Chris Pupecki / Interview

I met Chris when my band got the chance to tour with his current band Doomriders. Being the nerd I am I started freaking him out and asking all about Cast Iron Hike as soon as we shook hands. He took it real well though and turned out to be an awesome individual with a great taste in music. Reason enough to send him some questions to find out more about Doomriders, Cast Iron Hike, Backbone and the power of the riff... Enjoy.

Chris, do you remember exactly how you came into contact with loud/heavy music and eventually hardcore? What were some of the first hardcore records you got into and some of the first shows you saw? What kind of impact did those make?
I think it was probably 5th or 6th grade around 1984 when an older kid in the neighborhood would take me in his 4x4 truck to the local landfill, crack a couple brews and drive up and over these giant hills of sand at ridiculous speeds, all the while cranking Bon Scott era AC/DC and Black Sabbath. That's when I decided loud rock n' roll was where it's at. I was always craving harder, faster and heavier stuff though and at that time it was very difficult to come by. I loved Judas Preist, early Motley Crue, but I never heard a band that matched the anger that I felt at the time. Then I discovered "Ride the Lightning" and loved the speed and raw fury Metallica provided. My first punk rock experience was actually over the phone in the seventh grade, I had gotten a phone call from a buddy, he was about 3 words into our conversation when I stopped him and excitedly said, "what the fuck are you listening to?!" It was the most gnarly, raw and angry shit I'd ever heard up to that point and HAD TO HAVE IT! "It's Suicidal Tendencies" he said. Probably that day I went to the tiny record store in my puny town and special ordered the first Suicidal record and wore down the grooves on that fucker. As far as hardcore that most affected me; Black Flag, D.R.I, Cro-Mags, Minor Threat, Bad Brains and Agnostic Front were probably most influential. It's funny how these same records are most hardcore kids' first love records 20 years later. I feel lucky to have been part of that scene, at the time it felt like something important was happening in music. The first show I went to was Gang Green in '86. Other bands I saw around then were Uniform Choice, Youth Of Today, Slap Shot, Bad Brains, Agnostic Front, Scream, Cro-Mags, etc. etc. I could go on forever.

Was Backbone the first band you ever did? How did that band get together and how would you describe the band's sound? What kind of shows did you play? I imagine you must've played with Wrecking Crew and Eye For An Eye a bunch - how were those shows back then?
Backbone was my second band, my first was actually called Youth Crew named after the Youth Of Today song, but before it became the kind of hardcore movement it is today, back then it was just a song by one of our favorite bands. We played maybe 4 shows. Aaron Bedard (Bane) had a band called Raging Hope, he gave me a call one day and said he was starting up a new band and asked me to join. I really dug Raging Hope so I was psyched to start something up with him. That's how Backbone started, back then I loved Breakdown and Life's Blood and that's pretty close to what we sounded like, according to a MRR review at least. We played some badass shows back then, we played with Killing Time, Underdog, Supertouch, Slap Shot, Uppercut. Bunches of shows with local buds Wrecking Crew and Eye for an Eye (who's drummer Thos Niles is now in my other noisy band Blacktail). Wrecking Crew shows were some of the best I've ever seen, that band smoked in their prime. We actually played shows with Neurosis and Pantera as well, who were new bands at the time.

What did Backbone ever record and/or release? How long has it been since you've listened to any of those recordings? We released a demo tape in '89 and recorded a song for the "Boston Hardcore '89-'91" compilation on Taang. It sounds pretty amateur to me now, although it was recorded on a 4 track in my dad's garage by a bunch of kids!

After that band was done, how did the plans for Cast Iron Hike take form? What kind of sound did you have envisioned for that band?
Dave Green (the drummer from Backbone) and I started jamming again a year or 2 after Backbone broke up. We were a bit older and had much more varied taste from the Backbone days and really wanted to do something interesting and new. I'd say our early influences were Melvins, early Helmet, Sabbath, C.O.C., Bad Brains, and Cro-Mags.

While Cast Iron Hike in my opinion definitely had a hardcore groove and energy, you had a sound that was a lot broader and very different from what was going on at the time. What inspired this sound? What kind of bands were you heavily into back then?
We appreciated all kinds of music and wanted to incorporate it all. We also really wanted a singer who sang because we liked the idea of writing memorable melodious songs with catchy choruses... Plus we knew it would bum out most hardcore tough guy types! We loved the brutal experimentation of Melvins, the blues groove of Sabbath, the bounce of Bad Brains, and the aggression of the Cro-Mags. All of those things were a big part of the Cast Iron Hike recipe.

After two EP's you signed to Victory, with whom you released the classic "Watch It Burn" album. How did that work? Who signed you to Victory? What prompted you to make this move?
Tony Brummel signed us, basically we just held off for a while and let the buzz grow until the best 3 hardcore labels were in a bidding war over us. Revelation, Equal Vision and Victory were the 3. They all wanted us pretty bad and in the end Tony made us the best offer.

