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You've talked a little bit about how RevCo has a different vibe, and since you guys had this album completed a while ago, and you've mentioned that RevCo definitely has a more 'party' atmosphere, what was it like in terms of the actual recording process? Obviously you had more input on this album than you did on Ministry's The Last Sucker.
Quirin: Well, it was a lot more work, to be honest with you, for me, because basically Al had said to me that he wanted me to start working on the record. I asked him what, if anything, he had in mind, and he said, 'Well, that's your job.' And so he kind of let me loose in the studio, which was really cool, you know? As an artist, it's a really cool thing to have that freedom and that support from your producer, so that was a really cool thing. The first song that I wrote was 'HookerBot 3000.' I did all the music for that and then presented it to Josh, and he did all the vocals on it and stuff like that. Then we presented it to Al, and he loved it, and from that point on, he was just like, 'Write 10 more songs like that.' It was a very cool atmosphere for me; it was a lot of work, man. I felt...I don't want to say pressure or anything like that, but I definitely felt like I had to deliver the goods. I didn't want to let him down, and I didn't want to let RevCo fans down either. I went back to a lot of the older RevCo material just as inspiration, so to speak, because I'm a big fan of the older stuff; to me, songs like 'No Devotion' and the first couple RevCo albums were my favorites. I tried to bring back a little more of the electronic vibe, a little more of the dance vibe. Some of the repetitive bass lines and riffs are the things that I did incorporate with the new songs. So to answer your question, it was a fun vibe in the studio, but it was a lot of work, as well.
Josh, you had joined RevCo during the tour for Cocked and Loaded, and you actually also had a brief appearance on The Last Sucker, but this is the first album that you've actually had a part in writing and recording.
Bradford: For Cocks? Yeah. Did you actually check out that Cover Up album? I sang; I was the main singer on two of the tracks. I did 'Bang a Gong,' 'Radar Love,' and backups on 'Under My Thumb' and another one, so that was cool, but I think we recorded that after Sex-O Olympic-O. They were released differently. But yeah, this is the first actual one aside from a remix where I re-sang 'Fire Engine,' which was on Cocked and Loaded; this was the first Cocks stuff I had ever written, yeah, and it ended up being the whole album, which was pretty crazy. I was expecting in the beginning, 'Yeah, I get to write one or two alongside the rest of the crazy asses,' but it ended up going so well that Al just said to go with it.
You worked with Clayton in a band called Stayte before.
Bradford: Yes, for 10 years and we're still going, alive and kicking. It's how Al found us.
How does working in Cocks relate to that? In terms of how you approach the lyrics, how you approach the material, what are the main differences?
Bradford: There are some major differences. Stayte has always been mine and Clayton's heart and soul, where all our real passion and angst and everything has been, and that turned out really well. You know, Al and Angie really dug Stayte originally. We were supposed to open that tour, the Cocked and Loaded tour, but then Al was like, 'Screw it, you're joining Cocks,' which was cool, whereas writing for Cocks...it's like writing for Cocks, the best way to put it would be. I'm not saying that I actually did this, as I can't admit to any drug use or anything, but if you were to take off all your clothes and take a whole bunch of hallucinogens and just babble into a tape recorder, that's what Cocks lyrics – what you could make out on the tape – would be. It's a little bit different. Actually, some of the songs came to be because we would name the song first, the dumbest thing we could think of, and then write the lyrics around that. On 'Wizard of Sexville,' Al was like, 'Write something about wizards and weird shit.' He wanted me to compete against Robert Plant and all his weird lyrics and Led Zeppelin.
That worked, then, because you listen to the lyrics about Hobbits and just think, 'Wow, it's a song about Hobbit porn.'
Bradford: Well he said, 'Wizard,' so I was like, 'Hell yeah, we've got to rewrite Lord of the Rings, like the porn version.'
As far as your vocal style goes, obviously it's very different from what people are used to from Al. How have people responded to that in terms of when you performed on the tour and what people have been telling you about their reaction to the record so far?
