Band: The Real McKenzies Member: Paul McKenzie Label: Fat Wreck Chords Location: Starlite Room- Edmonton, Alberta Date: March 25th, 2006 Interviewer: Bobby Gorman

I had the chance to sit and talk to Paul McKenzie of The Real McKenzies in between the all-ages show and the 18 plus show in Edmonton. The all-ages show's attendance was disappointing, only fourteen people, but as we left there was already a huge lineup waiting to get in for the 18 plus concert. It was a good interview, and learned some things about my hometown I hadn't known. Thanks to Paul for doing and to Rob for setting it up.

Paul: It’s going okay. We haven’t been in Canada for quite a while, so it’s quite exciting for us as well.

Bobby: Why is it such a short tour? Just a couple dates in BC and then a couple dates in Alberta?

Paul: Because we had to throw this lineup together. We have to sporadically do as much of North America as possible in between other tours that have taken us to Europe and elsewhere. Because Fat is an American label and they want us to tour America, so we’re getting to that. We’ll get to that as often as we can.

So excuse our whole sporadic nature and all that, we’ll be hitting wherever we can. We’re probably gonna fly out to the east cost and we’ll do the east coast, stuff like that.

Bobby: There were some American fans on your message board wanting to know when’s the next time you’re going to be doing a US tour?

Paul: Umm... let’s see. We should be doing a short one this spring.

Bobby: Tonight’s show, why did you decide to split it up between all-ages and an 18 plus show?

Paul: Well we didn’t, it was a managerial thing. They just set it up, and we have to play another show tonight. I don’t know how they billed it, why wasn’t there a bunch of kids here?

Bobby: I don’t know. I don’t think there was much promotion for it. I don’t think they should have split it up, they should’ve had it as one.

Paul: Yeah, that would’ve been cool.

Bobby: I think there will be a really good turnout for the 18 plus show though.

Paul: What’s the legal age here?

Bobby: 18.

Paul: Oh, okay.

Bobby: Yeah, Alberta’s the only one where it’s 18. Okay, last August you released the new album “10,000 Shots” and I have to ask you about the artwork. It’s obviously a play on the WW2 memorial in Washington, but who came up with that idea?

Paul: The Bone came up with that. It was sort of a reversal. If you look at what’s happening on the cover, the guys in Iwo Jima were raising the flag, and these guys were taken the bottle down to pour it in the big glass in the back. It’s sort of a jab at America, not a real harsh one, but we actually had people criticize us for that.

Bobby: Oh really?

Paul: Oh yeah. American people. But its okay, I mean, I’m always ready to get up to bat and take responsibility for the shit we do. I’d rather be hated or love rather than just mediocritize, you know?

Bobby: Yeah, on that CD, and on your older ones, you have a selection of traditional songs on there. How do you pick which traditional songs to do?

Paul: It’s completely random. There’s so many of them, and we basically just pick through them and whatever comes to grasp at the time of our recording is what we’ll record. Cause there’s so many of them, thousands; literally tens of thousands of them.

Bobby: On that CD, my favorite song is “The Skeleton and the Taylor” because I love the ghost story behind it. Who came up with that idea?

Paul: The lyrical content of that song is actually a real story, a Scottish ghost story. And yeah, if you follow the lyrics, it’s an abbreviation of the story. I’ve done that before, not so much to try and promote that story itself, but to try and promote people to read those kinds of stories. Because once you get into just one of them, there’s a whole lot more. Like generally there’s a book with a lot of good stories, it’s really cool. You can sit around a fire and start telling theses scary stories; it’s kind of this old world sort of thing. I think people should read more, so I’m trying to get them to read more, and not in a pushy way.

Bobby: Like you just said, it’s cool to sit around and tell ghost stories. When I was a kid and we went camping, we’d always used to sit around a fire and tell ghost stories from these big books, what are some of your favorite ghost stories?

