Peeling The Onion
Peeling The Onion
Henry Rollins (Black Flag / Rollins Band) | Peeling The Onion Ep. 14 (January 2nd 2026)
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I think it's uh it's gonna be uh pretty warm today compared to how it was last week. The weather in Tennessee is kind of strange. Uh okay where uh in February the j the temperature will jump up and frogs come out, which is really bad for them because then the weather will slam down to zero and anything that's not hiding will get killed. And so um Mother Nature is uh wreaks havoc on the lower class animals in my neighborhood. I feel bad for them.
SPEAKER_04Right. Wait, wait, before you continue, uh maybe you have to accept the recording on your end. Does it say something on your like computer that you have to accept that we're recording this?
SPEAKER_00Okay, hold on. Oh, hold on. I think I see it. Oh, it says okay.
SPEAKER_04Okay. How's that? I mean, uh it's if if you said okay, then it's good. No, I just remember that last time we talked. Sorry.
SPEAKER_00Let's see, hold on. Uh uh stay centered with auto framing. I don't need that. But there's a thing that says said okay, and I hit that. Yeah. You can see and hear me, right?
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I think we're good.
SPEAKER_00And it is recording on your end, right?
SPEAKER_04It is recording on my end.
SPEAKER_00Well, then I guess we're good to go.
SPEAKER_04How cool, man. No, just the last time we spoke, you said the room that you're in is really cold, like it doesn't have heating. Yeah, well, what was the last time we spoke? We spoke on January 2nd, uh, 2024.
SPEAKER_00Wow. So it's been a while. Yeah, well, um, it's now uh uh early January, and uh I don't heat. Uh uh I kind of I try and be really uh I don't know what the right word is. Cheap, maybe, but I only heat the room I'm in.
SPEAKER_02Makes sense.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and and so I I got up at like four o'clock this morning, something like that, and I went down to my office, which was uh pretty cold, and I warmed it up a little, so I've got a bunch of layers on, but I'm now up in the attic where my little vocal booth is. This is pretty damn frosty.
SPEAKER_04So how do you heat up your like what what kind of heating do you use, guys use down there? Like what do you use to heat up your uh this house?
SPEAKER_00Uh I the office is an addition. The house is really small, but there's this addition the last guy built onto it, which is why I bought the house. Because it has uh commercial grade electricity, which is great for the stereo. And he built it for like big weekend parties and watching football, and it's really nice. I turned it into a big record room office library archive. Right. And the rest of the house, uh if you turn the heat on, it just kind of quits, like you get almost warm, and the heating system kind of goes, ah, sorry. And so I basically will have to replace it with a more, you know, a stronger system, but I just don't, I just don't care that much. I'll just put on extra clothes. Uh so it has central heating, uh, but it doesn't work all that well. And if you if you crank up the heater like upstairs where I am now, it warms up a little, and then the air coming out of the heater smells like like the ground, like you're like you're in some cavern or coal mine, uh, and it can't be good for you. And so I just leave the heat off up here and I just tough it out. Because I sleep right down the hall from here, and it's you know, it's really cold. And I end up sleeping fully clothed, two sweatshirts on, a hat and a hood under a sleeping bag, and a blanket in the fetal position. And the cold will sometimes wake me up because it gets surprisingly cold uh in Tennessee. Like you didn't you wouldn't think it would get that cold in the south, but it does.
SPEAKER_04Right.
SPEAKER_00And so I appreciate seasons, I don't mind it. Uh where I lived previously in Los Angeles, it was always kind of either hot or maybe slightly less hot in the winter, but here we really get it. And uh I I must say I I I quite like it.
SPEAKER_04I mean, I I was living in Mexico City for a while, and it it gets really cold there, and they they don't have any heatings in their house, you know, so you just had to put on a lot of clothes. So I know what you mean.
SPEAKER_00Wait, you you I only went to I've only been to Mexico City one time. Whoa, really? You guys never took you never toured down there? Uh-uh. No, I've only done shows in Tijuana, which you can kind of walk out of San Diego, like literally just across the border. Right. And there's a big street in uh it's basically for San Diego people to party. And it's uh the Plaza del Revolution, and they have a lot of nightclubs there. And with Black Flag, Rollins Band, we would just basically your fans from San Diego just get in their car and drive a mile south, and they come to your show. And uh I went to Mexico City because Iggy did three nights with Metallica, and I just had to see Iggy with a Metallica audience with 58,000 people a night sold out, and uh they really liked him, and it was just interesting. I just went down there just to kind of see what that would be like. And you know, if you're in Los Angeles, flying to Mexico City, it's a it's a cheap flight. So I I just did it for the love of rock and roll, man.
SPEAKER_04No, like I saw it, he came here in like 2014 and he was fucking phenomenal on states. Yeah, really good.
SPEAKER_00I saw him a few weeks ago. Uh I saw his last show for last year. Uh I I wasn't trying to. I was in Washington, DC to mix a record, and he was playing, and me and my friend Ian, we just went to the show because he was there.
SPEAKER_04So what is he playing? Is he playing the like the Stooges song also, or just his solo material? Like what's his repertoire?
SPEAKER_00Uh both, and it's the same set. It hasn't changed that much for the last like a hundred years.
SPEAKER_02Okay.
SPEAKER_00It's like three or four, you know, Stooges songs, big songs from The Idiot and Lust for Life. It's all crowd pleasing. Like every song, you're like, Oh, I know that song.
SPEAKER_01Okay.
SPEAKER_00And uh he has a new band, a bunch of young people. And uh it's I don't know. Uh, he has a bunch of shows planned for next year, his manager told me. So he's gonna be he'll be 79 or something. So nothing stops him.
SPEAKER_04I mean, he had an album come out like four or five years ago with Joss Hom from Queens of the Stone It's post-pop depression. That that was really good. Yeah. That's like a that's c'est classic. That's a good song.
SPEAKER_00The album is good, but what was really good about that tour, I saw it in Los Angeles and London. I saw that show that that tour, was the band. Josh Hami put together like a stage full of absolute killers. The Arctic Monkeys drummer was drumming. Uh Josh is really good. Uh um I'm forgetting his first name, like Sweeney was playing bass. Like he's in a he plays with a bunch of people. Like that band was amazing.
SPEAKER_01Nice.
SPEAKER_00And they did a two-hour show, and Iggy, I've never heard him sing better. Like the band was like incredible, he was great. And they sold out the Royal Albert Hall. That's where I went to see him. And like he probably could have they probably could have done a few nights there. Uh, but that was as far as like his different bands he's had for you know the last several years after the Stooges broke up again. Uh, that was his best lineup. I mean, those guys were just monsters, really good.
SPEAKER_04Wait, you've been off the road now for like two years. Have you have you done some shows since you since you got off your good to see you tour or what? What have you been up to?
SPEAKER_00No, uh that tour, that tour wrapped in November of 2023. Yeah, right? Yeah. Yeah. And I've I've done a few I've done a few shows, mainly speaking at conventions. Okay. Uh, like they have conventions about uh, you know, startups and independent companies and all of that, and they bring me in to speak about you know the punk rock ethos of DIY and all of that.
SPEAKER_02Okay.
SPEAKER_00And so it's not like my normal shows, but they, you know, they want me to speak for 45 minutes. And sure, you know, if it's interesting, an interesting topic where I don't have to be full of it. So I'm not gonna get go on stage and lie or be uninterested just for the money.
SPEAKER_04Okay.
SPEAKER_00Uh so I get offers and I say I say yes to some and no to the ones that I can't be if I'm not excited about, I just say no. So since I finished 264 shows in 28 countries, I've done only a handful of shows. Mainly I've been working on a lot of writing projects and working on uh a big idea uh that we're hoping to roll out this year in 2026.
SPEAKER_04Nice. Can you talk about that idea, or is it like can you talk about it? That that that big thing is.
SPEAKER_00Um since well, I'd love to, okay, but since I haven't done it yet, okay, and and like I'm about 99% sure we're gonna get it done, I really don't want to put the cart in front of the horse. Oh, cool. I mean, off the record, yeah. I just I just don't want to talk about it because it's so great, and then not deliver. Of course. I know I completely understand. So um by by early February, I'll know a lot more. Nice. Uh, in that I have a building I'm I'm selling here in Nashville, a big commercial building downtown. And the buyer is sometimes a bit sketchy, and so if he is able to fulfill his promises and close escrow at the end of January, I will have a lot more room to move to do these things that I want to do. Because all the projects I do, I'm self-funded. I know I don't have corporate sponsorship, I don't shake hands with people I don't want to deal with. So when it's projects that are bigger than a book, like this one is, right? It moves quite slowly because I'm just not going to go for the corporate route where you know it's uh it's a bad bargain. You you're gonna get compromised eventually. So I might as well tough it out and uh just go the slower, harder, far more stressful route.
SPEAKER_04Okay. We we'll talk about it next January 2nd, then there you go.
SPEAKER_00Perfect.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, wait, like Heidi, she's still your manager. Like you guys have been working together since the late 90s.
SPEAKER_00Yes, and uh we've been she wasn't my manager at first. She was she I have uh you know a few different companies, and so she came to work at my book company, and she's you meet her, she's obviously hyper intelligent, like super energized, and we we just get along. And so we're 28 years now working with each other, and about 10 years ago, I didn't want to fire my manager, I just he and I, he's a good guy, but he and I had ceased to be able to make interesting things happen, his ideas never changed much, and so he would just want me to keep doing the same things. And I'm like, Well, that's just really not interesting, and so I said, uh, I'm you gotta go. And so I just basically said, I'm done. And so Heidi said, What are you doing for a manager? I said, I'll manage myself, and she said, Really? That's hilarious, you won't last a minute, which is true. So I said, Well, how about you? And she said, Good. And everything, I'm not putting my previous manager down, he's a really good guy. But after Heidi took over, everything got better. Everything got better. Just she's just really smart, and she just has uh she's very creative, and so um she's actually uh has bought a home here in Nashville where I live. She's moving from California to do this project with me that we're rolling out this year, right? So we're we're you know, as serious as adults get. I mean, she is moving her life out here because we're both like blood in the eyes to get this thing done. Nice.
SPEAKER_04I remember like you referred to her as a kind of reality monitor. Uh like, I don't know but what what what qualities like does she have that made that partnership last so long? And like what what does she bring to the work like personally and and professionally that makes you want to keep building with her after all these years?
SPEAKER_00Oh she will without a second's hesitation call me out on anything. Like if I write something and she'll Google like, yeah, that you you've said that before, and the original version of this was better. So cut it out. Like we we edit last year. I mean, this year is so new, last year, we did two 80-hour weeks of editing a new book of mine where we just sit there going through every paragraph and arguing. And we did two, we did 160 hours on this book, and she's you know, she reads a manuscript and she just starts marking it up. She's incredibly observant. She goes, Okay, four pages ago, you kind of said this, and this sentence is weak. It needs something. I don't know, you're the writer, so fix it. Okay. And she has she's honest to a fault, and she cares about me. Like she wants to see me do well. And so I'll get some offer, you know, I'll get some offer for a lot of money to do something. It looks kind of interesting, and I don't care about the money. I just want to do cool stuff. And she'll go, look, the money's nice, but do you really want to be in this thing that'll last forever? It looks a little cheesy. I said, Yeah, it looks a little cheesy cheesy to me. She goes, Well, well, then let's just walk away. I'm like, Yeah, I mean, I would have come to that conclusion on my own, but Heidi gets there in about five seconds.