Bradford: Well, I definitely don't know how to sing, and so the only reason I continue is because of what Iggy Pop said, which was that 'I can't sing, you can't sing, let's all sing.' But I think there's a general malaise of people being too afraid to tell me to sing better. I think, as well, that a lot of people don't want to say something condescending, you know, to a man in a dress, because you never know how that can end up, you know? But no, the tour was fun; it went well. I had big shoes to fill on some of the songs, that's for sure. But, you know, I actually wanted the same thing myself, because I don't even necessarily think my vocal style fits in. I think I sound like a fag – I mean, in a nice way, you know – not like, condescending to homosexuals. But you know, that term. I think I sound stupid, but I guess everyone thinks it's OK, so hey, let's keep going.
Sin, you mentioned once before that for Ministry it was a lot more precise, having to play those machine gun riffs, and in RevCo it was generally a little looser. In terms of actual writing style, what was different in terms of your mindset? Obviously RevCo is a little more tongue-in-cheek.
Quirin: Yes, definitely. I had to switch gears, man, because going from Ministry, which is very precise in its writing and its playing, to more of a tongue-in-cheek party and dance atmosphere and attitude is what I had to do. It was different in that I didn't necessarily have to be – not to make this sound like I was sloppy in the studio – I knew I could play a little looser, if that makes any sense, with these songs and my planning rather than with a Ministry album. With Ministry, it's like, man my right arm looks like Popeye's after playing Ministry tunes and playing Ministry songs. With RevCo, it's more strumming some chords here and there, and it's a little more of a Rolling Stones attitude or vibe of playing rhythm guitar, where things are kind of loose; they almost sound like they could fall apart at any second, you know? So that's where I came from with that.
It's funny you say that, because Sex-O Olympic-O sounds like the most cohesive RevCo album. It seems like you guys have a really tight sound between the three of you – Josh, you, and Clayton – and obviously Al was involved as well.
Quirin: Yeah, stuff like that means a lot to me because I definitely had that in mind. I wanted us to have a cohesive album, not something that necessarily sounded like things were coming out of left field all the time. I wanted every song to be different in its own way, but at the same time, I wanted to make a statement as a whole. I wanted to capture a little more of that sort of dance vibe, which I thought the band had steered away from during Cocked and Loaded. I thought Cocked and Loaded was a little bit more of a rock album; the songs were very guitar-heavy, which was cool, but I definitely wanted to bring more of the electronic keyboard element, which is what I do with a lot of these songs. Actually, I wrote a lot of these songs on keyboard first, then added bass, and then I added guitar last. This was definitely out of the box for me, because I'm a guitar player by trade. I mean, I know how to play keyboards and bass and drums and all that stuff, but those are just instruments I picked up, and I do that in the studio, but my main instrument is the guitar. But in order for me to make that point and to come across as more of a dance album, the ideas just sort of came to me on keyboard or on bass.
In terms of Paul Raven's contributions – because unfortunately, he passed some time ago – but some of this material was written with him beforehand. Just how much of the material, not necessarily for this album, but in general, was thought out before you go into the studio?
Bradford: If I'm not mistaken, 'Wizard of Sextown' and 'Keys to the City' were Paul's. I know his contributions to the album were when he was laying down ideas for The Last Sucker, so I believe those were two kind of outtakes, like ones that he just jammed out, and even though they weren't going to work out for Ministry, they kind of kept them. And obviously Paul would have been one of the first we would have asked to play bass for RevCo. We all loved Paul a lot. It was an honor to be able to sing over those two tracks, which is really cool. But aside from those ones that he had kind of worked on, a lot of them just came from scratch. It was like, 'Hey, go nuts, guys.' Sin would work on an idea or Clay would work on an idea, and they would send them to me, and then we would just go crazy, and if I told you where a lot of my inspiration came from, I'd probably get sued. Let's just say that if I ever was to kill and eat the face of a celebrity, it would be Matt Groening. If I was ever to lurk outside the house in the bushes for weeks and then eat their face or take their skin and wear it on my own, it would be Matt Groening. Not that I want to do that, but just I'm just saying that if I ever really lost it, that would be the one. That would be the guy. Him or the only other one would be, ...who is the tallest out of all the Golden Girls? I forgot her name! It'll totally hit me. Bea Arthur! I would kill to see Bea Arthur naked in person. So I would totally lurk outside her house, yes. Aside from Matt Groening, she's the one.
