cessful tour, you have a successful
album, everything's doing well and you
don't even have a place to live.
J: No.
Will you ever?
J: I don't know.
K: I need a place to store my comic books
when I'm out on the road.
J: We've got some stuff, I've got a bed and
all that crap, it's just in storage. It sucks.
I've got an address where I can get mail.
And you guys are on allowances and
stuff like that?
K: Yeah, we have accountants. Now I get
to buy the comics I've been wanting since
I was a little kid. I can pay more attention
now to my hobbies. When I was younger,
I was always into comics and I never had
enough money to buy Fantastic Four num-
ber 1, which I just got today, because of the
price.
But isn't the price more now than it was
then?
K: Yeah, but when you think about it it's
pretty much the same price-what was a
quarter back then is a dollar now, it's still
at the same distance.
Are you buying these as an investment?
K: Sure, they're a good investment and I
do buy certain comics as investments, but
I'm not into this hobby just to make money.
That sucks, that's more like a broker or
something. I don't buy it as much for the
monetary value, though, as I do for just
sentimental reasons and from a collector's
point of view.
J: I've got two Dennis The Menace that he
gave me. I'm going to save them forever.
What is your reason for getting into the
comics, Japanese toys and the horror
stuff?
K: The reason I buy toys and stuff is it's
good plain fun. I'll admit it, I used to spend
a lot of money on drugs at one point.
Why?
J: Yeah, why?
K: Because I thought maybe drugs were
fun...
J: Why?
K: Until drugs all of the sudden weren't very
fun at all....
J: Why?
K: And it was just like a huge illusion. And
I thought drugs brought me a certain kind
of joy....
J: Why?
K: But, they don't... shut up, James...they
stopped bringing me a lot of joy. And around
the same time I was buying comics and
toys and they were bringing me a lot of, for
want of a better word...fun. It's healthier
for me and I have something to show for it.
J: Do you think comics saved you from
drugs? Spiderman saved me, dude. (laughs).
K: I've talked to friends who have made a
lot of money and asked themselves, 'Where
has all my money gone?,' and the answer
was always, 'Well, it all went into drugs and
booze and such.' And I asked myself that
same question and I have something to
show for it, my money went into toys and
comics and I got a lot of fun out of it and
I'm a lot healthier to boot. They can still
bring me a lot of fun.
J: What about comic books about drugs?
K: Those are the best ones.
What do you think of the growing trend
of older people who are involved in
something that most people say is for
little kids?
K: A lot of people make the association of
comics and toys with youth. They put two
and two together, when I was younger I
played with toys and they were a lot of fun.
But, why should anyone say that should
end because you're older? There's abso-
lutely no reason why that should end. I
mean, it might appear to be an immature
kind of thing to do, but if you think about
it, what's so immature about wanting to
have fun? People still go to the movies to
have fun. It's just another form of play.
Would you say that you have an addic-
tive hobby?
K: To obtain the unobtainable is a real rush
in itself, like to see something in a magazine
and go, 'Wow, I'd really like to have this..."
When you're playing are you performing
a little better because you have other
goals that you can accomplish with that?
K: The musicianship is an entirely different
thing altogether. The music comes first and
any sort of thing on the side I think of a lot
farther down the line. I don't go into studio
thinking, well, you know, we're going to
have to write some great songs so I can
buy some great comic books. It does keep
everything together because I have a more
sound mind and a healthier attitude toward
the lifestyle in general. Of course, if my
hobby was to get totally screwed up every
night and blow my brains out every night,
I'd be a crash and burn individual. If my
hobby is to collect comic books and have
a real sound mind, doing better in health....
comic books are inspiring to me. There are
a lot of ideas that I can find in comic books
that I can interpret through music. It's just
better in the overall picture to be able to
think clearly and to relate my music better.
It's real complicated, I never really looked
at it like that before.
An escape?
