BearingtheKross
An Interview with Redd Kross’ Steve McDonald
by Mark Norris [ARTVOICE MAGAZINE]

Remember that episode of The Brady Bunch where big brother Greg convinced Mike Brady to let him convert said patriarch’s den into a hippy crash pad? Imagine if this moment of television hyperbole was a reality. A real-life Greg probably wouldn’t be the upstanding older brother we’ve seen on a thousand TV episodes but rather a rebellious, disaffected, California-slacker youth (after all, his real mom died and now he’s got to share his father’s affections with not only a “new mom” but three snotty sisters, two whiney brothers, an overbearing cleaning lady and a dog that just can’t stay out of trouble). If this bizarro Greg Brady was allowed into television viewers’ homes, the soundtrack to his hippy love nest episode would not be the sugary Strawberry Alarm Clock knock off that accompanied that particular episode but rather the alternatingly sweet, savage and severe music of a band like Redd Kross.

Formed in Hawthorne, CA in 1978 by brothers Steve and Jeff McDonald, Redd Kross has experienced more shifts in personnel, musical styles and record labels than most musicians twice their age. With the recent re-release of the band’s classic 1987 album Neurotica, an EP of new material from bassist and vocalist Steve McDonald’s Steven McDonald Group and the musician’s surprise collaboration with The White Stripes, there is seemingly more activity surrounding Redd Kross right now than during the band’s heyday in the 1980s and ’90s.

Perhaps hailing from the hometown of The Beach Boys helped set the standard for Redd Kross’ blend of musical fraternal harmony and tumultuous inner band politics.

“ We were the kind of people that created our own world for sure,” says Steve McDonald in a recent telephone interview. “People were invited to take part of it but you had to get a lot of obscure references to feel like you were included...but that’s the world that we felt comfortable in and that was our trip. Ultimately, I look back on it and think, ‘Oh my god! We were total freaks and that is so cool!.’”

The band had a long time to accumulate its collection of “obscure references” both musical and otherwise. It also managed to draw legions of loyal fans into the band’s collective private jokes, which were thinly veiled in its songs, referencing all things pop culture.

Redd Kross’ beginnings saw the group performing under such monikers as The Tourists (years before Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart adopted the name with their pre-Eurythmics group) and Red Cross (before being threatened with a cease and desist order by that particular life saving organization). The band was playing gigs at such famed L.A. clubs as The Whiskey A Go-Go and The Roxy when brothers Jeff and Steve were still at the tender ages of 15 and 11, respectively.

Joined by future Circle Jerks member Greg Hetson on guitar and Black Flag member-to-be Ron Reyes on drums, the McDonald brother’s early punk leanings created songs played at breakneck speed with broken-fingered dexterity. While the punk ethos of the day called for seriously fast music dealing with serious issues, Redd Kross’ youthful exuberance sounded more like a juvenile tantrum set to a music that constantly threatened to collapse mid- song. Luckily for the rhythm section, the songs were over in a flash and a sense of wonderment, awe and humor was left ringing in the listeners’ ears.

The band released its first EP in 1980 and quickly released the full-length Born Innocent the following year. Despite the favor shown to the band by local impresario, DJ and club owner Rodney Bingenheimer—who put the band’s song “Annette’s Got the Hits” into regular rotation on the nascent KROQ station’s playlist—and the quick development of a local cult following, Reyes and Hetson left the band for greener pastures before a note of Born Innocent had been recorded.

“ All of our records do sound a lot different from each other and of course that’s probably because the musicians were constantly changing. Jeff and I were obviously horrible at managing inner band relationships; we later got a bit better. But when we started we were so young and the people that played with us were so young, too. Things were bound to change constantly. The different records always attracted a different crowd. The Born Innocent record was very much of like the cool art crowd. Sonic Youth really embraced that record back in the day, which I didn’t know until later. I recently downloaded a cover version that Pavement did of one of the songs off that record, but at the time, who knew?

For years I was embarrassed because I didn’t feel that we competed with groups like The Circle Jerks or The Descendents. That tight, fast well-rehearsed punk rock didn’t happen for us. You know, we were busy huffing spray paint in our parent’s garage. That record was really, really loose. But now that I listen to it again, I don’t care that it was really loose. I think it’s bold and has so a lot of fucking attitude.”

Attitude is the key word for all of Redd Kross’ early recordings. On Born Innocent, the band’s TV-obsessed mindset addressed such dubious personalities as Linda Blair, Lita Ford and Charlie Manson set to a savagely sloppy (yet highly engaging) musical accompaniment. Born Innocent was the sound of high school angst, aggression and fury unleashed from the locker room and placed onto vinyl.

“ We were pop culture junkies and were raised by our TV sets. So that record is a product of that environment and our reactions to that suburban South California lifestyle,” recalls McDonald. “That record is the one I’m most proud of right now. We were bold and I would love to make a record someday that captured as much spontaneity and captured a moment in time as well as that one did.”

By the time Redd Kross released Neurotica in 1987, the lineup had changed several times over (guitarist Robert Hecker and drummer Roy McDonald were added to the fray for the record) and so too had the group’s musical outlook.

