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Riding the Worms to Judgment Day By Joshua Bottomley Photos By Danin Drahos When individuals desire to learn more about themselves, they frequently escape to less populated areas so they can meditate, think and focus on their inner being. Dax Riggs is currently traversing the barren wastelands of Montana; only this is a different kind of pilgrimage. He is traveling from Seattle to Minneapolis, more than 1,500 miles, en route to another gig in support of his new album, Say Goodnight to the World. 8 DECEMBER 2010 PERFORMER MAGAZINE DECEMBER 2010 PERFORMER MAGAZINE 9 “Just take a look around. Take a good look. I don’t see how you could be writing Don’t Worry be Happy. really figure out what you’re gonna do musically. That’s why I feel that [Blood or Love] was kind of all over the place, and this one is much more cohesive. I think there’s some more original musical ideas happening on the new one.” Recently relocated from his home state of Louisiana, Dax has started fresh in Austin - the city officially known as “The Live Music Capital of the World.” There he hunkered down in his new home with bandmates Charley Siess (drums), Kevin Fitzsimmons (bass), and multi-instru- mentalist Robbie Lee, who also co-produced the effort. For two weeks they tinkered with Dax’s songs, morphing them into the versions that ultimately appear on Say Goodnight to the World. “Basically I write [the songs] kind of solitarily and then we get together and we figure out how it wants to be put out there. Some songs were really doomy, and after we worked them up on the record they were more like a punk propulsion kind of song, more forward moving. We just had fun experimenting with them 24 hours in a van full of musicians is a less-than-ideal setting for introspection, in the recording process.” Having the freedom to work out a song the way the band sees fit is precisely how Dax wants to write and record, “I really but the singer believes that his current period of inward exploration has helped open have decided that I don’t like working with producer-type people, who feel his eyes to a burgeoning musical career. “William Blake said ‘know thyself.’ That’s like they know what you need to do, but they don’t really understand how to do it originally.” what I’m into right now. If you don’t know yourself and you don’t know what you Although Say Goodnight to the World is officially his second release, you can find another album carrying the Dax Riggs moniker. Fat Possum On Say Goodnight, Dax and Co. take on The King, covering one of come from and what you are, then you don’t know anything.” Records, his current label, re-released If This is Hell, Then I’m Lucky Elvis’ most well known hits, “Heartbreak Hotel.” By slowing the tempo to in 2008, an album originally recorded and released in 2002 by Dax’s a crawl and lowering the melody an octave, Dax makes sure you’ll never previous band, Deadboy and the Elephantmen. Dax doesn’t want fans want to walk down to the end of that lonely street. But he isn’t concerning This state of self-reflection has not come easy for Dax. His vocal “That’s always what I’ve been interested in. I’ve always wanted to super- to be confused. “They did that against my wishes. It was supposed to be himself with how Graceland diehards will react to his interpretation, “I vocation began more than 15 years ago as frontman for the Louisiana impose doomy, kinda punk-metal with real songs. More of a traditional Deadboy and the Elephantmen, and they sent it to my house and it said couldn’t fucking care less. I know that sounds kind of rude, but I mean, I swamp-metal outfit Acid Bath, who would have gone down as just another kind of song structure, but with more phantasmagoric-type lyrics.” With Dax Riggs on it. And I was not happy about that, because I thought that it really do this for myself. I just played the song and enjoyed it.” band from the bayou if not for Dax’s addition of spooky, melodic croons, numbers like “I Hear Satan,” “You Were Born To Be My Gallows,” and the was disrespectful to that band and to the people that played in that band.” As he drives for an entire day through some of the largest, desolate mixed with fits of sadistic screams. Despite his unique performances and album’s title track, it appears that Dax has realized his vision. He confesses, “It was basically some maneuvering to get out of a former landscapes in the country, Dax ponders the next step: “I’d like to play quite disturbing lyrics, Acid Bath’s two albums, When the Kite String Pops and Throughout his various musical ventures, from Acid Bath to Agents legal mess that I really can’t get too much into. That was a ‘rotten’ situa- a bit around the United States. And then I’d like to make a new record as Paegan Terrorism Tactics, both released through the independent label of Oblivion, Deadboy and the Elephantmen, and his current self-titled tion - hint, hint.” soon as possible.” He has survived untimely deaths, numerous musicians, Rotten Records, were largely overshadowed by the Billboard-charting project, Dax has always focused on the mystical and macabre. This pes- Whether performing with his band or playing a solo acoustic set, and industry backstabbing, but still Riggs remains optimistic. “It’s actu- metal albums released during the mid 1990s. The group disbanded on the simistic outlook has become as central to his songs as his droning vibrato. Dax knows how to inject a haunting element into each tune, especially ally totally opened up my mind to the future of what I want to do. Now I most somber of notes, following the death of their bass player in a tragic He explains that his bleak point of view gestates from, “Just living in this cover songs. “I wouldn’t touch a song unless I could make it my own. I can see all the doors opening to me and all the different paths that I can car accident. world. Just take a look around. Take a good look. I don’t see how you could try to cop some of their vibes and put my own spin on it. I guess I look take.” On the refrain for “Sleeping with the Witch,” Dax sings, “I dug Fast-forward to the present, and Dax Riggs has done a relative 180 be writing down ‘Don’t Worry Be Happy.’” at learning those cover songs as schooling myself in songwriting.” He myself out of the grave, and rode the worms to judgment day.” The fact that from where his career began. Equal parts Misfits-style punk and ’50s Dax’s first solo album, 2007’s We Sing of Only Blood or Love, was a has put his “spin” on such classics as “I’m Your Man” by Leonard Cohen witches often make the best bedfellows is a lesson not lost on Dax Riggs. era rock & roll, filtered through a heaping helping of barroom blues, Say mishmash of musical aspirations that didn’t quite coalesce as he had and “Yesterday” by The Beatles, each time creating a creepy aura Goodnight to the World is emblematic of where Dax wants to be musically. hoped. “I feel that it takes a band of people who spend time together to absent in the originals. Xwww.myspace.com/daxriggs 10 DECEMBER 2010 PERFORMER MAGAZINE DECEMBER 2010 PERFORMER MAGAZINE 11 .

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