Motor Sister is a band you need to get to know and their new album ‘Get Off’ out this month on May 6th is a real Rock and Roll revelation. Featuring vocalist/guitarist Jim Wilson (Mother Superior), with Scott Ian (Anthrax) on guitar, Joey Vera (Armoured Saint) on bass, John Tempesta (White Zombie, The Cult) on drums and featuring the sublime vocals of Pearl Aday (Pearl), Motor Sister is a force to reckon with. It has been a awhile between drinks though with their first album ‘Ride’ released in 2015 – a live-in-the-studio selection of Mother Superior songs from their back catalogue. Now, six years later, Motor Sister return with an album of new material. We just had to take u the opportunity to chat to Pearl again and find out what’s been happening in the decade or more since we last spoke!
Mark: Good morning!
Pearl: Hello Mark!
Mark: Hi Pearl, hope things are good with you. Thanks so much for talking to The Rockpit today I think sadly the last time we caught up was about a dozen years ago.
Pearl: You and I spoke about the solo record!
Mark: You have a great memory. It has been a while!
Pearl: (laughs) Well how’ve you been?
Mark: (laughs) A lot has happened since then and the world has changed considerably since 2010.
Pearl: It has.
Mark: It was so great to hear the new Motor Sister album and when I was asked who I wanted to speak to I thought it would be great to catch up again. So let’s chat!
Pearl: (laughs)
Mark: It’s all your fault really isn’t it? Motor Sister?
Pearl: (laughs) No one has said it quite like that before! (laughs) But yeah, it was a gift for Scott’s 50th birthday. That’s one of the things he wanted most to hear the Mother Superior music played live again. So we figured out a way to make that happen, which turned into a party, which turned into one record, which then turned into this new one. So sure, it’s all my fault, I’ll take total blame! (laughs)
Mark: It’s a great album of pretty much new material too, I think Joey pretty much put it best when he described it as “No bullshit Rock and Roll” which is exactly what you get. It’s high energy stuff, and it’s right there in your face just like Rock and Roll used to be and how it still should be.
Pearl: Exactly.
Mark: So where did album number two begin, why revisit the Project this time with new material. It’s turned out wonderfully well, but what was the impetus? Did Covid and being locked away like the rest of the world like a lot of us have any bearing on it?
Pearl: Maybe, that might have put a little kick in our asses but I know that after we made the first record which was all covers of Mother Superior, our favourite Mother Superior songs – we all loved doing it so much that I know we all wanted and planned to make an album of original music because we all love playing together and writing together. So it was always there in the back of our heads and because it was like seven years between albums maybe the pandemic brought it to the front of our minds. But what it has to do with too is all the schedules coming together – you know if Anthrax is in an album cycle then we know it’s not gonna happen for a year or two and then Johnny (John Tempesta) is in The Cult and they are constantly on the road and Joey’s got Armored Saint and they just made a new album, so life happens with the other bands and the major projects that each one of us is involved in. So we knew it was gonna happen at some point and I guess more than anything it just happened when it could. But as you say things did slow down with the pandemic so maybe that gave us a little pause and a moment to go “OK I’m not travelling off with this band or that band and Jim’s got a really great bunch or ideas so let’s hear these and work on them.”
Mark: So that was where things started with the band taking up some of Jim’s ideas?
Pearl: You know what, actually I think we started working on this at first before, because the pandemic was like March 2020 right?
Mark: That’s right.
Pearl: So that was when we were actually in the studio actually recording the songs for the new album. I remember we all got the notice on our phones that L.A. was shutting down which is pretty cool because I think we had been in the studio maybe a week recording the new stuff, and we were all in the ‘live room’ because we all like to play together and record that way. And we had just gotten to the last track and were listening back to the one before that and all of our phones went of and we got the notification ‘Los Angeles is shutting down’ – you know, everybody go home and raid the grocery store then lock yourselves in your bedroom! And we all went “Holy shit… but hold on we only have one more song, maybe we can get that done?”
Mark: (laughs)
Pearl: So the latest single that we just out out – right at the beginning you hear Scott going “The World going to Fucking Hell! We’re making Rock and Roll” that was because we’d all just got the notification that the world was closing down and we weren’t done yet! (laughs)
Mark: What a great story, that clears that up I was going to ask about that!
Pearl: So that was like a real honest moment!
Mark: The album is out on May the 6th and I think people are going to be in for a real treat. The impossibility I guess is that you might get schedules to align again to tour this? Are you even contemplating dates at this stage?
Pearl: Oh yes. We plan on it, but we’re already booked for The Whisky in May and we’re also playing the Welcome to Rockville Festival in Daytona Florida also in May, in just a few weeks actually. But beyond that teh Summer is kind of out as Anthrax just announced they have a Tour with Black Label and Hatebreed, and Joey’s going to be out with Merciful Fate and John is doing Cult date so we tried to squeeze some in to coincide with the album release before everyone takes off with their individual things. But we will all come back together and it looks like maybe Fall, Winter or the beginning of next year for real touring and travelling with Motor Sister.
