Band Interview: Lucifer Jones Live Facebook Interview with: Aerik Von vocalist

Lucifer Jones
Live Facebook Interview with: 

Aerik Von vocalist

Facebook: Lucifer Jones

Conducted by: 
Lady Kat Chaos and Dave Wolff of Autoeroticasphyxium Zine

January 26, 2014


OCZ: Hails and  Welcome Aerik! Thanks for doing this live interview on Facebook with us and fans. How has your New Year been so far?

Aerik Von: 2014 started with a bang...we had a great show at Webster Hall to start things off...

OCZ: That's the best way to start the New Year off. What's it like playing live at Webster Hall?

Aerik Von: It's one of the best stages ever...we also bring a lot of intentional and unintentional madness...so a great venue like that gives us the proper forum to express what we are doing.

Patrick O'Donnell (guest): Who would win in a wrestling match? Lemmy, or god?

Aerik Von: No trick questions. Lemmy is God.

OCZ:  I agree Webster Hall is a great venue to play. Do you have to sell tickets?

Aerik Von: Nah. We didn't have to do anything like that. Some people probably do but we were simply booked to play and played.

OCZ: What other venues would you like to play this year in NY?

Aerik Von: Blackthorn has contacted us and we will happily play there...but mostly we would like to move up to bigger venues and tour more after we finish recording.

OCZ: That's another great venue and smaller venues are a ton of fun to perform as well. What are your thoughts about the New York scene?

Aerik Von:  I am typically an outsider to any scene but I see a frustrating focus on high school styled popularity contests vs. a focus on music. There are many good bands...but we try to not get stuck in any one place.

Dave (Autoeroticasphyxium Zine): Is the scene in NY better or worse off than two decades ago, from your point of view?

Aerik Von: Two decades ago is a whole different game...the internet wasn't in charge and the big labels were still relevant. In some ways we have more global reach but the internet has allowed too many voices to out-scream each other at once...not better...but VERY different.

Dave (Aea Zine): Do you prefer vinyl, cassette or CD and why?

Aerik Von: Vinyl is my big preference due to sound and presentation...cassettes sounded great and are how I learned everything I loved...hated CDs and the CD era. Skip, skip, skip. No wonder MP3's were such an easy transition.

OCZ: I agree, wasn't a huge fan of CD's either. Will you be releasing your next release on Vinyl?

Aerik Von: Yes...vinyl with digital download. I'm not such a bastard as to expect people to buy my music twice...

OCZ: Have you thought about doing a picture disc?

Aerik Von: Actually, no...but if the offer came I would certainly do it.

OCZ: How has the artistic freedom been throughout the history of your band? Have you had any limitations or did you get to do practically anything you wanted?

Aerik Von: I've done everything I wanted. We've had silent acoustic and shows where I barely made it out without passing out from blood loss. Musically, we do what we want, visually as well. We don't consider other people in our creative process and we never will.

Dave (Aea Zine): Do you think bands that set their own rules are more likely to maintain longevity than bands that care more about "pleasing the people"?

Aerik Von:  It's completely how you gain longevity. If you worry about constantly pleasing people and you're not Jon Bon Govi you are going to be constantly miserable in finding a way to seek trends. Even in the underground you find bands becoming slaves to what they think will keep them popular in their little circle and eventually they burn out. You either love what you are doing or you don't and if you think what you are doing is pretty damn good and get excited about it most likely other people will be too. Too many bands hit hard and then have no idea what to do next as they really don't have a long term concept for part other than a few free drinks every other Friday and some attention online. I don't function that way. I do this for my own reasons.

OCZ: You mentioned earlier that you were in the process of writing for a new release. How much is written thus far?

Aerik Von: We have over 200 songs written but actually going into a room and putting them down is a totally different scenario. Shane Keogh, David Andrew Guevara and I tend to work very slowly at putting the actual final pieces together. We've always had issues recording due to how insular I am about the whole thing so 200 songs written and you'll hear them 2-3 at a time on 7" singles most likely as that is the speed we work.

OCZ: As far as putting the final pieces together, what song has taken you the longest to write?

