Blowin’ Wind with Municipal Waste’s Tony Foresta: “Let’s cook up Rush Limbaugh since he looks like a big pig anyway. Just put an apple in his mouth and cook him up.”

Virgina punk/metal powerhouse Municipal Waste is back and this time they’re taking us to outer space. That’s right, Muni Waste has invited us all to The Fatal Feast: Waste In Space and I couldn’t be more pumped about this one. I had such an amazing time the last time I interviewed singer Tony Foresta and I was really looking forward to reconnecting with him again. Tony was an awesome dude as always and we talked about cooking up Rush Limbaugh, how the Beastie Boys changed his life, and he explained just why Muni Waste made a space album. This was a really fun interview and I know you all will get a kick out of this one. Sit back, get a beer, grab a bucket, and get to know my boy Tony Foresta of Municipal Waste.

Tony thanks for taking the time out to talk to me again man.  It’s great to catch up with you again.

Right on man.  Thanks for having me back man.  I really enjoyed the last one we did.

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I wanted to start off by offering up my condolences about Whitney Houston’s death.  I know she meant a lot to you.

[laughs] Oh yeah man.  I actually had a dance party that night with my friends in her honor.  I love me some Whitney jams.  I ain’t gonna lie.

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Last time we talked you guys were working on what has now become The Fatal Feast: Waste In Space which I must say melts some serious face so congratulations on finally finishing the fucker.

[laughs] Oh thanks man.  It took a long time to get that thing done, but I think it was worth the wait.  This album is the longest one we’ve ever done, but it’s got a lot more songs than we’ve ever put on a record.  It came out really good and I’m super happy about it.

Was the creative process much different this time around or something which made it take a little longer for this one?

Well, the process was different, but we also took our time writing it.  We took a year and a half off. We just wanted to hang out in Richmond, do other projects, write an album at our own pace, and not have to worry about a tour schedule.  When we finished the last record we literally left the studio, got on a plane, and went to Arizona to start a tour.  There was no rest.  When you’re doing that there’s time constraints and things slip through the cracks that you don’t want on a record or shit just gets rushed.  This time around we just decided we’re gonna hang out and not tour for a while and the payoff was a great record.  We’re really happy with it and now we’re going to tour our asses off for it.

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As you said, The Fatal Feast: Waste In Space is your longest album to date.  How many songs did you guys end up cutting for the album?

We went into the studio with a lot of extra shit, but some stuff just didn’t make it.  We ended up going in with about 21 or 22 songs I think.  The album has 17 songs on it and we recorded a couple of extra things for things like a split 7” with Toxic Holocaust and shit like that.

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The new album still has that punk edge to it, but it really sounds like some serious old school thrash and speed metal more so than your previous albums.  Is this a natural shift for you guys or is this just where you’re at right now?

We didn’t do it on purpose.  It’s just what it grew into and I’m really glad that we’re able to click like that.  We’ve been doing this for so long that we’re not rookies any more [laughs].  We knew what we wanted from this album.  It seems like it has elements of all the stuff that we’ve done in the past as well as a newer sound.  You can tell that the band is progressing, but still the same.  We’re still playing old school kind of shit.

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The overall sound and vibe of The Fatal Feast: Waste In Space totally clicks with me.  It’s kind of like you guys have been working on this style of music for a while and have really perfected it.

Thanks man.  I think it’s because we really had a lot of time off at home.  We were able to hang out in our hometown and hang out with our friends and just kind of be ourselves for a while instead of these dudes in a band who are never home.  I think it kind of brought us back to where we were when we recorded some of our earlier shit and we needed that.  We just kind of needed to be human again and be Richmond people.  That was the biggest pay off for the record to me.  Just to be home for a while was very inspiring to us.

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What can you tell me about the concept behind The Fatal Feast: Waste In Space?

We decided to call it Waste In Space because we’ve always wanted to do a space album [laughs]. We figured that since it’s our fifth record it was about time to do a space record.  It seems like every band who lasts for more that 10 records eventually does a space album.  It’s like once a band gets to a certain point they say, “Alright.  Fuck it.  We’re going to space!” so we decided to do that as well [laughs].  We just figured we’d get our space album out of the way and pump this thing out.  We knew it was going to happen eventually so Waste In Space was born!

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So does that mean that in 20 years we’ll get The Fatal Feast II: Back Into Space?

[laughs]  Maybe yeah.  You never know.  It may happen!  We may even do Waste In The Hood, but keep that secret.  I don’t want another band stealing that shit [laughs]

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So not only is the new album sounding killer, the artwork once again is awesome.  Did you guys go with Andre Bouzikov again or did you work with someone new?

This is a new guy that we’ve never worked with before.  His name is Slasher [laughs].  He’s done a couple of death metal album covers and we thought he was awesome.  We told him our idea and how we wanted it to look like an old horror movie and it ended up going far beyond our expectations.  The guy killed it and it was really cool.

I actually thought it kind of reminded me of a gory version of Iron Maiden’s Somewhere In Time album.

That’s funny because you’re not the first person to say that.  Somebody today said that it reminded them of a classic style Iron Maiden record which is great.

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Last time we talked you mentioned using a “secret ingredient” in the ink of your liner notes.  Did you guys pump some love into this new one’s notes as well?

[laughs] Oh yeah.  The cum [laughs]  Nah, we kept things clean this time around.  We wore condoms on this one.

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I’m glad to hear you guys kept it safe.  So Municipal Waste is out with Gwar and Ghoul for a tour, but you’re not coming to Atlanta on this run.  Do you have any other tours lined up?

