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VILE Interview by Lisa Selvaggio. www.paragonmag.com
I've been in contact with Colin Davis of Vile for a while now, but finally got to interview him formally about his various beliefs, especially those issues he speaks out about in his blogs. In addition to his music, he's famous for his writing, which exposes injustices of all kinds, offers warnings, and is out only to educate people about what they probably will never hear in mainstream media, and we respect him for that. Anyway, we delved into a ton of topics from the environment to voting to society in general, so check out our interview to tap into Colin's brain.
Lisa Selvaggio: Thanks for taking the time to do this interview. What drew me to you in the first place was your blog on Myspace and all the theories you have on the world today. I admire your courage in putting it all out there. What kind of a reaction do you get from fans of Vile?
Colin Davis: It's been about 90 percent positive I'd say. Although I have had over 15,000 views of my various politically oriented blogs over the last year, most people probably don't comment. But the few that do are generally very positive. If they weren't, I'd probably just use my own personal blogs for this kind of material. But because they have received it so well, I just kept it up.
LS: You talk about a ton of issues, but which do you feel is the one that people need to know about most?
CD: Well, I can't really suggest a single issue. Everybody has their own interests and subjects that they will be attracted to. I would probably just say that now is the time to re-educate yourself on everything you were taught in school or by the media. Because of the Internet, we now have access to a virtual Library of Alexandria that has been suppressed from us. Some call this time the Age of Revealing and really, this is correct. Everything that has been hidden from the public is now coming out and once you find out that you have been lied to in one way, you will begin to suspect everything. And once you find the truth about one major issue, it will give the experience you need to go out and find more deception.
LS: For those readers really interested in some of the things you talk about on your sites, what documentaries or online videos do you suggest they watch to get in the know? Also, any reading materials they should check out?
CD: I would suggest that people use Google Video and YouTube to search for the many documentaries and other presentations that have been uploaded there. If you are interested in the truth about religion you can check out the movie Zeitgeist and the author Jordan Maxwell for starters. For 911 I'd suggest an online resource at www.911docs.net. I would also suggest the works of Alex Jones, Michael Tsarion, and Alan Watt. That will get you pretty far. From there you can branch off to anywhere you like. Entering keywords into Google Video can yield hidden works on just about any subject. At least until they start to censor the internet, these video upload spots are amazing.
LS: Despite all of America's shortcomings, do you still feel it's the best place in the world to live?
CD: It depends on what you want. I love Holland and some of the other European countries a lot because the culture is much more intact. But I do love the way America is less regimented and generally freer although it's very unhealthy culturally and getting more rigid every year. Also the economy is about to crash so that's kind of scary.
LS: Have you ever lived for any period of time in another country, or even just noticed things from touring with Vile?
CD: Well, I have not lived in another country. But I have visited Europe many times both on my own and with the band. I have also lived in 4 states in America.
I wouldn't call myself a world traveler by any means, but I do have a healthy appreciation and respect for other cultures and ways of living.
LS: Who are some of the people you look up to; who are your heroes?
CD: My heroes are the few folks who do their inner work, find out who they are and what they are here to do and do it no matter what. I appreciate rebels like Malcolm X and Alex Jones. I appreciate maverick scientists like Nicola Tesla and the quantum scientists. I really love the comparative mythologists like Joseph Campbell and Carl Jung. Jesus is a fantastic hero although I am not a Christian and Christianity is not the religion of Jesus. Its much closer to Satanism I'd say!
LS: With an election coming up this year, which candidate do you feel would be the best for the job?
CD: Ron Paul without a doubt. The other three are all CFR or Bilderberg members, all scum of the lowest degree. They are just banker puppets. I'm a big Ron Paul supporter although I know he has no chance of winning. But he has been surprisingly successful in getting the word out about our criminal economic system.
LS: Can you tell us what you've found out about the U.S. elections being rigged?