Paul: I like a whole lot of them. But one favorite that comes to mind is a Lewis Carrol story. A lot of people just know he’s famous for writing “A Christmas Carol”, but he was actually quite a popular ghost writer. And one was about this ship builder called Chips and one day the devil appears to him and says “Chips, I’ve got a whole role of copper and a bucket of ten pound nails,” which any ship builder at the time couldn’t resist this. “The only trouble is, you gotta take this rat” and there was this rat on his shoulder with red glowing eyes like seething at him. So Chips says to him “look, I’ll take the roll and I’ll take the bucket of nails, but I don’t want that fucking rat.” He says “no, no, no, you gotta take the rat too or else it’s no deal.” He says “okay, fine, I’ll take the rat.” So anyways, he tries to kill the rat in various different ways but of course it never works because the rat is incorporeal with and an evil spirit and that. And he haunts Chips and he starts talking to the other rats and they all start talking to him and eventually he loses his mind. Ah, it’s a fucking great story, one of my favorites.

Bobby: Okay, you guys are from Vancouver, which isn’t incredibly known for its Scottish background….

Paul: Yeah, well, I came here in ’71; so yeah, since them I’ve basically lived up and around Vancouver. But did you know that this city has a Robert Burns statue?

Bobby: Vancouver does?

Paul: Not only Vancouver, but this city too. Every major city in Canada has a Robert Burns statue in it, donated by the Robert Burns society in the ‘20’s.

Bobby: I did not know that. My parents celebrate Robbie Burns nights and stuff, but I never knew that.

Paul: Yeah, now you know. In every one of them. Well, Canadian culture has got its Scot’s roots, a lot of it. A lot of people ask why is it that in Australia or say here that people are even more Scottish then traditional and it’s because that they don’t want to lose that part of their culture. I mean, the Scots have got it, they’re there; and we’re here for various different reasons.

Bobby: You’re bio describes you as the “haggis fueled McKenzie clan”, I’ve always been too scared to try haggis, is it good?

Paul: Well, you’re lucky you live here. Because there’s a Scottish bakery here, I can’t remember the name of it, they serve the best haggis. But don’t be afraid of it, I mean, you can get good hamburgers and bad hamburgers too right? And even as much as I like it, I’ve had bad haggis too. In Scotland they have deep fried haggis on a stick.

Bobby: How would you describe what Haggis tastes like?

Paul: Mackenzie haggis is quite good. Mackenzie haggis has lots of barley and stuff. It’s got as many vegetables as it does meat. My ma put Portobello mushrooms and stuff in it too; she was quite the chef in her day.

Bobby: You guys have been going for a long time now, and throughout that time, music has definitely changed a lot. Like you just sang “Dropping Like Flies” which says how a whole bunch of old punks are going away and making room for a new generation, and sadly, a lot of the new generation is sort of the “emo” trend. Why do you think that is? Why do you think emo and all that stuff is taking over the punk scene?

Paul: It is definitely crossing over isn’t it? I think the reason is, number one is probably that it’s really accessible and it sells a lot. And yet, could you imagine what an emo person would look like if you were to describe them? The punk look looks a lot better. So you can basically package anything if you have enough money. I don’t think it’s the kids themselves that are doing it, I think it’s more of a conglomerate. Because I mean, any punk rocker with half a set of morals and a safety pin would never do that shit. I’m not saying it’s not good to express yourself, but to snivel and whine about your problems and shit and make money of it; it’s just not something that I, personally, would want to do. I keep it to myself.

Bobby: Okay, I love going to concerts, over the next couple months I have a dozen or so that I plan on gong to. But of course, some are always more memorable than others, so thinking back to when you were still a teenager, what were some concerts that you remember going to that were really memorable for you?

