Garza Podcast - 188 - DERON MILLER: CKY, 96 Bitter Beings, Vinyl Collection & Regrets

Episode Date: July 7, 2025

Garza sits down in-person with Deron Miller. Vocalist & guitar player for the alternative metal band 96 Bitter Beings. Also best known as the former frontman & founder of CKY. https://linktr.ee/96bitterbeingsofficialJoin the Chug Norris Army on Patreon! https://patreon.com/garzapodcast CHAPTERS:00:00 - Vinyl Collection07:02 - First Bands, Oil12:38 - CKY’s Multimedia Approach14:33 - Naming “CKY”19:06 - Sober in the Early Days21:41 - Being a KISS Fan25:25 - Oil’s Sound29:07 - How CKY Got Their Sound35:22 - Boss OC2 Pedal39:55 - Crate Amps46:02 - Practicing at the Margera’s House51:15 - Writing 96QBB & Volume 157:53 - Riff: 96QBB Jam1:01:21 - Learning Piano & Guitar1:03:55 - Career Regrets // Mistakes1:05:35 - How CKY Happened1:10:38 - Being Ambitious 1:16:47 - Touring with Guns N’ Roses1:21:52 - Having Their Album Erased1:30:32 - Riff: Close Yet Far1:36:04 - CKY/96BB/Ozzy Logo1:39:55 - Biggest Metal Influences1:47:56 - Guitar Playthroughs1:50:02 - Writing // Jamming Together1:54:52 - Malevolent Creation2:05:19 - Bucket List2:08:09 - Finding His Wife // Just Do It2:16:33 - AI & Technology2:19:49 - Self-Doubt2:23:13 - 96BB’s Records2:25:24 - Freestyle Jam2:28:20 - ‘Esoterik’ Signature Guitar2:34:11 - FreestyleMetallica Jam 22:39:10 - Outro Jam

Darren Miller How you doing? I'm alive, dude. How are you doing? I'm alive, barely. Okay, I need your honest opinion. Okay. So I did my best to create this tone.

I was here. Yeah. Do you don't have the octave pedal? No, I used the octave actually in the quad. Oh, okay. It's built in. I have the old school one. I guess it's analog instead of digital.

So you're combined. finding both the digital and analog. Right. Yeah. Which I wouldn't know that unless you just told me. Sick. I'm a very la-dite. You know that word?

No. It's somebody that does not believe in, well, it's not that I don't believe, but it's somebody that doesn't have a clue about technology. There it is. Okay, this is a real word. Okay. La-dite, correct? Okay.

A person opposed to new technology or ways of working. Yeah. That's me. I'm not opposed to it. I just, I'm too slow to learn it. And you always been this way? Yeah. Okay.

I still am obsessed with physical media. VHS tapes, DVD, Blu-ray, which I was kind of not really willing to go to Blu-ray after DVD. But, yeah, cassette tapes I still listen to. You still listen to cassette tapes? And also so people listen and watch and know, like, your vinyl collection alone is just, it's psycho. It is. It's definitely a color. you have is it's on my bucket list.

I have all my favorite records. There it is. Oh, wow. Yeah. That's some of it. That's some of it. That's some of it. Yeah, more? Oh, God, yeah. Yeah. I don't even want to say how much that's worth.

Two questions. So how many of vinyl do you think you have? And then what do you think the worth of that is? Or maybe you don't want to say. Or you don't want to know. I'll say. Why not? I probably have, that thing holds a hundred. times a hundred. So a thousand?

And then I have another one of those. You have another one? Okay, so... I probably have 3,500. 3,500 vinyl. And I probably round them off to about $50, $60 a piece. Because they're all rare. There's only two vinals that I need to complete my collection.

And that's the best of forbidden. Best of Forbidden. Which was printed in 1991 in Europe. And the only copy I've seen is $300. It's called That's it Forbidden We can't find it

There it is This is it Point in No Return That's on vinyl On Music for Nations Came out in 1992 One copy for $300 bucks

So are you waiting for The price to go down Or what are you waiting for? I'm waiting for Me to just say Fuck it, I'm gonna get it $300 Yeah

Because it is like one of yeah there it is right there under one flag yep and i bothered uh craig about it i i bothered him about he's like man i don't know anything about that i was like wow i would have bought a copy from you but that would have been sick yeah i mean it's really strange to get to the end of collecting something because you've probably been doing it your whole life yeah i mean this i mean yeah so so your first final was from your mom right like a kiss a kiss record was was that was that your first record? The first record I ever had was from, well, my mom had Saturday Night

Fever and Barry Manilow and Beatles and Abba. Yeah. Carly Simon, like all this cool stuff growing up and then when I was about two, I discovered Kiss. People say, you were not two. You can't remember Beck. I remember back then. We were... You got that elephant brain. But no, because I can't remember like chunks of my life after that. But anything that, even some stuff that didn't make an impact on me, I remember.

But that made an impact on me. Going at my cousin saying, let's watch a movie upstairs. Chitty-chee-chee-bang, right? Chitty-chiddy-bang, bang. Nice. Yeah, how did you know that? You did some work, I guess. I guess.

And, yeah, and, you know, that famous poster of Ace Freilly from 1977 where he's... The one on fire. Yeah, the one on fire. I saw that, and I was like, I don't care about Dick Van Dyke and Don Knott's right now. Like, whatever that is, I need to know what that is. and it was 1978 and my cousin was like I was probably saying

what's that what's that you know whatever and my cousin took out all of his kiss records and I was like oh my God what is this you know because it was scary at first that's the one he had it on his wall

okay I got a quick dumb question is that a real picture like a real actual picture yeah 1977 that's all it could be is a real picture if you're just oh you're wow you're right

you're just pre-internet you're right okay so if you're just listening it's Ace Free Lee with the I'm want to see a Gibson Les Paul and it's completely on fire. Yep. It's almost on his face is on fire. Yeah.

And I just remember looking at that and saying, whatever that is, I want to be a part of it or know what it is. So this was when I was getting into kisses, like when I got older, like 1980. Kiss on Masked came out on my birthday of that album. And my aunt took me out to get it on my birthday. Oh, that's sick. But interestingly enough, on my 49th birthday, the 45th anniversary of Kiss on masked. I also got a copy of Kiss on Masked on my 49th birthday. So for 45 years, I've been getting this album for my birthday. But, um, so, but the first kiss album I got was from a babysitter that

babysat me when I was three years old. She, she's like, you like that band? It wasn't cool anymore. So she brought it over. And then I had another babysitter that brought over, she brought me dressed to kill. Another babysitter brought me destroyer. And I started to build a collection off of used records from my babysitters. Wow. Yeah. And then from there, three years old. You started your record collection at three years old.

Three years old. Who can say that? You should see some of them. That is, because I used to draw on. That's crazy. Yeah, I'm obsessed. I'm obsessed. You can't really track the beginning of your obsession, like where it comes from and why.

I don't know. It's like an OCD thing. Yeah. Can't explain it. But I'm obsessed with things. And then I get, I used to be obsessed with American flags. Just collect them. No rhyme or reason

No rhyme or reason It was just something But that helped me later on It's like this is sick dude It helped me later on in life Because obsession turned to passion And turn in motivation And then making things happen

Well you need obsession to find your sound That's true You know That's true And you're definitely on that Darren you're definitely on a list of people That found their own sound Yeah by mistake

It was by accident really By accident Yeah You found a Who decided to name a band oil. And just for, I'm going somewhere with this. Okay, yeah.

Well, I was in a band and when I, the very first band I had was when I moved to Westchester, Pennsylvania from Marlton, New Jersey. Okay. It was called This End Up. It was a thrash band, but we kind of had, like, some influences I didn't really like because it was just some guys in high school. I didn't know very well. But we got Rich Vos out of that, but that's a different story. and still friends with all of those guys but from there

that band everybody a couple guys in that band went to college so that band ended and then me and just Margera were in the same math class in high school you guys went to high school together yeah I went to high school with all those guys but um I was I failed my freshman year so I had to take like freshman classes my sophomore

and senior or junior year because I was overloaded with work from high school because of how bad I did my freshman year I was so depressed. So when I moved to Westchester, it was like starting a whole new life and I was able to leave all that New Jersey shit behind. Why did you leave Jersey? My dad got transferred in his job and he said to me, I'll never forget. He said, I got some bad news.

And I was like, what's that, dad? He's like, we got to move. And I was like, oh, thank God. Really? There's a lot of bad shit happened. Jersey. It wasn't good. I'm more than happy to get out of there. So long story longer, we moved to Westchester, had a thrash band, then that broke up. I met Jess Marjora in high school. We were in a math class together. And, you know, we were to make fun of the teacher and stuff.

She was a really crazy math teacher. Yeah. And we started the band Foreign Objects, which I based off of the Breed Beyond, the Roadrunner Breed Beyond from 1993, which was kind of like death metal, but they experimented on it like three bands pestilence believer and cynic and atheist was also a part of that and I started to get obsessed with metal but doing

not just not making it all about being heavy like making it more technical not in the sense that metal is technical today like it's out of control today it's out of control yeah but back then before Pro Tools it's like these bands actually had to rehearse this stuff and go in on a two-inch tape.

Yeah. You know, and that's what was so impressive about it. So I had gone through the whole death metal thing and still do, but what intrigued me about it even more was how some bands were really willing to go out and try new things. And Believer with dimensions and Pestilence with Spheres and Cynic with Focus, those three albums, all on Roadrunner changed everything, changed the whole, they all failed commercially, but whoever they did grab, they had a big effect on. And also atheist elements.

That was on Metal Blade, but it's really the big four of the technical jazz death metal thing of 1993. So we started a band called Foreign Objects was basically a death metal band. It was more like mathematical, even sung about numbers and math and the meaning of life, you know, high schoolers. But anyway, back to your original question. And we would send that demo out of that foreign object stuff. And everybody would be like, you know, back then with the record company,

you got to do what's like selling now. So I said, all right, maybe we should start a rock band and like try to get signed. Because that's what you tried to do back then when you were in a band. You needed to get signed. That's how you move forward. And we started a band that was like purely like we tried to be commercial rock. which was like grunge at the time. And Bam,

Jess' brother said, oil would be a good name for a band. He said that? Yeah, and at the time, I mean, he was like 14. Oh, yeah, yeah. And at the time... You guys were kids.

Right. And I was like, hmm, I was 19 years old. He was like 14 and I was like 19, maybe I was, yeah, I was 18, something like that. And we went with it.

Just because, you know why? Because back then, in like 1997, There were all one-word band names. Yeah, it's true. You know, I can't think of any, but I know. Nirvana. Horn.

Yeah. Like Soundgarden. Just stuff like one-word name. One word. Like fly-leaf. Like just, that has to be a band name. I know it is, actually. It's a pretty big band, too.

But, yeah. So, oil was not a good name, and it didn't last very long, because we figured out pretty quickly that we weren't able to play the kind of music that we didn't like. And that's one of the biggest epiphanies you can have as a musician is that you cannot go through with playing what you don't like because sooner or later it's going to bite you in the ass. Yeah. Because a lot of, you know, a lot of bands back then would play to make the money and then find themselves in a band that they didn't like. Kind of sacrifice for a soul.

Yeah. The soul comes first. Yeah. It'll come out at some point. we still for a year, five years, ten years, maybe even more, but it will come around. It does. Eventually it does. That happened to me quick. So that oil thing was over and then pretty much just said, fuck it. Let's do what we want to do and try to become a multimedia kind of thing. Because I always thought being in a band was boring.

I always wanted to take it somewhere else. You're a musician and you do more than just being a band. Yes. And that's exactly what we're doing here. When we were starting CKY and all that, we wanted to be multimedia. We wanted to do videos, all our friends get together and just call us all CKY.

We're all CKY. Brandon, Ryan, Chris, BAM, just everybody, we're all CKY. Was that kind of the idea? Because, yeah, you look at a band name more as like a movie, right, as opposed to a band name. And who, I was curious of, there's, correct me, if I'm wrong, Darren, but there was a pizza joint in Westchester that started. Amorees. Amorees.

And in 93. And I was so, so there, there's only one, correct? It's only, they, they only serve people in that county. It was, um, amorees, I think was just one restaurant. It's one, right? It's not a chain. It's nice. No, it was, it was, um.

Is this it right here? Um. No I was wondering because I can only find one fucking picture of it That's a moray A mores It was a

I look for a amorase And I'm like So I thought I think Darren messed up I think he meant a moray Right No well if you can't find it then Amorees

It was on either High Street or Gay Street But that's not the logo It's probably gone Amorees Yes he's So I Like apostrophe S

Like it belongs to a more. Oh, a posthri, yes. Yeah. It's not on there. Man, mate. I could be wrong about the name. I was curious because you talk about how you guys were there and that's when the CKY name was conceived. And I was curious, like, who was actually there eating pizza?

Are you guys eating pizza, drinking beer? Are you too young to drink beer? Like, what's the? Because you're part, I assume you're really talking. 20s? Well, now I'm confused because I remember the first band name we had after oil was I Dismember Mama.

Yes. Which is off of a movie. Yes. From like 1971 or something. Because I was thinking my bloody Valentine, which is a band and a movie. And I thought, wouldn't it be cool to name our band after a movie? So we became IDM.

I think for one show at Upstairs at Nix. You love the acronyms. Philadelphia. Yeah, yeah, right. Right out of the gates. IDM. I just remember Mama. We played Knicks Roast Beef,

which was a venue in Philadelphia under that band name. I just remember Mama. And then very quickly, I think, is when we ended up in the pizza place. And it was just me and Jess and somebody else that was tagging along. I don't remember who. Okay. But we're like, no, it's not working very well. Hmm.

I was thinking, it would be a good name for a band that could be a movie. And being a huge fan of Sleepboy Camp, I said, you know what? Can't Kill Yourself? And we all just went, well, me and Jess were like, oh, geez, that's insane. And you know, what is that? I was like, well, it could be a movie about a summer camp where you go to kill yourself for some reason. You're right, 19. Now, you are a psychos.

