interview with G.C.G.

Have any of you played in other bands? AL The Yeti Bones: Yes, we all have. I started in a band called Mister Bones, then formed Georgian Skull, and then joined The Mighty Nimbus (featuring members of Pentagram, Sixty Watt Shaman and Alabama Thunder Pussy). One of our guitarists was in Woods of Ypres. Our other guitarist is also in a band called Atmora, and our keyboardist plays in a band called Border Patrol.

How is it that you started playing music? AL The Yeti Bones: I suppose we all started playing music because we love it. 

What are your names? / Who plays what? / How old are you?

AL The Yeti Bones: AL The Yeti Bones: singer/ guitarist, Dustin Black: guitarist, John Serio: guitarist, Adam Saitti: Drums, Darren Brush: Bass, Nick Angelini: Keyboards. Age group is ranges from 37 to 24...
Have you had other previous members? AL The Yeti Bones: yes. But as time moves on, and we evolve, we end up losing a member here and there along the way. 

Did you make music even when you were young? Al The Yeti Bones: yes absolutely, it's how we all got into this mess. 

Where are you from? AL The Yeti Bones: we're from Windsor Ontario Canada. it's border town to Detroit, and 4 hours away from major markets like Chicago, Toronto, NY and it is also the best kept secret in Canada, as we have a very rich music history.

What year did the band form? AL The Yeti Bones: we formed Gypsy Chief Goliath in 2009.

What's your style of genre? AL The Yeti Bones: Stoner Rock. A cross between classic rock, old school heavy metal, doom and play it as loud and hard as possible in a bluesy fashion. 

What inspires you? AL The Yeti Bones: Family, Black Sabbath, Thin Lizzy, weed, beer, good times, bad times, and the love for all things that tend to go wrong. I embrace change, and bad news, as if I'm feeling good, there's no time nor passion for writing. If life is shit, then I finally have things to write about! We have a new album right now, so life is pretty good.

How often and where do you reherse? AL The Yeti Bones: we rehears in London Ontario, 2 hours away from our home town as our drummer lives in Toronto which is 4 hours away from us, but 2 hours on the other side of London, so we meet there, because its as central as it can get for us. We rehearse once or twice every few months. If we have a lot of gigs or are on tour, then we rehearse for a few weeks straight... but we're all so busy with our lives.

How have you developed since you started with the music? AL The Yeti Bones: We've kept true to our roots, in GCG there is a style, we just gotten better at doing it. We have been playing together for a long time, so this style comes naturally to us, the key is to keep evolving.

Do you have other interests of work outside the band? AL The Yeti Bones: I love my family, Jiu Jitsu, pro wrestling, and basketball. Big fan of NBA, and WWE. And really enjoy old arcade machines/games/pinball as well as good beer.

Are you looking for a booking agency, and what are your thoughts around that? Al The Yeti Bones: Always. i like booking agencies. They hold value in a industry like this, but only if you as the band are willing to work your ass off and tour.

Are you looking for a label, and what are your thoughts around that? AL The Yeti Bones: we are on Pitch Black Records. We've been on a few labels in the past too, i think labels are great, they do work that band members don't want to do. Or don't have any time for.  Distribution deals, setting up licensing for t.v and film, publishing, spotify, itunes all that shit I have no time for anymore.

What made you decide to make this music? AL The Yeti Bones: I always played this type of music. Early on I fell in love with Black Sabbath, Down, Clutch, COC, Crowbar....And never looked back.

What are your songs about? AL The Yeti Bones: lots of stuff. They are about stuff like time travel, mental illness, certain people, the things we do, the lives we lead...its' a blend of a lot of things. comes together naturally.

Who does the composing and writes the lyrics? AL The Yeti Bones: i do. 

Do you start with the music or the lyrics? AL The Yeti Bones: usually we'll have ideas of riffs, and i'll have lyrics already written for the most part in a book... I'll use different lines from different pages and try and make things work depending on what we're doing musically. 

Do you compose in a certain inviroment? AL The Yeti Bones: i like to write when no one is home, my life is extremely busy so when i get a bit of time to myself i love to sit down with some coffee, and a smoke and notepad, and start writing out ideas for songs.

Have you done any covers live? AL The Yeti Bones: yes. we used to do Go To Hell by Alice Cooper, Lady Day and John Coltrane by Gil Scott Herron, Red Hot Mama by P-Funk, The Wizard by Black Sabbath. We actually cover Killing Yourself To Live by Sabbath on our last album Citizens of Nowhere. 

What language do you sing in? AL The Yeti Bones: We live in Canada, all of our songs are in English. It's cool cause when we play in Quebec, places like Montreal most of the fans are French speaking, so when I speak on stage a part of me thinks, "do these people even understand what I'm saying?"