Paul: I saw a lot of them; I saw a whole lot of excellent bands. I ran away from home in’72 and went to Detroit, Michigan to see MC5 and I got a tattoo, and I still have it *he points to the tattoo on his arm*. At the same time, I saw the Stooges, Alice Cooper at the time, lots and lots of excellent bands. Then I returned later on in the seventies and saw lots of other punk bands, like the New York Dolls, like Television. I saw Blondie, I saw just about all of them. The memorable ones? There’s too many, I’d bore you all night. I’m just happy to have been there, that’s why I’m so diligent about what I do today. But let’s see… who have I been blown away by? Oh! Iggy Pop is beyond belief, but that was back in his day. The Tubes, the “White Punks On Dope” tour. They had this huge stage show, they brought a Vegas stage show with them. That was pretty memorable. Alive Copper, in Vancouver, when he fell of the box and broke his leg, no, broke his arm in Vancouver. I laughed so hard. Cruel of me, but I laughed. I saw the Gun Club and I was quite impressed by them. The bass player tried to steal my cat. I think probably one of the most memorable performances I’ve ever experienced was this Flamingo guitar player from Basque territory, I saw him play in Paris. He was amazing. Yeah, that would have to be the one. I can’t remember his fucking name though; I was really drunk on wine.

Bobby: Okay, now onto a bit more unusual questions that I just like to ask at all my interviews to keep it interesting.

Paul: Uh-oh. Uh-oh. Matt!

Matt: Yeah?

Paul: You wanna take the unusual questions? I don’t know if I’m up for them. Nah, I’m only kidding.

Bobby: Okay, first off, if you guys were stranded on a desert island with no food and nothing to eat, which one of the band members would you eat to survive and why?

Paul: I wouldn’t. I’d starve. I know what those guys have been doing. You don’t eat seagulls either you know? I’d rather die, I really would.

Bobby: If you were the member of the opposite sex for a day, week, month, however long you wanted, what would you do and why?

Paul: I wouldn’t leave the house. I would just stand there in front of the mirror and just totally molest myself, because I love women.

Bobby: Could you tell us something about the band, or one of its members, that not many people know about. Like a little quirk they do on the road or something like that.

Paul: A quirk? Let’s see…*he leans in close and goes quiet so that Bone, who is behind him, can’t hear* Bone poos in the shower and pushes it through the grid with his foot. So that’s pretty unusual. The physiological connotations are frightening.

What do I do? I’d like to think I’m weird, but when I think about it, I’m really not. I think it’s just an attitude. I’m sure I do strange things… Oh, I put my socks on before I put on my kilt, that’s pretty strange, a little quirky. I don’t know.

The rest is private, I don’t think I could go off on that limb. But wait a minute, Little Joe, he’s Portuguese and he’s allergic to fish. Have you ever heard of a Portuguese person allergic to fish? It’s pretty weird.

Bobby: Nope, never. I’ve never heard of anyone who’s allergic to fish.

Paul: Do you know what you call a fish with no eyes?

Bobby: No.

Paul: “Fsh”

Bobby *laughs* Okay, if you could have one thing at this moment, anything at all, what would you have and why?

Paul: One thing? Ah, let’s see. Oh, I would like to bring back stocks and the axe men’s blocks, and I think the politicians and the lawyers would go first, and we’d set up a blue collar society. What do you think? Good no?

Bobby: It could work, it could work.

Paul: Well, at least it was an ideal; it wasn’t a greedy, money oriented thing.

Bobby: It’s an interesting idea.

Paul: How about eviscerating the Queen in public? That would be cool huh? Pretend we were having an autopsy of her, but she’s still alive. But the guy would end up digging through the fucking table looking for her heart, because it’s not there. None of those fuckers have got hearts.

*Kurt walks by* So, Kurt, if you could have anything right now, what would it be?

Kurt: Beer.

Paul: *laughs* Right on, great answer.

Bobby: Okay, I guess that’s about it, thanks a lot for doing it. Do you have any final thoughts you’d like to add?

Paul: Thanks, I’m having a great time. I know it wasn’t that good a turnout here, for the people who were here, you know… I’ve seen bands that don’t give, they like give you the limp handshake you know. But these people fucking paid to get in, and it’s our obligation to give them a good show. So, c’est la vie. Anyway, we’re looking forward to tonight; it’s always a pleasure to be here in Edmonton, playing for the youngsters you know. I love taking the piss out of the kids, making then talk. Bone was gonna take a belt to them.

Bone: I was. I wield it well.

Paul: Alrighty, so, thank you.