Zebra kicked the door down in a major way back in 1983 with their self-titled album. They were all over radio and MTV with “Tell Me What You Want” and “Who’s Behind The Door.” At the time, it was the fastest selling debut album in the history of Atlantic Records. The band released three albums in the 80’s, but were dropped by Atlantic shortly after that. The music landscape changed a few years later with the emergence of grunge. The guys continued to do shows together as well as work on solo projects. 2023 saw them tour for the 40th anniversary of that epic debut album. I’m not sure if the success of that tour lit a fire in the guys, but 2024 looks to be one of the biggest and busiest years in the band’s existence. We had the chance to sit down with guitarist/lead vocalist Randy Jackson to talk about some of this year’s upcoming events.
Your tour last year celebrated the 40th anniversary of your debut album. I know a lot of times when bands do that, they are playing some songs for the first time ever in a concert setting. Was that the case with you guys?
Randy Jackson/Zebra: It wasn’t as much about the entirety of it. We’ve always played all the songs from the record but not many times where we would play all the record in one night and certainly all in order at one time. We did run into that with some of our other albums, but not this one.
There’s a lot of cool Zebra news for 2024! You guys are going out on another tour. Some people may not realize that you guys have never stopped performing live throughout the years.
We built a big fan base for ourselves down south and up in the northeast. We’ve never stopped playing live and we’ve played every year, at least a handful of shows, since we started. The last couple of years have been a lot more than we have done in probably 30 years. A lot of that has to do with Dave Rothstein. He came to us and said he wanted us to give him a shot at an exclusive and he’s really come through booking shows for us. I’m the youngest and I’m going to be 69 in a couple weeks and we’re pretty laid back. We would take gigs when they would come. People would call us about gigs and we would book them ourselves. To actually get out there and pound the pavement, you need someone to help do that all day long and that’s what Dave is doing. He is taking the bull by the horns and said ‘I’m going to force these guys down everyone’s throat again’ (laughs). There are a lot of Zebra fans out there and it’s hard to find them. In every city there’s enough to fill a venue or a theater, but to find them these days is tougher because they’re not on social media. Radio is not a great place to advertise anymore because a lot of them don’t listen to radio anymore because it’s the same song over and over. They tend to listen to the music that they download or what they already have so it’s kind of tough. So he’s found a way to find fans and get them out to a show.
Are you going to be going to new markets on this tour that you haven’t been to before?
For the most part we have been to them and that’s been the main focus to reestablish ourselves. Some of these areas we haven’t been to in 30 or 35 years. We had a pretty good following until 1986 when the record company dropped us. We just went back to doing what we had been doing. I did a solo album and then they decided not to release it because of bad timing. We weren’t out pounding the pavement but rather kind of taking the easy road and taking the gigs that are being offered to us. Everybody was also doing other projects too. When this thing came about with Dave, he kind of had a plan to get us re-established in those places first and then do other stuff. I mean, we’ve never played Europe and I know we have fans there so that’s something that we’re planning to do. I’ve been overseas a couple of times and did some solo acoustic stuff in Japan with material from China Rain. I’ve been to Europe and stuff so I know the fans are there so it’s a matter of putting together a tour and getting an organized.
Since you mentioned China Rain, I’m going to jump ahead to our fan submitted question from Eric’s Sound of Music from X/Twitter. He wanted to know if we were going to hear any of the China Rain stuff live?
I’ve played it before it live with a band and I did quite a bit of it solo acoustic. We haven’t done any with Zebra yet and we’re thinking about doing some.
Atlantic didn’t release that album? Do they own the masters?
They gave the masters to me and it did get released but not Atlantic. They just decided that they didn’t want to spend the money that they had to. We spent about a quarter of a million dollars making the record between writing with all the people that I wrote with and producing it. I had my head buried in the record and along came Nirvana and changed the entire music scene. It wasn’t that the record was bad; it’s just that nobody was buying that kind of stuff because the whole scene had shifted. Atlantic was having a tough time and they were in the red for two quarters. The scene had shifted and they weren’t shifting with it. They finally got on board with Stone Temple Pilots. The time my record was supposed to come out, they were scrambling to get their head above water and that’s when they started putting out the Led Zeppelin box set. I remember seeing the ad on TV and thinking to myself my god! Zeppelin had sworn to never put out a greatest hits but somehow Atlantic convinced them to. They must have paid a fortune to do that and they were advertising the shit out of it on late night tv.
It’s hard to believe being that massive of a label that they were that late to the game.
Yeah, but when you say late it was months, maybe a year. I don’t know what they were thinking.
Back to more great Zebra news! You guys are putting together a new documentary?
Yes, we did one about 20 years ago and it covered a lot of territory and it was a combination of live footage and interviews. There’s 50 years of stuff and even back then they were a lot of people that we didn’t get to interview that should have been interviewed. There are a lot of funny stories to tell and interesting too so we decided to do a new one with a whole different set of people. We’re bringing some new stories to the Zebra fans and new live performances. We’ve been recording a lot of the shows that were playing recently.
Who decided to do a new one?
Honestly, I think it goes back to Dave (Rothstein). He said he thought it would be a great thing to do and that the fans would dig it. There are some Zebra fans out there that probably weren’t even alive when the last one came out.
