INTERVIEW: ROB OSBORN OF FORCED DOWN
Founded in San Diego during the late 80s by the dearly departed Mike Denny and Pitchfork drummer Joey Piro, Forced Down were a unique entity on the American Hardcore scene at the time. The influence of Washington D.C. could be detected in their intent and ringing chords, but there was a burly rock approach that set them apart from the pack. Mike’s unique approach to hand-crafted packaging as shown on their four song, seven-inch EP Rise and the double seven-inch EP Stifle both released in 1990 was another unique element to their steez.
Earlier this month, Southern Lord released a collection of their recorded output entitled Liberate and to celebrate, a Forced Down reunion will be happening next month at the Che Cafe in San Diego. To commemorate both the release of Liberate and the reunion, I spoke with Forced Down vocalist Rob Osborne on Friday April 18th.
Photo courtesy of Southern Lord
Could you give me the origins of Forced Down?
Rob Osborne: I moved to San Diego in the summer of 1988 and a couple of friends were out visiting and met Mike Denny when they were out and about. He invited us to an Amenity show, and he and I met that night and became really good friends. Amenity had a big circle of friends that were musicians in different bands and probably about six months into knowing Mike he told me, “I love singing in Amenity, but I want to play guitar in a band. I’ve been getting together with Joey the drummer from Pitchfork to play”. He asked if I’d want to sing for this band and I told him I wasn’t interested. He kept bugging me and I kept telling him I wasn’t into it, but he invited me to a practice. They had two songs worked out and it sounded cool to me because it was a little bit different than what was going on around the Hardcore scene. Mike asked me if I knew somebody that played bass that wasn’t really a part of the Hardcore scene and I told him about a skate friend Chris Pippin who was into goth music. The next time I saw Pippin I told him about the band and that maybe he should try out. He went to a practice and was into it. So once he was in, I agreed to go ahead and try out singing. I never wrote lyrics before, but Mike helped me out a little bit and once we had those two songs down, we just kept going and going.
From the beginning. Forced Down was a project band. Everyone had full time bands that took priority over it. This was something we all agreed on and understood. So it was a little hard at first trying to make it work, but we did.
We recorded our first seven inch Rise and Mike had just started his label DownSide, so he decided to put it out instead of trying to get somebody else to, which totally made sense.He had a real DIY approach and did the layout himself and made it look pretty unique. He got these custom rubber stamps made and would have these sorta parties where everyone would come over to this house and fold and stamp all the covers. He did that with every release on his label.
We started picking up momentum and playing more shows, and we got Scott Bartoloni from Heroin on second guitar. I don't know exactly if Mike asked Scott or Scott asked to join, but with two guitars it was powerful. It was energizing to have that second guitar player, because it really gave Mike a little bit more room to play cool fills. It expanded our horizons.
Chris Pippen wasn't really into it at some point and was going into a different direction. He wanted to concentrate on his main band, The Abyss. I was playing in another band at the time, Statement, and went to practice one day and told everyone how Pippin quit. The drummer for Statement Josh said he knew all the Forced Down songs and would be more than happy to fill in. So he joined and added a lot to our sound.
We did a short tour up the coast into the Seattle area and down towards Sacramento, LA, and back here in San Diego. It was overwhelming how much people were into it because we had no idea how it was going to be perceived. After that, we recorded our two record seven-inch Stifle and shortly after that, Scott quit because Heroin was really taking off. After that, we stopped having practices and started to lose steam. Mike started doing these acoustic projects and Joey joined Inside Out shortly after. Josh went in a totally different direction and joined a band called The B Side Players. It was really weird. I didn’t know out last show was actually going to be our last show. It felt like we never had closure.
Forced Down had something different going on for the early 90s when everything in Hardcore seemed homogenized or compartmentalized. DC Hardcore I know played a role in the sound, but there was always something more rockist to it to me. Was Soundgarden something you all were listening to at the time?
I’ve never heard that comparison, but Mike loved Led Zeppelin. I don’t know if they were his favorite band, but they were definitely up there. But we all listened to different music and took a little bit from all of them. We loved New York Hardcore and we loved what they were doing in DC and we loved the stuff that they were doing up in LA, but we wanted to do something just a little bit different. Joey and I would always talk about UFO – that was one of those bands that we both really liked. Back in the day in San Diego, a lot of these venues didn’t have strict hardcore shows. You'd have a jazz band, a hardcore band, and then a rock band would play. It added to the diversity and opened up people's awareness that there were other types of music out there. You don't have to listen to hardcore just because you rode a skateboard, you know?
Photo courtesy of Southern Lord
In the 90s, you had a lot of unique music coming out of San Diego from Forced Down to Drive Like Jehu to Heroin. What was it about San Diego that produced stuff like that?
That’s a hard one to nail down. It may have come from everybody listening to everything and not being tied down to one specific sound. Also, bands were very supportive of one another. If you were doing something a little bit different, you were still going to be backed and supported and that made you want to push that uniqueness much more.
