Crazy Town is often only thought of as a “one hit wonder” by way too many people. The band has never truly received the credit that they deserve for their influence on the nu metal scene. The band exploded out of the gate with “Butterfly” reaching #1 and their debut album The Gift of the Game went platinum. The band imploded just as quickly and broke up after their second album, 2002’s Darkhouse, didn’t produce the same results. Band founders Bret Mazur and Seth “Shifty” Binzer reformed the band in 2007. They released the band’s third album The Brimstone Sluggers in 2015. Mazur left the band in 2017 and Binzer added as X to the band’s name hence Crazy Town X. Here we are in 2020 and the band’s lineup consists of Shifty (rapping/lead vocals), DJ R1ckOne (DJ & programming), Roland (drums/vocals), Elias “ET” Tannous (guitar/vocals) and Hasma (bass/vocals). The band just released a brand new single “The Life I Chose” featuring Hyro The Hero with plans for a full album release. We recently sat down with guitarist Elias “ET” Tannous who told us about the album how he joined the band, their misadventures with a moose and much more!  

The band’s been around for quite a bit, but you joined them just a few years ago. Can you tell us how the door opened for you to join?

Elias “ET” Tannous/Crazy Town: Yeah, so I met you, I guess it was four years ago at one of our Make America Rock Again shows. So that was when I first joined the band. I’ve been a part of Crazy Town for 4 years now. And the way that all came about is kind of a longer story. I played in bands my whole life, starting at 16 years old. I started playing the piano when I was seven years old. One of my bands that I was in, during my university years ended up getting signed to an Indie label called Gotham Records. We did a bunch of touring, and then we moved over to Los Angeles. I really thought was a bad move because I saw us getting traction over here in the tri-state area. But we moved to Hollywood and I got a job at the Whisky-a-go-go. Have you ever heard of that place? 

Oh, yeah; that place is legendary.

I got a job there because I just wanted to get my band’s foot in the door, you know? So I walked up to them and said “Do you guys have any available job openings?” They were like “Do you know anything about lighting?” And I said “I have no clue.” Then, I was surprised because they said “Really? You’re hired.” 

I feel like they did that because they knew that they could train me and they knew my band too, so they knew I wasn’t going anywhere. And also I wasn’t a professional lighting guy that was going to try and get more money. So, they didn’t pay me much. But for me it was the coolest job in the whole world. On whatever day I was doing lights for Alice Cooper and Kesha and Motley Crue. I did lights for the Alice In Chains reunion, all the local bands, and just too many to name and to remember at once. 

That’s how I actually met Crazy Town. They played a show in 2009 in between their hiatus or whatever. I remember going up to Seth and asking what kind of lights he wanted. He said “That’s awesome. No lighting guy has ever really asked me that. I just want to see like it’s a crazy party, the lights going wild, a lot of chases, and try to match it with the kick drum.” 

I think being a musician actually makes you better at lighting because if you can feel the music and there’s a beat to it, you can always just change and go with the flow. I did lights for them one time, and then I just remember bumping into Seth randomly at the Sunset Strip Music Festival a couple of months later. And then flash forward, six years later. About 2016 and I’m in Atlanta now and I had pretty much given up on music. I’d been screwed over, you know. It’s the age old story of just every musician who’s been taken advantage of having to be serious because you have to pay your bills. So I got a sales job selling cosmetics, which I was actually really good at. 

I had a picture of me & Seth that I decided to post on Instagram and looked him up, so I could tag him in it. He’d just posted a flyer for the “Make America Rock” tour with Trapt, Saving Abel, Saliva, Alien Ant Farm. I sent him a message to see if he remembered me and asked if he needed a guitarist or any services on this upcoming tour to let me know. I didn’t expect him to even read it. You know? About 30 mins later, he messages me back and calls me. He says he remembers me and says “We have auditions tomorrow for guitar players at 3pm. I’ll see you tomorrow.” 

So Seth puts that spark in me. He sent me three tracks to learn. “Toxic” I believe, “Butterfly”, and “Change.” So I learn the tracks, starting to think about all I have to do including getting a flight and get over there by three tomorrow. I was starting to feel a bit overwhelmed, so I was going to call him and cancel. My friends at the time said “You gotta’ go and you know, just give it a shot.” So I did, made it there by the skin of my teeth at three. Brett & Seth were there and I plugged in and auditioned. Then, Seth called about two hours later and said they had discussed it, and they would be happy if I could come and join them on the tour. That was it. So from that point on I’ve been rocking with Seth.