CD: You can watch a documentary called "Hacking Democracy" to learn a lot more about it. Yeah, there are many ways that votes are rigged. It's a really old practice actually. But now with the electronic machines, they can easily rig the votes, and they do. It's actually been proven time and time again. The research is out there if you want to spend the time. I suggest blackboxvoting.org as an initial resource. LS: Here's a long-winded one for ya: One of your blog sites has a video and information on reasoning that states global warming is a myth. I have to disagree, as global warming has been something that I've been fighting against for a long time, especially after a lifetime of seeing ozone depletion and clouds of pollution, nevermind reports of ecosystems being destroyed around the globe, from ice caps melting to bodies of water going dry. For me, the evidence is in what Nature is showing us, and our actions against the planet. I can't believe that it's a conspiracy to make money, because "going green" is hard to do – it's hard for people to change their comfortable way of life, it's hard for corporations to convert business practices, and overall there's a lot of money to go around in the system as it is, and reducing waste and converting to cleaner forms of energy would take money away from businesses like gas/electric companies, etc. There's no denying that our planet is suffering as a result of deforestation and pollution of land, water, and air. Whether or not global warming is something that occurs naturally, the problem is it's occurring at a much faster rate than normal, and, in my opinion, even if I'm wrong and you're right, and it's not caused by humans, there is nothing wrong with changing our ways to get back to Nature and a more sustainable way of life.
CD: Well you are definitely correct in pointing out that humans are massive polluters. We actually have a really bad pollution problem from our industries. The thing is, though, pollution is not global warming. They are not really linked.
And efforts to stop the warming would not even touch the pollution problem. There are no efforts being made to curb pollution, air and water toxicity, nuclear fallout, etc. This is brushed aside while the emphasis is put on an unproven warming thesis that is presumably solvable by taxing the common man and woman to the hilt. This, I am afraid, is just a very desperate effort to eliminate the western world's remaining middle class and help to usher in global governance.
But with regards to the warming itself, we have to look at the data. It's impossible to have an objective opinion about weather patterns without raw scientific data. And we have been collecting it with modern techniques for only about one hundred years. But we can now look at atmosphere that is trapped in ice core samples. Also we can look at sediment on the bottom of the ocean and detect levels of various minerals and evidence of chemical decomposition there. What we find when we look at the data is that our current temperatures and our current levels of CO2 are not anything wildly out of the ordinary. It's been much warmer and colder in the past 2000 years than it is now. In fact, if we go way back millions of years, the Earth had up to 10 times more CO2 in the atmosphere than it does now. Also we find that CO2 increases about 800 years after the Earth warms from solar radiation. It's not the other way around like Al Gore would have you think. The sun goes through phases, it heats up the oceans and this causes ocean plant life to prosper. As the solar trends slow down, this extra life dies off and decays into carbon which is disseminated into the air. This is how the large majority of CO2 is released into our atmosphere. The other large amount is released from dying plant material on the land. Humans are responsible for only a few percent of all CO2 released into the air. And then on top of all this, there is no evidence to show that increased CO2 will trigger global warming because it has been so much higher in the past. Also humans and most animal life are not adversely effected by hotter temperatures; its colder temperatures that are a problem for most species. It's also worth pointing out that our environment is in constant change all the time. It has never been static and never will be. Also 99 percent of all animal and plant life had become extinct before man even walked the Earth. We have a very narrow view of Earth changes. You can look at the Oregon Institute of Science and Medicine's report for the raw data and even view their petition that has the signatures of over 3000 climatologists who do not believe global warming is man made. Even in the IPCC's report there is only one actual piece of data that suggests that the warming is triggered by CO2. It's really a massively huge hoax and luckily it's now coming out. Although government agencies are only funded if they support the hypothesis, may individual scientists are speaking out against the fraud and it is turning the tide. Keep in mind that this doesn't mean the Earth is not going through a temporary warming period. It is. We are having the most active solar period we have had in thousands of years right now. The sun is affecting us and our weather. But this has nothing to do with CO2. For God's sake, CO2 is the gaseous form of Carbon, the element all life is made of! It's a life giving gas that is not poisonous and is not dangerous in any way. It's what plants breathe! More CO2 in the air only means more plant life and a lusher planet. It also means that crops yield more and are more heat resistant. It's as if they told us water was causing the warming. Would we believe that? What we need to focus on is the pollution, releasing free energy technologies that are being kept down by the oil cartels, recycling, corporate pollution controls, getting industry out of the Amazon, etc. A carbon tax on you and your family will do nothing to solve this; it will only make you poor and make the powerful elites even richer Also I don't believe that promoting a bald faced lie about global warming is the way to get people more environmentally aware. There is never an excuse for public deception. And really it's not intended to get them more aware. It's intended to rip them off with a carbon tax and to establish inter-governmental legal precedents. I've studied this subject pretty intensely and people need to ask for proof. Where is the proof? Have you ever seen any actual data? Why just cartoons in magazines? Why just a single movie from Al Gore, a known pathological liar? And why such harsh rhetoric for those who want the proof? They call us "climate change deniers" as if we deny climate change and the term is just a step away from 'holocaust deniers'! It's an old tactic. If you can't back up your claims with proof, you have to resort tobinsults and psychological ploys to keep people's eyes off the ball.
