Eagles of Death Metal Frontman Jesse Hughes on New Album ‘Zipper Down’ and Rock Star 101

Brendan Reynolds

Built on a friendship stemming all the way back to a late 1970’s Palm Desert soccer field, lifelong pals Jesse Hughes and Josh Homme form the refreshingly jovial two-headed rock and roll dynamo that is Eagles of Death Metal. Conceived as a tongue in cheek endeavor to fuse Eastern European Death Metal with classic rock super group, The Eagles, Homme and Hughes’ most recent exercise in shameless libido-heavy hard rocking candor, is their latest album “Zipper Down.” The brotherly duo has written/produced four albums together since 2004, in between Homme’s various touring and recording projects with his revered alternative rock band Queens of the Stone Age. Hughes, who serves as the primary songwriter for Eagles of Death Metal and also fronts a solo project called Boots Electric, recently shared a very candid conversation with Entertainment Voice about the group’s origin, his love for making music with his best friend, and the unhinged thoughts of a red-blooded Rock and Roll vet.

How did you and Josh first meet and start playing music together, and how did Eagles of Death Metal come to be?

We met at an underage glory-hole function in Palm Springs. I’m just kidding! We met in 1979 on a soccer field. He was the only other redhead that I saw, and I decided to stick close to him because he was big. We go way back. Joshua is one of my oldest friends, and he is one of the finest men I’ve ever known and I love him very dearly. He’s the best friend I’ve ever had, and he’s the kind of friend that if you were going to say something not nice about him, you’d probably not want to do that around me.

Understood!  That’s pretty great that you guys go that far back and now get to play music together professionally.

Some of my first conversations of any depth about music were with him. And I’ve been there, literally physically been there with him for every epic moment of his life, and vice versa.

You both developed into very accomplished musicians, do you feel your individual musical growth influenced each other as you were coming up?

Well we both love music, and I think it would have been in a different way, but our relationship has undeniably and profoundly influenced each other on many levels. I think without me there’d be no “Make It Wi Chu” and no “Misfit Love,” and without Joshua, there’d be no any in my songs (laughing). Some people have said that I was in Josh’s shadow, but I’ve said I just had it made in the shade. You know riding on coat tails is way easier that walking or climbing up the later.

Well I only know what I’ve heard you guys do on your albums, but it definitely sounds like you both bring equal amounts of power to your music.

An honestly most of the motivation with each part we bring is to see how hard we can make the other dude laugh. You’re not supposed to be able to do that! And to me that’s the only way to do it. Joshua has a concept called “the way it is supposed to be,” and the way we make music is the way it is supposed to be for us.  I have the best job ever. And every second of it is a joyous experience and it is not lost on me. Even the worst day in rock and roll is better than the best day in any other life. So many people want to do this and I get to. So for me to not have a good day is akin to blasphemy, like an outrage toward God, like really?

You and Josh, along with many of your collaborators go by a variety of aliases.  What’s the story behind one or two of the more colorful ones?

Well nicknames for us start off ironic, like a big guy named Tiny or a fat guy Skinny, but for us, our nicknames are hilariously diabolical. I was really small and I got picked on a lot, but if you messed with me, even if it took me the entire career of high school, I was going to get you back. And on one particular getting back moment, Joshua looked at me with sort of shock and disgust and said, “You’re the devil dude.” So that’s how that one came to be. Boots Electric came because I used to rollerblade and all my friends called me Fruit Boots. But when I finally earned the right not to be Fruit Boots, it became Boots Electrified. Josh looks like Baby Huey from the cartoon, the giant fat duck with the red hair, and when he gets pissed he looks exactly like that, so that’s how Fat Duck stuck for him. And we make a lot of them up on the fly like Jay Everett Huge or Jay Double Hommes. Whatever makes you feel like you have a d–k bigger than John Holmes, that’s our policy (laughing).

On “Zipper Down” you guys make use of an eclectic range of sounds and influences.  The back and forth dynamic of your and Josh’s individual styles brings to mind what John and Paul did on Sgt. Pepper’s.

I like what you just said about John Lennon and Paul McCartney, because we do fancy ourselves that way, but we see ourselves more so like Doc Holliday and Wyatt Earp. Lennon and McCartney started to hate each other, and you can tell that their parts are almost to mess with each other. Whereas with Josh and I, when I come to him with a song he’ll already have a guitar in his hand, and say what do you think about this, and it just clicks right away. So it’s like ping-pong, back and forth, and then all of a sudden we have a whole album. And it really is almost like that. Our rule is check your ego at the door and let’s make the best song we can make, and the music will tell you what it wants.  You don’t really have to think too much, or really even have to think at all

That’s great, it’s as if you’re of one brain almost.

Kind of like one brain, or more like the three sisters sharing an eye.

Can you share any general thoughts on the sound and concept behind the making of “Zipper Down”?

I can sum that up really quick, it’s like taking George Clinton, bending him over a couch, and giving it to him is Little Richard as the d–k, and The Sonics and Chuck Berry and The Rolling Stones are the balls, that’s three balls.

(Laughing) That was very concise.

It’s been over a decade since Eagles of Death Metal was born.  What has it been like working on and off with Josh and your other bandmates over the past ten years?

It’s been the greatest joy and honor of my life. I’ve never had to do anything, and I mean this, I am very spoiled, but I have never had to work with anyone but the finest musicians and producers in the business. And for me that’s not lost, I take none of it for granted.  It’s the greatest joy and greatest honor of my life. If the whole shithouse went up in flames right now, I’ve done something with my life that I feel very proud of.

Morrison would have been proud, you’re getting your kicks.

I’m getting my kicks and I never had to be a bloodsucking bullshit asshole politician in the process.

Eagles of Death Metal are unique in that you invite a wide range of musicians to play alongside you, even though you and Josh are the only official members. How does that dynamic affect your songwriting process and what does a typical studio session look like for you guys?

We recorded this album over the course of two years, with an actual logging of recording time of about eight days. So it can be difficult, but difficult is sort of a relative term, because it’s difficult for everyone else, but stoked for Josh and I. A typical day in the studio is like this: Where’s Josh and Jesse? We need to finish this. Uh, they had a jug of gasoline and a drone and they were headed to a whorehouse, so I don’t know, but it sounded fun.

So it took a while to finish but in actual recording time, it went pretty quick?

Just like sex and making a baby dude!

(Laughing) Well said.  And so how does the songwriting and collaborating with other musicians work?

I write everything and I bring it into Josh and he polishes it. When it comes to who we play with, on this album we didn’t have many guests, because we were so hell bent on doing it ourselves and we raised the bar on this album on purpose mostly just to tell people they couldn’t come. Juliette Lewis made it on the album, she did some pretty cool stuff. Also, my baby Tuesday Cross does the most bitchin’ Blondie type go-go girl rap on “Skin-Tight Boogie.” You got to listen to her radio show “Envy the Dead,” her voice is so rad, she has the most bizarrely mesmerizing voice I’ve ever heard. She’s also the bass player in my solo band Boots Electric. And she’s like the smallest girl you’ve ever seen but she literally plays like the biggest bass, it’s kind of rad.

So Boots Electric is your solo project.

You should check out the album I put out called “Honkey Kong” and you will notice that several songs on the new Eagles of Death Metal album comes from that album. You can compare the Beastie Boys produced version of “Complexity” versus the Josh Homme version of “Complexity” on “Zipper Down.” And that’s “Honkey Kong” like King Kong, but a white King Kong, you know what I’m saying.

Eagles of Death Metal‘s new album “Zipper Down” destroys Apple Music Oct 2.