PHIL ANSELMO Talks About "Heavy As A Motherfucker" Solo Album

PHIL ANSELMO Talks About "Heavy As A Motherfucker" Solo Album, Housecore Records, DOWN DVD In New BraveWords.com Interview



By "Metal" Tim Henderson

DOWN/PANTERA vocalist Phil Anselmo has been in a chatty mood as of late, drumming up awareness around his Housecore Records (HCR), the definitive collection of side projects from past to present, and the advancement and release of material the NOLA singer believes in creatively. The idea of Housecore Records was first concocted in the early to mid '90’s and is now nestled safely in his mansion/office, just north of New Orleans and mere moments away from Lake Pontchartrain. This interview was done just prior to the Gulf oil spill that is attacking Anselmo's back yard, only a few short years since Katrina ravaged the region in 2005. Of course we all know him as a fighter and this man ain't goin' down. Let the chin-wag with BraveWords.com begin:

BraveWords.com: So how’s your head these days? Did you find there was like a bit of a turnaround in terms of the way you were facing the music, or is it just the label that is inspiring you these days?

Anselmo: "Ah, man, well I’ve been on the up and up for a while with that. Shit, we did two years of touring on the last Down record, and that was all cool. Trying to retweak my back again, but that’s pretty much under control so all that’s behind me, man, and yeah, man, the label’s going real cool, man. It’s just small enough, just fuckin’ intimate enough of a group of bands, that it’s a lot of fuckin’ fun. It is invigorating in itself, just to be around a lot of the new blood. It’s fuckin’ good stuff."

BraveWords.com: Now it’s gotta be hard to keep it fun because there’s numerous challenges in running a label these days. But, as you say, you are keeping it nice and intimate. How are you controlling that kind of situation?

Anselmo: "Well, you just honestly, you keep the small roster of bands. Then you keep it simple, man. I don’t really know how to answer the question any better, but the bands that we have either are very clear on what they want and produce their own records and I trust their judgement, or a band like WARBEAST from Fort Worth, Texas who do really balls-out, straight out thrash. We kind of go into an agreement there. If they want me there for production, that’s fine. If a band doesn’t want me there for production, that’s fine, too, so you know I get to work with these cats. Warbeast HAARP I’ve worked with. And the full-length ARSON ANTHEM, so all that stuff here in just this short year we were pulling things together at the end of last year. The stuff strung together has really, really been cool. Learning experience every day and yeah, there are struggles, but you know what, man, if you’re gonna stick your neck out there, and you’re gonna do something with your life instead of sitting around man. I can’t do it, the kid can’t just sit around and be idle, man, you know? You gotta come up against challenges, and challenges are the story of many a life and mine included. So I shouldn’t be left out of the struggle, man, if you get my drift."





BraveWords.com: Now you said the word “work.” I would imagine this is more of a passion than a job.

Anselmo: "It gets to be both, but yeah it is big time passion. Without the passion then the work wouldn’t come so easy."


BraveWords.com: What kind of a return are you looking for with the label?

Anselmo: "Yeah, I hear you, it’s a valid question. Look, man: we went into this thing, I went into this thing knowing there ain’t nobody coming out of this thing stinkin’ rich and that’s where the fuckin’ passion comes from. Fucking extreme music has been so kind to me in one way or another. What I mean by that is one form of music or another, you know? To give back it feels very, very natural. It seemed like this is what I should be doing in my life, this is what I feel like doing. This feels right. This feels right, like, right now in my life. So once again Housecore Records is an absolutely artist-friendly label, almost to a fault. There really is no fault when you really want to come in with integrity. I’m not saying this is something I want to do for the rest of my life. I just think that right now in music I have some bands that are fantastic, that people need to hear. And yeah, we do metal, we do hardcore, but also we do what I like to call music that is just as extreme but not metal nor hardcore. A band like THE SURSIKS. They’re a band that are so extreme, you know, they’re so over-the-top, and they’re absolutely not metal. I mean for me to classify ‘em, that would be a rough one. But, you know, that’s why it’s there for people to hear, man, and that’s really what’s important to me, man, for a band that’s gonna bring something fresh to the table, that they do bring something fresh to the table. And I think we got a bunch of that.


BraveWords.com: Are you actively seeking out new talent, or are you just kind of hanging back?

