Interview by EvilG
Transcription by Will S.
All pictures courtesy of cageheavymetal.com
Cage
are a band that I first took notice of with their album ASTROLOGY. It was
with the release of their latest album, DARKER THAN BLACK, that I really
started paying attention. DARKER THAN BLACK is an instant classic and will
no doubt come out very high on many people's lists for "best of
2003". Part of it's strength is that it covers power metal,
traditional metal, thrash metal, and even black metal with Sean doing the
screeching black metal style in a number of places on the album. The main
thing is of course the songs and the hooks. After playing the album for a
few weeks I was given the opportunity to speak with vocalist Sean Peck. We
talked about the new album and about the band's lyrics which all tell a
story or cover something interesting like dark matter, the Philadelphia
experiment, the Chupacabra, etc. Enjoy...
I'll start out with a question which will stoke your ego a little
bit for you (laughter)....and that is: after slugging it out for over 5
years with Cage, how does it feel to finally be getting the recognition
that you deserve?
Well you know, being in the music business is tough, because you don't
make a lot of money at it, unless you're at the Madonna level, so getting
the accolades and hearing from the fans is really the main reward. You
know, to be playing live and having everyone just go crazy is really that
drug that keeps us pushing along and investing all the money and time into
it, pissing off all our girlfriends and wives while we devote so much time
for this stuff. As long as you keep climbing the ladder and push and make
advances, that's what really keeps you going. So it was important for us
to deliver the record that we were capable of, and we were pretty
confident once that it got out that people would freak out on it, so we
kind of expected it but to have all these perfect scores and everything is
just a little bit beyond what we expected, but we're stoked!
Yeah, for sure, man. I've seen some reviews hail DARKER THAN
BLACK as something better than anything Priest has done since PAINKILLER,
or the album, that could have followed PAINKILLER.
Right.
When you read stuff like that, what do you think?
Well
I mean, heavy metal is the source where all these different subgenres of
metal came from, so to me it's the authentic, the root and the foundation
of where everything else has been, and a lot of people try to touch on
what was great about Iron Maiden and Judas Priest and put it in their
music, but by staying just with this authentic sound, you know, the true
heavy metal sound, I think that we've managed to deliver the sound and
some songs that very few other people have been able to deliver. I mean,
I'm a metal fan, you know, and I just wait to get an album to go, 'God, I
hope this thing just kicks my ass!', and it hardly ever does, so that's
why we started Cage. It was up to us to create our own classic heavy metal
to enjoy, and you know, very few other bands put out songs that just make
me want to put my fist in the air, it's kind of frustrating. And that was
how DARKER THAN BLACK came, I was like, for me as a metal fan, what do I
want to hear? I want to hear just some ripping-ass good hooks and
choruses, a lot of screaming and your vocal acrobatics, and that was the
thought process when we were putting this record together.
So in your opinion, what do you think made DARKER THAN BLACK better
than your previous releases?
Well the production, obviously, was way better. I was working with Rick
Carr, so that was a step in the right direction. And you know, really
getting rid of the other guitar player really allowed Dave and myself to
just have no-when you're working with him, he was like an anchor man
hanging on, a cloud over us, we were always looking over our shoulder, 'Oh
well will Eric think that this stuff is cool? We don't know.' And once we
got rid of him, we just came right out with the most ripping stuff we've
ever written. We got back to what Cage was even before he had joined the
band, which was more heavy, a little more thrashy, and that I think was
the main reason that we were able to put out this bitchin' album...the guy
was like the negative aura that was gone.
So where did the album title come from? I assume it has to do with
dark matter, or maybe you're a bit of an X-Files fan or something, I don't
know!? (laughter)
Yeah, I'm always into that shit, but it was kind of a, you know, I
didn't quite steal it from Spinal Tap, but I kind of realized it
afterwards that they, Spinal Tap, played on that little game. (laughter)
But I just kind of came up with it as we were definitely trying to make
this more evil, more sinister, malicious vibe on the record, and that
title kind of popped into my head. I got a potential title for the new
album, I wanna see what you think about it.
Alright.
Ready?
Okay.
'Violence solves everything'.
Violence?
Yeah!!! (laughter from both ends)
And where did that one come from?
I was listening to some commentator that was talking about how your mom
always says, you know, "Johnny, fighting never solves anything,"
and it's like the total opposite, it actually solves everything.
Haha, I like it.
So, that's the one we're tossing around right now.
Ha, yeah, that's pretty cool.
So the album album cover art is also your finest artwork to date.
