"I love every woman on the face of this planet."
I've seen Ceremony nearly one hundred times now. They consistently put on a great show. They've released four full lengths and two shorter lengths. Ceremony is my favorite band. So when they came down to Los Angeles I forced Ross Farrar into an interview. He didn't seem too excited about it but I'm okay with that.
We entered Proof Bakery somewhere in the noontime. The woman at the counter asked us if we wanted our coffee hot or iced. Ross turned to me and smiled, "True players stay hot." So we got our hot coffees and sat down.
At one point a woman named Jennifer interjected into the interview. If you're reading this, Jennifer, hey. Besides that moment, we mostly talked about Ross Farrar's upcoming bout with writing and Ceremony's upcoming album, The *-****** ***. I hope you enjoy the conversation as much as we did. And if Matador's lawyers are reading this: sup?
ceremonyhc.com
Ross Farrar's website.
Painful Burning:
Why are you so hesitant to do interviews?
Ross Farrar:
I'm not really hesitant to do them, they're intimidating. Someone has a predetermined thought about you and they want to ask it upon you. And upon the asking you get a response and upon the response you get something that is totally free flowing that could be all messed up in the end. And you don't want to be all messed up, do you? That's the last thing you want.
Painful Burning:
You just did what you were describing.
Ross Farrar:
So you're saying I'm all messed up right now?
Painful Burning:
That didn't really make sense.
Ross Farrar:
That totally made sense.
Painful Burning:
We'll see. This is not how you talk normally. Do you put a persona on when you do interviews?
Ross Farrar:
No.
Painful Burning:
Because this isn't how you normally talk.
Ross Farrar:
That's not true, I talk like this all the time.
Painful Burning:
I bet this is how you talk in English class. Anyways, you don't like doing interviews because you think they're intimidating because someone has all these predetermined questions and you have to do everything off top?
Ross Farrar:
Yeah, off top. Skim off the top. Cream off the top.
Painful Burning:
So when someone comes up to you and says, "Can we do an interview?" what do you say?
Ross Farrar:
I sigh and I say, "Okay, fine, let's do it."
Painful Burning:
You don't do many interviews. When I was researching you I noticed there weren't any prevalent interviews from the past couple years.
Ross Farrar:
I did an hour long podcast three months ago. That's an interview.
Painful Burning:
I googled your name, Fader and Noisey came up but those interviews were from 2011 and 2012.
Ross Farrar:
That's when we were hot. But we're not hot right now because we don't have a record out.
Painful Burning:
Oh I see.
Ross Farrar:
You gotta catch it while it's hot.
Painful Burning:
Well, I'm trying to catch you while you're hot.
Ross Farrar:
Fan the fire, catch it while it's hot.
True Cali players stay wet.
Painful Burning:
Why did you stop taking photographs?
Ross Farrar:
I stopped doing a lot of things lately. I've become careless about time. I think it's because of the drugs and alcohol that I was pursuing there for a while. Also, I was in Bali and got my camera stolen. That put an end to it. It was my second F3. First F3 I lost in the Denver Airport. I set it down on the counter. I walked away. When I came back it was gone. So that was my fault. I was heartbroken. I waited about three months and got another F3, because it's my favorite camera. Then this one got stolen. It's been a damper on things. I don't want to go out and spend another $600 on a camera that I'm probably going to lose again or get stolen. I'm still trying to figure out what I want to do... If I want to carry around a point and shoot or if I'm even going to be taking pictures. And it goes with everything else. I've slowed down in a lot of the inspiration, so.
Painful Burning:
But you've been-
Ross Farrar:
I've been writing poems.
Painful Burning:
That's what I was going to say, you've been writing more. Has that been a conscious effort? To write more and photograph less?
Ross Farrar:
No, I just think that sometimes in my life I try to do too many things at once. Especially artistically. Try to juggle around different mediums. I think maybe I should just focus on one thing. I'm starting school for English which is all periods and commas so I think I'm going to focus on that more.
Painful Burning:
Why did you choose that over photography though?
