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P- You hate a clean sound don't you?
JJ- I'm not a good guitar player! If I was a really good guitar player I could play a clean sound. My instrumentals come out like Link Wray where as sometimes I'd like them to be like The Shadows but I'm not that good. But I do really like that hot, nasty, snarlin' sound.

P- For your song writing style it seems you like the beginning of the song to have an intro, to kick off and then it becomes the chorus.
JJ- The formulas I use are standard 1963 formulas for a song. I like to think about songs as being sound tracks. I like them to set an atmosphere or a mood. Even before we play I like to bring cd's to put on before we go on to sort of set the mood.

P- In The Downbeat 5, do you write the music and Jen writes the lyrics?
J- Yeah, that's a generalization but a fair one. We contribute 50/50 really and Jen balances me out; old school/new school.

P- Now, about your influences. It seems to me that most of your influences are early stuff, say pre-DMZ bands. Before '75.
JJ- A lot of it. I think there's contemporary stuff that I like too….(laughing) but they all sound like the earlier stuff! I like Billy Childish stuff. I really love him but he sounds like The Kinks in '65.

P- What do you think about people getting in to The Hives?
JJ- I'm not crazy about them myself but I'm glad that people are waking up to that style of music …or reawakening…people like them and the Strokes…It's kickin' down doors for other people.

P- Your latest Downbeat 5 release is played around this town, like unbelievably!
JJ- I don't listen to the radio but yeah, I hear that it is. I go to the Noise Poll and every month they put up the Top 30 of what's being played around town. We've been #3 for the past 3 months now. I got playlists from 'MBR and 'BCN and 'FNX. That blows my mind! We've been getting play lists from all over the country. We sent out a demo to maybe 60 stations around the country about a year and a half ago and it started getting a lot of play and it started charting at CMG and that's kind of unheard of for a demo from an unsigned band. So we wrote back to the DJ saying "thanks for playing us."
   Then we made a couple station ID's for the DJ's. Whether they picked up on it because of the DMZ connection I don't know. But I wanted The DB5 to have an identity of its own.. And they all said "When you guys get a real CD let us know." So as soon as we did we sent out stuff to the same stations around the country. We're doing all the hype on it ourselves. We all have jobs so we can't do it all our selves. Alex Piandes from 'MFO is helping us out too. The label ain't doing a damned thing. All they did was pay for the record.

P- Where did you record it? Austin, right? Not here.
JJ- Studiowise, everything around here is really hi-tech. And we ain't that kinda band. We each play a little bit more than adequately but there's a chemistry between us that makes it work. So if you go into a hi-tech studio it's gonna be all picked apart and sewn back together as records are today and that ain't us man!

ML- This is probably why all those other Boston bands, like The Nervous Eaters say, got screwed when they made their records. They were down there, in the nitty gritty and they were recorded in a away that lost all of that so it didn't work!
JJ- Yeah!

JJ's Eguipment Guitars 1963 Les Paul Jr. 1962 Hagstrom Futurama - Red 1964 Hagstom I I- Blue Amplifiers Fender Hot Rod Deville- 65 Watts-for gigs Fender Blues Deville-40 Watt-rehearsal 1965 Supro-15 Watt- homeuse No pedals Strings Ernie Ball - Heavy Bottom/Skinny Top Pick Clayton 50mm triangular

P- Did you record it live?
JJ- Yes, we recorded everything live except the vocals. We did everything in one or two takes. No over dubs. We just played it as if we were at the Abbey. That's why it's sloppy in some areas but I'd rather have it be faulty in a sloppy, real sense than faulty in a technically sterile way with no balls to it. We were in search of a room that would capture us. I'm a big fan of Toe Rag Studio in London. They recorded bands like The Milkshakes and The Headcoats and The Flaming Stars. It's a very live, vibrant, dirty sound. Not muddy, but dirty. It sounds very primitive yet it's designed to sound that way. It's recorded well and that's what we tried to get here.

   Jeff and I went to play a festival in Texas over Labor Day. We were DMZ with a pick up rhythm section. The guy who played bass for us was Mike Maraconda. He used to be in The Raunch Hands and he 's a producer and he said "Come by the studio where I work and see what you think." It was a tiny little shit hole in an old factory building in downtown Austin and I heard some of the stuff that came out of there and I said "I love this place!" I told him where we were at and sent him our demos and said "Let's work together."

   Then when Sympathy signed us they asked if we had a place in mind and I said "Yeah! The Sweatbox in Texas." We practiced for a month without vocals. We stood in a circle and Jen lip synched and we read body language and we watched each other for cues. Then we started practicing with our eyes closed to see if we had it down. The when we went into the studio and for the instruments we had a mic in front of each amp, a bunch of mics on the drums and two overhead mics for a live Mitch Ryder sound. We just stood in a circle and watched each other, Jen lip-synched and we played the songs. We went out of the room and then Jen stood there and sang then song. And everything was done in 32 hours.

