Crowd shot masthead ApologetiX Logo Keith Haynie plays bassBill Hubauer plays lead guitarJ. Jackson sings leadJimmy Vegas Tanner plays drums
KARL'S PHOTO GALLERY >>
What's your favorite thing about being in ApologetiX?
The millions of fans all over the world. There are literally millions of people around the world who love what we do, and we intend over the next couple years to actually get these people to hear our music for the first time and get the chance to find out who we are. In other words, They love us; they just don't know it yet. Here is a band that appeals to as many 30- and 40-somethings as it does to 20-somethings and pre-college students.

Tell us about your family life.
I was born in the middle of the "Springtime Blizzard of 1970." With snow coming down like grain out of a silo, my father at work in communicato and two babies at home, my mother called a friend and headed off to St. Clair hospital in Betty's sputtering beige Volkswagon Bug. In 1978, we moved from inner city Pittsburgh to the suburban countryside of Oakdale, Pa.

How did you get started playing the guitar?
My dad moved to Texas for two years when I was 12 and left his guitar in the corner of my room saying "Don't touch that till I get back," as I sat with my ankles crossed on my bed, reading the story of Thomas Edison.

I had all the "first position/campfire" chords down by the time he got to Texas ... he drove. I could play "Sloop John B." by the time he got his first job. I found his "Buck Owens: Live at Carnegie Hall" double album around the time he got fired from his first job. "Act Naturally" was in the can before the second job got underway. My girlfriend at the time gave me a tape of "Stairway to Heaven." I heard it a few times and she took it back. I worked on that a while, and as dad was pink-slipped at the Onion Creek Country Club, I started on "Proud Mary."

What was your first experience playing in front of people?
I took the old "Tennessee Flat Top Box" to the family reunion to test my fingers on "Proud Mary" and "Sloop John B." They hadn't heard of Buck Owens ... I was a-pickin, but no one was a-grinnin'! When I started playing "Stairway," I was met with "We don't play that kinda music 'round here."

When did you first get into Zep?
I received copies of all of Led Zeppelin's albums for Christmas from my sister Lisa. She said, "If you're gonna learn guitar, you might as well learn the best." I played each track one at a time until you couldn't make out the words anymore ... not to say you ever could.

What about all that Satanic stuff you always hear about?
I've studied the supernatural components of rock music in depth. And I've handed out my share of Backmasking tapes. Since then, I've decided that although I still agree that music you listen to will help adjust your mood and in extreme cases can amplify depressions. It also can pick you up, help you learn things and even convey a legitimate message. We've gotten surprisingly little flak doing parodies of "Secular" music. After years of prayer and seeking God's will, we believe that it is His will for us to be doing this. We can relate to a huge number of kids who wouldn't be caught dead in a Christian Book Store or the Inspirational section of NRM or Camelot. We definitely have something to say.

What do you think of Weird Al Yankovic?
We all love Weird Al, but I think the differences between Al and ApologetiX are:

Weird Al sings about food
ApologetiX sings about God.

Weird Al doesn't have a day job,
It took ApologetiX 3 years to raise $2000 to record our first CD!

Al gets to play with Bermuda Schwartz all the time.
We were only able to borrow Bermuda for one CD, Biblical Graffiti.

The only concert the whole band has ever gone to together was Weird Al's. It was great. I gave his bass player an envelope with a CD of "Isn't Wasn't Aint' and a "Don't you Guys Do Anything Original" ti-shirt. He said he would make sure Al got it, but we haven't heard from him. We asked our fans to email his drummer, John "Bermuda" Schwartz

UPDATE: It worked! We've been corresponding with Bermuda and he has recorded seven tracks with us on "Biblical Grafittti!!!"

What was your dad's reaction to your newfound guitar skills?
I was just putting on the last string of the new set when Dad smoked into town in his '76 Fiat. As he came up the stairs, I rushed six copies of "Guitar for the Practicing Musician" off the desk and under the bed. Then I pulled all my abandoned schoolwork out of the corner and stuck it on the newly cleared desk. As he walked down the hall toward my room, I gently placed the guitar back in the corner, picked up my Edison bio, and hopped on my bed, landing ankles crossed again. "Hi, Dad!"

