STEVE O.D. INTERVIEW
Interview with HOG CALLER guitarist Steve O'Donnell by Eaton Kunzler to be featured in SEPTI-GORE ZINE!!!
-
1.When did HOG CALLER form and why? Who are the members?
Steve: Formed Winter 2004 out of sheer boredom... HOG CALLER is Vomitrocious (aka Steve O'Donnell, aka The Drugstore Cowboy, Purveyor of Gutter Bravado) on lead guitar, vocals, bass, lyrics, samples; and The Dirt Farmer (aka Tom Richards, aka Tom Collins, aka Philepe II, aka More Than Snootful) on drum programming, guitar, bass, vocals, lyrics).
-
2. You were the guitarist for EXIT - 13. And created harsh electronic noise as PICA... both projects were released by Relapse Records in the 1990's. How long have you been making extreme music?
Steve: Making punk, thrash and hardcore metal since 1984. Maybe earlier? Making experimental music since about the same time, all influenced by massive amounts of drug and alcohol use... alcohol, marijuana, hash, hash oil, THC pills, mushrooms, LSD, Valium, Quualude, Dilidid, peyote, cocaine, crystal meth, heroin, morphine, codeine, Vikidan, oxycontin, Absinthe, moonshine, ... ha ha ha... I've been playing the same riff since 1984 and can't finish it! There is always the chance that EXIT-13 may return for another toke...
-
3. Why use a drum machine and not a real drummer?
Steve: More beer for the band. The drum machine never bogarts the pipe. We lost two drummers to strokes and heart attacks! Ever try to find a grindcore drummer in Middletown, Pennsylvania?
4. Do you make your own sauerkraut? Where did those bloody pig heads come from???
Steve: I have actually made sauerkraut, but only with cabbage from Colombia! Everyone knows pork and kraut is a traditional Pennsylvania Dutch New Years Day good luck meal! Cleans the colon... Groff's Meats in Elizabethtown, PA supplied the hog heads. The Dirtfarmer paid $10 a head. They make great Hog Head stew!
-
5.What is on your current playlist?
Steve: PORKTALLICA, HOUDINI'S PIGTRONICS, APRIL SWINE, JIMIMY DEAN HENDRIX, PIGGY SMALLS, HAMMY DAVIS JR., HOGWIND, ENGLEHOG HUMPERHEROINK, RIB ZOMBIE, PIGININI, CASS ELLIOTT, PORKLOAF, The NOTORIOUS P.I.G., ROGERS and HAMMERSWINE, ANGUS DUNG,
-
6. Do you prefer an oink or a squeal?
Steve: I prefer a grunt! Followed by a yelp and then a beer and a shot.
-
7. What equipment do you use to create HOG CALLER?
Steve: Everything released so far has been recorded on a Tascam cassette 4 track. I play a Gibson Studio Les Paul. Tom plays a Epiphone SG. We have a Conrad bass from the 1970's. A ZOOM drum machine. A Digitech RP 50. A Digitech Genesis. Weed. Troeganator. Hoegaarden White Ale. Pabst Blue Ribbon. Brandy + Cognac. Whiskey. Bacardi Rum. I smoke the rock out of a tire guage... The Dirtfarmer drinks cognac by the gallon and has psychotic interludes.
-
8. How many projects have been recorded at the Repugnant Trough Studio?
Steve: The Split CD with HEADCRASH, the Predestined For Hell full-length, two tracks for the REAL MEN WATCH PORN! 20 Way Split CD and three tracks for a Split 7" EP with PATOLOGICUM from Poland. The Dirtfarmer recently got a new Tascam digital 8 track and new Mac software so the HOG CALLER sound will be taking a filthier roll in the mud. We are currently working on several videos that The Dirtfarmer is editing at the Trough.
-
9. Having seen the videos, I can only say that they are quite bizarre... what is the premise?
Steve: Redemption through pig blood and the Holy Bible... the videographer almost puked. The Dirtfarmer is a professional video butcher and throws them together in a days work. We love guns and blood!
-
10. What do your parents think of HOG CALLER?
Steve: They think it's for square dancing or for picking up large women at Church.
-
11. Why mock George Bush? That sample at the beginning of Don't Drink The Water is brutal!
Steve: The Texas cattle baron? He's done more drugs than me! I'm jealous! The truth hurts. Ask the people of Louisiana!
-
12. Where is the Sweetest Place On Earth?
Steve: Hershey, PA. Radioactive chocolate forever and ever... Tom wrote that one about Milton Hershey being from another planet and coming to Pennsylvania to eat kiddies.
-
13. Do you call hogs? Ever catch a greased pig?
Steve: Every weekend, even though I'm married to one! Yeah, I caught a greasy one between the sheets! Check out CHARLES MINGUS Hog Calling Blues!
-
14. Do you think GOD will punish you for desecrating swine?
Steve: I like my bacon crispy and my BBQ spicy! I will not covet thy neighbor's hog! GOD pulls his own pork!
-
15. Are the rumors of a Split CD with Illinois BBQ maniacs LINCOLN LOVE LOG true?
Steve: We are currently writing material for that release. I have a track called Grey Matter about a demented brain collector. Another track is called Fear of Fear about the fear of fear. We are going to have some slow cooked numbers to match LLL's doom.
-
16. Actual influences of HOG CALLER? Seriously, what inspires the riffs and lyrics?
Steve: CNN, The History Channel, BLACK SABBATH, JIMI HENDRIX, ROBIN TROWER, FRANK ZAPPA, AC / DC, JOHNNY WINTER, Late night TV, The Three Stooges, The Simpsons, 50's Jazz, EXIT - 13, old NAPALM DEATH, REPULSION, TERRORIZER, DEAD KENNEDYS, Rachmananov, that's about it.
-
17. What's an average night out in Middletown entail?
Steve: Hit The Elks and The Moose for cheap booze and gambling, then on to Guido McNeals for some TROEGS Troeganators, smoke weed on the walk down to the Lamp Post Inn, several lines in the bathroom to wake up, rum and coke, a walk to Demp's Corner to hear EXIT-13 Smoking Songs CD on the jukebox, hit the Midtown Pizza for a slice and girls, a handful of pills from someone, was that an Oxy?, across town to the Blue Room, a road trip (and a fatty) to the Radio Active, back the Trough for shots of Tom's $50 brandy, more fatties, fall asleep in someone's yard and get arrested for public drunkeness, wake up in the Hospital psych ward strapped down to a gurney, ...told psychiatrist I drank so much because I was Irish!
-
18. Why play grindcore?
Steve: Couldn't make it as a Folk artist. My Gospel band failed. The Barber Shop quartet didn't approve of my drug habit. Opera made me suicidal. I play grindcore to pay the bills! I am drawn to the speed and intensity...
-
19. Scrapple or Souse?
Steve: I prefer bacon and sausage. Isn't scrapple ground up assholes? Last Souse On The Right!
-
20. How can listening to HOG CALLER improve your life?
Steve: Buy the CD so it can improve my life! Listening to HOG CALLER will stimulate every part of your pig.
-
21. Is pork really the other white meat?
Steve: Get porked! I haven't tried beastiality.
HOG CALLER c/o Steve O'D, P O. Box 71, Middletown, PA 17057 U.S.A.