Anselmo: "I went through a process for a while where I was evaluating some bands and I got in touch with a few of them that really piqued my interest, and we’ve done some business with them here and there and some bands we might do business with down the line. We receive hundreds of submissions and to be completely truthful, for me to get to each and every one at this point, for as many that are coming in, it’s like almost damn near impossible, because I’m also in the studio. I’m working, working, working, working with these other bands. So right now I think the plate’s kind of full, but that does not mean the plate is completely full for the future. It depends on the band. Some of these bands I know from years past and just whatever experience growing up with them and whatnot. That would definitely fall in the Warbeast category, because when I lived in Fort Worth jamming with Pantera, these guys were rippin’, man. The singer from Warbeast is Bruce from RIGOR MORTIS. And the guitar players played in a band called GAMMACIDE who were a very popular local thrash band and they fuckin’ rip man. And so they’re a top-notch band. Matter of fact, they are the epitome of DFW (Dallas/Fort Worth) thrash."

BraveWords.com: So how do you want this to grow then?

Anselmo: "I want it to grow the way it grows, and I want it to be as natural as heck, you know. I’m not gonna force anything. And you know, forcing music or whatever, there’s no such thing. People are gonna like what they like. They need to be seen. They really need to be seen. Haarp needs to be seen. Haarp is a very, very different band, man. And just to give ‘em a couple seconds of talking time here, they play slow but just to call them slow is not necessarily fair. They’re crushing, they’re resolute, they are excellent live. Warbeast is great live as well, so I think these bands need to be seen, man. When I was in Pantera - now take away all of our popularity that you know now and think back to when we were first beginning - there were no radio hits. We made this a point to tell everybody, remind everybody, we never had any damn radio hits or anything like that, and our best selling point as far as records went was our live show, man, was our live performance, was getting out there and playing every single town we could, as many towns over as we could. That way you build an audience, you know. I feel the same way about today’s bands, man. They need to be seen. And they’ve got my endorsement. People who respect my word will go, people who don’t respect my word might even go just to see what the heck. They’ve got my endorsement. I love these bands, I believe in these bands, and you know, it’s not like we’re not gonna have ads here and there and work the record to the best of our ability. But once again I still say, having been in the system and knowing so many different bands and so many different musicians, it’s a luxury in a way because of the relationships. To be able to put, say Haarp or Warbeast on a tour with a band that’s already established, that is obviously the more preferable thing to do, so you know, you get a gig like that and have them play to as many people as possible, leave a mark and keep generating, you know. Honestly I think it’ll be a one, two-time pass around each little town here and there, and these bands will be good as gold. They just have to keep playing more, writing more, growing. And we’ll grow together, man."


BraveWords.com: When you’ve got the label owner cap on, where’s the best way that Philip Anselmo listens to this music that comes in? For you to get in a zone, is it in your car, is it in your office...

Anselmo: "That is a great question. I think everybody’s a little guilty of listening to a band one time and not being in the right mood and not getting the band at first. That happens. First of all if a band really jumps out at me it can either be in an awkward way, a bad way, or in a good way. Ah, let me rephrase this: honestly if something catches my ear, normally it’s something that it deviates, man, from the norm, and it’ll make me want to listen. The last bunch of things that hit me like that I’ll just have it on and if it lasts more than one song, I’ll always skip through songs. Like say I get a stack of submissions, and I’m listening to them, I’ll skip through the songs and I’ll know what I’m getting’ nine times out of ten. But that one percent right there, sometimes it can be like, 'my god, this is so strange it’s bad.' And then I’ll listen to it again and it’s like, 'wow, this is intriguing.' It’ll catch me like that and next thing I know I’ve listened to the whole thing. And yeah, there’s been several bands like that, a few bands like that, and I’ll personally give ‘em a call, man, and just say, 'hey, great, great, great, great submission. Keep doin’ what you’re doin’. Basically I don’t have the time right this second to invest in your band, but I love what you’re doing.' Mood has a lot to do with it, but these days my mind is very open and I’m just listening for that different niche. I like to say and like to think that with music all the notes have not been played yet. So I’m looking for those bands that are hitting the extra notes, if you get what I’m saying."

BraveWords.com: Is this label taking away from your own personal creativity. How are you juggling, balancing?

