06-20-06

Inside Track: GNR Tribute
with Jake Brown

For this edition of Inside track we speak with Versailles Records President Jake Brown about their latest release: It's So Easy: A Millennium Tribute to Guns N' Roses

Inside Track: Tell us about the concept behind this tribute album?

Jake: Well, taking on such an epic band- that at least in the sense of my generation of music listeners- defined rock n' roll musically and visually at its most purest in terms of derivatives like the Rolling Stones, Aerosmith, and AC/DC, and bands like this- who we haven't DARED to touch yet with a tribute- we felt maybe Guns N' Roses was a good testing ground for that ambition in terms of future releases. To me, it's another level to try to pay homage to bands like that, so we're starting out kind of in reverse in terms of Bon Jovi, Van Halen, Motley Crue (our first double-album tribute which is due in early 07), and groups like that. I guess in a way it's kind of working in reverse, but rock royalty to me kind of works like this: the biggest legends sit highest up on the bleachers, in terms of seniority. So we're somewhere along the middle of the Mountain climb with GnR, and hopefully fans will dig what we've put together here. We also have a second volume to this tribute set coming out in the fall called 'Double Talkin' Jive: A Hard Rock Tribute to Guns N' Roses.' As a HUGE Izzy Stradlin fan, I also made sure both of these records were very IZZY heavy in terms of the songwriting, and that we didn't just do like a Greatest Hits tribute record. I think that is reflected in the track listing- plus on the second record, we have cuts like 'Bad Obsession', 'Dust N' Bones', '14 Years', 'Double Talkin' Jive', 'Out Ta Get Me', and 'Move to the City', but we also have hits like 'November Rain', 'Don't Cry', and 'Welcome to the Jungle.' Anyway, not to plug the forthcoming album, but its illustrative of the balance we tried to strike on both records in that respect, in terms of giving fans- especially second-generation Guns N' Roses listeners who will develop out of their forthcoming new album, as well as the Velvet Revolver success- the broadest possible sampling of what the band's best songs are- in terms of not strictly being limited to the hits. Anyway, below is the Inside Track of the latter, and kind of a behind-the-scenes on how a tribute album is made and how this first collection of songs came together:

You Could Be Mine - Richard Kendrick With certain songs, Richard is the only one I trust to pull off in terms of the technical exactness of each instrument as it should be played, but also the spirit of authenticity that the song should carry for listeners, which he's better at than I think anyone working on these kinds of projects today. He also takes a lot of pride I think in making sure that each track in those instances is as important as the other- so a bass track holds the same weight as a vocal, and a harmony holds the same importance as a rhythm guitar lick, which in terms of how fantastic Duff McKagen and Izzy Stradlin are as players, is the only way to go if you're truly paying tribute to a band that bad ass. What was kind of funny in terms of how precise Richard and I when producing these songs like every part to be- especially for instance the drum part on this song- wasn't exactly popping off right the first time we tried to record it. It was the first song we were tracking that day, and the drummer- who is phenomenal- wasn't exactly finding his groove, and it became quickly obvious that he hadn't had his 'coffee' yet. So I suggested he and I run out to the car for a little 'home grown' Java, and when he came back in a joint later, he did the track in ONE take. It was amazing to watch, obviously visually, but also in terms of the talent we got on tape to match Richard's. Anyway, it was maybe thinking outside the box for some people, but one man's poison is another's pleasure I guess in terms of what works best for different players. It was just an awesome thing to watch come together, and I think the result speaks for itself.

It's So Easy- RadioVipers: this band was- in my opinion anyway- born to cover this song. It embodies everything that the RadioVipers are about, and everyone says this, but truly: A LOT of what is MISSING in rock bands today, who try to pull off derivative influences maybe from a look or a type of guitar or amp they play through, but there's no heart in the product that results. I won't name names, but given that few of the rock bands that have come out in the last ten years have stuck past an album or two is the best example. Because the European rock scene is so alive in terms of really reflecting and respecting the roots of bands like AC/DC, Aerosmith, Guns N' Roses, etc in the roots of the sound they produce for rock in today's market, they almost create a new niche because those two worlds truly are bridged with bands like the RadioVipers. There is nothing contrived about the way they nail this song, or about their broader original sound as a band, and (PLUG) their debut album, 'The Morning Sunburst' includes 'Its So Easy' as well for that reason- because they're as proud of the song as I am. The energy of this performance will wow any GnR fan!

Rocketqueen - Derrick LeFevre: This song is my favorite on the album, but was also arguably the biggest MESS of the whole record. Richard Kendrick once again threw on the cape and saved this classic from disaster. The performances were great instrumentally to begin with, but we got the drums from one corner of the Universe, and the guitar from another, and everything was being sent over the internet to Richard in Belgium, where he had to sound replace the entire drum section, and ghost the guitars, and redo leads, and find a bass player at the last minute to do the part because the original cat hurt his hand, so it was just a nightmare, and we had like a week to get it finished. Then Derrick LeFevre, lead singer from Lillian Axe, stepped up the plate and just hit the vocal out of the park. The one thing I had asked Derrick to do when he was singing it was to try to make it sound as much like a vocal would have in 1986 when the album was recorded, more almost like you'd have heard on an Iron Maiden or WASP record, and he nailed it. There's a haunting quality to the vocal, and it just soars too like Blackie Lawless and Bruce Dickenson used to. It has so much soul. I think most fans will find this to be their favorite 'era-friendly' track on the album. The mix is also very reminiscent of the feel of the sound of those times, its just a really beautiful result…

Sweet Child O Mine - Jizzy Pearl/Tracii Guns/Gilby Clarke/Randy Castillo: This track Brian Perrera graciously allowed us to license for this album, and I wanted it mainly for the players and history it incorporates as it directly relates to Guns N' Roses- namely in Tracii Guns, who co-founded the band, and Gilby Clarke, who replaced Izzy. On top of that, one of my favorite drummers in the world, Randy Castillo did the drums, and Jizzy- who is a fantastic singer, nailed the vocal. Just nailed it. It's a very tight track, and we're lucky to have it. I wouldn't have tried to do another version of this cover; it can't be topped by what Cleopatra originally did.

Patience - Jasy Andrews: I wanted Jasy to do this song from like the first night I ever heard her play in this tiny little bar in Nashville in 2003, and we recorded it for her debut album, 'Little Girl' because she totally made it her own. We recorded it at Studio 19 in Nashville, which was originally Patsy Cline's first house when she moved to town in the 50s, so that was cool in a nostalgic kind of way. The song the way Jasy does it is as haunting and beautifully simple as Izzy's original acoustic demo. It was a review favorite from her debut LP, so we hope it gains a broader listening audience for her through this record, but also is a kind of perfect bridge for the album between the first and second half of the record. It's also to my knowledge the first hard rock tribute with an acoustic-Rhodes organ track with an operatically-trained female singer on it, so maybe in some small, silly way we broke some new ground here. It's a beautiful rendition.

Night Train - Phil Lewis/Erik Turner/Keri Kelly/Marko Pukkila/Chad Stewart: well, this one was another of those situations where all the players on the track belong to the era that GnR dominated- so you have players from Ratt, Warrant, L.A. Guns, Faster Pussycat, Every Mother's Nightmare, Pretty Boy Floyd, and others rockin' out like they did back on the Sunset Strip at the height of 80s hard rock, and you can just feel that vibe in the result. The track more or less speaks for itself.

Mr. Brownstone - Valerian: This really cool rock band Finland, who came straight out of the Michael Monroe-Axl Rose mold stylistically in terms of their front man contacted me about being on the record, and hit my soft spot for up and coming bands, so they then went about nailing 'Mr. Brownstone', and to my ears, it just scorches. We hope fans dig it.

Think About You - Drama Queen Die: This really cool, well-kept secret from Chicago, 'Drama Queen Die', who were actually championed by Chip Z'nuff of all people in the start of their career, and who first turned me onto them, did this really gorgeous acoustic version of 'Never Say Goodbye' for our Bon Jovi Tribute, which was our best seller of 2005, and so I thought we'd try and see if a little of that karma could rub off on this album, but in a kind of unusual way in that 'Think About You' is traditionally a hard rocking love ballad. When I suggested the song to the band done acoustically, they really channeled the energy the way we felt fans would have wanted, and I think we got a rocking result.

Civil War - One Bad Son: Aside from discovering and managing this singer for the past 3 years, and how proud it personally makes me that his band, One Bad Son, came together, wrote, recorded, and released their first album, 'This Aggression Will Not Stand', in one year, I will refer all other commentary on this track to a recent review of the tribute from JukeBox.ca, which wrote the following about the band's cover of 'Civil War': "Brilliantly delicate in the right moments, and then when the song explodes in true rock style, this version does it with a much heavier guitar tone than the original, marking this track out as one of the best GN'R covers there's ever been. The performance is superb and vocalist Shane Volk is only one this album that retains his own vocal style and doesn't try to sing exactly like Axl. Lewis and Pearl are distinctive enough because we're all familiar with their voices by now, but the others really do try to stay as true to the original vocal lines as possible. Volk does this as well, but in his own voice, which is much grittier than Axl's."

Paradise City - Joetown featuring Jimi Bell: This is for all intents and purposes the flagship Guns N' Roses anthem, and we wanted this to be a special rendition of this song. Whether we achieved that or not I'll leave to listeners to decide, but it has some unique musical contributions- including the lead rhythm guitar done acoustically, a Bag Pipe and Jimi Bell on lead guitar, so that's a good start. Hopefully fans dig it!

Pretty Tied Up - The Slashtones featuring Joe Lynn Turner: A longtime friend and collaborator of mine, Harry Slash, who is also a staple of the New York rock scene got this huge crew of rockers together, had a cow-bell themed party over a weekend, and knocked out this Izzy classic. The song features Tony Moore from Riot, Roderick Kohn from the Buddy Miles Express, Joe Lynn Turner from Deep Purple/Rainbow fame, Steve 'Budgie' Werner from Ace Frehley's band, and Arno Hecht from the Uptown Horns. Most importantly, as Harry would say, it features 'LOTS OF COWBELL!!'

Anyway, that's the record, it's in stores everywhere now across the U.S., and we hope you go out and buy a copy to support the legacy of GnR, the greatest rock n' roll band of the past 30 years!! Check out www.versaillesrecords.com to learn more about the label and our other releases.

Back To The Top

07-19-04

Antimusic.com Interview with Jake Brown, President of Versailles Records.

What’s Love? A Tribute to Tina Turner
Interview by Keavin Wiggins

A few months ago Jake Brown joined us a columnist, in case you didn’t know Jake is also the President of Versailles Records and the author of several books. Versailles just released a new CD “What’s Love? A Tribute to Tina Turner”. Naturally, since Jake writes for us we couldn’t very well review the disc, because of conflict of interest. But we have something even better than a review, we’re going to talk to Jake about the CD, how it was put together, the players involved etc. So let’s jump right into it.

antiMUSIC: Jake, I’d like to start out with getting a little background information on Versailles, it’s not your typical record company and I think people would like to know a little bit more about it. So what inspired you to start the label?

Jake: I worked in LA at a couple, Cleopatra and Geffen (very briefly), and decided that I could do what they were doing. Running a record label involves 3 key ingredients: a strong opinion about what music other people will like, access to backing money, and a fantastic distributor. The networking part happens by default, and we started in 2000 when the tributes were really popping, so I was lucky in that respect. I became friends with a lot of the artists who appeared in our records, which allowed me to build relationships that led to repeat appearances, etc. But the three main keys are a good ear for talent, money and a distributor. You can have two of the three, for instance a good record and money, but if you have a shitty distributor, your dead out of the starting gate. I also don’t believe in the myth that a label is credible if they “release records online”, that is horseshit, you need retail presence to be credible, and I will qualify that for you: let’s say you’re going after a bigger name artist for a tribute, the first question they and/or their management will ask you is: “Who is your distributor?” That is the first question I always get. Its the same every time. I learned that lesson from Brian Perrera at Cleopatra, he had Caroline distributing him, which is a fantastic company. He has moved over to Navarre now, which is also great, we almost signed with them in 2001, but went with Big Daddy Music Distribution instead, and it was the best move I ever made. That company is run by Burt Goldstein and Doug Bail, who used to tops at Profile Records, who had Run DMC, so they have platinum records under their belt. But they also have a truly indie approach that is perfect for labels like mine who only do like 3 records a year, instead of the 12 that my contract with Navarre would have required. Big Daddy won NARRM’s Independent Distributor of the Year award 2 years in a row, and they have a fantastic staff, from Larry Germack, their national sales manager, who was with WEA for 20 years, and Mike Dungerly, who is like a jack of all trades over there. Also, my buddy Rich Masio, who left recently, but was there for my first 3 years with BD, is a tops Indie man. That company is just growing and quietly growing, and its great to be a part of it. They put out Prince’s last record, the 3-disc live one, and have handled bands like Mushroom Head and Spyro Gyro, but also Otis Taylor, and some really cool oddball artists. We are sort of their in-house Tribute label, and I would recommend them to any new labels reading this, or for established labels shopping around for a new distributor, I would recommend them any day. They have shipped about 10,000,000 units in their 9 years in business, and continue growing every year. What’s lastly very cool about them is I can come to them with a Van Halen Tribute or Tina Turner Tribute, which is a much bigger and larger money making affair, or with Richard Kendrick’s album, and they give the same energy to every release. As far as Versailles, they were a perfect fit too because we are not a typical label, as you put it. We run the complete gamut from The Cult and Van Halen Tributes to Marc Bolan and an Alien Sex Fiend singles collection. Being generic or cookie cutter doesn’t work anymore, and its a great time for indies because of all the discombobulation and disorganization going on with majors, they are dropping some fantastic bands who don’t sell platinum anymore but have extremely loyal fan bases who would make any album Gold in exchange for shitty new 15-minute rock bands (who I won’t name) who will have one big single and be dropped by their second album. Its disgusting the lack of loyalty and focus on money that drives majors today, they’re pussies by and large. I dig Interscope and Capitol, but they’re about the only two labels doing anything ballsy anymore. Anyway, so we, in our little neck of the woods, just try to stay competitive by being different and diverse with our releases so we don’t get pigeon-holed. There’s no ego in that statement, small or large, it happens to everyone. We’re also just really grateful to the hard rock press (especially people like Cheryl Hoahing at Metal Edge and Andrew at Melodic Rock, and yourself) for supporting us over the years with news snippets, reviews, etc. Its important that we all stick together, especially now, and so while we are doing this Tina Turner Tribute, we really are staying format-wise to hard rock. Indie labels, be they us, or Cleopatra, or Sanctuary and Spitfire, are the only thing keeping that genre alive right now. By the way, any bands who want to send demos, we accept unsolicited stuff. Send anything you like to 168 2nd Ave, Ste 372, NY NY 10003, or check us out online at www.versaillesrecords.com. You can also check out our distributor at www.bigdaddymusic.com.

antiMUSIC: What was the biggest difficulty you had that you didn’t anticipate?

Jake: Ironically, it has NEVER been getting the established artists on my records that I wanted to work with, which I thought would be our biggest challenge when we started out. And we have had some guys on our records that have not played on any other tributes, so I know its karma working in our favor on that front. So where our challenge hasn’t been recruiting the talent, it has ALWAYS been paying for that talent. I spend alot of money on my records because I am a true patriot of the 1980s big budget rock productions, from Def Leppard to Bon Jovi and on down the line, and we try to capture that era in our work. Sometimes we do better than others, but being that we work with many of the stars from that time, it also helps to authenticate the performances, etc. Also, my head of production, Richard Kendrick, is an equal if not bigger 80s fan than I am, so he knows that sound really well from both a performance and production standpoint. But it would have to be the money that is the most challenging part, I underwrite at least $30,000 for each record between production costs, artists fees, and then all the requisite spending that the distributor does to get the records to retail, and so I live a very frugal life personally as a result, sort of like a corporate starving artist. That makes it kind of fun though because it means I’m right there in the trenches with alot of my childhood heroes, who are back playing clubs again and living in aparments, rather than mansions, and they are ALL the most down-to-earth and humble crowd of musicians I have ever known or had the pleasure to befriend, every one of them. Eye to eye with their fan base, which is the level we try to stay at constantly with our tributes as well. Its all in the spirit and celebration of hard rock though, in its purest form and era, which was between 1983 and 1991. The Turner Record was a departure because we went pop with the artist roster, but the record still has a very rock rooted feel, just like Tina’s sound did, so I don’t think it was that much of a leap. The bottom line, as I see it in answer to your question, is that the hard rock demographic is the most loyal and die hard in music, outside of perhaps hip hop, and you have to, as a label, be as passionate with your releases as the fans are. That means spending whatever money is necessary to get the best players to deliver the best product. There’s, proudly, nothing cookie-cutter about what we do, which I cannot say for all tribute-oriented labels.

antiMUSIC: Versailles is known for not only the original releases like Marc Bolan’s “You Scare Me To Death” and Richard Kendrick’s debut but also for your tribute CDs. Why did you decide to focus on tribute discs?