You just said Clayton and Sin do the majority of the music, but how much influence do you have into the music? Are you just strictly lyrics and vocals?
Bradford: Lyrics, vocals, and arrangement. I'll chop things up, but for actual musical writing, both guys are geniuses; I would only make it worse if I tried to add anything. Both of those guys are so freaking talented.
As far as the lyrics go for the RevCo album, we had talked about before how your style was, but obviously there's a great deal of humor that goes into it. This is kind of a silly question, but how do you guys perform it without laughing your asses off?
Bradford: Well, there's the monotony of touring. All the laughs happen in rehearsal, the first 50 times you're performing it; we all will just be laughing our asses off, having fun. So by the time you get to the road, we've got it; we've got our composure. What I want to do – which if I get my way, there's no way we'll be able to make it through – is I want to get interpretive dancers and little midgets to come out in wizard costumes. If we get a big enough budget, it will be very difficult to make it through the songs. We'll see. I want it to be like a Broadway production, like where we play with all these crazy people doing things, like girls coming out dressed like robots, half-naked. It would be great. If anyone wants to throw us like half a million dollars to do that, I can work it off via massages. Naked robot strippers are the way of the future.
Sin, you had done the programming for the majority of the album, and 'I'm Not Gay' was pretty much all you. In your previous band, Society 1, you started out as the keyboardist and then became lead guitarist. What's it like with people having this perception of you as this guitar god kind of guy, and meanwhile you're writing music on keyboards and doing all the programming and such?
Quirin: Well, people have that idea because that's what they've seen of me, and that's totally understandable. When I was younger and first starting out, I wanted to be the shredding guitar player guy and all that stuff. I did all those things that were in vogue at the time, but the older I got, the more serious I got with actual songwriting. It has been more important to me to actually try to create better songs rather than just be a hotshot guitar player. Not that I'm saying I am, but it took precedent for me. I'm going to hope people's ideas of me change once all this music comes out and they realize that I'm able to do these things, that I'm able to write on keys and bass and drums, so it's not just the shredding guitar player kind of thing with me. It's not a bad thing, but I just hope people realize that there's a bit more to me.
It's nice to not be the one-dimensional character, and the album seemed really guitar-heavy at first and then kind of gradually became more synth-heavy. Going through the press kit, it would seem that 'I'm Not Gay' is apparently very close to your heart. How did that song come about?
Quirin: It's funny, man, because that song almost didn't make the album because I had struggled with it so much. I had this idea in my head for awhile, while I was working on Sex-O Olympic-O. I had this keyboard line in my head, and one day, I got up and I started trying to work it out. I got most of it done, but I wasn't really happy with it, so I shelved it; I put it away and I started working on another song. I came back to it like a week later, and I did the same thing. I went through the same process like four times, where I would just shelve the song, and after the final time, I was just like, 'You know what? I guess it's just not going to work. I can't get it out of me. I can't get the idea across.' Finally, I went back to it a final time, and that's the version that ended up on the record musically. Then I gave it to Josh, and he did his thing with it, and he and Al worked on it and did the vocals on that, and it ended up – thank god – on the record. That was a tough one for some reason for me to do, man. 75 percent of it was on keyboard; the only time I added guitar in that song was during the chorus. That's the only time; all the other things were keyboards, and I actually didn't program them; I actually played them. All the keyboard parts I did on Sex-O, I actually played; I didn't program anything. The stuff that's programmed on the record is stuff that Clayton did. He did 'Touch Screen.' That was primarily his song. I added all the guitar parts to it, and there's one other one, I think, that Clayton did. But all the other songs, all the keyboards that you hear, I actually played; I didn't program anything.
That's pretty impressive; that doesn't happen much these days.
