After a few time and date changes, Cassie Walker finally got a hold of the charismatic and energetic singer of The Dead Daisies, John Corabi, to ask him questions about the band and their latest single and short film, Song And A Prayer.
C: When I was dialling your number I can hear Led Zeppelin playing instead of a ring tone, is every aspect of your life rock’n’roll?
J: You know what? I am so rock’n’roll that the phone companies and the universe just said he doesn’t need a dial tone, we’re just going to have Kashmir play. Then I programmed it to play Trampled Under Foot when I receive a call, so when you called me that’s what I heard- it’s just how I roll.
C: that is awesome! Do you find when people call you they’re in a cooler mood because they’ve just been listening to a sweet tune?
J: Yeah, it’s funny, people leave me messages, and they’re singing along to Kashmir on my message.
C: You must have some pretty cool people calling your phone, who is the coolest person who’s left you a voicemail?
J: One night a few years back, right after I joined Motley Crüe, Tommy Lee had some drinks with Eddie Van Halen, and they were partying in their superhuman way, and Tommy was so stoked he played Eddie a bunch of our demos, and he’s like “dude, I fucking love this, this is great” and Eddie’s like “Your singer’s awesome, he’s got a great voice” so Tommy called me and they left me a message, it’s Eddie saying; “He Corabi, it were Eddie Van Halen” and went on about the record- which was pretty cool.
C: What a message to wake up to?
J: I was pissed actually. I was out on my motorcycle, so I put my phone in my bag and saw the missed call once I stopped riding- it was all cool.
C: Now I’m so pumped on the new single ‘Song and A Prayer’ and the killer short film video clip.
J: to be honest with you, I have an odd way of doing things, and I haven’t’ seen the clip yet. We had some meetings when we were on our last leg of the tour, we landed in L.A, and we met some different directors, we talked about what we wanted in the video, I think the lyrics for the song are pretty self-explanatory, so we told them to stay true to the song, and we wanted something cool, and we split and went on tour. I like being aware of what’s going on but I’m also not the type of person to stand over someone and tell them what to do, especially when it’s something they’re good at because I hate when people do that to me, so I just say what I’ve gotta say and then I walk away, but I’m very excited to see it.
C: I feel so excited that I’ve seen something you’ve worked on before you have.
J: Let’s turn this around now, what did you think of it honestly? I’ve seen some videos that are spot on, and I’ve seen some that you sit there and go ‘what the fuck are they trying to say’? Either way, it wouldn’t surprise me, I’ll see it soon, but be honest with me, what do you think?
C: I could tell you anything right now and have you sweating for the rest of the interview, but honestly it tells the story perfectly, the scenery, the shots, the casting all paint the picture that the lyrics tell, and it still has that rock’n’roll edge that The Dead Daisies are known for.
J: I’ll check it out and see if we’re on the same page.
C: The band have been so busy since I first heard of The Dead Daisies, how did you get involved?
J: I think now that the lineup is solid it’s ok, but when the band first started they did everything ass backwards. A band normally gets together, writes some songs, jams, gets a record deal, goes on tour- these guys wrote some songs, recorded them, then decided we need a band, it was Jon (Stevens) and David (Lowy) and it just got too hard for the other musicians involved to stay with their other band’s commitments, so they asked me to play a show in Cuba and do a few shows that were already lined up and I’ve been in the band now for almost 2 years.
A lot of the band has been growing in public, but with myself, David, Doug (Aldrich), Marco (Mendoza) and Brian (Tichy) we want to keep it this way and keep moving forward with this line up.
C: So it the songwriting side of things a team effort with this lineup?
J: Yup! With the last two records, one in Sydney, one in Nashville we basically all got into a room, and we played each other ideas, and we turned 17 ideas into 14 songs, all together, all tracked everything in the same room, just very old school and both records we did in a month, wrote, recorded, mixed and mastered them.
C: How is that possible? I know you’re all extremely professional and talented, but that’s impressive.
J: I don’t know, but we did it. It’s funny, three of the band live in L.A, I live in Nashville, and David is usually in Sydney, Australia so when we get together to write or rehearse it’s a bit of an undertaking.
When they told me we were recording in Australia I’m like “Damn, how long will I be there for?” and then management told me a month and I panicked, but then being a music fan I found the making of Deep Purple’s Machine Head, which is their legendary record, I watched this whole documentary and they went from England to Switzerland, they had no songs, no riffs, nothing and they recorded that legendary record in three weeks- so I sat here and said to myself “if Deep Purple can record 8 songs in three weeks, then we can do 12 songs in four, it can be done”.
C: If you go back in history the most classic rock albums were made in that time frame, Led Zeppelin, The Beatles.
J: I think the reason our records resonate with people is because they’re honest. We’re not overthinking the songs. We write together; we work in the same room, and we feed off each other’s energy.
C: It’s a great recipe and thanks so much for the chat, enjoy the cruise.
J: I will, I’m currently in a high rise hotel room naked waving at people in a neighbouring room, it’s going to be a great cruise. We hope to get down to Australia sometime soon.
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The Dead Daisies have just revealed a new song called ‘A Song And A Prayer’, eight days before to kicking off their massive six-week joint-headline UK and European Tour with The Answer.
A short film has been created reflecting the poignant story behind the lyrics of ‘A Song And A Prayer’ which is the fourth single to be taken from The Dead Daisies new album “Make Some Noise”.
Dead Daisies ‘Song And A Prayer‘ Short Film
Filmed in Queensland with Producers Sally Madgwick, Benjamin Evans and Matti Crocker – Luminare Media, Direction from Damian Lang, a dynamic cast that includes Alex Ftizalan (Ren), Ruby O’Kelly (Grape), Curtis Bock (Bok), and Cliff Ellis (Top Hat Man),
The Dead Daisies are Doug Aldrich (Whitesnake, Dio), John Corabi (Mötley Crüe, The Scream), Marco Mendoza (Whitesnake, Thin Lizzy), Brian Tichy (Ozzy Osbourne, Foreigner) and David Lowy (Red Phoenix, Mink).
