In the process of preparing for this interview with Henry Rollins, legendary rocker, writer, raconteur and general alternative dynamo, I took a straw poll from a couple of friends to see what I should ask him. The responses were either massively positive, or filled with enough venom to make you believe that he’d killed someone’s mother and done the lambada with the corpse. I got two people wanting me to ask him whether he’d marry them (email contacts are available if interested), and someone else wanting me to ask him why the Black Flag albums he sang on suck so much.
Suffice to say that I didn’t take the suck option. But what’s interesting is the response that the man generates. He polarises individuals. Though you might like or dislike the man, it’s very difficult to not pay attention to Rollins. What’s unexpected, though, is that his demeanour – particularly with the last journo on the day’s interview trail – is one of the most positive and helpful that you’ll encounter.
Rollins has visited Australia roughly 26 times in his career, and while that’s a number that dazzles in comparison to other artists, for him it’s nothing particularly special. It turns out that we’re not more visited than anywhere else on the Rollins itinerary, no matter what the tourism departments might wish.
“I visit Germany probably twice that,” says Henry, before explaining why he journeys this way regularly. “There’s a few reasons I go to Australia so often.
“A: people offer me gigs. That’s what I do.
B: I love Australia – it’s no bad place to be.
“The fact that there’s work for me there doesn’t hurt. I do shows. If you gave me 50 shows to do, I’d like that. If you gave me a hundred, I’d like it twice as much. I just finished 119 shows, and I wish it was 219! The fact that I’m there every other year or so is [so I can] come back and do shows. I’m very grateful.”
Current affairs, politics and the state of the world being grist for the Rollins mill, I decided it was worth seeing what sort of coverage the Cronulla riots had received in the US. Rollins has spoken very positively about Australia previously, and I wondered if the footage he’d seen had sullied his view.
No chance.
“I think that I still would speak positively about Australia,” says Henry. “If you have a situation where there’s people and electricity, you’re gonna have a handful of knuckleheads saying stupid shit. England’s got it – you know, everywhere has it. Why would Australia get to be let off? I easily came to the conclusion, as I’m sure that every other American did, that those knuckleheads do not speak for Australia. It’s one busload of shitheads and we all know that. So I didn’t think any worse of Australia. It was ‘Yeah, well everyone’s got ‘em, and here they are!’ It’s just too bad. Hopefully, maybe somewhere in their lives, they get turned around to where they look back at what they did and think ‘Man, what was I thinking? How stupid!’ But don’t hold your breath.
“But as far as me going ‘Australia sucks now!’ – nah. It’s just a human thing. And you know, there’s always people that you can talk into doing that stupid shit, and it’s usually a male, a white male, needing somewhere to go with all of that frustration. And all it takes is for one guy to go
”’Hey, did you like that black guy looking at your girlfriend?’
‘Fuck no!’
‘Well, yeah, I wouldn’t like it either – what if he put his hands on her?’
‘I’d kick his ass!’
‘Well, let’s go kick some ass now!’
“and that, in America, is how White Power kids write me. They’re ‘Well, how come you’re not into White Power?’ and I’m like ‘Huh?’ – it’s like being asked if I’m into raping children. It’s like the weirdest question. These kids, they’ve been brainwashed, and they have these ridiculous trains of thought. They write and go ‘Well, the alphabet is the same in the ghetto as in a nice neighbourhood, so why can’t these monkeys learn spelling like I did?’ and I’m like ‘Oh no! Who got to this guy?’ That’s really hard to undo. And someone who would say this to a young person and inculcate them to this way of thinking – whew! What an agenda. They must wake up every day thinking ‘Hey, this is what I’ve got to do…’ It’s insane!”
I suggest that the average dayplanner would have entries about getting in a round of youth perversion, followed by a purchase of cat litter. It’s a theme Henry warms to.
“Yeah – ’...and then I’ve got lunch with friends, then the in-laws are coming, and I gotta burn some crosses…’ It is quite incredible.”
