RockNet Interviews Greg K

To be honest with you, the first time I saw the band was on MTV and I totally didn't get them, here it is a few years later and I'm really a die-hard supporter of the band so much I find myself closing in on owning all their old CD's as well as the new "Ixnay On The Hombre," the one that broke it wide open for me! I saw the band just blow-away a sold out crowd in Philadelphia a few days before this interview took place. RockNet caught up with Offspring bassist, Greg K., so go ahead, relax, you know what that means, glass of wine, your favorite easy chair, and this great interview with the Offspring! Go on, indulge yourself, kick off your shoes, put your feet up, lean back and just enjoy the dialogue... after all, music soothes even the savage beast!

ROCKNET: So now three years since Smash, how much of that was litigation with your last record label?

GREG K: We were planning on taking some time off anyway I don’t know really how much that pushed it back. It probably pushed it back another six months of what we were shooting for. We were shooting for maybe the summer and then some other things, we had to find a new producer which put it back a little bit, and I broke my arm which put it back a little bit more. Things just kind of ended up coming up later than we wanted, way longer than what we wanted between albums.

ROCKNET: So what was the main reason for the split with the last label (Epitaph)? Was it creativity or money?

GREG K: Well it wasn’t money at all because we ended up taking less to go to Columbia than we would have gotten on Epitaph. It was more like a personality, there were a lot of things going on and we just ended up not being able to work with them. We negotiated for a year and couldn’t work anything out and eventually it was best for us to leave.

ROCKNET: I read somewhere that someone said the new album is more commercial for you guys but I listened to your last album "Smash" and I feel the sound is the same, it’s just that the production is a lot slicker. Is it safe to say?

GREG K: Yeah, I don’t think we did anything really different going into this album. We didn't try to write any hits or anything like that because when you do it, it kind of fails. We took a little more time, that might be why the production might sound slicker. "Smash" was rushed within maybe three weeks and this one we took a couple of months just to make sure everything was right.

ROCKNET: So now Dave Jordan produced it, what differently did he do that Tom Wilson didn’t do?

GREG K: Their approaches were actually pretty similar I think. Dave was a little more hands off but that was because we knew what we were doing more. Whereas with Tom, when we first started he had to teach us a lot of things and by the time we did this album I think we were really ready when we got into the studio. So, Dave just sort of sat back and let us do our thing and just brought everything together.

ROCKNET: Where did you guys record, how long did it take and all that good stuff?

GREG K: We recorded at El Dorado Studios which is in Hollywood. The actual recording of it took maybe about a month and we spent a lot of time going over and doing some overdubs. We went to Europe in the middle of it so that pushed it back. We started in July and finally finished it maybe the end of September.

ROCKNET: Are you guys from L.A.?

GREG K: Yeah, were from Orange County, south of L.A.

ROCKNET: There is a great deal of questionable language on the album. Did that just happen that way?

GREG K: Yeah, I think so. I thinks Dexter (Holland) writes the lyrics and I don’t think he really... whatever words come out I think they are everyday words. I don’t think he intentionally tries to shock people and I don’t know if you really can.

ROCKNET: Do you guys just figure they will radio edit it?

GREG K: Well most of the ones aren’t going to be radio songs anyway but the one "I Choose" I guess is going to be one of the next singles and there are a couple "fucks" in there that they are gonna try to cut out. The first couple we’ve heard, they just had it muted and it didn’t sound good so we are still trying to figure out a way on that one.

ROCKNET: I think there is only one song without cursing in the whole album.

GREG K: Oh, really? Well, alright!

ROCKNET: Do you guys think at all about radio when you are creating a song?

GREG K: Before this album we never did because we thought there wasn’t a chance being on the radio but for this one we tried to really... I think we thought some songs were going to be on the radio but we just try not to think about that. If we try to create a radio hit it is going to sound like it.

ROCKNET: Tell me about the "Disclaimer" and "Intermission," are they just keeping with the time honored tradition of "Time To Relax" from "Smash"?

GREG K: Well the "Disclaimer" was something that we wrote to kind of make fun. It’s like a sarcastic poke at the fact that everybody is sue happy and we had Jello Biafra from the Dead Kennedys come in and do that and which we thought was great. "Intermission" was just something to try to break up the album and that was the "Time To Relax" guy so that was along the same set of lines as them.

ROCKNET: Can you explain what Ixnay On The Hombre means?

GREG K: Well Ixnay is pig Latin for nix, and down with, and Hombre obviously man. So like down with the man.

