DORO

During a busy period in the press tent, I managed to grab the pocket sized Metal Queen for a very quick catch up on her latest release 'Fear No Evil', current touring plans, her move to Nuclear Blast and any other exciting plans that she may have been hatching.

The recent release of 'Fear No Evil' was an interest to me as I wanted to know how fans and the media had reacted.

DP: Pretty good, pretty good, I think it has been one of the most successful records I have had out and in Germany it hit the charts at number 11, it was great and in Spain the single went to number 3 where you find only the chart stuff so that was good and it has been received very well by the fans. we are always asked to play 'Night of the Warlock', 'celebrate' or 'Herzblut'. Today we only had 40 minutes soIi kept it to two songs. I think we were really happy and satisfied.

As Doro and her troupe had been touring non stop recently, I wanted to know if there was anything exciting in their future plans.

DP: Yeah, yeah, it went really well. Actually now, we are going to the States for a couple of shows there then we are going to Japan for the first time.

I have never been there before so it's all new and exciting and all the other bands have said 'You have got to go over there, its great', but it never worked out up until now. and after that we release the DVD's.

We filmed the big Anniversary show, it was like two years ago, it's finally coming out with all the highlights of this year and last year and Wacken and hopefully there will be some of Bloodstock on there.

I have to deliver it next week, it's pretty much all done and that will be the first release on Nuclear Blast which I have signed a new deal to them four/five weeks ago. Things are going well and Metal is alive and well and its so great to see all the festivals this year, so fantastic to perform from Bulgaria, England, Germany, its awesome.

As Doro had brought up the subject of her recent migration to Nuclear Blast, I had to ask the reason behind this.

DP: The deal was up with AFM and Nuclear Blast offered us a good deal long term. I was very happy with AFM, we had a great supporter here Mike Exley. For a musician or a band you are always on the look out that you are taken care of and it's very hard to sell records and DVD's so we thought 'OK, lets try with Nuclear Blast'. I have a good feeling on this. So I thought let's try something new.

After her rugged and ruthless touring schedule over the past year, I was interested to see if the next year was going to be the same.

DP: For next year? Yeah, next year we will record a new album and we are concentrating on the DVD now. it will be like a double DVD, with the live DVD, so it will be a big package. I just saw the artwork which is very good, I like it. Next year a new record, I have no idea how it will sound, we want to take our time to make it nice.

For the past three years, I know that Doro has held exclusive Christmas shows, so was intrigued to know if she was going to follow suit this year.

DP: Yeah the whole of December I think we might do a big tour, I probably shouldn't say it because its not in writing yet but it might be the Motorhead tour, it might be, and I'm hoping that it will work out. I'm hoping we will come back to the UK.
 

GWAR (David Brockie)

GWAR is known for their fantastical image and quirky characteristics, so I really wanted to get to know the story behind it all?

DB: There are two different stories; one of them is that GWAR is a band of intergalactic monster horrible demon undead creatures from outer space who somehow found their way to planet earth had sex with apes to create the human race and then were reborn as a heavy metal band in the 20th century.

The other people say that GWAR are just a bunch of fucked up musicians and artists from a shitty little town called Richmond Virginia, that made 25 years of rock n roll history by fucking throwing down the craziest show ever.

There are the other people, and I'm one of those people, that says GWAR is a fucking metal band and that Bloodstock was the best ever fucking show that we have played in our lives.

Now I had found out the basics, I was intrigued to find out the real inspiration from for the characters and story?

DB: I guess everything around us you know, a world gone mad. WW2, WW1, those were big influences. The fact that mankind wants to punish itself and would never learn anything from it. It's more important to make money from selling bombs than curing the diseases of children.

This made us (GWAR) want to destroy the human race and start something else. Gwar is nothing less than an apocalypse. It's not just some stupid band. I think there is a deeper message to GWAR, and I think it takes everything that is amazing from punk rock and metal and theatre and wrestling and throwing a brick at a fucking cop car.  I don't even hate cops, I hate the system that made cops have to be around and the sooner we can get on to anarchy the better.