The performer recently played the Download Festival at Donington. Given his time in Black Flag and The Rollins Band, you’d imagine that rubbing shoulders with Black Sabbath, Slayer, Helmet and Mastodon wouldn’t really phase the performer. Only this time there was a catch: he’d be going onstage without the benefit of a band, and it’d be the first time he’d played a spoken word gig in front of as many people. It was a gig that was not lightly accepted.
“With much trepidation,” adds Henry.” My agent kept saying ‘You can do this!’ Man, it was a lot of money they threw at me. I don’t mind a paycheque. But I went ‘Nah, can’t do it.’ So my manager called and went ‘Are you crazy?!’ because, you know, it’s his 15%. He’d send me to the wolves for 15% of whatever he’d get for me getting chewed up by wolves. I said ‘I don’t want beer cans tossed at my head by angry guys who’re still high from the Slayer concert hours before! They’ll hand me my head!’ And the European agent I’ve had since Black Flag said ‘Actually, no, it’ll be great – trust me!’ so I said ‘OK, Paul, I do trust you. If you think it’ll be cool, I’ll do it, and I’ll be this hilarious guinea pig and you’ll pay for the stitches, because I’m surely going to get my ass kicked.’
“And it was about 3000 people, it was one of the most incredible audiences I’ve ever been in front of. Polite, rapt attention, with me all the way. If I had an audience like that every night, I’d never come home. And Paul said ‘I told you!’ and I said ‘You didn’t know! You just sent me out because of the pay!’
“I forget what we said, but he thought we should do it again and I don’t usually say no to gigs. And so when the Big Day Out people came calling – and I wasn’t their first choice, some band dropped out and they asked me to come in and sub – I went OK, wow – here’s five or six of these shows where I’m going to get my head taken off.”
The anticipation for the upcoming Australian gigs has wreaked havoc with Rollins’ holiday time, however.
“It’s kind of ruined – I have a few days off in the coming week where I don’t have anything to do, and those days of relative calm are shattered by anticipation of the shows.”
Of course, heading onstage when you’re armed with just a notebook, some ideas and a microphone is a lot harder than hitting the boards with a well-oiled musical machine at your back.
“The talking shows are way harder,” reveals Henry. “The band things are easy – you’re part of a group, if you make a mistake, no-one hears it, you know. You’ve got all these dBs onstage – it’s an assault. You’re part of this frontline of warriors going ‘Raagh!’ you know? You’re part of the horde.
“When you’re on your own, you know one guy can ruin a talking show, if there’s one guy who fucks with you all night. Because I don’t have like a set rap, I can’t just drown the guy out. If you yell at me, I only wish I could not hear you. Unfortunately, my ears will hear, my brain will process what you’ve said, and I will have to take time and devote, you know, RAM and hard drive energy to process what you said to me while still trying to stay on point. You know, you try it – it sucks.
“So the short version of it is that you’re pretty vulnerable onstage to anyone that wants to have a go. And so, you know, you have to trust, trust a bunch of people you don’t know. At one of my own shows I don’t really fear it, because if some guy’s gonna yell at me, the people sitting next to him will say ‘You better shut up.’ At a rock gig, I don’t know. But I’m happy and honoured to be part of it, and I really don’t know how it’s going to go.”
I ask Henry if he’s concerned that the 3000-odd people that saw him at Donington will seem slightly small compared to the fifty-odd thousand punters that’ll be present at some Big Days Out.
“I don’t know how many people are gonna care about me. I don’t think I’m on any main stage or anything. I’m kinda shunted off to the side, which is a good thing.”
Off by the concession stands, perhaps?
“That’s probably where I belong. I’m happy to do a show. This is what I do. But the fact that I get to be on the Big Day Out is fun. I asked to be on the Big Day Out many, many times, and I was always told no. And I asked why, and was told – by several people, actually – that the people who do Big Day Out don’t like me. I don’t know why, what it is about me. I’m sure there’s plenty not polite. But I was told that by a few people, ‘Yeah, they don’t like you!’ So I don’t know what I’ve done. I’m sure it’s something! For the last two weeks, I’m wondering why I’ve been asked to do this. So they can see what’ll happen to me? I dunno man.”
