Rick Perry is a long time fixture on the Texas metal landscape.  As far back as 1982, Perry was active in the Dallas area scene in Warlock, a cover band turned all-original thrash outfit.  Feeling the need to push his songwriting in a heavier direction, Perry disbanded Warlock in 1987, taking bassist Eric Roy with him.  The recruitment of Jamey Milford on drums and Varnam Poneville on vocals completed the nucleus of Perry's next project: Gammacide.  With it's hyper-fast speed yet clear vocal delivery, Gammacide took Bay Area thrash and gave it a distinctly Texas spin, with a fair dose of apocalyptic environmentalism and socially-conscious lyrics thrown in as well.  In 1992, feeling the Thrash wave has run its course and looking to broaden his personal musical horizons, Perry formed Puncture, a devastatingly heavy mix of electronics and crushing guitars.  With Puncture Perry sought to marry his appreciation of sample-based music, speed metal guitar riffs, and high-tech visuals.  The ensuing seven years produced two genre-defining full length CD's, two demos, numerous compilation appearances, and hundreds of successful shows including a full national tour opening for GWAR.  As the 1990's came to an end, Puncture was put on ice as Perry moved on to other more pressing familial matters, leaving a half-completed 3rd Puncture CD unreleased.

As the story goes though, you can't keep a good man down.  Perry has recently announced his intention to finally give Gammacide's only full length album 'Victims of Science' a proper CD release.  Both the first Gammacide demo from 1987 and the rare second demo from 1991 are to be included as bonus tracks.  Most exciting, however, is the recent (November 2004) reuniting of original members Perry, Poneville, Milford, and guitarist Scott Shelby to record two 'lost' Gammacide songs to be included on the CD.  For pictures of this recording session and other extensive photo and flyer galleries visit Perry's official Gammacide website at www.gammacide.com. 

Visit our Audio department for sound clips from Warlock, Gammacide, and Puncture. 

A few days after this interview was completed the world received the horrible news of Dimbag Darrel Abbott's murder.  I sent Rick a short note expressing my shock and outrage over such a senseless tragedy.  Perry's response was poignant and ultimately described the true nature of Darrell as a person who was loved and respected by so many.  

Rick's Perry:  I am freaked out about Darrell's death too.  That kind of shit transcends whatever kind of music you were into, but for fans of metal and especially Texas metal, this is a big blow. In the very early days, Warlock used to open for Pantera, then later on Gammacide and Pantera were kind of like rivals on the scene. Darrell also was a big supporter of Puncture, he used to come to all our shows if he was in town.   We had a few clashes along the way, I'm glad I didn't mention them in the interview... but... Darrell was always cool with me.  He remained a down-to-earth guy and he always took the time to spend time with me when I would see him out in public.  A lot of ‘rock stars’, and he was a rock star, wouldn't take the time to hang out with people from ‘back in the day’, if you know what I mean.  I'm totally disgusted.  I would say this is a tragedy on par with Cliff Burton and Randy Rhoads.

Texas Metal Underground:  What originally drew you to heavy metal?  Were there any bands in particular that you would consider influences?

Rick Perry:  When I was a kid I was heavily into monster movies and comic books.  So, when I got a little older,  and I saw Kiss for the first time, I latched onto that pretty hard.  I was a diehard Kiss fan for a couple years, then I started expanding to other hard rock and metal bands of the time like Ted Nugent, Black Sabbath, and stuff like that.  I always gravitated toward the heavier, more menacing sound stuff, so Priest was and is still one of my favorites.  In the early 80’s I discovered the underground bands of the time like Raven, Venom, and Exciter.  I was always searching for heavier stuff, but Slayer and Judas Priest made the biggest impact on me.

TMU:  When did you first pick up an instrument and decide you wanted to play in a band?  Do you play any other instruments besides guitar?

Rick Perry:  I started playing when I was around 16, my mom got me an electric guitar for my birthday, and a Peavey TKO amp, which I blew up the first week.  I didn’t understand why they would make the volume knob go up to 10, if it was going to blow the speaker!  I can’t really play anything other than guitar, unless you include programming a drum machine.

TMU:  Were you in any bands prior to joining Warlock in 1983?

Rick Perry:  No, not really.  Just garage bands, two or three friends getting together trying to play.

