Corrosion of Conformity

Back Room

Saturday, January 18

"You can definitely shake your ass to us," says Corrosion of Conformity founder and drummer Reed Mullin. Shake ass? Isn't COC -- together an astonishing 15 years -- best credited with being hardcore, metal, and grunge before each was cool? "You know what it was?" Mullin asks in return. "It was playing with the Big Boys at Liberty Lunch in 1983. That's where we first learned to shake our asses. It was the first time we'd ever seen the Big Boys and I was kind of slackjawed for a while. It's still a pretty vivid memory."

Obviously, those memories, as well as Mullin's recollection of playing Austin gigs with Scratch Acid, have drifted their way onto Wiseblood, COC's sixth and latest release. And while COC displays its penchant for East Coast hardcore outfits like Minor Threat and Bad Brains all over this dense and diverse collection, Wiseblood is perhaps best viewed as the cohesive slab of metallic boogie Metallica meant to make with last year's Load. In fact, the real bridge between The Big Boys and Metallica -- and 1983 and 1997, for that matter -- may be the new album's centerpiece, "The Door," which reveals a serious ZZ Top sweet tooth.

"Fuck yeah, we're good Southern boys and dig ZZ Top," says Mullin. "We were in Europe with Metallica last year and met Frank Beard in Germany. It was amazing. Then we met Billy Gibbons and told him we probably owe them a lot of money in royalties for ripping them off all these 15 years."

Sadly, Mullin will probably have to wait just as long before admittedly COC-influenced bands like Pantera, Korn, and Soundgarden start sending him checks, although COC ought to be able to pay a few bills of their own after beginning a four-month stint opening for Metallica next month (slated for the Frank Erwin Center in April). Could this high-profile stint finally be the payoff for 15 years of pioneering?

"Sometimes we were too early, sometimes too late," Mullin says. "It was a life hazard just being a punk rocker in North Carolina back then, getting beat up and stabbed by rednecks. Now you just go to the mall and pay $50 to be insta-punk. But you know, boogie's a peskier little rascal and doesn't die as easily. It's sort of like us, just still kickin' around." And shakin' ass? -- Andy Langer

[Orange 9mm and Flow open.]