Kinda like the waaaay old days with Deep Wound, Mr. J Mascis returns to the drum kit with his new band Witch, a loud reminiscence of 70’s metal (Budgie) and psyched out doom (Sabbath). Their 2008 release ‘Paralyzed’ tosses a bit of fuzzed proto-punk in with strange hints of something seemingly indie. Mascis' longtime friend (and fellow Canadian) Dave Sweetapple joins with bass and Feathers members Antoine Guerlain and Kyle Thomas.
Thomas told me that this record has faster material than previous due to Mascis’ hard hitting and hardcore influence constantly speeding everything up (“even on the slow jams”).
On a side note, Mascis is rumored to be an enormously difficult interview, very untalkative and rude, bored to a laconic point. [hint: read his parts in a nasally, dry, sarcastic tone]…and because I wasn’t entirely sure what to expect going into the thing, I ate a handful of mushrooms a few hours before I went to meet up with the band at Berlin's Knaack Club.
There was a lot of laughter.
I wonder if they knew….
Dave: Ok, enough about us…What are you doing here?
[This marks the first time that a band has ever prodded me with questions in an interview]
Jesua: That’s a good question, although there isn’t really an answer…
Kyle: Should we sit in a different position?
Jesua: No. I’d prefer things pretty informal, that’s why I wanted to go for a walk…I mean, I’ve heard [pointing at Mascis] that you hate talking, so I just thought we’d keep this as low end as possible…
[Explosions of laughter from everyone except Mascis]
J. Mascis: I’ve heard you were boring and difficult [in a light nasally British accent].
Dave: …a difficult asshole.
[more laughter this time from everyone, much more jovial]
Jesua: So, do you guys think that the world is actually going to end in 2012? [xoLaura]
Mascis: 2012 Mayan Prophecy I see fire…[singing in a metal voice, accompanying hand in the devil horns]
Kyle: I think it’s all just gonna start over…
Dave: Wait, I didn’t here about this…I thought it was all for like 2000 when everything would change…
Kyle: No man, 2012 is all about the Mayan calendar…
Jesua: Would you rather be able to fly or read minds?
Mascis: I’d rather fly.
Kyle: I’d get really depressed reading minds…
Dave: Board ze green bus to Berlin…[more laughing, this time leading into coughing] Does anyone have an inhaler I can buy? Do you have any asthmatic friends?
Jesua: I could ask…you really need one?
Dave: UDerol.
Kyle: Yeah he needs it bad, he can’t breathe.
Dave: I bought the wrong one….
Jesua: You never know what you can find with a few phone calls…
Are you guys friends with any Masons or Scientologists?
Dave: He’s a mason [pointing at Antoine].
Jesua: Really?!
Antoine: Yeah…a stone mason.
Mascis: I know some Scientologists.
Jesua: Do you feel they have any insights for your life?
Mascis: Not really…I find it…[trails off]
Jesua: I heard L. Ron Hubbard is an understudy of Aleister Crowley, did you guys ever hear that?
No’s go all around
Dave: Is L Ron Hubbard still alive?
I don’t know’s go all around.
Jesua: Did you ever hear about his recordings? He apparently got banned from every country in the world, so he got this yacht and sailed all around and recorded music and there are records pressed of it….
Whoa’s go all around.
Kyle: Is it lounge music? I bet it’s lounge music.
Jesua: How do you get banned from every country in the world?
Mascis: Well, the Germans certainly don’t like him. Scientology was banned in Germany.
Antoine: I know some people who are in a branch off of it…but I think Scientologists are encouraged to join other groups and influence them…that’s part of being one, you have to spread into other groups covertly.
Kyle: If you go to LA there’s that really creepy L. Ron Hubbard street…
Jesua: Yeah, L. Ron Hubbard Boulevard.
Kyle: There’s a very mysterious Mason house in the center of my town…nobody knows anything about it though.
Jesua: If you could play anywhere known to man where would that be?
Dave: The Commodore Ballroom. [in Vancouver]
[high pitch giggling]
Jesua: Hey, they put tires and horsehair under the floor so it bounces. It’s great for dancehall shows…I guess maybe you guys should play there.
Dave: People love to dance to Joey Shithead…
Mascis: Richards on Richards
Dave: Hookers on Davie…
[This is the "what we know about Vancouver" part where they also make fun of me]
Jesua: J who’s you worst enemy?
Dave: Lou Barlow.
[explosion of insane laughter all around, cackling even from me]
Dave: Dude, you just fired that shit outta nowhere, what’s that about?
Jesua: I’m just going for it…
Mascis: I’ll have to get back to you on that one…
Jesua: Who are your favorite hero’s of fiction?
Mascis: Pete Cougar [in the meekest, nasal voice I’ve ever heard].
Jesua: Who’s that?
