The ex-Guns N’ Roses sticksman’s latest collaboration is with Free and Sabbath alumni, as Emmie MacNevin found out
You played at the Sound & Vision Live awards to honour Paul Rodgers and Geezer Butler and ended up making a record.
I’ve been doing Adopt The Arts Foundation charity work for 14 years. I started supporting six schools, with about 4,000 kids, and I raise money through these events honouring artists. I’ve honoured Sammy Hagar, Billy Gibbons, Moby and many more, and this year it was Paul Rodgers (Bad Company/Free) and Geezer Butler (Black Sabbath). It was epic, because they both said ‘yes’ to it! Paul Rodgers lives in the US in the winter and I had a short-lived band with Geezer, Deadland Ritual, so Geezer was totally down with it. Then I started calling all the other musicians: Nuno Bettencourt, Steve Stevens from Billy Idol, a good pal. Epic guitar players like Phil X from Bon Jovi, Stevie Salas from Rod Stewart’s band, then bassist Robert DeLeo of Stone Temple Pilots. Perfect for Bad Company. Geezer played on the Sabbath stuff, and for the singer, we got Corey Taylor from Slipknot. The video of him doing War Pigs had two million views, so I posted that and Lzzy Hale doing Shooting Star. Lzzy, Corey, Glenn Hughes – the voice of rock – and Charlie Starr from Blackberry Smoke were the singers. I recorded it all on a laptop and it was amazing, and I thought, ‘I’ve got to make an album out of this!’ When I got the tracks back, I was even more excited. I spent three months working on it with my engineer, Kemble Walters, of Chevelle, here at Goodnoise Studios, [Palm Springs, California]. He mixed it, and Harry Reese shot it with two cameras and four Go Pros. It’s all about the vibe. It feels organic and it’s been really fun. We’re going to sell the vinyl for $99 via my vinyl club site, Experience Vinyl, and all the money made goes straight to Adopt The Arts. We’re going to clear about $150,000 for the kids. We’re only releasing 2,000 right now, so you gotta hurry up and grab one, because they’re selling fast!
Can you talk us through the recording process for the 2LP?
You just play the music and hope the live recordings are going to be good. There were a couple of technical issues but, luckily, we were able to tweak it. I had it on the rehearsal, so I was able to fix this one spot. Everything else was there and good, a completely live album. I just mixed it and got into really fine-tuning it. Everything sonically sounded great, and it was a labour of love. I’ve done a lot of records, but I got really inside this record, like I used to, to the point where I drove some of my bandmates nuts! Slash would say, “Matt this is rock’n’roll, you wanna take the rock right out of it!?” I’d tell him, “no, I just want to make it great”. And it’s the same with this record. It was me just trying to make it sound great, and I didn’t have anyone to tell me ‘no’. I was spending all my days and nights making it sound as good as I could for a live record, and I’ve had a lot of people online who’ve listened to War Pigs and the Lzzy Hale track and say that it sounds killer! I was the one who had the final say, so everyone can blame it on me if they don’t like it! My advice for anyone making a record is to make a record that you like, put it out, and maybe other people will like it. But you need to love it first!
You’ve collaborated with a lot of highly skilled musicians, which helps.
Collaborating with other musicians and band members helps to make a great record, because we all have a different take on things. This particular record, it was the great musicians that gave me such a big bed of music to work with. The singers just nailed it. Lzzy Hale, phenomenal. Glenn Hughes, amazing. But the underdog was Charlie Starr, who blew us away. A working class rock’n’roller! My old band mate, Billy Duffy (The Cult), said that I had to call Charlie and bring him in. I got online and saw Blackberry Smoke doing Children Of The Grave live, but they never recorded it. They did the Bad Company cover of Run With The Pack on this record, too, but Children Of Grave is epic! War Pigs is tough, because everyone and their brother has covered it. But there’s only one real big difference with our cover – we’ve got Geezer Butler! I did War Pigs once with Ozzy, when I had a band with Dave Navarro, but that never got recorded, though it’s on YouTube somewhere. I did Iron Man with Ozzy, too, but being with Geezer on stage was special. A lot of people might not know this, but Geezer wrote every single lyric you ever heard from Black Sabbath. Playing next to a founder who was a primary songwriter and epic bass player, playing his songs, was an awesome moment. Corey Taylor was definitely the right guy to sing that. I love Corey. He’s such a badass, and he got up there and nailed it.
As a drummer/producer, what details are you listening for in a live recording, to make sure the energy of the rhythm section translates perfectly to vinyl?
I had a bit of thing with that, because vinyl mastering is an art form. Black Sabbath music is heavy. I listened to old Sabbath and on those records it’s not heavy in the sense of sonics, it’s just heavy. It doesn’t have to be big. If you listen to Zeppelin, same thing. I wanted that sound, too. I got the bass where I wanted it, and I think we captured it. But it’s really hard to do on vinyl. If you think about the dynamic range on a record, bands didn’t play then like we play now. Everything is louder, especially rock music. It’s so out there, and it’s not as dynamic as in the old days. Even Bad Company didn’t play big and loud or distorted like younger rock bands. So the Bad Company feels really great, because I picked Robert DeLeo to play bass on that and he played it pitch perfect for the record. The record is more dynamic than maybe the Sabbath, but that’s just Sabbath – heavy and rocking! I’m really happy that we finally got to the vinyl done, because we wanted to capture everything in a modern way, but not too modern. Capturing the true essence of Sabbath while giving it our own thing.
You play drums on all the tracks. Which was the most challenging?
