COMBAT are a local NY area who were around in the mid 80's,but due to bad decisions (and a name change to NAPALM) they never really took off. I never heard of these guys until last summer when COMBAT played a "Battle of the Bands" in Brooklyn named La'Mours (The Rock Capital of Brooklyn) and e-mailed me about tickets to the show. I declined because I was incredibly busy with alot of things...but Rex and I have kept in touch ever since and when COMBAT released their demo/live EP,I recieved a copy and was blown away. I'm a proud supporter of this band...and when you hear them,their MOTORHEAD/Power Thrash will level your head...they're THAT good.
This is a great interview...and if you never heard of COMBAT/NAPALM,you'll leave this webpage being a fucking expert about these guys. Read on and then go check these dudes out on their site...tell them RUSH OF POWER sent you.
Interview by - Chris O'Brien
C.O.-What are the origins of COMBAT? When did you decide that you wanted to play drums for a rock band? What bands did you draw inspiration from at the time?
R.R.-This will sound dumb, but it all started when I was in elementary school orchestra playing clarinet. There was a song they had us do called "Blue Rock" and this black dude named Ellis got onto a regular drum kit and did a rock beat. I thought it was really cool. When I graduated to junior high I wasn't allowed to play in the school orchestra because we were new to the area. So I dumped the clarinet and somehow convinced my Dad to buy me a drum set. My brother was already playing guitar, so we started jamming right away.
The KISS Alive album got me hooked into metal. A friend of mine had a band doing KISS and BTO covers, and my brother and I decided we wanted to put a band together too. We formed a local rock/metal band called Invasion, around the junior high/high school timeframe. We did more practicing than playing out. In the last incarnation of Invasion that we were still in, we did a lot of the metal staples like Sabbath, Van Halen, Priest, Nugent, AC/DC, etc. I was a total Nugent nut. But when Iron Maiden's "Killers" came out it was like a quantum leap. We started covering some of the songs off that album. Soon after that we split up because Jeff and I wanted to go the heavier route. I think me, Jeff and the bass player (Joe Hanko a.k.a. Paul Dawson a.k.a. Tory Dawson) would have continued without Billy, the other guitarist, but it was easier just to disband since we were all friends and didn't want any hard feelings. Joe continued on with the Invasion name with a whole new line
up. (note: this is a recurring theme for us)
When I was in college, I played in a blues band and later in a rock/metal band - playing Zeppelin, Rush, Scorpions, etc. When I was back home on break and during the summers, my brother and I kept practicing in my parents basement. My brother and I stumbled onto Raven's "Wiped Out album". Man, that was blow away material to us! When I finished college we wanted to get a 3 piece together, and started looking for a bass player/singer that had chops like Geddy Lee, and could play Maiden and Raven. We auditioned 2 guys, one was a 15 year kid who could play like stink, and the other a guy who could barely play at all (recommended by our old Invasion bass player), none other than The Monarch! We liked the 15 year old kid because of his chops, but he acted kinda goofy and the fact that his Mom had to drive him around just didn't sit well with us. Monarch on the other hand was a cool dude, with a brand new Ibanez Destroyer bass, but he had no chops - he literally was just starti
ng to learn how to play and we told him that was a problem. He knew he wasn't there yet, but said he was making this his life and he would take it as far as he could. At that point we lost hope in finding a bass player and pretty much gave up looking. I think it was around this time we did a side project with Sergio the guitarist I had been in the blues band with, and Joe our old Invasion bass player. That was strictly for fun and only lasted a couple of months.
After "All For One" came out, Raven was scheduled to play at a local bar called Cheers (absolutely no relation to the sitcom except for the alcohol), and there was no way we were gonna miss that show - I was wearing that record out. Metallica, who we had never heard of before that night, was the warm up band. Holy shit, were we blown away! Raven was awesome, but it was Metallica that left the mark on us. Somehow I managed to keep the ad for the show:
Flyer for RAVEN/metallica concert at Cheers nightclub
Soon after my brother managed to get hold of a couple of Metallica songs on tape; I remember listening to "Metal Militia" in someone's car and my brother had this gleem in his eye like this shit was unreal. It was at that point we knew we had no choice but to get someone to play bass so we could play killer shit like that. It seemed like everything we had ever listened to had converged to this point. Thrash was it man, it was fast, sick and heavy - it was like a drug and it was calling.
