A Few Words With...Mistress Juliya

Interview by John A. Wilcox

Juliya Chernetsky, a/k/a Mistress Juliya is perhaps best known for her time on the Fuse cable network. Juliya, not content to be a beautiful face VJing on television, has expanded her reach to host the Slave To The Metal tour, as well as appearing in JJ Connelly's deliciously bizarre horror film Gothkill. Progsheet caught up with our Mistress recently for a far too brief 15 minutes as she burned through a promotional junket. A brief time, yes, but in those few moments, Mistress Juliya had much to impart...



PS: How is the Slave To The Metal tour going?

MJ: It's going good. It's something me and my partner have been building for the past year and we're hoping to build it bigger and bigger. Some bands out there really have to learn responsibility and not be flaky little douchebags. But the ones who work their asses off are doing a great job.

PS: Are there some on the tour who aren't?

MJ: Certainly. You know what it is, dude? When you go to places like New York, or L.A., or places where there's so many bands competing for attention - bands understand how hard you have to work to get to where you've got to go, to earn every fan, to actually be respected. When you go to places where there's not much competition - middle America, whatever - there'll be two bands in high school and they'll think they're the bomb because they're the only band in their little town, so they think they're frickin' rock stars. Meanwhile, they sound terrible, because they don't practice enough and they decide to flake out on shows. I don't understand why, either. I think they don't take it seriously enough. To them it's like, "I own a guitar, so I wanna be a rock star." They don't understand that being a musician is an art form, or craft. It's a very cutthroat industry, especially in the metal genre, since we're not the popular genre, we're not a generic genre.
If you actually want to make it and you want to be that rock star, you've got to bust your ass. And people just don't want to bust their ass, they don't understand how much hard work it takes. I'm hoping, that besides getting these bands to play, some of these bands will understand that you've got to work a little harder if you want to do anything in life. Whether it's music or art or anything else. I'm sorry I'm ranting. This has got me very pissed off!



PS: I've always said that all ego is local!

MJ: You're absolutely right, and dude, like, what do you need an ego for? I don't think ego got anybody anywhere. I mean, fine, if you've got so many notches under your belt that you're the shit, then maybe you can afford to have an ego. Still, when you're in the art industry especially, it's all creativity, it's all art. Either you want to create art and spread it all through the world and do something beautiful with it, or you can just use it to make yourself look good. Which apparently seems to be what most of these people wanna do. Which is shallow and cheesy and frickin' lame and really annoying for some of us that are trying to conduct business.

PS: Are you looking to make Slave To The Metal a yearly thing?

MJ: It never ends. We just do shows every weekend and it's not going to stop. We're going to keep it going and keep it going. If bands want to sign up and are actually serious about it and want to play our shows, or there are fans out there who would like to come out and hang out with me and check out their local scene, you can find all the tour dates on my Myspace page, which is myspace.com/mistressjuliya. There's directions there about how you can get involved, how you can come out. This is never ending, man. This will be going on for as long as we can do it. So come on down and play some tunes or check it out. We'd love it.



PS: How did you first get involved in the Gothkill project?

MJ: JJ - The guy that directed the film - he worked for Fuse. We got along really well, because we're both into metal. One day he came to me and said "I know you love metal. I know you love horror. What do you think about being a devil girl in my film?" I was like "Where do I sign up?" Acting has always been something I 've been interested in. Horror films are my favorite genre. That's how that whole situation came about.

PS: Where was it shot?

MJ: It was shot in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. I don't know how many days the film was shot. I was on set, as far as I recall. for one day or maybe two days. It was shot a couple of years ago. It was shot in New York, that's where most of the cast was from. A lot of the people are involved in the Coney Island Freak Show and do a lot of carney work.

PS: Fun shoot?

MJ: Very fun shoot! It's not the standard crowd, you know what I'm saying? It wasn't a bunch of actors that aren't into the scene. It was basically a collection of freaks hanging out all day, talking art and music. Dressed like a bunch of freaks. It was awesome. It was a blast, it was really fun. It was very long days, but we were all having a great time. Everybody was very willing to put in the time and effort to make it work, which was awesome. There were no egos in that situation, everybody was so cool. Everybody was on the same level, it was awesome!

PS: I like the fact that the film seems to have a sense of humor about itself.

MJ: That's my favorite part about it. The reality is that it's quite the throwback to the B horror movies, which I thought were great. It's like with rock and roll and metal - you ought to have a sense of humor. It's art and we're having fun and we can't take ourselves too seriously. I mean, come on - we wear black makeup and wear spandex from the eighties. I love the sense of humor in the movie. It's so great!

PS: Any other film projects in the works?

MJ: Not at the moment. If there are any horror directors that want to get me involved, I would love to!

PS: Please tell us 6 CDs you're currently listening to.

MJ:
Lamb Of God - Wrath
She Wants Revenge - This Is Forever
Killswitch Engage - Killswitch Engage
Slipknot - All Hope Is Gone
Machine Head - The Blackening
Skinny Puppy - Too Dark Park

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