TMU:  Tell us about the earliest days of Warlock and how you joined.  Weren’t Casey Orr and Hardin Harrison in the band before they left to form Rigor Mortis?

Rick Perry:  Warlock was one of the first heavy metal bands in the Dallas / Fort Worth area, along with Pantera, Eruption and Iron Cross.  Hardin started off as the drummer for Eruption.  Later, he joined Warlock along with Jerry Warden (vocals), his brother David Warden (guitars), and Casey on bass.  I met those guys camping out for concert tickets.  They were wearing all these spiked wristbands and leather, and back then not many people dressed that way.  When they found out I played guitar they invited me out to jam.  We hit it off pretty good, but that lineup never got as far as playing a gig.  Hardin and David got in a fight, and from what I understand, Hardin stabbed David in the nipple.  David retaliated by throwing Hardin’s drums in Lake Arlington. Kind of threw a damper on things.  Casey and Hardin left and they did ask me to come jam with them, but Jerry had the PA equipment so I stuck with him.  Casey and Hardin eventually met Mike Scaccia and formed Rigor Mortis, while Jerry and I formed a new version of Warlock.

TMU:  Musically, what was going on in the Dallas/Arlington/Ft. Worth area in 1983?  Was there any kind of metal “scene” happening then?

Rick Perry:  There really wasn’t a scene to speak of, just several bars that booked rock bands.  Actually, there probably would have been a scene sooner, but all the metal bands were trying to fit in the club format.  We didn’t know any better, so we learned cover songs that the club owners wanted to hear, and we tried to work our originals in whenever we could. Austin definitely had a scene going way before Dallas Fort Worth… we could see that right away when we went down there to play.

TMU:  Warlock started off as a cover band, as did another local band - Pantera.  Was that pretty typical of bands playing in the area at the time? What types of covers did Warlock play?

Rick Perry:  Yeah when we started all the bands were playing covers.  There were a couple of rock clubs around Dallas/Fort Worth – The Ritz, Matley’s, Savvy’s, Rock Haven… you would play three 45 minute sets a night, Thursday thru Sunday.  We played Judas Priest, AC/DC, Black Sabbath, Metallica, Motorhead, Iron Maiden, and other metal bands.  But the club owners wouldn’t let you play their club unless you played some more commercial tracks, so we also played stuff like Kiss, Ratt, and Twisted Sister.  Looking back, it was cheesy as hell… “tip your bartenders and waitresses!  Let’s see some ladies on the dancefloor for this next one!”    In the beginning, it’s kind of good, because playing a lot of different songs by other bands helps you learn your craft and figure out your own style.  I gotta say, though that Warlock was pretty terrible at covers… we were a lot better at playing our own songs.

TMU:  How did you end up at Pantego Sound for the recording of the first Warlock demo?  Was it through being friends with the Abbott brothers?

Rick Perry:  Yeah, Jerry was friends with Darrell and Vinnie, that’s how I met them.   Pantera recorded their early records at Pantego, and we thought they sounded pretty good, so we did our demo there, too.  It was our first experience in the recording studio.

TMU:  A lot of changes happened in the metal world between 1983-1986.  Warlock’s sound changed as well,  to a heavier, more thrash metal orientation.  Was this just a natural evolution based on your personal taste in music?  Were the other band members happy with the evolution?

Rick Perry:  Well, it was kind of weird because we thought nothing of playing songs by both Venom and Motley Crue.  Plasmatics or Aerosmith, it didn’t matter to us.  So our originals were along the same line, you know.  We had party-type rock songs as well as Priest-influenced power metal songs.  But I always leaned toward the heavier material.  The turning point was when we went down to Austin to see Slayer at Liberty Lunch.  The crowd was so intense, and Slayer was so brutal and uncompromising that it changed my whole outlook.  Around this time the S.O.D. record came out, and that was so heavy and strong that it made us look into the hardcore punk scene.  So we started hanging out at punk clubs in Dallas like the Circle A Ranch and Theater Gallery.  We saw D.R.I. and The Offenders and that stuff started influencing our music.  By this time Rigor Mortis had formed, they were a trio originally with Casey singing.  The first heavy metal show at a Dallas punk club was Warlock and Rigor Mortis at Circle A Ranch.   As you noticed Warlock was heavier by this time, we were basically power metal bordering on thrash.   I thought we were way stronger as a band by this point, but Jerry wasn’t entirely happy about it.  His tastes were more to the sleazy, cock-rock type stuff.

