Michael Anthony interview

I'm getting hot night tonight it's you had more ways than one boy there's so much I could ask you about but in our limited time I'd like to hit some of the highlights of your career for instance that band that you played in for a long time van Halen I think a lot of people know the story about how that band formed and how you became a part of it but I think as we get further and further into time there are probably more people that don't know that story so a refresher for those who know and knew what they forget now that's right well remember anymore do you remember yeah well what was that story you're a young guy and yeah you know I was playing in bands in the Arcadia California area and of course Evangeline bows were from Pasadena them and not actually Dave and joined the band about a year he'd been in the band about a year and the band that I was playing and Leasing and we were called snake pretty original name there we were both playing at the Pasadena College in the auditorium know at the high school passed in high school and I remember them blowing up their PA and Edie came and asked me if he could use the PA that we had so I said sure you know and so we opened up for Van Halen that night and I remember talking with Edie quite a bit in the parking lot after the show you know just kind of BS her alibi you know music the locals see how the local band type stuff and it was actually through a mutual friend of ours I was in a music class with Edie that he found out that they were I don't know relieving the bass player they were getting rid of their base by herself he mentioned my name and Alex I think I know if his Alex who called me and asked me if I wanted to come over in Jam they were playing rehearsing in some little garage in Pasadena some friend's house and I went went over there and you know we played and they kind of put me through the paces and all their stuff and whatever and asked me that day bondage the band and I said yeah sure I mean they you know they were playing clubs in Hollywood and stuff like that and the extent of our ban and we were doing a lot of parties and that kind of thing so that's basically how much I ban you're not with Van Halen anymore no and there are varying stories of why you are not any longer with that band and how about we take this opportunity for you to set us straight give us don't give us the rest I'll get as straight as I can I'm not gonna you know dig deep into it and the dirt and all that stuff because you know I'm not in all that kind of stuff but uh you know I just like any anything else you know people have differences of opinion or whatever and you know Van Halen was was on a extended hiatus and I wanted to go out and play now tomorrow just sit around do nothing and Sammy had put together this tour with Dave Lee Roth they were playing the Sam & Dave tour and he asked me if I want to come out and and guest on a few of the shows you know which I did maybe about a half away shows on that tour what Sam just come on play a few van Halen songs and well let's just say that the powers to be they were we're not too happy that I was doing something like that and you know I kinda got backed up against the wall and you know I just I want to go out in place so I decided you know I'm gonna go out and play you know I thought I'd be waving the van Halen flag high while there was nothing going on really with the band at the time so you know things just kind of kind of blew up from there and I could just kind of leave the rest to your imagination that's basically how it all kind of came to be well what kind of thoughts or feelings do you have about Wolfgang if you don't mind yes I think he's a great kid I mean I've said no to him or since he was born yeah and you know he's a great musician he's a great bass player I mean he plays drums guitar bass and you know he sings and so naturally I understood you know when he was doing when he went back with their Union thing that you know his dad that and wanted his son to play with him you don that's you know totally great I mean I guess I found out that he was going to be playing bass with the rest of everybody else when they did their press conference but nice I mean I wished him I wished him luck in a couple of interviews that I did and hopefully he read those and how about the current tour how's that going this is actually only the third show that I've joined Sammy I just joined him a couple of cities ago in Chicago but it's great well basically this is coming out he's doing Sam he's doing this for generations of rock tour where he goes who you know each of the major parts of his career certainly with Montrose and his solo stuff and of course the van Halen stuff was a big part that's what he asked me to come out and and play on and you know if you really think about it if you want to hear any of those songs the sandy era songs this is where you're gonna have to come in here and this is probably the only time you're gonna hear those songs play live by any of the people from Van Halen you know because obviously any Alex and you know they're not doing any of it what's happening with chicken foot chicken foot is on hiatus we tore it last year obviously we didn't tour as much as we would have liked to because one of the reasons was Chad was unavailable him the Chili Peppers were still alive waist deep into their tour and this this year probably in the in the winter around November December Joe is said that he's working he's got some demos that he wants to lay on us and so I think she's starting to get back together the winter and indoor venues I hope well when we're coming to Michigan probably studio first and will be will be going into the studio next January we'll probably go in and start hashing some ideas around and stuff like that and kind of getting back to that and obviously we wanted to wait until Chad was free and so that's kind of like why we didn't do anything this year because his band was they were finishing their I think they were kind of officially finished early summer but they've been doing one-off shows here and there and I by the end of the year they'll be completely finished with their torso chance wife will let them come out and play come on Chad we're ready you've got a new PV signature amylin tell me about that it's a 2-channel amp the second channel is a distortion channel but I kind of refined a forum by adding tone to it and a blend so that you can actually play at a lower volume and blend in the amount of distortion and how aggressive you want the distortion to sound and I think it turned out really damn fine myself switching gears Michael mm-hmm let's talk about mad Anthony cafe itching gears now let's talk Hot Sauce because I know you're very proud of that yeah what's obviously it's not something that I went into as deep as like Sammy with his tequila or you know like that but I do enjoy it and company in Southern California makes it for me and we're we're basically online and in a lot of boutique hot sauce stores and getting into a few more of the major markets on the west coast and we have a two hot sauces ones like a regular hot sauce which which still is hot and then I have a xxx which you know you can want to have well maybe not even water that's not gonna help you plenty of milk milk well helps and then though I we do a spicy yellow mustard and barbecue sauce a regular barbecue sauce and a spicy barbecue sauce it's just it's just something that's really fun to do I'm really passionate about hot sauce ever since back in Van Halen fans would find out that I loved hot chili you know Chili Peppers and stuff and they would start bringing me salsas and and peppers and stuff like that to the shows and some of the suggested hey why don't you do a hot sauce and right then I know Joe Perry was coming out with his but I found the right kind of people and they really let me again have control rather than me just slap my name on a bottle of hot sauce and call it mine this is this this is really my baby you know I don't know all that a lot of the technical stuff and the some of the spices and stuff to use know what I like with the flavor saw it makes suggestions service it's a fun thing to do and it's going really well last question Michael mm-hmm what would you be if you weren't a bass player oh my god something outside of music something outside of music well I'll tell you one thing if you ask my wife this she'd probably say that I'd be a gardener because when I'm home I'm always fixing sprinklers and stuff like that she goes god you must've been a gardener in your previous life no actually actually the only other thing that that I actually was working on before I my parents really let me go full time with music was I was in took a lot of psychology classes if you can believe that I wanted to work with with underprivileged and mentally disabled children that was really I really I softly have a soft spot in my heart for that you know so beautiful Michael Anthony great catching up with you enjoy the tour safe travels much luck and a continued success to you always good talking to you and you know same foot we'll be around soon like you said check the hot sauce out check the new PV VB ma antibiotic kicks butt you

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Views: 1,201,850

Rating: 4.8738885 out of 5

Keywords: Michael Anthony (Musician), Van Halen (Musical Group), Jon Liebman, Peavey, ForBassPlayersOnly, wolfgang van halen

Id: Bdb98et5bIM

Length: 9min 54sec (594 seconds)

Published: Sun Nov 03 2013