Interview:
Truly By Efren
Don't you just hate it when a band you are really into becomes popular? Sure,
you didn't "discover" the band but you can't help being bummed when you go to
one of their shows and see the meat-head factor tipping the scales, attendance-wise,
in their direction. Some examples that come to mind are Nirvana, Nine Inch Nails,
and White Zombie.
Fortunately, there weren't a whole lot of people to see TRULY play at Kilowatt
in San Francisco last June. After several years and records later, this should
all change, or maybe not. I've been wrong before, some examples that come to
mind are Drivin' Cryin, Warrior Soul, and Liquid Jesus.
Anyway, TRULY is led by guitarist/vocalist/songwriter Robert Roth. Also in
the band is Soundgarden co-founder/bassist Hiro Yamamoto and ex-Screaming Trees/drummer
Mark Pickerel. The new release, Fast Stories... From Kid Coma, is four years
in the making. The sound is almost archaic, with the sounds of a Wurlitzer,
vintage Mellotron and a complex aural web of distorted, effectively and uniquely
turned guitars. It clocks in at 72 minutes and is heavily saturated with fuzzy
psychedelic pop that leaves one continually re-adjusting ones bass and treble
controls.
Mark Pickerel, who does most of the day-to-day managing of the band, is no
stranger to interviews. He did his share as a member of the incredible Screaming
Trees, along with vocalist Mark Lanegan, and the two brothers Gary Lee Conner
on guitar and Van Conner on bass. I caught up with Pickerel after the Kilowatt
show, in the midst of a promotional "warm-up" tour.
Why did you leave Screaming Trees?
That's funny that you ask because that is the one question that I hope no
one would ask, but I'll answer it anyway. Basically it came down to that it
just wasn't fun anymore, tensions were high as well. There were business decisions
that they were making that I didn't agree with and I didn't feel comfortable
with.
Some insiders say that with you leaving, the band nearly broke up.
I didn't know that. All I know is that they've only done one record since
I left. I still talk with the band on occasion, not a whole lot though. Every
month or so I will talk to at least one of the brothers. I have a record store
in Ellensburg, Washington called Rodeo Records and they stop in every now and
then. I actually opened up my record store in the back of the Conners' family
video store. After several years, our stores were competing for space so I moved
across the street.
So when did TRULY come about?
After leaving Screaming Trees I went to work at SUB POP in the sales department.
There I met up with Robert who needed help making demo's. I agreed to do this
as well as help him with getting a record contract, that was back in 1989-1990.
At around that time I was also laid off from my sales job, actually, almost
the whole staff was let go during Sub Pop's financial crunch. Anyway, I started
to fall in love with some of the songs. So I asked Hiro to join up to complete
the band. The reason that I asked him is that he was really the only bassist
in town that I enjoyed listening to and that wasn't currently in a band. At
first, I was really apprehensive about asking him to join. I had heard rumors
that he never wanted to play rock music again and also that he never wanted
anything to do with the music industry either. When Soundgarden made the big
switch to A&M and suddenly the band became big business, the was really intimidated,
it wasn't what he really envisioned doing, being a money making metal band and
all. When hundreds of thousands of dollars are being directed your way, people's
expectations of what you produce and what you do with your time changes a lot.
So I think he had a hard time adjusting with being told what to do. It turned
into a job instead of something he used to do for fun.
How did you finally approach Hiro knowing all of this?
I called him and explained that I was playing with this guy who was writing
some really cool songs, and asked if he wanted to check it out. I told him that
I knew that he left Soundgarden for a lot of the same reasons that I left Screaming
Trees and that this time around it would be really casual. Of course four or
five years later, signed onto Capitol Records, he's in the same predicament
that he was in with Soundgarden. We're now working with big business and people
are expecting results. But he expressed to me a couple of days ago that since
he has already been through it once, he knows what to expect and how to approach
it.
What about the "Super Group" tag that is surely going to be placed on
TRULY?
Well that's O.K., but I don't think that we will get it that much because
me and Hiro are the rhythm section of the band. People tend to place more emphasis
obviously on singers and guitar players so I'm not too worried about it.
