Interview: Electric Wizard’s Jus Oborn on weed, satan, and the band’s first North American tour in a decade

Electric Wizard have always existed on the periphery, a highly-influential stoner doom band relegated to cult status. That all seems poised to change, however, as the UK band are about to embark on a sold-out North American tour for the first time in nearly a decade.

With songs centered around massively sludgy down-tuned riffs, expounding on themes of horror, weird fantasy, the occult, and weed, Electric Wizard have remained consistent over the course of eight albums, including fan favourites like 1998’s Come My Fanatics… and 2000’s landmark Dopethrone.

Despite early critical success, the band struggled with constant line-up changes over the years and became embroiled in a complicated legal morass with their former label Rise Above Records, with the label threatening to prohibit the band from releasing any further music. That still-simmering situation resulted in the band forming their own imprint, Witchfinder Records, distributed through the UK’s Spinefarm Records, to release 2014’s Time To Die album. Written and recorded while the band’s future was in doubt from their ongoing legal situation, the album is the band’s angriest yet, with vocalist / guitarist Jus Oborn describing it as “negative and horrible” (in the best way possible).

We caught up with Jus to chat about weed, record collector nerds, and the band’s plans for the upcoming tour, which includes a long sold-out Montreal stop at Virgin Mobile Corona Theatre on April 4th. For all upcoming tour dates, visit http://www.electricfuckinwizard.com/.

You’re about to start your first North American tour in almost a decade, what’s taken you so long to get back here?

Quite a few reasons, but one of the main ones is I’ve had a few visa problems over the years, so I’ve had to go through quite a few hoops to do it, it’s always been a pain in the ass. It’s always been hard getting into the States, it’s a big operation, and every time we go to do it, we get too lazy and never finish it, you know?

It must be vindicating that the shows have been selling out so fast, was that surprising to you guys?

It’s awesome. I guess we were holding on and hoping that it would at least work. We’re definitely pleased about it.

Do you have weed hookups in each city already?

Uh, well like 90% of them. We kind of tried to stay in cities where I know we could hook up. And so, we should be OK. Unfortunately, that’s why we’re not playing too many in the South.

That dirt weed wrecks my balls man! I have that shit.

I heard you had a good story about crossing into Canada a few years back, what happened there?

Ha! It was a bit difficult last time, we were refused our visas, so we had to kind of say we were going to see the House of Frankenstein up in Niagara Falls, which they kind of believed because we looked like a bunch of freaks. And then we just hopped on the tour bus like a mile down the road and just started crossing our fingers.

Did you get to see the House Of Frankenstein?

Yeah, it was with Enslaved actually, the early black metal band that are still going. And to be honest, it was the most terrifying thing we ever did, we came out screaming like schoolgirls!

Getting on to the new record, Time To Die, what was it like recording this record with all the legal troubles surrounding the band at the time?

Um, I mean, it was a fucking pain. All you want to do is record music, and when you try to record it, you can’t. You can’t fucking hold on for fucking assholes to get their shit together. It was a real nightmare, you know? The important thing was to get the music recorded. All that other stuff is torture. I don’t want to have to deal with any of that crap, but I don’t want to get shafted up my ass the rest of my life. So you’ve got to deal and decide when you’re going to at least start a battle to like regain your rights and shit, you know?

Did all that negative energy find its way onto the album?

Oh yeah, definitely. It’s hard for me to listen to now.

It’s spewing with like, hatred and negativity. It’s a really negative and horrible record, but in many ways that’s cool.

We moved up to a bigger label and I think there was a fear from people that we were going to become commercial. I’m proud of it.

Were you going for that raw production this time around?

In many ways it was a circumstance of the recording. You can’t beat those kinds of idiosyncrasies of raw recording, you know?

Are you satisfied with the way everything resolved itself with Rise Records?

Um, things haven’t played themselves out legally yet, so to speak. We’ll let the crucifixions be done publicly.

The band has gone through a number of lineup changes, how long does it take you to settle in with a new member?

