interview with Dave Catching                                        Luxembourg, den Atelier 25th June 2005

Dave Catching, simply the nicest guy ever and owner of the Rancho De La Luna recording studio in the south Californian desert and the man on Gibson Flying V for the Eagles Of Death Metal and other guitars for other bands such as Yellow#5, the earthlings?, Gnarltones, just as previously with Queens Of The Stone Age and Mondo Generator and also on all sorts of other fun machines that might eventually take a shit and die for instance during Josh Homme’s Desert Sessions and and and and, and you got the picture... well he hooked us up with a couple of beers and a backstage pass for the Eagles Of Death Metal - Queens Of The Stone Age concert in Luxembourg (aka Letztebeiuwsch) and unwillingly & unfortunately turned some of the most annoying people we’ve met so far, namely les mesdames et messieurs running the venue, on to totally bore the crap out of us for the rest of the night, but that was no deterrent to the fabulous concert and fun night we’ve had with the EODM and QOTSA, specially cuz these subjects of the Grand Duke couldn’t act in any other way, having been raised on asskissing and slimelicking on a daily basis and after all if one can’t cope with those situations without loosing his cool, one just ain’t got no business in this sort of business and modestly we kinda can keep our cool. 
Ok, we actually could have went on with this sentence, but even so anyone attempting to try to beat the shear length of it might have a tough time anyway, so anyway with that all said and the bad vibrations out of the way let’s get to the good vibes which obviously overwhelmed the evil eye of the day’s fools, as it always is when you’re spending a day with people as Dave, Brian, Jesse and Josh. As you can imagine there would be lots of stories to tell but this is neither the moment nor the spot for such tales. Let’s (slowly) get to the point now, you should also know that sitting on the couch next to Dave there were Brian “Big Hands” (I’m talking real big hands) O’Connor, the EODM’s bass player and Arnie Amsterdam, who were burning one up and more generally just messing things up. One last thing, before we finally let you alone with this interview, BTW if you read all the way to this point you are one hell of a nosy person, so you might as well wonder what the next sentence brings. We decided to act against any rule and leave the whole thing puro and just as it was recorded on tape, even though to some it might not appeal and seem uneducated, so what? 

as background music we had Grande Roses and The Delicious Deadly Octopus

Arnie: munch, munch, munch, munch...                http://pix.guitarsgalore.net


170: gotta make up some questions for you now

Dave Catching: alright

170: well first thing, you’re playing with the Eagles Of Death Metal now

Dave Catching: yeah!

170: did you also play on the record that
is coming out? 

Dave Catching: I do play on the record. It’s Jesse and Josh (Homme of Queens Of The Stone Age) plays drums and guitars and I play guitars, Brian O’Connor plays bass and a friend of Josh, Jack Black (of Tenacious D) the actor, he sings a lot on it. 

170: he sings, yeah? 

Dave Catching: yeah, really a great
singer, really great singer

170: hmm, yeah, yeah

Dave Catching: so far , ehm and Brody, Brody Dalle is singing on it as well and Mark Lanegan.

170: and it’s called Death By Sexy?

Dave Catching: yeah, heh

170: Ok. And when is it gonna come out?

Dave Catching: we were shooting for January, but right now I think it’s gonna come out in the summer, cuz everyone’s got a little too busy. It’s almost done, not quite

170: aha OK and, ... so

Dave Catching: heh!

170: hahhh!

Dave Catching: heh heh heh

170: ahm, so your other projects are basically on hold, you’re not doing anything with the other bands, like earthlings and Yellow#5, and all these a lot of bands you are playing in?

Dave Catching: no, well Yellow#5 the new album just came out, Mondo Generator has a DVD and a single out (with Dave still on it) and earthlings? Are having an EP come out in like a month or two. But as far as touring goes no. I’m having a break. 

Yellow#5 in the picture from left to right is Brant Bjork on Drums, Molly McGuire on vocals, bass and accordion, Dave Catching on guitar their live drummer is Gene Trautmann (Miracle Workers / QOTSA)

170: are you gonna do a lot of touring with the Eagles Of Death Metal in the states too? 

