Through out the last two decades, no other artists has done more to continuously provoke his audience than Blackie Lawless, leader of the shock glam-metal band W.A.S.P. Lawless has managed to do this album after album, show after show. From the bands first single in 1983 “Animal, Fuck Like a Beast” to their most recent CD “Dying For The World,” Lawless has achieved exactly what he set out to twenty years ago, say and do what’s on his mind and not care about the consequences. As a result, Lawless has found himself constantly in the midst of controversy during his career. His outrageous antics and offensive lyrics during the 80’s led to the record industry’s implementation of the Parent Advisory sticker. His live shows featured the slaughter of live pigs and raw meat being tossed into the audience. W.A.S.P. was even banned from playing in the sin capital of the world - Las Vegas. Lawless is a true Rock pioneer and legend.

What follows is an exclusive GlamMetal.com interview with the PMRC’s most formidable opponent - Blackie Lawless.

You Had a lot to say on this release “Dying For The World,” how much of a relief and a release was it for you to finish it?                        Not that much, to be honest. We were working on an other album at the same time. It’s going to be another story opera album kind of like the “Crimson Idol”. This was just something that I wanted to talk about in the interim. It wouldn’t have worked with the other story that I was working on. It’s not like any great epiphany because of September 11, it’s stuff that was on my mind that I wanted to talk about.

How long did it take you to write and record this cd?                                        The whole thing from top to bottom was between three and four months.

That’s amazing you did it that quickly.                                                     Yes it is, considering that I’m historically slow.

I think that the track “Hallowed Ground," may be one of the best songs that you have ever written. Tell us a little about the inspiration behind that track.                                Well, it was about going to ground zero. The first thing that hits you is the smell. It’s like a giant electrical fire. If you ever smelled electrical wires burning, that’s what it was. The smell was every where, you couldn’t escape it, it was really strong. There were ten’s of thousands of miles of electrical wires in those buildings, which was the predominant thing that was there. A few hours later, I went to get something to eat and that smell was draining down into the back of my throat and I could taste it in the food. I never experienced anything like that before. I started freaking out, that’s were the line in the song comes from “I tasted hallowed ground.” That literally happened. It was a pretty dramatic effect.

When did you go to ground zero?                                                         Halloween.

On 9/11 you where right in the middle of your tour for “Unholy Terror”. Did you end up cutting that tour short?                                                                   We continued, but we canceled out about ten dates. We wanted to see if we could move on and we did. I had mixed emotions about continuing on, at the time we thought that it would be good for people to try to take their minds off of what happen. But looking back, I don’t think that I would have done it the same again. But, it’s also a better part of a year later too. It’s one of the things that I will think about forever. I don’t think that there is any wrong or right answer to it.

On this new CD, you have a new guitarist Darrell Roberts, in what way did he contribute to the recording?                                                                           He toured with us last year. He had time to work into the fold, to get a pretty good idea of where we were going. He was playing in a Metallica cover band when we found him. He auditioned and he was a real good guitar player, but what impressed me the most was his singing. He was a lead singer, he was doing all the Hatfield stuff in the band. Him being a singer, they are always the best guitar players. I remember talking to David Gilmour of Pink Floyd once and I told him that he was my favorite guitarist and I asked him how he does it. He said that he’s a singer first. And he’s always thinking like a singer, any one who’s a singer will properly come up with the best case of melody. It certainly translates into what Darrell does.

Why did Chris Holmes leave the band?                                                     Just getting progressively into the blues. Like a lot a lead guitar players do. He was leaning towards a style similar to that of Billy Gibbons from ZZ Top. The important thing for him is to be happy. I hope that it gives him a sense of fulfillment.

What tracks did Darrell play lead on because I thing it’s difficult to distinguish your style and his.                                                                                   Well, I’m playing solos on “trail of tears,” “Black Moon Torsil,” but other then that I think that he's playing the solos on the rest of them. But to be honest with you, I think his style was more similar to that of Chris’. It was strangle and it wasn’t intended to be that way. It just kind a happened. His influences are not what Chris’s are. It’s just weird the way that it came down. I’m sure that Darrell has properly read this in other interviews, but I’ve haven’t talked to him about it, it’s just the way that it happen.

Now that Chris is out of the band again, isn’t WASP basically a Blackie Lawless solo project?   You tell me. I mean I’ve always written songs in the band, I don’t mean to diminish any ones else input into what went on, but I would say largely that from the beginning that I wrote 98% of the material. My situation in WASP is very similar to that of Ian Anderson in Jethro Tull. In a band that’s been together for almost twenty years, you are going to have parts that change from time to time. What worked in the beginning may not work five years down the road. Because of growth and things like that. I think that somebody’s got to be in there steering the ship. To give it the flavor of what it does. I have a vision of where I’m going and need people to help me fulfill it.

After Chris left, did you ever consider calling one of the original WASP guitarist Randy Piper?               No, because Randy is even more into the blues than Chris was even from the beginning. Not that it’s a bad thing, it’s just going into a different direction than what I’m doing.

You’ve pretty much outlasted many of the so-called shock rockers, how close to your stage personal are you?                                                            Well, I guess like everybody I know or anyone I ever meet, we all have different personalities to deal with different situations. The person that you are speaking to me now is properly not the same person who is going to get caught up in traffic or a stressful situation. There is an element of your personality that you’re going to use to deal with that particular moment. The stage personality situation to me is just as real to me as that part of you that getting stress out in traffic getting angry. That part of is still inside of you. I don’t feel any different if that‘s what you’re asking. The only thing that’s bizarre for me, or I should say when I tell people they find a little bizarre is that when I’m on stage everything goes in slow motion. I see it all, it’s kind of like anything that you may of done in your life that was really intense, like little league baseball when the ball is coming and your in the batter’s box, the concentration in you mind is so intense that it magnifies everything. In your mind it looks like half speed and that’s what happens to me when I’m out there.

Have you ever consider writing an autobiography?                                         Sure, but it’s pretty time consuming. I really haven’t had time to do anything like that. I would make for interesting reading, I would guarantee you that. I think that it’s one of those things that it would be a little later down the line, when I say I want to take a little break from actually making a record . But considering the fact that we’re working on another studio record now as we speak, it’s properly going to be a double record set. I hope to have it ready by fall of next year. Which I won’t swear to because I know that there is a lot of work that still needs to be done. We will do an extensive tour at the end of that which will properly take a year or so. From right now to the end of that is at least three years, so to answer you question, something like that would be at least that far away. Properly even longer.

Have you read any of the recent autobiographies of Motley Crue or Gene Simmons?       No, because I know those guys pretty well, I was there when all that stuff was going on. I don’t even know how close the stuff is to the true. I mean I know what the truth is, so I don’t need read something like that.

What’s the theme of your record that you’re currently working on?                         I can’t really go into that right now because I’m not finished with the story yet and I know that it’s going to change before I’m done, so I think it would be a little misleading to start plugging it before it’s finished.

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