It’s very rare that a band can come on the scene with a sound that is totally fresh and unique, but that’s exactly what Kurt Deimer has done. Led by charasamatic frontman and vocalist Kurt Deimer and his partner, Bon Jovi guitarist Phil X, they have come up with a different style of hard rock that is great on record but even better live! Kurt & Phil took some time during a break on their tour opening for Yngwie Malmsteen to talk about their new single “Hero” and much more.
Please press the PLAY icon below for the MisplacedStraws Conversation with Kurt Deimer & Phil X –
On how they came together – Kurt – It’s been a grind, but I got back into the music side of it, besides the acting that I do in December of 2018, and put together a demo and down in Birmingham with my first writing partner, Ben Trexel, and got it out to LA eventually towards the end of 2019. My manager wasn’t happy with the demo still, it wasn’t where I wanted it to be. He got hooked up with Chris Lord-Alge who said he’d take a look at it, which we never thought would happen. I can still remember the night going, Oh, there’s no way”. We were reaching for the sky, but sometimes you gotta reach for the sky and good things happen, and he agreed to. Chris kinda discovered me at that point and he loved my voice and my style, and he wanted to start producing me at that point. We had a little track we had done, Ben & I, of “Have A Cigar” and Chris said, “Let me show you how I can produce this and we’re gonna do it in your own way with your voice”, and he brought on his session players, which just happened to be this guy, Phil X, and I hear this guitar solo and about faint and the rest is history. We were shooting the video for it in August, that’s the first time Phil and I met was on that video on YouTube, and become friends and writers and brothers ever since, and here we go, man. We just want people to hear our music all over the world. 1:20
On the chemistry when they wrote their first song “Back of the School” – Phil – We had similar experiences. We were in high school at the same time. So pre-internet, pre-trolls, pre-haters, pre-everything, everything just happened on the schoolyard. So when he sent me the lyrics, I completely connected to the lyrics and I knew it was gonna be an aggressive song, and I knew I was gonna have a cool chorus, and when I sent to him, he was like, “What the F—, dude?” That pretty much happens every time he sends me a song. I need to connect to something. So that’s why it’s almost like a hit every time. I don’t mean a smash hit, I mean a hit or miss, it’s always like the Bulls Eye because he just sends me something and I read something that I connect to, and I can relate and then I can embellish upon musically and lyrically and then we end up with the final product, that’s been a really cool ride. We just kind of had a good vibe together ever since we first met. We’re both kind of the same kind of a dude. We’re very kind, big-hearted guys who love to help others and like you said, we would have graduated high school together if we would have been at the same high school. We’re blessed to have met, we have very many family similarities, so we’re just on a mission now together and we’re very glad we both crossed paths. 3:16
On how Geoff Tate got involved on “Burn Together” – When Phil and I started working to get together with Chris Lord-Alge, one of the songs I had brought a demo on was “Burn Together” from the Alabama sessions. I wasn’t sure when I first heard “Burn Together” if I even wanted to do it because I wasn’t a big fan of the original arrangement, and then Phil and Chris kinda took over on that, and when he became our producer and turned it into this epic rock song. My management, Andy Gold and Paul Gargano, Paul is a big Queensryche fan and knows the Tates. So when we knew we were gonna release Work Hard, Rock Hard which is our debut album, that came out last November everywhere, he flew them into town, the Tate camp, and we all got together out in LA and agreed that he would be on the song and in a video with me and then we would be direct support for our first tour together to launch our debut Work Hard, Rock Hard. So I picked “Burn Together” because I thought it would blend our voices well, and I was really happy with the new arrangement the Chris had done Phil, and just it was gonna be a really good tune. That’s how I picked that for Geoff to do and he agreed. We shot a video in the desert, 115 degrees, and just made it happen. Then he gave us that direct support slot, how lucky. Just another moment where I guess I’m lucky or I’m not lucky, I don’t know, it just happened. You work hard, good things happen… I don’t (sing Geoff’s part live), that’s our other guitar player Michael. He’s the second guitar player in the band and he’s also a great singer. We go way back to Toronto in the early ’90s. So we have that friendship, but I knew I needed another great singer, because when I do the tracks in my studio, there are lots of guitars and lots of vocals, and I knew I needed another really good singer. Then I go, “Hey, I think you can actually sing Geoff’s part when we play it live”. So we started doing that, and even at one point, Geoff’s band was watching us and they thought it was on track or something, and we were like, “Nope, that’s him”. 5:06
On their approach to writing lyrics – Well, I don’t force it, I write when I feel something coming to my brain and I’ve got my little handy note thing on my Apple iPhone, and I’ll open up my notes and I put what I initially think we might call this thought. I might write one verse or I might like it so much, I just go through the whole thing in that one session, but I don’t send anything, I guess I shouldn’t say that, sometimes I send Phil and Chris just little one-liners. I get a whole son of literal lyrics and the Phil kinda puts it into his brain, and if he digs the message I’m trying to say and how I got that structured, then he’ll add his special magic to it. We give each other the liberty to do what we wanna do with the songwriting process, which makes it very easy, a lot of people really get into fights and stuff. Being creative is an amazing place to be when you hand over your work to a Grammy Award-winning mixer who has ideas. It’s not unusual for him to say, “You know what, you didn’t have a second pre-chorus, but we need a second pre-chorus, so I just copied the pre-chorus before the second chorus”, and I go, “Hey, what you did at the end? Fading out, I kind of reversed it and faded into the song”. So it’s one of those things you wanna think, “I don’t know if I like that”, or you go. “Well, you’re the one with the Grammy, so you win”. We don’t ever take for granted each other’s talent and what we bring to the song. We know the three of us together will make a great song. Why not trust Chris Lord-Alge as our producer? If he wants to change a lyric, what am I gonna say it? His change is usually kick-ass as fuck. It’s cool because it’s three completely different brains but we’re all on the same page. 7:50
