insolence

The rap-metal craze appears to be fading but that doesn’t seem to bother the members of Insolence whose sound, a heavy ghetto-styled hip-hop/rock hybrid, dubbed Rasta metal by the band, is broader than your standard rap-metal fare.	Formed in 1995 Insolence – a diversely ethnic group featuring two Jewish vocalists (Mech 1 & Mark Herman), a Filipino DJ (Jerry Dalao), a Puerto Rican bass player (Paul Perry), an Irish/Scottish-American guitarist (Mike Rowan), and a Mexican American drummer (Armando Cardenas aka Mando) – has come a long way since its humble beginnings as a three-piece metal outfit.
Over the years the San Jose based unit has built a loyal following in and around the Bay Area and overseas. The band (known to fans as the I.N.S. Crew) also released four albums – Within, Universal, Terrorist, and Poisonous Philosophy – on their independent label Loudmouth Records before inking a deal with Maverick Records.	In June of 2001 Insolence released Revolution - an album which reflects the band’s cultural and musical influences and delivers a delicious feast of dub-heavy grooves, churning metallic guitars, turntable heroics, and bouncing verbal interplay.
BM: Insolence has been around since 1995. How did the band evolve to what it is today?	M: There’s six of us in the band and we all have different influences, in regards to what we grew up on, so that’s what makes us unique. One of us comes from a reggae background, one from industrial, one from metal, one from old school metal, and one from punk, so [our sound] is mixture of all that. We replaced our guitarist and bassist and brought in Mike and Paul, so that is kind of how we got the sound we have now.
*BM: What kind of reaction are you getting on Revolution?*	M: The only difference with having the album out is that everyone knows all the words. Before the album came out we would hear some people in the crowd singing, especially in our hometown, but now we can hear the whole place singing. We recently played a radio show for Live 105 in our hometown and everyone was singing along to every song. We just handed the mic to the crowd and they just sang the words. So that’s what totally changed with having the album out now. We’ve always got a good reaction to our live show. I think that is our strong point.
BM: I know the band is taking a small break at home right now. Are you guys getting the rock star treatment?	M: We always did because we’ve been around since 1995, and we’ve been to Europe a couple of times. When we’re home we run into fans just walking down the street and in the local clubs. The Cactus Club is one of our favorite places and whenever we go there we get asked for autographs. We’ve been in the scene for a while and better things keep happening. Now that we are on a major label we’ve acquired a lot more fans that we don’t know. Fans that I’ve never seen before, like the guy who comes up and says, “I’ve seen you guys for years.” Whatever. But they’ve always treated us with love down here in the Bay Area.
BM: Did you find that the treatment you received in your hometown helped you adjust to fame on a bigger scale?	M: Totally. The one thing about Insolence is that we went a long way on our own. It was almost like we had the cake, but when the label came along it was the icing on the cake to help us get [our music] out to the world. It was another step on the ladder. We all know and have had friends that were on a major label before, so we know that just because you got signed it doesn’t mean you’ve made it. We’ve always known it was just another step. It’s hard work. When we first got signed everyone said, “This is just the beginning of hard work.” We knew right off the bat because we had friends that were signed and dropped soon after. So we knew how it was. One thing about Insolence is there is no rock star bullshit. If you go to one of our shows you will meet us because we are always on the floor. People know that about us and now they come to our shows for that purpose. All the fans know to stick around and hang out because we’ll be there kickin’ it.
BM: Insolence played a few gigs overseas before signing to Maverick. As an unsigned band how did you pull that off?	M: We just had a good hook up. We knew this guy who had went to Europe with his band and when his band broke up he started promoting bands and bringing them over there. He went and showed us the ropes and that was cool. We got to play the Dynamo Festival, and there were a lot of Death Metal and Goth bands on the bill. There was no other band like us—no hip-hop metal bands at all, or Rasta metal as we call it, so we totally stood out. We didn’t know what the reaction was going to be like. Our first show in Europe was the Dynamo Festival and when we went out on stage people just started jumping and showing us love. It was like, “Whoa, this is it.” It was great. I remember thinking, “We are in Europe on a huge stage and there’s just thousands of people all jumping to our music.” I was like, “This is it. This is cool.”