Yeah, we’re doing a headlining tour about two weeks after this tour.  It’s not announced yet, but I think it’s going to be sometime in June.  We’re playing a festival called Chaos In Tejas in Texas and we’re going to start the tour there.  We’re going to hit all the big towns on that one.  The Gwar tour is like B-markets so it’s smaller towns which is pretty cool.  It’s going to be pretty interesting because there’s a lot of towns on this tour that we’ve never played before.  Then we’re going to head over to Europe to do some festivals which I’m really look forward to.

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Are we going to hear these new songs live for the first time on this tour? Yeah.  None of these songs have been played live yet.

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Being that you guys now have five albums under your belts, how do you make the set lists for shows on this tour?

For the GWAR tour we’re going to do a lot of older shit because it’s more familiar for people and it’s not really our tour.  We’re going to play a lot of old shit that we’ve never played before and then just rotate a couple of new ones just so we can get used to playing them live.  On the headlining run we’ll probably do like four or five new songs a night.  We like to play shit from all of our albums, but we’re definitely looking forward to getting some new jams out there.

So are you a bit nervous about getting out there and playing these songs for the first time?

Eh, not really.  We practice a lot.  I mean, I get nervous about just playing shows in general.  I got these new in ear monitors, so I’m more worried about those than anything [laughs].  I’ve never fucked with those before so I’m going to try and use those.  They say it takes about three shows to get used to them and then you’re addicted to them.

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So do you get nervous before you go out on stage for a show?

Yeah, I get a little nervous.  That’s why I drink so much on tour [laughs].  I get nervous before we play, so I don’t drink, but afterwards I’m so relieved that I get drunk as shit.  The second we start playing I’m not nervous anymore.  I’m more pumped up.  I wouldn’t say nervous really.  It’s more like anxious.

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So do you have some kinda corny warm up ritual like a group huddle or something?

[laughs] I warm up my voice.  I do the “me me me me me” shit, but nah, we don’t do that.  We played with Slipknot once and I remember looking at them and they were doing this big group hug and prayer thing [laughs].  I just thought that was kinda weird [laughs].  Maybe they were praying.  Oh well, I don’t give a shit [laughs].  We don’t do anything like that man.  We’re just dudes and we’re just hanging out.  I remember one time I was taking a shit and the band started playing without me.  I could hear them and I got really mad.  Luckily they play like a two minute intro without me singing.  I was so pissed by the time I got on stage.  I was fucking mad [laughs].  That was the only time I have ever gotten mad at my band while we were playing.  I was not being professional that day [laughs].

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What can someone who’s never seen Municipal Waste live expect form a live show?

Expect to see a lot of energy, lots of stuff getting thrown around and expect the unexpected [laughs].

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You guys obviously don’t play to backing tracks or anything.

Nah.  I wouldn’t even know how to do that [laughs].  I mean, if bands can pull that shit off good for them.  I just don’t really understand how that works.  How can you live with yourself [laughs]?  I mean, I would feel like I was cheating people every night.  I’d rather go out there and sound like shit which I have with a blown out voice and just play from my heart.  More people appreciate that than some shitty lip syncing.

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What was the defining moment in your life that made you want to become a musician?

Probably after going to the first show I ever went to.  I saw the Beastie Boys on the first night of the Check Your Head tour and it was a really cool experience.  It seemed like they were having the best time up there being a bunch of goofballs playing these killer songs.  I just said, “Shit, I wanna do that man.”  I fucking love the Beastie Boys.

So if you weren’t a musician, what would you be?

I worked at a screen printing shop for like nine, almost ten years.  I did all the old Municipal Waste shirts back then.  I’d probably do something like that or own a shop of my own.  It’s a good job to have when you’re in a band and I ended up really liking it.  It was cool.

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Alright dude, let’s get silly for a bit. If Hollywood called and wanted to make a movie about Muni Waste, who would play you?

[laughs] Perry Carvello from Windy City Heat.  Either him or Sam Kinnison [laughs].

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That would be awesome, but they’d have to bring him back to life and slim him down a bit.

Yeah.  That’s about as realistic as us having a movie. so yeah [laughs]

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In your opinion, what is the ultimate metal album that everyone should own and why?

That’s an easy question dude.  Slayer’s Reign In Blood man.  C’mon dude.  That’s the best album ever [laughs].

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So you’re a big Slayer fan?

Oh yeah.  I love Slayer.  I saw them about a year ago with Megadeth.  They played Seasons In The Abyss and that was amazing.  I’ve never seen a band play an entire album live before and I thought that was killer.

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So let’s have a fatal feast of our own brah.  If you could prepare, cook and eat any celebrity who would it be and how would you prepare them for our feast?

Hm.  That’s weird [laughs].  I was going to make it a perverted thing like some hot chick I’d want to go down on, but anyway.  Let’s cook up Rush Limbaugh since he looks like a big pig anyway.  Just put an apple in his mouth and cook him up.

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Kill, Fuck, Marry: Mitt Romney, Nancy Grace, Dave Brockie (Gwar singer)

Damn dude [laughs].  Hm.  I would say I would marry Brockie because he’s my buddy and I know we’d have a good gay time.  The wedding will be great [laughs].  I would fuck Nancy Grace and I would kill Mitt Romney.  I would be killing him while yelling “I wish you were Santorum” [laughs].

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Last but not least, do you have any advice for up and coming musicians trying to make it in the music world?

I would tell them to not expect to make any money [laughs].  Just do it because you love playing music and because you want to have a good time.  If you’re going into it for all the wrong reasons you’re destined to fail.

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Tony, thanks so much for catching up with me again dude.  I’m looking forward to puking with you next time you’re in Atlanta.

Thanks so much man.  Thank you for supporting us and for digging our shit.  I think I did puke the last time I was in Atlanta, so sounds like fun!  It was good talking to you again Don.

 

For more on Municipal Waste, head on over to http://www.facethewaste.com.  Be sure to pick up some beer on the way.

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