Generic magazine, c. '86 issue 9, interview and cd review

Interview1986Unknown source

Generic magazine, c. '86 issue 9, interview and cd review

Interview:
Generic: What bands were you in before the Goo Goo Dolls?

George: I was in a band called the Standards, back in 1970 something or other, then I was in the Paisley Marxists, Beat Generation, then Sex Maggot, then the Goo Goo Dolls.
Robby: Sex Maggot was the Goo Goo Dolls.

Generic: (To John) You were in the Beaumonts. Anything before that?
John: Yeah, I was in a bunch of bands.

Generic: Anything to mention?
John: I was in the Chaotics, and the Joy Buzzers.
George: I played for the Joy Buzzers
John: George was freelancing for the Joy Buzzers.
Robby: I could have played for the Joy Buzzers.
John: It's the Greg Sterlis Project. That's what we were gonna call the Joy Buzzers after everybody quit. I was playing and writing the tunes for him, and were gonna call it the Greg Sterlis Project 'cause it changed members so often.

Generic: Whoever need money would play?
John: Yeah, whoever needs a few bucks that night would play.

Generic: Rob, Cro Magnon... Spongy Bone...
Robby: I really don't want to talk about that.

Generic: Who put this band together?
Robby: We put ourselves together, we just played one night.
John: Actually we all answered an ad in the paper.
Robby: WANTED: Serious, Top 40 musicians... What actually happened was I was playing in the Beat Generation.... This first time we played, we played up on the roof at midnight, four stories above downtown Buffalo We had Laurie playing keyboards and we were playing full blast and the landlord came right in the middle..
John: He liked it though....
Robby: We played at this party in South Buffalo, we were Sex Maggot at the time. We went there and played all these songs and these people were ready to kill us, actually they sorta liked us...
John: Yeah, they were banging their heads on the walls and, you know what they said? They said 'you know, you know how to play the basic metal stuff real good, but you gotta sit down and practice a lot harder.' We were in their territory playing in their place together , we got a fairly good response.
Robby: But anyway, this party got cancelled halfway through it cause things just got too crazy. There was a HUGE fight. Like sticks, clubs, chains, guns. It was insane. So we took it upon ourselves to move this party to our practice space.
George: So we invited all the people and all the weapons down.
Robby: And we had this party down there, and someone pulled up in a car, I don't remember quite who it was, but someone decided that it'd be really, really cool to start whipping shit out the window at them, and there happened to be like, two or three bowls of macaroni salad, and an entire condiments tray, and pretzels and potato chips, hot dogs, cheese, stuffed mushrooms, and they were all flying out the window. Needless to say about two weeks later we didn't have a place to practice.
George: Actually, it was about two days later...

Generic: What do you see in your music?
Robby: We're playing a metal show Saturday (the Leviathan/Humongous/Third Man In/Goo Goo Dolls show). That was the last thing that was going through our minds.
George: You know, almost everyone I talk to, that's the first thing they say when they talk to me about the band is metal.
Robby: We don't see that at all!
John: Except just being loud and heavy...
Robby: fast...
George: I could play cut time in a lot of songs, but I don't. I play rock beats fast. Hardcore is like a polka beat. I never do that.
Robby: One song we do that in, and it's called 'Hardsores' and it's a blatant mockery of that music.
George: It isn't like a mockery meant to be mean, it's a parody.
John: We like hardcore, it's just that I don't think that any of us can handle these people that take is so friggin seriously that they just put blinders on and don't look anywhere else.
Robby: Let's play music and call it music. Let's play music and call it neo-60s heavy metal.
John: Pseudo European garbage art rock.
Robby: Oh yea, we promise, no putting teeth through lips.
[During the first interview with the Goo Goo Dolls, Robby stumbled as John was standing up and they bumped into eavh other and Robby's tooth went through his upper lip.]


Review:


The Goo Goo Dolls, The Goo Goo Dolls - Mercenary Records

What can I say?
1. It's the best record (and band) I've heard in a LONG time.
2. There's only one direction for this band to go and it's up.
3. There's something for everyone, from the melodic, almost pop 'Different Light', to the funniest song on the record, 'Baseball Bat'.
But you already know that. What I will say is that if you don't get a copy of this record, then you don't know where it's at. Cause this is it. Buy it, hear it, live it.
Oh, and uh, 'don't beat my ass with a baseball bat'!


There was also a small piece about their first tape that did the rounds:

The Goo Goo Dolls: Throw That Bum Out!, C20 tape.

The Goo Goo Dolls' newly released tape may have only five songs on it, but the buy ($3) is worth it. Better yet, there's more to come. Four of the songs are originals, with the fifth being a sped up version of Cream's "Sunshine of Your Love". After listening to their tape, you'll realise that they're not a trite thrash band or even hardcore, (though the speed and sound of their music may mislead you), they're just a trio of guys plaining plain old rock-n-roll who someday soon will take the Buffalo scene by storm.


Thanks to heathergoo for posting this on the Inner Machine forums.

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