THE WAIT IS OVER!!! STEEL PANTHER CROWN EIGHT FINGERED (AND DOUBLE THUMBED) FREAKAZOID SPYDER AS THEIR NEW FULL-TIME BASSIST

Band Announces Claus & Paws Holiday Party US Tour Dates
Adding to Previously Announced Canadian Res-Erections Run This Fall
https://steelpantherrocks.com/pages/tour

Steel Panther L to R: Stix Zadinia (Drums), Spyder (Bass), Michael Starr (Vocals), Satchel (Guitars) Photo Credit: David Jackson

Just as England recently announced a new King, California rock legends Steel Panther have crowned Spyder as the new R.O.L.E…Ruler Of Low End.

The story of Spyder and Steel Panther is like one pulled from any great American love story. If you have seen The Notebook or Jaws, then you know exactly what we mean. Spyder and the guys have known each other for decades. But it was in 2018 that Spyder did his first live show with the band. Little did they know that those shows would be a foreshadowing of what destiny had in store for their collective futures. In 2021, the band found themselves in a pickle, they needed a bass player. An exhaustive search brought many submissions and fans were treated to a variety of bassists on different tours.

The band had even considered a few well-known bassists to fill the void. Throughout the five-week European tour in summer of 2022, it became quite evident to all four guys that this lineup was unstoppable. A few more months of touring together perfected the new lineup and now anyone that has seen the band recently knows that Spyder is the perfect addition for Steel Panther. In other words, Spyder is the chocolate to Steel Panther’s peanut butter.

“We wanted it to be you. We wanted it to be you so badly. So, it’s not gonna be easy. It’s gonna be really hard. We’re gonna have to work at this every day, but we want to do that because we want you. We want all of you, forever, you and us, every day. To us, you are perfect. You had us at hello. You complete us. We’re gonna need a bigger boat,” explains Steel Panther.

To coincide with the new bassist announcement, the newly whole Steel Panther are announcing a new US tour, Claus & Paws Holiday Party. The eight-city tour will kick off In late November after the band wraps up their recently announced Canadian leg of the Res-Erections tour 2022. The holiday shows will be sure to bring out the ho-ho-hoes to Michigan, Ohio, Indiana, New York and Connecticut. More information on tickets and purchase links for all shows can be found at: https://steelpantherrocks.com/pages/tour.

Res-Erections 2022 Fall Tour Dates

10/28 – Calgary, AB – Grey Eagle Casino
10/29 – Enoch, AB – River Cree Casino
10/30 – Grand Prairie, AB – The Bowes At Bonnetts Energy Centre
11/1 – Saskatoon, SK – The Coors Event Centre
11/3 – Regina, SK – Casino Regina Show Lounge
11/4 – Winnipeg, MB – Burton Cummings Theatre
11/5 – Minot, ND – The Original Bar & Grill *
11/7 – Green Bay, WI – Epic Event Center
11/9 – London, ON – London Music Hall
11/10 – Toronto, ON – History
11/11 – Ottawa, ON – Algonquin Commons Theatre
11/12 – Montreal, QC – Corona Theatre

* Steel Panther Only/No Black Stone Cherry

A Claus & Paws Holiday Party Tour Dates

11/26 – Sault St. Marie – Kewadin Casino
11/27 – Grand Rapids, MI – 20 Monroe Live
11/29 – Warren, OH – Packard Music Hall
11/30 – Ft. Wayne, IN – Piere’s Entertainment Center
12/2 – Waterloo, NY – Del Lago Casino *
12/3 – Poughkeepsie, NY – The Chance Theater
12/4 – New Haven, CT – Toad’s Place
12/29 – Vancouver, BC – Commodore Ballroom
12/30 – Vancouver, BC – Commodore Ballroom

* On Sale Soon

Steel Panther has been hard at work at new material that will be released throughout 2022.

More information for all things Steel Panther can be found at www.steelpantherrocks.com.

