BANG
An Interview with Tony D’Iorio, drummer for the seventies' unsung metal gawds, BANG
(Interview by Perry M. Grayson)

BANG (1970-1973) Frank Ferrara - bass/vocals Frankie Gilcken - guitar/vocals Tony D’Iorio - drums BANG Discography Death of a Country (Previously Unreleased 1st LP, Aug. 1971) Bang (Feb. 1972) Mother / Bow to the King (Nov. 1972) Music (June 1973) Make Me Pretty (Single, 1973) Slow Down (Single, 1973) Feels Nice (Single, 1973) RTZ: Return to Zero (Nov. 1999)

SR: Please tell us a little bit about "RTZ" (Return To Zero), the new BANG album.

TD: We have some vintage BANG [graphics], we’ve got 15 tunes and we’re really happy with it. The old folks are gonna be happy with BANG. It’d be great if something happened with BANG (the band)–in fact the Franks are putting the band back together. We’re looking for a guitar player and a keyboard player right now. They up in Philly, and I’m in Dallas. And of course I’m not playing anymore. I’m strictly doing the business end and the website and that kind of business–and the writing. But one thing we’re trying to do with this CD is–we’ve got some great tunes on here that are basically hits, even some Country-type tunes. We’ve covered about all the genres except Rap on this thing. And one of the things that we’re doing is getting this CD to artists to cover some of these tunes. We’ve got some great tunes that could be covered. This could be our "Jagged Little Pill" album. ‘Cuz, hell, there are some great tunes on this album. We’re looking for checks in the mail. So, that’s where we’re coming from. "RTZ" was written mostly to be covered by other artists. We have Rock, R&B Swing, Country, Alt and Christian (i.e. "Should I"). We are hoping for checks in the mail so we can apply more of our lives to our music. Right now were still "apathetic 9 to 5, cashing paychecks to survive." ["Future Shock"]. I feel we have "hits" on it but our fans are probably disappointed by the lack of heavy tunes. If we are "one of the few bands whose sound defined what heavy was" then we have an obligation to go in that direction, and we will! It may take an awakening of who we were to allow us to be who we are.

SR: You played drums on the first (unreleased) BANG album, "Death of a Country" and the self-titled album. I noticed you wrote the lyrics on all the albums, too. I know it’s a deep question, but why didn’t you continue to play drums in BANG? What happened in those early days when you were with the band?

TD: The unknown story... This story has not been printed yet. This is coming up in the BangStory on the website. What happened has happened to so many bands, what happened to us. You read the story of how we happened, right? We bought some marijuana in Florida and we went to a record store to buy some rolling papers. And we had our equipment with us because I’m thinking this guy told me–this is how stupid it is–some distributor in Miami’s looking for a band. So, anyway, a chain of events put us into a store that had a sign about a battle of the bands. "Can we play?" "No, that was last week. And, so why don’t you go Orlando and Rod Stewart’s playin’, and you can play with him. Ha ha ha ha!" So, we’re back that night getting stoned at our tent, and it was decided, "Yeah, let’s go to Orlando and play with Rod Stewart. Why not?" Heck, you know, we’re just three guys with all our equipment. So we went there–we rolled in about six o’clock in the morning–we set up our equipment in the middle of the floor. Banged on the door, somebody came out. It was the promoter. We told him we were BANG from Philly, and as good as any band in the country and we’ve got our equipment set up. Come out and hear us. If you like it let us open the show, if not we’ll pack it up and go home. So we clanged our balls in front of him. He came out. He loved us. We opened the show. There were like 15,000 people. Rod Stewart, DEEP PURPLE and FACES. This guy signed us as personal management. He was with East Coast Concerts, which was partners with West Coast Concerts, which was the granddaddy of ‘em all. We did "Death of a Country." We recorded it at Criteria. And so Rick, who was the manager, started shopping it around. He went to CAPITOL. CAPITOL liked more of the business that was behind it, hearing him. ‘Cuz Rick basically guaranteed we were gonna be playing everywhere, opening up for the biggest names in the world. And so, "We need a record deal." That’s the same way we got a publishing deal. CAPITOL sent out a producer. They didn’t want to release the first album, "Death of a Country". He said, "I’ll be back in two weeks, write me another album." In two weeks he came back. We wrote the Bang album in two weeks. The song "Questions"–which was the hit–they didn’t even want to put it on that album.

