Interview: #10 – Satan’s Basement (Interviewed by Gary).

What is the name of your band?
Satan’s Basement (I also have two other solo projects, The Astronaut King and DJ Fartbot).

What’s the difference between these 3 bands/projects?
Satan’s Basement was the first project I started, mostly to make more metal oriented music with. At some point I started making electronic music that I didn’t feel fit with the sound, so I just started releasing those tracks as DJ Fartbot. I also started to record more experimental stuff that I didn’t really think fit to Satan’s Basement at that time, so I started releasing ambient, acoustic, and sort of psychedelic tracks as The Astronaut King. The biggest differences are that Satan’s Basement is mostly guitar/vocals/programmed drums, The Astronaut King is only electric or acoustic guitar and sometimes vocals, and DJ Fartbot is mostly made either on a computer, gameboy, with old synthesizers, or a combination of those things.

Where are you from?
St. Charles/Chicago, Illinois

When did Satan’s Basement form?
I think sometime in the beginning of 2006.

How did the band come together?
At the time I just could not find any band members that actually wanted to make music, and since my old band was pretty much falling apart I figured I’d just start making music on my own. I was still in high school at the time and had a lot of free time, so I just started experimenting and working with whatever junk I had to make music.

What was your old band called?
The Violent Sheep. I don’t remember exactly what my friend and I were talking about, but I think one of us jokingly said “Violet Sheep” and the other heard it as “Violent Sheep” and said “we should totally name our band that”. It was just me, my friend Mike on drums, and our bass player changed about 3 times before we just stopped practicing. We did some recordings on a tape recorder by stashing it on top of beam in his basement, but eventually it just broke. There are still some really raw and rough recordings of it up at http://www.soundclick.com/theviolentsheep.

Where does the name Satan’s Basement come from?
I don’t remember when I originally thought it up, I just remember wanting to name a band Satan’s Basement for a while. Once I started to record music I figured it was appropriate enough for the project.

What music have you released so far and on what formats?
So far I’ve released 3 albums on CD-R:
– (2006) Sludge Filled Wasteland
– (2007) Cerebral Apocalypse
– (2008) Satan’s Basement/Morgue Rat split

Have you been working with any labels, or have you been self releasing your music?
I’ve done all my music pretty DIY for a while. I think I’ve had a couple net labels ask about releasing my music, but some of them I just wasn’t sure if I could trust them.

What is Morgue Rat like?
I don’t know what he’s been up to lately, but he’s a cool guy from Texas who does lo-fi noise/grindcore style music. His material on the split I did with him was pretty killer.

Do you have any plans for future releases?
I’ve been technically working on a new full length since around the end of 2007, but I’ve been doing it song by song. So I think at this point the material isn’t going to sound way too consistent, but enough for you to tell it’s all Satan’s Basement. I’ve been planning up and thinking about more split albums and stuff too.

Which media do you prefer for music and why: Cassette, Vinyl, CD, or MP3?
I definitely prefer vinyl the most in my collection because I like the warmth of analog formats, but I like CDs too because of how much music you can play all the way through. As much as I listen to MP3s, it’s more of a choice of convenience usually.

Have you played many shows (tour, shows with larger bands)?
I’ve done live shows for my project The Astronaut King recently because it’s easier to take live, but I haven’t done a live show for Satan’s Basement in probably two years now. I’ve been thinking about it, but I’m not totally prepared to start doing it yet. As I’ve added more parts to my songs, it’s made it harder to effectively take everything live. It is definitely something I’m planning on getting together sometime in the future, because it’d be fun. I just want it to sound good while I’m doing it.

Sounding good is important! Do you have any plans of traveling, or do you plan on doing mainly local shows?
I’ve always wanted to do some kind of tour, but for now I’m mostly doing local shows until I get comfortable enough doing them. It’d be awesome to play shows in other countries, but I don’t think I could fund anything like that happening right now, haha.

What do your parents think of your band?
They’re actually pretty supportive. My mom usually likes it, and my dad finds my song “Laceration Masturbation” to be hilarious.

