PHILIP ANSELMO: 'What Is Underground Will Perhaps Be Mainstream One Day'

ARTISTdirect.com editor Rick Florino recently conducted an interview with DOWN/ex-PANTERA singer Philip Anselmo. A couple of excerpts from the chat follow below.

ARTISTdirect.com: What do you feel like separates [Philip's] Housecore Records from other labels?

Anselmo: First of all, it's a small, tightly knit group of bands. Honestly, our biggest goal is to let these bands have freedom and feel no pressure. In other words, I don't want anybody putting out a record before it's done, so we don't put real release dates down until records are finished. Then we start dealing with it. If we're towards the end of a record, of course, but you never know when you're at the end. I like the artists to be happy with their product. I guess it's exclusive because it's a do-it-yourself label, and I'm fine with that. I actually love that. I want to bring the best out of these cats via sound. All of the touring will come later. First things first, always, at Housecore.

ARTISTdirect.com: You're giving these bands space to develop their respective sounds, which is so important for artists in order to get their complete vision out there.

Anselmo: Yeah, I've been in the position where there are deadlines and you're up against time. In those situations, you're trying to squeeze a performance out, and it's normally one you just have to live with. Then you always go back and say, "God, I could've killed that or I could've done this better. We could've changed this or we could've changed that." You don't really have a chance to reflect on your work; and I know what it's like to be there.

ARTISTdirect.com: That reflection is so crucial because you're in the midst of creating, you don't really have the opportunity to think about it.

Anselmo: No…a band can write and be in the practice room for a year straight. If they're just bouncing these ideas off of each other, sometimes I might step in, but I never want to change the face of a band. I never want to change a band, but I will suggest things. To have that outside opinion, either way, has worked to the benefit of every project that has come my way. These bands have never had that opportunity before. Normally, their recording sessions have been for their own purposes. You get two or three days in a studio at the very most, and then the band tracks and the singer has two or three hours to do his vocals over ten songs [Laughs] before their time is paid for and they've got to get out. Any input that you can give young bands that are developing their sound just comes naturally.

ARTISTdirect.com: For artists working with Housecore, it must be refreshing to have that perspective from another artist who has gone through the whole process. You can offer true insight.

Anselmo: Absolutely! There are so many tiny little things that amount to a whole bunch when you're dealing with studio work and pre-production on a record. You're sitting there listening to fuzzy demos with strange arrangements — really they're just ideas thrown on a tape. It's challenging and fun to put songs together and to make them flow. Then there are production ideas that I know they've never dreamed of. I'm not a big "effects" guy. I don't think the bands I work with are big "effects" bands. As far as approaching production, I'm real organic. Take the vocals for example. There's a lot to be said for doubling and answering and all that stuff that I did with PANTERA — a lot of ping-ponging of the vocals and such. It's just fucking with your own voice, and it avoids the use of your regular old delays, echos and whatever other fucking magic button they push [Laughs]. I can't say that about all the bands. The thing about Housecore is when you look at the roster, I like to say every band on there is an "extreme band" in one way or another. We do metal. We do hardcore. Also we do this flip side of music that I personally would call "alternative." But, in my definition, figuring when I was growing up, alternative music was not a genre; it was the alternate to mainstream popular music in any form. You take a band like SKY HIGH; Donovan Punch, anything he touches — THE DONOVAN PUNCH EXPERIENCE, THE DISEMBODIED or BUM FREAK IN EGYPT. That's fucking different stuff, man. The SURSIKS are mighty, different and fantastic as well. I want to bring something fresh to the front. I want to bring something a little different to music. Don't get me wrong, of course when you say you have a heavy metal or thrash band, look, they're going to be a thrash band. If a band's going to be metal, that's fine. If you take a closer look at a band like haarp, you can classify them as "metal," but they're very hard to classify. You can say they're a slow band, but you can't call them "sludge" or "doom." Once again, it's making that difference, looking for that jewel in the rough — those bands that aren't just doing the normal fare and following the leader.

ARTISTdirect.com: On [PANTERA's] "The Great Southern Trendkill", you went to a different place, and it's one of the most honest places that I've ever heard any artist go.

Anselmo: I was very aware of what was going on around us at the time. We were a heavy metal band that had created our own heavy metal niche and that was PANTERA. I saw everyone jumping on a bandwagon that was destined to die and, sure enough, it did — like anything else. As a matter of fact, make that like three or four little movements in music there that were fleeting. That happened. That's history. Follow the leader for a little while until it gets burned out then bingo, right back to the basics. It's very obvious that music comes in cycles. We will have our day again [Laughs]. Those of us that are pure and true to our music will have our day again. Look at SLAYER. They got where they're at through longevity and consistency. They've earned their respect and made their way. I called out all of the little fucking trendy things, and I bashed them and lambasted them. That's where my head was at the time. I'm doing it my way now, really — a gentler, more logical approach, and that's Housecore Records. If you want to do something about it, make a dent, don't write a song.

ARTISTdirect.com: You've proved that it's okay for kids to be themselves and follow what's inside. It's freedom of speech and freedom of expression. That's paramount.

Anselmo: Yeah, you don't have to fucking conform to what everyone else is fucking doing. Look, I know what's going on right now. I keep a close eye on the underground. I see this whole lo fi movement of bands. It's been going on for quite awhile, and it's wonderful. There are a lot of labels coming out of Europe and the States that are strictly cassette labels. I love it, to tell you the truth! It reminds me of any drastic movement like punk rock was to disco, hardcore was to disco, early metal thrash was to disco. Lo fi/noise/black noise and a lot of the horror-type metal coming out of Italy is rebellion, man! Bands are showing their absolute freedom. They're saying, "Fuck what's going on." It's that rebellious nature that will always arise, and there's always going to be an underground. What is underground will perhaps be mainstream one day.

Read the entire interview from ARTISTdirect.com.