Sack
Trick Interview with Chris Dale
by Reuben Gotto for Blank
Canvas
www.blankcanvas.co.uk
Your new
long-awaited album of Kiss cover's is nearing completion, having
heard a lot about the roundabout way you've recorded previous albums, was it the
same with Sheep In Kiss Make-Up?
Whose
playing’ on this albums? Witch friends have "had a go"?
As well as me and Alex Dickson we also invited…(takes deep breath before some hideous name-dropping)…Dougie White (Rainbow, Yngwie J Malmsteen), Robin Guy (Rachel Stamp, Faith No More), Jem Davis (FM, UFO), Alex Sponder Elena (Bruce Dickinson), Bruce Dickinson (Iron Maiden), Ace (Skunk Anansie), Ben Calvert (Vex Red), CJ (Wildhearts, Jellys), Alex Kane (AntiProduct, Clam Abuse), Chris Sharrock (Robbie Williams, The La’s), James Spreda Bailes (Emma Bunton), Liegh Marklew (Terrorvision), Pete Friesen (Alice Cooper, The Almighty), Greg Smith (Alice Cooper, Rainbow, Blue Oyster Cult), as well as Bobby the Bus Driver, Chris Nubile, Milena Roxx, Mark Cevallos, Joe Inferno, Jinx, Damonski Henrik Johannsen, Mattias Reinholdsson & our next-door-neighbour’s party (which we recorded for them, in case they forgot to). But our big scoop came when we got the head-honcho from Blank Canvas records down to hear some tunes. We were so thrilled when he said he’d like to have a go. His name’s Reuben "Big A&R Man" Gotto, and he’s done some brilliant work on there including inventing a brand new word for the English language. We always try to expand the language by at least one word per album. Reuben’s new word for this album is 'Sacirifice'. It’s kind of like the word sacrifice but with a lot more blood and entrails, which some modern sacrifices tend to skip over. For the next album we’re going to put some instrumental MP3’s on our website then anyone can have a go too!
What
track's are on there and how did you choose from such a massive back catalogue?
Are there any track's which your particularly proud of?
No...Sorry
I meant, yes! I’m always mixing those two up. When you’re doing a Kiss
tribute album the whole thing has to be a labour of love. I’ve come to love
every moment of it, but then I would do, I like anything to do with Kiss. I love
the Spanish waiter who sings 'I’m a Legend tonight', I love the reggae groove
of 'Love Gun', I love the covers of unreleased Kiss songs, I love the FULL METAL
RIFF that we put in 'Almost Human', I love the version of Robin Guy singing
'Beth' and I even love the snoring at the end of 'All Hell’s Breakin’
Loose'. It was really hard to leave tracks off, at one point it was going to be
a double album, there’s just so many great Kiss songs out there. I think the
only bit I don’t love is the bonus track which scares me a bit.
Are
their plan's for a tour to support the release?
Oh yes! The whole point of making records (apart from the fun of getting drunk at home with a microphone) is so that you can then go and get drunk around the country. We’ll be booking a tour as soon as the records out (hopefully Sept/Oct 2002). We going to play a mixture of Kiss tunes our own tunes from the Mystery Rabbits and Penguins on the Moon albums, maybe some new tunes and intersperse them all with some drunken bum notes. We’ll play every toilet in Britain that will have us, then we’ll go and look at some European urinals too.
Presumably
the facepaint might come out for these then..
Why
the change of label for this release to Infernal?
There
are many reasons why bands change record companies. 99% of them are financial.
The reason we chose Infernal for this album is that the guy who runs Infernal is
Dante Bonutto. Dante has a special place in my heart as the guy who used to
write all the Kiss features in Kerrang when I was a kid. I used to read and
re-read his interviews with them before going to bed each night.
While on the subject of Kiss, haven't you been in correspondance with Gene Simmon's recently due to a certain website?
Yeah, I
did a website http://www.dsn.co.uk/osirinprophecy/
proving that Kiss are actually reincarnated Egyptian Gods. Check it out, it’s
quite funny. Gene didn’t really see that side to it, and wrote to me saying I
should 'get a life'. I wrote back and told him I was just trying to help him out
a bit with some profile building. He then took the time to explain humour to me
which was nice and told me to lighten up a bit. Dontcha love Americans? I wonder
if he’s going to like our new record?
Sack Trick have been busy this summer playing around Europe as Bruce Dickinson's backing band, how has that been going?
It’s been
reasonably metal actually! It’s just a good laugh to go and play Heavy Metal
to thousands of people each night. But it’s not going to take over from Sack
Trick, it’s just a free beer ticket for the summer. Me and Bruce have been
mates for a while now (I used to play in his solo band before he went back to
Iron Maiden) so he just called up and asked if Sack Trick fancied being his
backing band over the summer. He really likes Sack Trick for some reason. We had
some time off before going out to tour the new Sack Trick record so we thought-
why not indeed! The band is me, Alex Dickson, Pete Friesen and Robin Guy…and
it rocks hard and heavy!
I
don't suppose you managed to talk Bruce into slipping Penguins On The Moon into
the set?
Not
quite, but then when you’ve got Powerslave in the set it can’t really get
much better can it? But we did manage to talk him into singing a bit on Sheep In
Kiss Make-up, he thinks Kiss are rubbish, so he really had to grit his teeth
doing that one.
What plan's do you have for Sack Trick once the Kiss album is out and has been toured a bit?
Go
home, stay out of trouble… actually we’ve already started recording a new
original Sack Trick album. And started compiling ideas for a sixth one too. We
just can’t wait! We love making records almost as much as we love Heavy Metal
itself. I can’t say too much about these new albums yet. But we’re planning
to record the live album (number six) on a ferry in Finland. It will be called 'Live
on the Baltic'. Nobody’s ever done that before. Then again nobody ever wrote a
rock opera about Penguin Astronauts either. I’m not sure we get enough credit
for these ground breaking ideas. Is it just me or is US Nu-metal a bit boring
now we’ve had a few albums?
We’ve
also just released a card game, called Shape Card Championships, which people
can Email me at chris@sacktrick.com for
a free trial version. It’s quite a tedious game really, but we’re proud of
it.
There’s
always something new and usually embarrassing going on at www.sacktrick.com
or http://clubs.yahoo.com/clubs/penguinsonthemoon
like our new project to get people to pose with signs saying they wish they were
in Sack Trick. So far we’ve got Tom Araya, Yngwie J Malmsteen and Sick of it
All. They all wish they were in Sack Trick.
If
people want to keep abreast of what’s going on in our silly World they can
Email me for the card game and I’ll keep them udated from there on.
Have
any of you been up to anything interesting outside of Sack Trick and Bruce's
band lately? I hear Al Dickson has quite a few ongoing projects' at the moment.
Alex
Dickson is a cheekily busy chap in-between playing
with Sack Trick, Bruce Dickinson, Emma Bunton and Robbie Williams he also
finds time to record with dozens of side projects. Now everybody enjoys a good
side project every now and then- I like playing with AntiProduct, Robin likes
playing with Faith No More- but this boy Alex takes the piss. He’s got four of
them up on www.MP3.com . The bands are called
Streamer, Magnificient (yeah, I know spell check doesn’t like that one but
that how it’s spelt in Those Magnifient Men and their Flying Machines), Fling
UK and Al’s Strange Trip to New York. He really will keep doing more and more
until someone stops him.
Every
now and then a piece of genius drops through the PO Box (PO Box 16432, London W6
0ZQ). The latest one has been an album called Painful Love by Pillow talk.
(what’s their website again, Roo?) They’re great musicians taking the piss
out of all sorts of sick things. They will make you cry with laughter.