Talking To CJ Pretzel From The Drags About "Dragsploitation...Now" Wasn't A Drag At All!

Originally posted in Teenage Kicks #1

By Devorah Ostrov

L-R: CJ, Lorca & Keith
From the back cover of Dragsploitation...Now!
Photos: Nick Tauro

The Drags — most people assume the name has to do with drag racing but as guitarist/lead "singer" (their quote marks, not mine!) CJ Pretzel points out, there's (at least) a quadruple entendre: "You have the cigarette thing, the cross-dressing thing, the racing thing, and the bummer thing."

In fact, the group chose its moniker with ambiguity in mind. "We liked the looseness of it," says CJ. "It's sort of solidified now, but in the beginning, people didn't know if we would come out in dresses, or what."

Estrus Records advert for
Dragsploitation...Now!

Formed in 1993 in Albuquerque, New Mexico, the band centers around the threesome of...

CJ Stritzel/Pretzel: Originally from Arizona, he formed the group when he got tired of waiting for something to present itself. "After a while, I realized that I just had to do it myself," he states.

Lorca Wood: Originally from Oklahoma, this feisty onetime cellist was a novice bass player when she joined the band.

Keith Herrera: Described as "old school" New Mexico, in 1994 the drummer issued the Drags' earliest 45 on Resin Records, an indie label he co-founded with a friend.

The group's latest release is a fun-packed, eight-song 10-inch record called Dragsploitation...Now! (Estrus Records). Also highly recommended: the "Tales From Estrus" compilation EP featuring the Drags' cover of Crime's "Baby You're so Repulsive" and the Drags/PeeChees split 45 on G.I. Productions.

Teenage Kicks: Has the band always been a three-piece?

CJ: No, for a while we had two guitar players, but Robbie moved to Atlanta a few years ago. And there's been a couple of other side Drags — our friend Ray was a Drag, and this guy Tom was a Drag for a little while. But it's been pretty much just the three of us. There was a point where we really wanted a fourth person, but no one's come along who was ready, willing and able. Now, I kind of like it as three.

Teenage Kicks: Were you in any bands before the Drags?

Meet The Drags
Estrus Records promo postcard

CJ: No, this is pretty much my first band; I'd never sang before. And this is definitely Lorca's first and only rock 'n' roll band. She didn't even play the bass before we started; she played the cello as a kid. But we kinda wanted someone who couldn't play because a couple of us already sorta could. And I was trying really hard not to play guitar that well — or just to play it differently. I was trying to do things that sounded cooler. Not really anything that would freak out other guitar players, but just to be uglier. So, that was our idea at first, to have somebody that couldn't play bass, to add that certain spice to it.

Teenage Kicks: And what about Keith?

CJ: Keith just kind of came along. We lost our drummer, and we had a whole summer of just sitting around. I played the drums for a while just to keep it going. And then Keith presented himself, and we jumped at it.

Teenage Kicks: Do you guys consider yourselves a punk band?

CJ: Definitely! I mean... I dunno how to explain why. We do everything ourselves; nobody's gonna do it for us. And we're not making a shitload of money. We just do what we do. And I think that's as good an encapsulation of punk rock as any.

Teenage Kicks: Do you have a big following around Albuquerque?

CJ: It ebbs and flows. Sometimes it seems like we're doing really well. Sometimes it seems like no one gives a shit.

Gas Huffer, Clawhammer & the Drags at the Whisky
(Poster art by Chris Cooper aka "Coop")

Teenage Kicks: Is there a scene in Albuquerque?

CJ: Yeah, there's some bands that are really good. And there's a couple of places to play. That's all you need, really. But there's not enough bands so that you can go out every weekend and see a different combination of bands. The plan now is to make a record and be gone as much as we can. I don't wanna play there every two weeks.

Teenage Kicks: How did you hook up with Estrus Records?

Dragsploitation...Now!
(Estrus Records 1995)

CJ: We sent them our first record [the "I Like to Die" 45]. We'd seen the Estrus ads; they had great little monsters and stuff in them. And we thought they looked really cool. We were always stealing the stuff from their ads to make our flyers. So we figured, let's send 'em a record! So, we sent them a test pressing with a postcard from this breakfast restaurant.