1920. Yeah, I got, I have problems. There's I Dismember Mama Yep That cover is bizarre See the bottom left That's the VHS

Version I have on a You remember those big box VHS You could get at the video store I Darren I remember Okay Okay Because that's

I'm 3 or 9 There it is This is This is fucking great Am I allowed to say Bad words? Of course Okay

That's one of them But the bottom left Right there That's the one That I have Right now In my garage Yep, I just remember Mom.

Never watched. I think I watched it once and it was awful. Port your bucks. But an awesome name for a band. But I decided not to go with an actual movie title like My Bloody Valentine did and just said, let's come up with our own name and our own movie. And Camp Kill Yourself and we ended up making movies. And the multimedia thing kind of manifested itself into what we became.

It did, huh? Yeah, it did. I was curious in my I wonder where who Darren was with because I just assume okay he's probably with Jess

yeah yeah I was curious because you know you know the things are sometimes someone says something and someone else says something so I was just always curious

what uh I remember this shit so acutely that whenever somebody tells the story of it I'm like no no no no no no

but she asked me what I had for dinner last night I have no fucking clue I get it but there are certain moments that you remember because they stay with you because they have such a huge impact on what does eventually happening in your life yeah and so i remember that amore's pizza either on gay street or high street i can't remember because westchester's a college town so there was all these

different restaurants and and i lived on east barnard street which was right by amorese so you might want to check east barnard street and let's show you what amorese is but i doubt i doubt it's Me and Jay are kind of like determined right now to find, to find this fucking spot. If it's gone, it's gone. I mean, it might have closed down. Somebody right now that's watching this is probably like, that's not what it's called. It's called this. So I might be wrong about the name, but I'm pretty sure it's a mores.

A mores. Yeah. I just assumed it was just like a family owned. Yeah. I mean, just or a single person owned, you know. It was just a pizza joint. It was just where college kids went after, you know, partying or whatever. It was up until 2 in the morning or whatever.

Oh, shit. It was just a small little sit-down place. Did they serve booze? No. Oh. No. No. Not that we would have.

Hardcore pizza. We didn't drink, me and Jess. We were like, really? If you drink, you don't make it. That's what we thought. Really? Yeah. We stayed away from any kind of drugs or alcohol.

We used to play college parties and set up in the basement or, you know, anywhere in the house, we would play parties and everybody, be wasted and we would just pack up our shit and go home because we thought for sure if you drink or do drugs you're not making it so we kept to that that deal for four years maybe maybe a little longer but that's that was our our pact wow yeah what's up everybody finally we are on Patreon. If you're tired of waiting for Mondays, you can now get access to episodes early. And if you're curious what happens before or after the podcast, Patreon will offer you behind the scenes footage. And with social media, YouTube, getting kind of crazy, it's

impossible to reply to everybody. You get access to our Discord. And Discord will be the only place where I will be actively applying to everyone in our community. And I'll be doing exclusive live streams with other surprises. Head over to patreon.com slash garza podcast. That's patreon.com slash garza podcast or click the link in the description below. Because we figured, you know, that comes from Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons. If you do drugs, you're not going to make it. So I took that to heart. I didn't know that. So do they, do they, not that could be it yeah

is that in is that on what street is that on Concord Road City can we get the can get the city? No that's not it that's not it you know what fuck I wouldn't waste the time if I argue because I probably have the name wrong it could have been

Amory's or I don't know it's okay it's okay Jay it could be Mori's pizza I don't know I can't remember the name obviously because it's not online But the moment you leave, I'm going online and try to find this. Yeah, you guys will be up all night trying to find this damn pizza place. So, so did you get that from Kiss?

Yes. To not really. Yeah, Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons are like, because they're my Jesus Christ. Sure. Because from the very beginning. Do you're in the Kiss Army, huh? I'm beyond the Kiss Army. Got it.

That's all I can say. Got it. Nobody competes with me when it comes to the Kiss Army. Got it. That's all I'm going to say. Yeah. So you probably liked the disco period too, right? I love all of it.

Woo! But the disco period was where I was getting into it. Interesting. Because I was a kid, and who were they attracting in 1979, 1980? Four-year-olds, and I was four. Yeah. So I was the one, I was the kid getting into Kiss while all the diehard Kiss fans were getting out of them. So, you know, if you're a kiss fan, and I don't know if you are,

There was a string of, right, I don't blame you. I always say, I tell Matt, I'm like, if I didn't grow up with Kiss, I'd hate them, because it's just something that attaches to you when you're young, you can't get away from it. Yeah. It's just always with you. It's hard to explain. I get it. On to the next thing.

No, no, no. I want to hear it all, dude. But there was just a point where Kiss would put out an album every September, which means you would get it for Christmas. So there would be Kiss Unmasked, which is a pop album. Okay, so I know one thing I do you know about Kiss is that a lot of kids fans talk about unmasked not being a good record. Right. Is there something to that? Yes, they're right.

But also at the same time, it's like where records are made for people to listen to, a four-year-old listening to Kiss unmasked is, makes total sense. Because that's what they were making pop music for. They were going after kids because they wanted the multimedia thing. to do Kiss Parks. They had Kissed bubble gum cards, Kiss sleeping bags, Kiss, everything you can think of was Kiss. But then they changed their sound drastically

in one year and made an album called Music from the Elder, which is like an operatic dark thing. So I thought, there was a point where I thought that Kiss was the only entity making music. Because I wasn't exposed to anything else. Didn't have cable until later on.

And then Creatures of the Night and all that. of these albums it sounded different. I got heavier and better, but I don't want to bore you with kiss stuff because I know that it gets annoying. I hate when Kiss fans talk about Kiss. And you're, and you're, and you're, and you are

one of them. Yes. I'm curious. Where did, so you're, at some point you're a kid, a teenager, where did you see them or hear them say that? Oh, wait, uh, was it like a Paul Stanley interview that, hey, I don't drink?

Yeah, what, whenever, find out that you know it didn't that didn't come to later like when I was you know I mean I can't describe to you how much of a kiss fan I was okay like picture it and then go beyond that okay I heeded every word that Jean Simmons spoke and Paul Stanley as well and I would see interviews you know when I was 10 all 10 to 19 you know and still to this day where you know they say things and I'm like you know that's true and one of the things that hit me so hard is that if you drink or do drugs you are not going to make it in the music business and I I really took that to heart and I spread that word I pretty much influenced Jess too not to do that and um okay we didn't

do that until it wasn't possible to not drink into drugs which is when we started to tour and all that stuff. Interesting. Okay, so just to circle back. All right, so the band oil. Yeah. And then finding your sound, and now I realize now you guys are sober at this time.

So, and you're trying to, and you're playing music that isn't what you love. And so it was actually, was it actually the rejection of some labels that might maybe be like, Oh, like, what, what am I doing? Yeah. Shout out to you, Monty Connor.

Yeah, he says hello, by the way. Oh, really? Oh, cool. What's up, Monty? You saw him last week. Oh, did you? Where? I don't know, you saw him.

Wasn't it? Man, he told me that you saw him at a show in New York recently. He's a liar, so he might. I'm just kidding. I was kidding. No, he told me that he saw you. Well, he wanted me to say hi. Oh, but he is one of the people that was a, was,

rejecting us but that was way this was oil was way before yeah and then uh and to monty's credit from rogan it was like i mean like the cassette was like not sick right well the oil yeah um i don't think he got an oil tape he might have oh he did yeah he did and um yeah he was one of the people that did say you know i remember him saying like we were trying to be like I can't even say. Like, we were trying to be, like, a gutless commercial. You're going for it like that. Like a pearl jam, like meets offspring.

Oh, wow. It's a terrible tape. It was called the gold tape. Yeah, yeah. We just pulled it up. I don't know that one. Yeah. Yes.

500 of those suckers, maybe 300. I mean, it looks cool. This is gold tape? That's the best thing about it was that it was printed with a gold tint there. But yeah, we made like 300 of those, and for a couple months, we very begrudgingly and embarrassingly went out and played that material. And it sucked because we were doing something we didn't want to do. I was writing songs I didn't want to write. I didn't even know how to write them.

I didn't even have lyrics for some of those songs. But we went into Studio 4 in Kansha Hocking where the Butcher brothers were producers. Okay. They did, like Life of Agon. and anthrax and all sick. Third note for much bigger stuff than that. But we did our tape there

and we spent a lot of money on it. We thought that because we spent a lot of money on it in a really cool studio, Studio 4, of course people are going to find out about our music. No, we were learning as we went. So we got a lot of experience, a lot of rejection, a lot of myths that we believed were to be true were corrected and we found out

that that's not how it works. Yeah. So eventually we just said, fuck it. Let's just do music we want to do. And that's the music that... Clean slate. Yeah, clean slate. You want it to clean slate.

Fuck trying to be Pearl Jam, fuck trying to be food fighters, whatever. We said, fuck that stuff. Those bands are good at that stuff because they want to do that stuff. We don't really want to do that. So just being a fan of clutch and me being a metal fan

and Blue Easter Colt, Kiss, of course, and all that stuff. We kind of like just merged all of our, what do they call? Influences. Influences, thank you. You might have to fill in some blanks for me. And you just did perfectly. I'm here.

All of our influences merged together, and that's how we came up with what we were going to be doing, the CKY thing. And you wanted, since you're a fan of, like, horror movies, you want to, you wanted to like combine right what what you liked about rock music just yeah but but but also what what you love about about the horror movies right right slasher films yeah yeah everything i mean we we wanted to take that kind of music whatever we came up with that was it was death spiritual healing and um pestilence spheres that started the obsession with single no playing and then because you which death metal kind of hates this is when you take when you're influential

influenced by the sound and you do something so many different. They don't even light like that, but you were influenced by the single notes. Right. But you didn't speed pick it, and then you added... I slowed them down. Yeah. Yeah, I mean... Interesting.

I didn't know that until today. It's cool. Yeah, I mean, you just slowed it down to... And then, you know, one of the biggest songs that influenced us was death's low life. Oh, wow. So that became the CKY sound along with Clutch, and everything. thing was was put into cky why because we were already done with the let's try to go commercial thing's done i'm going to do what i want to do right and that's it well we all wanted it too yeah

so why did you go to the westchester music store oh albans yeah uh are you talking about to get the pedal yeah why why did you go it's this store hopefully i hopefully we got it right it's got it's got a different front now but it's it's it's it's got a different front now but it you to be Al Bian. Yes, yes. Albert was, and Bian is his last name, B-I-E-N. And he was such a funny guy. And they've been in town for decades.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm surprised you just found a new one. A new, yeah, a new picture. But getting an old picture would be hilarious. But Al, you would walk in and he would act like he knew you. And he had all this crap everywhere, like just piles and piles of you stuff. You know, in guitars, and you'd walk in and you'd be like, hey, Al, and he'd be like, hey, hey, hey, act like he's your best friend. And you'd be like, oh, I need this or I need that.

And he'd be like, I got it. And he would find it right away out of all this junk. But I ended up moving in with my girlfriend on Barnard Street, which is right down the street from Al Beans music shop. Okay. And one day, well, it was two separate days. I got up and I walked up there and I saw this Parker guitar. And it was a really cool shape. I don't remember the model.

It was a nightfly, but it was like an early version of the nightfly that they have. And I was like, oh, I want that. That's not, you know, I've never heard. I'm broke, though. Something just drew me to it. It wasn't nothing really special about it. I mean, it was just a black guitar. It was a Parker.

Parker's are sick? Yeah. Still. Yeah. They still, are they still sick? Yeah, they're out of business, aren't that? Well, I mean, I mean, not around. The old ones that are still working are sick.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I agree with that. Um, we went, I went to Albans and, um, I saw that guitar and I was like, shit, it's $998. So I was working three jobs and trying to make, get money to, to buy this guitar. And, um, finally got it. And when I took it home, I loved it because I had had an Ibanez before that. I was the only, I never had a lot of guitars. I had like a really cheap, B.C. Rich. And then I got an Ibanez, and then the Parker. What about your cardboard guitar?

Which one? You're a cardboard one. I used to cut out cardboard guitars and play them. Yeah. In front of mirror? Everybody did. Yeah, did they? Yes.

I didn't have a cardboard guitar. Yeah, I cut out cardboard guitars and play with them in a mirror. Oh, yeah, anything to get prepared for this. Okay. Prepared for what's going on right now. Yes. Absolutely. Okay.

Yes. Everything fell into place. It did. Yeah. It did. That's what we do. Yep. And you had, yeah, you had, I've been as an RG, I think it was a-R-G-570, 4-70?

Yeah, sick. Classic one. I used it for years and years and years. The only guitar I had. Classic. And my dad bought it for me. Oh, it's hot, dude. That's a hot guitar still, man.

Yeah. That's still a beautiful guitar. RG-570. Is that what it is? Yeah, yeah. That's it. That's the one. The pickups weren't as nice, but.

Yeah. And I played that all through my local. like all through my local bands in Westchester, every single show. Yeah. That's tight, dude. Eventually something happened to it. I don't remember. I'm sure it got smashed on stage, but I don't have any kind of emotional connection

to guitar, so it was okay. Oh, okay. Yeah, some people have that, what is it called? Sineminal value. Yes, thank you. Yes, exactly what I was trying to find. Thank you. Please do, because I draw blanks on very simple words. sometime. Yes, I don't have any sentimental connection to any kind of musical instruments. Now, you crease a vinyl cover of any of my records then.

I can kill you. Yeah, I have to go get another copy. Yeah. That's just my obsessive thing. But, yeah, you break a $900 instruments. That's okay. So what? So you went to the store because you lived down the street permit to check out the parker or what's the...

I checked out the parker. I looked at the price tag. I said, that's ridiculous. I'll never be able to afford that. And then I couldn't get it out of my head because I had the Ibanez And I didn't I wanted to move on and get a new guitar So I saved up for it

And finally I went up to Albans and I bought it for Mal We got it got home played it in my room And then I said I don't like the normal sound Of a guitar plugged into an amp You know so interesting

It sounded like you know everything sounded like this to me. Yeah. And I wasn't really, you know, so. It's missing something. Yeah, it's missing something. So I went. What's it missing?

