It’s always nice when a true global superstar rolls into town with his side project Phil X & The Drills and agrees to take time out to talk to ROCKFLESH, so naturally we choose to send a very nervous Jo Crosby along to chat to him about YouTube, ghosting on other people’s recordings and of course cake. He took all of this stuttering and stammering on Jo’s part in good humour, and here’s what happened.

“Hi Phil, welcome to Manchester and thank you for taking the time to talk to us. I have to confess that I have no idea what I can ask you about that you haven’t been asked a thousand times before so I threw it out to my Facebook friends to come up with some new questions for you. I hope this is OK!”

Thanks, yes, sure, (laughs) interview by Facebook, you can ask me anything.

“Ok well, what I discovered is that on my Facebook friends list I have some people who are very much into your work and also some who are just very weird! Can I start by asking you about Aldo Nova? You toured extensively with him, but did you ever record with him?”

With Aldo, no. Oh wait yeah, yeah kind of. It was a bit more complicated than that though. I was still playing with Aldo, still in his band, and Jon (Bon Jovi) got in touch to ask if Aldo would play on his Elton John thing. It was kind of like a tribute thing, and it was going to be Jon and Aldo’s band doing “Levon”. So I, yeah, I did the guitars on that, then Jon wanted a different sound so he brought Tico Torres and David Bryan from his band in and we did that together. So yeah, if you listen to that recording of “Levon” (note: you can find this on the 1991 album “Two Rooms”, credited to Jon Bon Jovi) that was me and Aldo, playing together, recording together, with Jon and his band. The only time.

“Oh wow I never knew that, thanks! Ok next question obviously you are most well-known now for replacing Richie Sambora in Bon Jovi but you’re here at the moment with your – side project would you call it? Phil X & The Drills. Did you have the Drills before Bon Jovi, or after, or has it always been kind of alongside?”

OK well I formed the Drills in 2008 so before I started with Bon Jovi. What happened was I‘d been working in a band with my now ex wife, the band Powder, and that had a very particular sound you know? So I was making the music that fitted her voice, her choice, her direction, and then when that all started to fall apart and I left that band I had all this stuff in my head. So yeah I just went away from Powder and I had all these ideas, like an explosion of songs, and I wrote like 11 new songs in 11 days, it just poured out. All my own ideas that I hadn’t been able to use, to express myself. And that was how the Drills started. Then it just carried on.

“So joining Bon Jovi then, one of my friends who is a drummer recently got a call to play with a major name and he wants to know how did you feel when you got that phone call, what went through your mind when that happened?”

Phone call, yeah I’m not sure there was actually a phone call. I mean I think I actually found out about in on Facebook or something! You know, that’s how it works these days right? Somebody will message me and tell me how pleased they are that I’m coming to their town and that’s like before I’ve even had the tour schedule myself right? And it was like that when I joined the band. I’d filled in a few times and then I was getting all these messages that said how great that you’re in the band now, and I was like – I am? Alright! I’m in the band now! So yeah, the modern way. But the thing with Bon Jovi was I’d bought my tickets, you know? I’d taken my girlfriend to see them on the New Jersey tour in my home town of Toronto in a stadium that’s not even there any more so now, when I’m on stage and I’m playing “Wanted” and I look across the stage and there’s these guys and, it’s weird you know? I still don’t feel like I’m a member of the band sometimes.

(At this point Collateral were soundchecking and it was a bit loud so we took a break and…..)
“OK Phil, off the record for a minute because I can’t record with that background noise, please tell me what was it like working with Tommy Lee and did you ever see him naked?”

<Phil and both Drills who were also in the room collapse into laughter> Oh my god no, I can’t answer that, although I did once…. <anecdote redacted in the name of decency!>

“Seriously again then, now we can hear ourselves, are there any bands or artists that you look up to, that have maybe influenced you”

I still listen to old Van Halen all the time. Because I’m older right? So I got to see Van Halen, I saw them 4 times before Dave left, between 81 and 84, and I was 14 at the time and it changed my life. It seemed to me like this was the most bionic rock & roll band. It wasn’t just about the party tunes, it was about the performance level that these guys brought to the stage. That’s what I think about when I go on stage, there’s this guy and he’s the best guitar player in the world but he’s also sprinting around the stage putting on a show and that was just like soooo…….

