Slunt readies for another ‘Cliché
Rock N’ Roll Party’
May 10, 2006
Remember a time when rock
n’ roll was fun? The four members of Slunt certainly
do, as evidenced by their songs about sex, partying and gay
cats. The New York City-based band caught its big break in
fall 2004, when Marilyn Manson chose them to be the opening
act on his U.S. tour. Since then, Slunt has traveled both
the United States and Europe with the likes of Motorhead,
Corrosion of Conformity, Drowning Pool and others. Now, about
a year after the release of their full-length debut, Get
a Load of This, Slunt is gearing up for album number two
by playing a handful of East Coast shows before heading west
to record. Greg Maki of Live-Metal.net caught up with the
band (vocalist/guitarist Abby Gennet, guitarist Pat Harrington,
drummer Charles Ruggiero and new bassist Jhen Kobran) prior
to a recent show at Whiskey Dix in Philadelphia, Pa.
Live-Metal: So you’re breaking in some new songs tonight?
Abby: Hell yeah. We’ve got about 14 new songs so far. We’re just gonna bust out a few more and then we’re going to L.A. in June to record our album. It’s very exciting.
Pat: It’s a test run for the new material.
Abby: Yeah, we’re playing for virgin ears tonight.
Pat: Tonight there are songs that we’ve never played before, as a matter of fact.
Abby: We don’t even know them. There’s “Push” and—
Pat: OK, so that’s three.
Abby: Yeah, “Over It.”
Pat: “Over It,” “Keepin’ It Real” and “Push.”
Abby: Three songs that no one has ever heard.
Pat: You can let us know and let everyone else know how much they suck.
Are you sticking with the same straightforward rock n’ roll type sound?
Abby: Yeah. We’re getting a little darker with this album, actually. This last batch that we put out is definitely a lot heavier. We’re doing some stuff in drop-D now, which is definitely a notch heavier than the last stuff. It’s still fun and dirty and weird, but it’s not – I guess it’s a little heavier.
Pat: It’s a little bit gritty.
Charles: Yeah, it’s a little grittier and it grooves a lot harder. It’s hyper without being like [gestures with his hands], if you can print that.
Abby: How do you spell that?
Charles: Yeah, I don’t know how that would be spelled.
How do you go about writing songs?
Charles: We yell at each other until someone comes up with something.
Abby: For this album, everything’s been happening really organically. We’ll go into a room and I’ll walk in and Pat will starting jamming a riff and Charles will start doing some drums, or Jhen will start jamming a riff on the bass. A couple of the new songs have been built off the bass line, which is really a first for us, too. And then I’ll just start going, “Blah, blah-blah-blah-blah” or something like that.
Charles: Eclectic, you know?
Abby: It really doesn’t make any sense at first. Sometimes we just hit a brick wall, usually on a Monday.
Charles: Mondays are our bad songwriting days.
Is there a target release date yet for the new album?
Pat: It looks like September, which probably means February 2008.
Abby: No, we’re gonna get it out in the fall.
Charles: It’ll be out in September.
Are you still on Repossession Records?
Abby: Yeah.
Are you happy with how they’ve treated you?
Abby: Oh yeah.
Pat: Yeah, we get to do another album. That says a lot right there. They keep giving us money, so we’re gonna keep making records. It’s worked out really well. To be able to do all this stuff that we did in the last year was awesome, and this time around, to be given an even better opportunity. In a business where we see bands that are much more talented or much more veteran than us fallen by the wayside, I know, personally, I’m just happy to still be around.
Charles: Yeah, we’re just kinda flying by the seat of our pants and it just seems to be coming together. We’re really fortunate. We’re really lucky.
So how did you find your new bass player?
Abby: We found her on MySpace.
Charles: Pat actually came across her page and forwarded it to everybody and we were like, “Let’s get her.” Basically, that’s what happened.
Jhen: It’s like going shopping.
Pat: It’s like eBay.
Jhen: I was auctioning myself off to the highest bidder. These guys showed me that shiny nickel and here I am.
Charles: She had one of those “Buy It Now” things and we just snatched her right up.
Jhen: Wow. I’m going back to Vegas tomorrow.
Abby: I think we’re gonna do a homecoming show at the end of May.
Jhen: Yeah and all those people I left behind will get to see why I left and tell me if it was worth it.
Pat: Yeah, on the way out to L.A., we’re gonna do about a week of dates across the country to make our way and pay our way out there, so if this comes out in time, tell all your readers to keep an eye out.
Abby: And Slunt.net, you can see all the dates there.
Jhen: Aren’t they better off going to MySpace? That’s updated more, right?
