11 tracks that will get your pulse racing right from the get-go, powered by great vocals, really tasty riffs and short but sweetly memorable solos. The selling point of these songs is the crunchy guitar that starts off almost all of them in combination with some beautifully constructed melodic parts. The results just define them as undeniably Beauvoir-Free, if you're familiar with both parties.

Jean Beauvoir has enjoyed a varied career that has seen him play with a range of artists from The Plasmatics, Gary U.S. Bonds, Little Steven & the Disciples of Soul, while also writing with or producing tons of others such as KISS, The Ramones, N'SYNC, Debbie Harry and many more. He has also garnered acclaim as a solo artist beginning with his 1986 album Drums Along the Mohawk which produced the hit "Feel the Heat" from the soundtrack to Sylvester Stallone's movie Cobra soundtrack.

I spoke to Jean recently to talk about American Trash and his renewed partnership with Micki Free. The man with the white mohawk proved to be a joy to talk to. The conversation was peppered with a lot of laughs and great stories from someone who has seen and done it all. Read on:

antiMusic: I guess to start off with it's been over 20 years since the first Crown of Thorns record with Micki. Why was now a good time to resurrect the partnership?

Jean: You know, we actually started talking about it a while ago. Like we split up in, I want to say, in '94 or something like that and after that I continued with Crown of Thorns, made a bunch of records and Micki went on and did his own thing. But we kind of got back together seven years later or something after that. We both ended up living in LA in the same neighbourhood and we ran into each other and he said, "Lets hang out". So we did.

Then we played Hard Rock Calling I think in 2010 or something but we always talked about doing something again. I didn't want to do it again as Crown of Thorns because the line-up had changed. We had made a lot of records but Micki and I always said, "We should do something though...some project...something else. We'll come up with something." And then finally this year I mentioned it to Serafino over at Frontiers and said, "You know, we're thinking of making this record, Micki and I, as Beauvoir-Free, the same name we used for Hard Rock Calling." And he said, "Sounds great. Lets go." (laughs) That's it. And it turned into a deal. (laughs) So we made the record.

antiMusic: Wow. Tell us how the record actually took shape. Did you and Micki have germs of ideas for songs and then the other would help flush out those ideas? Or was it strictly you with the lyrics and him with the riffs or was it a bit of everything kind of?

Jean: Well, it was primarily him with a lot of the riffs, for example, but we did everything together. I think pretty much almost every song that was written, we were in the room together. Except for maybe, "Just Breathe" which was something that I had started messing around on before. But the rest of it, literally he'd come down to my place for a couple of weeks and we'd go up to my studio, grab two guitars, he plays a little idea, an initial starting kind of a riff, and I'd go, "Hey, okay you're going here, you're going there." And then I'd start to sing melodies over it and then that's it. And pretty much, we'd have the song or at least the basis of the song.

And then from there he'd take off and then I'd start to do the work putting different instruments on it, putting everything together and usually when that happened, at that point it's just a melody. I would always just hum a melody with no real words. (laughs) Next thing we know we have the song. And then he's gone and he might send me some lyric ideas for some of the songs, for whatever, something that he thinks sounds cool, like "angels cry" and then we'll get on the phone and talk about it and then you know, write a lyric around that.

Some of the songs I would write the lyric myself like "Never Give Up" or "Just Breathe" because I just heard it and then that's it. Then I'd kind of mix it up, put it all together, send it over to him to listen to it and he's always positive. So he's like "Man, sounds great." And I'm always the one that's "I'm not sure. Maybe it needs this. Maybe it needs a little more of that." And he's like, "No! No! It's great!" (laughs) And that's it.

That's pretty much how I made the whole record. We'd just do that on maybe three or four different trips in by Micki. He'd come in, do the basic guitar, then he would come back for solos lets say or finish off the guitars once we had the basics. And I would put some guitars while he was gone and that's it man.

antiMusic: Wow.

