John Wisniewski: what was your first band, William? Before GG Allin.
William Gilmore Weber: The Spaztics. Senior year of high school (’81). Just a punk cover band. Ramones, Clash, Pistols, Dead Boys…etc. We were the only ‘punks’ in our school… and in our suburb in Cincinnati. We played one gig… a sock hop. I never studied or participated in anything dealing with academics… didn’t even show up for class pictures. But… I did want to get a picture in the yearbook playing guitar in the band. And yes… my picture was in there… with the bass player jumping in front of me… blocking most of me out. Up until I started playing with GG… I probably played in over 30 bands with varying degrees of public admiration.
John Wisniewski: Any favorite bands and albums? And are you a fan of punk?
WGW: I’ll admit… I’m not much of a collector… and I don’t really hunt things down. But I’ve been lucky enough to have had a few friends with huge collections… and they would turn me onto stuff. In my teens it was obscure punk. Mainly English bands… and CB’s/Max’s stuff. I liked it because… quite simply… I could play it. That, and everyone else in my area hated it. So, it gave me an ‘edge’. I have a pretty alright knowledge of music history and styles… and can usually tell who and what’s playing when I’m listening… sometimes by their style or sound. I enjoy all kinds of stuff… and absorb what I can… but not from a diehard fan angle. Sometimes I can kick ass at music trivia.
John Wisniewski: what was it like working with GG Allin?
WGW: eh… what can be said. It was a headache at times… and hilarious at times. Never a dull moment… for sure. I was with the group for 2 1/2 years or so… but a lot of that time… he was in prison. We did 2 tours before he was extradited back to Michigan on a parole violation… and sent out to finish the rest of his term.
Once he was back in jail… I didn’t hear from the others for quite a while. Then Merle called me up to tell me GG was getting released soon. He said GG wanted to go into the studio right away, record an album… then do a tour. To pass the time, he had written a bunch of lyrics. But, we hadn’t written one song since he was thrown in there. Merle was good for 2 songs… but at that time… that’s all he had. Me? I had nothing. So…I knuckled down with a cassette recorder and banged out 14 songs or so. Then the band would get together every week and rehearse the tunes. The plan was GG would get out… come to NYC, match up his lyrics to our songs… rehearse them for 2 days… then hit the studio. And that’s exactly how it happened. Back in prison… GG got all serious about his “manifesto” and bringing it to the masses. That was a part of him that was created in prison. Gone was the wasted, drug-fueled, passed out hack I had heard about. He recreated himself as a R & R juggernaut aiming to take-out anyone and anything in his way. We had no idea what kind of ‘wisdom’ GG had on paper to match up… and basically… we didn’t really find out till we were all in the studio! Not to brag or anything… but for how it all went down… I was amazed. The Brothers Allin decided to call the record “Brutality and Bloodshed for All”. Good enough for me. I believe it took 5 nights to record and mix everything, and shortly after it was finished… we were on the road doing the ’Terror in America” tour. Fifteen shows in twenty five days… coast to coast. Once back we took a couple of weeks off. We had the one gig at the Gas Station booked, we played it… and then… he was dead the next morning.
John Wisniewski: How did you meet the guys in Chrome Cranks?
WGW: Peter and I had played in a couple bands back in Cincinnati and musically clicked right away. I decided Cincy was too small of a town to be noticed or heard in… so in July of ’91 I split to the bright lights of NYC. I twisted Peter’s arm and he followed in Feb of ’92. Peter used to be a booking agent in Cincinnati… and kept in good contact with all the cool bands that were traveling out of the L.E.S. of Manhattan.
We had started hanging out with Jerry and Lisa of The Honeymoon Killers… who were kinda breaking up at the time. We talked him into playing bass on a few tracks we wanted to record… and it took off from there. We went through a few drummers before Bob showed up to ask us to do the backing track for his side project ‘Bewitched’. We talked him into playing drums for us at an upcoming music seminar, and… it all kinda snowballed from there. Jerry and I turned our rehearsal spot into a recording studio (Funhouse)… where we did 95% of all our releases. We also recorded a lot of internationally know groups and artists. Cool times…
John Wisniewski: .What are you currently working on? Do you write songs?
WGW:Since moving back to Cincinnati in Jan of 2000… I kept myself busy and in trouble playing and recording with a slew of bands… local and not. I built a nice recording facility (krakdhaus) in my basement… and I’ve recorded some regional and touring bands… and many little project I start up. I still get asked to record on various projects (although not as many as I wish!). As far as songwriting… I take on writing a lot of the music for anything I’m involved in. But lyrically… I suck. I knew right off that was a weakness!
In the past month I’ve just finished recording and playing bass on the second Pisswater Preachers album… and did some backing instrumentation on a song from an E.P. by Mara Moon… a local chanteuse/songstress of amazing talent. I enjoy doing little things like that almost as much as playing out. As far as my own stuff… I’ve released 6 CD’s over the past 10 years of different types/styles of music. Lately… I’m taking on orchestration and soundbed stuff. All punk rockers that are seriously into music go this way… eventually. There’s supposed to be money in film work.. heh-heh.