I suggest to Henry that he’s a test subject, perhaps. A new chapter in his multiple careers?
“Yeah! I’m the guinea-pig. But you know, I’m happy to do it. I’m always happy to do a show, and I’m always happy to be going back to Australia.”
Spoken word, of course, is one of Rollins’ key areas of involvement at the moment. He’s released more spoken word albums than music over the past couple of years, and that – coupled with his TV show and his ever-expanding range of literary titles – means that music’s not exactly what he’s focusing on at the moment. Is this the case?
“Yeah, for a few different reasons. One, I’ve done a lot of music. There’s not a lot you can tell me about making a record, or touring or writing a song. I enjoy doing it, but there’s nothing new about it. I’ve sailed the seven seas on that one for many years. And so, I come back from band tours now going ‘OK, that was really cool, but I didn’t learn anything.’
“The writing is constantly challenging. As much time as you want to put into it, the writing, like the Gobi desert, will suck it up like water. As you’d know – you write and know that 20 hours is good, and 40 is better, to get one paragraph to work. So that is always a challenge to me, that gets more interesting as I get better at it, as you know more of what you’re going after. That’s a challenge.
“Talking shows never cease to be challenging, as it’s like trying to hold on to the eel – it never wants to sit still. Events change, and it’s always like a tightrope walk, as there’s no 4/4 beat behind you. On band tours, the song is the song is the song, unless you’re The Grateful Dead or Miles Davis in 1973 and are improv-ing every night. We just kinda do the songs. And they become part of the ritual, like food and sex, which is fun, but it’s just a ritual. The TV show is completely challenging, because I’m not a TV guy, and I’m trying to make it interesting.
“Also, I’m 44. It’d be hard for me to convince a 22-year-old to watch a 44-year-old guy onstage. Also, people my age do not go to gigs any more. They’ve got children swinging off their ears. And so, I’m in this weird place where I’m not done with music, but I’m pretty sure that music is done with me. And that is unenviable. But that’s part of it.
“Even if you’re Mick Jagger – who I love – he still has to go out and do Brown Sugar, Satisfaction and all that other stuff every night or else people go ‘What the fuck, dude?’ Ozzy has the same problem. And I don’t wanna. So does Iggy and the Stooges. And shit, if I wrote 1969 I’d go sing it every night! Same thing if I wrote Satisfaction, but I didn’t. And so I don’t want to do that stuff and kind of put on the dog and funny suit to keep people coming to the show.
“It’s tough out there for touring bands these days. I mean, you can go out there and sell a lot of records and no-one will come to the show. I’m working on a record now, but it’s very slow. It’s not front-burner priority like when I was 25, and touring with a band was all I was going to do for 18 months, and you’re living on the practice room floor. And I quite like living like that, but I’m a big adult now and I have all other kinds of bullshit in my life.”
So has age and changing responsibilities actually made a difference in that regard? The answer seems to be, unequivocally, yes. Also, it appears that Rollins, a man of seemingly boundless energy – just look at his itinerary for any given year – is certainly at a place where he’s having to prioritise more than ever before.
“Well, I still feel the passion for it, but will anyone give it to me? If you’re really going to take eight or 10 months of the year to make a record and get it over the wall and get it on the road, it really is a year of your life. So you really have to go ‘OK, I know what it takes to do this and you can’t tell me otherwise. I really know what it takes. Do I want to do that long march to the sea, as it will be a year of my life, and I don’t have a lot of them left to do a thing that I’ve already done into the dirt as good as anybody?’ You know, I’ve played as hard as any motherfucker who ever held a microphone. And I’ll defend that ‘til I die – I’ve expended as many calories as any Iggy Pop or anybody. I played until I puked many times, so you can’t take that from me. I’ve done some good records, I’ve done some long tours that hurt, so I know they were real. So I’ve achieved all that. So I now have to see what it’s going to mean in 2006.”