So, we’re happening. We’ve got a first album. Now our producer’s Michael Sunday. He gets an offer he’s gonna go to COLUMBIA or some other label, ask us if we want to go with him. But we’re already signed into CAPITOL, so we couldn’t. CAPITOL got this other producer, whose name will not pass my lips. He comes out, and we’re gonna go out to Sound Factory in Hollywood with Dave Hassinger. I mean, we’re talking DOOBIE BROTHERS. This guy did the STONES. Top engineer, top place–the best. We go out to California to record. So, we come to the studio the next day and there’s some guy sitting in the drum booth. It’s Bruce Gary, the guy from the KNACK, I mean the best drummer in the world. I’m suddenly not playing on this album. And it’s like "What do you mean I’m not playing on this album." The producer decided that I wasn’t going to play. You know how it is as a musician and it’s happened to so many bands–that’s when the wedge was stuck in. So many bands go down the tubes when somebody comes in and changes things.

SR: Yeah, you know I’m in a band myself now and I’ve been in others before, and I’ve definitely dealt with something like this.

TD: And here I am... I was crushed. I mean, I’m a young guy. I’m crying, and the Franks are 17 years old. They have no idea what’s going on. Here were are, we went from a basement to having BANG Day at CAPITOL Records and this kind of stuff. All this incredible stuff is happening, and then suddenly the three of us... The marriage, I mean someone’s coming in between. So, I said "Fine." He thought the drumming was the weakest [point of the band]–and it was musically. But that’s what made the group. I said "Fine, I’ll go along with this. And in the meantime I’m gonna start really practicing–and I was only working out at the time– I’m gonna practice even harder so can get better the next album, the next whatever. I’ll play on it. So, that’s why Bruce came in. I watched this guy play, and he was so good. He was playing when he was like 3 years old. He’s incredible. If there’s anyone to replace me, it’s Bruce. So then what happened was we go into a thing... The band–this whole thing separated the Franks and me. And I basically left the group. I said, "I’m gone." And I went back home. So, the Franks were gonna finish up the album. We’d already written all the songs. We had been in Criteria and recorded a bunch of the songs. The producer took them back into the studio and brought in Duris Maxwell and Bruce Gary to record over all my stuff that I had done for the "Mother" album. And I’m back up in Delaware in the retail business, selling white socks, wondering how my life has gone down the tubes. And then the Franks come back and they’ve got the acetate of the album. And I’m like in tears listening to this thing. ‘Cuz it sounds good. "And where’s Tony’s at..." and "Tony’s crushed." And they dedicate the album to me, and all this kind of crap. And the Franks and I are tight, but it’s like everybody else is just screwing with our heads.

SR: I didn’t even have to ask about that one. You just answered my question about whether major labels in the 70’s would allow a band to keep a grip on their creative freedom and personal identity. We’ve already seen how it was in the 90’s. How will it be in the first decade of the 21^st century? Well, I think BANG’s presence on the net shows you that the web has been giving some power back to the artists themselves–and enabling them to do their own promotion, sales, et cetera.

