Doni-Bear, tell me about your alluring, hotheaded past.

DONNY-BEAR: When I was 15 years old, I started boxing. I got really into it, was good at it, and was actually was thinking about doing it for a career. When I turned 20, I figured it probably wasn’t a good idea to spend my life getting hit in the head (laughs). Once I started to go out to clubs and drinking though, I noticed I had some anger issues…

Ooooh, how hot.

DONNY-BEAR: (Laughs) And any chance I got to fight, I would take.

So tell me butch, boxing mortal, what were these anger issues about?

DONNY-BEAR: Just…stuff (laughs).

What kind of …. “Just stuff?”

DONNY-BEAR: Just…stuff…I don’t know.

But if you DID know, what would they be?

DONNY-BEAR: Growing up…just stuff. I had a good upbringing, but my Dad is a hard-ass. We get along great now, but as I got older, I noticed I had a passion for getting into bar fights.

Did you suffer any serious injuries?

DONNY-BEAR: No, I caused some serious injuries though.

Oooooh, how hot. What a great zombie you will make!

DONNY-BEAR: I realized I had to stop fighting though because I didn’t want to screw up my life. That’s kind of how I got into music.

Tell me about your assaultive confrontation of Brice Hancock, guitarist for Rubber Planet.

DONNY-BEAR: (Laughs) We don’t need to talk about that…

You will do as I say mortal! This will give you a chance to clear it up

DONNY-BEAR: Brice and I already cleared it up.

Yeah, but everyone else around town thinks you’re an asshole

(Everybody laughs)

DONNY-BEAR: Well, if I’m perceived as an asshole, I need to clear my name. I had an itch for Brice before I confronted him. It was due to a business thing that went wrong. When I met him, I didn’t think he was particularly friendly. I thought I had been very friendly with him. A couple of things happened at the bar…I had a couple of drinks…and I confronted him. I don’t think it was completely unprovoked. Did I need to allow it to escalate to that point? Absolutely not. It was immature and the next day, I thought about it and felt really stupid. I felt bad about the whole thing. Brice and I have since chatted and it’s like it never happened. I think Rubber Planet are a great band and I think they are all cool guys.

You realize, being that Brice is undead, he could have made dog meat out of you! He only resisted because I wanted to save the opportunity for myself.

DONNY-BEAR: Well, I realize that now. The people who know me though know I’m a good guy though.

So how did you go from this gay wet dream of a beginning to the doomed existence in a band called D.O.R.K?

DONNY-BEAR: I had decided to buy a guitar. I needed to do something other than go out, get drunk and fight people. So, I picked up a guitar to stay out of trouble. Dylan was my roommate at the time. We lived in this big house and used to have raging parties. Bryan came to one of our parties and asked whose guitar it was. So Dylan picked up a bass and Bryan picked up a guitar and together, they started playing this song by Blink 182 called.”Wouldn’t it be nice to have a blowjob?” Ironically, while they were playing the song, I was upstairs getting a blowjob (Laughs).

Ooooh, you just keep getting hotter and hotter. You may continue…

DONNY-BEAR: It was actually quite embarrassing, because I think she thought her friends knew.

So, what are you like when you’re receiving oral pleasure?

DONNY-BEAR: What am I like?

Yeah, do you make porno-movie sounds?

DONNY-BEAR: Um…I don’t know. I’ve never really paid attention.

Do you prefer to stand up or lay down?

DONNY-BEAR: I guess I prefer to lay down. Actually, I prefer to being having sex with the girl as opposed to just getting a blowjob. I’m not a big oral sex kind of person.

Oh really? Why not?

DONNY-BEAR: Because if she’s not having fun then I’m not having fun.

Do you find most female mortals don’t know how to provide acceptable oral gratification?

DONNY-BEAR: Yes.

DYLAN-CHEESECAKE: They don’t suck right. They just slop your knob with their lips (laughs). They’re not getting a good enough grip with their mouths.

