Recently, legendary Quiet Riot vocalist Kevin DuBrow, always a man of many words and interesting stories, was kind enough to take a break from his impossibly hectic schedule to speak with us regarding the seemingly unlikely rejuvenation of the Hair Metal veterans as well as the release of his highly-anticipated solo debut In For The Kill…

Todd: How was Quiet Riot originally formed?

Kevin DuBrow: “Randy Rhoads. I got a call from him in March of 1975. I had just come home from a cancelled Humble Pie concert. My brother had scribbled down a message that said ‘Smokey’s ex-guitar player wants to know if are interested in singing in his band’ Smoky was this gay singer in Hollywood that everyone used to roll their eyes about. They used to play his single at Rodney Bingenheimer’s English Disco. Do you know who Rodney Bingenheimer is?”

Todd: No, I don’t...

Kevin: “He’s a local celebrity in Los Angeles. He was a friend to the stars in the ’70’s. Randy wasn’t on that particular single. I remember hearing it and it was just awful. Randy and (original Quiet Riot bassist Kelly Garner) came to my Mom’s house. There are home movies of me singing...I guess they kinda laughed about it. Later on in the week, I was actually playing with Stan Lee, the guitarist from The Dickies. I drove out to Randy’s Mom’s house in Burbank. …(He had) a little practice amp and this Gibson SG. He plugged in and the first thing he played was the riff that later became (the Ozzy Osbourne classic) “Suicide Solution”. We called it “Force Of Habit”. He turned out to be a combination of all of my favorite guitarists. He played a bit like (late David Bowie axeman) Mick Ronson, a little bit like Jeff Beck, a little bit like Ritchie Blackmore, a little like Johnny Winter...it was just unbelievable. I remember it like it was yesterday. He was so great...absolutely unaware of how amazing he was sitting in this little Burbank bedroom. ...From that point on, we formed Quiet Riot.”

Todd: It must have been incredible to have been part of that experience…

Kevin: “We knew from that moment that he was destined for greatness...there were no two ways about it. I'd seen guys at (famed club) The Whiskey A Go Go...on a national level...that couldn't touch him. ...My theory was that if there was this guy that was this great that no one had ever heard of, how many other guys were there like that out there? I think it was fate that hooked us up. Or, they were so desperate for a singer because nobody had the balls to sing in a band like that in those days. I’ve never had too many fears of rejection (laughs).”

Todd: Musically, what are your influences?

Kevin: “There are vocal influences, songwriting influences...so many different things. As a songwriter, Pete Townsend is my biggest influence. …Ian Hunter from Mott The Hoople, The Beatles. As a singer, Steve Marriott from Humble Pie is still my all-time influence…Paul Rogers, Roger Daltry...Glenn Hughes to a certain extent, but I can't do anything he does. I think he influences me more as a musician than he does as a singer because we come from two different places vocally. He comes from a place that I don’t think anyone else on the planet can find (laughs). It’s so great and so hard to duplicate. Those are pretty much my influences.”

Todd: Personally, Glenn’s work with Deep Purple and Black Sabbath just blows me away...

Kevin: “For me, it’s his solo work that kills me. He has a body of solo work that is just amazing. I thought he was great with Deep Purple, too. If I had been David Coverdale, my penis would have crawled up my asshole and disappeared. As much as I like David as a singer and as a person, there is only one Glenn. Singing against that...it’s not something I would want to make a habit out of. I did it once last year. Glenn invited me to come sing at a celebrity golf tournament for missing children. Glenn came out on stage and played bass on “Metal Health” and half way through it, we played (the Junior Wells classic) “Messin’ With The Kid” .It’s not something you’d want to put yourself up against.”

Todd: What was the main motivation behind the release of your solo album?

