Phenomenal fan response and good reviews made this one year old quintet one of the top acts in the L.A. club circuit. Dave Aragon (originally from Denver), Tommy Thayer (ex - BLACK'N'BLUE, HARLOW, COLD GIN - played guitar on several albums and producer), Brian Jennings (guitar), Danny Parker (drums , originally from NY) and Kenny Kweens (bass, from New Orleans) are playing to sellout crowds. They've made it onto the Foundation Forum '93 unsigned cassette compilation and even appeared in a Dutch commercial for tobacco. We got more information from Tommy Thayer...

Tommy: "SHAKE THE FAITH is a real new outfit from CA. The band started out with Dave and Brian and had a different version of this band. It was alot different, it was about a year or two ago and they decided they wanted to change things around. So that time I was just getting done doing the COLD GIN thing , which was that KISS thing for fun and they asked me if I would be interested in getting into this band with them. So I did this, so we put the rest of this band together with Danny and Kenny, the bass player and the drummer, and it was about one year and a half ago, so we just been taking it from there; so we did that first demo in the summer sometime, the new stuff we just did a month ago (February) - this stuff's all gonna be on the Japanese record ."
How did you get the idea for the band name?
Tommy: "The band name came up, the old bass player in that early version with Dave and Brian, he came up with the name somehow, so we liked it, so we decided to stick with it. It's kinda cool, 'cos it's a little bit different, and it kind of really represents what we're kinda all about, too."
You plaved in BLACK'N'BLUE and COLD GIN before. Why haven't you mentioned HARLOW in the info paper, and what about the other bandmembers? Have they played in bands before?
Tommy: "HARLOW was such a short period of time, there I didn't feel that it was that important, I don't think anybody heard of it too much, 'cause we didn't sell too many records. And HARLOW started out as a recording. project, they needed somebody play guitar on their album, the singer, I did that and then they asked if I would play in the band on some shows so I ended up doing that for a while, but it really wasn't a big deal. But it was a good record. The other bandmembers... nobody's really done any, you know, they are all new guys on the scene and that's cool."
You played an the 1993 Foundations Forum - how was the response?
Tommy:"We actually played on the Foundations Forum Kickoff party at the Palomino which was the night before that all started and it was pretty cool, but seems that was a while back and we've really developed a lot since then, but I think the response was really good, and we're on the unsigned band Foundations Forum cassette and we got a lot of good response from that, too . 'Weight Of The World ' was the song on that."
Have you played any showcase?
Tommy :"No, we're not gonna really like to do showcases and stuff like that, I think we' re gonna wait for people to come to us, which is already beginning to happen. Especially if we get the CD all together for Japan, we have the whole package together, it's done and we're just hoping that somebody will release it, as you know, the way it is 'cause we put alot of time and afford into it and make it really cool and so that's what we wanna do. Just have somebody put that out in Europe too ."
Are you in contact with major companies?
Tommy: "Yeah , I mean we know some people at some companies and stuff , but like I said when time's right it's gonna happen, we just don't wanna rush it, and we don't wanna do like private showcase bullshit at rehearsal studios, stuff like that, 'cause that's lame , that's not what we 're all about."
How do you finance the recordings, do you have sidejobs or 9-5 jobs?
Tommy: "Yeah, everybody pretty much is working side - jobs right now. That's the cool thing about, everybody's really dedicated to, coming up with the goods and you know, but we need money to do things sometimes. People working it really helps out that, so the recordings we paid for by ourselves. We just split up the amount and pay for it, you know, split it up between. Now we got an advance from these Japanese thing so that 's helping pay for stuff now plus some gigs, we're playing around L.A., you know, doing really well, packing the clubs and we're making money doing that, too. But that's not our main intend, not to make money in the clubs ."
How did you get the chance to appear in the Dutch tobacco commercial?
Tommy: "Our singer Dave's, his ex-girlfriend worked in an agency for actors and stuff and she saw this commercial, they needed a band for a commercial, so she sent our tape and a pic and they picked us, so that's how we got that . They said that this next season in spring or summer they're gonna have us come to Holland to play some festivals maybe."
What will happen on the L.A.marathon?
Tommy: "The L.A.marathon was last week, on the 6th of March, but we decided not to do it at the last minute, 'cause we thought it was gonna be lame, 'cause we didn't realize that we would be playing at 10:30 in the morning and there wouldn't be any rock'n'rollers down there just families, so we thought it would be lame, so we cancelled it that last minute."
You will release your album an Alpha Brunette... please tell me more about this company.
Tommy: "Alpha / Brunette is a medium size Japanese label with two guys that are running it, they are really cool and they really understand our kind of music. We feel comfortable with it. We're not gonna only release the album in Japan but to begin what we are and we gonna release the same record all over the world when the time is right ."
Have you played many live gigs in CA?
Tommy: "We've been playing a lot of gigs in the L.A.area. We're one of the most popular, the most popular, rock'n'roll band here right now, cause there's no good ones at all."
What kind of music is popular in the L.A. area?
Tommy: "The scene here is really kind of down, cause lot of these bands and stuff have broken up, they're kinda lost or something because the whole alternative scene, you know, the rock'n'roll scene is really alternative right now and that stuff is happening more up in the North / West. A lot of these bands are coming from there and so the Hollywood scene is kinda dead right now - except for SHAKE THE FAITH! We're doing pretty good, cause we've kinda got a punk edge to what we' re doing which is different to what most bands are doing here right now. We have a real raw, aggressive angry kinda thing, too, which is for real. And people like that, our shows are really really really exciting!"
How many songs do you have with SHAKE THE FAITH?
Tommy: "I think we got about 10 or 15 songs and we do a bunch of cover stuff, too, so not BLACK'N'BLUE or KISS stuff . The cover stuff we 're doing : THE RAMONES 'Sedated' , THE KINGS 'Destroyer', which is on the new tape, 'So What' by this punk band called ANTI-NOWHERE LEAGUE , we're doing 'Dead, Jail Or Rock'n'Roll' by MICHAEL MONROE, stuff like that. The demo tapes are for sale and we're using it for sale and promotion, but the main thing for the dollars is just for the costs of making them and sending 'em out . So everybody can get one of these cassettes from us by writing to our P.O.Box. We have more songs recorded , 4 or 5 more songs which are really really cool. The new stuff we're really happy with it!"

Tina Ehmke

Original interview, courtesy of TAKE IT # 4 (print version) as pdf files: page1, page2, cover

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