Category Archives: Rants/Blogs

1) “Headlining” when you’re not a “headliner” generally means you end up playing to the smallest amount of people, especially on a weeknight gig. Remember that before you try and push your dumb ego and play last.

2) Tip the bartender, especially when you’re getting free booze. If anything it makes them get to you faster at a crowded bar. Mostly it’s just polite and shows you’re appreciative.

3) Burn CD samplers of mp3s to give to people who haven’t heard you before is cheap and easy promotion. It’s mp3s, so packaging isn’t as much of an issue and it’s a nice surprise for a potential new fan and shows you’re not all about their money…even if you are, you greedy bastard.

4) A guest list shouldn’t be for people who are cheap and just looking to be “in” with you. It’s for either special guests (MOM! BIGTIME LABEL EXEC! ANGELINA JOLIE’S VAGINA!), a pitylisting (unemployed pals need a nice night out, too), or fellow artist (especially one who has guest listed you). Every guest listed costs the promoter money. That could affect YOUR money.

5) Play on multi-genre bills if possible. Play with punk and metal and folk bands with a similar vibe. Why? There’s a limited pool of fans for “what we do”. Multi-gerne shows open people’s eyes to just how cool your music is so you’re not just “some EBM band…and what the hell is ‘EBM’ anyway?” Be an ambassador, but make sure not to suck and ruin it for the rest of us;)

6) Don’t shit-talk any of the other bands from the stage unless they’re a) Friends, and b) In on the joke. Trashing other artists, especially openers who maybe aren’t as good live yet just makes you look petty and mostly like a dick. Giving them props is immesurably better, especially if not as many people saw their set(s).

7) Take a few minutes before you get on stage to relax and focus. You want to start the show with energy so even just jumping around and doing a few simple vocal exercises helps you hit the ground running.

Sunglasses. Don’t wear them on stage unless you’re a huge star (note: you’re not if you’re reading this). They either make you look like you’re hiding something or scared to look in people’s eyes. You’re missing a connection with the crowd if they can’t see your eyes. You don’t look mysterious or cool. Believe me on that.

9) If you’re not using every piece of gear, don’t bring it on stage. Sure, you think it makes you look more impressive, but all it’s doing is slowing down your breakdown for the next band and makes anyone who knows what that gear does say “Why the hell did they even bother bringing that?”

10) On that note: Zip ties and duct tape are your friends– especially if there are a lot of bands playing on the same bill. Fastening your equipment so you can unplug and get off the stage in a few minutes makes you look professional, fast, and worth booking again. (I learned this from TERRORFAKT, btw.)

AND a very important BONUS TIP:

11) Do the same fucking show for 5 people that you’d do for 500. It’s not the audience’s fault there aren’t more people there, and if it’s a good show they’ll ideally tell 50 pals each and you’ll sell the place out the next time you play. Be grateful for what you get– they could be home watching Dirty Jobs reruns or playing Call of Duty.

Here’s a note to every person who bitches about “not getting any good shows” in their area: What the hell have YOU done to make them happen?

We live in a time where everyone can be lazy as fuck. You don’t need to pay for music or television or movies or ANYTHING if you don’t want to. On top of it you can anonymously whine online about all the shit YOU DIDN’T EVEN PAY FOR and be an asshole just because you hate your life or think it’s funny being a dick when you’re drunk.

Guess what? You’re the fucking problem.

I’ve done pretty much every position in this little genre, from promoting to making music to running a label and marketing CDs. I’m not “big business,” but I probably know more than you. Mostly I’ve done it because it’s fun. If I make a couple bucks here and there and know I’ve entertained a few people that’s cool enough. I don’t expect the world.

At the same time I stopped doing a lot of it because of the pure apathy I encountered. Some of it was because, at least locally, a lot of people here got married, had kids, or moved away. There wasn’t much point in promoting shows when nobody really came out anymore and I lost a good chunk of money every time. The only shows I generally book now are either good friends (and then not always either, depending on what they’re looking for moneywise), or…Assemblage 23. Oh, and Stromkern. I can always do well with A23 or Stromkern locally.

And that’s really fucking sad.

