WEBVTT

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Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, metal's my religion, and yeah, it's my dope. Standing in the thunder on stage in the pouring metal rain. What a feeling, baby, the lights are exploding.

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And I don't need my gun. Metal's my religion.

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Yeah, it's my toy.

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And save me from the politics, baby.

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Metal's my religion.

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Hello and welcome back to MetalDisciple.com's Metal Heads Podcast. My name is George. And I'm Puke. And we are back. Sorry we weren't here last week. I was busy running around in the mountains with my family. Remember, I'm the one who had the baby. I'm the one who should be canceling and putting off podcasts. But I can't do it if I'm not here. I'm not here. I'm not here. You know, you weren't there. So I just say I could have brought a portable rig along, but then you wouldn't have been there. So yeah, I was thinking about that with the week.

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while you're gone,

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if I just,

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you know,

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like fire up a recorder and just at least maybe broadcast about some news stories or what's out that week.

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Just something.

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I did that when,

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when Brie was born.

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Yeah.

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So I was like,

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I could maybe do that.

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Yeah.

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All righty.

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Well,

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we just got off the phone with Mike Conti from early man.

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Mike gave us a really great interview and we're going to be playing some of the early man music from the new album.

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Thank God.

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You've got the answers for us all.

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Yeah.

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He was awesome.

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He was.

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That was a great conversation. His openness, his honesty. He really knows what he's doing. Where a lot of people are like, oh, boo-hoo, the music industry is on the toilet. What are we going to do? We can't make any money. We can't live. We can't be rock stars. He really knows what he's doing. He's like, look, this is what I need to do to get by, and I do it, and it's working. Like he said, he paid his

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Rent by putting out a three-song Halloween EP. Boom. You know, he sounds like he's doing the right thing. Yeah. And that really makes me feel good about metal music in general because so many people are complaining and he's just like, fuck it, just do it. And that was really inspiring. So, you know, we'll be playing that for you in a little bit. So stick around and check that out. A couple episodes ago, we talked about the distortion of sound and issues with sound quality and MP3s.

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3 versus vinyl and uncompressed music and things like that. And we got an email from a listener that I would like to read. And I asked him and he said it was okay to read it. So this is from John. He said, Hi, I was just listening to your awesome podcast when you were discussing the Distortion of Sound documentary. I'll have to admit I haven't seen it yet, but I have some quick input on the topic. First of all, I work as a sound engineer and I listen to music in expensive

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I also have a proper hi-fi system at home. The thing is, I can't hear the difference between 320k MP3 and CD audio in an A/B test. I can't tell which is which. With good MP3 compression, the audio degradation is not audible unless you got some superhuman hearing or if you have spent so much money on your hi-fi system that you need to hear the difference just to justify the money you spent. What really ruins music nowadays is happening before the music

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gets converted to mp3 or streamed in a compressed format on the internet. I'm talking about the brick-walled mastering job that almost every album released gets, and it really sucks the life out of the music. Could it be that the Among the Living album you listened to was a remaster, and when you listened to it on vinyl, it was the original 1987 master, made before this loudness war had really skyrocketed to insane levels? I also buy vinyls, mostly because I like the aesthetics of the format,

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But also, some vinyls get a different mastering job where they don't brickwall it as much as CD digital formats. MP3 is not killing the music. It is the brickwalled, limited, no dynamics whatsoever productions that is the problem. Google the Loudness War. Regards, John. Thanks, John. Yeah, that was a great email. Yeah, I'm aware of that issue as well and probably should have mentioned something about it, but I didn't. And you are correct, in fact, I will.

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was listening to an original vinyl pressing of Among the Living. And my MP3 version, I think, was actually at 128k. I have such a vast CD collection. When I originally ripped them all, I ripped them at 128k. I've been going back and picking my favorites and re-ripping them at 320k, but Among the Living was not one of them that I've done yet, so that is probably why it sounded so crappy compared to the vinyl. Probably. So thanks for writing in, John.

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It's always good to hear from people. We got another email from Daniel in Sweden. I'm not going to tell you the specifics of his email, but basically Daniel suggested a band that we should put on the podcast. It was a band that I had actually heard of. And so I contacted the band and they're on board. So I'm not going to tell you who they are yet, but Daniel knows. So we got them for you, buddy. They'll be on the next episode. Thanks again for taking the time.

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I'm going to write in Daniel and John. Yes, both. And next, Will, our buddy, sent us a tweet when I posed yesterday. If anybody has anything for the podcast to want us to discuss, he asked us, what was the strangest thing we've seen at a show and the furthest we've traveled for his first show? And also what we think of the new Cavalera Conspiracy, which I don't know if you've heard it yet. I've only heard one song, so I can't really say much. I liked the one song that I heard. I just haven't listened to the rest of the album yet.

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I love their first release. Yeah. Yeah. I just haven't listened to this one yet. But Will, to answer the question, the strangest thing personally I've seen. I know where you're going. Is it going to be our dubbed Freak Boy? It is Freak Boy. Yes. George and I were at a, was it Mayhem or Ozfest? I think it was an Ozfest. And Marilyn Manson was the headliner, like second to last. And I think he was the headliner. I don't think he was the headliner. I think he was second to last.

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And this kid is... We were in... Okay, we were at... Nissan Pavilion. Nissan. Yeah. And we were out on the lawn. And we were, like, pretty far back on the lawn. And so it wasn't really densely populated with people back there, you know? People were fairly spread out. And I think it had just rained, too. Yes. In fact, I think it... Like, Manson came on, the clouds came in, it rained, Manson left, the cloud left.

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And there's no more rain. But anyway, during this, I'll let you tell. Yeah, during this, he was in your high school metal mall rat, for lack of a better term, look. You know, he had these extremely large baggy pants, 15 obscure chains and buckles on it. Short little dreads, if I'm correct. Short little spiky dreads. And like the ancient,

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Medieval Time floggers. He was flogging himself. Flagellating. Yes. He was hitting himself about the face and body and convulsing his face. It was... It was just like spasming and having convulsions of some kind. It was very strange. I've seen people wasted. Actually, that's another one to bring up.

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The Man of War show who just went boom and like, you know, pissed himself and like, for all we know, is dead. Like the cops came. It was pretty fucked up. But this guy, he didn't seem wasted. He seemed weird. But he was literally assaulting himself. Like these were heavy blows he was landing on himself. Yeah. We call him Freak Boy. And another strange thing we saw at the show, George and I saw King Diamond years back at Jack's. There was a...

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There's a rather large man, a flamboyant large man in a, like a trench coat. Black leather trench coat. Yeah, like a duster, like a leather duster. Did he have a top hat on? I think he did. I think he had some sort of hat. And he had a walking stick. And a beard. He was so flamboyant. About 500 pounds it appeared or something like that. He was huge. But right before they open the door, as they open the doors and are about to walk and go in, he turns to his female friend or partner.

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with him.

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Who was much smaller.

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And says, and I quote, lace me up.

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And she proceeded to kneel down and lace up his ankle high boots.

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So as he dubbed himself the Raven.

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Yeah.

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Could enter the show.

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Lace me up.

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Yeah, there's some strange people out there.

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But hey, there are people, aren't they?

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Well, the farthest I've traveled for a show, Will,

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I traveled to Philadelphia to see Pantera. Which is about how far from here? About three hours. Three hours. Yeah, about three, two and a half, three hours. Well, right about now, Tyler from Arizona is going, fuck you. Yeah, our friends, again, if you missed last week, who took a Greyhound bus from Arizona to Richmond, Virginia for the barbecue. Fifty hours, they told us, one way on a Greyhound. Three hours ain't

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shit. Yeah. So three hours is my farthest. Uh, mine's double that. And of course it's still not shit, but, uh, it was about a six hour drive. Uh, when we went from Michigan to Massillon, Ohio, which is a Cleveland ish area, uh, to see Manowar back in the late nineties, I think it was. So yeah, don't really travel too much for, you know, here in the DC area, you don't really have to because they've got a great scene here. So everybody, most of the time comes by.

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And plus, George gets cranky in the car on a long road trip. I like road trips. Just not my driving. Yeah, your driving sucks. Okay, so while we were off last week, I went down to visit my parents, take my daughter down to visit and meet her great-grandmother for the first time. We went to a soul food, comfort food restaurant. And I'm bringing it up here on the podcast because you know soul food, comfort food, it's that,

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You know food that you you know

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You can always kind of it's like a warm hug from grandma

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You know mac and cheese you're making me hungry. Yeah mac and cheese, you know fried chicken. It's you know

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It makes makes makes you feel good. Yeah, it got me thinking in a metal terms

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You have any albums that are your heavy metal comfort food? Oh, yeah

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Mind in obscure that I always go to obscure because a lot of people still George and I are amazed don't listen to him

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My Heavy Metal Comfort Food is Sentenced to Cold White Light. I was going to say that too. Sentenced is my something bad has happened. I'm having a bad day. I'm upset about something. I'm depressed. I go to Sentenced. They're definitely one of my go-to bands. Alice in Chains Unplugged for Me is an album I can go to and always feel good. Or in my third one, I thought of three. You don't have to think of a couple, but Metallica S&M.

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Really? For me. It's just like a nice hug. It's just a comforting album. Ride the Lightning is one of my comfort albums. I would always go and listen to Fade to Black. Also, Megadeth's So Far So Good So What, In My Darkest Hour. That's, you know, it's a song I, for years, have gone back to. But Latter Day, more recent times, Sentence is probably my go-to comfort food band. Yeah. I remember when I posed to you, they put this on the script tomorrow. You're like,

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What? I was like, what's food got to do with it? That was just something I think about. I was just wondering what you always go to. So last time we did our top three Amanomarth albums. And you gave me no end of shit over the fact that I didn't include with Odin on our side. Yes. I just happened to find myself listening to it after that. A few days, a week after, whatever. And I was like, let me just listen to this again. I haven't listened to it in a long time.

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And I was like, oh my fucking god! This album's fucking awesome! Yes! So, while I stand by my three choices for the reasons that I stated, I also, in a parallel universe, have to agree with Odin on our side. Should have been on my list. So, I give you credit for calling that one. Please, anytime I do something like that and you agree with me, please, I must always mention it on the podcast because it's so good.

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You guys don't understand how hard it is

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to get through his tough metal skin

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The vinyl is on the way

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Yes

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Yes

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Yes

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Yes

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So

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New stories now

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Yeah

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So you want to talk about this first one?