What are you favorite bands?
Some of my all time favorites are Bolt Thrower, Cavity, D.R.I., Assück, Buzzov-en, YDI, Gorement, and Cianide to name a few.

What are your biggest musical influences?
Black Sabbath was what got me to pick up a guitar, and Bathory was a big influence on me when I first started out recording music. Some of the bands that helped me develop my sound are probably Bolt Thrower, Benediction, Cavity, Carnivore, Terrorizer, lots of 80’s and 90’s hardcore, death metal, and sludge metal for the most part. Anything evil, angry, and full of hate.

What are the biggest non-musical influences in your life?
I’d say 80’s movies and video games have influenced me a great deal; especially movies like Escape from New York, Blade Runner, and Mad Max 2/The Road Warrior. I’ve always loved the anti-hero and the ‘only cares about himself’ kind of characters. I like a lot of old horror and sci fi stuff, and I love The Twilight Zone. I’m colorblind, so part of why a lot of my art and stuff is in black and white, or red, is so I don’t screw up colors – but mostly because I just like the look of black and white art. I guess a lot of how I think comes from an interest in the way people were during the 19^th and early 20^th century. For the most part, I guess I’ve become a cross between both of my parents.

What do you find offensive or obscene?
Even though the internet has desensitized us all to a lot, I get really grossed out by things touching people’s eyes, or just anything happening to eyes for some reason. Also, those videos with anything being inserted into people’s penises… I can’t even watch that.

The eye stuff really bugs me too! So what is your favorite porno?
I actually don’t know for sure. These days I think I watch too many clips and I fast forward to the parts I want to see haha.

Who is your favorite porn actor/actress?
I’m actually not sure for this one because there’s just so much porn out there and some days some kinds are just more appealing than others… I guess the fact that I forget names really easily doesn’t help me make a choice either.

Have you ever been in or made x-rated photos or movies?
Nope on both.

Do you plan to?
I doubt I’d ever really be in any, but I’d think about making it. Doing the soundtrack or production work could be interesting…

Have you ever been to a nudie show, strip club, quarter booth, or adult movie theatre?
I guess I really haven’t before, now that I think about it. I guess I just prefer nudity in private. haha.

Who is your favorite comic book or cartoon character?
I always thought Lobo was a badass, and I swear I had comic books of him when I was younger, but I can’t for the life of me find them. I always liked Captain America too. Bender from Futurama is pretty far up there in favorite cartoon characters. I’ve found myself turning into Hank Hill though.

Who is your favorite character on the Venture Brothers?
Most likely Brock Samson, because I mean you can’t get much more badass than Brock Samson.

Would you have sex with Dr. Girlfriend?
It’d be disturbing at first, but I think I could get over the voice haha.

What do you spend the most time doing online?
I spend a lot of time looking for music to listen to and checking my mail. I try to keep myself from buying things online because I don’t have much of an income at the moment, haha.

Elvis or the Beatles?
Elvis.

Politics or Sports?
I try to stay out of politics because everyone always wants to debate, and I do not. With sports I pay the most attention to hockey, other than that I was born in Pittsburgh so I mostly keep up with Pittsburgh teams.

Do you think being a professional wrestler should be a pre-requisite for anyone entering politics?
That would be pretty awesome actually, I’d be all for it! That just got me to thinking about how awesome Macho Man Randy Savage would be as president! OHH YEAHHH!

God or Satan?
Somewhere in between to keep things interesting.

Metallica… Your thoughts?
I guess I’ve actually never been too big of a Metallica fan, even before they transformed from musicians into salesmen, but nothing they’ve done in recent years has gotten me all that excited. Their attitude about piracy and everything just really started to bother me. The money shouldn’t be more important than the music ever.

Why should people listen to your band?
I make music because I enjoy it. It’s anti-social hatred as a form of music. It’s more underground than the mole people.

Do you have some links where people can go to check out your band?
http://www.myspace.com/satansbasement
http://www.soundclick.com/satansbasement
http://www.last.fm/music/Satan%27s+Basement

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