Trainwreck

From grand acclaim with the comedic rock ‘n’ roll of Tenacious D to the silver screen with Tenacious D in the Pick of Destiny, Kyle Gass, or K.G. as you may know him, has already accomplished way more than you or I ever will. But is he satisfied? No sir, he is not. Kyle Gass is hungry — mostly for microwavable chili cheese fries or those bowls with everything on KFC’s menu blended together, but also for the success of his very own rock group. He wanted something “with a western, country thing,” but he also wanted a band name that wouldn’t promise much. The answer: “Trainwreck.” Gass explained to Synthesis, “If the songs turned out really bad, I could say, ‘C’mon dude, it’s called Trainwreck, what’d you expect?’”

  That begged an all-important question: What should we expect? I was eager to know and Kyle was (or at least pretended to be) eager to answer. “Our music is pretty accessible upon first listen. We’re a pretty exciting visual act…there’s a lot to look at.” He paused to consider something — who knows what. “We’re kind of a collection of cartoon characters.”

  We then segued into a discussion about why cartoons are so awesome; however, unfortunately for you, dear reader, I am unable to say more about it because transcribing it — even summarizing it — would exhaust my word boundaries for this article. Without notice, Kyle revisited the original question and concluded that “there’s a lot of good dancing and, uh, I would say tomfoolery.”

  Now that the expectations for a Trainwreck show were adequately addressed, Kyle thought I would like to know more about what to expect from Trainwreck’s general sound, and I did. “Well, I would say that it’s a classic rock meets rockabilly, which we like to call ‘Wreckabilly.’” And to summarize: “It’s just some damn good playin’ and a whole lot of fun.”

  I had to admit, these ingredients sounded like the recipe for a foolproof plan, so I had to know how Kyle and the rest of the group had been received on their tour to date. “Well, the 10 to 20 people who have seen the show live…have all raved. And that doesn’t include my mom. She comes to all my shows.” They also had the pleasure of touring overseas in Sydney, Australia, and London, England, where Kyle frankly explained, “We did pretty well over there, but they had no idea who



we were.”

  At his point I hadn’t mentioned Jack Black or Tenacious D, which I figured Kyle probably appreciated, not wanting to be forever dubbed as “The Tenacious D guy,” or “That one guy who plays with Jack Black,” or, as I sometimes refer to him, “The guy who does that rad "fligoo-gigoo" vocal thing with Jack Black in “The Tribute.” But then I figured, “Like, ya know, whatever.” I wondered what Trainwreck allows him to do that he isn’t able to do in Tenacious D, if anything. It seemed to come down to simply having a voice, which at first I thought troubling because I always believed he was as integral to Tenacious D’s sound and atmosphere as Jack Black. He then expanded, “Well, the thing is, on stage, Jack is a steamroller. He feels that if he’s not talking, then there’s no entertainment going on.” (By the way, his tone there was not unpleasant or callous, but rather a simple statement of truth.) “So I had to start a whole new band just so I could talk on stage…and talk I do. Sometimes we don’t even get to the songs.”

  I figured I wouldn’t mind seeing a monologue or stand-up routine by Kyle Gass — he’d have to be better than that Scottish guy who follows Letterman. Of course, a rock show would be preferable. I wrapped up my Tenacious D-related questions with this: “Are there any elements from Tenacious D that have carried over to the Trainwreck project?” Pretty good question, eh? “Well, our songs tend to be humorous. Maybe I’m not a serious guy, maybe I’m afraid of real feelings, I

don’t know.”

  It’s not that Kyle Gass does not have real feelings, it’s that his feelings are so real that trying to describe or demonstrate them only results in the concept doing a 180 around itself and coming out deceivingly hollow. I thought to myself, “This is the kind of guy I’d really like to hang around with.” I had another set of questions to ask him but I figured I had extracted as much as he would have liked on any random interview — I also remembered that when the interview started at 10:15, his secretary came on the line to remind him that he had “a 10:30,” although Kyle had no idea what was happening at that time. Having said that, I felt the only sensible question to conclude this interview with was, “Do you want to get a beer after the show?” He excitably and sincerely replied, “Yes! Let’s do it!”



  Of course I’m excited to grab a beer with Kyle Gass, but I think I’m more excited to meet his mother. Who knows, maybe I’ll grab a beer with her, too. 

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