Great White has been a fixture on the rock scene since forming in the late 70s. The band is about to hit the road this spring leading up to M3 and Monsters of Rock Cruise. Founding member Mark Kendall took some time to talk about the entire history of the band and what’s coming next.
Please press the PLAY button below for the MisplacedStraws Conversation with Mark Kendall –
On who joins him, Michael Lardie, and Audie Desbrow in the current lineup of the band – Scott (Snyder’s) been in the band, our bass player, I think we’ve had four or five bass players, he’s been in the band, about 14 years. Actually, it’s funny because our original bass player was only in the band for like two years. When they disappear, crash and burn, whatever, we bring in another guy, and this guy’s lasted the longest, 13-14 years. So that’s Scott Synder, and then our singer is a guy called Brett Carlisle, just the greatest singer I probably have heard in 40 years. He’s just straight gangster on vocals, unbelievable. I’m actually gonna bring him out here, we’re writing songs on the internet, I’m going, “You know what, this isn’t working very well. I need you in person”. I’m anxious to hear him on some new songs that we have, that I’ve been writing and we’re gonna go into the studio. A buddy of mine who used to be in Dio for about seven years, and was in a card World War III back in the day with Vinnie Appice and Jimmy Bain and the singer called Mandy (Lion), but he has a better studio than my home studio. When I record something at home, I need two guys to come over and bring this certain gear, “Can you bring that cord?” It’s just too much of a pain, so I go down to Tracy (G’s). He’s got a nice setup, he’s done about 20 records there, and we’re buddies from our teenage years, we used to be in rival bands, so looking forward to hearing his voice with my guitar, should be fun. :54
On the early LA club days – Well, I can tell you that besides even those bands you mentioned, there were a lot of other bands that were a bigger deal than us. We played Sundays and Monday nights at the Starwood and the Whisky and the Troubadour. We really took our lumps for a lot of years and we got better because we played so much and we played free a lot, we would play anywhere that would have us as long as there were people in front of the stage. We did that for about three, maybe four years, and just finally somebody was in the crowd that can help us. We weren’t a big name, it looked like fly’s legs, that’s how big our name was in ads. Motley Crue was huge and other bands like Stormer and all these, Smile. It seemed like every band was bigger than us. We had a lot to prove. And Van Halen, I saw them when I was 17 years old in the backyard, and they seemed to play every night, and I’m going, “We have to do that. I don’t care what it takes, but if we don’t take that work ethic, nobody’s ever gonna see us”, we gotta put it ourselves in a good position to hopefully somebody in the crowd that means something and we better have a good night that night. 3:27
On what manager Alan Niven brought to the band in the early days – Well, for one thing, at least what I got from him personally was mostly from the neck up. He kinda gave me confidence and found my strengths and also identified my weaknesses. He did that with the whole band. Because with our first album, we were really just trying to be like Judas Priest or something. We’re very young, and then Judas Priest and Scorpions were kind of flying into the radar. I told the story before, but they weren’t big commercial bands and we loved those bands. Our intial goal was we wanted to get somewhere near as big as they are and they weren’t big, I mean, they were known by our peers, but not really had a big fan base yet, because there wasn’t really a lot of airplay, and so we were really Trying to write heavy, but my influences were Carlos Santana, Eric Clapton, Alvin Lee, and Johnny Winter, and Ritchie Blackmore. But I wasn’t doing that. I’m trying to be Sabbath, it didn’t turn out. I tried to do it, but it didn’t really turn out that way. But that was our version of trying to be heavy. What was happening is when I would noodle around, I would be playing other types of music, more blues style, and that got Alan Niven’s full attention. I think what clicked in his head was, “You should be doing that. Not what you’re doing now”. So he kind of guided us toward developing into playing from the heart, being honest with ourselves in that direction, and that honestly translated into more fans. I think there’s a lot to say about when you’re trying to be something you’re not. I’m not saying that people can totally read that, but they sense something’s not right, I would think, I don’t know for sure, but that’s my guest. As soon as we became honest and just played like the guys that made me wanna improve, just playing whatever came out of my head instead of trying to do some certain things, it all came naturally and our audience accepted it, and we gained a lot of fans. 5:32
