DEVO: Live on KCRW

Ahead of their performance at Cruel World Festival in Pasadena on May 17, art-rock legends DEVO stop by KCRW for a conversation with DJ (and legend in his own right) Chris Douridas. The band kicks off a new tour in May as part of its extended 50th anniversary celebration — something they’ve dubbed the “farewell tour,” though the meaning is open to interpretation. 

“ Well, it could be — you know, it's now or never,” quips co-founder and bassist Gerald “Jerry” V. Casale. 

“ Or it's a welfare tour. It's one of the two. We haven't really figured it out yet,” adds vocalist and co-founder Mark Mothersbaugh.

If you're only familiar with DEVO for their 1980  smash "Whip It," buckle up — the journey's worth taking. And if you're already a fan, you know they're far more than a New Wave novelty: DEVO’s pioneering synth-punk sound and incisive socio-political songwriting have established the band — whose name is short for their core philosophy of “De-evolution” — as one of the most influential and enduring projects in popular music (count David Bowie, Brian Eno, and Iggy Pop among their earliest fans). 

Casale and Mothersbaugh join Douridas for an extended conversation discussing DEVO’s origins in the 1970 Kent State massacre, playing their “Satisfaction” cover for Mick Jagger, and why — much to their chagrin — the band’s music and art is more relevant than ever. 

Chris Douridas: Let's talk one of the key formative moments in the band's history. You guys first met at Kent State. It wasn't long after, on May 4th, 1970, that students were protesting the expansion of the Vietnam War with the US invasion of Cambodia.

Gerald Casale: That's right. Without an act of Congress, which an informed populace was outraged at. 

I understand that you were there, Jerry?

Casale: I was there. I was a member of SDS, and so our group was part of the anti-war groups that were protesting. And we were running from the National Guard.

Mark Mothersbaugh: He was there the big day. There were three days of protests. I was there the day that we marched down on the army recruiting center downtown. And there was like, people throwing rocks, and I was like, “I'm like a peace guy. I'm not a…” And then the next day, my brother [DEVO lead guitarist Bob Mothersbaugh] was there. He hitchhiked in from Akron, he was a high school kid. He came in and he was there the day they burned down the Roxy building. And so we had FBI agents show up at our house about a month later with photos. And I got home and my mom's crying, “My Bobby!” And Jerry was there for the big day. 

The big day — I mean, you were in the line of fire.

Casale: I was. But they shot over the heads of me and my friends that I was with and killed people behind me, including Alison Krause and Jeffrey Miller, who I knew pretty well because they were freshmen. And my job during the summer, because I had a scholarship that was work study, I had to introduce freshmen to their curriculum and their professors and help them navigate orientation. Those two students were assigned to me, and we became friends. 

Nine students were wounded on that day. One paralyzed for life. And as Neil Young memorialized in his song “Ohio,” four were killed that day, including, as you say, Jeffrey Miller and Allison Krause. 67 rounds fired by the Ohio National Guardsman in the span of 13 seconds. I don't think people realize how terrifying that day was. Not just in that moment, on that field, but in our country. 

Casale: Well, it turns out to be a prelude to current events. 

I recently saw for the first time footage of you being interviewed on the BBC in 1970. This was a couple months after Kent State, right?

Casale: Right, where I was trying to be strident and brave and I'm just a little boy. 

I mean, you were probably still in shock. I would imagine that was pretty fresh right after. 

Casale: Oh, I think I had a nervous breakdown. I do. 

It's kind of harrowing to watch that conversation, knowing what was happening in that moment. Is it fair to say that the events at Kent State helped to propel you into the art world even further, with more commitment? 

Mothersbaugh: Oh, it gave us a focus, among other things. I was absolutely certain I was gonna be in music and art no matter what. And I wasn't going to be a school teacher. I wasn't gonna be working for an ad agency. But those events really made us feel like we had something to center around and something that we wanted to talk about, and to create a concept that we would follow, and that we still follow.

What I am astonished by when I go back and listen to the earliest recordings that I could find — I'm not sure which ones were first — it seems to me that from the very first time you guys laid down a track, the sound was locked in. Like you guys had landed on a sound, and it was pretty fully formed from the very first recording.

Casale: It's possible, because you're who you are, and you have these aesthetics that you share together, right? 

Mothersbaugh: We were looking for sounds, we were looking for rhythms, we were looking for things that were not already being used. I mean, we thought rock and roll was over in the early ’70s. We thought, “Yeah, they've done everything you can do in rock and roll, so what's next?” And that's what we were looking for. 

Casale: The things you're referring to are on a compilation that we ended up calling Hardcore DEVO with these recordings between 1974 and ’77. And you're right, those early recordings have this great, tortured sound. I mean, they're earnest and they're real.

The demos eventually found their way to David Bowie. This story I gotta hear. You guys went to see him in Cleveland?

