Marc Floyd

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Carpazine: Thanks for doing the interview, Marc. Can you please give the readers some background information about yourself?

Floyd: Hey Fernando! I grew up in Virginia. My family moved up to Canada in the 70’s to kind of get away from all the craziness that was going on: Nixon, Vietnam… people wearing polyester… haha... Moving from the southern states to a place where it’s fifty degrees below zero in the winter was a bit of a shock to the system. I don’t know if I’ve ever fully recovered from that. I’ve always been a bit of a weirdo. My life now is full of strange projects. I’ve toured with bands on and off since the 1980’s. I still time travel to distant planets where I find puzzle pieces to bring back to my home studio and weave into songs. I’ve got a daughter who’s twenty and is the coolest cat I know! I do interviews and art for Punk Globe Magazine. I love enchiladas and coffee. My partner - The Fabulous Ms. Ligaya - and I have been doing music videos for bands from all over the place for the past ten years. We’re now working on a documentary about the amazing Ginger Coyote that is going to be very cool! We also run a Safe House in Vancouver for street kids and high-risk youths who stay with us for a short time while we try to figure out how to help them. We’ve been doing this for over a decade and have had around 800 kids living with us in that time. It definitely keeps us on our toes.

Carpazine: Tell us the brief history of the bands you’ve played with.

Floyd: Man I’ve been in a lot of bands. I spent a lot of the 80’s touring the dregs and dives of Canada. In 1990, I joined a band called Smash L.A. that was one of the coolest bands I had ever seen. A friend of mine – Todd Kerns who now plays with Slash – helped me get into that band. It was heavy, crazy sleaze-rock - with a singer named Johnny Harley who was the coolest front man I’d ever seen. When I joined, they already had some good buzz going. They were getting help from producer Bob Rock who was trying to get the band signed in the States. But, we were just a little too off the rails and ended up self-destructing. 

In the early 90’s, I took a couple years off and then started a band in Calgary called Death Valley Dolls that were really heavy and weird. After that, I took quite a few years off of playing live, got nice and healthy, moved to Vancouver. Then I ended up meeting my partner Ligaya in Vancouver. She played bass in one of the coolest bands in the city called JP5. They were amazing! They used to tour all over Canada and the States with bands like D.O.A. They had a rotating roster of great drummers. A guitar player -Dirty Kurt Robertson, who also played with the Real McKenzies and SNFU, and an amazing singer: Gerry-Jenn Wilson. They needed a second guitar player, so I was in! That band was a lot of fun, but eventually fell apart. If you can ever find JP5’s record “Hot Box”… GET IT!

Over the last couple years, I started writing with a guy named Richard Duguay. He’s an amazing player and a real punk rock legend. He played with Personality Crisis way back, and then toured with Duff McKagan’s solo band, he even played on one of the Guns N’ Roses’ albums! Just a really cool cat and amazing writer and musician. We put out an album last year called “Bad JuJu” and are almost done with another record. It’s kind of a weird collaboration. I’m in Vancouver and Richard lives in L.A. He’s got his own studio at his place in North Hollywood called Into The Black Studio. So we both record stuff at home and just send it back and forth and build on pieces until eventually… Voila!!! We got a song. We both have a mutual love for dirty, sleazy guitar playin’ and old Alice Cooper, so it’s a pretty good match.

Carpazine: Who are some of your musical influences?

Floyd: My mom and dad had a real eclectic record collection, so when I was young I was surrounded by a lot of great music: The Beatles, Pink Floyd, Yes, C.S.N.Y., Simon & Garfunkel… I think all that stuff got embedded deep down in my DNA and gave me a real appreciation for melody and harmony and sonic adventures. Then when I was a little older – like around 10 - I got into other stuff like Aerosmith and Zeppelin… And I started appreciating some of the finer points of heavy, dirty rock n’ roll! Later on, I got into all kinds of stuff that really influenced me musically: Velvet Underground, Roxy Music, Punk and New Wave, Jane’s Addiction, Bowie...

Carpazine: What's the first record you can remember buying?