Do I go out to every show that comes through? No, I don’t, but I at LEAST help get the word out on it. What really, really, REALLY pisses me off in this scene is that we have a million ways to spread word of mouth FOR FREE and You Fuckers barely make a peep to let others know when shit is coming to town. I’ve heard countless times after shows “DUDE! YOU WERE IN TOWN?! I DIDN’T HEAR!!!” when I KNOW the promoter got the word out.

Is it REALLY so fucking hard to “share” upcoming events on Facebook or retweet something? Even if you’re not going, is it REALLY so fucking hard? Is your reputation so important that if someone actually goes and spends the $5 cover most promoters charge and don’t like the band it’ll damage your friendships forever?

I see people talk about every fucking MOVIE they’re going to see or the hot youtube video or a million OTHER fucking distractions out there, but these same people won’t talk up when “UP AND COMING EBM BAND X” is coming to town unless they’ve got that band’s logo tattoed on their vagina. Guess what? WE NEED SUPPORT. Guess what? MOST OF YOU DON’T EVEN PAY FOR THE MUSIC.

Seriously, what the fuck do we have to do? Our mouths aren’t big enough to blow every one of you (or girl-blow you. I don’t want to be sexist.) and we can only sweet talk to the point where we simply give up. I’m not saying go see a band whose music you don’t like, but you have no problem blowing money on even stupider shit in your daily lives and if you check the band out on Myspace (What? Google’s too hard to use for 5 seconds?) and it sounds interesting then STOP PLAYING WoW FOR A FEW HOURS AND GO TO THE SHOW.

Most fans (and I still consider you fans– I can’t judge that) are spoiled rotten these days. I’m obviously not trying to ingratiate myself to anyone here, but frankly what can anyone do to me? STEAL MY MUSIC?!?! Steal it LESS?!?

It takes 5 seconds to get the word out on a show and a few bucks to check the show out. Even if you hate the promoter don’t blame the bands for that. If it’s any consolation the promoter will probably STILL lose their ass, and that’ll be the subject of my next rant.

Yeah. I’m gunning for ALL you assholes right now…

Most people who promote in any genre of music where the main venue for the acts sells $2 bottles of High Life has very little clue on how to promote shows or clubnights. Here’s a note to all promoters: Putting an event on your Facebook page and inviting your 50 friends, half of which aren’t even WHERE YOU LIVE, and expecting a sell-out show is NOT promoting. Putting fliers out ONLY at the club the event will be at IS NOT PROMOTING. Complaining on your blog that nobody showed up IS NOT PROMOTING.

PROMOTING is promoting.

Okay, I’ve promoted probably 75-100 shows since 2001. I’ve been running a festival since 2002. I know How To Promote, and I know how to do it with zero budget.

It takes WORK. Just because you DJ or know a few people does not ensure that anyone will come to your gig. If people don’t come it doesn’t mean they don’t love you or aren’t your friends. You need to GIVE THEM A REASON. Whether that be a cheaper door price for coming earlier, a giveaway or some special twist, or making the show earlier if it’s on a weeknight and people have to get up at the asscrack of dawn to go to their shitty jobs.

Give them a reason.

And give it to them 1000 times.

I hate to say it, but being a promoter is all about reminding people over and over again but knowing that breaking point when you’re simply COMPLETELY ANNOYING. It sucks. It’s frustrating. It’s no fun.

But yup, it’s promoting.

And if nobody shows, when it comes down to it, it’s YOUR FUCKING FAULT.

If the bands you book suck, it’s YOUR FAULT for booking shit. If the DJs play terrible music and people leave it’s YOUR FAULT for letting them spin at all. If your sound person sucks or is always late it’s YOUR FAULT for hiring them. If nobody comes out it’s YOUR FAULT for not giving them a fucking reason to show.

It sucks and it’s ALWAYS an uphill battle, but you decided to promote. If you decide to become a doctor and every person dies on the operating table that’s YOUR FAULT too.

Do your fucking job. And if you can’t do it alone get other people to help you. There’s safety in numbers and getting the word out is a lot easier if there’s a few of you on the job.

And STOP FUCKING WHINING about stuff and trying to guilt trip people into coming to gigs. Promoting is basically a crapshoot and I have nothing but respect for people who do it as, like I’ve said, I’ve done it plenty. I’ve lost literally THOUSANDS of dollars over the years promoting shows. Know the costs. Know what you can lose. Know who you can count on. Or stop promoting shows.

