Thanks for calling, great to talk to you again.
Yeah, Rindell gave me a heads up yesterday, said we were going to finally do this, you know. I've been putting this off because I thought it would be better to do like sometime before the record was coming out...it kept on getting pushed back.

Is there any way I can get a little more volume out of your phone?

Possibly. You can't hear me real well?
Not that well.

OK. Now I can hear you pretty well. Maybe its just a case of redialing or...
<break>
That's definitely what it is, it's a bit of my tinitus.

So the years of standing next to an amplifier have taken there toll?
That and a lot of the symbols, you know, symbols are like really loud when you get drummers up on risers, you know, the sound comes right down directly at your ears. And, you know, loud motorcycles <laugh>, loud guitars and loud motorcycles.

You ride do you?
Yeah

Where about, just around your home there?
Yeah, well, you know, I go for a longer ride sometimes with friends, you know, we'll go...I've driven to LA before and back, you know, up to Lake Tahoe, and you know, just down to Hollister, CA, I mean it just depends. I can go scootin' around here just to get some air or I can take a longer ride.

Nice and relaxing.
Yeah, very relaxing .

Absolutely. So Arrival is now actually getting released in America. How amazing is that?
Well, its been a long time coming. I mean I think we've been done with this thing, besides the two extra tracks that we recorded just a bit ago, we've been done with it close to a year now.

Really? That long?
Well, not quite, but it feels like it is.

Yeah, I reckon. I mean it's been 6 months since Japan got it isn't it? How do you feel finally about that now?
Well, you know what, I think it's a good record and we're ready to go tour and we're ready to support it and, you know, that's about it, that's all I can really feel right now. It's not even out over here yet and, you know, there's quite a few fans that have bought the Japanese version of it and they seem to like the material live in Japan when we just played there so we're looking forward to just touring and having some fun with it.

Yeah, It's a great album. I think people will re-buy the American version.
Yeah. Well you haven't heard the other two tracks.

No, no.
I wanted to get it to you. I remember the fax that you had...the e-mail that you had sent me and, you know, I don't even have a copy of the songs.

Really?
We like said to each other, OK, when we finish those two songs we're not...none of us are getting copies, and no one at the label are getting a copy. Nobody's getting it until it comes out.

That's cool. Therefore no one gets an advanced preview right?
Yeah, well, I felt like after all the Napster, you know, the thing that happened with the record, that's the least we could do is have a couple of surprises for people that didn't buy the record yet.

Napster's just about shut down, what's your whole take on it looking back now?
Well, you know what, I have to say that, you know the whole ordeal with us with Napster was pretty shocking in the beginning, that they had gotten it from, you know, one of the execs at Sony, and it was passed on through somebody in Europe and, you know, we were all shocked. I mean, the record was just done it wasn't going to be out for months and here it was all over Napster. I mean I knew that once the record would come out it would be all over Napster like everything else is, and then I had my feelings about that too. I felt that it wasn't a bad thing but the artists do need to receive a residual and so do the companies, you know? I mean its just like, you just can't get stuff for free like that when there's artists involved; this is how we make our living. So, you know, I think until they come up with something, you know, I've been reading about it everyday in the paper, it seems they've appointed like a mediator to come in between the companies and Napster to try to come up with some sort of solution and I think that's going to be difficult to come up with, you know, the exact solution. They'll come up with maybe some basic solution and something to work immediately but then I think its going to have to be modified as time goes on. But I think that they, you know, the attorneys have spent enough money, the companies have spent enough money that they will definitely think about that before they close the books on the first mediation sessions.

As a band, did you guys do anything to try to get the tracks removed off of Napster or try and limit the damage?
You know, there wasn't much that we could do. Once they have it, they have it. You know, the label was upset about it. I was initially upset about it then I just said well, you know what, there's nothing you can do about it, and then I just started reading, like you and I have correlated before, I started reading the reviews on the record and it was something that actually worked in our favor I feel at this point.
We got to read the pre-reviews from our fans and what they thought of the record and, you know, a lot of them said the same thing that I was saying when we were in the studio, that, you know, it was a great record but it would've been greater with another couple of rock tracks. Or just more evened out as a record, you know, with ballads vs. rockers. And so, I think that all-in-all in the end that it worked for us.

Yeah, I think it might have as well. I certainly feel the same way, I mean it's a fantastic album and I think it's your best sounding album, but yeah, a couple of rock tracks is great.
What did the band feel, what were you talking about when you gathered again in the studio? Were you all in favor of re-recording a couple of tracks?
Well you know what, it all started from me. I started the whole fire. You know, I went on our web site and I started talking about, you know, everybody was asking what ever happened to "World Gone Wild" and this other song "Good Times" that we were playing live and then all of a sudden we weren't playing it, and then it wasn't on the record because John Kalodner didn't OK it and Kevin had never heard it and so everybody was asking about the song, "Why is this not on the record, I can't believe it didn't go on the record." So I started a fire basically on the web site and I said, "How many people would like to hear this and how many people would like to hear this sort of a song and what do you think if we added it to the record" and everybody came back almost like 100%, yeah do it. And so once I got the fire started then I got on the phone with management, then I talked to everybody in the band and basically twisted arms real good and then we went back in the studio and did it.

Lets start with the recording of the album. When you first got to the studio for the first time, did you have the songs written or did you right before you went to the studio?
No, we wrote the songs, we were prepared before we went to the studio. We actually wrote for like two years.

Yeah, it's been a while hasn't it?
Yeah, we had been writing for some time, you know. It was like, quite a bit of material was sitting there before we went into the studio. Actually, there was enough for another record, and then everything went down to our A&R guy, John Kalodner. He listened to it all and he picked his favorite tunes and then he sent his favorite tunes to Kevin Shirley and that's what we recorded at that time.

How do you feel about, you know, do you have to go through Kalodner to get the budget approved or whatever?
I think that's the way business works these days. I would love it to be more amicable between the band and our A&R guy though, and John, you know, in the future - if there is a future - you know, that we can sit down at a table and we can talk about what our needs are and what his needs are. I mean obviously they want to have some stuff that they can get played on the radio, and so do we. It's not like we've never paid attention to that.

Exactly. You're a very commercial band.
When Herbie was managing us everything's changed quite a bit. In the beginning, you know, we pretty much wrote all of our own material, and we orchestrated all of our own material and we went into the studio and we played live and then we gave it to the record company. They never really heard it before it was done. And that was a clause that Herbie had put into our old contract with the label, that we would have total artistic control. And somehow when the new contract came about, that clause was not, you know, in there any longer. And so we had to go through different channels and this is just the way business is right now.

Well, you'd think with a band with your track record, they would be a little more trustworthy don't you think?
I would like to hope so, yes. I think they were very worried though because it's a new record, you know, with a new lineup and they wanted to make sure. But I think that also we wanted to make sure as well, so I wasn't really worried about it.

How did you go towards picking a producer? Was Kevin Shirley just such a success from Trial By Fire that you thought, we'll do it again?
You know, we got along really well with Kevin during Trial By Fire and I really think he was a big fan of the band, and we became very close just friend-wise as well as musically, and he became a good friend of the band and it just felt like a natural thing to do.

Was the feeling the same during the recording of Arrival?
Yeah. Absolutely. You know, I mean, the only thing that I kept saying that everybody got sick of was like, you know, we can't have all of these ballads on this record. And then Kevin will turn around and he'll say well, you know, look whose names are on the ballads. And yeah, I did write a lot of music on this album with Jon and everybody else this time, a lot of ballads and a lot of rock too, but I had no idea that, you know, they'd pick every ballad that all of us wrote, you know what I'm saying? Actually I was figuring, like, if I wrote three ballads or co-wrote on three ballads that, you know, maybe one or two would make it or one would make it and the other two wouldn't, so I mean I felt like overwriting like having more than enough material was better than just having enough.
Then you could pick the best stuff and leave the other stuff behind.

There's quite a different sound on Arrival than there was to Trial By Fire. I actually thinks it's one of the best produced albums you've ever recorded, what do you think?
I think it sounds really great myself. It definitely sounds like the band and it sounds like us live, and that's basically what we did do. We went back to playing live like we always have. Journey has never really gone into the studio, with the exception of a few songs, and ever cut like rhythm tracks, or like laid down the drums and a bass and a rhythm guitar and then go back and overdub. We always just go in and play live, and I play live solos and then I go back and put rhythm guitars on later. Or if I need to clean up the rhythm guitars, I'll do that later, as opposed to, you know, a lot of different producers like to work different ways but I know for myself it's better to catch me live as far as soloing and stuff like that and actually jamming with the band.

Well the record certainly does sound live.
Well it is.

I just think the sound of the album overall is just fantastic, are you happy with the way it turned out?
Oh yeah. Yeah I think it sounds great.

Lets maybe go through the tracks on the album and just get your thoughts on it now that you've had a bit of time to live with them. "Higher Place"?
"Higher Place" was something that I had written a long time ago, I mean actually the music and, you know, we hadn't really done anything with it. I had the music sitting up at Jonathan's and we hadn't really worked on it. And we were running out of time and he was busy doing some other things and so at the last minute I had grabbed the remainder of my rock stuff that we didn't get to and I went up to Jack Blade's house and it was really the first time that Jack and I had ever written together and worked together and, you know, that was what came out of our first day of working together.

That's pretty incredible for a first day's work.
Yeah. I had all the music basically then, you know, I mean we tossed around a few melodies and he wrote most of the lyrics and then, there it was, you know?

Amazing. You two make a great partnership if I do say so.
Thank you.

Yeah. I want to see some more work.
Well, you know, we have a natural thing going on you know, Jack and I. I mean every time we get together and we write something… we actually just co-wrote something for Ozzy Osbourne.

Oh great.
I have no idea what it sounds like now because he's re-recorded it, but the initial demo that I sent, or that we sent, I thought was awesome.

Fantastic. Ozzy Osbourne heavy, that's what I like the sound of.
Well its funny, you know, I don't get a chance to play that type of heavy guitar all the time so I was hoping he was going to leave it on the record, and then at the last minute, I think Sharon came in. He loved it apparently. Jack told me that Ozzy loved it and he loved my playing on the actual demo, and, you know, Jack for a week straight, Jack was calling me, and he kept saying "He loves this and I think he's going to use the demo and re-do the drums and bass or something."
I said wow that's cool. And then at the last minute I think Sharon came in and it was going to be a...I think he wanted to add it to his record as well, this was for some interactive game he has coming out.

Who was that that wanted to add the track?
Sharon his wife.

OK, Sharon, yeah, sorry - sure.
Yeah, she I guess got involved because she manages him, you know that.

Yes...
And wanted to add it to the record as well I heard. But who knows, I mean this is just hearsay from me. I don't know the real bottom line of the deal… what it's gonna be, but Zakk Wylde came in and I think he replaced almost every guitar that I did. She had him re-do everything, and so, I haven't heard it yet.
But I think that he's a great guitar player and so I'm sure he did it justice.

Sure. What about "All The Way"? You described it earlier as a bubblegum song.
Well, you know, this is no mystery for anybody who knows me and has known me for a long time, that I'm more in to... I'm not a pop meister. You know what I mean? I mean we do play pop music but, I mean, always my role in Journey, except for on a few little occasions here and there, is to play like a really melodic solo over Jonathan Cain's songs, like "Faithfully" or "Who's Crying Now".
My role in the band is always to bring in the ass kickin' rock. And, so, this is what I do naturally and this is what I love to do naturally, even though I do melodic work very well and I realize that now, and it's something that I just added to my, you know, overall picture of everything, of how I look at music and what I like to play on, and so this was one of the more popier songs on our record and, you know, I mean I co-wrote it with the guys, but still in the end, I wasn't certain about it, you know?
But I think it's a good song though, I think that Kevin, you know, twisted it up a bit and he had me play some mandolins on it and some different instrumentation like that, that really made it come from a little bit different place.
Before the mandolins were on it, I really was not sure about it. But now when I hear it, I think it's a good song.

Oh it is. It's a great ballad. Absolutely. "Signs of Life" is one of my favorite tracks on the album.
That was actually one of the first tracks that Jon and I worked on when we got back together. We started writing for a new record when we didn't know if we were going to have a band or not.

This is after the Perry departure?
This was after we were just in, you know, we didn't know what we were going to do. The band was basically in hiatus, he had hurt himself, and we didn't know what was up. You know, I had nothing to do at the time and Jon didn't know what to do, and I said why don't we just start writing.

Actually, I think that's about the time that I interviewed Jon last time, yeah.
I said, why don't we start writing, I mean, you know, maybe Steve will decide that he wants to come back, maybe he won't, but at least when we decide what we're going to do, and we figure out what's going on, we won't be starting right at the beginning again. So I felt that we used the time wisely and we just started writing right away and we started compiling material.

Any other songs of that era that made the record?
Yeah. There is actually. "All the Things" was one of the earlier tracks that I worked on with Jon. "Signs of Life", "All the Things"...

Yeah. Absolutely, we'll run down them. On "All the Things", that is just a wicked guitar solo you've got going there.
Actually, you know what, it's a good guitar solo but the one that I played on the demo, I thought was even better.

Really?
Yeah. I just - it was like, you know, off the cuff and I always play the best when I'm not thinking and it's like usually the first take for me when I'm completely blind with what I'm going to do. And then I have to go back and try to copy it, you know, or reproduce it, you know what I'm saying, after that. And it never comes out quite as good. I thought definitely in that song, that was the case.

