Mushroomhead - STAGE THREADS Ep. 8

So this one's got a wet specimen in it. I add my fun bullets. I find a patch that I like. I like to make a really gory one. So this is this year's. It's a little bit darker than last year's. What's up? I'm Jackie LaPonza. I'm one of the singers in the band Mushroomhead. And if you don't know who we are, let me give you a little bit about our stuff that we do. We are a very theatrical band. We love our wardrobe. We love costuming. The guys wear masks on stage. Everything's in-house. We do everything from top to bottom, start to finish. We are the team. We have a new album out. It's called Call the Devil. And we're going to run through everything from the stage gear to the masks to the hats that we wear on stage for stage threads with digital tour bus. So Skinny and I live back here, and we have our wardrobe back here. So we're going to start here, and then we'll take you to the rest of the guys' stuff. On this side, we have Skinny's red set. So this is part of the Call the Devil touring gear. All black and red. Everything was black and red. And it looks great. Works great. Some of the hats that I do, I try to match to the wardrobe and whatever we have on stage for the night. I also match them to the mask colors. There's sets, different sets, different ways. Always something new. So these hats start off as like a blank base. I get them anywhere from gas stations to truck stops to tractor supply to Goodwill. This one was from Goodwill because I'm having the hardest time finding my bases on this tour. So we got a hat from Goodwill. I'm going to see if I can make it work, which I will. Same with the gas mask. I'm working on a little gas mask. It's not done yet, but it's started. It'll probably be in one of the shows coming up. So I take the blank base. I do some spray painting. I do some hand painting on them. I add my fun bullets. I find a patch that I like. I even add the string. I have specialty little beads that I put on them to hold the string. A lot of them don't have any of the beads or the string. I'll sign all of them. I add spikes. Sometimes I add piercing earrings. Different little things I find around anywhere. Sometimes pins go on. Yeah, it's all kind of random, however I'm feeling for the days. The mask I make for the night. So actually, this is my newer vest I made, and it's got some of my favorite patches on it. I know it's probably not the nicest, but I like embracing being a woman, and I like embracing the dumb slang, slur, whatever terrible words that they use. I use them as powerful words instead of downing people. Giddy up, sluts. Come on. Let's do this. I've got my T-Rex on here. I've always loved T-Rex. I always call it my spirit animal. Just different patches I've used. I'm big into guns. I like to shoot, so I put my special forces up there. I'm a huge animal lover, lots of dogs, so canine unit, more gun patches. Obviously my bullets that I use and my hats as well. Star Wars. I'm sure we have some Star Wars fans. And then flip it over. And a patch like this doesn't exist because we only have black and white or red and black, but I paint mine so that it's the color that I choose. Then on the back of this, a lot of people call me Jax, like Donnie always calls me Jax, and it's just a nice, simple name instead of Miss Jackie. So Jax works if you call me out and call me Jax. These are my staple. If you've seen me on stage with any wardrobe, I usually have this belt specifically and a pair of suspenders. It's just kind of my thing. It's always kind of been my thing for years upon years. I don't know why. I just like it. I like extra flair. And this, we just went to David Perry's Music Museum, Perry's Music Museum yesterday, and he had one of my old wardrobes hanging up. And I looked at him and I said, oh my god, it's the vest that fits the best. Can I finish the tour with it? He said, absolutely. So if you see this vest, this was my first original vest that I wore with Mushroom Head for years. It has the desire across the back, and it's just the perfect size that I'm... I don't know why it says a small, and this one also says small on the tag. But somehow, the length of it is much longer and the width of it is much wider, and no matter how much I alter this vest, it will not fit. Properly. So I'm really happy to be allowed to wear this one again, and I'm going to wear it tonight. Even though it doesn't have all the flair on it. It's the Rothko vest. We love our Rothko vest. But I'm assuming this must be a youth. But I don't know how I fit a youth small. Either way, it's right, and I love it. And it's back in my possession for now. Until I give it back. But we'll get there. We're going to get another one. So this one will be eventually up for sale, just because it doesn't really fit great. But it has a lot of my personal patches and pins on it, which now I have to go hunting for more. So if you've got any cool stuff, send them my way. Here's Skinny's vest for this tour. He's got some extra add-ons to it. I'll just take it down. It says Destroy. He's got extra pieces, parts on it. We have Jessica Haney back at home. She helps go through the wardrobe and make it as special as it is. And here's the jumpsuit that he wears. This is actually one of his original jumpsuits. This is an original jumpsuit. Skinny still has all his original jumpsuits. And every once in a while, he'll pull them out to use them. And because we're using the green jumpsuits on this tour, he pulled out his original. And so his goes with his vest. But I believe the ones that the guys are wearing... Again, something that doesn't fit me properly is the new jumpsuits. So I got my jumpsuit and when I put it on, we're like, yeah, no. It's like you're wearing a big bag. It just doesn't work. So every couple of shows, we switch. And this is my red wardrobe. And it's obviously, again, different than the guys because I want something that fits me properly. So this one, I got this one. Namilia is the vest and then I added to