WRIF Virtual Rock Room with Don Jamieson
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00:00Thank you so much for watching Riff TV. Now this interview is obviously with video, but I don't
00:05interview everybody on Zoom. That's why I put it on my Talkin' Rock with Meltdown podcast. We talk
00:10to rock artists from all over the genre. So check out Talkin' Rock with Meltdown wherever you get
00:15your podcasts. And now to today's video interview. And there he is, DJ. How you doing? Don Jameson
00:24joins us. How's things, man? I'm excited to be with you and I'm on the show with Tobias.
00:29So it's a great day today. It's like this has been the peak of your career, right? It's
00:34all downhill from here. Every time I see you, I feel like my career is peaking once again.
00:41Yeah. And you're a good liar. So good to see you, man. So you got Terrorizing Telemarketers
00:487 coming out. I have a lot of questions about this. You sent me one of the tracks, which
00:51was hysterical, the COVID mask. There it is right there. There we see it for people watching
00:56Terrorizing Telemarketers comes out on September 16th, this Friday, as I record this. So now
01:01you've done this, obviously, a bunch of times before. And some of these questions you might
01:05have answered a bunch of times before. But do people call you and you just start screwing
01:10with them? Or do you guys have like this phony number that you just know gets calls? How
01:15does this work?
01:16No, it's just a phone number. It's a hard line in Jim Florentine's basement.
01:20And so, you know, wait there. Yeah, we know we just wait up in the kitchen and, you know,
01:26just try to come up with ideas. And, you know, we work on our computers. And then when the
01:30phone rings, we both run down the basement steps and pick up the phone. And, you know,
01:36whatever happens, happens because you don't they're calling you. So you don't know what
01:41they're going to say. So we kind of come up with a rough idea. But then, you know, we have
01:45to change on the fly. But I remember we were doing one of the calls on here and and we're
01:50down there and we we got a great call. We hung up. We're both giggling. We run up the
01:55stairs and Jim's 12 year old son, Luke, was there with his buddy at the same age. And
02:01his son just looks as he goes, you guys are so immature.
02:07That's the key, right?
02:08Yeah, I go. I think we found our target audience.
02:10There you go.
02:11No, the one you sent me, the COVID mask one was hysterical. So how many tracks are on
02:16this one?
02:17Let's see. There's 13 tracks. And yeah, we've done six of these already, believe it or not.
02:22I mean, this is the American dream, right? You know, two middle aged guys making prank
02:27calls. It's not too bad now.
02:29And this goes way back, of course, with you guys. So how many of these? How many of these?
02:35OK, you got what just how many tracks you say there is?
02:3813, 13. OK, so how many 13 tracks?
02:40How many did you not use?
02:43There's a couple that that didn't make it, but because we had to leave room.
02:48See, we have what most of the calls are around, say, three minutes, right?
02:52Right.
02:52That's about all telemarketers can handle with me and Jim.
02:55So but the last track is called Fiancee and it's 18 minutes long.
03:01It's our rhyme of the ancient mariner.
03:03Because this guy, we put this guy in a situation where basically like he's talking to Jim and Jim
03:12goes, oh, wait, some food just came to the door. Jim goes to the door to answer it. I pick up the
03:17phone like to use it. And I go, oh, who's this? And he and I go, oh, man, you know, I'm having
03:24trouble with my roommate. And, you know, he goes, yeah, he's trying to get a mortgage with me for him
03:28and his girlfriend. And I go, yeah, I know he's going to marry this girl, but I haven't been able
03:32to tell him a couple of weeks ago. I ended up having an affair with her. Then Jim gets back on
03:39the phone. Now all three of us are on the phone. And I asked the guy, could you please tell him for
03:43me? I don't know how to tell him. He's one of my best friends. We get this guy stuck in the middle
03:49of this love triangle. And he dissects us psychologically, the both of us. Like he should
03:58have gotten a diploma at the end of this call. It's so, it's so, it's the saddest, funniest thing
04:05we ever did. So is it like one of those things, like obviously with the, with the one you sent me,
04:09you know, uh, you had to tell the marker guy kind of had enough of you guys, but this guy liked it.
