Metal Insider’s sister comedy site The Laugh Button recently got an opportunity to interview the legendary Steel Panther. TLB’s Blake Garris caught up with guitarist Satchel (second from left) about why they’re the greatest band in the world, groupies, Justin Bieber and Snooki. The band’s third record (second as Steel Panther) Balls Out was just released via Universal Records.
First off, your new record just came out. What’s it been like now that that’s out?
Well it’s bitchin’ because these days there’s this thing called Twitter which is totally fucking annoying but awesome when you have a record come out cause you can get instant feedback. And our fans are fucking loving our new record and the reaction from 99% of the people is just overwhelmingly good so that’s great. And of course you get critics that review the record and they just pan us; they fucking hate our guts. It’s awesome! That only supports my theory that critics are fucking idiots. That’s my theory.
You have a lot of celebrities on this record. How do you go about getting those?
Well we have a way to judge that. If they’re at least 10 times more famous than we are then we ask them to be on a record. And if they say yes then we find a place to put ‘em on the record, and if they’re not 10 times more famous than us then we don’t ask ‘em. But everybody that’s at least 10 times more famous than us, we ask; because we figure if we ever blow up on our own at least we can ride other people’s coattails. And that’s a good strategy for most people, especially us.
What’s next for Steel Panther?
We’re assuming that this record is gonna go at least 4 or 5 times platinum in the United States. We’ll probably sell 30 or 40 million records, that’s what we’re assuming. And if that doesn’t happen, that’s gonna suck because I just bought a new car and put a down payment on a house. But if that doesn’t happen, then what we’re gonna do is keep on fucking rocking because I don’t know if anybody told you this but everyone in this band was born to rock. We’ve been touring for like 15 years straight anyway so we’re gonna keep playing gigs. Because the thing is if we don’t make a whole bunch of money on the record or become hugely famous there’s always, no matter how big we don’t get, there’s always gonna be girls that wanna fuck us. So we’re always touring because you have to do gigs in order to fuck groupies cause you can’t really fuck groupies if you’re at home. You do the gig, then fuck the groupies. That’s one of the main motivating factors in rock. Of course we will continue to do that.
If You Really Really Love Me by Steel Panther
You have more ballads on this record than usual.
There’s at least two that I would consider ballads. “Weenie Ride” is the obvious, main ballad; the piano ballad. And then there’s “Why Can’t You Trust Me” which is kind of like this power ballad. It’s hard to not write a bitchin’ power ballad when you’re in a bitchin’ killer glam heavy metal band. I don’t know if you were alive back in the late 80’s, early 90’s but that’s almost all that MTV played back then. It was like “More Than Words” and all these ballads by heavy metal bands then. That was right before heavy metal died; I think the heavy metal ballad was what killed heavy metal. But it was really big for the last couple years before it got killed by Nirvana.
Is there any band out now that you can compare yourself to?
There’s nobody that’s doing what we’re doing; anybody who’s seen us live can attest to that. There are people that have compared us to Spinal Tap but I think the people that compare us to Spinal Tap have never seen our show. And to me that’s a terrible comparison because we’re real musicians; Spinal Tap was kind of like actors that played music. There’s a really big difference. I know all my scales; I’m pretty sure those guys don’t know any scales. But there’s not really anybody, and of course Spinal Tap is in their 80’s now so there’s no comparison there. We’re much younger in our early 50’s. Shit, even if you just want to compare us musically to other bands, there’s no bands doing authentic sounding 80’s rock the way we do it. I mean, we’re awesome. And I’m not trying to be modest here, but we are fucking totally awesome. You can print that.
I’ve been to a few shows where bands put up boxes that look like fake giant amplifiers. Have you ever seen that?
I don’t know. We play so many fucking shows; I barely even get to go to shows anymore. I’ve never seen a band that claims to be a band unless you’re talking about Britney Spears and Justin Bieber. I saw Justin Bieber on TV last night. He had a guitar player in his band, and I thought it was the fucking stupidest thing I’ve ever seen in my life. He had a guitar player in his band, and the kit wasn’t even plugged in. It was just like you said. And he had a Les Paul and long hair, like having a wired guitar player in Justin Bieber’s band is gonna make Justin Bieber sound any more rock. There was no guitar sound at all! And the guitar player was like banging his head up and down. And I’m thinking “where the fuck is the guitar? There’s no guitar!” It was the stupidest thing I’ve ever seen in my life. So no, we only jam out fucking live. So we’re live, we’re a live band. Our guitars are fucking loud as shit, and if anybody thinks that we’re not playing they can stand right in front of my amp and see if they can hear anything in their head the next day.
Can you describe a show for people because I’ve heard you put on some really great performances?
