Tapped out

Kirk Baird

Friday, June 8, 2001 | 8:43 a.m.

In the annals of rock 'n' roll lore few bands have out-rocked and/or rolled Spinal Tap.

Known as "one of England's loudest bands," over Spinal Tap's nearly 40-year career the hard-rock group has endured, in no particular order: nearly 40 personnel changes including the deaths of nearly every band drummer; a split-up, followed by a reunion, followed by a hiatus; several name changes (first as the Originals, then the New Originals, later as the Thamesmen and finally as Spinal Tap); an unflattering film documentary about the group; and a diminishing fanbase that, while loyal, is becoming increasingly hard of hearing.

With all this history is Spinal Tap the archetype for rock bands?

"I wouldn't say we're an archetype; we've never designed a single building," said Spinal Tap bassist Derek Smalls recently from the group's tour bus on a Los Angeles freeway.

But do other hard rock groups look to Tap, scheduled to perform tonight at Mandalay Bay's House of Blues, as a source of inspiration?

"In the sense that we've been ripped off on frequent occasions, yeah," Smalls said. "If you look at the average sound level of bands then and after ... you'll just have to do the math to get that.

"Our influence is felt in many ways some of it under our own name, some of it under the names of people you recognize."

Such as?

"I don't like to point fingers," he said. "Actually, there's no point of my body I like to point."

But it is worth pointing out the prodigious career of Spinal Tap. Adopting a more-is-less philosophy since forming in 1964, the band has released 17 albums including 15 in a 16-year span.

Although none of the records have gone gold, much less platinum, the band's 1974 "Intravenous de Milo" did attain "bronze" status meaning 1 million copies were returned. Of course, when only two albums from the entire catalogue are available in CD format, that tends to hurt sales.

"It turns out that a lot of the old analog tapes don't really translate very well to digital form," Smalls said. "Actually the tape is so old at this point it refuses to go through the little wheel, so they can't even get it to play. It's a bit of a struggle at this point. You can't get digital information off an analog tape, it turns out ... It's a technical puzzle.

"The music, if it did come out, I think would be even more well received, if possible -- and of course it is -- than it was then."

It's a Smalls world

It's been a while since Spinal Tap (for the record, the band dislikes being referred to simply as "Tap") has played together -- 1992, to be precise, not counting the odd commercial appearance or television special.

During the haitus, Smalls said he's been busy.

He served as the official spokesman for a Belgium snack food called Floop. ("It's 'flip,' only with two Os instead of the I. P as in Peter. L as in L. O as in oh-oh and O as in the same thing as the previous one.")

"It's some kind of snack that no one else in the civilized world would consider delectable, but the Belgiums and the Flemish find utterly irresistible," he said. "So, I'm the man for Floop."

Smalls also worked for the British Broadcasting Corp., coining the short radio station jingle, "Radio Five," and worked briefly as a California crossing guard, thus fulfilling his childhood dream of working with children.

He even took up falconry -- "the use and abuse of falcons" -- and is working to teach his falcons to speak. Critics be damned.

"People will tell you it can't be done," Smalls said of getting his falcons to talk. "But people use to say you can't climb Mount Everest, too. And where are they now? They aren't at the top of Mount Everest, that's where they are."

While his stubbornness in the face of criticism may seem illogical, in many ways it mirrors that of the band's. Never the critics' favorite, what the band hasn't earned in media accolades it's made up for in tenacity, perseverance and stick-to-itiveness.

No more is that evident than in the classic 1984 "rockumentary" of the band, "This is Spinal Tap."

A behind-the-scenes look at Spinal Tap's brief 1982 U.S. tour and everything that went wrong -- including backstage squabbles and tantrums, technical difficulties with onstage props and second billing to an amusement-park puppet show -- the band soldiered on through its concerts' increasingly dwindling attendance and the loss, then return of its now-deceased manager, Ian Faith.

Ironically, while music critics had ignored or verbally pummeled the band, film critics hailed "This is Spinal Tap" as one of the year's best comedies. Newsweek called it, "The funniest movie ever made about rock and roll!" And the American Film Institute last year named it No. 29 on its 100 Funniest Movies list.

There's only one problem: "This is Spinal Tap" wasn't meant to be a comedy.