It's missing the OC2, the boss OC2, and I went to Al's and I bought that. Just because it would be something that would help do something with a regular guitar tone. So did you go there? This is where I couldn't find, so I'm trying to fill in the blank. So did you go there specifically for that pedal? Or did you go in there? No. Just start looking.

No. I need something to make this tone better. I need something. I went in there and, you know, there's crap everywhere, pedals everywhere, but there was a tiny little display case and there was all these boss pedals in there. And I was like, oh, my God, look at all. Because I didn't know anything about it. I still don't.

I was like, look at all this stuff, man. This pedal probably does that. And what's this? A wah? Like, what's like a wah-wa-wa? Like, I was just perplexed. didn't know what I wanted, so I said, I'll get this octave thing. Because what I thought was, I knew what the octave was going to do. I knew that it was going to double one string.

Okay. So if I'm going to be doing single note songs, I don't want it to sound like a single note doesn't do it for me. So when you put this, not that, when you put this on, You know, it's like fattenes it up and it's like two guitars playing one note. I don't know what the hell I did here. Did I do something? No, no. No, no, I'm good. So it was just an accident.

Accident. And I still collect pedals that way. I go in and I look at the colors and that draws me in. I'm like, that one's blue and it says it's a, it acoustifies stuff and this is some kind of synth pedal and I'll buy them like that. I don't have like one single gadget that has all the sounds for me. But yeah, now I'm a pedal collector. So you found a brown. A brown octave pedal.

Octave one or two. It was that one. Not this exact one, but the exact same. OC2 in case you're just listening. OC2. Wow. Yeah. And we have the OC2 here.

Yes. Sick, dude. Right here, right here. This is not the one, but it's one of them. And we really, you know, in our career, we were praising the occupying the occupying the active pedal, the boss octave pedal, but boss didn't really seem to care. A lot of people were buying it. A lot of guitar players were buying it, but they discontinued it. And then they came out with OC3 and it was like, it didn't sound right.

Yeah, I think it might have been the transfer from analog to digital or something. I don't know. I don't know that stuff. It's like gibberish. So I got to get a OC2. Sometimes you'll get the same pedal, but like a, or like the next, and it sounds different. Like there's something

like, it sounds the same but something's missing and I can't put my fucking finger on it. Like it's broken or something? Like each one is made differently? Yeah. That could be possible.

That is the one Yeah, that is the one they replace. First of all, it has four knobs on it when you only need two. Already not stoked on that? I wasn't. Well, we bought one

and we brought into the studio and thank God we held on to the originals because we tried to use that while recording. We're like, something's not right. Yeah.

It doesn't have the thickness of the... It was more too buzzy. So that was definitely... That's what we were going to do. We're going to write songs with this stuff. So, all right, so you buy it for 80 bucks. Yeah, 90. Okay.

95 or something like that. Okay, and then you bring it home like this is exactly what I wanted. Yeah. Well, I plugged it in, tried to figure out how to set it up. You know, two chords, a battery, and the pedal and my guitar. You know, plugged it in, set it up to my little practice amp, which I still use and have, by the way. Is it, is it the crate?

Yeah. I had a gorilla one for a while. I was like, is he playing a crate, little combo amp? And you still have it. Still have it. And it's the same one that you were jamming on. Yeah. Interesting.

Yeah. That's, yeah, there is. No, that's, next over there is. from Matt's studio. Look at that thing, dude. I was like, is you playing a freaking crate? Yeah, I got a lot of praise and flack for that.

That's some heat, dude. Yeah. Crate has heat. I didn't know. Well, I started out with a crate half stack, and people were like, a guitar player, friends of mine with that kind of bust on it.

You know, crate, he stuck. So I ended up getting a PV Ultra 120, which was a killer. fucking ab. It was so fucking heavy. You listen to those old Dicide records, that guitar sound. Oh, yeah. That's what the PV Ultra 120 was.

But try to play alternative rock on that thing. It sounded ridiculous. Yeah, it's too much. It was just, you couldn't get it to you couldn't get it to have any kind of rock tone whatsoever. It was stupid, but it's all we had.

I bought that years before oil and then, so that's what I... I'm surprised that it still works. Well, there it is. The green one, yeah. That's the amp that I had. Oh, yeah.

I recorded foreign objects with that and the oil gold tape with that. This is a classic amp. Yeah, Ultra 120. Oh, God, fucking ripped. Just a look of it. It was so fucking heavy. When you had that thing cranked all the way, just horned up.

Nothing could beat that thing. And now you put pedals in front of it. All these modern. Pedals. Probably sounds nasty now. I would love to know. I think a friend of mine has mine. I think I gave it to him. Yeah, I don't think we said it earlier. I was going to say it, but then we went, I think we went somewhere else. So what's special about what you did, Darren, is there's a, there's a magic to not knowing. And he's so, when I first started talking to you, you said you don't know anything

about gear at all. There's just no knowledge about gear. Nothing. Nothing. It says amp, plug in. It used to be embarrassing. Like, I just, I just, try you'll be like up on stage like yeah yeah you just look that all like i seriously i have no idea how to work any of this stuff i know how to change my strings and sometimes can't even do that right congratulations wow seriously i i just focus more on the art of it than the technical like i like to drive cars so i i use them as tools i don't call you know what i mean yeah like a guitar is a tool to play music. That's how I see it.

I know I see other people that love guitars and love like all the vintage ideas and oh this kind of guitar and this kind of amp and this used to be for this. I just go by what it sounds like. You know, I don't think about all that stuff.

It's just a guitar to me and I use it to write songs. So that's my goal. I like that. It's sick. But I mean that part it probably helped you though. It did.

Because the benefit of that is if you don't think about that stuff, then it won't impede your progress in writing and all that stuff. Or you won't get an idea. You won't be completely distracted by what you should have instead of what you have. So I just worked with what I had. A lot of guitar players are like that, especially now. Good. I think there's like a, yeah, there's a magic not knowing what you're doing.

own and people get overly focused on like new stuff and I noticed like there's like well people aren't really concerned about finding their own sound right and we have a lot of that's a big problem today yeah especially with pro tools making every album sound amazing you got to put something special in there because you're just going to sound like a good you're just your songs are going to sound really good a good everybody else right yeah exactly yeah that's what pro tools is that's why we are where we are because when you used to record on two and inch tape, the album that would come out would reflect how much money you had to spend on it, who you had, who you hired to mix it or record it. And then an album would have that personality,

whether it was good or bad. As long as the songs were good, you could deal with strange production. But now in Pro Tools, everybody has the time to make everything perfect. So if you're going to make a perfect sounding album, you better have some good fucking songs on there. And you better have something special in there, some ingredient that makes you stand out from everybody else. Yeah. Otherwise, what's the fucking point? Yeah, yeah, you got, you got yourself in there, dude. Put some soul in that.

You have to find out what the hell you are doing. And biggest thing on your mind, if there are kids into this, and I don't see a lot of kids playing these days, at least, well, I don't really look. But I'm sure there are kids that are starting bands, not many, but metal and rock. because I have three kids and they don't know any metal heads. So that scares me. There should be some kids growing up and starting bands and not doing everything on their computer, not doing all their music on the computer, get together with some friends and find some basement.

I'm sure there's some mom my age that would let their kids play in the basement, start a band and do that. But make it special. Make it not just about what you like. You know, find your own thing. That's basically what I'm talking about. mouth is so damn dry. Oh, you're freaking down that water, man.

We might need a water refill. Yeah. So when you were in the, okay, so we got the pedal, we got the sound, so you're in a M. Bam's basement with Jess is jamming on a four track, right? 899 South Concord Road.

Wow. Yeah, right across the street from the shit factory. A shit factory? A shit factory. Quite almost literal. It was a waste treatment plant. It was where you flush your toilet and your turd goes to the waste treatment center.

Ryan Dunn ended up jumping into it later on. Are you serious? Yeah, it was a waste treatment center and it would thank you so much. I'm going to drink that more sparingly. It's okay to put it in? Sure. Yeah, so on hot nights we'd be rehearsing

down there in the basement And that place would get really bad. Like it would smell really freaking bad. So bad that they'd call the police. And they'd send police out there to make, I don't know how they got it to smell less like shit. But we used to joke like, let's flush a turd and race it over across the streets.

Wow. It got ridiculous. But yeah, we played 899 South Concord Road. I'm not doxing anybody because it's online that that's where it was. But yeah, that's where we played for many years. years years like from 96 to well it seemed like years it's probably only two years is this it yes it looks much different now yeah that's it holy crap yeah i think they got rid of the shift back yeah that right there where you are those trees right behind there was the they got rid of it

how do you get rid of a waste treatment center yeah it's gone probably doesn't smell that but i'm telling you dude it was awful so it was literally across the street yeah literally yeah that event must have been cheap dude that's why van probably had it well it was it was his parents house oh my god well it's probably why they could yeah they there it is well is that yeah i think that's it is that across the street west ocean yeah that's it sewer authority okay screw pump replacement project this project was financed by a grant from the commonwealth of PA West something sewer authority I guess maybe

still something's there and it might have to do with shit yeah and if you turn around that's the house right. Dude let's look and break in on on Google dude across the street that probably that probably smelled terrible no it was horrible during the summer when we were heard the summer dude the winter we got a break

in the winter we got a break from it So we tried to write mostly toward the word. Just humid. Just humid. Just humid. Pennsylvania heat, humid and heat. And just... Let's go.

Just the smell of... That's inspiring, though, right? Farts. Like, millions of farts just coming right at you when you're trying to write. That's how we made it through there. Like, we had a goal. We have to write songs. We had all these obstacles.

Farts coming in. It was horrendous. What songs did you write down there? All of them. I mean... everything up until our third record, maybe. Yeah. We play it every day.

And up until sometimes four in the morning. And the neighbors were really cool with it. That's awesome. That's it. Right there by that blue trash can is a door. You open that and it leads to the basement. That door right there. That one.

Oh, wow. You use a screwdriver. to open it up and go in and then April had all April Bam's mother had all this stuff furniture that she used to paint and resell and stuff and there was like a tiny little stage that was maybe like half a foot off the ground and um the drums were set up there and then we would plug everything else in if we had a third band member usually it was just me and him and we would go over riffs and sit there and write stuff and then sometimes the basement would flood and But our gear was safe because it was on top of the little platform stage usually.

That's why it flooded. So is that why you went to Jess's house and ended up writing another song, correct? Yeah, like whenever it flooded and we wanted to rehearse, we would bring our stuff into the house. And yeah, one time, yeah, maybe more than one time. but we did bring the stuff into the bedroom and practice there, the drums and everything, and that's where I wrote a couple songs in there,

96 Quite Bitter Beings and Knee Deep and songs from the first album. Most of them were written in the basement, though. And you both are sober still at this point, correct? Oh, yeah, yeah. Okay, so, and the record's written, and 93 Bitter Beans was the last song you wrote. 96, yeah, 96 quite bitter, Benz.

It was the last, last song we needed, we had 10 songs. One of them we didn't want to put on there because it sounded too grunge to me, and I was just, I was still stinging from the oil, the grunge stuff we did with oil. So we left that off the album because it didn't sound, all the songs on that album sound like different bands, but it's a song called Shippensburg didn't. We didn't want to put it on there. So at the end of 98, wasn't maybe, yeah, at the end of 98,

we were in the bedroom because the basement was flooded, and I just went, Ben-in-na-da-da-ban. Ben-in-it, ben-in-na-na-na-na-na-na. Just sitting there fiddling with it. And me and Jess had to work that night because we both worked at UPS.

What were UPS? you and for some reason this particular day you didn't go we were loading trucks we'd have been there for three years loading trucks after truck truck truck after truck and um our boss at uPS knew we were both in a band so it was really we wanted to call in sick and finish this song wow but if i called in sick and then just called in sick they'd be like you guys are doing something in the band so we pretended that we had a car accident both of us were in a car accident car accident and we we walked over to nussick's farm the pay phone at nussick's farms and we called in together like all panically oh we just got in this horrible car accident me and jess we can't come in

oh this is terrible hung up the phone and then went back to writing the song yeah did you have to explain to him after no no because no because they they probably didn't buy it i mean like oh they did the car accident this fucking give him a day off right we ended up i mean it's funny because because k y took off we ended up leaving that job at different times i can't remember when when he quit or if he got fired but i was still working at uPS when we um did the vans warped tour in 99 and i came back and i didn't have a job oh and i was like all right uh shit you know so that's how i left the ups But yeah, calling out sick from UPS is usually Like, because we had shows and stuff

That we had to call out for And started to get on their nerves But we were in a union and they couldn't fire us Oh, wow Yeah, working at UPS man, that's tough, tough work I can only imagine. So I was curious if If when the record was done, like

Did you guys think or did you think like Oh, we need like one more or it's missing something? Yeah, I mean, we worked on that album for like three years because we kept running out of money. So we would work at UPS, save our paychecks, whatever we could, then write a couple more songs, go in and record that batch.

And then there'd be six songs. That's why the songs sound different. Yeah. Yeah, they were recorded over a three-year period. Oh, that makes sense. None of those songs are the same drum setup at all. I don't think. I was wondering, I was telling you,

you, man, you should listen to that first record. It kind of takes you one on the journey. Yeah. It explains it now. All of the influences are in there. Interesting. Yeah, we never really wanted to fall into, we wanted to have our own guitar sound, but we didn't want to have our own sound. We wanted to kind of experiment and explore and write songs based off of all of our inspiration and influences, and that's what the first record is about, pretty much.

Interesting. So that day, are you just like, is it in your head first, or are you just noodling on the guitar and you're just like, doing in it? I didn't see it as like, oh, my God. Like, I just wanted to finish it because we knew. needed one more song. That song doesn't really do much for me. It never really did. It never did. No, it was just about, okay, we finally have the last song for this album. That's all. That's all it was. And then it became this huge thing because of what happened with, but later on. It was no special feeling. It wasn't like, it might be different. All this is a really cool riff. It was just, it was just, I thought it was good because it was the last song we needed. And then we went and the guy at the studio, his name was Walt.

