and some money for not having a show and that was our Denton show.
SCOTT: And ironically, we got paid more that night than we had any night previously in Denton.
DAVE: Absolutely, that was our best Denton show ever.

SS: DENTON JUST ISN'T YOUR TOWN. WAS THAT THE ONLY MESSED UP SHOW YOU HAD?

DAVE: Well in Tucson we showed up but no one else did, including the people who were supposed to open up the doors. I don't know, that was weird. But that was no big deal. It's actually been pretty good and we got all the way through the Southwest and South relatively unscathed, which is always the tough part of it. From now on, we're sort of home free, I hope.

SS: TELL EVERYONE ABOUT THE NEW ALBUM.

DAVE: Oh, the new album is new to all of you but not new to all of us. The label that we were going to put it out on ripped us off pretty badly, so we decided not to give them a new album. At that point we got signed to Lookout! but then we had to legally get out of the other contract, that was Lookout's thing and that's fine. So we did and they sat on the album for a year and then told us they weren't going to put it out. So then we had to go through a hold bunch of other labels and everyone had full schedules and so we went through 10 more labels and we found the one that we're on now, which is Go-Kart.
SCOTT: Who are treating us very nicely.
DAN: It's run by a cat you know.
DAVE: Murray the Go-Kat runs the whole thing. And funny enough, as soon as the guy who works under Murray said to somebody in his record store, "We just signed The Parasites," Murray threw up in the office for the first time ever.
SCOTT: So when the cat vommits, it's good news.

SS: IS THAT SONG "COLUMBIA" ON YOUR NEW ALBUM ABOUT COLUMBIA, SC?

DAVE: Yes and that's all I'm going to say.
SCOTT: You have to draw your own conclusions.
DAVE: It has to do with something that happened in Columbia with someone not from Columbia. But yeah, it's spelled that way so I figured yo might know that.
SCOTT: It's not about Colombia the country.

SS: WELL COLUMBIA IS PRETTY MUCH A HARDCORE TOWN NOW. WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT THE WHOLE HARDCORE/STRAIGHT EDGE CRAZE?

DAVE: Um, I don't like it, how's that?! (laughs).
SCOTT: It's fine for some folks.
DAVE: I'd probably rather listen to it than a whole night of ska bands, but that's about all.

SS: IS "DON'T DO THAT" OFF OF YOUR NEW ALBUM AN UNRELEASED SWEET BABY SONG BECAUSE I'VE NEVER HEARD THE ORIGINAL?

DAVE: They made a demo for it for their second album on Slash. It was that and I have like five other songs. They were starting to get some stuff together for their second album and then they never did it but I had a tape of it and Dallas Denery said we could do it.

SS: SO ARE YOU FRIENDS WITH DALLAS DENERY?

DAVE: Yeah, he's the one that got us signed on the label that did our first three albums. They played in New Jersey and I gave him a tape. He came home with a whole stack of tapes and he only liked one of them, which happened to be ours. He gave it to somebody and that's how we got signed in the first place. He always said that he would probably never do anything else for me his entire life but he did one thing and it was a good thing, so it was best to leave it alone after that.

SS: ARE YOU GUYS ALSO FRIENDS WITH THE BEATNIK TERMITES?

DAVE: Yes. We're actually playing with them when we get home. We just found out yesterday. We played with them three years ago?
SCOTT: I don't think I have actually played with them.
DAVE: They don't play very much. But they're finally doing a tour or sorts, I don't know how long it is but we're playing with them when we get home.

SS: YOU GUYS THANKED SOUTH OF THE BORDER ON YOUR NEW ALBUM. WAS THERE AN INTERESTING SOUTH OF THE BORDER STORY BEHIND THAT?

SCOTT: South of the Border is the greatest place on Earth!
DAVE: Everything in South of the Border is great. Where else can you get Herb Albert music coming out of plastic cactuses while you're in a disgusting scummy pool? We're going there in a few days. We're driving after a show real late so we can go there.

SS: SO YOU GUYS SET A DAY ASIDE JUST FOR SOUTH OF THE BORDER?

DAVE: Not this time. We usually do. We just hope that a show cancels the day before or the day after but it didn't happen this time.

SS: WHAT ARE YOUR FUTURE PLANS AFTER YOU FINISH THIS TOUR?

DAVE: Three more tours this year is what we'd like to do.
SCOTT: I'd like to marry money.
DAVE: What we're trying to do is get done with this and then go back to Japan, to Australia for the first time, back to Hawaii, then home, and then back to Europe, and then come back around the US again with some bigger bands, so that all the shows are huge. And we're going to try to put out 5 or 6 more CDs in the next two years.

SS: ARE YOU GUYS EXCITED ABOUT GOING BACK TO HAWAII?

DAVE: It was good last time.
SCOTT: The show itself wasn't so hot but Hawaii's a great place.
DAVE: We made the mistake of not renting scooters for the whole trip and not zipping around the island, which is what we're going to do this time for a couple of days at least.
SCOTT: Walking from downtown to the top of Diamond Head is quite a workout.
DAVE: And back. That night after we had gotten back I walked all the way back down to Waikiki again for hours and then came back and went the wrong way and went to the edge of the island and then turned around and walked back. I was gone for about 6 hours. My feet were like falling off. I stopped on every block and sat on a bench. It was awful. But I got a good tiki mask which is what was important.
SCOTT: And we saw Don Ho.
DAVE: Don Ho dedicated a song to us at his show. He called us the Brady Bunch from Berkeley.

SS: WHAT DO YOU GUYS THINK OF SPINAL TAP?

SCOTT: Spinal Tap is a work of genius.
DAVE: And that's why both of my new guitars look like the one that that guy uses.
DAN: We're trying to talk Todd at Clearview into doing a series of Spinal Tap cover albums. We'd get to do Break Like The Wind.

SS: ARE YOU GOING TO SPONTANEOUSLY COMBUST LIKE THE SPINAL TAP DRUMMERS?

DAN: Maybe later, after we go to the Waffle House.
DAVE: He's just going to break wind, that's all.

THE END