Parole Chat

I think the, um, overall length of every gig was probably about 15 or 20 minutes. I don't... the last show we did in Houston, we played about 40 minutes, because the undercover cops were there. So it was really kind of weird. When we came out, we had to actually wear something, because they were gonna arrest me. So it's the only show on the tour that I wore, like, underwear. Usually I'm all naked. Tomorrow night's gonna be fuckin' great, man. We're doing... [?] is calling me in the morning, and it's been in the papers here, and shit. But every show we did was in the newspaper. All the press people were there, and, uh... I'm sure after the show we got a lot of press too, so...

I thought the tour was over. When I was in the hospital, I said, "this is it", y'know, "we can't go beyond this point". Then I'm like, "fuck it, we've got to go on", y'know, "we can't stop it now, we've only played two gigs!" So I got out, and we just fuckin' did it. We did Frisco, and then eventually I started feeling a little bit better, started drinkin' a lot more, and started getting fuckin' back into the swing. And then we went down to Texas, and the first Texas show was fuckin' amazing. There were, like, two or three people in there videotaping the show. So I went out and took all the video cameras and, like, threw them up against the wall, destroyed 'em.

When I was... one guy was videotaping; we didn't want anybody videotaping us at all. So I went out when he was videotaping and I grabbed his camera, threw it right up in the air. Then I saw another guy videotaping, way in the back of the room. I could see this little red fuckin' light from the stage. And I jumped into the crowd. Went right through the crowd, went up and took his fuckin' camera and bashed it up against the wall. And then at the end of the show everybody was outside, like, throwing rocks at the van. They broke our window, and fuckin'... yeah, they were really pissed off.

My art is more street art, it's more... real life... you know. And you know, 'cause to me, art is like, very vital and violent. I mean, to me, if you see a dead person laying on the side of the road that's gotten hit by a car, to me that's art. And art is very real to me; it's not something that really needs to be acceptable. And to me, art has no limits, so I don't impose any limits upon myself. I believe that pain and violence are art. And I sort of take my whole life and... if you want to call that art, then that's how I put my art out. Use real situations for art. Real blood, and real violence, and real sexuality, and defecation, urination, masturbation. I mean, to me that's all art. But my art, real art, has to be challenging. And it must go beyond all normal expectations of anything. There has to be no limit till the absolute end.

But I don't want to be put in that same category as Finley and them, either.

I'm really not too pleased, because I don't know how people really take that. I don't want them to think, "okay, he does his thing and then it's over when he leaves the stage", because it's not. I mean, my performance art goes on 24 hours a day. So, when you place somebody in that category, people can sort of look at you differently. So I never really liked to be called a performance artist, but people seem to like to label me that. People don't want to admit that it's real, so they have to put a label on it. Y'know, "we can't really say that this guy is really like this, so we'll put a 'performance art' and then people can sort of take it as they want."

INTERVIEWER: Why do you do what you do?

I think that it's important because it builds character to push yourself to those limits.

And what it does is, if you go into every situation as if you were walking into death, then you fear nothing and you accelerate life more. You go into things that most people wouldn't go into, because they would be afraid of it. But, see, every day, I don't think about what tomorrow is gonna be. I think about today as the last day, so I'm gonna do whatever I can today. And I think the important thing is, if you set yourself with no limits except death, then you fear nothing. And then you will go anywhere and do anything. It will build endurance, it will build character, it will build strength, and you will be able to go into any situation and handle it. And I don't let anything get me down. I don't get into relationships. I don't get into situations like most people do that will dig a hole and bury themselves.

I keep myself very mobile and ready to go, and face the next danger when it happens. That's... uh, I mean, that's just the way I look at life, and... y'know, it works for me.

I think that too many people are worried about death. And they're worried about... y'know, everybody's afraid of this and afraid of that. And who gives a fuck? I mean, you're gonna end up worrying, and who gives a shit? Just, you know, if something's dangerous, fuck it. You confront it. You win or lose. It's a battle, and you're either... y'know, it's like going to war. Either you're gonna win the war, or you're gonna lose the war and you're gonna go out fighting. But if you go out fighting, at least it was exciting, wasn't it?

I mean, I'd rather go out fighting and have it exciting, than, than, uh... just die of stagnation. I'd rather die violently.

It just seems like it'd be more fun to get shot than to, like, have a heart attack. I mean, it might hurt, but at least you are experiencing some sort of sensation.

And I think that when you are dead, I think that might be kind of a fun time, too. I mean, I can imagine that, y'know, the whole leaving-of-your-body experience would be quite a high. You know, I think about it a lot. You know what I really think about, is when I do that final show, and I'm dead onstage, I'm thinking that I might be able to just float over the audience and watch the reactions of the people as I lie there bleeding, just see what... I think that I will actually be able to see what goes on. That really kind of excites me too.

It's like when I played the Cat Club, there was one review that really hit it on the head. It said, uh, y'know, "GG just went in and literally scared the fuck out of all these", y'know, "trendy little art fuckers, and all these"... you know. People came to my show thinking that I was gonna be like Karen Finley. And found out that, when I really wasn't, that they couldn't fuckin' deal with it.

It's more my participation. If they don't participate, I make them participate. In some way, I can make an audience very on edge just, like I say, by looking at 'em. I think audience participation is important, but it's more important for my own feelings than it is theirs.