He gave us a $100 day, where we could come in for $100 and record anything we wanted to. So we recorded like four things, and that was one of them. It was during the $100 day. And we just did it. And now, what the? That's what I'm known for pretty much.

I'm always curious how different bands, different artists write these songs or wrist. And every time I get like a different story, Sometimes it's like, yeah, is this, the other song? I'm like, wow, there's no feeling, no like, anything that's like, it's like, oh, there was no like, whoa, like it wasn't like that. It was just, and I still see it like that. I just still see it as, okay, it's a good song.

It got promotion, you know. If it had been a different song that had gotten the promotion, probably be the same thing. I mean, if a song gets promoted, people hear it. It becomes a hit. You know, it was never a single, fine. enough because we owned the record and we licensed it to our record company oh makes sense and then uh bam and ended up directing the video correct yes we did we've done a lot of music videos a ton of them yeah yeah yeah that's it we did that in a warehouse and i got duct tape to a poll

for hours it's another day i called out of work too is it really to be duct taped to that poll was this the second accident oh that's actually that's not the video this is in the same warehouse as the video that we did for to all of you which is a song on volume one um we did a video for that and most of the film got over exposed so only a couple seconds from that video lasted and it's on the end of the first cky video the first ckyd bd but the 96 video was filmed in two different times these guys did their thing and then we went to the same warehouse and film this video. That was fun.

It looks fun, man. Dude, that, that, that riff is actually surprisingly really hard to play. It's actually going to be a song I warm up with now. It is. It's a guitar exercise riff. Anything that involves one string and up and down, it's always great. I'm always kind of searching for those kind of riffs. And I found ones.

This week I found one. I'm like, oh shit, I'm starting playing this more often. I get my fingers going. So, so you're going to help out my band. It's a warm out. It is a warm-up riff. Yeah. Thank you.

What I'm obsessed with. Thank you. Warm-up riffs. Yeah. You're welcome. What, did it come quick? Were you jamming for a while? Or what do you have, like, a section you just pulled out?

It probably just came along as, you know, normal riffs do. Any riff. Probably just started out. You know, that's probably how it started. And then I probably got bored with that. And I probably went. You know, and then by the end of the day, it's technical and it's difficult. And that's what impressed me about music is if you can make a progressive piece catchy, hooky.

Because I start, you know, as a guitar player, if you're like, a songwriters don't care. Like, if you're a songwriter and you write hit songs, you know, you sing like, you know, but I was more about. Let's make the music catchy and worry about the words later. You know, the vocal line would come later. And the lyrics last. But yeah. It's a hard rip, dude. Right?

Yeah. You got it. With my perceptions in the mix, down 20 miles through the sticks, to the cloudy town of every population 96. I don't know if you want to go our way through this. And a four, we're not. All the streets. Just pass it through and where the rules just don't apply.

Yeah, and it was always important that you cut those last few notes off dead. I got it from you. Kill, kill, kill. I got the turn from you. You got to kill the notes. Kill the notes. Yeah, I got, I'm going to still that turn from you. Because that kind of stuff comes from synth, synthesizers.

They kill, piano kills notes right away. Oh, is that, is that what we got the style from? Yeah, I mean. Piano, because you took piano. Yeah, I did, and that didn't go very well. Yeah. Well, I don't know why. I always wanted to play guitar, but my mom stuck me on a piano.

Of course. And my teacher would give me candy after each lesson. Oh, that's what you went. It tasted like poison. So my parents thought they were poisoning me, and that's how I stopped guitar or piano lessons. But then finally, I got to guitar. Oh, my goodness. That's how I got the guitar.

Interesting. Yeah. Because you started playing when you were seven? Yeah. March 15th, 85. It's like, it's my piano teacher trying to fucking kill me? I mean, that's eight.

No, my piano teacher, that was before I started taking guitar lessons. My first guitar teacher was the brother of James Ingram who had that hit song from an American tale about that mouse. Okay.

I took lessons with his brother and I can't believe I don't remember his name, but my first lesson was March 15th, 1985. I know it was March 15, I'm not quite sure. I always remember that And then I took lessons for many years

Phil Ingram? Should we smoke Sigs? Yeah, and you want to smoke right now? Please. Right here? Yeah, fuck it. Because I was thinking, oh, God, great, I get to go to the bathroom.

No, no, don't smoke right here, man. Fuck it, dude. Can we take a break and go to the bathroom? Oh, you need to piss? Yeah. Okay, yeah. Quick, we're going to take a quick break from Riffin. I need to drain it.

Drain it. All right. We have a thing in a break in a while. This is a special occasion. It's not every day I get to a smoking cigarette with Darren. And likewise. Pretty cool, man. Pleasure.

Very cool. Whoops, we are. I'm having a great time. We are back. I have to say, I can't withhold that information. Oh, thank you, man. Thank you. I'm having a great time.

Me too. I got to grip with you. You know, I'm not one of those, you know, I used to be one of those people that would, you know, really not want to do something like this. Really? Yeah. Was there interviews and stuff? Was there any reason?

Just because, well, not always, but at certain times in the band's career when things weren't going well and there was a lot of interviews coming in because the record company would make you do all this stuff he just weren't in the mood to do it. And there was so much bullshit

going on behind the scenes, how can you get on there and talk about good things? You know, it was hard. It's hard. Being in that band was really hard. That's actually one of my questions. Darren is looking back in that era of your life,

because I have plenty of regrets with my band. I look back. A ton. What are some, like a main one, or what are some regrets you have with CKY? So many, man. We all made a lot of mistakes. I think one of them was not playing ball with the record company.

Not playing ball with anybody, really. But I wouldn't call that a regret because, it became what it became it is what it is I mean with the internet and how people talk about us now how we were it's kind of cool in a sense I guess you would say but yeah we we did a lot of things wrong but for me like heading towards mainstream success was really scary and awkward I didn't like it yeah because you don't even like traveling no I didn't I I still don't know I'm afraid of getting on planes I'm that kind of person that I've been everywhere and I don't care.

I don't appreciate it. And that makes me feel guilty sometimes because there are people that would just love to leave. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And, you know, like, I get it. I don't even know where I've been. You know, I don't even pay attention to that stuff. And there are people that would love to be able to do that.

And, yeah, I don't like traveling. Airplane scare the shit out of me. Yeah, so just a lot of regrets, a lot of mistakes. A lot of weird shit happened. Man. Yeah. Yeah, because you guys, you guys fucking took off, dude.

Yeah. And we all just, we all heard that song. I was gonna, yeah, I think that's part of my, my last question with, with that era.

Like, what, like, what happened? Like, when, I'm sure it was the help of, uh,

BAM, but like, how did that, when your song was on jackass, and it's just, it was just everywhere. Yeah. Like,

like, what happened? Well, basically what happened is the whole idea and concept of, not wanting to be just the band. And we, you know, being at that house and rehearsing in that basement, so many people would come through there. Skaters, all of our friends would come to hang out and watch us rehearse.

Yeah. And, you know, we were the kids that there they are, there we are. We were the kids in high school that hung out in the, in the lobby of the school while all the other meatheads and cheerleaders were doing their thing. We all, you know, got together and found each other. We were people that wanted to do creative things. And we would spend so much time together and film stuff. And it was just basically a way of saying,

how do we turn this into one thing, music and recording stuff? And I forget what I was going to say. Oh, there was a video. called Jump Off a Building that we had a segment in. I never cough. Of course, I'm cough. It was called Jump Off a Building. Special occasion.

Special occasion. And there was a segment on there where one of our songs was used. And it became one of the most popular segments on the video. It was BAM's five-minute segment of skating. This is annoying. And we got a lot of names. Mail, snail mail. Snail mail?

Snail mail. What's that? Fan mail and envelopes. It's called snail mail? Yeah. Like when, you know, using an envelope and a stamp, they call it snail mail. Oh, okay. Now I know.

Yeah. Just post office stuff. Okay. We're getting a lot of mail about that song and that part of the video. And, you know, being, BAM was like 15 or 16. I was 19, whatever. and I was like, why can't you get the people that made the jump off the building video to give you money to make our own video if they love that so much?

And then all of a sudden we did. And I think it was Rob Erickson that started it with, I can't remember the skate company. Landspeed, that's right. So Landspeed gave us the money to do our own video. and we were going to be the soundtrack to it. So that's what Jackass became. We didn't use Jackass. Jackass used us.

And they pretty much combined what we were doing on the East Coast with what Knoxville and Steveo were doing on the West Coast. And then MTV compacted both of them and used footage from our first video to make like the pilot episode. So yeah, I think that's... I don't know what that is. It looks familiar. But that's how happened.

And we just said, let's make a video with our, we'll do the soundtrack. You guys filmed skate tricks and skits. And then we'll put out our own video. But since you came up with a CKY, was it some kind of like agreement to where like it could be like a CKY crew? Like you mean a professional agreement on paper? No. It's more like a, hey, it was a verbal agreement pretty much. I think we did scroll something down on a pizza box once, but no, no, it was pretty much

understood that all of our friends, anybody that wanted to be involved in this would be a part of CKY. So it was, I don't think it's been done since. I mean, it's just a band and their friends that do funny shit. Yeah. And we do the soundtrack. Okay. And that lasted like three videos. and then we kind of started to break apart.

Sure. Growing up, we're all partying. Record company wanting us to do this while those guys were doing that. They were doing jackass. We were doing touring. We were touring. It just didn't stay what it was, but I don't think it could have. It was something that was fleeting from the moment it started.

Yeah. I see it that way. You're on a completely other trajectory. Like, I was a fucking blasting off, dude. Yeah, it was a weird way to start, but it was always part of the whole idea that I don't want to be in just the band. I want to do something that, like, Kiss.

They have amusement parks, merch, stickers, pinball machines, like all that cool stuff. So you had goals. Oh, yeah. You were, so you, would you consider yourself a, ambitious person oh god yeah okay yeah yeah um single-minded of purpose maybe not so much now well one-track mind okay you know as as far as eating and sleeping you know the rest of my day was just focusing on that goal and you just you just fucking focus when you have it you know you have it you know

you have that, you know. It's true. And I've seen kids today that have that, but they don't know how to express it because they're not really encouraged that much by their parents. And it's hard to get around the parents when they don't want you to be doing what you're doing. Yeah. Yeah, you kind of with your parents, you kind of have to show them.

Hey, this is, I mean, we put this venue in a hometown. There's fucking 300 people there. Something's happening. Right. You know, and it's, you kind of have to show them, hey, mom, dad, come out. Positive show. That's what did it. You're absolutely right.

Because when they would come see us at a tiny dive bar, like the, I can't even think of these names. We'd play places in Philly, all of them. Doc Watson's was one that I'm talking about. We would play at Doc Watson's, and my parents went to that one. And they were like, wow, this is what he's been doing. We got paid like 50 bucks. We were nobody's. But then, like, we have a video on MTV, and they have no idea anything about it.

So everything is like really local for them. And one, like my aunt cut out, is that it? Doc Watson. Yep. Is this it? That's it. And my aunt cut out a local article in a Philadelphia newspaper where our album was reviewed.

But never mind like the article and like a, you know what it means. But since it was a hometown article, it was like the most important. She had it framed and I still have it in my garage. I need to get it fixed. But that's what's funny about family. Like they don't, they don't look. outside of the hometown for anything you know what I mean it's hard to explain that's true but you know my parents seeing me at Doc Watson's like oh that's what he was talking about that's

what he wants to do but that's not anywhere near where we wanted to be we wanted to be you know what we became yes get out of the town get out of the state get out of the country right get out of the country yeah go on tour which was something I was terrified of I had trouble sleeping when I moved out of my parents' house and with my girlfriend, it scared the hell out of me. I'm not going to be in my own bed. It just freaked me out. Yeah. So I couldn't even travel from my parents' house to my girlfriend's house in Westchester.

So imagine me torn around in an RV, you know, with a bunch of beer drinking guys from Vulcum. And it was just really, really strange. But, you know, the more I did it, the easier it got. Of course. We were on tour a lot during those days after, during the first record, we were doing a lot of, we were crashing a lot of festival. Well, we crashed Warp Tour in 2000.

Under a different name, we played under a different name after they kicked us off. Did you? That was fun. Yeah, they kicked us off because the venue, one of the venues on the Warp Tour was charging like 35% for merch. Oh, didn't you make CDs specifically for that tour? Yeah, well, we toured a lot of times.

There's Warp Tour 99, and I'm getting them mixed up. Warp Tour 99, I think we played without a problem. Because we were part of the Vulcum stage. Vulcum had their own stage. There's other bands on there, like The Line, which Ryan Immigart from Volcom, who got us, found us from the video, got us hooked up with Vulcum clothing.

Nice. And a band called Buono and, A bunch of bands were on the vocal stage, and we played 99 without a problem, I think. But then on the 2000 Warped Tour is when we came up and had an issue with the venue is just ripping off bands. Like, we're working hard enough. You want to take our merch money now? And venues do that. It's always been an issue. It's not cool.

Like, why do venues need your merch money? I mean, come on. We're trying to survive here, and you want our merch money? How would we get some of the bar money? Yeah, exactly. Yeah, they wouldn't want to make that deal, believe me. Man, they just, they just fucking squeeze out every little bit, dude. Anything they could squeeze out of an artist.

By the time, yeah, when you're on tour, by the time. Exactly, every single penny they can. By the time you get done, what you have left is like, but, yeah, we were touring a lot. And then we got the Guns and Roses tour, which was fun. You guys were Guns and Roses? Yeah. That's why you guys started drinking.

No, we were drinking way before. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, the drinking thing just we, I started drinking a lot of beer on the 99 Warp Tour. I think that's when I fell off the wagon. Well, I never rode the wagon, but that's when I started. So first record is out, and that's when. Yeah, because I couldn't bear being on tour.

It was so scary. I started drinking. I did the same thing. Yeah, it's scary. I did the same thing after like a year. I was like, oh, I was going to start. I started my first drink was two weeks before my, 20 first birthday.