Floyd: When I was about ten, the first album I bought was Alice Cooper’s “Love It To Death”; and for me, that had it all. It was dirty, sleazy, funny, dark, and just cool. It was the whole package for me. “Love It To Death”, “Killer”, “School’s Out”, and “Billion Dollar Babies” was a pretty amazing run. I still remember being about ten years-old and walking around with weird stuff on my eyes and having that album foldout of Alice Cooper hanging from a noose in my bedroom.

Carpazine: When and how did you first become interested in playing music?

Floyd: Well, I loved music from the time I was listening to all those records as a little kid. It just transported me. I started playing guitar when I was about fifteen years-old. I took lessons for a while, but didn’t learn much… Just a few chords on the acoustic. I think my most advanced song attempt up to that point was “House of the Rising Sun”.

Carpazine: How did you get into your first band?

Floyd: I remember sitting in the library in my high school and this guy named Barry Shewchuk came up to me and said he heard I played guitar. I said, “Not really…” I just knew a few chords on acoustic and some folky kind of songs. He said he needed a rhythm guitar player in his band… “It’s easy, you just have to know how to play a barre chord and move it around. I’ll teach you.” So pretty soon, we were out at his place in the country playing Kiss and Cream and ZZ Top. He was right. I just had to learn how to play that one chord and move it around. And try to look cool at the same time, of course. Haha.

Carpazine: The first time you played live, tell me about the show. What you can remember?

Floyd: So with that first band, our first AND last gig in the small town of Ponoka, Alberta was a lunchtime assembly show at our high school. By that time we had decided to go with the commercial pop-friendly name Barry & The Bastards. Haha. If I recall correctly, we played a really odd mix of songs: Devo, Cream, Kiss… I think we ended with “Stairway to Heaven” and then “Earache My Eye” by Cheech & Chong - and Barry climbing up the curtains on the side of the stage and giving the crowd – including all of our teachers – the finger leading to a quick finish of the performance. I can’t tell you how much I wish I had a video of that show - probably the unintentional comedy event of the year.

Carpazine: What do you think constitutes a good song?

Floyd: It’s just gotta have something that makes me feel something… A connection to something real that someone else has touched. There are certain parts in songs that will bring tears to my eyes every time I hear them. You always know the songs that were created on earth and the ones that came from the stars. It’s pretty easy to tell when you listen to a song if it’s coming from a real place, or if it’s someone trying to “make a song”.

Carpazine: If you could tour with anyone alive or dead, who would it be?

Floyd: Paul McCartney. For me, he’s the master of magic and melody and lyrics. Over the years, I’ve listened to a lot of stuff that feels dark and aggressive. But, when I want to feel good and hopeful, I listen to Paul McCartney. It’s like giving your soul a bath!

Carpazine: Any plans in the near future to release some music?

Floyd: YES! Richard and I released “Bad JuJu” just over a year ago. We’re almost done recording another record that should be out in the next six months. Not sure what it’s going to be called yet. I’m sure Richard will come up with something weird and apocalyptic. Haha. I’m also planning on putting out a solo album in the next year. I’ve got a collection of stuff from the past and pieces I’m working on now that I want to finish, probably about 20 songs. Stuff that’s probably way too weird to do with anyone else, so I’m gonna have to do it alone. I’ve got some I’m working on that I’m really proud of. The names of some of my favorites right now are: “The Barbarians”, “Golden State Sunshine”, “Everybody Down Now”. There’s one I’m working on called “Reflections on Moonshine”. For that one, I stole some cool lyrics from a story my dad wrote many years ago. I think that one’s gonna be an epic adventure!

Carpazine: What’s the motivation for getting so much done right now?

Floyd: Well, since COVID hit, I thought, you know, none of us really know how much time we’ve got left on this planet. I could walk into a grocery store to pick up a box of cereal and get sneezed on and be dead ten days later. I wouldn’t want to be lying in a hospital bed taking my last breaths on a ventilator and thinking… “You know, if I had just finished those harmonies on the chorus and put that second guitar part in the bridge, I could have finished that song and had it out…” haha… I’d be pretty disappointed if I left this planet and didn’t get all the stuff out there that I want to finish.

Carpazine: When did you start making the covers of Punk Globe magazine?