TMU:  The second Warlock demo from 1986 reflects this shift in the band’s sound.  Was that recorded at Pantego also?

Rick Perry:  No, that was done by Rick Rooney at Planet Dallas.  The line up at that time was Jerry, myself, Eric Roy on bass, and Les Choate on drums.  That’s actually a pretty decent demo, you can hear the S.O.D. influence on “Gutter Rats”, with the bass starting off the riff and then the blast beat kicking in.  “End of The Line” was straight forward metal in a Priest vein, and “Iron Jaw” is total power metal.

TMU:  What was the main cause for the demise of Warlock?  By this time did you and Eric Roy have a good idea about the type of band you wanted Gammacide to be?

Rick Perry:  Well, like I said earlier, Jerry wasn’t thrilled with Warlock gradually morphing into a thrash band.  I thought we were doing great, we opened for Metal Church, we went down to Austin and opened for The Mentors and Scratch Acid at The Ritz.   But Jerry called me up one day and said how he wasn’t happy with Warlock’s direction.   I told him it let’s just break up, which I think surprised him.  I’m sure he was expecting us to come to some kind of compromise.  I called Eric and told him, and he said “What’s next?”  It was the best thing to happen to us, because we were able to take everything we learned from Warlock, including what to do and what not to do, and apply it to our new project.  Eric and I loved thrash metal, but we were old-schoolers too.  He loved old Scorpions, and I loved Priest and Maiden. So we wanted to play fast but we wanted to keep everything clear and distinct.  We also wanted to stay away from typical speed or death metal lyrics, like zombies or murdering posers.  We hooked up with Jamey Milford on drums first, then we met Varnam a few months later.  Early on, we kind of decided on keeping a loose theme where our lyrics focused on the dark side of technology and progress.

TMU:  The Texas metal scene (and especially the Dallas-area scene) was really diverse in terms of musical styles in the mid-1980’s.  You had the super-slowed down doomy stuff John Perez was doing in Solitude, the speed-gore metal of Rigor Mortis, the progressive power metal of Arcane, the groovy death metal of Morbid Scream, etc.  How do you think Gammacide fit into the scene?  Was the band immediately accepted by the local fans?

Rick Perry:  You’re absolutely right about Texas having a diverse scene.  When you think of the great metal scenes of the 80’s, you think about the death metal scene in Florida, or the punk/metal crossover scene in New York, or the Bay Area thrash scene.  Texas didn’t have an identifiable sound, at least at first.  We didn’t worry about fitting in with the local scene, because we were helping to create it.  I know some local bands were influenced by Rigor Mortis or Pantera, but we were more influenced by stuff like Exodus and Kreator.   Even though Gammacide was a new band, we had some of the Warlock following built in.  We played a few key gigs with Rigor Mortis and got exposure with the local thrashers pretty fast.  By early 1988 we were established in our own right and I would say Gammacide was one of the most popular local bands in Dallas/Fort Worth, along with Rigor Mortis and Talon.

TMU:  Through the years I’ve heard various accounts of some of the wild shows and crazy antics that went on in clubs like Joe’s Garage and The Tombstone.  Any particularly intense or memorable Gammacide shows?

