Latest / Ghost Cult Magazine Podcast / PODCAST: Episode 863 - David Brenner (GRIDFAILURE) on Sixth Mass-Extinction Skulduggery III

Transcript

PODCAST: Episode 863 - David Brenner (GRIDFAILURE) on Sixth Mass-Extinction Skulduggery III · Ghost Cult Magazine Podcast

• 0:00
  It's fun to be surprised by experiments and mistakes, you
• 0:05
  know, use the mistakes and, and and just make, you know, just
• 0:08
  turn them into something, you know, mistake loop it, you know,
• 0:10
  all of a sudden it can become What's up everybody?
• 0:20
  It's Kefi from coastcultmag.com. I'm super stoked to be joined by
• 0:23
  Dave Brenner of Grid Failure. How you doing brother?
• 0:26
  I'm doing just fine. Keith, how are you?
• 0:28
  I am so good man, I haven't seen you.
• 0:30
  I saw I bumped into you randomly like 2 years ago at Metallica
• 0:33
  which was amazing. Three shows or something.
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  I do have like 2-2 shows in a row in three days.
• 0:40
  Yeah, for Pantera, which was amazing.
• 0:42
  And that was like a big highlight for me of my last trip
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  back home. But I've been out on the West
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  Coast for a few years, so we haven't like had a real hang in
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  quite a while. But it's really nice to see you.
• 0:53
  And that's. The last time?
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  That's the last time you were out here.
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  I haven't been back. I think next year I'll come back
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  in for another visit, my partner will join me and I'll hit the
• 1:01
  East Coast again. And it's been a minute.
• 1:03
  Umm, I just haven't like this last year has been like, Oh my
• 1:06
  God, a black hole of dread and bullshit.
• 1:09
  But I'm hanging in there. I hope you're hanging in there.
• 1:12
  We've been talking offline about what an impossible time it is.
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  Are we pinch yourself. Is this any of this real that we
• 1:18
  in the matrix? I'm not sure.
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  It took both pills. I took both pills and I didn't
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  know what I expected to get out of it, but I got, I think we got
• 1:27
  what we deserved as a human race.
• 1:30
  I'm not sure yet. And Speaking of.
• 1:32
  A pot sounds like I'm in the right place.
• 1:33
  Sounds like you're in the right place.
• 1:35
  You know, we haven't caught up in a minute.
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  I've been a long time fan of Grid Failure, which has been
• 1:40
  your sort of catch all project for everything you do.
• 1:43
  And this latest series that the current record that's out now is
• 1:46
  1/6 Mass Extinction, Skullduggery 3.
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  I've been listening to the whole, you know, all your stuff.
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  Whenever I'm going to chat with somebody, I binge everything to
• 1:56
  just keep fresh and compare and contrast and things.
• 2:00
  And I do feel like this record in particular is like a bit hit,
• 2:04
  like a particular high for you. I'm getting like a lot of vibes
• 2:09
  from like the classic 90s Neurosis records and even like
• 2:13
  old Killing Joke stuff in there somewhere.
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  Plus all the other stuff you do, guests and collabs.
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  So first and foremost, man, like you've been doing this for a
• 2:21
  very long time. So obviously you, you make music
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  all the time. You know, we may be an idea that
• 2:27
  this will be the next release, but you're always creating,
• 2:30
  right? And you did the art for this and
• 2:32
  all the things. So yeah.
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  Where does it like, what's a, you know, a regular day in your
• 2:37
  life outside of work if you're making music?
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  Like, what do you do you go to nature first?
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  Do you pick up a guitar first? Do you think about a vocal first
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  or a weird pedal first? What do you what do you reach
• 2:48
  for in the Batman utility belt first?
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  There's literally no set way anything happens like this.
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  Is just a chaos project. It's just a straight it's
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  heavily improvisational. It's heavily, I don't know, it's
• 3:03
  like anti genre, you know, cross genre to the point of being
• 3:07
  anything goes pretty much It's it's it's it really, you know,
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  you said you're always creating stuff for everybody else.
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  You know, this record is has been sitting for two years
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  finished like mastered finished, you know what I mean?
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  Trying to catch up with everything.
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  It was and, and in that time I think I've released between the
• 3:23
  second record and this one, I think I've released like 15
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  titles on Band Camp, you know what I mean?
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  It's just constantly going. I think I have somewhere in the
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  realm of two dozen records in some phase or whatever, fully
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  collaborative records of people, random projects that will become
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  records, you know, all over the place.
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  So it's just kind of like everything, you know, one day I
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  want to play bass one day I need to make beats.
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  One day I'm just digging around, like you said, with a pedal,
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  like I'm always recording storms and and weather patterns and,
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  you know, found sounds stuff. We live next to the to it.
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  You know, the train tracks are right past our house.
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  I'm always recording, you know, odd railroad sounds, industrial.
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  It's it's really anything. So I just kind of amass and
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  library everything. I'm always recording and it's,
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  you know, random track names, random little things that become
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  snip samples, whatever. And then, you know, yeah, like
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  all the collaborative stuff happens different ways as well.