A bad promoter can kill all chances of ANYONE going to shows in your city. Hell, for YEARS bands in our scene wouldn’t play CHICAGO (remember that town? Home of WAX TRAX!?) because there was only one good promoter there and if she passed you were FUCKED because nobody else could pull off a gig. CHICAGO!!!!

Nobody goes into promoting for the glory. Small promoters aren’t generally the ones getting laid after a show for a job well done, but they are the ones that bands will remember, ESPECIALLY when they’re working their way up the food chain, and will appreciate later. I know personally I will only work with certain people if I play some cities because they took a chance on me when I first started out. Maybe I didn’t make a lot of money but there’s an unspoken loyalty that I know I have with some people.

Do it right or don’t do it at all. And learn how to do it better.

It’s your fucking job.

I saved the artists for last for a reason: It’s mostly YOUR fault.

YOU make the music. YOU inspire people to dance. Or feel. Or hate (edit- because hate isn’t an…emotion?).

And, frankly, most of us are TOTALLY FUCKING IT UP.

Just like the fans, we have gotten complacent. For a very small investment most of us can get a decent studio going…hell, the investment could just be a computer with a decent processor since all the software can be STOLEN.

And the software is easy enough to use. “Hey, I can make that bassline I heard in that Aesthetic Perfection song!” “Whoa, THAT’s how Cyanotic did that!” “Man, this sounds JUST like X, Y, Z, ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ”.

You have so much potential in your hands, and all you give a shit about is sounding like your favorite bands.

And then you bitch that nobody listens to you.

Here’s a helpful fucking hint to those of you out there making music: IF EVERYONE SAYS YOU SOUND LIKE A CERTAIN BAND THEN *CHANGE YOUR FUCKING SOUND* We already HAVE a Combichrist. We already HAVE a VNV Nation. Nobody WANTS me, but we HAVE a fucking CAUSTIC.

How are you DIFFERENT?!!? For a scene that pretends like they’re all “outsiders” and “rebels” (or at least that’s what the clothing lines you buy like to TELL you) we’re about as uniform as anyone ELSE in their uniforms.

But there’s one thing I’ve always loved about a vast, VAST majority of this scene: We’re actually creative as FUCK.

So why the hell AREN’T THE ARTISTS?

If you make music, STEP IT THE FUCK UP. Ask people their HONEST opinions on what you’re doing. PUSH YOURSELF. Don’t rest on your laurels because it sounds “Good Enough”. Make it YOURS, you braindead cunts. Why the hell are you creating music to BEGIN WITH? I love artists that I hear the song or the person’s voice and IMMEDIATELY identify that it’s them. I don’t WANT to hear another distorted voice sounding kinda sorta like Marshall from Psyclon Nine or kinda sorta sounding like Ronan or kinda sorta sounding like ANYONE.

If not in the music than in the CONTENT. Make your words MEAN SOMETHING. It’s really hard to write good lyrics in a genre that prides itself on production over substance, but WORK ON IT. CONNECT with people on WHATEVER level.

Sorry chief, but NOBODY LIKES YOUR MUSIC BECAUSE YOU PROBABLY AREN’T WORTH REALLY LISTENING TO YET.

PROMOTE YOURSELF. If you just do music for you and don’t mind it when people stumble on your stuff more power to you. Most of us aren’t that way, but if you want it DO THE WORK and SHUT THE FUCK UP. If you’re on a label and want them to do all the footwork YOU WILL FAIL. If you hire a “manager” (aka your soon-to-be “former girlfriend”) and think they’ll open all the doors for you YOU WILL FAIL. If you have accounts on every social networking site but don’t constantly pimp them YOU WILL FAIL.

The odds are AGAINST you, even if you’re making AMAZING music. Why? PEOPLE DON’T KNOW WHO THE FUCK YOU ARE.

It’s YOUR FAULT.

Nobody is handed anything, especially when there’s a glut of music out there. Having a unique (yet accessible) perspective is the ONLY way anyone will care about you. OR, maybe sadly, having a LOT of money and time to invest in pimping yourself.

Think of it this way: A major label spends at LEAST $500,000 on new artists they’re just trying to BREAK into the mainstream. You have no budget except free time and determination. USE it. Or SHUT UP.

And you’ll ONLY get big if you pimp hard AND long enough AND you STILL have to get lucky! I can count on fingers and toes people I owe my firstborn to because I was lucky enough that they liked what I was doing early on and took chances on me. I couldn’t force that luck to happen, but the more that you’re OUT THERE the better your odds are.