Jean: (laughs) We'd piece it together.

antiMusic: How long approximately did pre production take?

Jean: A couple months. Yeah, it took a few months. The record took a while. It actually probably took�not working every day---but it took six or seven months or something just because we had other things going. Then I'd come back in the studio and I'd go really hard at it for a couple of weeks in a row, in there every night etcetera. But it took a while.

Once you have the initial song, that's...I'm not going to say that's the easy part, but it's the part that comes quickest believe it or not, the writing of the basic song. Once you have that, then it's all the production stuff, like drums on the track, this part, the guitar part, all the background vocals, the keyboards�(laughs)�you know. Then mixing it and making it you know, sound right and then trying to get that message across of what we initially thought when we first put down that little humming idea. (laughs)

antiMusic: There's a slight variety in the material; straight-ahead rockers, a ballad, a couple of lighter songs. Was this purposeful or did you just choose the best songs of the bunch that came out?

Jean: We, I think we might have had a couple of extra ideas, very rough ideas that didn't make it, but we went with pretty much everything we wrote. I think that if we felt we weren't going in the right direction or when I say right direction, I mean it didn't sound like a good song for US, we wouldn't continue, right from the beginning.

We'd start writing something, boom boom, I'd hear a verse, I'd start singing, okay, that sounds good. Then boom boom...and the melodies are where Micki and I...it's always been that way, even the first Crown of Thorns record, I remember Jimmy Iovine used to call us the Short Order Cooks. (laughs) Because we'd get in there, and whenever we got in a room with someone...because you know, sometimes you vibe off of people in a certain way and you know, I write with a lot of different people and sometimes it can be simple.

Sometimes it can be a long process, like "Ah we don't have the chorus yet", days of work and nobody's ever satisfied. It's just not that kind of vibe with us. We sit in a room and right away, he'll play something and I'll sing the first melody that comes out of my mouth and that's the melody that's going to end up on the album.

It's usually a one-take thing where literally, we'll lay down the basics of the thing, you whatever, a simple click track or beat...just something very simple with nothing on it and I'll sing through whatever I hear from beginning to end of the song, you know humming it. And I'd say 95 per cent of the time, that ended up being exactly the melody that's used on the album. (laughs)

antiMusic: That's crazy.

Jean: It is. You know, that's just the way it goes. It's just pretty natural for us because we just feel each other, in a certain way.

antiMusic: You've got some wonderfully melodic passages, juxtaposed against some pretty nasty riffs...

Jean: (laughs)

antiMusic: ...but you get the feeling at the end of the record, and obviously with all the stuff that you do, that melody and a strong hook have to be king for the song to get your okay, it's not just enough for a riff�

Jean: Yes, it does. And I think I missed your last question a little bit, now that I think about it but it does...melodies and riffs, I think you hit right on it, because that's kind of the balance that we try find. I think maybe that's what makes our whole thing kind of interesting. Because a lot of time Micki has some pretty cool, unorthodox riffs. They're rock but at the same time they have some kind of other influences and I have the same in melodies and when we put those things together it creates something interesting, if you know what I mean.

antiMusic: Yeah. I would agree.

Jean: In regards to your last question, we didn't plan, okay now we have to play that kind of song, or that kind of song. It would just come. We would write something that's like "American Trash", and want it to have a certain kind of feel, we want it to be heavy, and pounding and we went for that. And then of course with the ballads, there aren't many. We actually made a decision there would only be one real ballad on the record this time. It's just from experience, sometimes you go "Ah, there were too many ballads on that last record!" (laughs) It's supposed to be a rock band so I'm going keep it to one, you know. (laughs) So we end up with some kind of a variety of songs that way.

antiMusic: Lets talk a bit more about the actual songs. And I'm not joking, I absolutely love every single song on this record

Jean: Ah, I mean, that's amazing. (laughs)

antiMusic: The first three tracks are absolute gold but far and away my favourite song is "Morning After". That opening riff is just real crunchy and when the verse goes into the most beautiful chorus I've ever heard, I think it's just the moment of the record for me. When writing the record how did you go from one extreme to the other? Did you hear that melodic part as soon as you heard that riff?