K: Yeah, you could call it an escape. It's
hard to say whether I really needed an
escape. I didn't really watch a lot of TV. I
wasn't a TV kid, I was more of a comic book
kid. You know, you get TV kids and comic
books kids. It's as much of an escape as
television. Everyone needs that sort of
entertainment. I collected that stuff for a
long time and then I bought a guitar and
got totally obsessed with playing guitar. I
kind of backed-down on the comics and
played the guitar a lot.
And now the two hobbies have kind of
matched...
K: Yeah, they've come back together,
because while I was playing guitar I would
walk into a comic book store and see
comics that I used to have and say, 'wow,
I used to have that,' and I slowly came to
realize that I still wanted it so I got back
into collecting comics and collecting the
things I like the most which are the horror
comics. The EC's and Famous Monsters
and just the whole horror genre in particular.
When I was even younger, I was a big fan
of Walt Disney.
Is there anything new that you like or is
only the older stuff good?
K: A lot of the new stuff is real good too.
There's a lot more violence in comics now...
Is that good or bad?
K: I think it's great. It's entertaining. It's
making comic books more interesting.
because back then when I was reading
comic books there was a comics code,
which is like the equivalent of like a PG
rating at a movie. The underground comics
were a lot more lenient and underground
comics are more like an R-rated movie.
Let's face it, most of the time an R-rated.
movie is better than a PG-rated movie.
There's a lot of good stuff out there
nowadays, like Mr. Monster, Teenage
Mutant Ninja Turtles. And there's other stuff
like Dark Knight. It's really good because it
puts Batman in a more realistic setting. It's
Batman, he's middle-aged, he's retiring and
he's freaking out because his profession of
stopping crime is turning him into a looney
case. It is like a social statement because
he is becoming what he once chased after...
you could relate that to something like a
song like "Sanitarium"....
Metallica, is playing a quicker, raw but
polished sound that most people say is
a violent type of music. Do you think
that's the way the world is happening?
Are you guys really screaming at people,
saying, "Look what's happening."?
K: Yeah, I think you've got a point there..
People can relate to that because it's more
like the world as it really is. I mean, let's
face it, the world is not a pretty place. The
world is pretty sick. There's a lot of ugly
things out there and no matter how much
you try and escape you always have to
wake up and face the fact that the world is
fucked-up and ugly.
Is that something you want to tell people
in your music?
J: Hell no. I don't want to tell people what
to do because I hate people telling me what
to do...
You guys are now in a position where
some people take whatever you say liter-
ally, they can even take it the wrong way.
J: Yeah, a lot.
K: It's happened in the past, people have
taken us wrong.
J: And then that's what gives the band a
bad reputation. It's utter bullshit.
K: When we're taken wrong and bad things
happen, like people get hurt, there's other
people who are quick to bring blame, even
though it's a personal motivation on that
person's part. The person takes us wrong
and brings harm to other people for what-
ever reason. That's fucked up, because a
lot of the times it's the person themselves
and not us who are really saying the wrong
things.
J: All these freak people are trying to build
in this huge symbolism between the music
they listen to and the lyrics and why they
did this...the lyrics I write I write pretty
much for myself. I'm not telling people how
to think. Like, 'If you don't believe the way
I do then you're not a real Metallica fan," or
some shit like that.
You're just putting out an opinion...
J: My opinion.
Then does the whole band agree with
your opinion?
K: I do. I feel that we pretty much stand
behind anything he has to say. If we didn't
stand behind it we would let him know that
in advance. So far we haven't so we pretty
much stand behind everything James says.
J: We talk about topics, concepts...
Are you happy with the success that you
have from what you're doing?
J: We're doing it our way, we've always
wanted to do it our way, I'm happy with it.
We haven't had to conform to any certain
standards, record companies or whoever
else wants us to do it. They haven't molded
us a certain way, we did it all ourselves and
that's great. I used to think back, and go,
'Oh my God, I saw us in Circus or Hit Parade
or I saw us that magazine, oh shit, I hate it.'
Why did you hate it?
J: Because it's so widespread, people see
RATN
STILLIC
running all this stuff and you guys don't
even have to talk to them because you
trust them to do this or that, then you
get to the arena and you and Kirk go to
the closet, grab your skateboards and
hop out and you take off. Is that like a
release for you guys?