Dave Catching: for EODM yeah. We got a real solid band now, Samantha Maloney (Hole, Shift, Mötley Crüe) is playing drums and Brian O’Connor plays bass, I play guitar and Jesse plays guitar and sings. We’re pretty solid now so we’re ready to go.

170: what’s with the Rancho De La Luna? 

Dave Catching: it’s going really good now. I moved in it, so I’m living there now. I've been fixing it up, you know, it suffered a bit over the last couple of years, it’s getting back there. Chris Goss is been doing a lot of recording there, also with Twiggy (Ramirez, ex Marylin Manson bass player)

170: He’s got this new band, Goon Moon (Goss,Twiggy Ramirez & Zach Hill) 

Dave Catching: yeah Goon Moon, they did a bunch of stuff there and in another friends studio. I did a band from Belgium called Hulk, that’s really cool. Did their record out there (he’s also playing guitar on some tracks) and I’m doing a band from New Orleans when I get back called Pocket Fox.

170: and the other guys like Brant Bjork (Kyuss drummer) and Scott Reeder (Kyuss bass player) are they also recording at your studio? Actually Scott, I think, has his own studio now. 

Dave Catching: Brant just finished two records. He did two records, one where he played everything and one where his band (The Bros) played live and they recorded it. Scott Reeder hasn’t been up in a while, I do see him occasionally he just finished the Sunn O))) record. He just did that record and they are actually on tour over here now.

170: with Scott?! 

Dave Catching: ah, no. (to Arnie) Is Tos playing? Tos is playing with Sunn O))) right? 

Arnie: ya!

Dave Catching: Reeder is not though, right?

Arnie: no.

Dave Catching: it’s just the three of them

Arnie: yeah, just the three of them, Anderson

Dave Catching: Scott

Arnie: no, Tos and what’s that other guy’s name

Dave Catching: ah, huh, O’Malley

170: and Scott Reeder is doing a solo record, I mean, well he’s been doing it for years now, I guess 

Dave Catching: yeah! He’s super talented, has great songs

170: but it’s basically done, not? He’s just waiting to get it out.

Dave Catching: I think so yeah.

170: did you hear anything of it?

Dave Catching: I’ve heard some of it, over the years but I haven’t heard it all, like all put together and ready to go 

170: I’ve only heard one song, it’s called “cold”. Maybe you heard it?

Dave Catching: maybe

170: it’s like five or six years old

Dave Catching: I’m sure I have then

170: it’s him singing and a saxophone and a bass line

Dave Catching: no I haven’t heard that one, heh 

170: I got it here with me

Dave Catching: oh, cool

170: I dunno where, but somewhere

Dave Catching: hah hah, yeah I love Scott, man. He’s just, what a great guy.

170: there, it is on that CD that I gave you, the one in the silver milk pack, huh, no wrong, actually it’s on that CD of the radio show, there... Rancho De Las Guitarras... Well, there’s also, like I heard there is a new Desert Sessions in the planning. 

Dave Catching: there is, I think Josh was talking about maybe December. We played an Eagles of Death Metal show, December of last year and it snowed which it doesn’t do very often and during the snow we recorded a couple of songs.

170: oh really!

Dave Catching: yeah, and we did some demos for like 7 or 8 new Eagles songs, so it’s going along pretty good trying to stay busy.

170: and those songs you recorded for Desert Sessions? Are they for the next Desert Sessions, like 11 or 12

Dave Catching: I don’t know, I think we were just snowed in and having a good time. But it turned out really good, so hopefully they will be

170: ahm, you are living on the Rancho De La Luna now, you moved in there and before there was Fred Drake (from the earthlings?, sadly he passed away) living there and you owned it together.

Dave Catching: we did, I lived next door with Hutch, the guy that is doing the sound for Queens. He and I lived next door and Brant lives there too. There’s three houses on that road and Brant lives in the middle house, Hutch lives in the far house and I live in the front house. 