TD: So, I was still tight with the Franks. We were like married, even though I was initially very upset. Because it was like, "Well why didn’t you guys do something when Bruce was there." But they didn’t know what to do. They were 17 years old, just a couple of kids. I was already married and had kids, and I could appreciate what was happening to us because I had already had a gig. I mean, I had the day job. So, to me this was incredible. This was a dream come true. To them it was just part of life. "Okay, I’m seventeen, now I’m a Rock star." So, after that I took over the management of the band. We got out of the management with Rick and Bowen, and we got guitarists and drummers to fill in with the band. And what happened was–and there are a lot of stories in between, I’m skipping way ahead–we were able to void the contract we had with Rick through a technicality and I went to CAPITOL to negotiate a third album. The "Music" album and the singles I negotiated with CAPITOL, and we renegotiated our publishing deal with Jam. I’m managing and things are looking good. Unbeknownst to us, Rick Bowen at East and West Coast Concerts were blackballing us. We could not get a gig. No promoter would hire us. They thought, "If you hire BANG, you’ll never get another act from us." These guys controlled the whole market. I was talking on the phone as we finished up the album, with the guy in California. We were gonna go out on tour with–his name will come to me. He was a big guy. I’m talking to him for weeks, and when it’s time to leave the whole thing was a sham. It never existed it was all part of a Rick trick. For me to think that we had this whole tour lined up–and it didn’t even exist. So, here we are back in Claymont, Delaware, with a new album, three singles and some time went by–and we can’t work. Nobody will hire us. And it got to the point, where it was like, "Hey..." And somehow that was it, it was over. The thing ended. And then 25 years later we got back together, and that’s where "RTZ" comes from. We went through probably what a lot of bands went through. A band has something, an essence. BANG has always been Frank’s vocal sound, Frankie’s guitar and my lyrics. Basically, at that point, that’s when I retired playing. I went back and I was working out. Man, I was practicing like 18 hours a day, trying to get my chops up. I started playing drums about two years before I met the Franks.

SR: And in my opinion, and the opinions of a lot of BANG listeners, you were amazing. I mean, there weren’t many double bass drummers back then. You were one of them. But it was a label and producer thing, eh?

TD: Yeah, it was out of our control. And the same mistakes are being made today. So many great bands that come up, and someone comes in and it’s like: "We’ve got a great guitar player, a great drummer, but this bass player? I dunno man. We need to get a better bass player. The band will be better if we have a better bass player." And you know that’s so wrong. ‘Cuz that’s what the band is.

SR: Yeah, that’s the essence, the soul of the band.

TD: Yeah, the soul!

SR: The self-titled album has to be one of the heaviest sounding albums of the early 70’s. What were some of the ingredients to making it so heavy?

TD: What was cool about that is it took like a day to get the guitar sound. What it was is, Michael Sunday–he was the guy who produced that album–he was really into. He spent a lot of time with Frankie trying to get the guitar sound down. And this is where I also found out about publishing. ‘Cuz Michael came in and suggested a couple of lines. There was one line in "Future Shock" he suggested. "Hey that’s good Michael, use that." Suddenly he was the co-writer. Because it was like "you’ll learn." "Yeah, Michael, I’ll use that," and so he got 25%. So, he spent a day at Criteria just getting a guitar sound, and he finally had it set outside. He inspired us.

SR: So was that Frankie’s sound before you guys went into Criteria, or was it going to be more like "Death of a Country?"

TD: Frankie’s sound? Initially he had a Vox amp, and Howie and Ron Albert produced "Death of a Country," and Carl Richardson was the engineer, who did all the stuff for the BEE GEES. We always had big time guys taking care of us. "Death of a Country" was almost done in one take. By the time we got to the "Bang" album, Frankie had gotten Marshalls. I think he may have gotten them before. And Michael Sunday basically got the sound. You know, the Heavy Metal sound.

SR: So was that guitar sound a conscious thing between the band and the producer?

TD: Yeah, it was definitely it was the producer. ‘Cuz he had produced BLUE CHEER.

SR: That explains it right there! If you want to talk about the first Metal bands, BLUE CHEER always comes up at the head of list for heaviest bands in the late 60’s. As far as your influences, I’ve noticed you guys said BLACK SABBATH and the BEATLES. How about some more?