LS: How about your thoughts on religion, especially organized religion?
Does it help or hinder the world in general?
CD: Religion is the organized and ritual aspect of spirituality and it's a natural part of our evolution. So it's useless to try and stop it or condemn it. But in general, it's been used to manipulate people and its teachings
are almost all fraudulent. It's still got a lot of truth in it if you know how to pick it out, but it's a form of mind control. I do appreciate Buddhism and the more Eastern teachings because they are less dogmatic and more aimed at personal growth rather than evangelicalism.
LS: I'm sure you run into people who think you're nuts for writing the things you believe. How do you react to these people? Have you ever been able to get at least some of these types of people to see it your way?
CD: Since most of my interaction with people about this stuff is over the internet, those that don't agree just move on. So most of my dealings with people are positive. Also most of my political stuff is backed up by documented proof and my spiritual stuff is subjective anyway so you have to be a good debater to get anywhere with me!
LS: What music are you listening to these days?
CD: At The Gates and Dimmu Borgir this week but I am a CD mastering engineer so I am always listening to Metal. I usually don't listen to too much of it on my own unless I'm working on other bands or working on my own music. But sometimes I feel like it or find a new band here and there. Also I do listen to other styles like Pink Floyd, Tool, and even Indian Classical or other stuff. I've got a pretty varied collection. After 25 years of Metal in my life, I know the formulas pretty well by now. I'm looking for bands that are breaking boundaries if I can find them.
LS: Update us on what's going on with Vile.
CD: Right now I'm finishing writing the new material and will record drums soon. Then we will finish the recording over the next few months and release this one by the end of the year. We have had label troubles lately and I am considering releasing the album over the internet. I noticed that a lot of bands are starting to do this, even big bands. I think that this is the future and there is almost no reason to do the traditional label thing. I'm thinking that we will sell the downloads, release the CD ourselves, and then license the store sales to a distributor. We will hire a U.S. and a European publicist to get it out to the media and see what happens. I really like the idea of going around the traditional trap and taking the chance. I have a feeling that if we do this, the fans will appreciate our effort and support us by buying the MP3s or ordering the CD from us. We had pretty decent deals with labels in the past but now we have a fan base and this new way really may be the best thing for us as well as helping to open up the scene to internet distribution. It really is the future of music distribution and the Metal scene is a prime candidate for using this new method. I think labels will become internet distributors and promoters very soon. Traditional magazines are almost dead now as well.
LS: Thanks again for doing this interview. Anything we missed that you'd like to add?
CD: That's about it. I thank you for the interview! It's cool to be able to talk about these kinds of subjects instead of the regular stuff like "Why did you guys choose the name Vile?" We use our Myspace page now as our regular website and if people
want to read the blogs that we have been talking about, they can go there: www.myspace.com/vile Also I should mention again that I am a recording engineer who specializes in CD mastering. Also, I have been trying to offer home recording musicians help in the field and if they go to my mastering website at www.imperialmastering.com they will find links to my blogs about recording and even instructional videos. It's just something else I have been doing to help people out in any way I can. I'm a bit older than many of the fans of the band so I figure I might as well talk about what I have learned, whether it is deep stuff like what we have been discussing or recording, which happens to be my professional trade. Cheers!
