Sacramento Cali rockers Tesla return to the top of the bill of M3 Festival for a second time in three years before hitting the road as part of a summer package that includes REO Speedwagon and Def Leppard. RockRevolt Magazine had the opportunity to sit down with lead guitarist and primary songwriter Frank Hannon prior to their performance at M3. Hannon filled us in on teaming up with Def Leppard guitarist Phil Collen to produce Tesla’s next album, the release of their legendary debut album, Mechanical Resonance, Live and the possibility that Prince isn’t dead.
You are back here at M3 Festival, once again headlining, it was a couple years ago you guys headliner here, right?
Yeah and I saw the poster for the show and it just blows me away that Tesla is always top of the bill. It freaks me out because, you know I’m very proud of Tesla and what we’ve done in thirty years or whatever and the songs have lasted this long. We’re from a small town, Sacramento, CA which is a bigger town now than it was in the seventies but when I was a kid I never dreamed that I’d be headlining M3 Festival 30 years later (laughing). It’s amazing.
And you’re back for a second time headlining, it’s obvious they really love you.
Well, this area of the country, you know 80’s rock and metal and good rock n’ roll music is still alive and well in this area of the country (talking about the Northeast).
After this you guys head out on tour with Def Leppard and REO Speedwagon.
Yeah, Def Leppard and REO Speedwagon. Last year we hooked up with Def Leppard and Styx and the tour went so well that we were invited back to tour with them again. It’s really cool because in 1987 we were on the Def Leppard Hysteria tour, we shared the same management as them and we met the guys in Def Leppard at a club in Amsterdam. Phil Collen and Steve Clark came to see us, the loved our first album Mechanical Resonance. It’s just so ironic and crazy how everything has come full circle 30 year later and we’re on tour with them again.
A couple years ago you released Simplicity, do you currently have anything in the works?
Simplicity we felt was a great album and we worked really hard on it. We spent three weeks at a farm writing it, we gruelingly worked in the studio nonstop for three months and the record just came out on vinyl. We’re very proud of the songs on that record but with today’s musical climate and the nature of the business, obviously it didn’t sell as much as it would have if it had come out in the 80’s. So we decided we weren’t going to make another record, we decided we were just going to play the hits and that’s it. Low and behold the thing with Def Leppard came about now Phil Collen has said no guys you can’t hang it up now let me help you produce a record. Now we have a new creative shot in the arm with Phil Collen, Def Leppard’s lead guitar player is going to help us put together another record.
With Phil involved are you going to work on it on the road?
The plan is we’re going to write it and record it while we are on tour and get it done by the end of the year. When you have an outside person with the motivation Phil has, sort of being your coach, it’s like any good football team if they’ve got a good coach then chances are they are going to win the game. That’s how we feel about Phil Collen.
When it comes to Tesla is it you writing a majority of the music for Tesla?
We all collaborate on it but it does usually start with an idea that I have on the guitar. We’re a guitar base band, so usually a guitar player will bring a riff in, that’s usually where a song will start.
You alluded to the fact about the current state of music and album sales, overall what is your view on the current state of the music industry?
Well, I think it’s amazing. On one hand the computer and the internet has made it possible for artist to create their own music in a way that we’ve never known before. You can be totally independent. But on the other hand it has opened the door for the public just to steal the music and not support the artist by buying the product. It’s a double edged sword, on one hand I love on the other I don’t because it’s taking food out of our mouth.
Is it hard to make a living off of music today?
It’s not hard to making a living in music today if you are a great live band. Luckily for us we’ve been around so long to where we have a brand and have songs that really stand the test of time. I would say if you are brand new, up and coming that yes I think it would be hard because you have to prove yourself live.
The live shows, is that where you make the money today?
Yeah, we make our living by touring and bringing the music to people.
What do you attribute your steady line-up to? 4 out of 5 band members have been with you since the start of the band over 30 years ago.
I don’t know what I attribute it to. I think it’s because we all, Brian Wheat and myself came from south Sacramento, we never forget where we came from and that would be, not to sound cliché, but pretty much from the ghetto so we appreciate what we have. We’ve managed to cut back on all the stuff that causes problems, drugs and alcohol.
Do you recall the first time you heard your music on the radio?
Yeah I remember the first time I heard Modern Day Cowboy on KZAP, which is a local radio station. We went down there and a good friend of ours was the DJ and he spun it on the radio and it was pretty cool, it was mind blowing. It’s still very exciting to hear your music played on the radio.
