A Writer Who Can Sing: Talking with Acid Reign's Howard 'H' Smith

If you've been keeping up with our Tower Instagram Live shows, you saw Thrash Metal band Acid Reign's frontman, Howard "H" Smith chat with Whitney Moore from lockdown in the UK about many aspects of his life and career.

Howard "H" Smith also got on the phone with Tower for a continued discussion about the 30th anniversary of some of their iconic youthful records, some of which are being released on vinyl for this first time in the USA this very week, including Moshkinstein and Obnoxious. H Smith, who is also a major podcaster about all things Metal and beyond, gave us a window on the band's reformation, the creation of their latest album (the first in 29 years) with The Age of Entitlement, and the goods on their "lockdown video" featuring a Metal cover of Suzanne Vega's song, "Blood Makes Noise".

Hannah Means-Shannon: Thanks for joining us, Howard. We’ve got a lot of records to talk about from Acid Reign.

Howard “H” Smith: We’re about to see the release of some of the records in the States where some are nearly and some are over thirty years old. And they’ll be getting their first release in the States, ever. It’s very flattering that you all want to talk about them.

HMS: Well, of course we are self-interested as a record purveyor. Right now, we have the new album, The Age of Entitlement, still available in blue vinyl, and in regular. We have sold out of The Fear, but will be getting more in. But Moshkinstein and Obnoxious are slated to arrive in the shop on June 5^th.

H Smith: What I would say to you is to go to the Acid Reign Youtube channel, Acid Reign TV, and you will see there is a documentary on the 30^th anniversary of Obnoxious, which was last month. It’s full of cool content. Also, if you look on the same channel, you’ll see unboxing videos for all of the vinyl.

HMS: That’s wonderful.

H Smith: I know, for a bunch of old men, it’s almost as if we know what we’re doing!

HMS: You have the AV down, but I already knew that. Because I saw a recent video release of yours…for your cover of Suzanne Vega’s song on Age of Entitlement.

H Smith: The lockdown video!

HMS: Yes. It was very funny, and a great way to engage with fans because everyone’s kind of curious about how people are living and surviving right now. And even though it’s not presented in a naturalistic way, it’s a nice window for fans.

H Smith: Funnily enough, the story behind that video lies in my podcast, Talking Bollocks, which I’ve been doing for a number of years. Because I do the podcast, I get to do various interviews…and I’ve completely lost my train of thought. I am sitting here in an AC/DC shirt, but it says “ADHD” in case you’re wondering why I’m so forgetful.

But anyway, the very first isolation video I saw was the song “Isolation” by Sepultura. Love the song and the album, but they all just looked fairly miserable. And I thought, “If we did something like that it would be…Oh hang on, I’ve had an idea.” And luckily I’m in a band with a bunch of idiots who will run with an idea like this. So, I put them under orders to record stupid stuff.

We filmed it, sent it to Paul, who’s the guy who wakes up at the beginning of the video. Sat in conkers. The narrative of the intro is basically that, of the four other members, three had filmed footage of themselves in bed. Me, Cookey, and Pete [Dee]. So, we had stuff with Marc just sat in the bath, too. Then Paul thought, well if I film myself also in bed, then it’ll look like we all live in the same house and we’re just waking up. And that’s how the whole narrative developed.

I pinged Suzanne Vega an e-mail and asked if she’d be interested in making a brief appearance in our video, saying she’d have full sign off on the video if she wanted her clip removed. Saying that would be absolutely fine. And she e-mailed me back about half an hour later and said, “Yeah, what would you need?”

It’s been a long road. And funnily enough, I’m sitting in my front room at the moment, and there’s a screen shot that I printed off on photograph paper and framed. It’s the very first time she responded to a demo that I sent her of that song, and it just reads “I LOVE IT” in capital letters with a love emoji. She said she wanted to share it with her team and that receiving it put her in a great mood. Receiving that, when it’s been two weeks since you sent it in total silence, hoping that she didn’t hate it, put me absolutely over the moon, as a long, long-term fan of her work. I think she even gets a thanks on our first album!

She’s been so amenable and performs on the song on Age of Entitlement. In that case she just recorded a clip for us and popped it over. It’s all a bit of a head-fuck for me because, funnily enough, I was asked recently in an interview if there’s anybody that I’d be intimidated to meet, and I said, “I’ve pretty much met everyone. I’ve pretty much interviewed everyone.” And the longer you’re in this game, the more you realize that everyone is pretty much a normal person. That stops you being intimidated.

I’ve been referred to as a legend before, and I always laughingly intercede and say, “Look. I am a fan OF legends. I am not A legend. Not unless the bar has been dramatically lowered recently.” It’s weird.