04:13Are you looking at Jim going never going to hang up? Yeah. Well, we're not hanging up if they don't
04:20hang up. So, uh, but yeah, this is fun, you know, COVID mask, you know, I just put my hand over my
04:25mouth and of course I'm the guy that has the important piece of information the telemarketer
04:31needs. And so how, how much was the loan for him? And he's telling me to take off the mask. And I'm
04:39like, you know, and Jim's like, no, he heard there's a variant you can get over the phone. So he's
04:43looking after your health. And it was pretty funny. I was listening to it with my 19 year
04:48old son in my car the other day, but he was half asleep. He didn't say how immature you guys were,
04:53but, uh, I don't know. He was just kind of doing his own thing. So that's cool. So how long did it
04:58take you to record all these, all these, uh, drops like a couple of weeks or a few months or what?
05:03Yeah, it took a few months. Cause you really do, man. It's like, it's like recording an album,
05:07you know, in a studio of like as a band, but except we got to wait for these calls to come in. So,
05:12I mean, most people are on the do not call list. We're on the please, you know, we got,
05:17we got a record to make. So, but, uh, yeah, we had a lot of fun with it, man. 13 tracks. And,
05:22um, yeah, man, it's, uh, like I said, it's a living bro.
05:27Yeah. But no doubt terrorizing telemarketer seven comes out, like I said, on the 16th,
05:31uh, uh, this coming Friday as we record this. So what else you've been doing with your life? I see,
05:35uh, you're at monsters on the mountain. Uh, you're doing all sorts of stuff. You have some cruises
05:40coming up. Uh, what's next year? Is it next year already? Or when, when, when are you doing that?
05:44Yeah, it will be, it's April, 2023, but the cool thing is monsters, the monsters are our cruise
05:50does this great land event called monsters on the mountain down in the smoky mountains of Tennessee.
05:55So, um, when we're not sailing at sea and partying like rock stars, we're partying like rock stars
06:01on the mountain. And, um, you know, we were talking before we came on, um, you know, about Joe Satriani
06:07down there and, uh, what a good dude, man. He, you know, he did a private show for people who bought
06:14his artwork cause he's doing painting now. And he had his gallery down there and, um, they had him in
06:19this tiny little room and behind them, they had all these blow up aliens, like blow up dolls, but
06:25in shape of aliens. And so I'm sitting there talking to Joe and, and I'm looking behind him and I was
06:30like, will you sign one of those aliens for me? And he's like, sure, no problem. So a couple of
06:36people took pictures and I got a nice picture of the alien signing the alien for me. Yeah, that's cool.
06:42You know, um, sometimes I find myself in those situations like that. Um, you know, I mean,
06:47we could go on and on about different things like that, but it's like, it's cool to have some of
06:50this, uh, stuff that you can kind of put aside for posterity, you know, and just like, you know,
06:56just to, to share an experience because like they say, every picture tells a story, you know,
07:00me, I'm a picture guy. So I got a room full of pictures of rock stars and, and every single
07:05picture you can ask me about, I can tell you a story about that picture. Now you got one with that
07:08alien. Yeah. Well, maybe I'll do like you and I'll make that the, um, the picture of my Christmas
07:13card this year. That's right. My Christmas card pictures. Yeah. I don't have one yet for
07:17this year. I gotta, I gotta think about that. Now you got me thinking. All right. I'll have to,
07:21I'll have to worry about this later. I see, uh, you bought some, uh, records recently. The last
07:25one I, well, I'll tell you what I've, I've gotten two recently and they're both brand new. I haven't,
07:29I haven't gone a crate, uh, hop in lately, but, uh, I did get the brand new Megadeth and the new
07:35Ozzy. What do you got? Well, I, you know, this guy, this is a reissue. I never, never had the,
07:41the original version of this, but this is the very first official metal blade records
07:48release 40 years ago. Was that Metallica? Yeah, that's Metallica. Now on the, on the original
07:55version, there's Metallica down, down over here on the original version, they spelt Metallica wrong.