What was it like being on Victory at the time, considering they were home to all the biggest hardcore bands at the time, like Earth Crisis, Strife, Snapcase and Integrity... Did you feel like Cast Iron Hike was overshadowed by those bands? Did Victory want to turn you into a band like that or did they know they were dealing with a different type of band?

When we signed to Victory all those bands were already doing well for themselves, we never felt overshadowed by them. We felt like we didn't belong anywhere actually, we were too rock for hardcore and too hardcore for rock. We were just happy to have our record available around the world. Victory didn't try to turn us into anything, we would have laughed in the face of anybody who tried. We were doing our own thing and that was it, if you didn't like it, fine, but no one was going to make us do something we didn't want to do. Tony actually had really high hopes for us, unfortunately we broke up about a year after the record came out, we were barely a 4 year old band.

Cast Iron Hike did a lot of touring as well. Did you have a booking agent or how did you get on these tours? What type of crowds did you draw? Generally speaking, how did those tours go and what was touring like in the mid 90's? We had a couple of friends booking shows for us, some better at it than others. We were asked by Sick Of It All themselves to tour with them. It was incredible to watch them shred the shit out of every band before them every night. Total pros, a well oiled machine. Most of the people who dug us were older, more open minded people and sound guys, the sound guys alway loved us. I thought that was cool because they see dozens of bands every week. Touring was rough in the mid 90's, no one had cell phones, not many had the internet. No Mapquest! So if you had to reach a promoter for something, you had to find a phone booth, and hope he's by a phone. Also discovering new music was tougher, you had to *gasp* go record shopping! Or read, or talk to friends. There was a much higher level of dedication back then. Especially in the 80's, not only was it a total bitch to find hardcore and punk records, everybody hated you for being a punk/hardcore kid. So you really had to be dedicated because it was kind of a lot of work at times.

I remember you toured with Sick Of It All at one point and Weston at another. Who else did you tour with? Which one of these tours sticks out the most?
We toured with Snapcase, Damnation A.D., Strife, Shift, Stillsuit, V.O.D., Ignite and a few more. We were supposed to do a tour with Hot Water Music and a European tour with a new band called The Hellacopters, but we broke up before those could happen. Touring with The Hellacopters at that time would have been life changing for me as I've since become a huge fan. They were a big inspiration to form Doomriders for me and Nate.

What do you remember about recording the "Watch It Burn" album? Any specific stories or anecdotes? Where did you record and who with? How long were you in the studio for? Do you feel like you managed to capture the sound you wanted to?
We recorded it with Jim Seigel at the Outpost in Stoughton, MA. He's also recorded Dropkick Murphys, Morphine, Blood For Blood and tons more. Brian McTernan (Battery/Miltown) and Ken Olden (Damnation AD/Battery) helped out with production. It was our first time recording in a serious studio where it wasn't one of our friends recording us so it was nerve racking and pretty new to us. I think we were in the studio for something like 12 days. There were very few overdubs and the whole thing is pretty bare bones.

When you listen to the album now, how do you feel about it, looking back? Is it weird to know it's become somewhat of a cult mid 90's hidden gem type of record?
I think the record has held up really well actually, sometimes I'll pop on a record that we loved around that time and it'll sound real dated. I think we avoided that for the time being. I talked to Brian a few years ago (who is a kick ass engineer now and has done some big records like Thrice and a bunch more) and he was saying he regrets not getting a bigger guitar sound for our record and I have to agree with him, I've never heard on tape what my guitar sounds like for real, I have to say Kurt Ballou has come really close though, he's good! I wasn't aware of any cult hidden gem status. That's pretty cool though, it's weird when people tell me they still listen to it often. I get bored of records really quick so it's always kind of a shock.

What caused Cast Iron Hike to break up? You still seem to be a friendly terms with everyone that was in the band, that is pretty cool. Could you tell us what those guys are up to now?
I'm still on good terms with all the guys, we've known each other for 20 years so we're always going to have a bond. We broke up because our singer Jake lost his passion for heavy music one day... Yeah I know, kinda weird. So now he's kind of doing singer songwriter type stuff and seems more at home doing that. Mike Gallagher is playing guitar in Isis, Pete Degraff is in a rock band called The Black, and Dave Green went to school in England and will be moving back to the States with his wife soon. I'm doing Doomriders and Blacktail (noisy, AmRep style stuff, we're currently unsigned and quite good, hint hint..)

What was your state of mind after Cast Iron Hike's demise? Did you do anything musical in between that and Doomriders?
I had a rough time when we broke up, our future was looking really bright and on top of that I was dumped by my girlfriend of 6 years just a few months prior. We tried looking for new singers but decided it wouldn't be the same band.. In retrospect we probably should have trudged on and found someone else but hey, live and learn. I jammed with dozens of drummers who were either really good flakes or not so good non-flakes.