I love Symptom Of The Universe, because it has a big drum solo. But it was my event, so I had a lot going on. At one moment, I had to remember I still had to play the music! We rehearsed here at Goodnoise Studios the day before. Everyone came. I’ve done a lot of gigs with one-off bands and this went down smooth as silk. Everyone was on their game, a bunch of super-pro badasses. There weren’t a lot of mistakes on stage. It was one of those nights without any major train wrecks, which has happened in the past. Not with these guys and girl. Everyone came ready to go and that’s what you’ll hear.
Were they surprised when you told them that you were turning the experience of the evening into a record?
A little bit, yeah. They signed up for one thing and got another. But what happened was, I started playing it for some people. I’d ask them what they thought? I made a few mixes and some videos. Geezer wanted to put War Pigs up three months ago and, if Geezer wants it up, you know it’s good! I told him that he’d have to wait. Then Paul, who’s the best human on planet earth. There were no band politics. Everyone was super into it. They all know it’s for a good cause.
It’s available in two coloured variants. How did you decide on the colours?
I had a bunch of examples, then we decided what we wanted – a colour for Paul and a colour for Geezer. I went a little darker with Geezer, burgundy blood. We sent some stuff around and it was a great process because it felt old school, like we used to do. Before we had email, what the hell did we do!? We used to sit in a room together and look at stuff. I remember when we used to do that as a band. We’d sit down and look at the artwork together and converse. The album artwork was done by Glen Wexler, who’s famous for work with Van Halen and others. Glen had his own artistic vision, and for a guy as creditable as he is, I had to give him some leeway. It turned out beautiful. All the gatefold photographs were done by cool photographers.
Why did you set up Experience Vinyl?
It happened almost 10 years ago. My friend, Seth Frank, used to do vinyl for establishments like John Varvatos. I remember going into the old CBGB, New York, and John took it over, which a lot of people got mad over, but he kept the CBGB aesthetic. He had a lot of vinyl and old stereos in there. I remember meeting him and he knew that I loved vinyl. He told me that he wanted to do an online thing, because he sold his other company and asked me if I wanted to be his partner, be the face of it and talk about it to people in the industry and get it out there. It started out as just a love of vinyl. Now it’s a business. We have over 40,000 titles. We’ve done reissues of records that weren’t going to be issued. I put out Velvet Revolver Contraband because Sony didn’t really seem to care. It was our 20th Anniversary, we’d sold three million records and I decided I wanted to put it out. I made it, and it was a success. One thing about Metallica, they run their own world and have their own vinyl pressing plant. They sell a million records per year, Jack White, same thing, he makes his own records on Third Man. There’s a lot of people out there who dig that and we do really well online with people having a search online and finding records. I urge people to check out this new Sound & Vision record. There’s a lot of other cool stuff on the site too, so go check it out and do a deep dive into whatever you’re into!
What are some of your favourites in your own collection?
Recently, I pulled out Nat ‘King’ Cole. When I moved to Palm Springs, I bought all that stuff. Gene Krupa. And I just pulled up Pink Floyd’s The Dark Side Of The Moon. When you listen to that on vinyl, you sit down in a room, turn the light down. I don’t drink anymore, but get a glass of scotch or wine, sit down, and remember what it’s like to have that experience. Dark Side was created from the beginning to the end as a story told. Pink Floyd’s The Wall, same thing. I also pulled up The Doors Strange Days. Look at the sleeve, look what they created. It’s art, and a lost art form. I love a lot of classic records and have an extensive collection. A lot of the time, when I have bands here at the studio, I like to go in and listen to records first and ask myself, ‘why does that sound so good? What is that?’ Just to get a vibe, taking inspiration from the records we put on. All these musicians that have come before us. I was in a few bands and we’d always think, ‘what came before us?’ That’s why I look at Paul Rodgers and Geezer Butler and it’s so natural for me, because I grew up with it. I’m very lucky I lived through the 70s as a teenager.
The Sound & Vision Awards was an Adopt The Arts Foundation event, which you co-founded. Can you tell us more about it?
Fourteen years ago, in Los Angeles, my neighbour came over and told me that there was no music in the school down the street. I read an article that they were going to cut music and art in LAUSD school district, so I ended up downtown at a rally on a weekday. I went with Debbie Allen, the dancer, and she asked me if I wanted to speak? I got up and protested, “you can’t do this!” I thought I was an activist and liked the way that felt. I got a call from the superintendent’s office the next week. I went down and met him. He asked what we could do together, and I told him, I wanted to bring music into schools. So, he gave me a school, and I started the Adopt The Arts Foundation at that moment with my neighbour, Jane Lynch, from Glee. We believe in the same thing. We were both public school kids and did alright in the end. We serve 25 schools in Los Angeles, 4,000 kids. My co-executive, Laurie Baker, is an amazing woman who runs all the inner workings, the heavy lifting. I’m on the phone with her 24/7, constantly getting the kids involved in cool stuff, including a choir called The Changels, who performed with Ringo on his birthday. They’ve performed with Foreigner, Paul Rodgers. Underprivileged kids from Los Angeles and Coachella Valley, getting them involved in really great experiences. It’s going to help shape them as kids.
What was your vision when you launched the Foundation?
To give kids the tools that they need to excel in life. I don’t know what would have happened to me if I didn’t have music. I’m quite fortunate that I come from a musical family. My mother was a music teacher, my grandfather a professor of music. With all my attributes and everything I’ve been able to achieve, it was the right time for me to give back and it organically came to me.
Do you plan more events/records?
If the band is tight, yeah! Let’s see who we get next year. We’re doing another one on 8th March 2027 at The Plaza. We’re going to try to get the honourees this month, and hopefully we can do it all over again. It’ll be another fun ride, for sure!
See mattsorum.com.
