Alien Ant Farm - Mike Cosgrove

By: Alex Lang

I can remember sitting in my room days after school got out in 2001. I was talking to my brother and watching MTV, and a new video came on. It was a cover of Michael Jackson’s “Smooth Criminal” by Alien Ant Farm.

I was hooked.

After the video ended, I grabbed my keys and headed to the record store to buy the Alien Ant Farm album.

Four years after “Smooth Criminal” Alien Ant Farm is set to release its third album, “Up In the Attic” July 18; however, the band hit several road bumps on the way.

In 2002 the band was involved in a bus accident in Spain. All members of the band were injured, but none worse than lead singer Dryden Mitchell. Mitchell fractured his C2 vertebra, the same injury Christopher Reeve suffered. However, Mitchell was able to recover, but has to live with the numbing pain. In 2003 the group released its second album “TrueAnt,” but the album failed to live up to expectations.

Then the group was dropped from its record company, Geffen and picked up by New Door/Universal. If that wasn’t enough, guitarist Terry Corso quit the band, citing “irreconcilable differences,” and Joe Hill was named the new guitarist.

But, after a lot of hardship, the band has come out stronger and is set for its third album and release of a music DVD July 18. Alien Ant Farm drummer Mike Cosgrove talks about the band’s past, new album and future.

AL) You guys got an album coming out July 18, how excited are you for that?
MG) Actually, really excited. It’s been a long time coming. We’ve had this record done for about a year. And coming from DreamWorks to Geffen … and getting dropped by Geffen and picked up from Universal, it’s been a long time coming and I couldn’t be more pleased.

AL) What was it like getting dropped by Geffen?
MG) Geffen was basically scaling down, just like the rest of the companies that weren’t making money and they were firing a bunch of people. It was kind of the politics and stuff and we got fired and I think that in our situation, coming from the bus wreck and not really having a successful second record and being away for a while, there wasn’t a whole lot of heat behind us and they naturally let us go. But, the one thing was, they weren’t letting us take the record, so Bob at Universal phoned Geffen and somehow it worked out and Geffen let them take the record.

AL) What are you hoping the listener gets out of the new album?
MG) I would hope some songs would creep up on you while you’re making your bed. I want them to go ‘Damn, I want to go hear that one song.’ We tried to make it a flowing record.

AL) What’s the difference between “Up in The Attic” and the previous two record releases?
MG) I think “Up In the Attic,” the song writing and lyric writing is a little bit wiser, a little bit more mature, maybe a little bit more focused. I think before, Dryden’s songs had cool lyrics, but I think as you get older and go through real life experiences, you have something to write about. Now that we’ve had some stuff, the songs are coming from a deeper place, a truer place. That said, we were trying not to cash in on the fact we were in a bus accident.

AL) Can you talk about the decision to put an acoustic song on the album?
MG) That was one of the tunes Dryden brought in and it was also the first song written on the record. I think it has a personal meaning to Dryden. Our guitar player had left and stuff; there were some personal issues that happen, taboo lines you just don’t cross. The song kind of involves that, so it has a lot of meaning. I think it’s cool how Dryden related your body to a house. And acoustic wise, it’s just fun for me; I love playing a lot of Latin stuff, those different rhythm instruments.
It’s weird because we’re known as this “jokey” band, but Dryden has a lot of really cool stuff that is personal and I think that song shows a piece of him.

AL) You mentioned your guitar player left the band. Can you talk about what’s different on this album with Joe Hill as a guitarist?
MG) All of our flavors and stuff are still there. The other cool thing is Joe and Terry were in their first band together way, way young. Joe comes from the same pool and same area we do, so he fits right in. I used to write Joe’s old band fan letters.
Having Joe come in is a lot easier to work with; he has an easier style. They are a little bit different; Joe is a little bit jazzier.

AL) On the same day the new album comes out you guys are releasing a DVD. How excited are you for that?
MG) The DVD is kind of fun. I had a big hand in making that. It was just a lot of fun. There is a documentary that is an hour that goes over the very beginning, just us behind the scenes, recording, sitting around, us goofing off and being stupid. There is a lot of Dryden running around and jumping on people’s bunks naked. It’s pretty funny and like “Jackass” stuff; I know everyone wants to say it’s “Jackass,” but it’s just us [screwing around] with each other. Then there is a show in Germany and one in Colorado. Its good footage, we’re happy with it. Then also there are all the videos we made and the new ones we made on the DVD. I’m not saying it’s cool because it’s us, but it’s pretty funny.

AL) Do you have a crazy story on the road you want to share?
MG) I can’t even narrow it down to one. The band goes on other people’s buses, while we’re at gas stations. It’s funny; you just have to go get the DVD. There’s Dryden giving everybody a “naked hug.”

AL) One crazy thing you guys did was “crash” the red carpet of the BET Music Awards to film your “These Days” video. Was there any talk of doing a collaboration with people who made cameos in the video? Or are there any other collaborations in the works?
MG) Proof from D12 was really cool, like a friend. He was supportive of the band when we came to Detroit, so hospitable and always there. That was one of the people we talked about collaborating with. [Editor’s note: Proof was shot and killed in a Detroit nightclub April 11.] We had some of the people call us from D12. That is as far as we got with the hip-hop stuff. We came close to doing some stuff with Xzibit. He was really cool. We want to do it, but we haven’t been around to.

AL) Is it something you guys would like to do in the future?
MG) I’m down. I love hip-hop and the energy. We played the Michael Jackson stuff, so we’re not scared of grooving, booty-shaking music. If we could collaborate with anybody like that, we would definitely be interested. It’s fun.

AL) How do you guys stay in contact with the fans?
MG) We have a Web site alienantfarm.tk, a fan-driven site. There are free downloads and video. There are B-sides. They are not the best quality, but they’re good. Also, we have a MySpace page. We run it, we take care of it. We answer as much mail as we can. If people want to get in touch with us, we do correspond. A lot of people are surprised, when they say ‘hey,’ we answer. I just want them to know we respond.

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