November Artist of the Month: Skeletonwitch
by Matthew Toledo - 11/11/2004
Skeletonwitch is releasing their new CD entitled "At One With The Shadows" this Saturday, November 11, 2004 at The Union in Athens, Ohio. The show starts at 10:00 PM and will feature openers Dead Sea, The Dead Hate The Living, and Seven Orchids.
The group has been playing together for two years, and despite the fact that their members are spread across three cities in Ohio, they still manage to write new music, practice, and kick ass wherever they go.
I recently had the opportunity to interview Skeletonwitch guitarist, Scott Hedrick, about their new recording. Other members of the band include primary song writer and guitarist, Nate Garnette, drummer Derrick "Mullet" Nau, lead vocalist, Chance Garnette, and their new bass player, Eric.
Skeletonwitch is a self described metal band, although they aren't sure which subgenera of metal they would fit into. Nate and Chance have loved metal all their life. Derrick discovered it while attending high school. Scott has also always liked metal and states that the first live concert he ever saw was Slayer.
The band practices most weekends in Columbus, Ohio at Nate and Chance's house. Derrick Nau's dedication to the group is impressive. He is the only member who has to purchase a $40 bus ticket from Cleveland to Columbus in order to make practice sessions and Skeletonwitch practices every weekend. When asked if they all plan on moving to Columbus once they finish school, Scott, a junior in journalism at Ohio University, stated that they don't really know what will happen just yet, since Derrick Nau is only a freshman at the Cleveland Institute of Art. At the very least, the band will have to wait three more years for Derrick to finish school before they consider relocating to one city. Derrick, who is studying painting, does most of the poster and cover art for the band.
They have been working on their new CD sporadically during the winter and spring of 2003. It was ready before the band left in August to play 23 shows across the nation in only 30 days. It was recorded at Peachfork Studios south of Athens. Derrick Nau, the drummer, is the son of Peachfork studio owner Bernie Nau. Nepotism could not sway Scott Hedrick's personal opinion of the studio, and the CD they created there. After giving me a disclaimer that he could not speak for the rest of the band, Scott went on to say, "I would definitely make a point of telling anyone do not record there. It was incredibly expensive for the services we got. For the time and money we put into it we were happy with what we had, but it still wasn't what we wanted."
Guitarist Nathan Garnette had a different opinion of the CD and of Peachfork. "I think the cd came out just as I had expected it to considering the amount of time we had to produce it.", stated Nathan via email, "Towards the end of the recording sessions we had a deadline to get the CD to the company to have them pressed before our summer tour. We discussed this with Bernie and we decided to go ahead with a sort of rushed production on the disc. I don't see any reason why you would not be able to record a fine CD at Peachfork studios, given the right amount of time and effort."
The total cost for producing Skeletonwich's CD ended up being somewhere above two grand with several hours donated to the band for free by Peachfork, including upwards of 20 free hours of work by Peachfork for their live CD.
They consider themselves extremely lucky to have only paid a total of five hundred out of their own pockets. "The band members only had to pay about a hundred dollars per member and there is five of us, myself included," stated Scott. The rest of the cost was picked up from merchandize sales and cover charge profits that the band had saved for the express purpose of recording their first CD.
When asked where he would like to record his next CD, Scott mentioned a gentleman down in Georgia whose name he forgot. Scott was impressed by the recording that their friends from the Cincinnati based metal band named The Dead Hate The Living recorded in that unknown Georgia studio.
Their current CD is available online from Hellride Music, The End Records, and Shift Records. If you need to buy stuff from a brick and mortar store, local record stores can directly order the CD from The End Records. Scott should know, he works at the newly relocated Haffa's records located on Union Street across from Skippers and The Union Bar and Grill.
The CD may not have lived up to all of their dreams, however Scott stated it isn't that big of a deal because the live show is much more important to them. "Review the live show before you hear the CD," said Scott, "because live music is our main focus. We take it very seriously."
The Tour
Unlike cover bands, it's hard for original bands to make money while on tour in America today. Skeletonwitch is extremely grateful to metal fans across the nation who helped their tour actually make a few thousand dollars net profit.