Abby: Yeah, but the web site is cool because it’s got all the picture galleries.
Jhen: Yeah, but it doesn’t have me.
Charles: You’re up there.
Abby: On the picture pages, but we still haven’t updated the bios.
Charles: We’ve been so busy writing and demoing new stuff for the record company that we haven’t had a chance to really—
Abby: We’re working on it.
Jhen: We’ve got that review on there where they called me Ilse all the way through it.
I saw that.
Abby: When we get to L.A., we’ll put Sophie on it.
Charles: We’ll whip Sophie into submission — Sophie, who we love, at Repossession Records.
Looking at all the pictures on the web site, it looks like you guys really know how to have a good time out on the road.
Abby: Yeah.
Charles: We know how to have a good time anywhere.
Abby: Yeah, we just like going out and meeting people and making new friends and partying with people and taking stupid pictures.
Pat: Rock n’ roll is about having a good time. We try and make that as much a part of it as we can.
Abby: We know people want to go out and have a good time and be entertained and have fun. So we always go out and party with people after the show.
Charles: And we want to have a good time, too. We’re all about it. There’s a reason we’re doing this and not waking up, putting on a tie and going to Hammacher Schlemmer. You know what I mean? There’s a reason for that.
Abby: Hammacher Schlemmer, huh?
Charles: Yeah, I like saying Hammacher Schlemmer.
Pat: I don’t even know what that is.
Charles: It’s a store. Rich people go there.
Jhen: That’s why we don’t know about it.
How many body parts do you think you’ve signed over the last year and a half?
Abby: Butts, arms …
Charles: Stomachs.
Abby: Stomachs, backs …
Charles: I signed a girl’s pubic hair recently.
Abby: With a really tiny pen?
Pat: I tattooed a chick’s cervix with my cock.
Abby: I signed the top of someone’s head once. I signed someone’s forehead.
Pat: We’ve gotten cell phones.
Abby: Cell phones.
Pat: Wallets
Abby: Pagers, wallets.
What do you think it is about this band that makes people want you to do that?
Pat: Usually, it’s the liquor. If it was just me and Charles, nobody would want me to sign anything.
Jhen: Aw, I’m sure that’s not true.
Charles: The women promote that kind of thing. We’re just along for the ride.
What have been some of your stranger fan encounters?
Jhen: Well, I’ve got a friend in Massachusetts who emailed a picture of himself wearing nothing but shoes and a Slunt sticker on his cock. And he’s never even seen the band.
Abby: And it covered everything.
Charles: So it’s not saying much about the guy.
Abby: There might’ve been a little bit of cock hanging out.
Charles: Um … Strangest thing … A girl came to me the other day and said, “I’m not wearing any panties” in my ear. But that’s not that strange, really.
Pat: Abby pierced a dude’s nipple.
Charles: Yeah, that’s good. That was hard for me to watch, actually. I can’t even look at the pictures. I can’t believe you even did that.
Abby: He was, like, 12, too. He was so young.
Jhen: Oh my god.
The first big tour for Slunt was with Marilyn Manson. That had to be an interesting way to start out.
Abby: The first night of that tour was in our hometown at Roseland Ballroom. I know that was the most nervous I’ve ever been playing a show. Not only was it our first show with Manson, but it was in our hometown. And not only that, we had these little kids in the front row that were just Manson freaks—
Pat: Fifteen-year-old girls.
Abby: —that had their middle fingers up the whole time. We just had to play and ignore them. But, of course, I couldn’t ignore them. I had to say something.
Jhen: So what did you say?
Abby: I said – we were singing a song about cock or something – and I said, “Is that alright for the second-graders in the front row?” I know I shouldn’t have said anything. I shouldn’t even have acknowledged them at all. But the Manson crowd, in general, really dug us even though our music is so different. It ended up being a really big tour for us. We sold tons of merch, we made a lot of fans and we still get people on our web site going, “Hey, I saw you in San Antonio with Manson.”
I was at the D.C. show and that was the first time I heard you guys.
Abby: Oh yeah? Cool.
Pat: Which show? D.C.? Oh, OK, 9:30 Club. Hopefully, when we go through to California, we’re gonna be hitting the D.C./Virginia area.
Abby: Yeah, we’re trying to book a show there.
Charles: You saw us with Manson in D.C.?
Yeah.
Charles: Sweet.
Pat: That was a great tour. Although, we did get spoiled because that was our first major tour and it was a high production situation. We went from that, playing to 5,000 people, boatloads of beer and whatever we needed and catered food, and then go out on our own, have 10 bucks a day, playing to 10 people.
