Snot

People are usually standoffish when they hear our name," admits Snot guitarist Mike Doling, "but not after they see us. We can get serious and tear your head off, but we also make fun of everybody, including ourselves. I mean, when you have a name like Snot ... " Singer Lynn Strait agrees: "Our subject matter is either pissed off or funny; there's no in-between." Guitarist Sonny Mayo calls the band "a hardcore lounge act." In late spring 1995, after years of playing in Santa Barbara, Calif.-based groups notable for frowns and fury, Doling decided it was time to get a band together just for fun, to play garage parties. Thus the name Snot, a product of kidding around.

"We never thought we'd go as far as we have," says Doling. "We figured, who would take us seriously? Who would sign a band called Snot?" But Snot began to get a huge response locally, and when they played venues in Los Angeles, audiences lined up around the block. In June 1996, little more than a year after the band formed, they were signed to Geffen Records. Get Some (released May 13, 1997) is Snot's debut album; it was recorded in North Brookfield, Mass., in October and November of 1996 and produced by T-Ray (House of Pain, Helmet). All of the Snots have paid their dues in underground bands. Doling was in the West Coast speed metal outfit Kronix; Strait played bass in the punk band Lethal Dose.

On the East Coast, Mayo was in Silence, a thrash meta ensemble. He later joined bassist John Fahnestock and drummer Jamie Miller in M.F. Pit Bulls. Doling formed Snot - of which he and Strait are the only original members - after Kronix was buried in the grunge avalanche. Music runs in Doling's family: His father was a bassist whose credits include Motown records and Johnny Mathis albums.

Strait was born in Manhasset, N.Y., but landed in Santa Barbara as a teen and immediately embraced the SoCal punk scene. Prior to his work with Snot, he had never sung in a band. "I always wanted to because it seemed like a lot of fun," he says. "But I wasn't into what most bands were playing." Starting from scratch,Strait points out, has been an advantage. "There's nobody to emulate. I won't say what I do is groundbreaking, but some of it is original; there are weird patterns in my vocals, because I got to make up my style as I went along." Fahnestock, meanwhile (who hails from Chambersburg, Pa.), had played guitar since he was 11 and was playing clubs at 16.

But when a friend, Shannon Larkin, the drummer in Wrath Child (later Souls at Zero), needed a bass player for his Kiddie Porn side project,Fahnestock volunteered. (Colorful aside: Fahnestock's father is a part-time professional wrestler known as John Magnum.) Not long afterward, Larkin invited Fahnestock to join him in yet another side project, M.F. Pit Bulls. Mayo later became a Pit Bull, too. Washington, D.C.-born Mayo played viola in grade school before turning to the saxophone. "Then I heard Metallica's Kill 'Em All and that was the end of that," he says. He switched to guitar, hooking up with M.F.Pit Bulls after his tenure in Silence. The Bulls subsequently landed a deal with an indie label. But then Ugly Kid Joe offered Larkin their drummer slot, he moved west, and M.F. Pit Bulls were consigned to limbo.

At the time, Ugly Kid Joe were recording with producer Garth Richardson (Rage Against the Machine), who heard Snot's demo and liked what he heard. But he felt Doling should revamp the band. So the guitarist enlisted Larkin , who in turn called Fahnestock. About this time, Mayo was also looking for something new. "Everyone was doing the heavy, deep, low thing," he says, "and it was boring me. I was praying for a call." When it came, Strait announced with a laugh, "We want metal." Answered Mayo: "You called the right place." That spring, Mayo and Fahnestock drove 65 hours from Pennsylvania in a 1981 Celica with a 4x8 trailer attached. "We hauled ass," says Mayo, "except going uphill; that was about 20 miles an hour."

When they arrived in Santa Barbara, the first thing Doling said was, "Wanna go jam?" It was two in the morning. Still, says Mayo, "It flowed. I knew we had to do this." Miller replaced Larkin in May 1996, solidifying the Snot lineup. A Baltimore native, he too comes from a family of musicians. At 13 he was playing drums and guitar, lying about his age so he could join bar bands. He later toured the country with the alter- native punk band Mary Suicide, which once played on a bill with M.F. Pit Bulls.

The Pit Bulls were so impressed with Miller, in fact, that they asked him to become their drummer. Then, when Bulls singer Larkin headed west to join Ugly Kid Joe, Miller took his place as drum- mer in Souls at Zero. Its demise led him to Snot - and sleeping on the couch in the house shared by Doling, Strait and Fahnestock. "Even from what I heard on the early tapes, I knew the band was unique," Miller says."It's hard and punk, but there's also a light side. Too many bands are too dark and mys- terious." And though their songs promote individual freedoms (as evidenced on "Snooze Button"), Snot doesn't beat audiences over the head with a message.

"All these L.A. bands have causes," sneers Strait, who serves as the band's lyricist. "If we have a message, it's to not take yourself too seriously. All we are is politically incorrect. We like eatin' steaks." For his part, though, Marvyn Mack did take Snot seriously; Mack, Geffen Records' head of urban promotion, brought the band to A&R exec Wendy Goldstein, who signed them to the label. Nabbing a record contract was a dream come true for some of his mates, but Strait was underwhelmed by the development. His response:"Yeah, now I can order cheese on my Whopper." Actually, while his bandmates were signing on the dotted line, he was finishing a month in County Jail, where he'd spent a year in the early '90s.

"There's a layer of filth that hides in every small town," he says. "Santa Barbara's no exception." Typical though it may be in this respect, the laid-back atmosphere that makes Santa Barbara a hot vacation destination has played an important role in the development of Snot's sound. This loose vibe, combined with righteous riffs and heavy beats, has created a singular groove, the band's metal and punk fattened with a heap of funk. "Even girls dig it," says Strait, "because it's flavorful. It's not all hard; you can shake your ass." As Fahnestock puts it, "We're a mixture of what we all grew up playing. We ingest it - and then we blow it out our noses." What comes out, naturally, is Snot.

In the beginning stages of recording their second album, Lynn was killed in a car accident on a California highway. The accident also took the life of Lynn's dog Dobbs, the dog that appears on the cover of Get Some.

Mike Doling: "We can't go on without Lynn, it's just bullshit when bands do that." [1]

Statement released by Snot: "Lynn just seemed to have this special energy, that no matter who was in the room, all these legends that we were touring with, they came second to Lynn's vibration. We wish more of the world could have experienced him. We cannot seem to explain that quality that he had in words. All the memories that we had with Lynn we will cherish in our hearts forever."[2]