The reason most interviews “work” is because, in most cases, both sides need (or at least want) them to work. Usually the person doing the interview has an article to publish and a deadline to meet, and the person being interviewed typically has something to say. An interview is like a dance, and when both partners are of equal skill, the dance may be graceful. Things don’t always work out that way. Sometimes, one partner may be a better dancer than the other. In some cases it is up to the person performing the interview to coax answers out of an unwilling or nervous subject. Other times, it may fall upon the person being interviewed to take charge and steer the conversation in a way that benefits them.
But what happens when one of the parties doesn’t want to participate at all? Take Gregg Poppovich, for example. Poppovich, long time coach of the San Antonio Spurs, is well known for his curt answers. He doesn’t agree with the NBA’s policy that requires him to answer questions before, during, and after games, and he protests this policy by being rude to unfortunate reporters tasked with asking him questions.
There’s nothing worse than trying to interview someone who doesn’t want to be interviewed.
Trust me, I know first hand.
On January 10th, 1997, a punk band named Boba Fett Youth played a show in Spokane, Washington. While I would never claim to have been a “punk rocker,” I was certainly familiar with (and a fan of) punk music. In the late 1980s and early 1990s I was listening to the Misfits, Minor Threat, the Sex Pistols, the Ramones, and the Dead Kennedys. In the mid-90s, I followed the next wave of punk bands such as Green Day, Rancid, NOFX, the Offspring, and Social Distortion during punk’s resurgence. I never had a mohawk or stuck a safety pin through my nose, but I certainly listened to the music.
I was looking forward to talking to the band because of their ties with Star Wars. The band’s CD (which I bought) had Yoda on the cover. I also got (bought?) a bumper sticker, which you can see stuck to the side of my old computer case (surrounded by smaller, random Star Wars stickers).
I watched the band perform and they were great in that terrible, punk rock way. They even played a version of the Star Wars theme that would have made John Williams cry. When their performance ended, I sat down to do a quick interview with the guys, and that’s when things went to hell.
Actually, I shouldn’t say that. I spent several minutes talking to all the members of the band except the lead singer, and things went great. We talked about the Vegas punk scene, how the tour was going, the fact that the guys ran their own ‘zine, and how they thought the show went. THEN the lead singer joined us, and THAT’S when things went to hell.
With each question I asked I got a snarky, smart-assed response in return. After two or three responses, I realized that he was doing a second-rate Johnny Rotten impersonation.
I tried to change the tone by asking some lighter, Star Wars related questions like how many Ewoks could you fit on a “ska bus” (one of the band’s songs), but it didn’t help. I don’t recall exactly what was said next, but at some point he insulted me and I committed the cardinal journalism sin and insulted him back. When he asked me if I was familiar with the band’s song “This 150lb Vegetarian Is Going To Kick Your Ass,” I said “this 250lb reporter would like to see you try it.” I’m pretty sure he told me where to go and I told him where he could stick his ska bus, and that was the end of that.
As I mentioned at the beginning, interviews normally go well because both sides have a vested interest in pulling it off. In this case, neither side was. In-Tune Magazine catered to the Spokane music scene; I had very little to gain from focusing on an out-of-town band, and I wasn’t worried about returning to the office without a story since I knew both the editor and the owner of the magazine (me, and me) pretty well and the office was my bedroom. Likewise, Boba Fett Youth had little to gain from appearing in my small town news rag. The only thing they lost was me as a fan, and it wouldn’t be very punk to care about that.
Two decades later, I look back and laugh at the incident. If the same thing happened today, I would definitely stay and complete the whole interview. The pen is mightier than an amplified guitar, after all. When bands are on stage with amplifiers and microphones, they control the room. When the show ends and the lights go dim, it is the writer who gets the last word — even if it comes twenty years later.
