INTERVIEW BY ZEKE:
OKAY. YOU THE PEABRAINS ARE DEFINITELY ONE OF THE BETTER PSYCHOBILLY BANDS IN SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA. YOU HAVE A GOOD SOUND, HAVE A GOOD BASE IN ROCKABILLY, AND GOOD SONGWRITING ABILITY- ALL VERY FRIGGING IMPORTANT THINGS FOR A BAND. YOU RECENTLY FINISHED RECORDING YOUR FIRST LP, “IN THE HANGMAN’S SHADOW” FOR CRAZY LOVE RECORDS WHCH HAS SINCE BEEN RELEASED IN EUROPE AND IS SOON TO BE RELEASED IN THE U.S. TO YOUR LARGE FAN BASE WHO HAVE BEEN EAGERLY AWAITING A FULL-LENGTH RECORDING FROM YOU FOR YEARS. LET’S GET TO KNOW YOU GUYS. YOUR NAMES…WHAT YOU DO IN THE BAND…?
Rob: I’m Rob. I play the double bass.
Abe: Abe. Play guitar and vocals.
Alex: Alex. Drums. Adrian: Drums
WHERE ARE EACH OF YOU GUYS FROM?
Adrian: I spent most of my life in Chino…in California.
Rob: San Pedro, California.
Alex: I’m from Lynwood, California.
Abe: Lynwood.
BRIEF HISTORY OF THE BAND. FROM THEN TO NOW…ANY CHANGES…IN PERSONNEL…ANYTHING.
Abe: Well, we started out in 2007. I have always been on vocals. I started on bass and had a guitarist. We went on like that for maybe two years…? And just decided to change it up. Decided to part ways. I got on- I was still on bass for awhile and then we got George from Los Mumblers..
Adrian: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Abe: …And he was playing with us for maybe two years. And me and Adrian were playing for HIS band- for Los Mumblers- so, I was playing bass-
Adrian: Yeah, we were doing two shows for them…
Abe: Yeah, so he was playing drums for Los Mumblers, I was playing bass, and George was still on vocs and guitar. Then about 2009, I decided to jump on guitar because I couldn’t really find someone to play the way that I wanted them to.
YOU HAD A VISION IN MIND AND YOU COULDN’T FIND ANYONE TO MEET YOUR VISION.
Abe: Exactly. I started off playing guitar as a kid. I was never any GOOD at it…but I enjoyed playing bass a lot better, a lot more. I met Robbie through a mutual friend back in the day..
WHAT YEAR WAS THAT?
Rob: I met him in 2008? Abe: 2006.
Rob: 2006, Yeah. I roadied for them and then what happened was that they switched guitarists and I ended up- I had a bass and I used to just fuck around with the bass and that’s when he started playing guitar (in the band) and he asked me to start jamming on bass. And since I was a roadie I was already familiar with the songs, we were already good friends- going to all the shows together…He just had me back him up since then. Adrian: I remember the day. We just said started dicking around and Abe said “Let’s write something” and I said, “Alright. Cool!” and..uhh…he said “You need to get some drums.” Abe: I basically talked them both into it.
Alex: He’s a sweet talker. Abe: He (Adrian) didn’t play drums before and he (pointing to Rob) was only messing around on the bass, he never tried to do anything like learning notes and stuff like that…
Rob: He taught he how to go along with the guitar and figure it out from there…Fuck, that took years.
Abe: Yeah, I started teaching him, like, notes and how to tune it and stuff like that and slowly but surely he started progressing. Slowly! (Abe laughs)
Rob: So, I’ve stayed with it over the past few years. For five years I’ve been solid (with the band).
AND, ADRIAN, YOU’VE BEEN SOLID WITH THE BAND OR YOU’VE BEEN ON-AND-OFF WITH THE BAND?
Adrian: I was solid with them, and I was filling in with other local bands. But then I stepped back about 3,4 years ago. Still doing fill-ins with other bands, but doing my own thing. I’ve been back with the Peabrains for a good solid year now.
AND ALEX WHAT IS YOUR HISTORY WITH THE BAND? BECAUSE YOU WERE THE DRUMMER AFTER ADRIAN AND NOW HE’S BACK IN THAT SPOT.
Alex: They just needed me to fill in and I came in. I didn’t wanna step on anybody’s toes because Adrian’s my friend…I took a lot of influence from him, so anything that I did play was whatever HE did.
HE WAS YOUR INSPIRATION AND REFERENCE POINT.