How did you start recording and producing ApologetiX?
When we met Andy Sparks, I found out he had a four-track recorder. He lent it to me and I said to J, "We ought to record some of this stuff." We worked all summer in 1992, a few minutes here and there. I was surprised at how difficult it was to get everything in time and clear and balanced. I wasn't even concerned then about "post-production" creativity, just getting the doggone thing to sound right. It was frustrating. I knew what I wanted to hear but the stupid machine wouldn't cough it up!

What goals do you set for yourself when producing a project?
To finish. The only problem we have is time, whether it's not having the time to schedule the right people or the fact that there's not enough time on a 90-minute cassette for our 50 favorite songs. Every self-producing band knows that the hardest part is keeping everyone's spirits up under long hours. "Oh, poor, poor, pitiful musicians, have to play for five hours in a row" you might say, but it can get interesting.

What about touring?
Our first large scale tour happened quite by accident. On May 25, 1996, we had a concert scheduled for the Sons of God Christian Motorcycle club in Washington, D.C. J and I were working together when we got a call from Brian Irvine. We'd met Brian at a concert in northern Pennsylvania, He told us he was from West Palm Beach and we should come play there. When he called back and offered again, I looked at J and said, "What if..." We got the week off from our boss, and I began writing emails to folks in between the two cities to try to fill a schedule. God miraculously filled that schedule, provided awesome accommodations all along the way (including spending three days in Atlanta with J's sister).

All along the way, we got a taste of "the Road." Four Christians and our tour assistant, Ryan Tomazin spent hours and hours driving in the rented van down the highways of the east coast. I had the idea to read the book of Acts together while driving the miles. So before we left I printed up a 3 chapter per day bible study. Even the unchurched- but seeking Ryan took his turn reading about the first group of guys traveling the countryside telling of Christ.

What do you remember most about that tour?
Honestly? Well, I tried to keep my mind firmly fixed on the mission at hand, but my wife Deb tried to plan a beach trip while we were gone but the schedule changed. She ended up going the week BEFORE! She got home after a week away a couple hours after we'd left for 10 days.

Fortunately, We were busy as bees but on the few free moments between concerts, I wondered how I ever could stand being single!

What were your other musical influences?
There was Chet Atkins, the Beatles, Whitecross, and my mom, who's a heck of a musician herself. It's hard to get her started but she plays a mean piano and hillbilly guitar.

Rumor has it you met Chet Atkins. Is that true?
Yes. In Junior High, Chet was my girlfriend's favorite so I got the albums to learn his stuff. Guess what; that stuff ain't easy! I fell in love with his ability to play melody and rhythm parts at the same time. I even started to read about him a little. He used to gently pull the wires out of his porch's screen door to use as strings on his guitar!

So how did you meet him?
That girl and I went to see him in concert. After the show he did an encore and as they were calling for a second encore, I saw he had started to undo his wireless mic. I grabbed her by the hand and said "Come on!" We ran out of the building, turned the corner, and flew up the street to the backstage door, which just happened to be open. We only sat in there a few minutes before Chet came out.

What happened then?
She blurted out "I love you, Chet!" He said, "I love you, too, darlin'," and our 15-minute conversation was under way. He talked and talked, and before I left, I had to ask, "Chester, is it true about the window screens?" He said, "Son in my day it was easier to find a ripped screen than a good set of $2 strings." Then he dissolved into the dressing room.

How did you become a born-again Christian?
When I was 15, I used to stay up all night in the summer watching T.V. In those days the infomercials were evangelists and Gene Scott tricked me into watching him by playing "Blues in the Night" on his saxophone. Afterwards, he blew a little cigar smoke into my face, tried to sell me a satellite and then taught the story of Balaam and his Donkey. I was hooked, although this is by no means an endorsement of Gene Scott.

So he explained salvation to you?
Actually, it was months earlier when my bus driver, Sue Dellapina, asked if we kids knew if we were going to heaven. We all were sure that we didn't know, and she said, "If you accept Jesus Christ as your personal savior, you can know for sure." That came back to me the night that Reverand Scott gave the only invitation to receive Christ that I ever saw him give; the following night he talked about the pyramids!