And that’s how I joined the group.

Nice! So that one question about the lights really made an impact on him. He’d probably never had that happen before. You never know unless you ask!

Exactly! You just never know!

I was looking at some of your tour dates and you guys sure keep busy touring. A lot of people only think about you as the “Butterfly band” or “the band with that one hit.” There’s so much more to the band than just that. I don’t know the extent of your touring in your prior bands, but you are probably traveling to a lot of places you never have before.

Yeah, you said it man. People don’t know that Crazy Town went platinum in I think 14 or 15 countries. So that’s another blessing. And Seth has always said “Some people just have the United States and have to grind out dates.” The USA has actually been tougher because they don’t really play Crazy Town on the radio even as much as they do in other countries. Europe is humongous and I know in Germany even “Revolving Door” was a #1 hit there for a while. We’ve been all the way to India. We’ve been to Russia; this band has taken me all over the world. We were in Canada and crashed into a moose. Just to be circling those markets has been my dream. I feel like one of the lucky ones. 

So we went to Australia. Australia was one of the places I’ve just always wanted to go there for trips, so to go there and get to play concerts was just… something. Amazing! You know? We were in Sydney and Brisbane, then in Melbourne and then Adelaide. I got to see the aboriginals and got some art. I collected a bunch of cool souvenirs. Then we flew into New Zealand and I got to meet the Maori and I learned a little bit about that culture. I was actually given a jade stone blessed by a shaman over there. It brings you good luck and I’ve been wearing it around my neck ever since.

Australia was just an incredible thing. We go to go and pet koalas and kangaroos. And the crazy thing is you know, they’ve never seen a deer. So they’re asking me about that. They just have a whole different ecosystem; it’s like a whole different world.

Then Seth calls me one night. It’s like 11:00, I’m about to go to bed and he says “You wanna hear some great news?” I’m like “Definitely! I wanna hear some great news” He says “I got a letter in the mail from Enterprise and they’re denying our claim for hitting the moose and we owe them $30,000.” I’m about to go to bed and he’s just saying “Have sweet dreams, buddy.” (laughing) “Thanks, man!” So I really… I couldn’t sleep at all. I’m about to have a heart attack about it. Turns out it was a mix up, that letter was never supposed to be sent. But just for about a day and half there, that pure sense of panic that we may be owing 30 grand. It really got me. 

That’s crazy. So you guys were playing, were you coming back to the US or were you still travelling through Canada going to more dates? Didn’t you still do a show a day or two later?

No, no. That was the day of. We crashed into the moose and we played the show there. We never skipped a beat. We didn’t miss a show. We played the very next day and continued the tour. I think with four or five shows left. A couple right outside of Toronto, Montreal, Quebec City, and then right back into the states. Then we went all the way back across the states too. Yeah, we did not skip a beat. 

Did Enterprise hook you up with another van or something?

The people at Enterprise totally hooked us up. We rolled up in a crashed up van. Then we just crammed all of our stuff into a Dodge minivan. I had everything on my lap and we were just crunched in there for the rest of the duration. So we made it through; we had to do it.

That’s hardcore, dude! That’s pretty awesome!

Jumping back though, we were in Australia. That’s when the whole Covid thing was just starting really, in February. We got back late February. And then the last show we played for 2020 was the big Heaven & Hell Festival in Mexico City. We got back the very day before when some had started shutting down the borders. Otherwise we would have been stuck there too. That was really the last huge festival, huge gathering. There were about 20,000 people there, so what a great way to go out. To have that as our final show that we played for the year was cool!

Then obviously, the whole music business has changed. It’s all now streaming. Entertainment has just really had to adapt. So we just shot a quarantine video. We had been recording a new record over with Mike Plotnikoff and Howard Benson over in the studios. Those are the same guys that recorded Darkhorse. So we reconnected with them since we were doing so well and just had this momentum. They were happy to have us back in the studio recording with them.

The record is sounding really, really great. Crazy Town is one of those bands, where we had “Butterfly” but then we kind of go on a musical journey. It’s melodic; it’s a hybrid of tons of styles. And Crazy Town was one of the earlier bands, they even influenced Linkin Park a little bit. They were around early enough to really be one of those bands that influenced a lot of the nu metal bands that came out after them. So staying true to that, we have a whole range of sounds on the record and it’s really sounding so great. I couldn’t be happier with the quality of it, and Seth is really happy with it too. Brett is helping with the programming. 