So until then KEEP PRACTICING. Create a good LIVE SHOW. Do things NOBODY ELSE IS DOING. KICK ASS.

And stop the fucking whining.

A note to all “industrial” elitists out there sucking the dicks of past artists: Stop.

By whining & bitching and/or hemmin’ & hawin’ about how today’s industrial isn’t REAL industrial you’ve missed the point of industrial in a major way. Industrial was MEANT to evolve. Industrial was MEANT to embrace new technology and expand in focus and incorporate new elements. It was MEANT to be limitless. In the late 70s all they HAD was analogue equipment and oscillators and tubes and hammers and metal. There wasn’t Logic or ProTools or sound libraries and everything HAD to be analogue and computers were still fairly hard to come by– data was stored on freakin’ CASSETTE tapes at that point.

Seriously, it’s like bitching that Harry Potter isn’t written like the fucking BIBLE. Shit CHANGES.

They embraced the technology they HAD and pushed it to the limits. And they had to scrimp and save (or grab scrap metal and disassemble refrigerators) to get the tools to make the sounds they envisioned. That was the ONLY WAY THEY COULD DO IT. And it doesn’t necessarily sound “better” than anything today– it sounds like it sounds. It sounds like what they had to make it sound like 30 years ago.

These artists were pioneers and deserve and incredible amount of respect for that. But I mainly respect them for one big reason: They wanted to do their own thing. They WANTED to be unique. They WANTED to stand out and be progressive on what is or isn’t music or, more simply, accepted AS music.

In other words, if “industrial” as an artform was still sounding like Throbbing Gristle then Genesis P-Orridge would probably be clawing his tranny eyes out right now. The reason they did WHAT they did was because they explored sound and pitted their creativity against uncommon noisemakers and new technology. We don’t need another Throbbing fucking Gristle. What we NEED is more innovation, even if it’s just baby steps, and there’s plenty of it out there IMHO. You just need to know where to look.

We now have virtually limitless potential using software and hardware to make whatever we want. And sure, that means most of what’s popular isn’t mentally challenging and may be boring as shit creatively (industrial music in the clubs is our “mainstream” when it comes down to it; our “top 40 radio”), but separating the wheat from the chaff is how any area works once the means are in place to do things cheaply and without much skill or experience. But remember that Kraftwerk makes dance music too– there’s nothing inherently wrong with dance music, only the originality of the artists behind it.

But the stupid thing here is currently there are actually a TON of artists out there making what elitists refer to as “real industrial music”– that is, if the elitists can expand their myopic visions of the genre and possibly accept that anything not actually ON Industrial Records could even fathom having the honor bestowed upon it to be called “industrial”.

And really? Do you think those pioneering bands took themselves THAT fucking seriously?

But these current “real industrial” artists aren’t the ones being played in clubs most of the time. Hell, they rarely tour. Why? Not many people like “real industrial music”, or moreso “real industrial music that’s not late 70s-early 80s pioneers”. Why? Maybe they just can’t be bothered to look and/or don’t care because it’s easier to dismiss current innovation than admit you’re lazy and ignorant of it.

I realize that the main point of most elitists who nibble at the teats of our scene’s sacred cows is that there’s too much uniformity and monotony in the current popular scene, and while that too could be debated by those of us who work harder to seek out artists who are more original, there’s obviously something to agree with there.

But there’s also something to be said for industrial as evolution, or better yet mutation. You may not like where the mutation has taken the genre (“OH NOES, THEY’RE INCORPORATING TRANCE!!” “NOT DRUM N BASS!!!!”), but the roots of many artists are still firmly planted in the original punk (and yes, TG is/was a punk band, as was Suicide and most of the others) aesthetic of Our Creators. Not all by any means– many are planted in the much more profitable world of pop, but not all of them by a longshot.

But mutation takes time, and can’t necessarily be forced. Sometimes it takes years for someone to innovate, so we hear the same thing over and over again until something fresh is discovered (and generally then overdone to death). But the fish didn’t crawl out of the primordial ooze overnight, y’know?

