ALAN ROBERT Looks Back On LIFE OF AGONY's 'Ugly': 'I'm Not Sure Everyone Got What We Were Trying To Do Until Much Later'

By David E. Gehlke

LIFE OF AGONY bassist Alan Robert has established quite a second career as a graphic artist behind his "The Beauty Of Horror" adult coloring book series. It's a novel idea that has brought what once was primarily a child and nature-based forum into the world of horror and gore, with Robert having released seven volumes that have sold over 700,000 copies. To top it all off, Robert has a central character in his graphic novels, Ghouliana, who is now receiving action figure treatment. It's not bad work for a guy who used to pass the time backstage by sketching while being in a band that he figured wouldn't last more than six months.

The aforementioned LIFE OF AGONY is gearing up for the 30th anniversary tour of their sophomore studio album, "Ugly". A noted departure from the brilliant metal / hardcore / emotional-but-not-EMO "River Runs Red", "Ugly" found LIFE OF AGONY toning down on the aggression and turning to more melodic and / or alternative fields. Reaction, of course, was mixed in the unforgiving mid-1990s, although a further inspection of "Ugly" finds that many of its songs have stood the test of time, one of the many items Robert shared with BLABBERMOUTH.NET.

Blabbermouth: Has "The Beauty Of Horror" series given you a second career outside of LIFE OF AGONY?

Alan: "Absolutely. First of all, it's going on ten years of 'The Beauty Of Horror'. It's pretty amazing. Before that, I was writing and illustrating horror graphic novels. It was really an unexpected thing when the first 'The Beauty Of Horror' coloring book blew up. It was intended to be kind of a spoof on other coloring books. It was the first of its kind because, at that time, in 2016, all the coloring books that were out there were nature-based or nice, cute farm animals. [Laughs] I was kind of poking fun at it, in a way. I would take a nice, serene scene and drop a zombie into it."

Blabbermouth: Were you taken aback when it became an Amazon best-seller?

Alan: "It was really a surprise. Not the publisher, but the distributor was a little weary: 'How is this going to sell? Are stores going to carry it?' It was pushing the envelope a little bit. It was shocking when it shot to the top of Amazon."

Blabbermouth: Is the series now all-encompassing for you? I'm sure there are quite a few opportunities that stem from it.

Alan: "Yeah. Working on other properties, like last year, I did the 'Beetlejuice' book and 'Universal Monsters' book, which was really a lot of fun. I'm working on two books that aren't 'The Beauty Of Horror' that will come out next year from other big properties. It's turned into something that I didn't expect. It's the yin and yang and the best of both worlds. I started as an artist even before the band. I went to the School of Visual Arts in Manhattan. I had set out to be a comic book artist when I graduated, but that was 1993. We had just gotten signed to Roadrunner Records. The opportunity to tour was dangling in front of us. I figured, 'This band thing will last about six months.' [Laughs] That turned into 30-plus years."

Blabbermouth: You always had something to fall back on.

Alan: "I guess I've been lucky to be able to survive financially doing the things that I love and to support my family. I've also had corporate jobs in the arts.

Blabbermouth: If you're a good graphic designer, you can make it in corporate America.

Alan: "I was a creative director in the city for about eight years while we were touring. I just ran around the globe with a laptop and called in when I had to."

Blabbermouth: Did you like it?

Alan: "I did. I kind of dug it. I didn't dig the commute when I was home. [Laughs] I didn't dig that and the nine-to-five grind. I've always hustled; I've always done multiple things at a time. Anyone who knows me knows I used to color when we were touring. I never stopped."

Blabbermouth: Do you have something similar to "Backwards Records" in mind where you do individual band members instead of album covers?

Alan: "I see no limit with this property. What started as the ultimate horror coloring book, with each volume, took on a new thing and widened the scope of what I wanted to do and pushed it to where fans are even more excited when I do a themed 'The Beauty Of Horror' book. There's the 'Backwards Records' to dead celebrities ['Haunt Of Fame']. Spoofs on horror movies. It's gone in a bunch of different ways. I think the 'Backwards Records' one was volume seven. It's getting up there."

Blabbermouth: Has anyone asked you to tone some of the books down to make them more palatable for a wider audience?

Alan: "No one has ever asked me to tone it. I'm surprised I can get away with so much. [Laughs] There's a bunch of spoofs in there that are questionable. That's a cool thing being with IDW. I basically submit the books, and they publish them. They don't really weigh in if something is off-color or not."

Blabbermouth: Where are you taking the Ghouliana character next?

Alan: "There's a lot of cool stuff going on behind the scenes. One thing I can talk about because it's about to come out is another NECA action figure. This one is bigger and fully posable with material clothing and comes with a glow-in-the-dark skeleton doll. That's going to be revealed very soon. It looks so cool. Growing up with action figures, to have my own character is so beyond my wildest dreams."

Blabbermouth: Let's move over to LIFE OF AGONY. When the year 1995 is brought up, what's the first thing that comes to mind?

