So what does spark the return of
West Claypool's of fearless Flying
Frog Brigade after a 20 year hiatus?
Massive public demand.
Yeah, that was a joke,
but not totally a joke. I, you know,
we're sort of in between Primus runs.
There's been requests for the past handful
of years for the early Frog Brigade.
Playing Animals,
it's an in its entirety incarnation,
so it just seemed like
the right time to do it.
And it started off with a few festivals
and now it's become this entire tour.
So two months of my life
and more actually I think
more's gonna happen on.
I know with the owning a pack of
Derma Winery, you've probably been
to Napa a few times and I saw that
that was one of the show dates.
Have you played any shows there before?
You know, I live in this ignorant
bliss of not knowing where the hell
I'm going to play, and usually when.
So I mean, I played Napa, we just did.
So we did a New Year's run with the *******
jazz with Vinny Callie Udon Drop this,
which was pretty sweet,
but I think it's a different venue.
But I could be wrong.
I don't even know
how fun will it be to play with the
fishbone again, like on the Napa date.
Well, anytime you can play with Fishbone,
it's it's it's a wonderful, wonderful
thing and I haven't seen those
guys in a number of years.
I might keep in touch with Norwood
who is an absolute champ, but I'm very
excited to play with Fishbone again.
You know Fishbone in the day was the
world's greatest live band and I have very,
very fond memories of of touring with them,
watching them play and the
camaraderie and kinship that we have.
So I'm, I'm very excited.
You also have a. July date at Hard
Rock Live in Sacramento. What are you
looking forward to about that show?
I didn't even know about it.
Sounds sounds like it'll be fun.
You know, I get in the bus and
go and I wake up. Here we are.
Wow, look at this. Look at this
place. And I think it's really cool that
the Sean Lennon is joining the frog brigade,
But that musical connection you have
with the Claypool Lennon delirium?
What are you most excited about
playing these songs with the Sean?
Well, you know, what's funny for
me is because I just asked him,
I said, hey, you know,
I was putting the Frog brigade together
to do this and you know it's Frogregates.
Always been sort of a mixed cast of
characters or even even basically
my all my solo endeavors tend to
morph and I wanted to be able to
attack things from throughout my not
just the early Frogregate stuff,
but throughout my my solo work.
And I asked Shiner to do it.
He was excited but.
What I'm finding very interesting is
how excited he gets about some of
these songs because he didn't know
the Holy Mackerel record or some of
the fungi and the foe stuff and he
gets so excited about some of these
tunes and playing them and learning them.
So he's a he's an he's an excitable
young lad so and we're very good friends.
He's like my brother, you know.
So it's it's always good to,
it's always good to have Shiner around.
How did that camaraderie with Sean start?
Well, it's funny because he, he,
he became buddies with my son first.
Actually, we were on tour and
his band Goes to the Saber Tooth
Tiger had opened for Primus,
and him and my son hit it off because
they're both kind of science nerds.
And he and I just had a impromptu
jam one day at backstage and
then in the back of the bus.
And then I was like, wow,
there's some really cool coming out.
We should get together at my
studio in Northern California.
And we did, And just subsequently.
It all fell together very naturally,
very organically. So
do you plan on playing having some
Promise and maybe some Claypool London
Delirium songs kind of sprinkled them to
never do. You never do know.
You never do know what's going to
pop out and I will leave it at that.
Who do you say are your biggest
influences? Was your bass playing?
You know, I just did an interview for guitar,
one of the guitar magazines
literally right before I talked
to you and they wanted me to.
Spout out ten of my favorite bass
players and you know it's there's
a long list of guys that were very
influential on me in the early days.
But you know, I mean I started off like
most rock guys listening to Getty Lee
and Chris Quire and John Paul Jones
and then I discovered Louis Johnson
and Larry Graham and Stanley Clarke.
You know these these guys that are
thumping and and then Tony Levin.
So that's that's kind of my it's
kind of my my list. My short list
now how did you land the South Park
theme song and how, how was the 25th
anniversary concert? How did that go?
Well the concert was amazing.
That was that was, you know,
there was a lot of rehearsal went
into that just to coordinate
everybody and whatnot and get Matt
and Trey comfortable with getting
ready to go on stage in front of it.
A lot of people,
because that's not what they do.
But it was it was incredible
and the whole thing went, went.
Went amazingly well as far as
how we originally got the gig.
You know, these two guys fresh
out of college had made this
little cartoon Spirit of
Christmas, and they were Primus fans. So
they sent it over and asked if we
would do the theme song for this pilot.
They were, and we never thought
it would even get on television,
let alone become a international phenomenon.
So we did it because we thought it was cool,
Not because of the profile or any of that,
because there was no profile.
Well, as your many projects outside
of Primus kind of help keep the
music exciting within Primus,
I think variety is the spice of life.
You know, I've always said I'm very
proud of my resume and the notion that
I've got to meet and befriend and and
collaborate with a lot of my heroes and
I've been able to do some very cool things.
I mean, I'm in a band with Stewart Copeland,
for Christ's sakes.
That's that's an amazing thing,
you know, with my thing with Sean,
but getting playing with Bernie Warrell.
But I think more than anything,
I have friends that are in bands
that don't do anything else.
And then which is a smart business move,
that's a brilliant business move.
But for me as a creative person,
I would go insane.
And I think I would,
we would have made some crappy Primus
records because we would have been trying
to force a square peg into the round
hole or whatever metaphor you want to use.
