Many thanks to Latoya for transcribing this. This 1 hour interview conducted with Gavin in California by Steve Warden was broadcast on Toronto radio station Q107 about a week before Razorblade Suitcase was released. Steve Warden: Gavin, congratulations on the new album. Gavin Rossdale: Thank you. Congratulations when we're done with it. SW: You made it. GR: Yeah, I did it. I did make it...just, skin of my teeth. SW: Really? GR: I sometimes wonder how I managed to write those songs and have...yeah, I'm happy...thank you. SW: What do you mean?...in terms of how crazy everything's been for the last while, just getting it done in that sense? GR: It's having no time, I mean originally we were going to have...I was going to get 2 1/2 months to write...and a 5 week tour turned into a 3 1/2 month tour, so it makes it a little bit tricky with writing...But I've done it, here they all are. SW: And it was supposed to come out next year originally, wasn't it? In the spring and it's been pushed up. Why did that happen? GR: Well, we had the time tight- Steve Albini (SA) who wanted it 3 weeks and we came out, played it and that was the problem really...everyone thought it would be early next year and have time to do stuff and just kick back and instead it's been like crazy, crazy, crazy. SW: Well, what effect did that have on the record, do you think? GR: Probably helped it..instead of having that 2 1/2 months off, I would have had more time to rest as opposed to really shagged, beaten, but like anything, it's the way it's meant to be. I don't sit here and think oh my god, I wish I had more time to craft this and that...I don't see this as the last record I'll ever make so therefore it's just the second record I'll make. SW: Tell me a little about writing lyrics. How do you do that? What triggers them? GR: I try to dial-in where I can. I try to keep aware of what's going on and...I don't know really...again, it's like that whole thing, I sort of don't have much of an idea of it really. I just kind of get through it...sometimes I really enjoy it, sometimes it's easy and sometimes it's a pain and they don't come. It's kind of a love-hate thing. SW: Do you have to work at them or do you wait for them to come? GR: It just depends song to song, certain songs. I mean, most of the songs I will have 2/3 of it completely done, like of pattern and that last 1/3 which is often the hardest one is then to finish it but as I say, I really like to vary it so that there is as much dynamic as possible. If you change your approach, you should by definition, change the end, the end result.. it's just pushing it. SW: What do you get out of it? GR: I feel justified...in my kind of Calvinist sense. I feel that I've achieved something. I feel I do stuff, that's how I've always described myself, as being a songwriter, so that's what I do. When I write a song, I'm really happy, like unbearably happy, because I feel like I've got loads of credit and I can go and take a mental holiday. SW: Can you give me an example from the new album that made you feel incredibly happy or proud? When it came together? GR: Insect Kin...another thought process thing...a mini-philosophy dealing with the...a few..I termed it as wasps and people who just are just out to sting and just out for...just for no other benefit to just kind of...derogatory and vitriolic..putting people, me, or the band down, it's just a little of that. SW: Was it true that people tried to dissuade you from using SA? Gr: yeah, I think even my milkman told me not to use SA. I went to buy a paper the other morning and the guy said to me...I really respect what you're doing but I can't believe you would bother making a record with SA, you can't even hear the vocals... You just have to follow your heart. I wanted to do my first record with SA. I've always wanted to do a record with SA. I mean I never thought I would get the chance to. I've just always liked him. So, I was just really happy that that happened and I feel...that it was the right decision, that he was great with the band. He worked really good with us. He really helped me, helped the band and he was brilliant. People have their preconceptions of him, but it's like a Sex Pistols gig...very few people went or very people knew about SA. People assume they know about him and think he's going to walk in like an indi-terrorist and just kill everyone but he's a very gracious punk. SW: What did you want him to do, and what did he actually do once you got together? GR: I wanted him in the same way that he'd done up the Breeders with Pod. I wanted him to mike the band...in the most revealing way. I wanted it to be as though, you know obviously when you record a bit of music or you sing, there's a journey..you sing down the wire, though the desk, onto the tape and then you mix it onto another tape and you come out and it's sort of these impressions. He's the one to me that seems to create the most interesting textures and rock sounds. He's just very true. Anyone from Palace to Smog to Shellac to PJ Harvey to Breeders to Pod to Engine Kid...I mean, Jesus Lizard, it goes on and on. They're all...what's particular about them apart from (?) the clunky drum sounds is just that you do hear the bands as the bands want to be. I mean, obviously he's never going to make us sound like Jesus Lizard, much as I would like, we're never going to sound like Jesus Lizard, so to use SA and turn into Jesus Lizard was never going to happen. The whole point about Steve, is that he can't construct a record for you. I did like 3 over dubs in like 20 songs and you just play really in that time...and that's his gig. SW: The song "Swallowed", has it changed? Were there a couple different versions of it or have you been refining it through the recording process? GR: No, this is the only version of it. There were kind of mixes, why? Did you have to cover different mixes of it? SW: No, I just heard that there were. I was just wondering if it changed substantially or not? GR: Yeah, we turned my guitar up (laughs). We did a version of it, came away from the studio having mixed 17 tracks and just decided that a few of them needed a re-visit. And that was one that had a re-visit. We're very honest on the sleeve notes and you'll see we've re-visited 5 songs out of 13 and I know that's not necessarily how Steve likes to work but that's just what it is...how Steve doesn't like to work. SW: Was Swallowed an automatic choice