You moved to Hollywood in 1985 to attend the Musicians Institute and took three courses simultaneously, studying guitar, bass and audio visual and sound engineering -how do you feel formal education influenced the path you took as a working musician?
I can trace everything that has happened in my career back to my beginnings at the recording school. I would bring musicians from the Musicians Institute over to the recording school to record as projects and that was an invaluable education as I learnt how to be on both sides of the glass.
Also I would record my bass lines while playing alongside some really good studio musicians. From there I got a referral to try out for a band called DV8 and got the gig. From there I learned to record in a real studio. Our band was a finalist in the Yamaha Soundcheck competition which exposed me to playing at Santa Monica Civic, recording in a mobile studio, doing video interviews and all that sorta stuff.

Was there any one key encounter at that time that really defined your journey?
I ran into Dennis Ryder, he was a music attorney who became UKJ’s manager. I met LOVE/HATE through Dennis, he was their lawyer.
I played a showcase with a musician called Ian Moore, Dennis was his attorney too. Then just meeting more and more people and networking and next thing you know I’m auditioning with UKJ up in Santa Barbara, got my first professional record release and things kinda took off from there.

Hollywood was at peak glory of Sunset Strip Superstars and once and future grunge legends -what was your experience entering that scene?
I was lucky I had the experience of hanging out with Bill Gazzarri one night.
My band DV8 played Gazzarri’s on a Monday night ‘pay to play’ and I learned a lesson that night because we didn’t have that many people show up so we lost money and the promoter kept my bass as collateral! I lost my bass but I ended up in the parking lot talking with Bill Gazzarri and he told me the story of how Van Halen used to come up those streets and Motley Crue and countless others. He saw where they came from and where they ended up and what was possible so told me don’t give up.
That was like my extreme initiation into Sunset Strip and Hollywood.

[laughs] Also in those days everybody would flyer all over the place trying to get noticed and ironically that included Pretty Boy Floyd who later on became the ‘namesake’ of the band I played in!

What was your first real taste of the rock’n’roll whirl?
Through knowing Jon E Love at NRG studios, LOVE/HATE took me on my first world tour as a Skid’s bass roadie when they opened for AC/DC on the Thunderstruck (Razor’s Edge) tour.
I was 26 and this was before I met the Ugly guys.
I would be standing side of stage watching them have an incredible night like at the Toronto Sky Dome, opening for AC/DC and having done radio interviews that day and video interviews then play a huge a concert. I felt like that was maybe my destiny, not to be on the side of the stage watching my buddies. Skid was very humble. I got a lot of experience as his roadie on that tour, he taught me a lot of valuable lessons.
New Year’s Eve, during the tour, I made a pledge that by this time next year I was going to have a band and sell a million records and that was the time I met Ugly Kid Joe.

What do you remember most on first meeting Whit and Klaus?
That they had the same happy-go-lucky attitude and it just felt natural.
It was a very natural fit with Whit and Klaus, very natural flow.
Very very cool people, very down to earth. And Whit, he would always be jumping around!

Tell me about the initial days as the band formed?
When I first met them, I got to this one car garage turned rehearsal room in Isla Vista CA, and Whit was sitting outside with the door half open because it was too loud. He was sitting on a beer keg with a mic and pa pointed out of the door so he could talk to all of his friends as they came skateboarding by -he would make comments like “get a haircut” or “get a job”. Then I opened the door and there was Klaus and Mark we started playing the songs I had learned from the 5 song demo I had got from Dennis. They had a really good demo made by Eric Dodd (Eric Valentine) and it was excellent, I learnt every single note on that, every backing vocal. I would go up there 2 or 3 days a week to jam.
It’s like you got out of bed, your feet hit the floor and you are doing what you are supposed to be doing. We started playing keg parties and people heard what we are doing and they got it too.

It seemed like the stars were aligned for success but it must have been down to more than just chance?
Yes, the band had a local radio DJ in Santa Barbara playing their stuff on a rotation. They already had a record company in their pocket ready to sign. I had NRG studios in my bag of tricks because I was in a band with Jay Baumgardner, the owner of NRG studios. We had Jeff Robert the manager, Jon E Love, Doug Thaler (Motley Crue’s manager) was also a friend of mine at the time.
He reviewed the management contract before we signed so we had a really good team going into the whole thing.

At what point did you see Ugly Kid Joe as really coming into their own?
We played the Foundations Forum which was a music industry convention. We were hanging out with Pearl Jam and Shannon Hoon from Blind Melon […starts singing “No Rain”…] and Ice T’s band Body Count and several others -it was a great year 1991. We met Riki Rachtman there and he put us on his show Headbangers Ball.
– [laughs] we plastered stickers all over the place bathroom walls, elevators everywhere! We had really good vinal stickers and we just put them everywhere. We had to have been blacklisted by some people but it got us noticed.

The early days of UKJ and the phenomenal success of ‘Everything about you’ and ‘Cats in the cradle’ are well documented – you were able to tour with many of your heroes such as Ozzy and Van Halen, but what was the moment of realisation when you thought “Holy Shit – I am a fucking Rock Star!”?
I don’t know if I ever felt like I was a rock star until I was sitting at home with a broken ankle waiting to go on tour with Ozzy and I was watching MTV and my band’s video was the No1 requested video in the United States and that was the time it clicked that Wow Ugly Kid Joe are No.1 and all the other musicians in LA would love to be where I am -and here I am!

