Interview

Interview With Mongrel Guitarist Adam Savage on Music, Recording, and Opening for The Misfits

If punk, metal, and rock had an orgy, Mongrel would be the bastard love child. A fusion of edgy and raging guitar, anthem-like vocals with heavy drums, Mongrel is an example of cross-genre at its best. Based out of New Hampshire, high-energy Mongrel has gained quite a reputation, building a fan base from the US to Australia, gaining radio play, touring non-stop and opening for acts like The Misfits, Otep, The Exploited, and All That Remains. Their album, “Fear, Lies, and Propaganda” was picked up earlier this year by Screaming Ferret Wreckords for re-release. I caught up with Adam Savage, guitar, and talked about Mongrel’s beginnings, playing cross-genre music, and playing live. Be on the look out for these guys, they are onto something.

The Harpy: So how did Mongrel come to be? Who asked who to the dance?

Adam: it was a cold, dark stormy night.... (laughs) I disbanded my prior band in the summer of 2003 and what was going to be a side project for myself and our original singer, Matt Rowe, suddenly became a primary project. He was no longer in his band, so we started the band with the intent of mixing up different styles and he suggested the name Mongrel. It just really captured what we were going for so well. We found a rhythm section, which didn't last too long, and started playing out within a month or so. By spring of '04 we'd already replaced the rhythm section and Rowe stepped down to pursue other things outside of music. He wanted me to keep the name going. We ended up going through another rhythm section or two and another singer before we got Drew (Barker) our singer, and Rev (our bassist) on board over the course of 2005. Our drummer Ed joined up with us in 2007 replacing Andre who was our drummer for a year and a half. He recorded our album with us during his stint.

The Harpy: Becoming the group you are now, what was the hardest thing to deal with?

Adam: A couple of things - one being getting the right people in place and keeping them there cause, as I’m sure you know, every time you replace a band member it sets you back -having to re-teach people songs and getting the group to gel again. The second would be that since we don't play a "mainstream" style, it’s sometimes tough to find bands that it makes sense to play with or to get the instant audience you get a bit easier when you play a more defined or more "acceptable" style.

The Harpy: But the bands you have played with are pretty kick ass. The Misfits, GWAR, Piggy D’s Evacuation Plan, and All That Remains. Do you think playing with groups like that has helped with that cross over?

Adam: oh absolutely! We’ve definitely had some amazing shows with some bands we really admire and are fans of (such as the Misfits) and we always do really well when we play them with. Actually our 5th show with them is coming up in October. But if you think about it, the Misfits have that kind of cross appeal to punk fans, metal fans, etc. We also had a great response from Otep fans, Prong fans, and even fans of The Exploited.

The Harpy: Which you can definitely hear in your music – the cross appeal

Adam: I meant more that we see bands that play stuff that sounds much more like any other song you'd hear on mainstream radio and they're kind of just accepted by your general rock club music fan. We have to target it a bit more to the non-mainstream fans. Fans of bands like The Misfits, Marilyn Manson, Scars on Broadway/System of a Down, Slipknot, The Offspring - bands like that have that cross section of fans at their shows - people who dig that kind of stuff usually really like us and "get" what we're doing. It’s the purist metal fans or purist punk fans, where if it’s not from Norway or it’s not punk if it doesn't sound like punk did when Sid Vicious was still alive - those people hate us.

The Harpy: When you first released your album, did you do it on your own? It was just re-released this year on label, yes?

Adam: Yep. We put out the album on our own, fully self-financed, in July 2006. Last fall, Tim Koukos from Screaming Ferret Wreckords approached me about re-releasing the album on his label and licensed through Locomotive Records, so the re-release came out in April 2008. We changed up some of the artwork and went into the studio and recorded our usual set closer - a cover of “Coma America" by Amen as a bonus track for the re-release.

The Harpy: What was that like, seeing the baby go into a labels hands, apprehension or jubilation?

Adam: Much more jubilation. I've known Tim for 7 or so years now, since back in my old band and we've always been friendly and got along great, so it was definitely a situation where I knew that the label would never intentionally screw us – which I’m sure, is a bit of a rarity in the music industry. At the point we started talking about having the label do the re-release; we'd been pushing the album on our own and had done what we could with it at that point. We were really excited to see what more could be done with a bit more backing and a label behind it. But yeah, teaming up with Screaming Ferret Wreckords and Locomotive Records has definitely been a positive thing for us. We certainly haven’t stopped doing our own work either which I think has been key.

The Harpy: What was writing the album like? Was it a collaborative process or is it primarily one or two of you that write?

Adam: I’m the primary song writer in the band and there were songs on the album that existed before any of the other guys were even in the band, but they all brought their own thing to the table as they joined and made the songs their own in the process. Typically I’ll write a song on my own, most of the time on an acoustic guitar actually, and bring it in to practice. We’ll jam on it, figure out if it needs a bridge/solo/etc and figure out the arrangement stuff as a group but I do about 95% of the basic song writing.

The Harpy: What is your favorite song to play live?

Adam: Over all, I’d have to say our Amen cover of “Coma America” - there's just something about it when we play that song that we just go off on it. That’s also when most of our injuries occur. Of our own songs... there's a few – “No Gods No Masters” cause its great to see the kids singing along and going off to it. Hearing people sing "Bound to Crash" along with us is awesome."The World Loves a Tragedy" is a lot of fun live... it really all depends on the energy of the crowd and what they get into on a given night.

The Harpy: Your Top Five Albums of All Time.... go!

Adam: Pearl Jam - "Ten"
Guns n' Roses - "Appetite for Destruction"
Slipknot - self-title
The Doors - "Live in Concert"
Minor Threat - complete discography
NWA – "Straight Outta Compton"
NIN – "Pretty Hate Machine"/"Downward Spiral"
Marilyn Manson - "Antichrist Superstar"
Public Enemy – "Nation of Millions"
AMEN - self-titled

More than five, I know.

The Harpy: What's next for y'all?

Adam: Well, currently we're finishing writing the last couple of tracks for the next album which will hopefully be coming out next spring/summer. "Fear, Lies, & Propaganda" will be getting released in Europe in 2009. We're hoping to do some touring in the UK and Germany to support it. We're just trying to push things as hard as we can for now so that when the next album comes out we can do some more extensive touring both in the States and overseas.