Anselmo: "It’s not, man. There’s been a balance there. There’s a nice balance there. I speak with the guys from Down every week. Everybody’s kind of going through their own thing, you know, decompressing. Like I said, we toured two years on the last record plus. So everybody’s kind of doing their own thing, but we all know, I would say after this particular fall, upcoming fall, we’re gonna kind of get our heads together. We have some shows in the summer. So we’ll do those festival shows and then I think we’ll probably all sit down and start talking about the new Down record, start jamming some stuff, after the fall once again. But other than that, man, yes I write my own music still. And it’s another beautiful adventure. Like if you look at any of my other bands, side bands, and this is important: not one of them sounds like the next or the other. And that’s, to me, why you do a side band, to explore this vast, fantastic world of music. Now what I’m doing now, honestly I haven’t let but one other friend, outside of this drummer that I’m playing with listen to it, and he’s not the best judge of labeling anything. But once again, it does not sound anything like I’ve done before, and it’s heavy as a motherfucker. That’s all I can say, it’s heavy and defiant, it’s fantastic. Feels great."

BraveWords.com: You did bring up Down. All the fans are wondering what are the legal issues around this DVD, if we’re gonna see it coming out soon?

Anselmo: "You know something, man, I really haven’t the foggiest notion what all that crap’s about, man. They’ve been back and forth with this damn company so many times and if I said anything right now I’d be a liar ‘cause I don’t know. I’m letting the bigwigs deal with that. I really wish I could tell people. An honest answer, but I just can’t do it, man, so I’m gonna keep that lip zipped, so I don’t know."

BraveWords.com: Can you give us a health update with your knee and your back? How are you moving around these days?

Anselmo: "Ah, man, you know it’s not so bad. It’s not so bad at all. This rest that I’ve had has been genuinely good. The knee’s real good. Honestly, it just takes a while. Anybody that’s had a little torn meniscus or semi-torn ACL like I had, these guys can get in there and clean your knee out. And I’ll tell you, there’s certain days that have a little zip of pain here and there, but other than that it’s just a little bit of stiffness. They fixed that up nice, but yeah, man, really the whole way to deal with a chronic injury, especially a back injury, is to take care of it, man, work it out. Work it out every, every day. Matter of fact HENRY ROLLINS just came through, did a spoken word thing here in New Orleans, and we e-mailed back and forth. I said I wasn’t coming out ‘cause I was having a bad back day, and it does happen, especially here in the south - down here in the swamp, man, with all the pressure drops and whatnot - you might have a bad back day out of the whole month, but when it hits it hits. So anyway, I wrote him and I told him, you know, 'bad back day. Wish I was comin’ out. We’re gonna drop you off some stuff,' and he wrote me back. He’s like, 'yeah, those back things are tricky. You gotta work it out, work it out, work it out.' Well, for Henry and for everybody else, I do. I work it out, work it out, work it out. And that’s what you gotta do, man. You gotta be diligent and you gotta have a set regime, regiment, and you gotta whoop ass, man. And that, you know, it keeps you on your toes, keeps you nice and stretched out and it keeps you strong as well, so I’m feeling good."




BraveWords.com: Well I can sense by the tone of your voice that life is good these days.

Anselmo: "Yeah, man, I can’t, really have no complaints, you know. Even the tough stuff just really, all you gotta do is deal with it. Everything, you know, every problem has some sort of solution. You know, whether it be in your favour or not you just have to deal with it and just keep rolling, keep plugging along, you know. So that’s where I’m at."

BraveWords.com: And you still have got the Nodferatu's Lair (old converted barn) where you jam and write in?

Anselmo: "Yeah, it’s a little more advanced but still cluttered as hell. We’re in the process of trying to move all the merch and records and CDs and all that crap into a different facility out here, and just have the whole downstairs of the Lair just strictly studio and office space. So that’s good stuff. So yeah, man, it’s advancing constantly all the time, slowly one section at a time, bit by bit, step by step. We have all kinds of people through here. A lot of local musicians that are good friends and they need to get some stuff done. And that’s the freedom of Housecore. You can record with whoever the heck you want. Just lay a record on us, you know. And that’s a rare freedom, you know. So we’re still out here and it’s really unbelievably fuckin’ beautiful