 Jimmy K here, Metal Voice. Look at this. The Metal Voice shirts are now on sale, just go to the video description to find out on how you can purchase one. Metal! Welcome to Metal Voice, today on the show, Alan. Who do we have, Alan? Hey, it's been too long since you've had Mark on. The voice, the voice himself, Mark Staracci of Crocus fame, of course. You know what, you guys, I was just going through everything I have that's Crocus and you know, I was just going through everything and you know, just listening to everything, just to remember, you know, what a big fan I was and how I've been and it's still going. It's still going. The quality, Jim, the quality of the video is much better than the last time we had Mark on. It was the early days of Skype. We're going back probably 10 years now and it was very grainy and I'm glad that the technology caught up to us. Well, me and Mark had it. He just turned me on to it. Thank you, Jimmy. So, Mark, you know, thank you so much for jumping on today. You know, for me and Alan, you know, you're sort of, I don't know what the, how do we phrase this, Alan? This is somebody we always loved, legend, legend. That's what it is. It's love. Thank you very much. So, I guess we could start off, there's a solo album. I mean, can you talk about that? Can you tell us about what's going on there? I can only tell you what I know. Well, that'll help. Well, if you don't know, who does? You want to know, should I start at the beginning? But it's a long story. You know, as long as you've got, I don't know whatever you want to do. I mean, 20 years ago, I wrote, I wrote the title song of the album, Live and Let Live, you know. Wait a minute. No. Wow. I'll do what you did. And there we go. That's cool. All right. Back to you. This is, these are all, I painted all these, so these are going to be a part of the backdrop and the album title, but they're going to be slightly bigger for the stage, you know. I could hope so. You'll have a spinal tap situation. Yeah. The pyramids. Yeah. No, no. So, Live and Let Live was written with this guitar player who is a neighbor of mine, was a neighbor of mine, and I used to go over to his place, little studio, cold or rainy days and icy days, and we spent hours writing songs and came out with about 20 of them. And this is one of them, which fits for the album. And it's the opener. It's going to be the live opener. Live and Let Live. There you go. You know, it's great, great song. It's quite a doof daf, doof daf, doof daf, good opener, you know. Not headhunter. I'm not trying to, not trying to be like Crocus at all, you know. But anyway, so many years later, I, we re, did the reunion and I've been busy with Crocus. And as soon as lockdown started, and I first did some stuff, which I put on YouTube and Facebook, some karaoke stuff, which I found, and did duets with my daughter, Juliana, and we split. She's now, you know, oops, something came in. Don't worry about that. And yeah, then I went on, after that phase with Juliana, I kind of fell in a hole of the lockdown boredom, you know, and I thought, no way, I'm going to get creative. I opened my drawer, you know, a pile of lyrics, you know, bits and pieces, leftovers, new stuff. And I thought, well, I've got enough material, and I need a guitar player. So this guy, I got in touch with, he's a new castle in England. We started communicating about ideas. He'd send me ideas and send him feedback and fit lyrics and build songs and stuff. And so we built quite a few, you know, and and then so I already went in contact with a couple of musicians whom I got to know whilst doing this big event film series for television in 2019. And this thing came out during lockdown. But what I was saying last year, while we were filming this, I also started thinking, well, we're on a farewell tour and I don't really want to stop, you know. So, yeah. And this thing came out during this contest, right? Is everybody sings each other's songs? Is that what it was? Exactly. It was a show. That's right. That's it. Who sang headhunter? Who sang headhunter? Nobody. Nobody. What crocus song did they sing, like from you? I said Bedsong Radio and Who the Woman. Okay. All right. Yeah. You know, Who the Woman was done by Francine Yordie. And she's like from the Chanson thing. And she said, Who the Woman? Who the Woman? Who the Woman? Wow. And yeah. So this thing came out, you know, which helped reduce the boredom. And in between, I was writing songs. And then I got to know these two other guys, the drummer and rhythm guitarist. And they also produced the whole music side of Sing My Song. Let's go. Sing My Song. Sing My Song. Yeah. Yeah. And so, and they asked me during the filming stuff, you know, in between, you know, you should do a solo album now. It's going to be over with Crocus, you know. What you're going to do? I said, Well, I don't know yet. It's not over until it's over. And I'm still enjoying it. So I'm not thinking that far. Taking it, you know, carpet DM, you know, day by day, because you never know what tomorrow brings. And too much planning sometimes you do it for nothing. Too much overthinking is unhealthy, anyway. So anyway, I came to that point. And then I called them, said, Guys, you want to do it because I really enjoyed working with you. You know, especially I realized