On if they could have been prepared for the success of Once Bitten and …Twice Shy – Well, we weren’t at all. In fact, I was actually a little bit concerned about how long, because we never had a hit in our life, and the first time that came up, our Capital Records album, which was the first one, the first single was “Rock Me”, and it was seven minutes long. My argument with Niven was, “We’re not Phil Collins, this isn’t our 18th hit”. You come with the seven-minute song, but there was something about that song that you didn’t realize it was seven minutes because of the dynamic, it wasn’t like a straight-line song that was just like metal bashing for seven minutes, just at one level. It took you here, up here, down here, and you didn’t realize it. Also, Alan did something very funny, meant as kind of a joke, really. But with the timing of the songs, every song on that album, Once Bitten, he put 3:59 on every song, and nobody realized it. So even on the single, we’re sending a seven-minute song to the radio, but it said 3:59. By the time they figure it out, the phones are already lightening up and it’s too late. But it was ironic that we took that big of a chance to come out with a seven-minute song because somebody brought to my attention that MTV wouldn’t even play a 7:00 song from Madonna. In fact, we had to edit “Rock Me” down to five minutes. We did it by re-recording the song because when we try to do technical edit, it wasn’t working. I was so worried they were gonna take my solos out because that’s usually what happened if there’s an edit, “There it goes the solo”. But it all worked out. 8:56
On if the band grew frustrated as music changed and success lessened – We just kind of took it on the chin, we didn’t really get down on ourselves, we just continued business as usual. We had to play 2000 seaters instead of arenas but still the fans were in front of the stage and we were packing them in every night, and just trying to continue to make the best music we can and just keep our energy. We vibrate at a frequency that we’re comfortable with, which is being creative, making music and just staying true to ourselves because that’s usually how we always do our best, not conforming to anything this popular, like, “Oh, Nirvana’s out, let’s all fo get Pendelton’s and trash ourselves or something”. So we welcome them and thought they were awesome, and we just took our lumps. Some people stayed home, we just went out and played slightly smaller shows with fans that were just as enthusiastic as they’ve always been. Fans are really loyal. It’s funny, I notice like in Europe or even Japan, they’re very loyal in the sense nothing can just swim by and they go, “Okay, bye Great White, bye 80, so we’re gonna go to these guys now”. They’ll go, “These guys are cool too, but we’re gonna go see these guys”. So I think that we basically grew up with them and our music is part of their lives, so even though there’s a Nirvana that might the landscape a little bit, it really wasn’t as big a deal as it may have been to someone else. I thought it was amazing. I go, “Man, these guys are out there like they don’t care, it sounds great and they’re playing pretty good”. The drummer, David Grohl, is just totally handling it, and they had a good melody in their music too, nobody talked about that. It wasn’t like they were just trashing to be rebellious, but have no musical content. It was like, “Well, that’s pretty cool. I like that melody. I like that chorus. I like this part in that part”, So to me, it was kind of a welcome breath of fresh air because I felt like the 80s was getting a little watered down, a little too predictable toward the end, especially. Everybody’s kind of started sounding the same, looking the same. So then you’ve got these guys, you come in with Pendelton’s and Levis and tee shirts, who don’t care. It was like a breath of fresh air, really… We’ve never changed or conformed to anything that is popular. It’s very simple. That’s why we keep it. I try to write a bunch of songs the best we can and pick the best, 10 or 12. We’ve never gone, “Okay, we’re gonna write this type of record”, apart from Sail Away. Niven wanted us to do something a little more acoustic, but that’s the only pre-planned record we’ve ever done, we were gonna kinda break out and do a more earthy type, a different look. But apart from that, we always just tried to write the best songs we can. The songs don’t sound that similar, but you could tell who it is. You can’t get away from yourself, but we’re trying to try to get better, we can always get better 12:59
On if he ever thought of stopping after The Station Nightclub tragedy – Well, it’s an interesting situation, it was basically a solo tour for Jack Russell, I went out committing to 4 weeks. I was actually in another band. I started another band with the keyboard player for Eric Clapton. We made a record called Train Station. I took a break and went out on that solo tour and tragedy (struck). as far as moving on, I basically talked to people, prayed with my pastor, being a witness to something like that is pretty brutal, but I don’t know if you call it moving on, but just mourning properly and feeling for those people. 18:27
On continuing Great White with Terry Ilous – We just always wrote like we always did, so it was really just a continuing. The singer, Terry just came to fill in for (Jack). Then he couldn’t return, then we kinda just kept doing shows, so it just seemed natural to go through the record, just continuing on doing the best we can. 19:48