C.O.-How did you and your brother,Jeff,meet the original bassist/vocallist Chris Weidner? Why did you guys give each other nicknames like "Deadfoot","Terminator", and "The Monarch"?
R.R.-As I gave away above, we met him through Joe our bass player in our old garage band Invasion. But as mentioned we didn't hook up the first time through. Monarch went off to play with a band called Amen Whip, and learned his chops there. I don't remember how, but we knew he was playing at Cheers every week. Sometime after the Metallica/Raven show we went down to see him play, which was about a year after we initially met him. Monarch says he had invited us down to try and hook us up with Bob (our current bass player). I remember meeting Bob, and he was asking what we were into. Jeff said AC/DC, which we had been jamming out to the last couple of weeks, but he said it just to throw him off. Bob had this look of disgust on his face and said "AC/DC?!" He was expecting a heavier answer!
But instead of hooking up with Bob, Monarch wanted out of Amen Whip to get heavier, so he decided to hook up with us instead! I don't really remember how it happened, it just did and quickly. Next thing I knew we were down in the basement practicing all kinds of noise. A lot of material was created by taking songs that Monarch had written and performed in Amen Whip - but changed around to be faster and heavier. That's exactly what we did with "The Monarch".
The nicknames... I'll say my brother gave Monarch his nickname. When we saw him play with Amen Whip he was strictly bass, no vocals, except for when they did his song, "The Monarch". He would sing that one. Calling him "Monarch" just stuck right away, it was perfect. I think in turn Monarch gave Jeff his "Terminator" nickname, but I don't really remember, and it wasn't until later on. And mine came from my old friend/roadie Dave "Death". He said something about my bass drum playing skills (lack of) in front of some people, something like: "Rex and that dead foot...". I thought it was funny and put signs on my bass drums "dead" and "foot".
C.O.-How long after you formed the band did you enough songs to record demo's and perform live? Where was the band's first live appearance? Who did COMBAT open for? What were the bands early live shows like?
R.R.-I'm pretty sure we played out at least a couple of times before recording the first demo - maybe 2 or 3 months, not sure. The first place we ever played was L'amours in Brooklyn for a battle of the bands tryout. We did 2 songs: "The Monarch" and "Kranked Up And Out". We were told we played too fast, too loud, and we needed a singer. We played at a place called Februarys in Elmont (border of Queens, NY) before recording the demo.
The first demo we put together was with a Tascam 4 track reel recorder that my brother and I had bought. We put out the "Let the Battle Begin" demo tape. It was basement quality (sludge). I don't think it really made it into the tape trading circuit, though Monarch might have given out some copies. Some of the songs are posted on our official website, and one of them is on our mp3.com site. We also did a one song studio demo but I'll cover that later as I see you ask about it in a later question.
Our shows were about playing loud, fast and raw. We weren't the tightest outfit going; we were always so revved up we could have been accused of playing beyond our abilities. We played covers that no one played back then: Motorhead (they were a HUGE influence on us), Fire Power, Witching Hour, Phantom Lord and others. We didn't have much of show, other than some smoke machines and gas masks. The places we played on Long Island just didn't cater well to thrash type stuff. Down the block from where we lived, a tiny place called Sparks, literally turned the power off and told us to get lost. Jack Starr was in the audience that night and told Monarch we should head over to Europe where they were killing for this type of stuff. Good advice which we should have listened to!
We might have been described as a cross between Motorhead and S.O.D. We always had a kind of punk/crossover drive. Raven was a huge influence as well: Monarch went out and bought a whammy bar for his destroyer bass, and then my brother and I proceeded to fit it with a guitar humbucker. It was very similar to John Gallagher's Explorer set up, and sounded nasty. Monarch also used an Ibanez tube screamer to really distort things. It was sort of a cross between a bass and a heavily distorted rhythm guitar.
C.O.-What was it like recording the "Let The Battle Begin" demo? Were there any problems in the band at the time amongst the three of you?
R.R.-Me and Jeff had been screwing around with recording for awhile, and thought we could pull something decent off. It wasn't bad, but certainly not real studio quality. I don't think we were confident enough to go into a real studio yet anyway.