SPEAKER_01Okay.
SPEAKER_00She goes, This is lame. Next, you're like, Yeah. And she's kind of like a dog in that the dog will always pick up the scent. Like the dog won't lie, the dog will say, The deer is over there. Um, that's Heidi. She has a a wide, you know, big radar for BS, and she's honest, and we've just been working together for so many years. And this big thing that we're doing this year, it was her idea.
SPEAKER_02Okay.
SPEAKER_00And I literally moved from Los Angeles here to Nashville to do this thing. Right. And so we're years into preparation for this idea. And it was all her idea. I wish, I wish I could take credit for it. Um, I mean, I I'm I'm the one who's gonna be building it, but it was she's the one who said, here's what I think you should do. And I was like, wow, I can't, I can't argue my way out of this. You're right. She goes, but you can't afford to do it in Los Angeles, so pick another city. I said, I'm moving. She goes, like, yeah. Like, whoa! And I I moved. I moved like 2,000 miles.
SPEAKER_04Why Nashville, though, out of every or any place. Why Nashville?
SPEAKER_00Uh it's uh a lot of people come here. It's music oriented, and this project is music-oriented. Uh it's in in sections very metropolitan. It's a city that's on the on the move, on the rise. About a hundred people a day move here. And living is pretty affordable, and you can get a lot of bang for your proverbial buck. Where in California, for me to do this project, she goes, you literally can't afford to do it here. So you gotta do it, and she's right. So let's let's pick somewhere else. And I never had any great love of California anyway. I like the house I was living in, but I moved and I'm fine. And it's I've been here almost five years now, and it's it's great.
SPEAKER_04I mean, like you landed in what LA in 1981 or something like that, right? Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, summer 1981.
SPEAKER_04I remember you talked about like like the police attention, like they were stalking your house, like, or was it mostly at shows, or did they were were they hanging around like the where where you guys were living? How was it?
SPEAKER_00Well, well, uh the the LAPD, Los Angeles Police Department, had a legendary, kind of horrible guy named Daryl Gates. He was the chief of police, right? A fantastic white Southern California racist. Uh doesn't like the queers, doesn't like the blacks, doesn't like this, doesn't like that. And and he instructed LAPD just to go beat the hell out of people. And California cops are scary. I mean, they're they're the scariest cops I've ever encountered in America. And you don't even have to be a bank robber. And in LA, you can have a really bad time. Just a normal citizen. You can have very memorable interactions with law enforcement that can be really terrifying. Even if you call them, like it's like calling the enemy. Anyway, uh Daryl Gates and the LAPD really had it in for punk rock. They just they thought it was like some youth rebellion, and they're like, nah, not in our city. And Black Flag was a prominent band in that scene. And also Black Flag uh would basically uh uh put the you know the the red cape in front of the proverbial bull. Uh there was a radio station that's still around now, very big, called K-R-O-Q, K-Rock. And back in those days, you could get an ad. You could make an advertisement, 30 seconds, 60 seconds, and put it on when all the punks would listen to Rodney uh Bingenheimer for really cheap. Now you can't afford a radio ad. But in those days, you could. And Black Flag was very, you know, got got things done. They would go in the studio and make up radio ads. They've all been compiled on a record called Everything Went Black. Right. And they would by name call out Daryl Gates. They go, Hey, Daryl Gates, the gorillas are knocking your door down. And they would actually mention his name. And of course, it gets back to him. And he went, Oh yeah? And so he had it in for Black Flag. And when I moved to Los Angeles, I became kind of sort of the face of Black Flag, you know, the lead singer guy. And immediately I was in the LA Times, I'm on TV, and the LAPD recognized me very quickly. And you know, I'm not a law-breaking kind of guy, I'm not looking for trouble. And I would, you know, be outside of the whiskey of go-go, the legendary venue, because I didn't have the money to get in. So I'd just be standing outside trying to meet girls, and like a cop would come up, hey, black flag. You're like, oh no, here we go. And there's the cop like in your face, you know, calling you names and trying to get you to do something. And like, really? You you'd break my neck. And that was the start of me having some really intense interactions with members of LAPD. And sometimes they would they would hang out outside of where we lived and shine their flashlights in our window, or just knock on the door and have us all come outside. Like, where's your ID? It's like three in the morning. We're standing there in our underwear, just because they could. And uh one time they we watched them, we had our little van parked next to a building we were living in in Hollywood, and they went into our van. They broke into our van and checked it out looking for drugs as if we could afford drugs. And then finally, they got some old man to make a police report that we had pulled a shotgun and on him and tried to rob him. No one in black flag owns a shotgun. If we had a shotgun, we would have eaten it. We were so hungry in this case. And so we got we got basically run out of Hollywood by the LAPD. And they said, Well, you pull shotguns. We're like, we don't have you know, and that's a big sh allegation. Like, okay, let's go to court, prove it. And they're not going to, they're just like, get out. So we left and we we went to the beach. We uh Uh went to Redondo Beach and relocated. Right. But I'm not a I'm not the kind of guy who like breaks into houses or robs liquor stores. I'm not a, you know, the cops don't need to be concerned with me. I I you know, I I drive the speed limit. I'm kind of boring in that way. But uh for the first five years I lived in Los Angeles, I I racked up quite a history of interactions with the LAPD for a guy who doesn't really break laws.
SPEAKER_04Right. So when you got into the damage sessions, had you been doing those songs live for like a few months, or were some of them recorded fresh? How was that? I I'm sorry, I I'm not understanding. Uh say the question again. Yeah, when you recorded the the first Black Flag uh LP damaged, had you been doing the songs? Yeah, had you been doing the songs live, or were some of them just like fresh takes in the studio?
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Oh no, no. Um Greg Ginn, you know, the boss of Black Flag, uh he would put us through a very rigorous schedule. Like Black Flag was a very hard-working band. And so when I joined the band, the band was on tour, and the other singer, Des, the guy I replaced, he finished the tour on vocals. I was roadie. I would load in the gear, practice at soundcheck, and then work security for the band, and then sing the encores. So they're slowly breaking me in. And so that was about three weeks to finish that leg of the tour. And then we got to Los Angeles, and we would do these incredibly long rehearsal days, like hours and hours, where you'd end up singing every song the band had like three to five times. Like incredible to be doing music like you're in school, like you know, you're gonna be in that building all day. And I thought I was ready, and Greg's like, oh no, you're not ready. And by the time I did the first full show, which was I think August, so it was about like a month of like boot camp, where we're just in the practice room all day. And the first show is early August, so it's like five weeks, four weeks of rehearsal, of like grueling, like every day. I I am now the new guy in the band. We're gonna be doing two shows in a club that night, like the seven o'clock and the ten o'clock. And we're playing in Huntington Beach or Coast Mesa, a place called the Cuckoo's Nest, a legendary punk rock venue, with a pretty violent audience who followed the black flag. And those beach guys were you don't want to mess with them, like they'll rip your head off. And so I'm the new guy, I'm 150 pounds, you know, scrunny. And I'm holding on, I grabbed the microphone, I walk up to the front of the stage, and this skinhead guy, you know, they're not like neo-Nazis, they're just, you know, California skinheads, they're just like thucks. The guy looked up at me, and this is a quote. He said, You better be good, faggot. And that was, I was like, okay. And that was the first thing said to me by an audience member when I did my first night. And then we started playing. And I'm not here to tell you that I'm any good, but I we it within the first minute of us playing, the audience was like, okay, and they went crazy. And that's when I realized all those hours of practice, you know, I there's no way I would have been able to perform like that had we just done a few practices like, let's see what happens. Like we did hours and hours, and I had confidence in that I knew the songs because I'd played them like you know, a hundred times each. And I that's when I understood to be good at this kind of thing, you gotta put the work in. And that's what Greg and Chuck of Black Flag already knew, and that's what I was learning as being the new guy in the band. And we did those two shows that night, and we were good because we had put the work in. And I put that same work ethic into the Rollins band. We're preparing for a tour. We'd be in the practice room. It was like, you know, getting ready to be a Navy SEAL. Like we're in there all day. Lunch break, go back in. And my bandmates are like, this is a lot. I'm like, yeah, but we don't do warm-up shows. The first show on the first night of the tour, we're gonna crush these people. And like, and that what I'm meaning is like, we're gonna be really good. Not because we're great, but because we're working at it. You know, we're putting the time in. That's kind of sort of how I apply myself to everything I do. You know, you you want to write a book, well, you're gonna have to rewrite the book like seven times. I'm on a book I'm working on now. Uh I just started like the sixth or seventh draft yesterday. Okay. And I'm reading the same book again, and I'm still finding sentences where I'm going, oh, okay, I can improve that. And it's just I learned that from minimum wage work, you know, repetition, show up on time, but I really learned that application of just being like stubbornly applied to the task from being in Black Flag, and it served me very well in my life.
SPEAKER_04I mean, and didn't Chuck Dukowski kind of take you under his wink for for his first couple of months or the years? Wasn't it kind of like, or like how was your relationship with Chuck?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, well, yeah, I you know, Chuck Chuck is amazing. Um, Chuck and I are very similar in that we both have, you know, a lot of we're we're hot-blooded. You know, like like we we go, you know, you start the music, we start sweating. And Chuck and I bonded because we related to Black Flag very much in the same way, where Greg is extremely talented, but but maybe more cerebral and were more emo, if you will. Okay, and we were kind of like these two maniacs, uh, center stage and stage left. And we just found at the end of the show, both of us are completely like exhausted, you know, uh drenched. And we kind of went, okay. And to this day, Chuck will always be you know, for me, kind of like an older brother mentor. Uh, and you know, I don't I don't I live thousands of miles away from Chuck. I I have no idea if I'll ever see him again. Uh, but he's still in my mind quite amazing. Right.
SPEAKER_04I I want to talk about this thing. I there's a clip on YouTube. I think it's in Germany, where at the beginning of the show you get hit in the in the in the head, like with a beer can, like a full beer can. Do you remember that?
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_04And you come out on the stage.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, that was February.
SPEAKER_03Keep going.
SPEAKER_00Well, uh, it was February 1983. It was the first show we ever played in Berlin, called West Berlin at that time, at the legendary SO36. And it was really cold. And the venue has no heating, so we're like spending sound check, like you know, watching steam come out of our mouths. And so we go out to play, and I forget who opened, like some like maybe German punk rock band, but we go out to play, and someone throws like a large beer can, and it I think it hit me like square in the head. Straight in the forehead. And I picked up uh yeah, yeah, and it hurt, and so I picked up, I think, part of a mic stand, yeah, like a metal bar, and I said, Come on. And the audience parted, and the guy was standing at the end of the hall with nobody in his way, like the the audience was like, Not me, and they got out of the way. And I think the guy ran and we finished the show. And so uh, I think at some point uh the PA, I think some skinheads like uh cut the PA, and only the monitors worked. So we just kind of had to get through get through the night uh as best we could, and I think we turned the monitors towards the audience. But that was uh the first time Black Flag ever played the European continent, and that was the beginning of '83. And then by summer '84, we went back again to a far friendlier reception.