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Yeah

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We lost another

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another

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music

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artist here

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Wayne Static

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from Static X

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We found out

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passed away

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For reasons unknown

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Yeah reasons unknown

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It's

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You know

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They don't hide it that, you know, for years he had, you know, drug addiction problems and alcohol addiction issues. Not saying that's been the cause of death now. They haven't given one. Right. His wife says that he was not doing any drugs or alcohol at the time. So, but she did say, you know, but he obviously did abuse himself pretty hard for years. It could be something just gave out, you know, but I guess we'll wait and see, you know, hopefully when the toxicology and the autopsy

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come back that they won't say that it was drugs yeah i was a fan of wayne for i was a fan of static x yeah i i was never really much of a fan you know they came out during the new metal era along with disturbed and and uh limp biscuit and bands like that and the first album didn't do anything for me the second album called machine that one was all right it was a little coil it was a little more metal um but

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You know, and then I guess maybe I listened to a little bit, and maybe he's a little more industrial towards the end there. It just never really did much for me, but it's always sad to see somebody playing heavy music pass away. Yep. So to anybody who knew him or was a fan, you know, sorry, he's passed. Yeah. Be careful. Don't do drugs. Handle your fucking high, as Kevin Smith would say.

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In other news, Phil Rudd, the drummer for ACDC, was arrested for attempting to procure murder. And then the charges were dropped. So I'm not sure what the story is there. He apparently was trying to hire somebody to kill a couple of people or, I don't know, the stuff I was reading after that made it sound like maybe, I think now he was just charged with like threatening people. Like what? So he said, I'm going to get somebody, I'm going to hire somebody to kill you.

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And then they extrapolated that to he's trying to get somebody. I don't know. I don't know what the story is. Tim from As They Lay Dying actually went out, met what he thought was a hitman. Money was exchanged. Yeah. That type of stuff. In this case, it sounds like he was just, you know, threats were possibly made. Right. They said that he never should have been arrested or brought up on charges because there was no proof of anything. So who knows? I don't know what his status remains in the band. They said they were going to be touring.

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But whether, like so many other bands, they're just going to boot him out or whether he's still in the band, I haven't heard anything about that. Interesting, because it was within hours, the news story was changing. Yeah, I mean, I first saw it on CNN. I was like, what? I just happened to see ACDC. I was like, drew my eye. I was like, you don't see ACDC on CNN unless it was like Malcolm Young. That made CNN.

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But I don't know. I guess we'll see. So Megadeth is going to be entering the studio in January to start recording the follow-up for Super Collider. Does this excite you at all? Not for me. I gotta admit, I've been a Megadeth fan for so many decades that hope always springs eternal. You know, there were some albums that came out after, what, Cryptic Writings? Mm-hmm. A couple of those albums after that. No, so good. They weren't great.

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But then, boom, United Abominations came out, and that fucking kicked ass. I love that album. And The System Has Failed, I think, was the one after that. It was pretty good. Endgame, right? Was that one? 13. 13, yeah. At that point, it started to kind of dilute the quality a little bit again. And so, like, Super Collider just wasn't really a fan. But being such a big fan of Dave Mustaine, I always hope that the next album is going to get back on track and fucking kick ass.

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So this last week we had two heavy metal bands in the Billboard Top 100. Both Obituary and At The Gates. Obituary came in at number 75 and At The Gates at number 53. Never thought to see At The Gates or even Orbituary for that matter in the Top 100. That's pretty awesome. That's pretty sweet. Yeah. That's cool. Congratulations to them. I picked up the new At The Gates. Yeah. It's cool. It is. I like it a lot.

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The production value on it alone is wonderful. That first opening track is a little weird though. It's like a Spanish is it in? Do you remember the first? I rarely look at song titles. Weird opening track, but man, great album. Yeah, cool. So did you see this thing about Slayer giving away free tickets to a fan? Apparently he was trying to sell his car or his vehicle, whatever it was, in order to get tickets to the Slayer show.

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And so he did this. I haven't seen the video. But he created a video of the Lincoln commercials with Matthew McConaughey. And he was spoofing that trying to get people to sell his car so somebody would buy it and he could go to the Slayer show. Apparently Slayer saw this and said, don't sell your car, man. Just here, have some free tickets. That's pretty cool. At least he was trying to sell his car other than the famous video of a fan carving Slayer in his wrist. Yeah.

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That's hardcore. Slayer fans will do some crazy shit. And that's probably why Slayer was like, you know, you just here, take the tickets. Don't do anything stupid, please. Yeah, please. Just come on. Yeah, it's on us. Speaking of stupid, you know what I don't need? What is that? I don't need eight new episodes of the Osbornes. No, the world doesn't need that. I'm like, really? After all this time, it's been like forever, hasn't it? I never really, I like watched like one episode.

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2001, 2002, around that time. Yeah, wow. That's been a while. So, yeah. We don't need that. No. Don't need that. We definitely don't need that. Just worry about getting out a new album, Ozzy. Don't worry about being on TV. Yeah. Worry about getting Bill Ward back in for the final album. Yes, that should be your priority. And did you see that news that came out that Ozzy said that getting... I don't know if Ozzy said it, but something came out that Bill Ward joining for the final album is all

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on Sharon or something now. Wouldn't surprise me. Yeah. Because apparently she handles all the business and stuff for the band. Right. But that's an hour between them to work out. Well, I hope she gets her shit together and makes it happen. Yeah. Because it would be sad if he's not on the album. All right. Blind Guardian's 10th album will be called Beyond the Red Mirror and will be released February 3rd in the US and January 30th in Europe. It's another one that I'm hoping is going to be a good album. I hope I have a return to form. Again, like we've said before, I've checked out on

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Blind Guardian recently. Yeah. It doesn't have the same imaginations. From the other side. No. It doesn't have the same type of sound to them anymore. No. It sounded kind of stock. Very much so. Yeah. It doesn't sound any excitement really with it. No. Too much flash and bang and not enough substance. Yes. Yeah. Well, one thing I am very excited about now, I don't know if you saw this, but Paradise Lost says that they're going to be

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a new album and that it's going to have a death metal edge embracing the band's early days. You know, the first thing I thought when I read that was it's because Nick is in Bloodbath now. That's what I was about to ask. I was like, oh, he got a taste of the hard stuff with Bloodbath and he's like, hey guys, this is actually kind of fun. Maybe he saw all the excitement. Yeah, and like Gregor, you know, Val and Fire, that's pretty heavy too. Yeah. So I'm pretty excited to hear what that's going to sound like. So am I. I'm really excited for the new Bloodbath. I cannot wait for that.

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Yeah, that's going to be awesome. I can't wait. Ooh, it's not on the list. I just got the promo for Nightingale. Did you really? I haven't heard it yet. Oh. But I'm so excited to hear that. We didn't mention it in news stories this week. I saw you posted it on Facebook. Witherscape announced an EP. That's right. That's right. I forgot about that. We are high on these guys. It's a Don Swano project. Yeah, he's apparently keeping busy. Yeah, they're releasing what, three or four song EP?

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Yeah, well, it depends on what version you get. I think there's like four songs if you get this version and like import version or vinyl version or whatever. We'll have like a couple more cover songs and, you know, there's a couple new songs. I think there's something like live or something or alternate version of something or maybe an extended version of, yeah, the what's that dead for a day. There's like dead for another day or something they call it because it's like an extended version of the song and then there's a couple of cover songs. So whatever it is,

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I'm going to get it. So there's something I want to mention. I saw a poster that, you know, my favorite band, Opeth, released. And it was for a show they have coming up. I think it's in London. And the tour poster was the candle that's on the Ghost Reveries album. I can only hope that this is them possibly playing the Ghost Reveries album start to finish. Because if I remember correctly, here,

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Don't quote me.

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If I remember correctly, Ghost Reveries was my number one.

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It is my favorite Opeth album.

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Right.

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If they maybe play this start to finish like they did with Blackwater Park,

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they maybe record this.

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Maybe we get a live Blu-ray from it, a live album, which I love.

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You know what I realized the other day?

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That live album they did, the live at the Royal Albert Hall.

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Yep.

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It never really hit me.

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I don't know why I thought of it the other day, but I've seen the Royal Albert Hall.

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I was there.

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I didn't go in.

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But I was there in London and I walked by it and I was like, oh, the Royal Albert Hall. I've heard of that place. And we like walked around the park across the street from it. And I was like, I just made the connection that that album was recorded in this place that I've actually been, you know, been into London and seen. And I was like, oh, it's that place. Okay. It's a pretty, you know, sweet looking building. Just thought that was interesting. So if Opeth is playing the Ghost Reveries album here, that would make my year. If they record it,

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Yeah.

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Man, that would be great.

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Well, we'll see then.

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We'll see.

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Yep.

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Good luck with that.

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And a little teaser here, where will Lopez album rate on my top 10 of the year,

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or however many we do of albums of the year?

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I don't, I certainly hope it's not on that list.

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Said Sean Connery.

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Yeah, it's like, it's almost mid-November.

00:25:05.940 --> 00:25:10.000
I have a list, but I, you know, it's at least 50 bands long.

00:25:10.720 --> 00:25:40.140
So I really got to start thinking about it and trying to put them in some kind of order. Remember, I had a baby. Well, my wife had a baby. I have a kid now, so my list would be a little harder to get together than yours. Yes, of course. And if it's not as long as mine, we're used to you not being quite as long as me. So let's get into new releases. I'm really excited this week because four out of these, I love. And one of these may be possibly album of the year for me on this list. Really? Okay, well.

00:25:40.400 --> 00:26:10.340
So let's hear it here. At least one of these is in my top ten. So. All right. First one is the new Lordi album. Scareforce One. Har har har. Take on Air Force One. I get it. We were pretty excited about these guys when they did the whole Eurovision thing. Yeah. I mean. We had tickets to go see them. We did. That's right. What did that get canceled? The tour got canceled. That's right. Wow. I forgot about that. Yep. Still got an unused ticket sitting around somewhere. Yep. Wow. Yeah. I haven't listened to the new album yet. So I can't tell you anything about it.

00:26:11.880 --> 00:26:16.000
I've dug their past albums, so I'll probably at least kind of like it.

00:26:16.270 --> 00:26:18.960
The next one, holy hell, have you listened to this one?

00:26:19.040 --> 00:26:19.100
Yep.

00:26:19.280 --> 00:26:22.800
I did not know who this was when I came across it.

00:26:23.000 --> 00:26:25.880
If somebody of note I don't know that, I've listened to them.

00:26:26.540 --> 00:26:31.680
This is a band called The Skull, and their album, For Those Which Are Asleep.

00:26:32.340 --> 00:26:35.220
Okay, this is 75% Trouble.

00:26:35.680 --> 00:26:37.100
Okay, now it sounds, now I can hear it now.

00:26:37.260 --> 00:27:06.960
Eric Wagner, the singer from Trouble, drummer, original drummer from Trouble, and I believe the bass player, not the original bass player, but from like Run to the Light and a few albums after that, the bass player from there. So I was like... That's right, the Trouble was so strong, the pentagram sound was coming through. Yeah, well, The Skull, it's named after the album The Skull, and obviously this is one of those, you know, Trouble is still around with completely different people, and they were like, hey, let's do something related, you know.