Absolutely no problems with the band at that point. We were really digging what we were doing, and whenever we played out, we played like we had something to prove, and with every ounce of energy we had. It was like magic, everything clicked with us.
C.O.-How did the band attract the attention of Combat Records? What was your response like when they told you about the "Bootcamp" series? Did they mention anything to you about a contract for after the "Bootcamp" record?
R.R.Joe Leonard was the singer from another local thrash/speed metal band called Frigid Bich. We had seen them play a couple of times, and Monarch was friends with him. When Joe left the band he started working at Combat. He always knew about us, but really took notice when we warmed up for Motorhead:
Flyer from a concert with MOTORHEAD opening for COMBAT
He didn't tell us anything about the Bootcamp series, from what I can remember. We just knew Combat signed heavy bands and it seemed logical Joe and Combat would be interested in us. Monarch gave him a copy of our "Let The Battle Begin" demo, but he said the quality was just not good enough for him to shop it around at Combat. He told us to go into a studio and make a decent demo, and then come back.
We came back with a demo from an 8-track studio, and he gave us a contract. I had no idea that the demo would become the Bootcamp EP; I thought they were going to have us to go into a 24-track studio to do a "real" recording.
I know the contract was at least a 3 album deal contigent on sales of the EP.
C.O.-How did you guys feel when they told you if you don't change the band name they would offer you no contract? Why did you guys choose the name NAPALM as a replacement?
R.R.-I think it was an unspoken understanding that we all knew this was going to be an issue when we started talking to Joe. In fact, in the back of my head I remember thinking when we chose the name COMBAT what would happen if we ever hooked up with Combat records. I just never thought it would happen, not knowing at the time that Joe Leonard would wind up there. You gotta realize, while Monarch had visions of album deals and touring all over the world, my brother and I naively never really thought about those things. We just thought about practicing and playing our guts out. Joe didn't bring it up until when he made us the offer to sign the contract. Which was smart because we were already hooked!
The name change really bothered my brother. Monarch didn't seem to mind too much and was eager to move forward regardless; this was his dream coming true! I was happy to go along with whatever, but it did bother me somewhat. This is where our problems started.
I think Monarch came up with NAPALM. It seemed cool in the same vain as the COMBAT name. I remember it took awhile to come up with it, basically we were just throwing out names and seeing if everyone agreed or not. It was always a "2nd" to COMBAT though - maybe we should have gone with Metal Blade!
C.O.-How much did the "Bootcamp" recording cost? What other bands were involved with the "Bootcamp" series? How many copies did you guys sell? How were the reviews for it?
R.R.-$200 for the whole thing, I still have the receipt. I don't think you can get a deal like that anymore!
The only other bootcamp band I knew about at the time was Powermad because I saw it in a record store next to ours. I remember seeing a Combat Bootcamp commercial featuring Dee Snider on one of those UHF MTV-like shows (U68?). I'd love to get a copy of that commercial! I only found out later about the other Bootcamp bands: Have Mercy and White Pigs. At War supposedly did the first Bootcamp but I can't find it anywhere so I'm not sure if they really did it or not. It would have been cool just to meet the other bootcamp bands and have put a bootcamp gig together.
I was in touch with Joe Leonard recently and he said we did somewhere between 700-1,000 copies. Steve Sinclair had told us some ridiculous number like 20,000 at one point, but that was just B.S. Joe knows it was not that because he was in charge of the pressing and only pressed 1,000 records. Unlike a lot of other bands I read about, we did receive royalties. I think it totalled somewhere around $200 after the royalty checks finally stopped. So we broke even I guess.
I didn't find out until later that we got some very favorable reviews from the EP. Some reviewers were shocked because we appeared out of nowhere and blasted their ears off. Some of those reviews are posted on our site.
C.O.-What happened to the band after the release of the EP? Why did you and Jeff leave the band?
R.R.-Things were never the same after the name change thing. Seems like everything that had clicked wasn't working anymore. We hit a writing slump. It was all up to Monarch and Jeff; they had been doing most all of the lyrics and music, and Jeff just didn't have anything new he liked. We had gotten the green light from Combat and they were pushing for a full length album. We just didn't have anything, and Jeff didn't want to rehash all of our old stuff just to get a record out. Monarch was pushing us to move forward; he wanted to realize his dream, and Jeff wanted to take a break. I was kind of stuck with whatever Jeff wanted to do, because there was no way I could go on without him. Monarch felt we were abandoning him, and he had to move on so he did. My brother and I pretty much quit playing right there and then.