SPEAKER_01Okay.
SPEAKER_00Uh back and did two shows in Berlin, and both of them were fine. We've got a guitar stolen, and I did get punched in the face. But uh the rest of the audience seemed a bit friendlier the second time around.
SPEAKER_04But you you were so completely reasonable to that person. You were talking with that person and you were looking them in the eye, and you were telling them, like, we came all of this way to play here for you guys. I never done anything to you. Why the fuck would you hit me in the face? Like you were being so completely reasonable to that person who had just assaulted you. You know what I mean?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, because when something like that happens and you're on stage and like someone throws an ashtray at your head or something, you know, any band person, they're like standing targets. Like, where, you know, where's the drummer gonna go if you throw something at his head? He he's sitting or she's sitting. Any any player, they have their head down looking at their instrument. The singer might have a chance if you know they're running around, but we're sitting ducks. And like, how can you do that to people who are plainly lit, like we're an easy target? Why would you do that to someone who just came to play the songs? I mean, I would it's just nothing I would ever do. I I've never thrown anything at someone on stage. Are you kidding? I just I I I just don't even have that, I I I don't even know when I would possibly do that. And so when it gets done to me, it I just kind of run out of anything to say, but like why? And on that same tour, we played in Switzerland, which is you know, uh no one's hungry there. And some guy took like a some a beer mug or something full of urine and threw it on Dukowski, and it's gross. I mean, I I I I got hit the next summer in Scotland. I got two cups of urine thrown on me. Thanks a lot, Glasgow. Anyway, uh Chuck kind of lost his mind. Like, you know, he we finished the show. It was it was disgusting. We finished the show, and Chuck, you know, we're like, Chuck, you know, there's a shower in this venue, believe it or not. Like, just go stand in the shower, you know, just take care of it. And Chuck just kind of lost his mind and destroyed the dressing room. And like, we we don't do things like that. You know, we don't punch holes in walls, like ever. And Chuck, there's mirrors in there, he just he just smashed them, and he was just beyond, you couldn't talk to him, you couldn't say, hey, you just had to let him do it. We just kind of got out of the way, and um man, it was crazy. And I don't I don't remember what happened, but it was just a really bad night, and I think Chuck just couldn't logic why anyone would do that, and I I can't logic it. Uh, why would you do that? Well, we don't like America. Well, huh? Like, and sometimes you would talk to people years later, like, hey, like this guy feels like, oh, I know that guy. Well, why did he do that? Because he doesn't like Ronald Reagan. I I've never met him. And it's just, you know, it's just it's what beer does, you know, beer, youth, anger. Right. And they take it out on and you know, in the days of Reagan and Thatcher, you know, Thatcher in the UK, Reagan in America, uh, there's a lot of you know punk rock music that came from those two leaders, like in and you know, to protest. But sometimes Europeans would get mad at the bands. Like, well, why are you mad at us? I mean, we're you what, you think we like Reagan? We're on your side. So, and so uh it was just those those days, like the 80s. You could have a lot of problems with an audience. You know, like ask Ian Mackay, like in Minor Threat, Fugazi, they would get all kinds of knuckleheads coming to shows, causing problems. And Black Flag definitely got their share of that aggression, and a lot of times they would you know beat up on each other, but sometimes they'd you know take it out on the band, but always the singer, like me, and like the one time it happened to someone else is when poor Chuck got the urine in Switzerland. Otherwise, it was always directed at me. Like, you know, like we don't like this new song. I didn't write it, and I never said that, you know. I never looked pointed at Greg, he wrote it. I just you know took the ashtray upside my head.
SPEAKER_04That would that would be easy though, just like, hey, that's that's the guy.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, but I I just it's just not for me to do that. Yeah, I know, and I just I would not do that because yeah, you know, but there was a lot of abuse you could suffer at the hands of your audience. And luckily for me, all of that abruptly went away in 1987 with the start of uh my own band. Like those people, maybe they just didn't like us, they couldn't be bothered to show up to make trouble, like they didn't want to pay the eight dollars to get in and to the venue and like beat people up. But I just never encountered that kind of thing happening at and I've done like literally well over a thousand shows after Black Flag, probably a couple of thousand, right? Um, and and there's been a you know, the occasional thing, but in Black Flag, it was like three nights a week. Oh, there's this guy, and you got to deal with him after the show, and that just kind of abruptly stopped with the Rollins band. And I don't know what it was a sign of the times, they didn't like the music. I don't know. But you know, because I never wanted trouble. If you're in a band, all you want to do is do the songs, play them really well, and have people go, We like you. That's all. Like it's that's it, it's pretty simple, right? Uh so there was at for quite a while in my life at least, shows had a lot of drama. Like sometimes the cops would come and they'd walk on stage, and they always took the mic from me. This show is over, and give me the mic back. I'm like, well, you heard him. Like cops standing on stage with us, telling the audience the show is over. And of course, you know, people get angry at us. Like, we we didn't call the cops uh on our own show. Like, why are you angry? Well, we want we want our money back. Talk to the venue, like we're getting paid 35 bucks, like shut up. So uh, but you know, things did get better, but for a while there, you know, touring was like a long battle. You know, you didn't make much money. Sleeping was wherever you could find a floor, and sometimes some idiot would be waiting for me after the show by the van. I'm like, come on, man, let's fight. Like, really? Like it we we drove nine hours to get here. We just did two shows, you know, a seven o'clock and a ten o'clock. We got to drive to you know another nine hours tonight. You want to beat me up? Why don't you help me carry the gear out to the van? You fuck ass. No, like and but you know, that was just those days, and and looking back, it might have been better not to get punched in the head as often. But it does train you for the rest of your life, right? Like if you're used to that, when things get a little better, it feels like winning the lottery, right? And things did get, you know, they did change with me. You know, the we started playing to bigger audiences, the venues got better. Uh we could each uh have our own bunk at the end of the night. Uh we actually got beds in hotel rooms, like wow, and that's great compared to how we, you know, how I used to do it. And so things on that level just kept improving, you know, where you you're not hungry all the time. Like you got some money, you're gonna buy some food after the show. It's a guarantee. Where in those days, like, okay, I've got two dollars and eighty cents. What can I do at this diner with that kind of money? And sometimes you talk to the waitress, I got this much money, and they would just like, are you hungry, dear? Yeah, and they would just give you like an extra egg or like more, you know. They would, yeah, no, they're always nice. And um one time I was in San Francisco with Black Flag's roadie Mugger, and Mugger and I had gone up ahead of Black Flag to put up flyers for our big Halloween 1981 show. And we're walking around putting up flyers. We are broke, and we see Jello Biafra of the Dead Kennedys, who's a pal of ours. He's in a diner eating, and we just walked in there, hey Jello, and we we were so hungry. We sat down and just kind of like took his plate and just like drank, started eating his food. Not even like aggro, where like you're you get so hungry, you see food, you eat it. We're like, hey Jello, how within two seconds of sitting down, and I forget what he was eating, and he kind of went, I guess you guys are hungry. And I remember the waitress like knew Jello and kind of sort of recognized me, I guess. And she gave me and muggers some food. We're like, Thank you. We're like, you know, we're dying out here, and um, that's what those days were like. You know, you you just learn to uh one time me and Takowski, there's a Mexican restaurant near where Black Flag used to live, and we're always low on money, always. And we would chuck, you know, he's like an animal. We went we went to this Mexican restaurant. I'm like, we're gonna get Mexican food that we didn't have the money. He goes, well, kind of. So we sit down and we order two glasses of water. So the waiter knows, like, like we're we got nothing. We want two glasses of water and a bowl of chips. Like that that's like 50 cents. I go, so we're gonna eat water and chips. He's like, no, see that table, it's a family eating, and you find out kids rarely finish their meals, you know, like little stomachs. And the family gets up to leave, and Chuck just gets up and he grabs like two or three of the plates from the kids and puts them onto the table. He's like, Go! And we just started eating this coldish food that was like, you know, partially covered in kids' spit. And the waiter sees us and just goes, like, you guys gotta deal, get out of here. And we just kept eating, like we inhaled this food, grabbed a handful of chips, and just kind of left. One time I went into uh a supermarket with Chuck, and he said, Are you hungry? I'm like, Of course. And we went up to the meat section, and he grabs like two steaks, like in the cellophane, you know, shrink wrap package, and he grabs it and he just opens it, and he hands me one of the steaks, and he takes the other one and he just starts eating it. Raw beef won't kill you, but it's kind of gross. Uh, and I like like the good acolyte, I'm like, okay, and I just started eating this. And the the people in the supermarket were like too aghast to do anything. They're like, oh my god, these guys are savages. And we just like walked out with these two pieces of meat in our fists, and like no one came after us. They just were so happy we left with like you know, eight dollars worth of steak or something. And we walked back to SST eating this meat and like classic Chuck behavior. I mean, he's not, you know, he's not an aggro guy, he's not a bad person, he's great, he's amazing. Uh, next level brain. But um that day, uh, raw steak was what was for dinner. What about and I've been back to that supermarket, you know, over the years. I've gone back there like, ah, I remember this place. Yeah.
SPEAKER_04But what about did you ever like have to eat dog food or shit like that? Or did you ever eat dog food? Um no.