00:27:06.980 --> 00:27:36.880
the skull. And wow, I was like, I was listening to this and I was like, man, that sounds familiar. Who are these guys? And I looked it up and I was like, duh. I was like, wow, okay, that's awesome. And that got me really excited. So. Really? I listened to this earlier today when I was working on my hockey stuff. It sounded great. Yeah, this is like classic, you know, early to mid 80s doom metal. Obviously a more contemporary style and sound, but you know, it sounds like old trouble, which is pretty bad.

00:27:37.000 --> 00:27:37.260
Godass.

00:27:38.200 --> 00:27:43.300
Next up, Carcass is putting out an EP of leftover material from their last album.

00:27:43.400 --> 00:27:46.160
It's called Surgical Remissions, Surplus Steel.

00:27:46.640 --> 00:27:48.020
I haven't heard anything off of this yet either.

00:27:48.250 --> 00:27:51.860
I did get a promo of it, but so much music, so little time.

00:27:52.300 --> 00:27:55.940
Next up, we have Devilman with The Great and Secret Show.

00:27:56.300 --> 00:27:59.580
This is the side project for Danny Filth from Gradle of Filth.

00:27:59.800 --> 00:28:01.080
Do you know what comes through hearing this?

00:28:01.580 --> 00:28:02.480
I'm going to mention this.

00:28:02.560 --> 00:28:04.120
How much of this have you heard?

00:28:04.220 --> 00:28:04.780
Not a lot.

00:28:04.940 --> 00:28:34.860
I heard a little enough to know that this is definitely different than Cradle of Filth. I like that he's doing a different vocal style, you know, getting outside of the Cradle of Filth box. You know, I know they did. I can't remember which album it was. Was it Damnation? There was one of those albums from that period. He did some clean vocals on like one or two songs and people shit all over him. And I thought it was great that he was doing something slightly different, but he hasn't done anything like that since in Cradle of Filth.

00:28:34.920 --> 00:29:04.720
that I've heard. So I like that he's doing something outside of Cradle of Filth where he can choose to do something a little bit different. Like I said, I haven't really listened to much of it yet, so I don't know how good it is. Okay, you can listen to me and text me or call me later, and we'll talk about it in maybe next podcast. Tell me if this doesn't sound like, with the band behind him, that Danny is not singing for Devil Driver. Really? That's exactly, exactly the sound that comes through. Devilman, Devil Driver. Yeah, it sounds.

00:29:04.940 --> 00:29:34.900
Exactly like Devil Driver. Just Danny being the singer. Interesting. I'm telling you it does. Okay. So I heard it today. Interesting stuff. I've never been a Cradle of Filth fan. You are. The early stuff you love. Yeah. So maybe I'll check this out because since I'm not the biggest Cradle of Filth fan, maybe with this, I'll really check it out. Yeah. This next album is a, I like this a lot. Really? I didn't know you were familiar with them. This next band is also probably going to be on, maybe my top 10, but definitely on my top 10.

00:29:34.940 --> 00:30:04.860
My List. Finish Band Ghost Brigade and their album 4, One With The Storm. I really, really loved their last album, Until Fear No Longer Defines Us. Great fucking mix of like death metal. Melodic doom. Melodic doom. You know, there's clean vocals and harsh vocals and just very atmospheric and emotional music. I really dug that album and I've been listening to this one this past week and it is also very fucking good.

00:30:04.940 --> 00:30:34.560
You need to listen to Ghost Brigade. Do you have any thoughts on them? Just that today, the... I was listening to them also this morning, prepping for the show, the melodic, clean vocals. This is what I'm listening to now. It's really interesting because the album starts off heavy. The first song kicks in and it's a pretty heavy song. It's like harsh vocals. And then the middle of the album gets really clean and pretty and not quite as heavy. I mean, they're still throwing some heavy here and there.

00:30:34.600 --> 00:31:03.940
But the album starts off and you're like, oh, this is going to be a heavy album. And then really changes direction. And you're like, oh, wow. Cool. It's very dynamic that way. And I jumped in right in the middle. Because I picked a random track right in the middle. And I'm like, man, this is soft. Yeah. But then it just picks right back up again and gets heavy again. So it's really good. So make sure to check that out. Next, of course, is Job for a Cowboy and their new album, Sun Eater. There's a lot of talk around this album. Yeah. I know Job for a Cowboy.

00:31:04.020 --> 00:31:31.460
I've listened to all their albums, but I'm not like, you know, I don't have everything memorized. I'm not a super, super fan of the band. I'm a fan, but so when I was listening to this, I was like, it feels a little different than the last album, like slower and more deathy, heavy, even a little bit of doomy sound to it. And I was like, right on. It was very cool. I was really digging it. I don't know what you think.

00:31:31.540 --> 00:31:58.780
The nice thing for Job for a Cowboy is each album from their EP when they first found them to where they're at here with Sun Eater. They haven't been stuck in a rut of the same. Like when they first came out, they were at the forefront of that death core scene. A lot of those bands aren't around anymore. They've always been one of probably the most popular of that genre, but they've evolved with each album.

00:31:59.060 --> 00:32:28.380
Yeah, they're one of the few bands that has any kind of core attached to it that I'll actually listen to. And that's kind of what I liked about this album was that it was really sort of distancing itself from that old core type sound. This was much more metal and just death. And I was like, yeah, I like it. Now this next one may be my album of the year. It is definitely in my top 10. I was listening to this yesterday. This is Machine Head and their new album, Bloodstone and Diamonds. Holy shit, this album is amazing.

00:32:28.700 --> 00:32:57.540
Every time, these guys keep getting better and better. They do. You know, when they released the video for Now We Die, we were talking about it. And you were like, this sounds like blackening. And I was like, this sounds like Locust. Having listened to the whole album front to back now, we're both right. Really? Yes. I was listening to it today at the gym, and I was like, wow, you know, he's right. This is very blackening. You know, the first couple of songs are very blackening. And that's the album that got us both on board. Again, with the band. And then, like, he'd go into the next song, and I'm like, oh, that's very Locust.

00:32:57.780 --> 00:33:27.640
And so what I get from this is that this is really the best of blackening and locust in something entirely new. Have you heard the whole album? Nope. Oh, my fucking God. Rob is pissed. Is he? There are like vocals on here that are like almost death metal. He gets fucking pissed. Wow. He's like, you know, I mean, he's got some like rough vocals, but oh my God. Now from blackening on same kind of longer six, seven minute songs. Yeah.

00:33:27.760 --> 00:33:57.700
Yeah, there's like seven, eight minute songs, plus some like three, four minute songs. Awesome. We don't have to worry about children singing no in this one, do we? No, unfortunately not. I have, but that was one of my favorite songs. I know who we are, a great fucking song. But this album, I mean, Now We Die, incredible. That's all I've heard. Ghosts Will Haunt My Bones is another really great one. Sail Into the Black, first half of the song is, the first time I heard it, this one annoyed me, because it was very quiet, and he's just kind of talking.

00:33:57.780 --> 00:34:27.740
for like three minutes and four minutes but then it just kicks in and like that lull it just and then to go from that and into something really heavy it was just really cool and dynamic and i loved it and eyes of the dead is another one on there fucking amazing the song game over holy he loses his fucking mind on the song game over it is fucking brilliant so yeah definitely going to be in my top 10 albums this year and you know if i had like a a separate list for

00:34:27.740 --> 00:34:57.320
I don't want to call them commercial, but more accessible and popular bands. It would be number one on that list for sure. Wow. Okay. That's where you put like your land of God's notes. Yeah. Yeah. You know, I mean, I've been saying it all year. Trypticon is going to be my number one. Tombs is going to be my number two. This may even creep into the top five. Okay. Wow. It's really fucking good. I mean, the songwriting is there. It's fucking heavy, but there's, you know, vocal hooks, not quite clean.

00:34:57.760 --> 00:34:59.620
But their hooks

00:34:59.740 --> 00:35:01.320
Their hooks have been always what's got me about them

00:35:01.320 --> 00:35:02.160
What I love about them

00:35:02.300 --> 00:35:02.400
Yeah

00:35:02.540 --> 00:35:04.240
Choruses, singing along with all the choruses

00:35:04.740 --> 00:35:05.060
Mm-hmm

00:35:05.720 --> 00:35:06.340
So good

00:35:06.450 --> 00:35:08.800
So, I mean, they really nail it on this one

00:35:09.020 --> 00:35:11.360
I guess canceling that tour to finish up the album

00:35:11.560 --> 00:35:12.660
Maybe they needed to do it

00:35:12.660 --> 00:35:14.120
I don't know how it couldn't have been finished

00:35:14.420 --> 00:35:14.520
But

00:35:14.660 --> 00:35:14.900
Yeah

00:35:15.559 --> 00:35:16.880
Well, good job, guys

00:35:17.160 --> 00:35:18.240
This is fucking brilliant

00:35:18.380 --> 00:35:19.220
Did you order this on vinyl?

00:35:19.420 --> 00:35:19.640
I did

00:35:20.020 --> 00:35:21.220
It comes out Tuesday or Monday?

00:35:21.720 --> 00:35:22.660
Yeah, Tuesday

00:35:22.940 --> 00:35:23.040
Yeah

00:35:23.220 --> 00:35:23.540
Tuesday

00:35:23.680 --> 00:35:25.000
I don't know when the vinyl's shipping

00:35:25.320 --> 00:35:26.380
I haven't heard anything yet

00:35:26.400 --> 00:35:55.480
Yeah, I'm really excited about that. Again, George and I have always been fans of these guys. You've known them longer than me, but as they kind of were going through their new metal rap and rock phase for a while there with some of the songs they were doing, their style was changing. Yeah. He was doing what he had to do to try and keep the band alive. And then the blackening came out. Yeah. Yeah. Enough said.

00:35:56.860 --> 00:36:25.360
Just listen to it. Yep. All right. Well, this last new release this week is a band that I heard. I got the promo a couple weeks ago, and I mentioned it to you. I don't know that I actually mentioned the band name, but I said, hey, there's this band coming out. It's like sludge, doom, heavy. The band's called Usnea. If I'm pronouncing that correctly, I looked it up online. It's a type of lichen that grows on trees, apparently. And according to the internet, it's pronounced Usnea, U-S-N-E-A.

00:36:25.580 --> 00:36:55.460
And their album, Random Cosmic Violence. This was, wow. This was like, you know, the last Ahab album, the giant, the like ethereal, clean guitar work. And then it just like punches you in the side of the head with something heavy. And the vocals are just like, you know, just harsh as fuck. And, oh, it's a really cool album. This might actually make the list somewhere too. I have to listen to it a little more and look at my list and see what, what's what.

