Monster Magnet

Powertrip (A&M)
An interview with singer Dave Wyndorf
by Martin Popoff

Diamond Dave Wyndorf’s mad, mad, mad, mad world

“Sex. Money. Power, you know? Anger. Elation. All the stuff that goes on when you don’t have the amount of money you want, and you don’t have the amount of power you want. Or you do, and you mishandle it.” So begins compact devil dog Dave Wyndorf, on his band Monster Magnet‘s latest and most emotionally exhilarating record, a spiral of bad, bad, goodtime rock, appropriately for the above reasons, blessed with the title Powertrip.

Wyndorf has dragged his Magnet through a lot throughout the band’s nine year journey, most of the anguish self-inflicted – Dave’s drugs and hard liquor colliding with a perception that seems too acute for the circus that is organized rock ‘n’ roll. First there was Monster Magnet, then Tab, then Spine Of God, Superjudge, Dopes To Infinity, and now Powertrip – a string of records that sludge progressively forward; mastermind, lyricist and pretty much sole music man Wyndorf creating his own modest piece of planet, a terrain populated by drugged-out zanies consumed by psychedelics, Satan, dirty old rock, and a mind full of towering disdain for the physical world.

From an uncharacteristically tidy hotel room in Toronto, a newly buff and chemical-free Dave held court for the press, splayed across a chair, black leather pants, jet black hair crowning a head full of ideas. But there was a reason for all this. Reason being, the man’s already well-regarded new journey called Powertrip, a record which tumbles and rumbles like a thick gumbo of four decades worth of hangovers.

To start with, could you put this record into context with respect to your other records?
This record’s a physical record, as opposed to Dopes which was a cerebral record. I wanted to rock, make no bones about it. You know, rock out with your cock out kind of thing. Lyrically, it’s completely different because I was coming from a different spot. I was coming from a really hardcore dose of reality, running up lots of bills, doing psychedelic light shows, tripping out for three years, and spending lots of money. So I went to Vegas. The whole vibe is different from Dopes. Most of it has to do with my personal take on what was going on with me at the time, which was just getting pushed around by a lot of commitments, and then watching a lot of American television, and watching this advertising thing getting way out of control, not to mention my own place in this world of advertising and selling. I mean, I’m in a rock band, I’m on a major label, so I’m part of this whole thing. So rather than just be this person who says “oh everything is just so horrible, blah blah blah,” and saying this stuff is getting me down, I just thought I’d go out to Vegas and kind of just deal with it and be part of it.

Do you feel stressed out by our commercial society?
Not so much stressed out as just ripped off. It’s like, there’s a million different choices and most of it’s just shit. It’s not like they’re offering me a variety of quality, it’s just a variety of variety, so it’s quantity over content. The story in the United States these days is success, not the content, not what made somebody successful. So it’s all kind of hollow, although obviously there’s some good stuff. But there’s just this whole overall insult to the intelligence, by having 150 stations, and everybody having a computer, and surfing the Net. That’s not going to solve everybody’s problems. It’s a bunch of bullshit. The Internet is a bunch of crap. It’s a big gossip line. What’s the Internet used for the most? Gossip and sex.

What literary influences enter your lyrics? Are you much of a reader?
I have been in the past. It’s funny, I hardly read any fiction anymore. I read mostly history these days. Mostly 20th Century civilization, and in particular pop culture, the history of music, or I just read books on a specific decade. I’ll read a book about the 1950s or the ’20s or the ’30s.

As we approach the millennium, do you think we’re spinning out of control? Do you worry about things like the 2000 bug in the computer system?
Oh, I can’t wait for that. I love stuff like that. I wish there were more horror stories like that. To me, the millennium is just the biggest New Year’s Eve party we’re going to see. And the advertisers know that and are capitalizing on it. It’s a great selling point. All the advertisers are going to come out with their most heartfelt messages, “as we come upon the dawn of a new civilization, blah blah blah.” Basically, it’s just another year, no big deal, except it’s going to be really cool to say I lived in the year 2000. That’s awesome. As for me, the stuff that was promised to me as a kid about the year 2000, it falls drastically short. Miserably, despairingly short. So fuck the millennium, you know? (laughs).