Rick Perry:  Warlock played Tombstone Factory several times, in fact Jerry Warden ran The Tombstone.  It was a plain warehouse made out of cinderblocks, and at one time it actually was a factory where they made tombstones.  Gammacide never played there because Jerry was pissed at me for breaking up Warlock.  It was a dump, but it was a haven for sluts, drug addicts, and underage drinking.  I remember Jerry booked Destruction and the Cro-Mags to play there.  The Cro-Mags played that night, but Destruction took one look at the place and said fuck it, and they drove to the next city.  Jerry used to charge 3 bucks to park in the parking lot, which was a muddy field.  When the cops showed up the guy who was working the parking lot would run in to warn everybody.  Steve Murphy already told you about the time our roadie caught a piece of shrapnel in his stomach from a flash pot.  The guy still has ulcers and stomach problems to this day.  Joe’s Garage was a rock club on the west side of Fort Worth .  The owner of Joe’s was an older Arab guy named Ab Grieg.  Ab was still booking cover bands who were playing 3 sets of covers a nite, and Walt from Rotting Corpse and myself went to ask Ab about booking us.  We told him we played all originals, and we were each going to play about an hour.  He was hesitant about giving us a weekend slot, so we ended up settling on the Wednesday nite before Thanksgiving, 1987.  We called it the Give Thanks for Thrash show and it packed out.  Ab immediately started booking Gammacide on a regular basis and changing his format away from the cover bands.  At our peak, we would draw three to four hundred people to Joe’s and it was like a mini rock concert complete with fights, mosh pits, drinking in the parking lot, groupies, and people freaking out on drugs.   I can’t really recall specific shows… it’s all lost in a haze.  Later on, Joe’s Garage started getting calls from booking agents wanting to put national acts in there, and Ab would call me and ask if I thought the bands would draw.   The first big band to play Joe’s was Death, and we opened the show.  He had Sacred Reich there, Exodus, Carcass, Morbid Angel, Pestilence, Testament, D.R.I., pretty much all the major underground bands.  Joe’s Garage at one time was famous nationwide among death and thrash bands, it was one of the top spots for touring bands to play.

TMU:  The first Gammacide demo from 1987 was hailed worldwide for its hyper-fast speed yet clear and defined vocals and guitar riffs.  Were you surprised at how quickly it spread through the underground and how positive the reviews were?

Rick Perry:  Yeah, because I didn’t like it that much myself!  See, I’ve always been a perfectionist when it comes to music, I’ve got strong ideas on what I want it to sound like.  I’m not very good as a collaborator, I do better by myself.  Anyway, after we did the demo I wasn’t entirely happy with the sound.  However, I was happy that everybody else liked it!  The zines came out sporadically, so it didn’t happen right away.  We sent out the demo and a few months later the reviews started coming out.  But yeah I was totally excited when I saw how well the Gammacide demo was being received.  And it started a chain reaction you know, every time a new zine came out, other zines, radio shows and fans would be writing us.  I used to answer 4 or 5 letters every day.  I loved it, getting that kind of positive response from all over the world, it kept me motivated, and it really made me feel like Gammacide was making progress and having an impact.

TMU:  In the period between 1987-1989, Gammacide added Scott Shelby as a second guitarist.  Did his addition have any effect on the way the band performed or wrote songs?

Rick Perry:  Well, as a one guitar band the power would drop a little whenever I did a guitar solo.  So we wanted to add another guitarist, and we knew Scott from playing with other bands.  Scott is a maniac on the guitar, he has no real musical training, but he’s a natural when it comes to speed metal.  Adding him to the band boosted Gammacide’s intensity.  We put more emphasis on speed riffing and he added a lot of his own influence.  He and I worked well together,  we would sit in the garage and come up with all kinds of demented harmonies and stuff.  Like I said earlier, my favorite bands are Priest and Slayer, so we threw in a lot of berserk dueling lead breaks.

TMU:  Gammacide got lots of label interest and made a few compilation appearances before settling on Wild Rags to release Victims Of Science in 1989.  How did you originally get hooked up with Richard C?  Did he pay for the recording and the pressing of the record or did the band have to cover some costs yourselves?  Whose idea was it to include the “extras” like the poster and lyric sheet?

Rick Perry:  You know, we didn’t really have management or any kind of lawyers or anything like that.  I did everything myself.   Richard C was selling our demo in his store and I went out to visit him.  He showed me some of the records he was putting out on his own label like Recipients of Death and Bloodcum.  We had submitted our demo to every label in the world, but most of them said they wanted to hear more material, which would mean we would have to pay for the recording of another demo.  We thought we could release a record on Wild Rags and show the labels what we were capable of.  We had nothing to lose, since it was only a one album deal.  We paid for the recording, but we had plenty of cash saved up from playing Joe’s Garage.  Wild Rags paid for the manufacturing, which was fucked up.  If you’ve got the vinyl, you’ll notice Side 2 is off center.  That’s one of the reasons I’m excited about reissuing the record on CD, a chance to fix that kind of stuff.  Richard C was doing posters and lyric sheets for all his releases at that time, I thought that was kind of cool.  We designed the cover and the layout and everything ourselves.

TMU:  What were the reasons behind Eric Roy leaving the band shortly after the recording of the album?

