Here Come The Mummies Sell Out Clearwater, Interview
Here Come The Mummies are a 5,000-year-old band of mummies known for bringing their raucous, party-vibe funk-rock good time wherever they go. They played a sold-out show at The Capitol Theater in Clearwater, Florida, on Friday, September 21st. They are currently on a national tour that takes them through the end of the year, so make sure to check out their tour dates to see when they are coming to your area. They even tossed in a special tidbit about a new release coming out soon.
To say that these guys have more energy at 5,000 years old than most do in their early 20s would be an understatement. They came out strong and, with essentially no banter between songs and no set break, dialed it up to full speed with the first note and didn’t let up until they left the stage nearly two hours later. These folks may be mummies, but they put on one of the best shows I’ve seen. Many times I looked around the venue and all I saw were smiling faces and nearly everyone dancing.
Just before the show, I was lucky enough to interview two mummies, Mummy Cass and Midnight.
Mummy Cass is lead guitarist and vocalist, while Midnight plays Syntar, percussion, saxophone, and just about anything he can get his hands on. I think I even saw him playing bass at one point.
Editor’s Note: To make things easier on the mummies, while I still did questions in a hat, all questions had hieroglyphic translations on the back. I cannot confirm if the translations all really worked, as this was the first time I’ve tried this.
MFN: Well thank you both for taking the time to talk with us today!
Mummy Cass: Hello out there!
Midnight: rrrrrrrrrrrrr
HAT QUESTION: When you play cards, do you like to play Gin Mummy?
Mummy Cass: It’s been a long time since I’ve played cards, cause I lost all my mummy, baby!
Midnight: rrrrrrrrrrr
MFN: So do you all have any pre-show rituals?
Mummy Cass: Well they gotta get us out of the sarcophaguses. So there’s usually a crowbar involved. Maybe other various things to coax us out.
MFN: Or pretty ladies would work, I would imagine?
Mummy Cass: Yeah that works. Or dudes, for some of the dudes, you know!
Midnight: rrrrrrrrrrrrr
Mummy Cass: Whatever works!
Midnight: We don’t discriminate, baby.
HAT QUESTION: When you all play live, everyone loves you, especially the ladies. Why do you think the girls go so nuts? Is it Pharaoh-mones? What is it?
Mummy Cass: I don’t know. Maybe they’re confused, and they think we are New Kids On The Block or N’Sync or something.
MFN: Well, you’re more like Anti-New Kids On The Block. You’re 5,000 years old. You’re OLD Kids On The Block!
Mummy Cass: We are old! I don’t care, though, you know? As long as people keep showing up and screaming, that’s all we care about.
MFN: So I know you all have a keyboardist. I’m kinda surprised though. I would think Mummies wouldn’t have any use for organs?
Mummy Cass: <laughs>
Midnight: rrrrrrrrrr
Mummy Cass: I don’t know how to answer that. We got two guys playing keys, actually. Midnight here plays Keytar. He also plays talkbox and stuff.
Midnight: Yeah!
Mummy Cass: He gets all the waa-waaaaa outta him, and then we got kind of a Rhodes-y, wurly organ with Mummy Spazz on the other side.
MFN: So you’re backstage, you gotta eat. What’s your favorite backstage snack – Mummy Bears?
Mummy Cass: Well we just came back from Colorado, so I’m gonna say Funyons.
Midnight: rrrrrrrrr
MFN: Serious question – it’s been a couple of years since 2016’s Blessing And A Curse. Have any material that you’re working on?
Mummy Cass: I’m glad you brought that up!
Midnight: Yeah!
Mummy Cass: All year long we’ve been recording a live CD of new songs. No one has ever heard these songs. So we bring like two out with us for a weekend. We try ’em out. Once we get ’em, we bring out another two songs. We got ’em all done, and we are looking at the first or second week of October that it will be available. We are doing two or three of them tonight. It’s gonna be called All Excess.
Midnight: Excess! Yeah!
