buzz: How do you approach writing a one man show? Do you perfect material before you perform it?

Henry Rollins:I don’t write it. I just go up there and tell you stories and editorialize. I don’t write it out.

buzz: So you never even write the stories down?

HR: No; you can tell me pretty accurately what you did this morning. Whether you can do it in a compelling way—that’s where the artistry lies. Whatever I use on stage, story-wise, is usually somewhere I went; something I saw. While I’m in those places, I’ll be writing and taking photographs daily. If I have to bring in anything factual—like a fact, figure, or a passage of text—I’ll commit it to memory; contextualize it. So, when I walk onstage, I have it in my head. It’s not like a written monologue.

It turns into one after a few nights. You tell the story, and it being what it is, it kind of finds itself. On night 10 and night 40, if you tell the story it will be kind of the same (well, truth-wise anyway). It almost turns into a lyric. Over several nights you do a live edit and you refine it and it becomes—not for route—but something you just have. You just have it.

buzz: I read an interview with you in Paul Provenza’s Satiristas and I listened to you on Marc Marron’s WTF Podcast. As a monologist, do you consider yourself member of the world comedy?

HR: No I don’t; maybe it’s for someone else to define. I just go out and do these “Talking Shows.” I’ve never called it anything but that. Promoters call it “Spoken Word,” but I just get up there and spcheal. Sometimes it’s funny; there’s funny elements. The truth can be funny, and I can report on it accurately, but I don’t sit down and write funny patter…

Humor is something that follows me home—like a dog. I’d rather it be more spontaneous…

buzz: So you wouldn’t file “Comedian” on your taxes then?

HR: If I did I’d have to go out on stage and every 5.7 seconds—or whatever it is—to make people laugh. I don’t need that kind of pressure. I think you screw the performance by putting it through that box.

buzz: On WTF you mentioned that you still get angry letters. How do you respond to critics that say bullshit like, “Henry Rollins hates America” or “Get out of my country?” What do you say to that?

HR: I try to default to a level they understand: I just say, “Make me.” Get me out; do something. What American hates America? I don’t think I’ve ever met that person. But, to not be able to look at your country critically: how would you ever be able to improve it? That’s where I find myself somewhat similar with comedians, because they rip on America—but very accurately—with a great deal of patriotic love for the country…They’re not saying, “Let’s all go make bombs and blow up schools”—I’ve never heard any comedian say that; I’m not sure I’d want to share a country with that person. But when you say, “George W. Bush put us into an illegal war,” (which is, obvious) this is usually relegated to comics. CNN doesn’t have the balls to say it; Fox will never say it—they have too much money invested in war and continuing conflict; Anything that’s sponsored by GE; even the New York Times is going to pull short! Where do you get your information? Jon Stewart.

With the vehicle of comedy, Stewart can look at his audience and say, “Are you fucking kidding me?” They have to bleep it out, but that’s what you’ve been saying all day when you read that editorial. That was your sentiment, exactly. Jon can get to it in half-an-hour while these guys [mainstream media] are never even going to hit it from a distance!

buzz: Do you consider yourself a talking head like Jon Stewart, then? Are you trying to change people’s minds?

HR: No. I just open my mouth and tell you what I think. I don’t think any of my ideas are of any great intellectual weight, nor do I think that anyone who is like minded couldn’t have come to on their own. I don’t think I’m anything special. I just assign time to working through what I read in the newspaper—cross referencing, looking through history, and trying to understand motivation.

Like in Egypt’s recent uprising: there’s people in America who are saying, “No! This is a bad thing!” Why would you be against democracy really moving—people taking their country back? These are people [corporations, governments, privileged elites] who have an investment in war. Murbaric was a thug, but he was our thug.

Maybe the new regime, in Egypt, would not be ready to buy huge amount of weapons without subsidy. Basically, it’s just laundering money. It goes from you, the taxpayer, to Egypt in forms of subsidy, and it comes back to Bechtel or Bowing or whoever is selling them ordinance. Egypt needs more weapons? I’m sure they have quite enough—enough to blow things up a whole lot of time. But those people have invested in war. The only thing that threatens them is peace; is democracy. The threat for these people is that democracy does spread across the Middle East—they can’t invade a democratic country, it’s just not done. When Middle Eastern nations are sitting down as a democratic country at the UN, they can no longer demonize Islam; marginalize it. They lose their War on Terror allusion: the paper tiger completely falls apart. You lose traction on demonizing liberals and democrats for being soft on terror—or whatever.

If you’ve noticed, in Cario, no one was yelling, “Jihad! Jihad!” (as Fox News would have loved to have happened). It wasn’t that: it was people yelling for freedom. It was relatively peaceful—most of the causalities were racked up by Mubarik’s Elite Gaurd by firing into crowds and beating up on “rebel” types. It wasn’t an attack on America; it was “Get off our backs!” I think that’s the same spirit you see in Yemen, and India, and other places…The thing you have to wonder about is, “What is America’s real role in this?” We have this perception of what we’re supposed to do—like, have a military presence in 150 countries in the world (which we do). I don’t think we need to have that; I think it inspires a hatred toward America.

buzz: How do you like doing shows in college towns? Is today’s youth aware of this stuff? Do they agree with you?