Mark: It’s a wonderful story and I must admit that I completely missed Mother Superior – I wasn’t even aware of them until that first Motor Sister record, but I loved that so much I started digging and thought – “Wow these guys have eight albums – that’s fantastic!” I just couldn’t believe that a band that was that good had passed me by and I really enjoyed digging into that back catalogue. Did you have any favourite tracks? And did they all make that first album?
Pearl: Those are some of my favourites but there are plenty more songs that I loved that didn’t go on the album. We did put one more cover on this new one….
Mark: ‘Rolling Boy Blues’ the final track.
Pearl: Yeah, because we had planned to put in on the first one or maybe we just forgot it, I cant remember, but we made sure to do it this time round!
Mark: I’m glad you did, I love that song and I love it to close the album. Another album that passed me by was your second album from 2018 which I only discovered last year during lockdown I think. ‘Heartbreak and Canyon Revelry’ – I’m finding all these wonderful albums, it was one if not the only highlight of lockdown aside from reading a lot more than usual. I love the Country Bluesy feel to that record. Have you got anything planned solo on the horizon? Maybe another album down the road?
Pearl: Yeah, its funny you ask, I’ve just recently been getting some offers to play with my solo band, so you know it’s possible that I might be picking that back up again. It’s funny because that second album I did was very different from the first one – the first was really Rock and the second one like you said, we called it California Country Rock and Roll! I guess we had a more Eagles kind of vibe, that sort of thing. But both of them come from very honest places in me, those are two very big parts of me. The second one was very definitely influenced by the fact that I had my son I was maybe not as… (laughs) I was probably really tired! (laughs) but maybe not as angry! You know I was feeling different stuff so different music was coming out. I do like them both separately. But I am really excited to be able to et back to doing the harder Rock stuff live because I had been doing live gigs with the music from ‘Heartbreak and Canyon Revelry’ which does lean more towards a Country flavour. I was coming for Country artist like Cody Jinks for a few runs then I started writing Country music with and for other country artists with Cody and Ward Davis – he recorded a song called ‘Threads’ that we wrote together. I wrote with Sonny Sweeney, Erin Enderlin, Erin Viancourt, so I was doing that for a while… but I really am a Rock and Roll soul, so I’m really excited to plug it in and grit my teeth again!
Mark: (laughs) I’m so glad to hear that. And I guess that’s inescapable growing up with music all around you as you did? What were your first loves musically?
Pearl: Oh my gosh. Well I grew up with a lot of Soul. my Mom always played a lot of Soul music: a lot of Ray Charles and Otis Redding and Aretha Franklin. And of course a lot of Rock and Roll: Rolling Stones, Bob Dylan and of course Janis Joplin and Meat Loaf. And also my oldest and best friend for my whole life is the youngest daughter of Dianna Ross so I grew up seeing a lot of Dianna up close and personal performing. So I grew up knowing and performing her music, and I’ve always been a huge R’n’B fan, a huge Soul fan and my Grandpa loved Country music and I love all kinds of Rock and Roll. Of course when I was a teenager I was dyed in the wool Hair Metal!
Mark: Like we all were!
Pearl: (laughs) But that question is so hard for me because my love of music and different genres and different songs spans such a broad spectrum. But Stevie Wonder. I guess it is always going to come back to Soul. Soul and early Rock and Roll – Beatles, The Rolling Stones and Ike and Tina (Turner), Ike and Tina has one foot on both Soul and Rock and Roll. They’re all together, Rock and Roll comes from The Blues.
Mark: I agree, it’s like my hero Steve Marriott said there’s only two types of music – good music and bad music.
Pearl: He’s mind-blowing! One of the best Rock and Roll singers that ever lived! I agree.
Mark: Sadly gone 31 years yesterday I think, I can’t believe it. I saw him play at a very small vebue about a year before he died and I just grinned all the way through, I couldn’t stop smiling. I’ve only been moved to tears a couple of times by a musician’s passing – Steve of course and then earlier this year Meat Loaf. I remember having my very first real kiss to a Meat Loaf album!
Pearl: (laughs) You’re not the first person to say that! (laughs) Yeah, jumping back to Steve Marriott for a while I know you must have heard of Rivals Sons
Mark: Absolutely, a wonderful band.
Pearl: Jay Buchanan, he’s a friend of ours but it doesn’t stop me being a dorky fan of theirs! I love them so much, and they covered ‘Black Coffee’ have you heard that?
Mark: I have it’s a great version and of course the Humble Pie version itself was a cover of an Ike and Tina song! There’s that connection that’s wonderful like you said before.
Pearl: I love Steve Marriott and I think that Jay did a great job too!
Mark: He did a great job. Steve was a great artist and writer in his own right but also a great interpreter of other people’s songs. I think Jay and Rival Sons are one of those few bands around today that really get it, that really appreciate the history and respect where music has come from. I think that’s missing in a lot of bands. Listening to ‘Get Off’ and talking to you today I just know that you have that love and respect too, but also that you appreciate where it all comes from. I think that gives an authenticity that you can’t fake when it comes from the right place – the heart.