Jake: This will be sort of an elaboration on the last question, so I will try to be brief in answering it. In short, Tributes pay the bills. What has been different for Versailles is this: we choose people to tribute that NO ONE else does, for whatever reason. That has been our niche, also getting oddball choices by conventional standards in the way of artists for our records, for example, Thrill Kill Kult and Jim Martin for the Cult Tribute, or our formula for pairing up established artists on lead vocals/guitars with up and coming rock bands backing them up. I don’t believe any one else, be they Cleopatra or Vitamen, or whoever, does that. Its really the freshest way to stay in touch with what is going on in today’s underground rock scene, and giving those bands a real chance at some national or international (via licensing) exposure at retail within the hard rock genre, which is largely relegated to Tributes, outside of major label supergroups like Velvet Revolver and Audioslave, or mainstays like Bon Jovi and Metallica. Tributes are filed under the artist’s name in their bin, so we don’t have to fight for shelf space, or pay some exorbitant amount of money to create a name card, and then hope fans go out and buy the record. Hard rock fans tend to buy catalog, not new releases, period. This is supported by soundscan, and by the lack of many new genuine hard rock bands in modern day. You have some, like Darkness and Buckcherry, but unless major labels rediscover this amazingly loyal demographic out there that consistently buy hard rock catalog by everyone from Motley Crue to bands like Warrant and Quiet Riot, and every summer, pack amphitheaters and summer sheds to see package tours with bands like Poison headlining. These bands continue to make a nice living playing live and selling records to this fan base, and major labels have just written them off. Its stupid of them financially given how badly the new shit they throw at the wall now adays sells, and its a goldmine for indie labels like myself and Cleopatra, who cater to that fan base. I personally am part of that fan base, and believe in the bands from that era, they made great music, were hard working, and wrote an entire soundtrack for a generation, so what’s not to love? So what if they wore alot of hairspray and tights, dude, MTV hasn’t played those bands for years, and they still tour and sell well on catalog sales, as I mentioned above. Anyway, that’s my spin on it, and we just try to be true to the era, with both the established and new bands we work with. Another thing we do that is unique to Versailles, I think we invented it in fact, is doing tributes that pay homage to two artists at once- for instance, Satriani/Vai, or Sammy Hagar/David Lee Roth. No one else has done that, and I came up with the idea by going through my old tape collection from the 80s, and checking out those cassettes labels used to put out with two different bands on the same cassette, one band/album to each side. Our distributor was very creative with the marketing, especially to mass merchants (Walmart/KMart), and so we have sold very well with those. Its cool to try and have little niches where you can. The Bolan record was a license from Anagram in Europe, and Richard’s record was too cool not to release. “Murder & The F Word” was more of our example to the rest of the industry of what rock releases are lacking today in substance and sound. That record is brilliant, it didn’t get one bad review, and still sells cool for us considering its an indie artist release that had no tour support, it still ended up in all the chains. I would hope more labels would try to be ballsy with releasing independent rock artists where they can, its really rewarding to see any presence for those records at retail. John Kivel does this, which is cool, and Brian at Cleopatra started the whole tribute thing, so he gets a pass, :-) He’s a veteran of the whole hard rock movement and is almost single-handedly responsible for its revival back in the late 1990s, I used to work for him, so he always gets props because I learned a lot from his company, but a lot of indie “hard rock” labels who have good distribution don’t take the chances they should be. With all the restructuring going on, it’s a great time to go out on a limb. Straitjacket Smile will be our continuation of that celebration.

antiMUSIC: This new disc takes Versailles in a different direction, up til now you’ve featured tribute discs to hard rock artists. What made you decide to go with a tribute to Tina Tuner?

Jake: I was watching cable on rainy afternoon in NY in the spring of 2003, and caught the movie about Tina Turner’s life, “What’s Love Got to Do With It”, and though I am not at all religious, had the closest thing I have ever had to what I’d term a religious experience. I had a similar feeling about the Cult tribute, so I started looking for the right signs- namely that no other labels had tributed her, which they hadn’t, then started putting my wish list together for the record’s artist roster, and it just all started to bloom from there. This record was pure karma, from A - Z. Rik (Kendrick, my production partner) was really into it, I think more as a challenge than anything else, and I have been building his name as a producer the past 3 years while Ross, his singer, was locked up, so I thought this would be a great expansion on that role. I think he thought so too, cause he just put his heart and soul into this fucker. That guy is an endless well of talent, and we’re attached at the hip in our love for the 80s music scene, period, so everything else just took course naturally. I also moved the company to Nashville last summer, so I wanted to do a record that would allow me to work with more female singers than we’d previously been able given the male-dominated hard rock market vocally. My distributor, Big Daddy Music, was really into the idea, and really stepped up to the plate with helping me where I needed it to get this record produced, and then in getting it into stores. We did a lot of retail marketing for this record that we don’t normally have to do with the rock stuff, which pretty much sells itself it the record is quality. We did, for instance, an 1890 piece listening booth program with Barnes & Noble, a 1000 piece one with Tower, who just reorganized corporately, and are now centralized rather than being run individually by store, so that made it easier to get a broad program going with them. The orders with all the chains in the states were really healthy. Anyway, we also are in final negotiations on our European and Asian licenses for this record, and the companies are really excited about the record, so I think this record will perform well internationally, by our standards anyway, so I’m really excited that a lot of people will be able to hear this record, probably in line with Turner’s fan base worldwide. That’s sometimes hard to judge, like with the Pacific Rim, or Scandanavia, but she sells well there, so the newer artists on the Turner record will get some great exposure too, which makes me happy personally. The last thing we did for this project that was a first for us was filming the entire recording for a DVD on the making of the album, which we ended up opting not to release separately here as a product, but will be doing so for both Europe and Japan as a bonus. I think that was a first for a tribute album, and its got some really cool, funny, behind-the-scenes moments I think fans will like. I just hope Tina Turner fans feel we did her justice on the album.

antiMUSIC: You’ve had a really good track record of attracting some big names to participate in your tribute projects, were there any artists that you really wanted to be on this disc but couldn’t secure? Who was the easiest and hardest to secure?

Jake: Yes, four- and you’re going to laugh at the first one- but I REALLY wanted Ray Parker Jr., and we just couldn’t come to terms. He did the Ghost Busters theme, and played with Ike and Tina Turner in the 1970s, so I thought he would be a cool novelty for the record in that sense, but probably also do a killer job with whatever song he chose. The second was Cindi Lauper, who I saw open for Tina, and really am a huge fan of. Her managers wanted WAY TOO MUCH money (if I may just say), so that was purely financial. The third was Samantha Fox, who I thought would be cool, but she goes by ‘Sam Fox’ now, and I couldn’t really have her on and not use her original professional recording name, it just wasn’t commercially feasible, but her management wouldn’t budge on that one, which I don’t blame them for in terms of her modern day career. That was cool though, everybody walked away with a good taste over it. Lastly, Jason McMaster was scheduled to to “Nutbush City Limits”, and scheduling just didn’t work out for that one, but he’s a friend of both my and Rik’s, so that was personally disappointing. He’s singing on the Bon Jovi Tribute, and has sung on every tribute we’ve done other than Turner, so I feel like he’s part of the family. Anyway, that was a little disappointing, but life goes on. We got 99% of the roster we wanted for this record. As far as the roster, the easiest to secure, by far, was Alannah Myles, because she was so gung-ho about the project from day one. The most difficult was probably Tiffany because her manager is a dickhead, but Tiffany herself is awesome. She was TOTALLY pro about the song, and I had a great time hanging with her while she recorded, and shot the DVD.

antiMUSIC: The one thing that struck me about the disc is how diverse it is. I mean the album includes Nancy Kerrigan and Kip Winger among others but in the end it seems to work. What was the biggest surprise for you when you heard the final playback? Which song turned out totally different then you expected?

Jake: As far as surprise, probably ‘Proud Mary’, which Rik and Ross did, because it gave me a hard on! It was fucking amazing, in every aspect and expectation I had in mind for that song. Songs like that I give to Rik to do because he’s the only one I have confidence in to do justice to the instrumentals. He is a true master of his craft, and this song really required that kind of ability to come out as phenomenal as it did. You just don’t fuck around with that. In terms of different, Nancy Kerrigan put all her heart into ‘The Best’, and it shows in the song. She will be the first to tell you that she’s not a professional singer, but her spirit is just felt throughout that track, I am proud of what we did with that song. Kip’s song just rocked, it was vintage Winger with respect to the balladry of it, but he also brought something really emotionally fresh to it. My biggest thrill on this album was Jane Child’s song though, I am such a HUGE FUCKING FAN of hers, and she’s been out of the limelight (by choice) for so long that it was a real honor to have her on this record. A true honor. I still have to pinch myself over that one, because she also gave us an AMAZING song that is a ready radio single. We will go to radio with that later this summer. Her engineer, Cat Gray, used to work with Prince, who is my favorite artist in pop music, so that was a thrill in its own right.

antiMUSIC: Speaking of who was on the album, I’d like to do an Inside Track with you. Can you take us through each song and tell us a little bit about it. Why you selected this song, how the person covering it got the gig etc? Or just anything you think would be of extra interest to the readers.

1. What's Love Got to Do With It?- Tiffany- With all this Teen Idol/Diva shit going on the last few years, I just thought I would go to the source of it all, the one who started it all, Tiffany. I am talking in context of the last 25 years when I say started it, but she was the first true female teen idol phenomenon, from touring shopping malls to having a number one record at 15, and underneath all the gloss, she could REALLY SING. There was very little manufactured about Tiffany then in the talent department, and not much has changed, other than that she has matured and evolved into an amazing vocal talent as an adult. She is also really cool, and has a fantastic head on her shoulders and perspective about the whole enterprise of making a living with what some would term the ‘stigma’ of being an 80s pop idol. She is proud of it, and has really grown as a songwriter on a whole separate level, check out 2000’s ‘The Color of Silence.’ She has a huge fan base around the world, and sold 14 million records, so there’s nothing really negative to say about her, which I point out because some have tried. I picked ‘What’s Love Have to Do With It’ for her because she sang it as perfectly on record as I first heard it in my head. She was first on my list when I put this roster together, and she is a really cool person as well, really cool. Her performance on the song speaks for itself, as does the fact that it started off the album.

2. Better Be Good to Me- Richard Kendrick- This was the last song we had picked for the album with no one assigned to do it, mainly because we kept thinking another name would want it, but no one asked, and we couldn’t in good conscience put out a Tina Turner Tribute without it. Rik coincidentally hadn’t picked a song either yet, and so it just kind of came together like that. He did a terrific job on it.

3. Beyond Thunderdome (We Don't Need Another Hero)- Jane Child - Dude, this was a gift. Radio is just starved for songs like this. Jane Child is one of my absolute all time favorite pop singers, and one of the industry’s most talented, period. She went away for a few years, so I was thankfully able to look her up, and she was into the project, and specific song I had in mind for her, which was ‘Beyond Thunderdome.’ I had NO IDEA however she would do what she did with it. Any major label would be lucky to have this song, its brilliant pop, this chick is like the female Prince of the record industry. She plays everything, and is just really ahead of her time. She was back in the early 1990s, and remains so through present day. Her inclusion on this record is a true career highlight for me.

4. I Don't Wanna Fight- Rose Reiter/Kyle McMahon - I got this amazing instrumental from a new artist named Kyle McMahon who was signed to a development deal with Warner Bros. in his teens, and then to a development deal with a label called One Eleven Records, who is owned by a friend of mine named Brad F , who also happens to be a member of LFO. Anyway, I got Brad hooked up with my distributor, Big Daddy, and in turn, he got the song together with Kyle. Anyway, we thought it was a finished deal when we first heard it, but then felt, as strong as Kyle’s vocals were, that we really needed a female co-lead on the song. Its very different, they did a really folky-instrumental, which I felt needed in turn a really folkly or blues rock-rooted female pop artist, and felt it would be a perfect opportunity to feature an up and coming artist. As a result, after digging around through like 30 female artist pages on IUMA, I came up with Rosie, who has this amazing voice that really fit the song like no one else could have. She has an amazing pop range, but also a beautiful organic quality to her voice that captured the emotion in the song that we needed for it. We ended up using her as the primary lead, but kept Kyle on the choruses and as a back-up on the vox, to really round the song out as something original. What was interesting is that, when we were mixing the record, the night before we were going to mix her song, we discovered the vocal she had sent was a corrupted file in Protools, which happened during the conversion from DP. Anyway, she went in that night, at like 10, and recut the vocals and nailed it in like 2 takes. Those are what you hear on the record, she’s just so talented its sick. Its a little intimidating to be around talent like that, kind of like Rik and Jasy, because you know you’re really lucky as a label, but also feel a responsibility not only to do Tina justice, but also the artists I just mentioned based on their own individual talents... I’ve been very fortunate as a label to be surrounded by really good people over the years, musically, in the studio, and most importantly in its own way, with my distributor, Big Daddy Music. That’s maybe a lesson for newer indie labels reading this, you can have the greatest sounding records in the world, but without good distribution, it doesn’t matter for shit. The two really go hand in hand.

5. River Deep, Mountain High- Darlene Love- This one was a breeze from the vocal aspect, although Rik nearly killed himself on the production, because he really wanted to do justice to the song. Darlene Love, for those of you who aren’t familiar, is a Phil Spector protégé from the 1960s, who either sang lead or back-ups on all of the doo-wop classics from that era, from “Be My Little Baby” to “Today I Met the Boy I’m Gonna Marry”, to “River Deep”, which Phil Spector originally intended for Darlene to sing lead on. She showed up at the studio on the day of recording only to discover that Tina Turner was there to do the song, a decision Spector apparently made at the last minute. Anyway, as a result, Darlene did backups on the song, but has sung it in her own catalog for years live, so we were really honored to have someone as talented and legendary from that era on the record. Darlene is a member of the Rock N’ Roll Hall of Fame, and incidentally, also played Danny Glover’s wife in the Lethal Weapon movie series, so she’s been around. I spent some time with her in NY at the session and then filming her DVD interview, and she is really sweet, and seemed really genuinely excited and honored to be on this album, so it was for us one of those special moments you tell your grandkids about someday... Her performance is equally as classic.

6. Rock Me Baby- Michel’le Featuring Tony Janflone Jr. - This was a really funny one. Michel’le, for those of you who happen to be hip hop heads out there, was a major West Coast R&B diva in the late 1980s and early 1990s, she had a multi-platinum solo album, and also sang on Dr. Dre’s “Chronic” album, Snoop Doggy Dogg’s “Doggy Syle” album, and alot of the Tupac material. She also happens to be Suge Knight’s wife, who I wrote a book about a few years ago, which made me a bit nervous approaching her, because they are weird about all that shit, very private and protective of the Death Row legacy. Anyway, I have been a fan of hers’ for years, through all the Ruthless Records and Death Row stuff, but she hasn’t done anything new since 1998’s “Hung Jury” album, until she showed up on a soundtrack Death Row put out for an Eddie Griffin movie “Dysfunktional Family”. I loved it, and it reminded me that she had been gone a long time, so I made sure Suge was locked up on a parole violation so he wouldn’t interfere, because she hasn’t recorded for any other labels besides Death Row other than for us on this project, got in touch with her through Death Row, and she called me. The funny thing is we became fast friends, and she taught me an amazing amount of things in that context that informed the production of the album. For instance, she taught me the whole nine on astrology as it relates to music, including Tina’s different vocal styles and musical attitudes, be they expressed in dance or song, as it relates to her astrology chart. It was fascinating, and from there, we chose “Rock Me Baby”, I wanted her to sing it, but its a blues standard, and at first, Michel’le wasn’t totally sold on it. So I got a friend of mine named Tony Janflone Jr., who is an amazing guitar player, to do this stunning blues instrumental of the track, which she heard and loved, so that arrangement gave her a blueprint of sorts for the song. She recorded it 2 weeks before Suge’s release in this great little surf punk studio called in Hollywood, it was really indie. I mention that because she’s used to Can Am and endless studio hours because Death Row owns their own studio. She knocked this out in 4 hours, and really was in the moment with the performance, it is almost live in its delivery, and would be naturally, but she brought this great urban feel to the delta native influences of that song. It was originally done by BB King, and then Ike and Tina Turner, and now by Michel’le and Tony, and it really holds up on its own as an authentic blues number.

7. I Can't Stand the Rain- Alannah Myles/Jeff Healey - I was a huge fan of Alannah Myles from “Black Velvet” obviously, but also her later material. I emailed her about the record, and she called me back and we became fast friends as well. I wanted her to do “Rain”, and she wanted to do it, so that was pretty much it. My only stipulation was that it be acoustic, and she wanted to produce it herself, so we came to terms, and she knocked it out. She suggested Jeff Healey play slide on the song, and that was just a gift, because he’s such a treasure. A lot of people don’t realize, at least from what Jeff and others have told me, that he is an incredibly gifted blues guitar player, outside of the rock stuff he’s known mainly for. The chemistry between the two of them was just incredible, and as Alannah put it, we got a “sweet little country single” in the end. That’s really what it is, my favorite part of this song is the chorus, its just really gorgeous in a purely pop sense of the word, and quite original.

