Interviews

THE DWARVES

By Janelle Jones

   The self-described "best-looking band in show business" are back with one ferocious record, the ominously-titled THE DWARVES MUST DIE. With its (disturbing!) Christ-like imagery and comparisons enveloping the record, one wonders: is this the sound of a Dwarvesian death knell? But even if it is, how can we be sure? After all, we witnessed the Christ-like maneuvers of guitarist HeWhoCanNotBeNamed some years ago when he was pronounced dead and was mysteriously resurrected, only to invoke fear in the masses once again. Anyway, from what singer Blag Dahlia says below, it seems The Dwarves will be around for some time to come, undoubtedly shocking, awing, and scarring all who'll watch/listen. (I truly wish I could reprint this conversation in its entirety, but alas, it's not to be.)

SKRATCH: You have a track on ROCK AGAINST BUSH VOL. 2.
BLAG: That's right. It's [a previously-unreleased track] called "Kids Today", as in those WACKY kids today. [?] You can only get it if you help to unseat the current occupant [of the White House].

SKRATCH: How important was it for you to be involved in that?
BLAG: It's important on the level that everyone kinda does what they can. I'm not much of a political speechifier, but I know an asshole when I see it. So they asked me for a track, and I was glad to comply; I was glad I had something interesting. It was a song that wasn't gonna go on the record and features some singing by some other bands: I got the singers from The Matches [?] and The A.K.A.s. [?] It's got Spike from Me First and the Gimme Gimmes singing on it, too, so it's sort of a group effort [...] We're pretty proud of it.

SKRATCH: And the new album, THE DWARVES MUST DIE?
BLAG: It's a masterpiece, Janelle.

SKRATCH: Yes, it is.
BLAG: I mean, what can you say about it? Have you gotten to hear it?

SKRATCH: Yeah, totally. I can't get "FEFU" ["Fuck Eat and Fuck You Up"] out of my head. [Laughs]
BLAG: See? Have you been playing with yourself at all when you listen to it?

SKRATCH: Um?
BLAG: 'Cause it actually works for that.

SKRATCH: Really. But is it really your swan song?
BLAG: Well, all of The Dwarves' albums have dealt with death, so you never know. [?] We've died so many times [and] been resuscitated.... I think the people want and need The Dwarves. The question is: how much do WE want and need the people? The answer's: not very much.

SKRATCH: Really?!
BLAG: [Laughs] Basically, it's the best record The Dwarves ever made. It's intensely weird, it goes through every single musical style, and it's got a really fucked-up cover on it. I think everybody should go out and buy it?unless you're chicken shit, in which case you should stay home.

SKRATCH: Uh huh. It's definitely, as you said, eclectic. Do you think some people won't "get" the hip-hop parts?
BLAG: Well, yeah, but that's part of the whole point, to me. I like all different kinds of music, so we do all different kinds of music. I came up listening to 45s I'd buy at Woolworth's on the weekends [...] or buying records on the street for a dime someone was selling at a garage sale, so, to me, if there's one good song on the record, it's good. But then you'll hear people complaining 'cause you got 10 punk songs and two hip-hop songs. It's ridiculous. Every good song you like is another point in favor of the album. I love the whole thing, but it just hits all these different styles. Some people like one style but they don't like another, but to me it's just all rock 'n' roll.

SKRATCH: Many people are narrow-minded.
BLAG: Well, and also what ruins it is...You talk about hip-hop. I love hip-hop, I always have, but a lot of people's attempt to do it is basically [saying] "yo" a lot and wearing their baseball cap backwards?and that's really not what it is. Also, a lot of what was called nu-metal a few years ago is kinda hip-hop with a guitar in it. There's a lot of kinds of music that aren't very interesting to me, and that's one of them. You can do cool things really with any musical set up, as long as you have a little bit of originality; and some songs just lend themselves to a hip-hop approach, while others are more rock 'n' roll?and other ones are a combination of the two. Part of what we did on this record was that a lot of songs people wouldn't think are hip-hop songs are actually songs where we took an old '60 garage song or an old punk song and then looped it the way you loop an old hip-hop beat and made a song off that. People hear that and they don't call those hip-hop songs, but in my mind they [are,] 'cause they come from loops. It's a question of how far your mind ranges in this stuff.

