UGLY KID JOE
ROAD REPORT - WHITFIELD CRANE CALLS HOME
(by Gerri Miller, Metal Edge - August 1995 - pp. 100-103)
© all rights reserved

On tour since May in support of their latest release Menace to Sobriety, Ugly Kid Joe segued from a European stadium swing with Bon Jovi and Van Halen to a headlining road trip through the states. Kicking back in a Florida hotel room with a documentary about albino tigers playing on the TV, vocalist Whitfield Crane called to fill me in on the tour and more.

G: Day off today?
W: Nope. We play six nights a week. When we were touring Europe, the tour was so huge we were only doing four nights maximum a week. I'd rather play five or six.

G: Tell me about that European tour.
W: It was an amazing experience. Europe's always a total pleasure to play, it's all general admission so it's pretty, chaotic. The first show was some Olympic stadium in Germany. It was neat, I grew up on Montrose and Van Halen. Those dudes were cool. It's always neat to meet people and find out that they're really cool. Alex is the ultimate. We went everywhere. Italy was great. Latin cultures to me are always the most intense, a different kind of energy. It was a long tour but all the shows were 40,000 to 80,000 people a night and to me that's like "Great! Gimme the microphone!" We played Wembley Stadium a couple nights. Remember the Freddie Mercury AIDS tribute? Same vibe. It was packed. My friend works for Bikini magazine and asked if I wanted to interview Ozzy. His kids Jack and Kelly came to the show at Wembley. I asked Jack if he wanted to come on stage and sing with us, and when we did "N.l.B." by Black Sabbath, I introduced him as "Jack Osbourne, son of one of my favorite men of all time, Ozzy Osbourne." Jack walks out, fearless, with a Ninja Turtles hat on his head and takes the mic and says, "Go crazy!" After that we all went to Ozzy's house and rode dirtbikes with him. He's got 30 acres, they bought this old house. Heard the album, it's totally 'cool.

G: Were there any mishaps or Spinal Tap type experiences?
W: Yeah, many goofy things, you can imagine. The stage was made of a material like slip 'n' slide, you could catch like 45' air.

G: Isn't that dangerous, with all the equipment and wires around?
W: It probably is a little dangerous.

G: Did you get hurt?
W: No.

G: Any other memories to share?
W: We did a couple of one-off club shows in between and we played a place called Rock City in Nottingham, England. Glenn Tipton came down and jammed and did three Priest songs with us. "Grinder," "Rapid Fire," and "Manilishi." Before that I had jammed with him on his solo [album] and he was sifting there playing this white strat guitar. I said, "Dude, I can name any Priest song in two notes," and he goes, "Sure you can."

G: You're playing Name That Tune with Glenn Tipton?
W: I got every song in two notes, I knew every one. Tripped him out. Any avid Priest fan knows that the guitar Glenn used to jam on was an SG. I had asked him, "What's up with the SG from Sad Wings of Destiny?" So at the show in Nottingham afterwards, he goes "Here," and gives me the actual guitar he used to track "Victim of Changes" and other stuff on Sad Wings. Klaus [Eichstadt] told me not to bring an SG on the road 'cause the neck would snap so it's at my manager's house. I don't live anywhere so I don't have anyplace to put it. My car, the blue lemon-a '66 Pontiac Tempest convertible with an outrageous CD player- is at my manager's house as well. I really don't have that many physical amenities. I have a green velvet couch that I bought in Santa Barbara and I wrapped it up and put it in Dave's kitchen, on its side. All I really have is the car and the couch. I'm not really a material man. I kind of like not having an anchor.

G: So where did you go in your time off between the tours?
W: We had about a week and a half so me and my friend Will, he plays in the Sweet and Low Orchestra, we drove to Big Sur, kind of aimless, we didn't know where we were going. We ended up in Monterey, this beach with all these babies running around.

G: Now you're back on the road, headlining. How's it going?
W: We're out with Souls at Zero. Shannon [Larkin, drummer] was with Souls for years and it was very important for me personally to take them out with us in the States. It's amazing, good vibe, all the crews are good. Everyone's helpful to each other. Shannon's dyeing his hair now, he looks like Frosty the Snowman. Shannon is the raddest dude ever. He's my hero. The Souls guys come out at the end of the night and Shannon gets to jam with his old band. It's a very positive vibe. We surround ourselves with great people. This tour goes for nine weeks.

G: And then?
W: We're gonna go to Canada, with a band called Varga. We hope to go to Australia, we want to go to Latin America. We've been lucky in a million ways and one of them is that we've been able to break worldwide. There are a lot of places we haven't gone. I'd like to go to Africa. Argentina. I'm convinced that's where my ultimate future woman is. I just feel it.

G: How much of Menace are you playing?
W: Everything but "Cloudy Skies" and "The Candle Song" No ballads. We're not playing "Everything About You," unless we pick some dude out of the audience to sing it.

G: Can you get away with not playing the song that made you famous?
W: Yeah, we can. I feel like standing with the new stuff. If we play a show and the crowd's just incredible, intense, we'll play everything, but if they're just sitting there, not feeling the emotion and the intensity, we won't.

G: How do you feel when you're on stage?
W: It's a void, it's such a hard thing to express verbally, it's so emotional.

G: What about after the show?
W: It's weird, it takes me a little while to get to where... I need a little space, I kick back. Take half an hour to zone out. It's a strange reality I live.

G: How do you travel, plane or bus?
W: Bus. The air conditioning doesn't work. We're in Florida, where you can cut the air with a butter knife. We're hoping they fix it. First we had a crazy bus driver and a bus straight out of Elvis. Then we got a new bus but the air conditioning doesn't work. It cripples your vibe.

G: Do you sleep on the bus or get hotels?
W: We get day rooms, we shower and watch television. This one has a Nintendo machine. We have a show almost every night.

G: Don't you need a breather to rest your voice? Does touring take a toll?
W: Not really. Singing is a strange reality. Some days you work out, you're healthy, you're eating right. I do try to eat as healthy as I can. Some days I'm possessed, I turn into health boy. Some days I'm not.

G: Are you doing any writing while on tour?
W: Yeah, we got ADATs out here and a bunch of crazy shit I don't know how to work. We got a cool song called "Bicycle Wheels."

G: How do you feel about MTV eliminating Heedbanger's Ball and otherwise not playing much rock?
W: Isn't that sad? It's almost sacrilegious. But MTV was an amazing catalyst for us. I have nothing to complain about on that.

G: Now it's back to the grassroots approach of constant touring.
W: I think that's ultimately the best way. think the trick is outlasting it. If we can keep on making albums, we'll last.

G: Anything else to say to your fans?
W: Life is to be lived on the positive trip, never lose the ground, never gonna slip. You're never gonna slip if you never lose the ground; always draw the line, never wear the frown.

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