Interviews
Primus and Proper: The Les Claypool Interview
by Felix Thursday
This is the second interview I did with Primus' (and Sausage's and Flying
Frog Brigade's and 
Oysterhead's--and
Blind Illusion's)Les Claypool. The first one isn't on this here website. Someday,
maybe, it might be. But, for now, it isn't. I don't remember exactly when this
interview was conducted--in 2001, I think. If you don't know who Primus is,
then you certainly don't know who Les Claypool is--and I'm not in the mood to
tell you. Les can play the fuck out of a bass. And, for a rock star, he is a
pretty cool guy. Cooler than you, maybe. Maybe not. Maybe you're really cool.
Anyway, here.
Usually I don't like to talk about music-related things, but it's almost
impossible not to with all of the stuff you're doing now. So, if some of these
questions seem kind of cliché, it's just because I need to inform our
readers about what's going on.
Les: Marvelous.
Yeah. Let's start with the Flying Frog Brigade and then move on to Oysterhead.
Is that cool?
Les: Sounds good to me.
People are calling Flying Frog Brigade "Les Claypool's Jam band". I
always equate "Jam band" with bands like Phish. But you're playing with one
of the guys from Phish, aren't you?
Les: I play with Tre (from Phish) in Oysterhead.
How do you feel about the "Jam" moniker being applied to you?
Les. I think it's fine. A little over a year ago if you'd asked me what I thought
of when I thought of a "Jam" band I would have said Phish, Widespread Panic
and bands like that. But it's actually a scene that's growing at an incredible
rate right now. It's quite a vibrant scene. I don't think it's so much about
the style of music you play as it is about the approach. There are many different
types of groups that are hovering around the scene now. You've got me--and the
stuff I play is much more aggressive than Phish or any of those staple Jam bands.
You've got bands like Galactic, that's a straight-up New Orleans funk band.
And they're all being embraced by the scene because it's more about the approach
than it is about the style of music, I think.
It makes me think of when Primus put out The Brown Album--which is the
closest you've ever come to playing straightforward rock. It had this 70's rock
album feel to it. I seems like listeners back then were less-reticent to use
their imaginations or their minds--or their attention spans--for a band. It
wasn't uncommon for a band to throw in drum solos or guitar solos and go off
for a bit from the song--not like today where everything is pre-packaged and
condensed. I sort of consider Jam audiences as the people left who can enjoy
rock music for its own sake, rather than as a product. Is that anywhere close
to what these people are about?
Les: You can't put a moniker on it. It's not a rock thing. There are jazz groups
that are a part of this scene. Like I said, there's a New Orleans funk group.
There's the Disco Biscuits--who've got sort of a rave/trance thing going. You've
got me. Stephen Perkins (drummer of Jane's Addiction) has a band Banyan that
plays around L.A., and when I had him open for us on New Year's people were
freakin' out over them. There like this tribal, aggressive art...art...I don't
know what you'd call it. It's more about just the approach to the music itself--it
being open-ended, it being casual, it being not pre-plotted or pre-planned.
These people want to see musicians go out and take chances, and dance close
to the edge and sometimes even fall off. I think it brings the human element
back to music--which we haven't seen in a while.
That's similar to the early 90's, with what you and other bands like Jane's
Addiction were doing.
Les: It's very much like that. In fact I've said that in interviews. The scene
that I'm involved with now reminds me very much of the early days of Lollapalooza
and the early days of Primus. Whereas in the latter days of Primus, I found
it very frustrating that things were very much about marketing and packaging.
I was very disinterested in the music world, and quite frustrated with it. And
after going to Jazz Fest last year and doing an Oysterhead show, my eyes have
been opened to this whole group of people out there that are looking for something
different. It's coming in like a gigantic, huge wave. It's a huge scene, and
I think you're gonna see more and more of it. With the advent of Pro Tools,
and all the sampled music and whatnot we've had for a long time--it's all great
and wonderful but we've had it for a while now. And, historically, the way trends--whether
it's music, fashion or films--go, you get an abundance of something and then
the backlash is usually the polar opposite. Then you get an abundance of it
for a while, then you get the backlash again. It's like 501 jeans and bell bottoms.
Right now people are wearing giant pants whereas, in the 80's, you'd look like
an idiot. It's just the cycle of things. It's one thing that I think is percolating
under the surface as sort of a rebuttal to all this packaged and well-marketed
pop music that's going on right now. And, at some point, somebody will latch
on to this and then it will become cliché--it's just the nature of things.
Recently I was interviewing Nomeansno, and I was talking to Rob Wright.
You came up in conversation because he was talking about how they always remained
a cottage industry band. If I had to think of a band that was even remotely
like Nomeansno, I'd have to say Primus. I told him that you somehow managed
to attain some commercial viability without really trying, and he commended
you for doing that. Saying, basically, it's pretty brilliant that they can put
out the weirdest albums and people will still go out and buy them.
Les: (Laughs) Well, it's true. I've got platinum records hanging on my wall.
That was never something that we saw on the horizon. I remember having a conversation
with my attorney years ago and he was trying to talk us into selling our publishing
to a publishing company. He said that if we took the deal we'd have to sell
at least 100,000 records for it to ever backlash on you, do you honestly believe
you're gonna sell more than that? And we opted not to take the deal just because
I think it's a dumb thing to do. And we've sold way more than 100,000 records.
