Lawrence.com

When you were Nirvana's single biggest influence and you've recorded "Smells Like Teen Spirit" with Leif Garrett, what's left? Nothing, according to Buzz "King Buzzo" Osborne of Melvins, whose approach to his career is as low-key as his music.

Ever since forming in Aberdeen, Wash., in 1985, Melvins carved out a niche in the indie rock scene and stayed put, rejecting various trendy bandwagons and practically daring music fans to stay away. Heavily hyped during the "grunge" phenomenon of the early '90s (Aberdeen was also home to Nirvana's Kurt Cobain and Chris Novoselic and Mudhoney's Matt Lukin, Melvins' original bassist), Melvins have steadfastedly stuck by their musical guns, refusing to buy into the notion that they are anything other than a hardworking ensemble from the Northwest. Proud of their metallic roots, too. The group once issued separate solo records aping the approach Kiss took in the late '70s. Decked out as Gene, Paul and Peter, Buzzo and his bandmates replicated the Kiss solo albums right down to the airbrushing and blood spewing. Kiss later repaid Melvins by inviting the trio to open a recent reunion tour.

Though the act was signed to Atlantic Records for a time (and unceremoniously dropped a few years later), it has never swayed from the sludgy path of its indie roots, still touring most of the year and releasing numerous albums. In 1999 alone, Melvins (vocalist/guitarist Buzz Osborne, drummer Dale Crover and bassist Kevin Rutmanis) issued no less than three full-length CDs, coming back the next year with more musical offerings. This year, the band has already recorded and released two new records ? "Colossus of Destiny" and "Electroretard" ? that underscore the diversity and prolific nature of underground rock's loudest band.

Between Melvins' records, Buzzo has managed to keep busy with a host of side projects, most notably Phantomas (Osborne, former Faith No More frontman Mike Patton, Slayer's Dave Lombardo and Mr. Bungle's Trevor Dunn), which will release an album of movie theme songs later this year.

Buzzo phones on a recent afternoon to talk with The Mag about popular music, Kurt Cobain and all things Melvin.

Q: Were Melvins disappointed by getting dropped from Atlantic?

A: "Not at all. They decided they didn't want to do records with us anymore because we weren't selling millions of records ? which was no surprise to any of us. Quite frankly, I was surprised they wanted to do records with us for as long as they did. I don't know what they were thinking. Strange. Obviously, they're idiots, but we came out of it better off than when we went into it. We had no problem with it. It was fun. I'd do it again for the money."

Q: What do you think of the current state of popular music?

A: "The current state of popular music is not a whole lot different than the state of popular music's ever been. There's always been crap bands dominating the charts, almost exclusively ... The music labels are doing really well. They're selling millions and millions and millions of stupid, stupid bands ... I make a modest living doing what I'm doing and I work very hard at it, but I'm able to go out and play my music. I'm very fortunate. It's a privilege and an honor to make a living playing the kind of music I play. I've worked on this thing for the majority of my life, almost half my life. This is my baby. People can say whatever they want, but we're the real deal. People may not like us on certain nights, or may not like our music, but it doesn't get a whole lot more real than what we're doing."

Q: Do the criticisms of the band phase you?

A: "People have hated every single record we've ever done and people have said that every single record we've ever done is total genius. So I've learned to expect it. I lay my ass on the line and I don't care if everybody likes it or not. A lot of times, I'll read a negative review. Then you scan through and look at what the same person does like, and it becomes fairly obvious to me that they don't like our band. I've run into people at magazines who told me, 'The editor of the magazine does not want me to write a good review of this record.' We don't have any radio airplay or MTV, and I can go out and play to hundreds of people every single night who buy our records. The world is a right place. The general public, the numbers of people that make platinum artists, will never like our band. We're too weird for the general public to accept. I know this. No one knows this more than me. I'm not living out some weird fantasy that I'll someday be Kurt Cobain, that's absurd. It's never going to happen because people don't have the brains for that kind of thing. The 270 million people that live in this country? Almost every single one of them would hate our band."

Q: When Melvins released the "Kiss" albums, was the decision to leave out Ace intentional?

A: "Yeah, we always like the Ace album the best so we thought we'd leave that one alone. But those guys ? as weird as they are and as strange as their existence is ? they're very nice guys and very aware of what's going on. Gene and Paul both said to me, 'We think that kind of stuff is really great because it keeps our thing going. We don't feel like it's a threat at all, we're flattered.' If you had told me, when I was 13, that someday I'd be playing in a band with Kiss on their reunion tour with full makeup, and then have Gene Simmons telling me those things, I never would've believed it. Gene came onstage with us and played 'Going Blind' when we opened for Primus in L.A. It just gets weirder and weirder. Figure that out. When I was sitting on the (1979 Kiss) Dynasty tour watching that concert, do you think I had any idea that that stuff would happen? It's amazing! It's great! I surpassed my expectations about what would happen to me ? bandwise ? within about the first six months of the band. When I first started it was like, 'Wouldn't it be great to play on a stage? Wouldn't it be great to play a show?'"

Q: Do you think the whole "Aberdeen" thing was hype?

A: "No, I think it's true. I think it's very strange, don't you? The fact that me, Kurt (Cobain), Matt (Lukin of Mudhoney), Dale Crover and Chris Novoselic (of Nirvana) are all from that area is very strange. There are lots of musicians there that are pretty stupid. We were the only ones to take advantage of something that was better than the norm. It wasn't that hard to do. You just have to figure it out and take it from there. Those guys (Nirvana) were a much more commercial-sounding band than we are, or ever were. It's no big surprise to me that they got very famous. But the whole phenomenon is what it is."

Q: Were you affected by Kurt Cobain's suicide?

A: "I grew up with Kurt since the time we were about 10 or 11 years old, so I knew him really well. I knew him long before he ever had any ideas that he was ever going to play music. So it was a tragedy. But I'm never surprised. When people are doing drugs of that nature, I'm never surprised when things like this happen to them. As for the suicide and all that stuff, I have varying opinions. It's a touchy situation that a lot of people refuse to look at."

Q: So you think Courtney Love murdered Kurt Cobain or had him killed?

A: "Who else would it be? It doesn't matter, there's nothing I can do. Even if I think that, no one is going to believe me anyway. I'd be the one that would be considered an idiot, so it's just better to leave it at that. People can go out and gather the evidence and look at it and judge for themselves. If after looking at all that, they decide that she's completely innocent, so be it."