Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
I'm Jeff Stevens. You've got myeighties show podcast, and I'm very excited
to talk to for the first timeever Kip Winger of Winger. Hey,
Jeff, how's it going, KipWinger? How the heck are you?
Man? I'm good? How areyou? I'm good? So first of
all, let's let's talk about thebox set. That's pretty awesome. It
is. It is great because Atlantic'sdone a lot of box sets or well
(00:20):
not know. This is the firstbox set that they've done remasters before,
and I've never actually been involved withthem, so this was the first one
I've I teamed up with the guywho mastered the albums originally and we went
back in the studio to clean themup and make them great. And so
it's actually the first box set thatI've ever actually condoned. And also there's
a lot of artwork in there thatI dug out of storage. It's the
(00:43):
people have never seen. So oh, it's pretty cool. I'm excited about
it. Yeah, I always wonderabout that when artists when something is you
know, remastered or you know yousee like remastered two thousand and nine,
and then you hear where the artistswill say, yeah, you know what
the labeled that I didn't have anythingto do with it. I wasn't involved,
But you were fully involved in this. That's that's pretty awesome. Yeah,
(01:06):
I was, yeah, exactly,And I had the guys write a
little thing on the back about theirexperience. And so it's all original members.
Uh when you see it's live,it's still all original members, by
the way, so nice. Yeah, and the box set reflects that and
skeet Well, there's also a discof demos on there from the demos that
(01:29):
I did before we went in thestudio, which gives it interesting juxtaposition to
how the you know, the album'sactually turned out. So there's I think
there's nine demos on there in adisc version that some of the demos have
been released before, but never onvinyl. So the cool fact. Well,
and I love the fact that,you know, obviously digital is so
(01:49):
convenient, but I love that thisbox set is on vinyl and CD both.
So the Yeah, the rock puristslike myself are like sweet, I
can get they and I still,I mean, I still have thousands of
CDs. So I love that youmade it available on all platforms like that.
Yeah, it's cool. I youknow what, I mostly listened to
CDs myself. I don't own aturntable, but I just ordered one,
(02:14):
so oh nice. You know youhave to. There's there's such a wide
range of turntables out there, soyeah, that's true. Out of a
cool science and it's really come back. So that's that's I'm from the seventies,
so it's cool. That's really takentaken on. Like there's a lot
of collectors out there, and wesee a lot of them at the gigs.
(02:36):
People want us to sign this vinyland it's pretty much everywhere. So
Kip, I want to talk toyou about when, in basically eighty eight
eighty nine, when we started seeingyour face every thirty seconds on MTV,
How did things change for you?Because obviously you were playing bass for Alice
Cooper and and you know, likeyou said, you've been writing demos,
the band had been together for acouple of years. How did things change
(03:00):
and then all of a sudden,you know, seventeen was on MTV seemingly
every hour, and all of asudden, your faces were everywhere. It
was really, you know, itwas surreal because we've made it pretty fast.
People don't know this, but whenthe record first came out, it
completely didn't sell anything. And sixmonths in and we hadn't done anything with
(03:23):
it, and the label was thinkingabout dropping us. And then we got
a Scorpions tour and that really waswhat lit it up. We got the
video for Madelane kind of took offa little bit on head Banger's Ball,
and then we got that Scorpions tour, and then radio followed, and then
all of a sudden, I think, you know, it went platinum really
(03:45):
quickly. So it was very surreal. When you're actually experiencing it, you
don't really notice it because it's reallyeverybody else around you notices it. More
like everybody that knew me really,you know, kind of was a thinking
more than I was. I wasjust really busy, you know, we
had a lot of gigs and stuff. But I mean, of course,
it was awesome to be recognized becauseI started in a band when I was
(04:09):
eight years old. Wow, mybrother, I've got I made my first
salary on a gig when I waseight years old, So it had been
a long time coming, and Iwas totally prepared for it, but it
was it was It was a lotto take in for sure, especially happening
that fast. It was not aslow build right well, and I my
(04:30):
girlfriend we would sit and watch Iwas I was. It was my early
days of being on the radio,and I was on from seven until midnight
at the time. So we'd getI get off the air at midnight and
I'd go over to my girlfriend's houseand we'd sit and watch MTV sometimes for
two or three hours. And soall of a sudden headed for a heartbreaker,
you know, something would come onand it'd be like, oh,
(04:51):
by lost her, She's gone,she's looking at a kip. I'm out,
you know, you no, it'sokay, It's okay. I don't.
