****let me start by thanking Jon Freeman of Freeman Promotions for setting this interview up for me and also to Hank’s Tour Manager, Amanda.****
I have been a fan of HANK VON HELL for quite a while now, and let me say I don’t do many interviews due to time constraints but when I found out I had a chance to talk one on one with Hank in person, there was NO way I could turn it down! This was really exciting and I felt honored to have a chance to sit with Hank. Now before I even start, do yourself a favor if you haven’t already and follow Hank on Social Media. His daily videos are pure comedic genius, so along with great music you will get tons of laughs too! HANK VON HELL on Facebook HANK VON HELL on Instagram
So for those that don’t already know, Hank Von Hell was the amazing frontman for the band TURBONEGRO for many years. A band that really earned their stripes in the European market and have a cult-like following World Wide. But Hank hasn’t been in that band for a long time now, and has kind of been off the radar for about a decade until his first rock solo album was released, called “EGOMANIA”. So let’s see where he’s been, what he’s been up to and what’s in the future.
So of course, right away it starts LOL! As Hank greets me “Hey John” and I ask “How are you?” I get a resounding “FACK YOU!”. That’s not a typo, please follow Hank on social media to get the joke! LOL! I ask Hank how he’s doing, I tell him he looks great (Hank has recently lost a LOT of weight) and ask him if by rocking he has sweated it all away.”Yeah but inside I’m dying, I’m dead inside. So….I look great but it’s just a facade…no — (laughs)”.
KAF – So I was a big Turbo fan, you guys started as this Hardcore Punk band and the sound really took a change when your formed the “Death Punk” sound. Was that conscious or was it like a natural evolution?
HANK – Um…I wouldn’t say it was Hardcore Punk either, because it was very influenced in the beginning by the Sub-Pop scene and also the Portland scene around Poison Idea. When Turbonegro started playing the Punk scene in Oslo (Norway) that was before my time. It was actually something new, something different. because there was a lot of classic Hardcore Punk before that, very European Punk. But that was bringing new American Underground into the sound.
****** for some reason my recording cut off the rest of Hank’s answer but he did go on to tell me that the addition of Euro Boy on guitar really made Turbonego’s sound change.********
KAF – When you left the band and were, let’s say “off the radar”, I saw that you were still recording music but it wasn’t rock, it was, I don’t know what you’d call it…
HANK – Yeah, it was Scandinavian Folk Singing. Also I tapped into a lot of collaborations with established singer/songwriters and Pop musicians and I went into Musical Theater.
KAF – You did Jesus Christ Superstar, right?
HANK – Yes, Jesus Christ Superstar , and I kind of pursued also my acting career. I basically did everything BUT Punk Rock…..to be honest, I kind of did that on purpose. Not that I had any plans on coming back, or not, I was willing to do either. Actually it’s not exactly true that I promised never ever I will be Hank Von Hell again, I just said it’s not very likely but I never actually shut the door, and I don’t do that in life. I never shut doors for anything.
KAF – Was that process all necessary for you to get back to where you are?
HANK – Well yeah, I just needed to know…… that under the Hank Von Hell/Turbonegro umbrella that there was a lot of limits for me artistically because the rules were very defined.
KAF – Because people expected you to sound a certain way
HANK – Yeah…..and also you stay within the core of business, and you don’t go out of character.
KAF – Is Hank Von Hell kind of like an Alice Cooper kind of thing? Where Alice says he’s Vincent Furnier then he puts the makeup on and he’s Alice, is that similar with you?
HANK – Yeah, very much….and that has to do with basic survival.
KAF – Now, being a fan, I had the (album by the band you made after leaving Turbonegro) Doctor Midnight and the Mercy Cult album, that was just a one album thing, right?
