Interview with Jacoby Shaddix and Jerry Horton of Papa Roach

Words by Brendan Monteiro / Photos by Marcus Maschwitz

Lately there has been mania surrounding Nu-Metal, it was “uncool” at one stage and now seems to be the in-thing.  How has this affected yourselves as a band?

Jacoby:  LimpBizkit is the only band that came back, every other band has still been playing.  It baffles me because everyone is like there’s a resurgence of…LimpBizkit.  Korn’s been out touring, Deftones keep making records, Incubus keeps making records and Papa Roach keep making records.  Just because one band comes back doesn’t mean it’s back.

Jerry:  I don’t really think it’s affected us.

Jacoby:  We’re definitely stoked about coming through and making the records that we made, but we’re also really proud of everything that we have done since as a rock n roll band.  We have really tried to distance ourselves from that whole style, just because there were so many bands in the genre that we couldn’t stand and we didn’t want to be associated with it.  For us it’s always been about evolution, the whole thing that has maintained our relevance as a rock n roll band is evolution and not just rehashing on old times.

And how do you feel about the tag of ‘Rap Metal’?  Obviously in the first album there is a connection, but since then I feel you have moved from that, yet your still earmarked to that genre.

Jacoby:  We identified ourselves more with Rage Against The Machine and that whole end of the style of music.  Also Korn too, they really wore their hearts on their sleeves, especially on that first record and that was a really influential record for our band.  For me listening to Social Distortion was also a big influence, he was just a story teller, he is one of my favourite lyricist and made me want to pour my heart out.  I had too, it was necessary for me to survive and my music was the outlet.

Jerry:  We weren’t the typical Nu-metal band, but we’ve never been typical.  Our music is a reflection of our lives and the music that we listening too and the world around us.

How would you best describe the whole evolution of Papa Roach?

Jacoby:  Well it’s like we started the band as kids and now were grown men, just imagine what goes on in someone’s life between when your 16 years old and when your 32 years old, everything changes.  Our music is a reflection of who we are, Infest was fucking young and angry and pissed off, LoveHateTragedy was dark and depressed and confused, Getting Away With Murder was about liberation and hope, The Paramour Sessions was sex drugs and rock n roll and finally Metamorphosis is just diverse and hard rocking.

The Paramour Sessions also seems to have a real thrash feel to it.

Jacoby:  Yeah it’s got some cock to the rock

And the latest album seems to have more of traditional rock feel to it.

Jacoby:  It’s definitely our most rock album, artwork, everything.  We were actually talking to our management and we had another cover for the record done.  And management and the label saw it and said that “it just doesn’t say what you guys are and it’s a little more subdued” and then we had this picture of me from a few years ago.  It was of me on a white background just rocking out and we just thought “what do the fans love about Papa Roach and what is this record about”.  And our fans love our live show, they love our energy and our management told us that they could see that, that we are an energetic band.  So we wanted that to come across on this album and I like that it’s simple, basic and it’s got energy about it.  To me it’s just about us, that’s what music is and that is what this band is, it’s about four guys just rocking out.

Jerry:  We’ve never had a management that has actually had an opinion and it was always kind of like “well you do what you have to do”, which is great but sometimes it’s good to have constructive criticism on what your vision is. 

In your earlier days you were perceived as having a breakthrough album, yet their were years of hard work before Infest, how did it feel having all that hard work completely overlooked?

Jerry:  It’s not that we thought that everything we did before Infest was great but it was a part of our lives leading up to that.  We were trying to discover who we were as a band.  

Jacoby:  I don’t think we were ready to be heard until we finally got signed, we thought we were, we were like “we need to get signed, why is nobody signing us”.  Everything happens for a reason and it gave us time to find out who we were as a band and lyrically I wasn’t ready until we wrote the songs for Infest.  That was when I really found where I wanted to go lyrically and everything previous to that was a lot more abstract and scatter brained and not as focused as the stuff on Infest was.  I really felt that when we wrote ‘Last Resort’ and ‘Broken Home’, especially when I wrote ‘Broken Home’, it was a really emotional song for me and I put everything out there and laid all my cards on the table.

How did you deal with those lyrics being so emotional and having such a huge impact on peoples lives?

Jacoby:  The thing is I didn’t realize it while I was writing it, I was just doing what I felt was natural and threw myself into it.  Then when we went out and toured and heard so many story’s from fans, kids going through the same stuff, and for me that wasn’t the intention.  It’s crazy because after that I thought I cant just become a parody to myself and write the same lyrical content.  So over the course of the records I really just thought about where I was going and what was going on with my life.  There is no shortage of shit to write about.

Your lyrics seem to be riddled with cautions and lessons, are those for the fans or more for yourself?

Jacoby:  You know when I first started it was just what I needed to survive, to get the demons out of my head and to get how I feel about the world off my chest and out into the air.  Then I met all the fans out there that told me how my lyrics meant so much, and I was like ‘oh shit, do I have a responsibility to them’.  But i realized that I don’t, and that I only have a responsibility to myself and I just maintain that.  This music is me and it’s rad that people connect with it, I feel blessed, but if I think about having that responsibility of other people with my music I think it would become deluded and boring.  I don’t want that kind of responsibility, I just want to rock.  And with this record we were like ‘fuck it, I’m gonna write a song called I almost told you that I love you that is just a sleazy, rock song.  I didn’t know what our fans were going to think but it’s fun, and I’m a horny mother fucker, it’s a part of me, I’m a sexual fucking beast and everything reverts back to the cock for me.  