I have no heart for that,you know, we all no.
Man. The thing is is wewere all hamming it up when when we
were doing the video, it wasgive me the demos in that back in
the day we were I was watchingMTV twenty four to seven myself, Yeah,
(05:13):
before my band had made it,and I'd just been out of Alice
Cooper and we were rev and Iwere making the demos. I mean we
were watching it was like White Snate, def Leppards. Yeah, you know,
all these bands, they all youknow, that kind of looked that
was happening, and yeah, wejust kind of followed suit in that because
I was never really like a greatmarketing person, you know, we just
kind of happened to fall into thatbecause it was the music was very similar,
(05:36):
and but we always felt like,you know, we had Rod Morgenstein
in our band from the Kinky Greg, so we were kind of just set
just a little bit apart from someof the other bands that were mostly focused
on image. We had a lotof stuff going on under the hood and
the music that, yeah, somepeople didn't have to to get, but
when we play live, it's prettyobvious. You know. I saw you
(05:59):
guys live when I think it wasBon Jovi, Winger and the Bullet Boys,
and you know, it just wheneveryou guys played out, it was
a fantastic show. And I think, like you said, some of those
other bands that that you know,didn't really last very long. Unfortunately that's
probably just kind of how it wentfor them. But you guys had the
talent and the songs to back itup, and uh, and people probably
(06:21):
saw that even more when they sawyou live. Yeah, I appreciate you
saying that. Yeah, we wereally were focused on being a good live
band, you know, and beingable to replicate what was happening in the
studio live and even you know what, A lot of bands nowadays played a
track and stuff, They've got background, vocal track, whatever. But we
played completely live, super old school. I love that, all original members,
(06:46):
same guys. That was back then, and we had I think I
think the tour that you're talking wasCinderella Winger in the bod Yes, yes,
yes, yes, that's what itwas great. Did that was like
six or seven month tour? Itwas awesome. Yeah, yeah, that's
exactly what it was. I was. I couldn't believe just how great it
was. I was more of afan of you guys at Cinderella, but
(07:06):
but yeah, what a what acool tour that was. You're right,
it wasn't bon Jovi Speaking of thelive shows, I know, we've just
got a minute or so left here. What can people? I know,
you're touring kind of through the endof the year and into almost most of
next year, right, Yeah,I mean, we just keep it going,
we we Nowadays you it's a lotof fly days as well, so
(07:27):
and you know, festivals, alot of you know, uh, cruises,
we do the Monsters of Rock Cruiseevery year, which is absolutely but
we know we play all the hits. We play a lot of stuff from
our new music. We put anew record out last May called seven,
and you can see the videos onYouTube from that, and it's super consistent
(07:49):
from I think that was start well. Obviously it was our seventh record.
So we play songs from all theears of the band and and uh,
let the sow shine and stuff,and I can still sing the notes,
thank god, So hopefully I'm goingto I'm going to as soon as my
voice starts to fail, I'm goingto give it up. I think it's
awesome that that your voice is stillstrong and everybody will see that when they
(08:13):
go see you and the cool thingI like too, and I'll let you
go, whether it's you know,miles away or headed for a heartbreak,
you know, seventeen or can't GetEnough, which is always on my like
my running playlist anytime I run,I listened to Can't Get It Of?
You know, it's just thank you. Yeah you guys are you got the
rocking, You've got the power balladsand uh and still the original members.
(08:33):
That's that's awesome. That's why everybodyshould go check out the Winger box set
and uh and check out Winger ontour next year. I appreciate that.