On whether there is a freedom in doing something so different from Bon Jovi – Oh, absolutely, you totally nailed it. I do the Bon Jovi thing and I do the Drills thing, and those are completely different things. I was looking for something that’s kind of in the middle but I didn’t wanna sing. Anybody can find a great singer in Reseda, California that can just come in and sing rock and roll. I wanted something really different, and when I heard Kurt’s unique sound, I was like, “Man, this would be really cool to dig into this”. Because the way it works now is that Kurt comes out and he tells a story and he’s the narrative, and then we all sing our asses off, me, Kurt, and Michael, in the chorus, so the choruses are always the climax of the song. It’s as like, “Hey, this is what we’re here for”, and everything else is a journey into it and out of it and then into the next. That’s how I’ve always looked at songwriting. I just think the chorus is the king, the chorus is the strongest part of the song, and we just vocalized that crazy to get that message across, and I think that’s why we win the audiences, aside from being visually different and energetic on stage, everybody is singing on our songs when they leave. That’s a really cool aspect as well. 10:26
On describing their sound – I don’t know, I’ve heard people describe it as “talk rock”. I also sing in the choruses, provide the bottom, more of a lower end in the choruses, which I think works really well. I would describe it as Kurt Deimer, my own unique style, my own unique sound. I think that’s a cool thing that people can’t describe you. You go see a band go, “Well, that’s like the Stones, that’s like Lenny Kravitz, that’s like Black Sabbath”. When you come and see us, you can’t really put your finger on it, and I really dig that. A lot of bands can get pulled together if they have the same similar sounds, I think we can always stand apart in our own unique way and either love us or you don’t, but that’s our style, our brand of music, and it differentiates us from a lot of people…We want our own sound, our own brand, our own name. Phil wants to play anything he wants to play how he wants to play it. He lets me be me, I let him be him. That’s what Chris wants us to do too. Our band supports us, and we just go out and kick ass every night. 12:15
On their cover of “Have A Cigar” – There’s definitely a different weight to it. We wanted to make it heavy. I remember laying down the guitars and just thinking, “This has gotta be very special”. We love Pink Floyd so we wanted to honor them, but we also wanted to do our own thing, and with us, it’s just make it heavier. Any of our covers, we honor the band and the song that we like so much. Chris has his thought in his head about how he wants it to sound, and he just wants us to bring it our way, bring it at you. That kind of vibe to it. So we’ve got some other cool covers coming at people…Even with the guitar situation, (David) Gilmour is such a hero. He’s an icon. So I didn’t wanna do the same solo, but I wanted to capture the same emotion intended that he had when he was soloing. That’s how I refer to it. Sometimes it’s not technically difficult but capturing the emotion is. It was funny the way that solo went down. I laid down that solo quick, just to get it to Chris, and I call Chris and I go, Look, “I’m gonna beat the solo next week when I have more time”. Then when I opened up the session the following week, I couldn’t beat the solo. Well, I called Chris and I say,” Hey man, I don’t think I can beat that solo”, he said, “Yeah, I wondered what you were talking about”. That kind of confirmed my suspicion and when Kurt heard it and freaked out, that confirmed it even further, and now when we play it every night, there’s like people freaking out after that solo. It’s an amazing confirmation of what I had in my head, and it’s also a testament to if you play from the heart you’re a different guitar player every day, because I can’t play it exactly as I did that day. 14:25
On upcoming plans – We’ve got a, I think, a pretty good plan for the rest of 2022. “Hero” just came out the other day, and that’s just available everywhere. On Father’s Day, we have a song and another single that’s gonna come out called “My Dad” that I wrote that I been working on a couple of years, getting it to where it’s gonna be when it comes out, which I think he’s gonna blow people away. Then we’re gonna wait till around August and release our second EP, and that will have six songs that we’re really proud of. I think it’s gonna blow people’s minds. Every time we write a song we’re upping our game, you want to beat the one before. Everyone says that, but we’re right. 17:15
On if there is a difference between playing arenas with Bon Jovi or opening theater shows – Well, that goes back to before Bon Jovi, I don’t care if it’s 12000 people or 12 people, just the same Phil shows up. There was a little bit of a culture shock playing Bridgestone Arena on Saturday night and then jumping on a stage in Harford on Sunday. There’s a moment, “What is happening?” Different mix, different gear, different singer, I sing different. Not to mention a private jet to our tour bus. A fan came up to me, and they said, “Wow, you really walked on stage, and you seemed unassuming and calm, and in a few minutes you exploded into Phil X, is that on purpose?” I gotta be honest, I was standing there going, “What’s happening right now?” Then when you realize I have a guitar in my hands and there’s a mic in my face and I’m just going to do what I do. Even my kids, 6 and 8, they’ll tell you, that’s what daddy does. I just wanna do it, and I’m happy to be doing it and I’m proud of how we’re doing it, and it’s just amazing. . I wanted to add something to what he said. Phil and I are pretty calm, chill dudes, but when we get a mic in front of us or we get on the stage, I’m a totally a different person. Phil does it all the time. 18:35
