Carl Begai

By Carl Begai

When Trans-Siberian Orchestra / Savatage guitarist Chris Caffery refers to Tears Of The Sun, he’s not talking about a new sadboy love song he’s just written, or taking a shot at launching a Broadway play. Nope. Tears Of The Sun is, in fact, a Caffery-created hot sauce that has gone from his kitchen to the stores through a series of fortunate coincidences. And unlike a lot of “celebrity” marketed products – which usually feature little or no actual input from the star in question even though his/her name is slapped on the label – Caffery can lay claim to having created Tears Of The Sun hot sauce from scratch.

“All of it is my recipe, actually, because I’ve been cooking my entire life,” says Caffery. “Steve Seabury at High River Sauces is responsible for getting it out there. The whole idea of making the hot sauce company that he has came about while he was managing some of my solo stuff and dipping his feet into the food business at the same time. I gave him some of the hot sauce I’d made at a business meeting, and he really liked it. From there Steve eventually got into doing it as a business, but this recipe is 100% mine. I measured the ingredients and sent it to the guy that was making it; they cooked it off of that. I had them tweak it a little bit because I wasn’t completely happy with the way it came out, and we ended up with the hot sauce we have now.”

“It’s not like I’m just stamping my name on a bottle,” he continues. “In fact, I didn’t put my name on it at all because I didn’t want it to be presented as ‘Here, a musician put his name on some salsa.’ I wanted to make something that would actually get taken seriously, and it won two really big national hot sauce awards since it hit the market; Best New Hot Sauce Of The Year and Best Fruit-Based Habanero Sauce. I think that if we would have said it’s Chris Caffery’s Hot Sauce, that wouldn’t have happened.” (continue reading…)

By Carl Begai

I recently caught up with original Saigon Kick vocalist Matt Kramer to discuss his newest project, A Book Of Poems From The Smallest Of Towns. During the conversation we addressed the rather persistent rumours of a Saigon Kick reunion looming on the horizon, which have been gathering strength over the last year. Kramer revealed that he and his former bandmates have in fact tossed around the idea of getting back together, which came as a complete shock given that the mere mention of original guitarist Jason Bieler’s name 10, or even five years ago, was enough to blast open Kramer’s well stocked crate of derogatory adjectives. It turns out there are certain finance-oriented requirements that need to be resolved with Bieler before Kramer will commit, but in a nutshell, if they can come to terms Saigon Kick’s return goes from being a pipe dream to a definite possibility.

A day after the story’s publication – found here – I received a polite email from Bieler stating that, if I had the time and interest, he’d be open to telling his side of the story. It was a surprising offer, and accepting it a no-brainer, particularly since Bieler rarely speaks to the press. Between co-managing his own label, Bieler Brothers Records, and working on his Owl Stretching project there isn’t a lot of time that can be dedicated to rehashing the past. Or at least there wasn’t until now.

It should be noted that Bieler didn’t set out to shoot down Kramer’s claims, nor did he take potshots at his former bandmate. In fact, like Kramer, Bieler didn’t display even the slightest animosity. On the contrary, Bieler is all for working with Kramer again.

“I think Matt has his own perspective, and maybe his life has gone down a different path than mine, which has given him his feelings on the way things went down,” Bieler offers. “Do I think that I hold partial responsibility for making bad decisions in Saigon Kick? Absolutely. I think everybody shares that responsibility, though. Matt and I have spoken a few times over the last year, and things have been really civil, so that’s a healthy place to be. When everybody was on the phone talking about the possibility of a reunion, I told the guys that I don’t care if they want to draw up contracts, it was cool with me. I don’t want anything more than my share. So, whatever Matt wants to do, if he wants to do it, I’m fine with it.” (continue reading…)

By Carl Begai

I recently caught up with keyboardist Adam Wakeman, the son of Yes keysman Rick Wakeman, to discuss his new prog metal band Headspace. Formed in 2006, the band – also featuring vocalist Damian Wilson, guitarist Pete Rinaldi, bassist Lee Pomeroy and drummer Richard Brook – issued their debut EP in 2007 and are now gearing up for the release of their first full length, I Am Anonymous. Wakeman also offered a look into his current status as a member of Ozzy Osbourne’s band and how that will affect his activities in promoting Headspace when the album in released.

