Bill Mosely aka Chop-Top at Milwaukee Metal Fest - PipemanRadio Interview

0:04 Hi, you have done to censure. Wow for you. Your This is the pipe Man here on the Adventures of Pipe Man W four c Y Radio, and I am at Milwaukee Metal Fest with. Bill Mosley Nice. So I gotta tell you, I was at the show downstairs, and I was pleasantly surprised when you got up on stage and got to announce the band and do your voice up there for the Texas toast Chainsaw massacre Ban.

0:49 I love that name, and so I want my first question is you've done a lot with music. You've done a lot with acting. Which passion came and how did they coexist? Well? I think writing probably came first, and also music. My mom was a great boogie woogie piano player. Nice and my two brothers and I older and younger brother all took piano lessons. My older brother and younger brothers were both good piano players. My younger brother was a great piano player. I wasn't really into it as much. I was more of a percussionist, and I know that the piano is a percussion instrument, but I needed something else, so I ended up picking up the trombone in grade school.

1:48 I think in about the fifth grade or sixth grade, and I wasn't really that good at the trombone, but I had a lot of air. So I ended up moving from the trombone to the tuba. Wow, And I. Was very good at the tuba because I had a lot of air. I couldn't read music, but I just squeezed down the little the three little valves and just fucking blue. And then. Somebody in the music department of my little school in Barrington, Illinois, the countryside School, I saw something in me, and so they promoted me to suzophone, even though I was a little shrimp of a guy. And I ended up.

2:29 Playing suzaphone in the all district band Wow, and we did. A bunch of Susa marches. And I still to this day don't read music, but I can blow and you know, I have a good sense of percussion, so I had rhythm and air. And so that was the beginning of my music career. Nice. Yeah, And I could bet you, probably after me knowing a lot of artists, that many of the artists here at the festival probably can't read music either, because you know, not everybody really goes that route, you know, and it is a different route to go for me.

3:11 I play. I started out in percussion. I played drums. I played in the school band, school orchestra. And it's funny you mentioned the horns because I used to look over as I'm playing the timpany at the trumpet players and the trombone players. I'm like, maybe I want to try that, but I never did. And then but I did go to guitar. Then I went to singing thrash medal. I sucked at all three, so now I do this. Well, that's good. You know, we all try to fail upwards, right exactly. You know, it's so funny because in sixth grade, sixth or seventh grade, I was friends with a kid in class named Christopher English.

3:53 His dad. This was in Barrington, Illinois. His dad was the editor of Downbeat Magazine, very famous jazz magazine at the time. And when I went. Over to Chris English's house, I remember for Halloween, his father had rented a copy of Creature from the Black Lagoon, which he showed in his living room, you know, on real you know reels like you know, eight millimeter. I guess it was probably, I don't think it was sixteen. I think it was eight millimeter. And I loved that, and Christopher English also introduced me to the bongos, and I play them to this day. So I love the bongos.

4:34 I still do that. Yes, stay too the bongos. So but yeah, I ended up having a band with my two brothers, the Moseley Brothers Band, and I played the drums and I played harmonica and I did the vocals. My younger brother played piano, my older brother played bass, and we played for like you know, we I played, We played for our cousin's wedding. We played basically, we just played at home, uh, just because there was there were a lot of problems in the family at that time. My parents had split. There was a bunch of stuff going on, and so we found refuge in the music. That was our haven and it was a beautiful thing. So that was really the beginning of it all. And that was also how I learned how to just make it up, like make up the lyrics as I went along, and that ended up putting me in pretty good stead when I made some music with Buckethead. His Buckethead is a very mysterious character and you know, you might see him for a couple of days in a row and then not hear from him for six months. So and all of that is not about his behavior, but it's about you gotta you gotta come ready right now. If you think, well we'll fix it tomorrow, that may never happen. So when I worked with Buckethead, every all the Cornbug songs we

6:05 ever did over from the nineties to the probably from the I guess it was, yeah, the nineties, seventy eight, so maybe the eighties and the nineties, whatever time we had together. We never did a second take of any song. I love that, and we did about I think we did more than fifty songs, but never there was there a second take, And very seldom did I have any written lyrics. So I would just make this stuff up. And it was one of those it was. And my younger brother and I we had that same connection, which was where you just he played something and I made up the words and it all seemed to fit. That's where the improv come. Totally, and that's where that came in. And and that that same kind of connection I had with with the with Buckethead. Yeah, like he plays something and I'd say something, or I'd say something and he'd play it, you know.

