Love/Hate rose to fame in the early ‘90s with vocalist Jizzy Pearl at the helm. Their debut album, Blackout in the Red Room received the title Best Album of the Year in both Kerrang! and Metal Hammer magazines, backed by the success of singles Why Do You Think They Call it Dope? and She’s An Angel. The band secured a devoted following in the UK with their follow-up release, Wasted In America.
In one of the most infamous attempts by any band to boost album sales, Pearl made headlines in 1992 by erecting a cross on the Y of the Hollywood sign, performing a mock crucifixion. After several hours, the police were called in and Pearl spent some time in jail.
The band carried on for several years, and also participated in side projects that featured some, but not all members of the band but due to lack of support from their label they packed it in the late 90’s. Pearl kept busy, taking the time to perform with other bands such as L.A. Guns, Ratt, and Adler’s Appetite and releasing a couple of solo albums to boot. The original band reunited for the first time in ten years to a sold out crowd in 2007.
Recently, it was announced that a new Love/Hate album would be released in early 2014, but at the last-minute, the 6-song mini-album was transformed to a Jizzy Pearl release, reportedly due to the threat of lawsuits by former members, who were not a part of the Crucified album. Pearl released a statement regarding the change, in which he stated that dealing with ex-members just wasn’t worth the fight, especially over a band that isn’t raking in mega-millions.He also stated that he would not be playing with those ex-members again. When asked if he had anything to add to his statement, Pearl said, “Basically the statement said it all. You know, that I don’t have the intention of spending thousands of dollars on a band that makes pennies and it’s not worth the hassle. I always did Love/Hate for fun. It was never a big financial thing for me, you know? So when it’s not fun anymore, I guess it’s time to hang it up.”
The album’s cover art is an intricate drawing that is reminiscent of the 1992 Hollywood Sign event. Said Pearl, “You know, a fan sent me that drawing a couple of years ago and it just sat on my computer, and I just decided to use it, with permission of course.”
Pearl has generously offered insight into each of the songs on the release. Hanging You Out to Dry ties in to the album art in that is about the Hollywood sign event, told from the perspective of the man being crucified. “I tried to get back to the start, a bunch of young kids banging out loud musical joy in a little room and the singer in the middle, one microphone, testifying to the world.” The next track, Sunny Day, is “ a love song to my girlfriend, plain and simple. Usually I had to break up with my girlfriends to get a good song out of them, but not this time thankfully.” You’re Making Me Nervous is “ a fictional account of every man’s idea of a bad date”, while I Don’t Want to be Your Baby is “a twist on the traditional power ballad, where the guy not only doesn’t get the girl, he doesn’t want the girl.” Pearl said his “Led Zeppelin roots came out” on Love is All and the final track, Too Late, is “a song about someone near and dear to me who fucked up.”
While Crucified will certainly please fans of Love/Hate, it is most definitely a Jizzy Pearl labor of love, so it is probably fitting that it is now being released under his name. According to Pearl, “Basically, I worked out of a studio in Los Angeles and I used Matt Starr on drums and I did most of the guitars myself… Other people did bits and pieces, but it was mostly sort of a one-man operation.”
The album will be supported by a UK tour in March. Is there a reason why there are only UK dates, and none on our side of the pond? “Yeah, because I’m putting Love/Hate to bed. And the UK– we’ve always had our strongest following there and I figured I would end it playing full houses.”
Immediately following that tour, Pearl will be continuing with his new duties as the front man of Quiet Riot. “It’s been a busy couple of months,” said Pearl. “You know, I did my record and I got invited to join Quiet Riot and I had to learn all their songs and I had to do a record with them.”
With all the acts that he has fronted, several of whom were already well-established acts, Pearl is used to the process of learning the complete songbook in preparation for a new gig. According to him, “The music is easy. It’s digging in, when there is a front man like Kevin DuBrow who is very unique. It’s more like I have to find my place in the new regime, you know what I mean? So that’s something that’s going to take a little time, but it’s exciting.”
In addition to rock n roll, Pearl has also entered the literary market, releasing three books on Amazon, entitled I Got More Crickets than Friends, Angst for the Memories, and Unhappy Endings. The Amazon description of the books is as follows: “ Jizzy Pearl is a rock ‘n’ roll singer/songwriter who has conjured the restless spirits of Bukowski and Burroughs in his sometimes humorous/ sometimes dark tales of life, love, fantasy and horror. Guaranteed visceral reading for people with short attention spans.” On his writing career, Pearl says, “Yeah, I wrote three books over the years. I’ve always written. They’re available in the e-book format on Amazon. You know, it’s definitely a different sort of discipline than music, so that makes it more fun, more challenging.”
Never one to sit back and rest, Pearl will spend 2014 on the road: “It’s gonna be a full year of Quiet Riot shows. They work a lot, so I’m excited about that.” In addition, the new Quiet Riot album featuring Pearl on vocals will be released soon, followed by another round of press in promotion of that.
In closing, Pearl encourages people to download Crucified which, is only available in digital format: “I would say that the Crucified record is only available in digital on iTunes and Amazon and what not. A lot of people have been asking me about making hard copy CD’s, but I don’t know, I’m just gonna stay with the dig, so that’s where people can find it…. Obviously everybody is affected by this–the internet and downloading stuff, so I figured the compromise would be to release six songs and hope that people would, instead of buying that Starbucks one morning, that maybe they would buy my record.”
So forego that morning cup o’ joe some morning and support a hardworking rock n’ roller instead!