It's a wonderfully heavy, basic blues riff isn't it?
Yeah. I wasn't really sure about that song.

Really?
You know, when we did it, I mean, I liked it, but I wasn't sure that it was a Journey song, you know? You know, it's sort of like, that's been the consensus of people now that I've heard the record too, from what I can gather, I think it's really more of a live song, than it is a record song.

It sounds like a Hardline song, actually.
Yeah. Easily. You know, those are a lot of my riffs and ideas as well as on all the Hardline stuff. You know, I wrote a lot of those heavy riffs.

And it shows a great side of Steve's voice doesn't it on the record?
Yeah, definitely. He's a chameleon, Mr. Augeri has a lot of different things he can do and personally I think one of the best songs for him vocally on a record is like "Kiss Me Softly". I really like his R&B inflection.

Yeah. Let's talk about that track. Another Jack Blades track. You and him?
This was, you know, Jack and I were sort of on a roll at this point and we had written like four or five tunes, and, you know, I just went up to his house and we were writing every day. And I didn't really have anything in mind, and I started playing this riff that I was messin' around with, for months and I actually pictured it much heavier, the same guitar riff that it opens up with, you know, but it was much faster, and it was heavier.
And so I was explaining it to Jack and he just went back and he hit like this loop that he had, this R&B loop that sort of sounded almost like a seal R&B loop on a drum. And then, you know, he goes, "Try playing that against this". And so I played the riff, and then all of a sudden, I was playing really clean Stratty like guitar, sort of like "Walks Like a Lady" type clean Strat tones, and we just went with it that way.
And, you know, by the end of the day, we had a completed song, and we sent the DAT out to Steve, and then Steve messed with it a bit more and he changed a few of the melodies on the front. He actually sang everything in a lower register.
I had written different melodies originally and he used pretty much the same phrasing, and he lowered everything and he sang it sort of in this low sexy type thing, you know? I was really happy with what I heard when it came back; I thought that he did a really great job on it.

It's really a neat song. It's a real change of sort of angle isn't it? While remaining flowing with the rest of the album, it's just a little something different.
Well, you know, I think it's important that we move in different directions. In the future I would like to even, you know, be more experimental like, you know, I love the time period in the band when we were doing Frontiers and Escape; I mean we were really experimenting a lot. I think now is not the time to be really, really safe all the time. You know what I mean? Everybody knew we needed to get our foot in the door with this record and just make people aware that we are working, we've got a working entity here, we are gonna tour, and that we can make music again, you know? I'm just hoping that the next stuff we work on, everybody's got an open mind to be a bit more experimental and try to go in to some new directions.

Talking of something like that, I love, I think "Living To Do" could've come off of Late Night.
Thank you. Yeah. It was something that my father and I had written a lot of the chords before he passed away. It was a couple of years before he passed away, and it was one of the last things that him and I sat down on a piano and we were playing together and I've got a couple still in my head that we wrote that I've never done anything with yet and they're probably going to pop out somewhere. I was like…I woke up one morning and I remembered all the stuff that we were doing in that song, and I was going up to Jonathan's to write and Kim Tribble was out, the lyricist that we worked with, on that song, and went up to Jon's and I just started playing it. I said I've got this bluesy idea and before the day was out, that song was sitting there. We really didn't change much at all in the studio on that one from the demo.

It's the first time I've heard that guitar sound I think since Late Night, it was great.
Well it's more of a blues inflection for me, you know?

Absolutely, Absolutely. It's a great track.
"I'm Not That Way" got left off of the American release...
Yeah, this is another one of the songs that I brought into the band.
You know, I brought in all the chords and originally I was playing it on acoustic guitar and it had more of a Sting feel to it. And in the end it ended up sounding more like a Backstreet Boys thing to me, I don't know. I think that we missed it a little bit on that song. Even though it turned out well, I think that we missed the boat on that one a bit. And, I think it's a good song; I still think it's a great song, but I would've preferred it to be done a different way and I think that it was smart, you know, removing that one from the record at this point.

To me, it sounded a little bit like, "It's Just the Rain" from Trial by Fire.
Yeah. I mean we needed some uplifting stuff, you know what I mean. We didn't need another slow song. I'm talkin' tempo, I'm going, you know, we've got a lot of same tempos here, we need some up tempo, up tempo, you know?
I think that we made the wise move there.

Now the record goes out on a great song with "We Will Meet Again". I really liked the drum sound. Where did the drum rhythm come from?
Well, you know, it started a long time ago. I came up with the drum riff and Deen changed it. He changed it into his own thing. Then we changed the whole song around, with the addition of the piano to it and Steve's melodies that he put on it.
It just blossomed into a very cool song. We were playing it live in Japan and it was just a great song to play live. It actually jams a bit more live than it does on the record.

How are you finding working again with Deen?
I love Deen. Besides being a phenomenal drummer he's a phenomenal singer and he really adds a lot vocally in this band.

Awesome. And how do you find the lineup on stage these days compared to the old lineup?
Well, you know, it's different, it feels different, but if feels great. It's a bit more rocky, everything seems to rock a little more with Deen. You know, you can't take anything away from Steve Smith, he's an amazing drummer, and Deen will be the first guy to tell you that. It feels different, but it feels good.

Steve Augeri, really, I don't think you could've picked a better singer.
Yeah, I think...you know what...<laugh> I've got a friend over here that's delivering a Buddha right now, in my garden <laugh>. That's awesome. Hold on one second Andrew.

Sure, sure.
<talking to another person> He's like, come down here.

Where's he from?
It's Michael Carabello, my friend the conga player from Santana. He's getting me a birthday present, a concrete Buddha in my garden.

Lovely! A Buddha! When's your birthday Neal?
It's February 27. There's a bunch of birthdays in this last month. Jonathan's is the 26th, I believe his wife's is the 22nd or 23rd, and Rindell, our tour manager, was at the beginning of the month, Steve Augeri's was at the beginning of the month. February was full of birthdays.

Well happy birthday for the other week!
Well thank you.

All right. Tell me, what songs didn't make the album then? How many have you got left over that you actually recorded?
You know what, I really haven't counted, but there's quite a few.

That many? <laughs> Not two or three or anything?
Yeah, and some really good stuff as well.

OK. Any plans for it?
You know what, when it gets around time and we get done with the tour, when we start thinking about putting another record together, we'll have to go back through and decipher that and sort of skim through everything and see what lives and what doesn't. But I think it's good stuff even if it doesn't end up being Journey material I think that it does have life somewhere else.

About a year or two years ago you shopped a demo with Steve Augeri and you gave it to your friends to listen to. Was that right?
Oh yeah, we let people listen to it and they thought it sounded great.

How many tracks was on that?
We had recorded "Remember Me" and it was a few others. There was about four or five songs.

OK. I just wondered if there were any songs on there that didn't make the album?
Yeah, there was probably...I can't remember exactly what was on there, to tell you the truth, it's been a while. Jonathan might be able to tell you, he would probably remember.

OK. So what are the chances of you and Jack Blades doing a record?
Well you know what, we've got some really great material that I actually wrote for Journey that we didn't end up using that I was dumbfounded at, actually I thought it was really a lot of the stuff we were missing elements of, you know.
And Kevin, I guess, didn't hear it, the material, he didn't think it was what we needed. Although I thought it was what we needed and what I wanted to do, you know. So there's some great stuff sitting there and I think I'm going to sit on it a while more cause Steve Augeri has added to it and he's actually co-written some of the stuff with us now and he put vocals on it and it sounds wonderful.
So I'm going to sit on it for a bit and wait and see what happens when we go back in to do another record. If it doesn't make it at that point, then I'd have to say, yeah, that Jack and I are going to do something with it. Obviously we'll get a different singer to sing it.

Maybe Jack? Or maybe you and Jack?
Well, you know, I was thinking actually, if we were going to do something like that, Jack can sing, I can sing, and, you know, we can use Deen on drums and he can sing all the high stuff.

That'd be cool. I want to see that recorded.
Yeah, well it's not going to sit there forever I can tell you that because I think the stuff is smokin'.

Awesome. But there's no immediate plans?
I want to sit on it for a little bit. It sounds like it's the type of material that's not going to get old really fast.

Yeah. Now you're an all right singer, when are we going to get to hear you on lead vocals again?
You know what, I'm ready to open my mouth again and start singing. I really am. I'm just completing two records right now.

What are you working on?
I've got two solo projects that I've been finishing, and they're both instrumental records. One is, of all things, this is for Higher Octave, so I came up with this idea a while ago because I was well overdue to give them another record and they started calling and said, "We'd really like to get another record, you were supposed to have one like a year ago, or two years ago, you know, we haven't gotten one since Electric World", and I'm like, Oh man I'm so busy, what can I do? And so the first thing that popped into my head, I was like so what if I do a record of all, the biggest hit ballads of all time.

Really?
Yeah. And so they ran it by everyone at the company and they ran it by Virgin because Virgin distributes them and they all loved the idea.

What kind of tracks do you have on there?
I did "Caruso" by Andrea Bocelli, and it's a great version of it. I did "Hero" by Mariah Carey and it's rippin' guitar, it's not a little jazz record. It's not supermarket music or K-Mart music, or elevator music, is what I'm trying to say. It's actually very bold, screamin', singin' guitar. "Hero" sounds amazing I think. I think they all sound really good. I've got "Hero", and then I did Roberta Flack, "Killing Me Softly", and I did Bryan Adams, "Everything I Do, I Do it For You", I did Shania Twain, "From this Moment", I just did "Our Love Goes On (The Titanic Theme)", which is like ripping. And these were all very challenging songs to do, if you can imagine, because they've got amazing vocals on them, first of all; so I have to sort of simulate this vocal without sounding like elevator music, so you can't really just play the melody on the guitar. You have to dig into the melody, find the melody, and then you have to do your own thing to it. For the most part I'm really happy with the way everything has turned out. Now I only have one song left to do and I'm doing a Leon Russell song, "Your Song", but I'm doing a Ray Charles version of it.

Ray Charles, great stuff.
Yeah, Ray Charles does an amazing version of this with orchestration, so it's a really well orchestrated record and its actually just myself and Gary Siramelli and he is like this amazing programmer and he basically did all the strings, he did everything, the drums, the bass, everything, on the computer. And I could just not believe how good they sounded when I heard it back. What was the other song the Andrea Bocelli had that was a big single?

I don't recall the name.
It has an Italian title. I can't remember the name of the song, but I did that one as well.

Hey, I need some music for my...actually, I've got to congratulate you here in a minute, but I'm getting married in January, so I need some music and this sounds ideal.
Wow! Cool! This record will be out by then.

When's it due?
It's going to be done very shortly. They're going to stick it out pretty quick here. The going title I have for this record right now is called, Voice. It's basically, my guitar is the voice on all these songs. And then the other one that I'm just finishing right now too, is more of a techno fusion type record, and it's very cool. I've got Omar Akeem flying out here next week to put on drums, and this one is a bit more jammin', you know, there's like some jammin' guitar on this record. I don't really know what the title of this record is going to be yet. I'm thinking of calling it Playground.

What label is that for?
That's for Higher Octave as well. I had some time off here and I owe them three more records, so I figured I'd knock out a couple while I had some time off and that's what I've done.

Nice to have the talent around to do that.
Well, you know what, it was a lot of work. My playing is the least work out of everything, I mean I have to sit there and mess with it and end up being happy with it until I'm happy, I'm not going to let it slide. Igor Lynn did this record, so what I did, I found two of the greatest guys that do this sort of work where they build the tracks and everything, which takes a lot of time, and I hired them both at the same time and got them working on two separate projects. Then at the end, they're both getting done about the same time and I just come in and I play on everything. Then we move things around if things are not working. It's a great way to work man, I love Pro Tools.

Yeah, everyone raves about that program.
It's a really wonderful way of thinking and working. One of the records I made right downstairs at my house in a bedroom. It's amazing and it sounds huge.

You're getting married very shortly? Congratulations.
Yeah. I'm getting married this month (April) on the 28th.

Great stuff. Congratulations.
Thank you.

Where are you getting married?
In Minneapolis. I've got Prince's old band The Power Generation, most of the people from that are playing at it.

That's nice. A nice wedding band! <laughs>
Yeah, Michael Bland and his band.

Hey, can I hire you guys to play at mine?
I'd love to say yes, but I really don't want to start playing weddings <laughs>

I could never afford it.
You can use our records though.

You guys did play a wedding though last year didn't you? Whose was that?
Oh man, I can't even remember. I tried to forget about that, because I couldn't believe that I was doing it. It was for quite a bit of money and this guy was this big, you know...

I heard he had some money.
He had a lot of money. I mean he flew us down in Lear Jets and flew us back in Lear Jets, it was all pretty incredible.

I couldn't offer you that.
Actually, Rod Stewart played at it, we played at it, REO played at it, and I think one other guy...I can't remember his name...a guitar player/songwriter.

Have you got the support of Sony for this? Are you pretty happy with their support, do you think?
We're going to find out here. I think they've got a lot to work with and I hope they don't blow it.

Me too.
I know they won't blow it and I'm really not worried about it because I'll tell you what's going to happen. As soon as we hit the road, that's when it's going to start picking up, I really believe that. And "Behind the Music" has helped already.