HMS: Well, from what I’ve read about your career and of your presence in the press over the years, that seems to speak to your personality. Because even in your early phase of Acid Reign in the 90’s, recording and touring a lot, you were a pretty big fan of your contemporaries and weren’t ashamed to say that, either. You went to a lot of live shows. They seemed important to you as a young person.

H Smith: Oh, yes. Get this—I’d only ever been to see, I think, two or three live gigs before I played my first one. Because Acid Reign, basically, we got together about 1985. We weren’t anywhere near being Acid Reign yet. I have a demo from that period that will never be released.

By the way, there’s an Anthology CD box set relevant to this, that came out in Europe, and I think is now out in the States…

HMS: [Looks it up] Yes. I found it. It is available.

H Smith: Anyway, that’s a tangent. It’s a great set because it’s the first time all of our albums have ever been released in the USA.

HMS: Did you have to do a fair amount of work on those songs to get them ready for the Anthology set?

H Smith: No, well, it’s mainly from the Apple Core Archives released in the UK and Europe in 2012. But we’ve added a few more tracks with the singles from the new lineup before the new album came out. So those singles were only ever available digitally, but they’re on the Anthology as well. We put the Obnoxious demos on there as well. So, it’s an extra disc worth of material compared to Apple Core. It was kind of a no-brainer to put these together and release the set.

Same with the vinyl releases. If you can get hold of an original recording, it won’t play brilliantly. It’ll be scratched to bits since it’s so old. With the re-release of the vinyl, all of them are remastered. They are all gatefold sleeves. They are all colored vinyl. The way I like to do things is: “What would I think as a fan?” Well, if I was a fan, I would think they were the absolutely fucking bollocks!

HMS: I can see that in the new album, too. Just to speak about the art on Age of Entitlement, I think it’s wonderful.

H Smith: Oh, good. Because there are two reactions. There’s your reaction and there’s, “It’s one of the worse sleeves I’ve ever seen.”

HMS: WHAT? What is the reasoning on that? Can people give any explanations when they say that sort of thing?

H Smith: It’s art. It’s in the eye of the beholder. The one real panning the album had was basically a very upset millennial who had already passed comment on the artwork that was on there before the album was out. As soon as the art came out, straightaway, it was like, “Oh, hell, look at these Boomers slagging us off.” And my response was, “Dude, it’s called the Age of Entitlement, it’s not about people who are of an age. It’s about entitlement. And the last time I checked, anyone, up until the age of being dead, is capable of entitled behavior. But the fact that you, as a millennial, think it’s all about you, is incredibly ironic and amusing!”

HMS: [Laughter] Wait…wait…Wow that hadn’t even occurred to me that anyone could take the album title in that way.

H Smith: Yes. And then the second review came out. And again it was about the artwork. He really gave himself away, because he started off saying he was really going to have an open mind, but the title of the review was “Old Men Hate Twitter”.

HMS: Wow.

H Smith: He said he would be fair, and then he absolutely hammers us. But the main thing he attacks is the production. And I don’t care what people say about us, but you’d have to be deaf not to think the production on that is really fucking good.

That drove me mad. I wanted to say, “You don’t hate this fucking album. You just hate us. So why don’t you just fucking say that?”

HMS: That’s really to the point. And it probably is true. They’ve decided, based on a willful misinterpretation of the album title, and on the artwork, who you are.

H Smith:  “Old Men Hate Twitter”. Yep. All you’d have to do is go on Twitter and see that we tweet at least once a day every fucking day, 365. [Laughter] That was quite amusing.

But to get back to the art, some people love it and some people hate it. But you know, that’s art? I would rather it be loved or hated. I would absolutely curl up and die if someone thought, “Meh. Average.”

HMS: Yes, you’re getting a reaction. Indifference would be terrible.

H Smith: If it’s art, you’ve got to be moving people. They either move closer to you or they move further away.

Do you know the story behind the guy who designed the artwork?

HMS: Yes, I know a little bit about Mark Wilkinson. Tell me more, though, because I think you had a familiarity with his work from a young age?

H Smith: Yes. Well done. In my hand, as I speak, I am holding a four disc set of Script for a Jester’s Tear by Marillion. Marillion is the first band that I ever saw live. They were also the second band I ever saw live, four days later. Because I had so much fun. I had to get my parents to get me out of going to France for the day with my school because I didn’t want to do to France anymore—I wanted to go to this gig. That is the first album that made me fall in love with music. Seeing them live made me fall in love with bands. Made me fall in love with gigs. Fish’s lyrics made me fall in love with writing.