So it's probably third tour. So you just, it just happens. You start, well, I'll say, I'll have one drink. Yeah. And then you're drunk. Yeah. And then you start, you're getting your first mixed drink and then you're doing shots. It happens quick, dude.

It does. It's a circle, or it's a snowball effect. Yeah. It was a box for you for a good five years. Yeah. Same here. Ten years. It was just unbelievable things happening.

I can imagine guns of roses, though. Oh, my God. That was hilarious. Is this one of the flyers? That is, yeah. Oh my goodness. This Master Mike. HP Pavilion.

Yeah. We did that tour. Guns and Roses played 17 shows. We did 18. Oh, my gosh. We got the headline, our hometown arena, and Guns and Roses didn't play. Are you serious? Yeah.

We played, sold out Madison Square Garden. And then the next night, We played the first union center in Philly. I had so many, I had friends and family in the audience, and I knew that Guns and Roses wasn't there. So I had to somehow get in touch. This is before good cell phones. I had to get in touch with people in the audience and tell them to leave

because I knew there was going to be a riot. Yeah, and they destroyed like a multi-million dollar soundboard. That place went nuts. Oh my goodness, dude. But we played that show and they didn't. So we played 18 and they played 17. of their own tour. The first one they canceled.

We even had to make it all the way up to Canada. Why they cancel? I don't know. I still don't know. Having diarrhea or some? I don't know. I don't know. You know, people always have said weird shit about Axel and rumors and stuff,

and none of it is true. He's the coolest fucking guy ever. So, such a great guy. And it really bothered me. because there were websites like metal sludge and stuff like that. Oh, sure. Yeah, we won't even name them. Yeah, they wanted us to, yeah.

And there was a lot of stuff going on about Axel. I'm sure there's still, but he was the coolest guy ever. To pick us, first of all, was so cool. You know, he could have gotten any record company. And it was funny is the record company tried to get us to not do it. Why? Because they wanted another one of their bands to do it. But they tried to make it sound unappealing for us.

so that we wouldn't do it and they could get somebody else they were really tricky that way they were sneaky they were sneaky that island records hey this guns and rose tour arena tours aren't fun i mean you guys won't have a good time so just don't do it they were right exactly or no their husbands why would you want to do that oh my that's what they said and it was up it was us against seven other bands and he picked us and we were on our sick yeah we were on our way home from san diego we had just toured for like two months oh that sucks it was like the last two shows it was like the last two shows and we had to cancel them to get our asses up to Canada it was almost impossible and we made it and then they don't show up So was it like a last minute thing? Mm-hmm Hey, tour is happening and fucking...

We were on the tour bus and our tour manager was waiting for the phone call that we either didn't get the tour or that we did. And I'm like, oh, we're going home. We just toured for two months. We're not going to get the tour with Guns and Roses. We had two shows left in Anaheim and San Diego, I think.

And we got the call. We're on. and we told the bus driver, go north. We have to be in Canada tomorrow. All that work driving, getting into Canada, customs and all that stuff, and they don't show up. We were told 15 minutes, guys, that's how close it was. You guys are on in 15 minutes, and we had just driven from the airport rushing to try to get to our time to go on stage. And we got there, and we were all like, uh-uh, and they're like, guys, you got 15 minutes, and we're like,

And then they're like shows canceled. And then Kurt Loder from MTV interviewed us. And there was a riot out there. We're just riots. The front and the back of that tour are just riots. Dude, that's kind of sick. It was fun. It was a fun tour.

It was cool playing arenas. It was a different experience. Playing arenas. Dude, do you dream about that when you're a child, man? And then we have your band. I think we could, I think we could do this. And then we, then we dream about that when you're a child, man. And then when you're in an arena, you're like, what though?

Oh, you should have happened? I guess I'm not that insane. Because you're actually putting it on a show. Yeah. You know what I mean? Like, when you're playing an arena, you can't see people in the audience. So you have to play the show not knowing whether or not the people are into it. Whereas in a small venue, you know, you see everybody and you interact with the crowd and all that.

But in an arena, it's really strange. I'm sure you've played an arena before. Yeah, you... It's weird. It's weird. You learn, you learn, and then you took that throughout your whole career. Yeah. How to play like a big stage is different.

Then you transfer it over to everywhere else. It's really different. I mean, festival shows during the day, I'm not a big fan of because I don't think rock and roll should happen during the day. It's kind of silly to wake up at 11 a.m. and go on stage. Start rocking, dude. Come on. But, you know, festival shows, arena, shows indoor arenas and clubs, you know, they're totally different experiences. I love them all

But You know I like I like to play smaller venues And interact With the audience Do you know It's something that would draw me insane

That happened to you So your third record was a Fucking disaster Yeah Right I know where you're going Yeah you know So

Yeah When I was I was just like Listening I was like I don't know what I would do If it happened to me I just don't know

So the third record, yeah, an answer can be found. An answer can be found. So it's done, right? It's done, and then the last day... Not to mention... Don't forget to mention that we busted our asses on it and spent a lot of money. Okay.

Fourth Street recording in Santa Monica. In Santa Monica, yes. And then... So obviously, it's still on a major, and it's spent a lot of money in time. Yes. And then... So the engineer...

The last day didn't back up the hard drives and it was gone. I guess you're supposed to do it every day that you record. You're supposed to back it up onto a drive or something? I don't know. But something happened. Basically, I don't know if this is figuratively speaking or not, but apparently it melted. I don't know, but I don't know if literally it melted. I think maybe that might have been just the way they explained it to me.

But the drive or whatever held way too much information and just broke or something. And the whole album was gone. And when I got that phone call, I'll never forget. I was, me and my wife were in bed. We were watching all in the family on DVD. At 4 a.m. 4 a.m. Chad calls me and says, dude, our album is gone.

And I was like, ha ha ha. Because we had just worked so hard on it. And I thought it was like some kind of prank. And he said, no, I'm not kidding. That's his voice, by the way. I don't know what you're talking about. We mean a race because we did half two inch tape, half pro tools. We did it on two inch tape, then download it into Pro Tools.

Yeah. And I don't want to say his name, but I want to. I shouldn't say his name, but I want to so bad. A guy that did it. But Chad said I'm going to the studio right now to kill him. And I get up out of bed and I put my clothes on and I head over to 4th Street to prevent a murder because he really was going to kill the guy. I don't know what I would do, man.

It was unbelievable. So the next, all we could do was, okay, we have this huge problem. How do we fix it? So we ended up hiring like a data like retriever that specializes in emails and texts. Yeah, like FBI shit. Like I don't know. Like I just was told certain things. I don't know what's true or not.

But this was like a data recovery company that was, I think was at once at one point worked with the FBI to recover data that was erased or whatever. We hired them and we ended up. getting the album back in pieces. Like a fucking puzzle. Picture like a like a 5,000 piece puzzle totally done and then just

getting it back thrown up in the air all broken apart and you had to put it back together again. We went to Sony Studios without telling the label we flew to Sony Studios and they helped they they sat there and pieced it back together again and every time I listen to that album that's all

here. Some stuff had to be re-recorded. Some, they had actual, some of the parts that we got back together were bad takes. Oh, no. That we had to use. It was a nightmare. It was... That would make we want to quit the band. Yeah, it was bad.

It was one, it caused one of the gray hairs on my head. Oh, my goodness, dude. I forget the engineer's name, and I feel really bad. He was at Sony Studios. He saved our asses. I can't remember what his name was. I should, shouldn't I? So, Chad, he's, so he produced the last three, the first three, right?

Yeah, we co-produced. Okay, yeah, co. And then you have an engineer. Yeah, we, you know, Island was cool. They let us produce our own records. That's a balsomew. Well, it was, you know, they knew they had to sign us. They just didn't know why. Who is that? Pablo. Pablo Araya. Yeah. That guy saved our fucking asses. Wow.

Yeah. He put that fucking thing back together again. Shout out Pablo. Yeah. Thank you, Pablo. That's my dad's name's awesome. Thank you for bringing that up, Jerry. Shout out to Pablo.

How long did that take to... So you get the mess. How long did it take to... Months. Months? Oh, my... I, because being so laudite, I didn't have to do anything

except sit there and wait and worry, panic. It was panic for like a month. Nothing but panic. Because we were expected to, you know, update people, you know, and I don't even think our manager now. I can't remember who knew. Wow.

But yeah, secretly, we're in Sony Studios, panicking. And you know what's the funniest thing ever? And this says a lot about weird human behavior. Yeah. The audacity. The engineer who erased the album called us while we were at Sony Studios

asking if he could get paid for the time can you believe that the balls it takes to call and ask to get paid oh my goodness for the time you spent erasing a huge multi-thousand 100,000 dollar record

yeah that that cost you more I can't think of an analogy I mean, I can't. It's like babysitting, if I babysitted your kid and smacked them around. And then you send me to jail, I get arrested and sent to jail. And then from prison, I call you and I'm like, yo, can I get paid for babysitting? It's like, it doesn't make sense. It was like, what?

You have to be kidding. That guy was weird. And I'm sure some people know who he is. They can say his name. I won't say his name. Good call. Good call. You don't have to.

I don't know. what I would do, man. It's just one of the many gray hairs on my head. It was not easy being in that. It's not easy being in a band. No. I mean, come on. Yeah.

You have some issues, right? Of course. They're burned there. They're in there. They are burned forever, dude. Mm-hmm. All those mistakes. And then the ones that are the worst are like that.

It's when you work so hard to something and then it doesn't pan out or it's like they get like the reverse effect. Like how did that go wrong? You work hours and It's about all this money months And then the way it comes together You're like, what the hell does happen? There's nothing what you expected

What the hell do you do? I mean, yeah, we could have just quit But it was more like You know, we have this problem and let's solve it And you know, in the end it works out Because it gives you a new part of your character You know, if there's a problem, you solve it You don't quit and whine like a little bitch

Yeah Which, you know, I've had a lot of quitters in my life But you know, you keep going Band members leave You keep going, you get new ones And keep going, learning It builds, it does build your character, unfortunately Makes you stronger, yeah

Yeah, the worst part, unfortunately, is you have to go through that shit But once it gets behind you You're good to go You've experienced the worst possible thing that can happen to a band and you can move on. And then when sometimes it happens, it'll, like, manifest sometimes. Like, your anger, you'll just, like, suppress it.

And then they'll just pop up in, like, other areas of your life. Oh, shit, I got to process this, man. It happens. I can't fucking change it. It's always, I actually have it on a postage note. I'm a computer, don't be a bitch. It's just like, I don't know. Oh, you should photocopy that.

I have a few people I'd like to give that to. Jesus Christ. It's terrible. man yeah that was bad it's terrible hey jay pull up their a second record infiltrate yeah i want i want to end this little segment on a high note no pull up their uh their track listing close uh okay close yet far that's my favorite riff riff yeah is there a riff in that song you mean the guitar work yeah i love that rip too To me, it's just part of a good song.

It's interesting you call it a riff. I guess it's a riff. G string has to be in good tune. Who said that I wasn't right? I've lived for years without a lie. I'm a soul on my side. Still ridicule despite how hard than I have tried. Don't take me under your way.

Don't need a hand. Don't need anything. I've got a roof over my head. As if I'd rather be alone with me instead. Close yet for... It's just that the whole time. I love that, dude. I appreciate that.

I'm not a big fan of it. You're not? No. I think some people know that. It's, you know, we weren't going for a single. Probably should have been a single. But, well, my dad thought so. He got in a fight with R.A. and our guy in New York City. That should be on the radio.

Oh, yeah. And he's on the phone, like, listening to my dad. It was just funny. That was really funny. What is that venue in New York City, like 2,200? I think it's in the square, right? It's like in the city. It's changed from palladium to Best Buy Theater to, uh,

what else is it? It's where Ozzy played on, um, speak of the devil, I think. PlayStation Theater? It was a PlayStation Theater at some point. I think it's a spot you're talking about. It's like right. It's like in Times Square. Not the Ritz.

Wits? No, it's not the Ritz, but it's something like that. what is that venue? Not Grammarcy either. Grammarcy. Oh, Irving Plaza? Yeah, there you go. Urban Plaza, yeah.

Okay. That's where my dad yelled at saying that song should be on the radio. He was probably right because it would have been nice to have like a shot like that, to have like that song. We made a video for it. It could have been released as a single. But I think the label said at the time that it would ruin our, what we looked like or whatever or do you want to have a career do you want to oh god you know yeah they did

they did a lot of stuff to keep us down you know like keep us where we are you know don't get any bigger don't get we won't let you get smaller we won't let you get bigger it was really weird there was weird shit going on there but you know we fought for this stuff you got to fight dude one thing i learned man my throughout my career sometimes you got to fight for shit yeah you got to say it and then you got to say it again and again and again and they'll try to make it sound like don't make it sound like, you know, it's not important or it's not going to happen or, you know, they don't hear you. And then, yeah, I mean. I'm surprised you said that about that song because you end up doing it again on your solo record. Well, yeah. I mean, when I did that acoustic record,

I had to do pretty much all mellow songs just to fill the record. Okay. I don't hate it. I just don't, it's not one of my favorite songs. I think it's because there were so many different renditions of it. there was an oil version of that song. Was there really? Yeah. Oh, wow. I mean, we demoed it so many times. Oh, wow.

It was just like, it had a different vocal line. It had different lyrics. It went through so many different stages. That's such a simple song. As a musician, it's not really interesting to play. But it's fun to do live at the end of a show. Yeah. Everybody's singing along, yeah.

I'm saying then I saw it on a set list is last. Yeah, always. Like, even when we play now, we do it last. I saw it with your recent set list. Oh, they're playing it now. He must love that song. Yeah. Well, I love that the fans.

love it. It's all about that. You know, I don't care. If they tell me, you know, if it's, people want to hear certain songs will play them, you know. I don't, why would I want to play my favorite songs? There's songs that people don't want to hear. People don't want to hear. Yeah.

You know, that's what it's all about. It's all about the fans. It's great that you're able to at least have that that logo. You know. Yeah. It's, it's funny that that happened.