P- When I first saw the DB5 it was at Frank Rowe's 50th birthday party. I hear Jen's voice….I think…"What the HELL is this?!" That was very early on for the band but even then, talking to people, there was already a buzz about you guys. And you are playing around and you're getting a great response. Now when you were in DMZ, I assume you weren't getting a great response then.
JJ- We got a buzz instantly. The very first gig was the thing at the frat house. It was on my birthday, February 28th, also Brian Jones' birthday. I asked Maxanne if she could hype the show on the radio. She said "I can't coz it's a conflict of interest because you gotta buy the time. But if it's a benefit we can do a public service announcement once an hour. So we called it the Brian Jones Memorial Fund Show and we snuck the PSA on every day. The place ended up being packed!
   At the time I was living with Oedipus and he was kind of managing us so we decided to go to The Rat to see if we could get a job. We blew into the doors of The Rat, passed the door guy. Jimmy Harold was sitting there. Oedipus went over and says "Set us up with some drinks." And Jimmy says "What the fuck's going on here?" Oedipus told him we were Led Zepplin! So Jimmy's pouring out the Wild Turkey! Oedipus says "We want to play a surprise gig here next Monday night but not under the name of the band." And Jimmy says "Sure, Sure, what's the name you wanna go under?" Oedi says "DMZ" That was our first club gig and it was fuckin' packed!

ML- Was Jimmy pissed off?
JJ- When he caught wind, me and Peter Greenberg were turning really red, we just started laughin' and shit and he looked at us and just goes "You little fuckin' assholes!!"

P- But I thought maybe the music itself would not be received….
JJ- It wasn't! We were AWFUL! We sucked! Our music wasn't very well received outside our scene. What was more well received was our dynamics, the excitement or the fact that we were going to beat each other up on stage. It was a volatile, exciting show to see. But we couldn't play.
    I remember at an early show at The Rat, Jeff taught us a song and we played it and as soon as we finished it we realized we had forgotten an entire chorus on it or something so Jeff made us do the song again, which we did! Like six people got up and left!! It was too much for them!

P- There wasn't really anything around that sounded like that, like DMZ. You were punk, where as The Real Kids were really rock with an attitude.
JJ- And we didn't even know it at the time. That word was not a part of the vernacular.

P- Before you started DMZ had you heard The Ramones?
JJ- It was at the exact same time. DMZ was together when The Ramones played their first gig in Boston, at The Club. We all went.

P- Back then there were like two hundred people that went to those shows and that loved the music. But, at that time, the world wasn't loving it. The world was saying "You suck."
JJ- We couldn't get work around here at all. Oedi would gumshoe it up and down Comm Ave , to the booking agents, all these different people but they just wouldn't sign us. We played at different clubs…out in Lowell, Peabody. It all sucked.

P- So you're playing and even though the world is saying "Punk sucks. You suck." do you know you're good?
JJ- Do we know we're good?? NO! I don't think that ever crossed any of our minds at any time. Were we having fun? Yeah we were having a blast! And that was the motivator, not "Are we good?" We didn't have anything to compare it to. The bands that I had heard at The Rat prior to our gig weren't good. Like The Mezz or The Infliktors or The Boize or The Real Kids.
   They weren't good but they were GREAT, if you can understand the distinction. They were fabulous to me but were they technically good? Well, when I saw The Mezz the fuckin' drummer fell off his stool and they started kicking him until he got back up and started playing again. Was that good? No, but it was fuckin' great! Now, Reddy Teddy. They were tight as nails.

P- You mention Reddy Teddy, man, Matthew Mackenzie was so great. Very under appreciated guitar player. He's never mentioned anymore, they don't play that album anymore.
JJ- Matthew is my idol, man. An absolute hero to me.

P- Where is Peter Greenberg now?
JJ- Houston, Texas. Vice President of Pacific Gas and Electric. He was studying the whole time he was in DMZ and he went into the Environmental Protection agency for a while. He spends more in taxes that we make in a year.

P- What was it like recording the Live at The Rat LP?
JJ- It was fun. I remember all of that really well. I remember Jimmy having a big bash for all the bands and we all discussed it and it was pretty exciting. I still have the notes that I took that day. We all set up and played 20 minute sets then listened to the session and got to pick 2 songs to go on the record.

P- What did you think of Miss Lyn back then?
JJ- I remember one time I was in a stall in the lady's room…..

ML- Oh no, this is gonna be very embarrassing!
JJ- Another couple came in to the stall next to us and I was in a position where I could put my head up and I went…."Wow, cool!" So not only was I participating in the adventures in my own stall I could be a voyeur too! And it was really neat! That's one of my earliest experiences of Miss Lyn.

ML- Was it some one from New York?
JJ- As a matter of fact it was.

ML- I didn't do that very often so I think I know who it was.
JJ- Oh, yeah Lyn neither did I!!! I'll believe you if you wanna believe me.

ML- I remember we were doing Roller Babe and I had set it all up for Lynn to use the darkroom at the New England School of photography. She was supposed to meet me at like 10AM on a Saturday. She never showed up and I kept calling her. Finally I heard back from her like a day or two later and she said "Oh I was with JJ and we were in no shape to get out of bed."…you know…drugs, alcohol…etc.etc… And I thought…."That bastard!! I'm gonna kill him!!"