What is your modus operandi for writing lyrics?
To tell you the truth, I’m a real coward when it comes to writing. I try to avoid it at all costs and then I do something really drastic like move to Vegas, get into a room, have a tape recorder, and look at the bare walls and go “Oh my God! I have to write!” (laughs). And then I’ll start writing until I have enough for an album, or maybe more than enough for an album. Most of this stuff is kind of just spinning around in my head anyway. I tend to be pretty scattershot. There’s lots of stuff rolling around in there. For the stuff that can’t get out any other way, I have to write it down and make a song, to get it to exit. It’s my way of keeping sane.

Are there any cool hidden meanings in your lyrics you can tell me about?
Oh God, all of them, I always tend to write on a couple of different levels, just to keep myself sane, and I write about different people in my life that I really don’t want to name by name. If you read between the lines, these lyrics cover several bases. On this particular album I make comments on American lifestyles, advertising, my own pathetic experiences with those things, relationships with women I’ve had. It’s all there. I don’t really expect everyone to understand it. I would hope people could take it for what they wanted it to be, and if they wanted to investigate, that would be cool. I’m always willing to answer what anybody might ask me about a particular song.

Musically, what are some of the influences on the band, starting with your older influences.
Well, old influences are pretty easy. There’s kind of this set of bands and grooves that I like, people who were inspired by bluesmen. My blues guys are like Black Sabbath, the Stooges, the Ramones. Those are the guys that got me going when I was a kid. Not that I’d really want to bust out of that. They make me happy, I like the chord structures. But in Monster Magnet it’s the overall thing, the huge, unending, unceasing barrage of human experience and pop culture, which are the two most interesting things I could imagine.

There’s some affinity there with White Zombie, their similar obsession with pop culture.
Yeah, sure! They are so much about pop culture. I don’t know if White Zombie are as autobiographical as we are. I write a lot about me, the person that I know best. And White Zombie seem to be about, I don’t know, science fiction or something. I don’t write soundtrack music.

How has the album sold so far?
Horribly, miserably (laughs). No, we do OK. It’s important to note that in this day and age, and in rock ‘n’ roll, and entertainment in general, there’s a blockbuster mentality that prohibits anybody from being a success unless they are a mega success. If this was 1972, people would think I was a fucking huge success, but it’s not. It’s 1998. You gotta be a Jurassic Park, you have to be Titanic. It’s an expensive thing, records cost a lot of money to make. It’s not the same world it once was. As much as people like to sell rock ‘n’ roll as that old freedom thing, it’s not a very liberating experience at all. It’s important for me to ignore that stuff as much as possible when I’m writing. I want to make the kind of music that I like, and then turn it over to marketing people, whose job it is to market it. Hopefully they’ll come up with a figure that makes them happy. I’m not really in it for the money. If I was I would’ve made a bunch of concessions a long time ago, and turned this into Whitesnake or something. I could have at any time, it’s not like it’s beyond my capabilities. But I believe in Monster Magnet. It’s my duty to rock!

How does this album compare to the records from your past?
Boy, I really don’t think about them. All I can say is how I felt when I was doing them. I tend not to want to look back. I’m not really that much of a great rock critic on my own music. I just remember how I felt when I wrote ’em. So Spine Of God. Those were songs that were just lying around for two or three years, recorded very quickly. Tab, I just wanted to make a big crazy psychedelic album. It was a lot of fun, ate a lot of mushrooms and went crazy in the studio. I was in the studio for three days. Superjudge, it was my first major label, cut out of a year-long tour. Wrote the songs on the tour bus, completely out of my mind, was nervous about being on a major label because I didn’t think we were ready. I didn’t have much faith in it. Did a lot of crystal meth in the studio, yelled at a lot of people, fired a lot of people, made an album in about two and a half weeks, mixed it in two days. It was on the stands within three weeks after that, and it all shows on the record. If you listen to it, you go, “this guy’s out of his mind!” Dopes, actually got some money for the first time in my life. I wanted to make a really pretty record. Went in there and kind of took my time more than usual, and came out with a pretty cerebral affair. And then Powertrip, back to reality, you know, back from outer space, you know, a little more wizened and a bit more cynical.