SPEAKER_00Um when I joined Black Flag, Mugger told me a trick he was doing when he used to live on the street. And he said you take dog food, and he learned this from other like really hardcore punk rocker guys. You take white bread, because it's cheap, you take a spoonful of dog food and you put it into the bread. And you know how white bread is, you squeeze it, and it kind of like remains in the shape that you squeezed it. So you squeeze it into a ball and you eat it as fast as you can. Don't taste it, don't think about it, just wolf it down and try not to throw up. And all it is, it's just like, you know, a lot of intestines, and you know, it's not, it won't kill you. It's just meat, but it it's just gross. And I and I was like a little kid. I'm like, I said, Did you do that, Mugger? He's like, Yeah. I go, whoa! And and you know, I I come from the I come from middle the middle class. You know, my my parents worked. I I never was hungry in in school. Right. And when I left left home to go into the world, I had jobs, I had an apartment, I paid my rent, I paid my taxes. You know what I mean? I I ate you know cheap food, but I ate every day. And I never understood being hungry. I understood like I can't wait for dinner, but I didn't understand there's no food and we have to go out and like start figuring out how to eat tonight. And that happened not every day in Black Flag, but now and then. And Mugger had already been in like the world of like the street punk, like no home. And I started meeting just by hanging out, people like years younger than me, whose life experience would, as they say, peel the paint off your car and kill your lawn. And I, you know, it would be like October, and you're somewhere, and there's like some 15-year-old kid on the street. Hey, you're the black flag guy. Like, yeah. And I would ask, act like some kind of cop, like, why aren't you in school? And the guy would just laugh at me. I go, Aren't you supposed to be in school? Like when I was your age, I was in school. And he went, I haven't, you know, I I ran away from home. I go, well, where do you live? Wherever I can, man. I go, what do you do for food? And he goes, Whatever I need to do. And this young, this boy one time explained to me that he would have sex with men, like a rent boy. I go, are you gay? I mean, are you used to male on male sex? He went, hell no. I was like, whoa. And you can do that? He goes, hey man, whatever it takes. I said, that's like the craziest thing I've ever heard from a teenager. I mean, like in Washington, I didn't know anyone who had done that. And in Los Angeles, this is like summer 81, going into autumn 81. I'm 20. And you would start hearing stories like that. Or you'd be at this, there's a hamburger hangout called Okie Dogs. It was just a big punk rock hangout, kind of legendary. Yeah. OK-Dogs. Right. Yeah, you can look it up. No, I've heard it. But you know, you'd go there. Yeah. You know, after a band would play at a venue, everyone would go to Okie Dogs and hang out, pick up on each other, whatever. And one night I'm talking to like these like scary skinhead dies who like we're black flag fans, they're being kind of cool to me. And two guys who shouldn't be in around their walk by. Uh they look like they have money. They got wrist watches on, you know, they're well dressed, you know, they look like they're not, shouldn't be in that neighborhood. And the skinheads go, like, oh, we'll see you later. And they just follow the two guys. I'm like, oh no. And they come back like 20 minutes later laughing. I said, Did you guys mug those two guys? They went, Yeah. And like they're laughing, showing me money. And they would just went right back to sitting down and talking. Like it was nothing. Right. Like, like this street crime where they probably, like, you know, if those guys were smart, they would have just said, Here, here's my money, here's my watch, don't hurt me. Because those guys, they would have hurt those two men. They're, you know, scary guys. But those are the people I encountered in my first year in Black Flag. And I'd never met anybody like that before I joined Black Flag. Like, people would show me like a bag of heroin. I go, what's that? It's like it's heroin. I'm like, ah! Like, where are you? Are you crazy? You know, I thought there was only heroin in movies, but there's a a little bag of heroin. And I are you gonna do that? And they're like, uh yeah. What do you think I'm gonna do with it? And I just, it was a world I I really wasn't exposed to until I was like up to my eyeballs in it. Right. Like it wasn't like, oh, you'll meet two or three scary people. Like, you're gonna meet like 30 of them tonight. And since I'm the guy in black flag, hey, you're the black flag guy. They they all are talking to me. And it blew my mind. Like I'd walk down Santa Monica Boulevard going towards Okie Dogs, and you'd see guys my age in mini skirts or hot pants, and they're rent boys. And they got like they look like they're coming out of a David Bowie video, 1972 or something. They're all glammed out, and cars are driving by yelling things like, hey, you fags, or you know, whatever. And these guys, you know, they're like a hundred pounds, like they're like the delicate looking, and so they're these guys like in fishnet stockings and hot pants and mascara yelling the most terrifyingly violent abuse back at the car that just yelled at them. And as Iggy Pop said, he characterized himself as the street walking cheetah with a heart full of napalm. This was the real street walking cheetahs with hearts full of napalm. This was the walk on the wild side, right? And I would walk around on the streets of Hollywood because Black Flag was living there before we got kicked out, and just trip on it, and just like walk by rent boys and walk by, you know, drug dealers, and just kind of take it in. I never got mugged or anything, I I looked broke, too broke to mug. But but it was so fascinating to me, right? And I just wanted to learn more. And sometimes at Oakie Dogs, you'd actually talk to people whose backstories were so sad, like the 15-year-old who's not in school. Well, where do you come from? New Mexico. Well, what are you doing here? I I left because my mom's boyfriend kept molesting me. You're like, oh no. And you'd meet young people whose backstory is so full of pain and horror, like abuse uh from the boyfriend or the father or the the pedophile. It's just like the stuff that you know, you're it should have been better for these young people. And they would come to LA, you know, it doesn't snow, and you might become a movie star. Who knows? And I I just met these people whose lives it just made me very sympathetic to people who you might judge before you hear the story, and it made me learn that everyone has a story, and so if you see someone, you're like, Oh, what's this guy's deal? Well, you what's his deal? Why don't you ask him? And his story might make you cry. Like, you might not, oh, this guy's an idiot. Like, nah, the the guy's seen more horror by age 12 that then anyone should have to endure. And so I never understood, I never even heard the word empathy when I joined Black Flag. It just wasn't in my vocabulary, you know, understanding someone else's plight. But I met a lot of people who had done prison time or had the awful experience with the stepfather or the mom's boyfriend, and on and on. That by the time I was like 25 in 1986, I had really connected with a pretty um intense demographic of Americans. And it was a good instruction because never again have I judged anyone like because you don't know the story, and quite often, even yeah, and and I apply that these days, like you meet some people and their politics are really wow, and they'll say things, you're like, that's none of that is true, and it it can be offensive. You know, Joe Biden needs kids, like, oh geez. And then you get to talking to them, and they're okay, they're just getting really bad intelligence from whatever the news outlet is. Well, my son-in-law told me, well, your son-in-law needs to, you know, he needs to get some better ingredients. And uh I I live in a neighborhood where you know people have their Trump Vance signs on their lawn, and uh, you know, it's not the way I vote, but then you meet them, and they're so nice, like you it's they're incredibly nice, and uh so you know, my early life, as it does with a lot of people, it prepared me for the rest of my life, and being on the streets so much, you know, because before a a show in Black Flag, there's really nothing to do, you know, you're not going the there's no money, so you're just kind of sitting around waiting to do the show, and that's what that's why I started writing. Just because like I I you'd see something crazy that happened the night before, I started writing it down. Right. I'd like to steal a pen from the bar we were playing in, and a lot of venues would have those flyers with like the month of shows, and the backside is blank. And I've got about 50 of those in some box somewhere with like crooked writing. Well, I saw a dope deal go down yesterday, and it was a guy who was an undercover cop, and I watched the guy get busted, and I just had these in this insanity of my life, and from like 1 p.m. to 8 p.m., there's nothing to do, you know, and I didn't do drugs, so I'd walk around, go to the local bookstore or record store, check that out, and do like a journal thing. And that became part of the uh book Get in the Van. Was just like trying to do something with the time, right, and trying to document these kind of crazy experiences. And I I think it was uh I feel very fortunate to have met who I met, seen what I saw, and have the presence of mind to document some of it. I mean, if I had to do it all over again, I would have documented all of it. Right. I I would have saved my money and bought a camera, you know, and took photos, but I I I never thought of that.
SPEAKER_04Is that how your spoken words got started? Or like did you did you start doing spoken word before that? It was that was through like uh Harvey Kubernetes. Didn't he get you kind of started into going into Spoken Word, or how was that?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, uh all that's true. And Harvey is still with us, fascinating guy. Okay, guy has a million stories, like he met he met everybody. The you know, saw the stooges, saw the doors, like he goes way back. He's kind of like an LA culture guy, you know, he knows everybody. And he would put on these shows in at different clubs in Hollywood where like 20 people go on stage, everyone gets like five minutes. And so it and you you can read a poem, you can sing a song, but it's five minutes. And like, how bad can it be? It's only five minutes. So if someone goes up there and they're awful, it's only five minutes. And if they're great, it was a great five minutes. And so he would do these multi-people shows all the time. Chuck Dekowski was one of the people he'd ask, because Chuck was always taking notes on things. He had these notebooks of doom. And we're living at the beach, which was like, you know, nowheresville. And Chuck said, I'm driving into Hollywood tonight in the black flag van to go do my five minutes at this Harvey Kubernetes thing. He's and I said, I'll go. Because you know, you might meet some girls, go into the, you know, into the big city. So I went with him. It was a great night. I think uh there's like members of the surf punks were on stage, uh, the Minutemen. I think Jeffrey Lee Pierce of the Gun Club was up there reading something. A couple of actors. Uh there's a guy from the film Taxi Driver. I think he was the character Doughboy, but he was also a local poet as well. I'm forgetting his name. And this is the kind of thing Harry Dean Stanton, the actor, he would show up for these things. Nice. And so I'm with Chuck. All these people do their thing. It's a great night. And Kubernetes comes up to me. I kind of know him. He said, Hey, you got a big mouth. That's true. Why don't you do five minutes on the next one of these? And I said, I don't know, man. I, you know, what am I gonna do up there except bomb? He goes, Well, we're paying ten dollars. I'm like, oh, I'm in, because ten dollars will buy you a lot of, you know, uh dented avocados. And so I'll take that action. And so, you know, a few weeks go by, and now it's Chuck and I are same venue, place called the Lhasa Club, uh in Hollywood. Uh, you can walk a few minutes from the Lhasa Club and be at Oakie Dogs, same neighborhood. Kind of beat, but not exactly dangerous. It's on a little street called Hudson. Anyway, I get on the stage and I read a couple of things that I'd written, and then I tell a quick story about what had happened the day before at Black Flag Practice, where some local neo-Nazis tried to run over Greg Ginn as he was walking to a store to try and buy some orange juice. And that was just a normal day for Black Flag, like you know, the neo-Nazis try and run over our guitar player. Um, we were in a gang neighborhood in Long Beach, and there's a Mexican gang, and we're you know, in the storage room trying to practice, and they came in and said, This is our neighborhood, so we want to be able to like check you guys out. We're like, of course, like what are we gonna do? And um, they liked us, and the neo-Nazis found out we had uh non-white people at our band practice, and they got angry, and so um they were waiting for one of us to come out of the practice place, and it was Greg, and he had to run up onto a lawn to escape a car full of these idiots. Anyway, I told that story, which is like me telling you that I went to the grocery store yesterday. It's like so, but in my life, it was a so what, like, yeah, our guitar player nearly got run over by neo-Nazis. And anyway, the audience does not live that way, and their mouths are open. They're like, What the hell? I want oh, look, my five minutes is over, and people are like, no, do more, do more. I'm like, well, it's time for the next guy. So Harvey comes up after the show and he said, You are a natural for you know telling stories on stage. How about this? How about you do like 15 minutes, and I'll give you$25 opening for a poet that I manage. Okay. So I'm in some, you know, coffee shop. I don't know, I forget it was like probably within six weeks. And then that goes very well, and then you'll do half an hour and you'll get whatever. And then the poet I opened for now has to open for me because I become a draw. Right, and this kind of went from strength to strength, 84, 83 into 84, and by 1985, I did a cross-country tour of little clubs, just me on my own, with some local poet person, you know, opening. And then the venues got bigger, and then by 80, late 85, I was asked to go to Holland to be part of a festival. And then by 87, I like finished the band tour in Europe. The band went home, and I went right back out and did the whole tour again with Lydia Lunch, like same venues, same cities. So I was in Europe for like four months, two with the band and two on my own. And then I just by a year later, Australia, New Zealand, uh, and I just the the I started just doing more of these shows in more countries. The last tour was like 27 countries. I've I've done talking shows in Dubai, Israel, South Africa, Afghanistan, Iraq, you know, with the USO in front of military. Right. Um, those shows have taken me pretty far and wide.
