Mercury Rev guitarist Grasshopper and St. Johnny vocalist/guitarist Bill Whitten are friends. Good a reason as any to have the former interview the latter. The interview was conducted via telex. Grasshopper was in Helsinki, Finland, at the Mitsubishi Personal Storage Facility, and Bill Whitten was in the Traveler's Insurance Risk Analysis Building in Hartford, Connecticut. We don't know where the other members of Mercury Rev or St. Johnny were, but we're glad they were someplace else because the conversation is confusing enough...
Grasshopper: Gee, I feel funny. Yo, Bill, Microsoft Word Up.
Bill Whitten: [Garble, garble, garble]
G: So your new album, Let It Come Down, hits the stores today, no?
BW: ...erotic terrorism, hatred for all modes of known existence...
G: Yes, and what do you think about the baggy trend in clothing, is it on the way out?
BW: The US penal system provides each prisoner with ill-fitting clothing in an effort to destroy morale and stamp out individuality. Similar methods are also employed by McDonalds and Burger King.
G: So you currently reside in New York City. Are you at all frightened by Nostradamus' predictions about the end of this century?
BW: I feel that I come equipped with an expiration date like a box of Polaroid film.
G: When people call a work pornographic, what the heck do you think they mean?
BW: I think some day exotic dancers will strip away their skins and reveal their throbbing viscera. How many Finnish kopeckis are needed to purchase a package of Hershey's kisses?
G: In retrospect, what are your views on the Cool Moose, your first band, which was a Dixieland band, in terms of wearing your heart on your sleeve?
BW: Ahh, the late Eighties, a time of schandenfreuden, i.e. shameful laughter. I have many regrets from that period. Suffice to say, if I were to die now and my life flashed before my eyes, I would be [garbled].
G: An old friend of mine, David Baker...
BW: All my best friends are pre-operative. I was over in the meat packing district the other day, just minding my own business, and I saw P_____ M_____ go into Hotel Lamprey.
G: What do you think separates Let It Come Down from previous efforts such as the "Gilligan" seven-inch, and by the way, why don't you shave down there?
BW: Everything prior to Let It Come Down was recorded before my conversion to Scientology. All you cynics will scoff at my new found science fiction-based spirituality, but MAJOR STARS like JOHN TRAVOLTA, TOM CRUISE and BECK are living proof of the validity and efficacy of the teachings of L. Ron Hubbard.
G: Evel Kneivel once said, "I'm not crazy, I'm just out of step. When you step out of society, you're all right." What are your comments on this philosophy?
BW: She's taking off her 100 percent polyester nurse's outfit and she's straddling the exercise bicycle...
G: Do you remember seeing Sun Ra play at the Dom Polski in Hartford with Jackie MacLean sitting at our table, back in the teenage days of [garbled]? What impression did that leave with you?
BW: I remember drinking Golden Dreams. That was the day after the night the firemen broke down my door and extinguished a smoking panful of my burning, blackened hot dogs. Jackie MacLean took umbrage when he saw Blaine staring at his wife's cleavage. Harrumph! Amen!
G: When we get dropped from Sony, I think I'm going to try to get into the cartoon business. I'd like to do the voices and music for something like Pink Panther, or maybe Snagglepuss. What do you think you'll do when you get dropped from Geffen?
BW: Meteorology has always been my one true love. To be able to predict the future with such stunning accuracy. the modern-day high-tech TV weatherman must feel god-like as he stands before the cameras and regales his viewing audience with details about fearsome low-pressure systems, Arctic cold fronts, tropical depressions, winter storm warnings, high-pressure systems, hurricanes, tornadoes, blizzards, small craft advisories, heat waves, not to mention the greenhouse effect, global warming, etc.....Whoops! I dropped my crack pipe. Yeah, sure, after my music career ends and I exit gracelessly from the stage, I can see myself taking the role of the modern-day soothsayer weatherman/uberman...cathode-ray priest/warlock. It's been a pleasure communicating with you, G, much more enjoyable than say, conducting an interview with some passive-aggressive rock journalist...oh, well, it won't matter when we're dead. Cheers!
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