170: how did it come up, like to start a studio in the desert?

Dave Catching: well Fred and I had been friends for a while we’ve been working in Los Angeles and he decided to go out into the desert and he found a house and it was so beautiful and so cheap that he decided that he wanted to move out there and open a studio and he did. It was funny because he had no equipment and he called me and he said: ”Hey man! Would you like to go and buy this gear?” From a friend who is closing his studio, he basically gave us all his stuff and we had to make payments, so it was very easy cuz he wasn’t in a hurry and that was really cool. But right at the same time another friend calls: “Hey can I store my studio there for like 6 months?” And he had another, like he had some really good stuff. Then like a week later Daniel Lanois, he produced U2 and works with Brian Eno, who’s really respected, producer, he moved all his gear out there to record his record. So at one point it went from having nothing to three complete studios, ours was like the worse one and then our other friends the middle one, and then Daniel Lanois was like world class, amazing like Brian Eno keyboards standing around.

170: has that anything to with the U2 record Joshua Tree, no, huh

Dave Catching: no, they’ve never even been there when they made that record

170: ah, heh, OK, well what year was that, when it started all out?

Dave Catching: ah, that was , ah 94, 1993-94

170: ehm, so, cuz I was gonna ask you if you knew the music scene there. Like the Generator Parties, but that was already almost over at that time.

Dave Catching: yeah, I went to a couple of those but not many, wasn’t really my scene. I was friends with Chris Goss and he and Fred and I went to one together one time, but like a fight started and we left. Cuz the bands were always really cool, but some of the people that came there would get too drunk and just wanna fight, like typical at those parties.

170: yeah, ah, and how long was that all going on, the generator thing? Like I think Mario Lalli (Fatso Jetson, Yawning Man, Sort of Quartet, Across The River) started it all.

Dave Catching: That was a few years. Yeah Mario, and I actually played at one of his generator parties, KYUSS didn’t play that time but his band across The River played and my band Tex And The Horseheads played and a bunch of Los Angeles bands played and there was a raid. The police came and chased every one away which isn’t a very smart thing to do when there’s 300 kids on LSD, stoned and drunk you know, in the middle of nowhere, going like: “Alright! Get outta here now!” actually Mario got fined, quite a bit of money cuz you know... 

170: yeah, then at a point he stopped doing it. But is that right, I think it started in the late eighties?

Dave Catching: yeah, yeah like when I played there it was probably like 88 maybe 1989

170: oh yeah? So you knew all these people like Mario Lalli and Across The River, Yawning Man? 

Dave Catching: I didn’t know them very well, I was friends with other people that knew them. Like I had a friend and once she had a birthday party, Across The River and some of the guys from Black Flag played at her birthday party. I kind of met them a little bit right there. I didn’t really know them, they lived in the desert and I lived in Los Angeles and then we got asked to do the desert generator party, it sounded like fun. I kinda met them a little more then but it wasn’t until I had the studio that I really met everyone. I mean I knew Josh and the Kyuss guys, cuz Hutch is my best friend so he just, he was working with them since they were kids. My mom even saw Kyuss.

170: heh, hah hah 

Dave Catching: heh, I took her to a show, she wanted to go see Hutch. 

Arnie: In Memphis?

Dave Catching: No, in Los Angeles. When they were “Sons Of Kyuss”, hah hah, my mom was like:”I’d go out with you!” I was like: “Really?!” So my mom showed up, heh

170: I found like a home video of one of those Kyuss shows from the desert. It’s Brant Bjork drumming, with very short hair and Scott Reeder grooving on bass

Dave Catching: yeah yeah, I’ve seen that one. I’ve seen that, some friends of ours in Italy had found it on the Internet and they were showing it to us.

170: they are playing this song I had never heard before, so there is still a lot of songs of them out there somewhere?

Dave Catching: yeah, but it’s a bunch of people standing around them…

170: yeah

Dave Catching: yeah, that’s a pretty cool one

170: so it was pretty much like that?