Abby: No roadies.
Pat: It was great, but it spoiled us a little bit. We’ve had great opportunities between that and Motorhead, Drowning Pool.
I wanted to ask you about them. You did a lot of shows with Motorhead. How did you hook up with them?
Abby: We had connections, people in our camp knowing their people and it kinda worked out that way.
Charles: One of the producers on our first record, Rob Caggiano, is tight with [Motorhead guitarist] Phil [Campbell] and thought that we would be a good match. So he put in a call.
Abby: We sent him some Slunt panties.
Charles: Yeah, we sent him the panties. And we got the gig.
Abby: Phil is still wearing them to this day.
Charles: Right now, I could call him up and he’s wearing them.
Pat: So, yeah, we scored, like, eight shows with them here in the States and then the big thing was we were offered to go to Germany.
Jhen: Then you were inspired to write a song about it.
Abby: Yeah, they definitely influenced us on this album. There’s a Motorhead-inspired song.
When you’re on tour and stuck together in a van for hours, are there times when you just drive each other crazy?
Charles: Pat and I drive Abby crazy. I know that. We say a lot of dumb shit nonstop. Jhen has yet to experience 12 hours on a plane with us.
Abby: I’m kinda numb to it now. It’s kinda just like I don’t even listen. It’s like the parents in Peanuts, like, “Wah, wah, wah wah.”
Pat: Now it’s just all white noise to her. We have very little drama, though.
Charles: We get along pretty well as a band, actually.
Abby: We’re all pretty rational people when we’re on tour, to a certain level.
Pat: And then we get loaded and Abby starts throwing keys and I start punching shit.
Jhen: Breaking your hand.
Pat: And I break my hand and then Charles—
Charles: I just disappear and go and do crazy things on my own.
Jhen: They call it “he did a Charles.”
Pat: Yeah, “pulling a Charlie.”
Abby: “Where’d he go? He pulled a Charles and he’s gone for the day.”
When you started touring, did you find out that anyone in the band has any strange quirks that you didn’t know about before?
Abby: Is gas a quirk?
Charles: Is lap dancing really dancing?
Pat: Alright, here’s one: don’t talk to Abby until she’s had her coffee in the morning.
Abby: They all bought me chocolate coffee beans for emergencies, like “break glass in case of emergency.”
Charles: “Do you ever shut up?” That was my favorite one, on the plane.
Abby: We took a red-eye and I wake up and all of sudden, it’s just, “Pow, pow, pow.”
Charles: I can’t sleep on the plane. So I’m up and I’m wired and over-tired.
Abby: He was talking and still, like, playing drums with his feet, like kicking the bass drum pedals. And I was like, “Charles, do you ever shut up?”
Charles: “Do you ever shut up? Ever?” Listen, I was nice. The last time we went, I actually got up. Everybody fell asleep and I just got up and I walked and sat under the spiral staircase by myself because I knew. See I’m not a great flyer in the first place, so whenever I’m nervous I fidget more and turbulence freaks me out. I guess that’s something you guys didn’t know, that I’m a little paranoid about flying.
Pat: Yeah, I was real thankful to figure that one out.
Jhen: OK, note to self: don’t sit next to Charles.
What are some of the bands that you would like to tour with?
Charles: Queens of the Stone Age, Eagles of Death Metal. Zeppelin.
Jhen: Yeah, right.
Charles: Velvet Revolver. Abby really wants to tour with The Who.
Abby: No. That’s a lie.
Jhen: Now what if Pete Townsend reads this?
Abby: I don’t care.
Charles: Then he’ll know that you hate The Who. But I love The Who and I want to marry your daughter, Pete.
Abby: Zakk Wylde, we’d love to do, Black Label Society.
Charles: We’d like to go back out with Manson or Motorhead because that was a whole lot of fun.
Jhen: Nashville Pussy.
Charles: Nashville Pussy would be a lot of fun.
Abby: We toured also with Zeke and C.O.C. It would be fun to go back out with those guys.
Charles: Drowning Pool. We might get lucky there again.
Jhen: Foo Fighters would be cool.
Abby: I’d like to tour with Heath Ledger.
Jhen: And what exactly does that entail?
Charles: If Charlize Theron, Heath Ledger and Orlando Bloom had a band, we’d want to tour with them.
Jhen: We want to tour with Dogstar so I can give Keanu Reeves some bass lessons.
What are some of your favorite places to play?
Pat: Whiskey Dix Saloon, Philadelphia, PA.
Abby: We love the Continental in New York City. That’s our home away from home. That’s like homebase. We love playing there. We feel comfortable and the owner always treats us so nice.