At first, the band was afraid their tour would not be a success. Their first stop at the Milwaukee metal fest was plagued by cancellations. Many of the larger named acts on the bill which were intended to draw in large crowds ended up canceling at the last minute. "If you talk to anyone who was there or look up reviews of the show on the internet you'll see that everyone was pissed," stated Scott, "Bands had to pay to play--it was horrible."
As a result, the band's moral was low during the drive to their next gig in Iowa, which they didn't expect to be any good. To their surprise, they had one of the best shows they had on the whole tour in Iowa. After the gig in Iowa, spirits were high for the rest of the tour.
The Skeletonwitch tour was booked without the help of a booking agency or agent; however the band had extensive help from friends of the band who they consider, "members of the band that just don't happen to play an instrument." Scott credits Eric Hedrick for booking a majority of the stops on the tour. Scott and Nate booked only about 20% of the gigs without Eric's help.
When asked how they researched their tour, Scott stated that the band looked at the websites of other metal bands that they admire, and studied the venues where they played. After picking a starter city, they chose venues that were less than a day's drive apart from each other. Calls to venues and other metal bands were also part of their research strategy. After they had made a list of all the places they wanted to play, the band proceeded to send out "tons of press packs" months ahead of time that contained a list of bands they've played with, a photo, bio, and a live recording they made at the Union in Athens, Ohio. After waiting several weeks, venues started calling back. Then it was just a matter of connecting the dots on the map.
The band dubbed their August tour, the "Flying-J" tour due to the fact that they slept together as a band in the cab or the bed of their pickup truck at various Flying-J parking lots. Truckers and travelers are allowed to park and sleep at any of the two hundred plus Flying J Travel Plazas located across the United States. A visit to their website shows all the amenities available at each location. Showers, restaurants, grocery stores, restrooms, and even wireless internet access points are available at many of their spots. The band only slept in a real hotel on the entire month long trip. It was in South Carolina when a few people from Athens including Curtis from the local band Tarantula Downpour and local drummer John Daft chipped in and bought them a room.
When asked what the band did for showers on their tour, Scott stated that Flying-J's have trucker showers you can use for six dollars, however they didn't use them that often. "Going on tour for thirty days, sleeping together in the back of a truck, you were almost willing to pay someone else's six dollars so that they would take a shower," stated Scott, "but sometimes we met some nice people who would let us stay at their house where we could take a shower." They also went camping at state parks and showered there on their days off from the tour.
How the band functions
Nate used to play guitar in the local band Serkersoren which broke up when their singer, Tom, died in an accident at a very young age. After the unfortunate break up of that band, Nate wasn't sure what he was going to do. During the down time he recorded a four song demo with a drum machine which demonstrated his talent as a guitarist and songwriter. Scott met Nate "at a party or a bar somewhere" where Nate's demo was playing. Impressed, Scott immediately asked Nate if they could get together the next day and play. They soon recruited their first bassist, Jimmy, who was also in Serkersoren.
Right of the bat, the newly formed group had four songs which were written by Nate which were only changed slightly. Nate, to this day, is the principal songwriter, who comes up with the framework for many of the songs by recording them on his four-track. The tapes pass from band member to band member, each refining the song as it progresses.
Surprisingly, their lead singer, Chance Garnette, is the last member of the band to contribute to the songwriting process. "It's coming up on two years on being a band--we've practiced with the lead singer once," said Scott, "Basically, we write and learn the music and know what we have to play, and Chance takes the tape and practices by himself with the recording. Sometimes I haven't seen him from a while because I'm from Athens and he's in Columbus so we high-five and I say 'We're going to play the music that we know how to play.' And he says 'I know how to sing it.'" Scott went on to say that Chance is an amazing singer that sounds like he's murdering someone while he's yelling. It's just what the band was looking for in a lead singer.
One might think that having the last say in the recording process puts a lot of pressure on a lead singer. In fact, it's quite the opposite. Scott says the band is under pressure to play exactly what they recorded so that the lead singer can perform what he practiced to the tapes. This system works for the band, which claims to have never stopped during a live performance, and has only made the usual minor mistakes that any band makes on stage.