SPEAKER_04You you even later lunch, you had this really interesting installation, like uh, I think at the Lhasa, where you had like this small dark room and one person was left in at the time. And you either like hooked them or like saltomized them, or like well, not quite.
SPEAKER_00Um, it was Lydia's idea. It was a it was a venue downtown, and Lydia said, You and I are gonna sit in a dark room. A friend of mine is gonna drag people in and throw them into the room, and we're gonna berate them and like you know, get in their face. And I I stupidly went, okay. And this bouncer kind of guy, friend of hers, like threw a couple of people in, and we said mean things to them, and they kind of went, uh-huh, what else? I mean, like, it was like the dumbest idea that and I should have said, I should have said no. And I think Lydia figured she could talk me into anything. And on that night, she definitely talked me into that. And it was incredibly stupid. The woman I yelled at, you know, if she walked up to me and punched me in the face, I would deserve it. Wait, but I am not into you you didn't touch anyone. It was only Whirlpool. Oh, no, no, no. We we grabbed him and and and dragged him into the room and everything, but no one got beat up. Okay. It was just, it was just Lydia, it's her you were the the imagination, the mind, it maybe you shouldn't do everything you think of. And she probably found she, you know, maybe not everything is a great idea. Right. You know, it's how it's how people lose all their money. Like, well, open a restaurant and only serve fresh zebra meat. Okay, well, that there goes your life savings. And so Lydia pitched me this idea, and I was like, you know, like what, 22? Okay. And it was completely dumb. It lasted like 11 minutes.
SPEAKER_01Oh.
SPEAKER_00The whole the whole thing. Like, this is yeah, like it was just like we thought we'd be in there all night, like berating people, and and it was like I said, it was Lydia's thing. And then we did a, you know, a couple of people and just kind of went, Well, this is really. Not good. And so we just left.
SPEAKER_04Okay.
SPEAKER_00And that was it. And every once in a while, someone was like, what was that thing you did? I go, Oh, yeah, that.
SPEAKER_04Okay.
SPEAKER_00I'm sorry, I'm asking a butt then. It's just no, no, it's just it's just one of those like dumb nights of your life. And I'm not trying to throw dear Lydia under the bus. I never I never would have come up with an idea like that, much less have done it.
SPEAKER_01Okay.
SPEAKER_00And it's my fault for have gone okay, but I and I did. I I went in with it, but it was uh Lydia's uh Lydia's brainchild.
SPEAKER_04Okay. I think it's around the early 80s you were corresponding with with Charles Manson, like letters back and forth, or is that story overstated?
SPEAKER_00No, no, it's true. Um, Manson had a lawyer, uh Paul Grossack, G-R-O-S-S-A-C-K, I believe, out of Boston. Okay, and Manson had apparently recorded some music he wanted to put out. So this lawyer started soliciting the music. Touch and Go Records, they got the tapes, SST Records got the tapes, and the tapes come in in some jiffy pack envelope, you know, Charles Manson, and I read the lawyer's letter, I probably still have it. And I listen to the tapes, and the music's not bad, it's very clear. Like, you know, he had the little tape recorder in the right part of the room. You can hear every word, you can hear the guitar. There's kind of a natural echo in the room, so there's a little bit of reverb. It's pretty good. And so Greg and Chuck said, Well, let's put it out. And Henry, it'll be your project. I said, Okay. I started thinking of edits will fade in and fade out, and I can make an LP out of these one 90-minute tape and one 60-minute tape. And so I wrote Charles Manson when he was at Vacaville. And I forget how I got the address, maybe the lawyer had it. I forget, because there's no internet. And dear Mr. Manson, I am I read the book about you when I was 14. And I'm gonna be editing your these tapes, and he wrote me back, which I didn't expect. And he goes, Hey man, you know, I've seen you on MTV. We look alike, we're probably brothers. I'm like, well, no, and I ended up editing the tapes, took them to a studio which is long gone, and the owners passed away, and we bounced the cassettes off of cassette onto quarter-inch tape, made the edits, and the record was gonna come out. And in fact, I think five test pressings were made, and that's as far as it got. And that's a rare record. Um, the LA Times found out about it and did an article about it or a blurb. Black Flags SST Records set to release the recordings of Charles Manson. Really not the name you want to mention in Los Angeles, considering the history.
SPEAKER_04I mean, it's not funny, but it's kind of funny because it's so not funny.
SPEAKER_00Right, but it was and so immediately we start getting death threats. Uh, and Greg and Chuck said, nope, not worth it, and they pulled the project. And so I'm in the position of having to write Manson and saying, okay, this will take some explaining. Members of Black Flag have a record label. It's not my label, it's the label I'm on. It's not Black Flag's label, it's two guys from Black Flag's label. It's a lot of nuance. And they, not me, they decided not to put your record out. And Manson, he's you know, he's crazy. He got really mad at me. Uh well, you guys are ripping me off, and just like the Grateful Dead did, just like the Beach Boys did. Like, he just goes into this, and I I still have the letters. He was really angry. I'm like, I'm I'm sorry. Like, it's not my label. Yeah, and like we made the record, you know. I we we put time and energy into this, and it's good, you know. It's not it, he was not untalented, he's not a good guy, but he he's he's not he's not dumb, and he was not an untalented musician.
SPEAKER_01Sure.
SPEAKER_00And so I thought the record was good. Okay, and so it never came out. Um Manson, you know, it took like a a couple of letter exchanges where I I got him to kind of understand. I go, look, we got death threats, you know, like we just I don't care, but you know, Greg and Chuck, they just don't want it. And it's just it's out of my hands. And finally, you know, he's not dumb, he he understood it. And he and we we kept in touch writing occasionally until 1987. Oh really? And yeah, and so it was like 1983 to 1987 that I was in and out of correspondence with Charles Manson, and I kept everything as as one would. And it was fascinating, you know, because he's uh just you know, the guy's different and uh a very recognizable face, like in America, you know, maybe a 10-year-old might not know. But if you're about my age or older, you definitely know who that guy was. And I knew a guy whose mom was supposed to be at that house that night when Helters when Sharon Tate and everyone else uh uh lost their lives, but she couldn't get a babysitter for this guy I knew, and she escaped, like who knows what would have happened. As far as I can remember, all those people died, and she might have been one of them. And um so you want to put out a record like that, I think Greg and Chuck looking back at it were probably right to have dodged that bullet because the blowback probably would have sunk SST and gotten us in some uncharted waters, as far as like I am walking down the street and a car full of people pulled over and beat the daylights out of me. Or cops found two bags of cocaine in my pocket, and I don't do drugs. You know, just thinking about it now, it would not have come without probably severe consequences.
SPEAKER_04But this is only 15 years after the fact. I mean, like the music is still there. How about putting out today? Because there's been more distance, you know, from the actual events. What do you what do you think about that?
SPEAKER_00Well, it's not mine to put out. And uh it's you know it's not my property, it's not my intellectual property. Mention step and all those tapes, you know, you can you can find, I think you can even find all the edits and everything online. Ah, really? And I think it yeah, years ago, it was on eBay for a minute as a CDR. So the music isn't at this point rare, and the unedited the lawyer sent those tapes out to a bunch of different record labels. And so I'm willing to bet in the tape trader world, those things went everywhere. Okay, and you know, Manson made a lot of music and would just give people cassettes. If you go online, there's a handful of Manson albums out there, and I'm willing to bet I've never really checked, but I'm willing to bet one of them might be the edits that I made. Okay, and uh it was just a really insane time. Uh, but looking back, and I I don't really think about it, but but thinking about it now, Greg and Chuck, you know, they're not dumb, those guys. I think they kind of saw the future because once you put out that record, you're always gonna be the label that put that record out.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. And that the guy that guy caused a lot of pain, you know. Yes.
SPEAKER_00And I it's uh you know, but we were young, and but if it were me right now, I'm like almost 65. If someone said, Hey, you want to put that on? I don't know. Well, what are you afraid? No. But the guy caused a lot of pain, as you said. And um maybe it's for someone else to do. I just don't feel compelled. I mean, uh as far as like showing off the correspondence, that I think is more historical.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, have you ever been letters or what? Or or what?
SPEAKER_00No, it's nothing I would ever put up online. Um, but if I had some way to display them where someone could see them, that might be interesting. Because the correspondence to me is just history.
SPEAKER_01Okay.
SPEAKER_00Uh, where a record is like a commercial entity, it's intellectual property that's being bought and sold.
SPEAKER_01Sure.
SPEAKER_00Uh, and and there's money, and that to me that's where you're in maybe making light of uh a lot of people who lost quite a bit uh to these people. You know, imagine being married to Sharon Tate, uh, you know, Roman Polanski, and like, how did your wife die? Did you see the photos of your wife? I mean, wow. I don't know how anyone ever recovers from trauma like that. And so maybe it's not the grandest idea to put out something that might exacerbate that condition. Yeah. But who gives a fuck about Roman Polanski anyway? Yeah, uh no, no, I uh he's a weirdo. Uh no, but it's his wife.
SPEAKER_04But his wife got he got stabbed in the fucking stomach with her pregnant child inside it. That's fucked up. That's fucked up. Barbaric. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00None of those people deserved what happened to them at all. There's nothing in their lives they did that deserved that. And uh, I I think it's you one must be very careful with history. Yeah, like you know, there's documentaries on all this stuff, and there's documentaries on Ted Bundy, but they're not celebratory. Awesome! Like it's just like here's what the guy did, and it's not like one or two people watches, you know, thousands, if not millions, of people will watch a documentary on this guy. They like that shit, and it's not and it's not like what you like, serial killing? No. So tell me why you're watching it. Well, it's interesting because I don't think like that, I would never do that, and that is to me fascinating. To like I there's interviews with that Richard Ramirez, the night stalker. There's like a a little bit of him online. I've watched it, not because I think he was great, but uh I just want to see uh how a guy who did what he did, like I just want to hear his voice. I just want to see him move on the on my laptop screen. Yeah, because on that kind of thing, I am curious. Definitely, and you know, Jack the Ripper was a rock star. You know, back in those days, he got away with all this horrible stuff that no one ever caught him, and to this day, people still, you know, they're still looking for him, and so there is a fascination with you know some really intense stuff. But I think those the content providers should tread very carefully with how they put it out there.
SPEAKER_04Definitely. I mean, you remember Eileen, how do you pronounce her last her last name? Eileen Wardos. Yeah, yeah. We used to have I used to have a band where we used to open the show where we did like this instrumental thing. We were like an indie rock band, and we did this in instrumental track, and we played snippets of an interview with her where she was telling because they got her prints after Richard, she killed a guy called Richard Mallory, I think, and they got her prints, and they just let her keep go out in the streets and kill guys who were violent and and shit like that. And I we just put that shit on and played like over it, and just like I'm not supporting what she did, but it's it's interesting art, you know what I mean?
SPEAKER_00Right. And it didn't that doesn't make you guys bad. It's you know, maybe if you got the band back together tonight, you might not do that. Or maybe you would. But you know, I don't think it's necessarily anyone is trying to hurt anyone or re-traumatize people at all. Uh, it's just people who do things differently, serial killers, criminals.
