He Who Cannot Be Named – Uber Rock Interview Exclusive
Written by Johnny H
Sunday, 08 September 2013 03:00
Having spent most of his adult life as the masked (and mostly nude) guitarist in psycho punks the Dwarves, you’d expect He Who Cannot Be Named to have a tale or two to tell about his life to date. With two UK live shows by his solo band scheduled for last month’s Rebellion Festival I took the opportunity to catch up with the six string enigma and wannbe ‘Humaniterrorist’ ahead of his ‘acoustic’ set to talk about his latest solo record ‘Love/Hate’ and all the things in-between, including his involvement in a new Dwarves album. Was he wearing any clothes? Was he wearing his mask? What the fuck do you think? Now let’s ‘Do The He Who Cannot Be Named’.
Hey He Who Cannot Be Named, it’s a pleasure to finally meet you sir, especially when you have a new album out, the wonderfully entitled ‘Humaniterrorist’
HWCBN: Thank you Uber Rock.
So let’s begin with where did the title of this record come from?
HWCBN: Oh it’s just one of the things one of the guys in the Dwarves used to say, one of our old drummers used to scream “I’m a Humaniterrorist” which I always thought was kind of funny, so it stuck with me. But there’s possibly another meaning within it too you know… (Laughing)
Thinking more about the songs on the record there are I guess kind of more of them influenced by the terror side of things. Stuff like ‘Die Die Die’ and Homicide Girl’ there’s certainly a lot of death on this record. For some strange reason I found myself writing songs about death for this record, which followed some personal shit in my life. My parents died, they were both killed in a car accident, so I guess I was working that out. But along with the songs about death there is also a song called ‘Getting Married Today’ which is…I got married you know. (laughing) I actually wrote that song on my wedding day so there’s this humanitarian thing going on in the record too. It all kind of made sense to bring it all together.
I loved your debut solo record ‘Sunday School Massacre’ how do you feel this new one compares to that previous musical rocket up the ass?
HWCBN: It’s a progression for sure, although it is pretty similar although there are different guys playing. I don’t think it’s that different. In fact some of the songs were originally written around that time but just weren’t done, so I guess they progressed during the time in between.
Looking back at that debut solo record one track kind of sticks out for me. ‘Machine Boy’ what was the story behind that track?
HWCBN: Well that track was written whilst working a job as part of my secret double life, which I guess wearing a mask to play in the Dwarves kind of lead to that you know. But as part of my secret other identity I worked at this place for troubled teens at a residential treatment facility in California, basically for kids with psychiatric issues. Actually most of ‘Sunday School Massacre’ was written while I was working there, I’d come up with songs like ‘I Hate Those Fucking Kids’, when I literally had just gotten off work and I was sick to death with those kids. (laughing) ‘Machine Boy’ was about this one kid, who also influenced ‘Motorboating’ too who was a really nice kid, bearing in mind that a lot of these kids had horrendous abuse in their lives to that point, and this kid had been fucked up by his mom’s boyfriend when he slammed him into a wall as a youngster, which meant he couldn’t really even grab things with his fingers, but for someone who had been through all that shit he was still super nice. Which I must admit was not the norm in that place, most of the kids were not nice, so they would pick on him, and all that shit. I remember on top of all that he also had trouble breathing so he had to breathe through this special apparatus, and I also knew this kid was well into comic books and he fantasised about being a superhero. So it was like “woah he’s machine boy” you know.
So then I took that and used the tubes to give him unlimited powers, and I figured that might have been going through his mind at the time, then as I started writing it I actually sat down with him and picked his brain about the concept, so I was like “what do you think the most powerful super power is?”, then after a short while he suddenly said “I think it’s the soul burn”, “that’s like when it doesn’t matter what they do to your body they manage to get into your brain, get into your soul and destroy you that way”. So that was like where “when the plague is upon you, when the evil gnomes burn your soul” came from and of course ‘Machine Boy’ is the one to save the hour.
And of course you worked with Brad Cook on that debut record, so going back to my initial question regarding Humaniterrorist’ what is the story behind the recording of this new record?
