A hell of an interview, round two: Greg Tribbett of HellYeah

	Greg Tribbett

February 23, 2011

It’s hard to think of a band better suited to the Jägermeister Music Tour than HellYeah, a band that seemed to become instantly known for partying and drinking. So it comes as no surprise to learn that Jäger flows freely on the HellYeah tour bus, which is often a dangerous place for unprepared members of other bands. “They don’t like to hang around HellYeah too much,” says guitarist Greg Tribbett. Of course, this wouldn’t matter if the band couldn’t bring it musically, as well. Two albums in (their sophomore release, Stampede, was released in July 2010), HellYeah is running strong, and though months of touring remain on the current cycle, one member at least is talking already about making record number three darker and heavier. Before the Jäger tour’s recent stop at Rams Head Live in Baltimore, just a few months after their first encounter at the Uproar Festival, LiveMetalNet’s Greg Maki hopped aboard the HellYeah bus to get the latest from Tribbett.

LiveMetalNet: Baltimore is kind of a big place for HellYeah. Your first-ever show was here.

Greg Tribbett: It was our first-ever show, on our first record. Plus, (guitarist) Tom (Mazwell)’s from here, so he actually went home today—fucker! [laughter] But yeah. It’s definitely cool. We’re definitely looking forward to the show tonight. It’s sold out, so I’m sure the crowd’s gonna go fuckin’ nuts. It’s gonna be a good time.

It’s kind of a diverse bill. The Damned Things are just kind of starting out, but the other three are established and have their own crowds. Have you been seeing a different crowd than usual?

Yeah. I think HellYeah’s definitely playing in front of a Buckcherry crowd. There’s definitely a Buckcherry crowd. There’s an All That Remains crowd out there. Overall, all the shows are great, and I think we’re turning some heads out there with HellYeah ‘cause people haven’t seen us before. (Vocalist) Chad (Gray) says it every night: “Who hasn’t been here to see HellYeah?” A lot of hands are raising. A lot did last night in Myrtle Beach. We were surprised. We were like, “Wow. Alright, cool.” Half the crowd is a Buckcherry crowd. I was like, “Awesome.” It’s definitely cool.

You ran into some problems with the weather on this tour. How did that go?

Well, we got snowed in, in Peoria for three days ‘cause they had two feet of snow just blow in over night. So we had to cancel Chicago and another Iowa show. I don’t know if they’re gonna make those up or not. It sucks for them guys.

What do you do when you’re stuck in Peoria for three days?

I spent a lot of time on the bus playing PS3.

What games?

Madden. [laughter]

That’s the only game I own.

Yeah, still trying to master that game.

Do you have a team you use all the time?

Bears, of course. I’m a Bears fans. I play our merch guy, Cotton, all the time. He’s a Steelers fan. We’ve got this rivalry going.

That must have been interesting last weekend then. [The Steelers lost to the Packers in Super Bowl XLV on Feb. 6, 2011.]

Oh yeah. Absolutely. I felt sorry for him. [laughs]

I don’t. I’m born and raised in Maryland, so I’m a Ravens fan. My dad is from Pittsburgh.

Oh really? Wow. Yeah, I was hoping the Ravens would’ve pulled it out this year, but they didn’t. I was pulling for Tom. Tom’s like, “Gotta finish, man.” [laughs]

This is the Jägermeister tour, so is there a lot of Jäger flowing on the buses and backstage?

Yeah, there’s a lot of Jäger flowing. There’s usually a constant stock of at least four or five bottles in the freezer on this bus. Bubbers, my guitar tech, and our sound guy, Getty, go through a lot of Jäger nightly.

You guys are known for throwing parties, and I heard about all the beer that was brought in when you recorded the first album. What about the other bands on this tour? Can they hang with you in that department?

I don’t think they can hang. [laughter] The bass player for All That Remains was on (drummer) Vinnie (Paul)’s bus. She lasted about three hours, and then she was passed out on the bunk puking—gone. There’s only a few people that can hang. We had a party on the bus the other night, and everybody was pretty hammered, drunk. The next day, a lot of people were hurting. They don’t like to hang around HellYeah too much. [laughter]

You must’ve had some legendary parties on the Uproar tour last year.

Yeah, that was pretty much every night. We were barbecuing every day. It was crazy. Needed a liver replacement after that summer tour. [laughter]

You’ve got a little bit of time off after this tour. What will you be doing during that time?