Pat: And they’re closing their doors to the bands.
Abby: Yeah, they’re turning it into a regular bar, but we’ll still go and hang out.
Pat: We’ve done really well in the South. Texas is fun. It’s weird because you find the best places in the strangest joints, like Birmingham, Alabama.
Abby: Kearny, Nebraska.
Pat: Kearny, Nebraska. Jack Rabbits in Jacksonville. We have fun every time we play there.
Abby: We have fun no matter where we go.
Pat: True.
Abby: But England. We love the crowds in England. We toured over there a bit and it was really great. The kids were singing the words to our songs and we were like, “How do you know our stuff?”
Pat: Scotland is a motherfucker, too. That’s a great place.
Abby: Germany.
Charles: We like everywhere.
Jhen: I really like Boston.
Abby: The Manson show we did in Boston, that was like our biggest merch night, right next to Kearny.
Charles: Yeah, that was Boston.
Pat: Santa Barbara was pretty fuckin’ weak, though.
Abby: Yeah. In Santa Barbara, we played a place where everyone had seats. It was like an old movie theater.
Pat: Where was the place that we played with Zeke on an off day, with C.O.C. and Zeke, and remember they had the—
Abby: The cage?
Pat: Yeah, the cage.
Abby: The Brick House in Phoenix.
Pat: It was all ages, so you couldn’t have beer here and you couldn’t have it there.
Charles: And the 18 and under or whatever it was, was the first part of the stage, or, no, was it the other way around?
Pat: You couldn’t drink on the stage.
Abby: You couldn’t have beer on stage.
Pat: Utah is fucked up like that, too!
Charles: But we did have a lot of fun in Utah. Mormon girls fuck.
Jhen: That’s the title of the album: Mormon Girls Fuck.
Charles: Mormon girls fuck.
OK. What would you consider the highlight of the band so far?
Pat: Motorhead in Germany.
Abby: Yeah.
I have a few questions now that maybe we can go around and have everyone answer. What was the first album you ever bought?
Abby: ABBA.
Charles: KISS Dressed to Kill.
Abby: ABBA. Was it Voulez-Vous?
Charles: Was that the one with the light saber on the front?
Pat: I split the difference because the first Christmas when I really got music, I got an ABBA album and KISS Alive.
Charles: Really?
Pat: Yeah.
Charles: That’s interesting.
Abby: What about you, Jhen?
Jhen: It’s got to be either David Bowie Ziggy Stardust or Patti Smith Radio Ethiopia. Everything up until then was all 45s.
Pat: I remember being really young and my babysitter put me to sleep by putting on “Stairway to Heaven.”
What about the last album you bought?
Pat: Eagles of Death Metal.
Charles: Eagles of Death Metal was the last record I bought, Death by Sexy.
Abby: The last album I bought? Cinderella’s Greatest Hits? I don’t know.
What was the first concert you ever went to?
Abby: The Bee Gees.
Charles: The Firm, Jimmy Page.
Pat: Anthrax and the Cro-Mags.
Charles: Oh, nice.
Jhen: David Bowie Glass Spider Tour with Peter Frampton on guitar.
Abby: My first concert without my parents—
Charles: That’s what I’m talking about, the first concert you ever opted to go to.
Abby: Without parents? Def Leppard with my brother for my birthday. Joe Elliott looked right at me.
Charles: I bet he’s still thinking about it today.
Abby: Yeah, that 13-year-old girl … I was up on my brother’s shoulders. He totally looked at me.
Do you have a favorite band of all time?
Abby: Led Zeppelin.
Charles: I don’t have a favorite band of all time. I’ve got a new favorite band every 10 minutes.
Pat: I’d say it’s Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath.
Do you have any guilty pleasures?
Jhen: She-male porn?
Pat: Make sure that Jhen said that. Pat did not.
Charles: The she-male porn thing was Jhen, J-H-E-N, Kobran.
Pat: We gave away our she-male porn. If we knew better, if we knew then what we know now, we would’ve saved it and given to Jhen.
Abby: I read those dumb magazines.
Pat: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Us Weekly.
Charles: That’s a band thing, too.
Abby: We don’t really care about those people, but we have to know what’s going on.
Pat: We have very long, loud conversations about the whole Angelina/Brad Pitt thing. I think the only time anybody ever yelled in the band was about that conversation.
Abby: It was Jen versus Angelina.
Charles: And I’m the only—
Pat: We don’t need to publicly take sides!
Well, I think that’s all I’ve got.
Charles: We’re just starting to get loose.
Jhen: Ask us the same questions after the show and let’s see what answers we come up with then. |
