Gunnar, that’s cool of you to say. If our paths ever cross I’d be game to grab a beer. As for the shit show part…I was feeling my way through the first time around. Some of the execution was maybe a bit sloppy. Not because I didn’t care…there were just things that came up that I hadn’t planned for or considered. One could say I bit off more than I could chew in some ways. Some things didn’t come together the way I would have liked them to in many areas. In the end I learned some valuable lessons. I can assure you from my standpoint I didn’t mail it in. I made the best record I could at the time. Some of the songs I’m still very proud of. Other songs not so much. When things started to look “real” and it became apparent that record might see the light of day I experimented with crowd funding. We sold some t-shirts and yes paper bag masks (not my proudest moment) to see if it was a legitimate method to get records in people’s hands. In the end I found it to be a horrible experience for myself because if one person out of a hundred felt let down that was not acceptable. It also felt lame…like digital pan handling for change on the side of the road. Crowd funding might work for some but it’s not something I’m interested in going forward.
As for this new chapter I’m really excited about it. It’s been streamlined and I think the songs, vision, and focus are much more aligned. It’s been much more fun to work on this batch of recordings. I’ve also played it very close to the vest because you never know what might or might not happen. It just seemed like a better route to take. I know you don’t dig what we did before but if and when this new record comes out I hope you’ll check it out. It certainly isn’t industrial (but then again the first record didn’t turn out to be either). I think the songs are pretty cool and it felt much more natural.
This little testimony flies in the face of “didnt take ourselves too seriously” and “just like making songs with my friends.” Which is it? Hobby with your friends or biting off more than you can chew while pan handling? Hobbies dont require pan handling. As far as the record is concerned, your music can always “see the light of day” there are so many ways to release your “hobby” with youtube being the most obvious, easiest and cheapest. I havent followed your band. But I have read what has been chronicled here though, and i gotta say your last two posts sound like excuses and back pedaling. Just own it, dude.
KNIKER: Just to be clear on one aspect, while I think the “band” and its execution was a complete joke, and I goofed also on the online pandhandling and other various douchebaggery (like ALL of it, basically) I actually thought the retarded paper bag mask shit was the only thing kind of creative and cool. It’s been an ongoing beef of mine that artists (title used very loosely here) don’t do more of this type of stuff. It really means a lot to fans when they have a bit more intimate interaction with the artist, so whether that’s a little hand written note or a small goofy sketch or . . . . yeah, a fucking paper bag mask . . . . I really do think it means a lot more to someone that they get something UNIQUE instead of the same generic bullshit that everyone else does. Props to you also for making good on whatever pledge packages y’all promised. There have been enough stories of people just getting completely hosed on such crowd-funding stuff so . . . yeah, good on ya, Mate!
I call a spade a spade and a turd a turd. Even taking out any of my theatrics, I still think this project was a giant unlistenable shitpile. I’m actually a little intrigued to see what the next offering will sound like (no, I won’t be purchasing it, but I will give it a listen if someone posts easily accessible samples) though, solely because of your claim that it is going to be non-Industrial (I think “industrial” as a whole, is the laziest, most generic fucking genre in existence today).
Anyway, I think I may have noted it before, but I actually do respect your coming here and addressing shit and not losing your cool, despite people like me who have no intention of cutting any unearned slack. It’s really far beyond what most people do (certainly a cut above Chris Connelly, hahaha), and I mean it when I say that, despite the shitshow both behind the scenes and on recording, you do seem like a decent dude.
So cheers! I wish you all the best for 2017, no matter how awful your “musical” diarrhea may or may not be this time around.
Chris makes decent fucking music, though. Not counting his solo projects, but Cocksure it excellent. (That Ms. Mayella Ewell sample from To Kill A Mockingbird in the song OCD Got Game is sick!!. bomp “You don’t bomp know nothing about nothing! bompbompbomp You Don’t know a goddamn thing about nothing!!!” bompbomp Good shit Maynard.) And while he would come here to advertise at least he didn’t promise to take you on a date if you bought him groceries.
I was referring to Connelly’s inability to take feedback that is anything less then a complete gargling of his nutsack. But, yeah, I don’t think he’s ever come scrounging for change. I actually really like a lot of his stuff too, though I don’t even bother trying any of his new jibber jabber, so I can’t speak much about it.
Chris makes decent fucking music, though. Not counting his solo projects, but Cocksure it excellent. (That Ms. Mayella Ewell sample from To Kill A Mockingbird in the song OCD Got Game is sick!!. bomp “You don’t bomp know nothing about nothing! bompbompbomp You Don’t know a goddamn thing about nothing!!!” bompbomp Good shit Maynard.) And while he would come here to advertise at least he didn’t promise to take you on a date if you bought him groceries.
I died laughing at the repeated Blazing Saddles sample in “Cock Ripped To the Giddy Tits”: Hey, where are the white women at?