HANK – Yeah it was Tim Skold from Shotgun Messiah, KFDM and he played guitar for Marilyn Manson. He also produced a lot of the Manson hits. We had Anders from Cadaver and Satyricon, he even played in Ministry for a while. We just wanted to make the album and see how it went, me and Skold wanted to do something together and we wanted to check this out, and see what it became. We realize it was a really cool thing but flying Tim (Skold) over all the time was very strenuous. I also had a LOT of other stuff to do so Satyricon demanded Anders’ attention so it became a rare occasion. But we have never ever said that it would never happen again, but it’s more like a project. When the time is right we could very well be interested in grouping up again.
KAF – Now I also noticed a few months before this current band was together and the Egomania album was announced, that you did a song and a promo video with the band MUSTASCH. Was that a stepping stone to get back to rock music?
HANK – For the label (Sony) it was. The producer and A&R from Sony music that had that project at that time. He kind of heard rumors that I was still alive and started a pretty intense research and investigation to figure out where the fuck I was…….
KAF – Where were you?
HANK – At that time I was actually trapped in a reality show so I only had 30 minutes of phone contact with my manager every 4th day. He’d call me and we’d do business but I had cameras all over. It was a cooking program kind of like Big Brother just that we were running a restaurant with other celebrities.
KAF – So how did you find the players for this (your current) band?
HANK – Sam (guitars) has been working with me for 7 years now. He’s been part of that Swedish Folk song thing, me and him translated a lot of Johnny Cash songs into Norwegian together, and recorded it. Just a couple of songs came out. He’s been touring with me in all sorts of Folk song situations. Also we made some hip hop songs with Norwegian Hip Hop God, we basically are very broad-spread variety act. It was of key importance to me that he went along for this project since he knows my artistry better than anybody else musically and also when it comes to creative content and stuff like that. He knows a lot. Then Dead Said Fred and Jean Genus who were also a result of a many year search. Also Cat Casino was on for a while, then he left. Sometimes we change the line-up, we have had Jones Kelly II and now we have KJ Melgoza. Basically the band has some sort of stable rooting but it’s a very dynamic root of musicians that I swap when I need, that I hire when I need, I fire when I need.
KAF – Is it a prerequisite that they hate Neil Diamond? **** Again, you all need to follow Hank on social media!!! LOL! This is along running gag that Hank does not like Neil Diamond AT ALL!
HANK – NO! They are actually part of his fan club. Yeah I have this philosophy to keep my enemies close. So I ONLY hire fans of Neil Diamond because, they don’t know it but, they can report to me what the fuck he’s doing and what he’s planning against me.
***** from Facebook*****-
Check it out – Extremely limited edition poster available at the merch booth tonight. Won’t be available in any webshop, only on tour. Oh, and Fuck Neil Diamond
KAF – People ask me all the time, what’s the deal with Hank and Neil Diamond?
HANK – well he stole my makeup! That’s MY swag.
KAF – I told you my theory, right? Because what’s the one thing you hate? Banana flies, right? (Again, follow Hank!) “yeah” So Neil Diamond used to write songs for The Monkees….so what do Monkees eat? Bananas!
HANK – I follow your intuitional hate (laughs) all these good reasons pop up like turds in water.
KAF – That was just my theory. Just throwing it out there!
HANK – Interesting theory. He’s been plotting against me and stealing my swag for years.
KAF – Then on the opposite side, the Ricky Martin stuff. (follow Hank on social media damn it!!!) Now I was wondering, we used to have an NFL Coach who used to leave a ticket for Elvis at the ticket booth for every game, would you do something similar for Ricky?
HANK – Ricky is always welcome, I just need to find his address so I can send him my new poems. So that he understands that they’re all about him.
We started talking about Hank and his ability to create funny and creative lyrics
KAF – I love the new album, the band looks great and sounds great. The show last night (Brooklyn) was fucking amazing! it’s great to have you back ( Thanks bro!). …and the lyrics to your songs, it’s almost like comedy. Some of those lyrics are brilliant, they way you come up with a melody and still make it funny.