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  People send me random, just random drum tracks or random
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  piano stuff or or whatever with, without hearing anything, just
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  hear, you know, use this stuff. And then sometimes I'm sending
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  people basically a constructed finished song with do your thing
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  to it. So it's, it's really all in
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  between. There's there's no one way
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  anything happens. There's always a million things
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  happening at once. So it's really just like an
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  ongoing collide rather than, you know, the sessions for this
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  record and the sessions for, you know what I mean?
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  It's it's, it's not very defined.
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  It's like I just save certain things aside and and craft them
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  into something at some point. And you know, once you're in the
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  mode and it's like, OK, here's the focus, here's the maybe even
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  the title, whatever. Then it's like go time.
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  Then it's like time to like hammer focus in on something and
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  try to finish it. At least get it to a tangible
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  point, you know? I don't, I dig that so much.
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  I am super familiar. I don't think a lot of people
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  connect the dots and I I think of you as like one of my
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  pinnacle favorite East Coast people with the same kind of
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  mindset as me. No pressure.
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  You know, I spent a lot of, I spent a lot of formative time,
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  even though I'm from the Bronx, I spent a lot of formative time
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  in lower Westchester and Hudson Valley because like I have
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  friends that lived in Peekskill and then they moved to Hastings
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  and I spent a lot of time and I used to go to a shrink in
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  Ossining and I had like a fucking, I had like a
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  belligerent relationship with my counselor for a long time
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  because he was like picking on me and I would pick on him back.
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  I was like, who are you trying to impress with that suit?
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  You have like, you know, I'm, I'm like, you know, I'm, you
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  know, who are you trying to impress with that suit?
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  And you're 3 divorces and giving me relationship advice.
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  So anyway, enough about my yeah, enough.
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  How she should have switched jobs.
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  I should have switched jobs. Enough about my mother and my
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  problems. But so like the nature, like,
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  you know, New York City, you know, which is like a jungle,
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  like it's always a concrete jungle, like it's always
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  presented. But like literally, even though
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  the Hudson River goes up, you know, north, then there's a
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  bunch of little pockets in towns, but you're maybe 10-15
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  minutes from any point of a city life into like wilderness.
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  You know, we used to drive down the the, you know, is that Route
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  9 Bear Mountain Parkway on, you know, like looking over to the
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  the cliffs during a snowstorm to go to concerts in like
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  Poughkeepsie. And I went, I spent a lot of
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  time at shows and like Poughkeepsie and the.
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  There's scenes all the way up along.
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  It's all the way. Up Albany Valley.
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  Yeah, So like, there you really can get deep in nature.
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  And I think about things like the only real 1 to one for this
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  for me is like what Rudrina does, where Einar goes into the
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  wilderness camping for a weekend and he just records trees and
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  the wind and branches and babbling brooks, you know?
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  And like Norway seems like very far away from.
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  Yeah. You know, it's probably much
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  easier for them to get some clean sounds than it is here.
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  Like I said, we got tracks like you.
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  Might get some cool train sounds and a little bit I.
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  Get a lot. Yeah, there's lots, lots of
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  great screeching and rhythmics. There's, you know, separations
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  and attracts that give rhythms. And there's there's all kinds of
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  that. I mean, there's, there's train
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  sounds throughout this this new record record, like even a lot
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  of the the the speaker kind of background voices and stuff like
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  that in the in the intro and everything else that's right
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  here. But yes, you can kind of, you
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  know, there's always like lawn mowers, plane, there's airports
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  everywhere. So it's really hard to get
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  really clean sounds. And it's the more you record
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  nature and that kind of, you know, and just, and you know,
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  delicate sounds of nature and whatever.
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  It's really difficult to differentiate and how to make
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  how to record fire, wind, rain, and make them all sound like
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  they're supposed to. Sometimes 1 sounds like the
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  other. So it doesn't really matter if
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  it translates into your, you know what you're trying to do
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  with it, you know what it what it conveys.
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  So it depends, you know, rain falling on grass is going to
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  sound different than rain falling on a glass patio table
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  or an awning or, or anything. So it's like, it just depends,
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  you know, the force of everything.
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  So it's, but it's a lot of fun, you know what I mean, to, to
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  incorporate that stuff. And it adds like an immersive
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  sort of element, even if it's not, you know, it doesn't have
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  to sound like the nature store, doesn't have to sound like a
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  National Geographic documentary or something.
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  But it just, it's something familiar to people outside of,
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  you know, when you're listening to music and you're listening to
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  separated instruments, you know what I mean?
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  It gives us more immersive, just quality to, you know, to what
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  you're you're working with when you have, you know, Yeah, the
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  babbling brook or the, you know, the, the wind howling through
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  something or, you know, it's, it's, you know, you really
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  change the mood of something with something that simple.