Ross Farrar:
It came to a point where I was going to do something to make money with it. That's the way you have to do it unless you're doing fine art. Whether it was doing publications or shooting things I didn't want to shoot to make money, I didn't want to pervert it so I kept it as a hobby instead of making it a job.
Painful Burning:
But ultimately you want to make money off of writing?
Ross Farrar:
That's a hard question. I don't know yet. But in order to put your things out in the world you kind of have to. I mean, I don't have to, I could put things out for free. It's something I haven't really come to terms with yet. I just want to people to feel what I'm saying. Whatever medium it is, I've always wanted people to feel what I'm saying.
Painful Burning:
It's easier to feel what someone is saying when there are words to be read.
Ross Farrar:
It's more direct.
Painful Burning:
Speaking of writing and college, you recently wrote a letter to the admissions office at UC Berkeley that was kind of funny. Do you remember it?
Ross Farrar:
Basically what happened was that I got a low GPA last semester at the JC because of all the trauma I was going through with breaking up with my ex-girlfriend of five years and drugs and alcohol.
Painful Burning:
Is that going to be an ongoing theme in this interview?
Ross Farrar:
There's no way to hide it. It's been kind of a problem. She said, "What's the deal? Why's your GPA so low? We might have to withhold your admission if you tell us why or give us any kind of reason of what's been going on with you." And my reply was, "I'm sorry, things get a little crazy sometimes." In so many words. It was a very informal letter back to her. And she said, "Thank you." Then I told her, "This life can be a mess." And that, "We're in the spirit world now."
Painful Burning:
Did she reply to that?
Ross Farrar:
No, she hasn't replied yet.
Painful Burning:
She's probably busy.
Ross Farrar:
She'll think about it for a second.
Painful Burning:
What are you hoping to get out of school?
Ross Farrar:
One of the big things I'm looking forward to is Richard Hass, he's teaching there. He's a world renowned poet. I want to get into a program with him, pick his brain. Eat some dinner with him and his wife. Go into the reasons. Go into the reasons of stuff. Go into the reasons of everything. Reasons for writing. Doing whatever it is he's doing. That's what I'm really looking forward to.
Painful Burning:
And you think that'll help you?
Ross Farrar:
Sort of. I've studied closely with a guy named Richard Speaks for a while. He's opened my mind up to so many different things. I think it's important to have people, friends, whoever it is that are inspirational to you around you because I grew up in a place where a lot of my friends were ding dongs, drug dealers and gangsters. You couldn't really connect with them very well on an intellectual level. I think at this point in my life it's important to have these type of people because I'm in the business of that stuff. Some kind of intellect, communication, some type of communicative intelligence. It's important to me to have good conversations, to talk with people and be around beautiful people. So I think he'd be one of those people who would open my eyes to certain things.
Painful Burning:
Would you say that that reasoning in particular is why you agreed to do this interview with me?
Ross Farrar:
Yeah, exactly. And your father is a part of that too. I talk to your dad all the time and he gives me different insights.
Painful Burning:
You don't have to bring him up.
Ross Farrar:
Yeah we do.
Painful Burning:
No we don't.
Ross with William, my father.
Ross Farrar:
Whoa, look at that.
Painful Burning:
This woman just had-
Ross Farrar:
-hella drinks.
Painful Burning:
She had fourteen drinks in her hands. Did you see that?
Jennifer:
I did, I was afraid you guys were going to terrify her or something.
Painful Burning:
Why would you be afraid that we would terrify her?
Jennifer:
You yelled, "Whoaaaa." Are you recording?
Painful Burning:
Yeah, yeah.
Jennifer:
Because you yelled really loud. That's a startling sound. Women are taught to be afraid of everything.
Painful Burning:
Is that true?
Jennifer:
No.
Painful Burning:
Ross, do you think women are taught to be afraid of everything?
Ross Farrar:
That's a crazy question.
Painful Burning:
That's what she just said.
Ross Farrar:
I think people in general are taught to be afraid of everything. I think the world is afraid of everything in general, you know what I'm saying?