8. Private Dancer- Jasy Andrews- Aside from my 5 year collaboration with Richard, this is the most gifted artist I have ever heard as a music fan and label head, and the most dedicated I have ever been to seeing an unsigned artist make it. I heard Jasy at an open mic one night last summer in Nashville, and thought ‘Private Dancer’ would be perfect for her. All I asked her to give me was a piano/vox rendition, and she came up with the most beautiful and haunting song I have ever heard. We have her signed to a 2-album deal, and Big Daddy is extremely excited about her potential, so that is really reassuring, to have my distributor as behind her as I am. She is arguably the brightest young talent God has given to this earth in the last 20 years, and I would put her up against any of what will someday soon be her commercial contemporaries tomorrow, or even at 3 in the morning if I woke her up out of a deep sleep! She dreams music, she lives it, she breathes it, and its a sound all her own, and a little piece of that beauty is captured in ‘Private Dancer’. I really feel blessed to have this artist, and her songs in our catalog. As a vocalist, she is a classically-trained opera singer and pianist, but as a songwriter, she is... amazing is the only word that comes to mind.

9. The Best- Nancy Kerrigan -Honestly, I got SO MUCH SHIT from everyone when I first told those close to me I was talking to Nancy Kerrigan about appearing on this record. This record in many ways, as is Tina Turner’s music, a celebration of girl power, female independence, the spirit of the 1970s liberation movement, and so forth thematically. Nancy Kerrigan embodies all those qualities when you really think about it- endurance, spirit, competitiveness, resilience. I saw a VH1 thing about athletes who sing, and Nancy was featured briefly, and I thought it would be something cool and kind of different to have her on. Everyone gave me shit about it, from my Mom to other singers on the record, etc. BUT- when it came time to do the vox, Nancy came in and knocked it out, also knocking everyone in the studio on their asses in the process. She put her heart into it, and you can hear that in the record. Also, I thought it would be interesting for media coverage, and we got written up on CNN.com, MSNBC.com, in Sports Illustrated, the Boston Globe, the Boston Herald, just a bunch of cool, oddball places we never otherwise would have been, so in the vein of ‘Any press is good press’, her inclusion also worked in the record’s favor. That was honestly an aside though, I thought she would hold up on the merits of her artistry, and she did.

10. Proud Mary- Ross Stephens- This song was special because it was our first collaboration with Ross Stephens since the label’s first release. Ross got locked up in 2000 over some bullshit charges he was never even tried for, he just didn’t have the money to post bond so he sat in prison for 3 years waiting to be tried. He never was, and eventually was released in 2003. He kept his vocal chops up in jail singing for other inmates, which is how he got by too in there, cause he was in maximum security. He’s a cool fucker. Anyway, when he got out, it was just in time to record for the Turner Tribute, so I wanted him to do ‘Proud Mary’ and Rik agreed, and there it was. He is also lead vocalist for Straitjacket Smile with Rik, so they are working on the debut LP right now, we will likely release that in the summer of 2005, if all goes well. I want to get them on a really good tour bill to support it. Welcome home Ross!!!

11. What You Get Is What You See- Deniece Williams- ‘Let’s Hear It For the Boy’ is one of the most classic pop songs from the 1980s, just pure pop. And Deniece Williams is a true gospel/soul legend. She has won 2 Grammy Awards, had a ton of # 1 singles, and honestly, is one of the most musically accomplished, dead on vocal performances on an album full of them. I love that song though, ‘What You Get’, its my favorite Tina Turner tune, and I thought Deniece was perfect for it. She wanted to do something else, as she later told me, but she knocked the whole vocal take out in 12 minutes, 2 takes. Her heart was in the perfect place for that song, and it shows up in her performance.

12. So Fine- Kip Winger - Kip is a friend of mine who also happens to live here in Nashville, where I relocated Versailles in the Spring of 2003. He is a phenomenal talent as a musician, something that the Beavis and Butthead coal-raking his band got via that geek Stewart wearing a Winger T-shirt caused to be overlooked in the historical overview of hard rock. I was never really a fan of Winger as a band, but Richard Kendrick turned me onto Kip’s solo material a few years ago, and it literally is a different world of sound, style, substance, etc. Its amazing, especially “Songs From the Ocean Floor”, which is about Kip’s wife passing away. Anyway, if his last name was anything other than Winger, people might be willing to give that new material a chance on a broad commercial level, because on its musical merits, he’s more than deserving. As far as Turner, since we were aiming for that very pop market I just referred to, I thought it would be cool and sort of a slap in the face to the stigma he has to deal with over the Beavis and Butthead shit to have him cover this gorgeous Ike and Tina Turner blues ballad called “A Love Like Yours”, which he handled like a true bluesman. I hope people who buy this record are willing to give him a chance outside of that 80s’ hairband label, because musically he’s always been years beyond it. Never judge a book by its cover, so to speak...

13. Silent Wings- Wendy Jans- I heard Wendy at an open mic here in Nashville, and really honestly saw her as the next Shania Twain as soon as I laid eyes on her, she’s naturally gorgeous, but also has a voice that just soars, so I thought, why not have her on board. I have always tried to have 4 or 5 up and coming artists on board for the metal tributes (Richard Kendrick- who is signed to Versailles, Tony Janflone Jr., Corey Craven, Tattoo Frank, Ross Stevens, Shane Volk, Jasy Andrews- also signed to Versailles, to name a few), and they have always competed equally if not, in some cases, overshadowed the name stars they were playing beside. I think one of my few great strengths or talents, if we want to be really ego-oriented, is my ear for new talent, my challenge has ALWAYS been having the funds available to properly devote to promoting their music. We have a fantastic distributor, but as an indie label, we have to keep the bills paid, so the tributes are a much better vehicle toward that end, which sometimes compromises what would be my personal preference in giving artists like Wendy, who is SURE to be a huge star in the future, a deal myself. By doing the tributes, be they metal or pop, we then get a chance to actually work with a broader base of up and coming talent, and hence Wendy Jans on ‘Silent Wings’. She chose this song (which is odd because I usually pick everyone’s songs), I believe it suits her vocal range and style, and highlights a legitimate star to come in country music!

14. River Deep, Mountain High- Darlene Love/Richard Kendrick-Rik played me the vocals for this song absent the backing music and it just stood up on its own, and in some ways highlighted parts of Darlene’s performance I thought were buried in the version of the song with backing music, also Rik’s back-ups were incredible so I thought it would be a cool way to close the album. You almost don’t know its the same song, just without backing music. Its that good.

antiMUSIC: Any personal favorites?

Jake: Well, its hard for me to be objective here, because I spent a year and a very large amount of money producing this record with Richard, but I have to say there are three, yes- in no particular order, they are Jane Child’s rendition of “Beyond Thunderdome”, Jasy Andrew’s “Private Dancer” for its being truely inspired and a little peak into something musically great to come, and Ross Steven’s version of “Proud Mary”, which Richard Kendrick actually deserves a co-lead credit on, but Ross just got out, and we wanted to give him some long-overdue star-billing. He really gave this song the sexiness it deserved in context of Tina’s version, but was still ballsy and rocked out enough to embody what Fogerty originally intended for it. Also, Ross is from New Orleans, so he brings a natural southern feel to the lyrics. Overall, what Richard did with the production on this album is fucking magic! Joe Viers and I were there for all of the main production tweaking and complete mixing alongside Rick, but what he did at his own studio with the pre-production, and individual vocal sessions was just incredible. He’s competitive with any producer working in the business today (and he doesn’t really even want to be labeled as a producer, rather a guitar player!!!) That’s just another testament to what a true gift he is as a talent! This record really reflected the true boundless borders of his artistry and talent.

antiMUSIC: Any songs that didn’t make it on the disc for whatever reason?

Jake: No songs, only individual parts that had to be replaced, or artists who we spoke with about appearing, but couldn’t make it for scheduling reasons, or whose management we couldn’t come to financial terms with. That aside, we really had everyone on this record that I had on my wishlist after seeing the movie.

antiMUSIC: This will sound strange to anyone that hasn’t heard the disc but another thing that struck me is that the songs are really diverse and cover some different musical ground, not necessarily areas where Tina ventured, but and that’s a big BUT all the songs seem to stay true to the spirit of Tina’s originals. Like I said unless you hear it, it will difficult to see that but that was the impression I was left with. When you do tribute disc how do you handle that balancing act? Trying to do something different with the songs so they aren’t just note for note copies but they also stay true to the original?

Jake: It’s interesting you say that, because some dickhead who obviously didn’t listen to the album said on Amazon.com in a review that we stayed TOO CLOSE to the originals. I think its just the opposite when you listen to the performances and variety in arrangements on the covers of this record. We cover the majority of Tina’s hits, and really do span her entire career. Anyway, I appreciate you for picking up on that and citing it. To answer your question directly, when you do a tribute to an artist as big as Tina, not to mention the FIRST and ONLY tribute to Tina, I think there aren’t more out there to her because its such a difficult balancing act. The core of that challenge I suppose is in delivering renditions of her classics that fans will feel do her catalog justice, but not too much justice, i.e. being too much of a copy. That then leaves artists a bit more room to experiment within the spirit of the original, and deliver what they feel and hear in their own heads accordingly on record. A lot of it honestly, in terms of performance rendition, is within the artist’s discretion. Rik and I attended every major vocal recording session, from Tiffany to Nancy Kerrigan, to coach on general (in my case) and specific (in Rik’s) production pointers we wanted from the artist. For my part, this was based on how I heard them singing each song in my own head when I picked them for the album, and for Rik’s part, what he heard when he prepared the backing tracks subsequently. The rest I suppose is just the natural beauty of the recording process, the artistry. The performers on this record are on the record because we felt they could do the best justice to each song, not because of how big they were commercially. I could have had bigger names in terms of record sales, but we had some truly unique performers on this album who made these songs their own in a way no one else could have. So I suppose, to finalize on that question, I put my trust in my own instinct, Rik’s musical/production abilities, the talent of the individual artists, and the overall spirit of the record that guided us through its completion, and it all worked out!

Now to go a little bit behind the scenes, I’d like to go into a bit on how tribute discs are done, at least at Versailles. What is the process like? Do you secure the artist and they select a song and go and record it? I’m sure it’s much more detailed then that. So if you give us an overview of how it’s done from start to finish.

antiMUSIC: With someone with a catalog like Tina Turner’s it must have been difficult to decide what not to use. How do you select the songs to feature?

Jake: I have been a Tina Turner fan since I was a young child. I saw her twice between 1986 and 1990, and I am only 28, which means my parents dug her too. They also let me go see Motley Crue live on the Girls tour when I was 11, so who knows, but I grew up on Tina’s solo material. As a result, I had a handful of songs that were musts for the record. Then I asked Rik what he thought would be cool or required, and he came back to me with ‘Better Be Good to Me’ and ‘The Best’. I thought Nancy Kerrigan would be a different but ideal choice for the latter, and Rik wanted to do the former song, but I picked everything else that shows up on the album with the exception of ‘River Deep, Mountain High’, which Darlene Love wanted to do, so that was a no-brainer. What was really cool about this record was that every artist I contacted, from Tiffany to Alannah Myles to Michel’le to Jane Child and so on, wanted to do the exact song I threw by them! There really was an amazing karma around this record throughout the whole thing. And I think you hear that in the music.

antiMUSIC: Was Tina involved in any way?

Jake: Not directly no, artists rarely are in tribute albums. Her management was aware of the project, and we hope she likes the results.

antiMUSIC: Now that you’ve covered the legendary Tina Turner, what project is next?

Jake: Well, that’s a good question- the Turner record took a year to do not just because we took the attitude that we would take as long as was needed, but also because, fortunately for me, I have been working alot as a biographer, which also helps to finance these projects- I had books on Biggie Smalls and R. Kelly come out this past June, 2004, and have been working on a co-authored autobiography with John Corabi of his life story, which has been incredible. I begin in the fall with Hanoi Rocks on their authorized biography, which I still can’t believe and is an incredible honor, and have books on Izzy Stradlin and 50 Cent, both unauthorized, coming out from Black Market Publishing and Amber Books respectively. Then there’s my rock producer’s anthology, “Behind the Boards”, which exclusively interviews each of the biggest and most influential/successful rock and metal producers of the past 30 years, for the first time in one anthology. That will be released in 3 volumes, the first of which comes out in November, and features interviews with Scott Humphrey (Motley Crue, Methods of Mayhem, Powerman 5000, Rob Zombie) & Tommy Lee, Dave Jerden (Jane’s Addiction, Sonic Youth, Alice in Chains, the Red Hot Chilli Peppers), Bob Ezrin (Pink Floyd, Alice Cooper, Kiss, Jane’s Addiction), James Michael (Meatloaf, Sammy Hagar, Motley Crue, Saliva), Andy Johns (the Rolling Stones, Led Zepplin, Jethro Tull, Ozzy Osbourne, Joe Satriani, Van Halen, Kiss ), and Tom Werman, my hero (Motley Crue, Cheap Trick, Twisted Sister, Poison, Ted Nugent). The second and third volumes will be out in 2005. Anyway, not to do a shameless plug there, but that amout of writing has limited me to one project for Versailles in the second half of 2003/first half of 2004, which was the Turner Tribute. I am really proud of how it came out, and now we are playing catch up. Toward that end (and to really answer your question), we have three high-priority projects coming up for us:

1.) Richard Kendrick’s band, Straitjacket Smile’s long-awaited (by fans) debut LP, which will be a double album, half originals and half covers. These guys are fucking amazing, and the best new thing to come along in AOR rock period in the last 10 years. Ross Stevens, the singer, who did Proud Mary on the Turner Tribute, was incarcerated for 3 years (falsely I might add), and was just released last year, so that delayed the album substantially. It is pure privledge to be involved with a band of this calibre, and I think their sound and songs will really give true rock fans what they are missing in the millennium in the way of great rock pop melodies, infectious hooks (all hits), geniune musical ability instrumentally, and the best live performance around. Anyway, Rick is working on production for that record now, and it will be out likely in the summer of 2005. Check them out at www.richardkendrick.com, or www.straitjacketsmile.com.

2.) We are doing a tribute to Bon Jovi, which will feature current/former members of some very big hard rock/metal bands from the 80s and early 1990s, as with all our tributes. What I feel is different about this record will also be the presence of up and coming talent, which will compose about half the record. We have done this on the Cult Tribute, Satriani/Vai Tribute, and Halen Tribute, and it hasn’t hurt sales in any of the aforementioned cases, so we are really pumped about the exposure for the new artists, in addition to the amazing renditions of the classic Bon Jovi tunes they are covering. Fans will also be really jazzed by the known artists who are appearing, which range from current/former members of Motley Crue to Whitesnake. It will rock. We hope Bon Jovi fans will like it. That will be out most likely in late 2004, or at the very latest, early Spring 2005.

3.) Finally, we are beginning work on Jasy Andrews’ debut LP, which I am really excited about. I discovered this artist at an open mic in Nashville, and I probably listen to her demos more than any other record I own right now. She is going to be a huge star, and while we may not be Warner Bros., I am privledged to play any role in that inevitable rise. On her musical merits, she has the most impressive sensibility as a songwriter that I have ever heard, and I listen to a lot of pop music. Her songs are extremely unusual though too in their substance lyrically and melodically, almost like a blend of Prince, Dar Williams, and perhaps Ani Difranco. Although as a songwriter, she also reminds me somewhat of Laura Nyro and perhaps a touch of Joni Mitchell. As a pianist, she is incredible, George Winston meets Nicky Hopkins and Tori Amos. Also, which is great for us as a label, ALL of her songs are instant hits. They are accessible to any ear, but still all feel really personal to the listener. I’m very proud to be involved with her. I really have no words for her sometimes she’s so beyond them. Her music will change people. You can check her out at www.jasyandrews.com or www.versaillesrecords.com.

What’s Love? A Tribute to Tina Turner
Label: Versailles Records
Purchase this CD online

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This interview was conducted with the Bristol Recording Studio's website staff a couple of months ago.

INTERVIEW OF THE MONTH:

Recently in studio news, we featured Olympic Medalist Nancy Karrigan recording vocals in Studio C with Senior Producer Chris Billias for a Tina
Turner tribute album. We got the chance recently to talk with Richard Kendrick, the producer behind this project. For more information about Richard, you can check him out online at www.richardkendrick.com

Bristol: How did this tribute album project come about? Who came up with the concept?

Richard: Versailles Records predominantly puts out "Tribute Records". Jake Brown, the president of the label came up with this one. We often discuss these
things and bounce potential prospects off of each other, and then we investigate who has been tributed and who has not. I believe on this particular occasion
Jake mentioned to me that after seeing "What's Love Got To Do With It", that movie about Ike and Tina Turner, he was inspired to do this tribute. Up to this
point the label has mostly tributed Hard Rock bands/artist.

Bristol: What was the purpose of creating this tribute?

Richard: Well, Tina Turner is a living legend, if anyone deserves a tribute it's her. For me though, I enjoy recording these things. Sometimes they can be challenging.

