In 2010, vocalist / guitarist Todd Kerns, guitarist Brent Muscat, bassist Doc Ellis, and drummer Rob Cournoyer capitalized on their popularity in the Las Vegas rock and roll circuit by self-releasing an 11-track CD, Exile On Fremont Street. To celebrate its 10-year anniversary, Exile On Fremont Street, now subtitled Ten Years In Exile, will be re-released, complete with three new songs. That re-release will happen March 27th, along with a full set from the band at Count’s Vamp’d in Vegas.

“It’s funny how these things creep up on you. One day you look and, Exile was ten years ago,” says frontman Todd Kerns, speaking exclusively to BraveWords scribe Aaron Small. “Original Sin has been playing shows; we’ve been relatively active. We’re not really interested in the residency side of what we started out doing. Now, it’s the ability to go out and play the Exile On Fremont Street music, and treat it as an original band show; which is to me what Original Sin means.”

“We started doing full-band versions of ‘Broken Record’ and ‘Hey Hey Rock N Roll’ from the acoustic EP we made called Broken Record, and they just kept evolving into cooler and cooler things,” explains Todd. “We thought it would be rad to record these… then when the Ten Years In Exile project came up; why don’t we include them? So, we did that. And I have a new song called ‘High’ that I contributed; we treat that as a bit of a symbol. It’s one of those things where it’s been out of print for so long… we never really had any intention to do anything with it, but this seems like the perfect opportunity to celebrate the ten years, celebrate the people who were around 13 years ago; starting in 2007, until 2010. There was that whole scene long before Exile ever came out.”

That scene included Kerns and co. playing alongside the who’s who of rock and roll. Inside the booklet to the original pressing of Exile On Fremont Street (from 2010), there’s a list of 127 very special guests that shared the stage with the group. “The band started as a jam band, but what I learned very quickly – well, apparently after 127 guests – was that the band itself sort of overtook our own special guest thing,” recalls Todd. “People were saying, ‘We come here to see you guys.’ Sometimes people were excited about this guest or that guest - but in reality - people were excited just to see us do our thing. And as we incorporated original music, into what was essentially a party jam band… we literally started the band as a Tuesday night residency at The Dive Bar. We thought, Tuesday night is a sort of safe night as far as bands around town; our musician friends from around Vegas can come jam with us. It started that way and built to anybody we could think of, come jam with us. What really transcended everything was the idea that we started doing our own thing. And that became – towards the end of our stay at places like Ovation at Green Valley Ranch – we went from initially having guests, to in my opinion, not needing guests. We sort of became our own guests, our own sort of special feature. The fact that these four guys can still get in a room together and have a blast, says to me that it’s something I plan to do a few times a year, until forever really.”

“Music is supposed to be fun; I’m really serious about fun. It’s a funny thing to say, but I am. Whether it’s with Slash, Toque, or Bruce Kulick; each have their place in my heart and in my world, but they all have a great deal of fun involved. So, Original Sin – what started initially as a fun thing, and then split off into a million different directions because of business – we found ourselves doing stuff together again, because it’s fun and we really enjoy each other’s company. We really love each other and want to make music together once in a while. These tickets (to the March 27th show at Vamp’d) are selling faster than anything we’ve done in a long time, but of course that has a lot to do with the fact that it’s a re-release of a CD that was in its’ own way beloved around this city and beyond; and the addition of three new songs. It really hasn’t been readily available, and I want to make sure it’s available now before… eventually, the idea of owning a hard copy of anything will be weird. We want to sign these CDs for people, and when they throw it in the car be able to re-live 2007 to 2010 and beyond; and yet still celebrate what the future could potentially be. That’s what’s so exciting about having two re-done, completely updated versions of songs that were essentially acoustic songs, that are now much bigger than I ever expected. To dig into ‘Broken Record’ as a rock band, I was surprised how good it was sounding. And then to actually sit there in the studio and put it together was pretty mind-blowing, what we did with it. ‘Hey Hey Rock N Roll’ is a Doc Ellis song – and it’s 100% Doc Ellis as far as the attitude goes. Then this ‘High’ song, it sounds so much like us; but in 2020 rather than 2010. And that’s very exciting! Hopefully these become classics in their own way, as I believe Exile has.”

Lyrically, what did you draw inspiration from for the previously unheard song “High”? “Actually, the catch line of the song is, ‘Do you wanna get high?’ As a guy who is… I’ve always liked songs to be ambiguous enough that people can kind of draw their own idea of what that means. In the day and age where – you live in, and I come from a country (Canada) where weed is 100% legal – it doesn’t feel rebellious to say, ‘Do you wanna get high?’ And it’s not really about drugs any way. To me, it’s always been about music. That’s the fascinating thing, when I’m sitting around with people and they’re talking about sports, or whatever else, I am completely uneducated, except for rock n roll. They want to talk about number seven for The Raiders… I don’t know who that is. But I do know who played guitar for Roxy Music. So, ‘Do you wanna get high’? Is that about love or drugs? Is it about God or rock n roll? I think it’s all of those things to different people, and that’s the beauty of it. It’s a song I’ve had kicking around for a long time. You always feel like, this has real potential, I think we should chase this down with something. Then this opportunity came up, and I’ve got just the song. It’s a funny thing, being a sober, boring, non-gambling, at home watching Netflix if I’m not playing rock n roll person in a city like Las Vegas, but it is true.”

