2020.08.13 - Drum For The Song Podcast - Interview with Matt

Excerpts from Ultimate Guitar:
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During an appearance on Drum for the Song, Matt Sorum looked back on his 1990-1997 tenure in Guns N' Roses, while also touching on the days of Velvet Revolver, and more.

Matt is promoting his new book titled "Double Talkin' Jive." Asked how he joined the group and if he could "briefly describe the process of recording 'Use Your Illusion'," the musician replied (transcribed by UG):

"The first thing we did on that album was we went out and we all got drunk together. I came out of The Cult in the late '80s, early '90s, and luckily, Slash and Duff had come to my last show with The Cult - that's 30 years ago, it's crazy. And that band at that particular time, we were on fire, we were doing really well - it was a strong tour, we were at the top of our game. So Slash and Duff saw me, I ended up coming in. Originally, I was gonna fill in for Steven Adler and just make the record and he was going to come back into the band because they started to try to record and it just wasn't working.

"I don't know the particulars but anyway, I came in there and we started working on all this material, which they had a lot of, and then one day, Slash asked me to come up to his house and he said, 'Hey man, we decided we want you to join the band.' And I said, 'Well, I'm already in a band.' I had to go back and tell The Cult I was leaving, and I was gonna join. They made me a member of the group. A lot of people don't know the story, like, 'He was a sideman, was he a hired gun.' But at that particular time, I was a member of the group. I kind of knew, 'OK, I've already got a band, let me negotiate myself into a membership.' I got a percentage of everything. To just make the story straight - I was not a hired side guy, I was a member of the Guns N' Roses band.

"I went in and I made those records, we started recording everything as we were going to make one album. So the idea was: we're gonna record 30 songs and we're going to whittle that down with 12 or 13-14 songs. In those days, a lot of bands would record a lot of material; maybe not 30 [songs], but 25 or 20. And then a lot of times in the recording process, some songs come out better than others, and you get like, 'Wow, I had no idea it was going to be so great.' So that was the mindset until one day Axl walked in and said, 'We're going to make a double album.' We were, 'What..?' And at that particular time, just joining the band, I was like, 'Wow, this is kind of over the top, it's a lot of material.' And now we had to go and we had to complete over 30 songs, which took a lot of time. They put the band out on the road. Before that, Axl had to finish all his vocals, so now he had to sing 30 songs.

"We started recording 'The Spaghetti Incident' while we were waiting for Axl to finish the vocals, so those particular records, that record, 'The Spaghetti Incident,' was done before we even left to go on tour with 'Use Your Illusion' 1 and 2... So we did the Spaghetti Incident, and then we started on 'Use Your Illusion' 1 and 2, the big world tour, and we haven't finished the records yet; we hadn't even finished the albums. We had about three months of touring where we were playing songs no one ever heard before. You got to remember, that was pre-internet, nobody would be able to get away with that now. We played Rock in Rio; if you go back and watch, we opened with a song no one had ever heard, but the place still went nuts. We opened with a song called 'Pretty Tied Up,' which was a really cool song that actually should have been a single. We had so many songs, so anyway, recorded those records, toured with that band and whatnot.

"When we came off the 'Use Your Illusion' 1 and 2 tour, I would say that we were a bit burnt out. We were out there for three and a half years pretty much straight, we weren't home at all, and it was just crazy times. It was far above any rock 'n' roll expectation, like, as a kid, you're like, 'Man, I just want to get on stage and play rock 'n' roll in front of people.' And then you get in a band like GN'R and it's like... it's kind of like more than you dreamt of. It's actually a bit out of control, it was a little hard to sort-of navigate it all.

"I think for all of us coming out of 'Use Your Illusion,' we were such a big band, it was, 'Where are we gonna go from here?' So after that tour, it took us a couple of years to get back together, and I made a record with Slash, the first Slash's Snakepit album. Me and him went - he called me up and he goes, 'Matt, let's go write some songs.' I'm like, 'Oh, thanks Slash, that would be cool. And I don't think he knew that I even played guitar in those days, but I played guitar, so there's a song in the album called 'Lower,' and I actually wrote the bass line to that and I played it. 'I didn't know you played bass.' Well yeah, I could play bass.

"As the story goes, we gave those songs, Axl and Duff came up to listen to what we had written, and at that point, Izzy Stradlin left the band, so we had all this material, like, 'Hey, let's play it for Axl. If he digs it...' So Axl came up and he didn't like what he heard. He's like, 'You wanted to make a different kind of record...?' He was listening to Nine Inch Nails, and we were getting a little bit like... we're firing on the same thought process, but we were thinking different things. So me and Slash decided, 'Well, shit, we got all these songs, let's record them.' So we called the label and they gave us a record deal, we made that first Slash's Snakepit record."