08:01It was N-E-T-A-L-L-I-C-A, but they, they fixed it for the reissue. So, you know, it took 40 years,
08:08but they got, uh, Metallica's name right on the album finally. But, uh, but this is a classic.
08:14There's, you know, rats on here. Um, malice, bitch, stealer with Ron Keel. Yeah. So those are the
08:22very, you know, the very early roots. And, uh, I'm going to, Whoa, what happened now?
08:26Why'd I get blurred? For those listening also, and Don is like, just a little blurry. I'm not
08:31sure what happened there. Uh, I got a blur going here. Uh, I don't know. I have a couple of
08:36cocktails. Uh, all right. We'll fix that in a second here, but yeah, he just showed the,
08:40a metal massacre album, which he just looked up. There you go. He looked good now. Yeah. Have
08:45you heard the new Megadeth record? Just the songs that are out. I mean, they're ferocious. So, uh,
08:51you know, I'm, I'm excited to hear the whole thing. Is it good from top to bottom? I'm going to tell
08:55you, man, I love it. I think it's great. It's maybe the, my favorite record of the entire
09:00year. Yeah. I think the Aussie, I put a review out on the Aussie'd say, I think the Aussie
09:05records decent. There's some songs I could kind of do without, you know, things here and
09:09there. But, uh, I mean, listen, when you got Zach wild and Eric Clapton, Tony Iommi, Jeff
09:14back, you know, um, I think it's, I think it's really good. But like I said, there's a couple
09:18of songs. I'm like, I'm not sure about this one, but some of the stuff, uh, obviously with
09:21Tony Iommi, thick, heavy, evil, you know, the whole thing. Yeah. No, you can't go wrong
09:27with those two. And it was cool to see them play again recently at that, uh, that little
09:32concert they did over in, uh, over in England. And so, yeah, I mean, the last couple Aussie
09:37albums, you know, you know, about five really good songs and, you know, let's see if he tours,
09:42man. I mean, he's, it looks like he's trying. So it looks like he's trying to get out there,
09:46get his stage, stage legs back. Of course, you know, Zach still the berserker, you know,
09:51always, always entertaining. He's a, he's a one man show. So, uh, and do you follow him on Twitter?
09:58Oh yeah. Yeah. I follow him on all socials. Yeah. He's, he's very entertaining.
10:02Like, yeah. Cause he's always posting, you know, just goofy stuff and skits and things like that.
10:08When I toured with him, you know, for a month, you know, I would wake up, like I would wake up in my
10:13bunk to, to him screaming. And like, I woke up to tour match, right? Like Zach. All right. Cause
10:19he takes the back lounge. I was going to break down the door. He goes, nah, he's just back there
10:22making videos. Yeah. For someone, for anyone who doesn't follow Zach for sure. So I'll tell you
10:29what, I didn't, I didn't plan on bringing this up, but I'm going to put you on the spot. So what do
10:32you think of this Pantera thing? Because I'm kind of on the fence. I think, uh, I'll, I'll just,
10:37I'll just tell you what I think right off the bat. I think a tribute to Pantera, a celebration of
10:41Pantera, anything like that would probably be a little bit better, but calling it Pantera. I
10:45don't know, man. I have something, something sacrilege about that. Yeah. Well, you and I feel
10:49the same way. Um, it's the, it's the perfect two right guys. There's no two better guys to fill in
10:57to do this. And it would just, it's funny how just a couple little words above the logo,
11:03all the difference in the world. I'm still trying to figure out why as a middle-aged man, I would care
11:09that much that just, it would say a celebration of, and then, and then use the logo. I get it.
