Steel Panther Drummer Stix Zadinia ROCKS!

First of all, say Stix Zadinia as fast as you can. Keep doing it til you get the joke. LOL!
The Steel Panther drummer is an awesome guest! Remember going to see the great 'hair bands' of the 1980's? When you go to a Steel Panther show, you get that and whole lot more. No 'politically correct' with these guys. Jump into the time machine and enjoy the podcast! 

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
It is such a great pleasure tohave with us a member of Steel Panther
drummer Sticks Zada is with us?Now, Sticks, did I say the
last name the right way? Yousaid it correctly, but you kind of
have to put them together and youneed to flow it all as one word
to really get the maximum power ofthe name. Well, let's hear it.

(00:20):
Let's hear it from from the manhimself. Sticks, how do you
do it? I want you todo it because this is gonna be eye
opening and mind bending when you whenyou when you say it and you figure
it out, say it all together? All right? So Sticks, Zada,
No, you didn't do it together? All right? Let me try
Stix. Oh, I got it? Now? Was that not worth the

(00:46):
wait? That was worth the wait? Absolutely? Dear God, this is
my proudest moment in thirty five yearsof radio. I got it, dude.
That is great. We were kindof looking at the name, you
know, and it's like, okay, we're not sure it might be zardinias
Ardilla. You know, who knowswhat I'm going to tell you one thing,

(01:07):
Gunner who got screwed on America's gottalent. Steel Panther got screwed on.
American has got Talent. I don't. I don't watch this show.
I heard the Steel Panther was gonnabe on there. By the way,
They're going to be at the BrownCounty of Music Center on the fifth of
May. Sinkle Demayo, by theway, Heidi Kloom, Sylvia Vargeria and
also Simon cal all give them astanding ovation. They don't make it through.

(01:32):
They blew everybody else away on theshow. What do you think Styx?
Oh man, Well, I gotto tell you that experience was was
kind of crazy because obviously we doa certain thing in our band that is
not necessarily network friendly. So wehad we had to play inside the sandbox,
and we decided, you know,we're gonna go on. We're a
pretty good band and I and whenI say that facetiously, I think we

(01:55):
rock. And so it's called America'sTalent. We go on and we're like,
well, we're talented. And whenyou go on a show like that
and you get beat by you,I guess the bottom line really is you
cannot fight the heart string stories.And I get it. We're four dudes
and spandex, you know, thrustingour hips and into the camera. There's

(02:17):
probably a little old ladies in Kansasin the middle of Kansas City going,
oh gosh, I want to votefor the comedian who tells jokes with his
vote and no flight to anybody else. It was a good experience. It
was cool. I got beat upby some kid from Bangladesh that does plate
spinning on a stick. It's like, come on, man, you can't
but you know you can't fight likeyou cannot fight kids. You gotta lose

(02:42):
every time. Yeah, no,that that's the deal right there. Steel
Panther going to be a Brown CountyMusic Center on May fifth. We're with
drummers, sticks. Yeah, Istill love that. I'm gonna I'm going
to say it all date for peoplethat have been I'm gonna go say it
to my wife in a few minutesbecause she didn't know how to say it
either. I'm gonna whisper it inher ear though. Yeah, there you
go, babe, slowly. Yougotta do it slowly. So for people

(03:07):
who have never seen Steel Panther,tell us what they're titting into. Well,
when you come to a Steel Panthershow, if you've never seen this,
hopefully somebody warns you about what you'rewalking into, because if you don't
go in, if you don't gointo it with an open mindset, you
will be you could be shocked,you could be offended because we don't care

(03:30):
about being politically correct. We're notpart of the whole deal. We are
in our own lane. We dowhat we do and we make no apologies.
And you know, what we wantis to create a room and a
party that you will leave with agiant smile on your face. Maybe you
meet somebody who you're attracted to,and you go have a rest of the
great night, you know, greatrest of the night. But like it's

(03:51):
a place where you're gonna come andyou're gonna throw down a party that like
we used to do in the eightiesand everything with all everything that's going on
in the world, it's it's anescape from all the bs and the and
the craziness and you just come watchSteel Panthers and enjoy yourself. It's I
know so many friends that just theydo not miss a show when you guys