it. And same with the pants. I don't know what the brand is, but I just add to it. Make it our own. And then here's the red pants that go with Skinny's red wardrobe. His red vest over there goes with these guys. And obviously, over time, a lot of pieces, parts fall off of these wardrobe. As soon as we wash them, things start going missing. So they're doing great, actually, for being worn for over a year now. It's always a gamble when we throw them in the wash. Try to fold them inside out and zip them up and see what happens. All right, so we did the back of the bus where Skinny and I have some of our wardrobe. Now we're backstage in our green room. And we can show you some masks and the other guys' wardrobe. So there's a few of us artists. Aiden, myself, Skinny, Victor, Jess, Joe. Everybody's kind of in on this. It's a team effort. We're all huge into art. Everybody does their part, for sure. From pouring to sculpting to painting to fabricating. There's a lot of steps along the way. All right, well, first off, the boss man, Skinny. Here's his mask for this set. Sick with the dreads. These are all hand-wrapped over his mask. They wear those for a couple songs. Scott, he's got an alternate. He's got the resin mask. I think Victor probably did the center. Yeah, he does 3D prints and ----. This centerpiece always changes, so this time he's got a pentagram. Joe, the Hulk for this ************. It's kind of weird. It falls apart. Yeah, it's hard to hold up. He doesn't like anything on his chin for singing. It's like the Guardian, Cleveland Guardian statue. This is Simon. Yep, killing it on water drums. Mohawk in the eyeball, too, just like the Skinny. Here I am. This one, I mean, the crowns are all different. Everything is custom every time. This is, I take wire, and then I wrap it in cheesecloth, and then I put all the bird skulls on, covered in some resin, and then painted up. This one is just a solid gloss black. Pretty sick. Just painted the mask. I painted the crown and fabricated all of it. Dr. F. Ryan. The Batman. Sick, always sick. And then Scotty. Scotty the dummy. Yep. This is his other mask, so he'll wear those, too, tonight. With the jaw, so we leave a little bit of latex on there, and then that's elastic, so the jaw moves just like that. I'll see, like, this is another set. This is a set done by Victor, and it's all the same sculpt with different paint jobs and different accessories. Like, obviously, it's the same mask, different mohawks, different paint jobs. Go through, got the skinny, the Joe, the Scotty, the hawks. You can kind of get it, and then same thing with the Doctor, the Stevie. Then we go into another paint scheme with, obviously, different accessories again, same sculpts. We tend to stick with the same sculpts for an entire album cycle, and then for this, when we redo them, it's more of just a progression of each character. It's the same character, just growing up or morphing slightly. These are my two alternates for the tour, and they're just a little more decked out than the other ones. So this one's got a wet specimen in it, so that's a diaphanized frog. So let me, thank you. So I've got LEDs rigged through the mask, and then usually that phone holds that down. So I'm going to turn that on, and then it comes out the top, right through there. So usually I do a specimen mask each show, or like one or two for tour. I just started it last fall tour, but this one is definitely my favorite. Yeah, and then just the inside is just some adhesive foam. I kind of foam it out different each time. Sometimes the mask is poured thick, so it needs less foam. This one's pretty thin, so I put a lot in there. This one, this is a thicker mask, so I didn't need any foam in it. Just put a lot of cheesecloth on this one, and it was honestly, it was on an off day. We stopped home, so I had like two or three hours or something of just rushing and *******, get it done, I want another mask. So this one came out like that. Usually the ones that you don't even think about come out the best, like when you're just like, get paint on it, get it out. These ones are usually my favorite. So while we're talking about masks, one of our mask sculptors is our very own Joe Gall, who is our guitar player. Masks, one-offs and stuff, but for this album cycle they chose Skinny's mask is my design, and mine of course. But we all make the masks as well and paint them, so from start to finish we can all cast paint. This newer Jason kind of hockey mask thing, I redid from one of our previous sculptors, Jason Kisner. Had like the X faces, teeth were like all biny and stuff, but I just kind of cleaned them up and added the triangles that are on the sides as well. So it's just a little bit more clean, just an updated look a little bit. They're fun. We're all horror fans too. We have a blow-molded head armature called the Ed Head from the Cleveland company that's actually huge in the industry called Monster Makers. It's like a one-size-fits-all head armature, and you just start slapping clay on there, making it to whatever you want it to be. And that molding just involves taking a gypsum compound, it's called Ultra-Cal 30. You can do it with Hydro-Cal too, but it makes a weaker mold and they start to get blurrier quicker. But basically it's just plaster and it turns to stone, and if there's enough shapes on it, like with ducks, ears, and this crazy stuff, the mold has to go around it so you don't undercut yourself because the latex will never go in there without creating bubbles and whatnot. So once you get the mold done, most of the time it will separate perfectly, and you clean all the clay out of it, and then after the moisture gets out of the gypsum, it's ready to pour latex in it. So you just do that, kind of let it sit there, fill it all the way up, let it sit there for about an hour, and then dump it back out, and a day or two later you can pull it out and start painting. Well, for this set, I just figured it's Halloween, man, how can you go wrong