Rock My Monkey: Hello, you are listening to the Rock My Monkey netcast on RockMyMonkey.com. Today we are speaking with Sebastian Bach about his new cd, Angel Down. How are you doing today, Sebastian?
Sebastian Bach: Great! How’s it going?
Rock My Monkey: It’s going pretty good. What song on here do you think is your next big classic, the song fans are going to demand for decades to come?
Sebastian Bach: I have no clue, dude. Hopefully all of them. There’s fourteen on there, so I don’t care which one of them is the one people like, because I like all of them for different reasons. You can’t really compare a song like Angel Down to Falling Into You. They’re so different. I don’t know, dude. The one right now that radio is freaking out on is “Back In The Saddle”, featuring me and my friend, Axel Rose, on vocals, who sings three songs on the record. Radio is really freaking out about that song. Also, “Love Is A Bitch Slap”. But I’ve been working on An “Angel Down” for seven years, so I really am so close to it, I can’t tell which one people are going to dig really.
Rock My Monkey: Now, my favorite song on this cd so far is the song “You Don’t Understand”.
Sebastian Bach: Wow.
Rock My Monkey: What was the inspiration behind that?
Sebastian Bach: The what? The inspiration?
Rock My Monkey: Right.
Sebastian Bach: That’s a song I wrote from the perspective of a dude in war, or I guess a girl in a war, in a tank, driving around Iraq, blowing people and things up. That’s really what I wrote it from the perspective from.
Rock My Monkey: Wow.
Sebastian Bach: There’s a lot of lyrics on the record that have the undercurrent about the war. I have a nineteen year old son, and I’ve been writing the words to this album for seven years. So I don’t see how in the last seven years you could not be touched or affected by the war and the situation. So there’s a lot of stuff on the album about that.
Rock My Monkey: Absolutely. Was it intentional to give it that, give that song-out of all the songs on that album, that one seems to have the most classic Skid Row feel. Was that natural just because you’re on vocals, or was there actually an attempt to do that?
Sebastian Bach: There’s no attempt at all to sound like Skid Row. I can’t help but sound like me. You know, that’s me. (laughs) That’s going to sound like me no matter what. But there’s never, I never, my personality, the way I am, I never try to sound like something I’ve already done. I always try-if something sounds like something I’ve done, I don’t use it. I throw it out. So if there’s something that does sound like something I’ve already done, it’s an accident.
Rock My Monkey: One thing that I did notice on this cd is that you’re using your higher octaves more than you have in a long time.
Sebastian Bach: Yeah. That’s true.
Rock My Monkey: What was the reason behind that?
Sebastian Bach: That’s very, very true. One thing, I did a play, Jesus Christ Superstar in 2002 that really got me screaming high again. It felt so good that I really said to myself ‘I’m always going to sing like this, only because I can.’ You know what I mean? (laughs) And why not? So I said, ‘My next record, man, I’m going to scream like Slave To The Grind. I’m going to try to sing like that first Skid Row album, that really high style.’ And a lot of singers came out that were singing in that style that are starting to make it cool again. One guy is AFI, Baby Chaos, and-there’s a lot-is that his name? Baby Havoc, sorry. (both laugh)
Rock My Monkey: Havoc, chaos.
Sebastian Bach: (laughs) A lot of these high singers were coming out. The thing is when I recorded most of the vocals for An Angel Down I was coming right off the Guns N Roses tour. We did a couple weeks of shows with Guns N Roses in Europe and then flew, we flew straight from Vienna, Austria. We did a festival with Tool and Guns N Roses all in the same day. It was an amazing festival. Then I got right on a plane and we flew right to L.A. from Vienna, and started recording right when we got there. And so my voice on the record is really high on the record on some of the songs because I was screaming with Axel Rose every night, and doing my set, and then doing my set and then “My Michelle” . And I can remember coming in to do the vocals for “Angel Down”, and my voice was so fucking high. Like really high! And it was hard to get it to go low. Like the last song, “Falling Into You”, is quite low, the verses, and I was so used to singing high that that was one of the hardest ones for me to nail, because my voice was really, really, really high when I was singing the album. And you don’t understand-I’m glad you mentioned that one. Because one thing I definitely concentrated on that song was to do it clean, and that’s very challenging to sing really clean and pure, for a guy my age. (laughs) So I really concentrated on that song, making it really pure and clean, and I love how it turned out. I love that song, too. I’m glad you dig it.