Painful Burning:
Yeah, it's a bunch of scared people.
Ross Farrar:
Anyway, I want to say some more things about what I was talking to you about. Poetry is a decision because I think a lot of people, especially in this day and age, don't really like poetry, they don't get it. It's kind of becoming an archaic form of art. I want people to start getting more into it. The stuff that I'm writing right now... I want it to be accessible and I want people to be able to relate to it. To be scared of it though at the same time, that's important, be scared of it, be very scared of it. But be able to relate it. Like little hand grenades, throw them into the world and boom! There they are. Little tight, little things. Little packs.
Painful Burning:
If it is archaic and it is dying what is the point of resurrecting it instead of going with the flow of something that is more popular now? Why poetry?
Ross Farrar:
I think it's just a feeling. I love the way it looks. I love what you can do with it. I don't think it's a choice going along with something new. I go along with new things all the time. I'm on Instagram taking pictures of myself in the mirror. I'm doing that. That's enough. Why can't I stick to my old god damn poetry? I think it's cool.
Painful Burning:
I don't get poetry.
Ross Farrar:
I know, I know.
Painful Burning:
You want to be able to express yourself better in this dead art form and that's why you're going to school?
Ross Farrar:
Not really.
Painful Burning:
Yeah, you're going to learn how to better your writing in this out of touch form of communication.
Ross Farrar:
I think that a lot of people that like Ceremony, listen to Ceremony, are modern people. I think if I throw some poems out to them and they like them, I think that's a job well done.
Painful Burning:
That's interesting, Ceremony has been a band for nine years now, it's almost a third of your life. It's such a big part of your decision making processing. Not just the band itself but the people it affects.
Ross Farrar:
I haven't even really thought about that. I was thinking about it a year ago but I haven't really thought about 'til you brought it up right now: How impactful it is on my life and the choices I've made. It's crazy.
Painful Burning:
Do you think all your choices have been subconsciously guided by it?
Ross Farrar:
No. Not all of them. But a large part of them, yeah.
Painful Burning:
The focusing on writing?
Ross Farrar:
Yeah, I think it guided me in that direction. I started writing the lyrics which I guess is a form of poetry in itself. Tight abstract balls. I don't want to call them balls, I want to call them something else.
Painful Burning:
Spheres.
Ross Farrar:
Yeah, spheres is better.
Painful Burning:
It's not as sexually oriented.
Ross Farrar:
But yeah, that got me into it I think. I think that writing for Ceremony was the segue into taking writing more seriously.
Painful Burning:
Is it okay if we move on? Are you okay with that?
Ross Farrar:
Of course.
Painful Burning:
Why are you so horny?
Ross Farrar:
I just broke up with Sarah so.
Painful Burning:
Even when you were with her.
Ross Farrar:
I guess I was. But now I'm really horny. Seriously horny as heck. Because I'm back into the wilderness again.
Painful Burning:
Heck?
Ross Farrar:
As Hell. Scratch the heck. It sounds bad. Horny. Seriously horny. And I love women. I love them so much. All different kinds. I'm just going to go out there and say it: I love every woman on the face of this planet. I'm not even kidding you about that.
Painful Burning:
What about under the face of the planet, the dead ones?
Ross Farrar:
Yeah, I love them too.
Painful Burning:
What about the ones over the face?
Ross Farrar:
I even love the future ones that aren't even born yet. Think about that. They're just thoughts at this point.
Ross Farrar right after the interview. Jennifer sits in the background.
Painful Burning:
Speaking of which, you don't have to talk about this if you don't want to. I see that you have a tattoo on your arm that says a woman's name.
Ross Farrar:
It says Sarah. We talked about her a second ago.
Painful Burning:
When did you get that tattoo?
Ross Farrar:
We were broken up for eight months. We got back together. Then I got it as a Valentine's Day present for her. Then we broke up a month later. Is that tight? I love it, I think it's fantastic.
Painful Burning:
It's like a scar, a memory.