If you've ever listened to Chance sing, there may be another reason why he practices at home and rarely with the band. Chance's vocals are insanely abrasive and harsh. When asked how Chance could possibly sing in that style night after night, Scott stated that Chance uses a certain "smoke treatment" to prepare his throat.
Many of the songs are thought of as instrumentals during the creation process. Nate and Scott's main goals are to make epic and melodic music that people can pump their fists too. The band even played four of five shows as an instrumental group before Chance was added to the band.
About the Scene in Athens
Unfortunately, there aren't a lot of local metal bands that have influenced the members of Skeletonwitch with the exception of the now defunct Athens metal band, Skerkersoren. Their favorite style of metal is the 80's thrash metal of bands like Overkill as well as the styles of older bands like Iron Maiden and Judas Priest. European melodic death metal bands and the American band Death have also influenced the Skeletonwitch sound.
Scott Garnette thinks that that Athens has a metal scene that has a lot of dedicated fans but not a lot metal bands to meet their demand. He went on to state that Skeletonwitch has been consistently surprised by the amount of people who show up to see metal shows at the Union. They vary in age from high school students, to folks who were around to see the original Iron Maiden tour. Unfortunately, there aren't that many metal bands left in Athens that plays the sort of music that these crowds want to see. Scott goes on to say that Columbus suffers from the same affliction going on to comment that most metal bands these days fall into the rap-metal or "nu-metal" categories which have taken metal and pacified it for conservative suburban teenagers angry at their parents for trite reasons.
Scott sites Mutailitia and Crucifixion Addiction for helping the local metal scene by bringing new crowds to Athens bars. He goes on to say that he is proud to call them part of the local metal scene. However, these bands primarily play Metallica, Judas Priest and Iron Maiden covers and are only just now starting to branch out into originals. Scott goes on to credit out of town bands like Dead Sea, Dead Hate The Living, the now defunct Wings of Saturn, and Teeth of the Hydra for helping the original metal scene in Athens to grow and thrive.
The Gear
Scott states that Skeletonwitch aims for an "old-school" unprocessed sound. None of the guitarists use any effects pedals, and they both tune in the key of E instead of tuning down to D or C. They site a lot of older bands who stayed in the key of E and still sounded heavy. Scott plays a Gibson SG while Nate plays a Gibson Les Paul. Both use JCM 2000 hundred watt Marshal Amps and full Marshal stacks. Derrick Nau, the drummer, has a Gretch drum kit while their bass player, Eric, plays a Rickenbacker bass.
Future plans
Skeletonwitch has no long term plans as of the moment. Derrick and Scott both consider it important to finish school before pursing any music careers. Most of the parents of the band members have been very supportive of the band and have come to shows to see their kids perform. Nate's parents went so far as to donate the truck and trailer used to complete their thirty day tour.
The band shares a strong bond, strong enough to survive days of living together on a long tour, and strong enough to survive the whims of girlfriends and the pressures of school. After the original bass player, Jimmy, was let go in an amicable break up, the band only had two criteria for a replacement. The first: "Here is a CD, can you play our songs." The second: "Can we hang out with you without wanting to kill you."
Rock on, Skeletonwitch, rock on.
The only way is down
Jul 10th 2008
From The Economist print edition
The high priest of “peak oil” thinks world oil output can now only decline
Fifth Ring
FOR a man who believes that the world as we know it is coming to an end, as least as far as energy is concerned, Matthew Simmons is remarkably cheerful. He magnanimously excuses The Economist’s poor record of predicting the price of oil: our suggestion in 1999 that oil would remain dirt cheap was conventional wisdom at the time, he says soothingly. He also shrugs off our more recent scepticism about his belief that the world’s production of oil has peaked: he, too, hopes that “peak oil” proves to be a myth, he says. But over a 40-year career in investment banking, Mr Simmons adds, he has learnt never to rely on wishful thinking. Most of the world’s oil analysts, he believes, are far too optimistic about how long existing fields will last, the prospects for new discoveries, technology’s ability to unlock new sources and to extend the life of existing ones, and so on. He prefers to rely on data rather than daydreams. And according to the American government’s own numbers, the world’s oil output has been more-or-less flat since 2005.