00:36:55.580 --> 00:37:24.160
But I really liked this album. Didn't we just say last week that things are starting to slow down for new releases for the year? Look at us now. We're so excited about four of these on here. Yeah, well, I did say November is a big month. Okay. There's a lot of stuff coming out this month, but then December, it's going to drop off big time. I don't know what the hell we're going to talk about. We may have one new release. Yeah. Since I know video games, I may throw in a video game or two. As long as it's like Brutal Legend where they play metal.

00:37:26.720 --> 00:37:27.460
All right.

00:37:27.720 --> 00:37:30.180
Well, I think it's time to get into the interview.

00:37:31.140 --> 00:37:33.240
This week's band is called Early Man.

00:37:33.660 --> 00:37:39.480
And as we mentioned earlier, we had the privilege and the pleasure to speak with Mike Conte of Early Man.

00:37:39.820 --> 00:37:44.500
So we're going to play you the interview now, and that will lead into the first song.

00:37:44.890 --> 00:37:45.720
And then we'll be back.

00:37:46.420 --> 00:37:46.820
Hey, everyone.

00:37:47.060 --> 00:37:49.380
This is George and Buke from Metal Heads Podcast.

00:37:50.080 --> 00:37:52.720
We are here today with Mike Conte from Early Man.

00:37:52.860 --> 00:37:53.460
How you doing, Mike?

00:37:53.760 --> 00:37:54.160
I'm good.

00:37:54.270 --> 00:37:54.840
How are you guys?

00:37:55.040 --> 00:38:23.680
Pretty good. Since there might be some listeners that are not familiar with Early Man, could you maybe start us off with a little bit of band history? Yeah, the band, it's actually been around, at least in my own mind, for about 20 years. It started with me in, I want to say, maybe the mid-90s, doing four-track recordings with anybody who was around in that era.

00:38:23.780 --> 00:38:52.880
I remember the amazing Tascam 4-track recorder. I used to have, actually I still have one of those. Yeah, yeah, they're great. They actually still sound good for some stuff, but I, as soon as the, and also any guitar player will know this, as soon as the pod was invented, the first generation, I lived in Ohio. I'm originally from Ohio, Marion, Ohio technically, but moved to Columbus, Ohio when I was about 17, 18 years old. I grew up in Michigan, so I know the area.

00:38:53.380 --> 00:39:23.340
Cool. Midwestern pride. Hell yeah. I bought a pod and I had a Tascam 4-track recorder and I bought an Alise's SR-16 drum machine. I got one of those too. And a pod. They're great. I mean, surprisingly enough, it's not that different than digital setups are now. There was a lot of things in that era that you could do with that setup that you still do now when you fire up

00:39:23.480 --> 00:39:51.640
and you use Superior Drummer and whatever, you know, a guitar plug-in. It's sort of the same difference. But I started doing tape demos into the mid and late 90s, and I ended up moving to New York City in 1998 after having spent a year in, actually in Minneapolis. I moved to New York, and I just started circulating tape demos of the stuff that I was doing.

00:39:52.800 --> 00:40:22.760
And at the time, there wasn't a lot of... Whatever I was doing, there wasn't a lot of that going around. It was somewhere in between early Metallica, early Megadeth, and Sabbath. And in New York City, we had a lot of electronic bands at the time. Okay. You know, or if we had metal, it was... I'm not going to mention any names, but it was very...

00:40:22.780 --> 00:40:52.600
It was like the Britney Spears version of heavy metal. Nothing heavy about it. You know. So the demos and the sort of, even though we were well past the tape trading days of heavy metal, that stuff was still kind of going on in the underground scene in New York a little. And that gave the band its legs a little. And from there, it sort of grew. And we signed with a label in New York, which would bring you to about like 2003.

00:40:52.780 --> 00:40:53.260
4.5.

00:40:55.180 --> 00:40:58.240
And that's a quick history of the band.

00:40:58.240 --> 00:41:02.940
We have two full-length releases on much larger labels.

00:41:03.200 --> 00:41:05.740
And in this latest release I just did, I released myself.

00:41:06.880 --> 00:41:10.500
Mike, you were talking about the early days there.

00:41:10.580 --> 00:41:11.820
That was right around the time.

00:41:11.880 --> 00:41:14.620
And George and I spoke about this a couple episodes back.

00:41:15.540 --> 00:41:18.920
What did you think about Napster at that time?

00:41:18.940 --> 00:41:20.380
And did you like it?

00:41:20.840 --> 00:41:46.200
And did you use it to possibly help spread the word of your band? As you know, the tape training days were kind of a thing of the past. That's a really good question. I remember having like very, it's funny to even think about this now, but I remember having like really hardcore moral dilemmas during Napster days when I got my first laptop.

00:41:50.900 --> 00:41:51.340
you wanted.

00:41:52.520 --> 00:41:58.240
And it actually made you stop and think like, well, you know, I think Dave Mustaine's got enough money.

00:41:58.770 --> 00:41:58.880
Yeah.

00:41:58.950 --> 00:42:01.720
So I'm going to grab his new record.

00:42:02.460 --> 00:42:04.880
And I was doing that stuff, as everyone was doing.

00:42:05.280 --> 00:42:10.120
But then all of a sudden when I was making music and I saw that it would take me six months

00:42:10.210 --> 00:42:15.860
to put two songs together properly into listenable form that I would let other human beings

00:42:15.880 --> 00:42:45.560
here, it sort of changed my opinion of how that should all go down. I'm sort of somewhere in between I'm definitely not Lars Ulrich, you know? I thought that shit was completely insane. Like, you know, some kind of monster. Here's a motherfucker selling like millions of dollars in paintings because he's bored. Going after poor people, you know,

00:42:46.860 --> 00:43:15.180
stealing his music that's doing nothing but making his band bigger. All it's doing is selling more tickets for him, selling more Metallica, CDs, T-shirts, whatever, and they couldn't see that. But at the same time, I also think, should music be free? Not really. There's got to be some support coming from somewhere, or guys like me can't do this. Yeah, that's always been my thing.

00:43:15.240 --> 00:43:45.200
I have always seen the exposure because I my first exposure to you you mentioned your early albums your was it 2005 you released your closing in album yes 2005 I saw I saw you in Jack's in Springfield for Virginia I don't remember who you were opening for I remember that show well yeah but I don't remember what tour that was but you know I had

00:43:45.220 --> 00:44:14.460
I believe it was through a Napster service or a clone like that that I had even heard of you prior to that show. So in that aspect, it was great exposure, but also by downloading it, whoever's taking money out of your pocket. Right, right. And I think, you know, what's funny though is I think that time period, we have anybody that's still a musician that's still complaining about that kind of stuff

00:44:14.480 --> 00:44:18.040
is also still living in 2005.

00:44:18.890 --> 00:44:23.600
Because we're way past that time period now, there's ways around that.

00:44:24.200 --> 00:44:24.580
There's ways.

00:44:24.820 --> 00:44:30.380
My band is never, thank God, going to be as big as whoever.

00:44:31.400 --> 00:44:33.140
Let's step outside of metal.

00:44:33.680 --> 00:44:36.840
I don't have to worry about early man becoming the next radio head.

00:44:38.099 --> 00:44:44.440
But because of that, you have such a tight fan base that, of course you can go to them

00:44:44.440 --> 00:45:14.180
"Hey, please support me. Let's at least have some good goddamn music left on the planet. Let's have some riffs. Let's have some things you guys that think like I do. Let's have some things that we can all share together." And those people will respond. It's funny, like you don't need... What do I need as a fan base to actually live off of this band? Not a lot. Anywhere between 500 to 1000 hardcore followers that are supporting me.

00:45:14.460 --> 00:45:20.200
what I'm doing and I'm fine. I'll write riffs until I'm 95 years old all day long.

00:45:20.859 --> 00:45:40.980
Now, us as metal fans, we are a passionate group. Do you think those same metal fans, though, you said you would rather have 500 or 1,000 passionate ones, what do you think they would do if this new album does for something take off? And now you're playing those 2,000 seat venues.

00:45:41.820 --> 00:45:44.940
And they say, oh, early man Mike is now selling out.

00:45:46.020 --> 00:46:10.500
Yeah, you're always going to get that kind of backlash. I mean, it's a tough one because as a musician, obviously your goal is how many people can I get to hear the music? This is partially why when I released the new record, I chose to release it through Bandcamp. I chose to make it free for the first month. It's no longer free now. Now it's $6.66.

00:46:10.580 --> 00:46:39.800
But it's funny because you're seeing guys that have a much bigger following than me use Bandcamp to do similar things. I noticed that Godflesh released their record through Bandcamp. I don't know if he did it exclusively, but basically all of the best, biggest perks and quickest, easiest way to get the record was through Bandcamp. That's veering off a little bit from whether or not it's free.

00:46:39.880 --> 00:47:09.860
But my point is just there's avenues now where I can say, hey, go here and download this record for five bucks. And I keep 85% of the profit right away into, you know, whatever, a PayPal account. If that fan base goes from 1,000 people to 100,000 people, it creates all kinds of new problems. I can't facilitate that myself anymore. You know, I can't wake up at 8 in the morning and be like, let me make sure that

00:47:09.900 --> 00:47:36.480
from Michigan has his EP. It's just not possible. If that happens, I won't be able to write music anymore. So I think your original question falls under the category of like, you can't please everybody. I'm certainly happy being the, I love being the underdog. I'd rather be the smaller guy, even on a tour. Let me play at 7.30 and blow the roof off the place.

00:47:37.520 --> 00:48:07.420
and make a 60-year-old Kronos actually try to look like he can still play bass at 10:30 at night. Believe me, I love Venom. I'm just saying we did some tours with Venom and we had an opening slot and we were like, "This is the greatest thing in the world. You play to a packed house at 7:00 p.m. By 8:00 o'clock, we're all wasted up the street eating cheeseburgers." It was amazing. So there's benefits to being the underdog, but of course, we've toured with bands.

00:48:07.500 --> 00:48:36.620
A Band That Comes to Mind is a Band of Sword. They opened for us on our first tour. Three years later, they're in an arena opening for Metallica. They're still the same guys. I know them all. They're all great guys. They haven't changed a bit, but they have numerous new fans. But then there's this sort of undercurrent of backlash against them because it's like, why didn't it happen to me? That's like asking why you didn't win the lottery. It happens to some bands. It doesn't to others.