I think part of the problem was that Monarch managed and marketed almost everything, while Jeff and I had little experience in those matters and rarely got involved. For example, he knew you had to "pay off" some of the club owners. If he had told us he was doing that, we would have said fuck those guys and refused to pay/play, without trying to understand the game.
The other part of the problem was that Monarch knew where he was headed with this. My brother and I never thought about getting "bigger" and what that meant. We always considered it more of an intense hobby than a career choice. If I could do it all over again, I would have dumped my day job and taken it as far as it would have gone.
C.O.-Where was the band's last show before you guys left for good? Did you even want to carry on in the music bussiness after that experience?
R.R.-We played CBGB's for the first and last time June 15, 1986
Flyer for the first/last COMBAT/NAPALM concert at CBGB's
Man, since we were having troubles we had a lot of aggression to let out, so it wound up being the fastest set we ever played. A couple of the songs from there are on our mp3.com site. One our way home Monarch's car engine disintegrated on the Kosciusko bridge in Brooklyn. I had to tow him all the back to Dix Hills with my van. What a way to end it all!
I had nowhere to go without my brother, and the situation just wasn't working for him. I think if we could have kicked back for a month and come back fresh, we might have had a shot at staying together. Bob, our current bass player, was one of our roadies, and he came over and wanted to get something going right after we broke up. We both told Bob we weren't interested, the drive and magic were gone. It took me awhile to accept that we weren't doing this anymore. There was no way I was gonna play after that and open myself to another let down.
C.O.-Were you pissed that Chris kept going with the name even though you guys weren't in the band anymore?
R.R.-Nah, it was cool. When we broke up he said he wanted to continue on; this was the life he wanted, and we gave him our blessing. I felt I had let him down because I couldn't continue on with him.
I think he had already been playing with Lombardi and Proimos for awhile, knowing things were starting to crumble. I roadie'd for them a few times, and got kicked out of Connecticut by the police once for being rowdy all night in a motel after one of their shows. I went down to Virginia with them for a gig with COC, and met Steve Givens, who I'm pretty sure is the same dude who now works with Sharon Osborne. At Monarch's request, me and my brother went down to one of their practices and showed the new guys how we used to do a few of the songs.
By the way, Steve Givens had us ranked #2 and #12 on his radio station playlist. It was weird to hear Monarch and his new crew do a radio interview with Steve while he played songs from the EP!
C.O.-Why did Chris Weidner use nothing but old COMBAT songs on the first NAPALM album "Cruel Tranquility"? Were you and Jeff pissed about him using songs you had written,but didn't record for the album?
R.R.-Well, they weren't all old COMBAT songs, but there certainly wouldn't have been an album without them. Some of it was mixed - Shake It Off and Mind Melt were the same lyrics but totally different music. It was probably about half old stuff. The big surprise was "Kranked Up and Out". That was a song me and Jeff wrote, before we joined up with Monarch, but inspired by him. Jeff Lombardi did a great job with the Fast Eddie wah-wah lead, very impressive, and the restarting of the song at the end was a great idea. We were down in the studio for some of the recording, and did some of the backup vocals where they needed a lot of people yelling. Hell, our names (Jeff and mine) were on the album but not theirs due to some printing screw up, so I had no complaints!
C.O.-How come the album came out on SPV/Steamhammer when NAPALM were signed to Combat Records?
R.R.-There was a legal issue when Monarch came back to Combat with the new crew. It really wasn't the same band anymore and Combat had a problem with that. I also think Combat was having its own problems which added to the confusion. They kept saying "you're almost there" but it went on like that for a couple of years. That's why they wrote that song "Combat Zone" on Cruel Tranquility, it's all about how they got fucked over waiting and waiting, literally years. Joe Leonard left Combat and joined/started SPV/Steamhammer US/America so he got them in for a new deal. However, the US/America part of the company folded right after they got their album done, so it was only available as an import in the states. I'm sure that hurt.
C.O.-What was Chris's reason for leaving before the second,and final,NAPALM album "Zero To Black" came out? Isn't it kinda sad that no-one from the original NAPALM line-up played on the final record?
