Scotti Hill beams a huge smile stretches his hand out and drawls “How ya doing man”. As a founding member of New Jersey rockers Skid Row he has experienced the high highs and low lows of the music industry. Since reforming in 2000 Skid Row have toured the world, recorded two albums ‘Thickskin’ and ‘Revolutions Per Minute’ and a pair of E.P’s ‘United World Rebellion part 1&2’. Originalrock.net caught up with the enigmatic axeman a few hours before the band tore the inaugural and amazing Stonedeaf Festival a new one. Armed with a new singer ZP Theart and with a brand new album on the horizon it’s time to catch up with the one and only Scotti Hill. He’s seen a million faces and he’s rocked them all.
Originalrock.net. So back in 1992 just a few miles down the road (from Newark), Monsters Of Rock Donnington, second on the bill to Iron Maiden…26 years ago,
Scotti Hill. It’s fucking crazy, everywhere I go over here I meet people that were at that gig. Which doesn’t surprise me because it was just a sea of people. And it rained as we would expect but the rain kinda let up when we were out there, it was still slippery as fuck!
OR. The record industry has pretty much done a complete 360 since Skid Row took off back in the late eighties & early nineties, how hard is it for an established band such as yourselves to get a record deal, with an advance and the promotional support that comes with it.
SH. I don’t even know what that means, (pausing). In the old days it was so, it was right there. You get a deal, there’s lots of money behind it and hopefully, you recoup and carry on. Nowadays it’s like, what are you actually selling…Are you selling downloads a little piece of a pie, it’s a very grey area it really is. We’re self-sufficient enough so that we don’t need tour support to keep ourselves out (on the road). So we can support the machine and keep it moving as such. If you need some power or money and stuff behind you, it’s hard to come by. Everybody’s making their money in different ways now.
OR. Touring is now many bands main source of income.
SH. Yeah, where it used to be the source of selling the product.
OR. So was there a point when as a band you sat down and said we’ve gotta change how we operate as a band because everything’s changed around you since releasing ‘Slave To The Grind.’
SH. Just remaining a band, just remaining. Around 96 we split up and there were four years when there really was no Skid Row. When we came back in 2000 with Johnny (Sollinger) it wasn’t a matter of getting a record deal it was the matter of getting a gig. The plan was to put together enough dates to get us out there and the name back out there. So there was no real master plan it was just to try and carry on.
OR. Do you think that experience back in 2000 has ultimately helped you because here we are in 2018 and you’re still touring and still recording?
SH. When I look back to what we did in the nineties and to what we started off doing in 2000, it was like up here as headliners and all that to umm, when we came back it was sleeping bags in a van, literally. Corner stage by the bar, right back where we started.”How many people out there tonight?” “About a hundred and fifty”, alright let’s go do it and just fucking hit them, hard. So it doesn’t matter if we’re playing here tonight (Stonedeaf Festival) or back in those little bars, we’ve always done that, it’s what we’re good at, the live thing. That experience, it went on for quite a while like that, it’s been such a gradual incline to get to this, and I’m grateful to still be here doing it. I can’t believe we survived all that shit. I mean the accidents, the fires the fucking substances and divorces and all that shit. We’re still here and still enjoying it more now than maybe ever you know.
OR. I think there’s a book in there somewhere.
SH. Yeah, could be. Maybe, maybe I’ve scribbled some notes down!
The band have recently recruited former DragonForce frontman ZP Theart as their new lead singer and after witnessing his London debut earlier in the year confidence and vocal dexterity will not be an issue.
OR. So how are you getting on with your new lead singer?
SH. We love him. We knew he was a great singer, from DragonForce, we’d known him for a while. He’s just one of us, a warrior he’s not afraid to get his hands dirty, he works, he can hang, and the dynamic in the band is such a brotherhood at this point. It’s really great, it’s a pleasure to be around these guys, we’re close friends we’re family, we watch out for each other and respect each other. I don’t think a lot of bands have that, especially after this amount of time.
OR. So was it a hard decision for everyone involved to part company with Johnny after he helped you rebuild your following and the band’s name?
SH. Yes, because I don’t have any personal grievances with John, it’s just umm (pausing) he had his things to deal with. I just wish the best for him, I don’t have anything bad to say about him.
