The guiatrist of this great band talks about their first ever DVD release...and more

The band has just released ‘Live Love in London’, a 2CD/DVD package featuring some of the greatest hits from the past 30 years. This incredible release features two hours of the KING’S X’s greatest hits live!

‘Live Love in London’ is the first-ever official KING’S X live DVD and it was recorded in January 2009 at the Electric Ballroom in London.

A good reason to talk to KING'S X guiatrist - TY TABOR.

An interview conducted by Vassil Varbanov

MR. TABOR, GOOD EVENING, HOW ARE YOU?
Great, great, doing great!

IT'S BEEN TWO YEARS SINCE YOUR LAST INTERVIEW ON THIS PARTICULAR RADIO AND IT WAS REGARDING THIS SOLO ALBUM OF YOURS, BUT THIS TIME WE ARE TALKING ABOUT THIS AMAZING DVD RELEASE OF KING'S X.

SO, HOW DOES IT FEEL TO HAVE IT RELEASED?
It feels great because we've wanted to do something like this for a very long time. I mean, we've been together as a band over 30 years - we got together in the 1980s - and it took us 7 years to get a record deal and that's a lot of years since then, you know, 23 years.

And during that time, almost the entire time we've been dying to put out a DVD, or put out a video, or whatever, you know, what's the format of the decade that we happen to be in. So to finally put one out it's a great release, because we finally can rest and know that we did it before we were too old to be able to.
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WHAT WAS THE REASON ACTUALLY THAT YOU DIDN'T HAVE AN EARLIER VIDEO RELEASE BECAUSE YOU HAVE OBVIOUSLY BEEN TOURING A LOT, YOU DID HAVE SOME GREAT SHOWS HERE AND THERE, BUT FOR THE FANS OF KING'S X AROUND THE WORLD, INCLUDING MYSELF, THE ONLY THING THAT WE GOT WAS THIS ROCKPALAST GERMAN TV SHOOTING, ALMOST SEMI-BOOTLEG THING, BUT YOU'RE RIGHT, NOTHING HAS BEEN OUT SO FAR. WHAT WAS THE REASON?
The main reason is money, because, believe it or not, it doesn't look like too much money to put something like this together, but it's very expensive. I mean, there is a crew of - I don't know - maybe about 10 guys running seven cameras, doing editing for months.

There is renting a facility and making sure you got this and that for the shoot, and I don't know... It just costs very big budget, and we just have not had big budgets to do albums since the very early 90s really.

Because the industry started to make a very big change around that time and people couldn't be handed out such huge amounts of money for making albums, so we found ourselves not knowing how to put out a video production.

Because everyone we talked to wanted so much money, it was almost the whole album budget, that we just couldn't do it, you know.

TALKING ABOUT YOUR STUDIO AUDIO RECORDINGS, WAS THE DOGMAN ALBUM THE LAST ONE WITH MORE SERIOUS BUDGET?
Hmm, let me think about that... Well, Dogman, that was probably the most serious budget we had ever on an album, and if I remember correctly Ear Candy was next, and on Ear Candy we did have a little less budget, but it was actually pretty good budget, and we actually had a plan of spending money on a video and a few other things around the time we got dropped by Atlantic.

And so from that point on we had to find a new record deal, and at that point we were in that chain of not being able to figure out how to afford promote things, you know.

SO, OF COURSE THE MOST LOGICAL QUESTION IS WHERE DID YOU FIND THE MONEY FOR THIS DVD RELEASE?
Haha, that's probably a better question for the record company, but I think what happened is, we all realized... we came to a point here recently that we were questioning whether we will continue or not, and I remember having a real heart-to heart with Thomas from Inside Out about it.

He came to New York to see us play, and it was a really big show, a great show, it was all exciting, and we were walking the street after the show and I was talking about how ironic it is that we are thinking about not doing this anymore. And basically Thomas was saying at that point "well, we have to make a recording of this in case you guys decide not to do this anymore".

And that's basically what it came down to. I guess that Thomas realized it's now or never and so they just came up with budget for it and made it happen. During that time, by the way, we have had several successful tours, since we've decided to do theВ DVD and things have turned around considerably for us as far as we play and we enjoy what we are doing again.

AND FOR FINANCING THE DVD RELEASE THOMAS SOLD HIS HOUSE?
Ha ha, I have no idea for that. He made it happen.

WELL, IT'S BEEN SAID A LOT, I THINK, BUT NOT ENOUGH OF THE PARADOX THAT YOU GUYS HAVE SUCH A HUGE AND LOYAL FAN BASE THROUGHOUT THE WORLD AND FACING ALL THESE PROBLEMS WITH MONEY - WHICH, I BELIEVE, TO A CERTAIN EXTEND HAD A POSITIVE EFFECT ON YOU NOT TO BE SPOILED BY IT, YOU KNOW WHAT I MEAN - WE'VE SEEN SO MUCH BANDS SPLITTING JUST BECAUSE OF MONEY.