Rock My Monkey: What was it about “Back In The Saddle” that made it the song you wanted to cover on this cd?
Sebastian Bach: No, that was actually Roy Z’s suggestion, because I did a bunch of cover albums in the 1990s. I’ve done enough covers to last the rest of my life. I don’t ever need to do any more covers. You know, I probably will. (laughs) The thing is I had thirteen songs done. There’s fourteen songs total on “Angel Down”, which is in stores November 20. There’s fourteen total. Usually a cd has thirteen, but Roy explained to me, he goes, ‘Dude, you should do “Back In The Saddle”.’ I go ‘Why?’ He goes ‘Because you’re Sebastian Bach, and you’re back, and you can come out onstage and go “I’m baaaack!”’ And I mean, that would be really cool. But I wasn’t committed to it, until I hear the band play it. Hearing Metal Mike and Bobby and Roy dig into that Joe Perry riff and the chorus, I was like totally freaking out. The band made it so heavy, I couldn’t believe it, and I just started screaming. And then Axel lays down his tracks and we have like a piece of music that is crazy to listen to, because we’re all going for it. (laughs)
Rock My Monkey: To be fair, your current backup band could make a Dolly Parton song sound good.
Sebastian Bach: Yeah, that’s right dude! (both laugh) I aim for the top. Halford takes the best guys in rock to be in his band, and when he joined Priest they were out of a gig. So it’s like, I called them up, and it all worked out great.
Rock My Monkey: Other than getting you to do “Back In The Saddle”, what do you think Roy Z’s brought to the cd as a producer that would not have been there otherwise?
Sebastian Bach: He brought one thing that was totally essential, and he really made the album a better album. And I’ll tell you why. Because as you said, my band is a great metal band, but they are real metal players. Like, Steve DiGiorgio plays bass on the record. He plays a fretless bass throughout the whole record, and he’s one of the world’s best heavy metal bass players. And to have him on my record is such an honor, and he did such a great job. Blows me away. But here’s the deal. We had songs like “Negative Light”. I wrote that with Steve. “Take It Down With Me”, I wrote that with Steve. Metal Mike, I had “American Metalhead”. Johnny had “Stuck Inside”. We had “Angel Down”, because I had that from Madame Albright. What I’m trying to say, all the songs I’m mentioning are fucking all super metal songs. And Roy said, ‘Dude, this is great, but you know what you need?’ I go ‘What?’ He says ‘You need straight up rock.’ And I didn’t really know what he meant, because I’m the artist. That’s why you get a producer. So he’s like ‘Let me fucking show you some shit.’ Then he plays me the riff to “Love Is A Bitch Slap”, which is (imitates guitar riff). It’s just fun. It’s not like “Negative Light” which is so metal. So what he did was he made the record more balanced. He balanced it out, which was very important. It was his idea to do “Back In The Saddle”, which I never would have thought of. It was his idea to add more straight up rock like “Love Is A Bitch Slap”, which is actually the first single. Rock and roll should always be fun, you know? And that’s what he brought to the table. A real fun, straight up rock vibe. That’s what he did.
Rock My Monkey: What is MRV Music?
Sebastian Bach: (speaking to someone in the background) Listen to the question. What is MRV Music? (laughs) (speaking to RMM again) It’s a subsidiary of EMI, and the reason I laugh is because MRV is short form for this name which is pretty much unpronounceable. (laughs) It’s called Merovingian Music. It took me a month to learn how to say it.