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  Right on. And do you have like a special
• 8:44
  portable bike and recorder that you take out with you or do you
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  know what do you use? I have a little a little task
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  Cam digital probably right here yeah, nothing special.
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  This is what I record a lot of stuff with.
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  They got really badass. My I mean even broke off all the
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  the pieces and this thing's been left in the rain overnight.
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  It's been frozen and defrosted and dropped off my mountain bike
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  while moving and you know I mean this thing's been just beat this
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  shit and it's it still works great.
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  I'll also I've recorded if you know, the press releases
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  everything for all these the the SMEs records say that mentioned
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  recording in actual weather events and you know, whatever.
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  However I had it phrased. Some of it is is that is
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  recording vocals or rhythmic things wherever out in the woods
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  or you know, even in the yard in the rain with that recording
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  storms at night. But some of it I actually had
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  right here in this window with Mike's running out into a
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  terrifying storm one night. And just here with Mike's and
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  rain blowing into here, I was trying to like keep things
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  protected. But you know, rain was actually
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  coming as windy it was, it was a gnarly storm.
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  And I was just standing here screaming crazy vocals into
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  that, you know, just there's a lot of different things.
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  Just trying it out and expecting like, hey, this is probably just
• 10:01
  going to get trashed. If I don't get electrocuted,
• 10:03
  I'll probably just throw all this shit out.
• 10:05
  And then sometimes, you know, you keep a segment.
• 10:07
  Sometimes you're just incredibly surprised, happily surprised.
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  You're like, wow, that actually came out sounding like, you
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  know, maybe not what it actually is, but it turns into something
• 10:15
  that you just hey man, put some reverb on that shit and clean it
• 10:18
  up a little bit. And like, it's fun to be
• 10:20
  surprised by experiments and mistakes, you know, use the
• 10:25
  mistakes and, and, and just make, you know, just turn them
• 10:27
  into something, you know, a mistake, loop it, you know, all
• 10:30
  of a sudden it can become a rhythm.
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  Yeah, it might make for a really good press release, but try hard
• 10:34
  not to get electrocuted making the next record like if you can,
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  try not to get killed like I'm sure a.
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  Lot of this that's so much of that was recorded like in
• 10:42
  several this random sessions so long ago.
• 10:45
  And like I said, like with this record sitting for two years and
• 10:48
  the stuff being spread out over 3 records, I think it started
• 10:51
  the first this, you know, this first.
• 10:52
  The first one came out in 2019 or something.
• 10:56
  Yeah, I think so. And the other one came out
• 10:57
  during the pandemic, so we couldn't even make tapes or
• 10:59
  anything. It was, you know, we just did
• 11:01
  the visual thing and then that's why I made the the box set for,
• 11:05
  for this one, we were making the third tape.
• 11:07
  We were making the second tape at the same time and made the
• 11:09
  shell. So we put all three of them
• 11:11
  together because, you know, it just, it just became a cool idea
• 11:15
  to do and, you know, already making all these tapes, you
• 11:17
  know, packaged them together and, you know, put the whole
• 11:20
  thing together. And yeah, but so, you know, I I
• 11:23
  don't think I've recorded in a lightning storm directly since
• 11:27
  then. I was recording right here in
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  the yard year and a half two years ago or whatever.
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  And I heard a limb come down pretty, pretty directly, pretty
• 11:35
  close to me. And, you know, it was pitch
• 11:37
  blackout between lightning strikes, whatever I was went out
• 11:40
  the next day and there was, you know, it was like the omen.
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  If I was like 20 feet, you know, just down below where I was, I
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  would have been straight and pale.
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  Like, I mean, it was it was a big limb stuck straight into the
• 11:50
  ground. It was like place my height.
• 11:52
  So yeah, that was just feet away from where I was standing when I
• 11:55
  was recording, you know, just wind or maybe I think I probably
• 11:58
  had my my camcorder out trying to record lightning that.
• 12:00
  Risking actual life and limb to make this music.
• 12:04
  I love it. What else will we do?
• 12:06
  What else will we do? You're not gonna have fun, you
• 12:08
  know? Yeah, you.
• 12:09
  Well, you're gonna keep it interesting, you know, keep
• 12:11
  them. Keep the Grim Reaper guessing.
• 12:14
  So, yeah, man, I've always been impressed with, you know, you've
• 12:17
  always had really carefully and and wonderfully chosen artists.
• 12:20
  And this is like the kitchen sink version of all these other
• 12:23
  records. Like it's everybody.
• 12:25
  So did you, did you, you said you, you know, you track things
• 12:28
  over time. And then as they start to take
• 12:30
  shape and the record concept comes together, do you then go,
• 12:33
  oh, this person for that? Or do you just say, here's
• 12:36
  here's a tape, tell me what you'd like to be on?
• 12:38
  How do you do that? You know, approach people?
• 12:41
  All of it. All of it really.
• 12:44
  Some of these submissions were just just sent for usage, you
• 12:49
  know, for me to do whatever with, you know what I mean?