Yeah.
Can you tell me how the artwork was conceived, or how you chose that
for the cover?
Well, I know we were getting away from the computer graphics. I'm a big
comic book collector, so I wanted to go after something....some sick art.
I was looking around for an artist, got a hold of Marc Sasso, who did the
Dio-KILLING THE DRAGON [cover]. Started talking to him, the dude is just
like the coolest metalhead, dude, we talked for just hours, just about
everything. Then I sent him the CD and he just absolutely fell in love
with the thing. I don't know if you've got the booklet and everything, but
you can see all the art and the love that was put into that thing, it just
looks fantastic.
I've got the full booklet, it looks excellent.
Okay, so I think that's one of the best-looking CD booklets that
there's ever been. And he always had this concept, I had kind of a couple
of concept ideas and he had this idea that he wanted to do like a gates of
hell image, and so we took some of my ideas and the gates of hell image
and kind of incorporated them and it slowly came into what it was, I just
fuckin' love it.
As we mentioned earlier, the album has gotten a lot of really great
reviews. Obviously you enjoy getting good reviews, but does it also, on
the flipside, make you have some kind of increased pressure, like there's
an extra weight on your shoulders now for the next album to outdo its predecessor
again?!?
Jesus, I know, what the hell are we gonna do now?
Yeah really? haha!
See, it was like, 'Oh no, this is it, you know, they did their third
one, this is gonna be their best one', but one thing I like about what
we've done is we got great reviews on the first record, we got great
reviews on ASTROLOGY, and I like the fact that I can really say truthfully
that this is our best record we've ever done, where everyone else always
says it.
But a lot of those bands, like the first album they did was probably
the best they've ever done, like Ozzy, W.A.S.P., Crimson Glory, I could
name a bunch of 'em.
The other thing is the progression that we make from album to album, if
you could take our three albums and give them to someone who had never
heard us before, and they could put them on a table in chronological order
just by listening to 'em.
And a lot of power metal today, you can't tell their first album from
their fifth album, you know?
(laughter)
So that's one thing that I'm pretty proud of, but we have like four
songs for the new album, and I'm starting to get pretty confident that's
it's gonna even be better than DARKER THAN BLACK now. We're gonna probably
go in a little more thrashy direction, just to show our heavier stuff, and
then vocally, we're doing a song called "King Diamond", about
King Diamond (laughter), that's gonna have my best King Diamond
impersonation which I think will trip people out pretty good!
Right on!
So that's one of our things. We don't really release a record until
it's absolutely positively better than the last one, and even going into
DARKER THAN BLACK, I kept listening to ASTROLOGY going, 'Fuck, these songs
are great on ASTROLOGY, I don't know how we're gonna do this', and we were
able to pull it off, so I know the production will probably be even be
better, and I'm still goin' for what we went for on DARKER THAN BLACK,
where every song has a hook. I think that's real important to people
liking the record.
So we're working hard on it though, but we hope to have it out next
year, quicker.
Is it gonna be on the same label, or…?
Yeah.
Alright, good.
Unless someone throws a lot of money at me.
Haha, yeah. So in terms of your label and where they distribute your
CDs...where do you find your biggest market? Is it still Germany, Europe,
or is the States catching up??
The States are starting to catch up. We were just in Hollywood, saw the
CD in a Tower Records, in its own section, 'Cage', there it was, that was
nice. We're getting lots of radio play on this record in the U.S. We've
got a couple of videos coming out. Europe is definitely the strongest, but
there are so many metalheads here in America, it just doesn't matter. I
mean, everyone that hears the record loves it. I'm here at the motorcycle
store, and they just bought three of 'em off me. They're playing them in
the back of the parts department, and they're just going fuckin' crazy
right now. So I mean, everyone that hears it loves it.
Yeah definitely, I can't see why anyone wouldn't like it if they're
into heavy metal, right?
Yeah!
In terms of metal bands in general, do you notice a different
approach illustrated by bands from different regions? Like everyone always
says how the U.S. bands are usually a little more aggressive in terms of
heavy metal bands.
I think so, I mean if you listen to the Seven Witches album, our own
album, the Agent Steel album, the Twisted Tower Dire album....I like those
albums better than virtually any European metal album that's come out. I
mean I like it better than all the Primal Fear stuff. To me, the European
stuff gets so happy that those happy melodies just ruin the metal for me.