BM: How did the band maintain a relationship with its fans overseas?	M: We’d stay there about three months at a time and live in a flat. We’d go hang out downtown with the kids, and when we came out the next year the group of kids that were into our music was bigger. I remember hanging out with the kids at the side of this pub. They had a fire going, and we were sitting on a car seat set out on the dirt surrounded by abandoned buildings that had been hit by bombs. We looked at each other and said,” Man, what are we doing here?” We were way down in the mix, just hanging out with the kids more than any band would. It was cool.
BM: What would you say was your most interesting experience has been on the road?	M: Being in another country where nobody speaks English and having people come up to us and show us love even though they couldn’t speak English or spoke very little. That was very cool. They’d say, “We love you and the music. Come drink.” Those experiences have been the biggest highlights so far. We are going to Japan in the fall, which I think will be the next big thing that is going to happen to us but, so far, the biggest highlight has been Europe and France. I really like France, especially the Eiffel Tower.
BM: What is your favorite place in Europe?	M: Probably France. Amsterdam was pretty cool because we could buy weed and smoke it there. But in regards to which was the nicest and where I would take my wife, I’d say France.
BM: Insolence released four albums before signing with Maverick. Were these self released or did the band have the help of an independent?	M: It was a small label, but it was my label. I wanted to start my own label and I said that the first release would be my band, which is what I also did with the rehearsal studio. I opened up a rehearsal studio so my band could practice in it. My wife and I put it together, and we also did the album promotion.
BM: What was the name of the label?	M: Loudmouth records.
BM: Is it still operating?	M: Yes. We are working with various hip-hop artists right now. It’s going to be similar to a compilation but it will be a collection of work that I’ve done with various rappers. Mech 1 and Mark will be on it and a bunch of other people I found down the line. It will be cool.
BM: What about the rehearsal studio?	M: It is still there, and we still rehearse there. All our stuff is crammed into it right now. Loudmouth Studios is where we met and started.
*BM: Is it true that the album was originally going to be titled 15 oz?*	M: Yeah, we were going to call the album ‘15 oz’ because that is about how much we smoked while recording it. We couldn’t think of anything else, so we kind of threw that name out there and the label shot it down right off the bat. I can’t really blame the label; it was more our A&R guy. Sometimes he’ll speak for the label. We could have fought it, but we weren’t really stuck on that name. Another name we were thinking of using was ‘World Wide Terrorism.’ We were all throwing out names, and no one wanted to shut down someone else’s idea because it would seem like you were doing it just because he came up with it. I always give every name a chance. I may not like it, but if all the other guys like it I’ll go with it. So all these names were being passed around and I finally said, “This is the name: Revolution,” and we went with it.
B: Is there a meaning behind it or did ‘revolution’ just come to you out of the blue?	M: There’s a meaning. Every time we would think of a name for the album we’d think about what we are about, what the band is about, and what the fans identify us with. We always used to go by the name Insolence Terrorists, which was based on the whole revolutionist terrorist notion because our music represented some type of movement and we felt we had this new sound. We want our music to be a movement of sound, and we felt that revolution captured that best. I also had to come up with something quick and [that name] worked.
BM: With so many members in the band is it difficult for you all to agree when it comes to making decisions?	M: Yes. I always have to step in and do it myself. When you get six heads in the kitchen your going to get different results. They all trust me because I’ve handled stuff like this before, especially with the other albums. When we put out the other albums I would just do everything and show it to them later because they would always want to make changes and that would set us back. I would just get it done, and they would just go with it. It’s hard, but they trust me with my ideas so that is good. They let me make a lot of the decisions.
BM: It seems like there is a good relationship between the band members?	M: Totally. Everyone knows what their place is, and no one tries to out do the other. We all know we have to work together. It’s not a race to write the songs by ourselves.
BM: How does the lyrically writing process work with two vocalists in the band?	M: I think it helps them because if one doesn’t have an idea the other one does. They feed off each other. It’s cool. If Mark doesn’t know what to write about, Mech will say, “How about this?” I think that is why Mark brought Mech aboard. He was a friend of his, and Mark introduced Mech to the band. Having Mech in the band took some of the work off of Mark. Mark can kick back a little more, especially on stage. He can do half of a verse and kick it while Mech does the other half. I think having two singers in the band is great. It works out well. It’s not like we planned it. It just happened.
BM: I like how the two of them play off each other during the band’s live show.	M: The girls like the reggae aspect that Mech delivers, and the guys like Mark because he brings heaviness to our sound, which usually gets a pit going. Then Mech will come back in with the reggae and some rapping, so it’s like two different worlds. It’s cool.
