Who knew the teenage Ben Stiller was rocking out as drummer in a garage punk band Capital Punishment back in 1979? Although the group only released one record in the early 80’s and didn’t quite perform any live shows, they have recently reunited to release their album, Roadkill and titled hit song, “Confusion” out September 14.
The song, “Confusion” is an experimental sound which exudes dark, squishy, eerie and bizarre noise. The group consists of Ben Stiller, Krisss Roebling, Peter Zusi and Peter Swann. All gentlemen are professionals in their respective fields. In fact, Kriss Roebling is a documentarian, while Peter Zusi is a London-based professor of Czech literature, Peter Swann is justice of the Supreme Court of Arizona and Stiller is an Emmy-winning writer, director and actor.
According to an article in Rolling Stone magazine, Roebling checked to see if the album, Roadkill was a collector’s item after all these years. To his surprise, he found out that Captured Tracks was a fan of this album for years and wanted to release it but didn’t know how to contact anyone.
Stiller admits to having a great time reuniting with his good friends from decades ago. During their Rolling Stone interview, both Roebling and Stiller reminisce about the odd sounds included on the tracks, including the news reports about the Hillside Strangler and the Himmler Speech. Roebling admits it was all purely random, with not much forethought. He had news reports from 1977 and 1940’s which he pulled for inspiration.
When asked what the Roadkill recording session was like, Stiller responds, “I remember being very nervous. ‘Cause I just really didn’t play the drums hardly at all. I remember feeling like I just wanna get through this and actually be able to play something that’s usable. … I wasn’t, you know, know, really that good at playing the drums, which you can pick up if you listen. You don’t even have to listen that closely to get that.”
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