"In Santa Barbara the whole attitude is completely different. There's a lot of college kids that are playing music for fun that are hoping 'God, I hope I can do something with my music, but I'd better go to college just to back myself up.'"
Lahr, himself a graduate of the University of California at Santa Barbara, recognizes the difficulty of attaining success in the heavy metal world today.
"There's a lot of great bands making great records," Lahr comments. "We're competing with Nirvana, Metallica and Guns N' Roses. We can't sell ourselves short and play half-ass on the album. It's a good push on us to do well."
The intense competition among bands and relatively poor prospects for real success influenced Ugly Kid Joe's decision to first release a six-song EP.
"Instead of spending hundreds of thousands of dollars and throwing a full-blown album out into a market that right now is really hurting," Eichstadt explains, "we thought we'd just get our name in people's heads so that when we do the album, we'll already have a fan base that will buy the record and tell their friends."
The real hallmark of the EP is the band's unique perspective and humorous outlook on life and the music industry.
"Madman," another Eichstadt creation and the next single to be released from the EP, tells of a tragic massacre in the perfect world of Disneyland.
As Ugly as They Wanna Be also features a driving cover of Black Sabbath's "Sweet Leaf" medleyed with "Funky Fresh County Club," Whitfield Crane's personal tale of jailhouse woes.
"Whiplash Liquor" celebrates the wild, weekend parties of high school. In this ode to "rock n'roll in the cul-de-sac," Ugly Kid Joe also offers a light hearted explanation of just who they really are: "Suburban white alcoholic trash/We ain't glam and we ain't thrash/We're victims of a society/That fucks with me about sobriety."
Clever and amusing as these lyrics may be, Ugly Kid Joe should stop underestimating themselves. These five friendly and engaging musicians have a lot offer the music world. Even now, the band needs and deserves a bigger arena than clubs such as T.T.'s can offer.
Past tours with such established L.A. metal groups as Lynch Mob and Kik Tracee enabled them to steadily build their reputation in California, but now the band is gaining national acclaim.
"Everything About You" has made their name and faces known to listeners of college and album-oriented rock stations as well as the all-powerful MTV viewers.
"Not saying we're successful, but things are going well," comments Eichstadt. "We're out on a bus touring and we're a real band now. We even have our own [guitar] picks and stuff with our name on it!"
Ugly Kid Joe has an unforgettable name and unmistakeable style. Once the band members themselves realize that they have the potential to be much more than just "suburban white alcoholic trash," they will undoubtedly gain success as headliners and a well-deserved place in the metal pantheon of the Nineties.