It was data that made Mr Simmons famous. He spent the summer of 2003 at his holiday home in Maine, poring over technical studies describing the state of Saudi Arabia’s oilfields. Although the Saudi authorities do not release much evidence to support their claims of vast oil reserves, engineers from Saudi Aramco, the state-owned oil firm, do give talks at conferences and publish papers about their experience of reservoir modelling and management. Based on these, Mr Simmons concluded that Saudi Arabia’s biggest fields were already past their peaks, required ever more expensive technological fixes to prop up production and would soon enter a period of inevitable and rapid decline.
Saudi grandees pooh-poohed Mr Simmons’s 2005 book on the subject, “Twilight in the Desert: the Coming Saudi Oil Shock and the World Economy”. But others held it up as convincing proof of the notion that the world’s oil production would soon reach a pinnacle, never to be exceeded. Saudi Arabia, after all, is already the world’s biggest producer, and is expected to cater to most of the growth in demand for oil over the next few years by expanding its output yet further. If, instead, it pumps less, there is little hope that other countries could make up the shortfall. In that scenario, as demand for oil continues to grow despite dwindling supplies, and as the search for substitutes proves fruitless, economic catastrophe ensues.
Mr Simmons helps to lend credence to this view in part because he is an old and respected hand in the oil business. He first stumbled into it in 1969, thanks to a chance encounter at a hotel in Palm Springs. He was two-thirds of the way through a doctorate in economics and had planned to join his father’s bank in Utah when he finished. Instead, he ended up abandoning his studies to help raise venture capital for a pioneering firm of divers working on California’s offshore oil-rigs.
Simmons & Company, the investment bank Mr Simmons went on to found (along with Michael Huffington, an oilman and politician), helped to funnel money and financial advice to the nascent “oil services” industry, which performs tasks such as seismic surveys and drilling wells on behalf of oil firms. Indeed, Mr Simmons says it was his bank that coined the very phrase “oil services”. It has handled over 500 merger-and-acquisition deals in the industry—49 of them last year alone.
All this means that Mr Simmons can draw upon long experience and deep knowledge of the oil industry. He does not dispute the main criticism of the “peak oil” theory: that improvements in technology, spurred by high prices, will eventually allow new fields to be found, more oil to be recovered from existing fields and artificial oil to be conjured from substances such as tar sands, coal and shale. But he thinks such advances will take longer to appear and have less of an impact than his detractors assume.
As it is, he points out, all the world’s drilling rigs are working flat out, and old ones are being retired faster than new ones can be produced. The same is true of geologists and many more of the industry’s essential inputs. This is slowing the development of new fields and pushing up the cost. By the same token, the technology being used to extract oil today has been in the works since the 1970s. It will take a long time for the next generation of clever kit to come into widespread use. Besides, many technological improvements seem to have simply speeded up the extraction of oil, rather than increasing the share of each reservoir that can be recovered.
Oil clocks out
In short, as Mr Simmons readily concedes, the debate between proponents and critics of “peak oil” boils down to an argument about timing. The optimists think that technology will advance quickly enough to offset declining production from mammoth fields such as those Mr Simmons studied in Saudi Arabia. But he and his disciples think the declines will come too soon, and be too sharp, for the world to adapt in time. The whole row could easily be solved, he says, if Saudi Arabia would only allow independent auditors to assess its reserves.
In the meantime, Mr Simmons is taking no chances. He plans to start up a farm near his house in Maine, in case the supply chain that provides America with food breaks down for lack of fuel. He plans to fertilise his fields with manure, rather than chemicals derived from oil and natural gas. He thinks globalisation must stop, and that as much trade as possible should be conducted by boat, to conserve whatever oil remains.
But Mr Simmons has not despaired. He holds out great hope for wave energy, and believes that at least one of the many different species of seaweed found along Maine’s coast will yield oil that can be turned into biofuel. He has got Simmons & Company involved in alternative energy. It is a brave choice for someone who is so pessimistic about technology.
R.I.P.
Robert Rauschenberg
22/10/1925 - 12/5/2008
Albert Hofman
R.I.P.
1906/1/11 - 2008/5/29
Swiss scientist and the inventor of LSD.