Yeah man, let’s party: CKY change the world by saying bad words
The members of Camp Kill Yourself don’t put on g-strings and bunny costumes and glide around parking lots in shopping carts. CKY isn’t “Jackass.” People like to think they wipe feces on each other with Steve-O, since drummer Jess Margera’s brother, professional prankster Bam, used CKY’s music in his homemade skate/prank videos (CKY, CKY2K and, yes, CKY3), but they don’t.
Sure, the band got a healthy nudge into the mainstream spotlight when their track, “96 Quite Bitter Beings,” played during the “shopping cart scene” in last October’s Jackass: The Movie, but CKY is more concerned with their dark, deafeningly legitimate Metal sound.
Lead singer Deron Miller’s rough vocals and pulverizing lyrics on their latest album, Infiltrate.Destroy.Rebuild, not only win fans, but also campout in the minds of listeners. Named after an imagined horror film, the band has suitably terrorized the Warped Tour (they’ve been kicked off twice for protesting prices, among other things) and trashed nearly all below par hard rock bands in the music industry.
This is a Life & Art interview with CKY’s bassist Vern Zaborowski.
Q: On the track “Plastic Plan” off your new CD, am I right to say that it’s about changing the world?
CKY: You know what, I think that everybody has a different interpretation of the songs. To me, we live in this plastic plan. It’s made fake by corporations and [CKY] is just trying to bend this thing and make it our way.
Q: Would you say that that sums up the mission of the band? To strive for change in the music industry?
CKY: Sure, that is engrained in us. That’s pretty much what CKY wants. We want change. We’re all sick of complaining about it and now we’re finally in the position where people can hear us, so we’re going to let our opinions be heard.
Q: Would you guys say that you’re revolutionists?
CKY: I think that we definitely have revolutionary ideas. I think that the music industry is gonna fall apart whether it’s with help from us or not. We’re going to fucking strive to get what we want, and to change the world and to make it a better place and a more interesting place for people who listen to music. I feel sad for all the people who get force fed all that crap.
Q: The MTV sheep?
CKY: Yeah, the sheep. They just keep running into the wall, dude, and they can’t get back out.
Q: And Carson Daly is the shepherd.
CKY: Oh, man. I hear he’s a dork, if you couldn’t tell. If I’d ever have to meet him, I’d want my fist to be in my pocket because I’d want to punch him right in the gut.
Q: What was it like touring with Axl and Guns N’ Roses?
CKY: Man, it was fucking fun. Axl is fucking cool and Buckethead and Brain are heroes of ours.
Q: What do you think about a lot of the bands today like Linkin Park who try to pass themselves off as a metal band?
CKY: Just let them do their own thing and they’re all going to crap out in a few years. I saw Linkin Park for the first time when we were waiting for our video (“96 Quite Bitter Beings”) to come on MTV. You know their break video, (in whiny voice) “Everything you say to me?” He’s trying to look so mean to the camera. I just rolled my eyes back and said, “Oh, God, this is why I haven’t watched MTV in years.”
Q: What would the Camp Kill Yourself horror movie be like?
Q: Not like Scream 3, I hope.
CKY: Oh God, no. I don’t think that it’d be jokey. It’d be a real movie, but it’d be a crazy fucking slashy movie with lots of blood and gore.
Q: It seems that in the media you guys are still closely associated with the “Jackass” crew . . .
CKY: Oooh, you said the “J” word.
Q: Well, do you want to be known just for the band, and not some television show or movie?
CKY: We pretty much do that. We’ve never done any of the “Jackass” shit. If people associate us with that, then they’re idiots. When “Jackass” first came out, and you’d go on the “Jackass” website, there were all of these questions about the show and most of them were wondering what song was playing during the shopping cart skit, which was kinda funny because people didn’t have any questions about the show. They could care less. They just wanted to find out what the song was.
Q: We should party when you guys come down to Fort Lauderdale in February.
CKY: Yeah, man. Just come up to us and say, “Hey, I’m Kevin, I interviewed you, fuck-face,” and we’ll fucking party.
Kevin Dean can be reached at biigdeano@aol.com.