Bristol: Has the project been completed?

Richard: Yes, it has been completed. It was mixed last week and mastered this past weekend.

Bristol: Which other vocalists and musicians contributed to this recording?

Richard: Nancy Kerrigan, Tiffany, Alannah Myles (Jeff Healey played guitar on her track), Deniece Williams, Darlene Love, Jane Child, Kip Winger, Michel'le (Featuring Tony Janflone Jr. on Guitar), Rose Reiter, Wendy Jans, Ross Stephens (The singer for my band, Straitjacket Smile) Jennifer Andrews, and myself.

Bristol: Have you ever been involved in any other tribute projects? If so, which ones?

Richard: Sure. I have been on:
"The Second Coming: A Millennium Tribute to 80's Hard Rock/Heavy Metal" -- March 1999
"American Hair Bands: The Best Of 70s/80s Hard Rock/Heavy Metal Anthems" -- November 2002
"Best of Both Worlds- A Tribute to Van Halen's David Lee Roth and Sammy Hagar" -- May 2003
"Lords of Karma: A Tribute of Vai/Satriani" -- January 2002
"Fire Woman: A Tribute to the Cult" -- June 2001
"Tribute To Van Halen" (Cleopatra/BigEye) -- March 2004

Bristol: What role did you play in the creative process of this recording?

Richard: Wow, well I was an engineer and a producer. I also recorded and played almost all of the music on it. I did a lot of the sequencing and I played guitar on many of the tracks. With the exception of a few of songs, I did all the back up vocals on the record. Except for all the lead vocals contributed by other people, most of this record was recorded at my house in Katy, Texas. The lead vocals were recorded at other studios, local to the artist. I was part of the mix team on the record as well.

Bristol: How did you enjoy working on this project? Is it something you would want to do again?

Richard: It was great. I love doing this stuff. Sometimes it gets a bit grueling because I find I don't have time to do other things that I would like to do, but I usually get a break between records.

Bristol: Where else besides Boston did you get to travel for this project?

Richard: I went to Los Angeles, Nashville, and Columbus, Ohio for this record. We were able to FedEx and FTP a lot of the vocal tracks on the Turner Tribute, so I did not have to travel too much. The artists would send me several takes of their performances and I could pick and choose what I liked.

Bristol: What did you think of the facilities here at Bristol Recording Studios in Boston?

Richard: Bristol is top notch. Very comfortable. Great atmosphere. Chris Billias is great too. I really enjoyed the visit, and I'm sure if we are ever anywhere near Boston again we'll be back over there turning knobs and pushing buttons. I had a great time!

Bristol:: Thanks Richard!

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I recently did an interview with Nick Martinelli at The Shred Zone. It's pretty lengthy. There are TABs for a couple of my tapping licks along with PowerTab files and .mp3s of the licks -- slow and fast. You can also read The Shred Zone's review of "Murder and The F-Word"

Murder and the F Word: A Murder Mystery with Richard Kendrick
Interviewed by Nick Martinelli
Published 9/11/2003

Richard Kendrick is no stranger to the world of hard rock and heavy metal guitar playing. He's a seasoned veteran of the southern music scene touring all over supporting major national acts and headlining shows with former bands. A few months ago we reviewed Richard's latest cd release "Murder and the F Word." We finally had a chance to catch up with Richard after his move to Houson, Texas, and here's what we talked about.

Shred Zone: So Richard can you give us an update on what you have been up to lately?

Richard: Well, I have just moved to Houston, Texas and I’m looking forward to seeing what the music scene is like here.

Shred Zone: Give us some background and personal history about yourself.

Richard: I grew up in Louisiana, listening to Vocal and Guitar driven bands like Queen, Styx and ELO. I loved the theatrics of bands like Kiss and Alice Cooper. My dad was a big help. He took me to see all the bands that came to town when I was kid. I got into bands like Judas Priest, Iron Maiden, Ozzy and Dio. I was the shy kid with the long hair. I started playing guitar when I was about eleven years old… so I guess that’s what?.. Twenty-two years ago. Yikes! I played in a lot of local bands and then I hit the road for a while in a Metal band called Dark August. I got to play everywhere between El Paso and Virginia Beach. Later on, I was part of putting together a band called Straitjacket Smile. Over the years we to opened for bands ranging from REO Speedwagon, Kansas, Cheap Trick and Foreigner to Lillian Axe, Zebra, Pantera, and Lizzy Bordan. We were, if do say so myself, one hell of a band. The vocals were tight, the songs were good, the chops were there, the show was good and we were a lot of fun to go see. SJS was a cross between Boston and BonJovi, but a little heavier. The timing was all wrong though - We were hitting our stride when the “grunge” thing happened and well, the next thing you know, the singer and I were playing the “Frat-House Circuit” in another band called Mudbone. The money was good. After a while, I got some recording gear and I started recording backing music on tribute records for Versailles Records. I have backed artists such as: Jake E. Lee, Tony Harnell, Jason McMaster, Paul Shortino, Dave Ragsdale, Jimmy Crespo, Brad Gillis, George Lynch, Gilby Clarke, Stevie Rachelle, Jim Martin, and a few others. Somehow, I wound up putting out my own CD, “Murder and The F-Word.” I don’t like to consider myself a singer so it is odd that I agreed to do that project… Now, I’m in Texas. There you have it.

Shred Zone: When did you pick up guitar and how did you get interested in it?

Richard: Christmas of 1981 I think… I had a friend at the bus stop that had just gotten a guitar for Christmas. I had owned one for years but I wanted to be a drummer. Anyway, this guy had a guitar, so we had something in common. We would get together and try to play stuff. Eventually, it started to sound like music and we started finding other people to jam with.

Shred Zone: What drove you to become the player you have become today?

Richard: I love the way it feels when you play something, even just a couple of cords, and find a way to make a melody lock into it a like puzzle. I can’t explain it. When I hear what bands such as Queen did with their songs it blows my mind. But, as far as pushing myself, if that is what you mean, I used to push myself a lot to be a great player. I was obsessed. I would play for eight or more hours a day. Eventually, I realized that being a “band guy” was better than being a guitar player if you wanted to actually be in a working band, so I changed my focus. I really don’t practice enough these days. My chops have a tendency to get stronger when I have been doing a bit of recording.

Shred Zone: How do you feel about educated musicians? Are you self-taught or did you seek out some instructional aid over the years?

Richard: Hmm… I think the more you know about something the better. Bands like Dream Theater are amazing. I wish I had the education in music they have. I do know a decent amount of the fundamentals. However, a lot of the stuff I play I just feel out. I seem to have a sense of where things should go. I took some piano lessons when I was a kid – but I brought my guitar to the lessons. Years later, I found out I liked to play the piano. I’m not very good, but sometimes when I’m working something out, I see music in my head, spread out on the piano, rather than the guitar. And it is a bit easier to work out vocal arrangements on the piano.

Shred Zone: At The Shred Zone, we stress the importance of being “educated players” and that theory and other studies are key to becoming a successful guitarist and musician. Would you agree?

Richard: Absolutely. I used to think that if you learned too much about what you were doing that you would get mechanical but as I have grown older I have heard a lot of well-practiced guitarists that still have a LOT of feel. Paul Gilbert, John Petrucci… Damn!

Shred Zone: Name some of the biggest influences on your playing? Who where the ones early on that impacted your life?

Richard: Hmmmmmm. That's tough. I think there are subtle and not-so-subtle things that I've ripped off of a lot of players. Brad Gillis was a big influence. Brain May, John Sykes, Randy Rhodes, Vivian Campbell, Ronni LeTecro, Steve Vai. I could name 20 more guys that blow my mind.

Shred Zone: Who are some of your favorite bands nowadays?

Richard: The same guys I grew up listening to and not much else. Recently, Dream Theater… and Kip Winger has put out a couple of great solo disks in the last few years… There is not a whole lot out there that does it for me right now, honestly. You will occasionally here a great song, but they never back it up with anything of substance. I never catch the name of most of the “one-hit-wonder” bands - Ya’ know?

Shred Zone: What bands or projects have you been in the past?

Richard: Dark August, Straitjacket Smile, Mudbone and about ten or so others.

Shred Zone: Can you tell us when and why you wrote and released “Murder and the F word?”

Richard: The record, originally, was not supposed to be a solo record. In fact, I never actually thought it would ever be recorded. I thought I would eventually just steal the songs for other records. I really wasn't sure I would be able to sing parts of it. I wrote much of it with other singers in mind.
Five of the songs were written as standalone songs and then I realized I had the outline of a story. I just started filling in the blanks. It was a good way for me to raid my 4-track tapes and old discarded songs for cool parts.

Shred Zone: Can you explain why the album is broken up into sections and why it evolved that way?

”Murder and the F-Word” is a semi-autobiographical concept album. The songs were all written or modified, intentionally, to flow well into each other. The story is divided into sections, and titled like chapters in a book. I did that to show where we were going next in the story. The Chapters are: "Fiancée" (songs 1-3), "Forsaken" (songs 4-6), ""Fame, Faith, Farrago" (songs7-12) "Flight" (song 13-15), and "Finale" (songs 16 & 17). I thought this might also help explain where we were in this guys head. It just felt right at the time. My wife called it pretentious. I agree, it was.

Shred Zone: One thing I always wondered about your release since I reviewed it at The Shred Zone.com, where did you get the name of the album from and how does it play into the music on it?

Richard: It was originally going to be called “Now I’m Alive.” But that title just did not feel right. Anyway, I knew the record was going to be, in part, about a Murder. Then one day, I wrote “F**K” into one of the songs - which is something that I normally wouldn’t do, but it fit. I thought, “that’s great, all people will get out of this CD is Murder and the F-Word.” I wrote it down and that was it. But, what I realized, is that the F-word is really “FRIENDS,” as in, “I hope we can still be friends.”

Shred Zone: “Murder and the F Word” was a real cool guitar driven album. You cover lots of ground and many different styles of guitar. What frame of mind where you in when writing for “Murder and the F Word” and why a vast variety of guitar playing?

Richard: Thank you. I wrote the record over a period of about 10 years – maybe more. I was just stashing the songs mostly. Being a guitarist, I like to try to play a lot of different styles. I have gotten criticized for my record being too diverse. I don’t understand that at all. Why would I want to write a bunch of stuff that all sounds the same? It was my record, I wrote it, I produced it, recorded it, played everything on it and I did whatever felt right within the context of the songs at the time. It was a lot of work but it was also a labor of love. I’m glad I did it.

Shred Zone: You also did some vocals on this release. Do you find yourself to be a natural singer or was it something you had to work at?

Richard: I always sang a lot of backups over the years. I’m not a great singer but I have decent range. I have a knack for hearing harmonies.

Shred Zone: Can you give us a play by play on each song? Fill us in on what you were going for and how the guitars and music evolved in each track for “Murder and the F Word.”

Shred Zone: (“Fiancée:”) "I Know Why"

Richard: In this song we find out where the main character and the love of his life met. She is a nerd named Sherri that pursues him until he sees her beauty and falls in love. After a while he feels that she is the most real person he has ever met and becomes quite co-dependant. This was the last song written for the album. I needed an up-tempo tune that gave the main characters a background. Also, before it was written, the second song on the disk would have been a ballad. I felt like that was a little too soon into the disk to slow things down. Anyway, I wrote the music, did all the programming and recorded it. I wound up re-writing all the lyrics while I was in the room singing it. This is not my favorite song on the record but I like the guitar solo.

Shred Zone: "One Life Stand"

Richard: I wrote this song after a fight I had with my wife (before she was my wife). I was feeling guilty and it inspired me. The song is about knowing that our buddy wants to spend the rest of his life with Sherri. I like the keyboards and the fretless bass guitar in this song a lot.

Shred Zone: "Don't Fly Away"

Richard: This was the first song written for the record. I wrote it back in 1989 after one of several break-ups I had with the female that inspired much of this record. It is about going to Pensacola beach, late one really, windy night, and flying this red kite we had in the trunk of the car. It was a very sweet moment… Full moon, really cliché, but perfect. Some of the artwork in the CD makes more sense if you know what this song is about. In this song the main character is concerned that the relationship is on the rocks.

Shred Zone: (“Forsaken:“) "Start Again"

Richard: I struggled with this song. I had these verses, an intro riff, a solo and a bridge that I really liked but I could not find a chorus that put across the point of this song. I knew I was working on a concept record by the time I was writing this one - so I was confined lyrically. The point of this song was to show that Sherri is breaking things off and give her reasons through the eyes of our hero. They were out of high school and growing apart. She is turning into a babe and is being pursued by men that had more to offer her than he could give. He is not maturing and she wants him to become a "new man". She does not handle thing the right way and keeps herself in his life just enough to make him think there is still a chance.

Shred Zone: "Sherri's Song"

Richard: I wrote the first part of this song with a friend of mine, John Vaughn, back in 1989 or 90. He had been seeing a girl named Sheri and they broke up. The song was originally called, "Why Am I Missing You." I was listening to a lot of Stryper at the time this one was written. I later added on the end of this song, which was actually about my female woes and decided to protect the innocent by calling the song Sherri's song. The song got another thorough re-write lyrically when I was squeezing it into the story. It is about how our hero can't take the separation and isn't dealing well with not possessing his girl. The lyric, "… it should have never come to this…" tells us that he has decided that if he can't have her, no one can. I am particularly fond of the chord changes at the end of this song. -- There are lot of stacked guitars and half of them are running through a pitch shifter tuned to minor thirds. I also used this technique in the solo for “Don’t Fly Away.” The trick was to play whatever note in each chord gave me the minor third and I gave the other guitar whatever note was left over. We used to play this live in Straitjacket Smile and it sounded wicked when the three part guitar harmony started coming out of two guitars. I‘ll give you an example:

The chord changes are Dm, Amaj/C#, Gm, A7, Bbdim7 and Fmaj/A – I would play (Dm) the note F which would give me F and the D below that. The other guitar would play the note A.

Next, (Amaj/C#) I would play E which would also give me C# below that and the other guitar would still play A. And I’ll speed this up some here –
(Gm) I played Bb – G - Other guitar D (A7) E – C# - Other Guitar G. The bass played A (Bbdim7) Bb – G – Other guitar E. This was actually a slow arpeggiated run that moved and it worked great because of all the minor thirds in the diminished 7 chord. (Fmaj/A) C – A – Other guitar F. The Bass played A
There is a lot more, but you get the drift.

Shred Zone: "Share This Tender Moment"

Richard: This was originally called "Scream." I wrote some of the lyrics for this song in 1990, when I was playing with Dark August. It had completely different music and sounded like a King Diamond song. I was trying to write the heaviest thing I could think of at the time. It was about a Stalker/Rapist. Yeah, I know, it's a little warped, but somebody has do it. Anyway, I really liked a lot of the verses from that song and when I started working on the concept for the record I considered what it would be like to make this song personal. Imagine stalking and killing someone you're in love with. Sounds like OJ Simpson, but I wrote this song before that fiasco. I think our hero may have done more than just kill Sherri, if you know what I mean.

Shred Zone: (Fame, Faith, Farrago:) “Don't Touch”

Richard: The next four songs, "Don't Touch," "Questions and Prayers," "Now I'm Alive," and "Losing My Place," were written as a medley, originally titled, "The New Man Medley." This is what inspired me to break the record into chapters. I had already worked out most of the songs on the album so that they would flow from one song to the next. I changed the title of this chapter to "Fame, Faith, Farrago." Farrago means medley. Getting back to this song… "Don't Touch" is the craziest thing on the album. There is a lot going on in there. There are two vocals that enter-twine, lyrically, throughout the verses and a lot of string sequencing. My favorite guitar solo on the album is in this song. I really just wanted this tune to be humorous. If you listen closely coming out of the first verse, there is a lyric "Say Jim, Whoo!! That's a bad outfit, Whoo!!" I stole that from the first Super Man movie. Some pimp says it to Superman when he sees him coming out of a phone booth. It was meant as an inside joke. Friends of mine and I have always thought that particular scene was funny. Anyway, this song is about a couple of things. The choruses revolve around the fame that our hero is receiving because of all the press attention to his murder case and how his ego responds to seeing himself on TV. The verses deal more with his asking Sherri if he has become the "New Man" that she had hoped for. Obviously, he is institutionalized. You CAN’T have a concept record with out that. Haahaa.

Shred Zone: “Questions and Prayers”

Richard: He reflects a little on his relationship, slips further into a psychosis, and starts to reject his belief in god.
I used to do a cover of "Talk To You Later," by The Tubes. The solo in this song utilized my interpretation for guitar, of the keyboard sound from their song’s keyboard solo. I always thought that was a crazy sound. My wife hates it.

