Interview by Mike Bruno
Hey Dave! Please give us a brief history of the Parasites and the origins of the formation of the
band.
The Parasites formed in the late 80s in New Jersey, but weren't a serious band at first. The original bass
player, Ron Nole, had a few shows booked for his band, The Accelerators, but they'd broken up
right before the shows. He changed the band name to "Parasites", and scouted around quickly to find
people to play those shows. Through a mutual friend, I was drafted, and I had never been in a band
before. I didn't join until the second of these early Parasites shows, so technically there are no original
members in the band now! We started playing here and there, and later self-released an E.P., but
still only played locally due to Ron refusing to ever tour. Shredder Records from California heard our stuff
somehow, signed us, and the first Parasites album "Pair Of Sides" was released in late 1990. A little later,
I decided that I genuinely wanted to try to make Parasites a “real band”, but Ron still only wanted to do it
part time, and still wouldn't tour, so we split up the band and I moved Parasites to Berkeley, California at
the height of the mid 90s pop punk explosion. By the way, "Ronnie Is A Psycho" pretty much describes
the split! Our first three California shows were with NOFX, The Mr. T Experience, and Green Day, and we
started touring a lot right after that, and have never looked back, though I took a couple extended breaks
along the way. I found out very quickly during those breaks that I'm much happier when I'm in a band than
when I'm not, so I'm gonna be around for quite awhile longer!
You were originally based in New Jersey, then re-located to Berkeley, and are now living in Ohio.
What kind of effects did these different regions have on you as a band? Do you think there was a
particular time & place where the Parasites flourished most?
In New Jersey, like I said, we really didn't accomplish much, but I made up for that a lot once I moved to
Berkeley. I've lived in a bunch of different places since then, and have continued touring, though less
often lately than when we were based in California. I don't think location necessarily affects a band, other
than whether or not there are good shows to play or a good underground scene where you live. You can
play music anywhere, really, though if you want to be noticed, you do have to live near or at least travel to
places that have a good scene for the type of music you play. California was definitely the place where
we flourished the most, but I'm looking forward to picking up where we left off soon and revving up the
engines again! I'm currently living in Ohio for my job, but I'm planning on moving to Maryland once my
lease is up. I will be recording a new Parasites album at the end of this year with guitarist David
Delarosa from BraceFace, who's recently joined Parasites on guitar and vocals, and we intend to tour a
lot both with BraceFace, and on our own.
A lot of the same songs appear on both your albums "Pair of Sides" and "Pair". Can you explain
the different between the albums for those who don't know & why you chose to re-record most of
the material?
"Pair Of Sides" was released on LP and cassette only. After it went out of print and Ron was no longer in
the band, we re-recorded my songs from "Pair Of Sides" and added some newer stuff to fill out the "Pair"
CD. It made no sense to re-release "Pair Of Sides" on CD since the band had changed a lot by then, and
the songs on "Pair Of Sides" were half mine and half his, anyway!
You recently completed a new album, tell us a little bit about the newest Parasites material...
"Non-Stop Power Pop", which is being pressed as we speak, is 14 obscure 60s songs from all over the
world that have a Beatle-y vibe to them, that I found through extensive searching of online music blogs.
Since a lot of them were originally written by foreign bands, and they were all written in a different era, I
fiddled with both the words and music a bit to make them both sound more modern, and more like
Parasites songs!
I understand you’re a huge Beatles fan, who are some of your other favourite bands and biggest
influences?
I like a lot of music from many different genres, and am influenced by anything that's good, really. The
Beatles will always be my favourite band, though! There were times when I was younger that my musical
tastes were somewhat defined by whether or not I thought a band was punk enough for me to consider
cool, but luckily I wised up a long time ago on that - there's no point in being closed minded about music!
Also, who are some your favourite current D.I.Y. punk bands?
Lemuria, the Dopamines, BraceFace, The New Rochelles, and The Promdates.
What does the near future hold for the Parasites?
Our tour will be going on when this zine is out at Insub Fest, so after I get back from that, I'll continue
working on new songs for the next Parasites album, which we'll be recording around the end of this year
at Drastic Sounds with Matt Yonker, as usual. He'll be playing drums and engineering, and David
from BraceFace and I will handle the guitars and vocals and production / arranging. I've got a line on a
bass player as well, and am hoping that it will be four different people playing on this album so that there
are musical ideas from all of us on it!
What is your personal favourite Parasites release as a whole?
I'll stray from my usual lame answer, which is "The next one, I hope!", and say the "Paramania" EP. It was
the first one recorded after the original line-up split, and I finally got to record and produce my songs in
the way I always wanted to, which was to go beyond generic Ramones-core (though I still love
the Ramones!). It was great to finally be able to make a conscious effort to grow musically and start to
create a sound that was, (and still is, hopefully) identifiable as "Parasites".
What is a Rat Ass Pie?
An anagram of "Parasites". No such pie exists in real life, thankfully!