Alan: "It was a rough time for the band. There was a lot of internal fighting; we were on tour for two years for 'River Runs Red'. Then we're thrown back into the studio to work on the second album so we could get back out on the road. There was a lot of pressure on us. We were in a different headspace than the kids that made 'River Runs Red'. It shows on 'Ugly'. It was a different direction. We used a different producer. The whole sound was different than 'River Runs Red'. It was a big risk for us to release it at the time. But we were always true to ourselves, and that's who we were at that time. Every record we've done represents who we were at that time. We never set out to duplicate the sound that we established on the previous albums. Every record, every batch of songs, is a representation of who we were at that moment in time."

Blabbermouth: Could you have used a break?

Alan: "We never got a break. It's weird because 'River' is looked at as such a classic album, but at the time, it didn't fit anywhere. We were on this metal label. We came up in the hardcore scene playing with hardcore bands. I think booking agents didn't know what bills to put us on for tours. We were always mismatched. I'm not sure everyone got what we were trying to do until much later. That's happened for the 'Ugly' record as well. It was not received well by the press and write-ups, but now, it's become such an iconic record for the fans. First of all, we've always included a bunch of those songs in our live set, like 'I Regret', 'Lost At 22' and 'Other Side Of The River'. Those are staples of our set. At the time, it was so different and such a U-turn from what 'River' was. I'm not sure people knew what we were doing."

Blabbermouth: You rattled off some of the stronger songs for which you are responsible. Do you recall what kind of frame of mind you were in to go in that direction?

Alan: "I don't think there was any intention. It was just the songs that were coming out at the time. By the way, especially to speak for my influences, I didn't listen to a lot of heavy music. I was listening to singer-songwriters a lot of the time. I was listening to PINK FLOYD, like 'The Final Cut' record — also, Sinead O'Connor and Fiona Apple. Of course, I love metal and hardcore. Some of my favorite albums are from those genres, but as a songwriter, I think I was more influenced by lyrics and melody, even the BEATLES. When I think of the early '90s, that's where my head was at."

Blabbermouth: You talk about how difficult it was to categorize LIFE OF AGONY: You had hardcore and metal influences and had a tremendous singer like Keith (Caputo).

Alan: "Keith is classically trained on the piano. He was also a big PINK FLOYD fan. The three of us: Joey [Zapella, guitar], Keith and I were all big FLOYD fans, especially 'The Final Cut'. When we first came out, even before we got signed, we had a keyboard onstage, and Keith would play them on a bunch of songs. We were really deep into 'The Final Cut' world. That's where a lot of high-range singing came from, like emulating Roger Waters. A lot of people didn't understand that about us. When PINK FLOYD goes down to a piano note and a vocal that was almost heavier to us than a big, fat riff—it tapped into a certain kind of emotion. We were trying to chase those types of moments. We were closer to it on the 'Ugly' record."

Blabbermouth: Do you recall, then, what kind of expectations there were for "Ugly"?

Alan: "There was a lot of pressure on us. I think we ran out of money. We were recording it and ran out of money for the mix, and we ended up doing the mixes during the night. It was basically me and Michael Barbiero, the mixer, checking into the studio at nine o'clock at night and staying all night for a few weeks until the record was done."

Blabbermouth: How did Roadrunner feel about all this?

Alan: "They gave us more money, but we had to cut corners to finish the mix. [Roadrunner A&R man] Monte [Conner] stopped by the Systems Two Studio a few times, and I think we played him stuff that was in progress."

Blabbermouth: Do you miss those days? Some bands tend to romanticize that era when they had a record company behind them.

Alan: "Nah, I think it's a bunch of bullshit. I think those are just fictitious stories that don't really matter. You have to go through the motions, have the record company show up, and get them all jazzed up. Is it really helping the creative process? Or is it just making them feel better that they spent their money on the album? We didn't even do a video for the record. We were on the road, and we kept getting video treatments from the label, which I guess they were farming out to studio directors. They all had car chases in them — things that were not related to the songs. We were like, 'No. This is horrible. We're not going to do it.' It was probably to our own detriment we didn't make any videos. We didn't see eye-to-eye for a music video with any of those songs."

Blabbermouth: "Lost At 22" would have made for a good video with the proper treatment.

Alan: "Yeah. I think we were always very hands-on. When we saw our own visions come to fruition, it always ended up better. We knew the band so well, what we were after, and the type of visuals we wanted to put forward. I remember doing some of the storyboards for songs like 'This Time' and 'Through And Through'. We got very involved."

Blabbermouth: What was the atmosphere in the band for the "Ugly" touring cycle? It wasn't long until Sal (Abruscato, drums) left.

Alan: "We opened for PRONG in Europe. That was a great tour. We played to massive amounts of people on that tour. It was a sold-out tour. That was great. We did the Ozzy [Osbourne] tour in America with KORN. What was cool about that was Ozzy only played three times a week. On the off nights, it was us and KORN in the clubs. Those shows were great. I think they went gold on that tour for their first album. To play with Ozzy and KORN in arenas for the first time in America — we were already playing in front of massive audiences in Europe, but to do arenas in the States was something special."

Blabbermouth: What are you looking forward to for the 30th anniversary tour of "Ugly"? Has your perspective shifted on the songs?

Alan: "We're super excited about it. We've never played close to half the record live. Just to play some of those songs live for the first time, and we're going to bring the keyboards back for some of the songs where they are prominent like the SIMPLE MINDS cover ['Don't You (Forget About Me)']. We're going all out for it."