ROB ZOMBIE: WHITE ZOMBIE 'Was A Painful Situation Most Of The Time'

BigMusicGeek.com recently conducted an interview with Rob Zombie. Several excerpts from the chat follow below.

BigMusicGeek.com: Overall, how would you describe your time as a member of WHITE ZOMBIE? Do you look back on it all with a certain fondness?

Rob: "It was a weird situation because when the band started, everybody was so young. I don't remember how old I was when it ended, but when you're basically right out of high school, you are not really in mind frame to sometimes handle what it takes it to put that together. And then you do mature, and then being in a band becomes a weird situation because it's almost like the situation hasn't matured with you. That band had a lot of growing pains, a lot of baggage all the way through and a lot of rotating people. I think we did a lot of good stuff, and I think we were kind of ahead of the curve in the beginning and did some groundbreaking stuff. But it was a painful situation most of the time, actually."

BigMusicGeek.com: In hindsight, even when the group was at its peak commercially, did it feel as if you were mainstream outcasts or perhaps even on the outside looking in?

Rob: "Well, we were kind of outcasts. We were definitely in our own world. I didn't even know what was going on in the world. Everything the band appeared to be was exactly what it was. Nothing was fake. We were all living in a lower east side, everybody was flat broke… no one had any money. Sometimes we would eat the free Hare Krishna food in the parks that they would feed to homeless people to survive. I mean, it was like we were a band of bums. I didn't even have a television, so I didn't know what was going on in the world. You could mention like the number one record to me and I would have no idea who it was. We were so far off the map. It was like our whole existence was the Lower East Side, (legendary New York City-based club) CBGBs… that world. That's what came out of it. Totally just not comprehending what was going on, which was a good thing. It was sort of what let the band become the band that it was going to be. We put no restrictions on it because we weren't even aware that there were restrictions. We didn't know how things are supposed to be done and we didn't give a shit, basically."

BigMusicGeek.com: At what point did you realize that WHITE ZOMBIE was coming to an end? I would imagine there was a time when the group's demise was both imminent and obvious to all parties involved…

Rob: "Well, you could feel it coming for a long time. Anyone on the inside knew it was more of a miracle that it was still holding together rather than it falling apart because people weren't getting along and people weren't speaking. I don't think the entire band was ever actually in the same room together when we made 'Astro-Creep'. We were riding on separate buses. I wouldn't even see those guys until showtime. I would walk on stage play, walk off stage. So it was more of a miracle that it lasted that long. I just remember it was the tour with PANTERA. I remember walking off stage and handing this guy who we called Wookie because he looks like Chewbacca the microphone, and just saying, 'Well, that's the end of that.' I walked off stage and walked to the car, went to the airport, went home and that was the end of that. There was no discussion at all. It was just sort of self-evident."

BigMusicGeek.com: What ultimately led to the group's demise? Was there a particular incident or was an accumulative effect of everything the group had endured during their career(s)?

Rob: "The main reason WHITE ZOMBIE ended was because the people that were in WHITE ZOMBIE couldn't get along anymore. That was the main reason. It wasn't because I had some artistic urge that I must be by myself. It was just a necessity. I mean the band could not be, so it was just a nightmare. It just ended over a bad feeling. It's kind of hard for me to actually judge it truthfully."

BigMusicGeek.com: What were the main motivation(s) behind releasing "Let Sleeping Corpses Lie" so long after the group's demise? In retrospect, I'm surprised it wasn't released sooner…

Rob: "The reasoning was because if I waited any longer, you wouldn't want to release it because it would be useless. I probably already waited longer than I should have. I mean I know…CDs are a thing of the past. They won't be around much longer much like vinyl and everything else. Maybe there will be some, but as a whole they'll be gone. But there is still something nice about putting together the set that you can hold in your hands. No one is going to go on iTunes and download seventy-nine songs from the box set. They'd probably pick and choose them. But there is something nice about presenting things in the format that you want them to be heard, which is something that's going away. It's nice to be able to put things out as you see that they should be presented. After that, people can do whatever they want with them, but I mean, at least at some point in time, they come out the way you want it. I've been trying to put it together for a long time. But I would let everything to take precedence over it… a movie, a new record because I am not big on revisiting the past. I like to move forward all the time…so whenever anything else would come up, it would go on the backburner. I had a little bit of window, and just knocked it out. I also figured that, if not now, when? So this seems like a good time."

Read the entire interview at BigMusicGeek.com.