Cristian BODNĂRESCU
Who could have thought that a famous rock band is still unknown for romanian public? If you wanna listen to quality music corellated with social attitude, fight against evil and spiritual themes, you will want to follow these guys from “The Muggs” how they are gibing the hypocrisy and ignorance in premiere at Wall Radio (Radio Zidul, at Word of Bodnarescu’s Radio Show). *The blues-hard-punk rock band The Muggs from Detroit which played out in front of hundred millions of people at “Next Great American Band” TV Show of FOX TV will be presented to romanian public by Tony Muggs and Cristian Bodnarescu on Wednesday of 13 November beginning at 1 o’clock PM (Detroit’s Hour) on Wall Radio – http://www.radiozidul.ro
The Muggs played with: Glenn Hughes (Deep Purple), Savoy Brown and Teen Years After.
*Q1 (Cristian Bodnarescu): *What is the meaning of life as you see it?
Tony (Muggs)*: Hi guys! I see life as pretty surreal these days. I’ve
survived a plane crush when I was three and a half (I was in the backyard
when a bi plane crashed into my garage), a stroke when I was 28 and nothing seems to keep me down. I believe in life after death, but I don’t believe in heaven or hell. I believe that, just as in life, where you make your own decisions like going to the grocery store or going to see your favorite
rock band, The Muggs, likewise, when you are dead, you can go wherever you want as well. So, I plan on visiting Jupiter. That’s my favorite planet, so
I think I’ll go there first. However, I don’t see life & death as most people do. The best thing I ever heard is a phrase in science about energy: energy is neither created nor destroyed, it is transferred. And that really speaks to me. So I don’t think when we’re dead, our energy is dead so where we go from there once we are transferred (dead), is our choice. I’m forty years old and enjoying every minute of it. While on tour in Europe in 2012, our Spanish tour manager, Juan Pablo, said: “Life is ONCE” and I have no
regrets, I’m a Mugg.
*Q2 – Cristian Bodnarescu: How do you see the spirituality?
Tony Muggs: Hi guys! I guess my vision about spirituality is that I’m not a
religious guy but I do believe in a higher being or power. I love Space and
Time and the Universe, so to me it’s more of a scientific approach towards
spirituality than one of religion.
*Q3 – Cristian Bodnarescu: What represents The Muggs for you?
Tony Muggs: The Muggs is the best blues- rock band in Detroit. We were just awarded outstanding rock band for 2013. But much deeper than winning awards, The Muggs is my heart and soul. The Muggs represents everything that is good about music. I’ve long thought that The Muggs are trying to compete with the best musicians of all times: the Beatles, Led Zeppelin, the Queen, Humble Pie, the Who, Rolling Stones, and so on. Because in my view those are the best bands of all time. Contemporary bands don’t really do it for me these days; I can’t tell you why. The music isn’t as potent as the music from the ’60 and ’70. So, The Muggs kind of represent the music from the late 60’s and early 70’s. We do the heavy riffs but we also couple that with smart arrangements and a good melody, interesting lyrics … so you know … in a nutshell that’s what The Muggs represent to me.
*Q4 – Cristian Bodnarescu: How do you see the band over 20 years? What about yourself?
Tony Muggs: Well, The Muggs haven’t been around for 20 years. We’ve been around for a total of 13 years, off and on. We started out in the year
2000, as three piece, with me playing bass-guitar, Danny doing his guitar
and lead vocals, and Matt Rost on drums. We had great success around
Detroit, we were a new band and so we had a buzz about us as a new band.
Detroit in general had a great rock n’ roll scene at that time. The White
Stripes were ready to burst into the world scene. So things were going
well. Then I had a stroke, at the age of 28 and I never thought I will play
again, especially with The Muggs. But instead of The Muggs continuing,
Danny Methric, who is one of my best friends for the last 27 years, decided
that there would be no Muggs without me. So Danny set aside The Muggs for a while and I was recuperating from my stroke … so as it goes, I had my
stroke in September 2001, and it took me almost exactly two years to get
back on stage. So, from then on it’s been a fairy tale for me. We have four
full-length studio albums: *The Muggs, On with the Show, Born Ugly* and out latest called *Full Tilt*. It’s just kind of the best of the three previous
studios albums and we popped in some songs that Danny loves, like Rory
Gallagher’s “Mississippi Sheiks” “Used To Be” & “I Take What I Want”. We
are also big fans of The Beatles and John Lennon, so there’s a John Lennon song “How Do You Sleep” and then we arranged it in such a way as to incorporate the song, “HELP” by The Beatles into one of our songs. So, over the past 20 years it has been a slow burn, meaning we’ve become more popular and more popular and we’ve stuck to our plan; we have a great online presence as well … So right now, as I’m recording this is May 1st 2013, we are more popular now, as The Muggs, than we ever have
been. It just seems to be getting bigger and bigger and hopefully the dam is going to break sooner or later with The Muggs . Then we’ll be a national band in the United States and we’ll be able to go further east into Europe and to play cities like Budapest and cities that we’d love to play!
*Q5 – Cristian Bodnarescu: How is it to be in a hard rock band in the 21st century?
Tony Muggs: It’s a little tough I have to say. Myself and other people have
always said that if The Muggs came out in 1980 we would be huge and we’d probably be millionaires, and I can’t dispute that. Everything is cyclical
and the music industry doesn’t want anything to do with rock n’ roll as
popular music these days. In the US you have your country and you have your R&B, which isn’t even R&B in the classical rhythm and blues sense. It’s just … you know: Justin Timberlake, Beyonce… that’s considered the R&B by today’s standards. So it’s pretty surreal and so far The Muggs are not where we intended to be by now. We’ve been a band for over ten years, we have 4 albums and we’re doing great, don’t get me wrong. We’re finally touring Europe consistently. Three out of the last 4 years we’ve been
touring Spain and parts of Europe and we were building a bigger fan base.
But, I guess, you always want more, and at this point my life I would’ve
expected to be bigger; and not necessarily with money, I’ve never wanted to be a multimillionaire, I’ll settle for 50 000 $ a year … If each of us, each member of our band would earn 50 000 $ per year, that’s probably more
than half of what we all make in one calendar year as it is. And that’s
nothing by rock n’ roll standards. I mean Kid Rock, Jack White, M&M,
they’re all millionaires. I don’t need much to survive, but 50 grand a
year would be more than double my income and I would spend it wisely, so ….
But I am optimistic; I’ve been talking to a lot of people in the industry, music industry, and everyone I talked to said that the music industry is
trending towards blues rock. Which means our day in the sun might not be
far off. It would be great after all of our hard work to catch a break and
be more popular at a national level, in America, and all over the world.
*Q6 – Cristian Bodnarescu: What’s your advice for kids who want to have a rock band?
Tony Muggs: Kids, if you want to have a rock band, especially in 2013, you have to know 2 things:
First thing: practice your ass off! You have to want it more than anyone
else in your city, and if you practice hard and every day, in 2 years you
can be the next Jimmy Hendrix.
The other thing is: nothing comes easy. So, work as hard as you can to
promote yourself on the internet, because as a new band that’s the only
place where you’re going to exist outside your neighborhood. So, get
involved in any website you can, make it your passion and make it so that
you can work every day on the computer to get your band’s name out there
and then you’re on the right track.
*Q7 – Cristian Bodnarescu: And one for your ladies fans: What is your favourite sexual position?
Tony Muggs : Ladies, right now, my favourite sexual position is when you are on top.
Cris Bodnarescu 