Friday March 29th 2024

Interview with The Trans Fats

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Interview with The Trans Fats at the Midway Cafe, Jamaica Plain, MA
By Slimedog

 

The Trans Fats are a rockin’, roaring old school punk hardcore band from Providence, Rhode Island, They fairly recently fell under the radar of TNB and we have been mighty impressed. They consist of Todd (Vocals), James (Guitar) Larry (Drums) and John on bass who, though being an original member, recently returned to the band. The following interview took place in the dungeon below the Midway where they had just played a gig.

Slimedog- I don’t usually start with this question but, who drinks the most in the band?

James- The most in years? Larry- cause he’s the oldest.

Larry- I definitely drink the most, it’s seven days a week.

Slimedog- I only bring it up because Todd’s not feeling well today. (he had mentioned from the stage earlier that he was very hungover)

Todd- There was a bottle of rum involved last night.

James- If we could align the ages somehow (Todd is the youngest in the band) make Todd the same age as Larry, or vice-versus, then…

Slimedog- Todd would get there?

Todd- I’ll probably be dead by Larry’s age.

Larry- But what Todd’s been doing I’ve been doing seven days a week, since 1984, I haven’t changed. It’s Heineken.

Slimedog- Oh, I wanted to mention I was looking at your profile (someone burps loudly) and as an influence it has Heineken and actually, that’s my favorite beer. And I saw James and Larry with one today. I drink it at home but it doesn’t seem as popular today.

James- That’s Larry’s favorite and I saw that he loved it so much and we both worked at liquor stores and that somehow, became the beer of choice. And he’s a hundred percent faithful.

John- And don’t forget his dog, Bradley, he drinks Heineken, too.

Slimedog- Oh, really?

Larry- Crack a beer and he’s like Pavlov’s dog, he’s just conditioned to start watering at the mouth. He comes right over and looks at you.

Slimedog- I don’t think you guys know this, but there’s a guy who comes to the Midway and his dog drinks Guinness. It’s a little pug dog and he puts him in a seat and the dog has his paws on the bar and the guy drinks a Guinness and the dog gets a little rock glass of it. And the dog laps it up and then he makes sure he licks every last drop off the bar.

Slimedog- (Now watering at the mouth) So, how did you guys get started?

James- Larry and I were drinking in a bar and we talked about doing a punk karaoke type thing where you play live and let people get up on stage and sing with us. It was just an idea, we got together and jammed a little bit and after a couple of weeks we realized this might turn into something original. So we decided to find some other people that’d be into it. I grew up with John, though he’s more of a guitar player, he’s super talented and I knew that he would work out fine. I was playing bass in bands for years and I was kinda getting bored with it so I was like, “I wanna play guitar, I wanna do something different.”

Larry- I was psyched because I thought he (James) would be playing bass but it worked out great.

James- And we tried out a whole bunch of singers and guys were coming down. And Larry had been in a band with Todd’s older brother and one time Todd came down just to fuck around and we knew right away that was the lineup right there.

Slimedog- Who writes the music?

James- We all do. Todd plays guitar, Larry does, too. We all bring songs to the table. There’s no one person that does everything.

Slimedog- How would you describe your style?

Larry- I would say a collaboration of Black Flag, Black Sabbath and Minor Threat.

John- And Bad Religion, we’re Bad Sabbath. (laughter)

James- We never sit down and say we’re gonna be this particular sound.

Larry- Our chemistry is good because we’re all working for the same outcome. Just trying to write a good song and have fun with it and that’s what we do.

Slimedog- What’s your take on the local Boston and Providence scenes?

Larry- it’s gonna take a little while but I think it’s on the way up.

James- And I hope we can be a part of the rise of upcoming bands.

Slimedog- Do you have any recording plans coming up?

James- Yeah, this is the last show we have lined up right now and then we plan on getting some serious recording done.

Larry- We have some recordings but we are so much better than we were two years ago. So were gonna get in the studio and record.

James- And now that we have John back on bass we’re ready to go.

Larry- We’re definitely fired up to get some recording. We realize that’s the next step.

Slimedog- Well, get it to us when it’s ready.

Larry- We definitely will. You guys have done so much for us. How long have you been on-line?

Slimedog- It’s been about a year. It’s funny because the date it was put on the web, and only Andy and I could see then, was the day that preacher bought all those billboard ads about the world ending- that’s when we went on-line!

Larry- So you guys were the reason the preacher was telling people to repent? (Laughter)

Slimedog- Who’s most likely to become a serial killer?

James- I say Todd. (All agree)

Todd- Yeah, probably me. I don’t like many people.

Slimedog-
And why Todd?

Larry- He’s so unpredictable.

John- He’s an angry young man.

Todd- People don’t like me. I don’t like people.

James- People do call me “Angry James” though.

Larry- The only kind of serial killer Todd would be is like a box of Captain Crunch, twelve o’clock at night.

John- I was thinking he’d be more like Jeffrey Dahmer. Chopping people up and putting them in the freezer.

Todd- (Visibly shaken) That’s fucked up. (Laughter)

At this point Todd fires up a nearby chainsaw and started menacing the other Trans Fats with the blade. Talk about a bad hangover! I used the excuse of “getting more tape for my tape recorder” and made a hasty retreat upstairs. As of this publication the Trans Fats are looking for a guitarist, a bassist and a drummer as the whereabouts of James, John and Larry is still a mystery.

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