Juggernaught Interview

“You can’t play Man-Rock unless you are born with the inner urge to be all the man that you can be.” -Snakebite

“Genres are for pussies, if you say you play post-hardcore-penis whatever then you pigeonhole yourself.” – Alex Munroe

Juggernaught are a bunch of hairy, whiskey guzzling, guitar slingin men, who play hairy, whiskey guzzling, guitar slingin music, they combine Classic Rock, Southern Metal, Blues and Rock ‘n Roll into one loud, dirty and very bad ass brew called MAN-ROCK.

We got hold of them and they laid it all out on the table. Headbanging, their whiskey, recording ‘Act Of Goat’, as well as RAW MEAT!

Juggernaught are:

Alex Munroe – Guitar/Vocals

All Man – Guitar

Snakebite – Bass

Oneyedog – Drums

Interview By: Scream

Published 2009-10-20

Headbang Today: Welcome To Headbang Today! Now, after I gave your new album a listen, I could tell that you obviously have quite a wide range of musical influences from many sub-genres such as Blues Metal, Southern Rock and the like. Which bands are primarily your biggest influences?

Alex: AC/DC, Motorhead, Clutch, Gov’t Mule, Ike Turner, Megadeth, W.A.S.P, Priest, Tony Joe White, Elvis, Deep Purple, Dissection, Robert Johnson, Sepultura, Skid Row… Too many, too wide a range to carry on mentioning…
Oneyedog: My cat, Ike Turner

Snakebite : Black Crowes, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Ike Turner and a LOT of country music. (Johnny Cash, Waylon Jennings, Hank Williams)
Jovan: Ike Turner and mostly stoner rock (Spiritual Beggars, Dozer, Halfway to Gone, etc)

Headbang Today: Whiskey, wine, women and rock and roll seems to be the only things you dudes care about! What do you care about the least?

All Man: AIDS and celebrities, especially celebrities with AIDS, I really don’t care about them.

Oneyedog: What everyone else thinks.

Alex: Man, theres just so many things I just couldn’t give a fuck about it’s hard to think of something specific.

Snakebite : Posh things

Headbang Today: So… when exactly was the last time any of you had a shave?

Snakebite : Real women don’t like men who shave.
Oneyedog: Since I’m the only one without a beard, it’ll have to be Saturday. That’s my shower day.
Alex: What are you talking about? I shave every day, just before I replace my tampons.

Headbang Today: HAHA! You’ve just kicked off a huge nation-wide tour. What do you look forward to the most during this very busy tour and what don’t you look forward to at all?

Snakebite : Playing every night is awesome, ’cause the band becomes very tight. Drinking every night is awesome, ’cause gotrut is awesome… I mean gutrot. I don’t look forward to the rutgot so much.
Jovan: Spending hours in the “fart box” driving with a hangover everyday sucks a bit, showing all the towns a good time and introducing them to Juggernaught rock balls though and makes up for it.
Oneyedog: Ahhh best part of the tour is obviously the gigs and the cool people we meet afterwards. The worst parts have to be waiting around the whole day for the gig in the evening, trying not to drink too much beforehand.
Alex: I think there are a lot of pro’s and cons, on tour there’s a lot of drinking, shouting and going nuts, it makes driving from show to show more difficult and it’s hard on the old voice, playing with a huge hangover and giving it your all every night sounds like fun but it’s hard work, wherever you go people expect 100% and i’m not about to let them down. We’re not the kind of band that plays a show and leaves straight afterward, we drink with the people at the place and get to know people in every town. Being professional becomes more difficult, organizing gigs, doing promotion etc. Also these days a band has to be in front of a PC in stead of on the road, well we’re not like that, we play a lot and were on the road a lot, we’re a live band, not an internet band.

Headbang Today: Leave the internetz promos to us! It’s our playground… How long have you been working on your new album ‘Act Of Goat’ and tell us a bit about the processes involved in writing your new material?

Jovan:Well, some of the tracks were written over two years ago and some just weeks before the recording, so the process is different for all tracks, but mostly an almost finished song is brought to practice and then we jam it, change it, add stuff, remove stuff, fight about stuff, until we all throb. Then it’s a done song.

Headbang Today: Did you record your album in some cabin up a hill in a dense forest or did recording actually take place in a studio, if so, which one? What was the treatment like (or were you the ones dishing out the treatment there)?