00:48:37.320 --> 00:49:06.720
I don't know if you read that piece I can't remember his name the guy from God Forbid put out a piece a couple months back about you know why some of those new metal bands don't call yeah doc put that thing about you know why some of these new metal bands didn't make it and why bands like kill switch engage for whatever reason the spark found them and they they made it right but quickly going back to band camp what you know what these crowdfunding websites like the band camps or the

00:49:06.760 --> 00:49:36.340
where you pretty much control your own product and put it out. What do you think about these larger, already established bands who might not have put out something in years kind of encroaching on your territory? Each circumstance is its own case, right? But I think what you're getting at is why... Because it is my field that, hey, yes, you know,

00:49:36.440 --> 00:50:06.120
The most reaching one that comes to mind, Obituary, did a successful Kickstarter campaign. I think they raised $60,000 or $80,000, something like that. To me, they're a band that I thought, hey, Kickstarter should not be for you. I agree with that. I actually just saw, I don't know if you guys watch that show Portlandia, but I just thought there was something on that show that was kind of a jab at what you're talking about. Major actors or actresses using Kickstarter,

00:50:06.440 --> 00:50:35.220
to fund movies or whatever. It's the same difference. You don't need that to do that. I actually need it. I actually took my, after Indiegogo and PayPal and everybody took their cut out of what we raised, I literally went with a stack of $100 bills to Sam Ash and bought recording gear. And I was like, okay, now we can get the show on the road. I don't think that's what Obituary did with their 80 grand.

00:50:35.500 --> 00:50:35.940
No.

00:50:36.560 --> 00:51:04.720
You know, I doubt it. And I also think that it's something that seems like a little bit, you know, I don't want to say sinister. That sounds maybe that's a little too dramatic. But you get the feeling that there's more going on behind the scenes with a with a band that big. Again, I don't know. I don't know their story. But I really do have a feeling that there's a lot of bands on Kickstarter, not just a feeling I know of some that are actually backed by labels. And the label is saying,

00:51:04.960 --> 00:51:09.460
Go-Go-Go-Go and let's at least get $10,000 going here.

00:51:10.220 --> 00:51:11.960
And then we'll put in the rest.

00:51:12.440 --> 00:51:13.840
That's bullshit, you know?

00:51:15.220 --> 00:51:17.860
Because a label has the juice to do anything.

00:51:18.080 --> 00:51:21.160
They could get you a song place somewhere for $100,000.

00:51:22.080 --> 00:51:23.460
They have that kind of power.

00:51:23.620 --> 00:51:28.060
They should be working with things from the ground up, as far as I'm concerned.

00:51:28.820 --> 00:51:30.140
But, you know, what happens?

00:51:30.380 --> 00:51:31.860
Everything gets homogenized.

00:51:32.140 --> 00:51:32.560
Everything.

00:51:33.120 --> 00:52:02.960
or everything gets taken over that starts in the underground, if it becomes cool, forget it. Everyone's going to do it. And that's exactly where the whole crowdsourcing, crowdfunding thing is right now. It's, in my opinion, it's over. I'd never do it again. It's already done. You know? Did you see the thing about Winter Sun? How they were doing some sort of crowdfunding or they wanted to? They're on Nuclear Blast. And originally, Nuclear Blast was like, no, you can't do that.

00:52:03.180 --> 00:52:31.400
And I don't know, it was a big deal or whatever. But I read, I saw like a little bit of, I read a couple like boards about it. I know what you're, I'm familiar with what you're talking about. And then whatever they got it worked out, they're doing, they're getting ready to do the crowdfunding. And the, the main winter sun guy put up their plans for what they're going to do. And they want to, he wants to build this studio so that they have somewhere to, to work. And he put up a diagram and there was a sauna in it.

00:52:31.700 --> 00:52:37.320
And people were like losing their shit going, why are we paying for you to have a sauna? Make us some fucking music.

00:52:38.140 --> 00:52:57.280
I mean, that's exactly, exactly. You know, that's, that's, that says it all right there. The other thing is if you want to build a studio, uh, I mean, that's great. And I think that's noble, but I don't think that's what we started crowdfunding for.

00:52:57.420 --> 00:53:26.780
I think you can also go get a night stocking job at Walmart for a year, put 15 grand back, and then build your studio next year. Because what's going to happen is all you're going to do, we all know what's going on, you're going to juice the costs for this bundle is $150 and we'll sign it in the blood of our grandmother, whatever the fuck it is. And it just gets to the point where you're like, dude, come on, man. All we want is eight to ten songs that rip.

00:53:26.880 --> 00:53:56.040
It doesn't really take that much. We all know you can go into a studio for somewhere between five to ten grand and do that. Or you can do what I did, teach yourself how to do it all with five microphones and a couple laptops, and it's the same difference. So some of that backlash is, I think, they deserve it. You know? Yeah. I noticed that you seem to be doing most of the instruments on this new album, which, by the way, is called Thank God You've Got the Answers for Us All.

00:53:56.880 --> 00:54:26.680
So what's the story there? What was your instrument of choice when you first started playing and what led to you picking up other instruments and just how much is you on this new album? It's pretty much, it's all me. It's a lot me. I don't want to take anything away from the drummer, John, who tracked all the drums, but I did also sort of write all the drum parts as well. But you guys will get a kick out of this. I actually started,

00:54:26.900 --> 00:54:56.140
I come from a very scary religious background family. Nice. The whole entire family is Jehovah's Witnesses. And that's actually why we have you on this podcast. This is actually a Jehovah's Witness podcast. It all comes full circle now. Anyway. Yes, you're at my door right now with the watch. It's all a big joke. The bikes are locked up down the street. Jesus Christ.

00:54:56.880 --> 00:55:26.840
But yeah, I come from a crazy religious family and they thought it would be a brilliant idea to have me start playing violin, which I'm not against when I was in first grade. And so I picked a violin up and I was pretty decent with it until I got to about, I want to say it was around like fifth or sixth grade. I kind of started looking around and I was like, this is really dorky, you know, to be a violin guy.

00:55:27.480 --> 00:55:56.840
Which of course is like a horrible thing to say because that's not true. But it is. But you know when you're at that age I was just like you gotta be kidding me. I started off with a trumpet in a denim sack. Okay. And do you think my school had actually trumpet in the band? No. They had those little ones. The cornets. Yeah. So I was the kid with the trumpet in the denim sack. That didn't last but two weeks.

00:55:59.380 --> 00:56:26.860
Oh my god, that's amazing. Those are like, I mean, I think it's great that they do that. Those are like gateway drugs for those of us that become actual musicians, you know, at that age. And of course, there were guys in a tiny little school in Ohio. I remember there being a guy in there who just ripped on violence. He was unbelievable, like complete virtuoso, you know. But it kind of made me think like, I don't think this is what I, I don't see myself

00:56:26.880 --> 00:56:55.940
doing this. And I threw a crafty series of lies and deceptive Bible quotes and whatever it needed to take. I got my hands on a guitar. My dad bought me a guitar. And I remember I learned Proud Mary was the first song I learned. And I was blown away because the guitar has frets on it. And obviously a violin doesn't. And I was like, this is a goddamn piece of cake.

00:56:56.900 --> 00:57:26.860
And then I took, I think, two guitar lessons from somebody. Ironically enough, this probably really shaped me at the time I didn't know it. I took a little bit of time off from guitar, but I started to revisit it in my later teens. And there was a guy, his name was George, who was a huge Maiden fan. And his whole, he was a guitar instructor, and his whole thing was he wanted to teach me some

00:57:27.800 --> 00:57:30.860
And he taught me a couple bar chords

00:57:32.560 --> 00:57:33.780
basically off of killers.

00:57:34.480 --> 00:57:37.060
Like, here's an example of what he's doing, and then here's how it's done.

00:57:37.860 --> 00:57:42.260
And then I went home and did that, and at the time didn't even have a distortion pedal.

00:57:42.350 --> 00:57:46.340
I didn't know what I was doing, but I was hooked from that point on.

00:57:46.470 --> 00:57:51.420
But it's funny because I got a late start much later than anybody else

00:57:52.050 --> 00:57:55.560
that you would consider an even remotely decent guitar player, period.

00:57:56.240 --> 00:58:02.980
I don't think I really went for it and picked the instrument up properly until I was about 19 years old, which is odd.

00:58:04.500 --> 00:58:13.540
We will play some of your songs later in the podcast. For the listeners out there who haven't heard you, your riffs are fucking killer.

00:58:14.890 --> 00:58:15.200
Thank you.

00:58:15.610 --> 00:58:19.620
Do you find it rough this day and age?

00:58:20.720 --> 00:58:25.580
Because me and you are different in this, obviously, because you know how to play.

00:58:26.060 --> 00:58:55.040
You and I listen to, you know, metal. I guess where I'm going with this question is, are there any riffs that you just sit there and you try and write and you're like, I've heard that before, I've heard that before. And is it a struggle for you to come up with these killer riffs that you do play? Yeah, you definitely have to. I'm sorry, I didn't, did I just cut you off? That's all right. I sort of was trying to squeeze in there. I was just going to say, did you know that one time I actually wrote Electric Funeral? Then I found out that somebody had already done it.

00:58:56.940 --> 00:59:21.080
You know what's funny? Yes, that happens. But let me try to give you the brief, the quick version of this story. So from a religious family who was obviously guarding me from the evils of Ozzy Osbourne and Randy Rhoads, right, as I was growing up, which was easy to do in a small town, I did not have that much exposure to music.

00:59:23.480 --> 00:59:52.860
As luck and fortune and as the fate of the universe would have it, my grandma had an accidental late son when she was 46 years old. And so he's my uncle and he's six or seven years younger than me. Already. Yeah. So this created this interesting setup when we would go visit. My grandparents lived in Dayton, Ohio, which is about two hours from where I grew up.

00:59:53.480 --> 01:00:22.720
So we would go visit grandpa and grandma and all of a sudden I had a little uncle to hang out with. That needs to be your next band's name. Exactly. Little uncle. Amen. But this was during, you know, I was young, so this is during, kind of picture this happening in the 80s during like the Star Wars period, all of that. And I was allowed to have a little bit of exposure to pop culture, but nothing like him. He was just a normal kid.

01:00:23.480 --> 01:00:53.200
So anytime he got to go to grandma's house, I got to play with Star Wars toys. I got to play with G.I. Joe's. I got, you know, my life opened up for two days and we were there for the weekend. Well, when we entered our teens, when I was 19, he was about, I don't know, 13, 14 years old. He started playing drums and he started a metal band with his friends at school called Silence. And they did covers of,

01:00:53.460 --> 01:01:23.440
all the classic stuff. Mainly, they were doing a lot of Megadeth, Metallica, and Pantera covers. And what happened was my grandma, who was sort of your typical slightly heavy set, bifocals, literally crocheting every day type of a grandma, we show up once when I was about 18 or 19 years old. She opens the door and she's dressed in black, has a Megadeth shirt on, has

01:01:25.140 --> 01:01:52.460
and has like dyed black hair. What? 20 years younger. What? And I was like, you know, of course, I was like, fuck yes. You know, I was like, are you kidding me? Like, my parents were horrified. You know, they're like, what has happened? So basically what happened was, obviously, you guys know the drill. This happens with a lot of parents. The son, my uncle, had started a band that was playing locally a lot in Dayton, and she wanted to support him.