Quirin: No, usually now stuff is programmed, which is great. That's cool, but I'm a little old school with that stuff in that I actually like to bring up keyboard sounds, I like playing the keyboards, I like doing this stuff; I sort of like getting my hands dirty, if that makes any sense.
Talking about Clayton, with him doing programming and you doing live keys, and obviously Josh doing all the vocals, what is it like among the three of you? Reading the press kit, there is the impression that everything was kind of put together piecemeal. Did you guys ever actually sit in a room and jam on anything?
Quirin: No, not at all. I mean, there were a couple times where the three of us were in the same room together, but that was just because we happened to be at a strip joint or something. But as far as being in the studio, it was really weird. Basically what happened is right after I did The Last Sucker, I think I did Cover Up and then Sex-O, or Sex-O and then Cover Up; I can't remember, it was one of those two. I basically stayed in the studio, and then I started working on the music for Sex-O right away. At the time, Josh was also living in El Paso, so what would happen is I would get up and write the music and then call Josh when I was finished with it. He'd come down, he'd take the song, and he'd have it for a couple days, and then he'd come back with vocals on it, and that's how the process went. We didn't actually sit there and work stuff out. Now, Clayton came down from Canada for about a week or two, and we sort of worked on things together. We just kind of crossed ideas and tried to collaborate a little bit, but it was mainly like if he had the idea, say for instance for 'Touch Screen,' he had that main idea, and basically said, 'Hey, I'm looking to add some guitar, what do you think?' So he would leave me the song, I would add my guitar parts to it, and then I'd give it back to him. That's how we worked on it, so yeah, it was kind of pieced together in a way.
Now Cocked and Loaded did have the remix album; are there plans to do that for this one? Are there remixes currently in the works? Clayton had remixed like nine of the tracks on the previous one.
Bradford: Yeah, Clay's so talented! He just did remixes for Filter as well. I mean, he's my brother; he's like flesh and blood, but he's so freaking talented. That's going to be a guy to watch out for in the future as a producer and a remixer. He's so talented. But yeah, hopefully we'll get a remix album out, definitely. There's already that one remix on the album, so I know Clay could whip up tons of amazing remixes, but I think they're even talking to a couple other people, some bigger names that are some secret names. But yeah, hopefully there will be a remix album for this, for sure. Hopefully they'll take out most of the vocals and make it sound like a Cocks album, or more like a Cocks album.
Of course, with Al as a producer, you guys mentioned earlier and it was said in the press kits that he basically left you all to your own devices.
Quirin: Yeah, he really did, man. And you know what? That says a lot about him and his belief in us. Thank god, and it was really an honor to me, and it was a big thing to have a guy that I look up to and have looked up to for many years have that confidence in me and that belief in me. To be honest with you, there were times that I didn't know if I could pull off some of the things that I did, but he knew how to pull those things out of me, and that meant a lot. It was cool in that he would let me do my thing, and he would come in and hear it and make his suggestions and make his changes, so that's how it's been with our writing process or our sort of team, if you will.
Josh had mentioned some questions he couldn't answer for legal reasons, and the tour question was one of them.
Quirin: Yes, he is definitely a homosexual. I can answer that for him, and you can write that, too. He is definitely a homosexual. You can quote me on that. He can't answer that, but I can answer it for him, Yes, he's definitely gay. He's stage gay.
He did mention something about dresses.
Quirin: That's what I'm saying. He's like Cher on stage; he goes through costume changes.
Bradford: If I need to start a rumor that I've been killed in a car crash or something like that, can I call you up and get you to help start it? Rumors are fun. If you can think of a good rumor – I can only speak for myself – please, spread it. The crazier, the better, please. If I hear anything, if someone's like, 'Dude, some guy from ReGen said, like, you got a sex change,' or something like that, I'll be all, 'Yeah! That rules!' Dude, seriously. If you like, wake up in the middle of the night, and you're like, 'I got it!' Just like, give me a call, and you know I'll probably be like, 'Hell yeah!'
What are the current tour plans for RevCo?
