Rex Brown
by Alissa Ordabai
Staff Writer
“Success or no success, for me to play great stuff that I couldn’t have played on another record, gives me a chance to broaden my horizons a bit,” Rex Brown says when describing his new project The Arms of the Sun. “I’ve been blessed with two great bands and it’s come around full circle. I think that the more people you jam with, the more insightful and more spiritual your music becomes to you.”
From playing jazz at high school, to being captivated by the Beatles, the Doors and 70s rock in his late teens, to becoming one of the founding fathers of a new genre of heavy metal, to playing country music in his spare time – Brown has always been driven by things that lay outside the box – something which gave him confidence to experiment and allowed him go beyond the routine. While he says that metal as a genre at times seemed limiting to him, you suspect that this, in the end, turned out to be a good thing, inspiring Brown to venture outside of existing methods, and to contribute to taking Pantera as a band – and metal as a whole – onto a new plane in early 90s. This open-minded approach, as this writer would later find out, drives Brown as a musician to this day.
While Pantera’s legacy still resonates throughout the contemporary music scene, Brown is the first one to emphasize how much Pantera’s music is different from that of Down, and how both are different from The Arms of the Sun. But while The Arms of the Sun is still very much a new venture for Brown (and the one for where he is still shopping around for a record deal) Down has been an on-going concern for 15 years now – with three critically acclaimed studio records behind their collective belt.
A new live CD / DVD package titled Down VI: The Diary of a Mad Band has been released earlier this month, and presents the band from a different angle – at its rawest, most uncompromising, warts-and-all best, faithfully relaying the vibe and the feel of a hearty, vigorous, hard-hitting Down show. Recorded during the band’s 2006 European tour, it presents its tracks in chronological order – a song from each show as the tour goes on – starting in Hamburg, Germany, and ending in Donnington, UK.
The band’s gritty energy and stamina, juxtaposed with brooding, overcast moments indeed take the music miles away from the Pantera vibe. If anything, this record shows that not only metal as a genre, but also individual musicians can grow, mature and change, at the same time illustrating the fact that – if sincere – the true core of any musical personality always retains its inimitable character. Down is not Pantera, and their expanded emotional range is not only the result of the passage of time, but of the band’s ability to see and function beyond the pre-set rules and outside of what many have before considered their members’ comfort zone.
This willingness to experiment and to broaden one’s horizons is what takes Rex Brown even further. The dichotomy between Down’s raw-edged energy and more traditional stance Of The Arms of the Sun, which is rooted in the classic rock (and which Brown likes to describe as “Beatles on acid”) presents an interesting, contrasting angle from which to consider Brown both as a bass player and as a rock personality of his generation.
Brutality versus introspection, dejection versus poetic-ism, and strong temperament versus rational insight are all equally telling when you follow his career up until now. This, as well as details of the new Down live release became just some of themes of this writer’s interview with the legend. Astute, insightful, and invariably fun, Rex Brown remains one of the best interviewees a rock journalist can wish for – straight and honest, but never forsaking his penchant for an occasional wicked joke.
Hardrock Haven: Rex, thank you for agreeing to do this interview with us, we really appreciate your time. And congratulations on the release of the new live CD / DVD package.
Rex Brown: Thank you.
HRH: Are you happy with the way this release has turned out?
RB: Yes, but I am also frustrated because we wanted it to come out about a year ago. That’s the only thing. The politics of the business really stepped on this thing, but we are happy to have it out. It’s a true-to-fact piece of work. Every little thing that we do is kind of chronicled on there, and it’s for a real die-hard fan.
HRH: It’s interesting you say it’s true-to-fact, because I was just going to ask you about the touching-up that this live material has undergone in the studio. How much, if at all? Because to me it sounded like none, like the live atmosphere was so perfectly captured, with all the rough edges and the live vibe so accurately preserved.
RB: It’s harder to get that sound in the studio than you would think. For most live bands it’s really hard to get a real live sound like they have on stage on the record. So this comes pretty close to it. Other than that, like I said, we are really glad to have it out. We try to make records as live as possible, that’s our forte. But it’s kind of hard to beat when you have this, when you have to top this. So there you go.
HRH: What was the criteria for selecting material for this CD and the DVD? Because you have mentioned in other interviews that you had tons of footage from that tour. How have you decided which song from a particular show would make it to the album?
RB: It was basically Pepper going through all the songs. We played 21 times and finding the best ones basically, and then putting it in a chronological order, so it sits with were we are going. We tried to get the best take out of each scene. It takes a painstakingly long period of time when you listen to the set list and select the song that sits out. It really took a lot of effort and time listening, and this is what Pepper has done in the studio, he’s really good.
