What a year 2016 has been. Getting to do what I do never ceases to amaze me, humble me, and make me feel the need to pinch myself. Getting the opportunity to talk to some of my favorite hard rock and metal artists never gets old. Whether they are legendary folks like original Alice Cooper Group bassist Dennis Dunaway, hard hitting up and comers like Stacey Savage of Savage Master, or someone making a comeback with lil something different like former Donnas’ vocalist Brett Anderson, doing these interviews is without a doubt the highlight of running this site. Bonding over W.A.S.P with Kevin Starrs of Uncle Acid & The Deadbeats, hanging out backstage and getting to know Demolition Man of Venom Inc, and cracking up laughing with Lips from Anvil are just a few of the memorable moments that took place this year and they are moments that I hope you all got to enjoy. If you missed any of them, they are all here in this post for your enjoyment so I hope you will peruse through these interviews and even you did read them once, maybe re-live them again.
Thank you, the readers, for all of your dedication and all of your inspiration and kind words. I love hearing the feedback you all give me from these interviews and they always just confirm to me that I am indeed taking the right path. Again, thank you all, much love, and enjoy 2016: The Year in Interviews.
Blowin’ Wind with Electric Citizen: ” I don’t think we’d be half as big as we are without the Internet. You can connect with people all over the world using that technology which is one of the coolest things I think about living in this time that we live in.”
Blowin’ Wind with Demolition Man of Venom Inc: “I don’t give a fuck if it’s Cronos or anyone else. Nobody can dictate to the fans what they can fucking hear or not. The fans want to hear what they want to hear. That’s why we started doing this”
Blowin’ Wind with Legendary Alice Cooper/Blue Coupe Bassist Dennis Dunaway: “What was the Alice Cooper band about? Well, it was about a bunch of high school guys getting this idea to incorporate artistic ideas into a rock band and talking their friends into believing in it.”
Blowin’ Wind with Tommy Victor of Prong/Danzig: ” Tuning down low and using 8-string guitars doesn’t make you heavy. It just means that you’re trying to impress other guitar players so you guys can have little circle jerks and wank off to each other.”
Blowin’ Wind with Europe’s Ian Haugland: ” We have to perform at 100% every night. It’s really important that you remind yourself how lucky you are, especially a band like Europe that comes from the 80’s, that you can still be doing this.”
Blowin’ Wind with Blood Ceremony’s Alia O’Brien: “I think that songwriting is another form of magic because you are creating something that is going to shape the mental state and cognizant state of other people. It’s a pretty powerful thing to be involved in.”
Blowin’ Wind with Sabaton’s Joakim Broden: ” We take our music and our lyrics very seriously but we don’t take ourselves seriously so that shines through way better on a live album.”
Blowin’ Wind with Duel Guitarist/Vocalist Tom Frank: ” I get more satisfaction from playing my own songs in front of 100 people than I do playing someone else’s in front of 5,000 people.”
Blowin’ Wind with Savage Master’s Stacey Savage: ” I don’t want to be told, “Hey, you’re good for a female fronted band.” I’d rather be told that this is a good band.”
Blowin’ Wind with Scorpion Child’s Aryn Jonathan Black: “Being compared to Led Zeppelin and Robert Plant over and over again throughout my life just drives me fucking nuts. Can you just think of one other person?”
Blowin’ Wind with Jorn Lande: ” I’m really grateful and I owe a lot to Tony (Iommi) and Geezer (Butler) and everybody in that camp. They were always so nice to me and treated me with respect.
Blowin’ Wind with Anvil’s Steve “Lips” Kudlow: “The people that buy the Anvil albums are devoted Anvil fans and they love us and much as I love my Black Sabbath and Deep Purple.”
Blowin’ Wind with Bill Lonero of LoNero: ” I never ever want to put out the same album over and over. AC/DC can do that all day long but for me, I can’t do that.”
Blowing Wind with Uncle Acid and the Deadbeats’ Kevin Starrs: “The first W.A.S.P album is a record that I recommend that everybody owns. From beginning to end, every song on there is a classic.”
Blowin’ Wind with Alice Cooper/Beasto Blanco’s Chuck Garric: “It was important for us to establish ourselves as not a side band. Beasto Blanco is a band with original material, it’s own stage presence, it’s own life, and it’s own beating heart.”
Blowin’ Wind with Stryper’s Michael Sweet: ” We still get heat from Christians who think we’re going to Hell in a hand basket because we tour with secular bands and play clubs.”
Blowin’ Wind with Sabaton’s Pär Sundström: “Seeing what Iron Maiden does at their age, they are the inspiration for me to keep going and to believe that I can do this for a very long time.”
Blowin’ Wind with Monte Pittman: “If you were starting out and you were going to model your career after someone, Steve Vai would definitely be a guy I would look to.”
Blowin’ Wind with Savage Master’s Stacey Savage: “You see some bands up there in age putting on better shows than people even younger than me. I don’t think there’s a point where you really need to give up. If you’re still doing it well, keep doing it.”
Blowin’ Wind w/ Chris Bennett of Widow: “The future torch bearers are going to have to take those classic influences and create their own thing with it. I mean honestly, if you can take inspiration from Dokken and mix that up with Black Flag and Discharge, we might have something here.”
Blowin’ Wind with Brett Anderson of The Donnas/The Stripminers: “We all had really big dreams for The Donnas and I think we did a lot of amazing stuff. I could see us having gone a lot farther but there was just a combination of a lot of things working against us.”
About The Author
I have been running this blog since 2009. AKA as the Great Southern Brainfart, Southeast of Heaven is my baby now and forever. I’ve had my ups and downs with bands over the years but they are all great experiences and memories. My Swedish friend Charlie said once, “Don is known for being one of the meanest bastards in American rock journalism.” It’s nice to be loved.
I also once took a shit in Anthrax’s dressing room toilet and didn’t flush.
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