Kevin: “...It’s an idea that Frankie Banali and I had discussed many years ago and were supposed to do together. Quiet Riot had just broken up. (Shrapnel Records founder) Mike Varney called me up and asked me about Quiet Riot doing it...that was the initial idea. Being that Quiet Riot had just broken up, I suggested to Frankie that we do it without all being in the same room. That was the only way it was going to happen. …Some of the songs on In For The Kill Frankie and I had picked out over ten years ago, but would not have been executed properly with the last Quiet Riot line-up. That line-up was very limited in its scope. It played certain things alright, and other things it couldn’t play. So Varney called me a week later and asked me if I wanted to do a solo album. I told him that I wanted to do a solo album of originals with Glenn Hughes producing. That was always the original plan. He told me he wasn’t interested in doing an album of originals, but if I wanted to do a covers album, we could talk. We worked out a deal that night and were recording within the next four days.”

Todd: How did you ultimately choose the musicians you worked with?

Kevin: “Mike Varney pretty much assembled the players. He had this guy Kevin Curry on guitar. I was really concerned about him because those songs are sacred to me. It’s my bible, what I grew up with...especially the Humble Pie Song “Red Light Mamma”. But when I heard what he was capable of, I was just amazed. The bass player was really gotten because he owned the studio and by using him, we got free studio time. He a nice guy, but he’s no Chuck Wright, ya know? The drummer...Mike Varney had a different drummer in mind who I didn’t think was right for the project. That was the only input I had on the musicians, so we got Jeff Martin from Racer X and Badlands and he was great. …We needed somebody in a hurry and there was nobody in Las Vegas that we could find. Jeff drove down from Lake Tahoe and turned out to be a great guy. I ended up doing some summer dates with him. Michael Lardie, who has turned out to be one of my best friends...was actually someone who I had done multiple shows with when he was in Great White yet had never said anything more than hello to in fifteen years of touring. Carlos Cavazo said he didn’t like Michael, which is weird because nobody dislikes Michael Lardie. He’s one of the nicest guys in the world. Plus, Carlos Cavazo doesn’t dislike anybody, so I don’t know what the problem was. Because of this, I was always a little hesitant to talk to him. He turned out to a great collaborator, he made my vocals sound great and he made the whole thing really fun to do. ...It was really fun because there was no pressure and no egos.”

Todd: What was the main cause for the break-up of the reunited Metal Health era line-up? For me, as a fan and as a journalist, the reunion was a dream come true...

Kevin: “It was a nightmare for me.”

Todd: Really?

Kevin: “You have to remember that when we went in to record Metal Health, the line-up was me, Frankie, Carlos and Chuck. Carlos had just got the gig a month before. The guys that we had auditioned with was me, Frankie, a guy named Craig Turner and Chuck. ...Right before that, it was me, Frankie, a guy named Bob Stephen and Chuck. It wasn’t a band at the time...it was called DuBrow. If you go look at the tape box in Sony’s vaults, it says DuBrow...we changed the name later. The Metal Health line-up, in my opinion, is something people envisioned as a band because of its use in videos and because people associate it with a certain time in their lives. Musically, the crux of it was something Frankie and I had been doing in clubs for a few years with a revolving door of other guys. That was the line-up that we had right as we signed that deal. I wouldn’t say that line-up was particularly responsible for the architecture of that sound...they just happened to be in the band when we got signed. It was also a line-up that had it’s inherit problems. The problems of the ’80’s were made worse by my drug abuse and by my ego. ...I’ve blabbed on and on about what they were and I really don’t like to put a spotlight on a problem that isn’t there anymore, ya know? Musically, I felt the life had been sucked out of the band by the end of 2003. It was a negative situation. When I’m not into something, I can be pretty difficult...I can be pretty territorial about my music. I take it very serious when I am up on stage. If the band isn’t together as a unit and isn’t grooving musically, I get very miserable. Every part of my life is miserable because I love music. Just because we may not be considered a valid musical force doesn’t mean I don’t take it as seriously now at the age of fifty as I did when I was eighteen, ya know?”

Todd: Taking everything into consideration, how do you feel the current Quiet Riot line-up compares to those of the past?

