Veteran bassist Greg Chaisson (ex-Badlands/Red Dragon Cartel) returned to The Double Stop Podcast to update them on the last decade since their last conversation. From joining Jake E. Lee's Red Dragon Cartel and his cancer battle/recovery, to his next projects Kings Of Dust, Atomic Kings and Rob Lamothe's Cross Country Driver.
On getting the call to rejoin Jake E. Lee in Red Dragon Cartel: "Out of the blue one night he calls me, which is very odd because Jake doesn't call. He doesn't like talking on the phone, neither do I. And so we ended up chatting for a couple hours and then the crux of the conversation was that he didn't like the bass player. They were going to be playing a show in Phoenix or in Tempe coming up that March which was in a couple months and would I be interested in doing this show? He sent me the set list - it had some Red Dragon Cartel on it. It had some Ozzy. It also had some Badlands. So I learned the stuff. Him and his band came out to play a couple days before the first show of the tour, which was at this place The Marquee here, and I found a place for us to rehearse. We hadn't played together since like the early 90s and we got together and it was just like yesterday. It was like him and I had been jamming together all along. And the drummer was cool, the singer Darren was cool, it was a cool deal. I did the show, I had a great time, and after the show, the next day, they took me to dinner, and they said, okay, we want you to join the band, are you interested in being in the band? And he said that they did the rehearsal and the gig, he wanted to make sure I could still play. And I guess I don't blame him. We hadn't played together in so long."
On the fan excitement to Jake and Greg playing together again: "I had no clue. It didn't even dawn on me. Jake and Greg back together again. I thought it would be like a minor footnote sort of thing. And even Jake was saying, this is a lot more intense than I (expected). He would joke around and he'd say, maybe we should call it Jake and Greg's Red Dragon Cartel, and I just laughed and made a joke out of it. But at one point my son said, hey dad, did you know you're trending? And I said, what does that mean? And he said, it means you're in the top 100 news stories nationwide. We were in the top 100 news stories nationwide and I thought, how can that even be possible? And sure enough we were. I mean, we were on tour and Jake said, hey, I'm gonna go do Eddie Trunk's radio show and he wants you to go. And I went, really? And so we both went. And even he was making a big deal of it. It never dawned on me that people would care that much. I misjudged what it would be because that's the closest to a Badlands sort of reunion you're gonna get. I mean, there's never gonna be one with Eric, I don't think, and I don't think there'll ever be one with Jeff. So having me and Jake together, which was half of Badlands, and we were in it the whole time, him and I were the only two that stayed in it from inception till we finally went our separate ways. So I guess I misjudged how big it would be. I appreciated the fact that people really got into it and still do. I mean, it put me back on the map in a big way when I wasn't even trying to get on the map, but it kind of made me relevant again after spending many years trying to be invisible about my music career. All of a sudden I'm like right back on top of it and it was pretty gratifying."
On his cancer diagnosis and passing the baton to Anthony Esposito in RDC: "I had 43 doses of radiation, 15 chemo's. You can only have 44 doses of radiation so I had one less than you could have and I went from being a big healthy 195 bluffed out dude to 121 pounds in five months. I mean, I couldn't walk from here to the front of my store. But it was the only choice. I mean, it's the only way that was gonna save my life, and Anthony (Esposito) became the bass player, and they're good friends and he does a really good job with it, and I couldn't wish for anybody better to take my spot in there. It's funny because when I would run into Anthony he'd go I hate you, and I said why? Damn songs. How do you come up with those bass lines? Where do those come from? I can't think like that and we would just laugh and then I would see him play them and he did an excellent job. He did a really good job with it. Of course I wish I was still doing it, but life happens.
"The funny part is my bicep was the same width as my wrist by the time I got done. So I mean, there's not a lot of muscle around your wrist. And that's what my arm looked like all the way up, you know, from a 195 pound guy to 121 pound guy. And I saw Jake and his wife a couple years later and she said, man, you're still too skinny. And I said, I know I'm trying to put it on, but you know, at my age, it's hard to gain. As much as I work out and all the stuff I do, it's hard to put on muscle. I'm old." (Laughs)
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