11:14People see the logo, they get excited, but look, I guess, I guess it's like any other band, man,
11:19foreigners out there, zero original members touring. So, you know, if you got two of the four
11:25to some people, that's, you know, you know what though? I mean, I, I posted this on my socials and
11:31I get different responses like that. Right. And it's like, you know, yeah, well, if foreigner can do it,
11:36or if so-and-so could do it, but here's the thing. And I mean, I'm kind of stating the obvious
11:41dime bag died, you know, 15, 17 years ago, whatever it was, Vinny's gone. It's like,
11:47those are the two keys, you know, in the cog, as far as I'm concerned, uh, that made that machine
11:54work. And now all of a sudden they're gone and they never showed any like, uh, inkling to put
12:01Pantera back together. Now all of a sudden it's back together. You know, it just seems weird.
12:05It does seem weird. And, um, uh, like I said, they're the, they're the perfect two guys,
12:10you know, Zach and Charlie are great dudes. They'll obviously play the stuff, you know,
12:16properly and it'll be exciting. But, um, yeah, I w I hope there's some last minute pardon from the
12:23governor where they still know you got to put, you know, a celebration of, right. What was the last
12:29concert you went and saw? Um, well, that monster's on the mountain. I saw like 30 bands, but, um,
12:36just as far as, you know, going to a show was a Rob Zombie here in Jersey.
12:40That was Peter. Chris showed up. I saw your picture. That's awesome.
12:44Yeah. Peter and John five are good friends. It was John's 52nd birthday, I think. So
12:50they had a little party for him, uh, backstage outside under this little tent. And, you know,
12:56I went and Jim and, uh, Peter was there and man, Peter looks great. He said, he's going to put out
13:02new music. Um, so that's cool. And, um, you know, I saw the, I saw Mr. Mrs. Zombie and we talked and
13:11I'm excited for the Munsters movie. One of my favorite shows growing up. So we'll see what Rob
13:16does with that. But dude, I've been seeing white zombie since I don't, the late eighties. I mean,
13:24I used to see white zombie, uh, in New York city at this tiny club called the Lismar lounge opening
13:30for a band called circus of power. And then next thing, you know, it becomes this whole thing.
13:35Rob zombie leaves. He's, he's gotten huge. I've seen every version of Rob zombie in a band. And I
13:43got to say, man, this is the best I've ever seen him. I mean, he, his voice sounded great.
13:49He was on fire. Peter, Chris came out and sang happy birthday to John. You know, he has all,
13:55you know, the monsters and everything are killer, man. It was just one of those nights, man. We're
13:59just everything. It was a great summer night. Everybody was having a good time. So yeah,
14:04Rob zombie still doing it, man. He kills it live in concert. There's no question about it. You just
14:09talked about the monsters. Uh, are you a horror movie fan? Uh, I, yeah, I am a bit, a bit of one,
14:15but I like the old school stuff. You know, I like Vincent price and stuff like that. Yeah. I remember
14:20going to see trick or treat in the movie theaters with my buddies. Remember that classic? Yeah. With
14:25a song by fast way. Yes, exactly. Yeah. Um, but, uh, I went and saw the movie barbarian last night,
14:31which is, uh, I didn't really even ever hear about it, but it takes place at an Airbnb right here in
14:37Detroit. I didn't even know that until I started watching it. Wow. Well, yeah, that's the new
14:43modern, you know, they don't have haunted houses anymore. Now they're haunted Airbnbs. Yeah. I've
14:48just gone down to a horror movie crazy. I've kind of been waiting for the weather to turn and now it
14:52is. So now it's like, okay, I'm going to watch all these horror movies, you know, where the teenagers
14:56like taking selfies with the, with the killer on wait, wait, before he sliced my throat, let's put
15:02this on Tik TOK. Yeah. Right. Tik TOK. Yeah. Don't get me started on that kind of stuff. Hey,
15:07you got any cool interviews coming up? Oh man. Um, for that Jameson show. Yeah. Um,
15:13I guess this is airing on what? The 17th. This right now. No, this is going to air today.