It’s never an easy thing. I hope we can pick the right people and keep things running as smoothly as possible, you know? I mean, you do know what you’re looking for, as you’ve been doing it for quite a while. You hope the transitions aren’t too painful for anyone, ha! I mean, you’re trying to keep the spirit of the band very true, so you don’t need too many wildcards coming into the band, everyone has to stick to the plan. People come in and they want to bring in their own stamp and identity, but then on one level, it’s still Electric Wizard, you know?

You’ve said that Electric Wizard could still continue if you weren’t in the band, do you still feel that way?

Ha well, I was just joking, but you don’t necessarily have to have me be a part of it, I think its become its own fucking beast sometimes. I’d say that to try and escape.

Do you feel that style you pioneered is living on outside the band now?

It’s hard to say, you know? I think the style has become quite, um, emulateable, right now, ha. I think there’s certain bands who really define their own styles that almost become like parodies of themselves eventually. It’s not easy, you know? We’ve done quite a few albums, and I hope we can still offer someone good quality music and still move forward in some way, but without changing that much.

There’s something to be said for having a consistent style though.

Yeah, I mean it’s hard, how many people want their favourite band to change? Slayer, Sabbath, Iron Maiden, people are like fucking furious when they try and move on.

People don’t want to hear a band like Motörhead change their style.

Yeah, exactly. I don’t!

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What are you hoping to do with your Witchfinder Records imprint?

It was just an idea I had … I’m not entirely sure where heavy music’s at at the moment, and it’s probably just a way to define it.

We’re keeping the idea of Witchfinder as kind of like, an inquisition against the kind of bands we’re not too keen on anymore.

I’m not naming any names or whatever. I hope to bring in bands and kind of just define, not a new style but … people will know they’ll hear the right kind of band, cool, heavy shit, you know? I think there’s so much out there these days, it’s hard to know where to start!

Do you find it harder to discover good new music now, even though everything is available?

Oh, I think so, yeah. There’s a hell of a lot of self-produced music out there, and to be honest, 75% of it isn’t that good, so you’re waiting for a lot, you know? There was a time when there was a kind of … filter against all the junk, you know? There’s too much now, too much music for everyone. It’s devalued it in many ways.

Even technically devalued, because people aren’t paying for it.

Well on one level, yeah, totally. It’s treated very poorly in away. People will invest a lot more energy into a movie.

You’ve been clear that the new record isn’t limited in any way; how do you feel about the trend of “collectible” LP’s?

It’s just mercenary; you’re screwing the situation at the moment. People have got disposable income … I’m not against things being limited, but there’s certain stuff, like a band, you want to put out smaller releases, 7”s, and you don’t want it to become a big thing. But trying to create collectibles is pretty fucking weird, you know? People used to create collectibles by default, because there was a mispressing or like, it didn’t get pressed properly. The idea of creating it is kind of weird, it’s like buying those fucking plates out of the back of Sunday newspapers. I don’t know if you have those in the States or in Canada, haha. I’ve clearly heard of the fact that there’s a few bands out there where people will pretty much buy the record because they’re like, getting a present in the post from Santa. They don’t really give a shit what the music is. I’d love to sell a million records in like, five fucking elaborate stand-up cardboard houses or whatever. That would be cool, ha! A lot of the bands make a bit of coffer of that.

Then you get certain labels, ones that we’re not so friendly with anymore, who still pay the band like .20 cents when they’re selling the records for $50 bucks, which doesn’t seem too fair to me.

The recent Electric Wizard vinyl represses were pretty pricey.

Yeah, and deliberately so. They were released in limited different colors and all this shit, to inflate the price for a record, you know?

Just to take things back a bit, was there any kind of scene for the band to latch onto back in Dorset?

Um, I mean, there’s all sorts of stuff there, Dorset has a pretty ancient culture, which goes back to pre-Christian times. It’s where the druids are …

We’d drop acid and get this sense of like, dethroned fucking kings, you know?

Like Dorset used to be something majestic and now we’re like decaying in ruins, you know? That came through the music, I think. And it’s kind of an epic landscape as well, in the north part. Those big rolling hills. I love that fucking sky, you know? It’s not quite as “chocolate box” as some places; I’m not too keen on that. It’s a bit more rural.