with orange and black? And then the first time I saw this band, I don't remember the year, it was probably like 2016, 2017, just as a fan, they had black masks with orange UVX face, and I was like, dude, I just remember being so far away from stage, but seeing how they popped, I was like, this is ******* awesome. So I figured I'd do a little throwback and put my own spin on them and stuff. And then Simon's, his accessory for this one, this mohawk, I think I just took dowel rods and just started breaking them and then taking a Dremel and sharpening them, and then they're just attached from the inside with super glue, and then I latex them in so it's all smooth on the inside. Skinny's is always fun with the dread wraps. Just zone out and wrap dreads. It really makes the mask, you know, like the black dreads would be cool, but it just adds a little bit more pop, and then the gloss black in select areas gives it a little more contrast. Ryan, our bass player, he painted that set in the back. Really muted colors, you know, subtle copper and gray. Definitely a cool set. And then we did a collab, I did my crown on that one, and then I believe Victor did the mohawk on this one. So it's fun to just change it up every mask, you know, like just those little features, just completely change it, you know, going from the bullets to the hair. It's small stuff, but it really changes the whole feel of the mask. I'm a huge horror fanatic. I have monsters tattooed all over me and stuff, so I always try to, like, on these tours, I like to make a really gory one. So this is this year's. It's a little bit darker than last year's, but yeah, I just kind of do some distressing with ink, and I just kind of kept it dark and high contrast, the black on white, and then the red, the blood, I just pour it all over its bladder everywhere. They're super fun. And for some reason, like, the blood on, like, my mask and some others, like, it just gives it another, in photographs and in video, it gives it another look. Like, somehow, like, my implied teeth kind of pop more in here. It looks more like the mouth's open. It's just something that the blood does. Yeah, I love these bloody ones. During one of our, during a couple of our songs, the water drummers wear these extra masks. They're, like, kind of bandaged up patients, kind of. And they wear these helmets with them. And this is kind of a throwback to one of the older members of the band, Schmatz. He used to wear something like this with, like, a flashlight on the side, and sometimes he'd have, like, eyepieces or whatever. But it's just kind of like your standard army helmet or tactical helmet or whatever, and we just kind of adorn them with other pieces that we make in our shop. But they look cool. Extra accessories, different costumes. We love all the theatrical part of it. All right, everybody else is just hanging out. I don't really do that. I kind of just, it's organized chaos, kind of. It's actually folded, so we're fine. There's my red ----. We're wearing this tonight. Jessica Haney makes all this stuff. Mine gets really filthy. My bad. Got the Zildjian patch on the back. Hell yeah. I like that. Yeah, so that's the vest layer. Just a red work shirt. Good and gross. This thing is soaked, so I can't wait to put that on. I got red pants. I don't really wear them because I'm playing drums, so I got these shorts that have been with me since day one. These are my alternate ones. I haven't worn them that much. I think I only wore them on St. Patrick's Day or something, the Static X tour, but I like those ones a lot too. That's just random nonsense. I got an alien in there. Chris gave that to me, some sunglasses, and then just random makeups. And then I don't know where my green stuff is. That's a really good question, honestly. I'll have to find that and get back to you. So this has also been with me since day one. I love this. This is honestly my favorite piece of wardrobe to wear. Just simple, illegal alien. There we are. Yeah, so this one is from Half Baked, I believe. Dude's got that same patch, so we just took it and flipped it upside down. This is just a UFO for highlighting the illegal alien thing. And then I got four, and then I lost one of them, but it was three, so I had 43 for my bullets. But they're gone. And then I got a little Perry's Museum patch. That's pretty sick. I don't even know what that is. I'll play with yours if you play with mine. I don't even know what that's on there, so that's funny. But yeah, there's that. And then a simple green jumpsuit. Everybody's got the same one. That's it. So it's honestly not the greatest because these sleeves always unroll, so I've got to cut those off, but we'll get there. Everybody's got their own personal little patches on things. This is Jenkins, so Joe Gall. I'm sure he'll come over and talk to you about that part-time. There's Scotty's. He's got the little snake that is unbelievably held on tour after tour. So these ones, it's pretty much just the patches that are all different, or the buttons. He's got the Indians and the straight-edge Scotty. And then with the red wardrobe, everybody's kind of got, like, a different layer over their vest. So, like, this, it could come off. I take mine off because it is just so much stuff to play in. It kills me. Everybody's front and back is completely customized. Everything's different. Jessica killed it. Kilt. I don't even know whose that is. I think this is Skinny's. Probably wrong. But, yeah. And we're back to green. And black. There's Stevie's. Insert Fest. Thanks for coming and checking out what we do, what we love, all the stuff that's going to be on these stages. You should come check out on this tour. And Sonic Temple next year, next May. And then we'll be in Europe next year. So, like, yeah, get this out there, get it worldwide, and come check us out at a show. We'll have all new sets of masks, maybe wardrobe even. Who knows? Whole new looks all the time. We're always making stuff. Call the devil. Hell, yeah.