Whereas by me going off
and doing Bully Mac Roll,
that was the first solar project
and then Frog Brigade and Fancy
Band and Oyster Head and you know,
all these things.
It it it, it helps keep Primus.
Primus, you know,
I'm not trying to bring in a bunch of
other crapping the Primus and changing it.
So.
And I think that's very important that
Primus remain the thumbprint of myself,
Larry Lalonde and you know,
Tim Alexander for the most part
and even the days when Brain and
and and Jay were in the band.
So that it's,
it's the thumbprint of those
3 individuals not.
Me trying to force some of my,
you know,
I even said in the old days that
Highball with the Devil were songs
that I didn't want to inflict
upon the guys in Primus.
So it keeps it fresh. If we were
doing a Primus tour this summer,
it probably wouldn't be that great
because we just did a bunch of touring.
So this gives the three of us a
chance to breathe because I'm going
off and doing Frogregate for a while.
By the time this is over,
I'll be itching to get in the
studio with Larry and Herb.
So and that's a good feeling, you know,
I don't want to do it just because.
Oh, we need to make a record.
Hey, we need,
we got some mortgage payments,
you know, it's like I want to do
it because I'm excited to go and
get in the room with those guys. Is
there any chance that The Frog Brigade
will would have a new album or maybe
even like a live album based on the tour,
kind of like you've done in the past?
I don't know.
I think I live albums more likely.
But there's no plans of any of this,
You know, I'm halfway through a
a Delirium record with Shiner,
so got to finish that up.
I'm, you know.
In the middle of a record with Billy Strings.
So we've got to finish that up.
So I got up, I got there's things in
the pipeline and I know we're working
on getting some Primus live records out
because we've never released a live
record except for our very first one.
So we've been going through all
these tapes and you know we'll work.
My son and buddy of his,
Jimmy Hayward are,
are are directing the new Primus documentary.
So that's in the that's in the works.
There's a lot of things in the works, so.
Pretty cool. Is there going to be any
maybe live footage of Primus,
like a DVD or Blu-ray coming out? Or do
they still make DVD's and Blu Rays
and you're talking to old School?
Yeah. Or even streaming.
Or you do Beta Max, Beta Max,
or or maybe even streaming.
I know the Beta Max, only
that's like, that's the way
to go, yeah.
I mean, there's there's a lot of stuff being,
you know, my son's working
on this documentary.
He literally has gone through
900 hours of video footage,
so there's a lot of
stuff that's he's sifting through
to make this documentary. So that
sounds like that'll be pretty cool.
Is there any date for for the documentary
or is it just kind of like. It's
it's already overdue as far as I know.
I don't know.
It's his, it's his deal. I mean,
he's directing it with Jimmy Hayward.
So they're they're working on it.
I think it takes a while to go
through 900 hours and I don't want
to go through 900 hours of anything.
So yeah, hopefully,
hopefully he hasn't learned anything
shocking about his old man in the process,
because I don't know what's
on those damn tapes.
I'm sure there will probably be
some Woodstock footage from 94, and
I have no idea.
Every now and again I'll I've.
I've walked in there when he's going
through this footage and I'll see stuff.
I go, Holly forgot all about that.
You know, like there's all the
sudden there's Alex Lifeson
playing trumpet on here,
coming the ******** with a piece
of electrical tape on his lip so it
looks like he has a big mustache.
And I was like,
I had forgotten all about that,
you know?
But those those things happen.
I know that there's kind of like.
All the rumors about when you were
starting out with the Metallica,
doing the audition for that,
I mean, how accurate are those
rumors about how they said you were
too good to be in Metallica and
you should start your own band?
Well, I mean, that's a stretch.
I had Primus. Primus was going,
so I went to high school with Kurt.
And he's part of the reason why I
got into music because he was always
talking about getting his Stratocaster
and all these things, you know,
and we were had algebra together and
he formed Exodus and I joined another
band that needed a bass player.
And so I had heard he had this
band that was doing pretty well.
I wasn't into metal.
I was listening to all this,
you know, Public Image Limited
and early Peter Gabriel and Fred
Frith and things like that.
I knew nothing about Metallica or the metal
scene in the Bay Area and
I kept hearing about.
Now his band was doing well.
You know my old buddy Kirk?
So then I I had met Cliff.
I actually met Cliff right before he
passed away because we did a Primus
gig with Faith and the more and he
was at that show and then I heard
like a month later that he had,
he had died in that bus crash.
And so Kurt called me and said, hey,
you want to come down and audition?
And I didn't know **** about Metallica.
I had Ride the Lightning because
he had given it to me and I
learned the songs and I went in.
I didn't realize how. Popular.
They were or anything.
And I played and I did not fit,
as is evidence with the results.
So you know, I showed up with a,
you know, a blonde Mohawk and A and
a hat like this on and two different
colored tennis shoes and baggy skater pants.
I did not fit the.
I didn't fit the image of what and
a base that looked like a hunk of driftwood.
I didn't fit,
so I didn't get the gig, but.
They were very kind to me and James
said years later that I didn't get
the gig because I was too good.
But I have a feeling it was more that they
thought I was a freaking weird looking bug.
But who knows?
But they're good guys and
I and I tell you what,
they have the perfect bass player
and have had for the past 20 years.
Now with Robert, he's a monster player.
He's one of the sweetest,
nicest humans in the music industry, so.
They got an amazing thing going.
They didn't need me and
they're screwing it all up.