Really? I heard it was a great show. People are saying it's one of the best ever.
It was a good show...I would've liked to have seen more of some of the other members of the band in it. I thought it was mostly the Steve Perry story. But I think that in the end, it was all a very positive thing for everyone, and the ratings of the show were very high. As soon as the show came out, our catalog just went nuts.

Really? That's great. Steve Perry's last words on the show left everyone shaking their head, what was up with that?
You know what, I have no idea what was up with that, and that's what everybody said on the show. I said it on the show, I said I don't know how you can not feel a part of something that you're completely controlling.

Tell me this. You guys were out on the road on the Raised On Radio tour and you were playing two Steve Perry solo tracks in your set. How is that not being a part of the band?
Yeah, I'd like to know that myself, I don't know.

How did you feel about playing "Strung Out" and "Oh Sherry" in the set?
You know what, to be quite honest about it, I did it because we had played one of my songs off of the record I did with Jan Hammer; we were playing "No More Lies". So I very well couldn't say, "No I don't want to play something from your solo record", because I had already done the same thing.

I didn't know that.
But I would've preferred to have just played Journey material.

This time around there are so many songs to choose from, are you just going with the hits and the best tracks off the new album?
Actually, no. We're digging back into a lot of our old material as well.
Before we went to Japan, we rehearsed for a couple of weeks, and we worked up all kinds of stuff. Sort of wiped the webs off everything and refreshed it and brought it up to date. We're digging back into the past and then we're digging into more of our obscure rock songs, and we're updating them. You know, when we played in Japan, we played a different set every night.

Yeah, I heard that. Rindell said that.
We're going to be doing that more in the States and we're even going to be mixing it up more so.

Great. What about playing outside the states? Have you go any plans at all at this point?
Well, you know what, we need to get offers. We definitely...we played Japan, we played Central America, and we had a blast doing both of those. We would love to come to Europe, we'd love to come to Australia, but we need to get offers from promoters.
Before we can do something like that, and preferably what I'd love to do...I mean I've been to Europe before and I've played the little theaters tour, and that would be all right to do that, there's nothing wrong with playing smaller places and that's not where I'm coming from, that I don't want to do that, but you end up losing your ass, money-wise, doing that. I'd prefer if there's some big festival, like rock festivals going on, where there's a lot of bands...I want to get in front of a lot of people. If we come over, I would love to get in front of a lot of people and just do an ass-kicking set, and not play a bunch of small venues.

What about a club/pub tour - something on a smaller scale?
The only thing, the only problem is, there's not much money in it, and it gets very expensive to load all the equipment, and road crew, it's just expensive bringing everybody like that when you're playing very small places and you're not big.
You end up losing a lot of money. Which, at this point, we really can't afford to do as a band.

What about doing a stripped down tour, just you guys and your guitars and jut picking up stuff there.
Well that's a possibility, you know, I've been talking with everyone about that, there's definitely...I don't need to bring all my stuff. I can rent gear and I can still get away with that, there's no big problem.. I think we can all do that. But we have to get an offer on the table so we can all look at it, so management can look at it and we can say yeah or nay.

You guys would love to play the UK, I guess? Have you got any firm plans, other than the US at this point?
No. Not really, we've got like about close to three months worth of dates I just saw yesterday in the US and that's it for right now. The tour is now is with John Waite, Peter Frampton, and us.

Tell me, you've just jumped into my next question, John Waite, what's happening there? Is he going to join the tour?
Yeah.

That's awesome I think.
Yeah, he's decided that he's in.

Too cool...
You know, I kind of started a rumor on our web site to see what kind of excitement it would generate from our fans. I'd have to say most of them were very excited about it. So a lot of them weren't crazy about my idea, I had an idea about John Waite opens the show, Peter Frampton plays, we play, and then John comes back on and plays with us at the end of the night and we play some Bad English songs, and our fans went, "No, I think that Journey should close the show, Waite should not close the show with you guys, but it would be great to see you guys play with him in his set, at the end of his set." So I went, that's a pretty cool idea.
So once again, using our web site and the Internet you can get it first hand from what your fans think you know.

It's a great medium isn't it.
I love it.

Yeah. I remember, I think I was the first one, I was talking to Jonathon, I was talking to Rindell, I was the first one to put online that Steve Perry was officially out, and I got absolutely abused and shit-canned for it.
Yeah, well that's a touchy subject. Ever since "Behind the Music" came out, I mean all kinds of people have different feelings about that show. All I can tell you is that it is just the topping of the ice burg, that show.

Really?
I mean, they didn't want to make a big controversial show even though it was sitting there. You know, they had interviewed Herbie Herbert, they had interviewed Irving Azoff, a lot of us, you know, were tied and gagged and were not able to talk because of contracts we had signed with each other. But I'd have to say that a lot of this stuff, they could easily do a Part 2, and a lot of it got left on the floor, a lot of the real stuff people want to know about.

Really? Was there more to the Steve departure than just his hip then?
Well, no, I'm not going to say that, I mean who knows what the real reason was, but there were a whole lot of logistics that were not gotten into, and pros and cons about a lot of things.

Yeah. But I think you guys have picked up and done the right thing, you know, you can't sit around so long and wait. I think you've got a wonderful singer working for you now.
Well, you know, that was one thing in the show that caused a lot of controversy, in one section it said we waited months for him. And I called up the producer and I said months? Are you kidding? We waited years. We waited ten years and then we got back together and then it was close to two years.
We asked for a commitment from him, we just said, "Do you want to do this or do you not want to do it, we'll wait for you if you do want to do it, if you'll commit to it", "No, I can't commit to it, and I can't commit to doing my operation", and so at one point Jon and I turned around to each other and just said, look, we could be sitting here forever, I mean, do you want to move on, or do you not? And I said, we've got nothing to lose at this point. We had already rebuilt this thing somewhat, and I want to continue doing it.

You guys auditioned, or thought about a couple of singers - you only auditioned a couple - one of which was a bigger name. I really couldn't see it working, but you must tell me, describe how it sounded, with Geoff Tate from Queensryche?
Yeah, he was a really great guy, a super nice guy, we got along really well.
We ended up writing a song, but it sounded nothing like Journey.
You know, and a lot of people are like, you know, I'm reading...I haven't posting anything on our site because there's so much heat and commotion going on there right now, and everybody's feelings about Perry being gone and the new singer Steve Augeri and how he's just a copy of Perry and blah, blah, blah.
Naturally, we had to get someone, because most of our music was based around Steve's vocals. It was not like Van Halen where everything was based around my guitar playing. It would've been much easier had it been like that, just to pick up somebody completely new that didn't sound anything like Perry.
But years ago when I heard Steve Augeri's voice when he was in Tall Stories, I said, this is when I was in Bad English years ago, and I heard him on the radio and I go, man if we ever wanted to put Journey back together, and Steve Perry didn't want to do it, I would call this guy, because I know we could make it sound like Journey.
It's nothing verbatim you're trying to copy everything this guy has done, but you need to have someone that has similarities to be able to pull off the old material.

Of course.
Because basically, that's what our fans want to hear, all the greatest hits, and then they want to hear everything up and above that. And how would you do it with someone that can't even sing that stuff? So that's the whole reasoning.
I mean people are like, some people are pissed off that we got someone that sounds like Steve, but I just know that there was no other way.

Yeah. I think if you go back and look over history, most bands that have had a successful replacement vocalist have done the same thing.
Plus, I know we made the right decision because this man is a great guy.

Yeah, I keep hearing that.
He's got his feet firmly planted in the mud, and he's a Brooklyn, New York guy. He comes off that way, you know I've never seen him act different, he's just a very cool guy, he's a very gracious guy, he's got the ultimate respect for Steve Perry, and our fans. He's trying to do as much justice as he can do to the older material.

Yeah, I heard a little bit of the live stuff, I'm looking forward to seeing the DVD come out, when's that due out?
No, not the DVD, but the live TV. There's a free TV thing that Irving has worked out, Irving Azoff has worked out where people that have dishes, satellite dishes, are going to get an hour free show of that, and it'll be running the whole month of April, I think.

Cool. And what about the DVD release?
We don't know when we're going to put it out. We're still talking with them, it's already finished, and it's very good, I actually haven't heard the 5.1 yet, but Kevin did.
My company Nocturn, my company with Herbie Herbert, is going to be going out with this this time, so we're going to be using the brand new screens we got in back of the band, so we'll be having cameramen on stage with us every night. There's a zillion different ways you can record the band every night with hard disk recorders that are out there, and I'm just saying, we've go the cameras, technology is here to be able to record the band every night. I said, "Lets record every night", you know what I mean? And then we're going to capture one of these shows is going to be pure magic. It always happens. But it never happens when you only set up one date to record. It always turns out to be good, but it's always not your best show. So how can you do it unless you record every show?

So you might do a live record down the track?
Well, who knows? If we go out and we end up recording every one of our shows, that would be easy to do. I could see us doing a double live record.

Yeah, please don't cut it to just 15 tracks, let's do a double.
Especially, we'll be switching setup every night, we'll have so much material that by the end of the tour we'll have covered, like, you know, 40 or 50 songs.

Describe to me with one word, or one sentence, your last live album, Greatest Hits Live.
I don't know. <laugh> That's my word, "I don't know".

I heard you weren't happy.
I wasn't happy with the choice of....everything that was picked, once again, I had no control over. Steve had picked the material and Kevin mixed it, and I thought the performances that were picked, were definitely not some of the better ones that I had heard that we had done.

Is it a little bit studio fixed?
No. It was not fixed at all.

Completely live?
Completely live.

OK.
Although some of it needed to be fixed. That's what I'm saying, I mean, it seemed like all of the tracks that were picked were tracks that I had out of tune guitars in, or Jonathan had glitches in the keyboard. Usually the band is right on, but you do have nights where people make mistakes and it seemed like all the tracks that were picked were guitar mistakes and keyboard mistakes and not sounding that great and, I don't know, I just did not care for the sound.
If you listen to Captured and then you listen to that, it's very weak.

Well hopefully, you'll get a chance to make it up. Let me ask you about a couple of songs quickly if I can. One of my favorite tracks, I don't think I've asked you this before, is a track called, "I Can't Stop the Fire".
Oh, with Eric Martin. Yeah, I wrote that years ago for that movie "Teachers".

You played on that though didn't you?
Yeah.

Because I've never read the credits on who played on it.
That's me on guitar. Actually, I wrote the song with Eric.

Yeah, I though so. And who else is in the band there?
I can't remember who played drums on that or bass. That's a very long time ago.

Did you record anything else, or just the one track?
No, I remember I did that track, I did "Just One Night", that was off of one of Eric's first records.

Of course, his first solo record, yeah.
I think that was it I'm not sure, there might have been one other track I can't remember.

So it wasn't like an album project or anything
No, we just got together and wrote a few tracks.

OK, because I'm a huge fan of Eric Martin, I must interview him soon here one of these days, but I thought he'd be a good person to do a project with.
Oh absolutely. We haven't actually been talking about that, but it's funny I run into him every once in a while and him and I definitely had some chemistry when we worked together. That would be interesting to toss around again, actually.

I actually think it's one of his best vocals he ever did.
Yeah, he can sing, man.

He's awesome. Another guy I know you're a bit of a friend of and I'm a big, big fan of and one day I'll get a chance to speak to is Sammy Hagar.
Yeah. Actually I just spoke to Sammy.

Oh did you really?
Yeah, and so I talked to him about...I'm going to be going over to his house in the next few weeks. I'm going to go over there and I think him and I are going to sit down and write a few songs.

Fantastic. You two guys have to make a record together.
Well I told him that, you know, the Piranha Blues release we did I said man, he goes, I'm talking to him and he's in Mexico and he said, "What's this record you stuck out Piranha Blues?", and I said, "Man, I played some of it for you" and he didn't seem to like much of it when I played if for him, it was in the rough stages, and he says, "Man, my cousin called me and he says this record just kicks ass", and I said, "Well, yeah, it does kick ass and I would've loved to have you singing on it". Richard Martin did a great job, but I would've loved to have Sammy Hagar, you know?

Yeah, cause you did the HSAS didn't you, that still sounds great today.
Yeah, I know, I love that record.

Oh God, it's so good. Did you get the re-mastered CD?
Yeah, I have the CD.

Oh it's fantastic.
We rehearsed for two weeks, wrote like 20 songs, in two weeks, rehearsed for two weeks, and then went and recorded live, and then we went back into the studio and I added a lot of overdubs on some songs, but basically all the end tracks were live, like all the lead guitar solos, and the bass and drums and vocals.
And then I just enhanced it on some tracks, I put more rhythm guitars, whatever.

I was in San Francisco in '92 and saw Hardline with Mr. Big. That must've been like a San Francisco rock reunion or something, because you had Eric Martin there, but you brought Sammy Hagar out to do "Top of the Rock" at the end of the Hardline set.
Yeah. Then you heard some real lungs <laughs>. That guy has got some serious lungs, I'm mean full out volume. Him and Jimmy Barnes, man.

Oh Barnes, yeah.
Him and Jimmy Barnes, have got sirens.

Did you know, it's an absolute fact, to this day - they still regard Freight Train Heart across the world, and definitely here in Australia, as his best record.
Really?

Absolutely, without a doubt. He's singing some absolutely appalling shit these days.
Really?

Oh yeah, he's doing these cover records and these horrible soul blues records, even his rock albums don't really hit the spot, he needs good song writers with him. Working Class Man and Freight Train Heart were just wonderful records.
Well that's the only time period that I paid much attention to him because you don't hear much of him in the States.