Actually, me and Chad are gonna be producing a band out of Phoenix called Man Made Machine, and probably gonna be doing that for four to six weeks. And golf. I’m gonna do some golfing. I live in Arizona, so perfect weather for golfing. Then after that, we’re going to Asia, so definitely looking forward to that. Never been to Manila. Never been to Bangkok. I’ve been to Japan a bunch of times. It’s gonna be great to get out there and play with Anthrax, too.

You’ve been pushing overseas a whole lot more on this album than the first one.

Absolutely, yeah.

What’s the reaction been like over there? Do they know you?

Yeah. It’s been great. We’ve been overseas three times now. We plan on going back to Europe again, in probably June, July or whatever. It’s been great. We’ve been wanting to break this band worldwide, so that’s why we’re doing so much.

You obviously had some time apart—you went back to Mudvayne and everyone was doing their own thing. When you got back together, did it take any time to get back into that HellYeah mindset?

Not really. Not for me. To me, the bands are way different, way too different, separate things. It’s just a matter of turning your cap around, putting a different hat on and just stepping in and getting into that vibe of what HellYeah sounds like. You just start from riff one.

The first album was really off the cuff. You were just kind of jamming and writing songs right there because you guys were kind of getting to know each other as band. So now, you come back for the second album, and you’ve already got one under your belts obviously. People heard it and it was successful. Were you able to get back into that same sort of vibe?

I think it was just that we knew each other more. We’d done a lot of touring, did the first record together. So we went in and just started. It was a lot of the same as the first record. We’d just come in and start ripping out riffs and go from there and end up with a song by the day’s end.

You did the first album at Dime’s house and the second album at Vinnie’s house. Do you always see this band heading back down to Texas to record?

I don’t know. We might explore a little bit on the next record. I don’t know yet. We haven’t all talked about it yet. But we might do something different to get a different sound for the record, just to do something so we’re not doing the same record over and over.

Do you think the setting down there played a big role in the sound of the first two albums?

Yeah, I think so. Well, definitely with the first two album because we used (producer) Sterling (Winfield) on both of ‘em, and Vinnie pretty much engineered and recorded the first two records. So it’s definitely similar—although I think the newest record sounds better than the first record just because I think we had more time to really focus in on what we wanted. The first record was a party basically, so it was like, “Fuck it. Throw it down there. Who gives a shit?” Yeah, the third record, we’re looking to expand at least musically, so we’ll see what happens.

On the new album, the song that really jumps out at me as being apart from the others as far as how it sounds, is the last song, “Order the Sun.” How did that come about, that sort of sludgy riff?

That was a riff I wrote one day. I was just hanging around. I think maybe me and Vinnie were sitting there watching TV or something, and I started messing around with that riff. Vinnie heard it and he was like, “Hey, man, let’s go try that.” It just came together like that [snaps his fingers]. Tom came in and started playing, and we put it all together. Chad loves that song, too. It’s one of the heaviest songs on the record.

Yeah, of the first two albums, it has maybe the darkest sound you guys have done, which is kind of interesting on this album, which, to me, has more of a rock type of feel than metal.

Yeah, I think that was something we just had to get out, out of our system real quick. We’re looking to make the next record probably even heavier. We’ll see what happens.

At this point, you’re just sort of talking about basic ideas like that? You aren’t really getting into any more than that.

No, I haven’t gone into it yet. We’ve still got a lot more touring to do.

Chad Gray and Greg Tribbett

Yeah. How much longer?

[Sighs] Till November, dude, probably, on this cycle. Like I said, we’re gonna have like two months off, which is the longest I’ve had off in almost 10 years. But I don’t really have off ‘cause I’ll be working. Not touring, I mean.

When will see you back in the United States on tour?

It’ll be in May. Sometime in May, probably late May. I think we’ll end up doing some radio shows and maybe some one-off packages with some other bands.

Is there a headlining tour in the works?

We’re still working on it, man. It depends on the demand.

It’s tough these days for any band.

It’s really tough for anything to happen these days with ticket sales. The economy, man, it’s just killing everybody. Nobody has the money to come and see shows, so you really gotta watch your ticket prices when you put a package together. If it was up to me, fuck, you know, come on, who cares? Five bucks a show, I don’t give a fuck. But it’s not up to me. It’s up to all the other bands that we take out, promoters. Everybody’s suffering on that end.

Anything else you’d like to add?

Uhhh … I don’t know, man. I’ve been out on tour for a year. [laughter] As I always say, go buy the record. Come see the band.

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