TD: Well, that was about it. We played Black Sabbath. All we did was our stuff. The Franks I’m sure had other influences. They’re the musical guys.

SR: So, what was the writing for "RTZ" like?

TD: I was up in Philly about three months ago, and we had all these songs together. We had written and arranged them. And the last four tunes I wasn’t there for the recording. I missed that, but the biggest thing for me was always I would sit and watch the Franks work it out musically. I either like something or I don’t. I hear something or I don’t. But as far as musical input I give very little. I come in on the arranging. The music the harmonies is all the Franks. They’ve got all that talent. On this last thing, when I went up to mix the tunes. It was like, "Wait till you hear Frankie’s guitar work on this album." I mean it’s not as if he hasn’t been doing anything all these years. This guy is a great guitar player. He’s so perfect. He’ll double a guitar and you can’t tell. He never looks at his left hand. He trained himself to do that. His chops are so good. And we got some great guitar sounds on this album. The first song "RTZ" is like the "Bang" album with ballsy, heavy guitar.

SR: How about the crowd reactions at BANG shows?

TD: I’ll tell you a story here... It’s something to have idols that you look up to. It’s another thing to play with your idols. And it’s an even greater thing to blow your idols off the stage. We were in North Carolina. We had played there two or three times. We had people who used to meet us at the airport. That type of a thing. We’re playing a show opening for BLACK SABBATH. Here we are we’re playing with our idols. Of course they were just guys, but you know you feel like when you play the music. And "Wow! we’re opening a show with BLACK SABBATH!" We were one of the first groups to have fireworks. At the end of our set, I had the double bass drums going. I’d be into this cymbal crescendo. The music’s just building up and building up. And then a roadie would light the sign and this fireworks display would go up over the top of my head and would spell out "BANG." It would go red, white, different colors. And we were in this crescendo, it was just our gig. When this fireworks sign went up the whole audience this about 15,000 people. They stood up and started rushing at the stage. I mean this just blew their minds. I remember playing, and it’s like, "People are gonna kill me. How am I gonna get outta here." They were just wild-eyed. I’ve got email from a guy that said, "I’ve waited 20 years to tell you that you blew BLACK SABBATH off the stage that night." And we thought that we had stole the show from them. So that was pretty cool.

SR: Double bass drumming! That was a pretty innovative thing for someone to be doing in 1970-71. That’s the thing for modern metal drummers. How’d you come upon that?

TD: Well, that was like Ginger Baker (CREAM). Carmine Appice in CACTUS. When we met those guys we were rehearsing up in Philly in the store basement. We had a couple of managers, before the Jimi Hendrix thing. And I just loved his style. That’s where I got my style from. Then we hung with GRAND FUNK. And this was the hardest working band. I thought we worked hard. They just put out. They were into it. Carmen and Ginger Baker... I liked doing triplets. My feet would be going "ba duh duh boom." On some of the songs you can hear that. And then at the end you’ve got both bass drums going, and your cymbals are going–it was great.

SR: Lyrically, you deal with a lot of real-life situations, a lot of personal stuff. What about books? You ever read anything that inspired you to write?