Why do you think it's important to "defend the faith"?
Basically, if what Christianity teaches is true -- and, of course, it is -- then it is important for everyone in the world to have an opportunity to evaluate it for themselves. We all wish everybody would come to know God the way we do but we also know that it's not in the cards. Some will hear and reject the teachings of Christ. That's O.K. I'm sorry for them, and I know what they're choosing and I'll continue to do my earthly part to win and woo them, but every mature Christian knows that the Holy Spirit draws people and some folks balk at that.

You were a physics major. How does that affect your Christian beliefs?
Simply put, it confirms it. Christianity is not mythology, as some modern science types would have us believe. In fact if Christianity is the truth, and it is, then the passionate pursuit of true science will show that. Part of that pursuit is discussion. I feel it is my responsibility to show how Science defends Christianity, and that Science that doesn't defend it can be questioned. In other words, don't rule it out because you're a college-educated techno-dweeb like me and would be ridiculed for believing in fairy tales. Instead, realize that scientists all over the world are embracing Christianity in ever-increasing numbers. If you think Christianity is the work of men or mythology, how can you trust the God that it describes?

Do you believe that true science disproves evolution?
Yes. As we continue to dig, the original idea of evolution as the only competition for creation has changed. In 1859, in Darwin's first edition of "Origin of the Species," he said, "Species gradually evolve over enormous amounts of time into other species. There are millions of in-between phases that apparently are extinct. We will undoubtedly find thousands of fossils of each intermediate phase between each specie." This would, of course take an immense amount of time and from that point on, the Earth was assumed to be thousands, then millions then billions of years old.

Did they find those fossils?
No, the fossil record has been greatly inspected. We have learned much: There are no intermediate-phase fossils. We thought there'd be millions. There are a few questionable fossils that by no means even imply that the original idea of evolution -- gradual change of long periods of time -- could possibly be true. Scientists are now trying to update this fallen theory with new ways that one specie could have come from another. The fossil record shows absolutely no connection, but the modern theories suggest quantum leaps -- a reptile laid an egg and a bird came out, type of thing.

How can they do that without any evidence?
They're just trying to explain God out of the picture, because the existence of God forces us to listen to His direction That's the smart thing to do, you know: If you live next to a plumber, you at least get some pointers while shmoozing at a party before you tackle the toilet. In the same way, it makes sense to listen to the advice of the Author of Life if your life isn't going well. The plumber will sometimes tell you things that don't seem to make sense also, but he does do it for a living and he probably knows what he's talking about.

What do you think Darwin would say if he were alive today?
Darwin himself wrote this in the original edition of "Origin of Species": "But, as by this theory innumerable transitional forms must have existed, why do we not find them embedded in countless numbers in the crust of the earth?" He also wrote this: "Why then is not every geological formation and every stratum full of such intermediate links? Geology assuredly does not reveal any such finely graduated organic chain; and this, perhaps is the most obvious and gravest objection which can be urged against my theory."

Where I can get more info on this stuff?
One of the places you can go to is : http://www.answersingenesis.org/

How did you first get interested in the science of apologetics?
I always knew that truth was like light in a dark room, and that personal testimonies are like little birthday-sized candles in the room. You can talk and talk about how the room is shaped and anybody will believe you, but if you really seek the truth through science and discovery, the truth has to become apparent. As each discovery lightens a small part of the room, it becomes increasingly clear which stories are correct. Even if incorrect stories are slightly updated to reflect the news of the little candle, more candles at different parts of the room will illuminate further discrepancies until the whole picture is known.

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Top Ten Musical Influences
  1. Led Zeppelin
  2. Buck Owens
  3. Chet Atkins
  4. My Mom
  5. Beatles
  6. Rolling Stones
  7. Pearl Jam
  8. Eddie Van Halen
  9. Beach Boys
  10. Billy Squier
Top Ten ApologetiX Songs
  1. Boulevard of Both Extremes (Wordplay)
  2. Rocky's Now My name (Wordplay)
  3. Want It Dead or Alive (Wordplay)
  4. Ephesians (Wordplay)
  5. Narrow Way to Heaven (Morningstar)
  6. Good Guys Bad Guys (Grace period)
  7. Hotel Can't Afford Ya (New and Used Hits)
  8. Tom Saw Ya (Grace Period)
  9. Smooth Grandmama (Hits: the Road)
  10. Devil Went Down to Jordan (Samson Comes Alive)