Mike Ladano: Exclusive EDDIE JACKSON interview, part I
I have to give Geoff Tate credit for a good answer to a tough question. Regarding “knife incident” and the rumoured Queensryche split, Geoff said, “I’m thinking, I’m not gonna really dispel too many of the rumors because it’s hardly ever that Queensrÿche gets any publicity, so this is great. All 43 people on the Internet are talking about it.”
That’s a great answer. He also says the band plan to tour in 2013.
With all this drama (hopefully) behind them, I’ll take you to Part 2 of my October 2001 chat with bassist Eddie Jackson. This is the unedited transcript, never before seen anywhere by anybody.
EDDIE JACKSON INTERVIEW, OCT 30 2001 (Unedited) Part 2
Q – Now the album packaging [Live Evolution] is pretty cool here, but what the heck does that say under your picture?
E – My credits? It’s backwards! All the letters, the words are backwards! They’re spelled backwards! The words are spelled in reverse. So let’s say you come up with the word “happy”. I start with the letter Y first, and then a P and then a P and then an A and then an H. You know, heck, gotta be a little goofy every once in a while! What I original wanted to do was to have it printed out so if you put it up to a mirror, then you would be able to read it correctly. But I didn’t think about that until after.
Q – Next album right?
E – You’re like the second or third person who asked me about that. [One guy said] “What is that, Spanish?” No, it’s not! I think you’d know if it was Spanish or not. You know, heck, just going a little goofy. Some creativity there.
Q – Are you “cyber-savvy” at all? Are you into the internet and stuff like that?
E – A little bit, you know.
Q – Do you see the internet as a way to reach new fans?
E – Oh, absolutely!
Q – Are you doing that? Are you noticing that?
E – I think so. Especially with our fan club. A lot of that is, instead of sending mailers out, we just send ‘em e-mailers. Not only is that a cost effective approach, but it’s a lot more efficient, I think you can do a lot more than just a letter or a flier. I think it’s done wonders. Obviously it’s been the wave of the future for a few years and I think it’s a great tool.
Q – You’ve got bands like Marillion who pre-sold their album online before even a note was recorded It’s just amazing how the dedicated fans will seek you out.
E – Oh absolutely, yeah yeah! Well again, we’ve been very fortunate to have this type of fan base. They’ve allowed us to evolve and grow as a band. And they’ve evolved and grown as individuals as listeners, as fans. What more can you ask for? [They’ve] given us the freedom to create and I think that’s great, and also by being able to communicate with them through our music and also through cyberspace. It’s great!
Q – Let’s go back to LIVEcrime for a minute. You’ve got more than one new release coming out, LIVEcrime is being reissued on DVD and album.
E – I don’t know if it’s on DVD though.
Q – OK, I’ll have to check. [Note: It is coming this month]
E – I was only told it was going to be the live CD, but you may be right.
Q – Now, the live CD is going to have some bonus tracks on it. Are these the same versions as on Live Evolution or are they with the original lineup?
E – Those are with the original lineup. Those two songs, “Road To Madness” and “Lady Wore Black”, those were recorded at the time LIVEcrime was recorded.
Q – From the same gig?
E – From the same gig. I mean, we recorded the whole show! But we were mainly focusing on LIVEcrime. Yeah, I mean, there were a few other songs through that whole set that we performed. Yeah, we recorded the whole show, but we just figured, OK. A lot of that was pretty much EMI’s idea. And so it was kinda interesting to hear about EMI releasing this. And here we are, just doing the groundwork on Live Evolution, and we’re just thinking, “Wait a second!” You know, are they going to conflict with one another? But I don’t think it has, I think it’s great because for the collector and for the hardcore fan out there, even though most of that LIVEcrime is the same as that released before, with the exception of those two extra tracks, that’s what makes it interesting. But yeah, that was pretty much our very first live recording. With the exception of The Warning tour. You know, that had the live video.
Q – Which is also pretty much impossible to find. If you ever talk to EMI about getting something reissued…
E – Yeah, good luck finding that one! But then again, that was only released on video, that was never released as a live audio. And then Live Evolution was our very first full length live recording from start to finish, and a lot of people ask us, “Why’d it take you so long?” But I don’t know! As you’re evolving through your career, and recording and touring and all that, I guess for me it doesn’t really cross your mind because you’re so busy and you’re so tied up at that moment doing what you’re doing. Whether it’s recording or touring that it never really crossed my mind. There are times when you release a new album, by giving it an extra [live] track or two which Japan loves…they love that type of thing, when you can add a bonus track or two. That’s always fun but I don’t know why it’s taken us so long to release something like that. Look at the Greatest Hits, [it] was released last year! A lot of people said, “Why’d it take you so long?” Well, why are you complaining? (laughs) Stop bitching about it, there you go, it’s right there! (laughs).
Q – Well here’s another release you can ponder. You guys did a video game, Promised Land a few years ago. There’s an exclusive track on that called “8 Miles High”. And it’s never been released anywhere else as far as I know on CD.
E – Have you heard it?
Q – Yeah. I couldn’t beat the game though, I had to, uhh…cheat.
E – Well I’ve got the cheat sheet for that thing.
Q – But it’s a great track and it would be nice to get it released, like you guys have collected a few B-sides and live things and remixes that you can release on a rarities album. Is that ever gonna be in the cards?
E – You know, anything is possible, but again, I don’t know if we’ve taken it that serious, to do something like that. Maybe perhaps the majority of the reason if, how satisfied are we with the results of that particular song? There was reason why it wasn’t added to the new album, or whichever album was released. Perhaps stylistically it didn’t coincide with what we were doing. Sonically, maybe it didn’t work. I dunno, that’s an interesting point, I mean, would we ever put something like that together? Anything’s possible. I think it would be fun. We have quite a few songs in the vaults. We’ve archived quite a bit of ideas, there’s even songs that we have from The Warning days. From Operation:Mindcrime days. Just a couple of songs that are floating around doing nothing. You never know, there’s actually been a couple of songs…let’s see, what was it. Which album was it? Promised Land I believe? There were two songs that we had used ideas from a song that was written back in…Rage For Order? Or Operation:Mindcrime? But we kinda took the intro or the middle piece of those songs and just kind of created a whole new song with it.
More:
Mike Ladano: Exclusive EDDIE JACKSON interview, part III
Mike Ladano: Exclusive EDDIE JACKSON interview, part IV
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