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Damn Your Eyes Bassist Oddie McLaughlin Discusses the Bands New Album “Kill The Outside”

New York based heavy metal group Damn Your Eyes have just released a brand new 10 track album titled “Kill The Outside”. The band which consists of former We Are The Enemy and Bonesmith members along with current Black Water Rising bassist Oddie McLaughlin have come together to forge a new musical path which draws deeply from the each of the members own personal experiences. Media Mikes had the chance to speak with Oddie recently about the creation of the new album, its deep personal meaning and what it like balancing duties between two bands.

Adam Lawton: Can you tell us about some of the work that went in to the new album “Kill The Outside”?

Oddie McLaughlin: Artie (Alexander) and I have played together off and on since we were first out of high school. We were always writing or learning different material. We recorded I think five songs with this drummer about fifteen years ago and then went our separate ways. Two of those songs from that period we kept. Basically it was just the riffs as there was no melody or vocal lines. That’s really where everything started. I got a call on day asking if I would be interested in starting something new and I said yes so shortly after we started writing songs for this release. When I got together with Artie after talking he already had few songs laid out including the two riffs we originally worked on. He had added some new ideas and things just started rolling. The writing for this album has been amazing and things have come together fairly easy. The songs all fell together nicely. Once we got our singer Kenny (Vincent Jr.) things moved even quicker. It’s just been a great process.

AL: The songs all seem very personal. Were the lyrics pulled from members past experiences?

OM: Oh yeah. Most of it is from Artie and some of it is from the other guys. They pulled from their experiences in the music business to how the world is going today. We expressed our emotions related to some of those events along with a bunch of other things. It’s definitely a record that deals with what is going on around us and personally.

AL: Do you ever find it hard to dig in to some of those emotions?

OM: No. We feel that if we put this stuff out there that it might help someone. Someone might see that they aren’t the only one feeling a certain way. I think it’s a great avenue to get it across to people especially metal fans.

AL: Along with personal lyrics the album also features a variety of musical styles. Was this something the band did consciously or was it something that occurred more naturally?

OM: I think it was something that happened organically. All the guys in the band like different styles of music but at heart we are total metal heads. We like a certain tone which has come from each of us evolving our sounds over the years. We all spent time on our own to craft just the right tone to get to where we are now. That’s what we are in to. The genre of music comes naturally for as we like to chug it out in order for that melody to come with a groove chorus or a main verse riff. We all have been doing this for some time now and we have a solid process which allows for the creation of material to occur fairly easily.

AL: What are the bands plans to tour in support of the album?

OM: We all work regular jobs and a couple of us have kids so planning a tour can be a little tricky. We are always willing and ready to get out there but for now have just a few shows set up to help things get going. I think this is a great band with great songs. I feel that no matter where we play we will go over well and we hope to be able to play as many shows as possible. Playing live is what we absolutely love. Practice, Recording and all that stuff is great but nothing beats performing live on stage.

AL: You also play in Black Water Rising. How do you go about splitting time between the two groups?

OM: It can be tough sometimes balancing two bands and your own personal life. You have to be really careful with scheduling in order not to double book yourself. Just last month this happened where I played with both bands in one night. I played an early show with Damn Your Eyes in Long Island and then had to drive to New Jersey for a show with Black Water Rising. I made it in plenty of time and something like that doesn’t happen often. When you’re booking you have to do things so far in advance that you forget and things get piled up.

For more information on Damn Your Eyes visit their official Facebook page here 

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Bassist Sam Rivers Discusses His New Band SleepKillers and Their Self Titled Debut Album

Sam Rivers is best known as a founding member and bassist for the band Limp Bizkit. His new band Sleepkillers which includes Damien Starkey, Bobby Amaru and Adam Latiff is set to release its debut self titled album on January 25, 2019. Media Mikes had the chance to speak with Sam recently about the group’s formation, the new album and their video for the song “Dirty Foot” which premiered Nov. 2.

Adam Lawton: How did Sleepkillers come together?

