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KILL CREEK - RE-BORN!!!! An Interview with Singer/Guitarist Scott Born by Kevin S. Hoskins As the singer/songwriter/guitarist for Lawrence, KS band KILL CREEK, Scott Born is mostly responsible for one of the greatest albums of the 1990s. Proving Winter Cruel is a devastatingly poignant expose of human emotion and of love gone awry. On it, he bares his heart and soul for the world and addresses despair, regret, and anguish with a superb intelligence that is frighteningly honest. Five years later, Kill Creek is back with another doozy of an album. This time, there is a lighter, redemptive and reflective feel to Kill Creek's music. Released this Fall on Second Nature Records, it also features stunning contributions from members of Casket Lottery, Coalesce, Shallow, and Frogpond (in additon to the first appearance of a trumpet in a Kill Creek song, courtesy Kansas City jazz man Tommy Johnson). There were some questions regarding Kill Creek that needed answers so I contacted Scott over email. -Kevin S. Hoskins September 7, 2001 ROCKIST: Scott, first of all, I have to say "Welcome back!." SCOTT: Thanks. It's so good to hear these songs at last! SCOTT: Yeah; it is a great thing for us, too. We are absolute perfectionists about everything from song structures to mixes to edits to mastering to sequencing to packaging and on and on, so it is great to finally have the thing the way I wanted so badly to hear it. ROCKIST: Proving Winter Cruel came out in 1996. Does it feel like five years to you? SCOTT: Jeez; yes and no. Everything about that time is really dark, so I just don't think about it. The past few years have flown, so it feels like the 96-97 years are weighted really heavy. They account for about 4 years, and the past 3 account for one! I'll get out Excel and get back to you. ROCKIST: What transpired in those five years between albums? (I know it's a long story, but I think it's good for people to know.) SCOTT: Well, you can steal that from the various stories that have already been written if you want. We discovered that I was horribly sick, and would continue to be, so I had some major surgery, and during that time we got plunked from our sweet-ass record deal. I went back into the real world and loved it -- I went to grad school, got married, got knee deep in research commitments and interests. I started living sensibly. We all grew up pretty fast after we got knocked out of the chase, and it fit us all really nicely. For some folks, getting "out" of the indie-rock tornado is like Michael Corleone in The Godfather; they don't have any other identities. I'm not sure we really HAD rock-identities, so it was both easy *and* exciting to take a break and go back to everything. We've been playing together since the late 80's, so it was just like before; it was practicing in a garage and going nowhere and having FUN going nowhere. ROCKIST: What's the source of the sentiment behind the line "Entertaining kids shooting up at clubs is no way to spend the night I turn twenty-nine"?? SCOTT: That theme is all over the record. There is a real sadness to what we do; like most bands, our biggest audience is dejected kids. You get suicide notes in the mail. You get kids writing you and telling you that your album is the soundtrack to the worst period of their life. You go on tour and see people at their worst. You don't get to see them doing really great things for their parents, or see them doing important work somewhere, or just being cool and playing Sega with their little brothers. You see them puking in bars and playing with needles in bathroom stalls. I'm just not cool enough with that culture to handle it anymore. It is a terribly sad thing. I'm cool with the fact that it is real, and that people can be completely ruined for years (and turn out fine), but I didn't want it in my face anymore. ROCKIST: How much of the record was recorded at Red House and how much at your house? SCOTT: Most of the vocals were recorded at my house. Some of the sampling and stuff. A lot of the guitar overdubs that sound bad. The stuff that sounds really GOOD was recorded by Ed at Red House.	ROCKIST: Can you tell me about the input/contributions of some of your guests on the record? SCOTT: Yeah, I'd call up Tawni and tell her to get her ass over here and make me sound better! Julie was perfect for "Divorcee" because she sounds like the most innocent, naive little voice in the world. I gave her a copy, and she showed up at RH and just knocked the fuck out of it in about ten minutes. She is unreal. My friend Tommy Johnson played the horn on that song, and I wanted to see if we could pull off that kind of melodic structure without it sounding like "that song with the trumpet" that lots of bands try to do. He's been a player in the Jazz scene here since before I could talk, and I was a trumpet player growing up, so that was really cool. Having the Casket Lottery guys was a last minute thing. I had been drooling over their last record, and we had become friends, but we are all kinda star struck about each other, so it was pretty funny to set up. I wanted to do this song as a full-throttle song, and it wasn't turning out that way. Finally, Ed just had them meet us at RH and Ed played drums and we banged out "Serotonin" in a few hours and it was ready for tape. I hope to do that on the next record. Those guys have an energy that is really shocking. We can't work that up anymore without a little push, and those guys are such great guys and so easy and fun with whom to do that. ROCKIST: How did you end up putting the record out on Second Nature? SCOTT: Dan asked us to do a gi [Government Issue] tribute album, and I wrote back, "We almost have an album done and paid for -- do you want to put it out?" I LOVE his stuff, and I just wanted to put out a record with someone I understand on more levels than record collections, and with someone who is involved in every step of the process. Not with some A&R dork who represents a label which is owned by someone I can't talk to. The scenario is perfect. ROCKIST: I want to back up a bit and ask you about the start of Kill Creek. You, Ron, and Patrick met at a punk show? What was the venue, do you remember? SCOTT: I think I was introduced to Ron on account of his "guitar prowess." My hardcore band had just broken up, and I was wanting to do something a little less "punk rock." I was thinking Scratch Acid, Sonic Youth and stuff, but it ended up a lot more song oriented. There was really only one club for those years, and it was called The Outhouse. We were both there at EVERY show, which was about 5 times a month. We were bored high-school kids. ROCKIST: So were you playing together in high school? College? SCOTT: High School Juniors. 1986. ROCKIST: Is it true that you saw the Oklahoma City bombing first-hand? SCOTT: I didn't see it. I woke up to the sound. I was sleeping in the van. They were in a house where we were staying. After it went off, you couldn't get anywhere near it, though, so we watched on T.V. with our jaws in our laps. It was really something. I felt like an alien in this guy's house. His town had just been savaged, and we were flopping there.... It was a bit much. There are a lot of stories that you wouldn't know unless you were there. The town was out for blood, and going after anyone Arabic, or just anyone darker than beer. There is a huge Arabic population in O.K. City, and that made things a little tense. They were firebombing Mosques and stuff. The town was so pissed that someone could do that to "America," and then it turned out to be a white-as-a-sheet military boy from Kansas. But we didn't know that for a day or so, so the initial reaction was pathetic and humiliating and horribly xenophobic. That legacy just didn't make the papers. ROCKIST: So, what does it feel like to finally have this record, COLORS OF HOME, done and out? SCOTT: Honestly? It doesn't feel any different. It doesn't change my life like it would have had we still been touring and trying to live off of tours and stuff. It just marks the start of the next record instead of the start of the marketing push! We are working already, and looking forward to trying to pull off one more record. I'm pretty convinced I have one more left, and then it is time to move along. I kinda thought that this might be it during periods of this record, but near the end, I got a really savage writing streak and a lot of inspiration. That is part of what delayed the record, but it also left us in a great position for a follow-up.
Kill Creek Discography Colors of Home (Second Nature, 2001) Proving Winter Cruel (Mammoth Records, 1996) St. Valentine's Garage (Mammoth Records, 1994) Stretch (Mammoth Records, 1994) Compilation appearances and rarities are listed on Kill Creek's very excellent website For three stamps and an address label, you can get a sampler of songs from Stretch, St. Valentine's Garage, Proving Winter Cruel, and Colors of Home. (One per envelope).The address: Kill Creek P.O.box 1771 Lawrence, KS 66044