• 12:52
  Like all of Jared, Jared Stempel, Secret Cutter and
• 12:56
  Orphan Donor does some of the drumming on here and, and he
• 12:59
  just had sent me, I don't know, four or five random drum tracks
• 13:03
  over different time, different discussions and everything.
• 13:06
  And a lot of times more like when he's just warming up, you
• 13:10
  know, he's just such a sick drummer.
• 13:11
  So like him just warming up and digging around all of a sudden
• 13:15
  becomes something I, you know, he knows I'll have fun with or
• 13:18
  whatever. And he, he makes his own drums,
• 13:20
  drum heads and stuff like that. So you know, the, the actual
• 13:24
  Toms and everything. So like he'll just test things
• 13:27
  out of wherever and send it over and I'll, you know, of course,
• 13:30
  just weave it in. There's there's two, at least
• 13:34
  two songs with him on it on this record.
• 13:36
  Then from Megalophobe is one of my most collaborated with people
• 13:40
  who've done, you know, 3 prior records and our 4th
• 13:43
  collaboration is is 90% ninety more than that percent done now.
• 13:48
  And he's like, you know, does the live grid failure improv
• 13:51
  stuff with me and, and you know, he's been on most of my records.
• 13:55
  He just had random submissions all over.
• 13:57
  He even had cello. So he usually contributes his
• 14:01
  accordion. He's got an accordion he cracked
• 14:03
  open and, you know, wanted him to, you know, just plug it into
• 14:06
  the text pedals and amps and everything.
• 14:08
  And that's normally what he does here.
• 14:09
  But he has some cello pieces on here.
• 14:12
  Alex Haber from, you know, Alto music, you know, heavy New York.
• 14:15
  I mean, you know, Alex, he he had a bunch of piano pieces on
• 14:18
  here because he does, you know, he does that stuff where he goes
• 14:20
  to like he'll go play like lucky 13 and cover, you know, death
• 14:24
  and Lacuna Coil and stuff on piano and make it sound like,
• 14:28
  you know, classical music and shit.
• 14:29
  So I had him just kind of like, you know, just do that.
• 14:31
  Like don't cover anything. Just just, you know, whatever
• 14:35
  and and that, you know, so he said that's his a lot of his
• 14:38
  stuff weaving throughout it to kind of create the arc.
• 14:40
  Yeah, it was all over the place. And then my buddy Steve from
• 14:44
  Steve Austin, Today is a Day is like one of my best friends.
• 14:46
  And he was working with his new record the whole way through
• 14:49
  from the pandemic into now. And I was the same, doing the
• 14:52
  same thing. And we, you know, we talk like
• 14:54
  pretty much every day. And I work with him and
• 14:56
  everything else. And they kind of grew together.
• 14:59
  And, you know, he had me on the new Today's the day record on a
• 15:01
  song. And you know, I had one on this
• 15:04
  record and he sent, he initially sent 5 guitar for five songs.
• 15:09
  I thought he was going to hit like 1.
• 15:10
  And he sent guitar multiple tracks for five of the 15 songs
• 15:14
  on this record. And then when I was done, I was
• 15:17
  like, I was like 99% done with this record, mixed and
• 15:19
  everything. I was like, hey Steve, those
• 15:21
  songs you sent, you know, do you want to do vocals with me on
• 15:24
  like one or two of them or something?
• 15:25
  He's like, yeah, sure. So he goes and he writes new
• 15:28
  lyrics on top of the lyrics I already had written and then
• 15:30
  sends like 3 vocal tracks for each of the same 5 songs.
• 15:34
  All of a sudden I had this, I was like, this record was done
• 15:37
  dude. And you know, so I had to work
• 15:38
  on Heshan and it's really that made me even rework the track
• 15:42
  listing and everything a bit and all this other stuff because it
• 15:44
  added this. He only did really sad clean
• 15:48
  vocals. He didn't do any of his harsh,
• 15:49
  roaring distorted stuff. It was all these clean, sad
• 15:52
  vocals like he did in the Lee record and, and like the new
• 15:55
  today's day and stuff. And it was and he's just sad
• 15:58
  guitar tracks and just added this this extra level of Bismol
• 16:02
  beautiful sadness to the whole record.
• 16:04
  You know what I mean? It it really.
• 16:05
  So, you know, there were certain people I hit up, you know, Dan
• 16:09
  from Black Matter Master and he plays bass and everything else
• 16:12
  and he's in the band Phaeton and whatever.
• 16:13
  And we we work on stuff together and you know, he masters all my
• 16:17
  stuff. So I had him hit, you know, we
• 16:19
  did bass on a track and then upright bass on another track.
• 16:23
  You know, Layla's on almost as many of my records as, as Ben
• 16:27
  is. You know what I mean?
• 16:28
  There's just so many people. My buddy Rick smaller from, from
• 16:31
  Vice Mascot and everything I've known forever like this.
• 16:33
  And then my, my nephew Isaac played.
• 16:36
  He he he was on one song before I did that when the lights go
• 16:40
  out series, when I put them on Halloween.