Speaking of new beginnings in the new year, I point out that The Mark Of Cain – a band who Rollins has previously produced, legendary for their military precision - are back and actively gigging again. Is that something he’d be keen to see?
“If I’m in town and can see them – are you kidding? I’d be first in line. I love that band. I’ll write John [Scott, TMOC guitarist and singer] or my agent, and get a schedule of theirs and see what I can do. Believe me, if I have an opportunity to see The Mark Of Cain, I will be there.”
They’re currently playing with a view to eventually recording again – is the producer’s chair something that Rollins would take up again for the band?
“Absolutely. Sure. I loved working on Ill At Ease – I’m proud of that. I think that’s a great album. Those are some of John’s best-ever riffs, and I’m really glad I could help them finish the product. That was a really fun time.”
I point out that the Scott brothers must have a similar work ethic to Rollins, in terms of intensity. Henry’s reaction? “They don’t fuck around, those guys!”
High praise, indeed. But how would the performer describe the Rollins Ethos? How could you funnel his take on life down to a sentence? It’s easy:
“Two and a half words. A contraction and a verb. Let’s go. Really, that’s all you need. Let’s go! Let’s do it! Let’s hit it! That’s really how I get up every morning – let’s go. What is it going to be today? I don’t know – give me the itinerary and let’s go. And at my age, everything hurts. I get out of bed and my hands hurt, my ass hurts, my knees hurt, my shoulders hurt. I’ve blown my body up through the years. And the only thing that gets me going is ‘Fuck these motherfuckers, man – let’s go!’ I’m pissed. That’s one of the reasons why I get out of bed.”
It’s something I admit that I can’t see changing.
“Hell no,” replies Henry, emphatically. “One of the things I’m still happy about is that I’m still pissed. You know, they asked Iggy a few years ago, and it’s an answer of his I quote quite often, an interviewer asked him how he keeps all that rage going. And he just looked at the guy and said ‘I work at it.’ Motherfucker! I love that. That’s so perfect. And to me, being American in the present climate, if you’re not angry or concerned about what’s going on, you’re really losing the plot and you’re sleeping on the job, and you’re basically complicit in, you know, boys and girls coming home dead from Iraq.
“And so, I’m pissed every day. I watch the news, I get pissed, I write about it, I get pissed. The decency in me makes me get angry about America in 2005.”
It’s not just a US thing, though.
“You Australians have cause for concern. It’s not a paradise that you guys live in. Your Prime Minister – is that what he’s called? – your PM is in love with Bush, so you guys have work to do. You have to take that guy out, vote in other people, get the Queen off your money. You guys, you’re wonderful, but you got work to do, just like every other country.”
It’s something that we’re aiming for, I tell the performer. We’ll get there, some day. And he agrees, wholeheartedly.
“You absolutely will. You’re a great country full of great people, but right now, you’ve got a government that likes Bush. There’s problems there.”
Our time is well and truly up now, and so I let Henry get off the phone and grab some free time. As he’s signing off, he’s friendly, and says again that he’s glad I got all my questions answered, before saying that he’ll see me somewhere down the road.
Damn straight he will. It’s where the man seems to be most at home. It’s a long slog to provoke a little thought, but I get the feeling that every audience member who questions the status quo as a result of Rollins’ probing is a reward well earned.
Catch Rollins and his spoken word at the Big Day Out shows and at regional areas around the country:
Friday 20th January, Auckland, Big Day Out
Sunday 22nd January, Gold Coast, Big Day Out
Monday 23rd January, Byron Bay Community & Culture Centre (early show @ 6.00pm)
Thursday 26th January, Sydney, Big Day Out
Sunday 29th January: Melbourne, Big Day Out
Tuesday 31st January: Geelong Performing Arts Centre
Wednesday 1st February, Canberra, The Playhouse
Thursday 2nd February, Newcastle City Hall
Friday 3rd February, Adelaide, Big Day Out
Sunday 5th February, Perth, Big Day Out
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