Alex: He’s the originator and I gotta give props to him.
Abe: And did you know that Skum (The Vectors) started playing drums because of Adrian? NAH!
Alex: Adrian’s energy is just different. He’s gotta lotta off-the-wall fucking energy. And that’s one thing that I really admired. When I was just a kid watching The Peabrains, roadie-ing a little bit, you know- helping ‘em out…? The way I came in- I smoked out with Abe…I smoked out with all of ‘em, actually…at the Mad Monster Party…
Abe: I didn’t like this guy when I first met him! (Everybody laughs) Alex: The Meteors came and they didn’t fucking play…I smoked a joint with them- I snuck it into the Vex(?)- and that’s how I met them. Abe: That’s when I was like, “Oh, he’s cool!” (All laugh.)
SO THE BAND HAS BEEN TOGETHER FOR HOW MANY YEARS? THEN TO NOW.
Adrian: Since 2007.
Abe: Twelve years.
Adrian: From what I remember, around 2007 was our first official shows. 2007, 2008 when we had our first gig. Awful. (Laughs)
HOW LONG WERE YOU PLAYING BEFOREYOU PLAYED YOUR FIRST GIG?
Adrian: I think that was it. Maybe a year while we put together those first three or four songs.
Abe: Nah, it was a few months, dude. I don’t think it was a whole year before we started playing.
IN THAT TIME, WHAT ARE SOME OF THE CHANGES IN THE SCENE YOU HAVE OBSERVED? IN THOSE 12 YEARS, WHAT HAS CHANGED?
Adrian: Goddamn. Well…how people get along with it. For awhile, there were a lotta people trying to dress to impress. People trying so hard has died out a little…
Rob: I’ve just seen changes in styles, influences…new music being brought into the scene. You get the waves that go by…like the hardcore psychobilly style and then later a more surf style will get big. Right now the scene’s doing good- seems like every week we have a show.
Abe: I think the main thing and the main reason why the whole scene started changing was the bands and their influences. I feel like there was a major shift- I’m not sure what year- from just shitty music…That’s the only way I can say it. All the music coming out was just no good, and I feel that maybe the internet had a lot to do with it…people started coming across better music and so the bands started CREATING better music…which influenced the AUDIENCE, and the audience started creating better sounding bands. VIA INSPIRATION. Abe: Well, I don’t know about via inspiration, but maybe via asking us what we listened to or by shit they would see in posts or on shirts or…who knows? “Inspiration” is a little far-fetched. Like, I don’t think I inspired anybody. Know what I mean? I feel like I might have influenced them through my
MUSIC… THAT’S WHAT INSPIRATION MEANS. DON’T UNDERSELL YOURSELF.
Alex: I was in the audience ‘cause I wasn’t playing with you guys yet, and I can tell you that I saw a lot of bands that…I didn’t know what they were selling.
Abe: That’s the point- they were trying to sell something, you know.
Alex: They were trying to be like somebody else.
Abe: They were trying to push omething.
Alex: Whoever was making it “corporate”, they wanted to be like that.
Abe: To “make” it.
Alex: They wanted to be like Zombie Ghost Train, they wanted to be like Nekromantix…
Abe: Tiger Army. A
Alex: Tiger Army…and they weren’t playing anything that was psychobilly at all.
WHICH IS INTERESTING BECAUSE MY WHOLE TAKE AWAY FROM THE PEABRAINS WAS THAT YOU CAME AROUND AT A TIME WHEN THE SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA SCENE WAS OBSESSED WITH THIRD-RATE HARDCORE BANDS WITH UPRIGHT BASSES…
All: Yes. Rob: Exactly.
AND IT WAS ALL JUST METAL RIFFS, SOMETIMES A DOUBLE BASS PEDAL…
Rob: Just fast.
AND JUST FAST. AND IT WAS MISSING THE POINT.
Rob: It was punk rock, metal, not really… IT WAS A GIMMICK.
Adrian: Like wrestling.
INTERVIEW BY EDGAR & PLASMA
SO, IT’S KIND OF A CORNY QUESTION, BUT IT IS SOMETHING THAT PEOPLE WANT TO KNOW IN MOST INTERVIEWS- WHAT JAS INFLUENCEDYOU TO MAKE THE MUSIC YOU MAKE AND TO LIVE YOUR LIFE THE WAY THAT YOU DO?