Is it true that you hate big cities?

I loathe them, ha! I guess because of my environment and upbringing, I don’t enjoy them at all. When I was 17 or 18 I moved to London for a couple of years, and I had a lot of fun, you know? I went to gigs and parties and shit. But in the end, it isn’t good for me.

Were there any local bands you felt any kinship with back then?

It was kind of a weird scene; there was punk rock bands, goth bands, kind of fledgling hardcore and grindcore bands. Everyone just kind of got together with the idea that we could make some music. It was kind of basic back then, you know? No one really defined their style back then, because if you did, you wouldn’t be playing gigs with anyone.

What were some of your non-musical influences at that time? Were there any particular authors or filmmakers that were influencing you?

Well, I grew up reading a lot of horror stuff, and black magic and occult stuff. I grew up with that more than anything, more than music really. My mum would buy these magazines with the occult and witchcraft, and paperbacks about like Hell’s Angels, and there’d be all sorts of this shit lying around, haha. To me, to find there was music that kind of related to that was pretty exciting. When I got turned to metal, I was really adamant that it had to be like, satanic music, you know? I was really into Venom and Slayer and Black Sabbath, and anything like that. And then things got a bit thrash, and I was like, “What’s happening?” And then in a perverse way, I got into bands like Trouble, because I liked the idea that they were like, completely anti-satanic.

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How did you find that stuff back then? Did you have it hunt it down by mail?

You had to hunt it down, and I think that was part of the charm, you know? It was more secretive; you’d have to go to some fucking weird bookshop down by the harbour. You’d find this weird shit, but you had to be prepared to look for it. It really would be underground; you’d have to go into these dark and more cryptic places. It was kind of the same really; it was actually a physical world, instead of a virtual one. I think I preferred it though, ha.

What do you think about the resurgence of doom, with the popularity bands like Pallbearer and Yob?

Um, I’m not a big follower of modern music, I’ll probably hear their albums like 10 years from now, when they’re like out of date again. I don’t follow much new stuff, but I’m kind of tired of the way heavy guitar is going at the moment. Too much emphasis on technology and stuff, and not much groundbreaking playing, you know, actual decent riffs and shit. So I’m waiting for something to happen, something cool. There doesn’t seem to be much individuality anymore. When we started, I knew each band, I knew everyone, you know? I could tell you who was who, because I could hear their sound, the vocals or the guitar playing. These days I could listen to 50 bands that sound identical, to me anyway.

How is your book on European porn coming along?

It’s a tormentedly long book to write. Every time I start a new chapter I end up finding new people, and getting new stories. It’s not a very well documented thing, so you end up finding whole new labels, new companies, new models, new fucking directors, ha! I’m trying to encapsulate it into one thing. The main idea is that no one really knows anything about the European scene, I think. In America, it’s better documented, everyone knows who Linda Lovelace is, but no one knows what happened in Europe. And it was kind of a heavier and darker scene, you know? I got into it by looking into like, borderline snuff movies and satanic stuff. It was creepy. No one’s prepared to touch it, as far as like, working on the book. It’s not going to be easy. There’s always research to be done, but usually during European tours I get to interview people on the road.

Is there anything in particular you’re looking forward to on this upcoming tour?

Well, we haven’t been to the States in a long time, so I think it’s going to be cool in many ways. I think the fans are going to be fucking nuts. I think it’s going to be pretty fucking good, you know? I think we’re going to be solid, with any luck it’s going to be fucking killer, you know?

Are you brining your whole stage setup over here?

It’s not quite as easy, there aren’t so many halls and stuff that we’re playing. In Europe, we’ve got a video show really, not really a stage show. This is kind of like dipping a toe in, to find out where we can play, show people we sold out a fucking tour, and come back and do those halls where we can put on the full show, you know?

Anything else you want to let people know about this upcoming tour?

Not much, just that we’re coming to your fucking town, so if you really want us to play anywhere else, just tell us how much weed you got, you know? It works! Really!

Electric Wizard play the Virgin Mobile Corona Theatre on April 4, with guests Satan’s Satyrs and Blood Ceremony. Sold out.