Quirin: I believe, if I'm not mistaken, the tour's going to happen in the late summer or early fall. It was going to happen, I believe, in April or May, but if I'm not mistaken, it's getting pushed back now. I'm not 100 percent on that one, so don't shoot me if I'm wrong with that. We don't have too much to do with when we go out; we're just told when we're going to go, and the last I heard is that the tour will happen late summer or early fall.
Bradford: You know what? That question I'll have to take a pass on. Going to plead the fifth on that one. Eventually though, we'll be hitting the road. That album will be hitting the road at some point.
How did the ReVamp tour with Sin and DJ Hardware come about?
Quirin: My publicist had sent out a big press thing after the Ministry tour saying that I was available for session work or any type of project that needed a guitar player. DJ Hardware's manager, Chris Knicker, who manages us in ReVamp, saw that and contacted my publicist and said, 'Hey would Sin be interested in doing this? We're looking to get a live guitar player.' They actually thought of me first, but didn't think I'd be interested, so they started looking for other cats as well, but when they found out I was interested, they dropped everybody else. That's how I got on board with this. I heard the stuff, and because I'm so into the electronic scene, it was perfect for me. It was something new and fresh, something that I had always wanted to do, and I really dug the material, and I liked the idea and the concept, and that's how I got on board with it.
Shortly before that was announced, you had mentioned something about doing DJ work. Was the ReVamp tour an extension of what that was to be?
Quirin: Sort of. That was a whole different thing. That's another thing that I had been kicking around actually with Josh, as well, and with Clayton, as far as us doing guest DJ things. This is a little bit different than that, in that it's almost sort of like a rock band, but we're not a band. There's a DJ and a live guitar player, but we come across as though it's a band playing up there. It's kind of different, and every market has been a little different. It's been good, it's been positive all the way around, and we're having a blast with it. At first, people don't really know what to expect; they don't know if we're just going both be in a DJ booth, and that's not it at all. We're actually both on stage; he's actually doing his mixes and stuff, and I'm just playing live guitar over it. Every show is different, because it's not like a scripted thing. It's not like a Ministry tour, where I know exactly what I have to play and I can't really change from it. With this, if I'm feeling a certain thing a particular night, that's what I'll play, and it could be completely different the next show, so, it's kind of cool for me because it keeps me on my toes, and it keeps my chops up, and we feed a lot off of the crowd. If the crowd's really big, we keep it going, and that's how we do our set.
As far as the RevCo tour, it's been pretty much the same line-up as Ministry for the most part. If you guys do take this on tour, is it going to be the three of you: you, Josh, and Clayton?
Quirin: Yes, it'll be me, Josh, Clayton. We've got a drummer locked in already – I can't disclose that at the moment. I think we've got a bass player as well, but I can't mention those cats yet.
There's also been mention of something called RevCo TV?
Quirin: Yeah, that was something that I'm hoping is still going to happen, but since the tour got pushed back, I think that's why it's been delayed. We're trying to get together something that's called RevCo TV, where we do YouTube updates and videos, just sort of info things, and they could be funny, could be serious, you know, anything that involves RevCo. Hopefully we'll get that up and running pretty soon.
Bradford: I'm always filming. What I'm working on actually right now is Clay and I have been filming everything that we've done from the very beginning, since we were 19 and starting out in a bad noise band. We filmed all of that all the way up to RevCo and all the good stuff that's happened. We have 10 years of footage, and I'm actually putting together a documentary that's going to be basically about our journey. It's going to be pretty bad-ass. It's not going to be all about music; it's going to be more, as funny as it sounds, more a philosophical side of following your dreams, the thing of what the journey is, what it represents, and where you are when you finish it. It's going to be bad-ass, and it'll probably be out in a year. But that's what I'm working on right now, which is really cool. So it'll have Clay and I, like everything: us moving to LA from Vancouver, Canada, when we moved to LA, where we struggled for years, and then Guns n' Roses' original manager picked us up, Vicky Hamilton, the girl who broke them and Poison and everybody, picked us up and tried to break us. One of the people she broke us to was Angie Jourgensen, who happened to see us, and then Al's wife took our stuff to Al, and Al was like, 'Shit, these guys are great.' So yeah, it's going to be that whole journey, so we're going to have a film coming out about it. It's not going to be about RevCo, but it'll have moments. So that's what I'm working on now. And the RevCo TV thing? Man, I would love to do it. I'm roaring ready to go. All I need is a good read, and I'm sure once we hit the road, I'm going to have the cameras going nonstop, getting all the craziness.