GWAR is that force. We combine entertainment and revolution in a way that's never happened I think.

It seemed that there was a deep rooted sociology theme blazing through so I had to know if he was either in the military or a victim of the system?

DB: Never a victim. They always try.

I've never let them get their claws into me that bad.

I think I was a child of the times. My parents were both embroiled in military conflict that destroyed their lives.

As I grew up, i felt that weight. even though i had a suburban existence, the fucking pain that my ancestors had gone through weighed on my spirit. That's what punk rock was all about.

I think the angst of a generation created punk rock. We didn't want to be hippies anymore. we were sick of it. We were like 'Fuck you and your wars' and we wanted to fight back and that's what punk rock was.

Metal had been around the whole time, we kind of had been doing that already, and once we drove off the bullshit showbiz track kind of metal - great bands but maybe not too rebellious or revolutionary.  I think GWAR took metal and punk rock and put it together in a way that had never been done before and then added the theatre as well.

I think we inspire other artists to do what they want to do, follow their dreams. If we can make something as crazy as this happen for 25 years on an international basis, then you can fucking go out and play your music, blow your horn and dance your dance and paint your painting and you can find great success out of it.

Interested to know how they had coped during the past 25 years, I asked how he thought music, the scene and their attitude had changed?

DB: We have gone on a whole musical journey. We started out as a thrash punk band but back then we didn't think GWAR, we didn't understand what we were working with.

As GWAR kinda grew up, we had a lot of conflict in the band because I still don't think even through our second phase we knew how powerful our idea was.

We had to fight to figure out what kinda band we wanted to be. Then finally in the third stage, which is where we are right now, we came back to our metal and just played good Metal.

We had been around for 15 years at that point and Punk Rock had come and gone, Punk Rock had become a fashion, Metal stayed strong through everything. I think we kinda came back with that strength and re-birthed ourselves as the metal band that we knew we could be. That's where we are at right now. Metal is the best musical brick that you can throw.

Knowing the Nineties was a particularly bad time for Metal, I was interested to know how it affected the GWAR camp.

DB: We declined a lot in the nineties, not just in Europe but in America as well.

It was just the hardcore fans that kept GWAR going. during that whole thing when Clinton was President and everyone was happy in America, and metal was going through all the Grunge thing, they had taken the legs out of Metal, like everyone was wearing flannel shirts. We were still playing metal but the albums were getting more experimental and all over the place and I think that was a reflection of the times we were going through.

Steering away from Politics and back into the musical theme, I wanted to know about their forthcoming album.

DB: Yeah, the "Bloody Pit of Horror". I know it's a weird Italian horror movie from the 60's. It was such a great title I had to steal it. I figured that anybody who worked on that movie is probably dead by now, so they are not going to fuck with me.

It's our way of kinda paying homage to that. It's our horror album, after 'Lust In Space' we were kinda Science Fiction stage, we wanted to get back to something a little darker and a little more just nasty.

That's what the "Bloody Pit of Horror" is. It's our treatise on horror and what horror is and why we love it. You know, why would we love something so horrible? I think that's a really cool question and that's kinda what the albums about and musically it reflects that, it's darker. it's heavier, it's sicker, it's the "Bloody Pit of Horror".

With GWAR constantly pushing the boundaries, with the theatre, the costumes and musically I was interested to know what more could be done.

DB: That depends on the world, what happens in the world you know. I think there is so much with GWAR that can be done.

There hasn't been a GWAR movie, a really awesome GWAR movie, and it's  unbelievable to me that there hasn't been a GWAR video game.

GWAR is such a big production and band that to get us to Japan is such a big, big thing.

This year though, after 25 fucking years we are finally going to Australia and New Zealand. Finally! So its like the doors are opening. We never compromised what GWAR was about and that means that when GWAR finally does bust those doors down, its going to be better than ever.