Interviews

Filthy Thieving Bastards

Interview with Darius on Nov 30, 1999 by Archive Bot

I'd like to thank Dave of BYO for his help and support of punkbands.com and Darius of The Filthy Thieving Bastards for taking the time to talk to punkbands.com. 

PB: One of your biggest influences is your punk rock experience. You've also been compared to The Pogues. What other aspects shaped the Filthy Thieving Bastards sound?
FTB: We have a pretty wide range of interests, musically, and listen to just about every style of music, as long as it's good. I'm kind of going for a country type of thing. The Pogues, Steve Earle, Townes Van Zandt, Robert Earl Keen, and lots of the old traditional country/folk/bluegrass stuff. That's what this band's about for me.

PB: Being a Swingin' Utters fan, I look forward to hearing the new album "A Melody of Retreads and Broken Quills". When working on the new cd and when forming FTB, how did your goals differ from when you formed The Swingin' Utters?
FTB: We weren't going to be a punk band, and we aren't at all really. I'm sure FTB will still be considered a punk band, though, because Johnny and I are behind it, but I think we have a little more to offer than just straight ahead punk rock. We'd already accomplished so much with the Swingin' Utters, but we just kinda wanted to branch out and play different stuff. I mean, it's not much of a stretch, really. . . most of the FTB songs could be Swingin' Utters songs, but we're really going for accoustic-based stuff, with layers of instrumentation, etc. . . as far as our goals, we're just doing this at our leisure, we haven't even played live yet, so there's no pressure from ourselves or anybody else to play, to tour, etc. etc. It's really laid back.

PB: To be honest the name the Filthy Thieving Bastards isn't the biggest eye catcher out there. So, for those punk asses who don't know what to expect, what do you want to say to convince them to buy the new record?
FTB: I'd say to Swingin' Utters fans. . . if you like the country-tinged Utters songs, the "weird" ones, like "Watching the Wayfarers", "Fruitless Fortunes", songs like that, then you'll like FTB. I'd say it's pretty heavily Pogues-influenced, and stress that it's not punk rock. I think there's one distorted guitar track on one song on the whole record. 

PB: It seems that the folk-like Irish pub-punk sound of Flogging Molly and The Dropkick Murphy's is now "in"! Would you agree and would you do a tour with those two bands if you had the chance?
FTB: It annoys me that it's this weird trend, but everything is eventually corrupted and done to death, so I'm trying to not let it bother me. . . I'd like to point out that I'm not really going for any "Irish" sound. I think Johnny goes for that a lot more than me, but I'm not Irish, not even close. I'm not interested in writing in Irish drinking song at all, it's never really crossed my mind, so I don't like when people call us "one of those Irish folk-punk bands", or whatever. . . but yes, we'd tour with either one of them in a second, I think it'd be a great fit. . .

PB: Have you ever put Gold Bond medicated powder on your sack (nuts)? If you haven't try it before a show and let me know how it feels.
FTB: Nope. I've put baby powder on my balls, but I've yet to try the Gold Bond.

PB: Besides Johnny and Darius there is Spike Slawson. The man from Me First & The Gimme Gimmes, Swingin Utters, and the Filthy Thieving Bastards. What's missing? Fat Mike playing the banjo maybe? If you could add to the line-up who would you choose and why?
FTB: We need an Accordion player. . . .

PB: Lastly, thanks for giving punkbands.com some action. I'm excited to see you guys on the road soon. Do you have any tour plans for the rest of 2001 and for 2002?
FTB: None at all, but we really want to play live someday, like a real band. . .