Pearl: Yeah, it’s not contrived at all, it’s just what comes out of us. And I think that’s what Rival Sons does too. It’s not a concerted effort for us, there’s no “Let’s try and sound like….Thin Lizzy!” because that doesn’t work, if it’s ‘try hard’ it’s not gonna pass. I know on the new album you can hear obvious influences on certain tracks, you know. Like I mentioned Thin Lizzy, AC/DC of course, Kiss. But like I said, all of us in the band are all such great friends and we’ve all known each other for 1000 years and we’ve all spent way more time in social environments, hanging out with each other and having drinks. And then the guitars come out and it’s inevitable that Kiss songs will be played all night on the living room floor! And Thin Lizzy too, it oozes from us! That’s just what happens! It’s organic, you know what I mean! So it’s really cool to hear that it feels natural to the audience.
Mark: That’s funny as that’s just how I imagined it came together – you all sitting down and jamming the songs together. It’s great to hear that you record n the band room too because it certain sounds like you do, it’s wonderful to hear. Do you have any particular favourites on the record? I’ve been listening for a couple of weeks now and my favourite changes pretty much every day. Today I was playing ‘Pain’ I love that one!
Pearl: That one’s killer! That one’s heart wrenching! And that one is really fun to sing. I love all of them really but I particularly love ‘Pain’ those type of songs really rise a little more to the top of my brain and I get really excited. ‘Right There, Just Like That’ I had that one with my son in teh car today as the gigs are coming and I have to go back and remember the lyrics! (laughs) I haven’t sung that one in a while so we were listening to it in the car, and that one might be a dangerous one to listen to while you’re driving (laughs) because its such a ‘chugga, chugga, chugga’ you now driving song!
Mark: I know what you mean, that’s another great one. What makes a great song, as a song-writer you sort of touched on it when you mentioned you had been writing for other people. But what does a song have to have to you? What draws you in? To me I think the older I get the more the lyrics become important, not just a big chorus and melody. Or, as I know it’s such a hard question to answer name a song that you think just has everything?
Pearl: You know I’m just going to go with what came right to my brain as a perfect song – ‘Wish You Were Here’ by Pink Floyd is a most perfect song. And I have to give it up for Dad as an album ‘Bat Out of Hell’ is perfect I think , it’s got the most rocking Rock and Roll on it, but it’s also got the most heartbreaking love songs as well. ‘For Crying Out Loud’ – come on! And who else could put “Can’t you see my faded Levis bursting apart” and have that work in a song other than Jim Steinman? You know what I mean? And ‘Heaven Can Wait’ – no way man! It doesn’t get much better than that!
Mark: Amazing. And despite its overblown over the top nature completely timeless!
Pearl: I sang on the road with my Dad for nine years and I can tell you honestly…. every single night I had my breath taken away a little bit when ‘Bat Out of Hell’ would start. That song gets me every single time. That songs is completely undeniably one of the greatest songs ever written, ever, ever, ever. Along with ‘Two out of Three’; ‘All Revved Up’ – forget about it! When that song opens up, you know that fast bit at the end… damn!
Mark: It’s genius and I think it’s one of those albums where every single track takes me back to a place, or a particular emotion, or a particular point in time, and few albums I think are meaningful enough to be able to do that.
Pearl: Absolutely.
Mark: A huge loss I once queued up for three hours for Meat’s autograph when he played Melbourne once!
Pearl: I’m sure you made it though because he was famous for never leaving until the last person had their thing signed.
Mark: He signed my ‘Bat Out of Hell’ it has pride of place on the wall. Just a couple of questions before we leave you. The first is: If you could have been a fly on the wall for the creation of any album from any point in history, just to see how the magic happened in the studio, what would you love to have seen being made?
Pearl: ‘Blood on the Tracks’ Bob Dylan. Joni Mitchell ‘Blue’. Aretha ‘Live in Paris’ that wasn’t really in the studio, that was live if I can have it? Van Morrison ‘Moondance’. Tina Turner ‘Private Dancer’ I don’t think I would have liked to have seen Ike in action (laughs)
Mark: (laughs) Yes I’ll pay those. Interestingly one of the first shows I ever saw was Tina Turner right at the start of that tour in a little 200 seater theatre. She’d just released it and two weeks later it was number one all over the world! It was crazy.
Pearl: Incredible. I love her so much. And Michael Jackson ‘Off the Wall’ I’d love to have seen that being created, but there are so many.
Mark: Yes I’d love to have seen Quincy (Jones) at work I guess on any of his albums. We’ll leave you with a really easy one: what is the meaning of life?
Pearl: (laughing) what is the meaning of life? To… to… how do I word that? To find enough love in yourself to learn how to love others.
Mark: Beautiful. What a great way to close. Everyone should be checking out May 6th Metal Blade Records ‘Get Off’ all new original music by Motor Sister. Thank you so much for your time today Pearl talking to The Rockpit, we promise not to leave it so long next time.
Pearl: Thank you Mark, I appreciate it!
Mark: Stay safe!