15:20The day. So tomorrow on that quick turnaround, this is February. No, this is September 12th. Yeah. Go
15:25ahead. Yeah, no, on my show tomorrow, I'm going to have, uh, speaking of bands that have new albums
15:30out that are really good. I got John Campbell, bass player for Lamb of God and Jerry Gaskill drummer
15:36for King's X who, uh, they just dropped their record on, uh, on what's his name's birthday there.
15:42Doug's birthday. Yeah. 72 years young. My God, the guy is ageless. Uh, not an ounce of fat on the guy
15:50whose voice sounds phenomenal. Jerry even sings three songs on this album. So, um, both and both good
15:56dudes to talk to both really funny guys. In fact, I talked with, um, I'm going to talk with John about
16:02that because, you know, Jim and I met the guys from Lamb of God, like way before that metal show
16:08when, you know, we do the phone pranks obviously, but we also did a bunch of DVDs called meet the
16:13creeps where we did hidden camera pranks on people. And, uh, we were friends with the band shadows fall
16:20and it was shadows fall Lamb of God and Slipknot all out on tour. This is like the early 2000s.
16:25Nobody in the metal world knew us at all. And shadows fall brought us around and introduced
16:31us to all the guys in Lamb of God. We just pretend we were normal fans and we just kept asking for more
16:36and more ridiculous things for them to autograph for us, you know, to be like, could you just write
16:41like something like, you know, Hey Don, thanks for the reach around. And I'm like, what are you
16:47like? Come on. You know, we drove away from Connecticut. You can at least write what we
16:51ask. And it got increasingly more and more absurd. All the things that we were asking them for.
16:56And finally at the end, Mark Morton, like basically makes a fist and he's like right about to punch me
17:02because they said, don't, don't ask to shake his hand. He's a germ freak. So me and Jim kept putting
17:06our hands out for him to shake. That's how we met those guys. So they ended up being good sports about
17:13it. And we've been friends with them ever since. So I had that happen with a
17:17sale from, uh, impractical jokers. And this was pre pandemic. I guess he doesn't like to shake
17:22hands either. Oh really? Yeah. Either does. Um, what's his name there? Uh, Carl Palmer.
17:27That's another long story. I could tell you sometime, but yeah, sale. He just does this
17:30thing, you know? Uh, all right. Next time I see him, I'm going to force handshakes on
17:34you. See those guys a lot being over there in that part of the country.
17:38I see a Quinn once in a while, you know, Quinn's a big, uh, metal head. Oh, I didn't know that.
17:44Okay. Yeah. Yeah. So I, I saw him, um, I saw him at the LA guns, faster pussycat show
17:49over the summer. So, um, yeah, I see him at shows and I just did a convention in Atlanta
17:54with, uh, with Murr.
17:57It was a convention. Like, what do you mean?
18:01It was, you know, those, well, speaking of horror, it's one of those horror conventions
18:04and they got, they do a comedy show there and you know, they call it the dead comedy jam.
18:09Okay. And it was, it was me and Jimmy J.J. Walker.
18:14I don't mind. Well, yeah. Which he won't say. Oh, really? No, he will not. He will not say in
18:20his act. So of course I said it like 50 times when I went up there because here's the thing,
18:26like in my mind, like for, well, first of all, when I got the email, Hey, do you want to come
18:30down and do a show with Jimmy J.J. Walker? My first thought was like, who canceled? Cause it's
18:35such a weird combination. Like, you know, here's this prank call and heavy metal comic
18:40and you know, this old sitcom legend, you know, he's 74 now, but it, you know, that's
18:46another show that I loved growing up. So I said, yeah, I'll come down and do it. That'll
18:50be great. But I'm figuring I just going to open for them, you know, so I put together
18:54a nice friendly opening set. Cause I'm thinking, ah, he, you know, he's probably does very clean
18:59stuff and everything. About an hour before the show, he comes down and, um, he's like,
19:05Hey, listen, man, you know, I'm 74. I'm pretty tired. You know, do you mind if I just go up
19:09and do mine first and then I'll give you a nice intro and then you could do your thing.
