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Interview Infectious Grooves

Reperkusound : this event is a French metal festival. It was organised in Lyon at the end of april 2008. Many bands like Fishbone, Sick Of It All or Infectious Grooves played this night. You can read the interview of Dean Pleasants, guitar on Infectious Grooves on Radio Metal website. Enjoy! Interview conducted by Spaceman in Lyon, 2008-04-25. On line by: Saff’ Radio Metal : You’re currently touring across Europe with Infectious Grooves. How is it all going? Dean Pleasants : It’s going good, the shows have all been very good, every one of them increasingly. We haven’t played in a long time, it’s been more than I expected, so it’s been really fine. You’ll be staying eight days in France, which is a lot. Last time you came here with Suicidal Tendencies you also had a massive tour. It’s become rare for an international band to play so many concerts in France in one go. This gives us the impression that France is a focus point for Infectious Grooves, why? The first time we came hear, the French welcomed us, they liked our music. Every time we have a CD out, we want to come here to play again. We want to show people we’re back alive. We’re still here. It’s the same with Suicidal, we wanted to come here, as well as other places; but this market has always been good for us, very positive, and the fans always welcome us as well. Actually you’ll be recording a live DVD tomorrow in Paris. Why did you choose Paris? It’s a good venue, we like it; we played there several times, for shows with Fishbone and Inspector Cluzo. We chose to shoot there because it’s a familiar place to us. We haven’t heard anything from Infectious Grooves for almost 10 years. We were kind of losing hope. What happened? It wasn’t a big focus to release anything, because some of the members had left, Robert was gone, me and Mike were doing stuff on our own. We wanted to keep it around, but it wasn’t a focus. We wanted to bring it back, so it’s a good thing we’re doing something now. Steve Brunner, the bass player, who plays in both IG and ST, and his brother Ron, from ST, are quite young. Josh Paul was 17 when he joined ST, and Brooks Wackerman was 14 when he joined IG. Do you think that choosing young musicians help the band to maintain some kind of naïve energy? Yeah, a young musician is like a sponge. He can take everything in, and put his own style into it and grow. Sometimes, musicians can be set in their style, they can’t change, they can’t adapt. With the younger guys, they really come in and they see what’s going on. They see what they can really do. There’s also the energy, they’re wild, like an untamed horse. How come former member Adam Siegel isn’t part of this reunion? Adam is currently not touring anymore. We talked to him, he’s married and I don’t think his wife would like the tour, but that’s between me and you. He will probably sit in if we do a show in LA, but I don’t think he plays heavy guitars anymore. He’s more into light stuff. It’s his choice, he’s still a friend of us, we’re cool with that. Will he still be doing his trademark album covers? I hope so. We’ll try to talk him into it, we’ll twist his arm! Are there news for the new IG album? What can you say about it? Hopefully it’ll be out by September, maybe sooner. With the line-up we have, it’s going to be great musicianship as usual. A lot of craziness also, but more on a groove side this time. The first album had a lot of different sides, this one is more funky. Will we have the pleasure to hear the comeback of the reptilian lover Sarsippius ? He’ll show up, but we’ll have to get him off the rock first! How did the idea of creating this special character come up? We had the idea of this special kind of music with INFECTIOUS, and he came from the music we had created. He had this slick kind of vibe about him. Who interpreted Sarsippius on the albums? Sarsippius is a guy named Aladin Sulemanagic. It’s his actual name, Aladin Sarsippius. He’s funny. He’s from Yugoslavia. A lot of people think he’s black. A new Suicidal Tendencies album is also expected. What can you tell us about it? It will be very different from Infectious, it’s back to the roots of Suicidal. Very hard, fast, in-your-face Suicidal. I think the fans will appreciate it, the power behind it. It’s nothing like Infectious. A few years ago we had things kind of mixed, no it’s totally separate, back to old school Suicidal. The line between Suicidal Tendencies and Infectious Grooves is sometimes quite blurry. Have the new songs for both bands been written together as if it was the same band or were there two separate writing sessions? It was two different sessions. We have a lot of material, sometimes Mike dictates the direction, how the lyrics go, how he hears things. Now, like I said, we really make a separation. The fans will notice the difference. We had Suicidal Grooves, which was kind of a heavier Infectious, but now you’ll see that Suicidal and Infectious are two different bands. It’ll be noticeable this time. Do you have any news from Robert Trujillo? I saw Robert a while ago. He’s doing well, has two kids, he’s very happy. I’m very happy for him. He looked well. He’s enjoying being in Metallica. I don’t think he’s able to do a lot of stuff outside of it, but he could hand out with me and Mike. Musically they want him to be exclusively in Metallica. We haven’t heard since a very long time his funky slappin’ bass lines he was so famous for in Suicidal Tendencies and Infectious Grooves. I guess you know him very well, so do you think he is happy with his playing style in Metallica? I don’t know, I’d have to ask him. I know he plays a lot different now, but he did some of his best bass playing ever with Suicidal and Infectious. I’ve known Robert before, he was in many bands. I met Robert so long ago, I knew him before I knew Mike. He’s the one who called me to play with Infectious. I was in a couple of bands with Robert, I know his style. But he’s able to play different styles, which is good. One last question: what is the last funky CD you bought? Oh gosh… The last funky CD I bought… The Brothers Jobson. INFECTIOUS GROOVES website : www.myspace.com/infectiousgrooves

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