The production seems a little more homespun.
Yeah, what I wanted to do was to make a physical rock ‘n’ roll album, in the least time as absolutely possible. Buck the whole super mastermind routine, you know? ‘I’ve got so many options here, and I’m going to tweak this and I’m going to tweak that (laughs).’ You know, you have to be out of your fucking mind. You know, 1998, and the past three years has been filled with so many Einsteins that it’s enough to make me throw up. Everybody’s a fucking genius, you know? Now is not the time to be Einstein, it’s time to be Frankenstein. I bolted this thing together as fast as possible, and relied on intuition. I wrote a song a day and said, ‘you’re going to use this song whether you like it or not.’ It was a complete gamble, you know? It was like, I hope I’m good enough to write these songs. And I like it that way because it was very painless. You stop second guessing yourself. And if you can’t write a song in a day, and record 21 songs in two months, you’re just a manipulator. So it was important for me to do it this way. Next time out, you know, I’ll probably go back to the old mad scientist routine.

Was there a sort of rehab period for you between the last album and this album?
Yeah, I don’t know. I guess on the bus. I rehabed on tour, I detoxed from vodka and sleeping pills while on tour, on a tour bus, doing shows and stuff. That’s my kind of rehab (laughs). No, I didn’t go anywhere, I didn’t join AA, or NA, or any of those things. The old brain had soaked up enough drugs, and now it was time to stop. So I had my delirium tremors on the bus, freaked out on the bus, then played. But that was a form of rehab, and so I quit drinking and getting high during that time. And then there were six months I took off after the Dopes tour, but that was just spent riding my bike around my house, and pretty much reading comic books in the backyard, feeding nuts to squirrels, doing the whole Vietnam vet routine (laughs).

What have the other guys done as far as other recording bands?
Not much. I don’t think the other guys have any recorded material. I think John was in a band called The Watch Children, which was like this psych band in New Jersey, and I think they may have a couple of independent singles out. Joe was in the Shock Mommies, which was a punk band, and Ed was in a band called Daisycutter.

Do these guys want to write, do you want them to write? Why do you write everything?
I write everything because I’m a workaholic, and this is my thing, this belongs to me. When I started the band it was a completely open door to everybody. And everybody else was just this stoner slacker that didn’t move fast enough, and that’s the way it’s been ever since. I love ’em, I love ’em to death. The guys are great and stuff, but they just ain’t quick enough (laughs).

And you’re writing all the music too?
Yeah, yeah, I mean that’s what I do. While those guys sleep, I write. While those guys eat, I write. While those guys are living their lives, and having relationships with people, and living, I write. As a result, I have no life, but I do have a lot of songs (laughs).

Can you give me a bit of a psychological profile of the guys in your band?
(Big laugh) Honestly?! You’re going to get me in trouble! Well, John’s like this incredibly smart drummer who doesn’t want to be a drummer, and would rather be a guitarist and listen to Brian Wilson and the Beach Boys. I don’t know what the hell he’s doing in Monster Magnet! Joe is a really super nice guy, cool, rockin’ dude, who’s pretty normal, and likes cocktail jazz, not much into hard rock. Ed is like a total blues lover, loves Leslie West and Mountain, almost like an idiot savant guitar player guy. He’s just off there in Leslie West land, you know? So our relationship is obviously pretty strange. I’m like this workaholic maniac, and they’re all like, “Dave’s so uncool.” And I’m like, work! Rock! More! Only because if you put a lot of work into it now, if you’re responsible for like a year, that means I can be completely irresponsible for like four years, know what I mean? It’s worth it for me to get the job done, so I can go out there and go absolutely fucking apeshit for four years, and nobody can tell me what to do.

So what would your best and worst qualities be?
God, (laughs) I don’t know. My best qualities, I have absolutely no idea. My worst qualities, there are many. You know, I smoke too much, and previously was taking drugs too much. I suffer from that Captain Kirk syndrome. I run the ship, but I’ll crash the ship if there’s some sort of sex involved. But that’s hardly new.

When you’re on the road, do you keep your eye on the business end of things?
I keep my eye on the business end of the things as much as I can, but to a certain extent, you have to let it go in order to bring out the side of yourself that you want to bring out. I would much prefer to be the total slacker, the guy who’s like, “hey dude, man, point me to the stage.” That’s why I work so hard now, it’s why I’m even speaking the way I’m speaking now. And I’ll turn into that person again. If I do my job right now, then there’s a course that’s set, a preparation that’s set, for me to goof off later. And that’s really my job in life – to be whatever I want to be. That’s what people want, and that’s what I want. But to do that, you have to tighten your shit down.