And some may ask “Would Our Creators love where we’ve taken things?” Personally, I don’t give a fuck. I don’t make the music I make for them. Their opinions on what I or any other artists do is irrelevant. And I think they’d be cool with that, because I think most of them had the same fucking opinion when they made their music in the first place. If they worried about someone else’s opinions so much they never would have made the music they did. They were, when it comes down to it, just enjoying the creation of their own music.

So if you’re whining about “WHERE IZ ALL THE REEL INDUSTRAIL?!?!” my answer is simply this: Open your fucking eyes. It’s everywhere. And if you aren’t hearing what you want to hear look harder. Or dust off your old vinyl and STFU. Some of us are having fun creating, and even more are enjoying WHAT we create.

You hear over and over and over again that “CDs are dead,” and in some ways that’s correct– every indication points to the fact that more and more people are using digital services for their music needs. The highest selling physical CD of the last few years was Susan Boyle. Why? Her average fan age is like 730 years old.

It’s not hip to make CDs.

Does that mean don’t make them? Hell no. I’ll still keep making physical CDs as long as the sales of them warrants the cost. It’s not smart business, especially when you or a small label is fronting the money, to make something that won’t sell. There’s “taking a chance” and “you’re a fucking idiot,” and honestly for MOST artists, especially newer ones, unless you’re playing 30-50 shows a year and touring there’s really not much of a chance you’ll be recouping on a run of even 500 CDs, and that’s usually the bare minimum that most replication plants (meaning non-CDR) will make.

So what to do? Give up entirely? Throw in the towel?

Hell no. Don’t be stupid. I’ve said it before, but just use sites like bandcamp.com and the zillion other music sites (it’s good to be on the major ones, regardless if you visit them often, and that includes the abortion known as MySpace. “Specialized” sites like vampirefreaks.com are a great resource for what a lot of us do, too.) to get the word out on your music. Get download cards professionally made so people can access your music on the internet after buying the card at a show. Give it away or sell it at breakeven prices. To do this means you’ll initially want to cut corners on things like mastering (which, to sell “professional product,” is a good thing) by finding someone who can do it cheap, and art (have a friend do it if you can’t yourself). If you think you’ve built enough following to get replicated or even CDRs make, do it, and good luck to ya. You may have a bunch sitting in your closet for some time, but you’re in good company.

Just don’t let your ego write a check your fanbase doesn’t warrant. Or at least their desire for hard copies of your tunes.

Get a website and make it look good and EASY TO NAVIGATE. I’ve told more bands to fuck themselves and moved on because I had to wait 30 seconds for some stupid flash animation to open on their main screen. Remember that everyone doesn’t have ethernet, and frankly a morphing 3-D picture of the band sure does look cool but if I want to hear your music I DON’T GIVE A SHIT ABOUT YOUR FANCY FLASH SKILLZ. Be aware of attention spans and get to the good stuff.

Looking professional is key, but there’s a thousand ways to do it by not sacrificing usability.

Also, invest in merchandise. One of the smartest things I ever did, and I mean EVER, is recognized that someone wearing a Caustic shirt is a person ADVERTISING Caustic. The more people that see that person/fan/parent of Caustic wearing that shirt, the more they may say “Hey, what’s Caustic?” and check out the music. The term “advertising” has a negative connotation with a lot of people “all about the music,” but to that I say Fuck You. You don’t get gigs if nobody’s heard of you, and passive advertising is a lot more pleasing to people than getting bombarded with emails and IMs when all you want to do is surf for pr0n in peace.

Plus, yeah, it’s pretty freakin’ cool going to a random show and seeing people wearing your shirt. Everyone digs a little ego boost.

I still sell my shirts cheap– usually between $10-15– and always have because basically it’s enough so I can make a few bucks, it’s a fair price, and MAINLY because I want them OUT THERE.

Get smart with merchandising. Don’t make thousands of shirts and max out a credit card. See what you can afford. There’s nothing to be ashamed about getting only 10 shirts made at first. If nothing it’ll hopefully help build demand when other people see them and say they want one, too.

And make the shirts unique, or at least consistent. This is, of course, just my opinion, but when I started making shirts the first band I thought of was KMFDM. Say what you will about them, but holy BALLS are they smart with marketing and branding their style. You ALWAYS know a KMFDM shirt when you see one. I wanted that for Caustic too. That shit sticks in your mind.