R.R.-I only recently found out most of the story, but suffice it to say the other Chris, Chris Liggio (BILE), turned the others against Monarch. You gotta realize Monarch was kind of like the old man in the band while these dudes were fresh out of high school. It's ironic because we told Monarch to stick with the 3 piece but he insisted on getting another guitarist, which turned out to be Liggio, and his undoing.
Agreed it's sad. When you listen to the EP and then Zero To Black, there's little in common. Jeff Lombardi even said something like this to me recently about Zero To Black "what were we thinking?"
C.O.-What made you decide,after not being in the business for such a long time,to come back with Jeff and Bob Eubank to re-from COMBAT? Did you guys talk to Chris Weidner about coming back to the band?
R.R.-In 1999 I started thinking about getting the rights back for the songs on the EP, because as you probably know, you sign your friggin life away on those contracts. I didn't have a lot of luck, but in the meantime started putting together the COMBAT website just to have fun remembering the good old days. The website has been great; we've gotten back in touch with most of the old gang thanks to it.
Doing the website kept me thinking "what if?". I started restoring my drum set. I had been in touch with Monarch, and knew he had no interest in playing again. But Bob was always calling us up every once in awhile to jam, so we finally decided to play for fun and maybe got together 3 or 4 times. As a goof I wanted to send in a video for the Slayer drummer spot. I started practicing again. I sent in a video, and nothing came of it of course. I can just imagine the look of horror on Kerry King's face as I destroyed each Slayer tune. But I was happy to be playing again and wanted to continue to do something with it, so we eventually decided to try and reform COMBAT with Bob on bass/vocals.
We did play once with Monarch, just for fun. He is cool with what we are doing. He just wishes we would have done it back in 1986!
C.O.-How long had COMBAT been back together before you guys played your first live,the infamous Battle of the Bands at La'Mours in 2002? What other songs did you guys play live that didn't make it onto the CD?
R.R.-Maybe 2 or 3 months. If I remember correctly, we also played: Intro/The Monarch, Tunnel Rat/All Out Assault, a Chemical Warfare/No Remorse medley, and Kranked Up and Out. It was a 30 minute set.
C.O.-The studio version of "Mind Melt" that appears as the last track on the CD...where and when was that track recorded? Why did you decide to put that song on the cd instead of more live material?
R.R.-Mind Melt was recorded at Flying Z studios out on Long Island (I'm sure it's long gone). We did it after the "Let The Battle Begin" demo but before the EP recording. It was a 16-track studio. The engineer was a hippy from the 60's and he showed up late and stoned, out of VW bus, and couldn't figure out how to put echo on the vocals. There was a guy roaming through the house that helped do the echo, then he disappeared so there is only one part that has echo. Bob was there and he wound up doing more mixing and producing than the hippy dude! I think it cost more to do that one song than the entire EP recording. I think our playing was good but the mix could have been much heavier, the guitars weren't loud enough.
When I was originally looking to get back the rights to the Bootcamp songs, my idea, if I got them, was to officially re-release a CD under the original COMBAT name, with all of those songs plus Mind Melt which had never been released. I found out that Century Media had beaten me to the punch, which was pretty cool anyway, but there was no way I was getting the Bootcamp songs back. So I thought this might be the only opportunity I would have for putting the old Mind Melt song out there.
There weren't any other entire songs recorded from L'amours so that's why there wasn't anymore on there. Bob recently found the tape with the 2 songs we originally did at L'amours at the tryout in 1985, so it would have been cool to include those, but, I don't think he had found them at that point.
C.O.-Who's idea was it to put the CD out using the sound source as the
camcorder? Was it a spur of the moment decision?
R.R.-That was all me. Bob and Jeff didn't know about it until after I had already sent it out to a couple of people. I had my reasons despite it being such a poor recording. I figured we may never get to the point of recording anything together - who knows if this would be our last time together! L'amours was the first place we ever played so I wanted to memorialize it. Plus I wanted to get that old studio version of Mind Melt out and I thought a single was too cheesy. The picture on the front is an inside joke, almost as important as the CD itself. I take full credit for all the bad reviews coming our way from that thing. It's really just a bad bootleg.
C.O.-What is COMBAT currently up to now? Any gigs coming up in the near future?