Man, It's nice of you tosay, Yeah, good talking to you,
Kip, take care man, andhappy Thanksgiving you too, man,
Thanks Jeff, thank you, Byebye
I'm Jeff Stevens. You've got myeighties show podcast, and I'm very excited
to talk to for the first timeever Kip Winger of Winger. Hey,
Jeff, how's it going, KipWinger? How the heck are you?
Man? I'm good? How areyou? I'm good? So first of
all, let's let's talk about thebox set. That's pretty awesome. It
is. It is great because Atlantic'sdone a lot of box sets or well
(00:20):
not know. This is the firstbox set that they've done remasters before,
and I've never actually been involved withthem, so this was the first one
I've I teamed up with the guywho mastered the albums originally and we went
back in the studio to clean themup and make them great. And so
it's actually the first box set thatI've ever actually condoned. And also there's
a lot of artwork in there thatI dug out of storage. It's the
(00:43):
people have never seen. So oh, it's pretty cool. I'm excited about
it. Yeah, I always wonderabout that when artists when something is you
know, remastered or you know yousee like remastered two thousand and nine,
and then you hear where the artistswill say, yeah, you know what
the labeled that I didn't have anythingto do with it. I wasn't involved,
But you were fully involved in this. That's that's pretty awesome. Yeah,
(01:06):
I was, yeah, exactly,And I had the guys write a
little thing on the back about theirexperience. And so it's all original members.
Uh when you see it's live,it's still all original members, by
the way, so nice. Yeah, and the box set reflects that and
skeet Well, there's also a discof demos on there from the demos that
(01:29):
I did before we went in thestudio, which gives it interesting juxtaposition to
how the you know, the album'sactually turned out. So there's I think
there's nine demos on there in adisc version that some of the demos have
been released before, but never onvinyl. So the cool fact. Well,
and I love the fact that,you know, obviously digital is so
(01:49):
convenient, but I love that thisbox set is on vinyl and CD both.
So the Yeah, the rock puristslike myself are like sweet, I
can get they and I still,I mean, I still have thousands of
CDs. So I love that youmade it available on all platforms like that.
Yeah, it's cool. I youknow what, I mostly listened to
CDs myself. I don't own aturntable, but I just ordered one,
(02:14):
so oh nice. You know youhave to. There's there's such a wide
range of turntables out there, soyeah, that's true. Out of a
cool science and it's really come back. So that's that's I'm from the seventies,
so it's cool. That's really takentaken on. Like there's a lot
of collectors out there, and wesee a lot of them at the gigs.
(02:36):
People want us to sign this vinyland it's pretty much everywhere. So
Kip, I want to talk toyou about when, in basically eighty eight
eighty nine, when we started seeingyour face every thirty seconds on MTV,
How did things change for you?Because obviously you were playing bass for Alice
Cooper and and you know, likeyou said, you've been writing demos,
the band had been together for acouple of years. How did things change
(03:00):
and then all of a sudden,you know, seventeen was on MTV seemingly
every hour, and all of asudden, your faces were everywhere. It
was really, you know, itwas surreal because we've made it pretty fast.
People don't know this, but whenthe record first came out, it
completely didn't sell anything. And sixmonths in and we hadn't done anything with
(03:23):
it, and the label was thinkingabout dropping us. And then we got
a Scorpions tour and that really waswhat lit it up. We got the
video for Madelane kind of took offa little bit on head Banger's Ball,
and then we got that Scorpions tour, and then radio followed, and then
all of a sudden, I think, you know, it went platinum really
(03:45):
quickly. So it was very surreal. When you're actually experiencing it, you
don't really notice it because it's reallyeverybody else around you notices it. More
like everybody that knew me really,you know, kind of was a thinking
more than I was. I wasjust really busy, you know, we
had a lot of gigs and stuff. But I mean, of course,
it was awesome to be recognized becauseI started in a band when I was
(04:09):
eight years old. Wow, mybrother, I've got I made my first
salary on a gig when I waseight years old, So it had been
a long time coming, and Iwas totally prepared for it, but it
was it was It was a lotto take in for sure, especially happening
that fast. It was not aslow build right well, and I my
(04:30):
girlfriend we would sit and watch Iwas I was. It was my early
days of being on the radio,and I was on from seven until midnight
at the time. So we'd getI get off the air at midnight and
I'd go over to my girlfriend's houseand we'd sit and watch MTV sometimes for
two or three hours. And soall of a sudden headed for a heartbreaker,
you know, something would come onand it'd be like, oh,
(04:51):
by lost her, She's gone,she's looking at a kip. I'm out,
you know, you no, it'sokay, It's okay. I don't.