You know, if they don't react, then I'm probably gonna go out and go off on 'em even more. If they do react, sometimes they might, y'know, kill themselves, and I can just sit there and watch 'em. Uh, so that's all right too.

Fuck all these movies and shit. Y'know, I'm telling you, if you spent a week here in Ann Arbor you would puke. I mean, this whole scene here is so fucking pretentious.

I mean, the whole music scene. I guess that's part of the college scene too, but it's just, it's so... fucking... y'know, if you don't fit in, if you're not in this band... I mean, you're not... "we don't give a fuck about you", "fuck you, you're an outsider". I mean, I have got no respect in this town. [laughs] Not that I expected any! I mean, Detroit is an hour from Ann Arbor, and it's like two different planets. Detroit is very cool. It's very... like Chicago, or New York, or Boston. Ann Arbor is just... too motherfucking, I don't know...

I mean, I really hate it here. I don't know why I'm here. Every day I walk the streets, and I see some of these fuckin' people, and it just makes me want to fuckin' puke on every fuckin' one of 'em.

I guess the fact that I'm not welcome here makes me want to stay. It's so great. Record stores don't carry any of my... I've never seen a GG record in one store.

Jerry told me he went into Schoolkids' Records when I got arrested, and they took everything out of the store. They said they wouldn't be a part of what I did. See, this community is so closely knit, they don't... you know, if somebody went in there and saw a GG record, "well", y'know, fuckin'... "you support him", blah blah blah...

People are so ignorant. People are so fucking... I mean, isn't that just the most ridiculous fucking thing? Because they don't like you, they're not gonna put your record in the store.

...or, like Big Black, or some of these other really fuckin' idiot bands, or some of these real... especially the art bands, or... or what's that...? Ministry. That's so fucking boring. As cutting edge as a fuckin' toilet seat.

I get so tired of it. It's, like, God, give me a motherfucking break.

There is no feeling. Every... I don't know, man, there's just no feeling in the music. That's why I try to put so much into my records. And that's why it really pisses me off when people sort of overlook them and just think, "oh, that's GG", y'know, "it's gotta suck". Or "he's a fuckin' asshole", blah blah blah. They don't realize that goddamn, man, the motherfucker... I mean, I put so much of my fuckin'... my whole life into this goddamn shit.

I can't think that anybody has done it to the extent that I have. I can't think of anybody. And, you know, there are a lot of people out there that realize that. And there's a lot of idiots, too, that don't.

It's like my body. I mean, I was good-looking and I had a great voice, and now I'm ugly and my voice has gone to hell. I can still sing, though. But, I mean, it's just through the years. You know, it's really weird because I listen to those Jabbers records. It's so great because, you know... I don't know, it's just... it was the time, and even though the records are definitely a lot more polished than our live... our live shows were terrible back then. Boy, we sucked. Yeah, I mean, if you've ever heard a Jabbers live show... there are some Jabbers shows that completely fall apart. Completely are horrendous.

...and that Jabbers show wasn't even one of the better lineups. Uh, but, you know, it's uh... you know, there were... there were much fuckin' crazier shows. But I think those Jabbers records are just great because of what they were at the time. I mean, I'll tell you, I was a big Bay City Rollers fan, whether I really want to admit that or not. I really liked that kind of sleazy pop, and I kinda liked that mixture of that with punk. And, you know, our whole thing was... my whole thing was, the stage show was the most important thing, because that's where I could get my revenge out.

But actually, the guys in the Jabbers were well-crafted musicians. They could all play well, and they could all write well. So a lot of... that's why those songs are so, y'know, so well-written. I mean, I wrote 'em, but they played, and the melody was there.

I mean, Rob was an asshole, but he could play that fuckin' guitar. And Little John, you know, had his rhythm down, and between the two of 'em, you know, they just had something. And Al was pretty good on bass, and whatever drummer we had at the time did the job.

So, I mean, I don't like all of that stuff. You know, I definitely prefer the later stuff, but I think some of it's pretty cool.

Back then, when I was, shit, about 20 or so, I mean... we were just... you know, it was just a really strange thing back then to, you know, be married, which was something I shouldn't have done, but, uh... and just, you know, being in this band that really nobody liked. You know, we used to lie to clubs. We used to tell 'em, "oh yeah, we can play this song, we can play that song". We even told one club one time we were a country band.

I used to call these clubs, and I knew, like, all these fuckin' Journey and Foreigner bands would be there, and they're like, "What kind of music do you play?" "Oh, we play Journey, we play Foreigner." "Oh, that's great." And then we'd get in there, and we knew we weren't gonna get paid. We didn't give a fuck! The money wasn't even important.

I just went in, and I'd see all these fuckin' prissy girls sitting in the front, or all these fuckin' jock lookin' assholes ready to hear fuckin' Foreigner. [laughs] And we'd go into "Bored to Death", and I'd just go off on 'em. And I knew, well, you know, "how long's it gonna last? We'll see."

You know, the whole thing of it wasn't money. It was just, how long are we gonna play before we get thrown out?

And then the Jabbers, being musicians, they got tired of it, because they wanted to play. They were like, "well, you know, we can play. We want to play." You know, "you're always getting us thrown out". And I'm like, "well", you know, "I want to play too, but I want to play it my way."

Goddamn, I've done more for the fuckin' punk rock scene than any motherfuckin' individual in the universe. I'm just so damn wonderful!