Interview Mat Arluck & Robert Lantham Sweet Cobra

Decibel Presents: BLESSED BLACK WINGS TOUR High On Fire Planes Mistaken For Stars Kylesa SWEET COBRA      2/20/05 Bottom Lounge

Lineup: Mat Arluck - Guitar Robert "Grumpy" Lantham - Guitar Remis Vasquez - Vocals Jason Gagovski - Drums

"Well the music industry is really a murky thing right now, but as far as all of us are concerned we're not part of it. We don't really give a flyin' fuck about it because we're not in it. We just want to do what we do and we give a flyin' fuck..."

Sweet Cobra are one of the hottest bands out of Chicago in quite sometime. Their sound is reminiscent of Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin, and they're favorite buddies Mastodon. They even have a song off their album Praise called Leviathan. In talking to the band's drummer, Brann Dailor, he called himself a big fan of this band from Chicago, that can't live without skating or the Top Gun soundtrack! In this exclusive interview, meet Mat and Robert, the guitarists from the best kept secret in Chicago. They speak about their influences, their songwriting and who'd they like to tour with. Also, Mat lets everyone know how he feels about Metallica's St. Anger. Read on to find out more!

Sharita: So introduce yourselves please?

Robert: My name is Robert "Grumpy" Lantham, and you are?

Mat: Um, I don't have a stage name. This Mat Arluck, I'm guitar and scream at random. Grumpy plays guitar as well.

Sharita: Your album is called Praise how has the response been for the album?

Robert: Well I'm oblivious to a lot of things especially when it comes to the album. Pretty much it's been...

Mat: It's been great.

Robert: I'm gonna go on and say great.

Mat: Well, I again I didn't play on this album but I was a fan before. I saw them with a couple of friends. Bob Lantham and I used to skateboard together. When I saw, them I was just blown away, and again when I started playing with them. I thought the record was awesome, the song's were great, all the guys in the band were friends of mine so, I'm pretty stoked about playing with them. Anyway, all the reviews that I've read online have been pretty good. The next one better get the same response because I'm playin' on that one. It don't want it to be like (changes voice) well the sophomore slump is evident here. (laughs)

Robert: I mean, I love Neeraj (Kane) the original guy in the band but having Mat in the band has been a dream come true because he's a friend of mine and we skateboard together and that's important to me. I wouldn't be able to be in a band that goes on tour and doesn't go skateboarding. That would be crazy!

Mat: Yeah, skateboarding is a part of our lives and everybody but our drummer skates.

Sharita: Ok great, so what would you say is your songwriting style? Do you take the approach of writing based on what you read?

Robert: Pretty much, we don't have any set curriculum for how we do anything. (laughs) One of us will come up with a riff or a whole entire song and tell everybody else and we just play off of one another. Once the song is together or it's been kind of sitting around, Remis (vocals and bass) will come up with the melody and the lyrics but know there has been a couple of huge songs, it's almost like were a couple of different bands, and it's because we have no set way of going about it. It really just kind of evolves.

Mat: We just come up with lyrical issues or topics and Remis writes all the lyrics and he reads a lot. I don't even know, it's a lot of historical stuff I guess.

Sharita: Did he write about Moby Dick?

Mat: Haven't wrote about Moby Dick. (smiles) He likes narrative kind of songwriting a lot of his lyrics are based on some kind of story or something fictitious that he wrote.

Robert: He kind of takes a subject and kind of loosely bases it on what's going on around him. He really lets it go...

Mat: He's pissed.

Robert: He's not very happy about a lot of things.

Mat: That's what makes it good though. He's a pissed motherfucker. It's good to be in a band with a guy that's pissed because there is some emotion involved. He really shows it on stage, it's like he's tough guy on stage. (laughs) He's a great guy but when he's up there...

Robert: It's a joy to be able to write songs as a guitar player and know that the person singing the song is going to come up with really good shit over it and it's gonna' be solid. It's such a relief. It's not going to be like aw man, and worry about it being weak. That's never happened.

Mat: We all write.

Robert: Yeah everyone in the band has written songs or parts of songs.

Sharita: Is there a title for the next album yet?

Robert: Ooh, I don't know if we can release that yet. (laughs) The working title is Sweet Cobra Forever and then we have a title of a song that's the same thing, which at some point you may or may not hear but that song is pretty tough.

Mat: Yeah that song is pretty cool, we wrote it together.

Sharita: So are you ready to start recording the album?

Robert: Oh Jesus.

Mat: We've got a problem in this band that I've never had with any other band; we write too many songs. (laughs) So every time we get together to finish one, we write another one. We got about six songs that we could record tomorrow.

Robert: But all together we have about fifteen songs we could practice. It's cool but it's also kind of a weird curse.

Mat: I've always been in bands that didn't have enough. The problem here is we don't have time to put them together because when we get together we write a freakin' no one. So it's like, aw man let's save that one. I mean it's great that everyone has songs and ideas but it's like geez let's finish one. If we have ideas we're gonna write a song every time at practice.

Sharita: That's a good thing.

Mat: Oh it's a great thing.