Jean: You know I think, to me, I love melodic choruses. All the records I do, I really try to go for great melodic choruses. And I try to go to a place that I think, that I hope will move people, make them feel something when it hits. And that riff... you hit it. It's a great balance of dah dah dah, very kind of straight rock kind of riff to it, and all of a sudden the clouds open and we take you to a completely different place.

And "Morning After", it's almost as if the music is supposed to fit the lyric and take you to, it's supposed to create this journey, this feeling of what the song is supposed to be about. It's almost like (laughs) The Beatles used to do back in the day, you know what I mean? And that's the concept, that's what we strive for anyway. We don't always hit it, but at least that what we try for. And that's one of the things I really like about that song myself because when I heard that thing come, when you're writing it, you feel it. You're sitting in the room together, and you're like "Wow man, that feels good!" (laughs) And when that part came, we listened to it over and over again because it just felt very nice. (laughs) But I'm glad that it's appreciated because that's what we were trying to accomplish.

antiMusic: The title of the record is American Trash and as you say it's the name of an imaginary strip club and a tribute to dancers across the globe. Did you get the idea for this during a particularly inspiring night in your local club? (laughs)

Jean: (laughs) To tell you the truth, yes. I was down in Key West. I used to live there. Key West is a really funky place and I've got good friends there. One guy's a rock dj on the radio, another guy's a writer for the local paper, and another guy is the dj in the premier strip club down there. And I go visit him every time I'm in town, once a year. And I walked into the club---and his name's Rocko ---and he's like "Hey Jean!" He loves my record and he's like, "I'm going to play something."

He starts playing Crown Of Thorns and he's like, "You've got to make another record. You've got to make another record because we need some great rock music for the club." He says, "All my friends, djs across America in all these clubs are looking for great songs that we can play. We can't find anything anymore." (laughs) "All the great rock stuff is going away." And then when I went back home, I thought about that.

Micki and I were talking and I told him about when I went down there and the conversation with my friend. I said we should write something. All of a sudden, "American Trash" came about. I just put down a beat and we started to playing to it and the next thing you know, we just felt it and that song came out of it. So it was inspired by that completely.

But you know, that's what writing is all about. it's supposed to be a reflection of life, a reflection of what people are going through, of what we're going through. To me that's what making records�that was the purpose at the beginning and still should be. You're a voice. You've got a purpose...at least that's how we look at it. I don't know if everybody looks at things that way anymore but, you know, as a fan of music that's what I would do. I go listen to records that move me, that make feel something, that told me stories, that took me into fantasy, made me sad, made me happy, talked to me when my girlfriend's pissed off here at home. (laughs)

antiMusic: By the way I know Little D. She has an act up here with her sister. They call it Double D. (laughs)

Jean: (laughs) Now I know you're from Canada. You guys know exactly what I'm talking about...that's pretty funny.

antiMusic: "Angels Cry" is a perfect way to start the record. I mean what a wicked riff. What inspired that lyric?

Jean: Even angels cry. It's like, the most beautiful girls in the world...all women have that soft spot inside of them, no matter what. And we see it. They've all got that�when they see that they're upset or things that they've been striving for in life just hasn't happened or whatever it is, they weep. And we're there. We're watching you. Even though women may seem tough and they've got it all together all the time, we're seeing you, we watch you and we know that even angels cry.

antiMusic: Cool. "Cold Dark December" is fittingly enough a colder feeling song than the other tracks, especially on the chorus but it has some of the best production I think. I love some of the background vocals�some of the yeah yeahs, the subtle keys and that sort of tinny percussion sound from, I don't know, tapping on the bell part of the ride or the high hat or whatever that is�.