Ross Farrar:
I was actually going to get her name tattooed on me when we broke up the first time, just to get it on there.
Painful Burning:
Do you remember what I said when I first saw the tattoo?
Ross Farrar:
I don't.
Painful Burning:
I didn't known you guys had broken up. I was like, "That's a bad idea." You were like, "Why?" I was like, "You guys are probably going to break up." And you just looked at me and said, "No, no, we already did break up." I felt real bad.
Ross Farrar:
What a ride, huh? My favorite tattoo is on the other side of my arm. It's a box and it has a Z and R outside the box. On the perimeter.
Painful Burning:
I would ask you what it means but I think it's implied.
Ross Farrar:
Everybody knows what that means.
Painful Burning:
You just finished your three and a half week tour. Where did you do most of your jerking off?
Ross Farrar:
I think I only jerked off twice.
Painful Burning:
In three and a half weeks?
Ross Farrar:
I swear. Maybe three times. Maybe once a week, if that. That might be the average.
Painful Burning:
So maybe you're not as horny as I thought you were.
Ross Farrar:
The first time I did it we stayed at one of Anthony's friend's houses. A lady named Amy. She's a professional wrestler. We stayed at her mom's house. Once in the bathroom, I did it there.
Painful Burning:
Straight in the toilet?
Ross Farrar:
Yeah. I was only in there for thirty seconds. Eight jolts. No joke. Maybe ten. It was pure.
Painful Burning:
Do you remember the second time?
Ross Farrar:
I don't really remember the second time because this tour was filled with chaos.
Painful Burning:
How so?
Ross Farrar:
I didn't have one day off of drinking and there were other fun things going on of course.
Painful Burning:
Was it because of Nicky?
Ross Farrar:
I think that was a part of it. He took three days off. I took no days off. Zed's shaking his head at me right now, like I'm some type of bad boy.
Painful Burning:
It's not that you're a bad boy, I'm shaking my head in concern for your health.
Ross Farrar:
I'm getting home tomorrow. That's when everything changes. I got a month before school starts. No more drinking... heavily. I swear. Moment of clarity. No drinking heavily, moment of clarity. Does that rhyme?
Painful Burning:
Yeah. That was a quick preview of Ross' poetry. What's up with you and Nicky? In the interview I did with him he alluded to you two being soul mates.
Ross Farrar:
Yeah, we just hit it off automatically. We both have the same scar on our head. His was from throwing his guitar straight up in the air and it coming down on his head. Mine was from a street brawl in the Tenderloin. But we got similar scars. He was born on September 11th and I'm September 10th. We just get each other, we like each other. We're both abusers, substance abusers. We both think that experience is the most important thing a person can have in their lives. That goes to all degrees. And we don't really have a wall for that. We'll do pretty much about anything that a person can do.
Ross Farrar with Nicky and other pals.
Painful Burning:
Yeah, it's very obvious when you're together.
Ross Farrar:
Yeah.
Painful Burning:
I'm not jealous.
Ross Farrar:
I know you're not.
Painful Burning:
Did you get into any fights on tour?
Ross Farrar:
Yeah, we got into a bar fight in Grand Rapids.
Painful Burning:
What happened?
Ross Farrar:
Nicky threw a chair because he was bored. The bartender jumped over and everyone working there tried to beat us up. They failed. We picked up this hood kid on the street. They were having a sideshow in the parking lot. Real, I'm talking real bad boys. Talking hiding guns in their dungarees and shit, ya know. We picked one up and we hit it off with him. We took him the bar, we bought him drinks, got him fucked up. He took his shirt off during the fight and was like, "I'm gonna kill all y'all mothafuckas!" It was awesome. Then we gave him eighty bucks and told him to get into the cab to go wherever he needed to go.
Painful Burning:
Really?
Ross Farrar:
Yeah.
Painful Burning:
That's crazy. I think there's a couple more questions. God, this is going to be such a long interview. When I saw you guys at The Roxy you talked about love a lot. You said the word "love" like eight times on stage.