Shred Zone “Now I'm Alive”

Richard: There's lots of deep, hidden meaning in this song - too much to explain. The chorus will not make since to anyone that doesn't know me. Lets just say that the main character sees what Sherri did to him as just as evil as what he did to her. Most of his dreams are about her and it's making him crazier all the time. He believes that she actually won their battle of wills, but in his mind, he also wants to deny it. He doesn't know if he's coming or going, or even if she really is dead. This song is about confusion. I know lots of people think I lost my mind putting in the techno drum kit for this song, but I felt like it really worked for the song. I meant to add some distortion and change the EQ on the vocal in the verses. However, I got so busy with the two records I was mixing at the same time (…F-word and a tribute to Steve Vai and Joe Satriani) in five days, that it slipped my mind. I was going for a NIN vibe.
The little waltz in the second verse is a reprise of the beginning of "Don't Touch." As I already stated, I almost named the album "Now I'm Alive"

Shred Zone: “Losing My Place”

Richard: He lives in constant drug-induced nightmares and desires to beg the only person he ever has contact with, which is the nurse that sedates him daily, to just let him stay awake. She doesn't care.

Shred Zone: “The Pieces”

Richard: This was comprised of the original guitar solo for "Scream" which became "Share this Tender Moment," and the guitar solo from a song called "Taken Away," which will never get recorded. I liked these solos a lot and wanted them on the record. I thought "The Pieces" was a good title because these solos were left over pieces of music. Also, in the story, the main character is struggling to gain his composure and pick up the pieces.

Shred Zone: “How Many Times”
Richard: In this song he continues to dream about being visited by Sherri. He thinks she is being cruel and still will not leave him alone to get over her.
If you pay attention to the solo near the end of the song, you'll hear that it's just a slightly altered repeat of the second-half solo from "The Pieces."

Shred Zone: (Flight:) “Freedumb”

Richard: I wrote the guitar solo first for this one. After that, I just massaged it into a song. I knew I needed a tune that was heavier than some of the others on the album and I needed to get this guy out of his padded cell somehow. I had written some lyrics that dealt with questioning religion a few years back. These lyrics were originally called "The Door." I was digging through some notebooks and found them. I realized I liked what I had to say and wanted to use them. So, I tweaked the lyrics a little to suit the storyline. At this point in the story, our buddy, the nut, no longer believes in anything. He just wants to die.

Shred Zone: “The Flood”

Richard: This was originally, lyrically, to be the bridge section for "Freedumb." In this one, Fate or God or Sherri or somebody… I have no idea who it is, lets him out of his cell. But the cruelty of it is, they give him back some of his sanity as well. He sees all the bad things he has done.

Shred Zone: “Laughin' Myself Goodbye”

Richard: "Laughin'…" was written by a friend of mine named Phil Wang. He used to play bass for Straitjacket Smile. We used to open our show with this one. I thought this song, which is about realizing your fate is to jump off a bridge, fit the story, and was a nice way to tie this album up. I rewrote the main riff and the solo, added a few vocal harmonies, and started the song acappella. Otherwise, the song stayed unchanged from the original. By the way, most likely, our hero broke all the bones in his body and survived the fall.

Shred Zone: (Finale:) “Reprisal”

Richard: This one is a mix of a lot of the string and piano parts that are buried throughout the record. I put it together in Sound Forge, on my PC, using ADAT tracks from parts off of the Album. I had spent so much time over the years sequencing and agonizing over some of these pieces, that I wanted to make sure people actually heard them. There is a huge amount of work included in this 2-minute song. The beginning guitar stuff is the solo from, "Laughin' Myself Goodbye," backwards.

Shred Zone: “The Attitude Song”

Richard: This is a cover tune of a song by Steve Vai. I recorded it for “Lords of Karma: A tribute to Vai/Satriani.” I have always loved this song. How the hell do you write something like that? I spent three or four days programming the drums. This one was tough. Don't ask me to stand up and play it… I got Jake, from Versailles, to let me put it on here so I could have a bonus track that was not, in any way, related to the story. It is also pretty impressive sounding - which is good if you need your ego stroked. This is the only song on the record that I had someone else play on. I got my friend Jason Keller to do all that cool “poppin' and slappin'.” He is one bad-ass bass player.

Shred Zone: So if this was a sales pitch what would your new listeners get from “Murder and the F Word?”

Richard: It is an album in which you will continue to find little neat things that you didn’t hear the first ten or twenty times you listened to it. There is a lot of stuff going on in there. The guitar playing is thought-out and I even like most of the lyrics.

Shred Zone: Ok, one of the most amazing things I found about “Murder and the F Word” was that it was all recorded at your home studio. You wore every hat that there was to wear, musician, engineer, producer, etc. Why did you do everything yourself, why not have other musicians play on it with you?

Richard: I had been working on it, just for fun, for years. As a result, most of the sequencing was done and just needed to be tweaked. There was really no need to use other people and it was a lot cheaper to do it all myself. I wanted to see what would happen if I did it this way anyway.

Shred Zone: How did you get into home studio recording? Was this something you’ve always been into or did you just want to record an album on your own terms?

Richard: I had a 4-track for years and I used that thing until it fell apart (I still use it as a little four-channel mixer.) Eventually, I was starting to work on these tribute records and I got tired of using other studios for the recording process. So, I decided to buy some ADATs off of Ebay. I own a PA and have run a lot of sound over the years and I had done a decent amount of recording projects so I had an idea of what to do.

Shred Zone: What other works are you on?

Richard: Here goes:
Straitjacket Smile “Temporary Sanity,” Released – In 1993 (Maybe?)
“The Second Coming...A Millennium Tribute to 80`s Heavy Metal and Hard Rock” – Released December 1999
"Fire Woman: A Tribute to The CULT" Released – March 2001
Richard Kendrick “ Murder and the F-Word” - Released February 2002
“Lords of Karma: A Tribute to Vai/Satriani” – Released February 2002
“American Hair Bands Vol. 1” -- Released 2003
“Best of Both Worlds - A Tribute to VanHalen's "Diamond" David Lee Roth
"The Red Rocker" Sammy Hagar” – Released 2003

Shred Zone: So how did you and Versailles Records begin working together?

Richard: I saw an ad in Metal Edge Magazines' Metal Wire a couple of years ago, for a record label that wanted to put out a record showcasing unsigned bands, paying tribute to 80 hard rock. I felt like I had the perfect band for that. I e-mailed Jake, and then he called me. I played him some songs on the phone and he really loved my singer, Ross Stephens’ voice. Jake asked if we could do two songs for that record -which we did. As Mudbone, which was our touring name for the fraternity band, we did "Wait" by White Lion and as Straitjacket Smile, we did “Photograph” by Def Leppard. The band could not agree on which songs to do so we let Jake pick the songs. Jake and I developed a great working relationship and he has included me on every Versailles Records project ever since.

Shred Zone: Do you have any plans for a new cd release in the works? If so any idea when this work will begin and or when you may put this album on the market?

Richard: Just some tributes and a Straitjacket Smile CD.

Shred Zone: Now lets take a little different turn with the interview. Now lets hit the hardcore guitar stuff. What is your favorite part of your playing style?

Richard: My rhythm playing is pretty tight and I like my right hand tapping. I also have decent squeals-ala-Zack Wylde. I wish I could get his tone.

Shred Zone: Favorite Scale or Mode?

Richard: D

Shred Zone: Favorite key?

Richard: D

Shred Zone: Favorite trick or lick, trick or both?

Richard: Okay, here is a fairly easy tapping thing I do sometimes, in Gmaj. The fret numbers in bold type are tapped with the pick hand. I use my index finger.
I recorded some mp3s of these two licks, through a Zoom, into my PC. I’m tuned a half-step down (…or somewhere close to that).

Lick 1

(E A D G B E)

4/4
Gtr I
E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E
|------------------------------------------------------------------22-17-19-20----|
|-----------------------------------------------------22-17-19-20-----------------|
|----------------------------------------21-16-17-19------------------------------|
|---------------------------21-16-17-19-------------------------------------------|
|--------------22-15-17-19--------------------------------------------------------|
|-22-15-17-19---------------------------------------------------------------------|
This second part is played with a triplet feel implied by the right hand.

E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E
|-22-20-19-17------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
|-------------20--22-20-19-17-----------------20--22-20-19-17------------------------------------|
|-----------------------------19--21-19-17-16-----------------19--21-19-17-16-----------------19-|
|-----------------------------------------------------------------------------19--21-19-17-16----|
|------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
|------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E
|------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
|------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
|-21-19-17-16------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|
|-------------19--21-19-17-16-----------------19-21-19-17-16-------------------------------------|
|-----------------------------19--22-19-17-15----------------19--22-19-17-15-----------------19--|
|----------------------------------------------------------------------------19--22-19-17-15-----|
E E E E E E E E E E E
|--------------------------------------|
|--------------------------------------|
|--------------------------------------|
|--------------------------------------|
|-22-19-17-15--------------------------|
|-------------19--22-19-17-15-12--0----|
Click here to download lick two's power tab file. Here it slow or fast.

Another variation of this lick would be to play it in, for example, the key of Dmaj and tap the shape of a D cord with your right hand as you move through the scale. Like This:

Lick 2

Gtr I (E A D G B E)

4/4
Gtr I
E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E
|-------------------------------------------------------------17-12-14-15-17----|
|-------------------------------------------------19-12-14-15-------------------|
|-------------------------------------19-11-12-14-------------------------------|
|-------------------------19-11-12-14-------------------------------------------|
|-------------17-10-12-14-------------------------------------------------------|
|-17-10-12-14-------------------------------------------------------------------|
E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E E
|-22-17-15-14-12-14-15-17-15-14-12-----------------------------------------------------------------------------*|
|----------------------------------15-19-15-14-12--------------------------------------------------------------*|
|-------------------------------------------------14-19-14-12-11-----------------------------------------------*|
|----------------------------------------------------------------14-19-14-12-11--------------------------------*|
|-------------------------------------------------------------------------------14-17-14-12-10-----------------*|
|----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------14-17-14-12-10--*|

Click here to download lick two's power tab file. Hear it slow, medium or fast.

Shred Zone: Recommended playing technique:

Richard: I recommend practicing in front of a mirror so that you are not always looking down. You can watch your hands from a different perspective. As far as a playing technique is concerned, I still struggle with my technique so I might be the wrong guy to ask. My wife tells me that I am great at making my playing look like it is difficult. So when people see me play live they might think I’m a better player than I really am. You have to love her.

Shred Zone: Suggested Theory books or readings:

Richard: Actually, when I want to learn a technique or some music theory I look it all up on the internet. I have learned some really nice finger picking techniques off of the internet. It has been more helpful than anything else that I have tried. I have a couple of friends that swear by Paul Gilberts video lessons and their techniques are flawless. They are two of the best shredders I’ve ever heard. So there must be something to it. I was thinking about giving those videos a test-drive soon.

Shred Zone: You have upbeat and in your face guitar playing technique, how did you get to the level that you’re currently at?

Richard: Practice. Actually, I used to play along with tons of records (remember those?) and those players’ guitar styles really rubbed off on me.

Shred Zone: What advice can you give to ammeter and beginner players?

Richard: Buy some Judas Priest or Iron Maiden records and learn how to play those first… Any band that uses a lot of scale type repetition provides a more entertaining way to run scales than just running scales to a metronome. Become good at that kind of thing a try to learn everything you hear – even if it is just a TV Commercial. No matter what, try to learn as much music theory as you can along the way. Take lessons… I wish I had done that. It might have saved me some grief.

Shred Zone: Recommend any CD’s for our readers to check out?

Richard: Dio-“Holy Diver” Ozzy –“Speak of The Devil” Anything by Queen or Dream Theater.

Shred Zone: What guitars do you use and why? Have you made any upgrades, modifications, or had custom work done on them?

Richard: I play a hodge-podge of old beaten up Kramer style Strat-things. They're all rigged with Seymore Duncan Invaders in the bridge and Customs in the neck. And I love my Floyds (Floyd Rose bridge). I have a Takamine EF-341C 6-string acoustic and an EF-381C 12-string acoustic. I also have an old Ibanez Custom, Les Paul copy with a bolt-on neck, a locking nut, and a B.B. King fine-tuning bridge.

Shred Zone: What gear are you currently using?

Richard: On my record I used a Rockman Sustanor and Chorus for all of my clean guitar, and a Digitech 2120 and its' speaker emulator for all of the dirty guitar. We beefed up the dirt on rhythms with Amp Farm in Pro Tools at the mix-down. When I'm gigging, I use the same rig stereo, through a couple of Marshall 8008s into an old Randall cabinet and an old, homemade Marshall copy that sound excellent. The Randall is loaded with Jaguars and the other is loaded with Celestions -- although I used it for about seventeen years with Peavey Scorpions in it. I have a really cool relay-amp-switching system that I made. It allows me to select any of three rigs at the same time or separately and it turns off and on the FX on my clean sound. I use a Heil Talk Box powered by an old Randall head, The Rockman stuff, which I run through an EQ and an old Digitech delay, and the 2120 setup. I also use a Dunlop Rackmount Wah. There is a lot more, but you get the picture.

Shred Zone: Give us your feelings on the current state of guitar driven music in worldwide?

Richard: I think there are still some really great players out there. There are guitarists that have created some really cool directions in a lot of the newer rock styles. I have to say, there have not been many new contributors to the shred community in the last ten years, especially in the press. In the 80s every kid that picked up a guitar was being exposed to some really evolved guitar playing and that is what drove them to be better. In the past ten years there has been less infuses put on soloing and I'm sure that has equated to less structured players. There are still some monsters out there that sneak through once in a while though. John Petrucci is just about a god. I'd sell a testicle to play like that and also get all those great tones. For that matter, I would love to have the chance to play through his rig. On another note, I get pissed off when I see someone that I respected as a musician in the past, playing down what they did in the 80s. Look, you wore spandex, you had big hair, you were a great guitar player, you tapped on your fret-board, you sold a lot of records... So what!! Be proud of it. Don't pretend that it never happened, or that wasn't really what you meant to do. You had a great time!!

Shred Zone: What are you currently up to?

Richard: Trying to get my life together in a new town actually, but in a month or so I will begin work on a couple of new tribute records for Versailles Records and I will also get back to work on the forthcoming Straitjacket Smile CD that will be released one of these years.

Some fun questions:
Shred Zone: What other outside interests do you have?

Richard: Reading and watching movies. Lately I have taken up building furniture since I moved to Texas. I just built my wife a bad-ass, tiled vanity in her closet.

Shred Zone: Favorite movies?

Richard: “Airplane,” “ Hedwig And The Angry Inch,” “Evil Dead 2,” “The Princess Bride.”

Shred Zone: Favorite actor and actress?

Richard: Wow. I strained my brain trying to single some out. I think Guy Pierce is really good and so is Collin Ferrel (he was great in “Phone Booth”). Hugh Jackman might be the next Clint Eastwood. Jennifer Love Hewitt is nice to look at.

Shred Zone: Favorite food and drink?

Richard: Taco Bell, Steak, Cheese Cake, Iced Tea.

Shred Zone: Favorite book?

Richard: “The Stand” by Stephen King is great but my favorite Author is F. Paul Wilson. Everything he writes is excellent. I also enjoyed all of the “Dune” series by Frank Herbert and the prequels his son Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson have written.

Shred Zone: Favorite song?

Richard: There are too many to name any. I have a new favorite song at any given moment.

Shred Zone: Favorite color?

Richard: Red, White and Blue.

Shred Zone: If you could form a rock or metal super group what fellow musicians would you want in the band?

Richard: That is a hard one. Rob Halford, Mike Portnoy, Kip Winger, Tommy Shaw. My alternates would be: Freddie Mercury, John Petrucci, Eric Car, Eddie Jackson and John Sykes. I like players that can sing and I’m just really into good tight rock bands. This question is hurting my head... If I was going to put together a super group, I’m not sure I would want to actually play in the band. I think I would rather just watch and listen.

Shred Zone: What sports do you enjoy or take part in?

Richard: The only thing I do anymore is throw the Frisbee and occasionally ride my bike. I watch Football, Basketball, Gymnastics and Figure Skating. I love the Olympics.

Shred Zone: Fondest memory?

Richard: Well, I really enjoyed going to Europe last year. I also enjoyed my Honeymoon in Hawaii.

Shred Zone: Is your guitar playing, touring, recording your full time job, or do you do that along with other things to supplement your income?

Richard: When I’m not playing or recording, I run sound for bands. I have a big PA and lights.

Shred Zone: Favorite music related websites:

Richard: You mean besides yours? I visit melodicrock.com a lot.

Shred Zone: Favorite Non-music related websites:

Richard: http://www.repairmanjack.com It is F. Paul Wilson’s site. I like the discussion forum.

Shred Zone: Favorite Guitar Magazine:

Richard: I get them all confused, but I subscribe to all of them. I had an ad for my record in Guitar One. That was cool.

Shred Zone: Can you share some words of wisdom?

Richard: My Dad’s favorite, “Don’t bet on the ‘nine dog’ in an eight dog race.“ Actually, take pride in what you do but never take yourself too seriously.

Shred Zone: Where can our readers go buy your CDs?

Richard: You can go to my website and hunt around… there is a link. Also, I have seen it in Tower Records. It even had a card with my name on it. I would just try to buy it at Amazon.com or Cdnow.com.