HANK – We want to have like a tongue in cheek approach to life basically. But there’s also a lot of truth in the humor, in the comedy.
KAF – Like “fake it to make it”?
HANK – yeah!
KAF – Now you guys were supposed to come over here a few months ago and it got screwed up (VISA problems). You said when you were going to announce the new dates for the USA tour that you were also talking about new music. I know you played one song on some of the Festivals (in Europe). What’s the updates on new recordings, any updates you can give us?
HANK – In the beginning of 2020 the new album “DEAD” will be released. I made a video the day before flying over here. You can hear it…..
So after I stopped recording, Hank did play me 2 songs that will be on the next album and they were fucking awesome!!! Thank you Hank for the preview, I felt honored to hear them in advance!!!
KAF – Now that song contest show that you were on, where you did “FAKE IT” (see the video above). What was up with that, it was incredible? All the pyro, and you flying around on that platform, it was awesome! It was like watching KISS because I see kids in the audience wearing your makeup, it was amazing! How did all of that come about?
HANK – The Eurovision Song Contest is a REALLY big thing in Europe. It’s usually a mix of Folk songs from different nations, and Pop music. It’s actually a song writing contest. It has a huge following in the Pride scene because of it’s roots in musical theater and sometimes it’s just a huge drag show. It’s a lot of great singers who perform there in different genres. Celion Dion actually represented Switzerland one time. They always want to have one kind of credibility thing so it doesn’t become an all out chessiness, ya know? So they wanted to have a little bit of a rock n roll alibi. They approached me and I said yes…… we didn’t think we were going to go to the European Finals but we were allowed to kind of have a pyro and costume budget and a seven camera production. It created exactly the amount of attention that we wanted. I don’t know if the song (FAKE IT) will be on DEAD or not. But it was an expensive and side consuming side track. We were going to start recording immediately but instead but when we realized the Visa thing, we were going to be postponed. We wanted to make like a 4 song 12 inch US Special Addition and give back to a charity, I picked the US Veterans. I still am very, very supportive of everybody who’s trying to make life for Veterans in Norway and Europe and of course America, better. I want to show gratitude and respect. As we started recording we realized we had a full album, so we put that aside and we are going to fulfill our promise to the Veterans, but it’s something we realized we had really good material, much better than we expected. DEAD will be out in February of 2020.
KAF – So this is all fresh material, not like left overs from the first album, right?
HANK – No, no, no – all new.
KAF – The only reason I know about the Eurovision contest is because of LORDI.
HANK – The biggest thing most Americans aren’t aware of is that ABBA won that contest in 1976 with “Waterloo”. So everybody looks to ABBA and thinking it’s actually possible to win that and become World famous.
KAF – Well Hank, you need to take care of yourself because we need you Hank…..The World needs ya, I mean you’re The Emperor Of America now!!!! ***during his current live show, Hank does a stage rap about how he can’t become the President of the USA because he wasn’t born here, so he referred to himself as the “Emperor Of America”******* What the United States gonna do with out Hank?! (laughs)
HANK – The Doctor said “If you’re gonna break America now, you need to have the health to deliver the coming decades of your life. So you’re not allowed to fuck it up!” I’m prepared.
HANK VON HELL & John Erigo, pre show in Brooklyn, NY . Pic by ROCKSTARPIX
So as we wrapped things up Hank went on to play me those 2 new songs. That was a real treat! This interview took place on Hank’s tour bus outside the Chameleon Club in Lancaster, PA on August 9, 2019. Again, I urge you all to check out Hank’s album title EGOMANIA and if he comes to your town, or anywhere close, GO SEE HIM LIVE!!! The band is great, you will no doubt enjoy it. Thanks again to Hank Von Hell for being so candid and allowing me onto his bus, it was so cool! I will leave ya with one more song, and also, stay tuned for Part 2, the show review and live videos and pix from the 2 gigs I attended.
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