(04:13):
come to town. They they loveit. I had not. I don't
know. It was two thousand andnine when I became aware of it.
I'm like, what is this,and then and then they're telling me about
it. You got to see this, and I was watching a lot of
videos over it. I mean,the show for your money, you're not
gonna have a bad time if you'regoing in there and you're gonna be offended
by something. Possibly, but youknow, it's like going to see a
comedian anymore. Guy can't say anything. These guys can steal Panther. It's

(04:35):
their room that night, they ownthe mics. You're gonna love it.
You're not wrong, you know it. Really, it's we get asked a
lot of times, where's your favoriteplace to play, what's the best city,
what's the best craft? And honestly, and this may sound stock like
a stock answer, but it's not. Yeah, people who come to a
Steel Panther show, or people who'venever seen it and been invited or dragged

(04:56):
by their friends, you will leave. I mean, there are gonna be
a handful of people who are like, ooh, that's not my cup of
tea, and I get it,but more than more often than not,
you're gonna leave. Going that wasso fun and refreshing because it's so different
from all the rules that we gotto follow. You can't say this,
You can't say no. It's anequal opportunity freak show and we're in Oh

(05:17):
yeah, that's that's absolutely awesome.Steel Panther gonna be coming to Brown County
Music Center May fifth. Now,Styx, you and I are about the
same age. I'm fifty six yearsold. Hey, if I had to
go out and spandex pants, thiswould be a very different look at this
age than when I was twenty five. So what do you have to do

(05:38):
to stay in shape and look goodin those pants? Well, you know,
you have to do a lot ofdrugs, and on top of that,
on top of that, uh,you know, you have to be
you have to be honestly, whenyou're in spandex. Nobody wants to wear
SPANX and feel un sexy, right, So like you're up, you're up

(06:00):
on stage and you're in stuff that'svery very revealing and does not hide a
lot. So like for me,you know, I actually try to stay
in shape as best I can.And I know that's not a fun answer,
but we all, we all putwork into it because it's the presentation.
You know, we want, wewant to look sexy, and we
want we don't want all dudes atour show. We want chicks to come

(06:20):
to our shows because it's fun toplay the chicks, and then the dudes
come for the chicks, and itswhole domino thing, like we actually we
bust our ass to try to makesure that we look uh you know,
we look sexy because it's important.A great way to look good and spandex
pants is to stay behind the drumkit. Fantastic. You know, you're

(06:42):
not wrong. You're not wrong.If you want, if you want to
be a big drummer in Spanex,you start playing the drums. Yeah,
you got to keep yourself together.Man, if you're going to be out
there, how many dates a yearare you guys out? Oh dude,
I don't you know what I couldI could just tell you this. When
we were when we started, weused to we used to be on the
road about ten months a year,I mean ten to elevel we were.

(07:03):
We it was a looking back,I'm like, oh my my god.
But now all told, we workwe're out for about a total of six
months of the year. We're actuallyon the road and uh, you know,
and in between that, we youknow, we film content. We
get together and we create stuff forour website and we just you know,

(07:26):
music now, the music business andthe entertainment business, especially in the world
of rock. So you have alot of bands out there, right,
and they play music, and there'sa lot of great bands, but frankly,
there's there's it's hard to be anexciting band past the music, right,
so like and yes, the musicmight be enough, but for us,
we grew up in a time whereit was visual, it was it

(07:49):
was visceral, it was dirty,it looked cool like that is important to
us. We're busy creating, youknow, a three hundred and sixty degrees
of entertainment for our fans. Andthat's even though it's six months on the
road, you know, we're stillgrinding at home, not just chilling.
Yeah, there's there's a number ofthe absolute top tier bands with huge catalogs

(08:13):
from the alternative rock era come upwith a couple of them are coming to
town here not too long, andsongs are great. They're huge, staring
at their shoes while they play theguitar, head down, looking down.
Nothing's going on. Man, Yeah, you're not wrong. It's so like
when you go to that show,like put it this way, if somebody
dragged somebody to kind of a shoegazerband. If they didn't care for the

(08:39):
music, there would be nothing elsefor them to latch onto. If you
feel the show and you didn't digthe music, there would be a multitude
of other things you can look atand your senses will It's a sensory overload.
Like there's visual, there's I mean, you can smell the show.
Sometimes it's awesome. I don't likemaking comparison. I don't like to make