6:54 So you know, and that is you know, when artists had that kind of a collaboration and that kind of connection, it's really very. Exciting, it is. And I love what you're saying too, because I think it makes it more natural and fans dig on that because they can tell that you are a true artist opposed to somebody just going through the motions. I'd say the same thing about especially at metal festivals, which I go and do metal festivals all over to US, UK and Europe, and I never have a script, never have notes. And I see all these other people, I'm like, if I was the artist, I would slip my throat right now because that shit's boring as hell. I would literally take their script and probably throw it on the ground.

7:40 Yeah, I've done with people that do shows in my station. They come in, they do it, and I'll go in if I know them, you know. If there's somebody I don't know, I might not and I'll just take their script right in the middle of their radio show, you know. And it forces people to be creative, is what happens. When you have that gripped, You're not being creative, You're you use it as a crutch. Yes, and I thought. Actually I was led to believe until apparently there was some equipment or gear problem that I was going to actually sing a Cornbug song on Thursday night of this of the Milwaukee Metalfest.

8:22 It was a pre show. There was some entertainment, and I was supposed to sing a song. And I thought, you know, well, let's see, there's no buckethead, there's nobody to rehearse with. I haven't been on stage in you know, a couple of years, but that shouldn't be too daunting. So I was trying to figure out what song would be the best one, and I thought of an old Cornbug song called. Spot the Psycho. And it's pretty pretty rudimentary. That's perfect for this too, That's what I thought. Let's see, uh, let's see. Yeah, I mean, he killed the dog, he killed the cat. His only friends a vampire bat. His brain is fried like a double eg. He's got a knife. He'll make you beg Spot the Psycho, Spot the Psycho, down a air down down to now.

9:11 Already liked that song right there, good one as killer. Yeah, now you also. But we didn't perform it because there was no gear or band or something. But well, maybe you have to like do something like a tour mat like bring back that, you know, because that's pretty cool. Well, I haven't talked to Bucket in a while, so it'd have to be some kind of a kind of a karaoke. Right right, And I was. It was cool to find out that you were also a journalist too, so it's like you've dipped in every area of creativity there. Well, that was you know, I was an English major when I graduated from college, and uh so the first job I had was as a advertising copywriter for a shop in Boston, Massachusetts, and I did that for a couple of years. That was Schmullenberger and Nargisson, and I was the head copywriter. Also I was the only copywriter.

10:09 So you know that that title, that title was stretched a long way, no doubt, but you know I did. I think my my greatest hit was h That was in the the Olympics where there was an Austrian downhill skier named Franz Klomber and he did an amazing daredevil on like one ski going one hundred miles. An hour and won the gold medal. Yeah, in the Winter Olympics. Back and I don't know when that was was at maybe seventy six something like that, and. By centennial, yeah, it was now that we're at two fifty. Yeah, I remember that well. And uh and so uh and we and one of our clients was Fisher Skis, and so they wanted, like they had a picture of Franz Clomber and his you know, his Fisher Skis and he his crash all met going down hill, and they wanted they wanted a good headline for that. So I came up with fast, Fast, Faster Fisher and they loved it. So that was that was my greatest hit as a copywriter.

11:15 That's great, But I. Just thought, you know what this is, Uh, this is a little easy for me. And uh, and it's it's a kind of it's a kind of profession where and you know, no, no, uh, you know, I'm not trying to diss any of you copywriters out there, but it was just like it wasn't challenging for me in a in a in an artistic sense, let's put it that way. Well that makes sense, yeah, because it is a different personality. It's a different personality, absolutely. Yeah. And and the best some of the best adlines are are cliches, you know, and you know, and it's you know, it's it's low hanging fruit to some people in some ways. So I lasted about a year.