SPEAKER_04Who do things differently? That's a great way of wording. People who do things differently. That's fucking funny.
SPEAKER_00Well, yeah, I I I would never think of grabbing women and and killing them. That's never crossed my mind. Me neither. And what the fuck? I would never watch a documentary to get tips on how I can go out and do it. But since I don't think that way, there is a fascination with someone who goes, Oh yeah, 50 times I did that. And that's why all of those crime documentaries and all those crime shows, you go online, they get literally millions of views. Are the people who are watching them, are they weird perverts? I doubt it. You know, they're just it's interesting. It's more interesting than watching.
SPEAKER_04It's more interesting than watching what? Finish your sentence, sorry.
SPEAKER_00Than a a documentary on Rembrandt. Yeah, which is interesting to me.
SPEAKER_04It's definitely low vibrational stuff, though. I mean, it don't feel exactly really, you know, festive after watching it like that.
SPEAKER_00No, and you know, I read, you know, there's some books that are very well written. Like there's a couple of books about Ted Bundy that are very graphic. You know, they just like tell you what he did to these people. And you you finish the book and you're like, wow, what why did I just do that? Yeah, why didn't I just read like 370 pages of that? But how many times has the film Silence of the Lambs been watched? Two times or millions and millions and millions?
SPEAKER_04Okay, dude, that's so funny because Silence of the Lambs and The Shining are one of the two movies I watched. I put the Shining on as like a comfort watch, which is fucked up, but I just put it on some some background, you know.
SPEAKER_00Well, but it doesn't make you a bad person. No, it doesn't, but it's interesting, you know what I mean? Yeah, exactly. And you know, we humans, you know, we we're our brains are high functioning. We can walk and chew gum and do this and that and that and that and that all at the same time. And so when you see aberrant behavior, uh pedophiles, serial killers, it to a whole lot of people, it's like I'll watch that. He did what? Like, can I see? And there's some, you know, on the internet, there's some really gnarly photos out there of all kinds of things. When I was young, when I was six, my father and my mother they got divorced very quickly after I was born. And a few years later, my father remarried a woman who had just left the FBI, and she was a lawyer, so she went into private practice, whole lot more money. And she had all these books on crime, and she was never very nice, and so I would sit and look at her books, and she wouldn't even talk to me, and she and she had these books of photos of dead bodies, like case study. And I'm like six, seven, sitting down with this big hardcover book called The Medical Legal Investigation of Death. It is now, I think, in its like in its seventh edition, okay, where they've removed parts of it because information has improved, uh, so this chapter is no longer relevant. And they've taken out a lot of the black and white photos and put in color photos. And so as a child, I was going through this book. Like every Saturday, I'm over there for the 48 hours of fear with my father and his scary new wife. I would look at these black and white photos of like dead bodies pulled out of a river after three days, gunshots, people OD'd with like the people hanging from a heating pipe in the basement of an apartment building. All this, it's what cops see. It's what detectives see, it's why they're so screwed up. And this is a textbook. Here's what a shotgun blast looks like from three feet away, from two feet away. Here's the burn marks on the flesh. That's how you know it's a contact wound. It's so an agent in the field can look at a body and go, okay, dead three days, because the insect activity, whatever. But for a little kid, it's like better than a coloring book. And so many, many, many years later, I'm speaking at the University of Dallas. And they have a bookstore, which is the size of a county, it's incredible. And so I slept somewhere on campus that night. The next morning, I'm gonna go to the airport and fly away. And I went to the bookstore because it's you know, it's the size of a Walmart. And I said to the young guy behind the counter, I go, Do you guys have the medical legal investigation of death? And he looks it up and he takes me over to it. And for some reason, I bought it because I, you know, and I I remembered the photos. And the reason I know that it's now in its like seventh or fifth edition, whatever it is, with color photos, because I just bought it again last year. And the color photo, yeah, and the color photography, everything is like crystal sharp now, and there's all this new information, okay, you know, DNA information, right? Um, more research on insect activity, right? Like, you know, timing the the date of the time of death, all of that, you know, CSI stuff. And it's in the new edition. And I read a long review of the new edition on Amazon, and I went, well, okay, to remember all those fond days from the 1960s, and the two editions sit next to each other in a bookshelf in my office.
SPEAKER_04Nice. Dude, do you remember uh do you remember a website called rotten.com? Say that again? It's a website website called rotten.com, r-o-t-t-en.com, rotten.com. Do you remember it? I don't I I I don't think I I know it. Okay, there's another website called shownomercy.com. And you could just go into suicides and then by burning, by hanging, by and I was watching like pictures of people with like who shot themselves in the head with a shotgun, so the the hat it just opens up when you shoot yourself. And and this is like when I was fucking I was fucking 10 when I watched this, and I'm 37 right now. And that shit is still it's I can't I can't unsee it. It's burnt into my brain.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, there's you know, the the human mind doesn't allow you to unsee things. And uh years ago. Dating a woman, maybe one of the smartest people I've ever met. And she was a forensic psychologist. And her area of expertise, and she's like a big deal in the state of California, a professional uh witness, you know. Anyway, um, her area of expertise was sex crimes against children, pedophiles. And she would be brought in by the state to assess a pedophile, to be an expert witness, so she would be given all the discovery, images, videos. And one night she came over, and I had a gate at my old house, and she goes, Um, I need you to close your gate. So I'm gonna take my briefcase and put it in my car. And I don't want anyone stealing it. And I go, Well, uh, why don't we I'll close the gate, but why wouldn't you just put your briefcase in the living room like you do other times? She goes, Because I have images in my files on a case I'm working on, and I just don't want those images in your home, even in a briefcase. I was like, wow. She goes, that's welcome to my life. And the stuff she's seen and heard, like testimony and the the people, the children that she works with as a as a patient, you know. I'm a like a lot of people, I'm very curious, really curious. Uh you want to see a photo of the guy who got hit by a train? Yeah, I'll I'll see that. You know, I'll just sure. Do you want to see child porn? I'm like, actually, I'll take a pass. And I have, you know, because you can't unsee it.
SPEAKER_04Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Or do you want to see, you know, a molested child, what that looks like. Uh no. Because I'm passing it. Yeah. And for a curious person, I have the anti-curiosity. You know, because I'm afraid of not being able to unsee it. Because, like, there's like probably like 10 people in the world who think it's okay to hurt a child. The rest of us don't think it's a good idea. We're violently against hurting kids. And I just don't want to see an image. Well, you're curious about everything else. I am, but not that. And I I just have no curiosity. And in the medical legal investigation of death, there is a chapter on dead kids. And there's some images in there. I can see it now. I won't describe it because you don't need to hear it. The book, you can find it. I suggest you don't. And I've I remember looking at that chapter as a little kid, going like, whoa, that's not interesting. And then I went through it as a 20-something when I bought the book and became its owner. I went, Oh, yeah, that children's section. I went through. I was like, and I just kind of quickly thumbed through it, and I've never returned to it. Like it's you know, all black and white, not the highest resolution, but it's it's children, and I just can't. Uh I I there's one image I remember. Thankfully, the rest of it somehow my brain went, nope, and it just it's it's locked them away. But there's one, and one time years ago, I was in a a crazy case, and I was a witness, and these detectives were grilling me day after day, and I hadn't done anything wrong, and they finally figured that out. But they're like treating me like I'm a bad guy, and I'm so pissed off. And one day, you know, they said, Well, Henry, we figured out that you're not criminally involved. I'm like, thanks, Einstein. And I said, So why are you guys such jerks? And the one detective he said, Henry, do you have any idea what we see and who we deal with every day? I'm like, No. He goes, Here's what we deal with. We go into a hotel room, and there's a dead guy on the floor, you know, prost a John in a prostitution thing, and there's the pimp standing over him with a smoking gun that he swears belongs to his cousin, and he's never killed anyone. Like, people lie to us, and we see dead bodies. We see dead children who've been raped and killed. We see people lit on fire, and no one ever says they did it. Like, we catch them with the gun and the bullet's still coming out, and I didn't do it. Like, everyone lies to us. Why would you be different? Yeah. I was like, I didn't lie to you once. We know that now, but we had to use the you know the detective process to figure that out because everyone lies to us, and we see dead bodies, and we're all screwed up. I'm like, wow, and I've never forgotten that conversation because I've met so many members of law enforcement, you know, because now they're like, hey Henry, you live here? Like they recognize me from TV or whatever. And you get into conversations with them, and I go, You guys see some really awful stuff. They're like, dude, it's heartbreaking what we see. Uh you know, what what gets done to women, you know, in in domestic violent relationships. Um, one time a Canadian prison guard wrote me. He said, Henry, I love your stuff, man, and I just need to vent because the people I deal with, like you know, that I mind over every day, they're just you wouldn't believe what people are in prison for. Yeah, and he describes this guy told me how him and his brother were high on crystal meth, and they did this to the guy's girlfriend's daughter. You're like, whoa! They're like, Yeah, and they're happy to tell you all about it. He goes, and that's what I take home with me when I leave the job every day. And he's you know, and the guy said, I'm not handling it very well. And I wrote him back, I said, I'm so sorry. Pal, you really should quit. Like, you know, just find something else to do. Why the fuck are you not one day gonna go? Yeah, because obviously you're not the guy for that job. And ultimately, I don't think anyone is. Like, eventually, it's gonna get to you. Even if you say it won't, it will haunt you somehow. And you know, during the Iraq War, I was in Iraq and Afghanistan and Abu Dhabi and Dubai, all these places, right, talking to the soldiers. Right. I I did it like quite a lot. Yeah, and I'm in those days, I was like 40 something, 50 something, I forget. And you're talking to 19-year-olds who the day before have seen more catastrophe. And they they tell you about the smell of burning bodies. You're like, whoa! And like you'll you never forget the smell of anything, pizza, perfume, like whatever. And that's what these young people uh endure, you know, and then they go home and they they go back to Wisconsin. Like they're 23 and they've seen more than what anyone should and for the rest of their lives. Right. You know, they're they're screwed. And it it's a great promotion for how war is such a uh incredibly bad idea. And even arguing in conflict, I am passionately against vigorous debate. Sure, let's let's talk about healthcare. Fine, let's raise our voices. Um but you know, abusing someone verbally or otherwise, uh, because they're black or they're gay or they're female, you know, that that stuff leaves marks. And uh I want you know, no part of it. But that's because I I've seen what I've seen, and it's made me uh ironically, it's made me a better person.