Sam Rivers: As far as the writing that went into this first record goes it was me and Damien Starkey. I was living in Jacksonville at the time and we had been talking on the phone about getting together and doing some jamming. I ended up going over to his studio and after a couple of hours of just having fun we had the basis of three songs. We wanted to keep going so we just dove in. Soon after that Limp Bizkit was going back on tour and Damien had some stuff of his own going and we kind of lost touch. During that time we had both played the tracks for people and they kept saying we should turn what we had into a full length record. About a year and a half later we reconnected and after a couple bumps in the road we are here now with a finished record.

AL: At what point in time did the rest of the band come together?

SR: Bobby Amaru came in when we were still working on some of the songs. He helped us really turn things around. Adam Latiff didn’t come in until later. This was going to be just a small project for Damien and me but we took it further and needed people to play live. Bobby wanted to play drums and we couldn’t disagree. He may be the singer of Saliva but he is one hell of a drummer! Adam was a friend of Damien’s for a long time and now he and I are friends and he is just a great fit and an amazing guitarist.

AL: Did returning to the material over a year later cause you to change any of the initial recordings?

SR: I think the sound was really already there so we just rolled with it. We worked really hard at making sure everything blended together and matched up and I think we did a good job. We had that initial vision from when Damien and I first got together and that’s what we stayed with.

AL: Do you see Sleepwalkers as being more of a side project or, something you hope to do full time?

SR: I think we are going to go with it. Right now it’s just a great time. Our plan for right now is to push out as much material and content as we can. That will help us find our core fans which we can build tour and things like that around. I think the biggest thing right now is for us to get this record out and show people that we are a band. As time goes on we are going to evolve so this will be something we do full time but it’s going to be wrapped around our other work.

AL: What can you tell us about the first single “Dirty Foot”?

SR: That was a hard decision. Damien and I kept going back and forth between two or three different songs and we just couldn’t decide. We played it for a few close friends and they all had different picks. This was really odd because we had thought they would choose at least one of these three. That wasn’t the case so that didn’t really help. We took it to some of our peers and people who we really respected and let them listen to it and then sit on it for a bit. That gave us a different view on things. We still hadn’t agreed that “Dirty Foot” was going to be the one but after everything we decided that it had everything we wanted to showcase in our first single and we went with it.

AL: Can you tell us about the video you just released for the song?

SR: We had been trying to find someone who was not only in our budget but someone who was going to put their one hundred and ten percent in to this as well. We talked with David and gave him some of our ideas and from there he just ran with it. We just gave him the clearance so from there we could see what he could come up with. Our biggest thing was once we found someone we wanted to get behind them and stick with them. That’s not to say we won’t ever work with anyone else but we wanted to really see what David could do and open it up to keep going.

AL: Has there been any talks of touring in support of the release?

SR: That’s something we are planning and look to do at some point. We do have a few shows currently lined up which we will be streaming worldwide. There is no way we can hit Europe and all those places at one time so we thought this would be a cool way for us to get to those places and give them a feeling for what one of our shows is like.

For more in on Sleepwalkers you can visit their official website at www.sleepkillers.com

 

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Former Panic At The Disco Bassist Dallon Weekes Signs “I Don’t Know How But They Found Me”

FORMER PANIC AT THE DISCO BASSIST DALLON WEEKES
SIGNS HIS ONCE AND FUTURE BAND
I DONT KNOW HOW BUT THEY FOUND ME
TO FEARLESS RECORDS
Fearless Officially Debuts Double A-Side Single:
“Choke” and “Do It All The Time”
Catchy Concoctions of Art Rock, Space Rock and Alternative,
with Swaggering, Charismatic Pop Vocals

IDKhow Dallon Weekes, Ryan Seaman Photo Credit: Lauren Perry

Dallon Weekes, long time Panic At The Disco bassist and one of the songwriters/ lyricists behind that band’s certified-Gold release Too Weird To Live, Too Rare to Die!, announces a global recording agreement between his I Dont Know How But They Found Me (IDKhow) project and Fearless Records. First up is today’s official release of the double A-side single “Choke” and “Do It All The Time,” its initial 2017 social media and TuneCore limited release, “Choke” accrued an astounding 5.7-million YouTube hits and 5.3 million Spotify streams, based solely on fan reaction and word of mouth; “Do It All The Time” makes its worldwide debut today.

