THE ATOMIC BITCHWAX

The Atomic Bitchwax composed of Monster Magnets' Ed Mundell, Godspeed bassist Chris Kosnik, & drummer Keith Ackerman. Towards the end of 1997, THE ATOMIC BITCHWAX recorded "Hey Alright" for the critically acclaimed & well-received "Welcome to the Meteor City Compilation. Then in early 1998, inked a deal with Tee Pee/Mia Records. Even befor the ink was dry on the contract, the band holed up in the infamous Trax East Studios with producer Eric Rachel (Core, Electric Frankenstein) and recorded its Tee Pee/Mia Records title self-titled full-length. THE ATOMIC BITCHWAX's first effort is an acid-laced, blues-based, riff-rock, explosion of solid gold jams: it is a raw reminder of what it's like to be bitten in the ass by the rock & roll bug. The bands smooth cohesiveness creates a fluid, dynamic groove built on unbeleivable chops, soulful licks, and empressive song-writing prowniss. I recently had the opportunity to speak with Ed about the band and other related topics. Here's how it went:

by David LaDuke

David LaDuke: I know that recently the band was forced to reschedule a web chat due to the apparent offensive nature of the bands name. would you elaborate a bit on this including letting us know how the band came to choose the name and how it came about.

Ed Mundell: Well, it sounds dumb to say they found it offensive, but it never ever crossed my mind. Give me a break! You know, when you're kids hanging around, Bitchwax was like a name for like the stuff in a lava lamp, the wax. It's like what are they talking about? Well maybe it's just a New Jersey thing, I don't know. But yeah, so we liked that word and I was really into Atomic Rooster at the time when we started the band, so I just wanted to have a band with 'Atomic' in there, (laughed) just somehow it became The Atomic Bitchwax. Although we did play our first show as 'Helium Head', which is the name of a Sir Lord Baltimore tune. As far as that, everybody out voted me for that name, but I still think it sounds cool.

D: As a member of both Monster Magnet & Bitchwax, do you foresee any conflicts of both touring & recording for one or the other? Also, is there any possibilities of a tour with Magnet & Bitchwax together?

E: God, I hope not! That would be a long night for me! And a lot of songs too! I'd probably have to be playing like 30 songs, or something. We're actually playing a Monster Magnet show tomorrow, here in New Jersey, and we leave for the Bitchwax tour on Tuesday. I know it get's kind of hairy at times, but I try to organize it so when one band isn't working, the other one is. So I can keep busy and play all the time. I don't play all the time, I kind of tend to get into trouble, so I don't want that. (laughed)

D: So basically, there's really no conflicts as far as both bands.

E: I try to keep it pretty separate. I mean it's still heavy rock, both bands play heavy rock. But when Magnet's off, you know, we're pretty much off. So that's when the other band gets more activated. Lately because of the CD and the record coming out, Bitchwax has been more & more, you know what I mean? Just more stuff to do, but I think I can handle it.

D: I understand the band has a arsenal of 25 originals. Was it difficult cutting it down to 9 tracks? And what was the process of eliminating one track over the other, you know, was it hard to do?

E: Well yeah! That was the hardest part of making the record, was figuring out, what we wanted to throw on there so it would flow alright. But, a lot of songs we forgot, you know, (laughed) we forgot that we wrote them. And we was like, thinking about it a year later, like, 'remember we used to have this song?' or 'remember we used to throw "In a Gadda da Vida" in the middle of this song?' and like, all this kind of stuff, like listening to old live tapes or videos, or whatever. People would taped the shows but a, we just did another song recently for an Italian compilation, Red Sun is the label and their doing a rock compliation thing like everybody's on. And we did, like the second song we ever wrote. We just called it "Vigorous", we never titled it, but now it's called "Marching on the Skulls of the Dead" a super old one, but we're just like remembering everything that we wrote. We have tons of shit! Just crazy how much we have. We used to jam like everyday for hours and hours out.

D: What lead the band into covering Tommy Bolin's "Crazed Fandango" (which no doubt has that 'Santana' feel?) and Core's "Kiss The Sun"?

E: Oh yeah, everybody calls it the Santana tune. 'Hey I love the Santana tune on your record!" Yeah, well the Tommy Bolin thing, I think that dude, that guy is like 'THE guitar guy', 'THE musician guy', you know like the guy I listen to. And that was a great song that a, fit really well with this band. You know, 'cause Keith could play drums like a mother fucker! Like I've never heard anybody that could play drums to that song, and Keith can do it and it sounds really good! That tune really fit in with our band, so I wanted to do and not a lot of people heard that song. Plus hopefully, people would check out Tommy's music which would be pretty cool. Now the Core song, Core used to be on Atlantic Records, they made a record called "Revival" and they live around here, I mean like 5 minutes away from here. I can ride my bike over there. I hang out with those guys. But that song was a great song, and they don't even play it live anymore, and like now, a lot of people bought that record or heard that record. It's just a really good record. So we were playing with them at a show one night. They went on before us or something and they did'nt play that song, and we had been messing around with it at practice, it's a great song! And a, we just like pulled it out, like you know, let's see, you know, let's see if they'll get up and sing this song with us. We just played it and their just like, 'What are you guys doing?' You know, looking at us all strange. But it's a great song. It's just like a different kind of heavyness. I think people should here it. (laughs) They don't even play it anymore, so we're going to.