I should send you what he does these days, I mean he's still a great vocalist, but, you know. You guys were going to do a band thing with him permanently weren't you?
With Jimmy?

Yeah.
I don't know, I don't recall talking about a band. I mean, I had played a few shows with him and played on the record, that's about it.

Yeah, OK. You didn't think of a more permanent thing to do with him in the States?
Well at the time I was still in Journey, I mean, we still had some stuff going on and I wasn't about to leave that, and really I had not gotten an offer from him to play in a band permanently. He had another guitar player, Johnny Diesel, and he was a great guitar player.

Yeah, he still is, he's good. I'm sorry I diverse on the subject a bit...Sammy Hagar, what are you going to write with him for, just anything?
Who knows until we get together, it's been a while since him and I sat down and tried to write anything so who knows what it's going to turn out to be, it's going to be very interesting.

Fantastic. I'd love to see you guys do a record.
I'd like to write him a really classic heavy ballad, like a heavy power ballad, something that's just classic though. You know, it's easy to write rock with Sammy, you know, it's so easy for me to write rock and roll with the guy.

Yeah. I like his softer stuff actually, so that'd be good if you could. I like it when Sammy slows down. Have you heard any of the craziness of what Van Halen are up to?
I haven't heard anything and I have no idea. I'm just like whatever man, I can't tell what's up.

Do you think Journey could get away with going 18 months without even a press release?
Well we went along for 10 years without a press release!!
We never broke up and we never had a press release. Steve just didn't want to work and we were on a hiatus. Hiatus for ten years you know.

That is a shocker isn't it?!!
OK, tell me, to wrap up Neal, I sent you that cover CDR of bands doing Journey songs.
Oh you sent me that tape, right.

What do you think of bands going out and doing Journey stuff. What do you think of the material?
I was not that impressed to tell you the truth. I thought "Edge of the Blade" was interesting....

Actually I thought that was probably one of the better ones.
Well I thought it was one of the better ones of all of them but there were really some not so good ones.

Yeah, I know, there were a couple of shockers.
But it's flattering that somebody even wants to do your material.

I thought the last track, "Separate Ways" wasn't great. (James LaBrie version on the Rock Superstars Vol. 3 CD)
It was not that great.

I think probably the best track on there was actually the acoustic, "Send Her My Love".
Yeah, I recall that.

But I did like "Edge of the Blade" (Jorn Lande), I thought that was pretty good and I thought "Stone in Love" (House Of Shakira) was pretty good too. Do you get a laugh out of bands doing that?
Well I wasn't laughing, no...well actually I was laughing a little bit inside, it was funny to hear someone else doing your stuff. I've never actually heard a Journey cover band. I know there's a lot of different cover bands in different parts of the States that do Journey material, one in Chicago, and one in...I can't remember, there's a band called Escape that does our stuff, I don't know if they're Cleveland or Chicago, or something like that. There was one in LA a while ago, and I've never heard any of them, so I don't know, you know, so it was strange to see or hear anybody doing our material.

One last question to wrap up. I'm actually doing a second web site to run in conjunction with my current one. It's going to be based on classics, all of the old stuff that people have missed, because that's what I get asked all the time, you know.
Oh, I think that's a great idea. Records that sort of went by the wayside.

Yeah, exactly. The most common question I get asked is, "I love all this stuff that you've got on your site, I've just come back into the fold after 10 years in the wilderness because of MTV and all that. What have I missed in the mean time?" So this is what the site is going to concentrate on.
One of the things I'm going ask different artists is "What do you consider the best rock albums out there"? Have you got favorite records that you really admire?
Yeah, absolutely. They're all really old records. Any one of the three Jimi Hendrix records, the first three. I love all of Led Zeppelin's stuff, but I really like the first record. I love all of Jeff Beck's stuff, but I really love that first record Truth. For rock records with vocalists, I think that him and Stewart were really great in that time era. And I love the first Small Faces record with Rod Stewart.
I thought that was a great party band. There's so much good stuff man, but I loved all the Cream stuff. I particularly loved Wheels of Fire, because that was the record that really sort of took me and stuck me in the improvisation world of guitar. Listening to that record I sort of figured out how I could move around on the guitar. And then you know, that's just rock, but I have my favorite Blues records and Jazz records and all different genres.

What do you think of Mr. Santana making a good comeback in the last year or so?
I'm really happy for him. I'm especially happy for him that he's a guitar player <laughs> and, you know, that I play with him and I'm glad to see someone that's a bit older than me that had a big comeback like that. It's exciting, you think to yourself, "Well, the same thing could happen to anyone, you know."
You come with the right record at the right time.

It could even happen to Journey.
Absolutely, I definitely think we're a contender.

Lets hope it starts with Arrival!
Lets hope man I'm keeping my fingers crossed. We're going to give it our all. We're going to pull out all the stops and we're going to give it our all.

Fantastic, fantastic. Well, I think you and John Waite on tour together is the most marvelous idea, I hope that comes off.
Well it's funny, you know, John and I had talked about a while ago, and I was saying to Jon, "We couldn't find anybody that we liked that was available to go out with us."

I thought Jonathan wanted to beat John Waite up.
No, no. I mean the past is the past. I heard that Waite thought that we both hated him. You know, maybe at the time when the band broke up we were not fond of each other.

Things just got frustrating?
Yeah, things got very frustrating and twisted up, but I mean so many years have gone by, I don't hold grudges against anyone. I don't hold grudges against Perry, I don't hold grudges against anyone. It's just, time moves on, people change and this is what you have to go with.

Actually, I've got one last question. Everything's going so well with you now, the record is fantastic, it's one of my favorites, I think it's better that Trial By Fire, etc. Steve Perry comes back to you now and says, "I'm ready to come back to the band. I'd like to." What do you say to him?
I think that we've got a solid band right now and there's no going back. Like he said in the interview on TV, he said, you know, when Jon called him and talked to him and said, "Well we'd like to move on", and Steve said to him, "Well there's no coming back", and Jon said, "We realize that."

I think that's the right thing to do, have some consistency. Lets hope there's many more Augeri fronted records to come.
You know what man? This is our first record in a lot of sense to me, it's almost like, I'm looking at it like we don't have any other records out there. Sure, we're playing the greatest hits and we're able to pull that off with Augeri, but really it's our first record, and so I think we're going to acquire a lot of new fans as well as take some old fans with us. We'll lose some of our old fans which is natural when you change the front man. But I think all and all, all we have to do is stick with it and keep pumping out great music and we're going to be fine.

I agree. Fantastic. OK Neal.
All right Andrew.

I think that's about it. I think I've covered everything.
That should hold us over for a while.

Absolutely. Great stuff. OK well we'll talk via e-mail.
OK.

Thanks for you time man
You're welcome.

Thanks buddy, I appreciate it.
Yeah, thank you. G'Day now!

Thanks Neal. Bye, bye.

 

I can not tell you how long I've been bugging Rindell to set this up for me, and hoping that it would come together. Because I am a huge fan of your work, let me say.
I'm flattered, I truly am. I've read your reviews and the kind words that you've said about me. I'm thankful, I truly am.

You have some big shoes to fill. I think you've done it with ease.
For me, although I've been at this for nearly three years now, it still seems, for this first record, I still feel like we got a ways to go as far as finding the right niche. But I think we're on the right track. I think every time we play together whether it's rehearsal, recording or shows, we still get a little closer to our final destination. And I think as time goes by, I think by the next record, I think we're going to get it. If you like it this time out, I hope to think you'll really like it next time, cause I think it will be that much more where it should be.
We did a lot of experimenting through the past three years. We were fearless. We tried a lot of different styles, a lot of different directions and we figured hey, you know, we've got time. Let's break down the barriers, let's not be this or that, let's try it all. After Kevin picked his songs, it became Arrival.
But before Arrival, we were all over the place. That was a lot of fun. We learned a lot about each other, we learned a lot about each other's musical influences and backgrounds, we dabbled in a little of this and a little of that. It was a lot of fun.
I'll tell you, it was a great deal of fun.

I've got some questions regarding the songs. What I think is very cool, and somewhat ironic, is the first line you sing on the whole album - 'So I think I've got it all in place now'. What do you think, does that just about sum it up?
You know, it's funny how that just happened to be the opening lines. Sort of like when we do our shows, when I sing "Separate Ways" its like 'here I stand' kind of a thing. It just worked out that way. Yeah. I mean, I have Jack Blades to thank for that lyric (laughs).

It just seemed very fitting. Your voice sounds immaculate. It's a fabulous line and it just sounds great.
I appreciate it. I first heard a batch of songs. That was a batch of, I think, three that Neal had sent me that he had written with Jack. And each and every one of them was better than the last. One after the other knocked my socks off. That one was absolutely wonderful. In fact, there were a handful of others that I couldn't believe didn't make the record. I personally think you would have absolutely flipped out because they were really melodic, really in vain of classic melodic rock. One song in particular, that we hope to see on the next record.

This is your first recording in several years as a singer. You've been with the band nearly three years. I can't believe how quickly that's gone. On the eve of the U.S. release, what emotions are you feeling now?
Well I'll tell you, just now I'm getting a little excited. The record could have easily been out a year ago, as far as I remember. My memory isn't as good as it should be. After age 40 , I kind of lost it (laughs).
Right now, everything is starting to come together. We've released two singles out through American Radio here in the states. And they are slowly but very, very surely gaining chart position. I just checked the charts yesterday. It's a nice sure movement. They are jumping up about 10 spots a week. If we continue this gradual climb up the charts, by the time the record gets released, in about a month's time, I think we're going to have some really great chart position.
And by then, hopefully the record company will feel very confident in promoting the record as they should. We all have our fingers crossed. There are no guarantees in life. No matter who you are. Especially not for Journey. Especially in the position we are here, right now. But I think, I take a look at the charts, and things seem to be taking shape very nicely and we're feeling very confident.

What support to you feel from the label. Do you have the feeling that they are behind you?
I'll put it to you this way. I've heard from their mouth, that we're going to get wonderful support. That they love the material and they are going to give us the support. But seeing is believing. The truth of the matter is, you can only have faith. We are all going to put our faith in the music and in the band. As long as we have faith in ourselves, we're going to make this thing happen.
I have all the faith in the world in these guys. With that alone, I feel very confident.

That's a great attitude for sure. I don't think I've seen any interviews with you thus far, or not many at least, a couple in Japan obviously. For those who don't really know the story, I just wanted to cover how you got hooked up with the band in the first place. You've got a mutual friend in Joe...
His name is Cefalu. I'll try to make it brief. Because it's long distance. I don't know, what time is it over there?

It's eight in the morning.
Ah, good morning! Have your coffee? I'm making a cup of coffee right now, how about yourself?

I just make one for my fiancée actually.
Congratulations. Good luck to you.

Thank you.
Well, I'll make this short and sweet, or as short as I can.
Joe was a fellow Brooklynite who since moved to Neal's neck of the woods in San Francisco. It seems he was a Journey fan as a child. Neal was basically one of his idols growing up. Anyway, he turned out to be quite some guitarist. Before he moved out there, I had made his acquaintance and I actually sang on a few of his demos. Just brilliant. Along the lines of Satriani and Steve Vai.
This was after Tall Story's first record. And we were just getting ready to do the second album, more writing for our second album, and we befriended each other. Anyway, I did some demos with him. Off he goes to San Francisco.
Hadn't heard from him in quite some time until one day I get a phone call from him and by the time I speak to him, I had sung with Tyketto for a short time and basically went into retirement.
To put it as simply as possible, I had a great deal more success in my career than a great deal of other musicians, especially people that I know. I was able to release a couple of records. I toured some of the world. I made a lot of friends along the way. I was able to perform my music in front of thousands of people and I felt myself very fortunate. But at the time, success hadn't come my way. And the fact is, I have a family, I had a child. I guess I was doubting myself perhaps. I guess that's reality. I had to take care of business, so I took myself a nine-to-five with The Gap.
Actually, I did 2 years of construction here in New York. I became a manager. I was a maintenance manager for thirty stores in Manhattan. So when they would fall apart, I'd have to fix them. Everything from broken plumbing to electrical and painting, you name it.
So a year goes by and Joe Cefalu, this wonderful guitarist gives me a call. He says listen, Steve, I'm friendly with Neal and I was speaking with Neal the other day and he tells me that Steve Perry is no longer with the band and they're starting to look for vocalists. They are wanting to reform Journey and go on with another singer. It had been a year since I was working at The Gap and it was two years since I even sang a note in public. So I was like, that's really great but, regardless of whether I was singing or not, I thought it was just crazy. Out of my reach. It was a wonderful, flattering thing but I thought he was just bonkers.

I love this story, I love it (laughing).
Seriously. Put yourself in my position. You're talking about Journey, you're not talking about a baby band. You're not taking about amateurs. You're not talking about the little leagues. You're talking about the major leagues. Yankees, World Series.

