Hello Rich!! What have you been up to, both musically and non-musically, since the split of Brutal Truth(rip)?

I don't really do anything non-musically: hang out with my girlfriend and visit my mom I guess...after BT's break up, I was pretty bummed out and focused mostly on my label, Deaf American Recordings, and the first CD release I've ever done, a CD by a Japanese band called No Rest for the Dead.

I believe you have a new band called Total Fucking Destruction that has recently released a demo, correct? Could you tell us about this new band?

The first ideas for T.F.D. came to me while BT was breaking up. I wanted to have a band with a bad attitude, making extreme crazy music, smoking lots of weed and grinding all over the world. I figured if the guys from Brutal Truth weren't up for partying, I would just do it myself. I wrote a few songs and lyrics and then met some old friends from my punk rock days. They seemed to understand the theory of Total Fucking Destruction and they helped me make it into a real band, not just a one man project. Anyone who wants to find out more about TFD can check out our website: http://welcome.to/totalfuckingdestruction/

Brutal Truth evolved into a very experimental and innovative grind band in later years, most notably on "Sounds of the Animal Kingdom". Do you feel saddened about the demise of the band from a creative point of view, because of the uncharted musical territory that Brutal Truth had ventured into? Would you like to further explore and evolve the Brutal Truth sound in future?

This is what sucked the most about BT's breakup: musically, BT was doing it's best stuff ever, live and on recordings. Check out the BT live double cd, we are playing one of our best shows ever, but it is just a few weeks before the breakup really started. The breakup was all personal stuff too, I think it is a shame that the guys in BT could not get over there personal differences, I think the next BT CD would have been even more out there, oh well!

Do you still have contact with any of the Brutal Truth members?

Very occasionally I get an email from Kevin or Gurn. I hang out with Danny every few weeks, either in NYC or at some show somewhere. Danny has a black metal band called Hemlock and T.F.D. has played a few shows together with them.

Was it a matter of members wanting to go different directions with BT, or did you just feel the band had run its course?

Neither. The guys who had personal problems with one another, had these problems for a long time, maybe even before I joined the band. Finally, each guy said one or the other has to go, but to get new musicians for BT would not have been the same...I fucking hate bands that have just an original member or 2 but keep the same name and beat the dead horse. We thought it best to end it all

I believe you originally came from a punk background, actually as a bass player, right? Do you feel more at home in the metal scene or the punk/grind scene? Where do you think BT belonged and where are you heading with your new projects?

You are going very far back into my past, so let's start at the beginning: I started playing saxaphone at age 12, I started a punk band my first year at college, 1983, and played bass from then until about 1987 in a lot of local hardcore punk bands. We were into stuff like Black Flag and The Dead Kennedys. About 1987, I switched to drums and started to tour the USA and Europe in bands that shall remain unnamed, but were sort of art/punk bands. From 1991 to 93, Mike Dean and I had a band called Ninefinger, we played music like Melvins/Sabbath/Eyehategod mixed with some Jimi Hendrix. When I joined Brutal Truth, I knew very little about grind/death metal. I don't really feel at home in any scene, I like to make music I think can't be put into a scene or category, I want to make music that is unique and an expression of myself/ideas. BT was able to crossover to many scenes and I think that is the best way to go with music: punk, grind, death, black, etc etc all come together to form a a larger extreme underground music scene. As for Total Fucking Destruction, I think the people who consider themselves part of a scene will hate us, because TFD's music is the harshest of many different kinds of music. I think we will give many people something to think about, maybe they won't like what they are thinking though!!!

Brutal Truth were well known for being huge weed smokers, but how big a part did it really play in your sound? Could you write a song without being stoned?

Probably, but we never did. A big part of the BT mindset was to smoke out the brain and let the body grind. Also, any BT show was a party, not a rock concert. I like to think I went places to hang out, party and play music, not to go and perform a concert for the ticketholders. Maybe some bits of psychdelia in the BT sound and songs were the result of cannibis-induced silliness.

On a side note, which country has the best smoke, and do you prefer bongs, buckets, or joints? How much do you smoke per day?