• 16:42
  He was on that one I released last year.
• 16:45
  That was the first time, but he sent some really crazy tracks
• 16:48
  for this one for the song. This was more than just killing.
• 16:51
  It was art. My buddy Mike who I went, I was
• 16:54
  in like Boy Scouts with in elementary school whenever well,
• 16:57
  more like high school. He, we were our first punk band
• 17:00
  together in like, you know, 93 to 96, you know, back in
• 17:04
  Lancaster. And he sent during the pandemic,
• 17:06
  he sent this really cool section of guitar and piano that would
• 17:10
  be the basis of that song. And then my nephew Isaac is just
• 17:13
  like this prodigy pianist. He just didn't take less or
• 17:17
  anything, just like knows how to kill.
• 17:19
  And he played a bunch of stuff to it.
• 17:21
  And it just things like that just kept building and building
• 17:23
  and building. I just kept adding more and more
• 17:25
  to it. And you know that there's 26
• 17:27
  guests on this record in the end.
• 17:29
  And that's more, that's like more than twice what I've ever
• 17:32
  had on any record. You know, it's, it's, it was a
• 17:34
  lot to manage. Well, I think, yeah, I hear you.
• 17:36
  You know, so many shout outs there.
• 17:38
  I love the new Today's the day. And you know how I feel about
• 17:40
  Steve Haber's a buddy Morgan Evans from Ghost Colton, and
• 17:44
  Walking Bombs is on the record. He's been.
• 17:46
  We've done a record together, Morgan's on a song on this one.
• 17:49
  Like a lot of people are are returning collaborate operators
• 17:52
  like that. And then, you know, Paranjal
• 17:53
  from Scram and Cardinal Worm. Oh man, it's all over the place.
• 17:59
  Mac, of course, you can't forget.
• 18:02
  It's so hard to think of everybody and Mac Mac comes out
• 18:04
  and records here. I've recorded him, you know, a
• 18:07
  ton out here. I recorded that whole record
• 18:08
  with him and everything else. And well, again, he was another
• 18:11
  crossover because his record just came out a few weeks before
• 18:14
  this one in today's day record. And he's on several songs of my
• 18:18
  record and he's on the same song that I'm on.
• 18:20
  I've recorded him for the today's today song that we're
• 18:22
  both on the secret police song on the new record.
• 18:24
  We're both, you know, and then I made the video for it.
• 18:27
  So Mac had to come back out again and record some video and
• 18:29
  like, you know, it was this whole thing has just been so
• 18:32
  it's you know, it's like so interwoven.
• 18:34
  It's you know what I mean? It's it's it's not just I can't
• 18:38
  really go well, here's the process, you know what I mean?
• 18:40
  It's there's so many processes of work at you know, for it's
• 18:43
  like 8080 some minutes long and it's 15 songs and it's 2026
• 18:48
  guests or whatever. It's just, it's a ridiculous
• 18:51
  amount of information, you know? And it takes a few listens, I
• 18:55
  think, to process. It definitely does for me.
• 18:57
  I enjoy repeat listening to things.
• 18:59
  I still love albums. I know it's probably hard for
• 19:02
  you to try to put this out on vinyl at some point because it's
• 19:05
  just too scrawling. 4 LP's and it would cost you know, I, I
• 19:10
  need a roof man. I don't have money for that.
• 19:13
  I'll be happy if we sell these 50 tape sets, you know?
• 19:16
  Yeah, yeah. If I get the Lotto, I got you on
• 19:18
  that on that vinyl press. Yeah, that's everybody.
• 19:21
  It's the first thing you do, like pay the rest of the
• 19:25
  mortgage, and then I just put all my shit out on vinyl.
• 19:27
  That's it, that's it. That's the dream.
• 19:29
  That's the dream. Same, same, same, same, same,
• 19:32
  different. But you know, it's a, I think
• 19:34
  it's a compliment to you that people want to work with you and
• 19:37
  continue to work with you. I think it's really, it's really
• 19:39
  nice and it makes these records feel kind of new and familiar at
• 19:43
  the same time. It's like, oh, I'm used to this.
• 19:44
  It's not. There are plenty of, you know,
• 19:49
  people I work with, of course, that work their way in, but it's
• 19:52
  I still consider everybody I work with friends.
• 19:53
  So it's like an honor that these people who are much more
• 19:57
  musically talented than I am, are willing to take part in
• 20:01
  this, in this thing and enjoy doing it.
• 20:03
  You know what I mean? It's not like I'm running around
• 20:04
  like begging people to do anything.
• 20:06
  I just kind of throw it out there.
• 20:07
  And anybody who's like into it, I, I'm just, yeah, sure.
• 20:10
  What do you do? What do you want to do?
• 20:11
  Like you want to do something that you don't, you know, if
• 20:13
  you're in a death metal band, you play guitar.
• 20:15
  Do you want to try ukulele on mine?