Snakebite : All of the above.
Oneyedog: It was a cool experience. Like every recording session it’s a learning experience and you always end up knowing a shit load more once you finished than when you went in. One should actually record the album twice if we lived in a perfect world.
Alex: We recorded the album at Wolmer records, it was engineered by Lanie Van Der Walt (Not My Dog). It’s in Wolmer which is a few kilometres further than the other side of the tracks, we felt right at home.

Headbang Today: Where did your album name ‘Act Of Goat’ originate from and what does it actually mean?

All Man: It’s like “Act of God” but better because goats are real
Oneyedog: All hail the Goat. He’ll get ya!

Headbang Today: Tell us a bit more about your names. Snakebite, One Eye Dog, All Man etc… Typical Southern Rocker names! Where do these aliases come from and how do they fit your characters on stage?

Snakebite : Take half a pint of lager, mix it with half a pint of cider, and you’ve got Snakebite. And I used to drink a LOT of snakebite, hence the nickname. Serendipity at work, right there.
Oneyedog: I believe it originated on a whiskey fuelled open mic night at the old Nile Crocodile. Lets just say they didn’t have open mic night again after that.
Alex: Uhm, they never had open mic night, you just got up thought you were Tina Turner and someone gave you the ol Ike Turner’s one eye dawg!
All Man: All Man all the time.

Headbang Today: /See kids, these are what you call real men!/ – What would you say have been the highlights of your career? (bizarre and crazy incidents count as highlights as well!)

Oneyedog:  We played some awesome gigs, but the best has to be Oppi last year. Of course that includes the debauchery afterward as well.
Alex: We have played some very good shows, Motherfudd, Witchfest, Lucky Fish, Oppikoppi etc. Had quite a few fights, showed my cock to lots and lots of people, drank a lot and rocked a lot, it’s the life i chose and i love it.

Headbang Today: Whipping out one’s member and displaying it to the public, does sound like fun… How would you best describe your general lyrical content to potential and non-fans alike?

Snakebite : It’s about the good,  the bad and the horrendously, stupendously, disgracefully ugly.
Alex: It’s a bit of everything, we are a serious band as well as a party band, there are serious songs which have to do with politics, religion, life, love etc.. and there are songs about girls and whiskey and Zamalek.
All Man: “Love” fag.

Headbang Today: If raw fish is called Sushi, then what is raw meat?

Jovan: Biltong and steak tartar, was this a trick question?
Snakebite : Salmonella
Alex: Food
Oneyedog: My cat (the other white meat)

Headbang Today: Define your self-proclaimed genre of MAN-ROCK! What’s the most important fact about it and can other bands use your formula or should they avoid it to prevent getting cannibalised!

Alex: I’d be honoured if there was another band worthy of playing Man-Rock. If some pussy band claims they play Man-Rock they will be consumed! Seriously; we came up with Man-Rock because people kept asking us which genre we’re in and we’re not about that. Genres are for pussies, if you say you play post-hardcore-penis whatever then you pigeonhole yourself. What you are saying is that you sound exactly like some other band. We have such diverse influences and we take bits from everything, we’re not Metal, Blues or whatever, we’re Rock ‘n Roll, we sound like Juggernaught, nothing else.

Snakebite : You can’t play Man-Rock unless you are born with the inner urge to be all the man that you can be.
All Man: Like the Bar-One man, only with more hair.

Headbang Today: Your favourite whisky?

All Man:Jamesons and My Kinda, not sure if they still make the latter though.
Snakebite : Wild Turkey
Alex: Jack Daniels, Jim Beam, Jamesons, Black Label, Wild Turkey, First Watch…
Oneyedog: Jim Beam Black Label. There’s a new SA whiskey/Bourbon called Baines which is really good. Support local

Headbang Today: Alex, we should hit the pubs together one night! At any one time 0.74% of the worlds population is intoxicated. How often are any of you guys a part of this statistic?

Snakebite : How often is this statistic measured against us?
Oneyedog: 74.0% of the time 100% of the time

Headbang Today: What has been you biggest obstacle for the band and how did you manage to overcome that very ass-aching obstacle?

Snakebite : I pulled it out, it no longer hurts.
Oneyedog: My biggest obstacle is the rest of the bands ressistance to my ass-aching obstacle, if you know what I mean.
Alex: I don’t know if anything specific was a big obstacle, we still face huge obstacles, getting our name out there, becoming recognized, making enough money to do it full-time?

Headbang Today: Have you ever considered pulling off a death metal number?