SPEAKER_04It's uh it's often stuck in families. Like my grandpa was a pedophile and like abused me and my cousins and every and no one did shit about it. And this is like in a small town on the east of Iceland, and I'm coming out with a poetry book next fall, and I'm talking about the town. Like you guys knew no one did anything. The small town called Dependency, it paralyzed you. And if it takes like a whole town to raise a child, it takes a whole town to molest a child. You know what I mean? And that guy's dead. I agree, and no one did shit to that guy.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, people get away with things. I mean, there's a there's heartbreaking documentaries on those, you know, the bad priest. And you see some guy like my age, you know, too old to be breaking down and crying like a little kid, but they get these people who are brave enough to tell their story, and the guy's like, you know, some big old geezer who's balding, and suddenly he's crying uncontrollably from something that happened to him like 50 years ago. And you you feel it's it's heartbreaking to watch this guy, he's trying to tell the story, but he can't hold it together. There's documentaries you can see, and you're like, wow, this poor guy, he's like 65, and this happened from ages like 11 to 13, and he's been carrying that, and he will continue to carry. And you know, for the benefit of the camera, he tried to talk about it and he couldn't make it through. Fuck, and you just see these grown men weeping uncontrollably in the pain. It's like not like crying at the end of a sad movie, it's like crying like my guts hurt and I'm I'm screaming in agony. The crying is so hard. You're like, wow, humans, and the thing I I talked about on the on either the last tour or the tour before. I said, maybe I'm old, but the thing that really occurs to me is that we humans were not delicate necessarily, because I don't want the alphas to get up and hit me, right? But humans are fragile because we can articulate that so well with our high-functioning brains, where also everyone can be broken, like, oh, nothing can break me. Two days of the good interrogator, you'll confess to killing Kennedy, just to make it stop. No, and anyone can be broken, anyone can be traumatized. So, as the Buddhists say, life is horrible, be kind. And so since you know that about yourself and everyone else, we are easy to get to. You can tease me and hurt me, and I'll act act out and kick a dog or something. You know, I'll take it out and get drunk. Like it has ripple effects, like the guy gets since humans are so easy to screw up, it doesn't take an act like molestation, which is catastrophic. It can just be like, hey, fat boy, like at school, like, hey, what's up, faggot?
SPEAKER_04Like something like that. Wait, are you talking about the people ruined people? Are you talking about people react on that shit?
SPEAKER_00I'm just talking about what humans do to each other so gratuitously on a regular basis.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, but it there's there's there needs keep sorry, keep it going, sir.
SPEAKER_00Well, well, I'm just saying since we know that we're all somewhat neurotic, all adults are weird. And no one had a perfect childhood. Everyone's got stuff, right? All adults are carrying baggage of some kind. You know, the bad breakup, the bad parent, whatever. Everyone's got stuff that keeps them up at night. Why why keep heaping it on? And you know, I I go out into the world every day, I go to the gym, I go to the grocery store. People talk to me all the time. Hey Henry, you live here? Like, yeah. And you know, I'm cool. You know, I don't carry myself like I'm any better. But here's the thing I've been doing for years, and it's very, very useful. I pretend that everyone I meet who comes like, hey dude, you what's up? At the gym, I talk to people kind of sort of every day. No way! Whatever. I pretend that person either lost their mom the day before, got their car wrecked, got their house broken into the day before. And so I just pretend that they just had a really bad experience. So I'm like, oh hey man, good to meet you.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Where it and it's a very useful thing to do, just to acknowledge that all adults in America credit debt, you know, everyone's got a mortgage they can't handle, their kids don't talk to them, you know, their their father sucks. Yeah, and you're now changing his diapers, like everyone's got stuff, and it makes me tread very carefully with my fellow humans, um, just because um, you know, all adults are walking wounded just because of what we do to each other. And these days with the internet, you can be really mean and not have to let anyone know who you are. You can hide and like talk about the fat chick at school and and like you know, make a Facebook page about some poor person who's 15 and has a weight issue. And I knew someone I I would go play with their kids all the time. One of the kids is named after me, so I'd drive over to their place on Sunday and play with the kids. Right. And one of the kids was a girl, she's a girl and she's like very actress-y. She comes in and starts singing, she's great. Um, she she would she got teased at school. I forget what grade it was, but the students made a Facebook page about her, and they really piled on as kids can be mean. Like, who's teaching them that? And with Facebook, you know, you can just do lots of stuff. The internet is harsh. And this poor thing got so tripped out, she lost control of her dietary habits, she had to leave the school. Uh, the trauma kept going, she got into drugs. Uh, she would literally escape from rehab centers. Like she just she she had this like a wild animal of a problem that clawed at her for years. And she she's okay now. Yeah, you know, she's not abusing herself with hard drugs and living with strange men downtown, which she was doing. It's like right out of a movie. And before this happened, she was like so much fun to be with, just a bright light. And this and and never hurt anyone.
SPEAKER_04I mean, she's just a she's a nice person. What's her light? What's her light to the thing? And the kids who did this to her. Did they squash her light? I'm sorry, did they squash her light?
SPEAKER_00Right, right. For nothing. And the kids who did it, well, but but they're not bad either. They're just miscarried.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I mean, who's who's to blame? Should we go like should we go and blame the parents?
SPEAKER_00Well, if it takes a village to raise a child, yeah, it takes a village to raise a pedophile and a molested child. So should we go to their house or what what's like what should we do about it? I I just think everyone who can should step up their game. Yeah, be more responsible. Yeah. And if you know, if you can't be cool to people, then stay inside. Like just like take the day off from humanity. Uh and just the the gratuitous, like yelling things at people out of a car, or you know, whatever people do, like, ah, he'll be okay. Why why have to find out if the person's okay? Um, and it just sounds like, oh, Henry got old, he's like, oh, peace and love now. Not hardly. I I I I've just seen so much of this in my life that's never appealed to me. But you know, as an adult, I I try and come up with with like solutions.
SPEAKER_04No, no, dude. No, okay, that's a this crystallizes, and when you got hit in the head with a fucking beer can in 80 something in Germany, and you could could have gone into the crowd and beat the fuck out of them, but you just looked them in the eye and said, I didn't do anything to you. Why would you do something like this to me? You still had that shit in you. You know what I mean? You haven't changed in that way.
SPEAKER_00And well, I am violently inclined, uh-huh, not to towards women, but towards men. I think every man, you you and me included, right?
SPEAKER_04You need an ass whooping and you wrote about that a thing in SIC, where you're thinking about just pushing him off a let. Was that in SIC?
unknownOh.
SPEAKER_00No, that's in some of your writings. That book that that book is drenched in violence. That book was fucking amazing.
SPEAKER_04You told me that you're writing a book. Is it like uh like I'm not telling uh it's not like a state fanatic book? It's like in the same vein as SIC. It's processed by you, that's what you're working on right now.
SPEAKER_00Well, I I am writing another one of those because that's just how I process everything from the president to history. Dude, another one of those.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. Sikh was fucking amazing. So Goodman. Um so good man, like Albert Guzman and you know the the the Baker.
SPEAKER_03All of that comedy fucking goldman. That's the funniest shit I've read. Space Force of Manta.
SPEAKER_00You know, getting those, like, you know, the the the king of the king of Benin. I I have 30 million dollars I need to give you. To get those people to write you back and to be passive aggressive with them, you know, and like all those transcripts that are in the book, none of that I made up. All of that is a direct. I mean, those people really did write me back. Right. And you just invent these characters, like, aha. And I'm writing these things like alone in my little office, like just laughing out loud as I'm writing it. Right. As the rivulets of lemon sauce go down their fat little cheeks. Aha! Um, it's because it's it's insane. It's it's what I do with my anger, you know. I I just write it out. Um, and so I've got another one of those books I'm working on slowly. Uh another Stay Fanatic book. I'm kind of finishing it right now, getting ready to give it to Heidi so she can be the volume five, yeah.
SPEAKER_04Volume five.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, no, there's four that are out, and so I'm the fifth one I'm working on.
SPEAKER_04Sorry, you're doing volume five now. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Of course. Okay. Okay, sorry.
SPEAKER_00Well, actually, there's ten that have been written. Uh, it's easy to write them. It takes forever to scan all the images and do all of the uh just to make sure all the facts are correct. Because in every paragraph, this record came out in 1968. Whoops, 1967. Don't get that wrong. So everything has to be fact-checked. Because you know, don't don't get a fact wrong about Iggy Pop. That's disrespectful. So don't get a fact wrong about it. And you know, scanning takes hours and hours and hours. The new Fanatic book, I think, has like over like six or seven hundred scans. And I don't know how that happened. I I have no idea how that happened, but it happened. Yeah, and so uh I I'm just trying, I'm down to like the last hundred scans. I I can't wait for this book to be done. I I've been working on it for like two years now.
SPEAKER_04Okay. So let's go back for just a bit. Uh I'm sorry to hold you this long. I was gonna go through much more more material. Uh there's uh like an early early spoken word piece called Al Johnson's bedroom. Like I think it appeared on Radio Tokyo Tapes World Volume 3. Do you remember that one where you go into your father's bedroom? I don't remember it. Oh Al Johnson's bedroom, yeah. Tom Trocoli was like doing like uh uh guitar on top of it, like uh yeah, Spur of the Mommy guitar.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Um i it's my father he died finally. But um he what he didn't like music. When did your father die? He died about five years ago. Okay, and you knew in uh an assisted living place.
SPEAKER_04You were never w in touch with him.
SPEAKER_00Uh no. Uh uh I I was in my office one day, Heidi and I were working away, and I got an email from a guy. He said, uh, I hope this is the right address. And he stated his name. He said, I work in an assisted living facility in Maryland, uh East Coast. And he said, Uh, your father is here, and his condition is deteriorating. He does not have long to go. And he wishes to speak to you. He goes, obviously, I don't know your relationship, but if you want to make contact with him, here's my phone number. I'm just he asked me to find you, and there it is. And I wrote the guy back and just said thanks, noted and sent it. And I didn't make contact with him, and then he died I think like seven or eleven days later. Is it?
SPEAKER_01But I'm I I don't keep going.
SPEAKER_00Oh, well, I just didn't like you know, I I showed the email to Heidi. She said, What are you gonna do? I said, I'm not interested in having a conversation with my father. Either he wants to be sorry or he wants to go, Wow, I've seen you on TV. I I don't want to hear any of it, I'm just not interested. And I don't want to give him the opportunity to somehow in his mind clear things up at the very end. Right.
SPEAKER_04Can I can I ask you if it's not too personal?
SPEAKER_00Like make it right with my son.
SPEAKER_04Like what what did it do or not do for you to feel this way about him? If that's okay.
SPEAKER_00He was a scary guy. Yeah, sure. He was a scary guy. Uh you know, he he was an alcoholic. Uh he wanted me to be a racist like him. So I would visit him on the weekends due to the divorce agreement, and he would tell me about Marvin food stamp, which is any black man, and he would call black men spades. So he said, the only good spade is a dead spade. He said, but there are every once in a while, there's a good spade, but there's not many of them. But most of them just should be killed. And he would make fun of my mom, and he would say, Well, you know, your mom is a spade lover because she had black friends, she listened to black music. And I'm like seven, and I'm like, What do you wow? Like, this is a bad childhood I'm having. This sucks. And he would get me to drink with him, you know, because misery needs company. And he'd get me, he'd make sure I was always sober when he'd return me to my mom. And then he married this terrifying woman and her pedophile son who became my stepbrother.
SPEAKER_04Really?
SPEAKER_00And yeah, a psycho a psychopath. And so it was a very unfun growing up. And I'm not trying to say poor me. I'm fine.