• 20:16
  You know, like try something new, do something you haven't
• 20:19
  played to play a style you don't play, you know what I mean?
• 20:21
  Play, you know, whatever it's, it's, it's more about like a
• 20:25
  testing ground. You know, it's more, more fun
• 20:27
  than it's not. You know, I'm not sitting over
• 20:29
  here, you know, I'm not going to act like I'm over here like
• 20:31
  charting music for 19 instruments and then like, you
• 20:34
  know, casting an ensemble. It's like it's it's more just
• 20:37
  like, you know, pull out of the hat out.
• 20:39
  That'll work like, Oh no, I want this over here.
• 20:41
  Go get so and so and, you know, and just like Frankenstein it
• 20:45
  together, you know? Right on.
• 20:46
  I love Frank. It's the Frankenstein season.
• 20:48
  It's Halloween season. So I mean, every day is
• 20:50
  Halloween if you try hard enough.
• 20:53
  I wanted to talk about artwork for a second because I don't
• 20:55
  think people talk enough about the artwork on these records and
• 20:57
  especially this series. And I didn't know, you know, how
• 21:01
  you made this cover, particularly this one.
• 21:03
  But like it's very, you know, of the times it's it feels very
• 21:08
  like modern and needed like it's, you know, it looks like,
• 21:11
  you know, we have skulls and they're on Pikes.
• 21:13
  But it's also like, you know, like disused to metal looks like
• 21:16
  this like a like a junkyard, but also like human remains.
• 21:20
  It's super cool. It's not like super bloody or
• 21:23
  graphic like a lot of things are doing these days.
• 21:25
  Looks real, like real. A real person made this and it
• 21:29
  you know it matters to the music.
• 21:31
  Thanks. Thank you.
• 21:32
  Yeah, it's, it's, it's all, it's I, I did a few, you just
• 21:36
  stippling pieces, all just pointillism, just billions of
• 21:39
  dots, you know what I mean? And layering and I drew just
• 21:42
  several pieces, not even finished pieces, just just
• 21:45
  layers of, of, of that. What you're talking about, just
• 21:48
  the skulls like in these sort of tentacle piles and crafted into
• 21:51
  things and whatever. And then I, I just each record,
• 21:55
  I pulled different parts of those elements together, you
• 21:59
  know, in Photoshop and whatever, and then just started mirroring
• 22:01
  and, and layering and everything.
• 22:03
  So it's like all 90% of like almost all all the grid failure
• 22:08
  stuff, artwork and everything I've I've done, there's a few
• 22:11
  collaborative records of megalophone that other people
• 22:13
  handle the artwork, but generally it's it's me doing it
• 22:16
  and it's almost, almost photo manipulation photo, you know,
• 22:19
  just all digital. So for these to to be these are
• 22:24
  the first ones I've actually done hand drawn art for is just
• 22:26
  these three, only three so far. And then it'll be the teeth
• 22:29
  collection and drought stick records that come after.
• 22:31
  These two are going to be a new series of drawings like I'm
• 22:35
  going to. I have some other stuff that I'm
• 22:36
  working on, so it'd be a different style I believe, but I
• 22:40
  have to get this one gone first, you know?
• 22:43
  So so much to work on with those two.
• 22:44
  It's kind of like produce on the fridge.
• 22:47
  Got to get this out, this salad stuff out before I can buy more.
• 22:50
  Yeah. It's going bad.
• 22:53
  Throw that tomato out looking looking haggard.
• 22:58
  So yeah, just cut all those elements up and put them through
• 23:00
  all three records in the series in in in like a sort of, you
• 23:05
  know, connected uniform sort of look.
• 23:08
  And then the box set and the artwork for this, the the main
• 23:12
  website and everything that's kind of again, all re
• 23:15
  manipulated using all the elements from all three records
• 23:18
  in one, you know, in one, in one spot.
• 23:20
  So it's you know, it's yeah, it's it was again, it was
• 23:23
  another massive under the the biggest undertaking of all of
• 23:26
  that was after having all the art done, was putting all the
• 23:29
  lyrics and credits for each song into a Jay card of a cassette
• 23:35
  for this for 15 songs, all of my lyrics, all of Steve's lyrics,
• 23:39
  and then all of the credits for 26 collaborators and 5th over 15
• 23:43
  songs. It was, I don't know, I I tried
• 23:46
  it several times, whatever. And it was like, you know, I
• 23:48
  just said to Greg Nefarious, I'm like, you're you're pretty good
• 23:50
  at this shit, man. You think you make it fit and
• 23:52
  somehow he made it fit into like a three panel J card of a tape.
• 23:55
  So that's. Insane.
• 23:57
  I have done a little bit of album layout for CDs and
• 24:00
  cassettes so I know how full well hard that is.
• 24:03
  I've done a lot but. This I know you have a.