SKRATCH: That song "Massacre" is basically a stab at what punk rock has become.
BLAG: Exactly. I could do a punk song about how lame punk rock has become, but instead I do a hip-hop song, 'cause to me it was like a battle, and the best place to do battle is in a hip-hop song. It's a battle rap, but it's about rock bands and how lame they are.

SKRATCH: Any favorite tracks?
BLAG: It's hard for me, 'cause they're all my babies. [He goes on to list practically every track, each for specific reasons] Things just get all over the place. [?] I can't choose. I like the last couple albums, too. I was a big fan of COME CLEAN and YOUNG AND GOOD LOOKING. [?] A lot of times bands make a record and they're not really happy about what they made, but The Dwarves are very happy with the last few records. Part of that is because we had a really great producer, Eric Valentine, and a lot of people helping us out. On this album, there's all these guest-star people and shit that we never really did before, but we figured, What the fuck. A lot of people helped us out, people I wouldn't have even expected: guys from The Offspring, Me First, and Urge Overkill, and just all kinds of people, gangsta rappers and fuckin' sound-effects men. [?] It all sorta came together, so it's hard to pick a favorite.

SKRATCH: What about Gary Owens! [Laughs]
BLAG: Gary Owens! That was another great one. I grew up watching LAUGH-IN as a little kid [?] and was always a big fan of SPACE GHOST, and Gary Owens is just a very popular, famous voice you've probably heard a million times without knowing who it is. When it came time to introduce the band at the beginning of the record, I thought nobody would be better than Gary Owens, so we hunted him down, found him out here in Hollywood. He's a great guy, really funny, and he did a great job. Who would've expected...like, how many people get a 70-year-old guy on their rock record? That's just The Dwarves. Most punk bands just get older and worse, and most rock bands just get older and more pretentious, but only The Dwarves get better and better. There's just no stopping us.

SKRATCH: Maybe it's your last, maybe not, but when it's all said and done, what do you guys wanna be remembered for?
BLAG: [?] Most of what we'll be remembered for, in reality, will be nasty album covers with nudity on them and also saying "fuck" a lot [?] because people need very simplistic things to boil it down to. [?] We'd like to be remembered as the first punk band to incorporate samples and sounds into their music long before there were samplers and shit. We'd like to be known as the first people to loop garage records and punk records [and] to be known as interesting lyricists. I always thought of The Dwarves' songs appealing on two levels: the one level's real basic?like "Fuck Eat and Fuck You Up"; and then the other level's like [?] what the song's about. To me, it's about survival and what it takes to live; but then on another level, it's just about saying the word "fuck" a lot. I would like it if people understood that there's more to The Dwarves than meets the eye, but then again, most all anybody gets out of anything is what meets the eye, and then they move superficially on. That's part of why we've had to watch a lot of bands that really suck but acted sincere be lionized by the press and have people act like they were on to something. At the end of the day, we just wanna be remembered as one of the great rock 'n' roll bands?which is what we richly deserve.

SKRATCH: Do you live by any specific philosophy/credo?
BLAG: [?] I guess that if you stripped it down, I would just prefer a world in which I was constantly fucking and getting high and being worshiped for my intellect. [Laughs] But it's hard to always live that lifestyle, you know?! That's where you wanna be, but I guess we're lucky as humans if we hit that every once in a while. Certainly from being in this band we've gotten our share of sex and drugs and to be worshipped. It's kinda the credo we live by.

SKRATCH: Cool. Anything to add?
BLAG: What can I say, except: buy the record, see the band, chew the bubblegum, sleep with the singer?it's the only way to go. The Dwarves rule. We shall return. We've done it again. Hide your daughters. www.thedwarves.com

» BACK TO TOP