HWCBN: Yeah with the new record I didn’t go down to Brad I did it in San Francisco with different guys, where I hooked up with this guy Cliff Truesdell, who had actually played guitar with me in the past, and he was going through this whole thing of wanting to be a recording engineer, and he has a band called The Black Furies, or he had this band I’m not so sure what they are doing right now. Anyway I got him to play guitar for me and we ended up in a studio started recording and then we started piecing it all together. Then we got into this studio in San Francisco called Broken Radio which is a classic old studio, and it might have got sold right after I made the record. (laughing)
This studio had a great room and it was full of that ‘70s vibe, although it kinda stunk. Every time I’d go home after a day in there my wife would be like “You smell like pot”, and I’m like “It’s the room…” Yeah sure. But anyway Cliff did a great job you know, I mean I didn’t want to pay lots of money to a big producer so this record was more about the people I knew. Salt Peter playing bass, I had a different drummer plus I got some other Dwarves guys to play including Holy Smokes who came in and played guitar, he’s one of the great Dwarves guitar players who doesn’t play with them now but if you ever listen to ‘The Dwarves Are Young & Good Looking’…that’s him. That record really was like his record, he did almost all of the guitar, and for my record I had to get a big guitar guy and he was it.
Which brings us nicely to hear and now I guess, as you’re here at Rebellion playing two shows, one acoustic and one electric, who’s involved for these shows?
HWCBN: Oh here in the UK I’ve hooked up with a guy by the name of Spike T Smith, who is a drummer, and I met him years ago when I was just like up at his house, and I’m friends with his friends and family now, but we met right here in 2007, I think maybe, then I saw him playing in Conflict in San Francisco maybe a year later, and that was when I really noticed him playing drums. I was like “this guy is amazing” you know, and then I kind of researched him a bit and found out he’s played with all these different kinds of people, then when he came back into town with Steve Ignorant and his Crass show it was like amazing again. But that was the catalyst for this, as we got talking about me coming over to the UK and playing some shows using some of Spike’s friends, so we put together two different shows two years ago, where we played in London and Canterbury, and that was so cool. So when this Rebellion thing came up I contacted him and we been rehearsing for the last few days for this, and it’s gonna be good.
Before this solo career you were obviously involved with The Dwarves for a very long time, but The Dwarves that first gave music to the world was a radically different one to the one I fell in love with in the nineties. I guess it would be safe to say you were almost psychedelic when you started in the eighties. So what was it like to be a member of The Dwarves back then?
HWCBN: We were definitely weird, we kind of didn’t care what anyone thought about us. We were kids after all, and we latched onto that whole psychedelic thing because we found these old records like the ‘Pebbles’ and ‘Nuggets’ compilations. I mean I was born in 1960 so I was around then but I didn’t really know what psychedelia was you know. But from that we developed into bands like the 13th Floor Elevators and The Sonics and I kept thinking “This sounds like punk rock to me”. It was hard edged and I think what was more important to us was the fact that no one else we knew was into it you know. Well in our little world in the Chicago area, (laughing) and like I had a Farfisa organ, which I actually still have.
I remember I was in college and Blag came and knocked on my door because someone he knew roomed opposite me and had told him he knew someone with a Farfisa organ. He came in we smoked like a bunch of pot and they had just done a demo tape, they were together before I joined, but their Farfisa player had left to go to college or something and they were all at High School so I was invited to play and there it was…..
You guys must have had a lot of fun during that time.
HWCBN: We had a lot of fun yeah, (laughing) we went to Chicago and we played one of our first shows at The Cubby Bear. The Chicago Cubs is a big baseball team, and the Cubby Bear was a small bar there that would do shows, I not sure if they do anymore, but they used to do alternative, punk shows back around 1983 or something. Which was before we ever recorded anything properly, but we were playing some of the stuff that made it onto the likes of ‘Horror Stories’. The funny thing about Chicago was that we were just snotty kids who had alienated ourselves from all these clubs, but the Cubbie Bear was like a cool place. Downstairs was all graffiti covered, so we thought like “cool that’s what you do at a club, you write graffiti”, so next place we play, which was called Tuts or something like that, the backstage had like freshly painted walls, and of course we just had to add some of our graffiti to them. We weren’t trying to be assholes you know, we just thought that is what you had to do, (laughing) next thing we know we’re kicked out and are being told “you owe us money.” So, that’s kind of where the whole us against them thing came from. However very quickly we found we weren’t able to play in any more of the clubs in Chicago, because of these stupid things we did.