Josh, you worked with Clayton in Stayte, you're in RevCo, and you've kind of contributed to other 13th Planet projects. What is the potential of you doing something outside of RevCo or any of the 13th Planet projects that are currently going on right now?
Bradford: That's a really good question, because I've been in another project for five years called VHS, a big up and coming band that's been kind of like disco/funk/industrial. We formed it with this 50-year-old man from France that we met who's totally insane. He used to be a big pop star in France back in the '80s, and he used to work for huge record labels and all that. So yeah, VHS is going to be big and up and coming, and that's not involved with 13th Planet at all; that's probably going to be an album coming out within a year, which is pretty cool. And we all kind of have our fingers in other things, like I've done children's music, and I have another solo project I've been doing for 10 years called Simple Shelter as well, but that's like faggy acoustic music. That's the best way to put it, especially for RevCo fans; do not listen to a track from Simple Shelter. It's the gayest music you'll ever hear. You can print that. RevCo fans...I've had them almost beat me up for doing that project. It's awesome.
Oh, and did you see that we got onto the Saw V soundtrack? Yeah, it's kinda crazy. The funny thing about that was that there was a whole bunch of people that we know, like Filter was on there; we're friends with Richard Patrick and stuff. It was kind of funny having that silly song among so many good bands and great tracks; it was funny. A classic little movie series to be on, that was fun.
You were also on the soundtrack for that Wicked Lake.
Bradford: Dude, I'm in Wicked Lake! Have you seen it? OK, it has two things going for it: it has the cool soundtrack, and naked chicks making out with each other. It would have been perfect in the '80s, you know, those slasher movies? But it was directed by the most awesome guy, a close friend of ours. I mean, he didn't have much to work with, with acting and stuff, but man, it was so much fun. There's an opening scene that Al is in; he's an art teacher, and one of the girls is posing naked, and this guy freaks out and runs out, and Al's the teacher, but when the camera goes around the students, I'm actually one of his students. It's pretty funny. It's just a quick little scene. The movie itself, like script and acting, is awful, but there's a couple cult moments, like maybe 5 percent of it is kind of culty, but definitely check it out. I recommend anyone who likes good music and hot naked chicks making out to buy that movie.
How interested are you in pursuing acting as a secondary career? Is it something that you're interested in?
Bradford: Man, if you look online, they're really poor quality because it's YouTube, but I did a whole bunch of the Ministry online music videos, the live stuff from MasturbaTour, I was their camera guy, as well as on the C-U-LaTour. In the USA, I did their camera work, as well. I don't have speaking parts in these films, but you'll see me in a new movie coming up with Charlize Theron and Kim Basinger called The Burning Plain. I'm in that one, just a tiny little short appearance. But yeah, I've been doing little film and background stuff for a while, here and there, and I love editing. I've been doing that for a while. I actually direct music videos for bands.
Is there anything that we haven't touched on that you would like to mention?
Quirin: Something that's just come up, and I hope it happens, is there's going to be a lot of RevCo record release parties coming up real soon, within the next month or so. There might be some shows where Josh and I will be performing a couple of acoustic numbers. We did one in December that was called 'RevCo UnButtPlugged.' It's basically an extension of that, but now, since we have these record release parties, we might be showing up at a couple of them and just doing a handful of songs. You know, some of the new stuff...we might throw in one or two older RevCo songs. It's just to add to the record release thing; we'll do a little meet and greet, we'll perform a little bit and just hang out with people at the clubs. But definitely look out for that. It's something we just started working on, and hopefully we'll have more info soon. That'll be up on all the MySpace pages: the Revolting Cocks one, the ReVamp one, my own, all those things.