Jean: (laughs) God you're good. You've heard some details on this thing. You must play. (laughs)

antiMusic: I've just been listening to it, Jean. I mean, I've been really listening. Although you could argue that Angels Cry is part of the same sort of vibe, did you want this on the record, "Cold Dark December" that is, to sort of balance out some of the lighter material?

Jean: You know, we actually went back and forth about whether that song was going to be on the record or not. We loved the song but we didn't know if it really fit in that whole�but in the end Micki and I are like, "We like it. Put it on."

antiMusic: It does fit. It balances the other tracks out and gives the album a well rounded vibe. You know what I mean? But I think it sounds different than the other songs.

Jean: Yes. And the funny thing is most people don't say that. You're one of the first people who actually said that, really saw that they're was some sort of significant difference in that song from the others. Most people don't see it. The production IS different, there's the whole feeling of it. It's just different. Yeah, we like it.

I think it's just about that time, that one day that I noticed that I was being advantage of. And it just happened to be a cold dark December and the feeling of the I'm not going to take it anymore kind of thing. The music kind of surrounds it and you try to create the story with the riffs and everything. But I think I know what you're talking about with that high hat, that ting ting ting during the middle of the chorus.

antiMusic: Yeah, it's subtle but you can really hear it, especially on head phones, it comes through well.

Jean: Hmm. Do you play drums?

antiMusic: No, I'm not really a musician at all.

Jean: Ah, that's interesting. You're hearing all the details. That's good stuff. That's funny.

antiMusic: Are you, and by you I guess I mean Frontiers, waiting to see how the record is being received before planning on any live dates?

Jean: Well we're working on live dates right now. We really do want to play live. We're trying to sort it out. We actually just booked the Frontiers Special but that's not till next year, that's in May. But we're trying to work out U.S. and European tours. We're just speaking to a couple different agents you know because we haven't been on the road in a while so we're just trying to get it all together. Micki and I really want to get on the road and it's about time. We have fun on the road and it's one thing to get out to the fans and perform. That's the beauty of doing this. Making the record is one thing, it's fun to do it and get the reaction. But the real pay off is when you're out there in front of an audience that digs what you're doing.

antiMusic: Absolutely. The problem is with a schedule like yours, trying to say no to all the things that are coming your way I imagine.

Jean: Well, I'm busy doing other stuff but at the same time, you've got to sometimes not forget, which I do at times...that this is really what I was meant to do. and sometimes you get distracted and you end up in other business things. It's funny, I always had this saying, "You've got the music, and you've got the business. And without the business, there's no music in the music business." It was funny I was watching a James Brown thing yesterday and he said a similar thing: "It's show business."

But sometimes you lose sight and then realize that your passion is music and being out there playing and doing this. It's not always so easy to just do that. It's the way life is.

antiMusic: We're getting to the end, so before I go I just had to ask about your playing with Gary U.S. Bonds. If I heard right, you answered an ad to play with him as a guitarist/band leader. If that's true, how on earth first of all did you have the moxy to audition when you were 13 or 14�and how did the other guys in the band react to you as the new guy coming in even though you lied about your age, I assume they were much older.

Jean: Yeah and you are so on it. You are SO on it. A couple of things. First of all, when I was 13. I was playing in a junior high school rock band that a teacher had put together at the school. And we basically had different singers. I was leading it with him. He was a drummer that had opened for The Who once and he really loved music and he was my math teacher. (laughs)

So I did that. I did that for a while and then summer came about. I said, I don't want to stop for the summer---so lets go play some local clubs. So I had this small little moustache (laughs) and I had mascara on it and stuff (laughs). And I was out there playing in various places for the summer.

This one day this manager, a guy named John Apostle, just comes up to me and says, "Hey, I love the band. You guys want to go on the road?" And I was like, "Well yeah". He asks, "How old are you?" and at that time I think I was like 13 or 14 and I told him 17 or 18. He said, "Okay. Well listen I manage a guy called Gary U.S. Bonds. He lives not too far from you guys and why don't you come out to his house on Sunday and meet him, play a little bit and see what the deal is."