Rick Perry:  After Scott joined the band, the new songs became more and more challenging to play.  We basically would play to the very limits of our endurance, and then crank it up another notch.  Eric had difficulty keeping up, and we gave him a hard time.  On top of that, some of his personal vices were getting a little out of hand.  Don’t get me wrong, the rest of us weren’t choirboys – we were a thrash metal band in the 80’s, so we all had a little chemical fuel coursing through our veins.  But Eric started missing practice or showing up for practice in a state where he couldn’t play.  He basically ended up quitting before we got someone else.  It sucked though, because he and I had been together almost since the beginning… he and I left Warlock and formed Gammacide, so he was a founding member.  We stayed good friends though.  Later on he formed a band called Apathy and they opened a few shows for Gammacide.

TMU:  Gammacide did lots of local and state-wide gigging, but only made it out to the West coast once.  Tell us some of your recollections from that tour.  How did the California thrash scene take to these speed-demons from Texas?

Rick Perry:  Well, it was basically a do-it-yourself tour.  I called bands and clubs on the way out to California and booked the gigs.  We all traveled in Jamey’s van.  Walt from Rotting Corpse came with us and ran sound.  For this tour Ghames Jones of the Oklahoma band Forte filled in on bass.  We played El Paso at some disco, it was a total mismatch but at least they paid us and gave us a free motel room.  Then on our way to Phoenix , we ran over something in the highway, causing two blowouts.  Of course we didn’t have two spare tires, so we were broke down in the middle of the desert.  We had just passed a penitentiary and there were signs warning not to pick up hitchhikers because they could be escaped convicts.  Just then it started pouring rain, and of course no one was going to stop for a group of guys that looked like us.  I remember Walt and Jamey rolling those flat tires down the road in the pouring rain, in search of the next service station.  We finally made it to the Sun Club in Phoenix , and we met up with Nuclear Death, another Wild Rags band that opened the show.  They were cool, kind of strange, but very friendly.  Then a couple of nights later we made it out to Hollywood and played a show at some big venue called Hollywood Live, it was right on Hollywood Blvd.  Also on the bill were Oliver Magnum and Insecticide, two bands we were friends with.  Then we headed up to Oakland .  We played two shows there with Hexx, who were also on Wild Rags.  The two shows with Hexx were the best, they drew a decent crowd.  The first show was at the Omni, and there were guys from Sadus and Autopsy there.  San Francisco was kind of the birthplace of thrash, you know, so we were excited to play there, and I think we went over very well.  Then a couple of nights later we played another show with Hexx and headed home.

There was one other show I’ve got to mention.  We got a call from a local promoter who asked us if we wanted to play on the side stage for the Clash of The Titans tour, with Slayer, Anthrax, Megadeth, and Alice In Chains.  Of course we said yes, and it turned out to be probably the biggest crowd we ever played to.  The gig was at the Starplex Ampitheater (now Smirnoff) and the side stage was set up near the concession and T-shirt stands.  The headlining bands’ hospitality tents and dressing room were right behind the side stage, on the other side of a fence.  We were supposed to play 3 sets, during the intermissions of the main stage.  Well, by about the third song the crowd went berserk and started a huge mosh pit.  No one could get to the concession stands or rest rooms because the crowd was going apeshit.  I don’t think the promoters were expecting that a band on the side stage would get that kind of reaction, so they pulled the plug on us after our first set.  They told us that we were “disturbing” Slayer and Anthrax as they prepared to go on!

TMU:  Gammacide recorded a final demo in 1991 that to some is the best material ever recorded by the band.  Why was that second demo not as widely distributed as the first?

Rick Perry:  It was mainly for the labels and zines.  We spent a lot of time on the songwriting and the recording of that demo, I think it sounds much better than Victims Of Science.  We felt we had something pretty damn good to offer.  We were holding out for a better deal,  we didn’t want to do another record with Wild Rags.  The material on that demo was so strong that we didn’t want everyone to hear it, we were saving it for our second record.

TMU:  Around this time (1991-1992) the U.S. metal scene was being devoured by the first wave of Death Metal.  Do you believe this had anything to do with the eventual demise of  Gammacide?  Was there anything in particular that finally caused you to break up the band?