What about your relation with Sub Pop? I have heard that there were some
major disagreements between the band and the label.
Well for one, I was horribly mis-quoted in Billboard magazine recently, I
think Sub Pop may have felt that I was slamming them, which is just not true.
We have had some previous differences with them, but those have long been resolved.
In fact, Sub Pop is really excited about releasing the vinyl version of the
new record. There is also a 10-inch record that was released by Capitol Records
as a limited edition promotional item. It was mailed off to mom and pop/punk
rock record stores as a sort of future collectors item.
You guys are the second band signed to Revolution Records, with is distributed
by Capitol Records, is that correct?
Yes we are, the first band on Revolution was Detroit's Big Chief, but now
the label is no more. The owner of Revolution, Ron Laffitte (who also is the
manager of Megadeth), just went on to some important position at Elektra Entertainment.
Big Chief went with Ron to Elektra and Capitol didn't want to let us go so decided
to keep us. That was a really good sign for us, it showed that they were really
seriously committed to TRULY.
Back to the subject of your record store, do you carry any of the early
Sub Pop releases? Specifically, Nirvana's first 7" single.
I already sold it. I actually bought that a week or two after it first came
out. Nirvana played a show in Ellensburg in a really small club back before
they even had a record out. I remember being a little bit confused by them,
confused about what they were going for. I wasn't sure if they wanted to be
a metal band or a pop-rock band. Here they were, decked out like hill billies
from the backwoods and their drummer had this huge drum kit, I think they're
called North drums. I remember Krist Novaselic jumped into the crowd and got
into this confrontation with one of the guys who worked at this community center.
I guess there was this girl who was either Krist's girlfriend or friend who
was slam dancing and stage diving during Nirvana's set. This guy wanted to put
an end to it and this girl spit on him. So he tried to grab her arm, to escort
her out. Krist saw this, threw his bass up in the air and jumped into the audience
and started pushing this guy around and the guy shut the whole show down. I
just remember being stunned, I wasn't sure if I loved them or thought that they
were completely ridiculous. A couple of weeks later, when I was with The Screaming
Trees, we went into the studio with Jack Endino (Ex-Skin Yard) to record Buzz
Factory. Jack said that he just recorded Nirvana and I said, "Oh my God, I just
saw those guys, they really left an impression on me, I'm just not sure what
the impression was." So he put the reels up and played Love Buzz and Big Cheese,
and it was really exciting for me to hear. Two days later I went to Fall Out
Records in Seattle and bought one of the last three 7 inch copies of the Love
Buzz single. I remember as I was there looking at them, I wanted to buy all
three copies, But I literally had only 3 or 4 dollars in my pocket which I needed
to get back to Ellensburg.
What about Soundgarden's first Sub Pop single?
That one I never had, but I actually just brought down a tape with me of Soundgarden's
first show in Ellensburg back in 1987. The Screaming Trees' soundman ran sound
for them and Faith No More that night to a crowd of about 30 people. Anyway,
our soundman recorded it and I sent the tape to our label SST. About a month
later, Greg Ginn asked Soundgarden to join their roster.
Hiro: And the rest was history.
I was just telling Hiro that the music sounds great, but Chris' vocals were
so unreal, it didn't sound like Chris.
Hiro: Hey watch it, he's taping all of this.
No I'm not slagging him, it was just so funny hearing him as such a young
singer. He was still hitting those falsettos and doing some of those Robert
Plant-type vocals.
I never thought that Chris would ever stop doing that
Hiro: I never thought he would either, he finally restrained himself more,
for the better. I think The Temple Of The Dog recordings were when everybody
realized the kind of range that Chris had. He was singing more straight-ahead
songs.
(To Pickerel) What of Mark Lanegan, do you see him a whole lot?
Not as much as I would like to.
I heard Kurt Cobain left him a couple of things in his will/suicide note,
what do you know about that?
Well I do know that Kurt and Mark were really close, outsiders don't really
know that because Mark had imposed a media-blackout after Kurt's death. I know
that Mark drives Kurt's car and I had also hard that Courtney Love gave Mark
a song that Kurt had written shortly before his death.
(City Revolt Magazine, August 1995)