(09:01):
comparisons between bands and bands. Butif you could be compared to a band,
not not music wise, but theperformance wise, Steel Panther are like
Red Hot Chili Peppers are in thealternative world. There everybody's freaking out,
everybody's having a blast. Yeah,man, I love that comparison, you
know. I mean I even wouldsay I think the Chili Peppers they throw

(09:24):
down, they throw a party.And there's Steff to like. You watch
Fleet, he puts on a showand you go, oh my god,
you're that guy, and you knowhe's crazy. And then you know you
have Van Halen, which which islike the prototype right for all the eighties
bands in my opinion, and theywere exciting to watch it was just it
was cool. It was a party, and that's what we're going to bring

(09:46):
on Sinker to my own. Yeah, we can't wait for it. Gonna
be Brown County Music Center on Mayfifth. Cinco Demayo sticks it in You
is with us from Steel Panther,Hey Sticks. Over the years, if
you got to meet in of yourrock heroes, oh dude, I've met
a lot. Actually, I've beenlucky enough to meet a lot of people

(10:07):
who I looked up to. Andyou know, it's most of the time
it's cool. Sometimes it's yeah,you're just going You're going. God,
I wish I didn't do that becausethey just totally blew it for me.
Like when I was younger, Iwas not even in Seal Panther. I
was playing in a different band andPrince came to the venue we were playing

(10:31):
and he did a late night showafter Marina show and he used to do
that regularly. And we were told, okay, because we were like the
house band, right, we werein a cover band, and he goes,
uh. We were told don't lookPrince in the eye, like and
all the stuff. You hear,right, don't look Prince in the eye.
You guys are getting kicked out ofyour dressing room. We're dressing the
whole thing up in red and purple, like calls crazy stuff. And then

(10:52):
I met Prince and he's like,you know, tiny stuff. I'm like
looking down and I had to lookat it, like when somebody tells you
not to do, you're gonna doit, right, yeah. Yeah.
So I'm looking at Prince in hiseye and he gave me his little,
tiny baby hand and he shook myhand, and I'm like, hey man,
how you doing? Because he's justa man, right like, I
go, hey man, how youdoing? And he just he kind of

(11:13):
dicked me off, he kind oflike and it soured me because he's insanely
talented, but he bug me out. I was like, ah, but
we've been fortunate enough to meet awhole bunch of people, and most of
the people are are super rat.Prince is like another He's a different kind
of bread, you know. Youknow what I mean. That's just that
you don't know what you're gonna getwith him. You meet Billy Gibbons,
You're gonna walk away going yeah,man, Billy Gibbons, right on,

(11:37):
Prince, Billy Gibbons. You knowwhat you're getting princes like what what is?
What was going on with that guy? A lot of stuff in there.
You're not You're not sure if Princeis digging your girlfriend or maybe it's
you. Whatever he gives, hegives an extended hug and he rolls the
small of your back, so youjust never I love I love the baby

(12:01):
hand comment. The first interview Iever did in radio was back in the
eighties and I interviewed Huey Lewis,who was a really nice guy. Limp
handshake. I was like, ohno, it was like someone someone had
put a fish in my hand orsomething like that. And I'm like,
oh, dude, well we've comeaway. Maybe over time he gripped it

(12:24):
up. I hope. So we'vecome away with three things today, baby
hands, Shoegazer, which I love, and styxid in on our work today.
That's it. That's it. Well, this has been a great pleasure.
It's going to be a blast.Sinko DeMaio Brown County Music Center on

(12:46):
May fifth, sticks. You're gonnalove that venue. It is absolutely awesome.
And tell us where they can findyou guys on social media and stuff.
Oh, you can go to Steelpanther dot com, or you can
go to our Facebook Steel Pans ofRock. Uh. You can go to
my at six at INYA s tI x z A d I n I
A on Instagram, and you cango to Michael Starr I think it's three

(13:09):
hours on Instagram and basically just typein bitching eighties band, super good looking
dudes, hard rocking who love theparty in the search bar and I will
just come right up. It's sosimple. Well, if we could only
if we could only live your life, yeah, it would be a fun
one. And uh sticks, wecan't wait to see you and thank you

(13:30):
for the time. Thank you boys, I appreciate it. Looking forward to coming out