When will it be done?
We want to have all the stuff we’re talking about done by the end of the year.
Another great thing to look forward to! Plus, you are also re-releasing the debut album on color vinyl?
There’s a record store in Long Island that has been doing a lot of things over the years. They’re taking some classic albums and re-releasing them on their own label. It won’t be a huge run of them but more and more people are getting into the vinyl. They worked out a deal to do it with Atlantic and then called us directly to get us involved. It was a good thing because we were able to add good things that they didn’t have access to. We added some old audio from rehearsal and a lot of photos and stuff that people wouldn’t have seen if they would have done it on their own.
Will there be a cd released as well or just vinyl?
I don’t think there are any CD plans for that. With the way things are, you’ll be able to find it all on YouTube before long.
Is the plan for that by the end of the year as well?
It’s actually been done for quite a while and it’s really just a matter of planning the rollout.
So much cool stuff! You guys are also working on a brand new album?
Guy (Gelso) and I have been staying down here in New Orleans, he lives down here, and we’ve been working on arrangements. We have eight of them done right now after the first week and we have two more weeks to go. Who knows how many we will have? We’re going to have a lot of good stuff and probably getting record ready for another one after that. Like I said, it’s been 20 years since we did the DVD that we did. It’s been equally as long since the last album Zebra IV.
2003 to be exact! So, will this new album be all new stuff, some old stuff or a little of both?
Some of it’s going to be older because people have been asking for things that we didn’t record but they love the song. There’s one in particular called “Directions” that people have been constantly asking for it and we’re going to put that on the record. There’s a lot of brand new stuff too so it’s going to be kind of a combination. That’s why I say we’re probably going to have a couple of discs worth of material by the time we’re done.
I sound like I am repeating myself, which I actually am, but is this something you plan to have out by the end of the year?
Yes, that’s the plan.
It’s amazing that you guys are still the original three (you, drummer Guy Gelso and bassist/keyboardist Felix Hanemann); the original three still together and still rocking! You don’t see bands sticking with the original lineup for a lengthy time, for various reasons. You hear stories of some bands where the members take separate buses and the only interaction is on stage.
No, it’s never been like that with us. We do have our disagreements, but we’re like family with each other. We get together socially so we don’t have any kind of those issues.
You don’t see that too often so I commend you.
We’ve been fortunate and it’s less to do with us and more being in the right place at the right time and the fact that we’re really still alive. We can do all we can about our health but the fact that all three of us are still here at this point is pretty amazing too.
I’m sure so much has changed in making this brand new album versus making the debut when back in 1983. Is there anything that you miss from ‘83 while making this album that’s not necessarily here anymore?
I think overall things are much better now. In the big picture of things, one thing that we don’t have that we had back then is radio. Back in the day, when you had a major label behind you, we would be getting played all over the country. These days that’s just not happening; we’re considered a classic rock band and nobody wants to play the new music by classic rock bands. It’s just not happening for whatever reason so that’s the tough part. Other than that, the recording process is easier and technology is so much better. You can record the album yourself and do it without needing a quarter of a million dollars. You can do it for practically nothing.
You can do it from your home!
Yes and you can get just as good of quality.
There’s a very cool story involving William Zabka who plays Johnny Lawrence on the show Cobrai Kai. He wore a Zebra t-shirt in one of the episodes. The show Stranger Things has given artists boosts before by playing their music. Did you notice any kind of surge or uptick from him wearing your shirt?
There was actually a big interest in it here in New Orleans. They specifically wanted to interview me about it for the local papers around here. People were sending me screenshots of him on the show because it’s such a huge show, so it was nothing but good stuff from it. Evidently he’s a big fan from back in the day and from what I understand he was listening to Zebra music to get psyched up for the audition for the show.
I saw a clip it and it was a trailer for Season 3. He’s sitting at a computer typing up a description about the show and the very last sentence in the description says ‘Zebra rocks!’
That’s really cool! I know he is getting a little bombarded by it too. People started bootlegging the t-shirt and selling them all over the place. We started reprinting it and selling it at our show too, so it definitely helped.
I see that our time is about up, so I definitely want to end this with our Three For The Road segment. We saved the hard questions for the end! Do you remember who your first celebrity crush was?
I’m going to say it had to be Shirley Jones.
From The Partridge Family?
Earlier than that; she was in a movie called The Music Man. She was in that and Ron Howard was in it too. I think it was even before Andy Griffith because he was a really little kid.
If you could have anyone be your inner voice, a cartoon character, actor, actress, whoever, who would you pick?
That’s an odd question; I think I might want Stephen Hawkins (laughs). It’s really identifiable plus I’m a physics head. I think people would get a lot out of it. I could see that being kind of a mechanical sounding voice.
Last one; if music was over today and you had to go into professional wrestling, what would your wrestling name be?
That’s really tough; all I can think of is Slam Dunk (laughs).
Well Randy, you have definitely given us Zebra fans a lot of cool things to look forward to this year. I’m sure we can catch it all on your social media.
Yes, plus be on the lookout for a new website launching in a month or two.
Interview by I’m Music Magazine Owner/Editor Johnny Price
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