   This restaurant... it's like a whole city block and it's in a barn. It's called the Frontier Restaurant. We discovered that they had these postcards with their Frontier Sweet Roll on them, which is their claim to fame. So, we wrote on the back of the postcard: "We just made this record!" I don't know what we expected; if we expected to get signed, or what. But they called us back and said, "We wanna sell the record." A good chunk of that first pressing was sold through the Estrus mail-order catalog. And then we went on tour through that. So, we were kind of halfway connected with Estrus even before we were signed. And when we got back, they offered to put out a record if we made one. 

Teenage Kicks: I know the Drags have played on some Estrus-package shows. Is that something the label tries to set up regularly?

Comic book version of the Drags included
in the "Tales From Estrus" Vol. 3 compilation EP

CJ: I don't know about regularly... We've done it a few times. We flew out to Chicago and played with Impala, the Lord High Fixers, the Mono Men, and the Insomniacs. And we've done it out here with the Mono Men and the Trashwomen a couple of times. But it's not like it happens all over. You've probably got an inflated idea of how much it happens, 'cause it happens here a lot. But it doesn't happen as much everywhere else.

   Dave [Crider, Estrus owner] was talking about going down to Texas and doing a show, but it hasn't happened yet. He was actually talking about buying a bus, and we'd all travel together — like the old soul revues. Each of us would play two songs and haul ass off the stage!

Teenage Kicks: Is the trash/sleaze culture something you guys are heavily into?

CJ: No, not especially. That's something that's sort of been put on us. It wasn't really about Rat Fink, or whatever. I have an appreciation for stuff like that, but it wasn't why we did it. I just wanted to have a rock band, you know.

   And the stuff we've done, like "Elongated Man" — it was a joke! This guy told us about Elongated Man, and we didn't believe it. Like I said, we're not really experts. But we ended up calling the song "Elongated Man" just because we thought it was a cool title. Since then, people have said, "Wow! You named it after Elongated Man. He's so rad!" But I still wouldn't recognize Elongated Man from... whoever!

Teenage Kicks: All the songs on the album are simply credited to "The Drags." How does the songwriting actually work?

CJ: We do it kind of collaboratively. I come in with something, and we mess around with it. And then I kind of scream until I find two or three words that go good together. And then we try to figure out what the song is about from there. 

The Drags 
(back cover of Can't Stop Rock And Roll - Estrus Records 1997)

Teenage Kicks: How did the split 45 with the PeeChees doing a Drags' song and vice versa come about?

CJ: Somebody sent us a letter asking to do a single. And we said, "Yeah!" before we thought about if we had any songs. 'Cause we write songs kind of slow. We called the PeeChees about something else and they said, "We just got this letter to do some single..." And they didn't know what song they were gonna do either. I dunno... It wasn't the most original idea on Earth, but we decided to do each other's songs. And when we presented the idea to the label, they said, "That's weird." 'Cause that's what they were thinking about doing.

"Tales From Estrus" Vol. 3 
featuring the Lord High Fixers, Impala & the Drags

Teenage Kicks: Do you purposely try to get a lo-fi sound with your recordings?

CJ: Sometimes we do and sometimes we don't. There's been times when we wanted to add a little extra heat to it, so we did that. And sometimes it sounds really good, and sometimes we've been burned on it. And there's been times when we thought it sounded a little high-tech in the studio, but once we got the record, it sounded really neat. And there's other times where we thought it sounded really neat in the studio, but when we got the record back, it was a little grosser than we'd intended.  

Teenage Kicks: I've heard that the "Anxiety" single [the A-side of the group's recent 3-song 45 on Empty Records, which also features "Elongated Man" and a cover of "Flying Saucer Rock and Roll"] was recorded on the spur of the moment. Is that true?

CJ: We did that completely on the fly. We did it the day after Garage Shock [95]. Our van broke down, and we were sitting in some hotel. Blake [owner of Empty Records] had talked to us the night before about wanting to do a single sometime. Usually, that's like the rock equivalent of "let's do lunch." So, we called him up the next day and said, "If you can get a studio, we're gonna be in town." And we had a single recorded within 24 hours of when he asked us to do it!

Poster for Garage Shock 95 with the Makers,
Supersnazz & the Drags (to name a few)

Teenage Kicks: Are you inspired by other vocalists?

CJ: I have been since I started. But when I first started, I was mostly inspired by fear. Just straight-up fear. I figured, "I need to do this because no one's gonna do it for me." And it horrified me. I was in the bathroom for the whole night before we played our first show. It was such a horrifying experience. Since then... There's people whose singing I really enjoy, and I think you can be inspired by other people's singing. But you've got your own equipment. There's not really much I can do to sound like other people.