SPEAKER_04I'm saying, I'm saying, Henry Henry, listen to me. I'm saying unfun is the biggest fucking understatement that has been uttered in this interview. Well, it it it fun, it could have been happier, I'm sure. I'm saying unfun is such an understatement, it's almost funny. You know what I mean?
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Okay, keep going.
SPEAKER_04I'm sorry, keep going.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Well, well, no, it's just um luckily I I understood at a very early age, and I was a young idiot, but I I came upon something quite profound, and I have no idea, excuse me, how I came upon it. By age eight, I realized neither Iris, my mom, or Paul, my father, had anything they could give me as far as wisdom, guidance, and I just realized I'm on my own. Wow. So as soon as I could, I got a job and make my own money. I never asked for an allowance. Like, hey, can I have a dollar to go to the movies? I'll make the money. I don't want to talk to you guys. And I that's what connected me with music. So I just stay in my room and listen to records of the radio. Or, you know, it got me working because if you're working, you can't be in the apartment with mom and her psycho boyfriends who like to beat up the kid. And you can't visit your dad on the weekends.
SPEAKER_04Did did your mom also had bad boyfriends?
SPEAKER_00Oh, the worst. I really they hated me. Uh yeah, and some of them were perverts. It was just a it was just like one bad turn after another.
unknownOkay.
SPEAKER_00And I'm you know, and I'm hyperactive, like you know, and they're putting me on drugs to keep me to from you know running out of the room. What was they giving?
SPEAKER_04They gave it the Ritalin.
SPEAKER_00They sure did.
SPEAKER_03Me too, men, me too.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, like Me Too men. Like by the by the by the like the fistful until I was like 17.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, me too.
SPEAKER_00And I just stopped taking it.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, me too.
SPEAKER_00I took Ritalin from kindergarten to 11th grade.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, it just dumps your fucking personality down.
SPEAKER_00It it it really it's not subtle. And uh in the summers, I would be let off the Ritalin, and man, I was like, you know, suddenly, you know, it's like a sailor with all the booze he wants. You know, you're just you don't know who this person is because you're so used to being under the the effect of Ritalin. When you're off it for like seven days, suddenly I don't sleep, I run around, I talk a bunch of crap, I'm uncontrollable, which is why they had me on it in the first place. But like summer camp, I'm like, you know, we gotta send your son home. Like he's biting the other kids, like I was nuts. And so, you know, and the interesting, not revenge, if you will, but the ironic, you know, chapter after, you know, I leave home is like I go out into the world and I become this person, you know, who's recognizable, you know, award-winning. And my father was always about money, he's an economist, so he's literally about numbers. He's a PhD, not a dumb guy, just a mean guy. And he was always about how much money do you make? Money, money, money, money. And my mom, you know, she was worked for the government, so you know, she's always broke. But my father's always about money. And I wonder if he has had any idea of that I probably ended up making more money than him and his well-paid lawyer wife together, like times five. And I wonder if he ever he probably never did, and I would have never called him to tell him. Uh money's not interesting to me. Um but the irony of I, you know, I went through some, you know, kind of regrettably sad times as a kid. I was able to take all of that and not turn into a junkie, a drunk, an abuser of women or children or myself, and I turned it into uh a pretty interesting life. You know, that is, you know, interesting events like records, books, movies, TV, and access. You know, I I've seen a lot, I've met a lot of interesting people, I've been to like 85 countries. Um, and that all comes from a lucky break, black flag, and and not turning the abuse on myself, which happens sadly.
SPEAKER_03Or other people end up or other people, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Right, and and you can turn it on yourself, you can turn it on others.
SPEAKER_04I I I got molested as a kid, I've never molested the person in my fucking and like it wouldn't occur occurred to me to do that.
SPEAKER_00Right, but and and thankfully you never did, sadly. Uh, and and psychologists talk about this. There's a name for it, yeah, where at a certain time in your life it comes back, and you need someone to abuse. Like sometimes the kid at school gets bullied, a year later, testosterone hits him, and he becomes the bully.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_00Because bad information going in, I mean bad results going out.
SPEAKER_04I I just cut my wrists. Can you see that?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I sure can.
SPEAKER_04And that one too. Like, I I just I just but that's in 2021. I just turned it in inward. I'm in a much much better place now, but I never took it out on a even if my girlfriends were like punching me in the face and destroying my phones, and I was in an abusive relationship. I was always just like, like, I'm not I'm not I'm not gonna fucking hate it.
SPEAKER_00Thankfully, yeah, uh thankfully a lot of people are like you where they got a they got abused, sadly. Yeah, but they it never occurred to them to be an abuser.
SPEAKER_04Right.
SPEAKER_00Uh and it's there's no excuse for bad behavior. Like you can't say, well, he was raised by bad people and that's why he had to kill nine women. Uh no, like sorry. Well, lots of people get abused and they don't turn into serial killers. Uh let's just admit that the guy just liked killing women. Like, like he he might want to say that before on his way to the electric chair, and not blame mommy and daddy. And so I don't blame my parents for anything. Like I had a I had a a childhood that kind of sucked. I'm fine. Like, you know what I mean? I I I I turned I took and that you know, my father, the only time he ever talked about music, he talked about how he liked Al Jolson. And that's why I wrote the thing saying Al Jolson's bedroom.
SPEAKER_04Wait, he didn't live in his house.
SPEAKER_00It's a reference to my father.
SPEAKER_04He didn't live in his house. Is that a misquote?
SPEAKER_00No, I I lived in my father's house on the weekends.
SPEAKER_04I know I'm telling you, your dad did not live in Al Jolson's house. That's a misquote. No. No, he didn't. Okay, that's just you know, he was a person. Ah, that's a mis misquote I got then. Okay, excuse me. Okay.
SPEAKER_00He was Al Jolson was insanely popular. Okay. Right around the time my dad was, you know, of an age to hear him. Right. You know, for me, I I've heard like two or three Al Jolson songs. It's not uh, you know, it's not for me. Yeah, but he was he was huge uh when my father was uh a young person.
SPEAKER_04But but that piece, Al Jolson's bedroom, it's a little bit like the ant by the doors. Where when you come into your dad's bedroom and you know you're gonna kill him. Is there anything else?
SPEAKER_00He might have been influenced by that song. I I don't know.
SPEAKER_04I I honestly it's it's much more direct, it's much more intense, much more more sinister. And I mean that in the best possible way. Oh, thanks. Yeah, I mean piece.
SPEAKER_00Oh, thank you. Yeah, I mean, I I never reread any of my old stuff. Like I get, you know, I work very hard. You know, books take a long time to write. I mean, they take a long time, or they take me a long time. It's easy to write them, it's the rewrite and the edit that you you lose, you know, two years of your life to. And so by the time a book comes back from the printer, and I own the company, so the books, you know, we get them drop shipped off the back of a truck. It's not magic. We put in an order for the book and they print them and they put them on a truck and they drive them from Michigan and they drop them off in my driveway. And we, you know, have to struggle to sell them. And so I will grab a book from the box, and I've done a ritual for over 20 years. The first book in my hand, I sign it and I send it to Ian Mackay, my best friend. And so for the last like 20 some books, the first time I saw that book as a physical thing in the world, it's on Ian's bookshelf at his house. And I always say, first one out of the box, Henry. And so I will look at the book, just to look at the printing, and go, okay, I'll spend about a minute or less looking at the book. I put I keep a copy for myself, I put it on the shelf, and I never ever go back to it.
SPEAKER_01Okay.
SPEAKER_00I just make I just make the next one. Yeah, I'm not. You know, I know some people in bands, they'll sit and play you. Hey, we just found this old demo of ours. Like you will like you're interested in listening to something you did 20 years ago? Yeah, I'm not. No, I I I have no interest in my past really. I'm just into and and one of the one of the best things about finishing a book is your work area is clear, so you can build something else.
SPEAKER_02Right.
SPEAKER_00And that, you know, for me, completing anything, the the joy of it is like, okay, we worked very hard, we did it, it's finished. It started in my mind, and now you can hold it in your hand. And but the best part of that is all right, what's next? I because here's an empty an empty table.
SPEAKER_04I love a quote that I heard by you many years ago that you like to feel like you always have your back against the wall, you know, so you have to prove yourself every time. Yeah, do you remember that quote?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I I really believe in uh always being a freshman with something to prove. Yeah. And I'd rather have resolve than ambition. Definitely.
SPEAKER_04So, Henry, we're out of time. Uh, I want to thank you for coming on. Sure, man. I started this podcast two years ago called Peeling the Onion. My first guest was Greg Norton from Who's Girl Doo. And then you and then you were my second guest, and I was nobody, you know, and you got on and talked to me. You know what I mean? And then I got Joe on from Fugashi, I got uh Chris Balou from Chr from the presidents of the United States of America, he's a great guy. Uh Blixabakelt.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, Joe Lally is an amazing guy too.
SPEAKER_04I I got Blix Abackelt from from uh Einsturs in the Neubotten. Wow. And I even went out, I did like a 90-minute interview with him, and then I went out to France, and we sat down for like half an hour and talked.
SPEAKER_00Is is that where he lives now?
SPEAKER_04No, no, they were just touring and I went out and saw some shows.
SPEAKER_00Because you know, he he was got married or had a girlfriend in 2008.
SPEAKER_04That's why he quit the bad seats.
SPEAKER_00Well, yeah, he was in, I think in like Los Angeles or Northern California. He was in America for a while.
SPEAKER_04Right, right. He was living in Santa Barbara.
SPEAKER_00Okay, Santa Barbara.
SPEAKER_04He's super cool, he's super cool.
SPEAKER_00And then I I met Glix uh when he was in the bad seeds. That's that's the first time I met him, summer 1984.
SPEAKER_04And then I had him on the other day, and I was like way too intense, and he shoved me down after 11 minutes, and I thought that was funny as fuck. And then I got Steve Albini on, like two and a half months before he died. I got Steven, I got Lou Barlow, David Yao, Bus Osborne, and then I'm starting this radio show this summer on Icelandic public radio called Leukuren or The Onion, where I'm gonna do like long-form documentaries about music and you know stuff. So I was wondering if it's okay because I wanted to ask a lot about the Raleigh Rollins band and stuff like that. If I could possibly get you on in like a month for just like a half an hour and just go through the questions because we just kind of rambled on. Is that okay?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I guess.
SPEAKER_04Okay. If it's if it's not too much, I I hope I'm not imposing.
SPEAKER_00No, I mean, I I'm not much on when I was younger, I learned from Black Flag and David Lee Roth to do every interview you can. Like in Black Flag, we did we would be interviewed like, hey, my father died, he wants to interview. We'll do it.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, yeah. I just want to go through a new meeting, David Lynch and shit like that. You know what I mean?
SPEAKER_00But you know, my old ethos, you know.
SPEAKER_04We we we got twenty we got 20 seconds left, just so you know. Oh, okay.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, well, uh, I was I was just going to say, I I used to do every possible interview and now I do them very rarely.
SPEAKER_04I really appreciate your time, Henry. I'm a big fan of yours, and and thank you so thank you so much for getting on. I'll send you an email for the next one. All the best, dude.
SPEAKER_00Okay, bye.
SPEAKER_04Okay, have a good day. Okay, okay, bye.