“He was definitely a legend. But you came to the attention of a lot of people in a different way, you had your youtube channel. Is that something that you planned? Or?”

Well no actually when I started the YouTube channel I had no idea what I was doing. Then it just kind of took off, and now I meet a lot of YouTubers who are doing really well and they go “hey man, you started it all” and I go great! Where’s my cheque?! So I feel like we didn’t know what we were doing but YouTube is an incredible tool when you use it properly. Cos a lot of people don’t use it properly, they put on stuff nobody cares about you know? Like hey, this is me doing this and that and nobody cares. But if you put a bit of personality in it like I did, you know…. I became this YouTube character, and even amps, I was using this Evil Robot amp that I picked up for $400 and then I saw it on ebay for like $1500 and it said “made famous by YouTube personality Phil X” and I was thinking why didn’t I think of that, someone just made $1100 on an amp because now I’m a personality?

“Right then, a daft question. My friend says I have to ask you a question that nobody will have ever asked before so if you were a cake, what kind of cake would you be?”

Well my wife’s a baker.

“What? No way! So you have an in-depth knowledge of cake then?”

I do, I do.

“So what’s the best cake in the world then, as recommended by YouTube personality Phil X?”

Well she makes this incredible chocolate cake, And it’s black, it’s like all black, and you go what the hell am I eating? It’s cake it’s just chocolate cake but it’s black as the night, and the icing is all black and it’s just…. You have to taste it. It’s the best cake, really. I’d be that.

“That’s great to know, So I need to ask you, what else is on the horizon this year for you, for Phil X and the Drills or just Phil X”

Well everything now is really just either Bon Jovi or the Drills, it’s like leapfrogging.

“So have you put the session work to one side for now then?”

Well I still do session work when I’m at home, but not so much now because usually when I’m home I just want to be a dad. My kids are 4 and 6 and it’s like, they change so fast and I want to be there for that. So this year, yeah. Depending on how this corona thing pans out, we’re going to be on the road with Bon Jovi in June and July, that’s a big tour, I think 21 dates, and then we get a month off in August. Then after that we’re working on some more stuff for us, for the Drills, we want to come back over and do some more stuff in Europe, and here, around October time, and maybe back in the States too.

“Any plans for any more recording as well?”

Well we’re kind of already there, 2020 is already done. We’ve already done “Stupid Good-lookings” volume one, that’s out, and we’ve recorded volume 2, that just needs to be mixed, and we’re about halfway through volume 3 as well, But I’m kind of up in the air about volume 3, and we might call it something else! I kind of have another title in my head that is awesome but I can’t tell you what it is because I have to tell Dan first, otherwise he’ll be like “Great, I found out the title of the record from an interview that Phil did!” So like me with Bon Jovi when the fans go oh, you’re playing Rock in Rio this year and I’m like no, that was 2017 and they go no it says it right here. And I’m like great, do you know when I’m leaving! So yeah, there will be a record, with a title.

But the session work has kind of diminished now because nobody has the budget for that stuff any more. So if they have no budget they will stick with the guy in the band and sometimes if there’s a bit more budget they will call me in to just like make it over a bit. And sometimes that’s a credit and sometimes that’s what we call a ghost session where nobody ever knows.

“So have you done many of those, many ghost sessions? I mean obviously you can’t say who but will there be many records we listen to where we’re actually listening to you?”

Oh yeah. But sometimes even the players don’t know that I’ve replaced their guitar parts. It’s just what has always happened you know? There’s been a lot of stuff that has to stay inside me you know. I’d love to talk about it one day but not now……

“So what will you be doing tonight?”

Oh we are going to rock your asses off. It’s like a different thing, it’s just us enjoying it, but it really works.

“Well that’s great, thank you so much again for talking to us and I’m looking forward to the show tonight.”

Yeah great, I hope you have a good time because we will be!

Interview by Jo Crosby
Photography by Ryan Hickson