• 24:05
  Lot, a lot of so much, man. It was like, it was like when
• 24:09
  they go into, you know, John Doe's apartment in Seven and
• 24:11
  there's just that, that rack of all those notebooks full of
• 24:14
  shit. It was like, put this in a tape,
• 24:16
  you know? Yeah, you know what the opening
• 24:18
  of seven is? John Doe is really great at
• 24:20
  scrapbooking. Hey, not only am I super cool at
• 24:24
  murderer religious themed murderers, I'm good at
• 24:26
  scrapbooking. Independently wealthy and spends
• 24:29
  all of his time buying crafts at Joanne and Michaels.
• 24:31
  And no one put that together. I'm hard to believe.
• 24:34
  You could have probably figured out the glue on the the was it
• 24:39
  the fuck me in the ass anyway? I don't remember.
• 24:42
  I'm a lapsed religious person, so fuck that anyway.
• 24:46
  Good movie, though. I just want Morgan Freeman to
• 24:49
  narrate my life like the last sentence in that film.
• 24:52
  Ernest Hemingway once said that, you know, life is good and worth
• 24:56
  fighting for. I believe in the second part,
• 24:58
  second part, second part, yes. So out of the second part, you
• 25:02
  know, so obviously you got new stuff on the horizon.
• 25:05
  I know it's obviously touring is limited.
• 25:08
  Is there plans for a sort of release show for this where you
• 25:12
  perform some of this material or when are you?
• 25:15
  The truth about Grid Failure Live is that that it is every
• 25:19
  show is very just singular. And that's why I released so
• 25:23
  many of the the the live recordings either on YouTube or
• 25:29
  or band camp or both, because it's 100% improv.
• 25:33
  Like I never have anybody learn any of this material material
• 25:37
  and play it out. It is something I want to do.
• 25:40
  It's a it's a you know, it's, it's, it's in the plans to do so
• 25:43
  at some point. But like you said, it's like the
• 25:45
  top timing is just, you know, there, there is none.
• 25:48
  And then to go, you know, Hey guys, I got booked it, you know,
• 25:52
  you know, trans picos on a Tuesday night with a bunch of,
• 25:55
  you know, dudes on tables and, you know, come out and we'll
• 25:58
  just hang out in the dark and make shit up and I can pay you
• 26:01
  and maybe like a beer ticket. And you know, it's really hard
• 26:05
  to beat, you know, don't, don't go make money at your don't go
• 26:07
  make $400.00 at your tattoo shop tonight.
• 26:09
  Come out and lose money with me and you know, and Bushwick.
• 26:12
  So it's like, you know, it's just a hard thing to to just put
• 26:16
  put together everything else. When I do, we go for it pretty
• 26:18
  hard. You know what I mean?
• 26:19
  It's, you know, and everybody's really into the whole
• 26:21
  collaboration thing with and go, hey, you know, we're going to
• 26:23
  start out the set this way or whatever.
• 26:25
  OK, fine, cool. And that's about, you know, 10
• 26:27
  minutes, 15 minutes in, let's take a break because I want to
• 26:29
  do this other thing and we'll have like a couple of cues and
• 26:32
  that's pretty much it. You'll see like a pause at some
• 26:35
  point. And normally it's like the the
• 26:37
  main lineup would be like me and Ben and Rich and you'll see the
• 26:41
  three of us kind of take a breather and all take a Sith of
• 26:44
  a Modelo kind of almost in unison.
• 26:46
  And then like somebody will just not, you know, give a little,
• 26:49
  I'll give a little point over to Rich that started, you know,
• 26:52
  starting drums or whatever, like, and yeah, we just kind of
• 26:55
  feel it out. So no, there's no plans of
• 26:57
  anything live as of now. I'll probably book some stuff in
• 27:01
  the new year. You know, we, we do, you know,
• 27:03
  Queens and Bushwick and, you know, like some of the local,
• 27:06
  you know, surround. And then, you know, Philly
• 27:08
  played a bunch and, you know, New England played, you know,
• 27:12
  Portland and Providence and stuff like that and Kingston
• 27:15
  upriver. But like, you know, it's, you
• 27:17
  know, I don't see us going beyond a couple of 1 offs or
• 27:20
  whatever, three dates maybe here and there.
• 27:22
  And you know, I'd like to, it's my, it's really my favorite
• 27:26
  thing to do is to play shows even when you're just making
• 27:28
  shit up like we do here. You know what I mean?
• 27:30
  Like a couple of grid failure shows, the couple of shows I
• 27:33
  managed to catch were Change Game Changers man.
• 27:36
  They were revelate, they were revelatory.
• 27:39
  And words start to fail me because it's it's night time
• 27:42
  here and I'm sure it's late where you are.
• 27:43
  I don't know if maybe 3 middle-aged guys taking a break
• 27:46
  in the middle of a set to drink a Modelo in unison is like the
• 27:49
  new KISS guitar thing. But wow, for sure.
• 27:56
  We've we've talked a lot offline off the record over the years
• 28:00
  about music. And so, you know, I end these
• 28:02
  interviews with a wild card question.