HRH: As American musicians, how did you see Europe on that tour? Did all the different audiences in different cities stand out for you and shown their own character? Could you, for example, with your eyes closed, tell, “Oh, this is a German audience”, or, “This is an English crowd”?
RB: No, not really. Every place that we played was kind of different in the way that the crowds interact. Of course, if you are playing in Germany at some of the beer halls, it’s just non-stop – you close your eyes and you get hit by a beer. Or a beer can. Or a beer bottle. Or whatever. It was our first trip as a band over, so it was enlightening in terms of performance – not knowing what would go on with the audience. And that was the fun of it. We kicked ass every night, but we had to start walking, and we did little baby-steps first to get to were we are in the video where it really matters. So different places, different people, and, for example, in Amsterdam it’s a little more laid back, very much laid back, which is fine, because the place is [inaudible] rock anyway, for a better word.
It’s just chronicles of what we’d done in that year of VI, and it was like an old rusty car that you build for the road, and all of a sudden it turns into a Hot Rod, you know? And that’s what we’ve built it into.
HRH: Do you ever get surprised when you are listening back to what has been recorded live? Are there moments when you are listening back to live material, and think, “Oh, I didn’t expect that from myself”, or, “I didn’t know there was this aspect to my character”. Does that ever happen?
RB: Nah. Because we’ve done it all our loves, do you know what I’m saying? It’s still with us. We are trying to give it the best we can. There are certain shows when we go, “Wow, that was really magical,” or, “That one really sucked,” but the ones in between are us trying to find the magic. When the magic really kicks in on stage, it’s truly powerful.
HRH: But what elements, do you think, need to come together for a great live show to happen?
RB: It depends on the mood of the band, on the mood of the singer, on the crowd – how long they have been sitting out there waiting, are they all drunk having sat there waiting all day, or are they fresh – just got the club and just had a couple of beers. Because we feed off the crowd. And the crowd feeds off of us. It’s an interplay that I think works really well with this band. We feed off of that, and if they give us the attention that we want, we go back and forth. And if not, we start making fun of the fun-looking dudes in the front row.
HRH: Ha-ha!
RB: We do! Like, “Look at that dude with the hair-cut, look at that dude!” – “Which one are you talking about?” – “That goofy-looking dude in the second row!” So we add a little humour to it, and that’s how you make it more fun for yourselves – the goofy-looking bastard in the fucking front row! (Laughs).
HRH: Are you yourself a fan of music DVDs? Are there bands or artists whose live performances you like to watch on your screen at home?
RB: Yes, I have a bunch of old stuff that I like listening to. There is one in particular that stands out – Tom Petty was playing at the Fillmore, he was paying 24 nights in a row in 1996, and this is like the 21st show or something like that, and it’s magical, just incredible how he commands the crowd. Then, of course, I’ve got all the Zeppelin stuff – that’s a given.
HRH: Let’s talk a bit about your other band – The Arms of the Sun. It has been announced that Vinnie Appice has joined you on the drums. How did that come about and how long have you known each other?
RB: He joined for about 30 minutes.
HRH: Oh!
RB: We decided yesterday that it’s not going to happen and we are going to use the original drummer that we had here. Vinnie and I are working on another project in LA, another heavy kind of project, I can’t really throw up the names yet. It’s really good stuff. Vinnie was going to play. I said to him: “I need some help on this. I need a drummer, if you would come down and see if it would work.” And so he came down and it really took a lot for him to… It’s really not his cup of tea. I talked to Vinnie yesterday and he bowed out gracefully out of the whole thing. But he is such and nice guy. We are really good buds and we thought we’d do the best for all parties involved.
HRH: But you have 12 tracks recorded already – that’s what you’ve been saying in your other interviews, and you are also planning to take the record on the road and hopefully come to England. When do you expect that to happen?
RB: As soon as I get a deal.
HRH: Are you shopping around for a deal at the moment?
RB: Shopping as we speak. So it will probably be next year sometime. I would like to come to England and play there first.
HRH: We’d love to see you up here.
RB: I want to break it over there before I break it in the States. We are going to devise a plan and see what happens. It’s really good stuff, I really worked hard on it, and it took a long time. I had to re-mix it twice, so I put a lot of heart, a lot of soul, and a lot of money (Laughs) into it. But it’s killer and I’m really proud of it.
HRH: How long did it take you to write the material – to go from initial snippets of musical ideas to the finished album?
