DATE OF INTERVIEW:

TRAGEDY

30th May 2012

MO'ROYCE PETERSON

METAL DISCOVERY: So what’s the most random experience you’ve had with a fan on tour?

MO’ROYCE: [laughs]

(Mo'Royce Peterson on Tragedy's quest for world peace)

"We bring people together...we can probably bring peace to the Middle East. We can maybe make the English stop hating the Welsh!"

Mo'Royce Peterson backstage at the Academy, Liverpool, UK, 30th May 2012

Photograph copyright © 2012 Mark Holmes - www.metal-discovery.com

Interview & Photography by Mark Holmes

RELATED LINKS

Tragedy Official Website:

TRAGEDY DISCOGRAPHY

We Rock Sweet Balls and Can Do No Wrong (2008)

Albums

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Thanks to Chris Dean for arranging the interview

Humbled By Our Greatness (2011)

Tragedy Official MySpace:

Tragedy Official Facebook:

MD: There’s a long list I bet! Or like the weirdest gift from a fan…

MO’ROYCE: I’ve got a good one for you. My band mate was walking down the street and a fan walked up to him and said: “I really fancy Mo’Royce.” She was wearing a rubber bracelet and she said: “A rubber bracelet around a woman’s wrist represents her vagina.” She took it off and said: “I want you to give that to him.”

MD: And what city was this in?

MO’ROYCE: This was in Newcastle.

MD: Interesting.

MO’ROYCE: I don’t know what you make of that but now you think all the women of Newcastle are like that, huh?

MD: Nah, Geordies are all lovely people. I’ve read you consider yourselves honorary Geordies because the first gig you ever sold out over here was in Newcastle?

MO’ROYCE: Yeah.

MD: Is there always a big crowd in Newcastle for you then?

MO’ROYCE: Yeah, Newcastle’s great.

MD: Always giving you vagina wristbands?!

MO’ROYCE: [laughs] Some variation of that happens everywhere we go!

MD: Okay, so I have a few comments from the web that people have written about Tragedy if I can run ‘em past you. Someone said on YouTube under a video clip: “Great show at the Bowery Ballroom, I’m over 60 and that’s the most fun I’ve had with my pants on.” Is that feedback standard; you get a lot of older people saying stuff like that?

MO’ROYCE: Yeah, but usually they don’t say it with their pants on!

MD: This one’s from your Facebook page, someone said: “My friend had so much fun at Tragedy last night he went home & pissed on his brand new Mac book pro! A $2500 piss!” Does that fill you with joy that your music incites people to urinate over expensive computer equipment?!

MO’ROYCE: We don’t take any responsibility for people’s technology or anything!

MD: But it’s still a nice reaction to get though. You’re making people that excited, they…

MO’ROYCE: I know. People lose control, you know. They’re gonna whip it out and who knows what’s gonna happen.

MD: Another comment from YouTube: “The sheer amount of metal-ocity these guys are generating is approaching the Dio Threshold. If they ever jammed with Tenacious D or Dethklok, the apocalypse may be upon us. And it would kick ass.” What’s your reaction to that; do you think that’s true?

MO’ROYCE: It may be true but we don’t wanna see the apocalypse in our lives. We’re just trying to bring the love. We’re trying to bring world peace. We bring people together. When we started in New York City, we had the disco gangs and the metal gangs and every night there’d be knife fights and people cutting each other up. Guys would end up at hospital and getting buried in the ground. And then we came along and we made peace between these rival factions and we think if we can do that, we can probably bring peace to the Middle East. We can maybe make the English stop hating the Welsh!

MD: That’d be good. And vice versa.

MO’ROYCE: No, the Welsh love the English.

MD: And sheep.

MO’ROYCE: Ohhh, why does everyone say that?!

MD: I know, that’s terrible. I don’t actually mean that at all; I don’t know why I said that!

MO’ROYCE: Our first tour manager, when we were driving into Wales… “sheep fuckers!” And then, every five seconds, “sheep fuckers!”

[laughs]

MD: One final comment here from YouTube, someone said: “Can anyone trump the might of Tragedy?” Do you think that’s rhetorical or can you think of anything?

MO’ROYCE: [laughs] That’s rhetorical, of course!

MD: Marvellous! So would you describe Tragedy as a guilty pleasure or the best metal tribute band in the world that everyone should freely admit to liking?

MO’ROYCE: I would say yes to both. I mean, really, if you think about your guiltiest pleasures, and they’re really your greatest pleasures. It depends, you know, it’s really between you and your lover what you want to admit to.

MD: Of course, yeah. My final question, if you decided to start all over again and transform into a different metal tribute act, who would be your next target?

MO’ROYCE: Well, we do that occasionally. Our latest conquest is Abba where we transform into Black Abbath.

MD: So that’s Abba combined with Black Sabbath or just a generally metalised Abba?

MO’ROYCE: [laughs] Well, you can judge for yourself. What else are we? We’re Bad Girls, the number one heavy metal tribute to Donna Summer in the entire universe. And the Saturday Night Beavers, the number one heavy metal tribute to the music of ‘Saturday Night Fever’ other than the Bee Gees…in the entire universe!

MD: Great stuff. Okay, so thank you very much for your time.

MO’ROYCE: Pleasure.