Rock My Monkey: Yeah, I’m just going to say MRV Music.
Sebastian Bach: (laughs) There you go. There you go.
Rock My Monkey: I heard you had a very special deal that gives you more control over the music.
Sebastian Bach: Well, I always have control over everything I do, or I don’t do it. You can ask Skid Row about that. (laughs) That’s the way it is with me. I don’t do anything I don’t want to do. That’s not just music. That’s me as a human being.
Rock My Monkey: Is there any plans for a video single for this release.
Sebastian Bach: Yes. But we’re figuring out what song. I mean, if it was up to me and we only had one choice, I would pick “By Your Side” to do a video for. But radio is freaking out about “Back In The Saddle”. They also love “Love Is A Bitch Slap”. And also a song that nobody’s thought of yet, that I think really could be the biggest song is a song called “Stuck Inside”, which to me sounds like it could have a real shot at the radio today because of the way it sounds. So we can’t choose right now. Because if I only get one shot, I got to go with “By Your Side”, because I think that’s the one that people will, at the end of the day, freak out about.
Rock My Monkey: Will 2008 be the year where you are endlessly on the road in America?
Sebastian Bach: Well, 2006 was, so I hope-(laughs). We just toured all America with Guns N Roses all over the country and all over the world. I don’t know. I hope so, but I’ve been traveling really hard since May, so don’t even want to think about that yet. But I’m sure it will happen.
Rock My Monkey: Do you have any idea when fans will get to hear you sing on the Chinese Democracy song, “Sorry”?
Sebastian Bach: I think it will be sooner rather than later. I really do, because I’ve heard it. I know Axel was very serious about putting something out before Christmas. He was talking to me about it. He was talking about finishing liner notes. I don’t know what happened. I don’t know why the fuck it didn’t happen. I know it wasn’t him. People like to say ‘Why doesn’t Axel put out his record?’ I think there’s a lot of business shit that goes on with him. It’s just not as easy. It’s a little more complicated than people think.
Rock My Monkey: When we talked almost a year ago, you said that you would not be working with MTv Networks on any more reality shows, due to the way you were treated on the Supergroup show. What made you come back to Celebrity Rap Star?
Sebastian Bach: No. I don’t think I said MTV, because I could never foresee MTV asking me to do a show. (laughs)
Rock My Monkey: Well, MTv Networks, which is VH1 and MTv.
Sebastian Bach: I think what I said exactly is I wouldn’t do another reality show. I think that’s what I said.
Rock My Monkey: So what made you come back for Celebrity Rap Super Star?
Sebastian Bach: Well, it wasn’t a reality show. It was a live music show. Which is always what I-that’s what I hoped Super Group was going to be. I would have hoped Super Group would have had the sound that Celebrity Rap Superstar had. Like good sound-hang on dude, there’s somebody buzzing through.
Rock My Monkey: I got less than a minute left, so I do have one final question. Every year we do choose one final question that we ask every single band from classic rock legends to the most extreme death metal bands. This year I’m asking people to look into their crystal ball and predict what political figure, world leader, musician, celebrity, anybody world wide famous, who do you think might die before the end of the year?
Sebastian Bach: Who will die?
Rock My Monkey: A little bit of an online death pool, yep.
Sebastian Bach: Oh, that’s pretty bad karma, dude. (both laugh) Let me think.
Rock My Monkey: It could be a world leader, maybe a celebrity, Hollywood celebrity kind of person.
Sebastian Bach: That’s what I’m trying to think. Fidel Castro.
Rock My Monkey: Alright. I thank you very much for the interview. Anybody that’s listening to the audio version can go to RockMyMonkey.com for the full featured version with clickable links, readable text, and many more wonderful features. I’m asking people to click on the album cover above and below this interview to purchase Angel Down by Sebastian Bach. And I do hope to see you up on tour in the Northwest sometime. Thank you very much for your time.
Sebastian Bach: Alright, dude. Thank you.
Click here to check out last years interview with Sebastian Bach!
