TROUBLE Guitarist Talks Singer Change

September 15, 2008

Sean Palmerston of Viewmag recently conducted an interview with guitarist Bruce Franklin of the legendary Chicago doom band TROUBLE. A few excerpts from the chat follow below.

On the fact that TROUBLE's latest album, "Simple Mind Condition", has yet to receive a U.S. release:

"Shortly after its release, the label that released it hit huge financial problems. [Escapi] promised us over and over that financing was in place and that they would be releasing the record over here but all plans fell through. This has been very frustrating for us. It was twelve years between the previous record (1995's 'Plastic Green Head') and the new one and we were planning a big comeback with the record but it still has not come out in our home country."

On how WARRIOR SOUL's Kory Clarke became the new TROUBLE singer, replacing Eric Wagner in April 2008:

"Rick [Wartell; TROUBLE guitarist] had done a gig with his side–project WET ANIMAL in New York and the band that Kory was playing in at the time, DIRTY RIG, were also on the same bill. Rick saw him and was blown away. He didn't know anything about his previous band, WARRIOR SOUL. I had seen Kory in WARRIOR SOUL in 1990 and thought he was great too. It was a lot of years in between, but we had both seen him and thought good things about him. He became the first thought of someone to talk to when it became time to think about a new singer."

On Clarke's inaugural tour of duty with TROUBLE:

"We had sent him some MP3s and he had the chance to listen to some stuff but it is not the same until you are playing with the band. We only had a couple of rehearsals before the tour started and the first few shows were a little rough. By the fourth show it was getting pretty good and from there on it just got better. We couldn't expect him to learn twenty songs at once, so we picked the most popular songs. We were hoping to do more early songs but Kory was latching on to the early Nineties stuff because it has the most hooks and is the catchiest material. It's probably easier for him to remember those. We did a setlist that was heavier in that era and finally managed to get one or two old ones in by the end of the tour."

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