11:55 Doing that and then I split town and ended up moving to the York in uh, I think it was nineteen seventy eight, and so there, and what I did there was I wrote for magazines. I wrote for National Lampoon. The best paying gig was a science science fiction magazine called Omni. Yeah, and I interviewed I interviewed scientists. That's cool. Yeah, So I lost. Well, that's like me. Okay. So I went to college for first pre med and then I graduate with accounting and marketing.

12:35 There you go. And then I went to New York Academy of Dramatic Arts. Like I have all those personalities, like so one thing didn't fulfill anything. So it's like, you know, all these different things and not necessarily for reason either except my own knowledge fun because I'm a knowledge junkie. So it's like I collect degrees and certifications like some people trading cards, you know, but you know it. Also, I have a trivia question for you, so we'll we'll now switch gears to you know, okay by New York. Yeah, two, you know Texas Chainsaw massacre. Yeah, so I have a trivia question for you, and it's a trick question because I'm probably the only one in the world that knows the answer to this question. Okay, do you know who was and I've never ever done this live or on my radio show or publicly ever, who was the roommate of Dennis Hoppers when he was in rehab before Texas Chainsaw Massacre.

13:48 I wouldn't have the slightest idea know. You wouldn't because it was my father. Oh my god, that's like. It was so funny because he always used to brag about he's not with us anymore, but he always bragged about like, yeah. I was in the nuthouse with Dennis Hopper. Wow, right, you know like that that's pretty funny and it's he even he was definitely whacked out of his mind at the time. He called me up and had me try break him out of the place, right, And I did try. Your dad or Dennis my dad? Okay, right, but I'm sure we have brought Dennis along. Yeah. Yeah, I was sixteen years old that I showed up at the place like I'm gonna really break him out. I don't know what I was thinking. But you know, I was sixteen and listening to my father. That's what I was thinking.

14:32 Well, there you go, you know. Uh, well he because Dennis had had just come out of a rehab, I guess, and my understanding, and he had and he he came out and did a three pack of movies. One was Blue Velvet right, one was I think it was Hoosiers and Texas Chainsaw two. So that's a that's a hell of. A three What a comeback? Yeah, I mean like, yeah, he's known for the biggest comeback ever. Yeah, you know. So that I think is really cool too because it shows no matter what happens in your life, whatever issues you're having, you can change it, and it can be changed. It can be changed. Yeah, not necessarily you, but it can be changed.

15:14 It can be changed. Right, A lot of times it's behind bars, but that it can be changed. So I want to know about I hope I'm saying it right. I want to know about the Texas Chainsaw manicure. Well, I was I was living in New York. So I was in New York from seventy eight to eighty six, and in nineteen eighty four. I guess. I was visiting. I was spending a little too much time in the mud club and Studio fifty four. I was writing a gossip column for US magazine, So I had, you know, free admission to a lot of late night clubs, and I certainly took advantage of that. So I thought i'd kind of clean my act up by spind a summer on a.

16:02 Dude ranch in Cora, Wyoming. Wow. And that's a culture shop. It was the Boxar Ranch. And I was out at the Boxar and I was doing you know, I wasn't a cowboy, so I was doing a lot of gruntwork, like you know, digging irrigation ditches and you know, stuff like that. So I was out there, and I was working with a kid who was, like, I think he was maybe sixteen. His parents had sent him out to the same ranch to kind of make a man of him or straighten him out, I guess, because he was I don't know if he was a juvenile, delinquent or just a nut, but. He was a sugar freak. And you know, in the morning.

16:45 He would chug the bug juice and eat the frosted flakes, and you know, he'd have the fudgsickles and he would go into and then we were working under the hot wyoming sun and doing physical labor, and he would go into what I called sugar deliriums and he would just suddenly start speaking in tongues, but in like cartoon voices, advertising jingles, top forty songs, I mean, all kinds of crazy stuff. And we were I would usually just turn a deaf air to him. And we were working one day and he's going cap'n Crunch, cap'n Crunch, doing his crazy shit, and then all of a sudden, he goes Texas Chainsaw Manicure and then he goes back to cap'n Crunch and crazy rabbit talk and whatever he was doing.

