While Volume Was Out
Interview/Review of Marty Volume/SXSW
By Smutstrutter
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As he finishes off his fourth tall boy of Lonestar beer, Marty Volume smelling good for his lady friends bound to appear, engages in on a dirty conversation with his smutty dear. Two dirty minds in two separate rooms collide through a two screens filmed with cigarette tar. I ask him what record’s turning and he answers with Kiss’s “Hard Luck Woman”. As I’m nearing my band practice’s bitching hour (burning bees wax candles beforehand), I ask him if he too, has any pre-rock rituals. A man who has managed to stay in the same band for twelve years, and has toured the entire world could be doing something right after all. He tells me the world would collapse had he not started with A string first and E string last which makes practical sense. “It’s a kinda an OCD thang for me,” he admits. At 6’8 it will be left to our imagination how long Marty’s killer heels honestly are. I’m sure every Lower Class Brats show begins with a bang when he whips out his ‘Larger Than Life’ Gibson for the crowd to crack their teeth on. Lower Class Brats have been known to not only rock a stage, but to own it. Rumors have it that you don’t have to be a skin or punk to own a back patch of them. He’s back in his hometown Austin, TX from a European tour that he recalls as being gay and boring. He asks me if he missed anything during SXSW that I happen to be at while he was gone astray and missing. I rubbed in the fattest fact first, that he missed me on some Austin mama’s back swinging a red bra around to the showcase held by Smallstone which inspired girls of all shapes and sizes to poledance around. He unfortunately missed the public humiliation of me unplugging Sasquatch’s amps during the middle of their set, which I highly apologize for. He missed Roky Erickson giving Priestess a chance to sweat some major balls opening up before they went on. While Marty was long gone, he missed Hank III, not playing but watching Matt Pike’s new band, Kales play on the back of a van that rambled all the way from San Francisco. He missed some of his own hometown bands that hold the sleazy-weight title, such as Broken Teeth, SuperHeavyGoatAss, and Amplified Heat. He missed those swamp monster rockers, Suplecs that survived a major greenhouse effect just recently. Crank County Daredevils also staked out those Tiki grounds of Headhunters with some new tunes to twist your tits to. He will be reported absent from Room 710’s obedient classroom in which Dave Chandler feverishly lectured with a microphone and left me with his guitar pic. Sadly, Marty Volume will be “not pictured” at The Hellacopters’ show where Billy Velvet swung me around, like a rag doll and into bleachers on top of Metal Dave’s lap for no sober reason. I’m sure this isn’t the first or last time Marty Volume has skipped school on picture day for the yearbook. Let’s just hope next year he attends the rowdy Texas revival reunion. There’s no chance, however, that I’m believing Marty’s life of 1 AM jet setting could ever be more boring than this trouble walkin’. He claims, “not even jet lag will keep me down,” and I’m assuming he means his zipper. His stories of living in the Krumbum house could probably do lap-dances on my liver. His tattoos and shoes are not the only thing he prefers, ‘Larger Than Life.’ Sexy tall dark rockers see the best and worst of life, and that solely revolves around being able to see over top of everybody. His answer to why are paths did not cross I Austin, “a day late, and a dollar short: the story of my life.” 
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SS: When did you get the TX state logo tattoo?

MV: I got the Texas tattoo in 1987. I used to ditch class everyday and hang out in the guitar shop drooling over those gorgeous Gibson 6-strings that I could never afford and one day Jason from Dangerous Toys came into the shop and I was awestruck! Anyway, he had the TX tattoo and I thought it looked cool and went straight to the first sleazy, Hells Angel tattoo artist I could find willing to work on a punk my age and got the Texas, permanently!

SS: How long have been in Lower Class Brats ?

MV: I've been rockin' with the Brats goin' on 12 years! Me and 'Bones', the singer, started the band summer of '94 and its been no sleep at all ever since!!

SS: First thing you do when you get home from touring?

MV: Well, it used to be that I would lock myself in my room for a week with the sweetest, dirty girl I could find, a 16th of speed, stacks and stacks of porn and just get disgusting!! Nowadays, I pretty much do the same, minus the dope cuz trying to keep away from it! (It ain't easy!)

SS: …patch with the most meaning?

MV: My bitchinest patch was an old school Thin Lizzy patch from like, 1981 or something! Some piece of shit swiped my Levi's vest backstage at a gig in Vegas! That patch and a few others almost as badass were sewn on it. It was on my birthday even!

SS: What kind of guns do you carry?

MV: Guns? I used to, but I think I traded 'em all for drugs back in the day! Good thing, cuz I reckon I'd be kickin' it with the peckerwoods in the penitentiary for shootin' a bitch by now if I hadn't!

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-Smutstrutter