In North America, Vancouver and the West Coast of Canada has the best high quality smoke around. When in Europe, Amsterdam or Holland is the place to be. I prefer buckets, bongs, joints, hot knives, earth pipes, bowls and hash under glass. I smoke as much each day as I can get!!!

"Goodbye Cruel World" was released last year. Were the live recordings originally intended for release before you split, or was it compiled as an epitaph of some kind?

It was only by chance that these recordings were made: when BT was on tour in Australia, our friend Lachlan from the band Nazxul (who are fucking great!!!) asked us if he could record one of our concerts to test out his digital recording equipment, because Nazxul was playing the same place a few weeks later and wanted to make a live recording. A month or 2 after BT was broken up, Lachlan sent us copies of the recording he had made and it was really great, the people from Relapse heard about these recordings and asked us to mix and release them as a posthumous live cd.

Apart from playing in bands, you also run a record label - Deaf American records. Could you tell us a little about when and why it started up? How do people get copies of your releases?

Deaf American is an underground D.I.Y. record label that I started in late 1993, about the same time I was joining Brutal Truth. I started Deaf Am because I didn't have any other way to release music, I just don't feel good about making a demo and shopping it to labels, I wanted to be able to release music of my own and my friends. So far most Deaf Am releases have been vinyl 7", the No Rest for the Dead CD was the first CD release:

The first 8 releases are out of print, the next release is an all new fucking amazing and totally unrelenting Cripple Bastards CD!!! If you want to get Deaf Am Recordings, email me for more info at rich666 or send $1 for a catalog/flyer/stickers/whatever I have laying around to deafam, c/o r.hoak, #3 bethel church road, dillsburg pa 17019 usa. There are many distros all over the world who carry Deaf Am stuff.

Could we talk about your drumming for a minute. How did you originally get into playing drums? You seem to have a very "free floating" style of playing. Who would say has influenced this?

I think my style is influenced by the fact that I don't really know how to play drums. I never took lessons or practiced on my own...I just learn songs with bands and practice with the band and play what I think sounds appropriate for the song. I think my style floats free because I let my body do the work and fit in whatever it can once I learn the song, when I play it, especially live, I just smoke out and try to rise above it, watch my arms and legs play the songs from inside my head also I have always liked crazy freeform jazz like Mingus, Sun Ra, James Blood Ulmer and though I can't play as well as the drummers in these bands, I try to think the way I think they are thinking about drums.

Do you spend much time practicing alone, or do you prefer to jam with others?

Jamming only, it is no fun to sit alone and practice paradiddles, or whatever they are.

Your kit set-up is quite minimal - almost awkwardly set up. Why this kit size and set-up?

It's all that I need, and it's just the way the drumset developed underneath me over the course of time in BT, with so much touring and travel, I learned to be able to play on any kind/shape/quality of drum set. My setup for Total Fucking Destruction is kick, snare, hi-hat, ride, two crashes and that's all easy to carry, set up, mike up, etc etc...cheaper too.

Outside of music, what do you do with your time?

Smoke weed, drink, hangout with my girlfriend, visit my mom....I also do a lot of yoga.

What bands are you listening to at the moment? Any new bands that you would like to sign to you label?

I don't really sign bands, Deaf Am is not a very formal record label. The bands on Deaf Am releases are all friends of mine, mostly I saw the band first or heard their demo and I was blown away. Lately I have listened to: a band called u.n.k.l.e., Heidnik, Doris, Association Area, Brutal Insanity, Groinchurn, Pignation, Hellchild, Bobbykork, Impaled Nazarene!!!!

Where do you seen grind going in the future?

Duh, I don't know...

Which direction would you like to see it go in?

I would like to see grinders get sicker and more crazy with their music and politics...and progressing with their grind until it is something new...I guess this is sort of what I am trying to do with T.F.D.

OK, that's about it, anything you would like to promote or mention?

I think I have already promoted everything I need to, anyone who is interested in Total Fucking Destruction or Deaf American Recordings, please get in touch...thanx to you for the interview and fucking thanx to all of the grindfreaks who supported Brutal Truth and continue to support the extreme music underground. Cheers.