Interviews

Some Words with Tarrie B. of Tura Satana

By: Mr. Christopher



When I first talked to someone from the publicity dept. at Noise/F.A.D. Records, all I expected was to maybe get material to review from Tura Satana and maybe, just maybe get a chance to interview one of the members sometime later. Well, about a week later, I received Tura Satana's "Relief Through Release" in the mail and was scheduled to interview the one and only Tarrie B. This was kind of psychout to me because I haven't done many one on one interviews by phone,etc. and suddenly I'm to interview one of my personal favorite singers...needless to say, I was a little nervous. I found myself a little clumsy in speech but did manage to get some good information for T.S.'s followers. So, through all of this, here is the words through Ms. B.

Smother: What has the past year been like for Tura Satana?

Tarrie: Well, we kicked out Scott...which was pretty dramatic. And we've got Brian Harra now, he was formerly in Spitkiss. We started with him out in Europe and played some shows in LA. We're getting ready to go back in Europe for two weeks for a full continental tour with Pitchshifter and Will Haven. We just got off the tour with the Damned in the US. Pretty dramatic.

Smother: Did you get taken off the Damned tour early?

Tarrie: Well, there were a couple reasons why we left...one, I got really sick which is the first I've ever gotten sick(on tour). I had a respiratory infection. The Damned was cool and everything, but the tour wasn't doing anything for us. It wasn't our crowd or our routine which was kind of pointless. We wanted to come home and get ready for Europe. Before, it was only the second time Brian had played with us. He only had a week to warm up, so we would kind of just play the same songs.

Smother: I had just gone to see Tura Satana's show in D.C. a while back and I was surprised at how small the crowd was.

Tarrie: Yeah, it was ridiculous. It was way better on the West Coast. Venues are sold out and things like this were just a waste of time. I like the Damned...but, I've never been a Damned "fan." It wasn't for us.

Smother: How has Brian been working out? When I saw you play, it seemed like he was really together and tight with all of the songs you played.

Tarrie: Yeah, he's great! He's definitely our godsent to the band, you know? He had to learn everything really fast. He only had a week to learn everything, he's great.

Smother: I've heard rumor that Tura Satana might be leaving Noise Records...is this true?

Tarrie: Yeah, well, they know too. We're talking to a few people right now. They (Noise Records) don't have the ability to promote us like they should. In Europe, it's been great, but over here it's not.

Smother: With the first LP, you went with Ross Robinson. Who did you go with on the second album? It seems like it has a much different sound.

Tarrie: Michael Vail Blum. It does (have a different sound), but Michael didn't really produce the record, he more or less just engineered it. Yeah, it sounds much better, but it's not because Michael is this great producer or anything. He just recorded the band. It's sort of a weird situation.

Smother: It doesn't seem like there is as much Hip-Hop element on this LP.

Tarrie: No, I'm trying not to rap at all.

Smother: Do you find that people in the US seem to react more to stuff off of the first album or the second album?

Tarrie: Well, it's funny because people know the first album, but they don't the new one yet. On the West Coast, there were certain dates where people did know the lyrics; they had ordered the second album through mail order from Europe. I love the second album. It's way more where my head is at.

Smother: Who did you record the video for "Luna" with?

Tarrie: I wrote the treatment for it. This guy who had worked with Type O Negative recorded it.

Smother: Another rumor I've heard was that Tura Satana was trying to get on either Ozzfest or Korn's Family Values Tour.

Tarrie: Well, yeah. I don't know about Ozzfest. I'm not sure how that works, but we are trying to get on the Family Values tour. We'd like to get on every tour we can, but...

Smother: Have you had much trouble with crowd hecklers this time around through the US?

Tarrie: No. We had one guy that yelled,"Take it off!" and we brought him up onstage. We got him on the video. We told him to take it off and he stripped naked. They had to turn all the lights off before we were arrested.

Smother: Do you have any tour stories that come to mind right off?

Tarrie: I don't know...there are always tour stories (laughs). Yeah, they're all going to be on our home video we're doing. We're putting together a home video right now. We're going to videotape our next tour in Europe. We've got a lot of good shit on there.

Smother: Are you going to release the video in both the US and Europe at the same time?

Tarrie: Europe first.

Smother: What are some bands Tura Satana's toured with this past year?

Tarrie: We haven't. We've been in studio writing a record and after that we went on a little trip through Europe, then we came back....and toured with the Damned and now we're getting ready to go back out again.

Smother: When you did the track with Lynn from Snot...was Snot actually signed back then? How did you hook up with Lynn?

Tarrie: Well, we played shows with them. I actually sang on their demo tape before they got signed.

Smother: After a show, when the band gets to hang out with people who stuck around after the show...do you have more guy fans that seem to come up or more girls?

Tarrie: Well, we have guys that come up to the guys in our band, but more girls come up to me.

Smother: Any idea why that is?

Tarrie: I think they (girls) can relate more to a woman fronting a band, ya' know? They don't feel like groupies walking up and down...it's the jocky guys that are weird about it, but the girls are ok with it.