The Ozzy logo happened when it was designed. We were doing one of those late night TV shows, which I was always like, this is where we're going. Like, this is what mainstream is. We're on late night with Carson Daly. It just didn't work. It was weird. But Ozzy was the guest.

And Carson Daly or Craig Kilbourne, I forget which one, gave him a copy of Answer Can Be Found and noticed that our logo, looked like his on the show and he's like, you know what if I keep, can I keep this? And we were like, oh shit, Sharon's going to see it. And we're going to get sued. We're fucked. Yeah, because it was a tribute to Ozzy.

Yeah. To have that. And because you can't not love Ozzy. Yeah. Ozzy was, um, well, well, where do I think of the logo from? We just manipulated the Ozzy logo into, I mean, we used the O. made it into a C. An early incarnation of the CKY logo

actually had the little seraph from the O. Everybody thought it was Eky. So we took out that middle piece. Oh, yeah, yeah. And, yeah, we just used the Y and the K. And that became, we have two logos. Another one was kind of like just a standard font.

But that's the one that stuck. It stuck, huh? Yeah. Yeah, so it's great that, 96, six, bitter beans can have a logo too. Can you trademark a logo? No. I mean, yeah, but I don't know if this still is the rule.

Legally, you can use anything that's trademarked as long as you change five things about it. Five things. So if I took your picture and wanted to make a T-shirt of you, and I just made, if I I just moved your nose a little bit up. One. And took off, you know, the Fumanchu part here. Yeah. And maybe made your hair.

If I changed five things, you wouldn't be able to have a problem with it. Legally. You would have a problem with it, not legally. Yeah. Okay. So we found that out because we used a, we used Carrie on a shirt, you know, from the movie Carrie. It was a movie.

Carrie. Okay. The Stephen King movie. Oh, okay. We made a shock and tear her shirt. We used Carrie at the end of the prom when she's all bloody. And we were like, are we going to get sued for this? And our merch set company said, no, we'll just change a couple colors and move a little,

think couple things around. You can do it. Five things. Okay, I'm going to keep that in my brain. Five things. That's what it was back then. I just remember that five things. Alter five things about any picture and you can use it.

Okay. Well, I'll learn something to know. That's pretty important to know. Don't quote me on it. Nobody actually used that advice because it's probably not right anymore. Someone says something to me on you. Well, my lawyer said. My lawyer, Darren Miller said that if I could buy things.

So it must be true. I mean, no. I remember things in pieces and fragments. Well, it's great. It's great. You can't trademark the logo. You know, bam can't take that, you know. Right.

That's great. Because it's Ozzy anyway. I was wondering It's still Ozzy Where did Ozzy get it? From some genius I have no idea Who designed Ozzy's logo

He's a genius Whoever he is I wonder man I wonder Ozzy was really important I mean What for you did three was Zeppelin, Kiss and a

No Zeppelin No? No ACDC No Aerosmith Leppard Sorry Def Leppard Yes yes sorry

Def Leppard Definitely Ozzy Kiss Yeah Blue Easter Colt Then I'm very I want to shout out to Anthony from Malaya Rage. An 80s thrash band that should have been much bigger than they were.

That guy's huge influence on me. Well, shout out then. Malia Rage was probably one of the best thrash bands of the late 80s. They were signed to Epic, so they had a lot of exposure but didn't take off because a lot of people didn't like that they didn't pay their dues.

They played like four shows and got signed. And that was a huge problem. Like, everybody in the end had a huge problem with that. Why? I don't know. It's like, but they,

I guess like, they wouldn't go, they couldn't get big tours because bands would be like, that band just got together, you know, yeah. But their,

their album, Solitary Solitude, man, is one of the best Thrash albums. Really? Yeah. Okay, well,

our listeners and watchers could have a new, a new band-a jam. Yeah, there you go, Malia Rage, that's killed to survive, their first record.

Okay, so this is Thrash, Darren? It's like heavy metal. Okay. It's not, it's like, power metal but without the

ah, okay yeah, it's like riff, riff metal. It's not fast, it's just really good. That's all I can say.

But they were a huge influence on me. And, yeah, Ozzy, loved, my brother had Diary of a Madman and my brother doesn't like metal. I don't know how he ended up with that album,

but I used to spin that while I was listening to Kiss and starting to find out about her. bands and stuff, death, cancer, all these weird bands I found out about that had huge influence on what we were doing. Do you like Kiss now more than you used to? Because when I go to it, sometimes I get, I get, oh, who's your favorite band? Corn.

Corn is? Yeah, I'll get, like, re-obsessed. How old are you? 39. Okay. So I still. I got 10 years on you. Nice.

So you found out about corn. And then, well, who did you like before? Poor corn. I'm 12 at this point. 12, like 11. So I was like, listen to my mainstream stuff. Like, I don't know,

Michael Jackson or something. Oh, Michael Jackson is still. Love them. Still. So they came about, you know, like,

you know, you don't find your music yet. You just know music. Mm-hmm. Well, I guess for you is different. You were fucking two. That was two.

Yeah. Man, it's so early. It's funny how people are like, there's no way you remember that. I do. I remember that. But you,

like, you found out about corn. Was corn all you listen to? for honestly for a while yeah so how obsessed how obsessed were you i was obsessed were you trying to get in touch with them writing letters no it's okay you didn't go that far but the when corn put out every album you were there the day of yeah okay did they ever put out an album you were disappointed in not till later i was i was older so do you like corn more now or than before i think now because there's more of a catalog for you there's more catalog that things mean more now

they have things to compare it to. Right. Obviously, when you're lacking inspiration, you can't redo your childhood. Right. So you always go back to the records. Oh, shit, you can be reminded and then you're reinspired. So you only go back to your childhood. You can't redo it.

So you have your selection of bands and areas that you had that you could kind of reawaken. Right. And it takes certain records, certain songs, certain sections. So in your mind back then, like, corn could do no wrong. Yeah. But now that you're older, you look back on those albums that influenced you so much and you say, how come I liked that part so much? Oh, yeah.

You know what I mean? Once you get more experience, you start to look over it with a different lens. Totally. So your question, do I like Kiss more now? Yeah. No, because I don't even need to listen to their albums because I can listen to them right now. If I just shut my eyes. True.

I can hear perfectly those records. Especially if you're really high. Yeah. Yeah. There you go. Dude, I was jamming. So you have a song coming out like this week, correct? A song?

No. Do we? Oh, yeah, duh. See? Thanks, man. I was like, did he just fool me? Yeah. I got some intel.

We did a play-through video for 96 Quite Bitter Beans. Okay. And people have been, you know, I've done it before, but like on not, like, Not really telling anybody about it, but we, yeah, my current lineup, my new lineup, which I should have to do a shout out to. Cam DeWald, who set this up, set me up with you. Shout out to Cam. That guy is badass. He's a band Gorgatron.

He's our new bass player. Thanks, Cam. Appreciate it, man. Tyler Sturgel from the band Zoth. Zoth. That's a band. It's our new guitar player. That's a band.

It is XOTH. That's badass. But, yeah, we did a play-through video. Cam superimposed in there Yeah It looks real It looks like we're all in the same photo Doesn't it?

Kind of, But it isn't Oh, you guys already are in the same photo? No, none of us are together Okay, sick I'm in California Tuamis, our drummer He's in Finland

You shouldn't have said anything I know I should have to have to add one more guy to that photo And these guys I'm sticking with till the end or I'm going to shoot myself in the fucking skull. I'm tired of, I lose lineups all the time.

I feel you, man. It's tough to keep the same bunch of people, man. These days... It's tough, dude. Yeah, it's really bizarre what some musicians think still happens in the music industry. Like, for instance,

when we signed with Nuclear Blast, our bass player at the time asked me, well i'd like to see the contract because uh i'd have to have me and my lawyer look it over i'm like contract dude this is not nineteen ninety eight this is a fucking two page memo pretty much saying here's a very small amount of money give us a record like why what do you talk about the record contracts are not 80 pages long

anymore dude it's a memo it just says make a record here's some money yeah and i'm like i'm just trying to communicate this shit to them it just they don't get it You have to, you know, and these guys get it. So, mark my words, this new lineup that I have, if these guys bail on me, I'm done. Because that means that there's no one out there I can work with. Yeah. So they know what's going on, though.

They, they... Good. Know what the fuck's up. Well, I hope, Darren, with age, you have, like, a maturity, and you guys get along. Yeah. and learn to a coexist. Yeah. You know.

Yeah. That's why I work really hard at that. Yeah. Raising three kids and figuring out that not everybody does the right thing all the time. You know, the difference between right and wrong, you don't always do the right thing. I mean, that's what you learn when you're raising kids is it. You have to understand that they have no idea what they don't know. so that's part of the job and then band members are sometimes worse they have no idea what they don't know

and you have to either teach them and it works out or they can't handle it and they bail yeah you got to speak their language yeah yeah it's tough if they learn how to speak it but yeah we did a play-through video of that and that's going to be really cool when it's it's dropping When is it dropping, Matt? Next week. Next week. Okay, so this drops on Monday. So we're talking next...

So if you're listening to this on Monday, it's going to drop it probably in five days on Friday. Correct? Because songs usually drop on Friday. Yeah. Hopefully. This is just... Yeah, we're doing a play-through.

It actually marks the re-release... It helps commemorate and celebrate the re-release of Tony Hawk's skater... What is that called? Parts... Tony Hawk four. Tony Hawk three or four? Three, three and four.

I should know this stuff, right? Pro Skater three. That's a massive game, dude. Yeah. We got a lot of exposure on that, thanks to him too. Yeah, he picked us to be on that. That was really cool. Oh, yeah, July 11th, 2025.

Yeah. That's coming up. And what's really, and I didn't even realize this for a long time, is how much people love play-through video. Dude, you gotta get on that. My Instagram was fucking flying when I started doing those videos. It was crazy. I had no idea.

Like, do people that don't play guitar when I watch that? Yeah. Really? Yeah. Learn something new all the time. I'm not sure if you know this, but you're a guitar player. And it's why people follow you. I know.

So when you do the thing that just natural, but it's good. It's just natural. I'm going to plug in my crate. I'll jam a riff. But for you, it says you're just playing guitar, but someone else doesn't get to see that every day, so it's new for them. Right.

You know? So that's hard for me to understand because this is such like an extra part. It's like a tumor in the guitar. It's been an extra part of my body. It's a tumor? That's pretty much. Well, I never. What's a positive term for growth?

That's a sick term, though. A twin. It's a Siamese part of me. Yeah. I'm going to write something right now. Yeah. Let's go for it. Yeah.

Today, I don't know what my issue is, but I've been dropping picks, like the whole fucking thing. Jay, can you, uh, hand you? Here's one. Oh. Thank you. All right, so what kind of song do you want to write? I like simple.

You like simple? I like catchy and I like it to come from you. It's actually cool to hold out that court, yeah. There's your verse. I was taking a river A little reflection One break in a Do your chorus

That's a lot of That's kind of a sick chorus See? We wrote a song If you had to copyright that right now Yeah, we just had a verse in the chorus Yeah, it took three minutes Honor Darren, that's fucking sick, dude

That's a lot of fun to do that shit I love with the octave When you do the power chorus, It sounds like massive. I never get to play with sounds like this. So I'm like... Oh, great. So I'm stuck about it.

Dude, how did you get the, uh, a leveling creation gig? Oh, Christ's sake. Because you sang for them for like two years, right? Yeah. People will kill me if I don't bring it up. I know. It was, uh, yeah, it was something that was eventually going to have to come up.

No, um, I used to, I was friends with, Brett Hoffman, their singer. Rest in peace. Yeah. He passed away in 2018 from a cancer, right? Yeah. He was only 51, man. I know.

He found out he had stage four colon cancer. And one of the times he was out of malevolent, he had a band called Down the Drain. And it's like 2000. He had just done a record with them and with a malevolent and then left to form a band. called Down the Drain and I took took took we took them out on tour for like two weeks nice and um me and breck we talked like online and stuff but that's when we first really got to hang out for two weeks and those guys were fun but touring with him was cool because he knew more about touring than i did because he had been doing it for so long well we came really good friends because he had the same

sense of humor yeah we were interested in the same things and i loved his work and his lyrics had a huge influence on my lyrics. Huge. Just the words he used and how he explained things and told stories and stuff. And I really gravitated to that. And we just became closer and closer

and we played jokes on each other. One time I pretended I was dead and he believed it and said, oh, better get somebody like, Harry! And I was like, blah! It scared the shit out of him. But just touring with him for those two weeks was awesome. And he was with us at the Christmas show and

he got to meet Phil in April and he was a big fan of Phil and yeah we were just friends forever and then one day we were talking and he's like one day you're gonna have that job my job singing for them I was like really he's like yeah I was like yeah that would be cool you know

but you're in the band you do the band and then unfortunately you know him passing made it kind of happen I mean, it was cool. Wow. And it's funny because the two years that I was in malevolta, which is the last two years from like 23 or 22, 24 or something like that,

I was so sick. I had the worst depression of my life. Like, it was soul crushing. It's the only way I can just describe it. I mean, chunks of my hair were falling out. Like, it was bad, really bad. And I was just drinking more to numb it. Oh, no.

And then the drinking made it work. It was a catch-22 situation. There was no good end to it. So I was like, I got to get the fuck out of this house. I got to go on tour. So I did five weeks with 96, and I came home, and I think I had about eight hours to get on the plane to go meet up with the malevolent guys.

And we did not rehearse. The first thing we did was getting on stage at a festival in Italy. I think it was Italy. It was a festival, our first show, never having played together we played like acoustically like

yeah you didn't they didn't even have an amp for you huh no well no it was weird like we were playing kind of acoustically and that was it didn't really count as a rehearsal but just got up there and just did it and it was fine I mean if you know a song

and they know a song and you know if Jerry knows a song you know a song if we're gonna play God of Thunder or something we'd get up and play it you know it sounds like true so yeah and That illness just was following me everywhere.

I was sleeping so fucking much. I could not stay awake. And with just trying to dive into being in both bands, and I don't really even know, like, what happened, how I ended up not still being in malevolentia. I might still be. I mean, I really don't know. I really don't know.

