Interview with Mikey Weiss

May 3rd, 1996

Author: Unknown

On May 3rd 1996, I got a chance to interview Mikey Weiss, bassist of the coolest “pop/punk/ska” group, The Dance Hall Crashers…
R: How is the tour going? [with Bad Religion, Unwritten Law]

Mikey: The tour has been going really cool, it’s great.

R: Do the punks dig you guys?

Mikey: Yeah! In a strange way…y’know, there are a good number of punk kids coming…they seem like they like it. The only show that we think that they didn’t like us…well we know they didn’t, was in Montreal. There were like five thousand people there, it was pretty fuckin crazy, and there’s these giant bleachers, mostly all the people on the bleachers…before we even got on there’s this big “booo” [makes hilarious "boo" sound], and we’re like “wow, they haven’t even heard us yet!”. But all the people on the floor were like totally getting into it.

R: When you guys were playing were they still doing that? [booing]

Mikey: Yeah! It was like this half “haaaaa!”, “boooo”, waaa!”, “booo”

[we both start laughing]

Mikey: It was really wierd! We were realling laughing, it was really funny because that was the first time that ever happened, so it was pretty damn funny. But yeah, Bad Religion has been really fuckin cool, Unwritten Law we’ve known for days and they’ve been really cool.

R: How did you come about joining The Dance Hall Crashers?

Mikey: About three years ago, right before the DHC was gonna go on their first tour, their bass player decided he wanted to do stand-up comedy, because he was messin around with that, and he took off and I’ve known Gavin [the drummer] for all through high school and for years we’ve played together, ever since I’d started playing bass, and he called me up and he’s like, “Hey, wanna play?”. I’m like, “Sure”. I’d heard the DHC, I used to go check ‘em out, so it was pretty cool. I used to go see them because Gavin was playing drums.

R: Did you like them, were you a fan?

Mikey: I wasn’t a huge fan because I was more into like, Camper Van Beethoven, The Pixies, I never got into going to alot of ska shows. But I did go to alot of DHC and Let’s Go Bowling shows. There’s not alot of ska bands that I listen to all the time. I mean I enjoy listening to it, but there’s only a few that I really can get into.

R: What are those few?

Mikey: Like Operation Ivy…

R: Everyone like them…

Mikey: Yeah, like everyone likes mash potatoes!

[we laugh]

Mikey: Uhh y’know, ya can’t beat The Specials, Let’s Go Bowling is really cool. I’m like the freak of the band that wasn’t like totally heavily influenced in ska before I started playing. Like Karina [vocals] listened to ska for years…and Elyse [vocals], Jason [guitar]. Jason was heavily influenced by Tim [Armstrong of Op Ivy, Rancid] back when the band first started, and Gavin [drums] is a big Police fan. So when I joined the band I was just like, “Alright, ska. Let’s see what I can do here.”. But since then I never took the the Op Ivy record out of my cassette player. It was glued in there, I super glued it basically…so I was pretty set on knowing what to do…I think. Well actually I probably…oh I sound like shit I don’t know…

[I hadn't caught that last part at the time]

R: When you all write songs, do you just go in a room…

Mikey: …pull the curtains, lock the doors! No one goes to the bathroom unless something’s done!

R: Do you just play until it sounds cool, or…

Mikey: Well this band is pretty freakish…well there’s one wierd problem with Dancehall, well it’s not a problem it’s just pretty wierd when it comes to songwriting. It’s that Elyse lives in L.A., and we live in Berkely [San Francisco] and that’s a good seven-hours drive. Well, our songwriting works. We go to band practice, someone busts out a riff they’ve been screwing around with, we all put music to it…if we like it, if it sounds cool we test it out, and then Karina will come and put a melody to it. Sometimes Jason already has vocals, and a melody line to it. I’m not much of writing melody…

R: If there aren’t any lyrics, does she [Karina] make up words right there or…

Mikey: Well no she constantly writes lyrics, like on the road she has this special book…

R: So she just reads them out the book…

Mikey: …or sometimes if none of that really fits with the music, or if she dosen’t like it, then she’ll just put a melody line to it and Elyse will listen to it, and we’ll like, if she’s not in town we’ll send her a tape of it, and then she’ll put something in. Then Elyse and Karina will work on it together, and see how it is in our practice room. When they come over it’s really funny because we’re playing, and there’s a bathroom right next to the drummer. They go in the bathroom so they can hear themselves while we’re playing.