• 28:04
  And of course, your record collection is the stuff of
• 28:06
  legend and it's behind you. So I had to ask you like, what
• 28:09
  is your favorite? What is your favorite record on
• 28:12
  vinyl? Like what is your favorite
• 28:13
  record you own that you have If you had to pick one?
• 28:18
  Probably. Oh damn.
• 28:19
  I don't know man. Probably my misfits walk among
• 28:24
  us with the Halloween bag. I'm sick.
• 28:26
  I'm mighty. Hiding out.
• 28:28
  Listen to it. Yeah, it's dead, man.
• 28:29
  It's time to hear. It is the time of year.
• 28:31
  Yeah, I'm holding behind menus and now it's I'm holding it.
• 28:37
  Yeah, probably the, you know, walk among us.
• 28:40
  I think, I believe it's the second press.
• 28:42
  I think the first press had a pink cover but still got the.
• 28:46
  Yes, that's so sick. Probably.
• 28:50
  Probably that one, Yeah, I have like I got thousands of, you
• 28:54
  know, 7 inches and and yeah, TV's and everything else.
• 28:57
  But yeah, vinyl to me is still the the most fun.
• 29:01
  It's the most, the the most fun to enjoy, you know, not not
• 29:05
  storing it and whatever, you know, obviously you know, you
• 29:08
  can stream things anywhere you are in the world, but I don't
• 29:11
  know, I can't stand earbuds and and Spotify.
• 29:14
  I like, I like stacking up, you know, a few, a few good, a few
• 29:19
  good records and listening to the whole thing, you know?
• 29:22
  So I need someone to lean on, maybe you and I'll go pay a
• 29:24
  visit to Rick Rubin's house. I need Rick to work with Danzig
• 29:28
  to get those Danzig originals like the 88 self-titled out on
• 29:32
  real vinyl, not a bootleg. You know, like that's my main
• 29:35
  struggle right now. Rick, man, come on.
• 29:38
  Fuck. Fuck AI and Suno AI and all this
• 29:41
  bullshit. You know, the guy who's made
• 29:43
  like some of the best records of my whole life is now fucking
• 29:45
  with AI. This is why we need an
• 29:47
  apocalypse, bro. Like this is the music, is the
• 29:50
  soundtrack, and we need the rest to get to follow.
• 29:53
  You know it was. Written for He's already in it.
• 29:55
  Everybody for a. Second, I was written for the
• 29:56
  random. Their phones and Yep, everyone's
• 29:59
  being sucked in it. Terminator didn't teach anybody
• 30:01
  shit. Nothing, we didn't learn
• 30:02
  anything from this shit bro. Have you seen this boy?
• 30:05
  But anyway, yo man, just a pleasure to see you brother.
• 30:09
  Thank you for this music. Thank you for just doing what
• 30:11
  you do in general. Like you're so I feel like this
• 30:14
  is so pure and good and hopefully inspires, inspires me.
• 30:18
  I hope it inspires others to do it themselves.
• 30:22
  And do you know, anything is possible?
• 30:24
  You can absolutely make music at home And and do you know, follow
• 30:28
  your vision, keep it to the more vision.
• 30:30
  Yeah. Yeah, I, I, I, I never, you
• 30:32
  know, I've been in punk bands. I've been in a bunch of
• 30:34
  different bands over the years, but like, I've never been the
• 30:37
  one recording engineering anything.
• 30:39
  And like, I figured it all out just to, you know, for this.
• 30:42
  So grid failure turns 10 years old next year.
• 30:44
  And it's like you said, this feels like, you know, this
• 30:47
  record with, with having all these friends on it and help
• 30:49
  make it what it is, is, has been a really special thing beyond
• 30:54
  what it usually. And I never, I never expect
• 30:57
  anybody to pay attention to review or interview or listen to
• 31:02
  this shit or buy it or anything. I put it out and I might finish
• 31:04
  a record and put it on band camp that day.
• 31:07
  So it's done, you know what I mean?
• 31:08
  Like, and I just, I don't expect anything back at all.
• 31:12
  And it just means a lot when people do take part in it and
• 31:16
  when anybody listens to it, when anybody buys something a track
• 31:19
  off a band camp or whatever, it's, it all means a lot.
• 31:22
  You know what I mean? It's such a negative project and
• 31:25
  but there's like, there's just, there's a lot of, you know,
• 31:28
  friendship and and love in it, you know, between, you know, a
• 31:31
  lot of really good friends and everything.
• 31:32
  So it means a lot when when people you know enjoy it or at
• 31:36
  least endure it, you know? Endure, and I love it.
• 31:39
  Perfect. No, no.
• 31:40
  It's what a great ending and I'm happy to endure many more.
• 31:44
  So keep making and you keep making and making them and I'll
• 31:47
  keep checking them out. Thanks a lot for having me on.
• 31:50
  Always brother, have a good night.
• 31:51
  We'll see you soon. Really good hanging out with
• 31:53
  you. Always a pleasure man.
• 31:54
  You know this is this is as much for me as you.
• 31:56
  Trust me.