Were there other bands in or out of San Diego Forced Down felt a kinship to?
We played a ton of shows with Inside Out. Zac and Mike were really good friends. Then there was a local band Sub Society that we played a number of shows with. They were all good guys doing their own thing and it was awesome. Like I was saying, you could play something different and still have that support in San Diego. Other San Diego bands we played with were Funeral March, Drift, Cow Punks, Blind Justice, Heroin, Helicopter, Crossed Out and Amenity. Some of the LA bands were Hard Stance, Reason To Believe, Far Side, Chain of Strength, Said, Head First and Carry Nation.
What about the graphics of the Forced Down releases?
With the first record, Tim Gonzales, the guitar player for Amenity drew the pictures for the front and back. I can’t remember if he showed us the drawings beforehand or not but we were all cool with it. For the second one, I can’t remember if we saw it before we starting putting the covers together at Mike’s house, but I absolutely love that Heywood Sumner artwork of the angel on the cover. That was my favorite cover of what we put out.
You mentioned before how you were in the band Statement. Could we go into their history a bit?
Sergio, the bass player from Amenity introduced me to Josh the drummer of Statement. Josh said they had a guitar player, but were looking for a second guitar player. I didn’t really know these guys, but they showed me what they were playing and it was cool. We had a singer and I don’t exactly remember what happened, but we decided to kick him out. Greg Anderson moved down to San Diego to join Amenity on second guitar and he happened to walk by our studio right after Amenity practice. He came in and listened to it, and said, “Dude, I want to sing for this band!” Since we didn’t have a singer anymore, we agreed. Greg really got the band rolling. He worked on a lot of songs with Josh and then we recorded a seven inch. Shortly after that, Greg decided to move back to Seattle and Oscar Paz picked up the mic, but by that point, everybody was ready for college and moving out of Chula Vista, so that was the end of Statement. Oscar was in Impel and Kill Holiday and he’s in an awesome band right now called Hingada and another one called Crashing Forward. He’s a busy guy!
Pushing the conversation into the present day, how did the reissuing of Forced Down material on Southern Lord come about?Probably a year and a half before Mike passed, he called me up out of the blue, and asked if I’d want to do a Forced Down reunion. I said no because too much had passed. Then, maybe about two months before he passed, we were in his garage and he showed me all the Forced Down tapes. I couldn’t believe he still had everything because he lost a lot of stuff in a flood when living in New York. Soon after showing me all of that, he passed. Then about a week later, Oscar called me up and said Greg Anderson wanted to re-release the Forced Down stuff and Mike was planning on telling me the weekend he passed. I called Mike’s sister and Mike already told her about the re-release idea. I got the tapes and handed them off to Greg. I’ve known Greg for a long time. He’s a stand up guy and I knew the tapes were going to the right place.
The funny thing is when Greg moved down to San Diego to join Amenity, Mike actually wanted him to join Forced Down, but he turned it down because we weren’t established yet. Greg and I laugh about it now. I think about how much different we would have sounded if he joined.
Anyway, he took the tapes over to Brad Wood, and I went up there one weekend and sat in on the remixing. It was amazing to hear everything. Hearing those raw tapes with Joey talking in the background and the different takes of some of the songs, or the guitars without effects, or hearing one voice instead of multiple voices made for a really cool experience.
How did the ball get rolling on the Forced Down reunion after Mike passed away?
I got in touch with Joey and Josh thinking the best way we could honor Mike was to play at the celebration of his life that happened last year, but both of them couldn’t do it. But Barry and Sergio, the drummer and bass player of Amenity, told me they’d love to do it. Barry had a friend who played guitar named Jimmy Park Hill, but I wanted at least two guitars. My youngest son, Jack who's 17 plays guitar in a band and it was my wife's idea for him to play a song with us.
Then, my friend Brian who I knew as a kid in Texas who had met Mike Denny before I did called Barry asking to play a Forced Down song on guitar. He then called me and we decided he would play the whole set. Brian came out a few days before the show and we did three practices. We played the show and it felt good to do that for Mike because he was Forced Down. He was the maker and the main genius behind the band. After that, we were offered a couple more shows and I just couldn’t do it. It didn’t feel right. I felt like it would be a bamboozle to get people to come out and see Forced Down with only one person from the band.
But then I was talking to Joey and Josh, and said how it would be cool to help Greg out with the re-release and play a record release party and they were totally into it this time. We have Matt from Heroin playing guitar and Brian is coming out again to play the second guitar. The practices sound good and everybody's into it. Oscar Paz has helped us out with rehearsal space and gear. The show we’re playing is with Hingada and Deaf Club so we’re really excited for it. It’s at the Che Cafe which is the heart and soul of San Diego. I can’t believe that place is still going on. My son goes to shows there and his band has played there. I think it’s going to really cool.