I always remember that being played in the car, in the house, and I recently checked it out again, and the songs just came back to me quickly. There's some great songs on there.

"You got to remember, Slash had been in a working environment. The thing that worked for Guns N' Roses was obviously Izzy Stradlin, and the fans always say, 'Well, where's Izzy?' Because Izzy's songwriting capabilities were like - he could come up with a basic core of a song, he could come in with chord changes, and then Slash and Duff would put like a riff on top of it, so maybe it was just like [sings], 'Take me down to the Paradise City where the grass is green and the girls are pretty,' but Slash would go [mimics guitar noises]. Those two and Izzy with Axl's lyrics - and Izzy wrote lyrics as well - that combination of guys, that was that collective.

"And then when Slash went off to do the Snakepit thing, now he had me, and I was discovering my songwriting abilities. I didn't really write songs for Guns N' Roses, you know, I was there, as a drummer I did my part to elevate the music... So, Slash gave me my first publishing - I had the publishing on that record. I was like, 'Wow, this is cool.' Then I learned about publishing, and I'm like, 'Wow, this is something I want to do more of.' So for Slash, it was basically - there he was, on his own in a way, with just me, and he was discovering that he could come up with songs on his own.

"And then when we started Velvet Revolver, I was like, 'I write songs,' so I jumped right in. I was like, 'Here, I got a song. What do you guys think?' They're like, 'Oh shit, Matt's got songs!' [Laughs] And I wrote 'Set Me Free' - everyone's got publishing, but that was the first song, and I had the riff on the guitar. But the thing that worked for that band was that we were all chucking in ideas. We were like, 'What do you think?' You know, it's hard when you're in a band, you got an idea and someone goes, 'Well, I don't know, man...' You got to be careful because you don't want to hurt someone's feelings - it's a weird thing. I was always taught to have an open mind about it and be like, 'Well, let's try it' even if at first you didn't like it. I got to be honest, Slash played some stuff, and I'm like, 'I don't know...' Or any one of the guys, or even myself, it'd be like maybe you see the look on their face, but we were all taught sort of like, 'OK, let's just try it,' and then if it didn't work down the line, we kind of, you know, it would organically come out and something better would come in.

"I found that working with those guys, it was such an open environment that I started, I'd go home at night and I'd want to write more songs, so that first Velvet Revolver album, I'm an equal writer on those records. The second one too, and that gave me, as a drummer, a lot of inspiration to go forward and do more things. On the new Billy Gibbons record, I'm a co-writer on all that material. And before, I used to be a little bit afraid to approach, like, 'How are you gonna walk up to Slash and play Slash riffs?' You know what I mean?"

https://www.ultimate-guitar.com/news/general_music_news/gnr_drummer_recalls_axls_reaction_to_slash_solo_material_talks_what_izzy_stradlin_meant_for_the_band.html

More excerpts from UG:
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During an appearance on Drum for the Song, former Guns N' Roses drummer Matt Sorum, who was a member of the fold from 1990 to 1997, talked about Foo Fighters, his work on the first Slash's Snakepit album, the early 2000s Velvet Revolver tenure, and more.

Asked on how he approaches songwriting as a drummer, Matt replied (transcribed by UG):

"Yeah - I think, as a drummer, it's an interesting thing - because you look a lot of drummers... I've always tried to be a 'song' drummer, so I'm always listening outward, like, 'What are those guys doing...?' I'm gonna try to pick up the rhythm of what they're playing and work that into my groove or whatever, so going the other way around, I mean, especially if you look up guys like Don Henley, Phil Collins and, of course, Dave Grohl. You listen to the Foo Fighters, that's so rhythm-driven. From what I understand, he records the guitar parts first, and then he cuts the drums second. So he's got the rhythm, you know, the guitar is such a rhythm instrument. And he knows in his head he's going to put the kick drum on that, so that's all already manufactured inside.

