Interview with Viva La Bam's Phil and April Margera
I'm not exactly the kind of guy to be hanging out at the Funkmaster Flex Car Show, but here I am. I couldn't really tell you if this one was any better or worse than other car shows, but there were some pretty sweet looking rides on display. The reason I was there though was to catch up with Phil and April Margera from Viva La Bam. With two sons involved in music (Jess plays drums for CKY, Bam is a skateboarder turned music mogul) I figured this sites readers would probably be interested in what the Margera clan is up to. So lets find out...
Anarchy: What have you been up to since Viva La Bam ended?
April Margera: We did the Jackass 2 movie, and I did a cookbook, it's called "There's An Alligator In My Kitchen"
(laughs) oh that's great
Phil Margera: And we've done a couple of these car shows. We've started to get into doing these things, they're pretty fun.
She's a good cook right?
Aw, look at me
You know what, put him on the cover, be like "I eat her food, so here!"
He is on the cover!
We're on the cover, the whole crew.
In fact, I think you're wearing this shirt.
That's right, I am
(he is wearing an Element T-shirt)
Oh nice, ALWAYS promoting
I know. Well they send him these shirts and its nice that they do.
You did the Celebrity Fit Club thing, how'd it go?
I won that season and I think I'm still the record holder at 41 pounds, but I gained over half of it back, which is bad.
Its hard because you're doing fruits and vegetables the whole time, just to get the weight off
And then you go back to normal
And then when you're done youre like 'OH FOOD!"
Just for the TV show they put you on a crash diet right?
Yeah, they holler at you all week.
Well, they basically tell you "you need to lose weight" which the person usually knows and then they're like "good luck, and show up in a few weeks and we'll weigh you in". So, you have to be your own police. They have experts that'll check in with you, but I think with The Biggest Loser, they have to live there.
They live there for 3 to 6 months, but we go home.
Whats in your cookbook is it just normal stuff youd make at home or how did that come about?
Yeah, I've actually been looking for a lot of skaters and musicians over the years, like everybody that just kind of crashed at our house. Tthen I would make food and take it to a set for like the HIM videos, CKY videos, I was always cooking.
You were catering and stuff?
Yeah, even Ville ate two chicken sandwhiches and loved them...and he doesnt eat much. But the CKY guys, I think out of all the things I cooked for the band the thing they liked the most was the grilled cheese and tomato sandwhiches (laughs) which I made at 4 o'clock in the morning in a cornfield with a generator.
Nice...now as Viva La Bam goes, whats the worst thing that ever happened to you on the show, as far as Bam pulling a prank, that sort of thing...I guess maybe the alligator thing right?
Yeah, but you know, I thought it was fake. For a lot of it I really just thought they were idiots for paying a lot for a dummy alligator. I think if I'd known it was real from the beginning I'd be really freakin. For the show I think the skatepark and the blue kitchen were like, the worst.
And for Jackass, being on the toilet...I saw it on a small camera, like on a regular camera, but when I saw it on the big screen I was embarrassed.
He's like "yeah, yeah this looks alright" I'm like "are you kidding, this is going to be on a big screen!". So when we went to go see it at Paramount he's like "how could you let me do this?" and I 'm like "I TOLD YOU" ITS GONNA BE ON A BIG SCREEN"
Thats great
Pretty funny
Were you guys pranksters as kids too or is that unique to the kids?
Oh yeah, we were doing it to Jess and Bam...I have...since they were born.
Yeah but, when you were young...
Oh, when WE were young?
But since he had three other brothers and three sisters...so they were always horsing around and doing crazy stuff.
Oh yeah, we did all that stuff.
So technically all this is YOUR fault since you were pulling pranks on the kids when they were younger?
YES!
Could be, yeah, because set traps when they came home from school and all kinds of stuff.
He was the one hiding behind the door, until he couldn't hide anymore
But yeah, he's always wrestled the kids on the bed and I'm always the one yelling "stop it, I just made the bed"
(I spot a fan who wants to take a picture so we take a break while I snap a few pictures. They engage him in conversation and the conversation switches to the local area)
Hey, you guys have a house here right?
No, we live in West Chester, PA
Well, it just seems like Don Vito especially is here ALL THE TIME.
Yeah, he's here all the time!
Yeah, he has a lot of friends in this area so whenever they book him something he jumps on it...he's down here all the time.
He was here about a week ago I think just hanging out.
Well, his friends take vacations here and he comes with them, and goes to bars and all that.
Yeah, he does it a lot.
Yeah, I run into him all the time...but anyway, with Jess being a drummer and Bam being so creative with skate boarding and video direting and all that...wasthat something you guys encouraged in them as kids?
I think the neighbors thought we were crazy for buying my brother-in-laws used big video camera and letting the kids use it. At that time video cameras were very expensive and nobody would hand one over to a kid.
It was the old fashioned VHS and it was bigger than Bam and he's out telling people what to do and he's 8 years old.
But he started filiming skate boarding then the band was practicing in the basement and they just put these funny videos together with skate boarding and the music.
But we knew Bam was gonna be a skate boarder because he was so good so we encouraged it, but other parents would say "he's gonna fail when he's older, you oughtta make him go to college" and we said "no, he likes what he's doing we're gonna let him do it".
We really believe that. I can't believe that we did, but we believed in him because he was really good at what he was doing
And Jess musically, we knew Jess was good.
We're usually not that kind of people. We worked 4 jobs between us at one point.
Then, "HEY, go be a drummer, go be a skateboarder!"
Nobody says that, right?
Well, both of my brothers are drummers. So, i had heard a lifetime of "you better get a back-up plan" for my brothers so i think that at the time when Jessie said "I don't want to go to college, I want to be a drummer" I think I decided to say the opposite of what my parents said which was "don't leave anything to fall back on, just move ahead".
Make it your top priority
(more pictures and autographs for fans...you know...The Margeras certainly don't act like bigtime TV and movie stars...throughout their entre stay here they've treated every fan with warmth and friendship...which leads me to...)
One thing I've noticed about Bam, Don Vito, Jess is that eevrybody seems so down to earth despite the fact that you guys have been so successful...was that also something yo instilled in the family growing up?
We always have and we really are trying to still.
I was really stunned because I have met some of the others just through working with the HIM guys, but Jess i just walked up to and he was just a regular guy
Yeah, Jessie really...they really are. You know, on our show the one person who we said kinda went all to his head was Vito...we call him Don Diva
Oh, hes a pimp though! Whenever I see him he's surrounded by a bunch of hotties
Oh my gosh, but you know we just keep telling the kids and everybody on the show "Listen"
We thought this would last two years but its gone on for ten!
Just remember where you came from and just rememberthat its importtant to remember who you are. And, its harder with bam now, because he's got a lot of opportunities, he's got power, he's has money
He's got a record label!
I know!
I'm so stoked...he's got a great band that he signed called Vains Of Jenna
Yeah! Vains Of Jenna!
I saw the video, its a good video. they have a website you can check it out on.
Yeah, i think they could be the new Guns N Roses
I'm really excited about that anyway, because the current music scene is so lame
Yeah, it's really sad.
And I've been saying "when is the rock n roll coming out?"
I think a lot of people are waiting for that, I know I am, and its crazy to see that he's turned to Europe other than CKY and Clutch...he really wants to bring that rock n roll kind of thing back.
Cool! I want to thank April and Phil Margera for keeping us up to date on everything Viva La Bam related! April's cookbook "There's An Alligator In My Kitchen" will be out in October so be on the lookout for that! Also, you can visit Bam's new musical discovery Vains Of Jenna at VainsOfJenna.com