Kevin: “Musically, it smokes it...smokes it down the road....it buries it on every fucking level. In the past, there were personality conflicts. Certain people just aren’t meant to play together. If you could see how a certain person’s actual personality differs from what the public perceives them to be, you’d be amazed. I can tell you that right now, we are already writing for our next studio record. We already have more than enough material even though we haven’t started recording yet. By the time we get it done, it’s going to be the best record that we’ve ever done. Frankie just played me a demo of three songs that he’s done with a guy name Neil Citron at Steve Vai’s studios. I’ve been doing my demos up here with Michael Lardie and (current Quiet Riot guitarist) Alex Grossi. It’s funky, it’s heavy...some of it sounds more contemporary, some of it sounds super ’70’s retro. Live, we have a band that plays in the groove, in the pocket and the tempos are great...it’s got a swing. You can play as loud as you want on stage if you play the parts that are right for the tunes...there is no limit to the volume, it doesn't hurt your ears. But when it's all...shit, it's all a little hard to take. We did a New Years Eve show in Baltimore and I was a bit concerned because we'd only had one rehearsal, but we sounded fucking amazing. The Metal Health era line-up never rehearsed. We never rehearsed because there was no fucking point...nobody listened. I told Frankie when we got back together that we had to have a different philosophy...we had to rehearse. You want to have an element of spontaneity each night, but you also want each member to know the songs going in. One of our previous members could not remember how to play “Slick Black Cadillac” at the beginning of a weekend run. That’s a song we’ve been playing since 1977. I don’t know what to say about that. The rehearsal was great and the shows have been great. We’re doing “Condition Critical” again...the song sounds much better than the record. Alex listened to the original recording and duplicated what Carlos had done within a live setting. Carlos never had that sound live. Alex is so serious about his tones...he brings a whole new element to our sound.”

Todd: We’re you disappointed or surprised when Carlos chose not to participate in the reunion?

Kevin: “Not really. Carlos is a nice guy and a really good guitar player, but he’s also, without a doubt, one of the laziest people to ever walk the planet. …He’d have a hard time arguing with me if he were sitting right here. The guy sleeps all day. He hasn’t written a song in five years...he’s probably writing songs with whatever band he’s with now because he has to figure out a way to pay his rent. He never called anybody when we weren’t working...there was no communication. I like Carlos, but you’re only as strong as your weakest link and Carlos just didn’t care. Alex cares. I talk to him three times a day. He was up here in Las Vegas and we wrote forty songs for the new album...they’re just smokin’. I’ve already nailed one of the vocals. I have some great recording software on my computer. I have nothing against Carlos and I know the gap left by his absence will give a lot of people the wrong perception about us because we don’t have that many original members, but neither does Dokken or a lot of other bands that go out there. I can tell you that we sound more like Quiet Riot now than we did with the reunited Metal Health era line-up.”

Todd: I’ve had the opportunity to see that particular line-up twice. Once in a very small club (The Tap Room in Duluth, MN) and once in an arena (The DECC in Duluth MN). The first time you were horrible, the second time you were brilliant…

Kevin: “Really?”

Todd: Yes. The first time, my ears rang for three days after the show. The second time, at The Glam Slam Metal Jam, you were just amazing.

Kevin: “I’ll tell you right now that the whole volume problem was related directly to Rudy Sarzo. He insisted on playing at a certain level and everyone had to turn up to be heard over it. He would not turn down. He denies it in every interview that he does, but in my defense, if you ask any sound guy that has ever mixed a Quiet Riot show, he’ll tell you the problem is with the bass.”

Todd: I seem to remember Carlos seemed very upset during the first show…

Kevin: “Hmm...I don’t know how upset he was. He never bothered to have that much contact with me onstage, ya know? We didn’t have that whole guitar player/singer thing goin’ on, so I was never too in tune with what was pissing him off. As I say, with that version of the band, playing clubs was more miss that hit. The Glam Slam tour was a better tour for us because we couldn’t hear how loud we were playing and we were just glad to be playing in bigger places and playing to more people. It was just a false sense of what was going on, though. ...It was a good show...we performed very well. Like I've said before, Rudy Sarzo is a very good performer, but you don't hear with your eyes. If you had recorded some of the shows, which we did, you'd hear that they were absolute garbage...total garbage. Words can’t describe.”

Todd: That's just amazing to me...

Kevin: “People have a preconceived perception of what they are going to hear. When a band has a lot of pyro and special effects onstage with them, people tend to walk away saying what a great show it was, but when the band records themselves, they have to doctor the tapes so much playing is not what you think it is...it’s what you see it is.”