Floyd: I started in 2008. I met Ginger Coyote that year when her band White Trash Debutantes came up from L.A. to play in Vancouver. Our band JP5 did a tour with them called “Anarchy In B.C.!” I got to know Ginger and we really hit it off.

I had done an interview with a friend of mine who was in a Vancouver band called the New Pornographers, but didn’t know what to do with it. Ginger asked me if I wanted to put it in Punk Globe. I told her that I knew a little bit of Photoshop - and could also maybe try to make a cover for the issue. So I did a really simple cover for my interview, and then Ginger asked me if I wanted to start doing them on a regular basis. I said yes, and realized I was actually going to have to learn how to use Photoshop! That was 2008 and I’ve done every month since then for almost 13 years.

Carpazine: How long does it take to create a cover?

Floyd: I usually do it over two or three days… whenever I have spare time I’ll sit down for a few hours and just keep adding stuff – coming up with ideas and moving things around. I really want it to look like a strange, kind of surreal piece of art. I also really want everyone who’s on the cover to look at it and think to themselves: “Man, I look cool!” I like putting all kinds of weird subliminal stuff all over the place too. I had a lot of fun doing the ‘Carpaneda cover’... There were weird little pieces of your amazing art all over the place! I also hide my daughter on all the covers somewhere, and she has to find herself in the big mess of stuff.

It’s been a wild ride being part of the Punk Globe world. Not long after I started the covers, my work was included in the Jayne County Art Show at the Chelsea Hotel in NYC. There were a lot of amazing people involved in that exhibit. That’s where I was first introduced to the amazing art world of Carpaneda!

Carpazine: How was it making the documentary "Ginger Coyote Punk Rock Doc"?

Floyd: It’s been an amazing experience so far. Ginger is a real icon and just an amazing human. She started Punk Globe Magazine in 1977 and it’s still going strong. She’s been playing in a band called the White Trash Debutantes since the 90’s and they are just a crazy, amazing sight to see! Ligaya and I have been doing almost all of this film ourselves; most of the interviews, camera work, sound, editing… We’ve gone down to LA several times to follow Ginger around and do interviews with people in her life. We’ve got some amazing footage: Interviews with Pauley Perrette, Ed Asner, Jack Grisham, Alice Bag, Jon Gries, Brandon Cruz, Cherry Vanilla… Jayne County, Bebe Buell, JIM ROSE!!! We’ve gotten to connect with so many amazing people doing this project. We’ve also been collecting footage of Ginger from over the years… Interviews, television appearances, live footage of her band playing in Japan… We’ve got her on the Jerry Springer Show! haha

Carpazine: Where can people watch the documentary?

Floyd: We’re still working on it right now. We’ve got a few more interviews we’d like to do, some more editing, some legal stuff – the fun part… haha… COVID has slowed things down a little bit, but we’re getting there. Also, not sure exactly how to release it at this point. It will kind of depend on what’s going on in the bigger picture. We were going to start off in film festivals and then shop it to film companies and then release it in as many theaters as possible. But since COVID started, even a lot of releases from the big studios are getting postponed for a couple years or the films are being released straight to online streaming instead of going to theaters, so we’ll see. You could see it on a big screen, or you might see it at home on Netflix with your favorite punk rock chill-partner!

Carpazine: Can you give the readers your Website and Facebook addresses so they can check you out?

Floyd: Yes. You can go to One Finger Films on YouTube and see a lot of our music videos, weird side projects, and teasers for the Ginger documentary.

The online link is: https://www.youtube.com/user/ONEFINGERFILMS

You can also find One Finger Films on Facebook and see blip clips and interviews from the Ginger doc and a lot of our work from past years.

The online link is: https://www.facebook.com/xxonefingerfilmsxx

If you want to check out Punk Globe Magazine, go to: www.punkglobe.com

And for the most recent stuff I’ve been working on musically, you can look for our record “Richard Duguay – Bad JuJu” on iTunes and most streaming platforms, or go straight to: http://richardduguay.com/

Carpazine: Anything you’d like to add?

Floyd: If at any point at any time on any day you get the opportunity to be a weirdo... Don’t hesitate!@#