Flickerstick
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Lighting Up with Flickerstick
Interview by Kelly Ladd
Brandin Lea (vocals)
Rex Ewing (guitar)
Dominic Weir (drums)
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| HardRock.com: What have you guys been up to since the last time you performed here at Hard Rock Live? |
| Rex: When was the last time we performed here? (asking Brandin) |
| HardRock.com: In September. |
Brandin: September, yeah. We've been touring non-stop pretty much. We had a couple of weeks off for the holidays. But besides that we did a West Coast tour. We'd only been on the East Coast and after the September show we went west.
Dominic: Work, work, work.
Rex: Were we here before New York?
Brandin: No.
Dominic: No. |
| HardRock.com: You first released Welcoming Home the Astronauts in early 2000 and then reworked and released it again this past summer. Have you begun writing new songs for the next album? |
| Brandin: Oh, yeah, we've definitely been writing new songs for the follow-up album. I don't know when we'll actually start working on the release because we're still touring off of this album but there is definitely a lot of new material that we're anxious to work on. |
| HardRock.com: And you write most of the music? |
Brandin: I write a good part of the music.
Rex: Come on now. Come on. You're a genius.
Dominic: (laughs)
Brandin: No, I'm responsible for the lyrics. And all the guys put on their mark for the sound that we have come up with. I know Rex and Cory's guitar riffs are most of our signature and I think they stand out quite a bit. Besides the vocals, you can tell when you hear it. A lot of the tones of the guitars that these guys choose to use, which I think, are not quite what you hear on the radio. It might be bad for us, but I'd rather stick to our guns. I think there are enough bands out there, that we won't mention, that sound alike. |
| HardRock.com: Yeah, identical. Do you think you'll always be remembered as the band from VH1's Bands On The Run? |
Dominic: God, we hope not.
Rex: We hope not. Jesus.
Brandin: No I think it's already subsided. Now that signing with Epic, that had nothing to do with the TV show, which is a common misconception. You know, we have "Beautiful" on the radio and it did all right, so now it's like we just have more people saying "Oh I heard 'Beautiful' on the radio." And they don't even know or they are like "I heard you guys were on some TV show, but I never watched." So it's kinda rolling over. But there will always be that stigma to it. It's so not a big deal to us anymore and I don't think the crowd is coming because of the TV thing anymore. I think it died off…
Rex: No, there is still a few dudes.
Brandin: Yeah there is.
Rex: "I can't believe I'm seeing you right now..."
Brandin and Dominic: (laugh)
Brandin: There is a lot of people now who come because they bought the album and they only saw like half an episode. No we're not really worried about that. |
| HardRock.com: Would you ever want to get rid of that association? |
Brandin: I don't think we care, I mean, the TV show did help in many ways. It didn't really hurt us in many ways, except we'd rather have done it without the TV show. The TV show just happened to be at our feet at a time when we were really wanting to get some bigger exposure to basically just get our music out there.
Rex: We're looking into getting another TV show. A sitcom or something. |
| HardRock.com: (laughs) |
Dominic: "The Drunkies."
Rex: Yeah, "The Drunkies." |
| HardRock.com: You won 50 grand, right? |
Brandin: We think.
Rex: Who knows?
Dominic: They told us we did anyway. |
| HardRock.com: You guys haven't seen any of it? |
Rex: There wasn't a big fake check or anything like that. We were told that and then it went away.
Brandin: We either drank it or it…
Dominic: Actually it paid off a lot of our debts.
Brandin: Yeah, a lot of our debts. I think we—out of 50 grand—each band member, got like 500 dollars. Maybe?
Dominic: We did?
Rex: Dude I don't remember, I honestly don't know.
Dominic: And then we won another 25 thousand online.
Rex: Where did that go?
Brandin: We don't know.
Dominic: We're up to 75 grand in the hole. We don't get any of the money. We're broke.
Brandin: Come on, haven't you seen Behind the Music? You make all the money, you never get it and then you owe somebody else.
Dominic: What did Rex call it? "Monopoly money." They say you have it, but you never get to see it.
Rex: I don't worry about nothing.
Brandin: "It's going to cost you another 1200 dollars." Aw, whatever. It's our money, but it's not like we're ever going to see it. |
| HardRock.com: If the VH1 producers had never called you to be on the show, where do you think you'd be right now and do you think you would've gotten this far? |
Brandin: I think we skipped a couple of steps.
Dominic: It would have taken us a little bit longer. But I still think we would have made it.
Brandin: I mean, we had major level interest for a while before we had ever got on the TV show. We were doing well regionally in Texas. I mean, we definitely would have broke, it was just a matter of time. You know sometimes just the right doors open up. Some bands they get big off of having an actor in their band.
