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by Steven
L. Roth
David Byrne of the
Talking Heads once penned, "I've changed my
hair style so many times now, I don't know
what I look like." Some may argue that Mad at
the World is on the road to face the same
dilemma musically as their sound has gone from
techno (Mad at
the World, Flowers in the Rain) to alternative (Seasons
of Love) to near-metal (their latest
release, Boomerang). Regardless of
what your opinion may be, Roger Rose, center
of said band, retains a firm perspective on
what he's doing and where he's going.
My Stupid Message
Most of you probably realize that Roger Rose
is the leadman for Christian rock's
ever-evolving music entity, Mad at the World.
And some of you are probably aware that during
the day, Mr. Rose dons gray, knee-length
shorts, pulls his hair back into a pony-tail
and takes to the streets as a U.S. Postal
Carrier (however, any attempts at humor by
drawing comparisons with Cliff Clavin are
futile, since Rose has never seen even one
episode of "Cheers"). What you probably don't
know is that Roger Rose has the coolest
message on his answering machine. After a
couple failed attempts to make contact via
Frontline Records, I managed to hook up with
his answering machine.
"The following is not rap
music," a voice informs you, which is then
immediately proceeded by an electronic drone
of fast-pulsed synth which sounds like it
should be the introduction to the evening
news. "Thanks for calling me; I'm not home,"
the singer begins, "So leave your stupid
message on the phone. And when I get home I
will listen to it. And call you back as soon
as I can do it." (Begin crashing percussion
now.) "Weeeell, bye mama. Y'know what I'm
saying, know what I'm talking about and all
that stuff? I gotta go!" (Beeeep.)
Uh, hello. This is Steve
for Notebored concerning our
interview. I'll try back later this evening.
(Silence.) Bye.
Myth of the Gloomy
Songwriter
With answers-don't-come-easy lyrics, sorrowful
and passionate vocals, stigmatized by certain
industry and media people as being
unapproachable, and with every photo I had
ever seen looking as if they're, well, mad
at the world, I prepared myself for the
journalistic equivalent of pulling teeth.
Roger Rose did not meet
my expectations. Not only did I have to cut
him off several times to get through my list
of questions, he spent a good deal of time
laughing along with the responses. "I am one
of those people that is real shy until you get
to know me. Then after that I'm probably too
loud and obnoxious. But people aren't going to
know that, so it's my responsibility to force
myself not to be so shy, and I'm trying to do
that."
Okay, but what about
those other rumors? "MATW has always been a
little bit of a weird band. I mean, let's face
it. We were people from Southern California
singing with a mock English accent, doing
music that wasn't heard of in the Christian
market. And a lot of the people who pay the
bills and take orders for albums just didn't
understand the music and didn't want to
understand the music, and I can see where
they'd think like that."
Boomerang: From
Depeche Mode to Judas Priest
If you haven't heard MATW
in quite some time, brace yourself. Even if
you did hear their last album, Seasons of
Love, you should be prepared for further
metamorphose as found in their latest release,
Boomerang. Based on Galatians 6:7-8
(look it up), Boomerang is a stripped
down, basic, two guitars, electric bass and a
drum set albums with the keyboards only
appearing on one cut. It's quite a departure
from their earlier material, which was chock
full of techno synth and sequencer gizmos. It
earned MATW the unofficial "Christian Depeche
Mode" title. A lot can change in five years.
"The only reason I
switched over to this type of music was
because we could have fun playing it live,"
explains Rose. "We would fall on our faces
show after show trying to do the keyboard
set-up live."
Understandable, but to go
from synth-oriented to synth-extinct (nearly)
heavy metal in such a relatively short period?
"As a songwriter, my influences are obviously
the sum total of every song I've ever liked or
been inspired by. Like, for this new album,
some of the stuff I was listening to was
Seventies rock."
Yeah, but still. . . "I'm
not musically prejudice. I can like a good
song no matter what style it is. There's so
much musical prejudice out there. If someone
is into metal, anything that isn't metal is
garbage, period, whether it is a good song or
not. The same is true for dance music or
whatever. I'm not like that."