Well, I think this is a perfect time to try the oral grip of the gay undead.

DONNY-BEAR: That’s OK, Maris. I guess I’ll just have to stick to having my knob slopped on badly.

(Everybody laughs)

So anyway, you are receiving oral gratification while Dylan and Bryan serenade you from downstairs. How did this turn into D.O.R.K?

DONNY-BEAR: OK, Bryan left his number and said we should all get together and jam. We ended up jamming, like, three weeks later. We found this little drummer kid who was like, 15 years old. He was scared shitless of everything we did (laughs). He was afraid that if he screwed up, we’d like beat him up or something.

Well knowing what a big bully you are, you probably would have!

DONNY-BEAR: (Laughs) I was more worried about screwing up myself. He eventually left though and we picked up Wade. I for one, didn’t even really know how to play an instrument. Dylan could sing and Bryan was really good though, so we started out just jamming. Eventually, Bryan and I wanted to take things up to the next level and go into the studio. Dylan decided he was going to go do other stuff for awhile

DYLAN-CHEESECAKE: I lost interest for awhile because I just wasn’t digging the music. I was a raging alcoholic. Actually, I still am! (Laughs)

OK, so how did Doni-bear become the bassist of the group?

BRYAN: We would practice in this garage and it was horrible.We were so bad. Dylan couldn’t sing and play bass at the same time so I told Donovan to try bass. He tried it and realized it was easier than playing guitar so it stuck.

What about Schuyler? How did he get into the group?

SCHUYLER: I was roommates with Bryan’s little brother. Bryan had been after me to join the band for awhile, but at first I wasn’t that interested. I remember one night I ran into him and Donovan at Media Play. Bryan asked me to at least come jam with them and see if I liked it. I agreed, but then blew them off. In fact, after that Donovan didn’t want me in the group.

DONNY-BEAR: Because you were a flake!

SCHUYLER: Originally, I didn’t take it that seriously. I finally did come and play with them though. I’ve been here ever since.

Were you in any bands previously?

SCHUYLER: Little bands in High School. I had little projects that didn’t mean anything.

Who influenced you to pick up a guitar in the first place?

SCHUYLER: Kurt Cobaine. I wanted to be him.

You aren’t depressed enough.

SCHUYLER: Actually, I used to be quite a depressed guy. Once I got out of High School it started to change. I started to find life more interesting.

Have you ever gotten laid as a result of being in a band?

SCHUYLER: Not even close (laughs). I’ve tried to use the angle of being in a band to meet women, but I haven’t even come close. (More laughter). That’s more Dylan’s talent.

So the only reason you have Dylan in the band is to get girls to the shows?

BRYAN: All of us hate Dylan. Whenever we play shows, all the chicks just follow him around (Laughs). I remember once, right in the middle of a show, all these girls were grabbing on his ass (Laughs). I’m just happy if a girl looks my way! (More laughter).

Something I’ve noticed is both you and Dylan is you have quite acceptable voices.

BRYAN: Thank you, but I’ve never taking a single singing lesson. I learned how to sing jamming out to the music I’d play in my car. Dylan has a real talent for coming up with melodies and harmonies. I have no idea what I’m doing. I just make noise.

DYLAN-CHEESECAKE: When my balls dropped and I hit puberty, I somehow developed a voice. I’ve been in choirs ever since eighth grade.

How did you end up with your sound, which is kind of a hybrid of Punk and Pop?

DONNY-BEAR: Because it was easy to play! (Laughs). When we started, we played really simple stuff. We just wanted to play music, so we played music we liked and that we were fans of. As we’ve evolved, it’s gotten more complicated. We’ve worked our asses off and we’re getting better. We move at a really fast pace. We only got together a little over a year ago.

Where was your first performance?

DONNY-BEAR: My house…we were horrible. Oh God, it was so bad. It’s been 71 shows since then.

Tell me about some of the more memorable shows

BRYAN: Our fourth show we played at The Roxy and the power went out. The P.A. stopped working and the lights stopped working as well. We stood up on stage for like 20 minutes and it was so uncomfortable.