“I would love nothing more, as I know the other guys would, than to dedicate 100% of our time to be out touring with Headspace and making more records. Part of the problem with not being 20 years old anymore is that we’ve got families, and mortgages to pay. We have to balance the time we allocate to each thing. Ozzy is going to be relatively busy this year, but it’s not going to take over the entire year which is good. We will have some time to promote Headspace.”

The easiest solution to the promo problem would be, of course, to nab a support slot on the next Ozzy tour, whenever that comes around.

“I think we could probably do a few shows,” Wakeman agrees, “but the reception we got when we did some support slots (in 2007) was quite funny. I asked Sharon (Osbourne / wife and manager) is we could do it and she asked me ‘Why would you want to be fourth on the bill? There’ll be nobody here.’ This was at Wembley Arena. I said ‘Yeah, but if there are 5,000 people in it’s the equivalent to us playing 20 club shows. We might as well get it out of the way all in one go…’ (laughs). It was good, but people weren’t really expecting us because we got on the bill quite late. So, when we walked on stage people thought we were Black Label Society. You could see the looks of confusion on the faces in the crowd (laughs).” (continue reading…)

By Carl Begai

For the uninitiated, Saigon Kick was a band that could have and should have made it big. By no means did they take the world by storm with the release of their self-titled debut in 1991, but anyone with an open mind fortunate to stumble across it was instantly hooked. A rabid cross between The Sex Pistols and The Beatles, with occasional stomps through the Orient, a truckload of attitude and tongue planted firmly in cheek as required, Saigon Kick sounded like no other artist on the scene. They quickly became a cult favourite. It was their second album – The Lizard, issued in 1992 – that put the band on the map, but for all the wrong reasons if you talk to vocalist Matt Kramer. When he quit in 1993 while recording their third album, Water, it was essentially the beginning of the end. The band went on to record three more studio albums with guitarist/co-founder Jason Bieler up front, but they were never able to recapture the magic of Saigon Kick’s early years.

Kramer has gone on record as saying that he and Bieler don’t see eye-to-eye on certain issues, making a reunion nearly impossible. An attempt was made in 1997, but things crashed and burned after only two shows. A follow-up tour in 2000 – without Bieler – held promise for some kind of future, but nothing materialized. Then, in 2009, word came down the band would get back together at the Rock Gone Wild Festival in Algona, Iowa. And once again, things fizzled out before they got off the ground.

“We were supposed to do the gig, but it went belly up,” Kramer explains. “The organizers went bankrupt before the show went down. It would have been a great show. We had Tony Sales from Tin Machine to play bass, we were looking at a couple different cats for guitar, so it would have been a really cool line-up. Sadly, it didn’t go through, but on that note maybe I can give you some interesting stuff that might have happened on the Saigon Kick road (laughs).” (continue reading…)

By Carl Begai

During a recent interview for the as-yet-untitled follow-up to his HDK album from 2009, System Overload, former After Forever guitarist Sander Gommans discussed his involvement on the new metal solo album from singer/songwriter and Avantasia / HDK vocalist Amanda Somerville. Gommans enjoys being his own boss, but he freely admits the creative process for the Trillium debut, Alloy, made him realize that even the master of the universe has to take the back seat once in a while.

“In the beginning it was hard for me because normally you wrote something for somebody and let it go, but since Amanda and I are partners, I didn’t let it go that easily. I wanted to make the best out of it, and I wanted Amanda to make the best choices. I helped her out with some of the administrative stuff and I wrote a few songs, but it was really Amanda’s project and I had to get used to her big involvement. Not so much in the writing of my songs, but in the vocal arrangements and lyrics. She had a really good idea of how the album should sound and what she wanted, and I kept telling her ‘It’s not metal enough… it needs to be more metal.’ And she would tell me, ‘This is my project, I want to have it exactly the way I want to have it…’ (laughs).”