HR: I don’t know if they agree with me or not. But, when I say these things, people cheer. I would take that as agreement. So far, no one’s shot me post-show. I don’t think I say anything that’s all that inflammatory. I’m not calling for Sarah Palin’s head on a stick—I’d like her to have a long and prosperous life. I’m just not a fan. I don’t think I’m going to say anything that makes people that mad…

Maybe we should try ten years of this libertarian, sissy bullshit. Fine! No helmets for your motorcycle. Take all the tax off cigarettes. Smoke up a storm! When your lungs keel over and die in the emergency room and you don’t have insurance or a credit card that works, then get your dying ass out of the emergency room! I’d be fine with that! Let’s see what that’s really like.

If a guy’s bleeding out on the emergency room floor, but no money? No money, no bandage, pal! Bootstraps! Pull yourself up on them or die by them! Let’s see how that party looks. I’m set. I don’t need your money. I’ve got tons of money. I could be one of those selfish, shitty Americans who say, “I’ve got mine.” Because honestly, I do!

But I’m not a moral coward.

I can’t adopt that world view; that point of view. You wanna play that game? All these Tea Party douche-bags: let’s see how it looks. Ok, South Carolina, let’s see how that looks. When the toxic water from deregulation and no EPA is making all your kids have light bulbs coming out of their heads, and goiters on their neck. No money? Well then take your shotgun and shoot the kid in the back yard! Bury it next to the family dog! Or eat it! Because you might miss your government then. On some days I’m just like, “Fine! You’re treating the place like a shit-house; here’s some gasoline. Just torch it and take it the rest of the way. Take it to its logical conclusion. Let the Coke Brothers run your lives!”

But I can’t do that; that’s not the way to go, as far as I’m concerned. It is a way to go, and what some people want. Maybe that will be the rock bottom that America collectively hits. Go full on into Corporatocracy! Mit Romney as president, running America like Walmart. See how you like it!

buzz: Is this anger similar to that you felt toward the “elitist hipster trust-fund kids” from the Youtube video that made its rounds on the internet? The consumerist youth?

HR: That kid was just de-marking her territory, which I guess she thought we were intruding on. I guess she thought we shouldn’t have shot our little thing in the record store—even though we did work it out with the owner (who’s very a nice guy). She was a wise-ass, so I was a wise-ass back.

buzz: I was surprised to see that video because I think that “hipster kids” love you. Did you hear The Dirty Projectors’ “reimaging” of Damaged, Rise Above? What did you think of it?

HR: It’s not my record. I didn’t write anything on the Damaged record. I don’t think I was apart of that topic. I think you lose a little bit of traction when you make blanket statements like, “Don’t hipster kids like you?” I don’t know. Do you? No, you don’t. Watch yourself, unless you get caught out there.

Whoever likes me, I guess, are the ones showing up at the shows…Things change, real quick. All of a sudden, your roof leaks and it’s a $30,000 repair bill, or your girlfriend gets in a car wreck and she’s dead. Shit happens real fast. I tend to live my life with that “Chaos Factor.” On the road, I’ve been living 30 years with it never being a sure thing. I’ve been doing an improvised bongo riff for three decades. I don’t have a job at the bank. I have obligations, certainly (I have a tour), but I have to hope every night that people show up. There’s no guarantee. If they don’t show up, there’s nothing for me. There’s no buy out; no bail out; no nothing. There’s: “Sucks to be you.” And that’s fine! I knew all this walking in; I left the straight world for all of this. So, you swing from vines and hope that there’s another one waiting for your hand as you extend it. I don’t know who my audience is, but I hope to find them night to night.

buzz: You mentioned that you don’t consider the music on Damaged to be yours, what do you mean by that?

HR: Well I didn’t write any of it. I sing on the record, but I didn’t write any of the lyrics. All of that music had already been written a long time before I joined the band. I was the fourth singer; all of Black Flag’s really great music had already been realized before I joined. I was there for the version that toured internationally and got noticed, but all the real groundwork had been done by the band and the three singers before me.

buzz: Is it weird to have that legacy of being in Black Flag when you didn’t write the music that people know the best?

HR: No, because I’m very honest about it. They needed a singer, I auditioned for it, I got it. I was in the version that did all the road work—the touring—year after year. I was in the version that took it internationally. I was the one guy in the band who got all the “stuff” thrown at him—being the singer. I was the one who got hit all the time. Got cigars and cigarettes ground out into his legs; got his ballsack lit up by butane lighters. I’m the one who has that. But I’m not the one who wrote “Six Pack”—that’s Greg and Chuck.

The reason why you might like Black Flag is not the songs that I’m on—usually it’s all the stuff before me. I do my best, for clarity, to tell people this. When someone says, “Black Flag is cool!” I say, “Thanks! I was a fan too.” I never felt like all that much a member of the band; it was Greg’s band. You always knew. It was never your band. Greg went out of his way to really remind you who the boss was. I got it; it’s cool; it’s a job. I gave it everything I had, truly. All of us—every member of that band—really gave what he or she could give for as long as they could. There were times when I felt like I didn’t want anymore of it, but I had nothing to return to except minimum wage. While I would have made more money in the minimum wage working world, I would have had more security, that’s not really interesting to me. Black Flag was more interesting, so I went for it!

buzz: That was a really good answer

HR: It’s the only one I’ve got.