Adrian: The music me and Abe grew up on…rock’n’roll…what was happening when we were kids…I hate to say “folk music” too…
Alex: For me it started with Black Sabbath, Christian Death…and then we can say, for psychobilly, The Peabrains, man. Honestly. I like The Meteors, I like psychobilly in general, but once I saw them (The Peabrains) it was like…And The Grims too, man, and Cannibal Madmen. Once I saw those three fucking bands, that’s when I knew, that’s the shit that I wanna move forward. And it started off with something that’s not even related to that at all.
Abe: Like Ade just said, I grew up listening to what my parents were listening to, obviously, and the area where they were raised- they were basically, like, ten years behind the United States, so their heydays were about the sixties and seventies. In THOSE days, there were a shitload of Mexican bands that were covering a bunch of songs from the fifties…
AND WHAT PART OF MEXICO WAS THAT?
Abe: Jalisco. In a little town called Acatlan de Juarez…This was a little village- cobblestones, dirt roads…It was tiny. And, they were ten years in the past…so all the music coming around was from the fifties. Fifties, early sixties. So, you had all these bands that were doing nothing but covers from the U.S. and that’s what I was raised on. That’s the first time I ever heard, like, Suspicion, or like a lotta shit from Creedence, from the Rolling Stones, a lotta stuff like that. The first time I ever heard it was in Spanish. And then I hear as I’m growing up, I hear it in English and it just blew my mind! I was trying to figure out who did what first…NOW, obviously, I know…But even still, as a kid, I had older sisters. They were listening to roc en español, which is in a lot of Spanish-speaking countries, but that was from the eighties. Now the first time I ever heard “There is a Light That Will Never Go Out” by The Smiths it was a Spanish version by Duncan Dhu. And then as I was becoming a teenager I heard The Smiths and I was like ‘What the fuck?’. Mind fucking blown. My godfather, he would listen to more rock- more “mainstream” rockabilly, like Elvis, the Big Bopper, and all that. So, I was like five, six, seven- that’s what I grew up on. So just the whole music style, the whole scene, the whole…how people looked back then, that was just a huge influence on me growing up, and it just stuck with me.
Rob: Myself, I found rock’n’roll and psychobilly in my high school days. I got interested in it with Frenzy and Meteors and since then haven’t looked back. Up until today I feel like it’s been a part of me and won’t leave! And for any mood I feel, I can find psychobilly, I can find that music to fill that mood. And I don’t have to go just to psychobilly- I can go reggae and rockabilly. But I don’t have to go that far to find that mode of music that I wanna hear for that shitty day, for that fucked-up day, I will find psychobilly to fit that mood and fill that need.
WHAT KINDA REGGAE DO YOU LIKE?
Rob: Traditional. Sixties. I don’t really care for that second- and third-wave…2-Tone…I just like the first- the early shit.
Abe: Ska, rocksteady…
Rob: Yeah, I get really into it. First wave. But anything after that, I don’t really care for it. It’s cool when you listen to it in the club, but personally I’m not really into it. Alton Ellis, Desmond Dekker, Ken Boothe…I like Prince Buster…!
ABSOLUTELY! THE PRINCE, BABY, THAT’S THE MAN!
All: Yeah!
YOU JUST FINISHED THE RECORDING. LET’S TALK ABOUT THAT. HOW MANY RECORDINGS YOU HAVE OUT SO FAR?
Abe: Oh, man…We have…We have a lot, man, we have a lot. The first time we recorded was in 2007. That was a little five-track demo, EP little thing. But nothing ever really happened with that. It was just to hand it out for a buck or two, y’know? We’ve given out CDs at our shows…Even to this day it’s never been about trying to make a buck, publicity, or…If you hear it. It’s because you wanna hear it, you had to look for it, but if you stumble upon it, that’s great too. I’ve never been one to push our music on anyone, really. As far as recordings go, we probably have about…seven different recordings? And each recording has been between five and fourteen tracks.
HAVE THEY ALL BEEN DEMO RELEASES?
Abe: Yeah, there hasn’t been anything official until now.
Adrian: I was trying to figure it out…There’s been two LPs or just one LP? Like, demos with enough tracks on them to make an LP…There’s been a few.
Abe: Technically there’s been nothing official until now. All that stuff that we recorded has been self-produced and self-promoted. Only released through us. So the only way to get it is at a show. This is the first time anything’s ever been pressed to vinyl.