DYLAN-CHEESECAKE: It was my first show

BRYAN: Yeah, we did our first three shows with just me singing.

Why did you come crawling back to the band, Dylan?

DYLAN-CHEESECAKE: I saw one of those three shows with Bryan singing. Once I saw them play and realized how serious they were, I wanted to be a part of it again.

Tell me about your first CD, “One Up.”

BRYAN: It was a really good first effort. We did our best, but even at the time, I think we all knew it wasn’t what we were completely capable of. Even the way we play some of those songs live has changed. It was a good starting point for us though.

You are rare band for your genre in that you aren’t afraid to do soft songs.

BRYAN: The slow songs come from me (laughs). I always liked it when harder bands played softer songs. I was always a fan of that. People often say they don’t like Metallica’s newer stuff, but I think their new, soft stuff is awesome. I’m also a Dave Matthews fan. I’ve always liked softer music, though I’m not necessarily trying to intentionally put it in D.O.R.K. music. It’s just part of my influences and it’s what comes out of me sometimes.

DONNY-BEAR: Now that we’re really coming together as a band, we’ve becoming a five-piece writing machine. We don’t try to copy anybody. We’re not trying to compare ourselves to the hard-edged Punk stuff. We play what we want to play. With everyone in the band having different musical backgrounds, a lot of different ideas make it into the songs.

Tell me about working with Geza-X

DONNY-BEAR: It was quite an experience to work with a legend. He produced albums back in the day by Black Flag and Dead Kennedys. We were all a little intimidated to work with him.

How did you hook up with him?

SCHUYLER: We have an entertainment lawyer that set us up with him.

And what was the point?

BRYAN:: All the songs we did with Geza X were on “One Up,” but he brought out the potential of those songs. As I was saying before, I don’t think those songs were taken as far as they could have been.

SCHUYLER: We went in there and it was really a fast process. We weren’t able to take our equipment out to California. There was another guy named Paul. He was kind of this hippy guy who did the tracking on Dylan’s vocals. He was amazing. He was awesome.

I heard Geza doesn’t like to go by that name any longer.

SCHUYLER.Yeah, he would correct you anytime you called him Geza. He’d get upset and tell you to call him “Blue.” We did whatever the man told us to do (Laughs). He was quite remarkable. He was very sharp.

So, you took the three songs you did with him and recorded two more here in Denver and released a self-titled EP.

BRYAN: The new songs came about since Sergio joined the band. He joined in September. He brought a huge, creative force to the band. He didn’t write the new songs, but it was easier to write songs with him behind the drums. His input made the songs richer. He’s an awesome drummer.

SERGIO: I’m into the newer, more melodic songs, just like Bryan, though my influences range from Jazz to Heavy Metal to Hip Hop. I’m also a Dave Matthews fan. Carter Beauford is a major influence of mine. When I first started drumming, I listened to a lot of Punk and Ska. It’s actually how I learned to play drums.

SCHUYLER: We all really like the new songs and we jumped at the first opportunity to record them. We worked with a guy named Bart, who was awesome. We recorded at Motaland. It was great recording there. Sergio brought his kit in and Bryan brought his guitar in. There was amazing equipment to record with. We had a little better idea of what we were trying to get out of the songs than at any time previously.

Is there plans to do another full length CD?

DONNY-BEAR: We move at a very fast pace. We’ve decided to take this very seriously, but we don’t have any current plans to do a full length. Whenever we have opportunities to record new stuff, we will, but our main focus will be on touring and continuing to grab label attention. We’ve been very fortunate in our career thus far. We speak with several major labels on a regular basis. We get phone calls every couple of weeks to see how were doing. We have good relationships with several A&R guys. They are like our friends now, which is weird.

How did they find out about you?