when I took the songs from the other guys and wanted to make them to fit to my style, or not even, not 100%, you know, but at least a couple of them. There was one song called Devil on your shoulder. So I picked that one up and I thought I can, you know, rock that one up and with their help, you know, it was really good to, it came out really good. And so we started and at the beginning of, at the end of last year, they already sent me two, two ideas. And beginning of this year, they sent me some more and I was got busy working, working with the demos and stuff. And here we are. It's ready. It's all recorded and it's in the mix. And I wrote down the names of the guys who played on it. I mean, okay, so describe the musical direction on this. Is this metal? This is, is this another headhunter? Is this a blitz? What is this? None of it all. None of the above. What is it? Completely new. It's kind of, it's, it's energetic, heavy, melodic, hard rock. And there's also a couple of ballads. You know, I'm a singer. We love ballads. And then there's something out of the ordinary. It's a blues song, which is not the typical blues song, which is like something I saw as a challenge when they sent me that, that music, I thought, what, you know, it doesn't really fit. But then I thought blues is always within inside the rock family, you know, it's part of the rock. The body of rock always has blues in there, you know, as opposed to jazz, maybe, you know, although that's also integrated sometimes. But then, and then there's this one song, I think it's going to be the last one on the album, which is quite acoustical, you know, and more lighthearted and paradise, you know, time just flies under a midnight sun, you know, it's great, great stuff. I mean, I'm saying it's great because I've worked for it and I'm emotionally involved with it. But people around us and around me have been telling me I'm on the right track and it's the results are good. So now I'm still, you know, nervous and excited for the release date, you know, 8th of December, we're doing the first gig in the mascot in Zurich, the first gig. Scorpions, you're opening up for the Scorpions, right? Yeah, but that's next year. Oh, yeah, yeah, I'm so happy about that. Wow. Yeah, yeah. Do you have a previous relationship with them that made it easier or is it? Yeah, Scorpions and I go back to the days when they produced some of their early works, you know, Rock Me Like a Hurricane with Dieter Dirks in Cologne, Germany. And in those days, I was with the band T, TVA, a progressive rock band, melodic and heavy. And Dieter signed us up as kind of experimental guinea pig, you know, to use his new gadgets on and effects and stuff, because it fit fitted more to our music than maybe other bands and stuff. But anyway, it was an experience. And it was like my first big step into the professional world, you know, where you write songs, do demos, go record the stuff and go on tour, you know, the whole circle. And we did that, we kept it going for like seven years, you know. But then we got the seven year itch and every moment is his own way. So there's that. So did you ever actually, were you in the studio with the Scorpions at the same time? Is that, is that where the connection is? Yeah, well, you know, we were there recording and sometimes they'd drop in to say hi from Cologne, I guess, or wherever. And so we met or maybe they had a meeting with Dieter about something else. And then we later on met, I think it was the last T tour. This was in London. We were on the road with our truck and bus, and they were going the same way, I guess. So we met on an autobahn, on an autobahn restaurant, you know, a freeway restaurant. And so we exchanged, you know, a long time no see fancy meeting you here in the middle of nowhere or freeway in England, you know. And so there was a relationship and we opened for them. And I also opened for them with Crocus a couple of times. And I met them later on when I did an album called Blue. And Klaus Mein and well, all of them really, they thought they said that cover you did of you know, Percy Sledge, when a man loves a woman. Wow. That's, they really liked it and said, you know, it's going to take me places. But then the whole project landed, took a bad turning for, you know, business, business, business, wrong business decisions and stuff. And, and I mean, you know how it is, an album even back then has a limited time and after that, you know, you can scratch it. But then there was a re-release later on by Sony, no, by BMG, about seven years later. And we put the band back together. Vic Versa and myself, we wrote the bulk of the songs together and we were produced by Robert Popst in Munich. So, and we did a tour and didn't have the expected results. So we went our ways and then came Crocus reunion, you know, life goes on. But looking forward to playing with the Scorpions, I really love the music. So it's Storaci, it's Storaci, that's playing with the Scorpions. That's just everybody clear. It's the Storaci band, right? Storace. Storace. Do you say Versace or Versace? I don't know. What should I say? You don't know. Okay, do you say Liberace? Liberace. Liberace. Okay, yeah. Okay, that's the other side of the phone. So I don't, I got it all confused. Do you want to say? It's Storace, I know. Storace. Storace. Storace. That's, that's the right pronunciation. The voice. It's an Italian name, you know. