When you get ready to interview a band like
TurboNegro, you don’t really know what to expect. I
was expecting to hear some kind of deep-voiced monster
saying "You bore me, I go make party now," and hang up
on me.
What I found was a band that had only a slight accent, despite their Norweigan handicap. The only
difference that stood out was that instead of saying
"ummm," there was a guttural sound that gave me the
sense of a man straining on the crapper.
Racket grabbed Happy Tom, bass player for the death-punk band, and we discussed penis-holsters, sports cars and groupies. Here’s how it went:
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Photo by Stian Anderson > >
RACKET: Hey there! You ready for this?
HAPPY TOM: Yeah!
RACKET: Alright! Let’s do this thing! First and foremost,
I’d like to know what you had for breakfast this
morning.
HAPPY TOM: Sort of… I had… We just played a show with
Marilyn Manson and Iron Maiden in Dublin, so I had a
very good hotel breakfast, consisting of scrambled eggs and a banana.
RACKET: Awesome. Just awesome. Are you touring with Manson, or are they big festivals?
HAPPY TOM: No, we played a couple of festivals with them in England, then last night in Ireland. It was cool.
RACKET: What is the funniest gift someone has given you on tour?
HAPPY TOM: I don’t know. We get a lot of weird stuff, like
this penis holster. Got it in the mail yesterday from
someone in Germany. It has a little thing for your
balls, too.
RACKET: Well, that was thoughtful.
HAPPY TOM: That might come in handy in the cold, Norwegian winter.
RACKET: Fuck the cold. Have you ever killed a man just to
watch him die?
HAPPY TOM: Well… (Exceptionally long pause) No, that would be unethical.
RACKET: Can you define a turbo negro?
HAPPY TOM: It’s actually a color you have on your car.
Especially the Italian cars. That’s turbonegro. I
don’t know if it’s named after us, or us after them.
RACKET: We owe our popularity to our overusage of
sweatbands. Do you feel that you owe a lot of your
popularity to Bam Margera?
HAPPY TOM: Yeah, because MTV didn’t want us on there and Bam helped us sneak in through the back door. There are a lot of people who wouldn’t have heard of us otherwise.
RACKET: In "Wasted Again," there’s a lot of, let’s say,
"sources cited." Just how many song lyrics are in
there?
HAPPY TOM: I don’t know, man. The entire record is music we stole from other people. It’s an illegal minefield
waiting to happen. An illegal time bomb.
RACKET: This will end in tears, Thomas, you mark my words. What is the plan for the future of the band?
HAPPY TOM: Just trying to get our career to peak, then drift into obscurity in a downward spiral of being a
degenerate.
RACKET: Have you received much trash talk from the band
Turbohonkey?
HAPPY TOM: We just like playing loud music.
RACKET: How have the ladies been over the years? Do they flock in by the dozens?
HAPPY TOM: Surprisingly enough, yes! Yeah.
RACKET: What city or country has the hottest groupies?
HAPPY TOM: Probably Scandinavia.
RACKET: Yeah? Alright, who’s your favorite author?
HAPPY TOM: Louis Beline. You’ll have to look him up; he’s a Frenchman.
RACKET:How does it feel to be in the most awesome band
ever, now and forever?
HAPPY TOM: We pinch our arms everyday just to make sure it’s not a beautiful dream.
RACKET: Okay. We’re done here… Thanks!
HAPPY TOM: Thanks a lot, man. I’ll talk to you later.
By Jonathan Yost