[reply]Chris makes decent fucking music, though. Not counting his solo projects, but Cocksure it excellent. (That Ms. Mayella Ewell sample from To Kill A Mockingbird in the song OCD Got Game is sick!!. bomp “You don’t bomp know nothing about nothing! bompbompbomp You Don’t know a goddamn thing about nothing!!!” bompbomp Good shit Maynard.) And while he would come here to advertise at least he didn’t promise to take you on a date if you bought him groceries.
I died laughing at the repeated Blazing Saddles sample in “Cock Ripped To the Giddy Tits”: Hey, where are the white women at?[/reply]
Thought they sampled that on beers steers and queers too didn’t they?
You guys can complain if you want to, but I enjoyed quite a bit of the album. I was also very thankful to see this and a couple other projects getting Pig back to recording. And to see the guy from Stayte actually releasing something again.
Gunnar, that’s cool. I’ll be interested in your feedback good or bad. I’m sure at the very least you can stream it on Bandcamp. I get what you’re saying about the unique elements of crowd funding. I brought that up because I sure as hell had a lot of people making fun of me for it. But, I can laugh at myself and I know I’m not a “cool” guy by any means. Your posts, sense of humor, candor and sarcasm make me laugh most of the time. (I know that you know that I know that you know that I lurk here a lot).
Smurf, It’s hard to explain how it all happened with the shift from hobby (which I still consider it…plus, it gets reinforced when explaining to my wife every time I want a new piece of gear haha) to something that was getting released (somehow…I just didn’t know what or how that would be). At first it was let’s make some songs and swap parts. As I went along more and more guys said they wanted to do something with it. Most of them did contribute and others never did. By the time all was said and done something that started out as just bouncing riffs and ideas back and forth became something else. The whole experience was bizarre (in a good way) and mostly fun. Then came the point where I was getting asked what I was gonna do with it. I hadn’t thought about that part of it. So there was this awkward point of trial and error…thinking about and doing things that were never considered from the start. Like I said it’s still just a hobby to me but to some of the other guys it’s a career so there’s this odd juxtaposition. I wish I could describe it better but I don’t quite know how. No back peddling or double talk here. I definitely stepped in some piles of shit along the way. There were also some songs that didn’t turn out the way I would have liked…but I’m not some “real” musician and sometimes a polished turd is still a turd. That said, I was really proud of some of it and I’m glad it happened.
As for the question about Luc he was into it and we were going to do stuff. However his family were in the middle of a move from Belgium to Luxembourg and it just didn’t happen.
You guys can complain if you want to, but I enjoyed quite a bit of the album.
Im not actually complaining about the album. (I havent heard it) i was more or less commenting on the apparent shabby treatment of his fan base and what appeared to be excuses for such treatment. Not sure where i could go to hear it… i figure i owe him a listen. My tastes vary from gunnars so i may dig it. Is it on youtube?
Kniker: You definitely score cool points for Going out of your way to try and soothe the one person on this board who would probably never buy your album in the first place (although i dont think gunnar buys much music anymore anyway but still) integrity is in short supply these days. Its really decent you took the time.
Maybe if his claim to fame was something more substantial than following Trent Reznor around like a little lost puppy for over ten years… Yeah, probably not even then.
I like Vrenna, but that nearly made me choke to death on an ice cube.
Kniker: You definitely score cool points for Going out of your way to try and soothe the one person on this board who would probably never buy your album in the first place (although i dont think gunnar buys much music anymore anyway but still) integrity is in short supply these days. Its really decent you took the time.
It’s true. I do buy a fair amount of CD’s still, but it’s never anything “new” unless a new album by a band 30+ years old counts as “new” music.
I don’t care for anything new typically, and I’m rather narrow in what I do listen to. But I can still be pretty fair in judging stuff even if it’s not part of a genre I’m into.
You guys can complain if you want to, but I enjoyed quite a bit of the album. I was also very thankful to see this and a couple other projects getting Pig back to recording. And to see the guy from Stayte actually releasing something again.
It’s been in my Amazon Prime rotation way more than I expected, especially when at the gym.
And, as I’ve said more than once before, these guys eventually did get their shit together while Bells Into Machines still can’t manage to figure out how to use Bancamp.
As for the question about Luc he was into it and we were going to do stuff. However his family were in the middle of a move from Belgium to Luxembourg and it just didn’t happen.
Interesting. I was going to ask about Chris Vrenna, too, but I think I know the answer: he went bugfuck and ran off to Wisconsin. Feel free to correct me if I’m wrong, though.
Why was his ex-wife writing articles, anyway?
Vrenna’s ex-wife, Carrie Borzillo, is a music journalist who’s written some mostly ignored books about Nirvana and an excruciatingly bad “lifestyle” book called Cherry Bomb. Around 2014, she decided that the internet at large was going to be deeply fascinated with the reasons behind her divorce and wrote numerous articles about what an awful, awful husband Vrenna was. I mean, I was interested, because I always get a huge thrill from people airing their dirty laundry in public, but I’m unusual that way, I think.
