Your guitarist Drew is from England. Is his wee wee circumcised or uncircumcised?

RHETT: He’s uncircumcised.

Is it a large wee wee?

RHETT: It’s OK (Laughs)

How do you classify your music?

RHETT: British Pop with an American edge.

Didn’t someone give you the name, “faggot rock”?

RHETT: Yeah (laughs). When we tour, we go through Omaha and Lincoln Nebraska quite a bit. We’ve built up such a great following there that two years ago, their paper there called “The Reader,” it’s like Westword, nominated us as one of the best bands. We had a lot of friends there; a lot of the bands there were our friends. Well, suddenly everyone hated us (Laughs) so someone from one of the heavy bands was like, “Oh, those faggot rockers CAROLYN’S MOTHER,” and we were like, “Hey, we like the ring of that!” (Laughs).

Why do you think CAROLYN’S MOTHER has become so popular?

RHETT: One business practice we’ve always had is our mailing list. Over the last 9 years, we’ve been religious about sending out a mailer for every show we do. It’s costly, and e-mail takes away a lot of the hassle, but for any band just starting out, FIND the money to send out your stuff religiously.

COLIN: Business-wise, I think we’ve done a very good job. Any money we make goes back into the band for promotion and posters, stuff like that. We don’t make a dime on this band. As far as entertainment, I think when people come to see us they have a good time, because we’re having a good time on stage. In the early days, I think it was Rhett that brought people back (to our shows) because he was pretty much a nut case on stage.

Your audiences tend to get out of control.

RHETT: Well, I don’t think it’s just our audience. Rock and roll in general makes testosterone levels rise. With our shows, there’s so much energy and it’s so upbeat, and there are so many people up front, tempers tend to flare. It pisses me off to see it. I’ve embarrassed people for starting fights. I’ll tell them from the stage I’m not there to be their babysitter.

COLIN: We are not a mosh band, by any means, but some of our audiences will find a reason to mosh. And I agree with Rhett. He has the luxury of embarrassing them and it’s great, cuz we are not a mosh kind of band, but people do get bounced around so much at our shows.

If you had your eyes closed while someone was giving you head, and you didn’t know if it was a man or a woman, do you think you’d be able to tell without looking?

COLIN: Well I think the facial hair would be a dead give away if it were a guy. (Laughs)

RHETT: Well I don’t know. Some of the women you’ve been with (Much Laughter)

How did it all come together for CAROLYN’S MOTHER?

RHETT: We started…Actually our first drummer and I had been in a band in High School. We broke up. We wanted to start a new band and start something different. It was ’92; everybody was playing Nirvana covers. We wanted to start this new band and we met Colin and a keyboard player through a mutual friend. They wanted to be a singer and a drummer. Well, we already had a singer and a drummer. So, Colin was like, “Well then, I’ll play bass” and the other guy, keyboards. So then we were like, “OK, now all we need is a guitar player.” Drew had been in the country for like a week. He was going to the Colorado Institute of Art. Our manager at the time was going there too. So he hooked us up with Drew who came down to audition. We were like, “OK, play something”. So he started playing “Bad” by U2. And about three notes in we were like, “You’re in!” (Laughs)

Were you called CAROLYN’S MOTHER?

RHETT: No we were called “The Floor.” We played a lot. 7 South, Mercury Café, that sort of scene. Twice Wilted kind of took us under their wing. We always thought it was weird because they were always kind of a dark band and we were light and poppy. But they took a liking to us and we seemed to play with them quite a bit. We played around for about a year. Then the band wanted to fire the drummer and I didn’t, so we broke up. About three months later, Colin and Drew came up to me and said, “Well, we know you’re gonna start a new band with Bill our old drummer. We want you to do some vocals on a demo ‘cuz we’re going to England.” So I was like, “OK, I’ll do the demo. I’m not gonna be in your band, I’m just gonna do the demo.” So we made the demo and the whole time we’re working on it, they’re like, “come to England with us!” But I said no, I was gonna go stay in Denver and go to college. So once the EP was done, they took me to Hooters (Laughs). And they said, “If you come to England with us, we’ll pay your way for everything.” So I was like, “OK!”(Laughs)

What was the goal of going to England?

RHETT: The goal was to get there and get a drummer, stay there for a couple of years and see what we could do there. We got there, we couldn’t find a place to live, we couldn’t find jobs and we ran out of money shortly. We were there about a month and then we moved to Phoenix, started a band there, and then moved back here. Some of the members moved with us, some didn’t. When we got back here, we needed a guitarist and that’s when Dyn-o-mite Don of Brethren Fast joined us.

