Geek Weekly #4

S: Oh, the Chronicle (The omparison being discussed was writen by Raoul Hernandez). [italic] Tony: I know he doesn't know what he's talking about. M: How did you guys all end up in New York? [italic] Marcellus: It's like a magnet. M: That's where I'm heading after high school. I want to go to school there. [italic] Tony: You'll be distracted. It's where everything is. Marcellus: That's why I went there. I wanted to be where there was a lot of exciting things going on. M: How old were you when you moved there? [italic] Marcellus: 19. Tony: Me too. S: Adventurous. And you? [italic] Alec: I lived all over. My father was a musician, so I had to live with him after I lived with my mother for a while - his turn to take care of me - so I ended up in New York, I don't know, early Eighties, right at the end of the big punk scene. S: Jennifer wanted me to ask if you ever got called the Marcellus Hall Blues Explosion. [italic] Marcellus: It hasn't gotten that far yet. Tony: The Blues Implosion, you mean. Marcellus: Why would anyone say that? S: You've gotten a lot of comparisons, or at least I've read a lot. I don't think they're valid but they're there. [italic] Tony: We were just talking about that. Should I just lay it down on the table again? S: If you'd like to. [italic] Tony: We are from the same town, on the same label, we're good friends, we play in the same practice space, we've been around longer - that doesn't mean anything, Pussy Galore was a big influence- not even an influence, just something that is graet- but as far as sound, the only thing that's similar is the fact that somebody could say we're both blues-based. We have totally dfferent styles of songs. Marcellus: There's huge differences You probably know them if you S: You got grouped with them geographically. Tony: The New York sound, yeah.

Railroad Jerk Interview.

S: I was wondering if therer are any other contemporary bands that you'd consider your peers, because of thinking of you in the same breadth with the Blues Explosion or Royal Trux - those are bands that I think pay tribute to a certain sound, whereas there's other bands around that are blues-based or blues-influenced that are more of a continuation, something that comes organi-cally [italics] Marcellus: I've got a list of bands that play blues here. You wanna see it? It's ike all the bands that everybody's talking about nowadays. (Marcellus pulls up a little black book). S: The only bands I would think of in the same breadth with y'all - and it's not even similarity of sounds, it's not even close to that - are the Grifters and Doo Rag. [italics] Dave: We get the Grifters, actually. Marcellus: Read them all aloud. S: Beck, P.J. Harvey, Jon Spencer, Blues Explosion- the Blues Explosion are a funk band - Palace Brothers, Grifters, Railroad Jerk, Royal Trunx, Gibson Brothers, Workdogs and Doo Rag. Royal Trux are an arena rock band now. \

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Railroad Jerk Interview 43

Marcellus: I'm not saying I respect all those, they're just the ones that I've noticed that are sort of -blues. S: Is there anyone out there that you consider to be contemporaries or peers of yours? Marcellus: I do like P.J. Harvey, waht she's doing. I wouldn't say we're doing the same thing or not, I don't know. Tony: I like Doo Rag. I t hink they're amazing. I think they're kind of a tribute more than a continuation. Dave: I think they'ere so much more straightforward bluesy than we are. Tony: I really like them. I really like to listen to them in my headphones sitting in the van driving, 'cause I love to play stuff like that, I love to listen to it. I don't think of anybody else in the same breath as us. It's not like we're doing anything original, but we've got so many influences other than just blues stuff, so I think that all comes through. We're not focusing on one thing, it's just that that's what we happened to come up with. M: Do you like the people that listen to your music? Tony: We love the people that listen to our music. Marcellus: We haven't met them all yet. Tony: But we're dying to meet them all. Alec: There's a lot of people that don't even--I don't know if they don't know enough 'cause of the audience we attract, or maybe I just take it for granted that I think people know as much about music as I would--I mean, I don't know a lot about music, but I don't have people saying,, "Oh, you play this, and it sounds like that, and it's blues!" A lot of people hear it for what it is and sometimes I'm thinking, "God, I know what this is!" and it's like I'm surprised they don't say it, but they don't know. You think you're going to get a response and you don't, and that's what's interesting. I take stuff for granted sometimes, but some people just don't see it like that, cause I think it's generational. I'm 29, I grew up with the Rolling Stones and Beatles, and nobody's said to me," the song that I sing, the part in the middle, the breakdown part, is totally stolen from "Dr. Robert" by the Beatles--it's exactly the same thing. S: Yeah, uh, i know that I wanted to ask a few things about the lineup changes. Oh, Marcellus, did you really pick up your first drummer in a bar?