Robert: The worst thing is when we get back together and go how did that riff go?

Mat: Yeah we need to buy one of those. (Mat points to my micro cassette recorder)

Robert: Yeah

Sharita: The recorder? (laugh)

Mat: Step into the 18th century. (laughs)

Robert: (laughs)

Mat: We need one badly.

Robert: There's one riff that we played the other day, I think I might have had ADD on and I can't figure out how to play it it's insane. (laughs) We spent at least an hour and I couldn't figure out how to play it.

Mat: Nothing was helping. I mean he put a milk crate on the ground and stood on it to see if elevation would work. (laughs)

Sharita: Brann told me that he has a little recorder that he hums into if he comes up with rhythms or lyrics late at night.

Mat: That's a great idea because there's a lot of riffs that come to you when you sit down with a guitar and they get stuck in your head, then you can hum it into a recorder. My friend has one like that too, and he just hums into it when he gets an idea. We're behind the times! (laughs)

Sharita: For all you young bands out there, buy a tape recorder. (laughs)

Robert: Pretty much. as far as the new album I'm lookin' at a double with about eighty songs on it. (laughs)

Sharita: Are you guys self-taught or did you take lessons?

Mat: I had guitar lessons when I was like thirteen, my mom rented me a guitar from Guitar Center and an amp. But I didn't even now you we're supposed to put your fingers between the frets, I thought you were supposed to put them on the frets which is right now. (laughs) I was like why is it buzzing, ooh! I had a teacher that was a stoner and he smoked all the time, I smelled somethin' on him; but I was only thirteen, didn't know what it was.

Robert: Maybe you thought he was burning leaves all the time. (laughs)

Mat: So, he would just sit there and jam and I'd be there with my guitar and watch him. He would go, ok I'm gonna teach you how to talk about love and I would go dude, I don't even know where to put my hand; (laughs) I don't even know how to hold a pick and this thing is not even in tune. It didn't do me any good, so I stopped takin' lessons and my parents gave that guitar back, so I end up getting a guitar at a garage sale and played that. So, I guess I am ended up teaching myself anyway.

Robert: I took a handful of lessons from a wonderful man named Ken Hazelrick and it turned out that he was just such an awesome guy to hang out with that we'd never get anything done. I'd get there and we just started talking and not play guitar until like fifty minutes in. He'd teach me Black Dog by Led Zeppelin everyday and I would go ok, I learned Black Dog today! (laughs) That only lasted like a month. I'm pretty much self-taught and Remis is also, I dunno about Jason (drums).

Mat: I dunno either.

Robert: I think being self taught is kind of important to us because all of our songs are a result of exploring our instruments. if we knew what we were doing we probably wouldn't be able to write songs, because we'd realize it's already been done. So our ignorance has got us taken us a long way so far.

Mat: (agrees) I learned how to read music and I just didn't think it was important to write it, I tend to just play by ear. I thought a sharp ear was better that reading notes.

Robert: A lot of things that we do are technically wrong, we change key and time things like that. I think it's helped us develop our own sound work.

Mat: Soundwork? Is that a word? (laughs)

Robert: Especially, Remis because he plays very percussively because he is originally a drummer. He's a great drummer. The way he writes is very melodic but it makes no goddamn' sense. As a rhythmic guitar player, I look at the CD and say that makes no sense but it sounds bad ass! We just go with it.

Sharita: Do either one of you have a favorite guitarist that inspired you to play?

Mat: My favorite, Grumpy T. Lantham. (laughs) No, I like Metallica, I was obsessed with them. Kirk Hammett and James Hetfield because he maintained all the rhythm. I was never really the biggest fan of the guitarists. Anyone can be an awesome guitar player.

Robert: I have too many to mention, honestly.

Sharita: How about the top guy.

Robert: The top guy? That's really tough man. As far as older bands, everyone that was in Thin Lizzy and there were about sixty guitar players in that band. (laughs)

Mat: Gary Moore. Shredder.

Robert: I'm kind of fortunate because I played with the guys in Mastodon. Everyone is just fuckin' awesome musicians. That's pretty much saying Thin Lizzy twice because they're at that same level. We know that playing with High on Fire is kind of ridiculous because they're awesome too!

Mat: Yeah, the Mastodon guys are fuckin' cool.

Robert: They are fuckin' stupid serious.

Mat: Yeah, Brann is like so good man. And they are so nice that makes a world of difference when you meet somebody as good and popular as they are you respect them more.

Robert: The majority of my idols are skateboarders. I draw all my inspiration from skateboarding. I don't really like music that much.

Mat: It's all because of the Top Gun Soundtrack?

Robert: Yeah. (laughs) I love the Top Gun Soundtrack.

Sharita: Really? What's your favorite?

Robert: Uh, ooh gosh that's tough. I'll say the Cheap Trick song, Mighty Wings. I mean outside of that I don't give a flyin' fuck about Cheap Trick. (laughs) I go on and say another band though. They broke up a couple of years ago and my friend Pete has their shirt on. (Pete is sitting at the table with us) The band was called Shiner. They could work really different sounds into a really structured song had a real big impact on me. They really got me into guitar playing.