RB: We did it in stages. Some of the stuff was for production music that we did. It wasn’t a project for me, but I’ve been asked if I had any material that I wanted to put on a soundtrack, or any songs to use on whatever, and I was like, “No, but I have a band and here are some of the songs.” We started picking songs out with the singer / songwriter I’ve been jamming with and we used it for production music, some of the songs. Some of the songs on the record are going to be used also, but a lot of it is for TV, movies, and other media. And so we took that and all of a sudden it started becoming a band sound, and became this monster that just started rolling. We came back and wrote five more tracks, it was really cool. I can’t emphasise how cool it is. We had five more songs, and my next door neighbour has a state-of-the-art studio next door to my house, so it was just me waking up, having a cup of coffee, going to hear what he was doing. Waking up every day, walking next door to see what was going on. So this is my first real production credit.
HRH: When you first started The Arms of The Sun, could you anticipate or predict your audience in advance?
RB: No, not really. The songs were just so good, that’s what it is. Just the songs that are really, really good.
HRH: How do song ideas come to you? Do you have to set a mood, lock yourself in a room, or do they come to you as you go about your daily business?
RB: Usually the singer has everything down as far as what the melody is going to be. There is one song I wrote – all the harmonies and everything, the main track – that I helped him out with. It just came naturally, we were sitting in a studio, and I said, “Well, give me some lyrics and I will come up with something.” I’ve done it with Crowbar before and it worked out really well. That way when the singer is stuck and is freaked out because he can’t figure out what he wants to sing there, you can always just bring some ideas to the table: “OK, let’s try THIS and see what it will turn into.” A lot of the stuff that I do is arrangement stuff. I’m pretty good at arranging material and stuff like that. I think when I get a good song riff, I always put it down on the guitar, like if I was sitting here right now and something came to me, I’d sit with my acoustic next to me and put it down that way. And then put it down to my Pro-Tools here.
HRH: But you’ve always had wide musical interests outside of metal – from playing jazz at school to the Beatles, and the Doors, and 70s rock, and country music. Did you ever feel stylistically limited during the Pantera days playing just heavy metal?
RB: I think so. I think it was one of those forbidden rules – you can’t go play with anybody else. And Phil stepped out of that picture when he started playing with Down, and it just started from there. Once I got out of the band, I really started playing different stuff. Down sounds nothing like Pantera. Just because Phil is singing isn’t the reason why it should sound anything like it. The music is totally different. I’ve been blessed with two great bands and it’s come around full circle. I am playing some of the parts on this stuff that I would never had a chance to play anywhere else. It’s more melodic, more sing-along-ish, but at the same time heavy on the bottom, it just gives me full circle being a musician, and that’s really what it’s all about. Success or no success, just for me to play with these guys and to have the opportunity to play some really great stuff that I couldn’t have played on another record gives me a chance to broaden my horizon a bit, and I’ve been very blessed. I think that the more people you jam with, the more insightful and more spiritual your music becomes to you.
HRH: Do you think that being a rock bass player as a profession has changed in any fundamental way since the time when you were growing up? Not in terms of recording technology, or changes in the industry, or distribution, but in terms of pure craft. Do you think there are more expectations now from rock bass players, or less, or has it changed in any big way?
RB: There’s a lot less. I think it’s less than there is anything. I think that there is only a handful of us left that are really original and do what we do. Mike Inez has been very true to his bass, I think Rob Trujillo is exceptional… I’m trying to think… You know, there are a lot of other bands, and I hate singling out people, those are just a few who really… We are all around the same age, you know? We grew up on the same kind of stuff, and there are a lot of other kids who are trying to get it, but just not getting it – playing along with the guitar the whole time, when you can’t play with the guitar the whole time. You can base your roots around that, but you can’t play with the guitar the whole time. And that’s what a lot of bass players do these days, and that’s what I didn’t do. One thing I made sure that I didn’t do in Pantera, even though there was a lot of it, but that was just because that was the main riff. But there are other parts where you hear me and Vinnie playing against Dime.
HRH: What would be your advice to anyone who is starting out these days?
RB: Just get a really good drummer. This is something that you got to have. Someone who can keep a really good beat and someone who enjoys the same music that you do. And just stick it out. It’s not an easy business.
HRH: Talking about Vinnie, do you ever see yourself on the same stage again?
RB: I never say never, but I don’t ever think so, no. The world is crazy, the world is just insane. So maybe there is something down the road, but right now I really don’t think so. You never know – tomorrow is another day. Today – no. Tomorrow – maybe.