Okay, but it's still a
big jump. "When I was younger, I was kind of
into heavy metal and then got out of heavy
metal. When I was 15 or 16, my album
collection consisted of secular music like
Judas Priest and all that garbage. I owned
their first two albums but then kind of got
out of it. So Boomerang is sort of
like me returning to some of the music I used
to be into."
Ah ha! So you are a metal
band now. "The difference between what we do
and just a metal band is in the song writing,"
Rose explains. "I try to keep the chord
changes and melodies more melodic."
Younger brother Randy
Rose, who plays drums in the band and has been
a part of the group from the beginning,
apparently has been dipping into his big
brother's album collection. With two of the
songs to his credit on Boomerang, Randy sounds
like a serious contender for a Jim
Morrison/Alice Cooper sound-alike. "He would
rather have us play all hard rock," chuckles
Roger, who is 11 years older than his sibling
and counts him as one of his very best
friends. "As a matter of fact, there'll
probably be a solo album from Randy out
sometime soon. He's a great songwriter and an
excellent singer; he really deserves his own
record."
Isn't Sex a Wonderful
Thing
MATW has always tried to approach issues and
questions honestly and openly, even at the
risk of being misunderstood or challenging
some of the Evangelical taboos as far as what
you can or cannot talk about. "There's
definitely some Christian music that talks
about only 'safe' topics and use Christian
cliches that they know will make people
happy," states Rose.
"Isn't Sex a Wonderful
Thing," one of the songs off the new album,
goes a step further than what they've done in
the past. "A lot of debate went into whether
we should even put that song on this album,"
admits Rose. "There's concern that people will
just hear the hook line (the title) over and
over again and think the song is promoting
sexual wildness or whatnot." But this
31-year-old mailman seems prepared with a
response should anyone ask.
"The title is actually a
question. Basically the song is trying to
force the listener to answer that question. I
believe the answer really depends on whether
we're living our lives by God's rules or by
ignoring them. I think God's rules for sex,
even if we don't understand them or they go
against our fleshy nature, is purity before
and fidelity after marriage. Under those
rules, sex is a wonderful thing. Outside of
them, it isn't. It brings confusion, breaks up
marriages, it causes fathers to molest their
daughters. It has a lot of bad effects in
exchange for temporary pleasure."
This type of
confrontational writing seems to come easy for
Rose. "I'm not afraid to talk about tough
issues and tough questions," he admits. "I'm
comfortable with that because for everything I
don't have an answer for, I don't let that
ultimately get me down. The ultimate answer is
that God is a loving God."
Rose concedes, "There's a
lot of evidence in life to suggest that God
isn't a loving God if you choose to believe
that. For all the questions I don't have
answers for -- why God would let my mother get
cancer when she's the most devoted Christian
I've ever known, or why babies are born
deformed, or all these kind of things -- if I
would say, 'Yeah, I don't understand this,
therefore God isn't a loving God,' I'm just
ripping myself off from the only hope that I
have. And the only hope I have is to believe
that God is a loving God. I choose to believe
that even though my mind doesn't totally
understand it. In my opinion, that's what
faith is."
Magic Bus
So what does this civil servant gone head
banger think the future holds for Mad at the
World? With tongue placed firmly in cheek,
Rose responds, "I think we'll sell a lot more
albums now that I've sold out and changed to
metal." He then erupts into laughter, causing
me to wince at the added volume emitting from
the phone. "Let's put it this way," he
continues, "I need my mailman job."
In a more serious tone,
Rose uses an interesting metaphor to give his
feelings on the subject. "I think of it like
I'm on a bus and God is the bus driver. If he
lets me off at the next corner, I'm more than
happy to step off and say I had fun doing what
I did. Or if God wants to take me on a long
ride for the next ten years, I'm content to do
that, too."
Rose also insists he has
no desire to become a secular crossover rock
star. "I think it would turn a life that I
enjoy into work and a hassle and a nightmare;
it's almost too much for the human ego to
handle, too much stress. There's even more
important things to life than selling a
million records to me."
Not bad, even for a guy
who's never even seen "Cheers."
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