by Daniel Emberg
Sometimes there is really no substitute for experience. If you want a sure bet for a great rock show, find a band with a track record. The Supersuckers have been going hard every time they hit the stage since forming in 1988, and have long described themselves as “the greatest rock ‘n’ roll band in the world.” They take each show as key to sustaining the credibility of that claim.
Eddie Spaghetti, the Supersuckers’ lead vocalist and bassist, insists, “We have to be awesome every night. We can’t just be good, we have to be incredible. We’re the last band going that actually does that. The Dwarves maybe come close to us on record, but their live show doesn’t hold a candle to ours. I feel pretty comfortable when we say that.”
That easy swipe might be delivered with a wink, given that Dwarves frontman Blag Dahlia mixed Get The Hell, the first Supersuckers album since 2008 and the one which brings them to the Pyramid Cabaret on Tuesday night.
Get The Hell has been widely praised and, to hear Eddie tell it, the long process of making it has thankfully reinvigorated the Supersuckers. It comes in packaging made to look like a well-worn record that’s been on and off the shelf hundreds of times, maybe dropped here and there or caught in the crosshairs of a few slippery bottles. Given the quality of the release, it’s easy to imagine a bunch of copies are already collecting wear and tear the organic way.
“It’s an awesome record, maybe our best ever,” enthuses Eddie. “It’s sort of weird to feel like we put out our masterpiece this late in the game. Nobody’s buying it, of course, but it’s been really well-received by those who do.”
With nearly six years having passed since the prior Supersuckers album, the band was fired up to finally make Get The Hell. “It almost felt like making our first record again, because we had so much time to make it,” Eddie explains. “You have your whole life to make a first record then nine months to make the next one, so it’s generally never as good.” Rather than sitting idle, Eddie and the band spent those years writing a lot more songs and had the luxury of being very selective about which ones would make the cut this time around.
The time off also led to some shuffling of the lineup, but Eddie sounds pleased as could be with where things stand. “Everybody in the band is super solid now, there’s little to no drama. Some bands thrive on tension and drama, but I don’t like it. We finally have a drummer [‘Captain’ Chris Von Streicher] that gets along with everybody, which had been a bit of a challenge for a few years.”
Even over the phone, Eddie’s enthusiasm for the Captain is obvious. “I feel like we sound more like when we first started. Chris has that reckless abandon our original drummer had, so it’s kind of like a polished version of the sound we had when we first came out. He’s way better than I thought he would be…I knew he would be a cool dude in the band, but he actually caught me by surprise with how good he is.”
Eddie can’t seem to say enough about about how well things are going for the Supersuckers right now, so it had to be asked: is there anything bad about it these days? As if on cue, the youngest of his three children screams loudly enough to interrupt the phone call. “Definitely, the worst thing about being on the road is being away from these little dudes. It really sucks, but we’re gonna rectify that next year. We’re going to pack everything up, put everyone in an RV or something and hit the road with the whole family.”
There’s more planned for 2015 than just bringing kids on the road – the spark of Get The Hell has the band ready to keep the momentum going. “We’re going to make a new record early in the new year, but it’s going to be another country record,” Eddie reveals. “We’ll be finishing up the last few songs during this Canadian tour.”
Now that was surprising to hear. The Supersuckers’ 1997 country record Must’ve Been High came out a few years before the trend cycle made a country turn viable for hard rockin’ bands, but it’s fabulous. If words aren’t enough to convince you, they pulled off country well enough for Willie Nelson to hire them as his backing band.
“Must’ve Been High eventually become our best selling record! At the time there were a lot of people who thought it was kind of a stupid move,” recalls Eddie, “but it’s held up as the high quality record we knew it was. Now every band is picking up acoustic guitars, but I think we might have been ahead of the curve on that one.”
Speaking of the curve, you’re a bit behind it if you have never caught a live show by the greatest rock ‘n’ roll band in the world. That’s the more immediate reason to be hyped about the Supersuckers, and the place to be is the Pyramid on Tuesday night.
Just heed Eddie’s warning: “Wear your clean underwear, because we’re gonna rock the pants right off you!”
The Supersuckers disintegrate your Wranglers at the Pyramid on Tuesday. The Lousy Lovers and Potatoes open the show. Be there at 9:30.