01:01:52.880 --> 01:02:22.820
And she just got sucked in and taken by the power that is heavy metal. The power of the riff. Of the power of the riff. She was literally taken by that at, you know, whatever, 50 years of age. That's awesome. And so what happened for me is that first visit, that was the first time ever that I heard a live band play in someone's basement. And you guys know how Midwestern 14,

01:02:24.360 --> 01:02:26.780
These kids were crushing it.

01:02:27.620 --> 01:02:31.280
I mean, it might as well have been Pantera in the basement.

01:02:33.320 --> 01:02:35.720
Playing walk over and over and over again.

01:02:36.040 --> 01:02:41.000
And for me, I was like, at that age, I was like, okay, I've been shown Jesus.

01:02:41.760 --> 01:02:43.600
I've been shown the possibility of college.

01:02:44.420 --> 01:02:46.980
I've been shown go get a job.

01:02:47.520 --> 01:02:51.260
What I'm hearing right now just altered my life.

01:02:51.960 --> 01:02:52.240
You know?

01:02:52.580 --> 01:03:22.560
Yeah. Just amazing. Like, unbelievable. So what happened was the kid that was their lead guitar player was like, what's the deal? So you've been playing guitar a little? And I was like, yeah, I've been playing a little, but not like that. You know, like, that shit's insane. And he was like, well, a lot of it's got to do with this thing called a distortion pedal. Imagine this. This actually happened. I was 19 years old, and I was like, what is it? He's like, it's this little box, and you plug the one cable in here, and then you plug out to the amp, and then now it sounds like

01:03:22.600 --> 01:03:52.520
this. And I was like, oh my God. He took pity on me. This is so beautiful. Like, you know, like only in the metal world, right? Yeah. Took pity on me and was like, here, put this in your back pocket and gave me a heavy metal distortion pedal. I'm sure you have seen or know that pedal. I think I have a few lying around. And I took it back home and my parents were like, what is going on in the bedroom now? Like, oh,

01:03:53.519 --> 01:04:22.560
And that really altered my whole, you know, I was beginning to get into, to get a little more serious about playing guitar. But between having just been shown Iron Maiden riffs, and then that experience happening, where Heavy Metal Grandma entered the picture. And in my mind, it kind of became like, oh, it's okay. Because before that, it was like, you know, that was a, that was a

01:04:23.020 --> 01:04:45.640
and also a very looked on your nose upon profession or choice in life. But that changed me forever. Still, to this day, when I go into an early man practice and we fire it up and it really gets rolling, that same feeling comes up that I got that day that I first saw those guys jamming. Same thing. It's right there again.

01:04:45.800 --> 01:05:14.920
Like us as guys sit around, we all talk about the first girl that we all hooked up with. Your story is even better because it's the first pedal that opened your eyes to this whole world in this first show. Exactly. And it was the next six months were like, I mean, talk about a good time. You know, it was this is before. It's funny you would bring Napster up because this is before you could do stuff like that. We're talking now about like probably early to mid 90s.

01:05:15.920 --> 01:05:40.360
So I had to find ways to sneak, you know, Judas Priest records, DO records, Sabbath records, Megadeth records in and out of my house and car in a very religious household. You know, anybody catches a hold of some early DO record artwork that's trying to convert their son to Christianity is not stoked.

01:05:40.480 --> 01:06:08.980
No. Growing up, I had one of my best friends. His mom was Jehovah's Witness. And she would not let him have any of the music that we were listening to. And whenever she would find any of his cassette tapes, she would throw them out. So he started stealing her religious tapes, bringing them to me, and I would dub metal albums over top of them. So they were in disguise.

01:06:10.180 --> 01:06:39.700
Everything I had to do with being discussed. It's funny. I would go by... I mean, you could get a lot of stuff from friends or whatever, but I would... You know, there's certain... Obviously, like, a record that comes to mind that was happening at that time that I will say now, looking back over my life, is probably the record that, in conjunction with that other story, changed me forever, is Countdown to Extinction by Megadeth.

01:06:40.080 --> 01:07:09.080
Because I knew it was coming out. I didn't know what it was going to sound like. But now I was armed with like, I know what heavy metal is now, motherfuckers. And this record is coming out. What's it going to sound like? And then it sounded like that. I was like, holy shit, this is the greatest. I want to be buried in a sea of this record for the rest of my life. But I remember going and buying that and having to dub it onto a regular looking old tape.

01:07:09.180 --> 01:07:38.860
in order to listen to it. Because had that artwork or that name even been found anywhere near anything I was doing, I probably would have been castrate. Who knows? I have no idea. Now, would you and Heavy Metal Grandma get in arguments about who was better, Dio or Ozzy era Sabbath? Yeah, we would talk about that. It's funny. I know you're probably joking. We would actually talk about that stuff. That is badass. She decided to start taking guitar lessons.

01:07:39.040 --> 01:07:45.200
and she actually became pretty good. She passed away about a month before

01:07:45.840 --> 01:07:51.920
September 11th happened actually. I went back to her funeral in Ohio. She was buried with her guitar.

01:07:52.320 --> 01:08:08.200
That is awesome. It stuck with her through her whole, you know, the rest of her life. But she was also taking guitar lessons and she was known around the city as heavy metal grandma. That's awesome. We would talk about that kind of stuff all the time. Like, you know, like, I don't know.

01:08:08.260 --> 01:08:38.080
There is some Dio Sabbath that is heavy duty. Let's not fuck around. But just amazing because literally five years prior, she's crocheting in the corner and we're playing with G.I. Joe's. Wow. It was intense. It's the greatest story I've ever heard. Yeah. All right. I know this is a rather stock question, but particularly now that I've heard all of this, I'm really curious to know what were your earliest influences? What were the metal bands that really,

01:08:40.639 --> 01:09:07.740
I think earliest influences were the big three that turned me I guess it should be big four that turned me were Metallica, Megadeth, Pantera and Slayer those were the four that I first heard that I was like oh my god like this is like you know what this is this is life if you don't if you remove this I'm jumping off of a bridge this is unbelievable.

01:09:08.240 --> 01:09:08.359
Yeah.

01:09:08.660 --> 01:09:11.920
You know how it works, especially if you're...

01:09:12.290 --> 01:09:20.660
Because I could technically be considered kind of like your typical middle-class suburban 19-year-old white kid at that point.

01:09:21.100 --> 01:09:27.940
I had different problems than the average guy, but I was going to be listening to a lot of whatever you would want to...

01:09:28.029 --> 01:09:29.740
A lot of people would call that mall metal.

01:09:29.950 --> 01:09:34.540
I don't agree with that, but stuff that you could walk into any record store at that time and buy.

01:09:34.819 --> 01:09:35.000
Right.

01:09:35.060 --> 01:10:00.420
So then after I got into those bands, I started digging a little deeper into things like Dio, Maiden, stuff that wasn't quite as pumped as those bands were at the time. But that led into when I started riffing a lot. Interestingly enough, I got into a lot of hard rock as well.

01:10:03.040 --> 01:10:06.640
UFO, Uriah Heep, that kind of stuff.

01:10:07.010 --> 01:10:07.640
Yeah, classics.

01:10:08.400 --> 01:10:10.560
But was also very blown away.

01:10:11.410 --> 01:10:18.520
You know, I guess the thing for me is I was taken by, here's a song that changed me.

01:10:18.670 --> 01:10:25.620
I was like, okay, there's something going on between what Mustaine does and what was happening here.

01:10:25.840 --> 01:10:29.540
You listen to a song like Sails of Sharon by The Scorpions.

01:10:30.780 --> 01:10:59.360
That's like, there's something there that's like early hard rock meets metal songwriting that at the time I was beginning to learn to play guitar and write wasn't happening that much. Even like the production quality of it, the whole thing. So those kind of things altered my songwriting ability and also just the importance I put on, it's got to be a song.

01:11:00.640 --> 01:11:29.900
For me personally, it's got to be I want an intro, I want a verse and a chorus with a hook that I can't get over, you know, that goes into this, that goes into that. Any band that was doing that type of stuff caught my attention. Even at the time, like, I differentiated, I always thought Alice in Chains was a killer metal band. I had no idea why, when I would watch MTV Headbangers Ball, I was like, why are they getting grouped in with,

01:11:30.560 --> 01:12:00.420
these horrible Seattle bands. You know, like this is a heavy metal band. And also kind of felt the same way about like early Soundgarden stuff. But I liked a lot of that stuff because it was it was songwriting. So those were definitely influences. And then I also do come from a very DIY punk background. Love Black Flag, love Minor Threat, you know, all that stuff. So there's this. It's kind of,

01:12:00.440 --> 01:12:28.560
It's a little bit of a ball of all of that. That makes any sense. That makes a lot of sense. My favorite thing about you, I know we talked about your riffs and stuff like that. I actually think your vocals are probably the best thing about you and your project that you do. I know you've heard it asked before, and it's been mentioned numerous times in write-ups and stuff. You have a very Ozzy, early Ozzy kind of sounding voice.

01:12:30.460 --> 01:13:00.420
I know some things were kind of born with how we sound, but did you kind of consciously go for that in your singing style? I think it, you know, to be honest with you, I don't know. I know that I definitely wasn't trying to sound like that. Yeah. And one thing that sort of opened my eyes is after Closing In came out, I started going to, there's a really famous vocal teacher in New York who's amazing, who deals with a lot of

01:13:00.480 --> 01:13:08.640
her whole big thing is I know she works with like

01:13:10.100 --> 01:13:12.920
Randall from Lamb of God and like all these like heavy hitters

01:13:13.820 --> 01:13:17.800
in order to get them to be able to growl properly every night and not lose their voice

01:13:18.440 --> 01:13:21.800
because there is a technique to do that where you have to sing from the stomach

01:13:22.740 --> 01:13:27.079
in order to not rip your throat apart if you're doing that style of singing

01:13:27.180 --> 01:13:54.980
And I started going to her because I started losing my voice a lot when we were on tour. Because it's very, as a smaller band, look, it's great for Bruce Dickinson. He's got a crew of 3,000 people and he flies his own 747 to each show, right? That's easy to sing against that backdrop. But if you're an early man and you're in a club playing to 35 people, I have to compete vocally with five full stacks, you know?

01:13:54.980 --> 01:14:24.740
And it becomes difficult. You have to learn. You have to train yourself how to sing properly and not blow your voice out. And I started going to her and she mentioned to me, you know, she was like, it's kind of funny because actually she did some tests with a piano and made me sing some few things. She was like, you're actually a baritone, but you sing. When you go to this certain place in your throat, this thing just comes out and it just sounds, it has that Rob Halford,

01:14:24.840 --> 01:14:26.660
to it.