That's why my vocal melodies are all on a very vicious, mean-sounding
melody like Iron Maiden and Judas Priest used to have it. That makes it
stand out, and I think the bands I named kind of have the same thing. But
I think American metal has had some strong releases, and I don't know, we
don't wimp out like some of the Europeans still do. I mean, even the
Masterplan, which has some cool stuff on it, great singer, is just too
happy for me.
I found it a little bit too bluesy hard rock in a few songs.
Yeah, that too.
Everyone likes different things, so whatever. What is the deal with
the US bonus track, on the copy I have here it's called
"Antimatter"? Stylistically, to me it comes off quite different
from the rest of the album. Was this deliberate?
Yeah, the idea was we were gonna make a "nu metal" track that
was a short radio formula that we could do a music video for. And then,
all the radio stations started loving "Chupacabra" and
"Kill the Devil", so we kind of dropped that idea since they
loved the old-school sounding vibe anyway. But a lot of people love that
tune, man. It's for the younger kids who are able to put that one and they
just rock to it 'cause it sounds like Disturbed or whatever. It was just
another way of showing that we could easily flip the switch and just
basically shit out a super radio Linkin Park-sounding tune that had a
great hook that was 3:20 long, but yet still had some heaviness to it.
Yeah, we're just still showing everybody that we can just be a chameleon
in metal and play any frickin' kind of style we want.
You mentioned earlier you're having your CD release party coming up,
and there's going to be some type of video shot there. What expectations
do you have towards the event, and do you have anything special in mind
for your CD release party to do?
It's in a fantastic place, like a 2,000 seat place. We're going on the
radio tomorrow to promote it. We usually have a real solid draw here, I
would expect probably 600 people, 700. During the day, we're doing the
lip-synch shots on stage with the lights and everything, and we'll add it
into the live stuff. We're also recording it onto ProTools. We have the
DVD ready to go, but if this turns out good, we might redo it since it'll
have better sound quality and use some of this footage for the DVD. We're
pretty excited, it looks like a lot of people are gonna show up, and the
buzz is real good on the record. Everyone knows that we've been playing
Cleveland, playing Milwaukee, we did killer in Milwaukee, I can't wait to
read the review on that festival, 'cause we just stole the whole show
there.
It's gonna be fun. A great venue. And the cool thing about San Diego is
that the fans of San Diego, unlike L.A., they go right up front dude, just
like Europeans, and just bang their heads and scream, they're not afraid
of being too cool. In L.A., everyone's like too cool to rock out like they
used to, it kinda sucks. So we're excited about it.
So you're gonna film your entire performance, right?
Yeah. Doing the video shoot for "Chupacabra" and "Kill
the Devil", two different music videos.
And will they both be live-oriented performance videos?
Kind of a mixture. Some live shots, some lip-synch shots, and then some
other images telling a couple of the stories.
You mentioned a DVD is already in progress, how close is that to
being ready?
It's ready to go right now. We just did all these interviews which are
really cool for each band member, and then I'm trying to dig up old
footage of the first time we ever played, at this party. You know, a
couple of shots from a show with Judas Priest, and we put in a lot of
bonus features, stuff like if I was finding a DVD for my favorite band,
the total insider cool shit that I would like to see. That's why it's
taking so long, 'cause we're just packing all kinds of material on there.
It's like a half hour interview with each band member, with the ins and
outs on things like the kind of gear they use, and funny stuff that
happened, it's really cool.
So this'll probably be a 2-DVD set or something by the time it's all
done?
Yeah, I don't think you can fit all this shit on one disc.
I have a few questions related to your vocals of course. Is there
any secret that you have to keep and maintain a professional voice, or
were you just born with the ability to sing like you do now?
Man, it's been tough. Even in the last week, I think I've made a
breakthrough on my singing. Especially when you're trying to do all the
shit that I'm doing, man. I could just use my regular voice I used on
UNVEILED for everything, and I could probably sing for a year straight,
but when you're trying to do the black metal voices and then that head
voice scream, and then the falsettos, and all the deep low ones, it's
hard, man. It taxes you, and not a lot of singers are doing that many
different approaches all in one show. So, I've just, like I said, recently
made a breakthrough to learn to control my head voice a little better
where I'm not straining it as much, and that's allowed me to have it more
consistent. These last three shows we did in Milwaukee and down here at
the Whiskey, I was just like, I can't believe we didn't videotape it,
that's what they were saying live. So yeah I'm encouraged that I just keep
getting better really, and I think it's good for the listener to hear. It
keeps it fresh and interesting for the listener so that the guy doesn't
sound the same on every song, you know? But believe it or not, Axl Rose of
Guns N' Roses, one of his cool things was that he had a couple of those
different voices that he used, which really made the songs have a
different texture to 'em. Then all the stuff that I'm doing on the
records, and the different experimental voices, and I think the listener
likes that. So taking care of your voice is tough because I don't drink or
smoke, and you just gotta get a lot of sleep, and the voice is a weird
thing that you just wake up one morning and your voice is gone for no
apparent reason, so being a singer is really a pain in the ass, to be
honest with you. (laughter)
Considering that you can obviously sing melodically very well, does
the shrieking hurt your throat at all, or does it at least present quite
an extreme challenge?