"Now, if you try to teach a guitar player that, he might not think, 'Oh, that's exactly where the drum beat's going to go'; but for a drummer, you're thinking the other way around, like, I'd be like, 'Slash, you got a beat for this?', he goes, 'Nah, not really.' I remember one time I wrote this song - actually, it's on the Snakepit album. I can't remember the name of the song, but it's a 5/4 groove, and I had this beat, and I was playing the beat and Slash goes, 'I got a riff for that.' It's on the first record, but the beat came before the riff, and I remember I said to him, 'Well, I inspired the riff, so let's talk about who's... I need to get credit.' [Laughs]

"Now, this is always the thing when you're in a band or whatever; bands have a hard time deciding, 'Well, I wrote the song, I came in with the whole song so I wrote it.' But if you're in the room hashing it out together - four guys come in a room and they start working on an idea, well, all four guys wrote the song."

Matt also said about the Foos:

"When the Foo Fighters came, I remember Velvet Revolver when we did our first record, and all those beats were like [thumps] rather than Foo Fighters [mimics percussion noises]. And all of a sudden, everything is really rigid - so I was listening to that going, 'Well, let's be aggressive that way.' If you go back and listen to the first Velvet Revolver album, there's a lot of that kind of shit going on. It came off punky, but it was modern. Rhythmically, I think the world moves rhythmically. What's the difference now about music in the '70s and even '80s? I usually say the drugs people are taking. [Laughs]"

https://www.ultimate-guitar.com/news/general_music_news/gnr_drummer_shares_opinion_on_foo_fighters_recalls_requesting_songwriting_credit_from_slash.html

Some more:
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During an appearance on Drum for the Song, former Guns N' Roses drummer Matt Sorum, who was a member of the fold from 1990 to 1997, talked about Ringo Starr and The Beatles, his Motorhead stint, and more. Sorum is promoting a new book titled "Double Talkin' Jive."

"Ringo, he lives about four blocks up the street from me - I'm very honored to know the guy now," Matt said, adding (transcribed by UG):

"Anyway, you got to remember, Ringo was the drummer in The Beatles, he had these looming characters, John Lennon, Paul McCartney walking in, and if you look at most of the catalog of The Beatles, it says 'Lennon and McCartney,' and then there was George [Harrison, guitar], and then there was Ringo. Now, they were given an opportunity to bring material, but it had to be as good as John and Paul's. It's got to be 'In My Life' and 'Blackbird,' so Ringo told me this story where he just, he was completely feeling left out. And he took off and he went down to the south of France and he had nothing - he couldn't come up with anything. And he was sitting on a boat on he wrote [1969's] 'Octopus's Garden.' And he was like, 'Oh god, is this good? Is this good? Can I show the band?' Because in your mind, you're like, 'Oh, it's not good enough!' He went and he walked up to those guys and said, 'I've got a song,' and he played it, and John and Paul were blown away. They're like, 'We're recording it.'

"When The Beatles broke up [in 1970], Ringo was the first one to have a No. 1 song. He became a solo artist, and he wrote a song called 'Photograph' [1973] - first guy. So that fearful process of confronting something that's fearful - he was able to break through and after The Beatles, he's like, 'Man, I can do this. I can go on my own, I can be successful.' And he was, and he still is.

"Obviously he'll always have that Beatles thing - like myself, I'll always be part of Guns N' Roses, people will be like, 'Why aren't you in the band now?' Well, I'm not in the band now, I'm doing different stuff. 'Well, what are you doing?' Well, I'm doing stuff. Always keep moving, right? I think when you're in a band, you're known for that band, and a fan would prefer if you were in that band forever. As we all know, when Lemmy passed, Motorhead went with it. But Phil will always be Motorhead, for the rest of his life. Me too, I'm like, 'Yeah, Guns N' Roses. I was in that band, yep.' And that takes you other places. It's like, look at our friend Mikkey and Scorpions now. Because of Motorhead, he's in Scorpions. He's a good drummer, yeah, that too. He can play, he's great, but he's got the legacy of Motorhead, and I have the legacy of Guns N' Roses, and that will never go away, and people call me and go, 'Hey man, I want you to do this thing, we love you.' The first band they always say - it's Guns N' Roses, and then comes Velvet Revolver. So that's a gift."