“I came to Vegas in 2003. I wasn’t coming here to play gigs, I just came and connected with people that led to my eventual move here in 2006; and that’s what led immediately to Brent Muscat, and shortly thereafter us putting a band together and playing around Vegas. It was the most non-committal band of all-time. It was sort of like, let’s get some guys together and have fun; it really wasn’t about money. I remember a friend of mine once saying, ‘Oh my God! I can’t believe you’re playing that Dive Bar place, that must be a total drag.’ We had more fun at that gig than you could ever imagine. We do whatever the hell we want there. We started off with the idea, this’ll be a laugh. By the second Tuesday, we were selling out the place. We were playing New York Dolls songs, Dead Boys songs, Motörhead, AC/DC, then it eventually led to pulling some songs off my solo album from 2004, Go Time! You have to remember; this was a time when I was in Vegas as a complete non-entity. No one was going, ‘Where’s this Todd Kerns guy?’ I came down with the attitude of, my friends were making a real living down here and making a real future for themselves. I have such deep roots in the Canadian music scene, I thought it would be really interesting to make my way down, and of course Vegas is so close to Los Angeles that it only made sense to throw myself into the jungle of the American scene. The fact that I’m still here in Vegas, 13 years later, and we’re celebrating Ten Years In Exile. In April it’ll be ten years with Slash. It’s just a fascinating turn of events; a lot has happened. It’s been a very interesting ride, and in a lot of ways, Ten Years In Exile puts you in this very reflective state of mind where you look back and… anything that marks a milestone always creates this sense of wow!”

The original 11 songs that comprised Exile On Fremont Street, have they been re-mastered, re-recorded, or is Ten Years In Exile a straight re-release? “We are currently punching it up in re-mastering; that’s the people smarter than me who know how to do this stuff. I was ready to do a straight re-release because I thought, the thing isn’t available, and I’m one of those guys that when you get a re-mixed or re-mastered version of a recording that you loved… I still want the Leathür Records version of Too Fast For Love (by Mötley Crüe), it drives me crazy when I hear the other versions. That’s sort of how my memory works, this is the way it sounded. As far as Exile goes, it may be imperfect, as a lot of great music is. We could have an endless discussion about remixing Raw Power by The Stooges, which to me is sacrilege. Although it’s an ongoing conversation about how abrasive that recording is, but that’s the recording I grew up on, I don’t want to hear some slick re-imagining of it.” 

“The funny thing is… everything about us is an inside joke. Exile On Fremont Street is a play on Exile On Main St. by The Rolling Stones. But the gag was, I was this Canadian guy who ran off to Las Vegas for a whole new start, and I used to call it my exile in Las Vegas. Fremont Street is the big downtown, old school Vegas; and it sounded better than Exile On Las Vegas Boulevard. Then the album cover is a play on us pulling an Abbey Road (by The Beatles) across Fremont Street. The whole thing has its inside jokes, we don’t take ourselves very seriously. And everybody knows that when they come to our shows. It’s a very abrasive, in your face rock show, but it’s also a lot of fun. When shit breaks down and we have a moment to talk, it’s never super serious and we’re not going to be talking about climate change.”

Rewind a decade, what are your memories of recording Exile On Fremont Street? “Honestly, it was a lot of fun to record, as you could imagine. (Drummer) Rob Cournoyer is always a pleasure to record because he’s so… he’s totally insane as a player. He’s sort of like a slightly more unhinged Keith Moon, in his own way; and he often doesn’t play the same thing twice. But when it comes to recording, he’s one of those people that is really quick with changes like, make this half as long and extend that. He never, ever phones it in. He always gives 110% to the session. We did it all very quickly, as far as recordings go; we weren’t making Hysteria (by Def Leppard). In retrospect, what I think was a real inspiration, was Sonic Boom by KISS (released in 2009). It’s a weird thing to say, but because KISS hadn’t released a recording in a long time (their previous album, Psycho Circus, was released in 1998), there was a feeling that when Sonic Boom came out, the intention was that they had made sort of a throwback KISS record, it was bare bones rock and roll, not a whole lot of fluff and production on it. It was just a great sounding rock record. I remember thinking, we should do something like this, just a straight-up rock record.”

“We’re not Queen, but we’re a rock band; in a lot of ways a punk rock band that just happens to be more in the hard rock vein. Muscat and I are not George Lynch guitar players, we’re from the Johnny Thunders school of guitar playing, and that’s sort of where the spirit comes from. But at the same time, we’re a very solid, tight band, and our songs are super catchy and smart, as far as arranging and a ‘pop sensibility’ goes. We just do what we do, and the intention was to try and capture that; whether it was The Dive Bar, or Green Valley Ranch, or Wasted Space. We wanted to capture the live energy of that band. It was recorded pretty guerilla style, but not really. We would never allow anything to go on tape – digitally or otherwise – or go out into the world without it being something we felt good about. The fact that we’ve still been doing Original Sin shows, largely playing the music from that recording in 2010, shows you that thing lived on.”

The Exile On Fremont Street - Ten Years In Exile CD will be available at Count’s Vamp’d on March 27th. For those who can’t make it to Vegas for the show, a CD pre-order will launch online at toddkerns.com very shortly. And if you’re going to the show, be sure to get there early and catch opening band Frankie + The Studs, featuring Frankie Clarke – daughter of former Guns N’ Roses rhythm guitarist Gilby Clarke on vocals and guitar. “Gilby and I have always seen eye to eye musically, we have the same fascination with ‘70s glitter rock – T Rex and Bowie, then Cheap Trick, New York Dolls, Ramones. And Frankie is a chip off the old block! It’s kind of mind-blowing actually. She’s basically Gilby Clarke in a small, female version, as far as the musical influences go. It’s almost like, did you feed her anything else other than your record collection? But I appreciate that. She’s definitely got this attitude and black leather, it’s like Joan Jett, Suzi Quatro. Honestly, I’m a fan.”