Like the black metal voices, like the black metal stuff?
Yeah.
Yeah, the black metal voices I do in limited quantities, and then the
bass player does some of 'em live which is kind of fun, 'cause then while
he's doing the *high rasps*, I'm doing the *lower growls* underneath it.
That's why we have four people on the front line singing, so we can do all
these harmonies. That's another advantage I think we have over other
bands, is all the backing vocals that we have that we've worked so hard
on.
Has anyone ever, who's more of a traditionalist I guess, complained
about the inclusion of black metal shrieks in your music?
Well yeah, I think some of the traditional people are, but I think it
was done really tastefully, you know? Just right when you're about to get
sick of it, it busts into the killer power metal vocals. But it's opened
up a lot more ears, it's done a lot more good than it has bad.
Yeah, for sure, yeah.
Because, you know, people that are into that kind of shit just dig it -
we just played Milwaukee Metalfest, all death metal bands, I'm up there
screaming my head off and then I bust into the black metal voices, and all
the death metal kids are like, "Oh, that's killer, how he just did
that!" So, I love playing shows where it's all frickin' death metal
bands, we stand out so good in that stuff.
In terms of phrasing your vocals, how different is the approach for
something that is not melodic like the black and death metal stuff, as
opposed to melodic singing?
Yeah, I mean the melodic singing of course, you've got a melody line
that you follow, but even in the black metal vocals, I have pretty much a
melody going in every one that I have. That's one of the problems with
death and black metal, there's no melody and that shit just sounds the
same over and over. So I still, even when I'm using that voice, try and
throw the melody in, keep the melody going in it.
You were involved with a book recently called 'Pro Secrets of Heavy
Rock Singing', that featured actually heavy metal singers, I don't
know why they called it heavy rock (laughter)....can you tell me
about the background and how you got asked to be involved in that?
This guy asked me to do it a long time ago, and then I was one of the
first interviews he did. He did the interview with me, he had never even
heard me sing, he just like, someone told him I was a great singer and he
called me up and did the interview, and I said, 'Yeah, I'll be in the
book, whatever', and then the book comes out and it's got all these
singers in it, so I was really excited about that to have my interview in
between Geoff Tate and Ripper, it was pretty good placement. You know,
it's an ego boost, and it's kind of immortalized you, and it was exciting
to see the book out on the shelves and go to the store and buy it, there I
am. I thought it was a great book though, I think people should really get
it, it really is insightful and has a lot of good stuff in there. I
learned a lot from the other stuff that the other guys wrote.
I've read through the lyrics on DARKER THAN BLACK a few times when I
listened to the album, and most of the subject matter seems to be things
that I guess interest you, and they're not so much based on personal
experience. Do you prefer to write about that type of thing, as opposed to
being more introspective?
Yeah, my girlfriend's busting my balls on how I need to write more
songs about love and feelings and real life (laughter). But to me, metal
was always like Iron Maiden, educating and entertaining at the same time.
You know, the heavy metal themes, 'love bites', I mean all of that stuff.
Different kinds of music give you different emotions, and heavy metal to
me gave me that positive aggressive feeling that just made me want to just
rock, you know? And I think that the lyrics need to kind of match with
that. I like to take topics that are totally intriguing, and try and jump
ahead to the future. On ASTROLOGY I wrote about stem cells, two years
later it's all over the news. Same with "Echelon", I try and
kind of be on the cutting edge of evolutionary science and the topics that
are based on fact and myth, like "The Philadelphia Experiment"
and "Chupacabra". And then even taking "White Magic",
a song about burning witches that everybody's done a million times, and
taking a different approach on it, a more intellectual approach of the
wicked religion that are actually based on nature and white magic, and has
been turned by the media kind of thing. Then this last stuff has strayed
away from my hardcore political beliefs, but you might see some of that
popping up on the next record (laughter).