“She made the choices in the creative aspects of the album, and now that it’s out, it’s about surprising to me how cool it is. It offers so much more than the average metal band, and it has so much more to it that you can really see what a talented person Amanda is when it comes to having her own vision. In my arrogance, I found out that I should stop being arrogant and shut up sometimes (laughs).” (continue reading…)

By Carl Begai

In January 2010, Fozzy – the side-project turned full scale war machine featuring Stuck Mojo guitarist/vocalist Rich Ward and vocalist/wrestling star Chris Jericho – released their fourth studio album, Chasing The Grail. Amongst the guest musicians that appeared on the record was Annihilator guitarist Jeff Waters, who laid down solos for the tracks ‘Martyr No More’ and ‘God Pounds His Nails’. Waters is no stranger to lending out his talents to projects he feels are worthy of time spent, and although it’s a no-brainer finding Ward and Jericho on that list, it’s still a big deal when Waters agrees to enter the picture and add his brand of shred to the canvas.

“That was the coup of ages, man,” laughs Ward. “I asked Chris if he was okay with having a guest guitar player or two on the album. We did it on the previous one (All That Remains from 2005), and it was cool having Marty Friedman (ex-Megadeth) and Zakk Wylde (Black Label Society) come in and lay down their stuff. For me as a fan of those guys it was just cool. Chris asked me who I had in mind for Chasing The Grail, and I gave him three or four names. He balked on all of them except for Waters (laughs) (continue reading…)

By Carl Begai

I recently caught up with Obsession vocalist Michael Vescera to discuss his latest career move as the frontman of the Japanese anime-inspired band, Animetal USA. We quite naturally touched on his stint with Loudness from ’89 – ’91, when guitarist Akira Takasaki fired original singer Minoru Niihara in the interest of gaining attention on the North American market. The change didn’t go over well with the majority of Loudness fans, and it was dubbed a failed experiment by some, but Vescera is still regarded as an important part of the band’s history. That said, when Loudness toured the US in May / June 2011 – with Niihara up front – the internet was abuzz with claims that Vescera would join the band on stage when they hit Nashville. The May 23rd gig came and went, but there was no follow-up on YouTube or anywhere else to suggest the highly anticipated reunion ever took place or had even been planned. Until now…

“That was absolutely true,” Vescera confirms. “We’ve been talking quite a bit, actually, me and the Loudness guys. I see their manager George (Azuma) quite often; when he’s in Nashville we hang out. When Munetaka (Higuchi/drums) died in 2008 (following an eight month battle with liver cancer) I issued a statement and Akira contacted me. We’ve been talking back and forth for a few years, and Akira’s mentioned a couple times that he’d like to do something again. So, when they were touring the States this summer they called me from San Francisco and mentioned they were coming to Nashville; would I come out and perform a couple songs with them? I told them I’d love to. I even talked to Minoru, who was totally into the idea. But, the night before the show we had tornados come through and they did so much fucking damage. I think the guys were in Chicago, and they couldn’t risk the possibility of driving through that, so they had to cancel the show.”

“The gig was at the Mercy Lounge, and everyone was going to come out to see them. The guys from Cinderella, Slaughter… basically anyone who was in a metal band in Nashville was going to come out. It was so sad that they had to smoke it. So yeah, it was definitely a true story.” (continue reading…)

By Carl Begai

Once upon a time, Kittie irritated the hell out of me.

It didn’t matter that I was a huge believer in and supporter of Canadian metal and assorted aggressive offshoots; the hype that surrounded their 1999 debut album Spit rubbed me the wrong way. It blew my mind that a band featuring a singer with zero vocal control was able to sell a song like ‘Brackish’, Kittie’s teen angst calling card featuring one of the most annoyingly memorable choruses known to man, woman and pub crawling beast. Any attention I paid to the band after that record was out of masochistic curiosity, and fleeting at best.