DONNY-BEAR: We went to the Blink 182/Green Day concert and threw 10 demo’s of “One Up” on stage (Laughs). Our buddy Troy actually hit a camera man on the head. So security came over and took the rest of the CD’s away from us. I kept one in my pants and when I had a chance, I gave one to another big security guy. I said, “Can you please give this to someone?” He gave it to a rigging guy, who listened to it and gave it to a guy at Electra. Right before we got to L.A., this guy from Electra emailed us out of the blue and told us how he’s Slipknots tour manager and how he’s an A&R guy at Electra. His name is Roberto Perdomo and he’s a really cool guy. We hang out with him every time we go out there. He’s been a big help to us. He came to one of our shows and afterwards, sat down with us and as diplomatically as he could, he told us we needed more work. He told us that it would take 50 to 75 or shows to figure out where everything fits in the band. I shit you not, it was on the 50th show that we realized we need to get rid of of Wade.

I was going to ask you about that. Why did you kick poor defenseless Wade out of the group?

DONNY-BEAR: It was a really hard decision because Wade was a good friend of ours. But we take all of this very seriously and we don’t have time to fuck around. We just realized by the 50th show that he just wasn’t cutting it. When we went out to California to record, Roberto told us he realized the whole time that Wade was the weak link. Of course all of us needed more work, but it was obvious that Wade wasn’t progressing as fast as the rest of us were. Roberto knew it from the first time he saw us however, as did our lawyers. He knew getting a new drummer was what we needed, but part of growing as a band is figuring out this stuff for ourselves.

How did you get entertainment lawyers and what do they do for you?

DONNY-BEAR: I stalked Dina Lapolt, who owns the law firm (laughs). She put us through a bunch of tests to see how hard we are willing to work. One time, she called us up on a Friday night while we were at a show and told me that they needed new material. She wanted to know how soon could we get it to her. I said, “Can you give us two weeks?” and she said, ” I need it on my desk by next Friday.” (Laughs). She later told me she didn’t think we could do it, but we did! (Laughs). After that, she realized we were serious. There’s another lawyer named Damian. He took on our band personally and helps guide us. They’ve really helped develop the band and we have a very tight working relationship with the law firm. We are both very straight up with each other. In fact, one night after a show, Dina, who is very aggressive, told me in her own loud, New York way, that four of us were ready for the pros, but one wasn’t even close. We needed to do something with Wade. Damien and I sat down with Wade and told him this. We gave him a deadline of four weeks. If he didn’t improve, we would have to replace him. Now, I thrive under pressure. Either you shine or you buckle. After that meeting with WAde, he got progressively worse. And finally, we had no choice but to let him go. We really wish it could have worked out, but Wade just wasn’t ready for where we were at.

So how did you get a Sergio as fast as you did?

DONNY-BEAR: Bob Rupp came to one of our shows, just to see what the fuss was about. Ironically, it was our 50th show, where we had decided we needed to replace Wade. We were in a really tight situation because we needed to find another drummer fast. So Bob saw us play and Ironically, I ran into him right after that at the “Taste of Colorado.” I told him my problem and he told me to come down to his shop on the following Tuesday. Bryan and I went down there and that’s when we met Sergio.

Tell me a little more about yourself Sergio.

SERGIO: I moved here from Wisconsin. I moved here because I wanted a better environment to pursue music. My brothers live here and so that’s kind of why I came to Denver.

I remember hearing that you didn’t have much time to prepare from joining the band to your first show.

SERGIO: Yeah, it was a little crazy. I had six days from my audition for the band to the first show.

Were you worried you wouldn’t be able to pick it up that quickly?

SERGIO: No, not really. I’m pretty good at picking up songs quickly.

DONNY-BEAR: Sergio really stepped up and did a remarkable job under pressure. In fact, his first show was that ill fated show in the Springs.

Oh yeah, that’s the one where SCHUYLER got too drunk. Tell me about that.