I mean, I was fired online. while I was on the tour. And it didn't make sense to me because, you know, Phil, the guitar player, he wasn't doing very well either. So weird shit was happening. He was in the next room next to me, texting out there that I was fired. I'm like, what the hell is going on? That's awesome. So is that a photo of us?

Oh, am I exed out? That's awesome. Did you do that or did they do that? No, no. They did that? Yeah. I mean, it's a little strange. It's a little, it's a little bizarre.

I don't, I really don't know what happened. The guy on the left ended up taking my job. And Jesse's, they're all cool guys. I don't have a problem with it. I mean, whatever happens happens. But I understand, like, everybody was in a really crazy place. And I don't discount my own fault for that. Like, sure, good.

You know, but yeah. Got it's your responsibility, you know? but it was just not the right time I shouldn't have been maybe I shouldn't have been torn but I had to and I it didn't affect you know

being on stage was the one thing that like helped me out of that shit and then you know doing the best I could were you torn for sanity purposes yes I was trying to restore some sanity well especially

everyone had a weird two years you know prior yes COVID fucked up everything for everybody. Yeah. Right? It destroyed my band's momentum.

It canceled tours. It stopped an album release. I mean, it was just, it was horrible. Everybody has their own COVID stories. Well, yeah, I mean, just jump back in. You got to get back in there. So that's what I did. I had to.

I had to. I had to go play shows. So I did. It's like we talked about earlier. There's a problem. Let's solve it. That's what I try to do to solve it. But, you know, and the shows were great.

The 96 shows were good. The malevolent shows were good. It was fun being in that band. And if I still am in the band, I'm in the band. Whatever happens, happens, you know. But right now, my 96 is my main focus. Yeah, if you were going through a rough time, was there a reason why you weren't touring with 96?

Just go straight into that? Well, we were, I mean, we were taking any tour we could get. It's really hard for us to get booked. You know, I wanted, I haven't played, we haven't been an opening act since Guns and Roses, I don't think. I have tried to get on tours with 96 and it just falls through or doesn't happen. We're going to do Alien Ant Farm and that fell through and all this. You know, I'd love to be an opening band play for an hour and kick, you know, kick the crap out of the headliner. That's always been the fun thing to do.

and we just take what we can get. So people are like, you're a new to tour, you never tour. Like when we get it, I'd like to be on the road six months out of the year. I would love it. But unless the booking agency comes up with six months worth of tours, you can only do what we get. You know, we're going out in October. I think like 70% of the dates are confirmed.

Great. So we're going out in this fall. So yeah, I love being on the road. I just don't love a lot of the aspects of it. It which most people don't. This is nothing special about that. Mm-hmm. You know, like 23 hours, you just kind of have to find a way to kill it.

But when you're on stage, it's like, makes it all worth it. I know. Yeah, it's like, why am I doing this? Yeah. And then he just could be minded. Yeah, you do eventually. No, shit. This is why we're out here.

Days off are the worst, man. Yeah. I'm still, yeah, I still don't know how I feel about days off. Fucking hate them. Yeah. Let's get up. Let's find somewhere to play. Like, does it.

You're in the, you know, you're in the whole habit of it, and then there's a day you don't do it, and it's just like, this is, it's just, I hate days off. I'd rather play every day, and we do try to play every single day when we're on tour. But, you know, once in a while you need that travel day. It's money down and drain sometimes. It's like, oh, there goes all that money. Yeah. And it's already expensive enough to be out. Worse than ever.

It's getting, it's right when you think it can't get any worse, oh, it's, it's, well, it's, course. Yep. You're like, Bob, gas is the main issue. Gas right now you're here. Unbelievable.

Gasing cost of cloth. Cloth? Yeah. What do you use cloth for? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay.

I was thinking tablecloth for some of it. Yeah, the price of merchandise. Do you 96 tablecloths? I mean, it's all this kiss talk, you know, get.

Yeah, there are probably are kissed tablecloths. I don't know why there wouldn't be. But yeah, I mean, yeah, merch the idea of like a t-shirt being 45 bucks is outrageous i remember we were selling them for 20 yeah and we were like wow 20 bucks that's a lot of money's a lot 45 dollars now like everything's

expensive and i hate charging people that much for something yeah sucks but you got to survive right yeah 2025 in a rock or metal band is not easy it's hard to never right now as far as like uh i don't think people understand that Expenses. It's tough. Yeah. Because a lot of people I talk to, you know, a lot of fans are like, why aren't you, like, why aren't you on tour? Like, why don't you come? You ever get those fans that are like, you're on tour, but why come, how come you're not coming to this place?

You have every single state and city asking you why you're not coming there. And I think it's your fault. Yeah, sometimes this happens, you know, you get the routing. It's like, well, we're not going there. Yeah. And they're like, they think you did it on purpose. Yeah, it's just, we just got a very, most convenient routing that we can give. Exactly. Maybe next time.

Yeah, maybe next time. Now, every band is competing with every band. Right. Like genres don't matter or age bracket. It's like you're competing with everyone for the same venue in that time. Right. And it's tough. It's tough to... I love being in this band. I'm always going to be in this band. And I'm always going to be making music for this band. And I'm going to go out like that. Because right now when you're 50, you start to think about getting shit over with. list stuff. You focus on that.

You'll see. Give yourself 10 years. Yeah, yeah. What are some of your bucket lit stuff? A lot of it. Just to release, just a lot of, I can't think. That's a good question. I want to travel somewhere that's not on tour.

There you go. So you're a traveler. No, but it's just. Where are you thinking? I want to go. It sounds stupid, but everywhere. I'm going to

Hawaii. I want to to go to somewhere Germany. I want to go to Ireland. For like a vacation?

Yeah, it's like vacated. You're not on a tour just me and a lady. We would go somewhere and just chill and have do little things. It's fucking

just chill. It's supposed to because it's different when you're there for music. It's just different. You don't get it. I tried.

It just doesn't work. Yeah. Everybody's always like, oh, did you see the, the Eiffel Tower? Well, it's like, no. You've run my mind.

Darren, you just from my mind. I've been to Paris, France. I don't know how many fucking times. I've never been to the Tower. And people are like, why didn't you see the eyes? You don't understand. Like, you don't get to travel around the city.

But I have one bucket list thing. I would like to move back into my old house. Really? In Fort and Pennsylvania. Yeah. I would like to buy that house back. Dang. And live there because that house was the best.

We had a hill. We could sled during the winter. There's so much area. And a lot of the stuff is still there. like all the trees and stuff in the back. It was like a forest and a stream. That house was so cool. It had like four stories, but they were small.

Like you go three steps and then it was just a really cool laid out house and I loved living there and I miss it. So I would love to move back into that house. Oh, wow. Yeah. What is late do you think? I have no idea. I haven't said anything about it. But yeah, that's something that I would.

That's a really cool. That's a good, I mean, if... Do you have a child at home? I do. I do like to go back to? I still go there. Yeah, you miss it, right? Not as much, not so much you'd want to have it back and have it be your own, but...

Yeah. It's just a really cool house. I mean, I don't know if I would actually do it, but it's something that I would really like to do. That's cool. Just move back there. Yeah. Back to Westchester and... You got to ask the, uh, got to ask the boss.

Mm-hmm. What, you've been married for 21 years, huh? Right? Yeah. Well, we've been together 21 years. Oh, wow. It's a while, man. Yeah.

How did you guys not break up? You have to keep it together for the sake of family. You go through rough times. Everybody does this. There's really nothing. There's no secret to it. Hmm. You just do it.

The way we met is just ridiculous. Really? Yeah. How did you guys meet? She was in, Felissa was in a movie called Sleepaway Camp that I saw when I was 12 and in it she plays a bullied camper

which I was bullied at the time a lot like really bad. That's why I wanted to get out in New Jersey. And I related with the character in that movie so much that I said to myself, I'm going to get that girl. Oh, wow. Yeah.

I said, I'm going to get her. And I didn't know how. and I didn't know how I was going to do it, but I manifested it, and then when the internet came out, I found out more about her, and then sent her a message. Next thing, you know, the band is at a movie site

where she's filming the movie, and I meet up with her, and that's that. What the fuck? Yeah. That's pretty bizarre, man. You just do it. Yeah. And that's what happened.

Yep. You straight of said, I'm going to get her. Yeah, 12 years old. Holy shit. There she is, yeah. Right there. I saw that face and I said, I'm finding that woman. Because she was seven years older to me and I said, I'm finding that woman.

I don't care. I don't care how or what happens. It's just going to happen. And it did. And that just goes to show that if you're not following what's on your mind, things that are on your mind and take up a lot of your time in your mind you got to follow those things and and find them no matter what means you just do it that's all i can it's like it's like nike just do it it's like the perfect catchphrase whatever it is just you want it just do it get it

wow and my my daughter really has that sense of just get it she gets what she wants she uses guilt she uses charm she gets what she wants from everyone including me and I say no and then she does exactly

what it takes to get me to say yes if it's money or a ride or whatever it is she knows what she so that's yeah that's that's how it works to anybody out there there's something on your mind that you want

just go get it why not what else are you going to do that is yeah what what separates uh this this is a thought i have often like how it separates you from the rest when you have a thought and it's not delusional so so let's say if it's not darren miller doing that if someone else said that you would you would think they're a psycho you're they're fucking nuts and and you are delusional blah blah blah blah blah yeah so what what is it because there's no such thing as delusion if it's possible

everybody thought I was delusional when I would say that out loud as a 12, 13, 14 year old kid people say what the fuck are you talking about? I didn't share it with many people but with the people I did they thought I was like an idiot crazy everything I wanted to do people thought

was delusional not possible and those people are the ones that don't want it to happen because they know they're not going to nothing's going to happen for them. You have to say fuck you to a lot of people in life. And that's not easy for everybody. Yeah.

You just have to. There is a there is an element to you where you do have to be an asshole sometimes. Not towards people, but you just don't listen. And yeah, you just say fuck you. Sometimes you don't say to them, you say in your mind.

Yeah. You say fuck you and in your mind, you just do it. And sometimes it comes out, which is you know. After like four shots. It happens. Yeah, you end up, yeah, that's part of the mistakes that we made in the band back then is we said what we were thinking too much. And we didn't have anybody, well, actually a lot of people were telling us to keep our mouths shut, but we couldn't because we couldn't stand what we were being told and when we knew it was dumb, you know what I mean?

It's hard to explain, but yeah, I mean, keep your mouth shut. If something's in the way, of getting what you want, try to deal with the obstacle, but do whatever it takes to get what you want. And that's what's going to separate you from the rest. Right. You got to know what you fucking want, dude. You got to know.

And I don't know what kids want these days. I have no idea what they want. I don't think they've thought ahead that far. I don't know if... What do they do? What do kids do? A lot of people want to be influencers, I hear. Yeah. They were like, YouTubers, I hear that pretty often.

Which is hard. You're a YouTuber and it's probably really fucking hard. Technically, yeah. I saw, I met someone. I saw Machine Head at the Wiltern and some drunk guy came out. It's like, oh, you're that YouTube guy. I was like, oh, fuck. Yeah.

It hits you, right? It hits you. Oh, wow. Your hard work's paying off. I saw your, John McKenzie, were you? Do you at Incantation show at 720 Club? No, we were talking about that. I went to the one in Observatory.

Okay. It was dope. When they're playing Mortal Throne in Nazare? The most evil album ever? It was evil, dude. Yeah. I was watching, I'm at a definite show. This is dope.

Even the way it was lit. It was like, they didn't even have other lights on. It was dope. I was like, oh, guys. That album, I mean, I saw Incantation when I was 14 at G. Willickers in Germany. Jersey. And then the next time I saw him was just a couple months ago. We finally met John in person. It was cool to see him on your show because... He's fucking great, man. He is.

Mortal Throne and Nazarian, man, that is the most evil album. And the counterpart, the rough mix of that album that they put out is called Upon the Throne of Apocalypse is even heavier and more evil. So you got two versions of the album, the same album. And they're both evil, but in different ways. It's really... I love that album. I love it. It's one of my favorite albums of all time. Yeah, John's a special guy. And then it was cool to see Chris Barnes on here too because a lot of us didn't know what was going on.

A lot of people had preconceived notions of how he is. And it was cool to see him on here because I had been told so much about him that your show proved wrong to all the people that had said shit about him. So it gave me like a clearer perspective on who he was. Yeah. Because I had heard so much. Yeah, I heard so much bullshit. shit. There's always

another side to people. Even like, dude, even like, I don't make people realize, even like assholes. Like, dude, there's, there's other side to them. Yeah. You only hear about the asshole part. You don't know what they went through as a kid or what they're going through in their career with like maybe they have a wall up.

Right. Maybe they're meeting a bunch of fucking fake ass people. You don't know. Well, you don't know the person at all. And you don't know the person at all. People that are, people that probably post, that make posts under under under the video probably say shit about you that doesn't even make sense to you oh sure in the comments comment section there you go yeah these people don't know who you are but you know everybody has a right to say stupid shit so they do and you know it's interesting times we live in

where you don't you know you can post something and not have to take responsibility for it you can be anonymous yeah with anything you do and a oh's AI has gotten so crazy right now. You can't tell the difference to be a real video. I saw a video of this really fat girl jumping off of a diving board. And it was just going to push and everything fell down. And I was like, what the fuck? And I was like, oh, it's AI.

Like I had to remind myself it wasn't real. Yeah. That's crazy stuff. Yeah, you got to remind yourself. And people are talking shit on AI, but also at the same time, they're also people are perpetuating it. Like they're liking a photo. They're sharing it.

and the thousands. I'm like, you are supporting what you're talking shit on. Yeah. I mean, thousands of comments and thousands of shares, what are you doing? I think people,

I think it goes back, I don't know if fan fiction is still a thing, but I think that people just want to have their own version of you in their head. Kind of like how I didn't know any, when I was a kid, I didn't know anything about Gene Simmons,

except that he wore that makeup and looked like that. So I would create all these scenarios about what he did in his free time. You know, but now you can look at somebody that you admire or you don't admire or you don't like. Yeah. Without thinking about it, you come up with all these personality traits you think they have. And you're wrong. You don't know.