And of course your reputation developed from there.
HWCBN: Yeah, I really do think that kind of fuelled the whole thing.
I’d heard a rumour that you guys used to deliberately wind up the hair metal bands that would be playing in your area around that time, is that true?
HWCBN: (Laughing) Oh yeah that’s true, yeah in L.A. yeah. We used to fuck with them, because they would have these magazines or newspapers that would carry advertising for their bands, and we thought that was funny. We were probably more punk at this point, and we were starting take on that persona which fitted us very well because of the violence and the “fuck you” kind of thing, and we just laughed at all the metal bands around us, because …they dressed like girls. (laughing) I remember going up to one of them one time after a show and I must have been wasted to get some kind of courage, plus I probably had a bunch of big guys behind me too (laughing) and I’m like “hey are you guys faggots?”, and this guy got so mad, and was like “I’ve fucked more women!”, he really didn’t get the irony you know. Also we would call their ads in those magazines and offer them record deals.
All those broken dreams lying out there on The Strip are due to you guys then (laughing)?
HWCBN: Yup, it’s all down to us. (laughing)
Looking back at your time in the Dwarves, what would you say is your proudest moment with the band?
HWCBN: Good question. That’s a tough one to call. I think there’s some really great records we did, I mean we did all the crazy antics, and that was cool you know, but I’m not really that proud of bashing someone’s head in, although I understand it made for a show, but of those records I think ‘Dwarves Must Die’ was a great record. And it’s not just the production part but also the songs. In fact to really answer your question, I think I’m proudest of the fact we wrote some really great songs. I’m not so sure I have a favourite track out right though. I mean for this show here at Rebellion we’re doing some Dwarves songs, which I hadn’t done until recently, actually after Blag kind of nudged me into that direction, after seeing one of my shows. He took me to one side after and said “you know you’re only doing part of your catalogue,” and damn it if he wasn’t right. There’s a lot of songs.
So you and Blag are still good friends?
HWCBN: Oh yeah, we’re still good friends we still write stuff together. There’s a new Dwarves recording in the works, it’s sounding great, and we got Josh Freese to play drums on the track I contributed, and listening to the roughs they just sound great you know. Next up I’ll be going in to do some guitars and overdubs and stuff, but it’s all going great. The Dwarves continue…we will not die!
I also noticed on your website that you have a CD out right now called ‘Love/Hate’, what is that all about?
HWCBN: Oh, right yeah…That’s a repackaging of these two solo albums, largely because ‘Humaniterrorist’ only came out on vinyl, so a distributor, Traffic Entertainment, was asking me about doing a CD version of it, and I was like kind of reluctant to do that, as CDs seem like they are on the way out now. However I do understand the fact they thought they could sell them…so. I opted to repackage the two albums and classify them as ‘love’ songs and ‘hate’ songs, plus there’s a booklet of cool photos and stuff. Trying to make it something people might want to buy you know.
Of course talking of buying things, you and Blag have been immortalised as Headknockers, and I’m lead to believe you do a fine line in fridge magnets right now?
HWCBN: Yes, they are here, the magnets are right here at Rebellion, as well as on my website. The collectables, and I must say they are inexpensive too (laughing)
So just to finish off then, where can we get these magnets and copies of ‘Humaniterrorist’ from, I’ve not seen the latter in any record shops here in the UK?
HWCBN: Well I have some copies with me, along with the magnets, to sell this weekend, (laughing) plus you can get it from my webstore, where we also have copies of ‘Love/Hate’ available. The website is called Music Cannot Be Named Records (http://www.musiccannotbenamed.yokaboo.com/) or you can pop over to my Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/HWCBN). Oh and check out my boys over here when I’m not with them they’re called Destroy DC, and they are excellent.
We will, for sure. Thank you for your time He Who Cannot Be Named we wish you all the best for the future.
HWCBN: Thank you very much and thanks for the coverage.
Photography courtesy of Dod Morrison and Cormac Figgis