On still sounding like Great White even with different singers – It was different vocally, a little bit, but even, God rest his soul, Bob Coburn who was the famous DJ on KLOS, which is the biggest station in Los Angeles, said, “I knew it was you guys immediately, the first time I heard it”. So yeah, like I said, it’s hard to get away from yourself. When we get in a room together and they really play together, it just makes it sound just like any band. I don’t know what it would be like if we email their parts to each other if we would be the same. When we jam, a lot of things happen that aren’t planned, “Oh, we didn’t think of that”. It just happened and we all kind of launched into that part. I don’t think a lot of those things could happen, but maybe it would sound like we always do. I don’t know. 20:34
On if he worried that the band would lose credibility by changing singers frequently – Well, in the case of me, I just wanted to get it right. I’ve been trying to find a singer. With Andrew (Freeman), I thought he did a great job, but he was in another band. He was in Last In Line and they’re doing two months of touring and so we got to cancel shows and stuff like that. So that was just kind of that case, but I thought he was a really good singer. Brett happened by accident, but he’s the best singer I’ve ever heard in my life. I wanna be able to do the best show that I can for the audience when they hear “Rock Me” or they hear our songs, I wanted to know what they’re looking at, what they’re hearing. Terry, same, great. He didn’t really sing our classics. Look at Foreigner, there’s not one original member, Mick Jones doesn’t even play anymore, hardly, and the fans don’t care. They wanna hear the songs delivered, and they do it unbelievable. I went and played with Foreigner, you cannot believe how they deliver those songs, it is beyond killer and the fans are out there, they’re just cheering and freaking out. When we were kids, I knew everybody’s name in every band. I knew just everything, it was a very human connecting situation. I think today’s generation in general, and even the old schoolers, when they go see a show, they’re reliving their younger years and they wanna hear the songs right. Brett sings our songs absolutely spot on. That’s why I cannot wait to do something with him. I guess you’d call it a Mach II or III or IV, or whatever. I remember them doing that with Deep Purple, it was Mach whatever. They came out with that “Hush” song and then Mach II and then Mach III with Coverdale and Glenn Hughes, Here’s the thing, I think we can make the best record of our lives, I really feel like we have it in us to do that. I’ll make Deep Purple my barometer. They came out with Burn, one of my favorite records I’ve ever heard in my life. The songs are so good, I’m trying to write the best song of my life. That’s what keeps me going, that’s what keeps me motivated. I honestly believe I can write the best song of my life, I have to believe that, or I’ll never do it. It doesn’t have to happen, but I really am putting in a lot of effort, I’ve learned from my past. The stuff I’m working on right now, I’m so excited about, I just can’t wait. I wanna record. 21:59
On Tony Montana’s comment on this site that the classic 5 members would never reunite – Well, for one thing, we have 14 studio albums, and Tony played at two of them. He was in the band literally for two years, and he’s a guitar player. I don’t know that…I guess you would consider the “classic”. I don’t know. But I really can’t envision because of health reasons and stuff like that, and I haven’t even talked to Jack or anything for like 13 years. Have you seen him? Have you seen this show? Have you seen videos or anything? I’ll just leave it there. 25:39
On what fans can expect on the upcoming tour – A lot of unexpected things and everything they wanna hear, with a lot of energy. We go out there like desperate men wanting to impress everybody. We go all the way back to the beginning, up to now. So you might hear something like “Stick It” or something from the first album that was a hit for its time with hardcore fans. It’s just like Master of Puppets for Metallica. Okay, the Black Album, everybody wants to hear that, but the hardcore wants to hear a couple from Master of Puppets. Our first album is kind of our Master of Puppets, so we like to grab “On Your Knees”, or “Stick It”, or something. Actually “On Your Knees” was the first song we ever had on the radio, and we didn’t even have a record deal at the time, so it kinda has a memory attached to it, even though, like we were talking about earlier, I was forced, and we were trying to be like heavy metal or something. We give a little bit of that, there’s some jams that we don’t know what’s gonna happen, so it’s unplanned and making it exciting for us or bringing the crowd into the show. And then all the hits that they’ve loved for years and been loyal to, I hear story after story after story about where people were when this song came out and that song came out, and like I was saying earlier, we basically grew up with our fans. We were kids when they were kids. We’re all still here and still playing and when we get together it’s a great time. 26:50