I really do love this story, I'm enjoying this.
That's the truth. I was yeah, yeah, yeah. He said look Steve, you can do it.
Send me a tape. Tall Stories records at the time, or CDs were very scarce and rare. He said please send me a CD and I'll give it to Neal.
I told him yeah, OK, I'll do that. And a week went by. We're calling on weekends and after certain hours because we're both poor. So he takes a whole week until the rates drop like after nine o'clock. He calls me and says, Steve what happened? I'm waiting a whole week for this tape. I said look Joe, to be honest with you, I was never going to send the tape. I said I just don't think so, I really appreciate it, but you're crackers.
He said listen, I'm going to put it together. What three songs do you want me to put together on the tape? I said Joe, I don't even know. He said, I'll tell you what, I'll put this tape together. I'll pick the three songs, you leave it to me.
I did exactly that. We hung up. I thought he was out of his mind and I didn't think anything of it, truly, until I get a phone call three days later from Neal, or at least someone who said it was Neal. I wasn't quite sure if someone was putting me on or perhaps it was truly Neal. I didn't acknowledge that it was him, nor did I blow him off totally. I waited until we got off the phone.
I called Joe back immediately and he said Steve, you might want to sit down because what I'm going to tell you is going to blow you away. I spoke to Neal and I gave him a tape and it seems as though Neal knew of me from my Tall Story days. He was aware of the band. He and Jon both, when they were in Bad English, he was living in Los Angeles at the time and heard a Tall Stories record on the radio out there all the time. When Joe handed him the CD, he said we were already thinking about this guy. So it was just one of those synergy things, it was synchronicity, things just seem to come into place.
The only thing I needed to do was I begged Neal and Jon to give me a couple of weeks to prepare. Because after two years of not singing, I was basically like... nothing was really there. I auditioned; I had a weeks worth of singing with them. On the last day of the auditioning process, which was a writing and a get to know each other as well as a singing audition.
Things seemed to come into place in the clutch. Just at the right moment, the last day, down at the final wire. I guess I pulled it out of my hat. It's incredible. Sometimes I still don't believe it. But on the other hand, this is something I've dreamed of all my life. As crazy as it sounds, I was just telling somebody this today, this is what I've wanted to do all my life. I've just expected to do...not with Journey, it's still ridiculous. I always wanted to sing for people ever since I saw the Beatles on national television on the Ed Sullivan show here in the states. It just took me a little longer than everybody else (laughs).

Good luck to you. Good luck. I just think that's fantastic. And what does your wife think of this?
Well you know, she couldn't be any more happy. You know, obviously the pitfalls are for a touring musician, when you have a family. The hardest part is leaving them every so often for a couple of months at a time. How do say goodbye to your wife and children? Except thank goodness for long distance bills and cell phones. So you're constantly on the phone and you fly them out as often as you can whenever the schedules allow. We've done that the last two tours and we'll do it again this summer.

That's wonderful. This may be too broad of a question but is there any song you auditioned on for the guys? Like your first song.
Absolutely. The three main songs were "Don't Stop Believing", "Faithfully" and "Separate Ways". Here's the beauty of the story, at least for me.
As I said, I hadn't sang for two years and when I first got in there, it was pretty rusty, the pipes were real rusty. It took about a week to get them warmed up and I was a little intimidated at first sitting down with the guys. By the last day I said this is a do or die situation. Things seemed to be going my way that particular day. We recorded these three songs. After the recording they were going to send it off to John Kalodner at the record company to get his opinion. After the third song, the guys were pretty happy and Neal was kind of high-fiving Jon.
I was feeling pretty cocky and pretty proud of myself. And I had one foot out the door, I was on my way back on an airplane to New York City and I turned around and I said listen, there's one song I really, really would love to sing. All the while to myself I thinking, if I blow this, I very well could be blowing the audition.
But I turned around and said listen, can we just try "Open Arms"? I don't know what came over me, I was just crazy. But I did it, and I guess it turned out OK, because here I am, speaking with you. But it could have went the other way.

I doubt it!
I've never been much of a gambler. I'll tell you what's funny too. I was working at this day job and I told my boss over at The Gap, I said listen, I need a week off, a leave of absence. Which they were good enough to give me. But is was a gamble, going out there and doing this thing. Chasing that dream, that lifelong dream. Because I'd never been a gambler. I mentioned to somebody else, I've never been very ambitious. In fact I'm what I call an under achiever. You can give me that title. This was something..., there is a wonderful song by Ricky Lee Jones called "Last Chance Texaco". Basically it's about that last gas station before you hit the desert. This was my last chance Texaco. This was my last shot at my dream. That's the way I looked at it. And well, it worked out.

Fantastic. I did hear it once said that you used a vocal coach, is that correct?
Oh absolutely.

Just to train it up - to get fit again?
Well, for sure. I saw the coach immediately after I left the guys in San Francisco.
I flew to Los Angeles to see one of the finer coaches in the Los Angeles area. And this guy got me on track real fast. And then I saw a couple of people here in New York. And quite frankly, I truly needed one.
Whether or not I hadn't sang for two years or not because I kind of grew up singing just the way I wanted to and never had any true guidance. Going out on the road for months at a time you've got to be in amazing...you've got to be an animal to be able to last five shows, two hours a night during the week and go a few months at a time.
When I was younger, when you're younger, period, you have the muscle stamina, you have the muscle tone. But once you hit a certain age, this goes for female vocalists as well, just like your body, just like the biceps kind of wither away if you let them, if you're Charles Atlas.
Do you guys know Charles Atlas over there? I mean, Arnold Schwarzenegger works twice as hard now than he did when he was a kid. That's just biology. Long story short, you really have to whip yourself back into shape and I just couldn't do it, what I used to be able to do when I was twenty out of pure adrenaline and pure youth. So I had to go and see somebody that would teach me the finer techniques of singing and think of something that would get me over those long two, three month tours. And low and behold, I've had some great teachers along the way, and it's still a work in progress. Just like anything else in a profession or any kind of educational area you can always keep learning.
Different people can teach you different things. I'm happy to say that I'm studying with a couple of different people for the different reasons and it's great fun to be honest with you.

Are you conscious at all of your natural vocal comparison to Steve Perry? Or is it something that's just there?
Yeah, you know I wasn't aware of it so much until people kept approaching me and I kept on hearing it more and more and more.
Within the last 15 years or so, especially with Tall Stories. Obviously there are similarities in timbre and even style wise. But honestly, it was a subconscious thing initially. Then when we did the Tall Stories record, as much as Jack Morrow, the guitarist would deny it, he was the first one to keep telling me Steve, you got to lay off of the Perryism. That was the word he used. The Perryism.
That was the little joke, and I was like, I don't get it. I don't understand what you're talking about. Perhaps I was in denial at the time. I just didn't see it.
He was a wonderful writer and he wrote wonderful songs that were not unlike Journey songs. He was very similar in his guitar approach, they're both really great, wonderful guitarists and they have a lot of similarities too. So I think that also added to the Journeyisms, not just the Perryisms.
But was I aware of it. Initially no, until it was brought up to me.
Before Tall Stories, I worked with a band, in fact three members of Tall Stories other than myself were originally three Brazilian musicians. And one by one, they were replaced by an American musician in New York City. Before that, we shot the tape to Columbia and they actually said this sounds like Journey meets Sade (laughs). That was the very first time anyone compared me to Steve Perry. And then it opened the flood gates after that.
But I'll tell you one thing, I'm getting more comparisons now to Kenny G lately. The visual thing. I can't walk down the street without people saying hello Kenny!!

That's funny (laughing).
You should try it someday (laughing).

I'll jump forward a little. I'm a big fan of the Tall Stories album and I had that long before you were in Journey. It took me a long time to find it on CD as you were saying. But I have it, thankfully. And I think half the album you're yes, Journey-Steve Perryish, but the other half you sound more your own person obviously but there's a little bit of another favorite lead singer of mine called Glenn Hughes in there.
Way back when, I was watching television here at home, and this is going back in the seventies, and I saw...put it this way, Burn, I was just crazy about that particular record, and Stormbringer. Glenn just absolutely blew me out of the water. I had the pleasure of meeting him during the recordings of Arrival. He was in town writing with Pat Thrall. Those two, that Hughes/Thrall record just slays me. That record kicks.

'I Got Your Number'... ah yeah...
Cover to cover, from the coolest, grooviest stuff to the two heaviest tracks you ever heard. "Muscle and Blood" and ... anyway, huge fan. Just absolutely huge fan. That dude, what he does with his voice. He takes it from a whisper to a scream. He takes it from..., the dynamics that that cat has, I truly aspire to sing with his kind of passion and his kind of control. Never mind the technical side is the emotion. Just beautiful what he does. He's my kind of guy. He's my kind of vocalist.

Really pleased to hear you say that.
Oh forget about it. Forget about it. But before him, my very first concert was a Humble Pie concert. Steve Marriott was my truly, very, very first..., aside from the Beetles which everybody liked. I was fifteen when I saw Steve Marriott and Humble Pie here in New York I was first row, my brother had taken me for my birthday. And that's when I knew, I've got to do this. I really have to do this.
I connected with Steve. It's a funny thing, we share the same birthday.

Oh, do you really?
I could swear, I'm telling you there was some connection that particular night and I said that's what it's all about. I mean I'm a bigger fan that I am...that's why I'm so charged about music today, because I'm such a huge fan.
When I got back to music, after coming back to sing with Journey, after I left the guys, when I turned around I said listen: this is kind of a far fetched thing, me coming out here and auditioning for you guys. I told them, one thing I have to thank you for is this could go one way, it could work out, it may not.
But I have to thank you guys so much for just having me out here and getting me back in touch with my love of music. Because I actually lost it. Because when I turned my back, you kind of, sort of try to bury the past because it was very painful. They unearthed it and they gave it back to me. I said if this thing doesn't work out, that's cool because I got a chance to meet you and have a little fun.
But I said you really did give me a gift in just singing again. And I said the one thing I'll do, I'll go back and I'm going to sing again. You got me back into it and you gave me back my music. I thanked them. So I've actually had this kind of rebirth thing and I've been getting in touch with my old records that I grew up and was inspired from and influenced way back when.
That's one of them, those early Glenn Hughes records and Coverdale. Those two guys were brilliant together. What a team.

I'd love to see them on a record together. There was some word that someone was trying to do that.
Yeah, I don't know. You know Tall Stories, we had another great vocalist in the band that never really got a chance to sing as much as he probably should have, and that was our bassist Kevin Dutorian. Looking back in hindsight, I would have loved to have done something like the Coverdale/Hughes thing. I'm sure there would have been some tension between the two but boy, did it make great records. Don't you think?

Yeah, oh absolutely, absolutely. Magic.
Those guys were just better. One guy was just better than the next every song you put on. Holy man.

Two enormous egos and both really going at it.
I imagined, I imagined. But the talent was there so you got to give it to them.

Oh absolutely. Look, I've interviewed both of them and it was an absolute joy talking to them, it really was. They're really nice.
Yeah Glenn was really a sweetheart, he was great. And Pat Thrall, he's wonderful.

Looking forward to their new record.
Oh, same here. It's got to be great.

I'll jump to Tall Stories still while we're on that. I actually had an e-mail from Jack a little while ago, your guitarist.
You're joking, no kidding!

Yeah! I don't know if you two are still in contact, or do you see each other do you?
It's funny, the last I saw him was at that fellow who got me that Journey audition, Joe Cefalu. He invited me to his wedding and my wife and I arrived at the reception and there was Jack sitting next to me. So it was wonderful.
It was a great re-union of sorts and we just laughed and had a few. Actually we didn't have any cocktails. Not that we don't drink or anything but we just happened to stay sober that particular day. That same night I was flying to San Francisco to meet with the guys so I was minding my P's and Q's. We had a great reunion and we talked over old times. So how was he doing? What was the e-mail about?

He was good. I actually mentioned him on the site that the Tall Stories CD was getting re-released in Japan in conjunction with the Journey back catalogue. And he emailed me going, What!!?
Oh how cool is that?

I'll have to forward his e-mail address to you.
You know, in fact, I think he had given it to me but I misplaced it. I would love it. I understand, did he mention, right now he's on tour with a Broadway show?

He didn't tell me what he is doing.
Yeah he's doing a show out here called Swing. And he's on tour with them throughout the states and he's back on the road. In a different capacity. Let me tell you, Jack, he's a guitarist's guitarist.
He went to school at a very high level music college down in Florida, University. And he can play inside out. He knows that thing inside out, upside down.
He'll play anything from Wes Montgomery to Django Reinhardt and then Jimi Hendrix. And his boy was really Eric Clapton. Boy he could whip out any Cream song at the drop of a hat. And then he had his own thing, which was wonderful.

Did you guys ever start recording or finish recording any extra tracks other than the original?
We did tons of demos. In fact, this is the crazy thing about, unfortunately, what the demise of Tall Stories was this; we were demoing and demoing and demoing and at that time we got the record out, very similar to the Journey record, about a year after it had been finished and should have been released already.
It had been, I wouldn't say shelved, but it was definitely postponed, the release date. So by the time it had come out, the timing was so wrong, it coincided with Pearl Jam's release. The writing was on the wall. The music industry in the states was going to change, was going to push this new sound. Which is very healthy, I guess, to business. Not very healthy to Tall Stories.
Wonderfully for us, we happened to go out on the road for two months with Mr. Big and that was great. It got us some exposure. We did some gigs. We did two months of touring with them, which was wonderful. They were very inspiring. The history was, this music right now was starting to get ignored by the record company. Although you'd never know it because we rolled into Seattle, the home of grunge, back in '92 and we thought it was going to be the worst gig ever.
But it was the best response that we got out of the whole tour. It was ridiculous. That was the irony thing. The irony was that the folks, the rock and rollers that were truly into melodic and hard rock were...maybe they just didn't want to hear another grunge song. They really wanted to hear something fresh for a change. Which is kind of what's happening now I think, here in the states.
You know things are kind of cycular. I think this sound, just good melodic rock and roll is coming around again. It'd be played at least commercially on radio stations that is. I think we're at a good time, here right now. Things are starting to look good right now. As far as the Arrival CD is concerned.