Dave Catching: oh yeah, it wasn’t like a million people. The one I went to, I can’t even remember, maybe a hundred people, something like that.

170:hmmm, it’s getting tough making up questions after hanging out the whole time before, like I could ask you the stuff we’ve been talking about but it seems pretty much a waste of your time, plus I’m not very good at faking. And, ahhm, actually I didn’t expect you here at all, I saw you and that’s it, I didn’t even know you were in the band 

Dave Catching: hah hah hah

Arnie: you didn’t know

170: no! I didn’t follow music for like five or six months and, cuz I went to Italy and ah, blah blah blah …subliminal message: go check out www.grasscity.com

Arnie: that is on the web site

170: yeah I had a look at the web site

Dave Catching: heh, hmmm I don’t know. I make my way around, had to play with everybody

170: yeah, I’ve seen you in a lot of bands now, at least four. You are always popping up when I don’t expect you

Arnie: we are all waiting for the David Catching Band

Dave Catching: ahh hah hah, the DCB?!

Arnie: heh heh

170: heh, like last time when I talked to Brant Bjork, he told me you were doing a record with the earthlings?, that it was already finished. But I think he said, it was just sitting on a shelf, just there… waiting to be released. Is that true?

Dave Catching: that is true, yeah we probably got two records that are done, but…

170: two already?!

Dave Catching: one is a, just like ambience style stuff and the other is more kind of rocky

In the background Arnie and Brian O’Connor are inspecting the Gimp’s last issue of the Choke Magazine and rambling on about cheap Dutch sluts, fluffy munchies and other highly intellectual subjects which are to delicate to be reported here.

170: so, like the first one you did, or ambience, in the sense of, hmmm like with some krautrock thrown in?

Dave Catching: yeah, yeah! Well the ambience one is really ambient, it’s no vocals or anything. It’s something that we did for Man’s Ruin. They wanted us to do, just this hmm huh… It was called e-caps, like earthlings caps. It’s kind of a play on words, like mushroom caps, e-caps but backwards it spells space. It’s just this space jam, but it never got released, but we still have it…

Arnie: last night?

Brian: Switzerland

Arnie: more legal than Holland.

Brian: …some guy that he went paragliding with brought him a can full of weed

Roadie: came back to his house, picked it out of his back yard

Arnie: and where is it now?

Roadie: up the top of the head

The day before the Eagles Of Death Metal were basically headlining a festival in Switzerland because after them the stage was falling apart, shaken by a storm and due to that, Queens Of The Stone Age couldn’t perform. Josh and Jesse got to the venue rather late and immediately started with the sound check. During the EODM sound check Josh was shaking and hopping around the empty hall, while we had some more troubles with the management of the venue which in the end prevented us from shooting any pictures apart from a few with a small camera with an empty battery, if want to see them click here ...chi s’accontenta gode. 
Both bands totally rocked, the QOTSA show was particularly energetic and the crowd really responded well, probably also because the majority was either Belgian, French or German. Nothing against you George, actually as far as I can tell you seem to have done a good job with the stage sound but your fellow countrymen are a rather peculiar flock. The sound at the Atelier in Luxembourg normally isn’t that exciting because it is actually a garage turned into sort of a disco but Hutch made it sound OK anyway. All in all it is a good place to go see bands with a certain degree of fame, just gotta be quick with ordering tickets have some coin and some nerves. 
Before the show we taped another one of our Rancho De Las Guitarras radio shows, with Dave picking most of the music, so tune in on 103.3 FM in Luxembourg City to hear it and if you click here you can check out the playlist. 
Besides that, you probaly could’t care less but after two months of Luxembourg we’ve had enough of it and are preparing to move our headquarters either to Melbourne or Adelaide, so we’re outta here. That also means this site is not going to be too busy over the next time. Alright enjoy the summer, we are preparing for an encore, cheerio.


for live pics go to http://pix.guitarsgalore.net

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