17:32 But I heard that and. It was almost like it it almost like it hit me on the head with a sledgehammer. And I went to Texas Chainsaw Manicure, and I immediately saw it in my head, like woman goes to a beauty parlor, you know, gets her hair down, wants sitting under the dryer, wants a manicure, you know, outcomes leather face. So I just I had that flash. I went back to the bunk house and kind of wrote out the rudiments of that. I came, I finished my stint on their anch, came back to New York City, gathered some friends, you know, worked out up scripts and and I ended up you know, getting a bunch of friends together. I think we probably I think it was maybe five hundred bucks all together.

18:16 And I lived in Manhattan. We we found a beauty parlor out on Staten Island called Sonya's Hair Fashions. That's a perfect place to pick Staten Island to do this. Okay, right, home of Terrifire, so right, but yes, we went out to Sonya's Hair Fashion spend a day. I had met a guy at one of the clubs. He was one of the bouncers at one of the late night you know, Manhattan clubs, who was like a naval power lifter. He was like six three and three hundred pounds. So we recruited him as leather face. And and so we shot this woman goes into the beauty parlor and she gets her hair done. She's under the dryer. She she wants a manicure. The beautician goes manicure.

19:07 You know that. You hear the saur rev and the slide of course got to be a steel door slides open and out comes leather Face, you know, and he's coming toward this poor woman who's literally trapped under a hair dryer, and he starts sawing on her fingers. She's screaming, bloody murder, you know. It's it's terrifying, and everything kind of goes. It doesn't do a blackout, it kind of red out. And then we come back and this woman has passed out lea, her face is gone. Beautician like pats are on the cheek. Man man, wake up. The woman wakes up. She goes, no, no, no, oh. She looks at her hands. She's got a perfect manicure. Wow, And then she goes. She comes outside to her husband in the pickup truck and I'm that's me, and I'm dressed as the and made up as the hitchhiker. And she comes out and she goes.

19:57 Look, honey, I got the best manicure ever. And I had gone to the market and gotten a big hunk of head cheese, which doesn't really look very dramatic, but if you know what the ingredients are, it's very funky. And she goes, look, I got this best manicure. And I go, hey, that's great, honey, we should celebrate with some head cheese. And a friend of mine. You know. Fast forward like a month or two later. I was covering the making of I think it was twenty ten, a Space Odyssey sequel, out in Los Angeles, and I went to see a friend of mine who was already you know, a young guy. You know, went to prep school with him. He was a young guy, but he had already He and his partner had already written Who Framed Roger Rabbit? So he was an established, hot, young screenwriter.

20:48 And I went out to his house for dinner and brought along the I'd brought along a VHS copy of The Manicure, all five minutes of it, and we played it after dinner, and my friend just loved it. He said, oh my god, this is great. He said, you know, my partner and I have an office right across the hall from Toby Hooper, who at the time was working on Poltergeist with Steven Spielberg. And he said, if you give me this copy, I'll show it to him. I think it's great. And I thought, you know, that's a great idea, because you know, I was already in debt. I was getting done to pay for the editing of the Chainsawn Manicure. I didn't really see beyond his offering. I didn't see that.

21:32 I didn't think about, you know, Toby Hooper will then hire me. I just thought it, wouldn't it be great. I've gone through a lot of trouble with this. Wouldn't it be great If Toby liked it? That would be fun. And so he walked it across the hall. He showed it to Toby. Toby apparently loved it, called in his producing partner, Steven Spielberg. He watched it. They loved the manicure. And my friend got me Toby's home number wow, and told me to give him a call, and so I did. He said wait a week and then, you know, call him up, and I did. And apparently the miracle was that Toby answered his own phone, because I called him at home and he was like, oh, And I said, yes, Hi, Toby, it said, it's me Bill Mosley and he goes, who.