So you've got a whole bunch of Tall Stories demos lying around.
Oh yeah, bunch of demos. And what happened was, we were playing them this, we were playing them that. And basically they were telling us that this sound was over. Steve, you sound like Steve Perry.
They sound like Journey tracks. That's when the Journey comparisons were really heavy. Basically the demise of Tall Stories was that we were getting compared to Journey a great deal at the time.
So it got to the point that we were starting to do songs that were absolutely out of my style, vocally. And I was trying, I was experimenting you know. I was brave, I was courageous. I'd give anything a shot, but it wasn't me. And as much as we tried, I was just going to feel like I wasn't true to myself any longer.
So quite some time passed by and I got a phone call from Brooke St. James of Tyketto. And Brook tells me, he says, you know what? We're writing a new record and I was wondering if you had some time. Won't you come down and we'll play some guitars together, try to write a couple songs.
So we had been friends together, Tyketto and Tall Stories. We were mutual friends. We'd go see each others shows here in the New York area. They're a great bunch of guys. I really like Brook a lot, and I said sure. At the time he never mentioned anything about Danny not being present.
So I took a drive out to the next state, to Jersey and started writing some songs. And as a week or two go by I start getting the vibe that Danny is no longer in the picture. I'm now three weeks into the writing sessions and their drummer lays on the deal that Danny is no longer with the band and would I consider, instead of just writing, would I consider singing with the band.
Actually, at the time, it wasn't even a Tyketto thing. They said, would you like to form a band? We were just jelling, and it was a lot of great energy and a lot of positive vibes happening. So much that, it hadn't felt like that with Tall Stories in quite some time. We were just getting a lot of negative responses from record company and management. As mush as we loved each other's music and music ideas, the thrill was starting to leave. The thrill was starting to go, and it was starting to emerge within the Tyketto camp. So it only felt natural, it felt like the right thing to do at the time, to join up with the guys.
And I said I had learned that Danny Vaughn was no longer with the band and I really enjoyed working with them so we gave it a shot. We started writing the record and I tell you we must have wrote it in a month. And we recorded it in even less time. We must have recorded it in two weeks. It seemed like that, everything went down that fast. Just before the record was going to be released, we had another name picked out, we were going to do music that we felt like doing. We just felt, stylistically, it was just the thing that happened. We didn't try to do this or that or the other thing. It's just what came out. Just before the release of the record, the record company gets back to the guys in the band and says listen, we are not going to release the record unless you release it as Tyketto.

Typical.
And it was the worst thing for us because it really stiffed the fans. It kind of limited our chances of any kind of success because everyone that expected the record out really was waiting for a Tyketto record.
Not a rhythm and bluesy, we were kind of doing 70's influence in a lot of the songs and it was just not as melodic as the Tyketto stuff was. Unfortunately we turned off a lot of their old fan base. We wound up winning back a couple of them and making some new fans along the way but I tell you, no regrets.
Great guys. We really had great times. We went over to Europe a couple of times. Traveling with a rock and roll band is always a lot of fun and we really enjoyed each other's company. Made a lot of friends.
Again, as I said, just going out and playing music for people. You don't have to go out and make a million dollars. You get into this business initially because you love the art form. The music. And that's what we did. We had a good time. And like I said, no regrets. We went our separate ways.
But that, replacing Danny Vaughn in Tyketto, was a very huge learning experience for me. Because, when I got the opportunity to work with Journey, I had learned a lot of lessons and I knew I made quite a few mistakes. Well, not so much mistakes, I knew some things to do and some things not to do. Again, I think it was meant to be.

Obviously on your first tour, maybe even your second tour, a lot people didn't know that Steve Perry was out of the band. Did you feel a lot of pressure to pull off the best performance you could?
Whether or not you're replacing such a heavyweight of a vocalist in the first place, you always go out with that...you always want to give two hundred percent. Then you add the Steve Perry factor, and the replacement factor. Ask Gary Cherone and ask Sammy Hagar. Although, obviously both those guys were established. They had one up on me. Getting somebody who's an unknown, actually maybe it worked a lot in my favor also, it's hard to say.
Because it might have actually helped. But yeah sure, I felt the pressure. But as I learned early on, you just have to do your best. Because the minute you start thinking about it, that's when the slope gets slippery. You just do your best, as with anything. If you're a shoemaker, you just try to make the best pair of shoes you can. Same thing with singing.

Were you happy with the fan reaction?
Absolutely. I mean really. I didn't expect the response that we had gotten. We didn't expect to get everybody back, all the Journey fans. But I can honestly say that I think that we got the majority of the old fan base back. It's hard to believe. And I never thought it would happen, but they were open-minded and open-hearted enough to give it a shot. To give it a chance. And for that I'll be forever thankful.

The response to, the feedback I've got from people emailing me about the shows and any reaction to the album has been absolutely, unanimously positive.
I couldn't be more thankful. Not to say anything negative but you really can't expect..., and there are some folks. Neal and I laugh about it.
Every once in a while, there'll be a show and there will be one person out there in the audience. And for some reason, there's a beacon on them. They'll have their arms crossed and they won't have a happy face, a very sad face.
And you know, you have to respect it because they had the love enough for the band to come to see the band, and hear the music. I have to respect it. One of my most favorite bands also of all time was Led Zeppelin. And as much as I love David Coverdale, now they didn't try to reform Zeppelin, but I don't know if I would have been able to see Led Zeppelin formed with anybody else but Robert Plant singing. So I understand it, I respect it, and that's exactly how I approached singing with Journey. I'm not a cocky guy, although, maybe come talk to me a year from now. I've never had much of an ego (laughs). I hope it doesn't change.

I doubt it (laughing).
I mean that's just the way it is. I'm a pretty blessed guy. I'm just happy with my life. I've got a good life. No complaints.

Nervous heading into the studio to record Arrival?
Yeah, big time. Definitely big time. As much as I was telling myself, no.
The fact of the matter was, yes. In fact, just before the recording, we happened to get into this rehearsal studio. And do you think, after all this state of the art technology that you have, you get a world class band, get some rehearsals a week before, of pre-production, before a major recording.
And there's a less than adequate P.A. system, and monitor system. So for a week, I'm singing into the equivalent of, pick a Deep Purple concert, the loudest band in the world. I'm singing out of a, what do they call it, a vocal master. Which was a couple of ten inch speakers. My voice was toast. And here we are going in to record a Journey record (laughs). So I had to take two weeks off.

Really?
Absolutely. And I was frightened to death. I thought, oh my God, what did I do to myself? That's part of the game. You learn as you go. I was never experienced enough, never had I been in this situation where I would have known any better. I'll tell you now, next time I'll be a great deal more careful. You'll know to ask, look, I have to have this, I have to have that. I can't sing unless I can hear myself a little. Now I have that information. I'm programmed now, so I'll know that next time I go in to do the record. Everything turned out all right in the long run.
It gave me a little more grit, a little more gravel. Probably would have preferred to have been a little sweeter at times but that's all right, I was always a big Rod Stewart fan.

Rod's awesome but I think you sound sweet enough, believe me.
You know that was actually, my very first single, record actually, that I ever owned was "Maggie May". He was also one of my very, very early influences.

He's got a great voice.
Rod could do no wrong.

He's got an energy, hasn't he?
The best. He's got it all. The voice, the attitude, the look. He always did. And he still has it. He's still out there, just released a record, he's still on the radio. You turn on the radio and they'll play his new single and they'll play, you know, "Maggie May" back to back. And I'll say, That's my man.         

Yeah, I've got several of his records. I like them a lot. I was pleased to see that you're involved in the writing process on the album. You've got five songs that made the album. I thought that was great.
Yeah, I think in fact, I'm not a hundred percent sure but, I think with the American release there's seven. But none the less, whether it was a hundred percent of the record or no involvement, the fact was when I was getting into the situation it was enough to sing. Just singing. That was enough of a case load, enough of a work load to deal with. The great thing about being with the guys in this band is that they gave me the opportunity to get involved in the writing process.
A part of the audition in fact when I first met them was, as I said, was not only to the singing part, as well as seeing if we were actually compatible. If we could stay in the same room for like an hour and not end up at each other's throat. You know, any fist fights. Which is very important. But they also wanted to see if I had any kind of input as far as creativity. Coming from them, to be able to do that to a novice, or an unknown, was very generous and they certainly didn't have to. So, as I said, they were gracious to offer that to me and I couldn't tell you how happy I am that they did.

How may songs did you demo for the album? I mean there's like fourteen on there.
I would say a minimum of thirty. There had to be at least forty.

Oh wow! So there's that many demos sitting out there.
And if I may say so, there were some songs that were left off the record that I really wish had gotten onto the record. In fact, there's a song that the guys wrote with Geoff Tate.

Oh really!?
Yeah. That was absolutely amazing. Just amazing. The week that I went out to audition, we recorded four Journey songs and we recorded about four new songs. And one of them was a song they had written with Geoff and one other was "Signs of Life". In fact that was the very first song out of the bag as a Journey song. And it wound up making the record. So it has some staying power.

That's one of my favorite tracks on the album.
Yeah, I'm glad. Thank you. It didn't change much from the very first day. So it was a keeper from the beginning. And the Geoff Tate song was spectacular. Stellar. And it was just brilliant. And it didn't make the record and I swore it would. It had a great ethereal, great moody vibe to it. It was very Pink Floydish. It had that dark thing going on. And I hope perhaps a soundtrack. I think it would be definitely suited for a soundtrack or something like that. "Walking Away From the Edge" it's called.

I would love to hear some of this stuff.
You know what, if we meet up, I'll make sure we have a tape.

That would be great.
I should hope that we make it your way.

I don't think so (laughs).
Oh I think we're going to get there. We'll get to Australia.

I hope so!
I only hope so.

But if not, I'm going to try to make it to the States because I've got to see you guys.
That'd be great.

Favorite songs off the album, that did make the album?
I swear it changes. In fact, I'll tell you what, going in to the recording I felt exactly the way Neal did. We wanted to make a rock and roll record. And then after everything was recorded, I found myself listening to ballads, or at least the less up-tempo, and the less mid-tempo. I jump depending on the mood that I'm in, I play the music that I can relate to. And so if I feel like jumping into the car and I've got to get to an appointment that I'm late for already a half hour, I'll throw on "Higher Place". And it gets me there. It makes that hour drive turn into twenty minutes, and a speeding ticket.

I play it on the way to work to, believe me.
You know, I think one of my favorites is "We'll Meet Again". It's one of my favorites and I'll tell you, it turned out a great deal different than the initial conception of the song. I especially like it because the inspiration to writing it was...after coming off tour on the first record, I was so impressed, getting back to the fans and the fans reaction. I was so impressed with their reaction.
And it was so difficult at the end of the night, after a two hour and fifteen minute set, to leave these audiences that went from skeptical to just charged and happy and elated that they had been to a Journey concert. And I was equally as elated that they were enjoying us, that when we came off the road I had this idea of just trying to express how I felt about how I can't wait to get back on our next tour. And how we would meet again. And that was kind of the general idea of the song. And the funny thing was, Neal had written a song years ago and laid a demo on it of a couple of really incredible rock and roll tracks, and that was one of them. In fact if you ever heard it, it was a guitar song. It was a major, major guitar song. It was a huge guitar song with like the guitar, rock and roll song. And it turned out to be quite less than that, but still I think it turned out to be one of my favorite tracks.

Yea, it's a real moody track, isn't it?
What Jon turned it into was beautiful, and I'm happy it made the record. I love that.

It's a great track to end the album, isn't it?
I think so, yeah. I'll tell you what I like, getting back to the up-beat thing.
What I do like about the record is that, and probably what I'd like about Journey or what I've always liked about them is they are...there's always room for negativity in life. And one thing that these guys have always been able to do for me, is lift me up a little bit when I'm down. Or put a smile on my face, or make me feel a little more hope than there may actually be. Or hopeful for tomorrow.
And I think that's what I really like about this record is that it seems to have a common thread. Although the songs may be diverse, stylistically, there seems to be a common thread in positively. It's not for everybody, and not for all times because sometimes I like to put on a Black Sabbath record, especially with Dio, like Heaven and Hell or Mob Rules. My point being, I like to turn a Marshall up on eleven just like the next guy, and play hard and heavy and dark stuff.
But then you have to have the other side, and I think the other side, a perfect example of that is a Journey record. I think that although it may not be the Journey of yesterday, I think it still carries on that positive direction that the band always had before.

I think it picks up perfectly where you left off. I think it carries on perfectly.
We've been torn about the balance of the record, whether a slow, up-tempo, hard, heavy or this or that. But in the long run, at the end of the day, I was happy with the integrity of the music and definitely, definitely satisfied with that.

Tell me about the two new tracks you went in and recorded.
Here's the thing about the two new tracks, Neal is a rock and roll animal. This is what makes this band, or for that matter, many bands very special. This is what fuels them. You have two definite and dynamic personalities in the writing team. That being Jon Cain and Neal Schon. Jon can rock like the rest of them but his forte in my opinion....