Todd: Are you planning on performing any material from your solo album on the next tour?

Kevin: “Yeah...we’re gonna do “Red Light Mamma, Red Hot”.  We’re already been doing it, in fact. It turns into a showcase for everybody. We do it long and we do a bunch of songs in the center of it...some Cream, some Humble Pie...Alex gets to play some great Blues guitar and the rhythm section just grooves. I just stop signing and let them go. They get my dick hard they’re so good. …Chuck Wright is just so amazing. We’re lucky he wasn’t busy.”

Todd: He does seem to be everywhere, doesn’t he?

Kevin: “There are enough hours in the day so that you can do a lot of different things...there is always plenty of time, ya know?"

Todd: When attending a gig on your next tour, what type of set list can your fans expect?

Kevin: “We’re pretty much going to ignore the Guilty Pleasures era. We’ve been playing stuff off of that one for a long time. It's hard for me to talk positively about the new line-up without slagging the old line-up, but I can only explain by comparison. The last line-up, as I've said before, had a great deal of difficulty rehearsing and learning anything new. Nobody would have anything learned. We had the same set list for the last three years. Because of that, we’re not going to be doing anything from Guilty Pleasures. We’re doing stuff we haven’t been or couldn’t do last summer. We’re doing “Condition Critical” again. We did “Breathless” this year on New Year’s Eve for the first time in twenty three years and it sounded great. We’re doing “Put Up Or Shut Up” from QR III... We’ve learned a lot of additional material like “The Ritual” from Alive And Well because I’m now able to call out a song and just do it, something that was impossible with the last line-up.”

Todd: As a die-hard Quiet Riot fan, I have to admit it would be nice to hear some of the more obscure material...

Kevin: “Chuck has been playing his “Bass Case” solo, we’ve been doing “The Wild And The Young”. I just love going to see bands that are able to play a song when a fan shouts it out. I haven’t seen that happen in twenty years. In the ‘70’s, I used to see bands like Humble Pie...if you’d scream out a song, they’d play it. That’s a real band, man. If you’d have done that with the Metal Health era line-up, Carlos would have looked at me and just shook his head. Now, we’re able to remember all of our material. …When someone yells out “Cum On Feel The Noise”, it’s not like we’re not gonna play it, but now, if somebody yells out something like “Breathless”, bam...were gonna play it, ya know? It’s a matter of the people in the band applying themselves and learning a larger repertoire of material and keeping it fresh. That’s what has happened here.”

Todd: What were the main motivations behind you being fired from the group?

Kevin: “I wanted to fire the management and leave the record label. I was very adamant about doing so. The rest of the band was too chickenshit to do it. They thought what we had was their bread and butter. The plan the rest of the band was like ‘Hey, let’s get rid of Kevin. He’s really high all of the time, he’s really arrogant, so let’s just get rid of him and do a record without him’. So it happened.”

Todd: Well, to me, the results speak for themselves...

Kevin: “It’s not my favorite record. I’ve heard that some people like it, but it’s not my cup of tea. I know Frankie still thinks it’s a good record. I don’t want to insult anything one of my best friends has done, but I’d rather listen to Whitesnake.”

Todd: I think it’s a musically competent record. I just think they should have released it under a different name.

Kevin: “I completely agree with you. …Unless you’re Van Halen and you have a great songwriting team already in place. Carlos isn’t that bad, he’s just not that good.”

Todd: What did you do to keep yourself busy during that time (1987-1998)?

Kevin: “I partied! (laughs) I had sex…I had money, so I wasn’t too worried about it. There were three or four years where I really didn’t do a lot. In 1990, I put together a group called Little Women, which was the first band of my own that I put together that led to Quiet Riot getting together again.”

Todd: Is it just my imagination or have you really sang on that many tribute albums?