TD: I was looking for god. I was into science fiction, death and pollution. These were the things I dealt with. The death and the dark stuff out of the BLACK SABBATH vein, with the heavy guitar. I read some of my stuff and some of it’s so trite and some of it’s really deep. I just write. It’s always a feeling thing. The lyrics on "RTZ" are some of the best I’ve ever written. It’s a feel thing. We had a song on "Death of a Country" called "Certainly Meaningless," and the lyrics were meaningless. I’d just get an idea. We were on a plane flying some place. We were flying to Puerto Rico to do the Pop Festival, and I wrote "Humble." A lot of times the way we’d write tunes is I’d write something and give it to the Franks and they’d make it a song. Or they’d have a riff and I’d come up with a lyric line and we’d go from there. I would write as we were playing. I write prose. I write poetry. They put it to music, basically. If you read my lyrics they don’t need music. It has a rhythm to it. A lot of times I thought, man it’s too singy-songy. Every second, third or fourth line rhymed or something. Some of the songs we’d have an idea where we’d just go with it musically and lyrically at the same time. The easiest thing for us to do is write songs. We can knock out three songs a day if we had to. We got back together after all these years, and boom it was all there. It just flowed right out. We have a great thing going. We’ve never argued about anything. Even personally we’ve never really argued. I could say, "No, man we’ve got to do it this way." And we’d just take a vote. If it was two to one, "Okay fine, the next one’s mine. You owe me on the next one. We’ll go my way the next time." So it was very enjoyable writing. Frank usually comes up with the melody, and Frankie usually comes up with the riff, the hook of the song. And that’s how we do it. The only thing I can think of reading was on the "Bang" album, I read the book Future Shock [by Alvin Toffler. NY: Random House, 1970. -PMG], and I was fascinated with the concept of future shock.

SR: So, what about that line in "Questions" that goes: "Have you read a book or two, or have books been reading you?" How’d you come by that one?

TD: I remember writing that. We were stoned–at least I was. I still remember sitting up against the wall with a mattress on the floor in a motel and writing that line. Wrote that at the Escape Motel.

SR: So, what are you guys listening to today?

TD: Well, I can’t speak for the Franks, but I listen to a lot of the stuff that’s out. Unfortunately I can’t even name them. If I heard a song, I’d know I like it. I like Matchbox 20. I’m not on top of the names like I used to be. ‘Cuz I jump around on the stations or I’m listening to my stuff or a sports station. But especially some of these chicks’ songs. I like–you know the "Jagged Little Pill" girl–Alanis Morissette. Some of her stuff is great. I could even name them, but certain songs just stick out and I just love ’em.

SR: I asked that just to give people an idea of what someone who was playing the heavy stuff back in the days is into now... I mean, you listen to what you want to listen to.

TD: Well, my head isn’t buried into the heavy stuff. Let me hear a good heavy tune. I love it. When I’m going through the radio and I hear some heavy tune I still get excited. I love heavy metal, but I also love these other things too. And my head isn’t just into that. The same goes for our music taste. By the time we got to the "Music" album we thought that we probably lost part of our edge and got too light, our music tastes were–not that they were changing–expanding. We were just going what every band goes through. We don’t say, "We need a heavy tune." We start writing a tune, and it is whatever it is. And we don’t say, "Well, we’re getting away from it." We just take it wherever it goes. On "RTZ" we’ve got a couple of beautiful songs, man. There’s one, "Whispers". BOYZ II MEN are the ones that need to do this tune–and that kind of thing.

[PMG and TD erupt into laughter]

Another one that doesn’t have any drums. It’s just percussion. It’s something like the Beatles did. This is like our "White Album," where we’re really just stretching and presenting 15 tunes. I guarantee that everybody’s gonna find two or three tunes on here they like. I don’t care if they’re an old BANG freak or somebody that just listens to country music. There are a couple of tunes here like that that we did our way.

SR: It’s a shame that even though you were on CAPITOL that the success you had back then opening up for bands like Sabbath that it didn’t carry on over the years.