Don was in CAROLYN’S MOTHER?

RHETT: Yep. That was in ’93. We played our first gig as CAROLYN’S MOTHER in May of ’93, I think.

Did you ever see Don’s ass? Does he have a hairy ass?

RHETT: I never saw it.

COLIN: The Brethren Fast boys are the hairiest guys in town.

What was the local scene like back then?

COLIN: Probably a little better. There was more of cohesiveness among the bands back then. Now it seems a little more competitive. Bands aren’t working with each other as much as they used to. There were a lot better bands back then. Don’t get me wrong. There are good bands around today, but back in (the mid ‘90’s) Denver had something to say musically.

How did you get your band name?

COLIN: The first demo was recorded, we were getting ready to press it, but we didn’t have a name for the band. We were thumbing through books, looking through…you name it. We couldn’t come up with a band name and the we were watching TV while we were listening to the demo. The sound on the TV was down. We were watching about the floods that happened in the Midwest around ’93. They flashed (a picture of) this lady up on the screen. Here daughter had been swept away by the floods. They had her name as a caption “CAROLYN’S MOTHER.” Rhett threw it out as a band name but meant it as a joke. But we all looked at each other and went Hmmm. (Laughs) We stuck with it at that point.

You mentioned some members stayed behind in Phoenix, who stayed?

COLIN: Drew stayed behind. We were without Drew for five or six months. When Drew came back, we had both Don and Drew in the band together. Mik moved back from LA, so Don and Mik went on to form Brethren Fast. We wanted two guitarists, so we auditioned a number of different people but it didn’t work. We decided it would just be the four of us. After about a year we lost our drummer. We could all tell that Bill wasn’t into it anymore, so we ended up with our current drummer, Jeff Gust.

But Jeff left the band as well. Now he’s back. Please explain this to my greatness.

RHETT: I think Jeff got burned out being on the road. He was in Blister 66 for a bit. I think after awhile, he wanted to do something a little mellower. We loved playing with Kenny and Andy, but having Jeff back is really great.

That’s right! You played with Andy “Candy.” He now plays with Mere. What can you tell me about his wee wee?

RHETT: On the road you get close, but he wasn’t in the band long enough for us to get that close.

(Latifa, a friend of Maris The Great comes up to the table to say “Hi.”)

Latifa, do you have a wee wee question for CAROLYN’S MOTHER?

LATIFA: What’s the total in inches for the whole band?

COLIN: I don’t want to know about Jeff.

RHETT: He’s 5 1/2, remember, he told us.

COLIN: (Laughs) Oh yeah…so that would be about 15 1/2 between him and I. (Laughter)…I don’t know, what about you Rhett, what are you pushin’ over there?

RHETT: I’m saying the whole band…about a total of 25 inches.

Wow! Ok, When you’re on tour, how do you get along on the road?

COLIN: We’ve had our moments. We went through all that bullshit stuff in the earlier days. We’re at the point now where we’re like, “lets just have fun.” We still love getting on stage. We still love that part. That’s what keeps us going.

So we were talking about your current drummer, Jeff Gust…

RHETT: Yeah. He had been in The Garden Weasels, and then he joined Another Barrel of Monkeys. We took him out to lunch and said, “You’re not gonna be in that band anymore, you’re gonna be in ours.” He said, “Well let me think about it for a couple of days.” We went home and he called us about an hour later and said, “OK” (Laughs). That was October ’96. We started to record our second album, 30 Pieces Of Silver.

Wait a minute. Wasn’t there an EP before that?

RHETT: Yeah, that was “Dream Of What You Fear.” It had three songs. Then our first album was released in the summer of ’95. That was called, Fridays And Other Small Tragedies.

At what point did you start playing seriously?

RHETT: Right after 30 Pieces’. We were on the road constantly. I mean, CONSTANTLY.

Was there any hint from the beginning that you were gonna be so popular?

COLIN: It was a slow start. I think that for every band it’s a slow start. We got some amazing breaks early on. We were thrown in front of big crowds. That really helped us out. I think our biggest turning point as far as noticing our crowd was getting bigger at Herman’s was when we played the People’s Fair for the first time. We played on the main stage. We were like the second to the last band in the whole thing. We had the tickets to Herman’s that we gave away, Blah, blah, blah. Well, there was a national coming through and Allan (-Roth, Herman’s Hideaway owner) asked us if we would open. He knew that we were slowly creeping up. So this national played at Herman’s on a Tuesday night, and because we had handed out tickets at the People’s Fair, there was like, 350 at Herman’s on a Tuesday night, which is awesome. So after that, we started doing our own shows on the weekend at Herman’s and it just got progressively bigger and bigger.