SO, YOU HAD TO RECORD SEVEN TIMES UNTIL YOU HAD SOMETHING THAT MADE YOU SAY ‘OKAY, I’M GONNA RELEASE THIS’…
Abe: It’s never really been a choice or a decision. If we woulda been approached back then, we woulda released it. This is just the first time we’ve been approached. And I’ve never been one to go out there to try and find somebody to press my shit. Y’know?
WHAT WAS IT LIKE WORKING ON AN ORGANIZED ALBUM?
Abe: It was great! It was a lotta fun, there’s a lotta new songs…Some old songs, but they all have a new different energy, which I really enjoy, and, out of all these recordings I’ve ever done- twelve years now- this is the only time that I’ve been 100% satisfied with the way that they came out and the way that we performed them.
I WANNA HEAR ABOUT THE EQUIPMENT YOU USE TO PLAY. WHAT DO YOU ALL USE? BESIDES TALENT, WHAT DO YOU USE TO GET THE PEABRAINS SOUND?
Adrian: Shit, man, if I gotta piece together my main traveller kit, it was a Pearl kit that I traded for a bump. Abe: The first thing that you started upgrading was the snare and cybals. Rememeber that you started getting different types of snares from pawn shops and shit?
Adrian: Now I am using a Zildjian ride and Zildjian crash, Pearl Rhythm Traveler kit…Uhh…that’s my kick drum…Floating tom, floating snare, Pearl pedal…I like the sound everything gives out now.
AND YOU WERE THE ONE ACTUALLY PLAYING DRUMS ON THE ALBUM. WHAT WAS YOUR SET-UP FOR THAT?
Alex: A big, fat fucking ride…a 22-inch ride. I need it to get that sound- it has to be nice and clean. The one that I have is Paiste, but you can get any one as long as it’s huge. As far as a snare, the one that I have, we call it “The Boobinka” (laughs). It’s made outta wood from Africa or some shit. We decided that a wooden snare would be a lot better than a steel snare. And the rattle is a big fucking thing because they got that one that has only twelve strands. I don’t know how much (mine) has, but just get fatter than twelve. We tone it down low, we want it to sound like that; that eighties snare that sounds like you’re hitting a barrel of acid in a big warehouse. (Demonstrates sound.) That’s exactly what we fucking did. We didn’t want it to sound like that high-tuned..like that crust-punk snare? That’s just what we didn’t want.
Abe: That tight…
Alex: Yeah. So, get the fattest fucking snare that you can. Widest too, as well, y’know? And that’s pretty much it. The rest is some shit that I got when I was in 4th-grade, when I was, like, nine years old. It’s been sitting out, it’s got mold, it’s got rain…It’s got new skins, but it’s the same shit that I had when I was nine years old. Rob: At the moment I got a generic bass, K&K preamp which is Abe’s, um…Vics Pickups- really good stuff, right there. For bass amp I have an Avatar 212 cab and a Hartke head. Still trying to find my sound basswise.
Abe: That’s like a lifelong journey type of thing. That’s how it should be.
(TO ABE.) WHAT’S YOUR SETUP?
Abe: Well, to contradict myself, I’ve been using the same guitar for twelve years. (All laugh.) Rob: Nah, you had the acoustic…
Abe: Well, I was using the acoustic in the beginning when I first started playing guitar for the band. This old, shitty Yamaha and I just took off a pickup from another old, shitty Yamaha ELECTRIC guitar and I just jury-rigged it onto the acoustic in the hole, and it souded alright…Because it wasn’t electric, it couldn’t plug it, but I drilled a hole, I did all this shit and said ‘Now I can plug my acoustic guitar into an amp!’
Alex: Didn’t you fucking record with that shit too?
Abe: Yeah! We recorded a COUPLE times. That worked for a little bit, then I decided to just go with my electric guitar…that I’d had since high school. This old Epiphone Les Paul. And I was using the same setup for years, up until about maybe four or five years ago when I started to upgrade it. So, I put a bixby on it- did it myself. Put some new humbuckers on it- me and Mondo from The Grims put ‘em on there…Just upgraded the guitar, but it’s still the same one that I’ve had since I was seventeen. And as far as the amp? Yeah, Ive gone through a bunch of amps. Right now I’m using an old eighties English KMD. It gets the job done. I like the way it sounds. I think that’s the point, y’know? Just ‘cause one person gets a certain sound out of their setup, it’s not gonna sound the same way when YOU play it.
WHAT’S YOUR FAVORITE SONG OF YOURS NOW?
Adrian: “Into The Sun”’s fucking great. Um..You can’t do that to me, you asshole!