Ross Farrar:
That's a part of my bit. I've been into love lately.
Painful Burning:
Yeah?
Ross Farrar:
Yeah. If you read my Instagram it reads, "I love you all."
Painful Burning:
That's your new thing, love?
Ross Farrar:
Yeah, I think it goes further than woman, I think I love every man too. I love women more though, but I love men too. All men.
Painful Burning:
Don't say that in front of me. I'm easily jealous.
Ross Farrar:
All men. I want it to be stressed though, that I love women.
Painful Burning:
Are you done with hate?
Ross Farrar:
I still hate.
Painful Burning:
What do you hate right now?
Ross Farrar:
I can't think of anything off the top of my head.
Painful Burning:
It doesn't have to be a person. Just something you hate off top.
Ross Farrar:
I hate cavities.
Ross Farrar hanging wild in Santa Rosa.
Painful Burning:
When I was researching you-
Ross Farrar:
That's funny.
Painful Burning:
Why's that funny?
Ross Farrar:
Because you're my best friend.
Painful Burning:
You have to research your friends sometimes.
Ross Farrar:
Best friends.
Painful Burning:
There's a guy on Twitter named Ross Farrar.
Ross Farrar:
Maybe there's one person I hate.
Painful Burning:
It's Ross Farrar?
Ross Farrar:
Yeah, the other one. I'm serious about that too. I hate that guy.
Painful Burning:
So he's the one man you don't love?
Ross Farrar:
Yeah.
Painful Burning:
Ross Farrar is the one man you don't love?
Ross Farrar:
Yeah.
Painful Burning:
Can we talk about the new album at all?
Ross Farrar:
Yeah, sure. What do you want to know?
Painful Burning:
What's the album name?
Ross Farrar:
I can't tell you that.
Painful Burning:
Why?
Ross Farrar:
I don't know. Maybe I should.
Painful Burning:
Yeah, just put it out there.
Ross Farrar:
Right on the internet, boom, right now?
Painful Burning:
Yeah.
Ross Farrar:
I can't do it, sorry.
Painful Burning:
Why?
Ross Farrar:
It has the word "The" in it.
Painful Burning:
But why can't you say it's The *-****** ***?
Ross Farrar:
I'm not going to, don't ask me.
Painful Burning:
Is Matador not letting you?
Ross Farrar:
Yeah, they'll get mad at us probably. I'll get mad at myself. I don't want people to know what the title is yet.
Painful Burning:
So Matador's lawyers will get mad at me if I put the title here?
Ross Farrar:
Yeah, you'll get sued. I'm going to sue you personally if you do.
Painful Burning:
Because you've heard of my history with Epitaph's lawyers?
Ross Farrar:
No.
Painful Burning:
Whatever, we're not going to get into how Matt Ebert said they're out to get me. So you recorded with John Reis.
Ross Farrar:
Yeah. He's one of my best friends now. Seriously. I love him, he's the best. He told me this story about The Cows. Did I tell you this yesterday? I did when we were walking down the street.
Painful Burning:
Instead of a telling a story he told you, tell me a story that happened with him.
Ross Farrar:
Okay, we were done recording for the day. The story doesn't translate very well. It's one of those feelings, you had to see his face, the way he moved his body and everything.
Painful Burning:
That sucks, it's not like you're a writer and you're good at expressing your thoughts through words.
Ross Farrar:
Okay, so I'm going to try to tell it. He was going to pick up his kid from babysitters, it was around ten o'clock. We were done recording. And I was like, "John, let's drink a beer." He was like, "Agh, I got to pick up Tiger." I was like, "Really?" I looked at him. He looked at me. There was probably five seconds of pause. Then he goes, "Alright, but we got to shotgun it." He sticks the key in there, breaks it open and shotguns it. Right there with me. Me and John Reis shotgunning beers. Gets into the car and picks up the kid. It was the best.
Painful Burning:
What was so specific about his face?
Ross Farrar:
He makes this noise and cringes his eyes. You look into him and you can see his thinking face.
Ross Farrar in the recording studio with some hard thinking guys.