Kevin: “Throughout the years, if somebody has asked me to contribute vocals to something, I’ve been pretty open to doing it. It doesn’t cost me a thing or hurt my reputation at all. I sang on a Keel record, I sang on a Starship record. ...Mickey Thomas...I love his voice. I’ve done a lot of little things like that. Personally, I would rather do things like that than all of the tribute albums. Most of them are absolute rubbish...total garbage. I did them all for some quick cash. I used the majority of the money to buy the computer system that I have. The last one I did...the final straw...was a Van Halen tribute record that I did. My whole stipulation was to only do the songs that were to be released with a Dance mix. Otherwise, it would just sound like I was auditioning for those bands.”

Todd: In hindsight, what is your least favorite Quiet Riot recording?

Kevin: “I really don’t like the song “Party All Night”. It got voted as one of the worst Metal songs of all time on VH1. The original version of the song was called “Keep On Rolling”. When it got produced by (Pasha Records founder/Metal Health producer) Spencer Proffer, the way he had me sing it with all of the over-annunciations...it’s embarrassing. There are other things on Condition Critical that bother me as well. I became almost a parody of myself after only one album. Most of the things that bother me are on Condition Critical. It’s the Quiet Riot album with the least amount of depth. It’s like a one trick pony.”

Todd: Is it safe to say your relationship with Spencer is less than friendly?

Kevin: “I try not to think about him. The difference between him and taking a shit is that eventually, when you flush the toilet, the smell of the shit disappears. With Spencer, the stink permeates the room for years and years after. It all has to do with the legal documents that we signed. A lot of people say I’m bitter about him, but I’m not. If you ask me a question about the guy, I’m going to give you an honest answer. Do I think of the guy? No, I don’t. If I were bitter, I would think of the guy all of the time. ...I think he’s a piece of shit, but I almost never think of him.”

Todd: It’s nice to hear you’ve been able to put a positive spin on everything...

Kevin: “I live my life for today...what is going to happen today. Who could live any other way? I’m fortunate that I’m back in Quiet Riot with Frankie and without Rudy who was making my life a living hell. I get to do what I like to do.”

Todd: Any truth to the rumors that you and Frankie had to reach a legal agreement with Rudy in order to continue using the Quiet Riot name?

Kevin: “Yeah, we came to a settlement, basically. …Actually, it’s worked out pretty well for us (laughs). Really well.”

Todd: At this point, is there a specific label you’d like to release the next Quiet Riot disc through?

Kevin: “...I don’t know. We’re talking about recording it ourselves. Recording technology has advanced so much, we don’t know if we want to do it the old fashioned way when it’s so easy to do it yourself. ...I don’t think we’re going to release it on our own label. Having said that, Quiet Riot’s reputation is different than other artists. There is still a lot of negativity out there over things that happened over twenty years ago. It’s funny...it’s like ‘If we take him off of the cross, we can use the wood’”.

Todd: In retrospect, where do you feel Quiet Riot stands in the history of Heavy Metal music?

Kevin: “...I think we’re a footnote. I don’t think we have the place in history someone like Glenn Hughes does. ...Even groups like Motley Crue...even though I think our catalog is better than theirs in some ways. They just had a longer, more successful run than we did. Ultimately, it’s for the fans to decide. Personally, I think we’re an entertaining live band and one of the few from our particular era that is actually playing better now than we did then.  If you look at a lot of other bands from our ear, they look bad, they sound bad...they are bad.”

Todd: There are definitely a few of them still out there that don’t look or sound too good…

Kevin: “You saw The Glam Slam Metal Jam tour, right?  Remember Warrant?”

Todd: Oh, God...they were awful...

Kevin: “...Yes...when you don’t care, you play like that, ya know? Not only that, but alcohol and Rock ‘n’ Roll only mix if you are listening to it. I don’t give a shit what anybody says. If you drink before you perform, you might feel more festive, but you’re playing definitely suffers.”

Select Discography
Rehab (2006) *
Live And Rare, Vol. 1 (2005) *
In For The Kill (2004) **
Guilty Pleasures (2001) *
Alive And Well (1999) *
Down To The Bone (1995) *
Terrified (1993) *
QR III (1986) *
Condition Critical (1984) *
Metal Health (1983) *
Quiet Riot II (1978) *
Quiet Riot (1977) *

* as a member of Quiet Riot
** as a solo artist

kevindubrow.com