ROCKNET: The third track "Mota" what does that mean?

GREG K: Mota is like a Mexican slang word for marijuana.

ROCKNET: That’s a cool song. I laughed my ass off and I had to read the lyrics and then I laughed more.

GREG K: Cool!

ROCKNET: You guys are pretty much a faceless band, why no pictures on this album or the album before?

GREG K: We like to keep the focus on the music more and I think it also helps in our private lives so we can go home and have like a normal life.

ROCKNET: Larry Bud Melman (Calvert Deforest), tell me how that came about?

GREG K: We actually brought him in to do something else. Another thing that’s on the vinyl, it’s not on the CD. It was a little thing about how to make a Molatov cocktail, we thought he would be a cool guy to do. He was always like from David Letterman and stuff and we called him up and he was into doing it. He came in and he started saying a bunch of things the heavy metal thing he started spouting off stuff.

ROCKNET: So now you have albums before "Smash" right?

GREG K: Yeah two albums before that.

ROCKNET: Are they readily available to people?

GREG K: Yeah, I think so. The "Ignition" was on Epitaph and that is usually still in the stores. The first one we re-released about a year and a half ago. It was self titled album. I think you can still find it, like most people still carry it.

ROCKNET: So now looking back over your catalog are you satisfied? Would you recommend all your albums still?

GREG K: I guess. I think they are all pretty similar. I think maybe we just got more refined as the years went on so if you buy the first one I don’t think you are going to be... not like a total shock or something that was totally different back then.

ROCKNET: So now "Smash" sold like eight million copies?

GREG K: Yeah about that.

ROCKNET: Does that mean anything less for this, would be a disappointment for you guys?

GREG K: Yea, well that’s the thing like it could do great and still end up being half of what "Smash" did.

ROCKNET: "Ixnay On The Hombre," did over a million, a lot of people would kill for that.

GREG K: That’s the thing, it's like you hit a point and it's like it makes everything else seem like a failure. So were not really looking at it that way we know that that was just kind of a fluke and we were real lucky with that.

ROCKNET: I don’t think it was a fluke.

GREG K: Not a fluke but we were real fortunate with that one.

ROCKNET: Off the last album "Come Out And Play," how long did you guys play with that little riff before you put it to a song?

GREG K: That was actually the last song that was done and it almost didn’t make the album because it was really kind of thrown together. We had everything all done. We didn’t even demo that one, we just kind of needed another song for the album. So it was kind of a last minute thing.

ROCKNET: So now "Gone Away" was the first video?

GREG K: No, the second video. "All I Want" was the first one. "All I Want" went pretty fast, it was more like a punk song that a lot of people didn’t pick up on so it broke pretty quick and everybody pretty much jumped onto "Gone Away."

ROCKNET: So are you guys going to do more videos?

GREG K: We don’t really know what to do. We are still debating between "The Meaning Of Life" and "I Choose." We’ll do that probably within the next month, one or the other. We got another week of this tour and then we go home, then figure out what were going to do next.

ROCKNET: So you guys did a mini tour, went to Europe and now you're gonna tour again. Are you going to go back out again on something else?

GREG K: Yea we’re pretty steady for the rest of the year. We usually go like a month on, two weeks off type of thing. So our next thing we do some California dates and then we’re going to Canada, South America and then Asia towards the end of the year.

ROCKNET: So I read in Kerrange, last tour or last time out and Dexter pushed some ceiling thing through and almost chopped his head off . Is that true?

GREG K: No, I don’t think it was that close. We were playing in this little club and they have fans in the ceiling and he kind of pushed one of those panels up and there just happened to be a rotor fan in there. I don’t think it was like really like he was decapitated or anything.

ROCKNET: I was outside after the show and was pretty impressed that Dexter signed like 150 autographs and made sure everybody got one. I was really impressed. It was nice to see man.

GREG K: Yea, well those are the people who are coming to buy the album.

ROCKNET: So what do you guys foresee for the bands future?

GREG K: We’re just gonna ride out the tours for the rest of this year and then figure out where to go from there. Hopefully the next album will be a little quicker. We will definitely have another album probably some time maybe by the end of next year.

ROCKNET: Do you guys hand pick your own opening acts?

GREG K: Yeah.

ROCKNET: So you guys picked L-7, and I missed AFI.

GREG K: They are a really energetic hard band from Berkeley.

ROCKNET: So in closing is there something you would like to say to our readers and to your fans?

GREG K: Nothing I can really think of. Just have fun.

By Alex Eichter, from RockNet