to be the first single? GR: It was the one that struck as the easiest link between the 2 records..the bridge...the easiest going bridge. I didn't want to come out with the biggest rock song or I didn't want to come out with a ballad. So I hit mid-tempo because it had sort of an element of low key and it just works on you in a subtle way and should come around back and just kind of grab you like that, as opposed to whacking you over the head. SW: I like the song "Mouth" alot. It's kind of a wierd song. Can you tell me a little bit about putting it together? GR: It's just from being with someone or around people that...whose mouth and sounds take on extraordinary power and can fuel intense loneliness or hatred or confusion or a desire for space, by the very few things or just something someone does. They are often people you love more that anyone and it's actually a self-hate thing because you're just trying to find stuff that bugs you and the easy way to being angry about something. And it's just that balance of either you know that people are at fault or else you know you're in between and you realize no one's perfect anyway and you just try and deal with it. And get on with it. And man, nothing hurts like your mouth. I like that line. SW: The musical style of the song or some of the sounds are unusual. Did it come out fully formed like that? GR: Yeah, what tends to happen is that the basis of the song which would be my part and the rhythm and ostensibly a little bit of the drums but obviously Robin changes it and builds it to what he wants and then Nigel just plays whatever he wants, so he was kind of crazy. I think he sounds like a fly on that song ot something, doesn't he? That song and "Communicator", he sounds like a fly. SW: (on the whole poster-boy thing) GR: When you listen to these 2 records...I've written every single song on there, I've played on them, there's so much integrity of work, irrespective of whatever success it may have, there's too, there's way too much...anyone can hear that, they may not like it, but they couldn't say it was a bad rock band. So, if people still chose to say "oh despite these 30 odd songs and these 2,3,4 years of touring and stuff and maybe having a few opinions here and there on interviews, I still think that that's just because of that guy or the way he looks or something..." It doesn't make any sense, it's just makes the person who says it an idiot and as far as the whole thing with my looks...I mean I've always looked the same way and it didn't particularly help me before so it's not as if that magic ingredient of my ugly face is the spark. It's just part of it. I'm not ignorant, I have a brain. So it's not..oh no, it's not any of it. Of course, it's part of it that people like the way we look. But obviously, I'm much happier when someone comes up to me and says...you know that song really changed my life. It's really interesting vs. gee, you have really nice hair. Obviously I'm not going to have much of an audience or speak to someone who says that because it's reasonably insulting and it does undermine the music. But I'm not going to sit here and whine and be like...oh god, honestly this song is good please listen to it. Shut your eyes or something...there's enough there...if there wasn't people would never like us... SW: Are you enjoying all this? I don't mean this interview. GR: Yes, I am. I love to...for me to make a record with SA, having grown up listening to the Pixies was just...nothing could make me happier...there was no one else in the world that I wanted to work with. So go figure. That's brilliant. Yeah, And I'm really bummed out about playing to sold out crowds that knows all my songs and are really into the band...so again...I'm really lucky and can't sit here and be like moaning and groaning. SW: Well, Congtaulations and nice job Gavin. GR: Thank you very much. promo bit: this was aired a few days earlier to promote this actual 1 hour thing. SW: How did the other guys in the band feel about the songs when you brought them in? And can you talk a bit about how the songs change or evolve once those guys come into the process? GR: We're English right, so they didn't really say that much. It's the strangest thing, I'm sort of half English, half Scottish, mostly Alien, so therefore I have an ability to just...I wouldn't...I'd be more sensitive to someone coming in and writing these songs...but, they just sort of get on with it. They just play them. It's strange, you'd have to ask them. SW: Did you write every song on the record? GR: Yeah SW: There was not collabaration or nothing like that? GR: Correct..I hate collaborations...I hate collaborations. SW: Why? Gr: Because I was too dependent on them in the past and I just never wanted to be dependent upon anyone. I like the idea of being self-sufficient. I mean, everything could collapse tomorrow and I'd still have my songs and my ability to write songs and therefore it's just a means of survival, I think, think if I'm helped(?) writing songs or even suddenly I wrote a good record...after that...oh no, I'll always need that person, a person, a figure to confirm I can write songs. But I don't, I just need to push myself. SW: Was the success of 16 Stone any kind of important validation of you as a writer? GR: No, not at all. If anything, despite the fact that it was so successful. There was critical curses..(?)...that wasn't too great, so no, I've never felt that. But I'm happy to have not had that, I don't want to be seduced by anyone. You know, I think it's just good to make the record, do the shows and not really pay much attention to what is written or what is said because it changes and it's relative to people's agenda. The day they get up, they have to write something about us and suddenly I have to suffer the fact that someone ran over their cat and their lover just left them. SW: But as a songwriter, did you think you had figured some stuff out because so many of those songs worked? GR: No, not really, just did my usual kind of...crawling though the mire of songwriting. You know, just get on with it. That's the only way I know how to do it. I can't ever really articulate it, I just know. What I begin each song, what I have to do, what the assignment I give myself, how I want it to be and just go for it. Trying to get it as true as I wanted it to be or how I find it as I go along. ~END~ Screaming Daisies border by "Ace of Space" backgrounds.