MFN: So what do mummies prefer – Haynes, Under Armor, or Fruit Of The Tomb?
Mummy Cass: <laugh>
Midnight: <groan>
Mummy Cass: Well, Fruit Of The Tomb means something totally different now than it did back then, so I would say Fruit of the Tomb!
Midnight: Yeah baby!
MFN: I heard one of you has family around here. When you come to town, do you bring your mom flowers like Chrysanthemummies?
Midnight: <groan>
Mummy Cass: Well some of the humans that are out with us, they got family here, but we’re all from Egypt-based.
Midnight: Families are long gone.
MFN: You all bring the stank when you come out on stage. You bring the funk, you bring the stank. That’s gotta get rough though with all of you just bringing it all the time, yeah?
Mummy Cass: Well, the summer time is the worst. Once the temperature starts dropping, we’re smiling a whole lot more, you know?
Midnight: Yeah. You get used to it, though.
MFN: When the ladies are rushing up on you all, do you have to worry about your clothes being all tattered rags? Do you have to worry about… blowouts?
Midnight: Oh they love it, baby! They love it. The wetter the better!
MFN: So I always like to throw a few weird questions in just to mix things up…
Midnight: Wait, so these have been normal so far?
Mummy Cass: <laughing> These aren’t the weird ones?
MFN: So you ever play the Would You Rather Games? So here’s one: Would you rather change gender every time you sneeze or not be able to tell the difference between a Muppet and a baby?
Midnight: A Muppet and a baby?
MFN: Yes!
Midnight: ….oh….
Midnight: I mean hell, I wouldn’t mind changing gender.
Mummy Cass: As long as our cycles don’t align, you know.
Midnight: Yeah, that could get pretty ugly for the other fellas.
MFN: Is it rough being on tour so long? You’re 5,000 years old, but have you been on tour for all 5,000 years?
Mummy Cass: No, we were playing as a band, then we got mummified and cursed. Some dude came in, moved the thing, read the script – we came back.
Midnight: Kapow, whoosh!
Mummy Cass: So it’s only been about 20 years. We kinda woke up in a museum.
MFN: Anyone ever give you any life-changing advice?
Mummy Cass: Well, Death-changing advice….
MFN: Do you embrace chaos on stage?
Mummy Cass: Absolutely for me, man.
Midnight: The crazier the better!
Mummy Cass: Yeah, we’ve got sections that are planned out that we stick to, but there are sections that are just surprise me. There’s a couple guys that… just go ahead and surprise me. Bring it on!
MFN: What genre do you consider yourself?
Mummy Cass: Well, I’m gonna say ‘rock,’ because we’re not quite as funky as maybe as P-Funk or those guys, and we play kinda high energy. Some nights it almost sounds a little punk, too. So I’m gonna go with Rock but there’s a funk-ness to this. It’s all about groove. At least, we try to make it about groove and… yeah.
MFN: Why isn’t there a Grammy for Funk music?
Midnight: That’s a good question
Mummy Cass: Man, we were around long before any awards so I don’t know, man.
MFN: So what’s the most ‘rock star’ moment you’ve had?
Midnight: I don’t know man, compared to what we went through when we were mummified – it’s all been pretty good.
Mummy Cass: It’s funny…. It just feels like we get out of the sarcophagus, get on stage and that’s the high point of the day. The rock star moment is between when the drums start and we stop.
MFN: Thank you so much. I genuinely appreciate you taking the time to talk with me today. It’s been a real treat and we look forward to more great things from Here Come The Mummies including the release of All Excess in October!
Here Come The Mummies:
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Tour Dates Happening Soon:
Tuesday Oct 2 – Ryman Auditorium Nashville, TN
Thursday Oct 4 – Green Bay Distillery Ashwaubenon, WI
Friday Oct 5 – Blue Chip Casino Michigan City, IN
Saturday Oct 6 – Jackson County Fairgrounds Jackson, MI
Sunday Oct 7 – Wenonah Park Bay City, MI