19:13So now I got to follow Jimmy Walker, you know, and the people go to these conventions,
19:18they're all into that nostalgia stuff. So I go, this is going to be horrible. But the good
19:24thing was I was signing in a rock room before and Corey Taylor and, um, Phil Anselmo were
19:29in the room with me. So a whole bunch of metal people were there at the end of the night and
19:34they all came to the show, including Anselmo who sat right in the front and I tortured him
19:39so bad that he walked out like three quarters of the way. Um, but it ended up being such a
19:46fun night, man. Jimmy was great, man. He gave me like a minute introduction. This guy's
19:52that I love working with this guy, this guy, I never met the guy in my life and he gave
19:57me this great intro. He's going to rock your world and ended up being a really fun, but
20:01uh, yeah, but Murr was down there from Impractical Jokers. Those guys are killing it, man. I
20:05think so, so, you know, instead of tuning into Impractical Jokers, go out and buy this and
20:12help, right. Help a New Jersey, a couple of New Jersey boys get a cup of coffee. I think
20:17that, uh, I think that doesn't Jimmy Walker say dynamite in that commercially has
20:22for, I don't know, reverse mortgage or whatever the hell he's, uh, does he say it? He's got
20:26to say it right. You got to get paid for that. Right. Yeah. I think, I think there's, I think
20:30there's, um, I think there's a number that you could give him that he'll say dynamite.
20:36Right. Exactly. Or sign it or whatever the case is. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, he did a whole
20:41bit about that. He goes, don't you hate these celebrities on TV trying to sell you reverse
20:46mortgages and gold. And cause to tell you the truth, I'm sick of myself at this point.
20:50So, Hey, you got to make a living, right? Yeah, absolutely, man. He was a good guy,
20:56man. I had a lot of fun with him. Uh, final thing here for you. I just, just thought about
21:00this as I'm talking to you. Is there any bites to bring back, uh, that metal show to anything?
21:05I mean, that was streaming and stuff. I thought that maybe, you know, maybe, uh, you know, just
21:10saying like a Netflix or something, anything like that. Is there anything like that?
21:12Um, well, there's a, I got a good mug out of the, you know, that was in my contract. I had to have
21:24a, but that show ended. How, how long ago did that show end? Uh, 2016. Okay. So, and since then,
21:30I mean, that's, that's six years since then, there's been a lot of stuff that you guys could
21:34put a show like that on. I know you would think so, man, but, um, I don't know. I, you know,
21:39we're, we've had offers and stuff over the years. It just wasn't, you know, things that weren't the
21:44right fit and, you know, obviously we're, we're affordable, so that's not the issue. And, and
21:49we're still all friends. I mean, we still all hang out together. So it's not like, you know,
21:54we got to have three separate, you know, dressing rooms and, you know, three buses until we get to
21:59the place. And, you know, I got to say as, ask as many questions as Eddie and Jim or any of that,
22:04you know, it, you know, we'll step right back into it. If, and when it happens, hopefully man,
22:10now's a good time. Cause with stranger things making metal big again and making it cool. And,
22:15and bands like Greta Van Fleet out there, we're bringing girls into the shows again,
22:19which is great. Cause Jim just saw Greta open for a Metallica. He's like, it's unbelievable.
22:25How many girls were going crazy for those guys. So yeah, he saw the show in Buffalo, I think. Right.
22:30Cause I saw the show in Pittsburgh a few days later. No, he saw it in Pittsburgh.
22:33Oh yeah. I was there too. Yeah. Yeah. So, so yeah, now would be a good time, man. But yeah,
22:39we'll see if, if anybody out there owns a television station or a streaming platform,
22:44get my number from meltdown. That's right. All right, DJ. Well, listen, man,
22:48thanks so much for the time. Terrorize the telemarketer seven drops this coming Friday,
22:53the 16th, as we record this. And like I said, if you're listening to this, you can watch this
22:57interview because you can't get enough of Don Jameson or myself. And we, we appreciate good luck
23:03with everything, brother. Thanks as always, man. I appreciate it too.