STARPOLISH: You said earlier in our interview that it's
a great politically to be a bass player in a band. Do you have any
specific advice for bass players? Or if you want to learn the bass,
any study suggestions?
WATT: Yeah, play a lot with
the Motown records. There's a lot of rhythm in it. Just turn them
all treble, and you be the bass player. Don't even copy the parts,
just play along with them. Jim Jamerson played bass on some of them
records. You know, he does what a bass player does in a band --
he pumps the band up, he's like the air in the tires. The guys are
just tires -- they're just rubber and rims, and you're the air.
So you gotta have a kind of underdog personality a little bit. But
also [be] kind of understated - there's nothing worse than a bass
bogart. Somehow you have to aid and abet. But I think everybody's
got that side of a personality to them. And it's just they want
that to come out, and think then they'll be a bass player. I do
believe girls probably make better bass players than guys.
STARPOLISH: Why's that?
WATT: I think they think more
with their body and less with their head. I play my bass a lot,
and there's a lot of guitar in my mind, and I don't think girls
think like that so much. Because they don't play guitar like that,
you know? There's something about lead guitar -- it's intense. It's
[the same with] keyboard players, too, and even drummers. I think
girls don't have that problem so much. Maybe they weren't raised
in such a thick culture that way. I mean, I love Jimi Hendrix, I'm
not against him. But there's something about the girls, I'm very
interested in the way that a lot of them think about the parts differently
-- you get more counterpoint. Whenever you get too much in-breeding,
it's like when everybody's on the same pedal on the bicycle -- whoa!
It's all lop-sided. But a foot on each pedal -- that's the way music
works good for me, everybody's not just on the same riff. There
are things pushin' for every pullin,' and pumpin' for every puffin'
out. That's the dynamic I see in making music. Again, that comes
from being a bass player. I don't really hear things as much in
layers. I hear them all working together, in one big ol' bunch.
But then, I've always kind of been in simple situations. Even on
[the album] Ballhog or Tugboat?, I played with 60 people but they
were still in small little units. I don't really have the experience
of playing with big bands yet. Maybe I will.
I like what I do. I even have my drummers point toward me, so I'm
looking at him right in the face, the kick drum right in my leg.
There's something about the whole experience to me. I feel whole,
like a swimmer. I'm in it. I'm in it.
ON MUSIC AND ITS MISSION
STARPOLISH: Could you talk about what, in your mind, the
purpose of music is? What it means to you - sort of a mission statement,
for lack of a better way of putting it, about how you view the future
of music, and the future of punk. The idea behind this question
is to give young people who may not have these thoughts solid in
their heads some inspiration on how to build these kinds of thoughts.
WATT: Well, I think music is
to prove to each other that we're alive. It's weird, there's a lot
action that's involved, there's a lot of planning. Practice. Getting
it together. There are also a lot of chances and accidents and quirks
in our personalities. But it all comes together to put fire in the
eyes, the heart, the ears. Music is a strange kind of thing.
"The future of punk, it'll be hopefully intense, using computers
and bands to break down borders, to break down barriers…to
break down all kinds of fake categories and stuff like that."
The problem [is that] it's associated with a lot of images that
aren't locked, static things that aren't free. And there's still
a lot of pressure on young people. In order for them to feel cool
they have to walk down these real worn-out hallways and cellblocks
and escalators at the mall. It's bullshit…they should be up there
springing and jumping all around the place…tree houses and monkey
bars and stuff like that. And so you get this other kind of thing
-- this is a problem.
I think the young people, for one thing, understand there's a campaign
against them, calling them slackers, trying to make them impotent
and having no power, making them a total herd for marketing. They
are vulnerable and I don't blame them for almost being cynical,
because they get hustles run on them left and right to buy everything,
making them get cell phones, cigarettes, and even telling them what
fucking songs to play.
So young people have to realize that in a way they are connected
with people who've come before them. 'Cause people who have come
before them have seen where ideas have failed and crumbled -- and
gotten kind of bummed out on that. And young people look for inspiration
from people who are kind of fearless, because they just don't know
yet, they haven't hit their head up against walls yet, and they
have this incredible enthusiasm. Enthusiasm is a great thing, you
know...especially if it's to tear, to fuckin' try crazy shit. I
can't tell you how infectious that is. It's sort of like the disease
of being curious. There are certain infections that I'm all into,
that I wouldn't mind them spreading around to people. I've tried
to live my life as a kind of example.
The future of punk, it'll be hopefully intense, using computers
and bands to break down borders, to break down barriers…to break
down all kinds of fake categories and stuff like that. Destroy government
and racism and stuff. I mean this is where I'd like to see it go.
Cure AIDS and cancer -- I mean, the whole deal! We'll have punk
doctors, punk scientists, punk…we already got Milo [Aukerman, who
left seminal punk band The Descendents to study medicine], a punk
biochemist. I mean, like I said, it's a state of mind. That's where
I see the future. I even kind of see it from the beginning -- it
always was a state of mind. It was at the Rocky Horror Picture Show
thing, with people throwing rice at the screen. They just didn't
want to sit and listen to the movie, they wanted to be part of it.
So I see those kinds of vibes in it for myself and my fellow travelers.