Painful Burning:
That's when you were recording the album named...?
Ross Farrar:
I came up with the name of the album two years ago. I just knew it was going to be called this.
Painful Burning:
And what is it?
Ross Farrar:
No one's ready for it yet.
Painful Burning:
What is it?
Ross Farrar:
It's too good.
Painful Burning:
But what is the name of the album?
Ross Farrar:
It's seriously too good.
Painful Burning:
Can you tell me a few song names? You think Matador will get mad if you give a single song name?
Ross Farrar:
I don't want to give anybody anything about it.
Painful Burning:
No, give me it.
Ross Farrar:
No.
Painful Burning:
Give me the dirt.
Ross Farrar:
No way.
Painful Burning:
Come on, I'm your best friend.
Ross Farrar:
I'm not.
Painful Burning:
Tell me some information. How many minutes is it?
Ross Farrar:
I want it to be about thirty five minutes.
Painful Burning:
And how is it different than Zoo?
Ross Farrar:
One thing that somebody told us after hearing it is that it will put Zoo into context. I think what it does is lets you see how we went from to Zoo to this new record.
Painful Burning:
Which is called?
Ross Farrar:
Oh my gosh, no.
Painful Burning:
Did you say gosh?
Ross Farrar:
Oh my gosh, yeah.
Painful Burning:
You're such a fuck.
Ross Farrar:
I say gosh sometimes instead of god.
Painful Burning:
That's so lame.
Ross Farrar:
That's partially because gosh is a better god. But that's just me.
Painful Burning:
With a capital G?
Ross Farrar:
That's just me.
Painful Burning:
With a capital G?
Ross Farrar:
All praise to gosh. Oh thank gosh.
Painful Burning:
You're not answering my question. Does it have a capital G?
Ross Farrar:
Gosh was actually Jesus' real dad. People didn't know that though.
Painful Burning:
God was his step dad?
Ross Farrar:
Yeah, you could say that. John Reis told me a story. I got to tell one story about him before we go. He told me when he was a kid he was on a plane and the plane was struck by ball lightning. It dropped about three hundred feet. It was mass hysteria. It was pandemonium. He was about twelve years old. Can you imagine that happening to you?
Painful Burning:
Yeah, easily. I have a great imagination. Could you imagine it?
Ross Farrar:
I couldn't imagine it. It would be so scary.
Painful Burning:
Do you know who could imagine it?
Ross Farrar:
No.
Painful Burning:
John Lennon.
Ross Farrar:
I was just about to say that.
Ceremony playing their sold out show at The Roxy.
Painful Burning:
Is there anything else you'd like to say about the album? Besides what someone else said when they heard it.
Ross Farrar:
It's further away from Ruined and Violence Violence than a lot of people are going to like, for the older heads. It's more chilled out.
Painful Burning:
Is it your best album?
Ross Farrar:
I think it is, yes.
Painful Burning:
And sorry, just for the record, what's the name of the album?
Ross Farrar:
Oh man.
Painful Burning:
Can you measure the loss?
Ross Farrar laughs.
Painful Burning:
Do you know why I'm asking you that?
Ross Farrar:
Of course, yeah. I don't know, I'm still trying to figure it out I guess. That's the big question.
Painful Burning:
Can I include that that's a lyric from the new album?
Ross Farrar:
Yeah you can.
Painful Burning:
Looks like I got some dirt. Let's the end the interview with this. Were you happy with these questions?
Ross Farrar:
Yes.
Painful Burning:
Could we do another interview in the future?
Ross Farrar:
Yeah, sure, that's fine.
Painful Burning:
You have to say something funny at the end.
Ross Farrar:
Funny?
Painful Burning:
Yeah, wrap it up.
Ross Farrar:
There's these two fish. They're swimming along in the ocean. They're younger fish. They were probably born a few days prior. Swimming through the ocean. They come across an older wiser fish. He swims across them and says, "Hey, boys, how's the water today?" The two younger look at each other and go, "What the Hell is water?"
-Z
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