So I did that. Went over there and Gary liked me right there and started calling me Booboo, which was my nickname at that time. And he was like, "Okay. Booboo, it's your gig. You've got it. I don't like to rehearse so you put it together. You can hire who you want, use who you want. You want to use everybody here that's fine. Do what you want to do. and meet me in Florida." And that was it.

That was some hotel someplace, you know he used to do one month in Sarasota, one month in Bermuda, that sort of thing. And so I actually hit the road, went down there and that was it. And the next thing you know, I felt like I was in the music business for real. Until close to the end of the summer, he comes into my room one day and he says "Booboo, I just found out something. I spoke to your mom and she told me that you're 14 and you've got to go back to school." I said, " I don't want to school. I'm in rock and roll now. This is my dream. This is it."

He said, "Nah nah nah. You've got to go back to school. You can still play with me and on weekends and stuff and I'll call your teachers if I have to grab you on a Thursday, I'm sure they'll let you go." And that was it. That kind of started a pretty long time relationship. The next year the band changed, there were some new guys that he had brought in because he was using some other people in between. And the funny thing you said about them being older, it's exactly what happened. He had a keyboard player, I still remember him, I think he was 22 or something at the time.

The guitar player was Tommy Lafferty who was older than me and we were playing in Bermuda when I called a rehearsal. Nobody showed up. (laughs) So Gary says "Okay, Booboo, you're the boss. You do what you've got to do to make sure that these guys do what they've got to do." So I said, "Okay, I'm going to dock people for not showing up for rehearsal." (laughs) They wanted to jet me. Everybody was like, "Who the hell do you think you are, you little punk? You're trying to dock us? blah blah blah" (laughs) And it caused a big stress.

And then Tommy, who's still the guitar player in Crown of Thorns today, at that time, came over to me and said, "You're right. I got your back and, I'm on your side." He was a really great jazz guitarist at the time. He had studied at Berkeley. But that was his thing. He played an ES335 really high so I lent him one of my Les Paul's, turned him into a rock and roll guy (laughs) and he became my dearest friend right up to today. He was in Voodoo X. He was on my solo record. He IS in Crown of Thorns up till now.

And this is that many years ago. And it was exactly what you said, exactly that's what happened. Older guys looking down at a little kid, really. But Gary really had a lot of respect for me and that relationship lasted up till now as well to tell you the truth. We're talking what 30 years? Because after that ended, Apostle was still managing Gary U.S. Bonds and they introduced me to Little Steven Van Zandt because Steven and Bruce Springsteen produced and played on the Gary U.S. Bonds comeback record.

antiMusic: That's right. That's what I was going to ask, I assumed that was your intro to Miami Steve.

Jean: That was it. That was it. John Apostle again, the same guy who found me in that club that day, is the guy who told me...when I left the Plasmatics and I was looking to do a solo record and nobody would sign me. He said, "I've got an idea. I'm going to have Gary U.S. Bonds, Little Steven and Bruce rehearse in a loft in New York and from there I think that you and Steven will hit it off. You've got a lot of credibility. You're a talented guy. I think that maybe something will come out of it." And then that's what happened. (laughs)

antiMusic: Wow. That's crazy. Were you aware of Gary U.S. Bonds prior to hooking up with them?

Jean: No actually. Because it was like a different era. I think his first hit was like in 1962.

antiMusic: Yeah, exactly

Jean: I was just born, you know what I mean? (laughs)

antiMusic: Yeah.

Jean: But I understood it quickly. And from there, of course playing with Gary, I met all these other guys and actually ended up working with some of them because sometimes Chuck Berry would show up without a band or Bo Diddley would show up without a band. And Gary would just walk into the dressing room and say, �Booboo, you want to play with Chuck Berry tonight? Do you want to play with Bo Diddley tonight?" (laughs). And I'd be, "Oh, okay." (laughs)

And then you'd basically just get on stage and be calling chords out to your guys, just watching and standing next to Chuck Berry or Bo Diddley. And I got to play all those Dick Clark shows all over America. It was amazing, a great experience. A great way to get into the music business. That was those years, 14, 15, 16, that's it. Then I joined the Plasmatics.

antiMusic: What a life.