R: Wow…

Mikey: Yeah, it’s pretty neat.

R: why don’t they just use mikes?

Mikey: Well if you use mikes, everything is just drowned out, and you can’t really hear harmonies that well. So they go into the bathroom so they can hear the music, but it’s not too loud so they can hear each other. Then when they have something down, they come in the room so they can sing it, and we’re all “Wow! That sounds cool!”.

R: Wow…they’re really in there doing spells!

[laughter]

Mikey: They’re in there shootin up heroin! We’ve never known what they do in that bathroom. We’ver never liked, peeked in there. They could be like getting naked! Probably in there taking a shit while we’re playing going “yeah, we’re gonna write something to this.”!

[laughing tears now]

Mikey: “The secret bathroom”, it’s cool though.

R: So you all practice in Berkeley…

Mikey: Yeah, well no, outside of Berkeley. Gavin and Jason are brothers and their parents have this house, and upstairs is playroom area that’s never been used. No one ever uses it. When I go over there, no one’s ever up there, and that’s where we practice.

R: The parents don’t mind…the neighbors?

Mikey: Nah.

R: [pointing up] Wow, there are Dance Hall Crashers up there!

[laughs]

R: Do the local kids ever sit outside and listen to it?

Mikey: Sometimes we’ve seen neighbors come over and stand outside the window going [imitates someone peeking in a window].

R: So, the DHC are going to Japan this summer right?

Mikey: I think…

R: …and Europe.

Mikey: Well, I don’t really believe anything unless I’m on the plane.

R: Is that how it works?

Mikey: Well…to me. I can’t look forward to anything or it never comes true. So, if you read it…sure!

R: How did you like your show upstairs in the balcony? [a sold-out show at LaLuna a few weeks ago]

Mikey: I liked it!

R: Were you bothered by the football players in the front who kept getting onstage and knocking over the monitors?

Mikey: Yeah, that always bugs…but you can’t keep ‘em out. So far with Bad Religion we had no idea what to expect. It’s Unwritten Law, us [DHC], and Bad Religion, and it just, opens with this punk band, us, and then Bad Religion which is hard again. It was really scary I didn’t know what to expect…if that could work.

R: I read that in an interview with Elyse on the internet…

Mikey: Occasionally there’s these people in the front row that like scream, “Take off your clothes!” to Karina and Elyse…

R: That sucks…

Mikey: Yeah that totally sucks…but that’s when I spit on ‘em.

[laughter]

Mikey: Lately I’ve been chewing gum onstage so when that happens, it’s always in the front row when they do it too, so I just walk up and spit gum in their hair.

R: Do they ever spit back?

Mikey: Well they really can’t do anything because they’re squished against the barricade!

R: Have you all found a name for your sound yet?

Mikey: Skapop. I call it rock and roll man! I tend to think that everyone forgot that word. I don’t think that word “rock and roll” has been used in so long. It’s all either alternative, or punk, or hard-core…

R: I think skapoppunk is the best.

Mikey: Skapop! I’ve been hearing ska-core. Have you heard that?

R: yeah… Do any of you ever get on the internet?

Mikey: I’ve looked at our page once and then I shut it off. I get scared of the internet because I don’t understand it, it totally frightens me…Jason, he’s really into the net, he’s got his own little page and everything. Yeah, but I don’t know computers at-all. The last computer I really used was a Commodore 64. And my brother had his own bulletin board and I used to come home from school and see what games came in.

The Dance Hall Crashers ripped through a flawless set to a sold-out crowd at LaLuna a few hours later.

Entry Filed under: Crashers, Mentions