A BIG HUGE MEGA PLUS is doing stickers. They’re cheap, plentiful, and people always somewhere to put them. Give them out free at shows, the club, or leave them in music stores in the area. Hell, mail them to people. It’s only a stamp for potentially tons of exposure on someone’s car or on someone’s laptop.

Also, do presales. I can’t stress that enough. For CDs, for shirts, for whatever. Even if you only get a few that’s money in your pocket. That’s money you can take off your credit card right away. That’s money in the freakin’ bank, y0.

Doing presales means you automatically start advertising EARLY. One thing I’ve noticed, especially in this scene, is that people tend to start mentioning up a release a few weeks before it actually comes out. I, on the other hand, have always tried to keep people in the loop on the whole process. Why? A) I have a big mouth and like to share, and B) It ideally builds or sustains excitement and gives a “behind the scenes” on what I’m doing.

There’s nothing arrogant or cocky about pushing your new CD– you worked hard on it and invested lots of time and money on it. If YOU aren’t proud of your work who will be? But be careful how you do it. Don’t be a dick and don’t be TOO annoying, which is a massive tightrope to walk, as you need to remind people often enough and lots of places but you don’t want it to get to the point where people say “ENOUGH ALREADY I’M NEVER BUYING YOUR FUCKING CD BECAUSE I NOW HATE YOU!!!!”

I’m sure I’ve reached that point with some people on occasion, but everyone’s got a breaking point and so it’s bound to happen. Just be careful.

Not losing money, or losing as small an amount as possible early on, is a key way to avoid becoming jaded and losing the reason you wanted to do this in the first place: To share your creativity. Don’t kill your passion because you spent a ridiculous sum on your first 3 song EP because you felt “it needs to be done right OR NOT AT ALL,” when in truth it was just an introduction of things to come. Nobody expects brilliance right out of the gate. Put your best foot forward of course, but be mindful of the fact that in even 6 month’s time you’ll be making music that’ll put that EP to shame.

Be smart, be prepared to work, and make sure to have as much fun as possible doing it. Sometimes the only thing you’ll get out of it is some laughs, but always hope for more. And if it doesn’t work out you won’t be saddled with 10 years of debt reminding you that you shouldn’t have paid DJ Fucksyourmom that $25k to remix your not-so-great-in-hindsight club track.

-If you decide to do a cover song as a joke, be prepared to have it requested until you’re dead. And then played at your funeral.

-If you tour, bring toilet paper you like. You’re not going to be playing stadiums. You’re going to be playing places that will give you crabs when you load in your gear.

-If you sign a contract, make sure you get the rights to your masters back after a few years. While the chances are that you’ll never get rich off the music, the term “in perpetuity” means you’ll never actually OWN any of it anymore, and that’s bullshit. (advice ganked from Moby)

-Always have your own DI (“direct input”) boxes if you need them for live gigs. Don’t depend on the club or sound guy to provide them, as depending on the club and what shows they normally do you might get looked at like you’re from Mars if you ask for them. The same goes for cables as well, although those are usually easier to find.

-Paying for remixes doesn’t guarantee you’ll make your money back. It mostly just means the track may get illegally downloaded the most, and I hope you make enough new fans to justify whatever you put out for it.

-Start and end your sets on time, if not a little early. Other bands remember if you screwed them on time, even if it was early on, and it could come back to bite you later on. Leave the crowd wanting more and be professional.

-Listen to your music on as many sound systems (studio, car, through crappy headphones) as possible. It’s the best way to see if you have a balanced mix. Never trust just one system.

-If someone’s hating on your music on a forum it’s important to remember 3 things: (1) That person is a bored dick, (2) There’s always room for improvement, so keep working at it, and (3) For every asshole out there that hates what you do there’s significantly more that probably enjoy it, especially if you’re always working on (2).

Don’t let one opinion ruin your day, especially some lame-ass hiding behind a stupid username in his/her mom’s basement.

-Don’t get caught up in drama. Get caught up in creating. One’ll actually be fulfilling.

-Only work with people you can trust and are dependable.

Having fans, to me, is a relationship of mutual respect. First off, I wasn’t really even ever comfortable with the TERM “fans” as it pertains to me because, well, it’s essentially WEIRD. I do what I do. I like and understand that some people ENJOY Caustic on whatever level, even if just for the song titles or blog rants, but “fans,” yeah that’s uncomfortable. Maybe it’s because you feel a greater sense of responsibility to not let someone down if you know they aren’t just some goober you’re pals with or have done a few shots with at a show. It takes the pressure off a bit not using that term, y’know?