Jean: It was crazy.

antiMusic: What was the most surprising thing you ever found out about Paul Stanley, maybe not even musically speaking?

Jean: I'm thinking. What is the most surprising thing? I know this isn't going to sound really surprising but he was actually, Paul is a real big Motown R&B fan.

antiMusic: Is that right? Nice.

Jean: See? I guess it's surprising.

antiMusic: It is.

Jean: He always loved that kind of music. At the time we were both living in New York together. We would go out to these dance clubs and we'd be dancing up a storm. You'd think we were Wilson Pickett or something. (laughs) That's what we would do. We'd go out to these clubs, dancing and spinning and doing all those things and if you watch a lot of his moves, you'll notice that a lot of those moves come from that real kind of R&B Motown kind of feeling.

You wouldn't think of that because you know one of the keys of music is when you combine certain elements that maybe (laughs) people don't put together. And it creates something unique. And he had a great understanding of that kind of music. (sings) "I was made for loving you baby.." right?

antiMusic: Yeah.

Jean: (sings) "standing in the shadows of love.." (laughs)

antiMusic: You're right. Yeah. Okay, it's not far removed actually.

Jean: You see what I'm saying? You know it's funny. R&B Motown, he loved that kind of music and he used a lot of that in his music... like we all do. I'm not saying this is a bad thing. We all do. I think what makes Micki and my writing different is that we both have different influences. Playing with Gary U.S. Bonds or playing with Bo Diddley who's keeping one groove, all these different influences put into what you're doing now, background vocals, make you approach things differently. In other words, he had a lot of depth in his mental rolodex when it came to music. And it wasn't just about some makeup and some chords. He had a really good understanding of it which is surprising.

antiMusic: I'm talking to Micki in a couple of days. I wanted to speak with him as well to talk about the record because as soon as he breaks into the solos on every song, it's like oh wow, it's over. Man it's nice.

Jean: His solos are great. I mean I actually listened to the record last night. You know sometimes you get away from it and last night I actually just grabbed a glass of wine, went up to the studio and just listened the record from beginning to end. You know you get to the point that you're far enough away where you can just listen a bit more objectively and you're right....the solos were just, yeah, really, really well done.

Yeah, the melodies in those solos...he's got a really great feel for understanding and being able to bring that to the song, which is an extension of the lead vocal melodies. It's not just ripping guitars. It's guitars that speak.

antiMusic: That's a great way of putting it. That's really what it sounds like. It's true.

Jean: You know what I mean?

antiMusic: Yeah.

Jean: It's like that unspoken thing why the reaction comes in the way that it does. Sometimes you can't explain. A lot of people will look and say, that guitar player's really fast. Or Yngwie Malmstein or that one or that one can do that.' But there's a unique thing about making the guitar speak and creating that same emotion from the guitar as the lead vocal does or the melody does.

That reminds me, I don't want to bore you with stuff, but I remember when I was playing with Gary U.S. Bonds, and it's great things that you learned back in those days. One guy...we had two guitar players, and one guy's really fast, he can do all these fast licks, he could do all these different things. And this other guy would just get upon stage and almost like a Hendrix thing, and he would just stand and play one note. And everybody would sit around and wonder, "Why does this guy just get up and just play like one or two notes and just make that note sing for like 60 seconds and move the whole audience and this other guy would be doing all these fantastic licks and nobody cared." And it was something you couldn't really understand.

antiMusic: You just feel it.

Jean: You just feel it. That's right. And that's it. That's how we feel.

Morley and antiMusic thank Jean for taking the time to speak with us. Look for Part 2 of our interview with Beauvoir-Free later this week when we talk to Micki Free.

Preview and purchase the new album here