He's the mellower one, isn't he?
I will be opinionated now. He can write a ballad or love song, whatever you want to call it better than anybody. And then Neal can write a rock and roll track better than anybody's business. So to me, in my opinion, again this is not factual, this is just my observation.

I tend to agree with you.
I think these guys have their fortes. So that being said, you got the best of both worlds. Somewhere along the line, I hope, somewhere down the line I want to find my place somewhere in the middle (laughs). But I like being the middle man right now. Where was my point?

Two new tracks...
The two new tracks, OK. I think one of them, to me, is absolutely stellar. And that would be "World Gone Wild". I think it's on the level of "Higher Place".

I can't wait to hear it.
To me, it's on that level. It's got a real musical and lyrical level of integrity. That's what I'm saying. The other track is definitely more of a party rocker. You know it's kind of, I'm not going to say it's a throw away. But it's definitely a party song. Every record needs to have a good time and it's like a no brainer.
It's a rock and roll song.

Something like "I've got a Reason" maybe.
Yeah, precisely like "I've got a Reason". So you know, it's like put on your jeans, let's have a good time, let's have a party or get a six pack and let's have our friends over and let's dance, kind of thing. Where the other one's a great deal more deeper. That's my view on them.

Fantastic. When are you off on tour again?
It sounds like we're going to be starting in the first week of June, it looks like. They haven't got everything one hundred percent confirmed yet. I'm still waiting for the actual schedule. It looks like something around June, first week of June.

And you've got my other vocal hero out on the road with you opening, John Waite.
Oh, you know, that's another crazy thing. I've had the Baby's Greatest Hits, or is it The Best Of? I think they call it The Best Of. The one with the bronze baby shoes on the cover. I've had it in my glove compartment box for a year before Jon and Neal called me. I used to go and I'd play that all the time. When I was stuck in traffic or something.
So I've always been a fan, I've always loved John's voice. And I've always loved their music. And it's funny how things come full circle. It's silly. It's really crazy. Honestly, I was as big a Babys fan as I was a Journey fan. It's going to be interesting to say the least. To have all these guys on the same stage and the same backstage area.

That's why I'm going to get over and see it. I don't know how I'm going to do it, but I'm going to get over and see the show.
It's going to be a rock and roll circus I assure you (laughs). They've got some great John Waite stories and they always amuse me with them. So I want to make our own stories for 2001. If we don't tell you in person, I'm going to make sure I have a couple of stories for you next year. Or at least after the tour.

That sounds pretty good. That sounds like a date.
Yeah, please make sure you come out first. That would be wonderful. If you come out, you could come see a couple shows.

Well, that's the only problem, you have to sell your third born, or first born to be able to afford the airfare out to the states.
I bet. And that flight's a bitch too.

And it's a shocker. It's not something you can do and just come over for the weekend. It takes a weekend to get there.
I hear that. Well you know what's crazy, it's just the time difference is wacky. That's what really knocks you out.

It is, it is. Like It's Sunday morning here, 9am. And it's the end of summer.
Yeah, and your toilets flush opposite.

Exactly.
When I went to Brazil I found that out, and I thought, that's amazing! Then I wondered, why do I even know this (laughs).

One of those things.
It's scary.

Look, it's been a real joy talking to you. And one of the things I've really picked up on while speaking to you, and I'm really pleased with, is that you're a fan of great music along the way as well.
I've got a young son, he's twelve. And I look at him and I think... wonder where he's going to be in ten, fifteen, twenty years. Where his life and his path will take him. And you can't choose for your children, just like my parents couldn't choose for me. Somewhere along the line, you see something that inspires you or you gravitate towards. And somewhere as a child I gravitated towards music as many of us do, whether as a listener or a performer.
It's such a wonderful part of life that should never be ignored. It's funny that I actually did it one short time, and I promise you I'll never do it again. It shines sun where there's been absolutely none, there's been a void for a long time. Puts a lot of smiles on a lot of faces where there normally wouldn't be. I'm in a kind of feel-good business and I'm glad to be doing it.

Well, you're certainly doing that now for a lot of Journey fans I can tell you that.
Well, I appreciate it. Andrew it's a pleasure to speak to you man, especially after all this time. I enjoy your website very, very much.

I appreciate the comments back. Thank you.
I'm curious, in addition to your website, do you publish a magazine as well? Or is it strictly the website?

No, it's strictly the website.
It's great. Because it's international. It's great to be on board.

Absolute pleasure. And you're helping me out by just doing this interview. Like I said it's great to speak to you finally. I can't wait to get it on line basically and see the reaction.
Cool! Well that makes two of us.

So Johnny, the first question I should be asking you, is what have you spent your time doing with life after Hardline?
Well, me and Joey started an e-commerce company that's going real well.

Really?
In 2000 we're going public

What exactly is the company?
It's a company called FULLe-com. What we do is handle the complete end-to-end transaction for an Internet site. Pretty much the Internet company comes to us and we don't do anything on the front end, we don't build sites or anything like that. We're all back office. We'll handle all the credit card authorizations. We have 327,000 square feet of distribution. We ship the product direct to the consumer. We do all the data storage and online reporting. We run Internet business for about 600 corporations. We started in a little eight by eight office 2 years ago in a little 3 car garage. We have 55 employees just on this coast.
We have offices in New York and Vienna, Austria.

Who else is the 'we' in that?!
My brother Joey and myself run the company. Joey is CEO of the company. My sister is also involved.

You are either incredibly smart cookies or had some fantastic advice or both?
Well you what is funny is that, this business is no different to making and selling a record. You have a story to tell and you go into pre-production. You build the record and promote the shit out of it. You release the record or release the stock and try to support it by working your ass or. The process is very much the same. Joey and I were always the business guys in Hardline. It just comes very easy for us. I attribute a lot of it to timing. The first time in my life I was really in the right place at the right time.

Yeah ok. Now tell me you obviously don't need to make records for a crust anymore but it's good to still see you involved.
Yeah it's in the blood. I gotta do it.
You are right though - financially I don't have to perform or make a record for creating revenue. I still have to do it or I will die internally.

It was a several year gap between the Hardline and the Axel Rudi Pell album.
Yeah it was a bunch of downtime that's for sure. It was out of the frustration of the band life. It's not having control of where you're going. It was the most frustrating part of music for Joey and I. The other thing was the fact that we had to make music to make money. When we were kids making music for fun and creating something was everything. Then all of a sudden you are forcing yourself to pick up a guitar or forcing yourself to write something that someone is going to like. That's when we looked at each and thought this sucks. This whole thing just fucking twisted on us. It's not supposed to work this way. That's when we decided we have to make a move to something we can control and we tinkered around with some things. We owned some rehearsal studios and we had a snowboard clothing company. We tried many things and it was Joey's brainchild to tinker around with this Internet thing. We had no idea what a browser was or what Netscape was. We had no clue. So we shipped product. I don't know if you guys have a 1-800-FLOWERS down there. We ship their orders.

No, but I know what you mean though.
I have 27 distribution clients. It's amazing. We ship anything from candles and food. We ship those infomercial products you see on television. We ship all that shit.

That's fantastic.
Thank you. I was telling a friend of mine today who was asking me how my daughter is. Katie (Caitlin) is 3 and a half. I said who knows I've seen her literally about 3 hours all week. When I come home she has to go to bed. That part of it is not fun. It still beats touring though.

Let me take you back to the start quickly. I've got a couple of question to ask you here. You first got started with Brunette…Why didn't that ever come to fruition? Timing again?
Probably. I think from a songwriter's point of view we weren't there with the music. We were a little dated. Although we were packing them in Hollywood, we were breaking like The Doors records at the Roxy and the Whiskey on the strip. The record companies were just thrilled but they didn't quite get the music. Now I look back I can understand. It wasn't right for that period. We were a little dated. In my opinion I think that group had a serious chance because it was incredibly marketable. We had 17 feet of hair and everybody looked like a brother. It was a good looking band I think. Almost the entire audience was girls and not that I minded that at all. I don't think we brought in a good mix of people.

You need a balance I guess...
Yeah you do need that.

You did record demos for the band and they are quite well traded around the fans these days.
Yeah I've heard of a few bootlegs out there. I actually have some people that check on all these auction sites like E-Bay and see what the hell is going on. I'm finding stuff I never even new we had.

Is it worth thinking about releasing some of that stuff?
I think we'll just leave it alone. Eventually I have a goal to make a disgusting amount of money in this business that I'm in now and then get back to music. I want to get back to my roots to when I was making music just to make music. That to me would be the ultimate life. Stylistically and musically I don't know that I'd go back to that direction. I think I'm looking more to the rock/pop and big ballad kind of sound. Something a bit different to what people are used to me doing.

Hardline was obviously an incredible band. People that visit my site often vote that as a benchmark album to comparing other albums. Do you still get good feedback on the record?
Yeah, absolutely. I know that you are aware of Sons and Angels the JVC group are begging me to come over 2001 and revamp that Hardline stuff. So the Japanese fans of Hardline could witness what that sounds like live.
I may give that a go.

I caught your show in San Francisco back in '93 . It was Mr. Big and the Electric Boys. The band smoked on stage!
That was a great tour. The goal was to try and destroy Mr. Big!! (Johnny said this is good humor folks!!). That was a very good tour for our morale and our ego. Truly you caught me enjoying every gig on that tour. I've had some miserable tours. The one with Extreme in Europe I would rather have been chopped into little pieces and sent home in a bag.

Why's that?
It was one of those tours that didn't sound right. The fans were not our fans. Every night was a battle to win the fans over. I nearly had to pull my pants down to try and get a reaction. It was a bitch.

On this particular show I saw Neal steps aside and Sammy Hagar steps out. The crowd just went wild.
It was so funny I had talked to Sammy and said make sure you know your own lyrics. He said don't worry I got it. He comes out singing all the wrong frigging lyrics and Neal and I just look at each other. This guy he doesn't care (laughs).

I've still got a Dean Castonovo drum stick he pitched into the crowd.
Oh what a drummer he is.

He's a machine.
He is just a mind-blowing musician. He's over with Neal at the moment. They look like they're catching a good wave with this Journey thing. I think the last I heard from Neal was that they are potentially using some of the songs that Neal and I wrote for this record.

What happened with Hardline? Who dropped the ball?
Our AOR Paul Atkinson left the record company. The new guy that came in was Ron Overman. He was a very respected guy but the only one that didn't respect him was Neal. The first meeting we had Neal just went ballistic on this guy verbally and Andrew I'll never forget it I walked out the door and I told our personal manager that's it we're done.
The very next day we were done. So do I blame Neal. Yep I certainly do. Could we have stayed together as a band and re-shopped another deal. Yep. The sad thing about the Hardline deal was and I'm open to admit it once the money was gone the band was gone.
Neal, Dean and Todd had a lifestyle to keep intact. They weren't really willing to dig in the sewers like Joey and I did. It was a shame.

How much money did the album cost to make?
It was half a million.

Damn!!
It was way to much. We had a 12 million dollar record deal. It was one of the biggest record deals for a new band in a very long time in this coast.

Bloody hell...
Bloody hell exactly.

Well you didn't piss it away then obviously?
No Joey and I saved every bloody penny. I know many people that have just lost everything. I knew there was a life span of about 3 years and Joey and I had this pact that if we could eek out a solid 3 years of income by enjoying our music then we are done. We have nothing to be ashamed with. It was time to move on.
Do I miss it though. Yeah.
I'm going to be doing the Bang Your Head Festival in Germany. This is old school rock. You know I want to play but I can't get the hell away from the business right now. So it's a struggle but I hope to open that up.

After Hardline you guys had a second project?
What we tried to do was not to disappoint the fans. We had to music all ready to go for the second album but couldn't' convince anyone to record it. So we started regrouping it.
Joey and I were always the foundation of it anyway. Neal was only going to be a producer in that group. He wasn't going to be a player but he twisted our arms. We turned him down the first time. We didn't want him in the band we just wanted him to produce.
We had a different vision. But anyway we started to have kids, which didn't make us want to sit on a tour bus for a year. Joey actually has 3 kids now. So we tried you know.
I do feel that every one that brought the first record deserved to see us play live or witness a second record at least. I especially feel we ripped off the Japanese market. We sold a shit load of record in Japan and the deserved more music and a live show. Maybe before I check out I may be singing Hot Cherie when I'm 60 but I will do a live show for some of those people.

Axel Rudi Pell e-mailed me and was looking for a new singer and I put him in touch with James Christian who in turn nominated you. How did the approach come?
It was strange. I had some of my guitars advertised for sale and this guy comes over to my house and I have a studio built into my house with all the Hardline posters up and the Billboard charts and this guy is like you're in Hardline. I said yeah I'm the singer of Hardline and it turns out he is a fan. We got to talking and he's become a very good friend of mine and he went back to his house and went to some Hardline page on the internet and put up on the message board that he met me. Axel accessed that Hardline page and e-mailed that guy that brought my guitar and said please forward this message to Johnny. I emailed Axel and we conversed via email for a year. It was old school stuff and I told him I could sing that sort of stuff in my sleep. So I told the family I'm going over there and I'm gonna make the record. He's like a brother.

You've made 2 and a half albums now?
Yeah that's right.

You sound a little different to Hardline.
Yeah. Journalists always say how do you compare guitar players. Neal to Axel. You can't compare. Neal is very polished and his chord knowledge is amazing. This is a more Richie Blackmore sloppy kind of style. I mean that in a good way. I don't have to be selling millions of records. I sing with people I enjoy working with period. I don't have to be top ten in the Billboard. I just want to sing and enjoy people.

