Updated: 02/19/00

For many, including myself, George Lynch is one of the best guitarists in rock music today. Formerly of Dokken, the man has resurrected his other band Lynch Mob with a vengence!!! Prior to the release of their latest album SMOKE IT, we had a chance to speak with Lynch Mob. Here are excerpts from our conversation!

Highwire Daze: What made you decide to leave Dokken and start up Lynch Mob again?

George Lynch: Basically I exercised all of my options in that band and pushed all of the real possibilities to the max. There wasn't really anything I could bring out of that band -- other than what we had already done. The best thing we had going was our chemistry -- the writing chemistry we had back in the late 80's. Since I was kind of being excluded from the writing process towards the end there -- that wasn't going to come back so I thought there was no reason to be there any longer.

HD: When you recruited members for the new Lynch Mob line-up, what were you looking for?

George: People I could relate to on a personal level as far as respect as people -- that's the number one thing just like in any other relationship you have -- business, whatever. All of us had to pull our own weight. I didn't want to play with people I had to provide direction to.

HD: So were any of you guys Dokken fans?

Kirk Harper: The songs were good and the guitar work was phenomenal! I wasn't a guitar player or even a singer back then. But George was always the factor -- when I went and saw Dokken live, I went to see George Lynch and so did all my friends.

Clancy McCarthy: Actually, everybody still does. They just don't know that he's not in the band anymore. (Much laughter) What happened? You lost a lot of weight!

HD: So what do you think of the new Dokken album that came out on CMC?

George: Don't know. Haven't heard it.

HD: Lynch Mob is on Koch Records and not CMC...

George: They are awesome, very hands on. They're workers and they know that we're workers too. We're just not another one of 100 bands on their roster. It's not like I wouldn't want to be on Atlantic or Sony Records or something like that -- but you pay for having all that attention. But it doesn't translate into anything really. You just have this illusion of living large for a while.

Kirk: We're hard workers. The band has a good work attitude. It doesn't matter how it comes to us -- we're gonna get out there and do a great show. All the other bells and whistles will come later on. Right now, we're just worrying about putting on the best show that we possibly can for all the fans -- both old and new. Because there's something they all can get out of it. We do some Dokken songs -- the one's that George wrote and he's proud of. At first, we were kind of shying away from that because we had new stuff. The crowd dug the new stuff but they wanted to hear some of the old stuff. So we're just going out, working hard and trying to make ourselves and our fans happy. There are no egos in this band -- we all love each other as brothers.

HD: When you look back at the older Lynch Mob CD's, what do you think?

George: I wasn't really happy with the second one. The first one I thought was great. I was a different person. It feels like it was something that happened to somebody else.

HD: So even though there have been other Lynch Mob albums, does this feel like starting over?

George: We just use the name to kind of get us in the door. People will realize after a while what this name represents. Right now it implies certain things and people may get over that. But after a while, the name will become what we are. After people see us live or hear us on the radio -- or after we make two or three records -- people will go, "Oh, that's what Lynch Mob is!"

Kirk: Yeah, we're starting over. But you can't throw away your past nor would you want to if it was a successful thing. You have to use that to your advantage. It's always nice to have some kind of upper hand, because there's too many bands out there and a lot of great stuff that will never get heard. So we're all happy about having the opportunity to do it on this level. It's all our dream come true. Even though we've been in good situations before, this is like the light at the end of the tunnel. We're looking forward to really being able to make a big push.

HD: Any messages for Lynch Mob fans the world over?

Kirk: Go to your stores, buy the record. Call the radio stations and request to hear it. And come see the show because the show will blow away the CD! It's a totally new ball game -- and it's all good to go.

HD: Any final words, George?

George: Yeah. Give us a chance. Give the record a chance and be a little open minded. I know some people are a little closed off to the new direction -- but it's really not a new direction. It's really the same thing -- just painted in a different color. It's the same energy -- just a different time and a different space.