Tommy Stinson
By Waleed Rashidi
At the barely ripe, eerily young and fiercely impressionable age of 13, Minneapolis-bred musician Tommy Stinson plotted the course of his life thus far, by simply joining as the bassist of his older brother Bob's scrappy punk outfit, The Replacements. Fronted by the now-revered Paul Westerberg and best known as a group whose drunken-blur stage antics generally superceded their surprisingly high degree of musicality, The Replacements' pop and blues-based punk gained national notoriety in the early '80s, paralleling neighboring punk act H?sker D?. Since The Replacements' demise, Stinson formed Bash & Pop, moved to L.A. and performed in Perfect, and then signed aboard the latest incarnation of Guns N' Roses. Although he's still associated with Guns, Stinson has been able to produce his own solo work. His latest, released this past summer, is Village Gorilla Head (Sanctuary). Nearly a quarter-century since his start, Stinson is still creating and producing rock that matters - this time, sans much of the riffraff that enveloped his earliest efforts.
Living in L.A., how much of your songwriting would you say is influenced by your surroundings?
You know, a good part of it is definitely that. I've lived here for 10 years and there's certainly a lot of songs that have been written in that period.
Did you move here for your career?
Mostly it was because I made a record for Warner Bros. and kinda how it was going down, or not going down, I kinda felt like it would work a little better if I was in their face, then I could kind of be around and that was a good part of the reason why I went out. As I got into town, that was really not exactly how it works. Then it all fell into place and I was there.
Where are you living these days?
I live in Burbank. I don't have any problem being (818), none at all.
Was there any resistance in the Guns N' Roses camp in releasing your solo album?
No, it's actually the exact opposite. [Axl Rose] has been real supportive of me and my stuff. He's listened to it all and totally championing me. One reason why is that it keeps me from barking up the tree, his tree, going "What are we doing? What am I doing?" I've been pretty straight up about everything and it works out good.
Everyone out there would really love to hear me talk shit and say, "Yeah, he had me fuckin' tied by the balls, and I decided to fuck him and make my own [record]" but it's really just nonsense. I've talked about it enough where it's like now, I'm done even explaining it in those terms. [Rose] is really supportive of me and I'm totally into doing Guns N' Roses again. We made a great record together and when it comes out, I'll be the first one in line to go tour behind it.
Getting to your songs on Village Gorilla Head, "Couldn't Wait" rocks. What's behind such a propulsive track?
Thank you, you know, it just kind of popped out, one of those things. The beauty of making this record is that I wasn't trying to make a cohesive record. I was trying to write a bunch of songs and each song is it's own little planet, so to speak.
Yeah, the album does seem a bit scatterbrained.
That's the way I like listening to records. I don't like listening to 12 songs that sound very similar to the one radio song, but they're not as good. I like to hear bands take risks and go places that maybe they're not geared for or take chances that they shouldn't take. That's kinda where I come from.
How much of a risk would you say this album is?
There's plenty of risk on it. I'm sure I'm gonna get panned to death on some of this stuff. I made a record I wanted to make and someone decided they liked it enough to put it out, Sanctuary Records, and it's like, cool, that's all I do. If someone can put 'em out, then put 'em out so the rest of the world can check 'em out.
After a quarter-century of playing rock, is there anything that starts to hurt after a while?
Only the business side.
On the web:
www.tommystinson.comView this band's Mean Street info page
http://mag.meanstreet.com/article.php?article_id=305&issue_id=59
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