Any other stuff you want to do career-wise besides music?
Really, rock ‘n’ roll is one of those things that, the only people who do rock ‘n’ roll are people who really don’t have any other options. That’s why I do it. I quit high school, and I have a lot of different opinions, and I’d really like to be involved with a lot of different stuff. I mean anything. It’s like, ‘Hey! Let me try that!’ Rock ‘n’ roll has allowed me to do that. Rock ‘n’ roll has allowed me to be a record producer, a video director, a graphic designer, a packager, an entertainer – I get to do all that different stuff. And thanks to A&M, they haven’t gotten in my way; there hasn’t been anyone there who said “oh, you can’t do that.”

Have you ever thought of publishing your songs or poetry in book form?
No, I’m really too much of a procrastinator. So I’m really going to have to do something serious like break a leg or something. I mean, there’s so much cool stuff to do, and I’m totally behind doing all of it. I don’t have a lot of patience for stuff that doesn’t happen really quick. Like it has to happen now! I want it now! As long as I’m on that wavelength, I may as well stick to what I’m doing.

What about the types of tags that get put on your music?
Without tags, people couldn’t talk. I don’t care what kind of tags people put on my music. There’s things that I can do that will change my life, and there’s other things I could worry about, but I could do nothing about. Tagging is one of them. Tags are invented by journalists, who need categories, and more power to them. I’m fascinated by tags, especially the sub-genre of tags; it’s just hilarious. It’s like they’re running out of stuff to call it. I know when I listen to the band, I don’t go “great post industrial…” I say “great band! Cool band!” And I hope that normal people would say that too, and that normal people could use these tags only as a sort of a guideline. I just don’t have the time to worry about it, so call me anything you want, just call me (laughs).

Are you much of a collector of old music?
Yeah! Tons! My records could fill this room, ’60s stuff mainly, garage and psych. And with respect to the German stuff, not the heavy metal so much, more of the prog, like Amon Duul II and Can and Man, that stuff.

Your stuff has that retro sound to it. What do you find about old music that is special?
Enthusiasm. Yeah, pretty much just like dumb-ass naïveté, which you don’t see anymore. And that holds through the ’50s and throughout the ’60s and into the early ’70s. Something within the spirit of the music shows that these people just didn’t know that there was an end to it. And it was like that with punk rock. I’m the biggest Ramones fan in the world. But then people got really self-conscious about who they were. And as rock gets older, it’s hard to maintain youthful exuberance, as a form. I don’t know how old rock is now, it’s got to be 35, 40 years old?

Has the music business turned you into a hardened cynic?
A bitter, complaining grump! Yeah, all the stuff you would expect has happened to us, total Spinal Tap all the way! It’s like being in a giant TV show. I mean, I love stereotypes, and I love it when they really are full-on stereotypes. So I’ve been in Spinal Tap situations, arguing with promoters, counting T-shirts, and then going out and drinking half a bottle of vodka, and you know, going away with two groupies somewhere. Because it’s all part of that same ridiculous thing. What happened to me in the end when I finally quit drinking, and I calmed down my lifestyle, I saw all this stuff that I had done before as really interesting. Because I’m thinking a little bit clearer now, I can find new ways to enjoy myself, while still living the stereotypes. But it’s all clichéd. The whole thing is a huge cliché.

Did you look at this as part of real life, or was it all just surreal?
It starts out very seductive and very surreal; you don’t feel that you’re part of it. But if you do this stuff for two or three years straight, who’s to say that it isn’t real? You really are a guy who lives on a bus, you really are a guy who’s had sex with 150 people. You know, you did it! You go, oh my God! What have I done? Yeah, very sobering moments, when you go holy shit! Is this the way my life’s going to be?

Would you define yourself as a nice, straight-up guy during that time, or really just as bad as every other cretin in the business?
No, I always try to be a nice person, I always try to give everybody a break. You know, as much as I’d like to be that irresponsible rock ‘n’ roll person, I could never be that way, because I come from a big family, and I had a really great time growing up, and nobody was really a dick to me. I had a great family. I was taught to pretty much be respectful of other people’s feelings. So yeah, I was an honorable guy. But there’s a big distinction to be made. There are people out there who want to be treated like shit, that’s their thing. So if you want to be treated like shit, yeah I’ll treat you like shit. It’s not a cut and dried, black and white world out there. There are people out there who want to get pushed around. There are people out there who get turned on by being pushed around. And I’m talking about personal relationships. But yeah, in business relationships, I’m always very square, straight up business, whatever, very fair, willing to give the benefit of the doubt, and then if the guy turns into a dick, then we just kill everybody (laughs).