J: There's nothing else to do. Our guys are
setting up our shit and...
K: The thing with all these people is, we
work with them. Those people don't work
for us, they work with us. We're all like a
huge bunch of family.
J: We all travel together.
K: We're like a gang. They have their jobs,
we have our jobs. Our jobs don't start until
7:30 or so, so we just wait around, skate...
Is being on tour boring?
K: A lot of the times.
J: It depends on where you are, but with a
skate, if you're bored you've always got
METALLIC
ETALLIC
Hey! Who threw that pig's head? Lars at the Castle Donnington Festival..
something to do.
you in the magazine, 'Oh wow another band
blowing it.' But we're doing it our way. We're
saying what we want to say in interviews
and they're not twisting the shit around.
Do you think you'll come to a point
where you have to write a radio hit, or
you're going to have to make a video?
K: If it happens, it happens by accident.
J: No. We're not worried about that. You
start thinking too far ahead and you start
fucking yourself up.
K: I don't think we've ever regreted anything
we've done.
I got the opportunity to go with you guys
on the bus, you have all these people
So the two of you got started skateboard-
ing through boredom on tour?
K: It just seemed like a real good idea.
J: It's just kind of so we can flip away from
all the hectic shit for awhile.
Do you get any hassles or anything.
when you're skating?
K: Yeah, I get hassled by security guards
but I just go on.
Do they realize you guys are the band
or do they think you're some little
roadie?
J: No way, hell no. They just think we're
freaks coming to watch the shows.
K: I just go to another floor and skate. Fuck
that.
So are you having a good time skating
when you're at these arenas?
J: Hell yeah.
K: The polished floors are really cool.
J: Well, it's best when there's no seats. A
lot of the places have got seats.
How did you get into this skating thing?
J:Wanted something to do on tour, because
there was a lot of idle time when we're not
doing anything. And I don't drink as much
as I used to so it mellows me.
Is that good or bad?
J: I think it's good.
You got hurt once didn't you?
J: There was a couple of shows where I
had to have my ankle taped up. For like a
week. It was banged up and twisted and...
Since you guys have started this tour
with Ozzy, you've got a little family of
skateboarding happening on this big
tour, corect?
K: Yeah, some people on Ozzy's crew and
Ozzy's band.
J: Yeah, guitarist Jake and his roadie are
skating together now too. They saw us with
our boards and go, "hey, fuck yeah, that's
a good idea."
And the management's not giving you
any hassles because you're valuable?
J: We told the management, "hey, look we're
thinking about taking boards out on tour...I
thought he was going to go, 'oh shit, no
way, you can't. He just said, well, you break
something, you still play
K: Yeah, "You break a leg on your skateboard
you play on stage with a broken leg."
You guys have been known to admire
the Misfits.
K: Hi Glenn. Fuck yeah.
And you're going to do a cover of one
of their songs, that's what the word is...
K: Yep. This is true. They're great.
What got you into the Misfits? Does it
goes with the punk thing?
J: Cliff turned us on to them.
J: All of his friends were into them and he
taped some stuff from his friends.
K: It just grew on us and we started listening
to it a lot. I like the Misfits. I liked the songs
and then I saw pictures of them and went,
'Wow, this is cool.' The imagery that they
used was like some of the stuff I've seen
in old horror comics.
James, what are you into, besides TV?
J: Live comedy. I'm into the Bobcat (Bob.
Golthwait) and Sam Kennison.
K: Cliff's into Dawn of the Dead type stuff,
stuff like that.
How come you don't have costumes?
J: Yeah, we still haven't got our costumes
back yet. Ozzy said we couldn't wear them.
We've got our red, white and blue sparkly
suits. (laughs)
Where's the make-up and the studs?
K: They got rusty and fell off because we
sweat too much.
You have a whole concept behind Master
of Puppets, right, is that why you have the
crosses and the whole thing on stage?
J: Yeah, I think it's cool, something new.
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