22:16 I said, yeah, I did, I did the manicure the chainsaw manager. He goes, oh, hell, Bill, I love the manicure. And I said, oh, that's great. I'm so glad to hear. He goes yeah, now who played the hitchhiker character? And I said, well, that was that was me. And he goes, well, hell, if I ever do a sequel, I'll keep you in mind. And you probably thought that was just h being nice. Well it sounded great, you know, I mean, yeah, that'd be great. And and he said, you know, send me a keep in touch, send me a postcard or something. I did. I think I sent him a postcard. Never heard from him again. So that two years went by, and then one night in nineteen eighty six, cold night Manhattan, you know, me and my little one bedroom apartment, the phone rang and I could tell it was long distance because there was there was this was a rotary phone with it not a rotary but like an old fashion phone with You could tell that was long distance because there was a sizzle, right, you know. And uh, and it was this guy saying his name was Kit Carson. And I didn't really I think it's I probably did know who that was because I would read page six in the New York Post and uh and I said, he said, hey, is this bill? And yeah, he goes, well, I want to I want to send you a copy of the Texas Chainsaw massacred to script, and you know, there was a big part of me that wanted to say, who is this really?

23:37 You thought it was a practical too, I. Was getting punk, prank or whatever. And but anyway, I gave him my address and uh, and a couple of days later, you know, here comes a copy of the script and a Manila envelope stuffed into my mailbox and uh. And I read it and I thought it was hilarious. And he had told me give me his number and told me to call on one. I'd read it and I called him back and I said this is this is great? He goes, really you think so? And I said it's hilarious. He said, oh, good, good, Well we'll be in touch. And the next call I got was from the Canon Films legal department asking if I had an agent, and I did not.

24:18 I was a freelance writer. But I had met a woman from William Morris at a Christmas party and called her up and she was more than happy to you know, negotiate like free money for her. And yeah, that's how I got the job, I mean. And never his history. Yeah, and that audition. That led you to be in here today at Milwaukee Metalfest. Yep, here you have it. And you even were like you're so tied to the music industry too, and working with Rob Zombie a few times, and like, you know, it's just like it's so cool that it all correlates together. And now here we are. You're a music festival across the street from the Ambassador Hotel where Chef Jeff is over there.

25:03 Yeah right, well, you know, my my buddy Katie here, that's that's more her her deal. She loves Jeffrey Dahmer. I've become, you know, it's fun. Obsessed with Jeffrey Dahmer, or you into Jeffrey Dahmer. I've been totally obsessed with serial killers recently, like I get lost in two B with all of the documentaries. I ain't even find out till recently that Texas Chain saw you know, like leather Face. And and. Dahmer, it all came from and some well Psycho all came from Ed Dean. I never knew that. Yeah, it's like everybody came from nut dude. It's wild, you know.

25:44 Yeah, well the fact that he had like you know, he made like skin clothes and yeah, Ed Dean was very uh, well, I guess you know, and Ed would probably say, look, don't don't look at me. It all came from my mother. Yeah right, my dead mother's weird instructions from the afterlife. II though. Right, Well, it's a pleasure having you here. Some great stories. We could tell lots of stories. It could take days, because it's possible you have so many credits under your belt. Yeah, and uh, I'm so glad you're here at Milwaukee Metal Fest and thanks for being here on the Adventures of Pipe Man. Well, I appreciate it. You know, I'm from northern Illinois, so people like think that. They say, have you ever been to Milwaukee before? I say, oh, hell yeah, yeah, there you go.

26:31 My way, my way north to go to go fishing. So absolutely, well there that's some fun. And I you know, I just saw something like there's actually some life threatening waves out there today, and I serve, Wow, it's like I've read life threatening three to five foot waves. I'm like in Milwaukee. Wow, right, yeah. But here we are. It must be the metal. I think it's the metal. Yeah, well it's it's the bronze Faunds. There it is. That's it. Well, thanks a lot, all right, My pleasure Hi, this is Bill Mosley and you're listening to Pipe Man at W four cy Radio and as Choptop would say, dog will hunt.

27:11 Thank you for listening to the adventures of Pipemin on W for CUI Radio.