I gave both records around the 9 out of 10 mark.
Oh thank you. I'll email you the reviews because I think I said several times that you were singing your ass off.
Oh thanks. This Maquerade Ball record I practically had to squeeze my testicles to get some of those notes. Holy shit.

I was going to say there was some pretty intense singing on this one.
I cut that whole record in 5 days. 4 days for the whole record and on the 5th day I touched up some harmonies.

You must have been busted after that?
Yeah I slept for a frigging week after that. I was fucking beat up. I put myself in the studio and I sing until I'm dead.

I'm really surprised it only took that long.
Yeah well I just don't have that much time these days.

How and where did you record the Sons and Angels record?
That was through Doug Aldrich. The music co-ordinator for the project got in touch with Doug to put them in touch with me. I started off by singing just one tune for there Sonic the Hedgehog project. I met Jun and we got along right away. That project led in to the Nascar Project and then JVC decided to turn it into a record.

So the Sons of Angels have both those songs on it?
Yeah that's right.

So how many vocal tracks are on there?
It's a vocal album with one instrumental song. What the music was written for is those entertainment games. So they are selling it as a band. We didn't write those songs for the public we wrote them for those games.
The unfortunate thing about that record is that I sang it sick as a dog. I was supposed to go to Japan to record and my schedule didn't allow that so they decided to come to me. So we record it here in LA. I got the nastiest sinus infection and sore throat so my range wasn't as great as I wanted it to be. I think it works ok though. I wrote some of the stuff on there too. Just think video game when you are listening to it.

So you guys are still based in LA then?
No, we have offices in New York so we jump back and forth. We are still LA boys.
I'm technically in San Bernardino, which is towards Palm Springs.
What's happening in your neck of the woods? How's the music scene?

It's not bad. Aussie is doing all right at the moment. It's more pop than anything else at the moment. We've got a few great up and coming bands that are going to make an impact at pop radio.
So how about Joey? How is he these days?
Joey is full on business guy and he's got one goal and that is to make this business a public one. That's all he cares about. He only misses one thing - Joey and I started a group called the Jiz Rivets with a Mexican drummer. It is the most hilarious full on punk. Joey often mentions that was the most fun he ever had. Joey's put on about 40 pounds. Oh my god it's funny.

That I would have to see…
I will send you a photo someday!

Thanks Johnny and thanks also for your time, appreciated.
Thanks Andrew…

I am totally floored at the quality of the album.
Really?

Yeah it was above and beyond what I was expecting to hear.
Oh thank you. We're huge rock fans and I gotta tell you there were a lot of ways we could've done this record. The musical climate right now in the U.S and I'm pretty sure around the rest of the world and the thing we were up against when we made this record was to either do what we'd done all along and pay attention to our roots like early Van Halen, Aerosmith, Kiss and AC/DC or we could have gone the other way and totally gone industrial with loops and all different kinds of stuff and make that kind of record.
But you know what we couldn't have done that because we're not that kind of band. We're a real rock band.

I'm so pleased to hear that because several years ago there were a lot of bands making music influenced by the early '80's and the '70's and making records in that vein, but bands today, I don't know who they're influenced by. I wonder what did they grow up on.
I don't know the thing is the band getting everyone's attention right now is Korn and Limp Bizkit. I'd like to say first and foremost above everything else is that I don't want to sit and judge another band and what they do.
Ultimately if it's dance music, county, hip hop or dance music there is a common thread and that is we all want to be successful at what we do and we all want to sell records. I can respect that from any band. On the other hand some of the bands that are coming out and doing what they're doing it's real hard for me to call rock n roll. I say that in the sense those to me and a lot of other people in the world rock n roll means AC/DC. It means Van Halen and it means a band that has guitars, drums and bass. You don't rely on computers and drum machines. They are not human elements of music. They are things that are made from computers. When you listen to our records - that is exactly the way we're are going to sound live.
That what we live by it's all about the rock.

I think that shines through on the album. It's a very raw, live sounding album that has a great production still.
Thanks. The production, well that's no accident that it sounds good because look who produced it....Michael Wagner.

He's a legend isn't he!
Yeah he is. You can imagine what our excitement was when we got to work with that guy. For the people who don't know it's Metallica, Ozzy Osbourne, Megadeth, Skid Row, Extreme and even stuff like Janet Jackson.
What that means is that we've got a guy so good he can work with anyone that's great. That was always to our advantage and we ended up with a really good sounding record.
I'm really proud of it. Michael did a really good job and I can't say enough good things about him. He was super.

I must say that out of all the records that have come out of the States this is one of the best sounding records I've heard in a long time. Honest, good hard rock.
Thank you. I think the next step is we want to go out and tour. I think anyone that tells you there are not rock n roll fans out there are pretty out of touch.

Yeah well judging by the amount of e-mail I get there are plenty of fans out there.
Yeah there are. I wanna come to Australia, London and Japan. We want to go everywhere.

Have you got any release schedule for outside for Europe and Japan?
Believe it or not the whole record was released worldwide April 3rd. It was April 4th in the U.S.

Well great I think it would go down very well in Japan particularly.
Most certainly. We've gotten a really good reaction from Japan. Even Germany actually, they like it. It was funny actually but one of the representatives over there actually phoned and called our record label and told them they thought we were the next Van Halen for them.
It was a huge thrill for us to hear. That band being one of our heroes. You can never depend on that sort of thing, you need to take it with a grain of salt and appreciate it but you don't rest on it you know. We think if someone likes it then god bless them.

This is your first big budget album isn't it?
Most certainly. Definitely.
We were no different to any other band in the world.
We were doing demos and shopping them to record labels. You do it in hope that one of them is going to call you and say we like you we won't to see you about putting out a record. We put out demos all the time and got turned down by every label in U.S, every major label. They all got back to us with the same response about us being too rock n roll.
They wanted us to be the next Bush or Nirvana.
They are good bands but they're not Hair of the Dog. They said you're too much like Aerosmith or Kiss.

How can that be a bad thing with all the millions of records that they sold?
Exactly!
I think that everyone forgot that bands like Bush I bet if you had a look in their record collections they'd all have Toys In The Attic in there.
So what we did was to take what we thought was our best song and it was released on an album sampler that went to every radio station in the U.S and low and behold a month and a half later that song ended up being the most requested song on several playlists across the States.
Record labels were calling our manager going what is this and who is this band. We bent the truth as far as we could without breaking it and that was the song was the lead track off our new record, which they are finishing in production right now and the record will be out in the stores in 3 months.
So we ran to the studio and recorded 3 more songs and took 6 other demos that we already had recorded and mastered it and tried to make it sound like one cohesive record. We put it out ourselves.
When you print a record yourselves you can't print just 10 copies there's a minimum of a 1000 records to print. We printed a 1000 copies of this record and we're like how are we going to get rid of 1000 records?!!
Before we knew it the 1000 were gone. We ordered again and then the next thing you know we've sold 15,000 records. We'd been touring for almost 2 years and whether it was good or bad every record label that had turned us down had a file on Hair of the Dog.
Whether it said good stuff or bad stuff I don't know they all knew who we were. When we came home we did a new record with Michael. So we did the record first and then went and shopped with that.
When it came time to sign we had that liberty that a few different labels wanted to sign us so it turned out great.

So Spitfire bid the hardest?
Well every label wanted to sign us for different reasons.
Spitfire being a new label and everything one would think that we wouldn't want to go with them right away. Then other labels that were a lot bigger that said 'you know what we really like this record but there's 20 of us on staff and only 3 of us really love this record' told us.
We had to think about that. We thought if we sign with someone like that are we going to be in the position that only 3 people who work there are going to work this record. Then you have a label like Spitfire where everyone on the label loves the record. So that's what we did.

Other bands have said they had only one person they liased with within a company who then left soon after.
Yeah well been very happy and very fortunate. Spitfire have been great to us, they are great people and are taking that the album gets out there. The record had only been out a week.

Any feedback yet?
We got a lot of feedback before the record was even released.
The label serviced tones of press and radio stations. I am just extremely happy and the amount of good response we've been getting. I think for every band out there the one that made it, they would have twenty set backs. Up to this point we have had so many great reviews that it scares me.
It makes me think that I'm going to wake up one day and get a package with all the bad stuff in it. We've been really fortunate.
There are people out there that think you can walk on water and then there are people that wish you would drown in it.

I think it's tremendous.
Do you have any favourite songs just for my own interest?

Yeah, it's not my favourite track, but I thought the first track on the album was more contemporary then say the rest of the album.
Yeah that was the first single that's being played on radio over here in America at the moment. Being the title track and the first song on the record I'd be a liar if I didn't say we had that in the back of our minds. On the other hand it's very rock. It's a very simple song only three chords.

I really like Five to Nine...It's an anthem.
That's a song for the working man and the party girl.

The other song I really like is You Are The One.
Yeah that it my favourite one on the record.

I think it's a very nice commercial pop/rock/ballad song.
It's got enough edge on it so it's not just you're average ballad but the sentiment in the vocal is enough to make it a love song.

It's an interesting hybrid between the two and I like that feel.
You know I see big things happening to the band because of that song.
I think that song could be the cross over song for Hair Of The Dog. The rest of the record is aimed at the full on rock n roll fan that doesn't like that kind of stuff.
I think that song can really reach a lot of audiences and help spread the word about us.

The other track I like is the last track, the Kiss cover.
Yeah we're big Kiss fans. The early Kiss days when no other band mattered to me in the whole world besides Kiss. The way they made me feel. I know they made a huge impact in Australia.

Yes...
They were a dangerous band, they were hungry.
They were in it to play rock n roll and get laid, they believed in that.
That's what made them a great rock n roll band in a lot of kid's eyes. The thing about the song that we did was by the time the record came out people really weren't sure if Kiss were still around for that matter.
We thought we would take a great Kiss song off a not so great Kiss album.
We wanted to let people know that we are huge Kiss fans and show them here was something about Kiss that you might not have heard.

Yeah it was an obscure track for sure!
Most bands if you asked them to do a Kiss song they would have down Detroit Rock City or Rock N Roll All Night.
We were like let's do something different and shake it up a bit. How many cover bands do you see in the bars play all the Kiss hits? How many cover bands have you heard of 'I'?!! I think they'll be happy to hear that we did it.

What you did with the middle section of the song was cool.
Yeah. Do you know what those songs are?

There's a couple in there.
Well there's Strutter. Love Gun. I Was Made For Lovin' You.
Long after Kiss the Kiss Army is still going to be around.

Well you could pick up a few of them. You've got the same feel good and fun rock n roll so I hope you can.
I never thought I'd be in anything that got this kind of attention. For example we've already got fans that turn up at our shows with the Hair Of The Dog logo tattooed on their bodies.

Oh no, fantastic.
It got so big that in our newsletter we dedicated a part of it to our fans who have tattoos. It's exciting.

So what are the band up to next, the next six months?
We are on tour forever. We know there are tones of people who still don't know about this band. We are still a new band and this is our first major release so the main thing that the label and the band agreed upon is that the band will tour to promote this record.
We are talking global, not just the U.S.
Anywhere that will have we will come there and do it. If it's rock festivals we'll be there, we just want to get out there and play. We think we can stand out from the rest with our strong work ethic of getting out there and playing.
We care about playing and we enjoy it. Bands that just put out records and never tour I think are missing out on a lot.
Our mission is to have as good a time as possible as often as possible with as many people and especially any cheeky monkeys as possible

What a great attitude!
Can you think of any other reason to be in a band?

Some of these bands take themselves far too seriously.
Oh, I agree with you completely.
We could do a whole other conversation on that.
The thing I never understood it's don't let any band fool you into thinking they are doing you a favor by merely existing. We're the lucky ones, the band is.
The band is fortunate there are music fans that allow us to be heard on the radio. If a band thinks that without there fans they can exist or go out and do what they like to do without treating their fans with respect.
I think that's a real bad attitude to have. I think its terrible when bands start taking their fans for granted or treating them like shit. I believe that 100%.

I think with an attitude like that you guys will go a long way...
Oh thank you. It's not lip service or bullshit. It's just the way the band is. We were all kids who wanted nothing more than to be in a band and make a record. To have a label that gives you money to be able to go out on the road and tour I mean how many people have jobs like that?
The other thing is how many other bands wish they had that going for them. Getting a record deal to me is like getting a gift. It's about getting something that you have to give a lot of respect or you'll lose it.

That's great. It's really refreshing to see a band that's happy and has a great attitude. It's good to hear.
Well I know one day you and the rest of the band will get too meet face to face.

Next time I'm in the States for sure.
Yeah if you're here you are more than welcome to look us up and vice versa.
I just want to say that a lot of music the last 8 years or so has become so depressing and songs about the bad things in life we're always coming out but my theory is wasn't music supposed to be fun.
What happened to the fun element? But anyway we're making our music and we've stuck to our guns, we've still got long hair.
We're not wearing flannel yet. The main thing is we won't people to know if you want to have a good time come and hang out with us. We'll supply the party if you just tell us where to show up.
I think 2000 is going to be a good year for us

I'll do my bit and get the interview on there and hopefully get some more people onto you.
Whatever we can do to help you. This is a huge favor for you to do this.

No worries Ryan…thanks for your time and the call.
Thanks Andrew.