I’m sure after working that hard to put something out.
Well, radio, when you’re driving in your car and you hearing the radio, you’re hearing it go through some major electronic compression and processing so it makes it sound even more pumped up than it does on the album. So when a song like Modern Day Cowboy comes on the radio it already sounds great then the radio just pumps it up even more. It’s pretty exciting.
Do you recall the moment that you wanted to become a musician?
My earliest memories, when I was like three or four years old were being at a backyard party and I remember there was a band playing in the backyard of our house and all the grownups were having so much fun. I just remember loving that. Then as I got older, when I was ten years old my mom took me to see a movie, my mom was really cool, she still is. She’s a hippie lady from Jefferson Airplane, Grateful Dead era of music. She took me to see a movie that had Jimi Hendrix in it called Monterrey Pop Festival and when I saw Jimi Hendrix on the screen playing “Wild Thing” that blew my mind and made me want to be Jimi Hendrix.
What’s going on with your solo work?
I’ve put pretty much all my solo shows on hold right now. Unless I get offered something very special I’m putting all my energy into Tesla for the next three years at least and not trying to juggle the two things. I’ve been juggling solo stuff and Tesla stuff for the past ten years and I realize its been way too much work. I’m still writing songs and recording songs and when the time comes in about three years when Tesla takes a break I’ll have a catalog of unreleased material that I can pick from.
Why do solo? It sounds like you have unlimited creative ability with Tesla, is it the style just doesn’t fit Tesla?
Yeah, I come from a background of everything from Jimi Hendrix to Johnny Cash and I love to learn and experiment and when I’m doing solo music I can experiment with different things sort of like what Prince did, jazz and blues and progressive. I can do that on my own whereas with Tesla it’s based around Jeff Keith’s vocals and keeping the songs really solid and strong. Whereas me as a guitar player I like to jam and improvise. When I’m on my own I do that.
You mention Prince, what a shock that was. You were a fan obviously.
Yeah, of course! I really don’t believe he’s dead honestly. I’m not going to get to, I think it’s a hoax.
You could be right, he was a pretty eccentric guy, did you ever meet him?
I never met Prince. But yeah he’s very eccentric, he did change his identity in the past. I know he was very spiritual and wanted to have a relationship with god, his god. So you know maybe there’s a chance he’s doing that.
Do you remember your first concert?
I can tell you, this goes back to what I was describing, and my first concert was Johnny Cash in 1976. When I was ten years old that’s what was the turning point for me as a person. For some reason at the age ten I fell in love with music and loved Johnny Cash. My mom took me to see Johnny Cash, she took me to see the movie with Jimi Hendrix in it. My aunt took me to see Robin Trower at the memorial auditorium which is basically like seeing Jimi Hendrix. Then I went to Day on the Green in Oakland Coliseum and I saw Scorpions and Iron Maiden, this was a couple years later. That was a big one for me. But in 1976 there was some great music, Frampton Comes Alive, Derringer Live, a lot of live albums. So when I was a kid I would have concerts in my own room cracking up the turn table with live albums. Aerosmith Live Bootleg was one of my favorite albums of all time.
Is there anybody out there today you would love to collaborate with?
I would love to collaborate with Steven Tyler, I would love to collaborate with Lynyrd Skynyrd, Gary Rossington.
Any conversations with any of them?
No man, I’m too shy I think. There’s a lot of things I would love to do but right now my love is with Tesla. By the way we are releasing a Mechanical Resonance Live, every song on Mechanical Resonance recorded live last year. On tour we put it together and it’s going to be awesome.
When is that coming out?
Comes out June of this year.
Was there a low point in your career that you wanted to hang it up?
There’s been a couple low points but in the 90’s when grunge came out and Tesla was at the peek of our career we had a lot of internal problems and we broke up for about five years. I actually had a job trimming trees. So you asked earlier why we have most of the original line-up intact, I have been back down to the lower hard levels and I do appreciate the work that Tesla can do. From ’95 to 2000, those five years were really low in my life.
When you are off tour what are you doing?
When I’m off tour I’m at home with my family. See that’s the thing before I would be off tour with Tesla then I would go on tour with my solo stuff. Now I’m at home with my wife, we have a dog, some horses and some kids and I’m spending time with my family.
Any final words for the fans out there?
Yeah, thank you for all the years of support and check out Mechanical Resonance Live, it’s coming out Jun 24, 2016, and we are real excited about it. Sounds great, every song from the album, live.