Shred Zone: Homepage Url: www.richardkendrick.com

Shred Zone: Other sites you can be found on:

Richard: www.VersaillesRecords.com

Shred Zone: Contact email address:

Richard: rik@richardkendrick.com

Shred Zone: Lastly, any closing words, or things that come to mind that we may have over looked in the course of this interview?

Richard: Well, I just want to thank you for letting me sit here and talk about myself. And thanks for giving my CD a listen.

Well shred heads that about wraps it up for this one. I would like to thank Richard for taking the time out of his hectic schedule for doing this interview. Richard's latest CD "Murder and the F Word" is avalible for sale in stores and online. For more information please drop by Richard's website.

Back To The Top

03-15-02

Instead of posting all of the interviews I have done regarding Murder And The F-Word, I have decided to consolidate them all into one. I need to thank Guitar Mania, RockNWord.com, Rockhardplace.com, and Skylight E-Zine for their questions. Here we go…

RAAHP: First of all Richard, before we get into your latest project, can you give us a history of what past projects you've worked on and what bands you've been in and who are some acts you've played with? (That's a long way of asking for your bio, LOL.)

Richard: I got a guitar and a little Pig Nose amp for Christmas when I was maybe 7 or 8... some time in the late seventies. My parents were trying to discourage my desire to be a drummer I think. I did not start trying to play the guitar until maybe late 1981.
I played the rock scene of the south-eastern United States for a good part of the last 12 years or so with a few different bands: Dark August, Straitjacket Smile, Mudbone and a couple of others. Over the years we opened for bands ranging from REO Speedwagon, Kansas, Cheap Trick and Foreigner to Lillian Axe, Zebra, Pantera, and Lizzy Bordan.
When the bottom fell out of the US melodic rock market, somewhere in the mid 90s, I played fraternity house parties to keep myself on stage.
I have also done a lot of the backing music and backing vocals on tribute songs for Versailles Records. We did a tribute to 80s Hard Rock/Heavy Metal, a tribute The Cult and a tribute to Steve Vai and Joe Satriani.
I have backed artists such as: Jake E. Lee, Tony Harnell, Jason McMaster, Paul Shortino, Dave Ragsdale, Jimmy Crespo, Brad Gillis, George Lynch, Gilby Clarke, Stevie Rachelle, Jim Martin, and a few others.
I do the recordings in my spare time, at my house on 3 ADAT recorders. For percussion, sometimes I use a sequencer and sometimes I get Dave Campbell, the drummer of my band to do it. I have friends that occasionally contribute bass guitar to some of these tracks. I play as much of the guitars as I can get away with and then I add the keyboards, if they are easy enough. If not, I use a sequencer for the keys too. Next, I mail off tapes of a rough mix of the songs to the artists. Then they record their parts and send the tapes back.
When all of the songs for a particular project are ready to be mixed I fly to a real studio (John Schwabb studios) in Columbus, Ohio and mix them down with a killer Pro Tools engineer named Joe Viers. He also helped mix my record.

RNW: What inspired you to do a solo album?

As far as my inspiration to do a solo album goes, I had a lot of songs sitting around that I wanted to record, at some point, with my band. I had actually been halfheartedly working on a concept record that included these songs, off and on, for years. However, my band was in limbo over the last year or so and I had been doing a bunch of work for Versailles Records. Jake, the president of the label really liked what I did with "Edie (Ciao Baby)," on the Cult Tribute CD that we had put together. He knew that I had all this music I had been working on and suggested that I put it out. When he gets an idea in his head he goes for it. He worked on me and convinced me to do it. So, while we were working on the Vai/Satriani disk I was also doing my record. That was quite a busy 5 days of mixing. I've been, sort of, the Engineer/Producer of these records and it has been the best learning experience of my life. I'm very thankful to Jake for trusting me with what I have contributed.

G.M. What motivated you to want to learn to play the guitar?

Richard: Kiss. Well actually, a friend of mine that used to hang out with me at the bus stop, was just getting into guitar and starting to take some lessons. We started trying to jam. I'm sure our parents were in hell. At some point, his mom took us to see Judas Priest on the "Screaming For Vengeance" tour. That concert really had an impact on me. Another motivating factor was that I had musical relatives. I was exposed to a lot of live music as a child.

G.M. All of the music you have recorded showcases your depth as a musician and
your strong technique as a gifted guitar player. Tell us about your
technique and how you developed it?

Richard: Well, when I was in high school I, I played guitar nonstop. I stood in front of a mirror and watched what my hands were doing. I spent a lot of time playing along with Ozzy tunes, Dio and Judas Priest… That stuff is just great for learning chops. I don't think I ever consciously worked on technique. One time I spent a little too much time learning how to do that Jeff Watson (Night Ranger) 8-finger tap thing and forgot how to use a pick for a while. I feel pretty guilty, but I never really practice anymore. There just isn't enough time. When I have some stuff to record I just limber up for a while and then start taping.

G.M. You have had a varied background with many different bands. Can you give
us some highlights from those experiences?

Richard: Things have run the gambit for me. I've gotten to open for a lot of great classic bands over the years. I've gotten to be a starving musician. I've had big hair and worn spandex. I made lots of money playing cover tunes for drunk, fraternity-party idiots. My entire life has been playing guitar and singing.

RNW: You are signed to Versailles Records. Previous to your solo album you also contributed music to Versailles tributes for the Cult, "The Second Coming - A Millennium Tribute to 80's Hard Rock /Heavy Metal" where you covered Def Leppard's "Photograph" and White Lion's "Wait" and more recently you contributed to the Steve Vai / Joe Satriani tribute album. How did you hook up with Versailles and what made you decide to sign with them?

Richard: I saw an ad in Metal Edge magazines' metal wire a couple of years ago, for a record label that wanted to put out a record showcasing unsigned bands, paying tribute to 80 hard rock. I felt like I had the perfect band for that. I e-mailed Jake, and then he called me. I played him some songs on the phone and he really loved my singers' (Ross Stephens) voice. Jake asked if we could do two songs for the record -which we did. As Mudbone, which was our touring name for the fraternity band, we did "Wait" by White Lion and as Straitjacket Smile, which was the name of the band Ross and I had been in prior to Mudbone, we did Photograph by Def Leppard. The band, which also included Dave Campbell on drums and Jason Keller on bass, could not agree on which songs to do so we let Jake pick the songs.
Jake and I developed a great working relationship and he has included me on every Versailles Records project ever since. This led to my doing the solo record.

RNW: Did you find it difficult to do the cover tunes for the Versailles tribute CD's?

Richard: No. "Photograph" and "Wait" were recorded on 16-track 1-inch tape witch was a little limiting if you want to reproduce something and do it justice but the songs were pretty easy to put together. I used to play "Wait" in a cover band, so that one went together quickly. All the rest of the songs have been pretty easy to knock out as well. I enjoy it.

RNW: Your music has a big guitar sound, much in the vain of the great hard rock scene of the 80's. Do you find it difficult to find an audience for that kind of music in this day and age with the charts ruled by music that relies a lot less on "expert" musicianship? And what do you think of the current state of music? Do you think kids are being short changed?

Richard: Sure, I think that it is really difficult to find an audience for this kind of music. I do see it rolling around some, but not enough. If I worried about the state of the music biz too much I would pull my hair out. I did my record without giving a lot of consideration to sales or who would like it. I needed to get those songs out of my system. They are a little bit of departure from what my bands sound actually seems to be. Although we played a few of these songs over the years, the band leans a little bit more in the direction of a Firehouse or BonJovi.
And yes, I really think kids are being short changed by what's out there. You used to able to go see a band at a club and really get a good show. You don't find that anymore. Everything is so scaled down now.

G.M. You have been playing guitar for many years - seen many style changes.
Who would you site as your main influences?

Richard: Hmmmmmm. That's tough. I think there are subtle and not-so-subtle things that I've ripped off of a lot of players. Brad Gillis was a big influence. Brain May, John Sykes, Randy Rhodes, Vivian Campbell, Ronni LeTecro, Steve Vai. I could name 20 more guys that blow me away.

G.M. What type of music do you enjoy listening to?

Richard: Queen. Actually, I would have to say that I stick to rock music. Classic rock like ELO and Styx, all the way though Dream Theater. I really like music that uses cool chords, not just root-fifth, within the context of a rock song. I'm not really big into Jazz, although the playing is amazing sometimes. What can I say, most of the time I listen to talk radio.

G.M. What equipment are you currently using?

Richard: I play a hodge podge of old beaten Kramer style Strat-things. They're all rigged with Seymore Duncan Invaders in the bridge and Customs in the neck. And I love my Floyds (Floyd Rose bridge). I have a Takamine EF-341C 6-string acoustic and an EF-381C 12-string acoustic.
On my record I used a Rockman Sustanor and Chorus for all of my clean guitar, and a Digitech 2120 and its' speaker emulator for all of the dirty guitar. We beefed up the dirt on rhythms with Amp Farm - in Pro Tools at the mix-down.
When I'm gigging, I use the same rig stereo, through a couple of Marshall 8008s into an old Randall cabinet and an old, homemade Marshall copy that sound excellent. The Randall is loaded with Jaguars and the other is loaded Peavey Scorpions. I have a really cool relay-amp-switching system that I made. It allows me to select any of three rigs at the same time or separately and it turns off and on the FX on my clean sound. I use a Heil Talk Box powered by an old Randall head, The Rockman stuff, which I run through an EQ and an old Digitech delay, and the 2120 setup. I also use a Dunlop Rackmount Wah. There is a lot more, but you get the picture.

RNW: Now I'm going to ask you about each track on your new album "Murder and the F- Word". If you could tell us a little about each track, any funny stories behind them, their deeper meaning or anything you feel people would be interested in knowing about the songs.

Richard: The record originally was never intended to be a solo record. In fact, I never actually thought it would ever get recorded as is. I thought I would eventually just steal the songs for other records. I wasn't sure I would be able to sing parts of it. I wrote much of it with other singers in mind.
Five of the songs were written as standalone songs and then I realized I had the outline of a story. I just started filling in the blanks. It was a good way for me to raid my 4-track tapes and old discarded songs for cool parts.
Murder and the F-Word is a semi-autobiographical concept album. The songs were all written intentionally to flow well into each other. The story is divided into sections, and titled as chapters in a book to show where we were going next in the story. The Chapters are: "Fiancée" (songs 1-3), "Forsaken" (songs 4-6), ""Fame, Faith, Farrago" (songs7-12) "Flight" (song 13-15), and "Finale" (songs 16 & 17).

RNW: "I Know Why"?

Richard: In this song we find out where the main character and the love of his life met. She is a nerd named Sherri that pursues him till he sees her beauty and falls in love. After a while he feels that she is the most real person he has ever met and becomes quite co-dependant.
This was the last song written for the album. I needed an up-tempo tune that gave the main characters a background. Also, before it was written, the second song on the disk would have been a ballad. I felt like that was a little too soon into the disk to slow things down. Anyway, I wrote the music, did all the programming and recorded it. I wound up re-writing all the lyrics while I was in the room singing it.

(Back To F-Word Lyrics Page)

RNW: "One Life Stand"?

Richard: I wrote this song after a fight I had with my wife (before she was my wife). I was feeling guilty and it inspired me. The song is about knowing that our man wants to spend the rest of his life with Sherri.

(Back To F-Word Lyrics Page)

RNW: "Don't Fly Away"?

Richard: This was the first song written for the record. I wrote it back in 1989 after one of several break ups I had with the female that inspired much of this record. It is about going to Pensacola beach, late one really windy night, and flying this red kite we had in the trunk of the car. It was a very sweet moment… Full moon, really cliché, but perfect.
In this song he is concerned that the relationship is on the rocks.

(Back To F-Word Lyrics Page)

RNW: "Start Again"?

Richard: I struggled with this song. I had these verses, an intro riff, a solo and a bridge that I really liked but I could not find a chorus that put across the point of this song. I new I was working on a concept record by the time I was writing this one so I was confined lyrically.
The point of this song was to show that Sherri was breaking things off and give her reasons through the eyes of our hero. They were out of high school and growing apart. She was turning into a babe and being pursued by men that had more to offer her than he could give. He was not maturing and she wanted him to become a "new man". She did not handle thing the right way and kept herself in his life just enough to make him think there was still a chance.

(Back To F-Word Lyrics Page)

RNW: "Sherri's Song "?

Richard: I wrote the first part of this song with a friend of mine back in 1989 or 90. He had been seeing a girl named Sheri and they broke up. The song was originally called "Why Am I Missing You." I was listening to a lot of Stryper at the time this one was written.
I later added on the end of this song, which was actually about my past situation and decided to protect the innocent by calling the song Sherri's song. The song got another thorough re-write lyrically when I was squeezing it into the story. It is about how the guy can't take the separation and isn't dealing well with not possessing his girl. The lyric, "… it should have never come to this…" tells us that he has decided that if he can't have her, no one can.

(Back To F-Word Lyrics Page)

RNW: "Share This Tender Moment"?

Richard: This was originally called "Scream." I wrote some of the lyrics for this song in 1990, when I was playing with Dark August. It had totally different music and sounded like King Diamond. I was trying to write the heaviest thing I could think of at the time. It was about a Stalker/Rapist. Yeah, I know it's a little warped but somebody has do it. Anyway, I really liked a lot of the verses from that song and when I started working on the concept for the record I considered what it would be like to make this song personal. Imagine stalking and killing someone you're in love with. Sound like OJ Simpson, but I wrote this before that fiasco. I think our hero may have done more than just kill Sherri, if you know what I mean.

(Back To F-Word Lyrics Page)

RNW: "Don't Touch"?

Richard: The next four songs, "Don't Touch," "Questions and Prayers," "Now I'm Alive," and "Losing My Place," were all written as a medley, originally titled, "The New Man Medley." This is what inspired me to break the record into chapters. I had already worked most of the songs on the album so that they would flow from one song to the next. I changed the title of this chapter to "Fame, Faith, Farrago." Farrago means medley.
Getting back to this song… "Don't touch" is the craziest thing on the album. There is a lot going on in there. There are two vocals that enter-twine, lyrically, throughout the verses and a lot of string sequencing. My favorite guitar solo on the album is in this song.
I really just wanted this song to be humorous. If you listen closely coming out of the first verse, there is a lyric "Say Jim, Whoo!! That's a bad outfit, Whoo!!" I stole that from the first Super Man movie. Some pimp says it to superman when he sees him coming out of a phone booth. It was meant as an inside joke. Friends of mine and I have always thought that scene was funny.
Anyway, this song is about a couple of things. The choruses revolve around the fame that our hero is receiving because of all the press attention to his murder case and how his ego responds to seeing himself on TV. The verses deal more with his asking Sherri if he has become the "New Man" that she had hoped for. Obviously, he is institutionalized. You can't have a concept record with out that. Haahaa.

(Back To F-Word Lyrics Page)

RNW: "Questions And Prayers"?

Richard: He reflects a little on his relationship, slips further into a psychosis, and starts to reject his belief in god.
I used to do a cover of "Talk To You Later," by The Tubes. The solo in this song utilized my interpretation for guitar, of the keyboard sound from their songs keyboard solo. I always thought that was a crazy sound. My wife hates it.

(Back To F-Word Lyrics Page)

RNW: Now I'm Alive"?

Richard: There's lots of deep, hidden meaning in this song - too much to explain. The chorus will not make since to anyone that doesn't know me. Lets just say that the main character sees what Sherri did to him as just as evil as what he did to her. Most of his dreams are about her and it's making him crazier all the time. He believes that she actually won their battle of wills but in his mind he also wants to deny it. He doesn't know if he's coming or going, or even if she's alive or dead. This song is about confusion.
I know a lot of people think I lost my mind putting in the techno drum kit for this song but I felt like it really worked for the song. I meant to add some distortion to the vocal on the verses but I got so busy with the two records I was mixing at the same time, that it slipped my mind. I was going for a NIN vibe.
The little waltz in the second verse is a reprise of the beginning of "Don't Touch." I almost named the album "Now I'm Alive"

(Back To F-Word Lyrics Page)

RNW: "Losing My Place"?

Richard: He lives in constant drug-induced nightmares and desires to beg the only person he ever has contact with, which is the nurse that sedates him daily, to just let him stay awake. She doesn't care.

(Back To F-Word Lyrics Page)

RNW: "The Pieces"?

Richard: This was comprised of the original guitar solo for "Scream" which became "Share this Tender Moment," and the guitar solo from a song called "Taken Away," which will never get recorded. I liked these solos a lot and wanted them on the record. I thought "The Pieces" was a good title because these solos were left over pieces of music. Also, in the story, the main character is struggling to gain his composure and pick up the pieces.

(Back To F-Word Lyrics Page)

RNW: "How Many Times"?

Richard: In this song he continues to dream about being visited by Sherri. He thinks she is being cruel and still will not leave him alone to get over her.
If you pay attention to the solo near the end of the song, you'll hear that it's a slightly altered repeat of the second-half solo from "The Pieces."

(Back To F-Word Lyrics Page)

RNW: "Freedumb"?