01:14:26.960 --> 01:14:28.800
And there's not a whole lot you can do about it.

01:14:28.800 --> 01:14:32.660
And it's the first time that I became extremely aware of it.

01:14:33.440 --> 01:14:37.140
And to be honest with you, even a little bit on this new record,

01:14:38.080 --> 01:14:41.280
or a little bit on a lot of the stuff that you'll hear,

01:14:41.520 --> 01:14:45.240
I've got a lot more stuff lined up coming up very soon.

01:14:46.060 --> 01:14:53.000
I make sort of conscientious efforts now to sing in different keys and whatever

01:14:53.020 --> 01:15:22.840
and try to pay a little more attention to that. But brutal honesty, early on I just wasn't paying attention. Subliminally was it there? It had to have been. You can hear the influence in everything that's happening, particularly on closing in. But not to say that the early stuff sounded cheap. The early stuff, to back up what you're saying, the early stuff almost sounds like you just hit the record button and just went. Right.

01:15:23.020 --> 01:15:52.980
Exactly. Exactly. Exactly. And you know why? Because that's basically what we did. The beauty of that era is it was like, I don't know why, but for some reason, unwisely, for whoever that was, because I'm sure he's down about half a million for making this decision, but for some reason, everybody in the music industry in 2004 decided we were going to be the next

01:15:53.020 --> 01:16:22.980
thing coming out of New York City. So everything we did was hurry up, hurry up, hurry up, get them recorded. And there was a lot of pressure on us to make demos and to make records. And it was a stressful time for me because the proper amount of thought, which then translates into whether or not I'm getting my actual idea across to people musically, was being stepped on. Because everything was just like, oh, we just want, it needs to be

01:16:23.000 --> 01:16:52.980
Raw. Just go, man. It's like total Nirvana meets... Everything's got to be packaged and labeled. It's almost like Nirvana meets a retro Metallica meets a... And I'm like, what are you talking about? Three months ago, I was alone with a four-track in a shitty apartment in Brooklyn writing riffs. Now, all of a sudden, we're putting all these stamps on it. And I'd have people emailing me like, Mike, I can really hear the new wave of British heavy metal influence in what

01:16:53.020 --> 01:17:22.980
you're doing and I literally had to call someone and be like what's new wave of British heavy metal what is it what is this guy talking about it was awesome it opened up a whole new I was like oh all these bands I've never heard of wow amazing and we sound just like them this is this is incredible but there was never a conscientious effort made to sound like that it's it kind of goes back to what you were saying like you know you wrote a guitar line that existed a similar situation

01:17:23.000 --> 01:17:52.960
Now, you just touched on it there. In those early man days, I'm talking 05, 06, when I saw you on tour, the press for you guys at that time, I saw you on a whole bunch of websites and all that. And please, I don't mean any disrespect by this. I kind of saw the talk of you guys go dark. Not saying that's a bad thing. Is that because you kind of went off doing a

01:17:55.720 --> 01:18:22.500
Yeah, I mean, basically what happened was I was never prepared. Everything that happened with the band in New York, I was completely unprepared for. I was just a novice to what was about to happen when we signed our names to a contract. I had been in bands all my life, and going back to the heavy metal grandma story,

01:18:22.620 --> 01:18:50.700
Nothing makes me happier than recording a good jam with killer riffs in it. I've been doing that for forever. And that's kind of like, that was my version of, you know, a 75-year-old man's garden in his backyard. You know, that's what I did. That's how I relaxed. I cranked up the four track and did my thing. And I wasn't really prepared for, given the situation with my, I'm sorry?

01:18:50.720 --> 01:19:20.360
I'm just going to say, I didn't want to take the words out of your mouth, kind of the limelight you were starting to get. Exactly. And I wasn't prepared for, I had a lot of family problems at the time that dealt with, that were due to the religion. This made them 50,000 times worse. The fact that all of a sudden we were literally on MTV, still in a time when it actually kind of mattered. And I wasn't prepared for that at all. And not only was I not prepared for that,

01:19:20.400 --> 01:19:47.720
If you think I wasn't prepared for it, let's talk about the other guys that were in the band at the time. What starts to happen is there's these things called girls, and they start coming out of the woodwork as soon as your face is on a magazine and on MTV. Other guys in the band, and I'm not shit-talking by any means. I'm still good friends with every past guy who's been in the band. They're all great dudes.

01:19:51.560 --> 01:20:18.940
It was like we went from being, hey, we got a pretty good demo here. Let's play a couple basement shows and maybe we'll play over here at this club and over here. We played at this club called The Hole once and there was literally like, I'm going to say about 1,500 to 2,000 people. They had to close the street down trying to get in to see us into a club that holds maybe 500 people. Wow. That's too much buzz.

01:20:20.420 --> 01:20:50.020
If you want to say like, whereas the regular musician will be like, I really want to make it. I really want to see what that feels like to make it. After that night, I made it. I did it all. I was the king of New York City and I hadn't only been on the scene for three months. It was like, what is going on? So to be quite honest with you, the band peaked in the biggest city in the world so hard, so quickly that it was almost like,

01:20:50.400 --> 01:21:15.340
And maybe at my own fault a little bit, but particularly for some other people in the band, when you actually have to go out and do the work, in other words, go on a 120-day tour, and you're the opening band of four bands, and you feel like you've already, you kind of already did it, as far as you're concerned, maybe not as far as the world is concerned, that's a grueling thing to go through.

01:21:16.140 --> 01:21:45.360
That was actually one of the questions, probably the biggest question I wanted to ask you today is because, you know, going back to my original question, the talk of you guys was, the buzz was huge. And you fast forward right now to, you know, November of 2014. And you see the sound that you guys had when you started, the sound that you guys have evolved into now is kind of what in the metal scene now is getting revived and is actually getting big now. Right. And you guys were at the forefront of that.

01:21:45.360 --> 01:22:12.480
10 years before these bands are doing it now. Yeah, I mean, it makes it interesting. It's an interesting position for me personally to be in. Let's just put it that way. But talking to you, it doesn't sound like you have any resentment or any, you're not bummed out about it, you know? No, woe is me. No way. Are you kidding me? I'm from Marion, Ohio.

01:22:15.360 --> 01:22:44.760
You know? Yeah. Any success that I can have on any level. The fact that last night we just did a Halloween EP and I was working with my girlfriend actually who's been working her ass off with me to get these orders shipped out. How many guys can say this? I paid my rent in LA this month by releasing a Halloween EP. How rare is that? That's nice. That's amazing. But hundreds of orders to ship out.

01:22:45.360 --> 01:23:13.100
And I was sitting there last night looking through, like, we got orders going to Sweden, Japan, Germany, you know, Peoria, Illinois, Mexico City, Australia. That to me, I judge my own success. I'm just competing with myself, if you will, you know, like I'm not really paying that much attention to what's going on out there. And for me, I'm having raging success.

01:23:13.760 --> 01:23:43.480
If I'm not playing tambourine in Macedon yet, oh well, so be it. But I'm very happy with where I'm at right now. But you're right. It's humorous and it's funny for me because people will discover us and kids, 14, 15, 16-year-old kids, it's not their fault, but they'll send me emails like, you guys sound exactly like these eight bands. And I won't be like, oh, you mean the eight bands that we inspired to pick up a guitar?

01:23:43.760 --> 01:23:44.800
Yeah, we do sound like them.

01:23:47.160 --> 01:23:47.660
All right.

01:23:47.700 --> 01:23:49.800
Well, let's talk about the new album a little bit.

01:23:50.260 --> 01:23:52.440
Thank God you've got the answers for us all.

01:23:52.900 --> 01:23:56.080
I sense a little sarcasm there, and particularly after hearing your backstory.

01:23:56.720 --> 01:24:00.360
Yeah, I mean, that's just, let's just go ahead and call it.

01:24:00.460 --> 01:24:02.940
That's a straight shot at Jehovah's Witnesses right there.

01:24:07.060 --> 01:24:36.460
But yeah, it's a really important record to me because over the past year and a half, maybe two years, I reached an age where I had a decision to make. I was either going to quit doing this and join the ranks of the rest of the world, God forbid, or something had to change so that I made this, even from just a financial aspect,

01:24:37.060 --> 01:25:04.000
So that I made it possible for myself to continue releasing records and keep the pedal to the floor. And so I realized I really needed to learn recording, engineering, all that stuff much better than I had known it. Believe me, I'm a badass on a Tascam 4 track, but it doesn't mean much in 2014. So this record is an important one for me because I really had to push through.

01:25:07.640 --> 01:25:37.020
throughout the making of the record that I wasn't going to finish it or that I didn't want to finish it or it wasn't what I was trying to say or I hadn't recorded something well enough or whatever. I finally got to the point where I was like, you know what? This is fucking heavy metal. Again, let's go back to those tape trading days. Some of that shit was done on one mic hanging from a ceiling. It's not about that. It's about does the song have a soul or not. Every song on this record is

01:25:37.659 --> 01:26:06.240
has a major importance to me from that aspect. Already since I recorded this, I've become ten times the engineer, producer, whatever, since this was laid down. But that to me makes it special. Like it says on the Bandcamp page, recorded in various garages, closets, attics, you name it, over the course of a year and a half.

01:26:06.300 --> 01:26:35.400
So it is what it is, but I'm very proud of it. And it's a great album. Thank you. Appreciate it. So Thank God is not as thrashy as Death Potion was. Not that Death Potion was super thrashy, but it had a bit more of a thrashy sound. And Thank God sounds a little more laid back, groovy Sabbath kind of thing. What sort of evolution have you gone through since Death Potion? I think what happened was,

01:26:36.300 --> 01:27:06.260
I think that I felt like I love Death Potion. It's such a killer record. The riffs are like out of control. But I was pushing myself at the time we recorded Death Potion. We recorded that record with Jack and Dino, who's a total genius. So absolutely love just becoming friends with him. Recording that record was worth the whole experience, period. But I was pushing myself to sort of outlive.

01:27:06.360 --> 01:27:29.100
do myself with thrash riffs. What happened six months after the record was made is the label sat on it and didn't come out for two years until after it was recorded. And I didn't listen to it for quite some time because of that and actually became a little bit of a thorn in my side, obviously, when a label will sit on a record that long.

01:27:29.200 --> 01:27:31.500
There's nothing you can do to kind of force them?

01:27:33.540 --> 01:27:33.680
No.

01:27:34.840 --> 01:28:04.100
There is a little bit, and we tried, but with a label, the bottom line is money. It's a business, and I'm not knocking them for that. That's what they're there for. Music is music, and the music industry is the music industry. For them, they wanted to line us up on a big tour before we released that record. Basically, what happened is I had lost interest and lost the financial ability to say yes and no to certain tours by the time they were ready.