"We were a laughingstock," a still bitter Smalls said. "That was (film director) Marty's (DiBergi) tribute to us."

Referring to "This is Spinal Tap" as a "hatchet-job of a movie," Smalls refused to even credit DiBergi for increasing awareness of the band that, prior to the film, few people knew even existed.

"Hitler made Germany more famous, didn't he? (He) got Germany on every front page for years, but you wouldn't say he was a good bloke, would you?" he said.

Ultimately, though, the band had the last laugh.

In the recently re-released DVD version of the film, the three permanent members of Spinal Tap -- including Smalls, lead singer and guitarist David St. Hubbins and lead guitarist and singer Nigel Tufnel -- provided a commentary track to the movie as a way to set the record straight.

The trio were particularly ruthless when it came to DiBergi, questioning his name and heritage, skills as a filmmaker and even the authenticity of his beard.

"We were ruthless to him? What about him to us?" Smalls asked rhetorically, his voice rising with irritation. "You don't think he was ruthless to us? It was ruthless in kind. It was ruthless is as ruthless (does) to have been ruthless to -- don't you think?"

Even those who attend Spinal Tap concerts to be "part of a joke" are not escaping the wrath of Tap.

"One of the things we tried to do when we tour is to say, 'Well, laugh at this. Is it loud enough for you? Are you still laughing?' We find the best antidote for laughing is pain. So, we just turned it up," Smalls said.

Tap marches on

Despite the ill will the band retains for DiBergi and the film, Smalls admits the re-release of "This is Spinal Tap" -- including a limited theatrical run last year -- helped the band get back together ... sort of.

He's quick to point out the band "never really split up" after its most recent album, 1992's "Break Like the Wind."

"It's just that the taste and demand for our services has slackened a bit -- seasonally adjusted slackening -- and so we decided to go our separate ways and wait for the return of the momentum," Smalls said.

"The momentum did return when the film studio relaunched this hatchet-job of a movie about us, which, ironically, has the function of bringing us back together (under), if not the spotlight, at least one of the little sidelights.

"So we said, 'This will be a good time to exploit ourselves one more time.' And that was really the impetus and inertia for coming back together again. It was really more an exercise in inertia than anything else."

That present state of inertia is pushing Spinal Tap to hit the road for a brief 15-city U.S. tour through July. The plan is for the band to take another break before performing again in October during the New Orleans Voodoo Fest.

"We call it a Tourus Interruptus," Smalls said.

After that it's anyone's guess what Spinal Tap will do.

There's talk of the band recording a new album. "With this Internet thing we might end up self-releasing. And then we might self-buy."

The notion of turning the concept song "Stonehenge" into a Broadway musical, a la the Who's "Tommy," is tempting. But Smalls said potential legal entanglements with various Druid coalitions would probably negate that project. "Who needs to be in a court of law facing an array of Druid barristers?"

The band's musical ode to Jack the Ripper, "Saucy Jack," remains a "work in progress, of which there's more work than progress."

And the idea of doing another film -- to really get it right -- has been ruled out. "That's like asking Marie Antoinette would you like another guillotine in the near future."

So at the moment Spinal Tap is completely focused on its upcoming shows.

"It's pure Tap. It's a back-to-the-music kind of thing," Smalls said. "In '92 we had so much stagecraft ... I think it dazzled people. It made them say, 'Oh, were you guys there, too?' So, this time the focus is definitely on us. We're standing there primp naked, except for our clothing, and just bashing out loud Spinal Tap music the ol'-fashioned way: one note at a time."

It was while discussing the back-to-the-basics Spinal Tap, he said, that he wanted to set the record straight on a rumor that has plagued the band since the '70s: The stories of backward masking by the group, whereby hidden positive messages such as "eat your vegetables" and "no swimming for an hour after eating," were inserted into the band's songs.

"It's a rural legend. We didn't start (the rumors), it was done to us by somebody at one of our record companies," Smalls said. "We did a lawsuit and it was thrown out of court because the court said, 'What's the damage in positive messages?' We said, 'Well, it harms our reputation.' And the judge said in his ruling he found it hard to believe we had a reputation."

The judge, obviously, didn't know his rock 'n' roll.

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