R.R.-We're trying to get a gig at the King's Club on Long Island or the Red Zone in Queens. But it's tough with being such an unknown. The guy booking those 2 places seems to have brushed me off. Maybe I'll send Monarch over there with $100.
We've got some new material going finally. 2 new songs plus the makings of a 3rd. I'm hoping for one more and then we will cut a demo. We will also include 2 of our old songs on the demo, one's that we as COMBAT never recorded. So if we're lucky we'll have a 6 song demo at some point, hopefully in the not too distant future. I guarantee it will sound 100% better than the Battle CD!
C.O.-Why is there a car grill on your drum set? Does it make a good sound to compliment the music? Where did the grill come from? Whose idea was it to do that? Are you mad,sir?
R.R.-It was functional! I carried around a car battery with me and jumper cables to hook it up with, and had a dimmer foot switch button to turn it on and off. I don't know why the hell I did it, I guess I thought it was cheap way to do a light show or something. It was from a '63 Buick LeSabre that I had bought for next to nothing. A friend of mine had the same car and I had bought it as a goof. My brother blew the engine, so we had taken some of it apart before junking it, and the grill was just sitting there in the basement.
It didn't make any sounds, but it helped brace my bass drums and blind people in the front row. I had a chrome fire alarm bell on the kit as well that I stole from my college dorm. I don't have either of those things anymore, but am on the hunt for another "grill".
C.O.-Why were you and Jeff referred to as the "CAP Attack"?
R.R.-We used to always wear caps, not when playing though. Jeff had an army cap and I had a cam2 oil cap, amongst others. I think Monarch's old Amen Whip buddies started calling us that.
C.O.-The song "Shake it Off" is about wrestling....anyone in patricular? What were the inspirations for the old COMBAT songs? Is that the same inspiration for the newer material you guys are currently working on?
R.R.-Shake It Off is about the Road Warriors, Hawk and Animal, the sickest wrestling tag team there ever was. If I remember correctly, they played Iron Man when they came out. Monarch was a huge wrestling fan and so was Bob. They got me and Jeff into it. I know some people are reading this and saying, huh, who are those guys? They invented a lot of the sick shit you see today!
By the way, we beat Slayer to the punch writing a wrestling song by at least 16 years!
I think the best way to describe the inspiration for COMBAT, old and new, is conflict. Most all of our shit is about that. "Kranked Up and Out" for example was about playing music that would purposely offend people.
C.O.-Have you guys gotten any offers from any labels since the release of the demo? Does it piss you guys off that you might not get signed,but "Hammerfall clone band #1,692" will because they have a trendier sound?
R.R.-Ha! That would be a big negative. We're in it for the underground so we're not worried if we get noticed or not. We'd be much happier with 10 hardcore fans than 100 posers.
It's funny how the music industry really hasn't changed in that regard, with nu-metal taking the place of glam/hair metal. I'm content to stay in the underground where it's real.
C.O.-Do you guys still keep in touch with Chris Weidner from time to time? Just curious.
R.R.-Definitely! We lost touch for a little while but message each other all the time now.
C.O.-Isn't Repo Man a classic film?
R.R.-"watcha got in the trunk?"
"oh, you don't want to go in there..."
Anytime someone mentions they want to go eat sushi, I can't stop myself from saying "Let's eat sushi, and not pay!"
C.O.-Alright man...I can't think of anything else...any final words for the people reading this interview?
R.R.-Stick up for your freedom and 2nd amendment rights people or this country is gonna go down the toilet!
Chris, man, thanks for giving me and COMBAT the opportunity to do this. Keep kicking ass and taking names!
DISCOGRAPHY
198?-Let The Battle Begin (demo)
1985-Bootcamp EP (under the name NAPALM)
1999-Combat Bootcamps CD
2002-Live Battle at La'Mours (3 live songs-studio version of the song "Mind Melt")
CHECK THEIR WEBSITE FOR TONS OF MP3'S,VIDEO FILES,and other random insanity.
LINKS
(RUSH OF POWER / UNSTOPPABLE FORCE WEBZINE)
*** USED WITH KIND PERMISSION ***
(re-released by Century Mediocre,NAPALM is on it with POWERMAD,WHITE PIGS,and HAVE MERCY)