TD: In Zoo World which was a publication out of Miami who loved us, we had the whole big front cover. And it was: "BANG, will they be bigger than GRAND FUNK?" ‘Cuz there was a point there where it looked like it was gonna happen. Years later Frankie got to talk to some of the guys who were working at CAPITOL. "Questions" could’ve been in the Top 10 if not the Top 5. Because there was a point there where they stop working it. What was happening at CAPITOL was that the management–at the same times as we were having the problems with the producer and our management–everybody who had anything to do with BANG was fired. Not because of it, just political. And a whole new group of people came in who had their own bands they were trying to push. The vice pres. who signed us and the A&R people were released because a whole new echelon of people came in. This is the same thing that happened with BANG, why we didn’t continue on. It all happened at the same time. There was just no way we could overcome all these different things: management problems, CAPITOL problems where they were changing management. It was like "Hey, I have my band, why do I wanna push BANG?" Do you know that CAPITOL actually came to us and asked us to write a song like "I Am Woman" by Helen Reddy, cuz she was a hit. They said you need to write a song like "I Am Woman." Yeah, right! And like "Little Boy Blue." "Look beyond the stars for you dreams that shine forever on." Our dream is still alive. It’s been alive for 30 years and it never died. I don’t care about all these old bloated longhaired freaks that you see you ain’t never gonna see us looking like that. So, these old guys are coming back. But the dream is still there, and I have no doubt that something good’s gonna happen with us going into the millennium. Whether it includes some of our old stuff or not. I don’t think our old stuff ever got as far as it should’ve. But we wrote and write some good stuff, but there are a lot of bands doing the same thing.

SR: So, you’re the designer of the BANG website? That’s quite a feat for someone who isn’t exactly a twentysomething anymore.

TD: Even the web thing, which I saw years ago... I got into computers years ago and I love this whole web business. It’s the same with that as it is with promotion before the web. There are a lot of bands and musicians who write hits but they don’t happen because of timing, or they give up too soon. We have the ability to write great tunes like a lot of other people. We made an opportunity. We made it happen. It was so foolish what we did, looking back on it today. It was stupid, but we took the step and when our opportunity came we were ready. We were a unit, of one mind. That’s what a band has to do. They have to be of one mind and get a vision and go with it. A lot of these bands are always changing personnel. It’s tough to keep a focus, and it’s tough to know what to do. I’m faced with this thing again. We have a CD coming out that could stand on its own. It has hit tunes on it whether they’re BANG hits or someone else does them. This CD has hits on it and I have no doubt. I know nothing if this CD doesn’t have about 5 or 6 hits on it. But we’re faced with the same thing. There are a million bands out there with websites. We have a catalog. The people that email me, they’re professors of Russian universities and Yale. Another guy is the president of Capcom. So, a lot of the old BANG fans are the man now. So, that’s cool. They’re doctors and they’re lawyers. And I always ask them about their history. They talk about the summer of ’71 and how BANG was the only thing they played and they’re so happy to find the site and get a hold of the CD.

SR: I think there are so many people out there like that that it’s amazing!

TD: We sold a coupla hundred thousand albums of all of them. If every one of them’s buying a CD I’d be very happy.

SR: You guys are fortunate in that respect that you have not only an older audience, but there’s this whole younger one to tap into. Look, I’m 25. I just saw BLACK SABBATH for the first time when they had their reunion a few years ago. That was probably one of the highest points of my life as a concert-goer...

TD: Music has no age to it. I mean Mozart, how old’s he? And his music’s still great. And even Heavy Metal. All the genres of music. A good tune is a good tune. Whether you’re 50 or 15. If it carries no evidence, you just hear a song and you either like it or you don’t. Like you said there are a couple of generations who have never heard our stuff. Frankie’s going up to L.A. and he knows a couple of producers to try to get our tunes on movie soundtracks. No band has been launched from the web yet. I feel like we could be the one. A thousand other bands feel the same way. Even people around us say,"Yeah right." But we have the vision, and that’s what it takes. There’s a lot of faith involved in this.

SR: You're listed as playing drums & percussion on "RTZ" withGary DiSabatino and Frankie Gilcken. Did you actually play some of the drum tracks on "RTZ?"

TD: We used a couple of different drum machines.

SR: I couldn’t tell! You mean that wasn’t a real, live drummer?!? Thanks again for taking the time to talk about BANG.

Or write to:
Bangmusic.com
2535 Marsh Lane, #1103
Carrollton, TX 75006