I have no heart for that,you know, we all no.
Man. The thing is is wewere all hamming it up when when we
were doing the video, it wasgive me the demos in that back in
the day we were I was watchingMTV twenty four to seven myself, Yeah,
(05:13):
before my band had made it,and I'd just been out of Alice
Cooper and we were rev and Iwere making the demos. I mean we
were watching it was like White Snate, def Leppards. Yeah, you know,
all these bands, they all youknow, that kind of looked that
was happening, and yeah, wejust kind of followed suit in that because
I was never really like a greatmarketing person, you know, we just
kind of happened to fall into thatbecause it was the music was very similar,
(05:36):
and but we always felt like,you know, we had Rod Morgenstein
in our band from the Kinky Greg, so we were kind of just set
just a little bit apart from someof the other bands that were mostly focused
on image. We had a lotof stuff going on under the hood and
the music that, yeah, somepeople didn't have to to get, but
when we play live, it's prettyobvious. You know. I saw you
(05:59):
guys live when I think it wasBon Jovi, Winger and the Bullet Boys,
and you know, it just wheneveryou guys played out, it was
a fantastic show. And I think, like you said, some of those
other bands that that you know,didn't really last very long. Unfortunately that's
probably just kind of how it wentfor them. But you guys had the
talent and the songs to back itup, and uh, and people probably
(06:21):
saw that even more when they sawyou live. Yeah, I appreciate you
saying that. Yeah, we wereally were focused on being a good live
band, you know, and beingable to replicate what was happening in the
studio live and even you know what, A lot of bands nowadays played a
track and stuff, They've got background, vocal track, whatever. But we
played completely live, super old school. I love that, all original members,
(06:46):
same guys. That was back then, and we had I think I
think the tour that you're talking wasCinderella Winger in the bod Yes, yes,
yes, yes, that's what itwas great. Did that was like
six or seven month tour? Itwas awesome. Yeah, yeah, that's
exactly what it was. I was. I couldn't believe just how great it
was. I was more of afan of you guys at Cinderella, but
(07:06):
but yeah, what a what acool tour that was. You're right,
it wasn't bon Jovi Speaking of thelive shows, I know, we've just
got a minute or so left here. What can people? I know,
you're touring kind of through the endof the year and into almost most of
next year, right, Yeah,I mean, we just keep it going,
we we Nowadays you it's a lotof fly days as well, so
(07:27):
and you know, festivals, alot of you know, uh, cruises,
we do the Monsters of Rock Cruiseevery year, which is absolutely but
we know we play all the hits. We play a lot of stuff from
our new music. We put anew record out last May called seven,
and you can see the videos onYouTube from that, and it's super consistent
(07:49):
from I think that was start well. Obviously it was our seventh record.
So we play songs from all theears of the band and and uh,
let the sow shine and stuff,and I can still sing the notes,
thank god, So hopefully I'm goingto I'm going to as soon as my
voice starts to fail, I'm goingto give it up. I think it's
awesome that that your voice is stillstrong and everybody will see that when they
(08:13):
go see you and the cool thingI like too, and I'll let you
go, whether it's you know,miles away or headed for a heartbreak,
you know, seventeen or can't GetEnough, which is always on my like
my running playlist anytime I run,I listened to Can't Get It Of?
You know, it's just thank you. Yeah you guys are you got the
rocking, You've got the power balladsand uh and still the original members.
(08:33):
That's that's awesome. That's why everybodyshould go check out the Winger box set
and uh and check out Winger ontour next year. I appreciate that.
Man, It's nice of you tosay, Yeah, good talking to you,
Kip, take care man, andhappy Thanksgiving you too, man,
Thanks Jeff, thank you, Byebye
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