I'M NOT SAYING NOT HAVING MONEY IS GOOD, BUT AT LEAST TRYING TO WATCH THINGS FROM A POSITIVE PERSPECTIVE. BUT FINALLY, PROBABLY BECAUSE THERE ARE NEW GENERATIONS OF KINK'S X FANS - BECAUSE AS YOU SAID, YOU STARTED THE BAND 30 YEARS AGO, 23 YEARS IN THE RECORD BUSINESS THING - AND LAST TIME I GOT THE CHANCE TO SEE YOU LIVE IN BELGIUM, IT WASВ A YEAR AND A HALF AGO, I SAW THAT THERE WERE QUITE AВ LOT OF YOUNG PEOPLE IN THE CROWD. DO YOU HAVE THE SAME FEELING?
Oh, that's most definitely what's happening over here. That's kind of what's making me exited again, because the last tour was huge and there were a lot of younger people who new every word and it's true it's like another generation coming along as fans, and that makes you feel valid, you know, makes you feel like your music is not a token and not just only good for one age.

At least that's what you always hope about your own music and when kids come out there and they are loving it it makes us feel validated and what we're doing is the right thing, it's the real deal.

'Cause we're just trying to make real music and not worry about trends and whatever other crap is going on out there. That's the stuff that we've always loved all our lives and it doesn't get old to us, just the stuff that feels really real.

So when kids come out and love it, it makes us feel like that hopefully that's what we're doing and it feels great.

THE PRESS RELEASE REGARDING THE DVD WAS SAYING THAT YOU ARE ALREADY WORKING ON YOUR NEXT STUDIO RECORD, WHICH IS SUPPOSED TO COME OUT SOMEWHERE AROUND 2011. IS IT RIGHT?
No, we're not actually in the studio working on it, we're all just writing music and stuff. But we are not in a big hurry to get to in the studio, we kind of want to give the DVD a little bit of time and make a little bit more touring to promote the DVD.

But we do most definitely want to do another record. But we are not in a big hurry, there is a lot of stuff going on right now. I'm trying to move actually to another state, Dug just moved out to LA a few months ago and Jerry moved to New Jersey few years ago.

And we're all going to be in totally different areas, well we are in totally different areas right now, but I'm trying to move to another state myself and that's gonna take a little bit of time, so I'm in no hurry to get back in the studio.

We are just going to get on through the rest of this year with a little bit of time off and rest and take care of our personal things and starting out early next year we may get back out down the road a little bit first and then do the album.

WHERE ARE YOU GOING TO MOVE IN, IF IT'S NOT A SECRET?
I try to keep that to myself just to keep the fans who try to follow me around.

WE CAN SEE THAT YOU, TY, YOU ARE KIND OF A HYPER-ACTIVE GUY,. ANDВ DUG LOOKSВ THE SAME, YOU'RE ALWAYS DOING SOME PROJECTS, SOLO RECORDS AND STUFF.

THE QUESTION HERE IS - DO YOU CONSIDER THE TWO OTHER GUYS IN THE BAND, JERRY AND DUG TO BE THE TWO BEST FRIENDS YOU HAVE?
They are almost outside of what I consider "just friends". We are like family, I mean we have grown up together, we've been stuffed on in a vehicle together more countless hours than another human being, if you can imagine what I mean.

We are just family, we are beyond what normal friendship is. When you are in a band and you live together that much and you work together that much and have to be a team, it's a real marriage, it's nothing less than that.

So they are the guys that when I started playing with them, I realized, this is the band I want to be in. And that's the same way they felt and we are veryВ  very lucky to have found each other. Because that is the key and that's the thing that is so hard when you put a band together.

Because a lot of times there are people that are ment to play together and it's so hard to find that, so we are very lucky 'cause we always felt it right away and we stubbornly held on to it our whole lives.

YOU MENTIONED TOURING AND FOR ME ACTUALLY IT WASN'T SURPRISING TO SEE YOU GUYS SHARING THE BILL WITH ACCEPT.

BECAUSE IN A CONVERSATION SOME 3 OR 4 YEARS AGO WITH DUG HE TOLD ME THAT HE LIKES ACCEPT A LOT BECAUSE OF ONE GUY WHO USED TO SERVE BOTH BANDS AS A PRODUCER - MICHAEL WAGENER.

WAS HE THE LINK BETWEEN YOU TO DO THE TOUR?
Not sure, he might have been. Here is the deal - basically when we started working with Michael, his studio was located on some land Wolf owned. He lived right next door to the studio.

So we were there for months working on the record, and we did that twice, and Wolf was the next door neighbour, you know what I mean, we got to see him, we got to know him a and his wife while they were out playing with his dog every other day pretty much.

So they became familiar with our music, I think, through that and that may have had something to do with it, 'cause they used to always say that they really liked what they heard was working on a lot and they liked the band.

So that probably was a connection, just the fact that we were working with Michael and happened to be there next to Wolf's place.

OK, I'M REALLY GLAD THE DVD IS OUT AND IT'S REALLY AMAZING NOT JUST BECAUSE THIS DOUBLE AUDIO CD BUT THE QUALITY OF THE DVD ITSELF IS AMAZING, SO THANK YOU VERY MUCH AND I REALLY HOPE THAT SOME DAY THIS VERY FIRST KING'S X CONCERT IN BULGARIA WILL HAPPEN.
Me too.

PLEASE SAY HELLO TO THE OTHER GUYS AND I'LL TALK TO YOU SOON.
OK, take care. Thank you very much.

rights Tangra Mega Rock