Sharita: Is there any bands besides Mastodon that you're really big fans of?

Mat: I'm just a big fan of metal.

Robert: Metal Mat! (laughs)

Mat: Every time people say metal gonna die out, it seems to come back again, ya' know? I mean it changes and it's gonna get popular and it's gonna die out [repeatedly] but they will still fuckin' play it [regardless]. If metal was a trend it wouldn't be around anymore. Like so many forms of music come and go and those bands [go right along with that trend] no where to be found. Metal is timeless, it sounds weird but [who cares]. People are like it's back but it never left! I mean Metallica thought they reinvented metal when they did St. Anger, it's like who the fuck do you guys think you are? Don't start that kind of shit, ya' know?

Robert: (laughs)

Mat: Just admit that Entombed and Meshuggah influenced your sound and then you're sayin' you brought metal back? Get the fuck outta here! The nerve of those fuckers!

Robert: There's just way too many bands to mention. So many good bands.

Mat: Bands like early 90's period like Bolt Thrower, Entombed, and Carcass. Early death metal music.

Sharita: Well, let's talk about touring where are you guys playing after this?

Mat: We're only doing shows in the Midwest right now. Then we're going  to be taking a couple of long weekends but we are talking to a promoter about going to Europe for three weeks in September. So we're still trying to figure out time off from work and logistics and stuff. I think it's going to be our own tour! We were supposed to go out with Mastodon, (Mat changes voice) but a little band called Slayer came along. (laughs) They were like yeah you guys wanna go on tour, let us manage you too!

Robert: (laughs) There was another band we were supposed to go out with called Coliseum from Kansas City. They are fuckin' incredible! We are lookin' to do a couple of weeks with them.

Mat: They like Motörhead meets Black Flag.

Robert: Touring with them would be like the best thing ever, I would be able to die that day. All I would need to fulfill my life. They are very articulate and they don't get as drunk as we do. (laughs)

Sharita: I don't like the term Stoner Rock. Being a lady in my 30's...

Robert: I'm close I'm knockin' on heaven's door. (laughs)

Sharita: I pretty much have always said that anything that rocks out and kicks my ass, it's metal, do you appreciate that term?

Mat: It's all about the way you categorize it, I mean I dunno when someone says stoner rock, you kind of know what they're talkin' about. I guess it's just a necessary evil.

Robert: I don't think we would be Stoner rock but I understand the necessity of labels like that and having conversations about music you need that but I don't use it or apply it to myself. I think it's a tangible way to relate to different kinds of things. I'm about to understand what's rad about different types of music.

Sharita: Well for one thing they call Mastodon stoner rock...

Robert: Uh, I definitely wouldn't call them stoner rock. You're having a bad trip if it's Mastodon! (laughs) If you're out to sea and you took a bong with Captain Ahab then you would call them that. They are way too intense for that!

Sharita: I'm thinking more Queens of The Stone Age...

Robert: Or a band from here called Buried At Sea. You can call them stoner because it's literally like being buried at sea and being stoned kind of lends itself to that. (laughs)

Sharita: How has Seventh Rule been treating you?

Robert: Oh, like gold. Everyone in the band was in other bands and they knew people so we had a couple of different options as to who we were gonna record with but it turned out to be a friend of ours that knew Remis very well and they wanted to start a label, a husband and wife actually. They saw us and they were like that's it, Sweet Cobra is the band we want to start the label with. I mean we had other options that would've probably worked out better but, we knew them and they knew what we were about so it turned out great! It's the best of both worlds and they have bent over backwards for us.

Mat: Its great they're friends, and we haven't run into any of the snafu's that come with working with your friends. It's been great. They pressed the LP on vinyl (laughs) 180 gram pressing so we will make some money on vinyl.

Sharita: OK let me play devil's advocate here, if a major came to Sweet Cobra and asked you to come to their label what would you do?

Mat: Well, we would do what any band would just start demanding the most ridiculous shit like Seventh Rule being a part of our deal or something like that. I mean, a lot of bands do that and the label is like aw fuck, well come on.

Robert: Yeah, we'd have a lot of stipulations especially Remis.

Mat: Absurd things like it would have to be exactly the way we want it or we wouldn't do it.

Sharita: So what would you lie to see change in the music industry?

Robert: Well the music industry is really a murky thing right now, but as far as all of us are concerned we're not part of it. We don't really give a flyin' fuck about it because we're not in it. We just want to do what we do and we give a flyin' fuck...

Mat: Yeah, We're not on a major so we're really not apart of it. I mean if we we're on a major or we were being touted by one then I would have an opinion. Everyone's been playin' in bands since high school, if somethin' came along where we could play, come back home for a few days, go back out and pay like half our rent cool just so we could play music fulltime. A lot of things have come across for us to tour but we have to work and [we can't take advantage of the opportunities].

Sharita: I feel the same way about my job, I can't do FourteenG all the time. (laughs) Thanks so much guys! You have been great.

Robert: Thanks Sharita for the awesome interview.

Mat: Thanks Sharita!