Still, the oft-reluctant 48-year-old isn’t incredibly open and detailed when it comes to Puscifer, of which he is the only constant contributor. He speaks with a calm and thoughtful demeanour of the project and its origins.
“Initially it was a project I was doing in ’95 in and around the comedy clubs in Los Angeles, doing some sketch comedy and stuff like that. It evolved from there, we started playing some of the tracks live in ’99. And eventually it seemed right to get some of the music down on record. There was a lot of videos and animation out there, some merchandise as well. It seemed like the right thing to do.”
Puscifer was first introduced to the public as a fictional band in the cult television hit Mr. Show. It was when Keenan funded and then released Puscifer’s 2007 debut V Is For Vagina that many began taking note of the project. Featuring collaboration from many Los Angeles-based musicians and friends, Keenan strived to capture those voices inside his head. As he notes, finding the right people to collaborate with is of utmost importance when it comes to bringing these voices to life.
“It’s just a matter of taking the idea and collaborating with different people to get it right,” he says with an assured confidence. “As far as that collaboration goes, it’s not so much the having as it is the getting, as they say. The process of bouncing ideas back and forth is important. The collaboration is certainly the cornerstone of this band.
“Usually it’s friends or friends of friends,” he continues, noting the process of how he chooses musicians he collaborated with for Puscifer. “I’ve been working with a lot of these guys in different ways, just behind the scenes.”
2013 sees Keenan release Puscifer’s third EP, an eight-song collection called Donkey Punch The Night. Still maintaining an industrial lean to his hardcore stylings, Keenan undertook a challenge when it came to the opening and closing tracks on the EP: putting his own spin on the perennial sing-a-long classic, Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody. It may sound easy enough to record this karaoke standby, but Keenan quickly interjects.
“It’s a pretty challenging track to undertake, there’s lots of layers. The original track had 80 tracks of vocals, so it was certainly a challenge.”
It was a challenge that Keenan revelled in and ultimately produced unique results. A creator in the truest sense, Keenan is constantly compelled to dip his feet in a variety of genres and has fully embraced the digital world as a medium for his music. Yet Keenan has also stated that Puscifer is a project with no clear goals, which presents another challenge. How does Keenan manage to pull in the reigns and actually finish a song or an idea? Evidently, it’s a concern Keenan quickly puts to rest.
“You don’t,” he says in response. “You record it, you put it out. And if you want to change it, then you change it later via the digital world. It’s like a blog, you just go back and change it.”
It should come as no surprise then that Donkey Punch The Night features a variety of remixes and past tracks that have been reworked.
“We’ve done remixes of a lot of songs. We go back and find things we didn’t like and we just change them. Especially with the animation aspect. We’ve reworked some of the comedy sketches. Things evolve over time.”
Not only has Maynard’s musical output evolved over time, so too has the visual association with Puscifer’s music. Music videos are heavy on the animation front, and Keenan has been responsible for designing an array of clothing and accessories. Everything from backpacks to condoms have been designed by Keenan. But he’s not just making attempts to brand the Puscifer name. Keenan just isn’t contend to let his creativity stop at making music.
“You have an idea you want to put on a t-shirt, or something more practical like a backpack, you don’t wait for someone else to do something, you make it yourself.”
Maynard James Keenan has always taken a very hands-on approach when it comes to creating. Puscifer is yet another avenue, and likely won’t be the last. He’s not short on creative impulses and with Puscifer, these impulses have found a home.
“We always have a lot of different ideas floating around. For lack of a better word, you compartmentalise. You group things together.”
BY JOSHUA KLOKE