Perhaps more people might have been interested if Vrenna had pulled a Phil Spector and kept her as a prisoner in their home and threatened to bury her in their basement if she ever left him, but abusing drugs and having sex with groupies while on tour is just kind of par for the course.
I think she’s since gone back to writing about sex for trashy men’s magazines and posting pictures of herself on Instagram while Vrenna continues … doing whatever it is he’s doing in Wisconsin. Eating cheese and building snowmen, probably.
Back in the '90s Vrenna produced an album from a friend of mine’s band.
He had no real dirt to reveal at all. But Vrenna apparently had a huge collection of action figures.
Smurf, I wasn’t trying to soothe anyone when I rejoined this thread. My intention was really to stick up for Chuck. He’s my friend and is really truly one of the nicest people anyone could meet. He’s done a lot of cool stuff mostly outside of music since his FNM days. I just didn’t like seeing him being “beat up” when most folks don’t know that he had a horrible accident or that he’s a really loving and proud Dad.
I’m glad I jumped in though because it turned into a really cool exchange with guys like you and Gunnar. I may not be such a lurker here in the future. It’s always cool to get to know new people. If nobody on this board digs PR I’m cool with that. There are some “horrible” records that I love and some legendary bands and records that I hate. It comes down to personal taste in a lot of cases and I respect that. I know the first PR record wasn’t perfect. But, I also know it was the best I was capable of at the time so I feel good about it.
I hate that there might be people out there that have the perception that I didn’t care about people that were interested in the project. That couldn’t be further from the truth. I’m just some average guy and so it’s amazing to me when people check PR out regardless of their reaction to it. Trust me if I had the benefit of hindsight there’s a bunch of stuff I would have done differently. know I fumbled through some things and I’m glad most people were gracious enough to understand I was figuring a lot of stuff out as I went along.
As for the post about Vrenna. I love that guy. He was like a big brother to me. He’s done well for himself since moving to Wisconsin and from what I can tell is very happy. That’s more important to me than him being on some record.
Bells Into Machines: I’ve heard their record. I love it! I think it’s far and away superior to PR in every way. I can’t speak to all the issues of delay in their release. I can only offer my speculation from the little info I have and/or my own personal hurdles with PR. It’s difficult to get a record to market when people involved have certain expectations. It only becomes further complicated when there are several “publishers” involved. I think things like Paul joining Puscifer and other commitments the guys in that project have may have led to delays as well. I’d say cut those guys some slack. Brian is a good dude. They’re making a killer record and want to get it out the best way they can. Sometimes that means things don’t go as planned right off.
Alright guys I’m off to Daddy diaper duty. I’ll check back in later.
[reply]
Alright guys I’m off to Daddy diaper duty.
Take the dirty one. Slap in into a paper sleeve. And call it Erie Loch’s Primitive Race 12" RemiXXX.
Cheers, Brother![/reply]
LMFAO seriously that was awesome. [laugh][laugh][laugh]
Just so you know all those MiXXX album titles I worked on for 13th Planet were NOT my idea. So much to tell but it’s all water over the dam now. [laugh]
The Prong was one was a ton of fun because Tommy is fucking cool. He’s become family to my wife and I.
Just so you know all those MiXXX album titles I worked on for 13th Planet were NOT my idea.
HAHAHAHAHAHA!!!
I didn’t even know you worked on any of that shit.
I was just taking a shot at Eerie . . . as well as Al and 13th Planet for that endless tsunami of dead cow’s milk between 2006-2014.
To be honest, I never knew (still don’t know, actually) what you actually DID for Primitive Race. I just knew you as the poster boy for Primitive Race from the various updates around the Internet and here.
If you had musical or technical input / contribution to any of those albums I can’t really comment on the so-called “quality” of anything as it ain’t my cup of tea and just a few seconds of samples usually already bore the hell out of me (I did listen to some of Eerie’s “Mixxxes of the Mole” which I thought was dogshit — not sure if you worked on that one or not).
The Prong was one was a ton of fun because Tommy is fucking cool. He’s become family to my wife and I.
Glad to hear he’s a good dude to y’all . . . . . if you could forward a kind request for him to NEVER play on another Danzig song ever again it would be much appreciated.
(I did listen to some of Eerie’s “Mixxxes of the Mole” which I thought was dogshit — not sure if you worked on that one or not).
Gunnar and i are gonna break on this one. I liked a couple songs off of mixxxes of the mole. I cant remember which particular song it is right now since its been years since ive listened to it but there was one that was just vocals and piano. that song was better than the original.
. . . . . if you could forward a kind request for him to NEVER play on another Danzig song ever again it would be much appreciated.
Again another slight break from gunnar. Im good with tommy victor playing with danzig but jesus limit the squealies to maybe one or two pinch harmonics a song. Not every measure needs 463 squealies. Damn that’s obnoxious
Edit- although all 463 per measure do work on black candy.