“The Life I Chose” will be the first release off it coming out soon. And then we did a quarantine video, where we all have to shoot our parts in different parts of the country. Obviously we’ve been away from everyone. So we’re going to come out with a video and a new single shortly.

So is the album finished? I know you’re scattered right now, but are you done with it?

The recording’s all done. I went in there and everyone laid down their parts. Now it’s on to the mixing and mastering and then it’s finished. The artwork we’ll want to choose and how we want to go in that direction. After four years, this is going to be my first time. I’ve been playing other people’s tracks and as an artist myself, that wears on me. I love playing, but one of my goals has been to get on a record and do something with Seth. This time it’s actually happening. So I’m going to be able to go out there and play riffs that I wrote. I think that’s going to be a whole different experience for me. Something I’ve been looking forward to for four years. A lot of members have come and gone and it’s a hard thing to keep doing it when you’re not the face of the band like Seth. He is one of my best friends in the whole world; we speak every day. I’ve stayed loyal to him, and we stay loyal to each other. I’m just grateful and have been blessed to be in the studio with him and him asking me to be a part of this.

That speaks volumes of what he thinks of you and the whole chemistry in the creative process there. He believes in you and obviously likes what you’re doing. One of the things I’ve been asking everybody since all of this has been happening. I know you’re in New York, which is one of the hardest states hit with this. What are you doing to adjust and to just keep from not going total stir crazy? How are you dealing with things?

This has given me the opportunity to tighten up. I’ve been practicing my scales and working on music theory. When you’re touring all the time and traveling, you don’t really have that ability to sit down as much as you’d like. Now it’s given me a lot of time to just practice, which is huge. And also, I’m going to be releasing my own solo album. I’m writing with my friends from Atlanta. I’ve been playing music and writing music myself for close to 20 years now, but I’ve just never released anything on my own. It’s given me the time to be as productive as possible and not waste time. I’m just trying not to waste any time.

I’m not 20 anymore. I remember I could eat anything and not gain any weight. I’ve been noticing I’m starting to gain a little weight in quarantine for sure. So I’ve started to have to really work out and stay active. I’m lucky to be around my family now. So I’m just helping around the house. Maintaining this and that, cleaning, cooking. It’s really up to the person to find opportunities. There have been a couple of days where I just watched tv, binge watched some series like everyone else. I didn’t watch “The Tiger King,” I couldn’t get into that. I don’t know why everyone else did. (laughing)

Life is a never ending journey. Especially playing the guitar; that’s a never ending journey. So there’s plenty of stuff to keep me busy. I could never say that there’s not, otherwise I’m just being lazy.

So before we end this, I have hit you with a couple of tough questions. The other questions loosened you up like stretching before a big run. Are you ready?

Let’s do it!

What was the first album you ever bought with your own money?

First record I ever bought with my own money? I think it was either The Offspring – Smash or Nirvana – Nevermind or it could be Weezer – Blue. I was obsessed with Weezer. I grew up with an older sister, so she influenced me a lot. Everything 80s. Anything from Tears For Fears or Duran Duran, Boy George to Depeche Mode and George Michael. And she listened to Madonna, and Whitney Houston. She had a huge CD collection, so I remember just going to town looking through those. I always have to give it up to my sister for really influencing me in music and also my mother for introducing me to the piano.

Did you have a favorite cartoon growing up?

That’s a split between the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. The 1980’s cartoon version and The Thunder Cats. He-Man! Yeah, him too, definitely. I really loved cartoons growing up. 

If you had any celebrity at all to be the voice-over for your inner voice, who would you want to be your inner voice?

Who was the guy that did The Wonder Years? Who’s the guy that did that for Fred Savage. 

Daniel Stern.

Yeah! I feel like that guy or the guy that did Aladdin’s voice. I don’t know why, but I could definitely just picture that right now. It’s Scott Weinger. Yeah! (laughing)

Last one! If the music industry was over tomorrow and you had to go into professional wrestling, what would your wrestling name be? 

Gosh. I liked the old school. I loved Hulkamania, I loved The Undertaker, and Ultimate Warrior. Those were my guys for sure. “Macho Man” Randy Savage, I loved The Million Dollar Man and obviously Andre the Giant. Man, what’s a good wrestling name? You’re right, that’s a tough one. Maybe The Greek Freak, because I’m Greek. (laughing) I can see my blue and white spandex to represent the Greek flag for sure.

By I’m Music Magazine Owner/Editor Johnny Price