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, okay, so the Scorpions have been retiring now for the last 10 years. Yeah. Is this going to be the same thing with Crocus? Like, okay, everybody has this trend. They're always retiring, right? And I get it. You don't want to leave the stage. I get it, you know, but. Yeah, apparently, it's quite serious with Crocus, actually with some members anyway. And, you know, I'm not one of those. And I think Chris isn't one of them either. Chris Bonrore would like to, first of all, we owe still, we owe the other side of the pond a tour. Yeah, yeah. And we, we had to do Mexico as well, which we'd love to do in Canada. So I mean, I hope we can do it. Now that I've been working on my solo stuff, I'm going to do a load of gigs here. And the USA is calling for a few gigs as well. So if I don't come over with Crocus, I'm going to be over by myself, maybe by next autumn. And hopefully then Crocus will, will follow suit in 2023, you know, would be nice. Yeah, yeah. And I'll still have a voice because I'm not going to stop, you know, hopefully. Thank you. What about the documentary? Crocus has a documentary. What stage are you at? Well, it's my document. Oh, it's your documentary. Okay. It's about my, me, and of course, Crocus, we've got Che. Che. You only have to do is remember Che Guevara. All right, Stora Che. Anyway, yeah, no, no, I've got this documentary I'm working on. We're so far behind, unfortunately due to COVID because the idea was to go down to Malta and do a few interviews there, maybe get 10 minutes coverage, you know, and then go to London, you know, go follow my old footsteps, you know, and meet a couple of people, maybe from Easy Money or whatever. The band I had in London, we did the pub rounds in those days. And that was just before I joined Crocus. And then obviously come to Switzerland and do the whole thing like the tea thing and the Crocus thing. And then, you know, maybe go to a couple of spots in Europe and come over the big pond and go to a couple of spots there and do some filming and tell some stories there, you know, maybe have some guests or make it as interesting that I can do it through all the people who are still alive that I can invite to talk, you know, make a part of it to make it interesting, you know. And so that we're in a stage where we're going to Malta now on the first November for four days and we'll film on the second and third. It's going to be jam-packed, you know, full schedule and we can rest when we can fly back home. That's where we're at right now. And do you have a release date? Like, do you have a goal? Like it's going to come out by 2022? No. We did, but we abandoned it because in the meantime now, SEP, SEP Sutter, he's the director and he learned his ropes in Munich working there for a long time. And now he's retired and he said he only wants to do stuff which he would love to do and he approached me. It was his idea and I said, yeah, that sounds great. And we had a schedule, we had a goal and off, you know, fell down with COVID. And in the meantime he got involved in my solo project and he already did the first trailer which is with the intro of Live and Let Live on it. So that was a help, you know, coming soon and did a great job there. And a couple of days ago, we did the first video which is a video of Live and Let Live, you know. Okay, good. So he's coming. It's not like a James Bond thing, is it? Live and Let Live? Great song. Wow. And then there's what's the new one called Live, Don't Say. Die and Live Tomorrow. I never say. It's always something like that. Never say die. Live on. Live and Let Live. Well, that opens many discussions. Live and Let Live. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So the new album, Mark, is it a worldwide release where you'll be able to get it in North America? Yeah. My manager, Roli Egli, you want to know some background on Roli? He was the drummer in Tee. Okay, there's a connection there. Dall in the family. He's very academic, you know, and, you know, he knows so much, so much. And we still have a relationship. We started doing rock circus together, like ages ago when you look back today. And now, after that, we did this in a big circus tent, you know, rock circus. And you can only squeeze a thousand people in there. But it's like a cabaret kind of rock atmosphere people really get into it. And now he's produced his own show. It's called This Is Rock. And we've got shows coming up around in December, no, no, sorry, over New Year. We're playing, we'll have the dates up on my website as soon as possible, which will be pretty soon. I want to ask you, so what is the chances, like Crocus would record another album, at least if they're not going to tour? But they didn't even want to do that when they were, when we were still together without any thought of splitting up. And I was always like, hey, hey, hey. I love doing the studio stuff, you know, the whole writing, getting up in the middle of the night and with an idea and you write it down, stuff like it's like it becomes a part of you. And I don't know, I don't know, maybe the only, the closest I got is I was down at Chris's place in the Solethorne, we were doing