Teenage Kicks: I want to ask about the stories behind a couple of the songs on Dragsploitation...Now! One of my favorites is "My Girlfriend's in the F.B.I."

CJ: That was probably the quickest song I've ever written. It just kind of came to me when I was driving around one day. What was the word that I heard? Usually, that's the way it happens. I'll hear a word somewhere, and I'll start running with it when I'm driving around in my car. My car doesn't have a radio, so I have to keep myself entertained. So, I was driving around and it just came to me. I had it written by the time I got home. All I had to do was figure out how to play what was going on in my head.

Teenage Kicks: What about "Teenage Invasion"?

Mono Men & the Drags at Kilowatt in SF

CJ: Same deal. I just thought it was a really great title. I just thought "invasion" was a great word! That's actually the fourth incarnation of "Teenage Invasion." You know, there's the old philosophical question: If you change the head and you change the handle, do you still have the same axe? It used to have a different verse, but we thought the chorus was cool. So, we changed the verse. Then, we thought the chorus wasn't so cool. So, we changed the chorus, etc., etc. 

Teenage Kicks: The new "Tales From Estrus" compilation EP, (which includes the Drags' cover of Crime's "Baby You're so Repulsive") comes with a comic book featuring all the bands. How does it feel to be depicted in comic book form?

CJ: Oh, that was so cool! Dave told us that was going to happen, but it didn't really sink in at the time. But once we got the comic books back, it was really great! Although, for the record, I don't wear Converses. They make me look like I have duck feet.

Teenage Kicks: Why did you choose to cover "Baby You're so Repulsive" on the EP?

CJ: It was just kind of a neat song. I think one of Keith's friends had the record. We hadn't really heard of Crime. I mean, I knew that "Hotwire My Heart" was theirs — the song that Sonic Youth did. But that was about it.

Teenage Kicks: Have you heard anything back from Crime?

CJ: No, but you know, all our songs are ripped off from something else anyway. We keep expecting to hear from a whole lot of people. Haha!

★ ★ ★

Here's a link to the track "My Girlfriend's in the F.B.I." from Dragsploitation...Now.

Teenage Kicks Meets The Makers!

Originally published in Teenage Kicks #3 (1997)
By Devorah Ostrov

The Makers are loud, aggressive, snotty, sexy, arrogant, smart, cool, cute, nice, funny, and completely crazy. Teenage Kicks interviewed Michael Maker following the release of the group's latest LP Hunger and the 2x7" EP "Tear Your World Apart," both available on Estrus Records.

"Tear Your World Apart," released by Estrus Records in 1997, 

features artwork by Love And Rockets co-creator Jaime Hernandez.

The Makers are...

Michael Maker — vocals

Don Maker — bass

Jamie Maker — guitar

Jay Maker — drums

How they met... 

   "We went to North Central. It was a shitty high school in a shitty neighborhood. We were always getting into fights with the jocks. That's how we met each other. We were always saying, 'I saw you getting beat up the other day.'"

What they listened to & where they bought it...
   "We went to thrift stores all the time. I don't want to say we were poor, 'cause that sounds stupid. But we always wanted to buy a ton of records, and new records or CDs were too expensive. So all the records we got were from thrift stores, and they would cost 25 cents. We would buy stuff that looked cool — like if there were a bunch of guys on the cover, like the Count Five, or a group that looked badass. That's how we found all our Sonics' records and the Shadows of Knight. It was the coolest music we'd ever heard in our lives!"

Michael Maker
Photo: Devorah Ostrov

There's no mom & dad Maker...

   "It was a stupid Ramones thing to do. We're over it now. I don't even like the Ramones anymore. I can't even listen to that shit."

What color are their eyes? I dunno, they're always wearing shades...
   "We played a lot of hick taverns in Spokane, and it was tough. We were really young, and we weren't all white. We would get into fights every night. At first, me and Donny decided we were going to wear shades just so it would be harder for people to tell who we were."

Everything's cool now...
   "We used to get dressed up for shows, but every night our clothes would be ripped to shreds. People would just attack us and rip our jackets off. I'd spend some money on a nice jacket and some idiot, hillbilly motherfucker would grab me and rip the thing off. So, I'd get pissed off and smash a bottle on him. And then all hell would break loose! When we were just starting out, that's how a lot of our shows went. But now everything is cool. People come to our shows to hear our music. We get along with each other, and we get along with the audience."