I got to interview him for my podcast and we had a really cool time. When I got to interview him, he said, “I’ve always thought of myself as a writer who can sing, rather than a singer who can write.” And I just went, “Me, too”. He said, “Really?” And I said, “Yeah, I think so.” Imagine meeting your hero, and for him to be so cool, and then to have—well, I wouldn’t call it an “epiphany”—but it was certainly a light bulb moment.

So, obviously, Marillion’s artwork means a lot to me, too. Originally, when I was writing songs for Acid Reign albums, I would have been sat at a desk in front of a six foot Marillion poster of Punch and Judy, which is the lead single from the Fugazi album. So, here we are, 29 years after Acid Reign’s last album, and about nine months previous to the new album coming out, I’m at the Bloodstock Festival. And I bumped into my good friend Al Barnes, who was, at one time, guitarist with Venom. And I’ve always known that Mark Wilkinson lives in the same village as him. And as we’re there, he introduces me to Mark Wilkinson.

And in the back of my mind, straightaway, I’m thinking, “albumcover, albumcover, albumcover, albumcover.” So, Al is there talking about how brilliant we were when we headlined second stage in 2016, and we’re having a chat. So, I kind of mentioned the band, and Mark said that he was actually trying to do more work rather than less work at the moment, which I kind of knew, since he’d had a reported illness.

A little later, he asked, “Well, what kind of music is it?” And I said, “Thrash Metal. But we talk about meaningful things and we have a good time vibe. Kind of punky.” And I was desperately searching around in the dark to come up with a way to connect with him. And I said, “Yeah, we have a cover of a Suzanne Vega we are doing on the album. And she really likes it and has agreed to guest on it.”

And he said, “Which Suzanne Vega song?” And I said, “Blood Makes Noise”. At this point, in the UK, people usually go, “Huh?” They know “Luka” or “Marlena on the Wall” or “Tom’s Diner” if you’re lucky, and that’s it. And he said, “Good song. I’d be very interested in hearing your version.”

We all said our goodbyes, and it was great to meet Mark Wilkinson. I was really chuffed.

About three days go past, I ping him an e-mail with a link to the MP3 version of the song. He e-mails me back about an hour later, saying, “I can’t stop listening to this. Really love it. Reminds me of my 1970s punk roots. Forget everything I said. I would love to do the cover of your album.”

HMS: Amazing.

H Smith: There you go.

[A lockdown sketch from the band...]

HMS: These weird things happen. If you had just said something a little different to him than you did, it might not have worked out.

H Smith: But it’s also a lesson in this: if you do good stuff, more good stuff will happen. The “good stuff” was getting Suzanne Vega to say yes and like the song. That was great stuff. That was wonderful stuff. But then that acts as a hook to land Mark to do the artwork!

HMS: That really speaks to how important collaboration can be in music as well. It brings people in who might not normally work together and it brings in fans who might not normally come across different types of music.

H Smith: Oh, yes! That’s why you see so much of it in the “modern” marketplace. Though the use of the word “modern” makes me sound like an old twat. Well, I am. But no need to sound like one as well.

That’s why it’s very common in the music industry at present. For there to be lots of collaboration and lots of reaching out, sometimes across genres even.

HMS: Absolutely.

H Smith: There are two reasons for that. One, a bold new era of exploration. And two, make more fucking money. If you can sell your music to genre A and to genre B, that’s a lot more money.

Now, I’m not saying that us playing with Suzanne Vega was a calculated marketing decision. It wasn’t. But we live in a time where I have to say, it was in the back of my mind that it would a great name for the press. How many Thrash Metal bands can claim that they have her on their album?

But funnily enough, commercially, looking at the artwork that Mark did, we also were aware that the album cover has to work as a t-shirt in order to make money. It’s not just releasing this thing, but selling t-shirts off it.

HMS: Wait, I have a question for you. I thought I saw an alternative image used for the tour that was also by Mark. It wasn’t the album cover…

H Smith: Yes, that’s right! That’s the clown from the vinyl label. When you take your vinyl out, he’s staring at you from the front of side one.

HMS: Oh, that’s really cool. So, there are actually two Wilkinson images for Age of Entitlement.

H Smith: Yes. Well, I can talk you through the entire concept of this if you want. And I will because no one ever asks about this or gives a shit. It’s very rare.

HMS: Sure!

H Smith: On the front, that is Ego the Clown. Then, on the back, that is Vanity the Clown. And the guy used for the tour and the guy in the middle, that is Spike. These three parts of the narcissist’s makeup are referred to in the lyrics to “New Age Narcissist” which is spray painted on the wall in the background. There’s a lyric that refers to an “ego chamber”, a play on “echo chamber” and so what you see are the “ego chambers” behind the clowns. They are trapped. But that’s the way they like it.

Stay tuned for the next part of this interview with Howard "H" Smith of Acid Reign on PULSE!