By
Jeb Wright
Rob
Zombie has hit the road with a new tour, a new record label and
a soon-to-be-released new album. Titled Hellbilly Deluxe 2,
Zombie is taking a risk resurrecting the album name that first
saw him break as a solo artist. If it is great then he will be
lauded as a visionary. If it is less than great then he will be
ridiculed as a hack trying to relive glory days. Zombie,
however, is not known for ripping off his fans. He is also not
known for recycling his musical ideas and visions. If the past
gives us any insight into Rob’s creative mindset then the new
music will be daring, cutting edge and loud while the tour will
be colorful, ghoulish and intense.
Zombie
recently reflected on his decision to name the album
Hellbilly Deluxe 2, “I thought I'm just not going to call
the record that unless it seems like it makes sense so, even
though the idea had been floating around my head for about 3
years; it wasn't until we we're completely finished with the
record that we kind of listened to it and then thought about it
for a long time. Finally, I decided to title it that. I just
didn’t want it to seem like, ‘Oh well, they slapped this title
on there and it doesn’t tie in with the other record, it doesn’t
make sense.’ When we were done, it really felt like a perfect
companion piece for the first record.”
The
writing of the album actually led the artist to new
discoveries. “We don't really have a process of what we're
trying to accomplish,” Zombie admits. “I mean, sometimes, with a
song like [the first single of the new album] ‘What?’ we’ll be
like ‘Let's write something like we're all standing in the same
room playing at the same time, like when you heard a recording
from the 60’s, like an old garage band, and it sounded terrible
but its sort of the terribleness of the sound that fed into the
energy of it all. We purposely left it sounding raw. We could
have made it sound super slick but then it wouldn't sound as
good.”
Zombie
is not satisfied with making a “normal” sounding metal album.
Over the years, he has become a master of taking noise and
making it into music. “I ran into that problem on the first
Hellbilly when we recorded ‘Dragula.’ We had laid down the
guitars and they were a noisy mess but there was something about
them I really liked.” Zombie continues, “We re-cut the guitars
and they were super sharp and clean and it went from this sort
of big mess of sound to sounding like a Judas Priest song.
Sometimes there’s happy accidents in the mess and that's really
the process. We just kind of start writing and we don't try to
– you know -- I never really try to put boundaries like ‘It has
to be heavy.’ I think sometimes, especially in the world of
metal bands, you feel like it's always going to be heavy. It's
always going to [have] this metal tag and that's very limiting.
I don't think bands used to feel like that.”
Zombie
admits it’s a challenge to stay true to oneself yet retain a
distinctive sound. “I try to mix it up on each album as much as
possible. I mean you have your signature sound, more or less.
You know your voice is your voice, in the general things you
do. But I always like to keep it different. I'm always a fan
of things sounding different. Sometimes I get a record of a
band that has changed their sound and I don't like it but then
I go back to it a year later and suddenly it's my favorite
record. I just wasn't ready for the change at the time.
“I
definitely am not a fan of every record sounding the same, to
the point where you feel like you don’t even need to own it
anymore. That's why I don't like to make tons of records. I
mean, maybe I make too few, a lot of time does go by. I want
each one to be meaningful on some level.”
Equally as important as the music to Zombie is the live
presentation. It is within this format that Rob can mix his
love of theater and his love of music. Creating a unique show
is one of his highest priorities, although, this time around, he
was tempted to simply revisit the past. “I have the stage set
from the first Hellbilly Tour in storage. I toyed with
the idea of actually pulling out the set from eleven years ago
and using the actual set,” Zombie confesses. “We started doing
that but there was something about it that felt tired and
contrived. It just seemed fake; it didn't seem right.
“So
we've sort of gone back and created what seems like the new
version of that. I can't wait for people to see it. We're all
pretty excited. It's like the modernized update of that. You
know the stage feels very fresh, very modern, very high tech,
but really has the spirit of that first show. Minus
unfortunately, the days of shooting off massive amounts of fire
everywhere. Those days are long gone. That is a huge problem
now, it’s impossible to get the OK to do that. But everything
else is pretty nice.”
This
tour has whet Rob’s appetite because, unlike former gigs such as
opening for Ozzy Osbourne, he knows that this time around,
people are coming solely to see him. Zombie explains how being
a headliner allows him to expand both his musical repertoire,
and his stage show, “Since we're doing this first run of smaller
places I assume that people coming out are pretty familiar with
the material, so you can mix it up a little bit. As far as the
stage show, there has been some pretty incredible advancements
in digital technology, so it's a pretty high tech show going
on. It's pretty awesome. We didn't want to go out and just do
the same old show so we’ve dug deep and we kind of tried to
really mix it up. There's always the obvious songs you have to
play that people want to hear. But we’re actually going back
and grabbing some songs that I've never played live; songs from
the other records that I think people will know.”
With
the tour already underway, and already a success, the rock
star/movie director refuses to rest on his laurels. For Rob
Zombie, it is going to be a year of relentless traveling and
hard work with a one of a kind concert experience being the
payoff. If you don’t see your town listed under ‘tour dates’ at
www.robzombie.com then keep
checking back as Rob admits, more will be added, “This is just
the beginning. Once this first leg of the tour is done, we’re
going to take a quick break for Christmas and then go back out
to hit the other places we missed. As of now, the plan is to be
on tour at least till around this time next year. So, there’s a
lot more shows coming. This is the ‘just getting the ball
rolling’ segment of this tour. We’ve got a lot more to come.”