D: Do you remember an early Fleetwood Mac release entitled: "Then Played On"? The 1st time I heard Bitchwax, this CD came to mind. Any influences here? What about Robin Trower?

E: Oh yeah! Well for me definitely! I don't know if the rest of the guys have heard that record. I love that record!

D: Oh, I do too! I haven't thought about it in years, and I was listening to you all and that was one of the 1st records that came to my mind, you know?

E: Wow! that's cool, thanks! Yeah old Peter Green & Fleetwood Mac is like awesome! I really really love it. And that record in particular is a good one. As far as Robin Trower, yeah, I've heard it all. I listened to him the other night. Yeah, I listen to like everything. I mean like guys like Robin Trower, Frank Marino, Ritchie Blackmore, Ted Nugent.

D: As far as the album cover design, who actually came up with the cover design?

E: A guy in San Francisco. Actually I just saw him the other night at one of our shows. He's moving to Philadelphia now. His name is Brian Landow. He's kind of like a Frank Cosick (sp?) kind of guy, he makes really cool concert posters. I hate to say Frank Cosick, because he has his own style. But Brian makes posters and designs for bands and stuff in San Francisco. But since he moved to Philly he started a t-shirt press and is going to make some t-shirts for us and hopefully he'll do some more artwork for us as well.

D: I wonder if the cover on Bitchwax CD had anything do with them finding Bitchwax as being offensive? I never really thought about, it never even crossed my mind, till I read about in the press release.

E: I guess maybe someone could have looked at this chick with nothing but shoes on, like a cool pair of shoes. But uh, yeah I guess they could've, it never crossed my mind either. I hope nobody finds it offensive. It's not meant to be offensive.

D: I think it's a nice cover myself.

E: We alway's put chicks on our posters, everywhere, so we needed a chick for our album cover. (laughs) So it wasn't meant to be mean or offensive or anything.

D: What type of gear are you currently using as fas as amplification, effects and guitars?

E: Of course in Magnet I use a bunch of things. But in Bitchwax all I use is a Fender Stratocaster and an Orange amp. And I have a Vox Crybaby and a rotovibe to get, you know the Robin Trower kind of effect. And a Big Muff, that's pretty much it. Once in a while I use an echo plex for spacey effects, but I don't know if I'm gonna bring it on the road. It's kind of fragile.

D: How are Bitchwax originals contructed, by jam sessions or do you all get together & throw around ideas, or is it done individually?

E: Oh, that's a good one. Well they're all kind of different. Generally, somebody comes in with a riff or an idea. When I start things, I usually don't have the entire riff. I just, you know, like I wanna do something that kinda sounds like this, but those aren't the right notes. But I need the groove and I need to play it for about a half hour to figure out the right notes. So we all just jam on something for awhile untill we figure what notes they should be. It usually starts with an idea. Somebody has an idea and we just build from that. And somebody will say, 'well let's go here after that', & Chris will say 'great I've got some lyrics' & he'll throw something on & we'll just build it up. Sometimes it takes, you know 5 minutes, sometimes a couple hours, or sometimes we'll work on things on & off for a couple of months. So it'll fall together when the time is right. But everybody, you know, pitches in & works on them all.

D: Are there any videos in support of this release?

E: Oh no! Are you crazy? There's just one guy that runs our record label. They don't have money for a video! We encourage people to come to our shows & tape the shows, video or audio tapes or whatever they wanna do at the shows.

D: Do you feel that the industry (America) support of metal is as strong as it should be? Especially when you compare it with the European support of metal?

E: I don't really listen to much metal. But as far as hard rock goes, it seems like rock is kinda coming back now. Which is kinda cool. There are actually more band on the radio & in magazines that are just rock bands. The whole 'stoner rock' scene is coming around now. It just basically rock bands. It's not really 'stoner rock'! It's just 'hard driven rock bands', like Black Sabbath, Led Zepplin. You know, there's a lot more of that coming around now. And there's a lot more kids Although it's weird, because now kids, some kids are playing guitar you know, & don't really know who Jimi Hendrix is because they've like been force fed Korn & Limp Biscuit for the past 5-6-7 years!

D: Well that's about it! I appreciate the interview, love the album, plus I want to wish you luck on the tour with Core!

E: Yeah! We leave a week from today, for Cleveland.

D: In closing, is there anything you wish to add?

E: I don't know. (laughs) Listen to Deep Purple! How about that, that's what I want to add!