BM: The lyrics have a real street feel to them. Are they reflections of Mech and Mark’s experiences?	M: They hate to say that because that is what every vocalist says. It’s more like the two of them kicking back, smoking weed, and listening to reggae. That pretty much sums it up. They’re not out there picketing every day and voting. They are just surviving on what they can do. They know they are musicians and this is a job they have to do and they draw from experiences derived from that. Their message is kind of like a weird painting. It sounds kind of angry because they are screaming, but if you listen you’ll hear that it’s not a violent type of anger it is more about emotion.
BM: I found it interesting that the band worked with Sylvia Massy Shivy. It’s not often that a heavy band works with a female producer.	M: We were looking for a producer at the time that we got signed. The label wanted to get us in the studio as quickly as possible to record the album. They ran all these names that were available on such a short notice and she was one of them. At first, we didn’t jump on it right away, so the label rented a room and we rehearsed for all these different producers. Sylvia wanted to work with us. We heard about what she’s done and, after meeting everyone else, we knew we wanted to work with her because she had the best vibe. Everyone else came in saying, “I think if you do this and do that it will be good.” It was like they were showing off. Sylvia was more like a friend coming in. She set up candles and made the whole vibe cool right from the beginning, rather than just coming in and trying to show off by telling us a bunch of shit that could be done. She just said, “I really want to work with you,” and we liked her vibe and trusted her and it ended up working really well.
BM: She did a good job with the album. There’s a lot more going on musically than what you hear in the live performance. How do you feel about the overall energy of the album?	M: Everyone has been saying, “I love the CD, but I really like hearing you guys live.” I think it is because of our live energy. It is hard to capture that. In the studio we had the opportunity to experiment with a lot of things that we had wanted to do. I put a midi hip-hop beat over my drums, which is something I really wanted to do because I couldn’t on all the other albums. I wanted to use whatever I could and make it sound like a big orchestra. Sylvia did a great job with that. When we play live we don’t use all that midi stuff, so it is a different vibe—It’s rawer. The album does capture some of our live energy. We played our hearts out on it. Sometimes I’ll listen to the album and say, “We have to play it like that – fast with energy.” When we play live, we’ve found that it is better to speed things up a bit and get some hype going. It is hard to capture the way we play live because it is so raw. Live, there’s only three instruments playing and we don’t use any of the midi stuff, except what Jerry puts in his samples, so you always get something different live.
BM: How much work goes into the band’s live show?	M: A lot. We want to incorporate more of the midi stuff but it is really hard to play to a click all the time. It’s like, “Are you going to play your whole set to a DAT or just play some to a DAT?” That is why we just stick to going out there with the instruments and just doing it instead of trying to make the live show all technical. We just play as well as possible, and it just comes out raw. It is almost a treat to see us live because it is as if you came to our rehearsal studio and we just setup and played for you. It’s better than us getting all high tech with midi beats and making everything sound perfect.
BM: The band does exude a lot of energy when playing live.	M: Totally. If we played like that in the studio it would be so shitty. It wouldn’t be tight. I remember playing so hard that my headphones came off. We try to really get into it in the studio - to the point where we can feel it, and with the money Maverick gave us for the album we had the time to do that. With some of the stuff on the album it’s like, “Wow! I hope I can play that again.” In fact, I’m still learning all the parts I played on the album.
BM: I noticed the number of complicated beats incorporated into the album’s tracks. Did you have any formal training as a drummer?	M: I’m totally self-taught. When I was a kid I would turn on the radio or put on Black Sabbath records and just play whatever I thought was cool. I tried to play along to AC/DC, but it was too simple so I played along to Black Sabbath and stuff that had more complicated beats. I was totally self-taught. I just turned on the radio and went for it.
BM: I noticed the wide variety of guests on the album. Do they reflect the members various musical influences?	M: Yes. At some point in our lives we some how connected with the people who are on our album. Sen Dogg from Cypress Hill is on “1-2, 1-2,” and when Cypress Hill first came out their music changed my life. We all saw Fishbone at the Stone in San Francisco when they opened up for the Beastie Boys, and we were also into Suicidal Tendencies. Everyone who is on the album reflects a period in our life.
BM: What does Insolence stand for?	M: We have our own little meaning for the name. To us, it’s like an arrogant pride within yourself. You know you got it going on and you don’t have to worry about any body else. So it is kind of like that certain pride within yourself when you just don’t care what anyone else thinks. We are not arrogant, but when the band was coming up we were always the underdogs and we always said, “Okay, you’ll see, you’ll see.” We never said it out loud but in our heads we thought that. It was like, “Okay, we’re gonna get dissed now, we’re gonna get spit on, but later I think this band is gonna come up.” That is why I came out with the albums. We stuck with it, and Insolence was just that name.