What’s the biggest crowd you’ve played at Herman’s?

COLIN: When we played with Rocket Ajax. There were 800 people who came through the door that night, granted they weren’t all there for us. But the place was packed.

What influences make up CAROLYN’S MOTHER?

COLIN: U2 and The Cure, definitely. I don’t know if so much anymore. There’s a new wave of British Pop bands like Radiohead out right now. It doesn’t really change the way we write but it’s given us other avenues to look at.

How did you begin singing, Rhett?

RHETT: When I was five years old, my Mom asked me what I wanted to do with your life. I said, “I want to be a songwriter.” It’s always been something I wanted to do. I sang in choirs in School and Church. Somebody e-mailed me the other day and asked me who I studied under. And I was like, “I didn’t” (Laughs).

You never took formal lessons?

RHETT: My Mom has her degree in music so she was always pushing me to get my degree in music. But I never wanted to do it because I know how music makes me feel, but I don’t know why. I think if I got into theory and all of that, it would take all the mystery out of it. It would be turning it into a math equation.

So, after 30 Pieces’, what happened?

COLIN: When 30 Pieces’ came out, we were at that point where we were doing our own shows at Herman’s. When it came out, people were actually waiting for it. People were actually anticipating the release of something we had. It’s done very well. It was a very memorable release party. Big crowd. Herman’s went to town for us. Sharon Rawles was the manager then. She’s now down at The Soiled Dove. She was our manager for awhile. There has always been a special bond between us with her. She’s amazing, she’s great.

Joy was your next CD. What was the biggest difference between the two?

COLIN: It was a little gloomier. A little darker. We had been getting that way as we grew as a band. I don’t think it was intentionally. We were all about the three-minute happy pop songs, but everybody changes. We like the way we’ve changed. One of the reasons that we’ve changed is because every record has a different drummer on it.

How did Joy do in comparison to 30 Pieces’?

COLIN: Joy is our biggest seller.

RHETT: Radio outside of Denver really paid attention to Joy.

What’s the advantage to working with a manager? How long have you been with Zach?

RHETT: We’ve been with him for 2 1/2 years. At this point because we have so much going on, it’s good to have someone who knows where we need to be and to keep the schedule.

Have you ever seen Zach’s wee wee?

RHETT: No I haven’t.

As far as local bands what do you think is a common mistake you see them make?

COLIN: Overkill. Playing way too much in one particular market. If you’re playing once a week or twice a week in one particular town, people will look at you and go, “Well, they’re playing next week so I won’t go this week.” I think that hurts your crowd. When you are first starting out, you’ve got to play out as much as you can and do as much as you can. You have to do that to get your name out. But once you start to draw and are getting a crowd, that’s when you start branching off. Denver’s not a huge town, though it’s getting bigger.

How does the premise of having fun doing your music as opposed to doing your music to get signed affect your creative process?

RHETT: I think when you’re doing it just because you love it, it relieves some of the pressure. When you’re not concerned about who sees you, I think the music becomes more heartfelt. If you’re doing it because you are like, “we have to get to this point by next year” I think it takes away some of the mystery of it. When you do it out of love, I think people know that, see it and respect it.

COLIN: With Joy and the newest EP, Doris, I think we started writing a little more just for us. Rather than worrying about what people might have wanted to hear. We weren’t nervous about it but when we wrote Doris it was a little bit different kind of music. We wrote it more for us.

Speaking of Doris, why did you decide to release an EP as opposed to a full length CD?

RHETT: A lot of the bands in England, before they get signed, put out singles. It’s rare for an independent band in England to put out a full-length record. They normally put out singles. So we decided, “let’s try that for awhile.” The plan was, and we’re still trying to stay true to it, is put out a new single every four or five months. We’re due right now, but we haven’t started working on one yet (Laughs).

COLIN: We have like four or five songs in the works, but not far enough along to hop in the studio and put them down.

Is there gonna be another full length CD?

COLIN: I don’t know.

If anyone were to be gay in the band, who would most likely be the one?

RHETT: If Drew were here, he would say Colin.

How would you respond, Colin?

COLIN: I’d probably agree with him! (Laughs)

Have either of you ever had a homosexual experience? What’s the closest?

RHETT: A few years ago there were rumors about me. People thought that maybe I was gay because I was so well dressed. I kind of played with it and had fun (Laughs). We’d be out and a friend of ours, a friend of the band…we’d freak people out, smooch a little and stuff, but that’s about it.

COLIN: Probably just kissing Rhett one time. And I’m not the person he’s talking about! (Laughs)