Well you heard right. Our show is fucking awesome and there’s no way to define it. And I think if you asked anybody who went to our show to describe it, they’d have a hard time too. But we’re a heavy metal circus. First of all, we draw really well at all the places we play regularly and we were a live band before we ever made a record. So for us it was always about making every show as entertaining as possible and there’s really no lines that we won’t cross. And every show is totally different so one show you might have like lesbians on stage making out, fingering each other. And the next show, you might have a girl giving birth or something. I don’t know. Every show is different and that’s what brings people back because there’s always really entertaining things happening and we just sound fucking awesome. I think a lot of times people go to our shows like in LA and in Vegas because they don’t want to miss something awesome if it does happen. So once they go once, they come every week for the rest of their lives.
[vimeo]http://vimeo.com/31411314[/vimeo]
What’s it like with fans?
Well the places we do our regular gigs, like in LA and Vegas, a lot of people come every week so we’ve met a lot of those. But it’s always awesome going to different countries and different cities that we don’t play on a regular basis. Cause some fans are just rabid, they just can’t wait to see us live and they wait around in the cold outside forever to get you to sign their records and stuff. And guys will offer up their girlfriends and let them get gang banged by the band. And I think guys just kind of assume that it’s Steel Panther, they’re gonna probably fuck my girlfriend anyway so I might as well just offer her up, you know? And that way I know that they’re fucking her and I could tell all my friends that I got herpes second hand from the lead guitar player of Steel Panther.
What’s the coolest part for you being in Steel Panther?
For me personally the coolest part of being in Steel Panther is getting to write songs where people sing things like “I wanna jam it in and out at a real fast pace. ‘Til I squirt hot juicy all over your face.” And when I see the whole crowd singing the words to our songs, it makes me so happy inside. And especially when I look down and I see a 17-year-old girl that knows all the words to “Weenie Ride,” it just gives me a warm fuzzy feeling and sort of a half chub. But yeah of course, doing drugs and fucking girls is fun too.
Who are your musical influences as far as guitar players go?
Wow. That’s the best question you’ve asked so far. That’s a really good one. I think some of my favorite heavy metal guitar players; I would have to put Eddie Van Halen at the top of the list. George Lynch from Dokken was bitchin’. Angus Young from AC/DC, fucking awesome, one of the kings of heavy metal. And you know what, he’s right there with all the guys, Malcolm Young who never gets credit who I just think is totally awesome too. He’s a rhythm guitar but he’s got one of the coolest jobs in the world being the rhythm guitar player for AC/DC. What a fucking awesome job would that be?
How do you get your hair to look so good?
You know what, that’s actually better than the last question you asked. And it’s really, really important too because a lot of people don’t realize we have a team of hair people at every video shoot, at every photo shoot. Two to three girls from HairClassy that are hair professionals on each one of us that make sure our hair is perfect at every moment of the shoot. And the thing is, we used most of our recording budget on the last record for just hair and makeup for the photos for the shoot. And we only spent about $2,000 on recording the record and then the rest was just for hair and makeup out of $100,000. So most people aren’t gonna be able to look as good as we do because our hair is like pretty much perfect, you know? But I would strongly suggest protein, hot oil treatments everyday of the week, I would say make sure you cut the dead ends off your hair every six weeks. Try not to blow dry too much because you’re going to kill your hair and also try to find an all-organic hair spray especially if you have synthetic hair like I do.
A lot of celebrities start dating other celebrities to publicize their work. Have you ever thought about doing that and who would it be with?
Wow, that’s a great question. And yes, Snooki. Because I don’t even know Snooki and I’ve never seen her show but she’s super famous. I mean anybody who could get that famous being… like she’s got like no talent, right? I mean I’ve heard all about her; I’ve never fucking seen her. I want to fuck her and I want to be her boyfriend. That’s just free publicity. And everybody will know who Steel Panther is if I’m fucking Snooki. And I mean, how hard would it be to fuck Snooki? She’s gotta be pretty easy to fuck. I mean she’s kind of a whore, right? I mean that’s what I hear, I don’t really know for sure. But I know if I get to meet Snooki some day I’m gonna tell you right now, you can print this, I will fuck Snooki. Get me in the same room with her, I will fucking pound her vagina. Okay? You heard it here first. And Snooki if you read this, then please come to a Steel Panther show and let me fuck you so I can get more famous.
Be sure to pick up Steel Panther’s latest record Balls Out right now. The band is currently out on tour and will be hitting the road with Motley Crue and Def Leppard in December with dates in Europe in March. For more information on the band and when they’ll be coming to your area, you can visit their website.You can also follow Satchel on Twitter @Satchel666 and the band @Steel_Panther.