Rex: The show put off a lot of labels. They didn't get it. A lot of labels thought that we were created by VH1, like we didn't exist before. It was like The Real World or whatever. They just picked a band and put it on there. And the labels were all like "What's this all about?"
Brandin: A lot of other musicians think that we were only signed because of a TV show. When actually it deterred a lot of labels that were interested in us. We had to kinda start back over and get past the TV show. The labels that did throw deals down on the table were "we like the CD, we don't care about the TV show." That's cool. A lot of bands are like "Oh, that's that band that got signed to Epic." Especially the bands that aren't signed, they have a bitter problem and say, "They only got signed because they were on a TV show." And we are like "Hey, man, that TV show almost stopped us from getting signed." So, don't let that fool you. |
| HardRock.com: What line in your song "Coke" did you have to change because of Coke's threat to sue? |
Brandin: The line was "Lying here naked with my girl." And Coca-Cola liked the song, but didn't want "naked" to be associated in the song. I don't know.
Rex: They wanted us to put "butt-naked" in it and we said, "No, we're not doing that." We'll do "taken" all right.
Dominic: Butt-naked. (laughs)
Brandin: It's a pain, but Epic kind of, you know, there was a decision that came down that, you know, that Coke didn't want the song on the album if it was going to say "naked." |
| HardRock.com: What did you change it to? |
Brandin: It says "taken" now. Which of course was not something that myself and the other guys wanted to do, but Epic knew that it was probably the biggest single on the album and it was kind of "You need to do this change." One of those things. "We're not going to make you do it, but it's in your best future interest to do it." So none of us wanted to go back to waiting tables, so we did it.
Rex: Like it would effect Coca-Cola in the least bit. It's not like you'd go to the machine and be like "Hmm, they have that song that says 'naked' in it...Pepsi." |
| HardRock.com: Because of this, do you now wish you were to give the world a Pepsi instead? |
Brandin: We thought about it. (laughs)
Rex: RC Cola. Give the little guys a shot.
Dominic: RC.
Brandin: I think it's all kinds of ridiculous.
Rex: Get real with Dr. Pepper, dude.
Brandin: Dr. Pepper is a very Texas thing.
Rex: Very Texas. Extra sweet.
Brandin: My mother will only drink Dr. Pepper. No Coke. That's not because of the song. |
| HardRock.com: Have you ever taken the Pepsi Challenge?
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| Rex: They still do the Pepsi Challenge? |
| HardRock.com: Yeah, I've done it. |
| Brandin: Dom didn't study for it. |
| HardRock.com: I did. I studied for it and got an "A." I chose Pepsi. |
Brandin: I like soft drinks. But no diet drinks.
Dominic: Sodas are bad. |
| HardRock.com: Yeah, I drink water. Now, I understand that you guys can really drink.
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| Dominic: Whatever gave you that idea. |
| HardRock.com: Tell me one of your craziest experiences that you remember. |
Dominic and Brandin: (laugh)
Rex: See, now there lies the problem. You lost me at remember.
Brandin: You lost me at remember. |
| HardRock.com: Alright, so tell me some that you can't remember.
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Rex: There are too many.
Dominic: They told me that I bit somebody last night. |
| HardRock.com: Bit somebody? |
Brandin: Yeah, he bit our tour manager last night.
Rex: Did you?
Dominic: Yeah.
Rex: Why did you bite him?
Dominic: You lost me at remember.
Rex: You bit yourself the other night.
Dominic: Yeah, I was trying to bite him, but I bit myself.
Brandin: It's true. He was wrestling with a friend in the bus.
Rex: What's up with the biting, man.
Dominic: You can't feed me after midnight.
Brandin: And they both had no shirts on, so there are two bare arms and they were locked up in this thing and he went to bite the other guy's arm and he bit his own arm. (laughs)
Dominic: (laughs)
Brandin: Yeah, I mean it's pretty ridiculous.
Dominic: We drink way too much alcohol.
Brandin: Our alcoholism is quite ridiculous. |
| HardRock.com: How many beers can you drink in one sitting? |
| Dominic: Let's just say we go through five cases of beer and two bottles of Jagermeister every night. |
| HardRock.com: Every night? |
Brandin: Put it this way. Every club that we go to, they look at our list that they give us backstage and they go, "How many people are in your band? Is it an orchestra?"
Dominic: And that doesn't include all of the shots that people buy us.
Brandin: Well, that is the thing. Don't go on a TV show and drink a lot and get a reputation for liking to have some drinks.
Dominic: We get about five series of shots pretty much every night.
Brandin: Everybody wants to do a shot with you. Even if you don't want to drink. People are like…
Dominic: Tough $@#%!