Whatever happened to Tim...
   "Tim had a lot of problems. He drank a lot and took a lot of bad things. But there's a happy ending! He's all cleaned up now, just like he used to be — just like when we were in high school. And he has his own band called the Vindictive. I haven't heard them, but they're supposed to be good."

Tell us about the new guy...
   "Jamie was always our buddy. We always considered him as one of us anyway. So, when Tim got fucked up, Jamie was just there. He's a really good guitar player, and he already knew our songs."

Michael Maker

Photo: Devorah Ostrov

The Great Northwest tradition...

   "It's nice to be a Northwest band. I'm proud of where we're from, but I also don't give a shit about it. It's all bullshit now. Nowhere is really all that great. Everything's been fucked around with and tainted. We don't even play that much in the Northwest; it's not worth our time. We do far better on the East Coast than we do in the Northwest. We do really well in Seattle, but mostly they couldn't care less about what we're doing. They don't think, 'Alright, somebody is carrying on the Northwest tradition!' They just want to hear Soundgarden. And we don't give a shit about them either. Fuck 'em!"

The mystery of the Young Lions...
   "It's a real righteous organization led by Tim Kerr of the Lord High Fixers. They're real good people, and everything they stand for is true and right. You can't really argue with them. They took us in because they like our music. They believe in our songs. But we don't really know who they are. They say they go to our shows, but they never introduce themselves. We get letters from them saying, 'I saw your show in New York. It was very inspiring.' Real simple, no return address. They're real subdued."

Love And Rockets...
   "That was a big deal for us. When we were little kids, we read that comic book and got all into the characters. It turned out that he's [co-creator Jaime Hernandez] a fan of our music, and he wanted to do this cover ['Tear Your World Apart'] for us. Every time I look at it, I'm blown away! It looks just like one of his comics — except it's us!"

Turning Japanese...
   "We went to Japan right before Hunger came out, and we did really well over there. We doubled in popularity! The women over there are really stoic. They'll have you sign all their records, but they don't go gaga. They don't play up being girlies. They're really respectable people. They don't make asses out of themselves like a lot of Americans do."

Cartoon panel from the Tales From Estrus Vol. 3 sampler

featuring the Makers, the Drags, Impalas, and Lord High Fixers.

The high cost of nonstop destruction...
   "We went to Europe after our first album. It wasn't as satisfying as playing in Japan, where everyone knew our songs and our history. In Europe, people came out of curiosity. They weren't real fans of our music. And I don't think we won too many people over. To tell you the truth, I don't think they'll have us back. Sometimes we talk about Europe, and we just look at each other and go, 'What the fuck were we thinking?'
   "At one point, we were playing on a dock... This was in the winter, it was freezing outside, and the dock was twenty feet above the water. Donnie took this rockabilly idiot, put him in a shopping cart, and threw him in the water. We almost started this huge Mods vs. Rockers battle! We went haywire at this one club and destroyed everything. The next day we found out it was actually an art museum. We destroyed it all! We didn't sleep a second on that tour; it was nonstop destruction! We actually ended up owing thousands of dollars. When we got back home, we got an invoice. That was the height of our fucked-upness."

The Makers - Hunger (Estrus 1997)

The writing process...
   "I write all the time. Something just pops in my head... I have a stack of napkins under my bed that I've written songs on. I've got tons of shit just lying around. When we go into the studio, I have a big folder full of paper flying everywhere, everyone's picking them up."

No time for overdubs...
   "We just went in and cranked Hunger out. Then we mixed it the next day. And that's it. We don't want to do it like that all the time, but it costs a lot of money — you pay by the hour. A lot of times, I wish I could've had a second take so I could've said something differently or changed it completely. Sometimes I wonder, 'What the hell was I thinking?' And every time I hear it, it makes me cringe.
   "Not so much with Hunger, but all of our other albums — I just can't listen to them anymore because we did them so much quicker. And sometimes we're so fucking drunk we don't even know what's going on. I would just improvise the lyrics! It's fun at the time, and it makes for good stories. But when you're the person who made the record, you just can't listen to it, y'know."

No offense to engineers and dishwashers...
   "I write about personal stuff that I think most people can relate to if they're anywhere near like us. We get letters from people that say it means a lot to them. To say something in a song that's going to move somebody — you can't talk about bullshit that doesn't exist or stuff that's degrading. I just take it more seriously than that. I don't always think we make good music, but if we were making shitty music like that, I would never do it. Going on tour is pretty hard. If you don't think you're doing something important, it's a waste of time. You may as well go and get some shitty job as some fucking engineer. Unless you put something into it that is personal, or tough, or aggressive — it's just a waste of time. You may as well be washing dishes somewhere."