From the band, “The hard working people at IDKhow are pleased to align with Fearless Records to unearth and uncover the rare and forgotten recordings of I Dont Know How But They Found Me. We look forward to rediscovering this long-forgotten music together and giving IDKhow a second chance. For the first time.”

“I Don’t Know How But They Found Me,” a piece of dialogue from the ’80s classic sci-fi film “Back To The Future,” is a musical entity with a conceptual backstory: a band from the late 1970s/early 1980s that got its start on a popular cable access talent show only to have its songs and music videos completely disappear, and fade into obscurity. And now, thanks to the advent of the Internet, IDKhow is seeing its performances and recordings being rediscovered – for the first time – by a world that finally just might be ready for them.

“I was in the middle of making a record when I came across this series of old cable access talent shows from thirty-something years ago,” Weekes explained. “It was this bizarre, low budget parade of the strangest people, and I couldn’t stop watching it. I wanted to be on this crazy show, which was of course impossible. That’s when the concept of ‘I Dont Know How But They Found Me’ began.

“Do It All The Time,” Weekes’ critique of the very popular “Do What Thou Wilt” philosophy that seems all too common today, is a brand new track, never even performed live, that was recorded in Los Angeles last month. “Choke” was recorded at Weekes’ kitchen table in 2016 and subsequently remastered for today’s release on Fearless. With a nearly non-existent budget, the recording was forged in large part by friends who made necessities like recording equipment available to Weekes. IDKhow live performances followed with Weekes enlisting professional drummer and longtime friend Ryan Seaman to play in secret around Los Angeles. As word got out, the duo would deny any involvement in the band, and would deny it even existed at all. This secret ‘deny everything’ policy quickly made each of their officially unannounced shows near-instant sell-outs. With an initial seeding of the project to Weekes’ half-million Instagram followers, IDKhow has accumulated a combined eight-million+ views on the IDKhow YouTube channel and 7.5-million combined Spotify plays.

Beginning tomorrow, IDKhow makes its first-time appearances at the Reading Festival and then the Leeds Festival, which will be followed by a handful of select headline shows in London, Manchester and Glasgow. Dates are below. A North American tour slated for later this year will be announced shortly.

AUGUST
25 Reading Festival, Reading, UK
26 Leeds Festival, Leeds, UK
28 O2 Academy 2, London, UK (headline/SOLD OUT)
29 Manchester Gorilla, Manchester, UK (headline)
30 King Tuts, Glasgow, UK (headline/SOLD OUT)

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CKY Bassist Matt Deis Discuss The Bands New Album “The Phoenix”.

Matt Deis is the bassist for the recently reformed CKY. The band is set to release a brand new album on June 16th titled “The Phoenix” and will performing on this year’s Warped Tour. Media Mikes had the chance to speak with Matt recently to discuss the band getting back together, recording at the legendary Rancho De La Luna studio and what fans can expect from the band during this summer’s tour.

Adam Lawton: Can you give us some background on the reformation of CKY?

Matt Deis: A couple of years ago I stepped away from the band. This was around 2009/2010. I was having trouble juggling things at the time and just couldn’t do the band anymore. A couple years went by and during that time Chad and Jess had started working with Daniel Davies on vocals. Matt Janaitis who replaced me in the band wasn’t going to be able to work with the band anymore so the guys who I had never stopped being friends with called and asked if I could fill in on a few shows. We did some shows with Daniel but ultimately he chose to step away but suggested Chad should sing. From there things just kept going I was glad to be working with them again?

AL: Was doing a new album pre-planned or did this evolve over time?

MD: Things kind of evolved out of doing those shows together. We didn’t really have a set plan outside of knowing that we wanted to play again. Music is something I just know and having worked with the guys for so long everything felt very natural and we just went from there.

AL: Being this is the bands first undertaking as a three piece. What was the writing and recording process like?