Jerry:  We were kind of tripping and then we went on to iTunes after our record had been out for a month and we found out that our 2nd or 3rd most downloaded song was I almost told you that I love you.  Obviously the fans have spoken as this is the song they’re downloading, and so we are going with it as a single and so we shot a video for it and I think it will do good.

Jacoby:  It’s big, sexy and dumb and fun.  To me it’s what makes the record human, it shows that we don’t take ourselves too seriously and everybody’s down to getting into a little fucking!

And What direction were you going for musically Jerry?

Jerry:  Tobin writes a lot of the material but on this record I think it was a lot more collaborative.  We had a lot more jamming sessions and had quite a few of the songs come out of those.  One of those was actually ‘Nights of Love’ which was totally spontaneous, Toby was like ‘I got to put something to that’ so he wrote the lyrics and it came out to be one of my favourite songs on the record.  It’s vibey and it’s got groove.  That is one of the things we said in the beginning, that we didn’t want to go for any certain thing and that whatever idea’s came out, whatever musical idea’s struck us, that we just wanted to work on them and make them good.  I think we got a pretty good diverse group of songs that actually fit together.

Jacoby:  It’s an entertaining record from beginning to end.  With that song too people confuse, I use women as a metaphor for drugs and alcohol.  Sometimes when I’m singing about a chick or a love relationship it’s actually about this mistress I’ve got that I like to fuck occasionally.

The Bottle?

Jacoby:  Yes, its fantastic

So what was behind the choice to use some of the songs from the earlier E.P’s on the Infest album?

Jerry:  Yeah there was an E.P called Let em Know that had ‘Binge’, ‘Snakes’, ‘Legacy’ and ‘Tight Rope’ but it was an alternate version of ‘Tight Rope’.  Then we got a demo deal with Warner Bros and wrote ‘She Love’s Me Not’, ‘Last Resort’, ‘Dead Cell’, ‘Between Angels And Insects’ and ‘Broken Home’.  We were going to put out a full length record, we were pretty much going to put out Infest on our own if we didn’t get picked up but then we got picked up by Dreamworks and we were ready to go and track the record.  So then all we had to do was record six more songs and we had the songs already done, we already knew what we wanted to release as singles and we just did it.

And why did you choose to not add ‘She Love’s Me Not’ from that earlier Warner Bros demo to the Infest album?

Jerry:  We just didn’t think it was right for the record, it was kind of ahead of it’s time and we kind of felt like it was too rock.  We thought that it wasn’t what we were going for at the time and decided to save it for the next record.  

Jacoby:  We knew it was a great song and I remember after we wrote it we were like “should we play this live or are fans going to trip out”.  We thought it was way ahead of it’s time and and felt we needed to keep it for the next album.  When your in the moment and your trying to create a vibe and energy it just seemed like the bastard cousin to the record

How did it feel after the demo deal and not being signed to Warner, then being signed to Dreamworks, and having Infest do so well?

Jacoby:  I would of loved to have signed to Warner Bros.  That to me would of been fucking great, there are so many great rock bands on that label.  They haven’t gone under, they are one of those labels that have just been solid for years and years.  I would of loved to have gone with them but it just didn’t work out.

It must of been hard as a band getting the promo deal and then not being signed. 

Jerry:  We were bummed, I remember we were sitting in a van in San Francisco when we got the call.  It wasn’t only that though, the guy that was sort of courting us got fired so we had no representation.  We had a moment in the van when we were thinking “Is it over”.  It was a fight.

Jacoby:  But we fucking made it dude, were fucking here five records later, fuck yeah.

With the first album the artwork was directed at the name, I know the name came from Jacoby’s Step-Grandfather, but where did the logo come from and was that the label’s idea?

Jacoby:  That was our whole thing after we named the band.  I remember Dave drew a cockroach with dreadlocks on it and we were like “It’s fucking cool dude, cockroach dude, that’s the logo” and then he drew the upside down one and we just adopted it.  That was in our independent phase and it was already in place and that was the logo.  Then it got played out and I don’t want to see cockroaches on everything we do now.  It’s like when Warrant did ‘Cherry Pie’ and it was like cherry pie this, cherry pie that, fucking cherry pie in my asshole.

Three of the albums you have released had had name changes, can you explain why?

Jacoby:  Almost every record had a name change.

Jerry:  Did Infest have name changes?

Jacoby:  I don’t think so, we were psyched, like that was it, P Roach!  Infest!

Jerry:  We just want to make a sort of cohesive package, we want the title actually represent what is on the record.

Jacoby:  LoveHateTragedy should of been called Born To Rock

The cover would of suited that title perfectly.

Jacoby:  When we look at the cover were like “this is Born To Rock dude, why did we call it LoveHateTragedy”.  I think part of that too is the fact that creatively, especially when Dave was in the band, everybody had idea’s and we wanted to make all those idea’s fit around each other.  We didn’t want to squash anybody’s creative influence and that is why it was kind of that art with that title.

Is there any truth behind the rumors of releasing an album of acoustic versions to previous songs?

Jacoby:  Were putting out an acoustic E.P right now and its got just three songs on it, ‘Had Enough’, ‘Carry Me’ and ‘Lifeline’

Jerry:  It’s three new tracks that we went in to Nashville with this guy James Michael (lead singer of Sixx:Am) and cut some acoustic tracks with him.  We’ve talked about doing the full blown acoustic record but right now the focus is on the task at hand.  And that is to tour on Metamorphosis.

Jacoby:  Maybe over the years we will just keep recording them and eventually put them all on one record

Metamorphosis and Naked and Fearless (acoustic E.P) are both out now through Interscope records

This post is tagged Jacoby Shaddix, Jerry Horton, Papa Roach