01:28:04.160 --> 01:28:33.620
to release the record. So it never really lined up properly. And it's the sort of evolution of from going from that record to Thank God, I think is more of you hear, you know, ironically enough, it's almost like there's more pain and anger in Thank God than there is in Death Potion. You know, and I think it's because it's a little bit of an exorcism of like, I want to try this.

01:28:33.760 --> 01:29:02.840
and it's okay. I want to try this sort of, I'm just going to keep, you look at a song like The Longer the Life. That song came out of me revisiting Bleach by Nirvana and just having my mind blown thinking like, he's not doing anything. He's not playing anything. He keeps playing the same note over and over and over again. And they're like the greatest raw, like shitty punk rock songs of all time.

01:29:02.960 --> 01:29:30.520
They're unbelievable. But, you know, five years ago, I couldn't really bring that to the table. Because the label is going to say, no, no, no, no, no. We got to keep you, everybody views you as mini Metallica. So if you don't follow that path, then we're going to lose record sales. And at that time, I was totally down to play ball with that. Now I am the complete opposite. You know?

01:29:30.580 --> 01:29:35.800
Now, I would rather on purpose show people like, hey, I've got diversity you don't even know about.

01:29:37.440 --> 01:29:44.700
But it's funny. You might see me do a record that sounds even thrashier than Death Potion six months from now.

01:29:46.260 --> 01:29:48.560
It's just something I had to get out on this one.

01:29:48.920 --> 01:29:57.840
Are you at a point now that you can't, because you just mentioned it, are you at a point now where you could say, hey, no, we're not going to do that shitty tour with this.

01:29:57.900 --> 01:30:01.980
I'm not saying we're talking trash about any bands, but I'm not going to do that tour.

01:30:02.620 --> 01:30:06.000
I'm not going to slug around the country and do this.

01:30:06.500 --> 01:30:12.220
I think you just described the AM of every one of my days that I live right now.

01:30:13.320 --> 01:30:16.040
It's all about making wise.

01:30:17.060 --> 01:30:23.420
I'm not going to say who said it because it's not a metal guy, but this is the most genius thing I've read in quite some time.

01:30:23.960 --> 01:30:53.920
I just read a quote of somebody that said, "The most perfect way to ruin a friendship is to be in a band with somebody. And the most even more perfect way to ruin a band is to go on tour." Those are the two truest statements I can possibly think of to explain, at least from my perspective, why this model that for some reason we still follow of putting a band out in a van, making them sleep in

01:30:53.940 --> 01:31:23.740
Walmart parking lots every night for no money. I'm speaking particularly of metal bands. Putting them out on the road for eight to ten months a year so that they all want to kill each other. Nobody has a dime. Under the guise that they're going to quote unquote make it and eventually be on the cover of Rolling Stone is an old system that we shouldn't be following anymore. For me, I want to choose wisely across the board.

01:31:23.760 --> 01:31:52.680
The songwriting, the tours, all of it, if that makes any sense. It totally makes sense. You know, you see that news that came out a couple weeks ago about no artist has reached platinum level success selling albums this year. And I think that just factors into the whole level that the whole music industry as a whole has just changed. And since it's changed so much and you now have seen it, that you know what you can do and can't do.

01:31:52.740 --> 01:32:21.680
and you're not going to get fucked over anymore. Exactly. And the important thing, here's the most crucial part for me. The important thing is to stay, to keep a positive attitude, which as metalheads is not our strong suit, you know. But the important thing is to not buy into, listen, music is music. I sit down, I make it, it's got to be the best possible riff for that moment in time.

01:32:22.020 --> 01:32:51.260
It's got to be a song about something. I choose the subject matter. I get it down and I'm done. That process has absolutely nothing to do with the music industry. So there's no reason for me to tie the two together and let the latter, the music industry, disrupt what I'm doing with my music. That's all that happened with early man for a decade. We just let these guys push us this way. This manager tell us to play with these guys.

01:32:52.020 --> 01:33:21.820
It should be four times longer. It should be shorter. Wear bell bottoms. The jeans aren't tight enough. Which metal shirt is it going to be? It's important. They'll see it. Fuck all of that. It is really that fucking deep? Yeah. It's that deep. It's that deep. And these are coming from people that you think that's not happening with. You know? Believe me. Believe me there's a guy with a tape measure measuring Kerry King's chains. Trust me. Yeah. Yep. They're exactly where they should be. It's that deep and it's ridiculous. So,

01:33:22.020 --> 01:33:52.000
For me, I just try to say I'm really trying to do something here that I honestly think has never been done. What I'm going to try to do is to be more prolific than anyone you've ever seen. Because I've taught myself how to record, I've taught myself how to mix, master, produce, do the whole thing, whether that's in a studio or whether I have to do it by bringing my gear to someone's house, whatever it's going to take. Since I've taught myself how to do that, I can now just

01:33:52.020 --> 01:34:21.000
go. And there's no reason I can't release at least two, three, four records full lengths a year at this point. There's absolutely no reason for that. This record is the sort of breaking open of the dam of that possibility happening. But that, to me, is exciting. You know, you have all these guys right now that are all over Blabbermouth and Facebook and Twitter, the record industry. Kiss says even the record is dead.

01:34:21.080 --> 01:34:50.800
Rock and Roll's dead. Get the fuck out of here. Sit down and write a song. It's only dead if you kill it. Right? Yeah. So if you're making music, if you're putting it out there, if there's avenues for me to literally three weeks ago at my own birthday party, I just had an idea like, I wonder if we could get a Halloween EP, a three song EP out to the world on Halloween day. It happened. Do you think that would happen in 2000?

01:34:51.060 --> 01:35:19.520
5. No. We'd still be having meetings about what color should the logo be, though, in Japan? It's just ridiculous. It's too much for somebody who's truly focused on their music. It's too much for them to deal with. I think that's the real reason why you saw at least me over the past 4 or 5 years just kind of lay low.

01:35:20.360 --> 01:35:50.340
Because I said, you know what, I want to take this seriously, but I need a new business plan for me. Something that works for me. Outside of that realm. You know, in this lifetime, no one's going to look out for any of us. And just talking to you this last 40 minutes or so we've been talking to you, your intelligence really comes through. And it sounds like you're not going to be fucked over anymore. You're taking the ball in your own hands, the ball in your court. You're running with it. Yeah. I mean, that's...

01:35:50.360 --> 01:36:20.340
You're right, but what's funny is we, particularly as musicians, just to get this point across to anybody that's listening to your show as a musician, stop listening to these fucking people. Stop listening to rich people. Stop listening to them. Stop buying into it. They're all completely full of shit. Anybody that comes along and offers you anything that doesn't have something that massively boosts your career, where you can see it like, oh yeah, that's a good one.

01:36:20.360 --> 01:36:50.200
makes sense. This guy wants to do this and whatever. You should avoid it like the plague. We have examples in our history of guys. You can go back to guys like Johnny Cash selling records out of his trunk. There's a reason that that system works. Forget about being on the cover of fucking Terrorizer or whatever. Don't worry about that shit. Just put a business plan together.

01:36:50.360 --> 01:37:20.020
that says, like, can I pay my rent and can I avoid the, you know, the wide road that the rest of society is on and continue to do this by keeping my very small, tight fan base happy and connected with them? What I'm doing is working like a charm right now. So I wouldn't change anything, but I would definitely, I agree with you. You get to a point where you're, here's the problem. Most guys at my age,

01:37:20.360 --> 01:37:48.540
And at my point that I'm at right now, what do they do? They just quit. They quit. They're done. You don't hear anything from them anymore. There's hundreds, maybe even thousands of amazing records gone because of that. We'll never hear them. And so for me, I just kind of came to a fork in the road where I was like, nah, not mine. You motherfuckers are going to have to hear my riffs until I'm 90. That's just how it's going to work.

01:37:51.440 --> 01:38:15.880
So it's definitely a new approach for me over the past six months to year. But I'm excited and I'm thrilled that guys like yourselves have picked up on it and like the record. Question for you. One last thing. In this year alone, again, we've lost some musical greats. We lost Dave from GWAR. Right.

01:38:18.600 --> 01:38:21.660
X died. Have you

01:38:23.760 --> 01:38:26.500
or have any words of advice for these guys out there living this

01:38:27.080 --> 01:38:30.780
crazy drug-fueled alcohol? Don't do drugs.

01:38:31.930 --> 01:38:33.260
I do have advice.

01:38:35.260 --> 01:38:38.400
Nobody, going back to what we were discussing earlier with me

01:38:38.940 --> 01:38:42.420
being from New York and really being at the top

01:38:42.530 --> 01:38:45.680
of the king of New York for a while while

01:38:45.680 --> 01:39:14.600
early man was blowing up. Nobody did more coke. Nobody drank more. Nobody was crazier than me for a long time. Push it to almost nearly a decade. But I went completely sober about two years ago coming off of a really gnarly experience I had with all of the aforementioned problems. And it's really the only way to go. I mean, it brings your focus.

01:39:14.880 --> 01:39:42.540
I'm just talking about, I'm not one of these guys who's going to tell people not to drink or none of that. People should do what they want to do and make their lives enjoyable. But it's just unfortunate as rock stars, like the guys you just mentioned, we buy into a story that's bullshit, that we are all supposed to be out there living like Keith Richards or Lemmy every day. And it doesn't work for all of us. We're not all built the same.

01:39:43.200 --> 01:40:11.780
So once you're not 22 anymore, one line of that shit or a couple extra beers can put you in the grave. And it's unfortunate. So I would say to anybody out there, be careful. Don't overdo it. And also don't think you have to do any of it. Go to work. Write a business plan. If your choices are buy an eight ball of Coke or write a business plan for your band, write the business plan. That's my advice.

01:40:11.960 --> 01:40:41.780
Indeed. So, we're planning to play a couple songs here on the podcast. Cool. And first up, we're going to play Black Rains Are Falling. Would you like to intro that, say anything about it before? That song is about the first group of firefighters that responded at Chernobyl when it blew up in, I think, 86, for those that may or may not be familiar with that situation. But the coolest thing about this song,

01:40:41.860 --> 01:41:10.480
is through the crowdfunding campaign that we ran, all of the solos of the song are fans. It's three different guys. There's two solos that happen in the middle and then there's one that happens at the end. That's not me. Those are long-time early man fans from, in some cases, over a decade ago that got to play on the record on what I think is one of the best, if not the best, song on the record.

01:41:11.020 --> 01:41:14.900
Excellent. All right. We're going to play that for you now. Black rains are falling.

01:41:47.500 --> 01:42:06.680
Lying wide awake late at night I see a sudden flash of light Are these explosions in my head Or have they come back from the dead?