All Man: We have a blues blast beat in a new song, does that count.
Oneyedog: no

Snakebite : We have done, many, many times… in the band room.

Headbang Today: For those that are unaware of your upcoming gigs OR have never been to any of your gigs before, what would you say they are missing out on?

Snakebite : Sweat, beer and the sound of a train constantly approaching.
Oneyedog: The coolest rock n’ roll show this side of hell.

Jovan: Ear buggery and a good ol’ time.
Alex: Snakebite’s boyish good looks

Headbang Today: Which song on ‘Act Of Goat’ do you think will stand out the most to fans and why? Also, which song do you enjoy playing the most?

Oneyedog: Tough one, i’d go with Riverside and Wild Turkey. I think they encompass our style and the most fun for me to play.

Snakebite : I love “Wild Turkey”, it kicks the mule in all the places the mule wants to be kicked. Fans always respond very well to that one. They respond well to all our songs, but some others that stand out are “Daddy’s Land” and “Only love her when she’s gone.”
Alex: I love all our tracks but the ones which immediately stand out to me are: Only Love Her When She’s Gone, Down ‘n Out, Meathook Shuffe.

Headbang Today: A day in the life of Juggernaught?

Snakebite : Well on tour, it’s Drive, Breakfeast (including beer), Drive, Lunch (including beer), Drive, Play cards, Soundcheck, Dinner (including beer), the Show (including beer), Beer (including alcohol)
Oneyedog: We gonna have Juggernaught big brother next year with a full complement of ladies of our picking, so you can check it out then.

Headbang Today: What has the response been like from fans at recent shows?

Snakebite : They gave us lovely, reassuring smiles.
Alex: The cops who tried to get us off stage in P.E. seemed to be very excited, not sure if it was in a good way though.
All Man: Great, some get what we’re doing some don’t, but most find something they like.
Oneyedog: Awesome. As we still getting our name out there and building up a fan base its really cool to see everybody at the gig enjoying it. We make new fans every show.

Headbang Today: The list of your upcoming shows is simply too big to be mentioned here. Let’s just say that you have without doubt the busiest year as well as the year after (2010) ahead of you. Which gig do you look forward the most? (Is there any specific town that you know of that will definately rock the country into oblivion?)

Snakebite : Cape Town rocks and always will rock. But I love our Pretoria shows, homecoming’s good. It’s like wanking in front of your family.
Oneyedog: After the last tour, can’t wait to get down to Cape Town and the South Coast again.
Alex: Looking forward to Motherfudd, gonna try to get into Rammfest and some other festivals away from Gauteng.

All Man: I just can’t wait for Snakebite to see us as his family.

Headbang Today: What can we expect from Juggernaught in the future? Got some more metal in the pipe-line?

Alex: If you know us, you know what to expect, Rock ‘n Roll, Debauchery, A good time, more tours, more albums etc.

Snakebite : More Goat!!! More Goat!!!
Oneyedog: gigs, tours, recording

Headbang Today: Last but not least! Give us your thoughts on:

Headbanging:
Snakebite : Come see our shows and you will see my personal philosophy on this matter.
Oneyedog: If that’s what you into, cool.
Alex: I’m a huge Priest fan, ‘nough said.

All Man: Do it.

South African metal and hard rock scene:
Snakebite : Some awesome groups out there like Black Cat Bones, Warinsane, Southern Gypsey Queen and stuff. I saw a band in Cape Town called Bone Collectors who blew my nose and my mind, but they have no recordings yet!!
Oneyedog: I think we need some more diversity. Theres a lot of bands and the standard is quite good, but a lot of the stuff comes out sounding the same.

Nano-organisms detected on meteorites:
Oneyedog:  Transpermia may be the reason there is life on this planet.
Jovan: Don’t use big words, I’ll klap you
Snakebite : Well, it just might be the key to life on earth and how we got here, so it’s very important. I believe that Juggernaught were once tiny, bearded, drunk nano-orgasms.

The best location for hunting:
Jovan: The Zoo
Oneyedog: My garden, for my cat.
Snakebite : Your backyard. Or my backyard.

Dread-locking your own beards:
All Man: Nu-Metal
Oneyedog: Better said than done
Snakebite : Much like Rap, it is fundamentally wrong.

Your Fans:
Snakebite : Salt of the earth. Real honest, working men and women.
All Man: Rock on brothers, rock on.
Oneyedog: Awesome

Official Site: http://www.juggernaught.co.za

Their Second Album, ‘Act Of Goat’ Is Out Now!