I'm equally in surprise that Primus was able to do what it did.
That's what keeps music interesting. Occasionally someone will do exactly what
they want to do and a large contingent will embrace it.
Les: Well, it takes a lot of work. It's a harder road--you have to work your
ass off. We worked our asses off. Not that Nomeansno didn't--they worked extremely
hard. We were just fortunate and made a lot of right moves.
Yeah, which is cool. I have to ask you about the Animals cover CD. Out of all
the Pink Floyd albums, why did you choose Animals?
Les: Well, I've always wanted to play "Pigs". But I've always been in a three-piece
band so I never had the instrumentation. All of a sudden I had two guitars and
a keyboard and we had the ability to do it, so we started learning it. So I
thought,"Hell, let's just learn the whole record. We'll just do two sets and
not have an opening act". Animals was the first Pink Floyd record I ever purchased,
and it's probably my favorite Pink Floyd record. It's funny because for a lot
of people it's either their favorite Floyd album or their least-favorite Floyd
album. There's generally little gray area.
What I thought was interesting, too, is when I was listening to it I
noticed that not only are you pushing your instrumentation but--in order to
do the Roger Waters stuff--you were pushing your vocals in a way that I haven't
heard you do previously. Did you have to spend a lot of time practicing those
notes?
Les: Well, yeah, we had to practice all that stuff. The Roger Waters stuff has
tended to come fairly easily to me--we have a similar nasally whatever the hell
it is. It's the Gilmour stuff that's harder for me--my voice isn't sweet enough
to do the Gilmour stuff.
We'll move on to Oysterhead...how did that come about?
Les: Well, basically, what happened was there's some promoters in New Orleans
called Superfly. And, once a year, for the Jazz Fest, they put together something
called the Super Jam, where they get a hold of a musician and ask them to put
together a jam project for an evening. They called me and the first person I
called was Tre. I knew Tre and I figured he'd be the perfect guy. He said that
he'd always wanted to do a project with me and Stewart Copeland (drummer of
The Police). I knew Stewart from working with him on Anti-Pop, so I called Stewart
up and he was all excited so we did it and it was this huge thing. We sold out
a 3,000 seat theatre in twelve minutes. We saw tickets on e-bay for two grand--it
was just nuts. Francis Ford Coppola was on the side of the stage and Matt Groening
was in the audience--it was nuts, I couldn't believe it. We felt this amazing
chemistry. We got together for three days and wrote seven songs. It just felt
amazing, so we decided to make an album. We're mastering it today.
This is being released on Elektra, right?
Les: Yes.
We were talking about marketing music. What are they trying to get you
to do? Are they just going to let you do what you want, or are they trying to
get you to make the accompanying video and the radio-ready single and all that
stuff?
Les: Well, we have some songs that are pretty radio-friendly.
Really?
Les: Well, what is radio nowadays? It's pretty testosterone-oriented, and this
is not that heavy of a band. It'll be interesting to see. If we decide to make
a video, we'll make a video. I've directed quite a few videos, so that's no
problem. They haven't really heard the material yet so it will be interesting
to what they do wanna do, but I know they're very excited about the potential
of the project.
Yeah, it seems pretty cool. Is this something you're gonna tour behind?
Les: We're doing a brief tour in October. That's the only thing we've got scheduled
at this point.
You've been out in Vermont. What do you do for recreation out there
as opposed to what you'd do here?
Les: Well, being somewhere that you're not familiar with--you have the whole
tourist aspect. I cruise around, look at the countryside--it's a beautiful place.
We're out in the country recording in a two hundred year-old barn.
I know you get asked this all of the time...I know you're a fishing
enthusiast--have you been able to do any fishing?
Les: Well, it's not like my whole world revolves around fishing. I like to fish.
It's salmon season right now--I haven't gone out yet but I'm hoping to.
Are you more of a sea fisherman?
Les: I'll fish anywhere, but I do go out in the ocean quite a bit.
The reason I ask is this: I talked to Merle Haggard, and he's obsessed with
fishing.
Les: He is?
Yeah, and we were thinking about doing a thing for our magazine with you and
Merle Haggard fishing.
Les: Alright, I'll do it. I'll take him out in the ocean.
That would be rad. We'll try to hook it up.
Les: Is he local?
He lives in Redding, so it's kind of a trip. But not too much of a trip.
He's kind of a trip.
Les: Yeah, I'll drag him out in the ocean.
Really?
Les: Sure
If we could set that up, that'd be awesome.
finis.
The rest of this interview is none of your beeswax! You're not missing anything,
though. Sadly, the Merle Haggard/Les Claypool fishing trip never materialized.
Merle doesn't know who Les is (or so he says), and Merle don't like ocean fishin'.
But isn't Les cool for wanting to, at least? Speaking of never materializing...this
interview was never printed, for which I must apologize to Mr. Claypool. Better
late than never, I reckon. As far as Oysterhead...I don't know what happened
with that. It did pretty well, I think. Primus put out another album since this
interview. Les Claypool is still the best bass player in the world--okay, except
for Jaco Pistorius. Oh yeah, and Steve Harris. So, Les is still the 3rd best
bass player in the world--which is pretty good. I'm the 4,561st best bass player
in the world. I always play with a pick, though--which, I guess, makes me the
7,931st best bass player in the world. Primus sucks!