Aerik Von: I have called "Withered Root" which is still being pieced together properly! Usually they come into my head as complete designed but "Wither" has been going on for some time now and has yet to reach the band. It was written an acoustic in a house with no running water and barely any electricity. A lot of inspiration on that but perfectionism keeps it hidden away in the basement for now.

OCZ: At times different atmospheres can be inspiring to create a song. Where do you mainly write your material?

Aerik Von: Very much so...I live in a city with a million ghosts and secrets... I also have spent time in some pretty strange locales...the atmosphere of all of them comes off in the songs.

OCZ: What is the biggest secret you have learned and wrote about it?

Aerik Von: A lot...there is nothing like a city filled with junkies, maggots and general human failure to inspire a record.

Dave (Aea Zine): How does your environment have an influence on your lyrics?What bolstered your feelings toward the environment you see around you? And what strange locales influenced the atmospheres you include in your material?

Aerik Von: A lot of forest central areas in the mountains of the north had a huge effect on me... The seedy hotel rooms on the road had a huge effect on me. The more emptiness and hardship you see the more problems you have to face...the more.you have to write about. I'm not one to live my fantasies in my lyrics.

OCZ: Speaking of hotels, you wrote a song called "Roach Motel" in which we have many of those throughout NY. I would rather sleep in a car then book one of them places. It's not easy being on the road. What do you like and dislike?

Aerik Von: Be patient folks! I am here! I like playing to new people and not being "stuck" in one place...I hate the being stuck in a car with other people and the shitty food. Roach Motel is actually about the Chelsea Hotel.

OCZ: Chelsea Hotel, where the walls still talk. One of the oldest hotels around NY. What was your personal experience like staying there?

Aerik Von: I pretty much lived there for awhile...it's kind of like Kubricks take on the Shining but it's all real.

Dave (Aea Zine): Dive or not, the Chelsea Hotel is an important piece of NYC history that is still around now that CBGB & OMFUG, Bleecker Bob's and more recently Gray's Papaya (8th street) are gone. What is your view toward this?

Aerik Von: It's disappointing but I saw it all coming. The time of old NYC is being replaced with a new, horrible monster of change. It's not possible to resist so why get upset?

OCZ: Patti Smith and Sid Vicious both lived there as well. Many great places, venues and record stores in NY are closing down, greed, rent to high, laws that have to be met to run a venue, the new generation of buying records, and so forth. What NY clubs do you miss playing at that have banished?

Aerik Von: L'amour was fucking great. I played my first NYC show there and it was fantastic.

OCZ: Good ol' L'amour's in Brooklyn. Did you ever play L'amour East in Queens? 

Aerik Von: Never played L'amour East...

Dave (Aea Zine): On the other hand, we still have ABC No Rio and free shows in Tompkins Square Park, along with other new clubs and new vinyl outlets opening in NY and other states in the U.S.. Do you consider slim hope better than none?

Aerik Von: I have hope for the US...not as much for NYC...I have played in the park recently!

OCZ: Was there ever an instance onstage you knew you were going to be sick or were feeling extremely fatigued? What did you do about it? Did you leave the stage or keep playing? What was the most obscure or chaotic experience you had at one of your shows?

Aerik Von: I once went onstage was pneumonia...that was rough. I just gutted it through. The MOST chaotic??? Hmmmm...I would say that the Bowery Poetry Club show where we offered a legal summons for property damage was pretty nuts. Blood and bodies everywhere.

OCZ: A lot comes down to the bands when fans get a little chaotic at shows and they try to make bands be fully responsible. How do you think things could be handle differently?

Aerik Von: They can't really. I escaped that one because I was attacked before the show by an idiot.

OCZ: Do you feel you always have to watch your surrounding all the time now with all the mayhem that has been happening to other band members as well?

Aerik Von: Not really...things have calmed down a bit...we are taking a "music first" approach to things that has tamed a lot of the drama.

Gene Olivarri: Who influenced your guitar playing?

Aerik Von: Tony Lommi, Euronymous, Billy Gibbons, Leslie West, Glenn Tipton...some of the early ones.

OCZ: I know that you have to head out in a bit and you're willing to return to respond to any questions anyone has to ask about your band Lucifer Jones. I thank you for doing our first live interview...

Aerik Von: We will continue this later! Feel free to ask me anything you want on this thread later!