MURDERDOLLS : Beyond the valley of the Murderdolls
| There’s well a before and an after Slipknot on the DesMoines, Iowa, scene : Stone sour and Murderdolls, and have an eye on ‘Down the sun’, being the most flagrant demonstrations. Benefiting from a break between the incessant world tours of the nine masked ones gang, Murderdolls start all over again and propose a invigorating cocktail of glam rock and metal, a ‘total rock attitude’ look and an extra musical inspiration made up for the most part by horror movies from the 30’s to nowadays. Imagine for an instant an happy death metal band, a credible New York Dolls or a Cannibal Corpse who would stop to get on their tits et live again the intense pleasure of a Rocky Horror picture show on a saturday night fever. You can do it with your friends, your girl or boyfriend or with your family (er maybe not...) when you listen to ‘Beyond the valley of the dolls’ and dream about carnage, serial killing, fire, torture, zombies and ghosts, all that in joy and happiness, because, as it’s said in posface of the cult slasher movie‘Last house on the left’ : ‘Remember, it’s only a movie...’ Fast parisian meeting with Wednesday 13, charismatic singer of the Murderdolls |
| -How was born the Murderdolls project? -W13 : It started a long time ago, seven years in fact , before Slipknot and Static X exist : we were the Rejects then, it was Joey’s thing, and then with Slipknot he met Tripp Eisen on tour, who was in Dope in 99, the band of course, and they composed a lot of songs, when they had time ; shortly at the time, I joined, first as a bass player, then Eric arrived, so I moved to the singing, and Drummer completed the band, at the...drums. -Is it a special project for you or a real band ? -W13 : No, it’s absolutely a real and concrete band in itself, not a hobby at all, a very serious thing, but a lot of fun inside. -What is the origin of this name ? -W13 : It’s the perfect mix of our influences, a cross between the New York Dolls and the murder , which is omnipresent in all that kind of movies we like : we thought this mix would fit for a name. -Who produced the LP : -W13 : Joey produced it. -Could you present the album to us ? -W13 : As I said, the idea was to bring fun through our two main sources of inspirations : horror movies and glam metal from the eighties, so the songs are sharp, rather short, with melodies and a lot of rock’n’roll in it. If you take « Dead in Hollywood » or « Slit my wrists », so you’re in a real horror movie. But for me the scarier things of life are in newspapers, so don’t take those stories at the first degree, if not, they’ll eat you, guys ! -What have been you inspiration for this LP, W13: Horror movies, mainly : our songs are not stuck in the real world, it’s a fantasy world, mostly horrific, but not at all talking about our own experiences or wishes or so, like many bands do ; but telling horrible or surreal stories can be part of your own reality ! -Rather old or new ? -W13 : Both : I really love the actual and 80’s movies like Halloween, the Exorcist, Friday the 13th (...mmh !), Freddy’s adventures, but look : (at that moment, Wednesday showed me the superb tatoos on his arms and shoulders : Boris Karloff, Bela Lugosi, the bride of Frankenstein, le Pinhead d’Hellraiser...), I love the old ones too ! Anyway, my all time favorite is Wes Craven’s Last house on the left’. -What were your musical influences : -W13 : We’re not that much influenced by modern bands, Motley Crue and Twisted Sister were the bands I really enjoyed as a kid, those 80 / 90’s heavy metal bands, as well as Alice Cooper and the New York Dolls for all the rest. -In Murderdolls, Joey plays guitar and not drums : why ? -W 13 : First, Joey is not in Slipknot when he’s in Murderdolls, and that’s why he does it, as Tripp Eisen for Static X : why do the same thing twice ? And beside, the spirit of the band is very far from what they do usually. So I guess iy’s a lot of fun for them, changing instruments, and style, and everything. And myself, I was playing bass at the beginning. -Will you do concerts, and, if yes, with a mask or make up or elaborated shows, like Rob Zombie does ? - W 13 : Sure we will do concerts, and I don’t know if you remember the Plasmatics (sure we do, ndlr), but their show was great, with that girl singer half naked and pierced with this incredible look, but that is the kind of show I want, something that people would and will remember, and enjoy, I hope ! -As a movie fan, would you enjoy to make soundtracks, like Spiderman ? -W 13 : Sure, it would be great to do a full score for a movie, not only some songs : so the Murderdolls would be at their kind of ultimate, as our songs are already like short movies in itselves. -I’ve heard that Marilyn Manson is guest on one song of the lp ? -W13 : He was, in fact : we met in L.A and he was very nice, but at the time, he split up with Twiggy, so he was’nt that much in the mood to do it ; we would have waited, so album would have been put forward, maybe november, and as we wanted it to be out in August, we didn’t do it. That will be for another time. I’m a big fan of what he do. -The future for Murderdolls ? -W13 : Doing records, touring ; killing...by music ! ‘Gimme danger’ sung the Stooges : avec the Murderdolls, you’re gonna be served.. Official website : www.murderdolls.com Interview made in Paris by Jean Paul Coillard Photos : dr. Thanks to Karine and Benoit for their precious help.
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