side. That was the side of us that
was shown
Why did you want to show the wiolent
aide?
1 ke violence, i think it's part of the
world. it's only normal to write about
things that you see a lot of and tha
you experience a lot of, so thats
what I like to do
So is your stuff pro-violence or aware
of violerice?
Yeah, ke that. What I am is a su
vivalist, and a realist 1 basically just
come up with an idea. If I want to
write about it I do. Usually n
start writing lyncs, and sno they
take me where I want to go, or where
they want to go
How did you come up with the con-
cept? Did you do the music first or
the lyncs first?
I don't have any set standartis
Sometimes 1 come up with great
lyrics Sometimes the stuff in ke
poetry and I just work it in, like Bullet
That was all poetry
What about the Teenagers from Mars
7? You made five night?
Yes, five acetates of Static Ago
Teenagers from Mars
Why didn't you ever pur it out?
We just didn't really like it at that
point. We were very picky about the
records we put out, which may sound
weird now when you hear them but
at that time we were mal picky about
what came out and how it sounded
There's also a Who Killed Marylin
Where Eagles Dare 45 that never
But you ended up doing Who Killed
Marylin on your own.
Yeah.
What was the Static Age album, the
one you recorded that never came
out?
A lot of the stuff that was on Legacy
of Brutality and a few songs that
aren't. And actually. Cliff Bomstein
was the one who iried that up. We
sbid him Blank Records because we
owned the name and they came out
with Blank Records from Polygram.
Blank Records, now thats the one
that Caugh Coci was on, night?
Yeah, we owned it and they had this
whole promo comirig out that they
had Blank Records, but our record
pre-dated even their concept. So
they signed a deal with us that they'd
give us 20 or 30 free hours of studio
time at Mercury Records in New York
and we would sign them over the
label They had an option, if they
liked the racord they would put it out
and all this kind of stupid stuff
So is that why Cough Cool was not
on Plan 9
Yeah, we had to get a new label so
we came up with Plan 9 for the Bullet
label
You foured in England, how did that
go?
It went wel, but Jerry didn't get our
contract signed before we went over
and the management whichis Motor-
heads management now, screwed
us over and told us we were only
gelding pied for half the shows that
we were supposed to get paid for
and we were only getting E50 a night
($125), so we just walked off the tour
Who was the barid when you did that
That was the Night of the Living Dead
64
VIELF
Early exposure of the Misfits: Jerry, Googy Glenn and Doyle.
band Jerry, me, Joey image on drums
and Bobby Steale on a Afor
that came a fong braak in vingt. We
were recording but wo never came
up with anything we lied! We played
live sporadically
What was the brawd resocrise at that
mo
it was good. New York was going
through a lot of changes there was
that Star bullshit going on (Doo-Jun
1980 We didn't play for a long time
because we didn't have a drummer
We got back from England in
January 1980. We hung out there
We had an agent and a deal from
CBS The drummer was supposed
to come back over and we were sup
posed to go on tour with the Clish
But our drummer never came back
over so we didn't gut to tour and wo
dicin't get the contract with CBS. So,
we caine back, we looked for a drum-
mec, and about April we lourd Googy
Then we were mapy to do a tour in
Texas which foll through We just
started playing around New York in
about fune or July with a benefit for
magazine and a few other shows
How long after that did you record
your nxt record. These Hits from
Hell
We started recording that in August
Eventually we kicked out Bobby bu
carme he wasn't showing up at rehear
sals or sturfio sessions. He was just
saying, "Well, heve Doyle play for
me, cause 1 just can make He
was really involved with drugs and
thal, so mventually we just said, This
is bullshit, lets just get Doyle and
luck Bobby out. Three Hits from Hell
cime out in April 81 and then Halto-
ween cathe cut in October. In between
there was the Who Killed Marylin 45.
which I put out myself on the death
date, August 5th
Wily did you do that yourself, without
the Misfits?
Because we had stopped doing that
song and none of those guys were
interested in doing it, and this guy.
who was one of the onginal helpers
and organizem of Plan 9, had ap-
proached me and said, 1 realy
wanted this record to come out and
want to do it now, I told him the
cther guys didnt want to do is So
ne said, "Do you want to do 4? Wo
werent doing anything, and it wasn't
because me and Googy didn't want
to do anything win the Misfits, It wan
Jerry basically who didn't want to
play or do anything
Soit was a stagnant period for the
Yeah, and lo done the record and it
was doing well, a Googy and I both
went down to the band and said,
Lonk if we don't release more r
bords and start playing out live moro,
we're leaving And thats it Ma and
Googy were going to start our own
ann So those guys said, Cicay
cay because the Marylin cecord
was doing really good and
You played all the instruments on
that?