But then ASTROLOGY had "Souls and Flesh", which was a great
kind of power-love-ballad. I love that song. I don't know, you might see a
little more of that in the next record, a little more introspective, but
to me, some of the introspection shit gets really old and tired, and I
don't really like to be negative in my songs, 'cause that's so played out,
'everything sucks and I'm so depressed', that's fuckin' lame. That wasn't
what metal was about when I was into it, you know what I'm saying? Judas
Priest wasn't singing about how sad and shitty everything was. (laughter)
So I try and stay away from that, that "Antimatter" song, it was
such a cliché, I wrote the song really as a joke, that the whole thing's
just negative, just a generality, there's no particular meaning but it's
general, you know?! Song lyrics that can apply to anything, 'You let me
down', like religion, your dad, anything. It's comical, most of it. I just
took those, you know, 'Okay, we gotta make a song for the kids, and it's
gotta be totally fuckin' pissed and sucky and depressing, and it's gotta
be three minutes long, and it's gotta sound like this', so that's just an
example of how I can easily go to there. But then I took another cliché,
just flat-out warfare, I took it into an eight-minute epic, "Wings of
Destruction", I think I pretty much used the entire dictionary on
that one. But I love that song, the lyrics that I have in there. I've only
written a few lyrics for this new album, so I don't quite know what
direction it's gonna head yet. I always want it to be intellectual though,
kind of, even though it does sound to myself like I did kind of dumb down
the stuff a little bit.
Did you deliberately dumb it down?
Yeah, I deliberately dumbed it down this time, yeah. (laughter)
Where does most of your inspiration come from? Do you get your ideas
from movies, or books, or…?
Well, I listen to Coast to Coast, AM show, you know what I'm talking
about?
Oh, I don't think we get it up here.
You probably do, but at night time, it's on like 600 stations across
the country, it's everywhere.
I just don't turn on the radio, because it's all shit, haha.
Well go to AM some time at like 10:00 at night and listen to Coast to
Coast, and all they do is talk about total cutting-edge science, UFOs,
psychics, monsters, genetics and shit, and it's just total fodder for
great metal songs. (laughter) But we used the guy, in UNVEILED, we sampled
his voice on the song "Unveiled" on the first record, Art Bell.
Did he know that?
No, fuck no. (laughter) I didn't ask for his permission, I just did it.
And so that's a great source of inspiration, and then I'm a constant
absorber of the news and politics and stuff, so I've got all kinds of shit
going on in my head.
Regarding the song on here, "Philadelphia Experiment", did
you chose that legend/story/whatever because it's something you believe
that really happened, or was it just something that you thought was
interesting?
A little bit of both. The song, we had all the music done, and I had
the 'rules were made to be broken', and I wrote the rest of the lyrics and
they just sucked, I look back at them and I go 'This is fuckin' lame', so
we kinda really shit-canned the whole angle I was going at. I'd wanted to
make a song about the Philadelphia Experiment, because it was such a
fascinating story, and unlike a lot of people, I research all of my songs,
I researched that, I researched "Secrets of Fatima", and I
thought it would make a fantastic, you know…
Did you also watch the movie, 'The Philadelphia Experiment'?
Yeah. More than the movie, I mean like on that show I was telling you
about, they had two different people who claimed that they were there, and
to hear these guys tell their eyewitness account of what happened, these
guys have to be completely the best actors in the world or completely
delusional, 'cause the details these guys just rattle off for hours about
is amazing, so it's hard to believe that it wasn't true, but you know,
there's a lot of evidence that it wasn't true, but who cares, you know?
Myth and legend, it's a great story.
Do you consider yourself a perfectionist when it comes to doing your
music, and researching these topics, writing lyrics, and things like that?
Ahh, I wouldn't consider myself a perfectionist, no. I mean, you try
and get it as good as you can, but I don't go crazy. I produced the record
with Rick, and you could lose your fuckin' mind doin' that shit, 'cause
it's just, 'I don't know is the snare too loud? I don't know, I think it
is, I don't know, maybe it's not'. I mean, you spend five hours going
through that shit, it's crazy. But yeah, the lyrics I do spend a lot of
time on to make sure they're right. I do make sure everything rhymes
pretty much, it just makes the song sound better when they rhyme, you
know. Usually I get the melodies ahead of time, then plug the words in,
'cause the melody is really the key to most metal songs, that's where that
melody and the vocals is really what fuckin' grabs people.