this interview because we're both, we both become 70. I'm already 70 now in on the 7th of October, and he becomes 70 on the 22nd. Don't tell me it's today. It is today. It may be. The 21st. We're good. We're good. We're good. We were doing this. That was that email you got before. I forgot my birthday. Okay, go ahead. So, yeah. Yeah, we were doing this interview and in his living room, he's got this grand piano one. And they said, you know, would you like, will you sit at the piano, you guys, and pretend you're doing something? And they started slick, slick, slick, slick, slick, slick, you know, like open up beer. And Chris played a few chords and I started singing to it. The lyrics just flowed out. This ballad and he immediately took his, took his mobile phone and put it there and recorded a bit of it. So who knows, maybe that's going to be a spark that started the fire, you know. Because you did. I mean, you did. I'm a positive thinker. But Mark, I'm trying to understand, like you did, was it, that was that Hellraiser, which album did you record by yourself where the other original members weren't on, right? With Chris and I mean, Yeah, but I took an ex-member. I took Mandy Meyer. You took Mandy. But I mean, how did you, like, can you not do the same thing? Can you not? I don't know. I'm just asking here. I mean, can you not just create another Crocus album the same way with Mandy or or is it just not politically right to do it right now to go there? I mean, right now anyway, because we're not officially finished. We are in Europe. But who knows what's going to happen. Maybe 2023 we'll be back on the monsters of rock cruise and that, you know, light the fire and start the whole forest burning. You know, one thing for sure is, you know, Fernando will not, cannot, for health reasons, take the flight over the big pond. He doesn't want to do the big tour thing. And at the most, he would, you know, do the short flights we have in Europe or take the train and do gigs because he loves, he loves playing. He loves going on stage, you know, and I think he will never, ever sign a record contract again in his for the rest of his life. So, but there, you know, I didn't, you know, for my solo thing, I'm doing, doing everything with Rolly, him and I together without the record company, you know, because, well, Switzerland, you know, they're so poppy, you know, and if he says I heavy melodic hard rock, not, not even heavy metal, you know, hard rock, they just step away from you like you've got corona without all right. So I'm going to leave you with this mark. I'm on the plane. I told Alan this before I'm on the plane going to Switzerland. I'm probably maybe 15 years old. And back in the day, they had those, those headphones, but they look like the doctor had stethoscope. You remember that? I was probably on KLM. No, not KLM. I was on Swiss air and they had those funny headphones that you plug in and every channel going to Switzerland was yodeling. Every channel I turn and they were yodeling, yodeling, yodeling, and then, and then crocus. And then back to yodeling and yodeling, yodeling, and then crocus. So it was yodeling and crocus. That's what they were offering us Canadians as we were going to Switzerland. Can you believe that? No, but, but that's still popular. I was just, I was just shocked that I get the, I get the yodeling on the plane, but then crocus comes on. So you guys are a national band, you know, and I mean, on the airlines, they're playing crocus. Yes. Now you would turn to one more, more and more, Jim, you get got hard would be playing. Yeah, that's it. That's it. But I'm just trying to say the magnitude of how popular crocus was. They're playing your music on Swiss air flight from Montreal to Switzerland. Amazing. Isn't it? That's in 1980. It was probably, the song was American Woman actually. That's what they were playing. Yeah, it's amazing. Yeah, in the USA, they, we were used 1984 for an advert on a Volkswagen advert. And one of the astronauts that went up onto the moon, not the first time. The third time. He had a cassette, a cassette for crocus songs. Yeah, that's cool. That's cool. Amazing. What else? Yeah, there's a couple of things like that. Mark, we're going to have to cut the short. We're going to have to cut it. And we're going to do a part two because we got to get back to our work here in Canada. Appreciate all the time. Thank you so much. I'm happy we got the zoom working. Yeah, me too. Thanks for turning me on too. You got it. And we'll do this again very soon. Just send me. Yeah, closer to the release date. That would be great. Yeah, we'll continue all of this. So the video we'll be able to see it soon, the video? The video. Yeah, it'll be cut. I've got it all here, but I'm, you know, it's too early to, to let the cat out of the bag. It should all go in one day and the websites should be ready. And then the video will, will hit the screens and I'll do more interviews and stuff like that. And you know, we'd like to start with a bang. Now it's like a little bit trickling water, you know, and thanks a lot for talking with me. Any time. It's always a pleasure, Mark, to be with you. And we can do another one just before the release. Absolutely. That would be great. Yes. We open the floodgates. The water comes rushing through. Exactly.