IT’S HARD AND I’M PUTTING YOU ON THE SPOT, BUT THAT’S WHAT I DO!
Alex: “Duranged”.
Rob: “Duranged”.
WE GOT TWO VOTES FOR “DURANGED”!
Rob: It’s fucking fast and it’s, like, half instrumental.
Alex: You just close your eyes and go wild.
Abe: That song does sorta induce auditory hallucinations at a certain point when you’re playing it. That’s what I enjoy about playing music. I don’t think I could really be in a band if it’s not like that; to the point when you (are playing)
WE GOT TWO VOTES FOR “DURANGED”!
Rob: It’s fucking fast and it’s, like, half instrumental.
Alex: You just close your eyes and go wild. Abe: That song does sorta induce auditory hallucinations at a certain point when you’re playing it. That’s what I enjoy about playing music. I don’t think I could really be in a band if it’s not like that; to the point when you (are playing and) you feel like you don’t need anything and you have this sense of euphoria just from playing with your band mates. Nothing comes close to it- no drugs, no alcohol, no women- there’s just…complete bliss when you’re in the zone. My favorite song right NOW…probably…”They Say”. It always just hits the spot.
WHAT’S YOUR BIGGEST STYLISTIC DIFFERENCE BETWEEN WHERE YOU STARTED OFF AND WHERE YOU ARE NOW?
Abe: That’s been affected by…Mainly just the way that I perceive the world in general. The way I perceive life and what I’ve been through so far. All of my songs are based off of life experiences, except for maybe one that’s based off of a movie- “Leon”, based off of “Leon, the Professional”. Other than that, my changing life experiences affect that style- I start going through some shit, I start wriying about it, and…it turns into a song. Sometimes it’ll be years later after I wrote some shit down, and then I come up with the melody and I just put it together. Years between each of those things individually sometimes.
AND THAT’S BEEN A CHANGE FROM WHEN YOU FIRST STARTED WRITING TO NOW? IT’S LIKE A DIFFERENT PROCESS?
Abe: That sort of has always been a thing, that very unorganized type of writing. At the same time, sometimes I could sit there and…there’s certain songs where I sit there and write the whole thing- the melody, leads, and the lyrics.
AND YOU ARE THE PRIMARY SONGWRITER FOR THE BAND. Rob: He’s the ONLY…
Abe: I write everything. I give them the (song) structure and then give ‘em artistic freedom to do what they do whatever they want. If I don’t like something I let them know respectfully…constructive criticism sorta thing…But pretty much 100% I am the songwriter, composer.
WHAT DOES EACH ONE OF YOU SEE AS THE FUTURE DIRECTION FOR THE PEABRAINS?
Adrian: Travelling, if we could. Going anywhere that they wanna hear us. I love making music with these guys and I wouldn’t trade it for anything.
Rob: We have more music to record, definitely. We had many ideas for this album that’s coming out within a few days or weeks and we’ve been working on a whole ‘nother album already. With Adrian AND Alex. A mix of semi-old and new stuff. A lotta new stuff that’s still unheard…I wanna tour with these guys. We’re older, we have families now- some of us- and I wanna enjoy the time with my boys, going to Europe or Japan and see what the world has for us. After being in this band for ten-plus years we barely got an album coming out…it’s like ‘Oh, shit, we still gotta lotta shit to do as a band!’ A lot of stuff that we all can go through- all four of us here.
Alex: I just wanna keep having fun with these guys who are now my brothers, and that’s all I could ask for. Just to keep jammin’. That’s our main excuse to get fucked up together.
Abe: I think that’s been the major problem with the band’s progress- it’s that I never really had a goal. Never had any expectations, never had any direction. The main thing for me- and I’ve told all three of these guys- as soon as it’s not fun, there’s no point. There’s really no point. At least not for me. I’m here to enjoy myself with my friends, with my brothers, and uhh…just…Not that I don’t care about anybody else’s opinion, but I’m not doing it for nobody else. I’m doing it for me and to have a good time. So, it’s hard to say “directions and goals”. There is really no LIMIT, you know? I want it to go as far as it can, but at the same time it’s not really a goal. It’s not something that I hope for or something that I wish for..It’d be cool, but I just wanna have fun and…
AND LET IT GO WHERE IT GOES.
Abe: Exactly. But still being true to ourselves. To myself.
Adrian: Not doing it for any reason besides that we want to.
Abe: And that’s the only reason we’ve ever done it.
Alex: A lotta this (indicates the conversation)
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