SCHUYLER: (Laughter). Well, what happened was I had drank waaaay too much. I was a mess, acting a fool, knocking stuff over. I hadn’t realized I had drank that much. So, we got up on stage and started to play and in the second song, I fell right into my amp. I fell right on my ass. The sound guy didn’t realize what had happened and thought I had just tripped on stage. He was trying to fix things from the sound board. I remember Donovan was really pissed off.

DONNY-BEAR: We had no choice but to keep on playing. I went over to SCHUYLER and told him to leave. I said, “just go sit in the van.” So he left and sat in the van, but then came running back into the club and tried to jump back on stage, but tripped again and fell flat on his face.

(Everybody laughs).

SCHUYLER: At that point, the bouncer came and kicked me out. After the show, I was outside, trying to start shit with Donovan, of all people (Laughs). I was really trying to push all his buttons. He kept his cool. He knew I was just being a drunk fool. The next day I heard about all this stupid stuff I did. I felt horrible.

DONNY-BEAR: That’s not the first time SCHUYLER put his foot in his mouth. There was the time in Utah. Tell him about it.

SCHUYLER: Well, it was just another one of my silly little incidents (Laughs). We were all at a gas station in Utah. This cute girl pulled up next to us. Dylan started talking to her about the band and whatnot. She acted all interested. For the first time, girls weren’t rejecting us (laughs). Well…they never reject Dylan, but for the first time a girl wasn’t rejecting the rest of us. So, she’s all interested and kind of flirting with Dylan. She went inside for a minute and when she came back out, I didn’t realize she had come back out. I said to Dylan, “Correct me if I’m wrong, but I think that girl wants to fuck you.” And she was standing right behind me (Everybody laughs). Her jaw just dropped. She jumped into her car and drove away with the gas pump still attached to her car (more laughter).

DONNY-BEAR: SCHUYLER’s notorious for doing weird shit like that. I remember the first time we were in L.A. we were walking through The Rainbow room. It was a Saturday night and the place was packed. There was this record guy…we didn’t know he was a record guy until our lawyer told us what a big deal he was. So SCHUYLER is walking by this guy and the record guy is like, “Hey, who are you?” SCHUYLER’s like, Um…I’m SCHUYLER. The record guy goes, “You have five minutes, start talking.” SCHUYLER didn’t have any idea who he was but started talking. He said, “Um…I’m in a band, I play guitar, we’re called D.O.R.K. and um…the rest of the guys are over there if you want to talk to them.” And then he turns and walks away! (Laughs). It turns out, the record guy was a the right hand man for Lou Pearlman, who discovered Backstreet Boys. (Laughter). It’s all good though. We ended up getting to showcase for Mr. Pearlman.

While you were in California, you played at The Whiskey. How did that go.

DONNY-BEAR: It went very, very well. We played to a packed place that was filled with industry people. They all really loved us. We went over really well. In fact, Dina talked to us after that show and said things were really coming together and that we could start making plans for the future.

Anything else?

DONNY-BEAR: We’re really excited and we’re having a lot of fun. We’d also like to thank a number of people. Josh at Denverlocalmusicscene.com has been really cool. Our friends and families have given us a ton of help. We’ve been very fortunate with some of the things that have happened to us. We just want to keep a level head about some of that stuff.

My final comment is in regards to you and I Doni-Bear. I think if you were gay, you would make an acceptable mate for My Greatness. Do you agree?

DONNY-BEAR: I’m not good at relationships.

Why not?

DONNY-BEAR: Because I’m too busy…period. I cannot give someone the attention that’s required.

Yeah, but the fact I’m dead would mean I don’t require as much attention as someone who is alive.

DONNY-BEAR: Yeah…that’s true, but I’ve dated GIRLS that have said they could deal with my schedule, only to find out they couldn’t within two weeks.

What if you were gay and we were in a gay porno movie together? Do you think you’d find me hot?

Donovan: I’m not the right person to ask. You should ask SCHUYLER.

If you were in a gay porn movie with me SCHUYLER, would you find me hot?

SCHUYLER: I find every gay zombie hot. Especially you , Maris.