Rick Perry:  We loved Death Metal.  We used to always listen to Obituary, Death, Carcass and all those bands.  Unfortunately, most death metal fans didn’t care for thrash.  To me, it wasn’t that different, just another branch off the metal tree, but with the death metal scene taking over, a lot of the thrash bands started fading out, including the big ones like Vio-Lence and Exodus.  Some of the labels that we sent the demo to wanted the vocals to be more death metal.  We were still packing the local gigs, but it became apparent that we the big independent labels weren’t going to give us a deal in the current musical climate.  There wasn’t a deciding factor, in fact when we played our last gig we didn’t know it was the last gig.  I wanted to quit while we were ahead, so I decided to call it a day.  I’m proud of Gammacide’s achievements in the realm of thrash metal, but I think we were a couple of years too late.  By the time we got good enough at our game, the wave had already peaked.

TMU:  On the final Gammacide demo a few samples and sound effects were starting to work their way into the music.  Where did your interest in electronic/industrial music begin?

Rick Perry:  After playing thrash 5 nights a week in the garage, I wanted to listen to something different.  I started getting into rap bands like Public Enemy, Ice-T and Geto Boys.  Some of that stuff is just as heavy as any metal, it’s just a different form of music, but it still can be heavy and aggressive.  I started becoming interested in the technology behind rap music, you know programming the beats and samples.  Then I started getting into industrial bands like Skinny Puppy, Ministry, and Front Line Assembly.  That’s when I got the idea to start a new band, combining electronic music with really heavy guitars.

TMU:  Puncture was certainly a more visual and theatrical presentation as compared to Gammacide’s stripped down image.  Was that your intention from the start?

Rick Perry:  Yeah, I wanted to put on a show.  When we first started we didn’t have a live drummer, we just used the drum machine.  So there was a big empty space on the drum riser.  We stacked TVs on it and had a couple different VCRs going, playing all kinds of sick footage,  bondage, autopsies, meat packing plants, cartoons, anything off the wall and shocking we could find.  The band was pretty much cloaked in fog and strobe lights and you had all this bizarre footage on the TVs and it really set a doomy tone.

TMU:  Puncture’s first gig was at the legendary metal club Joe’s Garage.   Did the metal fans take to Puncture’s “machine-metal” style immediately, or did you have to win them over?

Rick Perry:  Although the death metallers didn’t like thrash, they were pretty open minded.  The heaviness and the super dark negative tone of Puncture won them over immediately.  I think they thought it was “hip” to be into an industrial band.

TMU:  How did the Puncture live performance change over the years?  Were you always trying to bring in new elements to enhance the experience?

Rick Perry:  Yeah, the members and the image of Puncture were constantly evolving.  John Perez from Solitude was in there for a while.  When he left we got Mike T.  We went down to Houston and opened a show for Dio and Motorhead.  Puncture definitely lost some power when we were outside in broad daylight, so we decided to add a live drummer and make it more of a “rock” band.   We were always adding and changing elements, like smashing the TVs with sledgehammers, setting things on fire, throwing bloody baby dolls at the audience, anything to get a reaction.  We knew a professional dominatrix named Mistress Zaria  and she would bring her slave up on stage and do a little S&M bondage performance, the crowd loved it.

TMU:  After two great albums and a successful national tour with GWAR, Puncture seemed to come to a rather abrupt end.  What happened to cause the breakup?

Rick Perry:  Our label dissolved.  We tried to get another deal, but it was tough.  Almost the same situation as Gammacide, the 'industrial wave' had peaked.  Or so everyone thought.  Actually, bands like Static X got pretty popular.  Their style is very similar to what Puncture was doing.  Also, I was getting older and so was my kid.  It was time to stop spending all my evenings in underground rock clubs.  You know, after awhile it just boils down to some drunk guy buying you a beer and saying, “Dude!  You guys rock!”  That doesn’t pay the rent, and I had already had that happen to me about 1,000 times, so I called it a day.

TMU:  Was the 3rd Puncture CD ever finished?  Will those songs ever see the light of day?

Rick Perry:  The third Puncture CD was 80% written when we pulled the plug.  The songs on it kick ass.  It is by far the best stuff we ever did, and some of the strongest 'industrial metal' I’ve ever heard.  Mike, Per, and myself have started recording it at Mike’s studio.  We’ve been taking it really slow, but I think we will start cranking it up next year.