MD: We got in a room and just starting jamming as a three piece band. When we were a four piece things were kind of very, cut and paste. Ideas were just sort of thrown out and pieced together. For “The Phoenix” we went to into this dirty warehouse with a very minimal amount of gear and wrote songs that fit the three of us. We didn’t try to get too crazy with the layers or anything like that. We just tried to make things sound good as a three piece. That was the real focus throughout recording. Chad had a lot of song structures figured out going in but there were holes that we all helped to fill in. We locked ourselves in the studio we rented for pre-production and just played. Everything was very natural.

AL: What was it like recording at the legendary Rancho De La Luna?

MD: For me personally I was just amazed that we got this opportunity. I had always seen it as this magical place for a select group of musicians so to be able to step foot there was a childhood dream. A lot of albums I grew up listening to were recorded there. Needless to say I was geeking out quite a bit. How it initially came about was Chad had gone out there with some friends and ended up falling in love with the place. When he brought it up about going out there both Jess and I were quick to say yes.

AL: The bands previous album “Carver City” had a unique concept to as it does “The Phoenix”. Can you tell us about that?

MD: The past albums did have a number of lyrical ideas and concepts attached to them. We didn’t do that consciously with “The Phoenix”. The phoenix in its most open interpretation is a mythical creature that rises from its ashes. That was sort of us as a band. We all had some things we needed to work through so there is a lot of re-growth and us individually over coming what we each had going on.

AL: Tell us about the bands first single “Days of Self Destruction”?

MD: We hadn’t intended on that song to be a single of any kind really. After meeting with our record label they felt that would be a good track to give out to fans. There really was no plan to give it the treatment like you would a single however the reception it received was so good that we just went from there. That song definitely has all the classic elements of CKY. It’s probably our most straight forward track off the album as it has big riffs, a big chorus and a big guitar solo at the end. For someone who has never heard CKY before the song is a good primer as it kind of showcases what we are all about.

AL: Can you tell us about the plans for the bands run on this year’s Warped Tour?

MD: I am really excited as I think this is one of the only remaining traveling tours of this size still happening. I remember being in High School and trying to see CKY on their first Warped Tour run in 1999. Things came full circle as Kevin Lyman the tours founder brought it up as he wanted to bring back bands from years past. We were in the early stages of recording at that point but the opportunity was too good to pass up. We figured everything was going to line up with the album release so we said yes immediately. The tour starts in Seattle so we are going to do a run through Canada before hand and just work our way over. We have such great Canadian fans so it should be a lot of fun. Coming off such a great UK run where 12 of the 13 shows sold out we really can’t wait to get out there here in the States. I think there are going to be a lot of people who get to see that maybe up until now only knew of us from an older sibling. Warped Tour tends to be a younger crowd and we aren’t sure who likes us these days (laughs) so this is going to be a great opportunity for us to meet a lot of new fans.

For more info on CKY head over to www.facebook.com/ckyalliance

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Bassist Pete Griffin talks Giraffe Tongue Orchestra and their “The Walking Dead” connection.

Pete Griffin is a Grammy Award-winning bassist who has worked with everyone from Dweezil Zappa and Steve Vai to Edgar Winter and Dethklok. Griffin’s latest musical endeavor is that of Giraffe Tongue Orchestra a group whose members also include Brent Hinds of Mastodon, Ben Weinman of Dillinger Escape Plan and William DuVall of Alice In Chains. The group released their debut album titled “Broken Lines” in September and is hitting the road this month in support of the release. Media Mikes had the chance to talk with Pete recently about the bands formation, the creation of the album and what fans can expect from the upcoming tour.

Adam Lawton: How did the group initially come together and what is the story behind its unique name?