With the help of producer T. Erdelyi (aka Tommy Ramone), the band dropped its original musical angst in favor of a more commercial (but still maniacal) sounding blend of pop, metal, punk and harmony. Songs like “Janus, Jeanie and George Harrison,” “Peach Kelli Pop” and “McKenzie” (a tip of the hat to One Day at a Time star Mackenzie Phillips) pushed the band’s pop culture references into overdrive. Musically, Redd Kross had managed an approximation of the sound KISS, the New York Dolls and The Cowsills might make if you threw all their albums in the blender. With Neurotica, the group managed to create a hard rock masterpiece.

Unfortunately, the hair band mania of bands like Guns N’ Roses, Poison and others was looming on the horizon and commandeered all radio and media exposure for the next five years.

“ I kept thinking that ‘Peach Kelli Pop’ could have been a smash if it could have competed sonically with ‘Welcome to the Jungle’ or something like that,” says McDonald. “It seem stupid to think about now, but that was the only thing that we really had to compare ourselves to. Bands like Poison were our contemporaries and were succeeding in the industry. But we didn’t relate to those bands creatively at all.”

Shortly after Neurotica was released, the band’s label went bankrupt ensuring all hopes for future radio play and wider national exposure would be dashed in the process.
Although critically hailed and highly influential to the current breed of rock n’ rollers, this classic album has long been out of print to music buyers. Recently re-issued on Five Foot Two/Oglio Records, the reissue sees the addition of bonus tracks, remixes and a slew of previously unseen photos over the course of a 14-page booklet.

Although most bands would have easily crumbled under the crippled expectancy presented by Neurotica’s release, and subsequent withdrawal from record racks, the brothers McDonald soldiered on.

Prevented from recording under its own name due to legal wranglings with its old label, Redd Kross formed the Tater Totz, featuring an “all star” cast of musicians. Recording surreal covers of both well known and obscure songs, the band’s 1989 release, Alien Sleestaks From Brazil, featured appearances from former Partridge Danny Bonaduce and a cover of Os Mutantes’ “Bat Macumba” (pre-figuring the current revival of the 1960s Brazilian psychedelic band by nearly a decade).

By 1990, Redd Kross was back to its old nom-de-plum and signed to a major label. Yet it seemed the band was yet again a victim of the old adage “being at the wrong place at the wrong time.” Had it been released a few years later, the burgeoning underground music movement would have rightly accepted the release of the band’s album Third Eye with open arms. Yet the widespread popularity of that particular music trend was still a few years in the offing. “We were 19 or 20 and used to go up to Seattle and play with all those bands like Soundgarden and Green River and they used to open for us!” says McDonald with a laugh. “But of course they all went on to become these big groups so it’s kind of funny how it all turned out.”

The band would continue its trend of critically hailed/commercially-ignored releases for the rest of the 1990s (including the two excellent full-length albums Phaseshifter and Show World). By the end of the 1990s it seemed like the group might decide to call it a day. Yet since the group had been working in the music biz since their early teens, where exactly were these guy going to go?

“ I would say that after we finished touring for Show World I realized I had been doing this sort of thing for about 20 years.” says McDonald. “I mean, I paid for our first demo with my paper route money! By the time I was 30 I was thinking, ‘Ok, I made this lifelong decision at age ten. So how’s it working out for me now?’ The tunnel vision and competitiveness of being in a band was getting tiring and I just need a little while to shake myself out of that spell. I was working on an eleven year old’s sense of reality for a really long time. I needed to take a step back to get a little perspective and sort of re-evaluate to see how I felt about keeping all my eggs in just that one basket.”
Yet the McDonald brothers still had a few eggs left in their basket to roll. Along with a series of production gigs (Jeff and Steve produced The Donnas’ 1999 release Get Skintight), the brothers formed Ze Malibu Kids and released a full length CD this past year. Steve also received widespread national attention while handling the bass duties for The White Stripes. Of course, McDonald hadn’t necessarily been asked to join the notoriously bass-less band but rather took to re-recording the band’s entire White Bloods Cells album with his own bass parts added on for good measure. The ensuing album, titled Redd Blood Cells, was available for download on the band’s website and threw a new limelight on the life-long musician.

“ What surprised me was when it got mainstream attention, like from Entertainment Weekly,” says McDonald. “That sort of surprised me. I can’t say that it wasn’t initially motivated to get attention, but as I did it, I realized how much I really liked the White Stripes. Aside from a couple of choice Redd Kross records, it’s actually my favorite record that I’ve played on. I loved making up my parts and I loved the way the record has a spontaneous sound.”

The past year has also seen the debut release by The Steven McDonald Group in the form of This is Not A Rebellion, This Is Mass Awakening (also released on Five Foot Two Records). While the over-the-top pop referencing of Redd Kross’ lyrics have been replaced by a more refined sense of self-awareness, the music itself does plenty of referencing. Echoes of The Beatles, The Who, The Rolling Stones and The Velvet Underground run wonderfully rampant throughout the recording and the five-song ep has an immediacy and presence often absent from much of the current wave of over labored rock records.

“ The point of this record was about capturing a moment that was honest and spontaneous and not competing with the sonic boom of The Foo Fighters,” says McDonald. “At some point for me, that kind of thing became an uncreative process. After recording the White Stripes thing, I think that it was liberating to hear all the warts, to hear all the lo-fi trashy sound quality which made no apologies for itself. There’s no excuses like ‘oh , we didn’t have enough money to record it the right way.’ It’s more like, ‘This is the way we want it to be and this is fucking rad.’”

The future may offer new recordings for Redd Kross, but the group has already officered a legacy that far outweighs that of almost every group on the scene today.
For more information: visit www.reddkross.com.