You have no idea. Yeah. You have no idea. It's funny. It's interesting to watch the shit that goes on now. It's interesting than watch the world. Just be the world. And how everything that we used to work so hard on is so easy now.

Oh, dude. You know, you used to wait like weeks for an album to come out, and then you'd be outside of Best Buy, at midnight waiting for them to open the doors, so you could buy the CD. Now it's just like, put it on. I don't like it, turn it off. Scroll, scroll.

Oh, I like this band. Next, next, next. That was nothing like how music was back then. You know that. Yeah, you like, you had to justify your purchase. Yeah. You're like, I have to listen to this fucking record. Yeah, you invested your money.

But I fucking bought this soul fly. record. I'll fucking... You don't like it now. You better listen to it and learn or like it because you spent your $18 on it. Yeah. Kids will never know that shit.

They'll never, never know all that great shit. Yeah, the shit that we have access to is just just crazy. It's outrageous. I mean, you know, also, idiot like me can have, you know, cameras and be able to post like that, like a TV show. So like I want to hate it, but also at the same time,

I am reaping the benefits of it. Right. It comes with any job. Sure. And you did it. I mean, you manifested this. You did it and you get to meet all these awesome people. You know, if I could be doing this, I would love to do this.

I want to do a podcast. I want to figure out how to do that because I always still, I still want to be multimedia. I want to be banned and podcasts and do all that stuff. I need other people to help me start because I have no idea what the fuck I'm doing. Yeah. You need help. I do need a lot of help. I need somebody to plug in my guitar for me.

Yeah. It'll take me a day to figure out why a pedal won't work. Oh, there's no battery in it. Yeah. Always have the end and the out. It's not turning on, dude. What the fuck? What the fuck?

I had to figure this thing out. Sometimes things in your mind seem impossible, but I've learned in time. Just turn it off. I've always said, like, self-doubt, it's just, I turn it off. Just knowing, I know when, I know when my brain's lying in me. and that takes self-awareness. I know, okay, this is, this is just a thought. Some thoughts are real, some are not.

Right. This is not a real thought, so I'm going to cast her the side. Oh, this is a real thought. I'm going to, or self-doubt sometimes. I always run towards it just out of fun. Your brain is like a path. It has different tracks. You have to figure out what thoughts make sense

and that are achievable and possible. Mm-hmm. And just maneuver with that. And a lot of people don't know, like, how to do that shit. I guess it hits creative people or anybody that wants to to achieve

a goal like an employment or something or be start a business like I mean I'd love to do something like that I'd love to bartend I'd like to start a record label

although it's way too late if I did start a record label it would just be no streaming it would be just physical product oh wow interesting but I mean those are some bucket list things I'd like to want to be a bartender

because I like listening to people's problems really yeah I'd like to another thing I want to do is I want to get online and start helping people with depression and shit like because I got a therapist although I don't know if you have to be certified I would like to just talk to these kids because it's a huge issue and I'm very experienced in that

yeah so I hear a lot of bad advice online for kids that have depression I'm just like shit That's stupid. So I would like to do that, something like that. More than just music. I like being in a band, but it's not the only thing. Band should have, to me, it should have more than that, you know. I'd always be 96, bartending, 96 bars.

I don't know. I'm just, see, I'm just rattling off bullshit right now. I don't know. You never know? Am I stick? It could. I mean, all these things are attainable. Just have to work at them and not give up on it.

not giving up it's a whole other that's a whole other realm yeah sometimes you just don't give up right you can't I've had days where like oh that I can't it's over I quit

I literally quit one day the next day I woke up I'm like what the fuck am I doing yeah you jump right back on it's like yeah there's no quitting if it's on your mind if it's on your mind

you have to get there you have to attain it something yeah you have to get it you literally have to get it out of any means necessary anything that doesn't sacrifice, character, or integrity.

Or hurt anybody. Or hurt anybody. That's what I'm going to do it. Literally, I'm going to do it. As long as you don't hurt anybody, you can do whatever the fuck you want. Physically, mentally, emotionally, not hurt anybody, and you're good to go. Now, you might hurt people along the way that don't want you to do what you're doing, but that's a casualty of wanting to do that, just the way it works.

Or sometimes you lose touch with people because you're just, always gone. And that hurts as hell. That hurts. That fucking hurts bad. Yeah. People just move on. They have their own lives and they move on.

You're like, oh, shit, damn. This is part of the price. Part of the price, man. Yeah, well, Darren, thank you for the vinyl gifts. I literally have four vinyl. I put one up here for the first time. That's the first record. And we got a...

Oh, we're all under blood. And we haven't talked about tactical yet. Yeah, we did that in 2008. I forget. That album was tough to make a lot of roadblocks, but eventually it came out. We were supposed to be a real band and tour and everything, but it just got to, it wasn't possible.

It wasn't feasible financially. It wouldn't have worked out. We were going to, we were almost going to. Tim Young on drums, right? Yeah. Master Blaster. He's insane. insane drummer, awesome guy too.

Dude, this fucker's synergy is fucking dope, dude. Thanks, it's my favorite I've ever done. Is it? Yeah. Yeah, you talk really highly of your vocals now. It's cool. I, um, everything that I've ever done

is represented on that album in some way. It's just, it's just perfect in a, in a, I can't explain, it's just a perfect piece to me. It's just, everything on there is is what I wanted to be on there. I can't explain it. Yeah. It turned out exactly the way I wanted it. Nice.

Whereas every other record has something on there where you're like, ah, I shouldn't have done that. Practicing your vocals, going, drive into a Circle K and is sitting in a parking lot and is practicing or what? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Screaming.

Yeah. That's exactly how I warm up. Yeah. Screaming in the car, singing in the car. Fuck, yeah, dude. Now I just, if I had to drive somewhere far, you sing along to all that shit and just get in the car and scream, because you can't do it in front of the people

that's too loud, they're going to call the police. Yeah. So, yeah, that's how I practiced singing. I never wanted to be a singer. I had to by default. Couldn't find any. You couldn't find anybody, huh? No. I'm not the best singer in the world. I'm not even close, but I was the best that we had at the time. And so I never stopped. I never gave up doing that.

So it's fun. I was trying to think of that first trip again. I forget it. I always forget shit. Something like that. That's awesome. And I would throw in like just to make it interesting for me to play, to interest myself, I would probably go.

It's kind of like a disco thing where you play with the octaves. That's how we would write a song, just taking one note, turning it into. And then just coming up with a crazy way to rhythmitize it, which is where I just made out. Interesting, man. Yeah, I haven't sat down and, like, actually tried to write in a long time. Well, hopefully this, this sparks something. It's cool. I've been demo and stuff, but, you know, I haven't done that in ages just actually recording a song before you record it for an album.

Oh, yeah. Do you demo stuff? Oh, yeah, always. I never do. Now I'm finally doing it again, and shit's starting to come up, like, oh, okay, that's, That's good. Oh, good. Yes, it's a good idea to have some, some rough demos.

Yeah. Yeah. Finally doing that again. Finally doing that again. Why so, okay, maybe, I'll like to close it off with your esoteric. Yeah. So is, so did you always not do the, at the height, the two high strings? I started to do them once in CKY because they were getting in the way and I'm not a lead guitar player at all.

Yeah. I mean, if I write a lead, it takes me a long time, and I probably do it in three pieces in the studio. So I'm not a lead guitarist, but if I need to be, I will. But when we were doing CKY, I took the last two strings because I just get in the way. And they, you know, if they just sound, I don't really like the way they sound. So it's probably been since like 97 or 98 I took them off because I just used the four strings to... That's it? I'm a riff player, a riff writer and riff player.

I don't, you know, I was just not a glee guitar. It's fair to me. Sick. No, man, I'm not a lead guitar player. But no, my esoteric, I have a custom one coming. And it's gorgeous. These things are awesome guitars. Have you played it?

Yeah. Check it out. L.Siamming it, dude. Oh, you were? You played it? They're badass. They're fucking sick. And they supported me for a while.

Ever since I left Parker, they've supported me. Awesome. I'm going to support them until the end. I have somewhere, hopefully online, there's a rough outline of my custom. I don't know. It wouldn't be, I don't think it would be up there,

but. Are they into doing a, a sig model? What model? A signature? Yeah, it's a signature, yeah. That's what I meant to say. Yeah, there it is.

Oh, that thing's crazy. That's what's coming. Oh, wow. blue and yellow are my favorite colors are they really nice when you put them together I just love the way they look and it has 96

the 6 on the 6th fret the 9 on the 9th fret it's got just one volume knob 1196 why do I use that number yeah well it was the year that I started CKY

oh okay a lot of good shit happened in that year turned 20 years old it's just a very lucky number okay 96 is my number. Swamp Ash Body. Yeah.

It's past the design stages, as you can see, it's gorgeous. They're working on it. I hope it comes out before the end of the year, but I'm not sure. But I wanted to make it kind of tacky because you don't see tacky guitars. You see guitars that were like developed and very, unique they're not unique to me I wanted to make one that was unique

unique colors not so busy just a volume knob and there it is and we there it is and well I think we got it

I can't wait to pick one up and play it but yeah that's just a rough outline of what's happening that's rad man yeah I haven't seen a blue guitar

with the yellow headst like ever. Right. I think it's going to, I want it to be hopefully a darker blue than that. And a darker yellow. But if you put those, there's something about blue and yellow next to each other. It's just, I like it. It's just, there's something about it. That's dope. Yeah. So that's going to be a signature model. Yeah. Cool. Yep. Well, Darren, are you have any, um, it's blue and yellow like that darker blue. Yeah. See, there, you know, you know, we go. That one on the right? Was that say Kiesel?

Oh, Kizel's crazy with the with the paint jobs. I have trouble playing guitars that are like strangely bodied like a V or something. I can't sit down on V's. Yeah, I have trouble. If you can't sit down and play, look at that thing.

What the hell is that? Is that a toy? That's my signature model. It's like five pieces of spaghetti and a fly swatter. Yeah, Darren, do we, uh, anything that doubt we missed? No, man, we covered a lot. Okay. I'm hoping, uh, hoping we, we covered a lot.

So, uh, I had a blast. I could sit here for another 10 hours. I'm modern, man. It was cool. It's hard to find people that know music and want to talk about it at the same time. Both things, no music and want to talk about it. Yeah, I'm, I'm really honored and I'm glad Cam hooked me up with you. that kid rules.

I'm getting him shouting out to Cam DeWald. Boom. And I'm thanking Matt Sheehan for driving and helping me out with this. And Jerry, you're awesome. And Chris, I can't tell you how honored I was to come here and talk to you about music. Pleasure, man. I don't know if you do repeat, but I'll love to come back. Yeah, man.

Just when new shit happens. Yeah, get a fucking new record out or anything that, that will be. we get help with because we're not going to go anywhere. I mean, I'm doing it still. I'm dead. Good. That's a way to approach it. Yes. Look at it that way. You're doing it until you're dead. So I try to build relationships with people to want, fans that don't want to come back. It's come back. Who cares?

We're not going to work. We're going to keep doing this every week. Every Monday. I think it's great. Thank you. I think it's great. Thank you. And I want to do the same thing you're doing, but I just don't want to compete.

I want you to be better at it than I am. I want you to always be more. successful and better at this than I would have. Oh, dear, I appreciate that. You guys. I love that chord. I love reverse power chords, man. It's really sad and melanchol.

Oh, yeah. What is that? I was taking its toll on you, the line to crack your face. It's a Metallica song from Killem All. Is it? Seeking Destroy. or, uh,

it's one of the first songs I learned. Or is it? Four Horsemen. Nice. Yeah. Nice. I loved those first four Metallica albums. I used them to play,

figure out how to play rhythm and guitar because James Hetfield is the rhythm god. He is. James Heathfield, I mean, can't beat it, dude. He can't. He could play the same guitar part eight times

and it would sound like one. Wow. He's amazing. I love that guy. Real quick, Darren, where can people find you? It could find me usual Instagram

You know Darren Miller underscore official Yep That's me right there 96 bitter beings underscore official Yeah Facebook I'm on there

I mean I'm Where else Matt The website 96 bitter beings com Yeah and some asshole That was in the band Before like hijacked their old

What is it Instagram He's a fucking pussy asshole. Yeah, so we had to fucking get a new one. It happens. As fucker. It happens. Just a total, the worst person in the world. So we have this new 96bb

underscore official. Yeah, see, we're just starting out that one. Nice. So, Spotify, yeah, I've never been on Spotify. I have no idea how it works. Okay. Nope. That's fine. funny, isn't it? Pick up the new...

If I like something, I will buy it. Take up the new record on cassette. They make cassettes. I know. I'm the guy that buys them. I'll buy one just... If I like a band, which I don't anymore, but if I like a band, I will buy their CD.

Sick. I haven't found a new band in, I don't know how long. Officially, we have an official store. I didn't even know about that. Store, vinyl. Yeah. You know, anybody out there, check out the Synergy Record, the Synergy Restored Record 96Bitter Beings. Buy a physical copy of it. It supports the band.

Buy that physical. And check out the podcast every single Monday and check out our new Patreon. Yep. Get into vinyl. And get in the vinyl. Keep your Blu-rays because if you, you know, if you count on streaming. what are they called servers, streaming companies or whatever, to always have what you want to hear or watch.

Yeah. And they don't, like, you have to keep your Blu-Rays and shit because they can just decide, oh, we're not going to let you stream this movie anymore. Interesting.

It's true. Keep your physical media, people. Keep your CDs. I think this one calls for a jam out. I think we're just going to fade out with a jam. Thanks, Darren. Thank you very much. What do you want to play?

Let's play. I'm fast. Okay. I'm fucked up, dude. That sound. I gotta get this thing. I'd be writing so much more. See?

It's inspiring. It is. All right, Darren. Thank you so much. Pleasure, brothers. Dick. I'm honored. Thank you.