Richard: I wrote the guitar solo for this one first. After that, I just massaged it into a song. I knew I needed a tune that was heavier than some of the others on the album and I needed to get this guy out of his padded cell somehow.
I had written some lyrics that dealt with questioning religion a few years back. These lyrics were originally called "The Door." I was digging through some notebooks and found them. I realized I liked what I had to say and wanted to use them. So, I tweaked the lyrics a little to suit the storyline.
At this point in the story our buddy, the nut, no longer believes in anything. He just wants to die.

(Back To F-Word Lyrics Page)

RNW: "The Flood"?

Richard: This was originally, lyrically, to be the bridge section for "Freedumb." In this one, Fate or God or Sherri or somebody… I have no idea who it is, lets him out of his cell. But the cruelty of it is, they give him back some of his sanity as well. He sees everything he has done.

(Back To F-Word Lyrics Page)

RNW: "Laughin' Myself Goodbye"?

Richard: "Laughin'…" was written by a friend of mine named Phil Wang. He used to play bass for Straitjacket Smile. We used to open our show with this one. I thought this song, which is about realizing your fate is to jump off a bridge, fit the story, and was a nice way to tie this album up. I rewrote the main riff and the solo, added a few vocal harmonies, and started the song acappella. Otherwise, the song stayed unchanged from the original.
By the way, most likely, our hero broke all the bones in his body and lived.

(Back To F-Word Lyrics Page)

RNW: "Reprisal"?

Richard: This one is a mix of a lot of the string and piano parts that are buried throughout the record. I put it together in Sound Forge, on my PC, using ADAT tracks from parts off of the Album. I had spent so much time over the years sequencing and agonizing over some of these pieces, that I wanted to make sure people actually heard them. There is a huge amount of work included in this 2-minute song. The beginning guitar stuff is the solo from, "Laughin' Myself Goodbye," backwards.

(Back To F-Word Lyrics Page)

RNW: "The Attitude Song"?

Richard: This is a cover tune of a song by Steve Vai. I recorded it for Lords of Karma: A tribute to Vai/Satriani. I have always loved this song. How the hell do you write something like that? I spent three or four days programming the drums. This one was tough. Don't ask me to stand up and play it…
I got Jake to let me put it on here so I could have a bonus track that was not, in any way, related to the story. It is also pretty impressive sounding - which is good if you need your ego stroked. This is the only song on the record that I had someone else play on. I got my friend Jason Keller to do all that cool poppin' and slappin'. He is one bad-ass bass player.

(Back To F-Word Lyrics Page)

SL: What about your song lyrics, were they based in personal experiences?

Richard: All of them were except for track two (One Life Stand). Only, I never killed her or went in the nut house. I had a pretty inspiring break up at one point in my life. It has been so long ago now that it was hard for me to muster up some of that pain to use in the recording.

SL: Your music sounds like most of the late 80's bands, am I right?

Richard: Yes, I would say that's fair. I grew up on that stuff. Actually, I tried to blend a lot of my influences into the recording. I love bands like TNT, Queen, ELO, Winger, Dream Theater, Stryper... I could name so many. I just did what I do (whatever that is) and the end result was F-Word. I expected to be slammed very hard by reviewers for not sounding modern or not fitting into any particular AOR box. I was never really concerned about that. I was not doing this record for them. I think, more than anything, releasing F-Word was just a way for me to get some of this pent-up music out of my system and prove to myself that I could do something like this. Now I can move on.

SL: You are a great guitarist but a good singer too, so you prefer the role of guitarist or singer?

Richard: Thanks very much. I wish it were cool, in this day and age, to be a "Great Guitarist." When I was eleven I started playing guitar no less than 8 hours a day. When I was seventeen, I realized there were millions of great guitarists. Most of the time the one's that were in working bands could sing. And the ones that really had a grasp of harmonies were the guys that caught my ear. I decided I wanted to be a well-rounded player that would have all the tools to be in a great band.
To answer your question, I prefer being a guitar player. Although, if I'm not gigging, I don't practice much. In a band situation I love to sing harmony. My singer, Ross absolutely puts me to shame. We have played together for years, covering bands like Boston and Styx - Writing songs that are a lot more melodic and strait-forward hard rock than my record.

SL: Have you ever tried to sing in your current band Straitjacket Smile?

Richard: Yes, I used to sing a few songs. I did "Don't Fly Away" for years. I also used to cover "Love Gun" by Kiss. I get the "you sound like Paul Stanley," comparison a good bit. I have done quite a few songs over the years.
We were singer-less at one point and I took over most of the lead vocals, but it wasn't much fun. We did one gig.

RNW: Do you have any tour plans to promote the album?

Richard: No, I'm putting together the band right now to play gigs so I can pay some bills. I overproduced most of it anyway. It would be pretty hard to pull off live.
The brutal truth in this business is that melodic hard rock does not put butts in seats in the USA - especially in the South. The people actually love it. They just don't seek it out. During our shows, we'll be hitting them with Straitjacket Smile originals and maybe a couple of my songs. We'll see how it goes from there. Maybe I'll sell a few CDs that way. I'd love to have the record distributed overseas. I think it would be better received there. I'd love to play in some other countries as well.

RAAHP: You mention your love for B-Movies, Horror / Sci-Fi and Big Overproduced Hard Rock… it sound like you're a child of the 80's! Can you talk more specifically about how they influence your music?

Richard: Well, I love all of those silly horror movies. Movies like "Evil Dead 2" and "Phantasm" are low budget, "E" for effort, examples of people taking what they have to work with and creating something entertaining.
I love reading horror and Sci-Fi authors like F. Paul Wilson, Clive Barker, Stephen King and so on. They all have a way of inserting something that will get me to laugh out loud one second and cringe or squirm the next second. I've never written anything that was inspired by any story I've read, but I really tried to tackle F-Word like a novel. You have to make sure that if you are writing a story within several songs, that you are able to tie all the songs together on a lot of levels. Melodies must repeat in places under different circumstances, lyrics should be descriptive and if you can make some of the songs stand alone outside the context of the "concept," well then you have done something extra.
As far as being a child of the 80s, I would agree with that. Maybe a child of the 70s would be more accurate. I really loved bands like Queen, Kiss, Styx, ELO and Alice Cooper. However, spandex pants were pretty comfortable (hahahaha). I loved where the guitar sounds went in the 80s. John Sykes on the Whitesnake album, Brad Gillis on Ozzys' Speak Of The Devil. Those sounds were just so powerful to me.

RAAHP: The 80's Style music has been slammed by the press and mainstream for some time now, was there ever the temptation to change your style to be a bit more mainstream?

Richard: Nope. Only when I do the cover thing to pay bills. When I do that, I tend to stick to VanHalen-izing a bunch of 80s pop tunes. That seems to go over really well in the US market of today. But I have been known to learn stuff I would not listen too under normal circumstances.

RAAHP: I mention this in my review of the album that you do in fact move AOR forward with this record by not following the traditional routes for a Rock album. Did you purposely go out and try to make a record that takes a different approach?

Richard: No, I just did what I have been doing for years. What happened was, at one point I was not in a band and I thought I would get a keyboard with a sequencer and go do solo shows with my guitar at Holiday Inn or... I don't know - I was losing my mind. Anyway, that never happened thank god. But I did buy the keyboard, and what came out of me when I started learning to program it is was what you hear on my record. I have no idea where some of that classical style string arranging came from. When I was learning music as a kid I just wanted to be Ace Frehley.

RAAHP: Is the art of guitar dying? Do you think that the level of playing has diminished and why?

Richard: No, I think there are still some really great players out there. There are guitarists that have created some really cool directions in a lot of the newer rock styles. I have to say there have not been many new contributors to the shred community in the last ten years, especially in the press. In the 80s every kid that picked up a guitar was being exposed to some really evolved guitar playing and that is what drove them to be better. In the past 10 years there has been less infuses put on soloing and I'm sure that has equated to less structured players. They're are still some monsters out there that sneak through once in a while though. John Petrucci is just about god. I'd sell a testicle to play like that and get all those great tones.
On another note, I get pissed off when I see someone that I respected as a musician in the past, playing down what they did in the 80s. Look, you wore spandex, you had big hair, you were a great guitar player, you tapped on your fret-board you sold a lot of records... So what. Be proud of it. Don't pretend that it never happened or that that wasn't really what you meant to do. You had a great time. Don't Lie!!

RAAHP: Could you have financially made this album 15 years ago, or has the cost of production made is possible for the individual to make their own album?

Richard: 15 years ago it could have been done I guess. I knew someone that had a home recording studio back then. But I don't think it would have been quite as easy. I'm very excited that the price of recording has come so far down with the technology boom of the 80s and 90s. I bought ADATs used off of EBAY and I did all the recording for F-Word in my guestroom. It cost me the price of the tapes and my time. The mixing was done in Pro Tools at a real recording studio though. That cost a little bit of change but nothing compared to what it would have cost me to record the entire thing in a real studio. I spent a good amount of time working on it. There are a LOT of Vocals on my record. I did some of them Def Leppard-style - for example, in the last chorus of track 2, One Life Stand, there are almost 200 of me singing at the same time. I admit, I went a little overboard, but I was just trying to experiment with things and have fun. I was happy with it.

RAAHP: How much as the internet affected your career? Can we order your material from your website?

Richard: I think if the internet had been around In the late 80s and early 90s to the extent that it is today, things may have been a lot different. It has enabled me to meet so many music business contacts. I met Jake Brown, Versailles Records' president on line and I hooked up with David Campbell the drummer I'm playing with these days. I could expound all day about how great a tool the internet has been for me as it relates to the music scene and my career.
I try to keep my website pretty current. I am linked to a couple of online retailers from my site where my CD can be ordered. I have corrected song lyrics on my website... The booklets were printed before I finished all of the singing.

SL: What are the future plans for Richard & Straitjacket Smile?

Richard: I'll be talking with AJ Caruso, the other guitarist/songwriter from a past incarnation of SJS and hopefully, be working on an SJS record sometime this year. We had a decent following in and around Louisiana and people ask me about the old SJS tunes all the time. We have some great melodic rock songs and the songs deserve to be recorded.
I plan to continue to record music for Versailles Records as well. I enjoy the work and the experience and I think it helps me get exposure for my band. You never know what can happen in this business.

RNW: Ok this is a question I always like to ask in interviews. What is
the biggest misconception that you think people have about the music
business?

Richard: That being signed means anything. I remember when I was a lot younger going around wishing I would "get signed." Even if you do get signed to a major label your chances of doing anything, almost, do not exist. And even if you have a hit record your chances of being developed beyond that, almost, do not exist. I like the situation I'm in now. I have a working relationship with a small label that is not in business just for the money. I'm not saying I wouldn't like to have a ton of money and hit records, but if that is why you get into music, you will have a crappy time.

RNW: Finally, what do you want people to take away from your music?

Richard: I want them to know that I worked extremely hard on it and not to think I take the subject matter real seriously. I'm just a guitar playing goof ball, and I hope that comes across in my songs.

Back To The Top

Interview with Jake Brown, President of Versailles Records.

04-20-02

by Keavin Wiggins http://www.iconofan.com/

This being a new series, I thought it would only be appropriate to profile a new record label-Versailles Records. I recently spoke with the label’s founder and President Jake Brown to get the inside story on what it takes to get a label off of the ground and his inspiration and motivations for starting the label. I was expecting to get a basic interview but when Jake started talking it became apparent that this interview was going to far beyond the basics. Jake discussed at length Versailles Records current and future projects including the new “Fire Women-A Tribute to the Cult” as well as gave us some inside stories on the bands involved in the recording, some secrets to success for an indy label and we also learned that Jake is a kindred spirit to us here at iconoFAN, his motivations come from the love of the music and let me tell you that is hard to find at a record label these days. We also learned a little about what Jake has in store for us in the future, both with Versailles releases and biographies he is writing on some leading characters in the drama that is rock music. I came out of this interview with a lot more than I expected going in, Jake has quite the story to tell and in the end he just reaffirmed the conviction that this series was a good idea. Much thanks to Jake for taking the time out of his busy schedule and we here at iconoFAN want to wish him and his new label the best of luck!

Q&A with Jake Brown- President and Founder of Versailles Records

iconoFAN: What inspired you to start Versailles Records?

Jake Brown: Frustration. I was living in Los Angeles trying to get my own band off the ground, and at the same time had the benefit of working for an independent record label, Cleopatra, where a lot of indie bands were signed who had played around LA for years, and Cleo was as commercial as they had gotten. At the same time, they were pumping out all these industrial tribute records that I was working promotion on, most of whom had in-house 80’s acts like Dead and Alive and Gary Numan covering Metallica, which seemed to make no immediate sense, but they pulled numbers, so I started realizing that it was more the latter than the former that sold those kind of records i.e. name recognition. In this light, I wanted to put together a record of my own which featured sunset strip bands covering the 80’s rock metal bands that had made it out of LA’s gutters and into the mainstream, as more of a showcase than anything else. From working promotions, I had some press contacts, and Gerri Miller (god bless her heart) ran a Metal Wire for the project, which they actually misprinted as something more generic to any unsigned band in the US, vs. just in LA.

I took it as an accidental opportunity to do something more commercial, and at that point, had just quit working with Cleopatra, and decided to try my own label. Six months later we had “The Second Coming: A Millennium Tribute to 80’s Hard Rock/Heavy Metal”.

I finished with the Second Coming disc, and decided to try my hat at something more commercial, but quality, so I spent the entirety of 2000 working on the CULT record. I think fans will see it, and most importantly hear it, in the result. Bands took big cuts too in working on it because I ended up with a much more diversified roster than I had planned, with artists I would have planned on working with maybe two or three records from now. That is another reason why I established the backend percentage, to make up the cuts people took to work on this record. If the band sells records, they shouldn’t be left out in the cold beyond their performance fee if they are earning the label 10 or 12 times that number? As a musician, that makes no sense to me. It is not excessive, but we try to be fair.

iF: How was the label established?

J B:Once I decided to do the Second Coming project, I relocated from LA to NY, got setup, and went through Orphan and Electric Kingdom for distribution before settling on Big Daddy Distribution, which is New Jersey based, and has about 30 independent labels on their roster. They are perfect for us because they deal with all the major retail chains, but don’t require all these ridiculous release quotas that some of the bigger independents tend to, and we had a good deal of interest off of the CULT tribute. The staff at Big Daddy is very cool because they embody a very independent spirit but have roughly 50 years of major label experience between the top brass. Anyway, we have a lot on the plate with them this year, and I think as we grow they are the best company to be with in that process because they will work with us gradually, i.e. not every release has to be an A-release, some we can release regionally if its appropriate. Its interesting, because a lot of distributors who are in business to cater to independent product have these ridiculous minimum release schedule and catalog requirements that aren’t inline with the philosophy of a start-up label, which is to grow your catalog gradually. Big Daddy was cool enough to give us the opportunity to grow at a comfortable pace, and they are equipped to accommodate us on any level.

iF: What do you feel is the biggest obstacle to having a successful album release?

J B:The biggest obstacle I think is the amount of product that is put out every year. Getting the record into chains if you are an independent band is near impossible unless its on consignment with local mom and pop stops. Tower will do consignment on a per-store basis, but if you’re a band on an indie, you would almost always have to commit more to promotion than you would ever recoup on sales, so its not worth it in a lot of cases for indie labels to take the chance. That is why we chose to start out with Tributes and build the label’s name off featuring established lead players with up and coming backing players, it allows me to accomplish two goals in one breath- that of promoting new talent while working with some of rock’s most talented players who have extremely loyal fan bases (Enuff Znuff, Jake E Lee, Bruce Kulick, etc.)

iF: What made you decide to go the tribute album route?

J B:In expanding on the latter answer, by highlighting our release schedule with tributes we first of all pay our bills, and secondly get the opportunity to work with a wider pallet of artists. With the tribute records we do, Versailles picks quirky artists who have the fanbase there, but wouldn’t normally be a band an indie would take a chance on. Our Satriani/Vai tribute (coming out in September) plays to both fan bases, as well as that of guitar players in general, and that is exactly how I intend to market it.

iF: How do you decide which artists to pay tribute to? / How do you decide which artists to approach to record tributes?