Yeah.
How did this all lead up into the co-
tract with Slash, or Ruby Records?
Slash in who we contracted with.
Ruby Records was basically a label
that Slash had for bands who didn't
want to do a three album contract,
only wanted to do a one off deal.
That's all we wanted to do with them,
thank God, or we'd still be screwed
up I had gotten in touch with people
at Slash to find out about where we
could play out in LA. They said they'd
heard we'd done an album and were
planning on putting it out on IRS
They said they'd give us a fair deal
and that IRS was the worst label and
stuff Ske that. Eventually we put
Walk Among Us out on Ruby rather
than waiting for IRS, who we had
heard a lot of horror stories about
What kind of deal did Slash offer
you?
At the time it seemed like a really
good deal. They paid to remix it,
which wasn't that much. They gave
us a good promo push, it was okay.
Iwould have like to have gotten paid
They haven't paid you at all?
$400 for 500 records Total records
sold, though, and I think this is a
conservative estimate, was 35,000,
that includes the overseas pressing.
Did they license it out to somebody
overseas?
Yeah, they licensed it out to a record
label in Italy. We signed contracts for
the foreign thing, but they just basi
cally wouldn't get on the phone with
us and we eventually had to get a
lawyer to sue them.
So is this matter solved yet?
No, it's going to be solved. We're
going to get the rights back and
hopefully put out Walk Among Us as
an American release again.
Same cover?
No, tho cover will come out right this
me, because they fucked it up. Orig
inally the whole sky was supposed
to have black and there was sup-
posed to have been a red and blue
touch to make it purple. Now it'
come out the right way
When did the cult following start?
That had happened back when we
put out Bullel and Horror Business.
Our violent reputation had pre-
ceeded us.
What do you mean by violent reputa
tion?
Well for crazy shows and stuff like
that. Our shows werent normal punk
shows. They were violent. They wer
shows where people could really go
off. Our music was real fast and real
loud. In NY at the time the only other
punk bands were like the Dead Boys
or the Erasers, who weren't even a
punk band. They were like an imita
tion Voidoids, but with girls. We were
the young little snotty kids who
came on the scene and were totally
irreverent to what they were doing.
Loud and fast, screaming and yel
ling
Did you have the whole stage pro-
sense yet, and the image?
Yeah, I was wearing the Bone shirt.
Jerry used to spike his hair but it
kept falling down, so I said why don't
you just slick it up... and he kinda
had this cockatoo haircut, right in the
middle and it came down into a
small, small devil lock right under
the ear. And I was already doing my
hair into a point to be kind of ske
Eddia Munster-ish, and it was getting
longer and longer it was down to
about the bridge of my nose, that
was like 78.
Whem did you come up with the
name devil lock?
Somebody's mother actually came
up with it. She said, "Oh, these are
those guys, that, that band with the
devil locks on their heads We
thought that was pretty funny, Actu
ally it turns out that there was some
African tribe that wore their hair like
that, and they called it a devil lock
So when actually did the Misfits
start?
Misfits started in 77
So with the big punk explosion along
came the Mislits? And by the time
Doyle came along you were putting
cut stuff that was fotally your own.
Totally ours. We were totally ours in
79. A lot of the stuff from Waik Among
Ua was written in 79. Stuff like De-
monomania, that's like 1981 Earth
AD was written in 81. It just took a
long time for us to get stuff out
So once the record came out on
Slash it brought the limelight to the
band, cause basically you won an
underground band. What happened
to the band after that?
We got a lot more shows. We got to
go on tour a lot mor
So mat's when you had the legendar
San Francisco incident.
Yeah, Slash set up a California tour
for us and they booked us in the Elte
club as opposed to the On Broadway a
and there was no security it was just
total nidiculousness and co basically
you had that, incident that right
If andma kr a lot of people in SF
won't forget Inat incident because
As been so blown out of proportion
Well thats why It's been blown out
of proportion, Didn't Joliny Thun-
ders k somebody with his guitar in
San Franciapo?
I don't think anybody remembers
that
Yeah, okay also the guys in Fear
said they hit somebody with their
quitar and I know the guys in Flipper
used to regularly hit people. I found
out a lot about that incident also.
Bobby Steele had sent a few of his
friends out to fuck with us. He was
silli mad because we had kicked him
out of the band for being i drug
addict and being a total fuck up.
Everybody every band that played
that night was being petted with
cans i was the thing to do at that
time. All the other bands put up with
if and we didn't. We said, 'This is
bullshit, quit your stupid punk routine.
you're boing exactly what all these
stupid magazines want you to be.
stupid idiots