I think I've got a knack for good heavy metal melodies. I've been doing
all these interviews, like there's thousands and thousands of fantastic
metal musicians, but there's only a handful of great metal songwriters
left, I believe.
And who would some of those be, in your opinion?
Hmm…
...that are still writing good stuff today…
Yeah, Roy Z., Roy's a great songwriter. The guys in Iron Maiden, and I
like some of the Gamma Ray songs too.
Do you like any of your other contemporaries from your area in the
United States, or…?
Yeah, like I said, a lot of the Seven Witches album's really good, and
a lot of the Agent Steel album's really good, so…
Yeah, definitely!
The Agent Steel guys, we're like best friends with 'em, so we
definitely dig playing with those guys.
In terms of researching topics, do you always have a little folder
of press clippings or printouts from the internet that you keep on hand
for a future idea?
Kind of, I just have a mass sheet, like song ideas for record #4, I
just write phrases. I just wrote down 'student of exoteric science'
yesterday, a little phrase I wrote down (laughter). Once we get started, I
go through 'em, I plug in what's where, and use different things. I got a
little tape recorder, when I start coming up with melodies and shit in my
head, I write down or put on the tape recorder, and bam, out comes a
killer metal tune.
I was wondering if you have any thoughts on, or if you're looking
forward to, the reunited Judas Priest with Rob Halford back on vocals?
Totally stoked about that, Priest is my favorite band, Halford lives
here in San Diego. I think it's gonna be great for our genre, for heavy
metal in general. I don't think Black Sabbath created heavy metal, I think
Judas Priest really did, because they were the ones that put the whole
package together, the whole 'fist in the air, we all dress like this,
we're all-(shouts something to someone off the phone)', the whole, you
know, rockin' together thing, so I think it's gonna be fantastic, and
maybe once people go out and see what Priest was all about, and they'll
just go, 'Holy shit, this makes fuckin' Disturbed look like kindergarten
shit.'
Haha, and it is. And how about the news from Friday or Thursday
about Ripper singing on the new Iced Earth record?
Is that a done deal?
Yeah, I've actually heard clips on the Iced Earth web page.
Oh, there's already clips on the web page of him singing?
Yeah, they're already online. You can download three 3-minute clips
of Ripper singing on the new album.
No shit! Well that'll be great, it's funny 'cause I got an email from
my Greek fan club that said there were rumors going around that I was
gonna be the new singer. (laughter) But you know, Ripper's one of my
favorite singers, so that'll be sick. I just hope they write better songs.
To me, Iced Earth, God bless 'em, they're fantastic, but only half the
songs on the albums really rip to me. Usually the album comes out, half
the songs are totally kickass, and then the other half are like 'eh',
so-so.
It's often like that with a lot of CDs, it seems.
Like 99% of all the CDs, that's what I'm sayin'! I'm a metal fan, dude,
gimme somethin' to rip to! I still listen to my own CDs, 'cause they rip
so much, then I don't have to worry about it! (laughter)
You can actually listen to your own music without getting all
critical?
Fuck yeah, the fuckin' songs are good, you know? In all music, the most
important thing is to have a good song.
I'm sure you know of a progressive type metal band from your area
from the 90s called Psychotic Waltz?
Right.
I wonder if they had any influence on you maybe musically when you
formed Cage, and do you happen to know the guys from that band?
Yeah, I'm about to go see the drummer in like 10 minutes, that's funny
you said that!
Okay. (laughter)
We're playing with his new band at this CD release party, so we're real
good friends. But they didn't really influence us that much. To me, I like
my metal a little more straightforward, and a little more hook-oriented,
and they really had a unique sound which is really important, but still a
little too abstract for my personal taste. I like my stuff just a little
more direct, I don't know, hooks and everything, but God bless 'em. They
are the greats of the San Diego scene, and a lot of great metal talent
here in San Diego, a lot of bands getting signed. For that style though,
we've kind of filled their shoes, and we're kind of the band from San
Diego that's got all the love in the air now. You know, the two guitar
players are sitting in their closets doing nothing, and the drummer and
the newer guitar player are in a new band.
What's the name of the band, anyway?
Teabag.
Teabag, right....
Horrible name.
Yeah, it's a weird name.
I don't know why, I tried talkin' him out of it.
Yeah, I remember the name, because I heard it and said, 'Teabag?
That's.....interesting…' (laughter).
Well man thanks for your time today, it was great to finally have a
chat with you!
I really appreciate it, and we'll keep in touch and we'll let you know
how the new material's coming.
Please do!
Okay, take care, bro!