	When we first started out our sound was faster and a lot heavier. It was more along the lines of heavy metal, and the name Insolence fit real well. But, as we evolved and started incorporating more reggae into our music we kind of questioned [the name]. It still fit because we still had a heavy edge to our sound. It is also kind of a punkish name, which we dig because we all sort of come from a punk rock background. Our roots stem from hip-hop and punk rock. We hang out with the punkers but look like cholos. People would always trip and say to us, “You guys play rock?” We’d say, “Hell ya.” Or they would say, “Who let those cholos on stage?” And we would play straight metal with double bass and they’d be blown away. Afterwards, they would try to be cool to us and we’d be like, “You should have been cool with us from the beginning, regardless of what we look like.” We were always cool with the bands. We never copped a rock star attitude, but then they thought that because we were cool and coming up that we must suck because all the good bands had attitudes. Every time we toured with a band they would always say, “ I want to say thanks to Insolence because they aren’t like what we thought. Looks can be deceiving and these guys are really cool.” Most of the bands would see our picture and think we were going to kill them.
	There was a guy from the San Jose Mercury News who refused to interview us for years. We always wondered why and, finally, he had to because of the new album. His boss basically forced him. When he came down he told us that he avoided interviewing us because he was afraid of us. He thought we’d do something to him or be mean to him, but he ended up having a great time with us. He was the coolest guy.
BM: As the saying goes, “Never judge a book by its cover.”	M:I know. That’s what the band always says.
BM: Unfortunately a lot of people are like that.	M: Unfortunately, but we are the nicest guys. We might look crazy but we have kids. We are the type of guys that host Bar-ba-ques.
BM: I kind of got that impression from the live show and the interaction that went on between the band and its fans. You guys give off a very down to earth vibe.	M: That’s because we are.
BM: What advice can you offer to unsigned artists?	M: To stick with it even when it seems impossible. When you think you can’t do it and you think you are not major label material, think again and just keep pushing it. I totally thought Insolence was going to be a little band on a little label making a little noise. I always told everyone, “We’re going to do this,” and they were like, “Yeah, yeah.” But we stuck to it and turned down all the little deals and ended up signing with Maverick and now things are happening. So, stick to your dream no matter what type of music you play because there’s a space for you somewhere.
BM: Have you met Madonna yet?	M: Not yet. They say we will, but I’m sure we’ll have to sell millions of records before she takes notice of us. So we’re still working on that one.
BM: How did you guys land the cameo in the movie Driven?	M: Right before we signed with Maverick the label flew us to Toronto Canada to do that movie with Sylvester Stallone. Guy Oseary, who signed us, is friends with Sylvester and he told him that he had the perfect band for his movie. Sylvester really liked the song, so we got the gig.
BM: Have you seen the movie?	M: Oh yeah, the day it came out. We did a video for it - a tight video for it - so hopefully it’s on the DVD.
BM: What are some of your favorite hangs in San Jose?	M: The Cactus Club, which is our hometown bar. Actually, Downtown First Street is really the only place to go. If we go out we go downtown because everything is there, from cool bars to a place to have a great burrito.
BM: What are some of the band’s goals?	M: To stay on the road and be a strong band on the road and not be a one hit wonder. If the label gets sick of us, or something like that, as long as we are strong on the road we’ll be around forever. Our goal is to be a band with longevity. When you can pack a club you’ve made it. You can do whatever because the doors are open. If you can pack all the clubs you don’t need a label. Once we get to that point we can be comfortable. We will know that wherever we go we can sell out the clubs and have good shows and that is what will keep us together. We just want to play big shows with a lot of fans and sell records. Trying to stay on the radio and keep up with the whole thing is useless. You just have to let it happen and forget about it. Let the radio do what they want to do and you just concentrate on playing live and getting your next budget together. So our main thing is to stay on the road.
BM: It seems like the band pretty much figured out how to do all that before getting signed so the chances of survival and longevity are good.	M: Exactly, and that is why we feel so confident. Our record sales may not have hit billboard right off the bat, but the album is doing well and the sales are staying steady. But our live show is what keeps us alive…going out there and tearing it up live is what keeps us happy. We kind of just let the other politics work themselves out, but the road is our main goal.