Fast forward to 2007 and a four song EP entitled Never Again dumped in my lap by management via BW&BK HQ. I couldn’t believe my ears even after repeated listens, and I was left wondering what the four women masquerading as Kittie had done with the Lander sisters. They were, after all, the creative core of the band and had proven limited in that capacity as far as I was concerned. This new material, this was music. Hell, it was fucking metal.

And singer Morgan? She’d picked up control, shred-ability, and a Flying V along the way.

Calls were made, emails were sent, and I learned that Kittie was a family affair, with Morgan (vocals/guitars) and Mercedes’ (drums) parents taking care of most of the band’s legal and promotional affairs. The interview with the sisters that followed, for the Funeral For Yesterday album, proved to me that the ladies could stand on their own feet rather than needing to rely on mommy and daddy. They were also real musicians with a clear view of where they came from and a vision of where they wanted to take their music. They turned me into a Kittie fanboy. (continue reading…)

By Carl Begai

During a recent interview with producer / guitarist Andy Sneap about working with his childhood heroes Hell (found here), we discussed the hands-on role he played in putting German legends Accept back into the spotlight with their 2010 comeback album, Blood Of The Nations. Calling the record a success is a massive understatement given the fact the band did it without original frontman Udo Dirkschneider, receiving praise for creating some of the strongest material of their career. Not only was Mark Tornillo embraced as Accept’s new vocalist, the songs as a whole seemed to reach back to the band’s classic early works without sounding dated. Guitarist Wolf Hoffmann has gone on record in numerous interviews claiming that Sneap was single-handedly responsible for kick-starting the Accept machine back to life, and while Sneap downplays his influence, he’s happy to be on board for the follow-up.

“I’m doing the new Testament album, and that should last about six weeks, so I’m looking at the end of August to start working on the next Accept record. I’ll pop over to Nashville and sit down with Wolf to go over ideas on that. The good thing about that and the Hell record, and the Testament record as well, is that I’m actually quite involved from the ground up. I’m not just coming in, pressing buttons and just recording the band; I’m actually a valued person to bounce ideas off. It’s almost like being an extra member of the band.” (continue reading…)

By Carl Begai

Even though the release of Kobra And The Lotus’ new album, Visionary, is still months away, the band has been anything but quiet. In a surprise move they issued a video for new song ‘Welcome To My Funeral’ as a taste of what’s to come without a date even being set. On top of that, they’ve been tearing up the road in the UK, and have confirmed an extensive European tour supporting metal veterans U.D.O. for the fall. Recent developments saw me doing some work on behalf of the Kobra crew, which involved hearing Visionary in its entirety, and it’s safe to say the band has evolved into something much stronger and meaner than even their most devout fans can imagine. Vocalist Brittany Paige took some time out from a hectic tour schedule to discuss where the band has been, where they’re going, and what kind of mayhem the fans are in for.

Bottom line; it’ll be worth the wait.

“After our first big summer tour in 2010, it put in perspective the main areas of improvement we needed to focus on,” Paige begins, discussing the line-up changes that have taken place since the release of their 2010 debut, Out Of The Pit. “The first step was making sure the line-up was strong enough. We needed every member to be on the exact same track in terms of commitment, vision and effort. We parted ways with Matt Van Wezel (guitars) and bassist Ben Freud. It put us in a very tough position because we had the UK tour coming up shortly after. When we came back in the winter, Chris (Swenson / guitars) and I began writing the album. This also really put into perspective the true foundation of the band. I composed some of the songs by myself – such as ‘Welcome To My Funeral’ – and together we wrote the album, so the fact that the bass and lead guitar weren’t filled concrete roles had no effect on the writing process.” (continue reading…)