**1. How did you first become interested in music and being a part of bands?**
Keith: Guess ever since I was young. I just wanted to listen to it, move people. I wanted to do it, and thought I could.

**2. Is there any particular album or artist that you’ve heard and were like, “this is the shit I want to do?”**
Keith: Led Zeppelin. All the Livelong Day. No doubt about it.

**3. What was the first album that you bought?**
Keith: First record I bought... was probably Kiss Alive I. That was a double album, so I really had to save for that.

**4. What was your first instrument?**
Keith: The first one was guitar. An upside down guitar cause I’m left-handed. Most guitars are issued right-handed, so that’s what I started out on. I play it in standard form now. Caught on to the fact that I was doing it wrong and got one switched over to lefty. The best place to find them now is e-Bay. Music stores advertise what they have on e-Bay; it’s not just private owners, pretty much anybody, and that’s the biggest selection. That’s where I’ve sold some and bought some. Around here, that is the only place.

**5.Who or what has really influenced you musically over the years?**
Keith: Um, musically, certainly people like Jimmy Page, Stevie Ray Vaughn, definitely. B.B. King. You can never forget B.B. King.

**6.What for you, has been the most important or valuable thing you’ve learned from your music?**
Keith: Staying humble. Very important; staying humble.

**7. How did you end up getting involved with The Grinders and the Thunder Gods?**
Keith: Cause the guy before me was hard to work with. He was an asshole, and I wasn’t. No, actually, the Grinders came apart- came about rather- cause it was Todd and another guy, Doug, trying to get a new drummer. Doug ultimately just quit. Todd had some songs and worked with the new drummer; they got a guitar player and bass player and they were the Grinders for about ten shows. Ultimately over time, that guitar player proved too hard to work with. At that time I was not in a band, and I went to Todd- just by chance- and said, “What do you have going on?”. It just so happened right at that week, they had ditched this guitar player. So that’s how I did it. Todd’s the only original member, and I’m the longest standing member behind him.

**8. Did you play on the Thunder Gods track that is featured on the Garage Pop Rock and Roll Compilation?**

Keith: Yes I did. It was an accident. That was, they went to record these songs, like 3 or 4 songs- one of them was for the comp CD. Deryk was in the band at the time, and Deryk didn’t show up. Pat and Rob called me, woke me up and said “Would you come down and play these songs?” So I went down there, they showed me how it went, and we went for it. That was before Deryk left the band. I don’t know what happened to him, I think he overslept.

9.**There was an article back in October, a crap article, just going on about how the music here is retro. I feel that the bands are drawing on the music where they get their influence from; isn’t that how it evolves?**

Keith: The guy’s a moron. Everybody steals from everybody. If there’s something valuable, why not adopt it? Bring it up to a current place. But the description of being retro is vague. All music is because of some other kind of music. As it should be. We’re just ripping people off along the way and trying to interpret it and create something different.

**10. Who would you consider to be the greatest band or musician of all time?**
Keith: Stones. Longest surviving Rock and Roll band ever. Who knows how many- I can’t even count how many records. The Stones. Basic, fundamental Rock and Roll. Nothing dramatic, no interpersonal soul searching, just cars, drugs, girls and goofing off. They’ve been able to maintain that part of themselves that was 15 years old into their mid 50’s. It’s pretty clever. No band has gotten more mileage by just playing Rock and Roll. You know what I’m saying? It’s pretty incredible that they would be able to do that. I love the Stones.

**11. Any advice for someone who wants to be in a band?**
Keith: Just do it. Just find some people and do it. They don’t even have to be competent. Thunder Gods weren’t competent- I saw some of their earlier videos- but they didn’t care. They said, ‘This is what we want to do, and we’re doing it. We’ll get good along the way, we’re not fucking worried about it right now.’ And I don’t blame them. There’s a whole list of other things that factor in beyond the ability to just mechanically play. Working with other people is as important as being able to play. You can take a guy who’s super-talented, but he’s an asshole- he’ll never play with anybody. But you take a guy with mediocre talent, who has his personality traits where he can work with people, and he’ll be in any band that floats by. My advice to anybody playing- get with a group of people and just start playing. It really is that easy. It’s not that hard. It’s intimidating at first I bet, but fuck it. What isn’t?

**12. Is there any one show, one whatever just playing that’s been a high point for you?**
Keith: I guess there’s three. One was with the Quitters at a Garage Pop- I got to play a set with them. I love the Quitters, I respect the Quitters; they’re super-talented guys and they rock, and they asked me to play with them. It went well, which was a big plus. That was pretty important to me. Another one was the first time I got to play with the Thunder Gods as a Thunder God. When I got to play with them at the Garage-Pop before this last one, that was pretty cool, cause they’re guys I love, and they asked me to be part of this band and to do it. We did it, and it went well. But one of the wildest shows had to be the Grinders at RED. Performance wise, it was probably the worst show we ever had but as far as a how goes, was my favourite by far. Everything went wrong that could’ve gone wrong, we were standing in 1/8 inch of beer... Todd ended up at some point taking his pants off, and swinging his cock around; it was mayhem. We went on last after a band called Bitter Flesh Thing. It was like 1:30 in the morning, and the guy from Bitter Flesh Thing had closed his set with “I’d hate to be the band that follows us.” So I told that to Todd, just to get him psyched up, and he flipped the fuck out. He went crazy. The place was packed with people and it was just madness. Stuff was getting broken, things were getting smashed, it was the most fun I’ve ever had by far. That is definitely the most memorable. That show proved to me that even if a show’s going in a tailspin, you’re obligated to pull it off. So that’s what we did. It was a mess. Everything stunk like beer for weeks. It was fucking crazy.

**13. I don’t really know how to pose this as a question, but is there like a- when you play with people for so long, whether it be in a band or just sitting in- is there a familiarity to it? Does it work for you more than not at times?**
Keith: What, there’s an instinctive quality that takes place between the two people? Sure. What I’m getting from what you’re trying to ask is does that instinctive communication between, in this case, Todd and I, is it an advantage? Does that work not only playing live on stage, but between the two of us. No question that it does. What it provides you with, particularly in a live situation, is an ability to anticipate what the other person’s about to do, or what could possibly go wrong; and you mentally, not even conscientiously prepare for that. If there’s a part where he kinda messes things up in a certain way, you may face him deliberately so he can reference to your hands about what’s gonna come next. Even though there may be four members in a band, it may not happen between all 4 members. Usually when it happens, it’s between two. Cause four people trying to steer the thing is a cluster-fuck. It doesn’t have it; the thing’ll sink like the Titanic.

**14. How old were you when you really started playing?**
Keith: The first time I started playing was probably around 11-14. Twelve maybe, but I didn’t take anything seriously because I was just goofing around. That’s what I always did till I was in my mid-twenties, pretty much. Then played to be in a band. Started out playing acoustic, doing acoustic shows here [Java's] when they had poetry nite and shit. And that was a big advantage playing live acoustic, cause that’s as honest as you can get. There’s not distortion, there’s not racket. You have to know what you’re doing pretty much or it’s going to show. That helped me, cause after that I had no issue with nervousness with playing live after.