I’ve always tried to treat the people who listen to Caustic as friends more than anything. Not to kiss anyone’s ass, but in a musical climate where people get screwed over and music is downloaded illegally at an alarming rate I’d rather people actually know ME a bit and know how “stealing” from my label (or me if I self-release something) affects ME. You need friends more than “just” fans these days.

I’m not some major rockstar. Hell, I’m not even a minor rockstar. I work two jobs and douche around with my pets and wife and am curbing a drinking problem and a barely stable mind and I like to talk too much. But I don’t hide. I don’t lie (well, not intentionally or with malice). I share my opinion and try and help others out where I can. I do what a pal would do, even if I barely know you.

I don’t see music as a competition. I see it as an opportunity to connect with people and make this life something worth living. You get what you earn, but you can’t win ‘em all. And if my fans show me respect I do it in return. I’ll gladly admit I like pulling the curtain back a bit on how all this works– I compare it in some ways to how Penn and Teller do it, and just to show that YOU CAN DO IT TOO if you’re up to the challenge and have the talent to back it up. That’s what friends do: encourage each other.

I despise any artists that treat their fans like they’re lucky to have us. That’s not the case. We’re lucky to have EACH OTHER. Johnny Depp has explained that he doesn’t work for studios, he works for the fans. Without them he’s doing summer stock productions of Brigadoon and wondering if he can afford a 1998 Chevy Cavalier in a few months if he scrimps his pennies and sells enough plasma.

But without the artists THE FANS don’t have someone trying to express themselves in own unique way. Sure, there’s a million artists and a million bands, but I’ll be fucked if there’s a million Skinny Puppys, Slayers, or even Caustics (and believe me, I know I ain’t SP or Slayer:)). No, the artists that people like are there for a reason: People want to hear THEM. The reason you like WHAT you like is because that’s the music that speaks to YOU on some level. That’s fucking beautiful and sacred, even if it’s dancing around to a song about taints.

And so without us you wouldn’t have that. Sure, you’d find something else but that doesn’t mean it’d be the same, especially if it influenced you.

The reason I wrote this is because I was thining about Al Jourgensen and Ministry and the Revolting Cocks. Without Ministry and RevCo there wouldn’t BE a Caustic– they influenced me that much. I met Paul Barker a few years ago and he was so nice and I was a giddy little schoolgirl for a week because of it. And when Ministry (sans Paul) did their final tour it wasn’t called the MasturbaTOUR for nothing: It was Al jerking off on all his fans for 2+ fucking hours and playing nothing but shit off all the post-Barker CDs. This was a FINAL TOUR and he gave us scraps from the first 15 fucking years of the band, or in other words all the stuff the LONGTIME fans loved.

That’s not only insulting, that’s just fucking rude in my mind.

And not only that, he turned the Revolting Cocks into Menudo. When RevCo (as they’re now officially called, as I hear it) toured there were literally NONE of the founding members involved, and Al only made a handful of appearances which were actually BILLED as such, and probably only in the markets where they needed to sell more tickets to make their money.

Is this respect? No, it’s fucking bullshit. It’s a fucking COVER BAND.

Any self-respecting artist will know the debt they have to those listening to them and supporting them. They won’t be ruled by the fans’ tastes though. “Giving them what they want” should only apply to the live sets and only to a point. I think bands that won’t play “their big hit” are kind of ridiculous– “OH WOE IS ME I WROTE A SONG PEOPLE LOVE BUT I’VE GROWN BORED WITH IT!” Gimme a break. Play the fucking song and give it some gusto– Trent’s been trotting out “Head Like a Hole” for 20+ years and still sells is like a motherfucker. Be a professional. Don’t hate the fans for loving you.

With that said, the greatest respect an artist can give their fans is always following their creative muse and making what THEY consider great music. Whether or not the fans like it is not in your control, but whoring your sound (or a band’s name AND sound, as Al is now doing) to “keep them happy” is when you should probably simply stop. Unless all you care about is the paycheck, but the vast, vast majority of artists out there aren’t getting a big enough paycheck to warrant even the internal debate on that shit.

Don’t embarrass yourself or your fans. Friends don’t do that to each other.