Cast Iron Hike also recorded a GG Allin cover that appeared on the "And They Came From Mass." compilation, which I think sounds incredible. Whose idea was it to cover that track? During what recording session did you record this cover?
I forget whose idea it was to do a GG song, but it was my idea to do that song in particular because it has that whole "we are the real rock'n'roll underground" anthem of a chorus which I knew was perfect for us, and the riffs were pretty epic rock'n'roll for a GG song... And it wasn't about sleeping in your piss or anything dumb, it actually had an empowering message. You know, shoot, knife, strangle, beat and crucify! OK, maybe it was another dumb GG tune, but we thought it was less dumb than most. We recorded this real early on, it was after the Salmon Drive EP, but not long after as it was recorded in Brian McTernan's first apartment studio in Boston, it was in a dirty, sketchy basement. Brian and Jonah from Only Living Witness helped out with backing vocals on the song too. So probably '94 or early '95.

There's been some talk of an upcoming Cast Iron Hike DVD, I've seen the trailer for it as well... When can we expect this to drop? Who's working on that DVD and what should we expect? Also, rumors of a one off reunion to promote the DVD has been floating around - what's the deal with that?
My good friend Bruce Millet is the one working on that, we weren't psyched on the recent interview footage we had done, so it's kind of on hold for the moment. I just need to go through the footage with him to decide what to use and what to scrap. Bruce was there from the beginning of the band, most times video camera in hand, so there should be a good amount of footage to look through. He's got some Backbone footage as well, although I don't know if I want that to see the light of day. Hopefully it'll be out soon though. I think we'd all be into doing a handful of shows at some point, although Mike is really busy with Isis and I'm not even sure what coast he's on at the moment, he's kind of a nomad. I know the other guys are down though.

I seem to remember Doomriders primarily being the brainchild of Nate and you. How did the idea for a band like that come about? I imagine the fun of rippin' it up and playing loud had a lot to do with it?
We met when he was in Jesuit and I was in Cast Iron Hike and we were huge fans of each others bands. Every time we'd play Virginia Nate would be there and we'd excitedly talk music for way too long, we have always had very similar tastes and started talking about how we should start a band someday, We talked about how we wanted it to have elements of our favorite styles of music but remain our own sound with lots of guitar harmonies, punk/hardcore energy, and lots of rock riffin'. The main purpose of Doomriders from the beginning was to be a fun band to play in as well as to go and see.

Doomriders is the kind of band that wears its influences on its sleeve (Danzig, Entombed, Thin Lizzy, Integrity, Motorhead etc.) but still succeeds in sounding fresh, vital and not exactly like this or that band. What would you attribute this to?
We really make an effort to not sound exactly like any one band besides Doomriders.

Was Doomriders always meant to be a fairly busy band or would you say it's a project that got out of hand (ha!)? You guys have been to Europe, Japan, toured the States... How hard is it being in your mid 30's and juggling a job with a touring band and family life?
We never planned to do any of this, I knew when Nate and I got together we would create some badass music, but it's been great from the start with people really digging us and offering us shows and this and that. Most of the things we've done have been shows or tours we just couldn't turn down, we've been lucky with great offers pretty much non-stop. Working a full time job and being in a band where you wish you could spend more time writing or touring is definitely an issue, but I'm lucky to have done all these things. I really thought Cast Iron Hike was my one chance to do those things and to get to do them 10 years later is pretty cool.

What was it like sharing the stage with Danzig for almost a week? I heard the old fella really likes Doomriders a lot? Was he watching on the side of the stage? How were you received by his crowd? Can we expect him to be doing some guest vocals on the upcoming Doomriders album?
Touring with Danzig was awesome, especially since we were specifically requested by the man himself. What an honor. He never really left his dressing room until the end of the night, but we did get to talk to him and he said he loved us with a huge grin on his face and said he loved all the "Wishbone Ash guitar parts", it's nice to get the thumbs up from one of the masters. Guest vocals? Who knows, definitely something to think about though.

Speaking of which, what can we expect from that album? How far into the writing process are you? We're about half way into the record, it's really hard when everybody has other bands, full time jobs, and wives. JR's wife Steppl is having a baby in February as well so that should be interesting. The material is getting better and better though in my opinion, we're really utilizing the 2 guitars to make a more interesting racket and we're also really finding the Doomriders sound.

I know you are an absolute music freak so I would like to know what some of the best shows have been that you have seen in your life... Let's go for a Top 5 or Top 10! I also remember you telling me about seeing the Bad Brains & Leeway together, make sure you don't forget that one.
Yeah, Bad Brains/ Leeway was incredible, it was in '88 or '89 at the Living Room in Providence, RI. I remember HR playing a trumpet, the intense smell of weed all around me, and the fact that I could literally lift both of my feet off the ground at the same time and just hang there... That's how packed it was in there. Slayer on the "South Of Heaven" tour was epic as well, I remember feeling my eardrums folding inside out. I saw the Melvins a bunch, but one time with the Obsessed was mind blowing, Wino is definitely one of my all time guitar heroes, and to see him in his prime was a blessing. Other shows I've seen more recently that have blown me away were Comets On Fire, Dead Meadow, the Hidden Hand, Dungen and the Sabbath reunion in '01.

That's it Chris. Thank you for your time, feel free to add whatever you want right here...
Thanks for the interview Bjorn and for giving a shit. Check out Doomriders and Blacktail people! RIDE THE RIFF!!!