[Mascis looks at me like “Who’s Who?” and shrugs…]
[silence…pondering]
Dave: …a hero in his fiction…[barely getting it out before bursting into raspy hysterics]
Jesua: Pete Cougar?! [I repeat joining in the howling]
At this point everyone goes barking mad, Dave and Kyle actually fall onto their backs, scream-laughing and I’m worried my spot will be blown because I’m laughing so hard it’s hurting…
Antoine: …a hero in his own fiction [Baaa hhahaha hahhaaa]
Mascis: Can you think of a better one? What?
The laughter goes on for about 130 seconds non stop on my recorder.
Pete Cougar
Jesua: Ok, known to other people then…actual people….
Mascis: Well, specify…
Kyle: I read a lot of Richard Brautigan when I was young….
At this point things get even weirder and Mascis’ apparent brother-in-law joins us with friends using a TomTom GPS system to locate us at the Lenin monument 5 blocks away from the Club.
Jesua: Who are your heroines of non-fiction?
Dave: Leni Riefenstahl. She was a photographer from Berlin, she did a lot of photography for the 3rd Reich, and then she started doing a lot of nature and under water photography…
Kyle: I was listening to a lot of Alice Coltrane…like everything she’s done...
Mascis: What about Emily Dickenson? I live right down the road from her house…
[more laughter]
Kyle: Lindsay Mackaw…
Antoine: Ruth Garbis.
Kyle: Yeah, of course!
Now Dave and J pick up my recorder and start making animal sounds into it whilst giggling like schoolgirls so that I can’t hear a goddamm thing that Kyle is telling me about Ruth Garbis other than the keywords “best friend” and “totally perverted”.
Jesua: Where can I find her stuff?
Kyle: We’re recording her album right now, so she doesn’t have anything yet, but…
Jesua: Hey J did you ever see the Bad Brains live?
Mascis: Yes I have.
Jesua: Tell me about it, where was it?
Mascis: A place called Mavericks in Boston, they showed up really late and it was all hardcore…no reggae…and it was like 20 minutes long… it was awesome. Then I saw ‘em again later in Amherst after the SST record and it wasn’t as good, but it was alright…backflips both times. That’s definitely one of the best shows I have ever seen…one that was 20 minutes long. Sick.
[Dave giggles like maniac in the background and I’m beginning to think he’s taken the mushrooms]
Mascis: The first one was the famous show where skinheads threw snowballs at Ric Ocasek when he came to see the band.
Dave: [busts into weez laughing like a maniac now…then gets a hold of himself finally] Jesua, did you ever see the Bad Brains?
Jesua: Naw. Unfortunately it was ahead of my time….
Kyle: Just the Bad Brians…[referring to the Bad Brains cover band]
Mascis: Where were you in 1982?
Jesua: I was 2 years old…so probably at the Parkland Mall looking at the Tigers with my Uncle Mike…
Mascis: You coulda gone!!
Jesua: I wish someone woulda taken me.
Dave: My Dad took me to Alice Cooper when I was 6.
Jesua: What was your first show?
Mascis: Mick Ronson and Ian Hunter opening for J. Geils…
Dave: You dick! You saw that?!
Kyle: Mine was Corrosion of Conformity.
Antoine: I think my parents went and saw 999 when my Mom was pregnant with me.
Dave: The Brains couldn’t get into Canada, so I had to go to Buffalo to see them. I still think of that as the best show I’ve ever seen.
Antoine: My parents took me to see the Crash Test Dummies when I was young. The singer said he had 3 balls and that’s why he sang so low.
Mascis: My gym teacher had one ball. It got shot off in the war.
Dave: Is that the guy with no legs?
Mascis: No, it’s the guy with one ball.
[laughter explosion #37]
Jesua: [Getting a hold of myself again] Ok, Ok…I have one last question. Everyone ready? What are your earliest music memories?
Mascis: I remember bangin’ on pots and pans…setting ‘em up…
Dave: My Aunt and Uncle were babysitting me, and they had this blue Mustang…and I was 2 or 3 and I remember laying in the backseat and this fucking song was going on and on and on, I was thinking ‘what the fuck is this?!’ And at that point I developed this hatred for what was playing on the radio and I came to find out later that it was “Hey Jude” and since then I’ve hated the Beatles…
Jesua: I’m not a Beatles fan either.
Mascis [giving me a round of applause] Alright!
Kyle: That’s my favorite band.
Dave: You like the Stones?
Jesua: I love the Stones…
[another round of applause, this time with cheering] I am amongst children here!
Kyle: I used to sing and record ‘Somewhere Out There’ from that movie ‘An American Tail’. [starts singing it to Dave, hands together serenade style]
“Sommmmewherrrre out therrrre, beneath the pale bluuue skyyyyyyyy….”
Jesua: I think it’s ‘beneath the paaaale moonliiiiiiiiight’.
Kyle: Whatever.
Thank you for a lovely evening Witch. I am so glad you guys were completely rad.