Pete Griffin: Ben and Brent had been touring together off and on for a decade with their respective bands Dillinger Escape Plan and Mastodon. Even though their sounds are a bit different there groups are both heavy and are very forward thinking. They have been friends and co-workers for some time. Those guys started kicking ideas back and forth and they ended up being better than the average ideas one might pass along. This all started back about eight years ago. The idea for the group has been around for some times and there have been various rhythm sections and recording sessions that didn’t yield any solid results. Last year I got a text from Brent after meeting him while I was out with Dweezil Zappa. I got asked to come and jam with those guys and we started working on a song that would end up being titled “Crucifixion”. They had already started working on things before I got there so I just walked in and just started going. It was at that moment that I think we all agreed there was something there. A month later we tracked the rest of the record with no vocalist. During that time Ben and I were having some pretty hilarious text messages back and forth about who we should get to sing. We were throwing out names like Sting and Paul McCartney which were just pipedream ideas. Around this same time Brent ran in to William in Atlanta and asked him if he would be interested in doing the record. The name of the group was already in place by the time I came along. I think it was one of those flash in the pan ideas where they saw a nature documentary about giraffes and you got to have a band name so there you go. On the flip side you have the abbreviation GTO which when you read it often gives people thoughts of the muscle car which is a hard driving automobile. I think that is a pretty accurate description of our sound as well so in a silly backhanded way it became a good moniker for us.

AL: Are the songs that make up “Broken Lines” ones that were already put together before you joined the group or is this an entirely new group of tracks?

PG: About seventy five percent of the songs were blocked out before I came in. The parts were all there but the bass lines may have needed some tweaking. We also may have done some arrangement changes but Ben had demos for three quarters of the album. When we got together we wrote three more songs as a band and things went from there. The last song we did was put together from three different jams we had recorded. We came up with a way to put them all together and make them work as one song. The interesting thing about that was going back and learning that song in its new form. Now that we have done it a few times its one of the more fun songs to play as it jumps around quite a bit.

AL: The group made some ties recently to “The Walking Dead” television series can you tells us how that all happened?

PG: Bear McCreary who is the composer on the show is a good friend of mine. I have worked with Bear for many years now on a number of his other projects. Have yet to work on “The Walking Dead” but I have done stuff for “Black Sails” and a bunch of other movie score stuff. I had let some of my music friends know about the new album when it came out so they could check it out and a couple weeks letter Bear made a post telling people to go check it out as well. It was cool to get the praise from him.

AL: What can fans anticipate from the upcoming live shows?

PG: So far I know we are going to be performing the full record. With the record being only forty five minutes I am sure we are going to be looking to add some other material or do some extended jamming but we will have to see. At this point we are still experimenting with who we are live. We did two festival shows in England but other than that this is all still very new. It’s definitely going to be a great show though every night we get up there. I am really excited to get things going. A couple days before the tour starts we are all heading out to Ben’s in New Jersey to put everything together so it’s going to be a lot of fun.

AL: This tour runs through mid-December. Have there been any talks of what you and the band have planned for the remainder of the year and into 2017?

PG: Currently after December there isn’t anything else booked for Giraffe Tongue. That doesn’t mean that there won’t be anything else as I would love to keep doing this but nothing is scheduled for right now. Personally for me after this tour wraps up I have a pretty quite rest of the year. Going in to next year I will be working with Paul Gilbert in January and February as we will be going down to Brazil which I am definitely excited for. Ben will be out with Dillinger in Europe promoting their last album and Brent has a new album with Mastodon coming out. It’s going to be a busy 2017 for all of us. That’s something fans should consider when thinking about coming to see Giraffe Tongue Orchestra is this could one of the few times you will get to this project live. That fact also will make the shows even more special.

 

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Bassist Ricky Phillips talks working with Styx, Reo Speedwagon and Ted Nugent

Ricky Phillips is no stranger to world of rock music. Over his 30+ year career Phillips has played bass for a number of successful groups. He is probably best known for holding down the low end for the legendary classic rock band Styx. Media Mikes had the chance to talk with Ricky recently about the bands current tour with Reo Speedwagon and Ted Nugent as well as about the bands recent Blu-Ray release titled “Styx: Grand Illusion/Pieces of Eight- Live”.