Estrus Records "coughs up a few tasteless treats for yer

rabid holiday appetites," including the Makers' LP.

Behind the lyrics on Hunger...
"Tear Apart"
   "It's about people who can't escape from relationships, who can't tear themselves away because they have all these memories. But there's memories to be made everywhere. Basically... tear apart from your childhood and fucking grow up!"

"Razor Blade"
   "That's like one of those moments, like at three in the morning, when you feel like complete shit. I'm not talking about actually using a razor blade to kill yourself. To me, razor blades are symbolic of suicide. It's painful, slow, and messy. You hack away at yourself and wait to die. But I like the word. It sounds threatening; it sounds powerful.
   "I was thinking about those times when you feel like, 'What am I doing? I'd rather be dead than be here.' It has a lot to do with other people too. Like, why are people I despise so happy? Why do they love this world so much? But people like me and my friends have to struggle. Why are we at odds with everything?"

"No Count"
   "It's just one of those self-loathing songs, y'know. You gotta throw in a few of those."

"Worlds Apart"
   "That's about people who get involved with other people out of convenience — their next-door neighbor, their boyfriend from high school. And they don't realize that even though they're living in the exact same world, they're complete strangers; they have nothing in common. You're not gonna find somebody just like you just because they're right there. The people closest to you, the people you see every day at work or school, are actually worlds apart from you."

Michael Maker
Photo: Devorah Ostrov

"Temper Tantrum"
   "Well, I've got this really bad temper... First, Donny came up with the music, and I thought it was like having a temper tantrum. It's got a nonstop beat to it! The whole song, I'm bitching and whining, and then right at the end I do what I have to do every day — pull myself back and say, 'temper, temper.' 

   "You can't freak out all the time. I've spent enough years freaking out, getting onstage and smashing everything, making an ass out of myself having temper tantrums."

"Hard Times"
   "It's just a big whining song. I'm a big whiner! Just A Bunch Of Whining And Bitching, that's the title of our next album."

"Live or Die"
   "That's about somebody who always wants you there. They don't necessarily need you; it just means a lot that you're there. Like I say in the song: 'She doesn't care if I live or die/As long as I do it by her side.' It's a pretty stupid song."

"Crash Ride"
   "It's about Tim, our last guitar player. A 'crash ride' is a cymbal. You ride on it, then you whack it and it makes a crash sound. It's my favorite thing on a drum kit! And I thought the two words together sounded quite profound.
   "Tim looked at the band in a different way. He wasn't expressing himself or having fun. He was just driving himself into the ground and fucked himself up completely; he couldn't handle it. I thought the words 'crash ride' pretty much summed him up. There's some harsh stuff in the song. I say: 'You're a waste/You're a victim of your mother's bad taste...' He understands that he was fucked up. At the time I wrote that song, I was really upset. We just totally lost him. He decided that getting loaded was more important than sticking it out with his friends. That's an insult. If he can insult me like that on a grand scale, I'm gonna insult him on our record. He was my best friend, y'know."

Michael Maker
Photo: Devorah Ostrov

"Fair Game"
   "That's such a kick-ass fucking song! Everybody is fair game. Especially if they don't do shit, if they're the fucker who sits around — 'like whatever' — they've got no response, no reaction, no input. Those people are always fair game to me for anything."

"Why Can't I Live Forever"
   "What I say in the song: 'Why can't I live forever/This life of stormy weather...' It's kind of tongue-in-cheek, and again, it's about people. I've got to an age in life where people start dying. I guess everyone gets to that age. All of a sudden, people start dying from car accidents, killing themselves... And all of a sudden, you realize everyone you thought you were going to see for the rest of your life is probably not going to make it — and you're lucky if you do.
   "For some reason, I feel like everyone is croaking, but somehow I keep going on. And I probably live a more dangerous existence than any of them! Why me? I don't necessarily consider myself worthy of this long a life, anyway.
   "But there's a lot of different meanings to that song. At the time I was writing it, it seemed real personal to me. I also say: 'Why can't I live forever/This life of tar and feathers...' because it seems like I'm humiliated a lot financially and personally."

To sum up...
   "Songs are like these moments you have, these thoughts, captured moments. My lyrics are all pretty basic and embarrassing. But at the same time, I understand that they're little moments I captured, little annoyances — and every once in a while, something I think is beautiful. So, they're not necessarily that important, except to me. But I think the album turned out really well."