Casale: He was playing keyboards for Iggy Pop. And Blondie was opening for Iggy on that tour. And we went up there armed with the cassettes and and the early kind of handouts of the biography and all that. … And more than one was slipped to the band, because Bob Mothersbaugh’s girlfriend put some in a basket that supposedly made their way backstage. And I got in backstage, but I didn't see Iggy. I saw [Blondie guitarist and co-founder] Chris Stein. And he was very nice and helpful, and I gave him the stuff and he claims he got it to Iggy. But it doesn't matter, because Iggy actually listened to it, no matter how he got it. And he gave it to David.

Mothersbaugh: He said that they had recorded the first album together —  Bowie recorded two albums with him — and they had recorded the first one, went on tour together, and then went back to Germany to record the second one, Lust For Life. And he said that they hated German radio 'cause it was like, they'd play something by Tchiakovsky, then they'd play something like “Jailhouse Rock,” and then they'd play something by the Sex Pistols, and then they'd play something like a bebop song. They were something for everyone, but it made it so that nobody really liked the station. And he said they were going through all these different demo tapes people had given them, and they found the DEVO one. And he said, “We didn't think it was a real band! We  didn't think it was possible.”And so they were learning DEVO songs in the studio in Germany. They were just playing them over there. 

Do you remember what was on that demo that they got a hold of? 

Casale: Certainly “Uncontrollable Urge” and “Mongoloid” were on there, and maybe three other songs.

And the way I understand it, Bowie was initially intrigued enough to wanna maybe produce the band. 

Casale: We had a full intention he was gonna produce us, but he kept delaying it 'cause he had so many projects and so many things on his plate.

Mothersbaugh: So then Eno stepped up. 

So I'm wondering how that must have been for you guys to meet Brian Eno?

Casale: It was great! 

Mothersbaugh: It's like going from Akron, Ohio to meeting all these people, that showed up at our shows… After we played our first show, every show we played in New York was always filled. The Rolling Stones would be at a show, and Zappa's band and, and actors [like] Jack Nicholson and Dennis Hopper, all these people would show up at every show. And we met a bunch of them every time. It was kind of a different world. We went from obscurity to kind of a notoriety, like overnight basically. 

Casale: When you're a creative artist and you're unrecognized, and especially if you're kind of original and experimental, you meet a lot of derision and a lot of naysay. A lot of people just want you to go away and die. And you dislike them as much as they dislike you, but all you care about is respect from people you respect. And that's what we finally got, is vindication, because we loved David Bowie. We loved Diggy Pop. And it was amazing that they liked us. 

That first album that Brian Eno produced, Q: Are We Not Men? A: We Are Devo!, in 1978, featured a cover [song] — one of a handful of covers you guys have done over the years. You haven't done covers a lot, but the ones you did were pretty cool choices: Lee Dorsey, Allen Toussaint, Jimi Hendrix,  “Secret Agent Man.” You covered Dylan. 

Casale: We only poached from the best. 

What was so cool about what you did with your cover of The Stones’ “Satisfaction” was that it just helped illuminate your style because it was wrapped around a song that everybody knew. It was a ubiquitous song at the time. And it just was such an angular, different kind of approach.

Casale: It was proof of concept. 

Mothersbaugh: It gave people who would listen to our music and go, “What are we listening to?”, they'd hear that and then they'd get an idea. 

And was that deliberate? 

Mothersbaugh: It kind of happened spontaneously. We used to rehearse in a car wash in Akron, Ohio, in the storage room — unheated storage room. And so we'd be talking and breathing and there'd be like, steam coming out. And the guys would have gloves with the fingers cut off so they could try and stay warm enough to play guitar at the same time. And [late DEVO guitarist/keyboardist and Gerald’s brother] Bob Casale started this riff that we all kinda were like, “What's that?” You could tell he was nervous and cold, you know? And then people just started falling in with parts and it just kind of fell together. It was kind of magical in a way. 

Casale: It was DEVO jamming, like Devo does. Like the parts all made sense and it was incredible, actually. 

Mothersbaugh: Like within an hour, we were all laughing about it. 

Casale: People thought we were making fun of The Rolling Stones and we clearly weren't. We thought they were the best rock and roll band in history.

Mothersbaugh: Yeah. It'd been ten years since the song came out and we thought it needed to be reinvented for the ’70s. 

Did you ever hear from Keith or Mick about it? 

Casale: Oh yeah. We had to get his permission. … They considered it a parody, because the music was all different and the phrasing was all different. The sounds were all different, so it wasn't a faithful cover. Intellectual property was taken seriously back then, and Warner's was not going to allow us to put it out unless Mick Jagger said yes. So we flew to New York, Mark and I did, and we met at [Rolling Stone manager] Peter Rudge's office near the Warwick Hotel. Mick came in and we played the song on a boombox over the mantle of a fireplace that was burning with a fire, in a sumptuous office with English brown leather club chairs. 

Mick got up in his stocking feet after about 30 seconds and started dancing in front of Mark and I. He goes, “I like it! I like it!” We were so elated.