Railroad Jerk Interview

Marcellus: Yeah. S: [in italic font] And just found out that she was a drummer? Marcellus: Well, yeah. She was asking us if she could drum with us, and we were kind of reluctant,and then we gave her a try and it turned out great. But it's funny, I didn't pick her up - it wasn't legitimate because she was so drunk that she didn't even know who I was or where she was when she woke up. She didn't know where she was, and I told her where she was, and she started calling me Richard. S: [in italic font] Did you pick up Dave in a bar? Marcellus: That didn't happen. He tried to pick me up. S: [in italic font] Why did she leave? Marcellus: Uhh.... Tony: She moved to Germany to start a T-shirt company. She quit the band at that point, and when she didn't like what she did, she came back to New York and we had already found another drummer. M:{S?] [in italic font] How did the rest of you meet? Tony: Me and Marce met at the same time that he picked up Jez in the bar, and then we went through a few miscellaneous drummers and guitar players. Marcellus: Bill Berger recommended Alec to us. Tony: He played on Raise the Plow. And a guy named Tom Greenwood played on that, and they both did like one live show each. At that point we were just in flux. Marcellus: That's when we had tension. S:[in italic font] So what was all this tension stemming from? Marcellus: Uh, the flux Tony: Yeah. Youthful angst. Marcellus: You know how we met Dave? We were searching kind of desperately for adrummer and we asked somebody at Matador - it was Dan (Varenka) - he said, My brother." Tony: He has Walt Records. That was about two and a half years ago, when Dave got into the band. Alec was about three years ago. We were so incredibly lucky. When we were searching for new guitar players before the second guitar player came into the band, we put an ad out and we sifted through all these people. We put in the ad, "Influences: Robert Johnson, the Fall, must not have looks." For Dave, we just had Railroad Jerk Interview 45

to try out three drummers and Dave was the third, and forget it it was an easy choice. Especially for me, being a bass player, you can tell right away, and immediately me and Dave Dave: We fell right in love. It was unbelievable. Tony: We both came at the same time. It was really good. S: Do you two have any other projects - anything else going on? I know Marcellus put out the solo record on Walt. [in italic font] Tony: I used to play in - before we split up - Mother Head Bug, a twelve-piece- strings and horns and stuff like that. I played on the last Lubricated Goat album, I played bass just as a worker for Stu. That was a real fun thing to do. I do this blues thing, and play the slide guitar, and that's to be coming. Alec: I played bass in this band Smack Dab for three years. You probably don't know them down here, they haven't really toured that much. We were on Homestead Records. M: Do you guys feel like rock stars yet? [in italic font] Tony: Almost, but not quite yet. Marcellus: In a few more hours, maybe. Tony: Ask us later. Do you feel like we're rock stars yet? M: On your way. Well on your way. [in italic font] Tony: I definitely will buy you a drink later. Marcellus: What are your ages? S: I'm 18 and Margaret's 16. [in italic font] Tony: You guys look similar too. S: I think we have the same parents. How come you guys take so long to put out records? [in italic font] Marcellus: How come Matador does? S: So it's Matador's fault? [in italic font] Dave: Hell yeah. Marcellus: You want the number? You can call them. Tony: Right now, Matador is totally streamlined. It took Raise the Plow [underlined] over a year to come out when we handed them the final artwork and everthing [everything]. Finally, when it was ready to come out, the printer, the color seperator [separator], fucked up so it took another two months. OUr timing has been impeccably bad, for releases and ads and everything for every

Railroad Jerk Interview