Gerald Casale (vocals, bass, keyboards): I was a member of the student organization that organized the protest against the extension of the Vietnam War in Cambodia. I knew two of the four students, Jeffrey Miller and Allison Cruz, who were shot and killed by the National Guard. We saw it happen and we saw the Kent newspaper say “Students kill guards”! We realized that everything they had told us was a big lie. We already made music, but when you see something like that it changes you forever. When I saw Devo at Knebworth in 1978 supporting Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers, Jefferson Starship and Genesis, the docile, stoned hippies suddenly became furious and fired missiles at the scene. Have you encountered hostility on such a scale since? bhunabhoy Mark Mothersbaugh (vocals, keyboards, guitar): We only played in small clubs before, so we didn’t even have a crew. We set up our equipment wearing blue work equipment, ran to wear the yellow costumes of the stage to play and then changed the blue uniforms again to download the equipment. The band before us finished its set by waving a giant Confederate flag, which was adored by the crowd. Then we came. Casale: The difference between the UK and US electricity cycles meant that our effects units made these horrible flicker sounds. People started throwing things, but because the stage was so high, we missed it and hit other people in front. The crowd began to quarrel with each other. We have to watch a demo of De-Evolution [the band’s idea that mankind is de-evolving] where it resembled the Planet of the Apes. We have faced this scale of hostility since then and we are trying to bend it to our advantage. Your appearance on Saturday Night Live in 1978 [performing a radical deconstruction of the Rolling Stones’ Satisfaction] is permanently etched in the minds of almost everyone in America aged 15 to 30 at the time. Can you describe how your life changed in the coming weeks? JSpicoli Mothersbaugh: In Ohio, no one would hire us because they just wanted bands to play the Top 40 hits. Often after our first set we get paid to give them up! So we had a lot of time to work on our aesthetics, with the yellow hazmat suits. Casale: We came to TV fully configured. During the night we arrived from a tiny club complex to blow up on the national stage. When Ronald Reagan was elected [in 1980], you commented: “America is turning to a bad B movie actor to solve all its problems – this is even more Devo than we could have predicted!” How many more Devo do you think we have become since then? Was everything in decline? JPH1964 Casale: Of course. We now see the elimination of the truth, which clearly serves the oligarchs, billionaires and authoritarian right-wingers who want to pull the strings of power, because the population is confused and numb and ready to do whatever it tells them. It is very Orwellian. In your classic 1979 album Duty Now for the Future you claim that “the future will be maintenance-free”. Are you disappointed with how it worked? judge Casale: This is a line from Clockout, a song about toxic masculinity. The idea was that in the future women would no longer need men because they would have too many sex toys… and, well, that’s somewhat true [laughter]. As is well known, siblings in bands can be hesitant with each other. How does it work when there are two groups of brothers? HenleyRegatta Casale: This was Mark and Bob 1 [Mothersbaugh] and me and Bob 2 [Casale]. It functioned as a nuclear exchange rate. Will your recordings with David Bowie ever see the light of day? BluesBuddah Casale: Bowie is supposed to be the production of Q: Are We Not Men? A: We are Devo !, but he had a complicated program, so he closed it to Brian Eno. But then Bowie appeared in the studio [in Cologne]. Mothersbaugh: While we were making the equipment, people were moving around. [Dieter] Moebius and [Hans-Joachim] Roedelius, Holger Czukay. We all ended up jamming with Bowie and Eno, which was recorded on a two-track cassette. Everything lights up at some point, so they will probably come out. Club kids De Devo plays at Max’s Kansas City in New York, 1977. Photo: Allan Tannenbaum / Getty Images There seemed to be tension between you and Eno during the production of your first LP, reducing its influence. Would you consider asking Eno to remix the tapes now to present his vision for the album? David1 Motherbaugh: Brian was great to work with because he let us do what we wanted. I mean, Eno and Bowie came back at night and added things to our songs, like Tibetan monkey songs, some of which we used but mostly didn’t. But he never imposed it on us. Casale: The “intensity” has become occult. It was not real tension. Brian was in the Zen era, and we were from Akron, Ohio, immersed in industrial brutality. We did not want our songs to be as beautiful as his, but we were never in conflict. We loved him. We’d love to hear him remix these songs now. It would be funny at this point. Is it true that you wrote a song using a washing machine as a rhythm part? CanMeckie Casale: I played guitar on my mother’s machine – it had such a kerchunk-kerchunk rhythm. Mothersbaugh: Before drum machines we used to write songs sitting in the car to the beat of the windshield wipers. Our first drummer, Jim Mothersbaugh, was a circuit breaker and invented the forerunner of electronic drums. How did Neil Young’s collaboration come about? Fruit covered nails Mothersbaugh: Actor Dean Stockwell hired me to write him a play outside of Broadway – Dean had made films about Neil and introduced him to Devo. Casale: Neil had our own production single. We met, Neil loved us and asked us to be in the Human Highway movie. We played together Hey Hey, My My. Mothersbaugh: Neil told us we sell merchandise! He said: “Merch is not nice. It’s not part of rock’n’roll. ” [Laughter] What’s the story of Johnny Rotten entering Devo? 1234 Ramones Mothersbaugh: In the winter of 1978, we slept on sofas at a friend’s house. In Bob Casale’s room the windows were open and in the morning he was covered in a foot of snow. [Virgin Records boss] Richard Branson called and asked if we wanted to be in Jamaica together. Bob and I went to this hotel, where there was a pile of very strong marijuana. Richard waited until we were stoned and told us that Johnny Rotten was in the next room and wanted to be the singer in Devo. I could not stop laughing and told him it was the most absurd sentence I had ever heard. Later, Richard almost killed us. He took us to eat in the mountains and then he drove so fast the jeep slipped off the road and got stuck in a tree. We were in the back seat, Bob had landed on top of me and, as I looked down, it was a 100 meter drop. Richard started laughing like crazy nini. Are you still playing Mongoloid? MagnusPym How do you feel about Mongoloid now? Bertsas Casale: Mongoloid is a politically incorrect term, but the song attacked people who used it to underestimate other people. But I do not think I would probably write this song now. Mothersbaugh: We’re still playing it. It’s one of our main songs, but in those days we were completely uncensored. In defense of the song, we received dozens of letters from parents of children with Down Syndrome saying, “My child is so happy that there is a song for them and they like the song.” Uniform appearance… Gerald Casale, left, and Mark Mothersbaugh in 2011, 38 years after the creation of Devo in 1973. Photo: John Shearer / Getty Images Have you seen the British tribute band We Are Not Devo? How do you feel about such bands making your music? Wearedevo Mothersbaugh: I listen to these bands and sometimes I think, ‘Oh, we should have done that.’ We went to a Polysics show in Tokyo – they make their own music and some tributes – and the kids made the gestures and gestures we wanted in our shows. We played easy, organic loungecore versions of our songs before we went on stage – parodying ourselves, but people loved it. Warners refused to turn it off, so we released it ourselves and sold thousands. Mark said that while he was Covid-19 he had hallucinations and was imagining a new project for Devo. Will we hear new material? Agustina_argentina Mothersbaugh: When I was taken to the intensive care unit, I was hit in the eye. I pulled the tube out of my throat and a guy holding me said, “Sit him down!” The next thing I knew was that I had these crazy dreams of playing in these five-story inflatable objects, with people watching us from below. It was a very good show! So much new material αι yes, of course. I feel like we are halfway to Devo. We have another 50 years. Devo were nominated for this year’s Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. Admissions will be announced in May.