OR. What do the next twelve months hold in store for Skid Row?
SH. Well in the little gaps of off time that we get we’ve been going to Nashville to work on our (new) record. We’re doing pre-production in the studio with Michael Wagner, which is very exciting for us because he produced our two biggest records (Skid Row & Slave To The Grind) and we’ve had a great friendship ever since. He’s got a really nice studio there when we go in it’s like home and we work on the stuff. We’ll be back in there in two weeks for another week before we go out and do another string of shows.
OR. And is the album going to be part of ‘The United World Rebellion’ series?
SH. It’s going to be a full length ‘United World Rebellion’, chapter three, finally. I’m pretty sure it’s going to be called Chapter Three, I don’t know man, (laughing) I play the guitar. Yeah, so it’s going to be full length which I’m very happy about. Stuffs been coming a lot easier these days, due to the fact…it’s just easier to get shit done.
OR. Skid Row as a band has come through a hell of a lot of ups and downs when you look back to your peak, the Slave To The Grind era is there any one defining moment when you thought or went (omg) Fuuuuckkkk…Because from the outside it looked like a giant carnival.
SH. It was one of those Donnington’s or even Milton Keynes (1989). We came over and we played The Marquee (club in London) then a few days later we played Milton Keynes (bowl) with Bon Jovi. I remember standing on the back steps of the stage with the band for a photocall and it was like “Holy fuck” there was sixty photographers just going nuts, it was just crazy. Oh, and of course Moscow in 1989 was just crazy. (In 1989 Skid Row along with the biggest names in Rock music flew to Moscow to perform at ‘The Make A Difference Foundation’ Festival to raise awareness and provide treatment for drug and alcohol addiction. The other bands on the two-day bill included such upstanding abstaining members of the musical community like Motley Crue, Cinderella, Bon Jovi and Ozzy Osbourne. The whole show was marred by backstage squabbling about stage time, running order and pyros. With no official headliners, it was Bon Jovi who closed the show with a huge firework display and thus followed a fight between Tommy Lee and the then Bon Jovi manager (and festival organiser and possible drug importer (never proven!) Doc McGhee.)
OR. Someone just needs to write on book on that.
SH. Oh, that was just outta control. All of getting on an aeroplane, playing together, sneaking their booze on…
OR. It sounds like a lads holiday?
SH. It was just fucking over the top man, over the top. Everybody was just partying their fucking faces off. This Rock against drug and alcohol thing! We were never much of a drug band, I can’t speak for everybody, but we were certainly a drinking band, and it nearly killed me, I had to give it up. But back in those days, it was flowing mighty hard ‘n’ easy!
With time running short and the PR giving me the one more question look we switch to the bands set list.
OR. Are there any songs you wished you’d never have to play live again?
SH. I wish I could say yes but everything we play I’m happy to play. There are a few songs that we don’t play that I wouldn’t want to play. (Pauses) ‘Can’t Stand The Heartache’ you know it’s a nice song but I don’t think it’s representative of what we are, but it was our first record and we were still figuring out who we were. The band you got on the first record and the band you got on the second record were very different.
OR. And the set is primarily made up of the first two albums so is ZP learning stuff of United World Rebellion 1&2?
SH. We mix it up off those two, we play something off that (World Rebellion) I don’t know, that’s why I have a giant set-list! No glasses and a giant set-list which pretty much says the same thing every night but I still need it! And of course, we play the stuff people have to hear (18 & Life, Monkey Business, Slave To The Grind and I Remember You etc…) and they’re fun to play. People ask me if I get tired of playing them and I don’t know but I don’t get tired of seeing the reaction of the people when we play them and they hear them. The hands just do what the hands do.
And he’s off but not before a final quip about today’s Festival,
SH. You know what the sun’s shining now but it’s gonna get cold later but we’ll warm them up!
And they did.
Skid Row continues to write new material tour the world and their ever-loyal followers continually flock back for more of the same. The reason is simple, the songs still stand up, the band give it 100% every night and fans new and old love hearing those timeless songs that surfed over the Metal genres. Skid Row’s Rock-tastic back catalogue and undoubted work ethic mean they won’t be the ones left behind.