How did it feel to reach that point most only dream of so fast?
I felt very humbled and very grateful for the people that I knew, the people that I learnt from along the way. I couldn’t believe it was all happening -having a cool band with a great lead singer and a good label and good manager. It felt natural, it felt like that was going to happen, it was supposed to happen that way and then it happened quick.

Which tour or particular show stands out in your memory as being the most epic of your experience at the time?
MTV Spring Break -the first one they had.
It was in Florida, we were playing live on TV and in front of so many people. We were staying in high-rise hotel right on the beach. It was a really fun place to be. We played with Primus and I got to play Les Claypool’s bass. They were frying on acid. Salt & Pepper were there too. I was part of something special that day.

In the late 70s in London, England, the Sex Pistols were acutely aware that they were both the epitome of a cultural revolution whilst also instrumental in its evolution and future significance. When Ugly Kid Joe were touring the globe in the early 90’s as perfect poster children of the bratty MTV generation, were you aware of your own role in that cultural moment?
No. I had no idea we were anything. I don’t think we were close to the Sex Pistols. We would tour with bands like Scatterbrain, they were another influential band at the time. Both our bands were very sarcastic, we were taking the piss out of everything and It just seemed natural I don’t know if we stood out different from other bands. Bands from Seattle wearing flannel shirts and we were in California wearing cut off shorts.
Thomas Mignone was the Director of ‘Everything about you’, he visualised what our image could be like and he captured it.
I thought we were cool because I was wearing the same clothes I was wearing when I was working on cars in North Hollywood. It was very natural. I was still wearing my normal clothes and I was jumping around on a beach with a dog and a blow-up doll.  But I was just being myself, showing off, grabbing my bass to jump in the ocean and play…

The music industry was vastly different back then, especially the money involved. Do you feel you had opportunities which bands today are unlikely to experience?
To start a tour in Europe is expensive. I don’t know if most bands can up and go to Europe. We borrowed money from our record label. We had to pay that money back which we did. But I don’t know if bands will get that financial support now to go on tour like that. It took a big label to be able to do that, do the promotion necessary and to get a record heard overseas and I think that would be difficult now for some bands maybe to try to get that push.

Can you share any tour stories from those days? Leave out names to protect the guilty if you wish.
I remember being in Japan, I wanted to smoke some weed and ended up smoking some hash with Whit.
We had decided we were going to go into the Japanese Garden to become one with the world. So, we put on our kimonos and our little slippers, we are walking around trying to find this garden smoking hash from a coke-a-cola can.
It was a big hotel, we didn’t know where we were going but we found ourselves in the flower room, a room where they keep all the flowers before delivering them to the guests, and it was lovely in there, it smelled really nice and there was a boombox in there so we were listening to music. And I guess we were pretty stoned and we heard people coming so we started walking around the hotel in our kimonos lost looking for the garden again.
Then there were lots of people coming so we decided to split and Whit ran down the hall in one direction and I ran down the hall in another direction and we never did find the garden.
There was a lot of debauchery too but they are stories for another time.

How did you maintain a level head and not end up consumed by the excess of rock ’n’ roll?
As soon as you see your friends or your family, people that you have always been around and they remind you to watch your Ps & Qs. That’s how you can keep it real.

During the 10year break, when UKJ were on hiatus you were free to explore other projects, how did you flex your creative muscles then?
I played in a band called Abercrombie with the former guitar play for UKJ before I joined them so it was ironic that we were now playing together and we made some music.
I kept recording and mixing tracks for bands and friends in LA.
I spent that time raising my daughter as well she was about 2yrs old so got more into the family lifestyle at that point and moved to the desert. Became a window washer for a spell, it was good to do some hard labour! I had a rap band out in the desert. We were called the Dirty Dozen Clique.
I just kept recording with friends. I just kept playing - I can’t stop playing. Maybe to a fault. Maybe when I should be doing other things but I just like tinkering around with music gear making recordings.

You have worked with an incredible roaster of artist throughout your career, who do look back on as living up to your expectations? 
As a kid I would have fantasies about meeting Eddie Van Halen and becoming his bass player, and later on as my career progressed, I got to tour with Van Halen and met Eddie and asked him every question I could think of! I didn’t get to play with him but we hung out.
Meeting Angus Young, when I was a roadie. He was cool, he took the time to hang out, show me his guitar rig and playing Back In Black, smoking Benson+Hedges. And Malcom was there too.
I got to ask Lemmy 100 questions over the years, he always took the time to share his experiences with me.
And the guys from Love/Hate, they were always very cool.

Do you still wake up inspired every morning with something creative gnawing away inside you?
Yes, I would say so because I find myself recording between three and five song ideas every day in the studio that I have now. I like to play drums, I play guitar I play bass and I like to see the sounds I can get playing those and mixing synth sounds -it fun to create noise and jam with friends. The ideas might not all get finished and become something but I like to create something every day.

What do you still want to achieve professionally?
I would like to see my band with Nikita La Tijera -Hear Kitty Kitty, come to fruition.
We have 50 or more unreleased songs. I think it is good and I want to put out our second album. I want to see that through.
There are so many great people and talented musicians out there I want to work with, I am just looking forward to seeing what the future brings; just by playing it by ear.
…I can’t think of anything more fun or more rewarding than to see the enthusiasm of an audience when you are performing and bringing music to them.

When your time here is up and you are part of the cosmic soup once more, how do you want to be remembered?
I would like to be remembered as a musician, who loved his family, loved animals and made a difference in the world through music -by smacking the shit out of a piece of wood with strings on it

Words: Sarah (Thirteen Broomsticks) - December 2022