The Amazing Royal Crowns
(Velvel)
An interview with Jason “King” Kendall, Jack “the Swinger” Hanlon, Johnny “The Colonel” Maguire
photos and review by Margo Tiffen
Tell me what you guys have been up to, what you have planned for the near future?
Jason: Well, we’re the Amazing Royal Crowns and I’m Jason “King” Kendall. I sing. This is Jack. What do you do, Jack?
Jack: I play the bass. I played the flame bass tonight, it’s not our bass. It’s my friend’s bass.
Jason: We just flew in here the day before yesterday from New Orleans. We’ve been on tour for the past few weeks. We played with different bands – Voodoo Glow Skulls, Cherry Poppin’ Daddies… We just flew in here to do the show. We borrowed all that equipment we used on stage, last minute kind of thing. I think it came out pretty well… Um, the Colonel plays guitar and Super8 Nate plays skins, drums, and that’s pretty much it.
Are you recording a new album? The last one’s pretty recent…
Jason: Well, we’re going to be on tour for another week and a half. We come home for a few days and then we leave for nine weeks out with the Bosstones. We’re not going to be back until November and then we’ll take a couple weeks’ break and start recording a new one. We’ve already written enough songs for a new album. We’re ready.
You really broke with the WBCN Rumble.
Jack: Yeah, that put us over the top.
Jason: We’ve been together for three years, but yeah, definitely.
You play around Boston a lot…
Jason: I think we overdid Boston for awhile. With us, any free show that comes up, we’ll play it so that people can see us, you know what I mean?
You have a great communication with the audience which is why no matter how many times you play, people will keep on going. They know it’s going to be a lot of fun.
Jason: I love it, every time I play.
How was it playing the New England section of the Warped Tour?
Jason: That was great. We have a funny anecdote from Warped. The Royal Crown Revue saw us and Colonel gets offstage and before he even took his guitar off, a guy goes up to him and says, “We want to talk to you…”
Colonel: “We need to talk to you guys on the bus. We got a record company who wants to sue you and I’m gonna send you a cease and desist order.” I said, do you think I can take my guitar off before you fucking sue me?
Jason: We are on our own label. While we licensed it to an indie, we’re on Monolith out of Boston which is a very low-key… You can’t get blood from a stone. Let ’em try. We already changed our name to the Amazing Royal Crowns to alleviate the problem. We’re more of a higher energy kind of band. It’s apples and oranges. So, hopefully, there won’t be a problem.
How did you hook up with Spring Heeled Jack on “Do The Devil”?
Jason: We played a show with the Toasters and Spring Heeled Jack in Providence and we met… It was love at first sight, it really was. Ever since then… You should have seen us when we saw each other today, we haven’t seen each other in months. Hugging and wrestling… Oh, I love them.
It’s the perfect marriage.
Jason: They wrote that horn section for “Do The Devil.” They’re one of the best bands going.
It’s good that the Bosstones now have the influence and the ability to pull their friends up with them.
Jason: The Bosstones could have done a huge label tour. They want to help out their friends, they want to help out their community, and that’s the good thing about the Bosstones. There’s a lot of people who get big and don’t look back and that fucking sucks.
Well, the scene here is really tight.
Jason: We just came from the West. It was good, but you could tell it’s a totally different scene. They were very receptive, but not like here. Not like the East Coast.