Adam Lawton: Can you give us some background on the bands current tour with Reo Speedwagon and Ted Nugent?
Ricky Phillips: Both Styx and Reo Speedwagon have some incredible history that goes way back. We are both from Illinois and have toured together before but this is the first one we have done together in about 3 or 4 years. We did do some one off shows here and there but the idea came up to put us together and have Ted Nugent open. It is sort of a collaboration of Mid-West rock bands. The attendance at these shows has just been amazing. When you go out each year you never know what the shows will be like. The first leg of the tour went well and was sort of business as usual. This second leg has been sold out every night which just blew us away. It’s really crazy how it’s caught on. This success may lead to us doing a similar tour sometime next year. The fans seem to really enjoy the line up and if you think about it each group is quite different so we are trying to put a different slant on mid-west rock.

AL: What has been the biggest difference in the crowds as of late?
RP: There are so many young people now that have discovered classic rock bands. They seem to be at a point in their music listening lives where they are looking for what came before. We are those guys. When I and the rest of the guys in the band were younger and at this point we were heavily influenced by the British music movement. From there we looked back and found artists like Muddy Waters and Howlin’ Wolf. Guys like Eric Clapton and Jimmy Page were into these acts so we started searching them out as well. It is pretty cool seeing these new young faces as they watch and sing along. We have a great cross section of fans.

AL: Can you tell us about the DVD/Blu-Ray the band recently released?
RP: The “Styx: Grand Illusion/Pieces of Eight- Live” came out really great. The Blu-Ray did amazing and I couldn’t believe how many people were waiting for that. I think we were actually number 2 in sales for the first couple weeks on Amazon.com. Those two albums go together so well that the discs came out beautifully. Doing those shows was like going back the vinyl era where you dropped the needle and boom the music kicks in. We did each album in its entirety the way it was recorded so fans could have that feeling of knowing what the next song is. They could get wrapped up in the songs. We would then take an intermission and come back and play “Pieces of Eight”. It was just so much fun. When we first did those records and you were trying to get them on the radio you would pack one side with what you thought were going to be the hits. You were trying to foresee the future. When you do a live concert things are exactly the opposite. You generally start with the B cuts then the hits and close out with your encores. It was a bizarre way to do a live show like an album but it seemed to work really well. The Blu-Ray version of the show is definitely the way to see it.

AL: Was it hard going back and playing some of the material that you hadn’t played in awhile?
RP: At first it was a little tough. We worked pretty hard on the material and once we got in to it we knew we weren’t turning back. We did a lot of switching off between vocals parts as there are just so many stacked vocal parts on those albums. We even threw a microphone back to our drummer Todd Sucherman who is a great singer. Getting those extra voices were crucial and probably the biggest challenge. We like challenges like that and we welcomed it. Things turned out really well.

AL: VH1 recently did a re-mastered episode of the “Styx: Behind the Music” episode. What was it like having to delve once again back in to the bands history?
RP: Personally I am not a fan of those kinds of shows. I am a bit of a weirdo. I don’t like people knowing my bands business. I liked the concept of not knowing about a band until you went and saw them live. You might see a picture or two of a band in a magazine or something but that was about it. I loved that mystique. Watching these types of shows is a little difficult. I know fans like them and we are in a different age now. With reality television and things I guess these types of shows fit right in. The episode is pretty well represented I think. They shot some footage of me while I was in England and I was a little afraid to watch the show. After seeing I thought it was good and gladthat it was out there for fans to see how the band came about and how we have evolved.

AL: What other plans are in the works for the band?
RP: The band will continue to tour and live its daily life. As that happens things are always evolving and stuff start to tell their own stories. We have been writing new material and talking about getting it recorded for some time. I have started to hear more and more about it as of late. We may find some time in our schedules to actually do that. For us it’s really about the touring business. After this tour wraps up I think we have about a week off and then we go back out doing “An Evening with Styx”. I kind of know what parts of the country we will be in but I don’t know the exact venues.

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Filed Under: Interviews, Music Interviews Tagged With: bassist, nugent, phillips, reo, ricky, speedwagon, ...
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