J B:Our niche, as I briefly referred to above, is that we pick unusual bands who I think other labels like Cleopatra or Dwell wouldn’t take a chance on being commercially viable in the tribute market. This is not to say that going generic is a bad marketing move. In a way its a smart move on the part of Cleopatra, because Brian Perrera has chosen, in my opinion, to largely release tributes to only those artists who are household names in the Metal and Rock communities, for example, Motley Crue, Metallica, and Def Leppard, which can saturate things a bit. This presents competing labels who want to release tributes with the challenge of releasing albums which are going to give the record buying audience the immediate most for their money. Tributes sell largely in an impulse buy market. As such, our philosophy is that you have to raise the bar as much as possible over what has become the typical tribute formula. For example, we had porn star Kendra Jade pose exclusively for the cover of the CULT Tribute, which I think is the first time something like that has been done for a tribute record. We did that because we felt both the CULT fans and the band deserved something original that was part of a true tribute to their sound, which is both very sexual and spiritual, and we wanted to capture the essence of that, both visually and musically

With the CULT, you have the unusual combination of a band who earned much of their following in the alternative underground but were recognized at their most successful peak with Sonic Temple in the mainstream rock market. This gives us the advantage of marketing to both audiences. You might have a fan of the Southern Death Cult who loves She Sells Sanctuary, but lost touch with the CULT before Fire Woman was ever written, let alone a mainstream MTV hit. Additionally, Versailles is different because our goal is to put out only quality product, whish begins with each artist who participates having being a fan of the band, and having a genuine respect for the material they are covering. In the case of Thrill Kill Kult, who partially reformed to cover the Witch, or Paul Shortino and Jimmy Crespo, who personally requested Sweet Soul Sister, you can hear the natural synergy of their performance in line with something they might have easily written for their own catalog, so the translation is natural. In the case of a band like Enuff Znuff, who is just such a bad ass rock and roll band to begin with, but whose best-kept secret in my opinion has been their underdog status, everything with that band is earned. In that vein, when I came to them with the tune they ended up covering, She Sells Sanctuary, Chip left it to me to pick that song. They actually really didn’t dig the song, or respect the CULT’s artistry till they were in the studio recording it. When it turned out to be a vocal challenge for Donnie, who has sang Freddie Mercury more easily from what I understand, that opinion changed, and their performance turned out being one of the album’s strongest. Other artists, like Richard Kendrick, who is signed to Versailles and covered the album’s most difficult song, Edie (Ciao Baby), recorded almost the entire song himself, minus the drums. He had the added challenge of having to do the lead vocals, and he is a guitar player, because his singer, Ross, got thrown in jail on some bullshit a week earlier, but he pulled it off beautifully. He is a true talent, like an undiscovered, rare gem of some kind. It is his time to shine now.

In that way, Versailles is very focused on upcoming artists, because I pair a lot of unknown backing talent with established lead players. The formula seems to be working beautifully, because someone like Richard, who grew up playing to Jake E Lee, now gets to back him up. This dude is backing up players now like George Lynch, Toni Harnell, Brad Gillis, Jake, and a slew of other platinum musicians who have never had better things to say about a backing band, who in this case happens to be just one dude. A funny story to end this question (finally) actually has to do with the night Enuff Znuff was recording the song. Chip called me from the studio, he was in Chicago, and I am in New York, and it was like 11 at nigh my time, and he asked me to read him the lyrics over the phone, because Donnie had forgot them. I had to go on line while on the phone, and get them off a CULT fansite, and he wrote them down on the phone, laughing the whole time. But Donnie recorded the vocals like 20 min later, and he played it for me the next day and it sounded amazing.

iF: Is it difficult to get artists to agree to participate?

J B:I think that depends on two things, principally. The first is having an attractive project to go to artists with. The second is your ability to network. Some artists are easier to contact, check their own e-mail, negotiate their own deals, so you don’t have the roadblock of some ego-maniac manager deciding for them, which is purely excessive red tape, and which has gotten in the way of artists, who later I found out wanted very much to play on something we were putting together, but couldn’t because their managers overruled it without even consulting them. On the other hand, sometimes you get really cool and relevant managers like Time Heyne, for example, who handles Jake E Lee and John Corabi among others, who is almost easier to deal with, and is very good because he is always looking for good opportunities for his artists, which means he brings every offer he gets to them. I have had other situations where, with someone like Toni Harnell or George Lynch, who I paired on Shy Boy for the Satriani/Vai tribute, both of those dudes have done like maybe 3 tributes in their career, and generally steer from them. In those cases, I have been fortunate to have their ear on the material we are bringing to them to cover, and the way we treat them in the process. Getting the right roster together is the core of any successful compilation, because everything else roots from it, from the fan bases you can reach, to the quality of the reviews you get, to the radio play you might pick up, and the retail chains who will ultimately stock the record. As another example, I am putting together a RUN DMC Tribute right now, which strays completely from my area of expertise, rock, so we will see if a combination of this being a group who really pioneered hip hop commercially and is way past due for a tribute and a lot of really cool hip hop, old school and new, artists being willing to put down for their roots, might make that equally as powerful a statement. I think we are on the right path.

iF: I noticed from the detailed liner notes in Fire Woman- A Tribute to the CULT that Versailles Records really took their time and put great care into profiling the artists doing the tribute. I know Chip from Enuff Znuff was impressed with the enthusiasm Versailles. I guess this isn’t really a question, but do you have any comments?

J B:My comment would be damn right we are enthusiastic about bands like Enuff Znuff. Those guys have busted their ass for 15 years, and because of fucked up management and other trend-related entanglements missed the bus that Poison caught, but I firmly believe that if they had come out in 1986 instead of 1989, they would have been just as big, and headlining an amphitheatre tour now instead of opening one. Its great that they are opening one, but they deserve better. I, as I am sure a lot of Indies do who deal in rock metal from the 80s and early 1990s, get a lot of inquiries from artists who had about the level of success that Enuff Znuff did about handling upcoming releases, and while I am flattered at the interest on their part, I try to steer most of the interest toward Spitfire or a label in that vein who can handle putting the kind of promotional push that a band like Enuff Znuff deserves behind them. I think after the remainder of 2001, and probably the first quarter of 2002, we will look eagerly into taking on some bigger scale releases with bands like LA Guns and Enuff Znuff, where we can give those bands the true promotional push they deserve. That’s why I like Tributes for now, because we are working with some fantastically talented artists coming out of the gate with established fan bases to sell to, and because of the nature of the releases, i.e. tributes, I get to interact with a much larger pool of artists than I would were our money tied up solely in pushing individual artists. We will have to see how this year goes, but my outlook on this industry is rooted very much in the amount of right I can potentially do by my artists. All the artists playing on our tributes get a half page of the cd booklet, with a photo, biographical information, and plugs on what’s happening now- website addresses, tour announcements, album plugs. I pushed Enuff Znuff’s “10” in every metal edge I ran last spring. Some industry people might say that’s not the most financially practical way to approach recoupment either, but I would give them the same response I give anyone who asks, this is not only about selling records- its about pushing artists wherever we can. New talent, established talent doing new things. Whatever the translation of that concept is in the individual cases of our contributing bands, I am down.

iF: Are the artists being covered involved in the process in any way?

J B:Sometimes. They may pick the song they do, or ask for suggestions, and then take a song we give them and do something totally different with it, like with Thrill Kill Kult and Project 44’s version of The Witch. In most cases, I have backing tracks done by in-house people so I can control the sound quality for our final mixes and the studio budgets, which means the vocalist or guitar player just has their leads to worry about. It is personality a lot of times. Bruce Kulick wanted to do his own gig with the backing tracks, and who am I to tell him no? He is a visionary guitar player, and played with one of the biggest bands in the world, KISS, for 11 years. Enuff Znuff records as a band, so it varies from artist to artist, and song to song.

iF: What projects do you have in the works?

J B:Well, the pressure is kind of on us as we signed a 3-year distribution pact with Big Daddy Distribution at the end of April, so we have been rushing everything with getting the CULT release ready for a June 5 street date. I am dropping it the same day as the CULT’s new record in the hopes that the impulse buy factor I discussed earlier will play into our initial sales total as fans go to pick up the CULT’s new record. I am also rushing to try and finish up the Tribute we are doing to Joe Satriani and Steve Vai, which features seven songs from each artist’s catalog. That record is a special project, it features only the top notch of rock and metal guitar players, like Bruce Kulick from Kiss, George Lynch from Dokken and Lynch Mob, Brad Gillis from Night Ranger, Jake E Lee from Ozzy and Badlands (of course, I won’t ever do anything he isn’t on if I can have my way), Jimmy Crespo from Aerosmith and Rough Cutt, and a number of other notable guitarists, including some regional legends like Neil Zaza and Toni Janflone Jr., and of course Richard Kendrick, who is doing Vai’s Attitude Song, which is probably one of Vai’s most difficult pieces. Enuff Znuff is covering Yankee Rose, which the band picked for a change. Its interesting because while Satriani’s catalogue happens to be mostly solo, Vai’s side of the disk is turning out to be more of a career-spanning collection, with everything from his Zappa days to Alcatraz to David Lee Roth, White Snake, and solo selections. I wish I could do a double album with a disc to both of them, they deserve it. That will be out in September. Then in November we are releasing Richard Kendrick’s long, long overdue solo album, tentatively titled Murder and the F Word. I am in the final stages of negotiating an endorsement pact for him, so we will be doing a lot of heavy promo around that, a real grass roots radio campaign, and hopefully will be building off some of the momentum from his appearances on our tributes. Then in February, 2002, I am dropping my baby, the King of Rock: A Tribute to RUN DMC, which is going to feature a jaw dropper of a cast of artists

I am also a biographer, and am in the midst of finishing a biography on Death Row Records’ CEO Marion Suge Knight, which is a little intimidating, but I am trying to paint a fair picture of his actions as a means to an end in terms of the freedom Death Row has allowed other independent African American CEOs, like Master P and Puff to own their own labels. On a lighter note, I am working on a biography of Nikki Sixx’s life story, independent obviously of the DIRT, Motley’s biography, which focuses on Nikki’s role as a hard rock icon and where his songwriting and vision took the genre commercially in the 1980’s, and how that has transcended the 1990s as an influence on the acts who are rocking today in the mainstream. Everyone, from Coal Chamber, to Kid Rock, dating even back to Nirvana, has cited Motley as a pivotal influence on their sound and look, and I think Sixx deserves to be recognized singularly as the epicenter of that movement. I am interviewing Tom Werman exclusively for this, Corabi, Blackie Lawless (hopefully), so we are really going to get an honest depiction of his life’s story.

My agent and I are also talking about starting up a publishing imprint devoted solely to releasing biographies focused on Hard Rock and Metal artists. The first under that deal will probably be an Ozzy/Sharon Osbourne biography, and a Kid Rock Biography, but we are still working things out with Ingram on that. Lastly, Versailles is sponsoring a series of gatherings for unsigned NY musicians which will hopefully commence in September or October of this year and focus on educating unsigned New York bands of all genres on how to survive in New York as a starving musician, and more importantly, navigate their way onto a more commercial path where they can gain some exposure. To that end, I am calling it “Starving Musician’s Forum”, and I want to co-sponsor it with another East Coast label, maybe Spitfire if they are into it. We will have free dinner, demo submission, maybe a question and answer period with a featured guest who will appear at each meeting, which will most likely occur on a monthly basis.
So we have a lot on our plate. Secretly, I would also like to put out a live Enuff Znuff retrospective, but I haven’t gotten into that yet with Chip, so we will have to see what comes of it.

iF: What is the most difficult challenge in setting up a new label?

J B:The single most difficult element is the money. I have to work 80 hours a week to keep this label afloat, and the first couple years, as with any startup, you lose money, so it is all out of pocket. The only break is that it is all write off, but there is still a lot of sleepless nights and big phone bills. Some people that I know have chosen a more flashy route, like they start out leasing an office space, where you can sublet space with a conference room and be just as well off. You need a website, a very competent artist, who I found in Jason Cooper, who is mainly an S&M artist who runs Black Heart Studios, and is like Richard in the sense that he gives me back a 100% whenever I throw something at him, the result is always better than I needed or expected. I think having a good support network of Indie partner labels is always good, to call for advice, or share resources with in terms principally of contacts, press plugs, ad space, etc. You have to advertise, and Metal Edge is the last viable Rock/Metal publication out there. You can find that magazine in Barnes n Nobles, Tower, WalMart, and Gas stations, i.e. anywhere. It has 90,000 a month circulation, and I think it sells so well because it is fair to fans of both eras, 80’s and 90’s/2000. You always find a feature on Ozzy or Motley when you find one on Papa Roach or Limp Biscuit. Paul Gargano and Cheryl Hoahing are great editors, and Dov Teta is the most competent advertising rep I have ever worked with. Also, having a solid online presence is important, beginning with a website, but beyond in terms of keeping your projects in the news, not just a press release, but as they develop, cool recording bits, artists as they are added, etc. The best sites I would recommend for this type of thing are MelodicRock.com, Hard Radio.com, ElectricBasement.com, and of course, Metal Sludge.com, which I think has effectively replaced Beavis and Butthead in terms of setting the underground bar for what is cool in the millennium. I miss Beavis and Butthead because they were fucking hilarious, and broke bands like White Zombie, etc. But Metal Sludge gives a very fair and measured perspective on what is and isn’t cool these days. They are like Metal’s check and balance system. If you are going to do radio, Concrete is really good for hard metal stuff, and Skateboard Marketing is ideal for mainstream rock. They hit the CMJ reporting stations, but also focus on the grassroots stations that will actually consider playing you band, i.e. keeping the cd and not selling it to the dollar bin. The biggest key to longevity of any kind is faith in what you are doing. If you believe in the projects you work on, be they established bands, up and comers, or tributes, treat the record it was your own solo album. I guess in that respect I come from the opposite school of throw it at the wall and see if it sticks, but the goal is not to become Interscope overnight, but to build a solid reputation among rock fans based on the quality of your product.

iF: What do you think is the biggest myth that most fans have about the record industry?

J B:That corporate labels care about artist development in any long-term sense. For example, Ricky Martin’s last album had half the promotional campaign of the one that broke him, with Living La Vida Loca. Why? Because it had half the hit potential. He will always have a fan base, but with bands who have a fourth of that success, i.e. one top-20 hit, that is usually it. I mean, in terms of top 40 rock bands, who is there that last beyond one record? Matchbox 20, because Rob Thomas did that Santana song. It is not all about hit songs being on an album, A&R has to commit to push that song at radio, which is what launched Buck Cherry for Dreamworks. That record went gold, but their new album spent 4 weeks on the top 200 total. Why? It is full of great, bluesy rock songs that are more ballsy and intellectual than most of the shit they play on KROQ in a given rotation schedule. The problem is that the label wouldn’t throw any real money behind pushing a single. They provide tour support, but that is all charged back to the band anyway. This is where Indie labels segway in and begin to become appealing to an artist like Alice Cooper or eventually Buck Cherry. An indie label will benefit a band like that in two principle ways- 1.), they will work four times as hard as a major to push the band’s record because it is probably one of their biggest ones, and 2.) the artist will get a much better return on any money they would be making anyway. Usually the royalty is much higher, and by that fact, if you sell only 20,000, you might get back $3 or $4 a disc, depending on your deal, versus $.80 or $1.20, and that is after the major recoups their promotional budget. This is why Warrant filed bankruptcy three years after they sold 2 million records. And those rock bands, I mean true mainstream rock bands like Stone Temple Pilots, the Chilli Peppers, and Pearl Jam, who survived grunge, have had to continually put out records filled with hits on the chance that radio will embrace one of them. Pearl Jam’s cover off that charity record sold better than any original material they have written in the past 3 albums as a single. I think Limp Biscuit will go through that cycle, and all their offspring like Papa Roach, etc. will end up being comparable to Warrant and Ugly Kid Joe, the second tier metal acts that killed off 80’s rock. I take my hat off to Poison for giving bands like that a chance to have a large live audience again. Of that tour, we all know which band deserves it the most, Enuff Znuff, and they are opening the tour, which probably means they only get 2000 person exposure. Still, if of that 2000 people, maybe 1400 of whom aren’t Enuff Znuff fans dig what they hear, which they always will with a band like that, maybe Enuff Znuff sells another 300 records locally. Their entire back catalog was reissued, so that is actually really great for them. Also, because Chip issues the whole thing through Stoney Records, the band’s imprint, they make a lot more back. Being on an indie label isn’t a failure at all, as most people view it, but the best bet for a lot of bands in terms of any sustained career. Most Indies also have their own financial restrictions on what they can blow beyond the bare bones essentials, so you avoid excessive advances we can recoup, and though most Indies can’t provide a whole lot of tour support, they usually end up doing it anyway by default, calling radio, placing tour ads, etc. The promotional end is much more of a grass roots effort, so every fan out there will potentially be targeted.

iF: Finally, why do you do it?

J B:Because I love rock and roll, and I believe artists have been fucked for years by corporate bottom lines, and that is not why the true gentlemen of the record industry do it. Look back at David Geffen, or Clive Davis, or in more modern times, Master P, who controls a $394 million dollar entertainment empire. Everyone of those guys has conducted himself with dignity in dealing with their artist roster, and you know how you can truly tell? Most of their talent, who are in their older age or retired are not broke. Period. It sounds simple, but the business of managing artists goes beyond reassuring their insecurities. It means taking care of them as an asset. I read about an estate sale last month that Mark Slaughter was forced to have, selling off most of his shit because of financial difficulties. That dude sold 8 million records, and has a family to support. Some people think its funny because of the way Slaughter got treated on Beavis and Butthead, but there is nothing funny about his being so financially destitute that he has to sell off his kids shoes. I don’t know the specifics with his manager, but I know a lot of managers who didn’t do right by those guys back in their heyday, and the band is paying for it now. That’s why every artist who plays on a Versailles tribute will own a backend portion of it. We have to recoup our production and promotional costs before it kicks in, but I believe in the spirit of taking care of your own, and as long as I am putting out rock and roll, no one I deal with will be left out in the cold.

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