Matt then talked about his September 2009 stint in Motorhead, when he filled in for Mikkey on tour. Sorum said:

"When I left the Motorhead tour, I cried like a baby, and I actually said, 'I never have to play in another band again. I've just played with the greatest rock 'n' roll band of all time.' There's a scene in a movie called 'Field of Dreams'; Kevin Costner, and Shoeless Joe Jackson from the team that got basically blackballed from American baseball, he comes back as a ghost, and he builds this field, and he's been run out of baseball, with the greatest baseball team of all time. At the end of the movie, Shoeless Joe Jackson is so happy that he was able to come back and play on this field that Kevin Costner had built in the middle of this cornfield, and it ends up that Shoeless Joe Jackson is Kevin Costner's dad. And he turns around and says to him, 'Son, thank you,' and he walks off into the cornfield, and he vanishes. And I thought that's what I'm going to do after playing for Motorhead. I'm gonna walk off in the cornfield, disappear with my Motorhead tour jacket on. [Laughs] I was honored. I don't know why the fuck they fucking called me. I'm like, 'What...?' And yeah, it was probably one of the greatest times of my life because I've always been in bands that were a little bit like, you know, could be difficult, let me put it that way.

"When I was out with Motorhead, we were on stage every night, on time, we played a rock 'n' roll show, and Lemmy opened with the immortal words: 'We are Motorhead and we play rock 'n' fucking roll!' And we kicked in, and fucking came off stage and it was just like, 'Yeah, that's how it's supposed to be done - just like that.' Of course, I watched that band many times, but I've never been in the energy of it. And I'm up here with these guys - holy shit - just rolling down the highway. It wasn't a long time, I was only out with them for a month, but it was one of the greatest months of my life. Of course, I've been at the Wembley stadium with Guns N' Roses and all that, but it's very high on the list for me, and I always say that to people: you never know what's coming down the pipe.

"I said this at Lemmy's funeral - because Velvet Revolver had broken up, and I didn't really know what I was gonna do next, I had no band in sight... We broke up in 2008, so almost a year had gone by where I was sort of in a limbo, like, 'Oh shit...' And as a musician, here I put Velvet Revolver together, we were very successful, we won a Grammy, we sold three million records - I was like, 'Can I pull this off again? Do I have it in me?' People think, 'Oh, yeah, get a band, put a band together.' And I'm like, 'It's not that easy.' So I was sort of in the middle place of where I was going to be next, and all of a sudden, I got invited to come to play with Motorhead. So that really kind of lifted me up a lot. And I always said this, and I said it at his funeral - it was almost like a god shot. It's like, 'Matt, you're gonna be OK. You're gonna move on, you're gonna keep going.'

"When I left that band - when I left that tour, I formed Kings of Chaos. I started doing my own thing, and then similar to the call I got from Billy Gibbons to join his band - it's like that moment when you don't know... And I always say to people, 'Man, just have faith. You don't know what's gonna happen next' because as musicians, we kind-of live in limbo a little bit sometimes. We're like, 'What's going on? I don't know what I'm doing.'"

https://www.ultimate-guitar.com/news/general_music_news/gnr_drummer_recalls_how_ringo_opened_up_to_him_about_beatles_struggle_explains_what_motorhead_did_properly_compared_to_guns.html

And more:
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During an appearance on Drum for the Song, former Guns N' Roses drummer Matt Sorum was asked about the economic hardship many musicians are going through during the ongoing lockdown.

Asked about the current situation, Sorum replied (transcribed by UG):

"I get called every day to do a Zoom charity, and this charity, and that charity - that's been going on for a long time, but in the last four or five months, more than ever. And I always tell people, 'Don't forget about us musicians.' I think there's some notion that we're all out here doing this for fun and that we actually don't have families to feed and bills to pay. And music is sort of this gray area of, 'Oh, yay! You're just doing that for fun, right?' And I go, 'No. It's actually how I make a living.' I work. And there's some idea that we don't work hard. It's like, 'Actually, we do work really hard. When we tour, we're in a van or a bus bouncing down the highway for eight or ten hours, and we get on stage and we play, and then we get right back in that van and we go down the highway and we're tired.' And we're entertaining, and that's what we do - we're entertainers.

"As an artist, you should be able to decide what you wanna give of yourself - because everybody comes to us, 'Hey, I've got this charity thing - will you guys play?' You're like, 'God, I've done 10 this year...' "Don't get me wrong - I love helping, I love all of that - but then there's a point, especially now, that it's time for musicians and artists to have some relief. And what's gonna happen to us? This isn't about you going out and having a good time. We've chosen our lives, and this is what we're doing. So I hope that we can find a solution to this for musicians, artists, crew guys, touring individuals, guys that run venues, clubs... It's tough, man, and my heart goes out to all the guys that are really struggling out there."

https://www.ultimate-guitar.com/news/general_music_news/ex-gnr_drummer_matt_sorum_says_people_tend_to_have_odd_notion_that_musicians_dont_have_families_to_feed__bills_to_pay.html