We flew back, and on Monday morning, we were so proud and we went to tell Elliot Roberts, our manager, that everything went well. And he goes, “Yeah, yeah, yeah. I told Peter Rudge to tell Mick to say he liked it 'cause you guys are gonna make him a ton of money, 'cause they are going to keep all the publishing [rights].” So, yeah, we got schooled.

Elliot Roberts was also Neil Young’s longtime manager.  You guys have a really interesting interweaving with Neil Young and that camp, going back to his song “Ohio,” about what you guys experienced. And then, of course, you guys did the movie Human Highway with him in 1982. 

Casale: We were very surprised that Neil Young loved us. Toni Basil and [young’s co-director and co-star] Dean Stockwell got him the demo tape, and also a copy of the first [DEVO] film, The Truth About De-Evolution. He was starting to do a movie that morphed many times, and he came to see us when we played [former San Francisco nightclub] Mabuhay Gardens. 

Mothersbaugh: Yeah, he had a lot of beatnik energy in him, and that's kind of where we crossed over, more than the hippie side. 

Casale: He loved what we were doing and he asked us to be in the movie, and that's how we met Elliot Roberts. Elliot probably thought, “Well, Neil likes these guys, okay. Because I don't get it.” 

I think that's true for you guys throughout your career, that people didn't know what to make of you, and they would misunderstand the band, in a way. How did you feel about the public reaction as the band started to emerge on the world stage? 

Mothersbaugh: It was interesting because it was everywhere in the world except for the US that we were accepted first. We put out three singles with Stiff Records before we put out our album, and three or four of the songs — out of the six sides of three singles — all charted in Europe before we even had an album deal. Nobody in the US paid attention, except for like a few local radio stations. 

Casale: It was very polarizing, and not on purpose. We weren't really just trying to piss people off. We just did piss people off, because we looked different. We sounded different. We talked different. We had concept-driven ideas. We were multimedia at a time when everybody just had mullets and was mining this kind of stale rock and roll formula. And that's what radio was composed of. We'd have to go around and meet the DJs at the radio station, and they'd all have the satin jackets and the pseudo-hippie hair with the mullet, and they would just be repulsed by us physically when we walked in. 

Mothersbaugh: We looked like the maintenance men for the building. 

What do you suppose it is that holds you guys together for all this time? This relationship has been, now, 50 years-plus. What's holding it together?

Mothersbaugh: A strong concept. That's really it. And we both still believe in it. 

Casale: And I think that everybody would agree now that, you know, DEVO is no longer polarizing. Everyone knows that De-evolution is real. And right now, as of today, we're living it more than ever. That's why the festival being named Cruel World was more apt than the promoters could have ever guessed. … And I'd say as of right now, today, the world is far crueler than it even was five years ago [when it first launched]. 

The concept behind the band DEVO itself is short for “De-evolution,” the idea that mankind has stopped progressing and is now instead regressing.

Mothersbaugh: Devolving, yeah — that maybe humans are the one species ou of touch with nature. We're the ones destroying nature rather than being a symbiotic part. 

Casale: DEVO was always commentary on the duality of human nature. Because we're out of harmony, like Mark said, what is it that justifies the human species, right? It's only the upper things they can do with the brain, right? That's what separates 'em. So it's the good. But they're obviously capable of such immense evil, which we are seeing now — it’s a palpable evil across the land. We're practically all the way living in a dictatorship right now.

And so De-evolution is about logic and rationality falling apart, crumbling… you know, “the center cannot hold,” right? The second law of thermodynamics, entropy — fear takes over. And that's where we are as a society and as a species. 

Mothersbaugh: Capitalism is the ultimate virus. And it’s winning. Greed is winning.

Image courtesy of the artist.

Gimme some good news. What's the good news? 

Mothersbaugh: The good news is technology has a flip side to it that's awesome. And if you're an artist, there's a lot of amazing things you can do. When Jerry and I were kids, we were writing songs and we were thinking, “Well, are there any record companies in Ohio? I don't think so. Are there any recording studios here? Never heard of them.” But now it's like, a kid who has an idea for a song, you don't even have to learn how to play the instrument. You can hum it and it'll play the bass line, or you can hum the guitar line, you can hum the drums, and it'll play a set of drums. You add 'em all together and you make a song. And if you think you really like it, if you think you did something good, you can just post it. You don't have to go looking for a record company to put out your record. You can just put it on the internet and the whole world can hear it. 

Casale: So ideas matter more than ever.

If I were to look at you two as a married couple, in a way, Jerry, how would you describe Mark Mothersbaugh to somebody who’s never met him?

Casale: Oh, yikes. [Laughs] A force of nature. 

Mothersbaugh: Okay. I'll take that. 

Mark, how would you describe Jerry? 

Mothersbaugh: A thinker. 

And I’d say those two energies have helped keep this thing spinning. 

Casale: Yes, I guess so. We had different skill sets. I was an analytical kind of guy and always trying to plan. And I was also the field marshal, like beating the drum for De-evolution. It is a battle cry.