Brandin: You can be nice, signing autographs and having a good time and meeting people, having a great time. And people are like (mimicking a drunken fan) "I told my brother that I was going to take a shot with you." |
| HardRock.com: (laughs) |
Dominic: (laughs)
Brandin: And then you look back and they have a line and then you see all these other guys holding shots. And then you are like (sighs).
Rex: I've had people in one club get in line to buy me shots. I'm like, "you're third dude." (laughs) I had to escape. I had to leave.
Dominic: I have to go, man!
Brandin: It's really not that funny. It's funny sad. (laughs)
Dominic and Rex: Funny sad. (laugh) |
| HardRock.com: (laughs) In light of your song "Beautiful," what do you find to be "Beautiful"? |
| Brandin: Like in the song? |
| HardRock.com: No, like in life… |
| Brandin: In general? |
| HardRock.com: Yeah. |
Dominic: The fact that we get to do this for a living.
Brandin: Yeah, the fact that we've all wanted to do this since we were young.
Rex: Puppy dogs.
Dominic:(laughs) Puppy dogs. |
| HardRock.com: Puppy dogs and flowers. |
Rex: Little bunnies.
Brandin: Bunnies are beautiful. Rex has a lot of stuffed animals in his bunk.
Rex: Bunnies are vicious. I had one as a pet, they are vicious, vicious animals. They fool you. They fool you.
Dominic: What?
Rex: Bunnies. I had one as a pet.
Dominic: Did it bite you?
Rex: Oh terrible, terrible pet.
Dominic: (laughs)
Rex: They are terrible. They are like squirrels. They are cute and everything. But they will scratch your eyes out.
Brandin: You're a kid and you think it's going to be all…and you're holding it and "aughhh!"
Rex: "Aughhhh!" It's a vicious rodent.
Brandin: Rabid bunnies and our jobs is what's beautiful. Ah, no, I don't know. Normal things. See your dad healthy or your mom…
Rex: Pizza.
Dominic: Pizza's evil. There is nothing beautiful about it.
Brandin: A cooler full of ice-cold beer.
Rex: I had one last night. You can't have that on the bus, dude.
Dominic: Yeah, we have to get rid of the toaster oven.
Rex: Yeah, the toaster oven is a bad idea.
Dominic: All with that comes a lot of frozen @#$%.
Brandin: That pertains to which question?
Dominic: No one really.
Brandin: (laughs)
Rex: Don't know really. |
| HardRock.com: How did you guys come up with your album's title, Welcoming Home the Astronauts? |
Brandin: The story is…it was an instrumental song that we did.
Dominic: 17 minutes.
Brandin: Yeah, it was like 18 minutes long. We used to tour west Texas and if you ever toured west Texas it's pretty terrible.
Dominic: You see a bunch of people with no teeth.
Brandin: They only like country or metal. And we would be booked in these places and they would be "what the hell is this crap?"
Dominic: "Free Bird!"
Brandin: So we would open up with this space rock like opus that was called "Welcoming Home the Astronauts" in order to piss off…
Rex: Opus?
Brandin: I don't know, whatever. An epic song.
Rex: Opus.
Brandin: …in order to piss off all the rednecks. So they would either leave or we would know who was already not going to like us. And then when we chose the album title we just thought that it just blended with some of the other songs that kinda had that kind of atmosphere and vibe. That's basically it—to piss off rednecks. |
| HardRock.com: If you could flick off anybody in the whole world, present or past, who would it be? |
| Rex: Flick off? |
| HardRock.com: Flickerstick—flick off, you know. |
Rex: What does that mean exactly? Is that a bad thing?
Dominic: This is a flick. (shoots Rex "the bird")
Rex: That's a flick.
Dominic: That's a flick. I didn't mean it.
Rex: Oh.
Brandin: Put it this way. Probably the #1 band in America right now.
Rex: Hey man, don't bite the hand that feeds you.
Brandin: I'm just going to keep my mouth shut.
Dominic: I can say something obvious and say "Saddam Hussein."
Brandin: What?!? (laughs)
Rex: (laughs)
Dominic: (flicks his buddies off) |
| HardRock.com: (laughs) |
Rex: Still mad at Saddam? We're on Bid Laden now, dude. Saddam is on the back burner now.
Dominic: Okay. My bad.
Rex: Bid Laden is a good answer.
Brandin: Who shot Lennon?
Rex: Hinkley?
Brandin: No, he shot Reagan. |
| HardRock.com: Yeah, he shot Reagan. Oh I can't believe I can't remember who shot Lennon. |
Brandin: I can't think either.
Dominic: We're dumb. We need food.
Rex: Me hungry now.
(As an afterthought, it was Mark David Chapman who assassinated John Lennon at around 11pm on December 8, 1980 in New York City.) |