TMU:  Tragically, Eric Roy was murdered in 2001.  Are you still in touch with former members of Gammacide and Puncture?  What are they up to now?

Rick Perry:  Jamey moved to Colorado.  He plays drums in a Christian band.  Varnam moved back to Louisiana after Gammacide broke up.  He formed a band called Cauldron, they put out a CD called 'For The Love of Pain'. Blade was pretty active in the local scene after he left Gammacide and he formed several local acts.   Mike T learned a lot about sound engineering while he was in Puncture; he started off running sound at clubs and now has his own recording studio.  He’s done a few of the records on John Perez’ Brainticket Label.  Per is a DJ at a local club, he’s the goth techno guy.

TMU:  Are you still involved in music in any way?  Any current musical projects?

Rick Perry:  A couple of years ago I helped a guy out on his CD.  It was kind of redneck rock and it was called Bad Motherfucker.  Lately I’ve been busy with work but I did get inspired to publish a Gammacide web site: www.gammacide.com .  Like I said, the 3^rd Puncture CD will eventually see the light of day.  But right now I’m excited about reissuing Gammacide’s 'Victims of Science' on CD.  It will be completely remastered from the original tapes.  We will also include the entire '91 demo on it, which will be cool because a lot of people never heard it.  Also, and this is the first time I’ve announced this, is that the members of Gammacide are getting back together to record two “lost” Gammacide songs.  We will record at Mike T’s studio over the Thanksgiving holiday.  The two tracks are “Vapor Lock,” which was a downtuned crusher, and “Against The Grain,” which is traditional uptempo Gamma-thrash.  If the tracks turn out okay, we will include them with the 'Victims' reissue.  I’m hoping to have it out be early next summer.

TMU:  The mid 1980’s – early 1990’s Texas metal scene is revered worldwide to this day.  I get email daily from people all over the world who are absolutely fanatical about this music.  In your opinion, what made the Texas scene so different and unique?

Rick Perry:  You know, the hip scenes are always on the East or West coast.  By the time fashion or trends reach us, it’s already played out in California or New York.   Being isolated from the so called cultural hot spots of the US, Texas was forced to come up with its own style, which ended up being very diverse.  I think the fact that Texas is so big and it covers so much ground, you know it was really like several scenes including Dallas/Ft Worth, Austin, San Antonio, Houston, and Corpus Christi.  With everybody spread out so far, the bands all developed their own sounds without too much outside influence.  Texans have a lot of attitude, they are kind of cocky about being from Texas, and they have a history of saying “Screw it!  We’re gonna do it OUR way!”  You’ve seen this quality in Texas throughout history and I think it also came out in the music that was being produced at the time.  I’m really proud to have been a part of it, and that there are still people out there who are interested in this music.

TMU:  And finally, what are your thoughts on the metal scene (or lack thereof) of today?

Rick Perry:  I go to some of the clubs around here sometimes, but none of the local bands really grab me.  I respect what they are doing, though.  The bands of today are busting their ass just as much as we did 15 years ago.  The difference is in the support from the fans.  These bands will have a couple of their buddies and their girlfriends in the crowd and that’s about it.  When Gammacide or Rigor Mortis or Hammerwitch played in the late 80’s it was not unusual for there to be 400 or 500 people.  The crowd would be packed at the front of the stage before we even went on.  Everyone was wearing shirts by Dead Horse, Annialator, or whoever.  The cars in the parking lot were covered in stickers from local bands.  I don’t know what happened, but it seems like the kids today are just accepting what they see on MTV or whatever, you know they are into Limp Bizkit or Eminem or whatever, but they don’t show the creativity to go out and dig up some new, unknown shit.  That’s what kept the underground going back then… it was cool when you discovered some great new demo from some band you never heard of.  And it was a matter of pride when you discovered something that was kick ass that your friends hadn’t heard of yet.

TMU:  Rick, thanks so much for taking the time to answer this Q&A.  Feel free to add any additional information I may have left out!

Rick Perry:  It was inspiring for me to discover your website.  It is so cool that the Texas scene made that kind of impact, that people around the world still remember the bands and love the music.  From 82 to 99, I spent 17 years in the trenches of underground metal, and although I never made any money to speak of, the memories and friendships I made during those days are some of the things I value most.  Thanks to the all old school headbangers!  Die hard!