What are the least and most people to attend one of your gigs? AL The Yeti Bones: the least is probably 10, and most about 2,000 maybe more. I don't know. We've played a lot of gigs and toured with some great bands.

What ages are most of your concert attendants? AL The Yeti Bones: 19-50 wide age group. Everyone loves live music. And if they don't they're just weird as fuck.

Do you always play the same songs live, or do you vary? AL The Yeti Bones: We play the same songs for awhile, then when a new album comes out we add some of those in as well. The set varies from time to time as we decide to change things up a bit. But if we're on tour, its the same set every night, might have slight variances but nothing too far away from what we intended. It's a new set each night when you're playing in front of a new audience in a different city, even when it's the same set to us...

Do you have a regular place you play live often? AL The Yeti Bones: We have a strong following in South Western Ontario. 

What was your first gig like? AL The Yeti Bones: awful and amazing all at the same time. Everything went perfect and yet so much was wrong.

What was your latest gig? AL The Yeti Bones: when we played with Diamond Head.

Have you had to cancel a gig? AL The Yeti Bones: We sure have! Our van broke down.

Where have you played live this year? AL The Yeti Bones: mainly in Canada.

Where do you plan to gig the comming year? AL The Yeti Bones: mainly in Canada. We're playing more logical shows. The gigs we play have to make sense. So long as we know there is going to be a desire to have us play in a particular town, we will play there.

When did you start to sell merchandise, and what do you have for sale? AL The Yeti Bones: from the beginning. and we have shirts, hoodies, stickers, patches, other stuff  too!

Where can people buy your merchandise? AL The Yeti Bones: email us, or come to a show.

What do you think about people downloading music instead of buying records now a days? AL The Yeti Bones: I think its' fine. It's complicated though. Because we are at a level where even though we sell cd's we don't make much money off the return. It's harder to track when the albums are distributed world wide, and when a label is dealing with the sales. Without the label doing what they do, we wouldn't have the same visibility. So we are at a level where we'd love to make money off albums, but if we didn't have a label the cd's would be sitting in our basement cause we are all so busy, none of the "work" would actually get done. And a label deserves to make money for their "work". When we play live, that is our "work". day to day, so we keep the money. when we sell our cd's at a show or online directly through the band, we make that money. But we're not HUGE, so the volume of cd's we sell is not profitable like so many other bands... So that's when I don't mind people downloading. if it helps people find our band, i know they will buy an album eventually. Or see us live.

How do you think the music industry have changed because of this? AL The Yeti Bones: The Industry has changed big time. We have discovered a lot of great new bands because of it. Labels no longer have the control they once did. And bigger bands now have to tour more then ever, to make their money as they are not selling the volume of cd's they once were. In a few years, just like the stock market even the music industry will find a way to correct itself. 

Is it easier to find inspiration from older bands, or bands that are more active today? AL The Yeti Bones: I find inspiration in both. 
What have been your biggest obstacles? AL The Yeti Bones: Not having enough money to do what needed to be done.

What advice would you give other bands or artists? AL The Yeti Bones: budget your money. Spend your money wisely. Put money aside, if the whole band puts $20 away each week, at the end of the year they'll have like $5,000 or $10,000 that'll be enough to record an album, and use the rest of the money to tour. Or pay for PR, radio, and a trailer/van. Most bands' biggest problem is they have no money. But they have all these big dreams. So they end up sitting on the couch smoking weed all day, day dreaming... Go out there and get after it! Live your life, live it rock and roll style. Save up and head out there and play music infant of people and forget about being famous. Just get really good at what you do, and you will be undeniable.

How do you get psyched for a gig? AL The Yeti Bones: I don't.. i have a few beers before hand to keep me busy, I talk to people, that's about it. Shows are kind of boring for me. Takes forever before we get a soundcheck, sometimes we don't even get a sound check, from there it's so many hours before we hit the stage... and then the load out is a process too. It's all a big mess. haha. I used to love it. I would get to the venue drunk, and continue drinking throughout the night and when we played it was the balls to the wall attitude that got us through. 

Do you have any new material? AL The Yeti Bones: yes. we are working on a new album called Masters of Space and Time. We also have a beer, an IPA called Black Samurai (IPA) it's a craft beer, that we've been pushing this past year.

What are your web sites?

AL The Yeti Bones: https://www.facebook.com/GypsyChiefGoliath/

here's some videos:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aSVm9ckIO1Y

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oIUNM70W9jg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LfMXZCp2-D4
How can people reach you? AL The Yeti Bones: [email protected] is usually the best.

What are your plans for the future? AL The Yeti Bones: to keep releasing albums every 2 years or so, and do a few bigger selective shows, and keep building the bands reputation under our own terms.

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